by Heidi Lowe
“Who told you about my bar?”
“My friend Petr mentioned it. I thought it would be a nice change of scenery.”
Her smirk couldn't have been more smug if she'd tried. She knew I was full of crap. She knew I hadn't come for that reason. But did she know the real reason?
“Would you like a drink? On the house of course.” She signaled to a red-head barmaid, who came rushing over immediately. She was wearing a scarf. “Darling, could you get my friend another beer, please?”
“Anything you want, Jean,” the girl said, smiling ingratiatingly, sickeningly, before skipping off.
I watched her with disgust. It took me a while to notice that Jean was staring at me again.
“Do you call all your employees darling, or is it just the ones you're screwing and feeding off of?”
She folded her arms, her eyebrows raised in alarm. I felt like she was about to give me detention and a couple of spankings! The thought turned me on big style, I'm ashamed to admit.
“I think we need to set some boundaries, you and I,” she said. She didn't sound as angry as I thought she would, which only annoyed me further. I wanted to get a rise out of her.
“What? We're supposed to be friends now, aren't we? We're supposed to be able to share.”
“And are you this candid with all of your friends?”
“Well my other 'friends' don't have warped sex lives, so they don't have a problem being open with me.”
She laughed. “For something you find so warped, you certainly do ask a lot of questions about it.”
I was silent. She had me there. However warped I claimed to find her sex life, it didn't stop me wanting to be a part of it. To join the world of the scarf-wearers. How had I done a complete 180 in just two weeks, going from someone who despised vampires with a passion, to someone who couldn't go five minutes without fantasizing about bedding one? The truth was, I'd been able to separate her from the rest in my mind.
“Just curious,” I mumbled.
She nodded. “Is that why you were watching us downstairs?”
My body suddenly felt heavy, like rock; my heart thumped against my chest. My cheeks burned; I knew I was blushing all over. She was looking at me again, absent her smile, her expression unreadable.
But... how? How did she know I was watching? How did she know I was there? She didn't look up, I know she didn't. She was too busy with her teeth stuck in Robyn's neck. No one could have seen me down there.
I swallowed several times but my throat remained dry. Where was that damn beer?
“I'm not mad,” she said, but this only made me more embarrassed. I wanted to die!
I couldn't look at her. “H–how did you know...?”
“It doesn't matter how.”
“It does to me!” I growled. “What did you do, read my mind?” I prayed that wasn't the case. It was a myth, it had to be.
“No. We can't do that.”
“I have to go now.” I jumped from my chair, nearly knocking it over in my haste to get away.
“How are you getting home?” Her hand was on my wrist. Cold but soft. Several people were looking at us.
“Walk. Cab. I don't care,” I said. I tried to pull away but she was too strong holding me there.
“That's out of the question. Not after what happened the last time. I'll drive you.”
“I don't want you to.” I just wanted to be alone with my shame, not being driven home by the cause of it.
“Too bad. I'm not letting you go home by yourself.” I could see in her eyes that she had won this battle. But why me? There were probably plenty of girls who would be going home alone that night who could have used an escort. Why was I the one she felt compelled to save? Maybe I wasn't on the outside looking in after all.
EIGHT
She had a black SUV that she drove carefully. I remembered seeing the car parked in her driveway.
After five minutes of turning my back to her and ignoring every question she put to me as we drove, I was ready to stop being a child and face the music. I'd been caught doing something I shouldn't have been doing, and it was time to grow up.
“If I caught someone spying on me while I was having sex, I'd flip out.” I straightened up, looking ahead, not yet ready to look at her.
“We all do things we regret,” she said indifferently.
“I don't regret it.”
Silence.
“Did you think I was going to apologize for it?” I went on. “Apologize for being turned on?” I'd never been this frank with anyone my entire life; it was a refreshing change. Something about this woman awakened my inner rebel, brought me out of my shell. I felt as though I could tell her anything and she wouldn't judge me.
“Lissa–”
“Let's not pretend that any of this is coming as a shock to you, Jean. You insert yourself into my life, insert me into your bed, and then you wonder why I turn up at your bar looking for you. Then you wonder why I stand outside your office watching you making love to your girlfriend.”
She pulled up to the curb and cut the engine with a deep sigh. Her hand clutched the wheel, her eyes closed. I looked outside – we were still a couple of miles from my place.
“Lissa, I don't think you should say anything else.” Her voice sounded pained, as though my confession upset her. Too bad, because it was a weight off my mind, and I was on a roll.
“Why not? We both know it's true. You know, I get it now, why Robyn went off at me like that when I turned up at your house. An ounce of jealousy gets magnified tremendously when it comes to you. I wanted to beat the crap out of her for being with you, and you're not even mine.” I laughed bitterly. “Imagine being so overcome with jealousy over a woman you've only known two weeks. Being so consumed by it that you can't even think straight.”
“You don't know what you're saying. You're confused.”
“You got that right. Confused with myself, how I have suddenly become this person I don't recognize. I didn't know this type of crippling desire for another person was even possible.”
