Midnight Brunch

by Marta Acosta

  Oswald gazed at Silas and said, “Do you mind my asking what happened to you?”

  Silas’s bitter smile, which he directed at me, looked especially bizarre on his taut, pink-skinned face. “Ian Ducharme told me that you had been cut.”

  I said, “Do you mean the knife incident? Zave apologized for the accident, and I understood that it was just between you and Ian.”

  “Ducharme considers you his personal property. He gave me one hundred cutss for the one ‘nick’ you ssuffered, Misss De Loss Santoss. Every time one began healing, he cut me again. We do recover, but we are not invulnerable to pain.”

  It wasn’t difficult to believe that Ian had done this, and I felt emotions too dark to analyze now.

  “I’m well aware of Ducharme’s attitude toward Milagro,” Oswald said. “He’s no friend of mine and he was invited to my ranch only as a courtesy due to his position.”

  “I thought ass much,” Silas said.

  “Can we please drop the subject of Ian?” I asked. “I admit that I made a mistake with him, and I’d like to move on to other things. More exciting things, like the Project for a New Vampire Century.”

  “Sure, babe,” Oswald said. “Silas, Milagro and my cousin Gabriel have been telling me more about your project.”

  Silas was skeptical. “You don’t strike me ass an idealisst, Oswald. No offensse.”

  My boyfriend gave a lopsided smile that made me ache. “I’m not. I am more interested in my professional development and new ventures. I’ve outgrown my small practice and I’m looking for something I can invest in that will give me a bigger return.”

  “You’re sspeaking about our new treatment center?” Silas asked.

  “Yes, and I think you could use a plastic surgeon with my skills who knows how to treat both vampires and normals.”

  “What about the goalss of the project?”

  “Do they really matter if we’re bringing in the money?” Oswald said. “Let me buy into this place and you won’t regret it.”

  The thing about corrupt people is that they always believe that everyone else is just as corrupt. Silas understood greed.

  I gave him a seductive look and said, “Now isn’t this much more interesting than conducting academic research? You get to use my blood, but this isn’t a charity project. I want a cut of the take.”

  Silas returned my look. “I thought there wass more to you than an earnest bookworm. I say, let’ss cselebrate our new partnership.”

  The flunkie brought out a bottle of partridge blood and a bottle of champagne. Silas sketched out the overall goals of the Project for a New Vampire Century. They sounded great if you didn’t listen too closely. Willem had envisioned a utopia where stability, both communal and financial, was paramount.

  His first step was working to eradicate all things that threatened the family. “We’ve started with campaignss againsst gay marriage, on the grassrootss level,” Silas said. “Sso easy to get support for that. Then we will move on to restrict divorce. Our ultimate goal iss mandatory arranged marriagess, and no divorce. We have an eight- to ten-year plan for that.”

  “What about people who have children harum-scarum?” I asked.

  “Our kind are already overwhelmed. Various sscares can be created to encourage a limit of two children. Eventually, we will reduce that to one human child per couple, until our numberss reach parity. Reducing family size for humanss will also encourage financial ssolvency. We have plans to increase interest ratess to an onerous level, discouraging borrowing and unnecessary purchasess.”

  “You know, I had student loans for school, and most people can’t buy a house without a mortgage,” I said.

  “In many countriess there are no home mortgagess or sstudent loanss. People must learn to do without those thingss they cannot afford.”

  “How does the elimination of all personal debt advance the vampire agenda?” I asked.

  “Lesss dependence on corporate structure and more dependence on our moral authority. Individuality has been elevated in thiss country over the national good. Life is not only the purssuit of pleassure,” he said.

  Oswald chuckled. “You don’t have to give her long explanations. All she really cares about is partying, flirting, and spending my money.”

  I laughed and said, “Oswald knows me too well.”

  “How is living with Thomas Cook?” Silas asked.

  “Ah, Silas, very clever of you to keep me occupied while I was here. And thank you. I loved having that hunk of eye candy around. Oswald was so jealous that he’s promised me a convertible!”

  Oswald rolled his eyes.

