by Barb Hendee
He shook his head.
No, he existed alone. He believed in the purity of remaining alone-as all his kind should. Unnatural, undead beings who fed on mortals should function alone, not pretend to be some kind of human family. The very thought repelled him. He was convinced that the behavior of the elders, their need for each other's company, and their close physical proximity to each other must have generated the first inklings of their telepathy, of their twisted need for laws, in the first place.
He was sure of it… Centuries and centuries ago, one vampire must have become aware of this power and begun assisting the others. Why else would a new vampire have to be «taught» by his or her maker? Why else would a new vampire need an elder to awaken such abilities?
That thought brought him back to Robert.
He had to do something!
Strength in numbers.
He took his fist away from his mouth. If… if he created a vampire to assist him, the obvious choice would be to pick someone strong, an intelligent and resilient fighter. But he could not bring himself to do this. No, he would have to pick someone who could be controlled and easily dispatched if necessary, but also someone who yearned for more than what he had, someone who could be used and tempted.
Julian would need to find the right type. But he was not telepathic, and he was not a good judge of mortals by simply studying their faces, especially Americans. They all looked the same to him.
He glanced around the room. "Mary, are you still here?"
She materialized by the fireplace, seeming somewhat put out. "Yeah, I'm here. You give up on staring into space?"
"I need you to find someone."
"What? Again? I told you. I know right where they are."
"No, I need you to find a mortal."
"Someone still alive? How am supposed to do that? Even if I had the right name, I can't exactly turn pages in a phone book… Well, I guess you could turn them for me and-"
"Quiet!" he ordered, wishing he could strike her. "Listen to me. I need you to find a specific type of mortal." He closed his eyes, visualizing. "A man in his late teens or early twenties. He lives in near squalor, not homeless, but in some shabby apartment where he watches TV at night. He has a job but makes just enough to scrape by. He has failed in relationships with women, but he believes success is a matter of luck, and that if only he had wealth and drove a BMW, then all his problems would be solved."
When he opened his eyes, Mary was floating right in front of him. "Geez, Julian."
"Can you find someone like this?"
"Here? Sure, the city's full of guys like that. You probably couldn't swing a Barbie doll by her hair without hitting one. I just can't believe you know that much about people."
"Find one," he said coldly. "Tonight. And come back with his address."
Mary materialized inside a darkened doorway near the mouth of an alley. She'd already been looking around the city for an hour.
In spite of her flippant words to Julian, Mary was having a tough time locating the right man. Although she'd never paid attention at school, she wasn't stupid, and she knew exactly what kind of guy Julian was looking for.
She would never admit it, but in the past few nights, she'd felt more satisfaction with herself than she had in all of her previous life. There was something satisfying about tracking Eleisha in secret and always finding her, about traveling wherever she chose with a freedom that no other ghosts seemed to enjoy.
Mary was unique.
She hadn't even thought about her parents in several days. Even though Julian was a cold-blooded bastard, she was starting to kind of… well, like the tasks he gave her. Weird.
Focusing on the task at hand, she spotted a FOR LEASE sign on an empty shop next to a video store, and she got an idea.
Blinking out, she blinked into the empty shop and moved up alongside the window to peer into the street. She could tell a lot about people by the movies they rented.
She started to study everyone who came out of the video store and walked past her.
The first guy was bald and weighed about three hundred pounds, and he was stuffing movies inside his coat like he was ashamed. The films were probably porn.
Nope. Too perverted, she thought.
Next, a couple came out arguing loudly because she'd wanted to see Fried Green Tomatoes again, and he'd wanted to rent The Fast and the Furious with Vin Diesel. They weren't carrying any movies, just arguing.
Nope. Too married.
The next guy was tall and good-looking, wearing tight pants and a tank top. His hair was perfectly gelled, and he had a movie in each hand: The English Patient and A Room with a View.
Nope. Too gay.
Then a slender man of about twenty, with shaggy brown hair, came out of the video store alone. He was wearing jeans, a leather jacket, a backpack, and a pair of ancient Adidas athletic shoes that must have once been white. His shoulders were hunched forward, like he was closed off to everyone else.
Mary looked down at his right hand. He was carrying two movies. The one on top was Spider-Man with Tobey Maguire. When the film slipped slightly, she saw the one behind it: Spider-Man 2.
This guy had promise. He liked movies where an ordinary boy gets bit by a spider and becomes a superhero that Kirsten Dunst would consider sleeping with.
She let him get a little ways down the street, and then she blinked out, rematerializing in an alley down the street so she could keep tabs on him. She repeated this process several times until he reached an apartment building in the Mission District and went inside.
The stairwell was empty, so she managed to follow him up to the fourth floor without being seen. Then he went inside.
Apartment 4-E.
She thought she was on the right track with this one, but she still wasn't sure, so she blinked out and tried to gauge the distance to the back of a small apartment, rematerializing again-poised to wish herself into nothingness-and finding herself alone inside a dirty bathroom. The door was open, and she heard the television come on.
Peering around the door, she saw that he didn't even own a couch, just a shabby overstuffed chair and a TV and one end table that looked like it'd come from a garage sale. He had no other furniture in the room. Looking up, she saw a Keira Knightley calendar hanging on the wall. The light on his answering machine was not blinking. He had no messages.
