by J. R. Rain
Love. I shook my head at the insanity of it all. But it did make sense. Fight hate with love. Good versus evil and all that.
I liked to think I was on the side of good.
Suddenly, it struck me. There, the house to the left. The closest house, in fact, to the strip club. The interior was in disarray, and I had seen blood.
I dashed off.
The door was locked.
That was, until I lifted my foot and kicked it in. Not that I wanted to alarm this sleepy neighborhood, a neighborhood that was used to crime; a neighborhood, I suspected, that had learned to shut and lock its doors and windows and wrought-iron driveway gates.
I pushed the broken door all the way open, as the splintered wood from the doorframe caved inside.
The smell of blood and brains was strong. Almost too strong. The demon within me perked up, but I stamped her back in her place.
As the stench intensified, I stepped over a broken picture frame and drops of blood, then passed by a bloody hammer neatly propped up in the far corner of the room.
I found something else propped up in the next space, which was the kitchen. There, wedged between the refrigerator and the blood-splattered cupboard, was the woman my ex-husband had cheated on me with.
It had been a clean hammer strike that had caved in her skull. One bash.
She had died, I assumed, instantly.
Her spirit was nowhere to be seen, which wasn’t necessarily rare. It just meant that she had moved on, much faster than most.
I stood over her, and stared down at her bulging eyes, and bloody thighs, and into the hole at the top of her head.
The thing within me was interested in the corpse and all the blood, but the thing within me could go to hell.
And so, I stood there, with the corpse of a woman who had, I thought, loved my deceased ex-husband. A woman who had done her best to befriend me and make things right. A woman who was still turning tricks, despite my pleas for her to give it up.
‘Easy money,’ she had said.
Maybe I’m more psychic than I thought.
There were only a few who knew of this house, and who would use it:
The strip club’s elite customers. The politicians, the lawyers, the judges, and—dare I think it—the cops. Those requiring privacy for their dalliances. The top-tier clients of a strip club that would have, believe it or not, reverted to our kids, had the world known that Danny was dead. I idly wondered if he had had a share of what the women earned in the working house. I shook my head. No, he wouldn’t have gone that low. I hoped not, anyway.
The world, of course, only assumed he was missing, or maybe on the lam from a debt, which was how I wanted to keep it. The world didn’t need to know that he was buried in a cavern under the Los Angeles River, along with two vampires.
A long story that was best kept secret.
I straightened, fury building inside. Yeah, I cared about Nancy. I cared a whole helluva lot. And now, she was dead.
I turned and dashed through the broken door…
And headed to the strip club.
It was midday and as a creature of the night, I wasn’t yet at full strength.
However, I had feasted on Nancy just the day before—practically hours before she had been killed. Bad week for Nancy. I came up to the strip club’s back exit, the very exit that I suspected Nancy and her killer had used, what, twenty to thirty minutes ago.
The door was locked, but not for long. I’d yet to come across a lock that could keep me out. Or any vampire, for that matter. And no, I didn’t need to be invited in. When would I ever get any shopping done? Or go anywhere, for that matter? Who would invite me into a mall? Or the gas station? Thank God that little factoid had been debunked. It was bad enough that I couldn’t see myself in a mirror. I didn’t want to have Anthony running into the Walmart or Target to get the managers to invite me in, too.
I paused and scanned my surroundings, making sure no one was directly behind the door. The space was empty. Good thing, because when I was done kicking it in, the whole thing slammed back in a clanging cloud of dust.
To hell with invitations, I thought, and stepped into the strip club.
The crash got the attention of two strippers, both of whom came rushing out, and both of whom were bouncing in places—never mind.
I pointed to their changing rooms and they stared at me, then at each other, then bounced off and slammed their respective doors shut.
At least they’re street-smart, I thought, and pushed through the back hallway.
Music thumped. Lights flashed. And on the stage gyrated a completely nude, skinny, tattooed girl whose mother and father probably wept into their pillows at night. Hundreds of white lights were focused on the stage, around which one-dollar bills had been tossed, with the occasional fiver thrown in for good luck. Or a hope for more of a show.
It was midday—hell, not even one p.m.—and the place was nearly half full.
I’d been here before, back when I had applied for a job—long story—and I knew the layout fairly well. It wasn’t much: in the center, a raised stage. Single brass pole. Chairs encircling the stage, filled with bored, mildly turned-on, middle-aged men with nothing to lose. The girl on stage was completely nude, gleaming with sweat and looked, unbelievably, like she was enjoying herself. Dancing and cavorting and slinking and spreading, she seemed, well, into it.
Like they say, love what you do.
I shook my head and continued surveying the room. No one took an interest in me. Maybe because I had clothes on. The Hispanic bartender leaned a hip against the back counter and watched the dancing girl. If I had to guess, his mind was elsewhere. Working here, day after day, night after night, year after year, how many naked women had he seen? How many had it taken him to begin losing interest? Or, was it even possible for a guy to see too many naked women? I didn’t know, but his blank stare suggested it as a distinct possibility. Rick, the manager of the joint, was at the bar, his back to the dancer. Rick had, I think, the thickest neck I had ever seen. Even thicker than Kingsley’s.