  Seeing that this was a sore subject, Silas said to Oswald, “It is ssuch a benefit to uss to have Gabriel’ss ssecurity resources and skills. Perhapss, too, you can help me recruit Ssam and Winnie.”

  “I was thinking the same thing,” Oswald replied.

  Silas told us about the launch party for the new treatment center. “It will take place, two nightss from now,” Silas said. “Milagro, you will be a prominent participant in thiss event. We would like to offer tastess of your fresh blood to our important dignitariess at the gala. I’d also like to have a pint for our spa saless.”

  “Are you sure you can afford a whole pint?” I said. “I am a rara avis.”

  “Let me negotiate that with Silas, honey,” Oswald said. “I can also draw the blood, no charge.”

  “I knew you would be of sservice,” Silas said.

  We chatted a bit more about the new treatment center and Silas said he’d give Oswald a tour the next day. Then we exchanged good nights and went back to the casita. Oswald automatically reached for my hand and I jumped away. He said, “It’s killing me not to touch you.”

  “I’m getting better, but slowly.”

  “We’ll be done with Silas in a few days, and then we can deal with your condition.”

  I nodded. “Okay.” Our shoes crunched the gravel below our feet. “Silas thinks you’re unethical and greedy and he thinks I’m slutty and greedy.”

  “Then we were successful.”

  “Yes, you were very convincing when you said that all I cared about was partying, flirting, and spending your money.”

  He laughed. “What about you calling Thomas a ‘hunk of eye candy’?”

  “If I sounded like I was telling the truth, it was because I do think Thomas is a hunk of eye candy!” I skipped out of his range.

  “Why do you torment me, Maria Dos Passos?”

  “Because I am crushed by the loss of my beloved pet goat, Pancho,” I intoned. I started laughing every time I thought of that line.

  When we went into the casita, Oswald said gently, “Milagro, we can still find ways to be with each other now. I love you. Come on.”

  I followed him to the bedroom. He opened his medical bag and took out a narrow box of surgical gloves. “See,” he said. “We just need to be creative. You have a degree in creative writing, so it will be easy.”

  He placed a pair of the gloves on the bed and quickly put a pair on his own hands. He smiled and came toward me.

  “You have got to be kidding, Oswald Grant,” I said. “I am not going to start having safe sex with you now. You can just wait until I’m better.”

  “It’s been a long time. I don’t want to wait.”

  “Oswald,” I said more seriously. “It will be better when we can touch each other and I can kiss you again. Do you mind?”

  He groaned. “Yes, but it doesn’t seem like I have much of a choice.”

  I took off my sandals and my shorts and washed up. I slipped into bed and Oswald wrapped the sheet over me and then embraced me through the sheet. Occasionally his hands would wander, rubbing here and rubbing there.

  “Cut it out, Oswald. Go to sleep.”

  “You are torturing me.”

  “Good. Maybe next time you won’t keep secrets from me.”

  Before I’d met Oswald, I’d thought that being in love with a man and having him love me in return would solv
e all of my problems. Now, even though my problems weren’t solved, I knew that I wasn’t alone. I had to believe that I would get better. The alternative was too dismal to contemplate.

  Twenty-Three

  When it’s time to Party,

  we will Party Hard

  O n the day of the party, I felt sick with anxiety. Charles had arranged for Mercedes to act as the gala’s head bartender. A biker friend, Ernest “Pepper” Culpepper, and his crew were on their way to replace the original security team. The Dervishes were already at the motel in La Basura and they’d been a big hit at Lefty’s on open-mike night.

  Bernie and Charlie had visited an electronics superstore and bought cameras that they hid throughout the Paragon ballroom, which was on the back of the top floor of the main building. Mercedes had made up a nice dossier on Silas’s criminal activities. Sam had provided contact information for the council members, and they would receive the dossier after the event, along with a video that we had tentatively titled “Vamps Gone Wild.”

  I hadn’t seen Gabriel again, but he’d had a heated discussion with Oswald and tried to get us to leave the Paragon.

