Oliver put a gloved hand onto mine and squeezed it gently, “you’re intelligent Victoria you’ll figure it out.”
We sat in silence looking up at the stars, our differences put aside and our pasts far, far behind us.
“Thank you for doing this for me.”
“I owe you one for not killing me when you had the chance.”
“I’m going to have to tell Levi, if he finds you he won’t give you a chance to explain,” I said more to myself than to Oliver.
“Who is Levi?” Oliver asked, and I told him.
I told him everything that had happened since our immortal beginnings. It felt good to tell him everything, the good and the bad.
“I’ll make sure to avoid him,” he said, laughing lightly, “He must be a good guy for you to put up with all of that.”
I took a breath and nodded with a small smile. I turned to him and stood as I said, “I should head back.”
“Be careful,” he called after me.
“Goodbye Oliver.”
When I got back to Gabriel’s he was on his porch waiting for me. I stood in the driveway for a while simply looking up at him. Slowly I walked towards him and he stood and took me into his arms. Jesse had left shortly after I had, telling Gabriel where I had gone. Everything was a mess, ten times more so than it had been before.
“Tomorrow I’m going to see George,” I announced, over dessert.
Gabriel looked up to me and nodded with a smile, “He’ll be glad to see you again.”
“I hope so; we’re hoping that he can help us. That way we might be able to avoid further punishment.”
“Levi didn’t seem to mind,” he said, bitterness creeping into his tone.
I shrugged and took a drink from my glass of iced water, “It’s not all up to him.”
That night I slept far from soundly. The dream was torturous. It was the same as the others, it replayed throughout the night until my mind wandered from sleep. Levi was stood before me his hands held out, blood soaking them. Each time I looked down and saw the blood pouring from my empty chest the dream would begin again, I knew as he held me the final time before I awoke that he was dreaming with me.
“Jesse called by earlier, dropped this off,” Gabriel said, sliding a sealed envelope across the table. I sat down, my arm itching furiously. Gabriel watched me with curiosity as I scratched my arm and tried to open the letter simultaneously.
I opened it as I took a sip from my cup of tea. I frowned as I read the letter that Jesse had written up for Oliver. “Mortals,” I cursed, standing up from where I sat at the table and I ran upstairs to change.
I drove to the address that I was given for Jesse’s hotel and knocked onto his door impatiently.
“You got my letter?”
“What does this mean?” I asked, thrusting the letter into his hands.
He read over his typed words and looked out up and down the corridor. “What is it that you don’t understand?” he asked, as he offered me a seat.
I stayed standing in the doorway and stabbed the paper where the name Bernadette Francis was printed, “She has been missing for forty years, what on earth has she got to do with this?”
Jesse put the papers down and began to explain. Oliver had been to where he believed the mass of the dead had been created, and killed two untrained hunters before a third and final terrified girl gave him Francis’s name. She told him how she had been visited by a woman who had told her would help her out financially, she ran an agency that gave young girls like her jobs, and then she was killed and woke up in her flat uncertain as to if any of it was real. Oliver killed her and disposed of the bodies, passing the information onto Jesse.
“You think it’s really her?” I asked, not wanting the answer.
He shrugged and let out a breath as I stood, I could see that he wanted to comfort me, but just like me he had no idea what to say to make it right.
“I have to go,” I said, panic ensuing within me, “tell Oliver to keep looking, there has to be another reason, another name… I’ll call around later and you better have a reason as to why her name is on that paper that I can believe.”
Jesse stood and nodded; he walked to the door with me and watched as I ran from his house.
I didn’t stop running until I reached Levi’s home. He was stood outside nailing something to a tree. I stood by the gate to his driveway and called over to him, “What are you doing?”
He rested his hammer onto the small shelf that he had fixed onto the tree and walked over to me, pulling his shirt sleeves up over his elbows, “Trying to get rid of my headache, why are you here?”
“I need to tell you something,” I looked over to the hammer and swallowed, “But you have to promise that you won’t kill me, or anyone else for that matter.”
He frowned and opened the gate for me, “It’s that bad?”
“Like you wouldn’t believe.”
Clarence poured wine into our glasses and sat down next to Levi, who was sat opposite me in his drawing room.
“I accidentally found Oliver,” I began, waiting for his response. He sat back into the sofa and nodded for me to continue, his patience surprising both me and Clarence. “I nearly killed him, but I didn’t, instead we made a deal.” I paused again, I could see anger building up inside of him, but he was fighting to keep it at bay.
“What sort of deal?” Clarence asked, almost on the edge of her seat.
I closed my eyes and smiled tightly, waiting for the blow as I spoke, “He has been undercover, if you will, to try and find a name, to find Katelyn’s killer, the leader of the corruption.”
“And has your dead lover found us anything of any use?” Levi asked with his dark cutting eyes fixed hard onto me.
I held my hands out on my lap and clenched them into fists whilst I told them what Jesse had told me that very morning, not mentioning him by name or matter. Clarence was dumbstruck. Levi slammed his wine glass down onto the table shattering it into hundred of tiny pieces, his red wine spilled onto the cream carpet. He stood and walked around to the back of the sofa.