He put the first film into his DVD player, sat in the chair, opened the backpack, and pulled out a bag from McDonald's.
She'd seen enough.
Blinking out, she stopped once downstairs to get a better look at the building-and then the mailboxes-scanning for the resident of apartment 4-E.
Jasper Nesland.
She blinked out again, focusing on Julian and rushing back to the suite.
"Come on," she said, before she'd even materialized completely. "I think I've got him."
Jasper Nesland ate his Quarter Pounder with Cheese and tried hard to focus on Spider-Man.
Watching the story of Peter Parker usually made him feel better, but he'd had a bad day-bad week actually-and he shouldn't have stopped at the video store and spent eight bucks on movies.
He'd been working for a year at the Quickie Mart on 19th Street, always keeping an eye out for something better. Paying the rent on this rat-hole apartment ate up almost everything he earned, but he just never seemed to get a break like everyone else.
When he was seventeen, his mom ran off to Sacramento with her newest boyfriend-and they didn't invite Jasper along. He'd never known his dad, and it sometimes ate away at him that he didn't have parents to help him out. But since Jasper couldn't change this fact, he'd decided to keep himself afloat.
He worked hard to pull his own weight. He didn't smoke. He rarely drank. He knew a bright future was waiting just around the corner, with money and respect and pretty girls. He just had to wait for some kind of break and be ready to pounce.
Then, earlier this week, he found out his landlord was raising the rent by eighty
dollars, and yesterday, his boss had cut his hours, due to business slowing down because of a brand-new Circle K down the street.
Today, he'd felt so bad, so down about everything, that he'd spent forty dollars on lottery tickets, just hoping to get lucky, but he'd come up with nothing, and now he was out forty dollars and might have trouble even making this month's rent.
He shouldn't have rented these movies.
But he had, so he tried to forget everything and keep his eyes on the TV and his mind on Kirsten Dunst. He sighed. If only he had a decent car.
Somebody knocked on his door, and he jumped slightly.
Who could that be?
Even desperate salesmen wouldn't come to this part of the city. He didn't move and the knock sounded again, louder this time.
He stood up and walked over. "Who is it?"
"Open the door."
When the words reached his ears, a cold feeling began to crawl over him. He didn't want to open the door, but he was afraid not to. Something in that voice wormed through his body, filling him with terror of what might happen if he didn't unlock the door.
His hand moved as if functioning on its own, flipped the latch, and turned the knob.
A large man stood in the hallway. He had pale skin, dark hair, and expensive-looking clothes… black slacks, a dress shirt, and a long coat.
He walked in and Jasper backed up, his fear increasing.
What the hell was going on?
The man closed the door and locked it again. Then he looked about the apartment.
"What do you want?" Jasper managed to ask.
But when he spoke, the man's head swiveled rapidly back, his eyes narrowing as if Jasper shouldn't dare speak.
Fear hit him. He'd never been so afraid in his life. He'd never felt anything like this, and he sank to his knees, too shaken to remain standing.
The man strode over and grabbed the front of his shirt. Jasper wanted to scream, to beg, but he couldn't even speak. He felt himself being slammed against the wall, and then to his shock, the man pressed in closer and bit him on the throat.
No… more than bit him. Jasper felt teeth tearing into skin, puncturing deeper, and this time he did try to scream, but nothing came out. He bucked and fought and pushed, but the man was as solid as a moving statue, and he was drinking Jasper's blood.
After a few minutes, Jasper couldn't struggle anymore, and he could hear his heartbeat growing slower and slower, until it barely beat. The man let go of him, letting him fall to the floor. Was it over?
To his horror, the man knelt down, ripped the veins of his own wrist open, and shoved the bleeding wound into Jasper's mouth. He started choking, and the man ordered, "Drink."
Again, the voice filled him with fear, but the blood flowing down his throat tasted good. He obeyed and started drinking.
Then the world went black.
Julian waited in the shabby apartment for several hours. He still had time before dawn and didn't want to be seen carrying an unconscious body.
Finally, Jasper's eyelids fluttered and opened.
"Get up," Julian ordered.
Jasper saw him and cried out, crab-stepping backward to press against the wall.
"Just get up," Julian repeated coldly.
Jasper put his hand to this throat, which was nearly healed. "What did you do?" he whispered.
"I gave you a gift." Julian motioned to the dingy living room. "You're going to leave this place with me and never come back. You will have all the money you could ever want… anything wealth can buy. Your body is much stronger now, and you will never grow old. But you can't go into the sunlight, and you'll drink blood to live."
He let the words sink in. Most mortals would be horrified at a statement like this, but not Jasper. His eyes shifted back and forth as he absorbed Julian's words.
"I can hear every car outside," he said softly. "I can hear the people walking in the street." He touched his throat. "Vampire?" He rushed to the bathroom. "No, I can see myself in the mirror!"
Julian wanted to sneer. "Of course you can," he answered.
Had he made a mistake? He would only settle for a servant he could completely control, but this one seemed even more vapid than Mary.
