Stakes & Stilettos

by Michelle Rowen

I took a step in her direction just as Amy called my name, and I glanced over at her.

  "Sarah, what do you think of this?" She held up a necklace that had a big early-Madonna-like bejeweled cross on it.

  I immediately added to my growing list of curse side-effects:

  Extreme aversion to crosses. EXCRUCIATING.

  The cross turned a blinding white color like a tiny death-sun and sent out waves of agony directly toward my eyeballs.

  "Put that thing away!" I yelled at her, falling to my knees and covering my eyes.

  The light disappeared and Amy rushed to my side. "Oh, my God. Sarah, I'm sorry! I didn't even think about it."

  "It's okay," I said weakly. "Just don't do it again. Please."

  I looked up at the entrance to the store but Stacy was gone. I staggered to my feet and ran outside looking in all directions.

  That bitch. She'd completely disappeared.

  I glanced off to the side to see George and Butch discussing something obviously more important than keeping an eye out for the witch who'd ruined my life. They looked at me.

  "What?" they said in unison.

  Panic clutched at my chest. I wanted this curse gone. I hated it. I hated everything about it. It was completely ruining my life.

  I swallowed past the tears that wanted to fall and went back into the store, got the clerk to come out of the back, and Amy and I walked out five minutes later with two lovely matching diamond pendant necklaces.

  Sure it was stealing, but at the moment I didn't really give a rat's ass.

  I also kept the bathrobe. So sue me.

  Chapter 10

  We arrived at Haven at a little after nine o'clock, so it was open for business. A scattering of customers sat at the tables, sipping on their drinks in the upscale club and listened to a mixture of jazz and contemporary tunes. Two waiters—both of whom I knew had already landed jobs elsewhere in readiness for the club's transferring ownership—strolled the floor. Since it was Friday it wouldn't take long before the club was completely filled, as vampires of all professions came in to chill out after a long week at their day jobs.

  I currently didn't have a day job, but I sure as hell needed to chill out.

  Thierry wasn't sitting in his usual booth; instead he stood at the door scanning the entrance for our arrival. He came directly toward me as we entered the club and seemed about to hug or kiss me, but he didn't. In fact, he took a step back from me.

  I swallowed hard. He was afraid to touch me in case we went all vampire-Sid-and-Nancy on everyone. It figured that the moment Thierry was okay with public displays of affection, they were off the menu.

  "I was worried," he said, his face tight. "When the phone went dead—"

  I held up a hand. "Stacy took off. I don't know where she went."

  His jaw tightened. "At least we know she's definitely in the city."

  "At least." I felt a tap on my back and turned to see Amy with her arms out.

  "Somebody need a hug?" she asked.

  I nodded and hugged her. It was better than nothing.

  She patted my back. "Just don't bite me."

  I pulled back. "Why do you have to say something like that?"

  "Better safe than sorry."

  George and Butch moved off to the side of the bar and ordered drinks before the bartender moved over to me.

  "Hey, Sarah!" he said happily. His name was Ron and he was a big fan of the Slayer of Slayers. He thought I was some kind of hero. I hadn't tried to change his mind yet.

  "Order something to drink," Thierry suggested. "Have you had any blood lately?"

  I bit my bottom lip and glanced at his neck. "Not since last night."

  His expression darkened and he clasped his hands behind his back. "I am finding it difficult not to touch you. Especially after last night."

  I blinked. "Seriously?"

  He nodded gravely. "It is troubling."

  I let that disturbing, yet also slightly exciting, knowledge settle over me, and then I told him about my reaction to the cross jewelry as well as my mind-control abilities. I left off the part about the unpaid-for merchandise.

  "Stacy wants me to apologize to her." I turned toward the bar and leaned heavily against it. "I'm getting the feeling that she won't be receptive to helping us out until I do that. But I don't know how to get in touch with her."

  "We now know she's definitely in Toronto. It's only a matter of time before we find her or she attempts to contact you again."