She looked hurt when she stared at me, lost somehow, shaking her head. “This wasn't supposed to happen.” That's what I thought she said, though it was so quiet I wasn't sure. What could it have meant?
“So now I'm thinking this is how you recruit your lovers, your blood donors. You entice them, make them fall for you, then they happily give themselves to you. Is this why you saved my life? What's the price?”
“You're wrong.”
No sooner had the words escaped her mouth than my lips were on hers. They were cold, colder than I thought they would be. Our tongues had barely met before I felt her hands pushing my shoulders back. She moved her head to the side, separating our lips, and giving me her cheek instead. Rejecting me.
“I'm taking you home now,” she said, fixing herself and starting the engine, while I glared at her. “And then we can forget this ever happened.”
Like hell we could! Perhaps she could move on, act as though nothing had happened, but now I wanted her more than ever before. And my loins ached while I sat beside her, while she kept her eyes on the road and made a conscious effort not to look at me.
“Is this just your way of playing hard to get? Teasing me, making me work for it?” I asked, still glaring at her. “Because I don't like that game.”
“You're wrong,” she said again. “About me, about everything. I don't want to sleep with you, and I never have wanted to.”
That was a crushing blow I didn't see coming. I felt close to tears, mostly because when she said it, when she looked at me, I knew she meant it.
NINE
Petr cocked his head to one side, closed one eye and stared at my painting, then closed that eye and opened the other, giving it another look.
“Well I don't hate it...” he said. We were in our studio. He'd just arrived with a couple of shakes for us. He joined me on his king-size beanbag, sitting opposite me while I lounged in mine, slurping sweet, creamy goodness through a s
traw.
“But you don't love it either.” I finished off his sentence. “It's fine, I'm not attached.”
“You did this all this afternoon while I wasn't here?”
I nodded. “Something came over me.” It certainly had. Since Jean's rejection a week ago, many things had come over me. I was no longer backing down and letting Hilarie win our arguments. And now I was painting bleak images of broken things, in stark contrast to what I usually painted. You would think that for a kid who watched her little sister be adopted into a good family, and was left in care, I would be immune to rejection. Well, I thought I was too. Until Jean happened.
“I'm not sure how I feel about this dark side of you,” Petr said with a big grin. “I'm used to you being lily-white and well-behaved.”
“Maybe that's my problem,” I said miserably.
“Talk,” he commanded, getting comfortable on his beanbag. “You've had that face for days. What's going on with you?”
I hadn't told him about what happened in Jean's car, about me trying to kiss her, and about her making it clear she wasn't interested. Embarrassment and shame makes you keep your mouth shut.
“Are vampires easy?” I asked, sloshing my straw around in my shake, refusing to look him in the eye. I just knew he would be gawping at me like I was a rare species of bird.
“What kind of question is that?”
“Just answer it. Don't make a big deal about it.”
“I don't know every vampire that's ever lived. I know they all have multiple lovers. But I think that's more about the blood supply than the sex. Why are you asking me this?”
“No reason.”
He gave my knee a nudge with his foot so I would look at him. I didn't.
“What you're really asking is, is Jean Posey easy...” His voice was surprisingly sympathetic when he made his accusation. Honestly, I thought he would laugh at me. “It's pretty obvious. You've been asking little questions about vampires ever since you met her, trying to get info from me on the sly. Can they ever walk during the day? Does it hurt when they bite you? You want to be one of her many lovers.”
Wrong. I wanted to be her only lover. But even if that were possible, that she would have just one, it wouldn't be me. She didn't want me.
“I did something incredibly stupid last week.” I covered my eyes with my cold, wet hand, and cringed. “I went down to her bar with Hilarie. Hilarie got called away and Jean drove me back home. And then... I tried to kiss her...”
“You tried? So what happened?” He didn't sound surprised.
“Well... she didn't kiss me back, that's what happened. In fact, she told me she didn't want me and never had. I wanted the ground to open up and swallow me, Pete, it was awful.”
“Wow. I wasn't expecting that. Gotta say, I wouldn't have expected her to react like that. I mean, she brought you to her bed to recuperate, twice. How many people would she do that for if she didn't want to sleep with them?”
“That's what I thought!” I exclaimed. “But obviously I was wrong. So now I never want to see her again.”
He kicked me a little harder this time.
“So you're just giving up? Have you learned nothing from me?”
I didn't know what I was supposed to have learned from him, because as far as his dating history went, he'd never been rejected, not even by supposedly straight men. Petr was beautiful, though, and everyone knew it. I knew I was attractive, and certainly more so than a couple of those lucky scarf-wearers from the bar, but it didn't seem to matter to Jean.
“Look, she's playing hard to get. She wants you to work for it. She's a classy woman; she doesn't want to come off easily obtainable.”
He didn't see her face when I tried to kiss her though. She was adamant.
