Bitten & Smitten ib-1

by Мишель Роуэн

  “Till then, Sarah,” he said before he disappeared into the club. The door slowly closed behind him and locked with a click.

  I stood there for a long time while large flakes of snow landed in my hair and on my face, melting thickly against my skin.

  I headed home. I couldn’t do anything by staying at Midnight Eclipse other than feel crappy, and I figured I could do that just as easily on my sofa curled up in the fetal position. There would possibly be some thumb sucking involved, too. The infantile kind, not the boss’s paper-cut kind, that is. I got off the bus in front of my apartment complex and walked steadily toward it, placing one foot in front of the other. If I concentrated on the easy things, maybe the difficult stuff wouldn’t feel so overwhelming. One foot in front of the other. One deep breath of cold-evening air after another. And a hand clamping down roughly over my mouth. I was so surprised that I didn’t even try to scream. Whoever it was had me locked tightly against him, with his arm around my chest like a safety harness on a carnival ride, the other hand pressed tightly against my mouth. He was strong, whoever he was, and he dragged me around the corner into a deserted alley. Then he let me go. I spun around to see who it was, a scream rising in my throat. Why wasn’t I all that surprised to see that it was Quinn? He was dressed all in black and wasn’t wearing a smile.

  “I am so going to kick your ass for that.” I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand.

  “Just what in the holy hell do you think you’re doing?”

  He reached into his pocket and pulled out a length of rope. I eyed it uneasily.

  “What’s that for?”

  He met my eyes. “I know you’ll protest what I’m going to do, but I need you to come with me.”

  “I’ll come.” I held my hands up to ward him off. “No need to go all psycho on me. Now, why don’t you tell me what’s going on before I freak out?”

  He paused, wrapping the length of rope around his wrist in the same way a potential strangler might do. It wasn’t doing much to ease my mind.

  “We’re going to get the cure,” he said. “Tonight.”

  “No way.” My voice was firm, yet ever-so-slightly hysterical. “No, Quinn, you can’t do this.”

  “I’m doing it. It’s the best decision and it will benefit both of us. I’m going to get you the cure, whether you like it or not. Now, we can do this with or without the gag, Sarah. It’s entirely your decision.”

  Needless to say, the gag was required. As soon as he came toward me again, I started screaming, more from reflex than fear. Not that anyone came to help. Weren’t there any good Samaritans in the city anymore? Maybe they’d all headed south for the winter like birds do. In less than a minute he’d trussed me up like a Thanksgiving turkey. He didn’t hurt me in the least doing it, though. Made me wonder how much practice he’d had tying women up in dark alleys. There was a car parked in the shadows. I thought for a second that this was going to be a mob-style kidnapping. He’d throw me in the trunk of an ominous black sedan or something. Turned out it was a rented silver Volkswagen Beetle, and I got to sit in the front seat. Lucky me. For a while I made as much noise as I could, calling him every name in the book, even though it was muffled by the gag, and the sounds I was making were more along the lines of “Mrrrghhh!” I struggled against the ropes. I probably could have thrown my body against his, but the best I could hope for by doing that would be his losing control of the car and possibly ending up at the side of the highway in a fiery, mangled mess.

  So, I ended up sitting still, with my eyes facing forward, and tried to relax. I knew he wasn’t going to hurt me. But I couldn’t promise I wasn’t going to hurt him when he finally untied me. He was going to tell Dr. Kalisan about Thierry and where to find him so the hunters could go and make vampire mincemeat out of him. And he was doing it because Thierry killed his mother. After all that Zelda had told me, I didn’t have much of a leg to stand on if I wanted to argue in Thierry’s defense. I’d like to believe he didn’t do it, that he’d never hurt anything larger than the odd spider. But I couldn’t. Quinn pulled up to the doctor’s trailer and put the brakes on so hard that the car lurched forward. Luckily, he’d made sure I was properly seat-belted before heading off on our little road trip from hell.

  He leaned over to unfasten me and finally met my angry gaze in all its intensity.