He paced back and forth and shook his head, “There has to be an explanation for this. Francis wouldn’t do that to you, would she?”
I stood and walked around to him, I took his hands in mine and he seemed to calm almost instantly, “I have told Oliver to find another name. Francis would never do this; she always understood the importance of the balance.”
“Who else knows what you have organised with Oliver?” Clarence asked.
I told her that Gabriel only knew that I had found him, and that he didn’t know about our arrangement.
“It has to stay between us,” Clarence said, “If there is a living immortal in league with them we can’t risk it getting out that we’re onto her.”
“Clarence, will you come to George’s with me?”
“Sure, Levi will you be ok here until I’m back?”
He nodded and sent us on our way.
I knocked on an oak door which held a memory from many years ago. When it opened George stood back in shock and laughed. I smiled and waited for him to welcome me in.
“My, oh my, have I stepped into a time machine? What has it been, fifty years?”
“Fifty seven in January,” I said quietly. Clarence followed me in and we sat as he sent his help out of the room.
His house was an ultra modern box, but it was fortified stronger than any other building in the city, there were hidden rooms filled to the brim with artillery, weapons of every calibre, and there was a panic room on every floor of the house, he was either insane or a genius. His interior decoration on the other hand was more evil genius; everything had a sharp edge and was either black or chrome with the occasional splash of red or green.
“I like what you’ve done to the place.”
“Right,” he muttered offering us both a drink, “You hate it,” he laughed, “you always were an old fashioned girl.”
I nodded and met his dark blue eyes,
“when I said that I’d call…”
Clarence laughed under her breath and I heard her mutter, “typical”, or something of the sort.
“Don’t worry yourself about it, when the eighties came I forgot all about you,” he took a sip of his wine and looked at my hair, “I prefer it short. So,” he said, putting down his glass, looking between me and Clarence, “I doubt that you’re here for another round?”
Clarence laughed again and I shook my head, “I’m afraid, George, that we’re all in mortal peril. It’s a rather terrible situation.”
“I have noticed, but what can I do for you?”
“As many hunters as we have on side the fewer repercussions we will face when we take them out.”
“So, no love making at all?” he asked.
“Not this time, George.”
“Does Gabriel have you this time around?”
I bit my lower lip and shook my head. It was at times like that when I regretted ever looking upon a man. Over the years I had my fair share of lovers. Who wouldn’t after two hundred years? Most of them were to pass time, numb senses, or just because that was all I knew.
He laughed and mused, “The virginal hero has become rather clichéd I suppose.” With a sigh he sat back and opened his arms, “I will join you in hunting; I’ll see you out on the field old girl.”
Clarence and I left and set out together back to Levi’s. The clouds were threatening rain as they often did. I had never been one for the winter. I much preferred the warm breeze that would accompany an English summer.
Flowers in full bloom, reds, pinks and blues were everywhere you looked. No garden would be without a tree or some kind of shrubbery. Children would don their white dresses and cotton trousers. Men would leave behind their jackets and their braces would hang lazily from their waists.
I would fan myself delicately and feel the light puffs of the welcome cool air on my powdered face. My golden hair would be pinned up, but whispers of it would fall around my neck and my ears. I would walk bare footed, but no one would see as my dress would run along the grass. My underskirts would be lying on my bedroom floor and I wore only two layers. The top layer being my favourite light pink simple cotton dress, the sleeves would stop around the tops of my arms, but I would wear an open jacket. The only flesh visible would be the top of my breast leading up to my long slender neck.
“You look a million miles away,” Clarence said, as she hooked her arm through mine.
I opened my eyes and smiled to her. “I miss the summers here.”
Chapter 7
“Levi,” Clarence called into the house.
Levi emerged from one of his back rooms. He pulled his shirt on over his head as he walked towards us. “I didn’t expect you back so soon,” he said, running his right hand through his hair, a thin light sheen of sweat on his forehead.
“Sorry,” I said, clearing my throat, “If we’d have known you had company we would have gone back to Gabriel’s.”
He frowned and a smile crept onto his face, “Company? I was in my gym.”
My lips parted and Clarence laughed as my cheeks flushed red, “Come on you,” she said pulling my arm. “We have girl stuff,” she said to Levi.
I couldn’t help but notice a look that they shared as I turned from him and entered the drawing room.
“Do you have something you want to tell me?” Clarence asked, as she sat down opposite me.
I shook my head, “I don’t know what you are talking about.”
“Oh come on, you were jealous as Hell just then.”
“Clarence, why would I be jealous, he can do what he wants.”
“Sure,” she said, lowering her voice to a whisper as she continued to question me, “Have you seen Victor recently?”
I frowned and worried that she had somehow seen into my thoughts and witnessed my memory of our meeting in the alleyway. I shook my head and fixed a smile onto my face, “No, why would I?”
She didn’t believe me; I could see it within her accusing eyes, “Whatever you think you feel for him, it isn’t real Vic, trust me.”