  I went for a long run to work off my energy. I was cooling off, circling around the back of the Paragon, when I saw several men unloading a long, heavy wooden crate from a truck. Silas, wearing a Panama hat, long-sleeved T-shirt, and jeans, was directing them, saying, “Be careful. That’ss pricelesss.”

  As I watched, he came over to me, so close that his hip touched mine. “Milagro, thiss iss the altar.” He smiled suggestively, and now my internal gauge registered a strong heterosexual reading. “Are you excited?”

  “I’ll be more excited when you deposit that money in my bank account.”

  He laughed. “We’ll give them a good show, won’t we? I know you don’t take the ritualss sseriously, but they have a power. They can be a real turn-on.”

  “I’m looking forward to it,” I said.

  His hand drifted to my thigh and I didn’t brush it away. “I’m sso curiouss about you, Milagro. What iss it that you do that makess ssomeone like Ducharme sseek revenge for you?”

  I looked at him from under my lashes. “Play your cards right and you might find out.”

  Then I walked away swinging my hips. Inside, I was thinking, “Ew, ew, ew, ew!” I wished there was a way to bleach away the memory of flirting with Silas from my brain.

  At least I didn’t have to worry about what to wear this evening. One of the neovamps had delivered a white gown for the ceremony and the most exquisite white silk slippers embroidered with flowers and glittering with red jewels like drops of blood.

  When I tried them on, I said, “Oswald, do you think I’ll be able to keep these shoes?”

  “I don’t see why not. They look as if they were made for you.”

  I sat and put my legs straight out, the better to admire the slippers. There was a tapping at our door and when Oswald answered, Silas came in.

  “Hello,” he said. He saw me and looked pleased. “I’m glad at leasst one thing arrived on time.”

  “Why?” asked Oswald. “Is there a problem?”

  “That’ss why I’m here. Our family knife wass ssupossed to be delivered yesterday, flown in from Prague, but Willem made an error in shipping. It arrived jusst now, but it iss too precious for me to trust one of the thrallss to pick it up. My own men are sso busy.” Silas said that the knife was at a shipping store near the airport. “Could I assk you to pick it up? I know that it’ss a long drive.”

  Oswald looked at his watch. “I can go now and I’ll be back by ten thirty at the latest, in plenty of time for the ceremony. That is, if Milagro doesn’t mind if I miss the cocktail reception?”

  “As long as you’re back for the main event, darling,” I said.

  “Thank you,” Silas said. He handed a yellow sheet of paper to Oswald. “Here iss the receipt and my authorization for you to ssign for the delivery.”

  When Silas left, Oswald said, “You sure you don’t mind?”

  “It’s fine. There’s no traffic here and you’ll have lots of time. What’s a ritual bloodletting without the ritual knife?”

  He took off and I was glad to have solitude to prepare for the night. I took a long bath and read the copy of Vile Bodies that Bernie had loaned me. I thought about my own once reliable but now vile body.

  I put on the pristine gown carefully. It was beautiful, the silk flowing down to a few inches above my ankles. The neckline was perfect. It revealed just enough to entice without seeming slutty. Since I would be on camera tonight, I took my time with my makeup, and even let the first layer of mascara dry before adding the second. Inspired by Trevini’s hairstyle, I made a few slender braids and let the rest of my hair hang loose around my shoulders.

  I had checked in with my accomplices and told them that Oswald had gone to pick up the knife but would be back long before the actual ceremony. I was worrying that my slippers would get dusty on the walk to the hotel when the doorbell rang.

  Silas stood there, looking sleek and stylish in a black suit and white shirt. “I thought you might want a ride.” He gestured to the golf cart behind him.

  “Thanks, Silas. You must have read my mind. I didn’t want to muss these pretty slippers.” I picked up a shawl to keep me warm against the breeze.

  “A fitting adornment for ssuch a beautiful woman.”

  “Did you deposit the money?”

  He pulled a slip of paper from his pocket. “Here’ss the deposit sslip.”

  I took it and looked at the sum. It was like holding a winning lottery ticket: incredible that the numbers were real. I said, “Excuse me,” and then I went to the bedroom and put the deposit slip in the small hotel safe.