  “I know what you’re thinking, but this is for the best. And it’s not just revenge.” He paused as he unclicked me, and then with emphasis added another, “It’s not.”

  Right. And I bet he almost believed that himself. He came around to my side of the car and tried to help me out, but I wasn’t budging. He gave me zero choice about coming along, and I wasn’t about to make things easy for him. He groaned with obvious annoyance and then bent down to throw me over his shoulder. Okay, if I’d known he was going to do that, I might have agreed to walk on my own. He carried me to the doctor’s front door like an industrial-size sack of potatoes. If I weren’t already steaming mad, I’d be embarrassed.

  He knocked on the door so hard it shook in its frame, I could feel the reverberations going through me. A couple of minutes went by before Dr. Kalisan appeared. I’m not sure what the expression was on his face when he saw me—well, the back of me, anyhow, at eye level, but he quickly ushered us inside. Quinn carried me down the flight of stairs and put me down on the couch in the doctor’s living room. Then he finally removed the gag from my mouth. He probably expected me to unleash an immediate tirade of expletives, but I didn’t say a word.

  He didn’t make a move to untie me further. He just pushed some hair that had fallen across my face back and tucked it behind my left ear.

  “Are you okay?” he asked with concern as he knelt down beside me. “I’m sorry I had to do it this way.”

  I turned my face away from him. I’d officially decided that I wasn’t speaking to him.

  “This is simply the only way.” There was no joy in his voice. No excitement at the prospect of getting the cure.

  Perhaps I could save the silent treatment for a more opportune time.

  “There is another way,” I said.

  “What? Tell me.”

  I took a deep inhale of stale subterranean trailer air. Not so surprisingly, the scent of wet dog was mixed in with it. I briefly wondered where Barkley was today. “I don’t know, but

  I’m sure there is one. There has to be. If we had a few days—”

  “But,” Dr. Kalisan interrupted me, “in a few days hunting season will be over, and the more affluent hunters will have moved on. They’ll still desire the information, of course, but it will be worth much less by then. Time is of the essence, I’m afraid.”

  Quinn stood up. “So, how does this work?”

  “Quinn!”

  “Sarah, I’m going to do this whether or not you want me to. I’m going to cure both of us, and when it’s all over, if you never want to speak to me again, well, I guess that’s just something I’m going to have to live with.”

  “There has to be another way. There has to be. I won’t let you do this.”

  “Look”—his voice was harsher this time—“I know you and Thierry are… close. He’s helped me, too. But I’m not damn well going to feel guilty about this. He killed my mother. Do you know what that woman meant to me?” I shook my head and lowered my eyes. “I was only five years old when she died. Even I don’t know how much she meant. But I remember a woman who’d give anything for me, for our family. By giving his location over, I’ll get my revenge and get us both the cure. There is more good to be had from this situation than bad.”

  I sighed, a slow, shaky noise. I wished I could argue with him, but the fight was draining from me. If Thierry had killed his mother, then he had every right to seek revenge. I wasn’t stupid; I got that. It’s just that the world wasn’t quite as black and white for me as it was for him. Whatever Thierry might have done in the past, I didn’t think he deserved to die for it now. The thing is, though, Thierry wanted to die. He was sick
of living, and was possibly planning his suicide at this very moment. So, then, would it be so bad to do this? Well, not do it, but let Quinn do it without making it into a bigger deal than it had to be? After all, Thierry might beat the hunters to it in the end. What a disappointment that would be for them. Or perhaps they’d just believe that he’d vanished, safely keeping his reputation as a legendary master vampire intact.

  “It’s very simple,” Kalisan said. “You will give me the location of where he can be found, and I will get the cure for you. In a matter of moments all of this unpleasantness will be over.”

  That gave me an idea. What if Quinn went ahead and told him where Thierry’s location was? Then we’d get the cure immediately, like he’d said. Next thing you know, I’m on a phone warning Thierry to clear out. Yes, it made perfect sense. Nobody had to get hurt. We could all get what we wanted out of this. But I had to play it cool.