There were, maybe, twenty customers. Most were seated around the stage. A handful were in the back booths. Single guys, sitting alone. Not talking. Hating themselves but interested in naked flesh even more.
From the back room to my right, emerged a man with short, slicked-back dark hair. From all appearances, freshly cleaned up. Refreshed, even. He nodded to a bouncer type standing guard outside what I knew to be the private rooms. Or the sex rooms. The big guy returned his nod. The two looked, well, like they had a secret. I doubted the big black guard knew it extended all the way back to a murdered stripper. If I had to guess, the big bouncer had arranged for Nancy and this guy to be alone just outside of the club… and by arranged, I meant paid nicely.
But as I watched the exchange, growing admittedly more interested by the second, I noticed two things: the guy with the short black hair had his dark shirt on inside-out.
Oh, and he didn’t sport an aura of any kind.
He was, I was certain, a vampire.
As he slid into the back seat, I could smell it now. Fresh blood, wafting from him. His shirt, I suspected, was covered with the stuff.
Nancy’s blood.
Before overreacting, I reminded myself that I had spilled that same blood.
No, not spilled. Drank. Deeply. Violently. Angrily.
In fact, I had taken a decisive step backward from all the progress I had made these past few months. I had reined in the demon bitch nicely, and for that I was grateful. The less fresh blood she had, the weaker she became. That’s the way I liked it. That’s the way it had been for many years after the initial attack that had turned me. Since then, I had drunk only the putrid cow and pig blood. I had inadvertently kept her at bay with the least-desirable sustenance I could find.
That was, until the first kill. The thug who had wanted to gang rape me was my first blood. That hadn’t ended too well for the young man.
Still, I reminded my
self, I hadn’t killed Nancy. I had only… partaken of her. And awakened a slumbering giant within myself. In fact, I felt her rising up through my consciousness now. She sensed, as well as I did, that the shit was about to hit the fan.
And she wanted a front-row seat.
Well, I thought. Enjoy the ride.
I moved away from the back doorway, and headed behind the stage and to the sated vampire who watched me near him.
With a smile on his face.
I took the seat opposite him, my back to the stage. I was missing the performance of the girl who danced like no one was watching—except, of course, most of the pervs in Colton.
The chair seemed unstable, and I wondered how many lap dances it had endured. And with that thought alone, I vomited a little in the back of my mouth.
The man with the slicked-back hair wasn’t a man. He wasn’t a werewolf either. He seemed too slight. The werewolves I had seen were big boys… growing bigger, in fact, with each full moon. The older the wolf, the bigger he was. Which made Kingsley one of the oldest, I realized.
And hairiest.
“You killed Nancy.” My voice came out flat, emotionless, even.
“Oh, was that her name?” He hadn’t blinked yet. Oldest trick in the book. I could out-unblink the crap out of him. He kept his wide-eyed stare on me. His skin was flushed. He had had a healthy feeding, of course. After all, why waste all that good blood? I, of course, hadn’t had anything all day… and the Jamba juice didn’t count. At least, not for my kind.
Whatever kind I was, that is.
A vampire, I told myself. A vampire, once and for all.
Except, of course, I didn’t really believe that. I never did. I wasn’t so much a vampire as a person possessed by a very, very dark and powerful entity, an entity whose own supernatural powers leaked through.
No, not leaked… poured through.
And the guy in front of me seemed too fresh, too excited, too happy. He seemed, in fact, to revel in exactly what he was.
He’s a new vampire.
Which boded well for me. The older the vamps, the stronger they were… and the more aware of their powers. New vamps relied on strength alone. At least, I had.
Except, early on, I had had my early warning system, a slight ringing in my head, which was, even now, sounding strongly… warning the crap out of me.
“Yes,” I said, “and she was a friend of mine.” And she had been a friend, dammit. Even if only for the past few months.
He said, “You should turn around and pretend you never saw me.”
“Or not.”
Oh yeah. This guy was new, and a little full of himself. And, judging by the damage he had inflicted on Nancy, a certifiable psychopath. Not to mention, he couldn’t see auras—at least, not yet. Had he been able to, he would have seen what I was. No matter.
“Leave now, and I won’t kill you, too,” he said casually.
“How many others have you killed?” I asked.
He tilted his head a little. Still didn’t blink. Still a little too full of himself. If I had to guess, he probably had posters of Tom Cruise as Lestat on his bedroom walls, and probably a poster or two of Damon, too.
“You wanted to be a vampire all your life, and now, you are one, and you think it gives you a license to kill. Except, asshole, some of your victims are going to be friends with other people, people who are not really people, but say, your own kind.”
Finally, he blinked, and that might have been my greatest victory yet.
“You’re one, too,” he said, after a moment, piecing it together.
“Lucky for you, being a vamp doesn’t require an admissions test.”
“Well then, I am sorry about your friend. If it’s any consolation to you, she was delicious.”
“That’s a shitty thing to say about someone I cared about.”