"So, what do I have to do?" Jasper said, turning from the mirror. "For all that stuff you said… about money?"
Maybe he wasn't so stupid. But as of yet, he had no true idea what had just happened to him, and he was already trying to hedge an advantage. This creature had desires. He could be worked upon-and controlled.
Julian was pleased. "You just need to pass a test… when I tell you."
Chapter 9
The following night, Eleisha sat at the kitchen table watching Wade as he got the water boiling and then scrambled a few eggs. Philip was in the shower, and Rose was packing-although Eleisha suspected she was so anxious over the impending journey that she just needed some time alone in her room. So far, Seamus had not appeared tonight.
"What time does our train leave?" Wade asked, placing a tea bag into a mug.
"Just past midnight, from Jack London Square."
"Did you tell Philip not to hog all the hot water?" he asked, bringing her some tea.
She looked up at him, and he stopped with the mug in midair.
"What's wrong?" he asked.
"Why do you think Philip is being so cavalier about Robert now, and he's so hostile about Rose? You'd think it would be the other way around."
Wade dropped into the chair beside her. "Because neither one of us seems to like Robert."
"What?"
"Think about it. You threatened Philip back in Seattle. You told him you wouldn't forgive him if he stopped you from finding Rose. Then you got me interested in helping her, too. You exchanged letters with her, and you want her company. He sees Rose as a threat to your time and affection-maybe even to mine."
Eleisha blinked. "No, even Philip isn't that self-involved."
Wade pursed his mouth at her as if she'd said something stupid, and he stood back up to get his eggs.
Out in the sitting room, she heard a soft knock on the front door, and she tensed. That would be Robert.
"I'll get it," Rose called from her room.
Wade scooped his eggs from the pan onto a paper plate, and he sat down beside Eleisha with his own tea. Voices carried from the sitting room, and then Eleisha looked over to see Robert standing in the archway. He was quite possibly the most physically intimidating person she'd ever met, and she didn't know why. He wasn't even as tall as Philip.
Maybe it was his eyes.
He carried over one shoulder a narrow nylon bag that stretched down to his thigh, and he was looking around the kitchen at the bright pots of herbs and the teakettle and egg pan on the stove. Then his gaze moved to Eleisha and Wade sitting at the table.
"Is there more tea?" he asked.
That was the first moment Eleisha felt any kind of connection to him. She remembered waking up after her first night here and how wonderfully comfortable it had been to just sit in a kitchen and drink tea with other people. How long since he'd enjoyed such a simple pleasure?
"Yes," she said, getting up. "Come and sit. Wade, you finish your eggs."
She made Robert a cup of tea and brought it to him, deciding not beat about the bush, as they didn't have a great deal of time. "We've decided to leave tonight. I reserved two adjoining cabins on an Amtrak," she said.
"So soon?" he asked.
"There's no reason to stay, and I should start making arrangements to purchase the church. I can give you our address in Portland if you need to think this over and perhaps join us later, or you can come with us tonight."
"Tonight? I don't have a ticket."
"I bought one for you last night when I booked ours."
He stood up, ignoring his tea, seeming uncomfortable. "You bought me a train ticket on one night's notice? How much did that cost?"
"Cost?" She shook her head. "I'm not sure. I won't pay the Visa bill until the end of
the month."
"It's all right, Robert," Wade cut in. "Eleisha doesn't… she doesn't need to worry about money. It's fine."
Maybe Robert liked to pay his own way?
Philip walked into the kitchen wearing nothing but his Calvin Klein jeans and rubbing his wet hair with a towel. He half turned to grab a mug out of the cupboard, exposing the white cigar burns on his shoulders.
At the sight of him like this, Robert froze, as if recognizing him for the first time, and the tension meter in the room suddenly shot up.
"What?" Wade asked in alarm, looking at Robert.
Philip stopped rubbing his hair and took the towel away, glancing down at himself, and then he locked eyes with Robert, but with some kind of intense realization dawning on his face until Eleisha wondered if the two of them were sharing a memory.
"Eleisha," Philip said slowly, putting the empty mug down. "You'd better take your shower while I get us packed."
She hurried over to him, still not sure what was wrong. "Of course. Can I borrow a sweater? I didn't bring enough clothes."
"Sure."
He backed out of the kitchen and then turned around. Eleisha followed him to the guest room.
"What was that about?" she whispered.
"Nothing." He turned away. "Go take your shower."
She never pushed him when he got like this, so she gathered up some clothes to wear, not paying much attention to what she grabbed.
Considering his mood, this was hardly the most opportune moment, but she wanted to speak to him before they left.
"Philip," she said to his back, "Rose is afraid of traveling, and I want you to look out for her, be kind to her, protect her like you do for me and Wade."
He glanced over his shoulder, and she could see his expression darkening. This would be so much easier if she could just use her gift, but he'd feel it, and afterward, he'd blame her.
"Rose is like Robert," she said quickly, "just someone we're trying to help. She'll never be the kind of friend that Wade is to us, and she will never be what you are to me."
The anger in his profile vanished, but he didn't answer.
"Be kind to her," she repeated, hurrying out toward the bathroom.