  “I have to know one thing,” Quinn said. “You have to assure me that no one else will be harmed. The place where you can find Thierry is populated by other innocent people.”

  “Don’t you mean populated by other vampires?” Kalisan laughed under his breath. “My, how things change. The mighty hunter becomes one with his former prey.”

  Quinn scowled. “It’s not that. It’s just that there’s no need for additional violence. Promise me that no one else will get hurt.”

  “I’ll do what I can. But I’m afraid once the information leaves my hands, the control does also.”

  There was silence then, and I glanced at Quinn. His forehead was set in deep furrows; he was bothered by this. But that was the price he’d have to pay. Did he really think things would go completely smoothly?

  “Untie me,” I said, and Quinn’s gaze flicked to me. “I promise I won’t do anything.”

  He seemed to welcome the delay and began working on the knots he’d made. After a minute the ropes dropped loose and I rubbed my wrists. He met my eyes.

  “Remember, you promised.”

  “I know.” I felt a dull fog hanging over me that had been building for an hour. Hell, who was I kidding? That fog had settled in days ago, around the same time I realized that my being a vampire wasn’t just a crazy dream.

  So, we were going to be cured. Why didn’t I feel happier? Plan or no plan, this situation sucked. I decided that after it was all said and done, after I was back to normal—not that I was even sure what normal was anymore—I was going to move away. Start fresh somewhere else. Maybe I’d head out to Vancouver. I went there as a kid, and I remembered being thrilled by the mountains and the ocean. I’d be thrilled to be thrilled by anything again.

  Quinn turned back to Dr. Kalisan and took a deep breath. “Okay, here it goes. You can find Thierry de Bennicoeur at 217 Lakeside Drive in Toronto. He owns the tanning salon there called Midnight Eclipse. There’s a secret vampire club in the back.”

  Dr. Kalisan nodded. “Good. Very good.”

  I wiped a tear away. So, that was it. Hardly took any time at all. I wondered how much longer I could play it cool as a cucumber before I totally freaked out and ran for the nearest phone. The countdown began.

  “Now, the cure?” Quinn’s voice was strangled, fighting back some serious emotions of his own. “Please?”

  Dr. Kalisan nodded curtly. “I’ll go get it for you. I happen to have it on hand. I had a feeling that you’d be back this evening.”

  He turned and left Quinn and me alone in the living room. Quinn looked at me.

  “I’m sorry.”

  I couldn’t answer him, so I just shook my head. I felt terrible. I felt like I’d just shoved the first of many stakes into Thierry’s chest. I’d decided my plan was stupid. Even if Thierry got out alive, the club was a write-off. Shit. It was all my fault. I should have done something to stop this. I didn’t know what. Anything.

  “Sarah.” He touched my arm, and I flinched. “Say something.”

  “How about don’t talk to me? Ever again.”

  “Fair enough.”

  A few minutes passed in silence. Long enough for me to have second, third, and fourth thoughts about what we’d just done. I was about to turn and leave, but Dr. Kalisan reappeared at the doorway that led to the kitchen. He had a self-satisfied smile on his face.

  “You have it?” Quinn asked.

  “What makes you think that the cure is an it?” the doctor said.

  Another person appeared in the doorway from behind him. A familiar face, lined and worn with age and experience. A well-kept graying beard adorned his face. His eyes were similar to his son’s, but much less friendly and compassionate.

  “Yes.” Quinn’s father stared at the both of us, but he was speaking into the cell phone held to his ear. “Midnight Eclipse. That is correct. I shall meet you there.” He closed the phone and tucked it into his inner jacket pocket.

  Shit. Double shit. My stomach dropped.

  “Father?” Quinn’s voice was barely audible.

  Roger Quinn shook his head, an obvious motion of disappointment. “Why am I not surprised? My only son has sullied the family name. I can smell your vileness from where I stand.”

  “I’m sorry.” Quinn took a step forward. I wanted him to do anything but apologize. I had a feeling that he’d spent his life apologizing to this man, even for things he hadn’t done.