“Ok, if I see him again, I’ll bring his heart back for you, just to prove to you where my loyalties lie.”
I had meant what I said; I would kill him, I had to. His death would free me from my insanity, or at least I had hoped that it would. Victor, although he felt like the missing fragment of my life, had to die, whether it was by my hand or another’s. No matter how much I longed to hold him in my arms again.
Clarence’s phone rang out and I used it as an excuse to leave the room. I wandered outside and took out a homemade cigarette from my inside pocket, as I placed it between my lips Levi held out his lighter. I closed my eyes and smiled, the tree that he had been working on earlier caught my eye and I laughed as I realised that he had fixed onto it an ashtray.
“Smoking that stuff is a terrible habit Rose.”
“You’re not doing much to discourage me.”
He shrugged and stood tall before me, “I know that it helps.”
It did help; if I had been mortal I would not have touched them in a million years, but having forever to avoid the consequences of the habit I took respite in their mind numbing side effects.
He laughed and looked up into the tree that I was leaning against, “Do you think that we’ll ever just be normal?”
“As long as immortal blood runs through our veins we will never be normal, our lack of human feeling doesn’t go a long way to help.”
“We both know that’s bull, you feel just as you did before, you’re just better at masking it.” His eyes were hot on mine, but I shrugged and took a drag, closing my mind to the troubling thoughts.
“That’s what loneliness will do to a person,” I uttered, my voice laden with bitter regret and sarcastic cruelty.
He took a step closer to me and took my cigarette from my mouth and stubbed it out. “You don’t have to be alone Roseanna.”
“Victoria,” I said quietly. “Meet you later for the hunt?”
When I returned Jesse was waiting by my townhouse’s door, without his usual briefcase.
“Have you been waiting long?” I asked, taking out my key and unlocking the door.
He stood back and shook his head, “Not long, no. I’ve not come about business.”
“Oh, come in.” When he sat down I leant back and crossed my legs. “So, what did you want to talk about?”
“I hope you weren’t upset this morning. When I have my business head on I tend to forget that people have emotions.”
“I’m a big girl. I forgot to mention earlier that you’re looking really good.”
His sparkling eyes glinted and he shot me a smile promising trouble. “Five years can change a man.”
“How old are you now?” I asked, pulling my shoes off and sliding them across the room.
“Is that yours?” he asked, pulling my copy of Wordsworth’s Lyrical Ballads across the table, avoiding my question. I nodded as he asked, “So you’re a fan of Wordsworth?” He was watching me with fond curiosity as I became lost in my memories. “Oh it has an inscription,” he uttered, opening it gently, mouthing the words as he read, and as he read them silently I recited them aloud.
“My darling Victoria,
…Imagination, which in truth
Is but another name for absolute power
And clearest insight, amplitude of mind,
And reason, in her most exalted mood…
My love forever…”
I sat back. I ran my index finger across my father’s script and smiled softly. “You still haven’t answered my question.”
“Twenty five,” he uttered flicking through the pages of Wordsworth’s poetry.
I took the book from him and lifted his chin with my index finger. Our eyes were locked, our connection seemed to go into over drive and the bond that we had forged five years ago grew to immeasurable heights. “I have to go,” I said quickly as I stood and pushed my feet into my shoes and threw him his
coat.
“I’ll call if I get any more news.”
“Goodnight Jesse,” I said as I locked the door behind us and ran to my car through the light rain that had begun to fall.
That night something woke me in the night. A door slammed and a glass smashed. I sat up in my bed and a sharp pain seared through my left arm. I searched for the lamp’s switch and when the light doused my skin I saw the end of a needle buried in my arm. I pulled it out and cursed as my skin tore and blood dripped lightly down my arm. I walked across to my bathroom and cleaned the wound, by the time I dried my arm it was healed.
I crossed my room to the window, but there was no one around. Quietly I searched through the house to find one of Gabriel’s glass figurines by the front door smashed across the wooden floor. The door was locked and there was no sign of forced entry anywhere.
I tapped lightly on Gabriel’s door and he wandered out to me groggily, “What’s wrong?”
I pulled him closer and could smell the pungent sweet smell of chloroform; the level that they would have had to use to take Gabriel out would have killed a mortal man. “Chloroform!” I barked.
“What?” Gabriel sniffed the air and stumbled forward. I caught him and his eyes opened wide with realisation.
I walked him to his bathroom and washed his face. With the cold water his senses were revived.
“What happened here Victoria?”
I held out the needle head and bit my lower lip before I said, “I think someone has been taking my blood.”
“How did they get in?” he asked standing at the top of the stairs with me.
“Your keys?”
Gabriel dropped his head, but as he saw the broken glass on the floor he turned to me and uttered, “I loved that fish…” He shook his head and frowned as he asked, “What are we going to do?”
“You are going to go sit down and I’ll get you some tea to wake you up.”
He nodded sleepily and wandered down into his library. As I made my way to the kitchen I picked up the house’s phone and called the one person in the entire immortal universe that could help me.
An Immortal in London: Corruption Page 7