  I felt his hand at the small of my back then, and I looked up at him. Nothing happened other than the nice warm imprint of his touch. I smiled and slid my right hand up the center of his black shirt to his chest. "See? We're touching and there's no vampire apocalypse. Everything's going to be okay."

  "Perhaps I've simply been overthinking the situation." He took my hand in his and kissed it. "I picked up your school yearbooks. They're on the desk in my office."

  "Thank you."

  "Now, if you'll excuse me for a moment I must speak with Butch."

  He left me at the bar and Ron set up three shots of B-Positive in front of me and I took a moment to toss them each back. It was my favorite blood type. I continued to hold on to my theory that it would make me "Be Positive." Ten weeks with fangs and I was still waiting for the positive energy to kick in.

  I guess Ron recently had a shipment from the "Blood Delivery Guys," the appropriately named blood delivery company. I saw several self-refridgerating silver kegs were piled up behind the bar neatly labeled with the corresponding blood type.

  Ron leaned over the bar. "So have you heard?"

  "Heard what?"

  "About the Red Devil? He's back!"

  The image of my scarf-wearing hero flickered in my mind. "Who told you that?"

  "George."

  I glanced over at the culprit, who wasn't supposed to say anything about the Red Devil's potential reappearance.

  "It's so exciting," Ron continued. "Finally after a century I can start to feel a little bit safe again."

  "Has it really been a hundred years since he's been around?" I asked.

  He nodded and poured me another shot. "Everyone thought he was dead."

  I thought about that. It was a long time to disappear. "So why do you think he disappeared? And why did he choose now to return?"

  He leaned closer. "I have a theory."

  "Do tell."

  He ran a cloth along the top of the bar. "I think that after centuries of being an incredible champion to vampirekind, he became disillusioned with the fight. I think he felt that no matter what he did, it didn't change anything. Hunters would always exist and vampires would continue to be slain, so he quit and has tried to live a quiet, secretive life ever since, feeling that anything he did might only add to the problem instead of being part of the solution. And now, after all these years of self-reflection, he is willing to step back into the ring and do what he can even if it is an ultimately futile battle."

  I frowned. "Do you really believe that?"

  He shrugged. "Who cares? He's back! He's going to protect us vampires from hunters. And how cool is it that he's chosen Toronto out of all the cities on the entire planet to make his reappearance? Maybe the Red Devil is Canadian!"

  "Yeah, that's pretty cool." My frown deepened. If he'd been gone for a hundred years why did he choose to reappear now? Why here of all places? And why did he save me in particular? Not that I was complaining, but still, it didn't make a whole hell of a lot of sense.

  "You two should join forces," Ron suggested. "The Slayer of Slayers and the Red Devil. You could be an amazing team!"

  "From what I've heard, the Red Devil works alone."

  He nodded solemnly. "He is a loner. Doesn't want outside help. But he might make an exception for you."

  "I wouldn't bet on it. Besides, I don't have a shiny cape and mask at the moment."

  I surveyed the club. Thierry was talking with Butch and George. Every now and then George's focus would shift over to me. Ob
viously they were talking about me. Big surprise. Amy was now with Barry, and they also glanced over at me every now and then.

  Yeah. Disaster of the week right here. Present and accounted for.

  God, I hated just waiting for something to happen. It made me feel so helpless over this whole situation. What if it got worse? What if I hadn't found out all of the curse's side-effects yet?

  I hoped that, since I had reacted that badly to a cheesy rhinestone cross, no one had any holy water on them tonight. I glanced nervously through the rest of the club.

  Holy water bad.

  I wracked my brain for other vampire myths and came up with another one.

  The ability to turn into a bat.

  I arched an eyebrow. That might be interesting.

  Then I downed another shot of B-Positive, closed my eyes, and concentrated. After a moment I opened my eyes and looked down at my hands, but they were still hands, not small leathery wings.

  Cross one myth off the list. No shape-shifting abilities.

  Then I froze in place as I remembered the most prevalent myth of all about vampires that I used to believe, aside from the whole drinking blood thing.