  I returned to Silas. When I saw that he was going to take my arm, I shifted the shawl so that it blocked his touch on my bare skin. He led me to the golf cart, then got behind the wheel.

  “Is anyone there yet?”

  “A few memberss of the Diamond Club. Mosst will come fashionably late.”

  “Oh, good. Then Oswald won’t miss much.”

  We arrived at the Paragon and I got out of the cart before Silas tried to hand me out. He walked around to me, looking like the evil twin of the gentle academic I’d first met. His pale blue eyes boldly ran over me. “The question iss, will you miss Oswald much?”

  I returned his stare. “Let me take a good look at your customer base, and then we’ll talk of romance.”

  “You are teasing me, Milagro.”

  I laughed girlishly, as I imagined Brittany would, all hair flipping and teeth. “I assure you, Silas, that if I like what I see, I won’t tease much longer.” I hated using feminine wiles on someone I hated.

  The lobby was decorated with towering urns filled with long-stemmed red roses, velvety burgundy gladioli, and creamy tuberoses that perfumed the air with their heady fragrance. A red carpet led the way to the elevators. One of the neovamps held it for us and said, “Good evening, Mr. Madison, Miss De Los Santos.”

  Silas punched the button for the top floor. When the doors opened again, I saw two guards in front of the ballroom entrance. I hardly recognized our biker pal, Pepper, dressed as he was in a suit with his beard trimmed.

  Pepper opened the door to the ballroom, and when Silas wasn’t looking, he gave me a wink.

  The ballroom’s magnificent windows had been cloaked in lavish inky-black velvet drapes. Urns with flowers were placed between the windows and by the doorways. On the stage, the Dervishes, dressed neatly in black shirts and black slacks, played gentle folk music. I recognized a tune from the sixties about love and daisies. Mercedes said that they always started out quite innocently.

  Refined vampires and wealthy degenerates attired in designer clothes milled about the dance floor and sat at tables covered in white linens. Each table had an arrangement of red roses and numerous candles in gleaming silver candlesticks. Goth waiters in black and white circulated with trays of drinks and tasty-looking chow.


  As we went by the main bar, I made eye contact with Mercedes. She looked ridiculous in heavy eyeliner, a conservative church-lady wig, and a black suit. “Let’s have a drink, Silas,” I said. I turned to Mercedes and said, “Champagne, please.”

  Silas asked for a vodka martini. When we got our drinks, I said, “Bottoms up,” and I tossed mine back, hoping that I was still as resistant to chemical enhancements as Ian. Silas looked amused and said, “Here’ss blood in your eye.” His glass was filled to the brim, and he drank the martini in one long gulp.

  “Another round, miss,” I told Mercedes. As she poured the drinks, I said to Silas, “You must be a little tense about tonight.”

  “Not too much.” Leaning close, he said, “Sso are you impressed with the clientele?”

  I looked around as if calculating the wealth of the guests. Diamonds sparkled on ears and necks; rubies and emeralds hung from ears. Most of the men wore tailored suits and had the well-groomed, self-satisfied look of the very affluent. One guy in a bad haircut, grubby polo shirt, and ill-fitting khakis was at the center of a group. His glasses were held together with tape.

  “Who is that?” I asked.

  Silas mentioned a high-tech company. “He’s sso rich, he doesn’t give a damn about appearancess. But his wife wantss our new treatment.”

  I raised my second glass of champagne. “To you and the success of your new venture.” I drank the whole glass.

  “Thankss.” He took one sip and said, “This vodka is a little rough,” and put down the drink. What I knew and he didn’t was that his martini was made with the insanely potent Balkan vodka. Other drinks were being spiked with 190 proof grain alcohol, brought over the state border by our biker buddies.

  Silas was already wavering on his feet as we went across the room to the front table. Gigi sat there, one long golden leg crossed over the other, wearing a tight red strapless dress. Silas was pulled away by a guest, and Gigi waved me to her side. “Milagro, darling,” she purred. “I adore your fashion sense. White looks fabulous on you.”

  “Thank you. You look amazing.”