  “Don’t waste your breath. I have nothing more to say to you.”

  “But, Father, I’ve come here to get the cure. I don’t want to be what I am. I don’t want it! And now I won’t be. Dr. Kalisan said that he has the cure for this. That’s why we’re here.”

  “Stupid boy,” Roger Quinn said. “There is no cure.”

  Chapter 23

  My mouth dropped open as I heard his words fall on the air. “There is no cure?” He had to be kidding. He just had to be playing a game with us. Any moment people were going to spring out from behind the couch and tell us where the hidden cameras were. It was a joke. It just had to be. Then why wasn’t anyone laughing?

  I looked at the doctor. He shrugged slightly at me. “I’m sorry, my dear, but he speaks the truth. There is no cure for vampirism. Never has been, never will be.”

  “But… but why did you lie to us?”

  “A means to an end, I suppose. It was a rumor originally started by the hunters, a ruse to draw out some of your kind. Clues had been scattered, here and there. Mostly as an experiment. My name was leaked due to my background as a scientist and my friendship with Roger. It’s what I do to help fight the evil in any way I can.”

  I tried to frown, but my face felt frozen. “How many times do I have to tell people that I’m not evil?”

  “It’s in a vampire’s very nature to be evil. I don’t blame you any more than I could blame a lion for stalking her daily meal.”

  “You used us,” Quinn said, his voice still soft. “To find out Thierry’s location. That’s all this was about.”

  “The opportunity presented itself. That particular result wasn’t planned, it was just a happy coincidence.”

  “But he killed my mother.” Quinn glanced at his father.

  Roger smiled a thin, unpleasant smile. “How you remind me of her right now. She protested her innocence right until the end as well.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  Roger sighed and shook his head. “I never told you the truth about your mother. And now, now I feel as though I’m living those horrible days all over again.”

  “Her murder—”

  “Her punishment,” Roger corrected. “It would have been better if you’d been led to believe from the beginning that de Bennicoeur slaughtered her. But, instead, I told you nothing. I assumed you’d try to find out more on your own and was disappointed when your curiosity didn’t lead you any further than it did.”

  “Father, what are you talking about?”

  “Your mother was a whore.” Roger spat the words, his anger as palpable today as it must have been twenty-five years ago. “An adulterous whore who cavorte
d with vampires.”

  “What?” Quinn’s eyes were wide.

  “When I found out, I confronted her—demanded the truth. She didn’t deny it for a moment. She said she was in love with one of them.” He laughed, and it wasn’t a pleasant sound. “ ‘Love,’ as if a vampire could know the meaning of such a word. At the time I was still in love with her, and ready to forgive her indiscretions, but she’d already been turned, the marks still visible on her pale white neck. She was planning on leaving me, leaving you, boy, without a word of explanation that very night.”

  I could feel my heart beating loudly and violently in my chest. I wasn’t liking this tale one little bit, and I can’t imagine that Quinn was, either. He stared at a spot on the wall just to the side of his father’s head. His hands were clenched into tight fists, but he made no sound that might stop the truth from being told finally.

  “Your mother,” Roger continued, “was a whore vampire, her black heart filled with the joy of deserting those she promised before God to love and obey till death do us part.”

  “You were the one who killed her.” It was my voice that said those words. I didn’t mean to; they just came out all by themselves. Roger looked at me directly for the first time.

  “I did only what had to be done. And knew that from that day forward, it was my sacred duty to rid the earth of scum like her.”

  It wasn’t Thierry. He didn’t kill Quinn’s mother. This news should have made me happy or, at the very least, relieved, but I was numb. I waited for Quinn’s reaction. What was he going to do? He’d just learned after two and a half decades that his father murdered his mother for being the exact thing he was now.

  “You didn’t seem to be having much of a problem with Veronique the other night,” I said.

  But then, I already knew why. She was the traitor. Roger Quinn liked vamps as long as they provided him with the means to kill other vamps.