  Vampires were evil.

  But I wasn't evil. I didn't feel evil. I breathed out a long sigh. Along with the bat thing, being evil was obviously a myth that I'd sidestepped.

  Thank God.

  Then again, Stacy thought I was evil, didn't she? That's the whole reason she'd cursed me in the first place. For revenge.

  I walked through the bar and headed toward Thierry's office. I closed the door behind me so the noise and music from the club were muffled.

  Sitting behind Thierry's desk, I looked at the four yearbooks he'd placed there.

  I remembered high school as being four years of dull, with the occasional school dance, then more dull followed by one year at university before I decided that school and I were breaking up for good. Sure, there was the whole cheerleader thing, but it was no big deal. Obviously I wasn't even that good at it. After leaving university and bombing at the acting thing, I had tried out to be a cheerleader for the Toronto Raptors, but those girls were professional pom-pom shakers. I was small-town. In every way. Hadn't even made the callbacks.

  I flipped open my senior yearbook and smiled at the inscriptions from my old friends, most of whom, except for Claire, hadn't bothered to show up for the reunion at all. A good number of the pictures of teachers had mustaches and devil horns drawn on with blue pen. That may have been my doing. I will admit nothing.

  There was a picture of the homecoming committee. I wasn't on it. The drama club. I was there in the back row making rabbit ears behind a friend. A glimpse of my leg in an action shot at a basketball game when I fell off the top of the cheerleader pyramid. I still had a small scar from accidentally kneeing another girl in her brace-filled mouth.

  There was the picture of the squad itself. Six of us with three alternates all smiling and looking happily at the camera. I shook my head. Now that I thought about it, I'd had a lot of fan with those girls. Being on the squad automatically made us more popular than we might have been without it. And the guys on the teams, both football and basketball, were more likely to go out with us than anyone else. I had a fairly steady boyfriend from the basketball team during my senior year. He was the one who'd popped the question just before senior prom. I believe my exact response had been, "Get married? Are you kidding me?"

  Unfortunately, he hadn't been kidding.

  And that had been the end of our relationship, which was probably for the best since I hadn't been in love with him in the slightest. That's when I went with Stacy's alleged true love, Jonathan, to the prom.

  I flipped forward to the football team's photo. There was the love interest in question. Still as cute as I remembered him, but my memories of him were less than favorable being that he'd decided he'd rather tear my expensive prom dress off in the back of the limo than actually show up at the prom itself.

  I recall kneeing him very hard in the groin.

  I'd been stuck with the limo bill. And he'd gone to the hospital.

  Ah, the memories.

  I frowned as I looked at the cute boys in their football uniforms. There was another figure behind them. I squinted at the fuzzy black-and-white photo. I wasn't positive but it might have been Stacy lurking in the shadows.

  Creepy.

  I flipped forward to my grade and trailed my finger down the page. There I was. Sarah Dearly. Forever immortalized in the yearbook as the girl most likely to close her eyes during a photo.

  I flipped forward a few pages to get to the Ms. There was Stacy staring out at me with the same icy glare she'd given me in the washroom at the reunion.

  Her eyes were the only thing I recognized. The rest of her was completely different. The vengeful woman I'd met in the bathroom had been a petite, yet busty blond with killer legs. Well dressed in expensive clothes and designer heels. Perfectly applied, though too-heavy makeup. Expensive perfume.

  The girl who looked up at me from the small black-and-white photo wasn't the same person at all. She had dark, greasy hair pinned back with barrettes, a sullen face full of pimples, and a couple of extra chins. And she wasn't smiling.

  The absolute worst thing about her photo? The fact that as I looked at the teenaged Stacy McGraw, the memories started coining back to me. Things I'd forgotten for ten long years.

  I chewed on my bottom lip. Yeah, I'd known her. Not well, of course, but I remembered her. She'd been in a couple of my classes. She'd been a loner, and I couldn't even recall that she had any friends.

  I let out a shaky breath. Oh, no.