“Then, that’s your problem, you care too—”
“Cut The Vampire Diaries angst, asshole. This is the real world, and you just killed a friend of mine, and, I suspect, others like her. And, I suspect, you are going to keep doing this to people until someone puts you in the ground with a silver stake through your heart.”
He blinked again, and again, and I believe he saw that I might have been serious. And that he might be hip-deep in some serious shit.
“So, what do you propose we do?” he asked.
“I propose that you stop killing innocent people, for starters.”
“She was hardly innocent. She was just a who—”
“Don’t say it,” I said. “Remember that part about her being my friend.”
“You know, who are you? Fuck you, and fuck your whore friend. I just wish I hadn’t killed her so quickly.”
He was bigger than me. Physically, I had no doubt he was stronger. By how much, I didn’t know. I’m not the oldest vampire. Hell, I’m relatively new to this stuff, too.
Except… well, except I had some mad skills.
I saw the flame, and a blink later, I was by his side. He gasped and turned and reached for me. But I already had a hold on his arm.
The flame again, and this time, we disappeared together…
Only to reappear somewhere that I was very familiar with. In fact, I had investigated a murder scene out here… in the desert outside of Corona.
The open desert. Where there was no shade.
We both stumbled and fell. After all, we had been sitting in the strip club when we’d disappeared.
We stood up about the same time, although only one of us looked shocked and horrified and, well, hot as hell. His skin, I noticed, was already smoking.
I dusted myself off, pointed to the sun above, nodded, and popped out just as he lunged for me.
It’s good to be me.
Sucks to be him.
It was late, and I was waiting. Impatiently.
There were times when I didn’t like Nancy. In fact, if I added up all the time I had spent hating her, it would far outweigh the time I, well, tolerated her. But she had made the effort to see me, the effort to connect, and, dammit, there had been something there. A spark. I was sorry to see her go.
Whether or not the vamp in the desert had made it out alive, I didn’t know, but I doubted it. He was as good as dead, and I didn’t feel much sympathy for him at all. As to the entity within him, it would simply depart, only to find another host. A very sick circle indeed.
The entity within me, throughout the course of the day, had mostly settled back into the darkest corners of my mind, where she would stay, waiting for more blood, waiting for more pain, and waiting, also, for a special someone.
That special someone had yet to make another appearance, but I often sensed him nearby, watching me. Waiting for me. Waiting for me to… what? Come around, perhaps. After all, her special someone was special, indeed… none other than the Count himself. I just happened to like the guy, which made me question who and what I was all over again.
I checked the time on my phone again. 3:22 a.m. When did these places close down, anyway?
I didn’t know, but by now, there were only a few cars left in the parking lot.
At 3:45, the last one drove off. I recognized the outline of Rick’s thick neck, as the vehicle receded in the distance. I used my vampire senses to see if anyone was still inside the club. Empty.
That was also the time I got out of my minivan, which I’d discreetly parked down the street. With a spring in my step, I approached the strip club, with a can of gas by my side.
It didn’t take me long to dowse the structure with gasoline. That I did so with a surprising glee should have been alarming. I never knew I had such an inner arsonist.
I stood a few dozen feet away, and held up the fancy lighter I’d purchased at a smoke shop for just this occasion.
The damn club had brought so much pain to my life. Hell, it had been the beginning of the end of my relationship with Danny.
I hated it, even if it did bring an unlikely friend into my life. The friendship had been
bumpy and likely would have remained so. I might never have truly forgiven her, but I had been willing to try, and so had she.
Either way, it was time to close this chapter of my life…
In a grand fashion.
I held up the lighter, flicked it to life, and tossed it into a nearby pool of gas.
ome call me a vampire.
I say, why use labels? I’m uncomfortable calling myself anything other than a mother. That’s the one label I am comfortable with. I’m a mom first and foremost. A private investigator next, even though that is fairly recent. Seven years ago, I wasn’t a private eye, but a federal agent.
So, even that is subject to change. Perhaps someday I might find myself better suited for a different job, although I will always help those in need. Although I’d always admired Judge Judy, I would never want to be in her position: to judge the actions of others. That takes wisdom… a lifetime of wisdom. Technically, I’m only in my mid-thirties, although I look much younger. Still, far too young to judge others.
Truth is, my current lifestyle’s perfectly suited to private investigation. Other than meeting new clients, who tend to want to meet during the day, I get along just fine working the nightshift.
So yes, one of the constants in my life is that I’m a mother. Of course, even that was threatened just a year or so ago, when a rare sickness almost took my son from me. A son who was growing so fast.
Supernaturally fast.
Don’t ask.
I have a daughter, too. A daughter who offers many challenges, the least of which is that she can read minds as easily as she reads her Facebook newsfeed. I’m a sister, too. My sister has had a rough time of it, of late. She’s recently been introduced to some of the darker elements of my world, and might be holding a grudge. But she’ll get over it. She’d better. I need her in my life.
Of course, there is another constant in my life… a constant I ignored. A constant I denied. And, as they say, denial isn’t just a river in Egypt.