  The day that I'd broken up with my boyfriend had actually been a lot more traumatic than I'd prefer to remember. He hadn't taken my rejection very well, and it had been a big agonizing hallway scene that had put me into a very foul mood.

  That day had also been cheerleader tryouts. We were going to put together a squad for the summer. Just because it was summer vacation didn't mean that there wouldn't be some more games. Abottsville was fairly boring, after all. No multiplex cinemas. No mall. But we had a lot of sports fields: soccer, baseball, football.

  Stacy had been one of the girls who'd tried out. I'd been tired, angry, annoyed by life in general. And I'd told her in no uncertain terms not to waste our time. I didn't remember exactly what I'd said, but it hadn't been kind and it had revolved around her appearance. Her weight. Her face. I'd spewed some nastiness at her because I'd been feeling nasty.

  I felt it with a clarity I'd rarely felt before—

  I'd shown her the dark side of Sarah Dearly.

  After that, I must have snapped out of my foul mood and moved on with my day and forgotten all about it.

  Obviously Stacy McGraw hadn't forgotten about it. Ever. And if she'd been festering about the hurtful things I had said, add on the fact that I'd been asked to the prom by her secret crush, and it's no wonder that she hated my guts.

  And now she was a witch with a very big grudge.

  I closed the yearbook and leaned back in the high-backed leather chair, feeling sick to my stomach.

  There was a knock at the door and it slowly opened. Thierry entered the room, his gaze steady on me.

  "I wondered where you'd gone to," he said.

  I held up my yearbook. "Just in here walking down memory lane."

  "And how did that go?"

  "It's a rocky road."

  I told him about my discoveries. My throat was tight as I admitted to being a bitch to Stacy in high school. I expected him to look at me with disgust or shame, but his expression didn't change.

  "So obviously I deserve to be cursed," I said.

  "That's nonsense, Sarah. You may have spoken poorly during this one moment in your life, but that doesn't mean you're a bad person."

  "Sure it does."

  He sat on the edge of the desk near me. "No, it doesn't. What happened in the past is just that, the past. You are a different person now. You're olde
r and wiser and see the error of your ways."

  I raised an eyebrow at that. "Isn't it funny how you can give me that advice, and yet when it comes to your own past you can't take it?"

  "That is different."

  I shrugged. "Maybe, maybe not. I know I'm not the same person I used to be. But I've always thought that in high school I was the nice girl. That people liked me. That I had a lot of friends. Sure, I didn't like school very much and I wanted to get the hell out of my hometown at my earliest convenience, but I'd always thought of myself as one of the good guys. But maybe I wasn't so nice after all. If I was a mean girl to Stacy, who else wasn't I nice to? What else might I be conveniently forgetting?"

  "You are one of the good guys. There is no doubt in my mind that you are good, Sarah."

  "If you say so."

  He gave me a very rare smile. "I do. I've met many people over my existence, be they human or vampire. Out of everyone I've ever met, I would have to say that you are one of the most genuine and special of them all."

  "You really mean that?"

  He nodded and reached down to take my hand in his. "Most assuredly."

  His hand felt warm against mine. "Should you really be touching me?"

  He didn't let go. "I am not feeling the darkness at the moment, only the light." He paused. "Besides, Butch is waiting just outside the door. I've asked him to intervene if anything… unusual occurs."

  I grinned at him. "That sounds vaguely voyeuristic, but I'm okay with it."

  He drew me closer, the chair rolling smoothly against the floor, and leaned over to kiss me chastely on the lips. He threaded his fingers through my hair. "I know we haven't found her yet, and I am very sorry for that, but it won't be long."

  "When we do find her, or if she finds me first, I know what I'm going to do."

  "Oh? And what's that?"

  "I'm going to apologize to her. Now I know I have something to apologize for, I'm going to beg her forgiveness and hopefully that will convince her to break this stupid curse."

  "That's a very mature decision."

  "I'm very mature." I kissed him then pulled back a bit. "Hey, listen, Ron has an interesting theory about the Red Devil's reappearance. You should ask him about it."