“Maybe I'm just not her type.” That thought depressed me. From what I'd seen of her lovers, she didn't have a type. They were a mixed bunch of sexes, races, ages. Lots of representations, yet I was the one she'd turned down. It made me miserable and angry.
“I wish I could forget about her, but I literally can't stop thinking about that woman. Is that normal, for a vampire I mean?”
Petr chuckled. “You're not under some sort of spell, Lissa, if that's what you're implying. She hasn't hypnotized you. You're smitten, like many before you. It's not witchcraft.”
I didn't want to be smitten if it felt like this. Even with Hilarie, my longest relationship, I had never felt this all-consuming desire, like nausea swirling in the pit of my stomach. It felt a lot like witchcraft.
“Why can't I go back to hating her and her kind? It was so much easier.” I sulked and slurped miserably.
“Because you've finally realized what many of us have known for a long time: vampires are irresistible.” He spoke like a ringmaster at a circus; like the poster-boy for the dead. “And I personally think it's bullshit what she said to you. Have you even asked yourself why she just happened to be exactly where you were when you needed her, on two separate occasions?”
I had, but none of my conclusions made sense. I knew there was more to it than she let on, but I didn't know what. Coincidence couldn't explain it.
“That's why we're going back to that bar, you and me. Leave the old lady at home, and we're gonna bag you an English vampire.” His eyes gleamed with excitement.
I didn't share in his enthusiasm or optimism, but my need to see Jean's face again, to feel her presence once more, was greater than my shame. I just couldn't keep away.
The Lox Ridge Lounge on a Wednesday night was a shadow of its former self, with maybe one third the people it held the Saturday Hilarie and I were there. The music, the atmosphere and the clientele were different too – more laid back, quieter and reserved. And fewer staff. It could have been a different bar altogether, but for those symbolic scarves. I counted three wearers, two I hadn't seen the previous night. I wondered how many more there were, and if Jean confined it to just her staff. Was that a stipulation in their employment contract? Duties include serving drinks, cleaning tables, screwing the boss and letting her suck you dry, something like that. And how did she choose which ones to take as lovers? Was it random? So many questions.
“I like it here,” Petr said as we sat down at the far end of the bar, once a cute, scarf-less barmaid took our orders. “It's got a rustic feel to it. Maybe this was how bars looked back in her day.”
“How old do you think she is?” I asked, my eyes scanning the dimly-lit room for any sign of her. She was probably in her office getting serviced by Robyn or one of the others.
He shrugged. “I bet she's like two hundred or something. And just like fine wine, the older, the better, if you know what I mean.” He wiggled his eyebrows lecherously.
Hilarie was the oldest woman I'd ever slept with, and she was only thirty-two! All my girlfriends had been older than me – I preferred them older – but not that old. Still, what did it matter? She had the appearance of someone in their mid-thirties.
“But don't you,” I started, then leaned closer to whisper, “feel a bit out of your depth with someone so experienced? I've been with four women, and we were never adventurous. How would I ever satisfy a woman like that, who probably knows every move in the book?” I was speaking like I actually stood a chance with her. Worse still, like someone who was single. Cheating had never been my style, though it had been Hilarie's. Quite early on in our relationship, she'd slept with her ex when she went back to Portland, Oregon to visit her parents.
“At first, maybe, but sex is a difficult thing to screw up when you're on the receiving end. They like to be in control. All you have to do is turn up.”
“You don't know how lesbian sex works at all, do you?” I said drily. “I'm not gonna be a pillow princess.” Especially not with Jean. If I ever got the chance with her, I wanted it all. Every inch of her, everything she had to offer.
He patted me on the shoulder. “Then you better start practicing.”
When the barmaid brought our drinks, just as she was about to fl
it away again, Petr stopped her.
“Excuse me, my friend here is looking for a part time job. Are they hiring here?”
I opened my mouth to protest, mortified, but he kicked me on the shin to shut me up.
The barmaid looked from him to me, uncertainly. “They kind of only hire by referral.”
“So how do you get referred?”
“Well, I'm not really sure. A friend of a friend knows the duty manager here, and she put in a good word for me. But it wasn't easy. This might not be the right place for you.”
I narrowed my eyes at her. How the hell did she know what was right for me? This felt like high school again, being left out of the popular group because I didn't have parents, or the nicest clothes, or because I was the strange art geek. It was like some exclusive club off limits to me.
“What would you know about it?” I asked sharply.
“I didn't mean anything by it,” she said quickly. “It's just that the woman who runs this place, she's very particular about who she hires.”
“I know your boss is a vampire, all right. It's not a secret.”
“Oh, I wasn't talking about the owner. I was talking about her second in command. Robyn.”
The biggest sigh escaped my lips, now certain that I would never get the job I didn't know I wanted a minute ago. Robyn would never hire me. She hated me; we hated each other.
“So that's off the table,” I said bitterly, once the barmaid was gone.
“Why? People love you. You'd be an asset to this place,” Petr said encouragingly.
“Robyn's the girlfriend I was telling you about. She loathes me. She already thinks I'm trying to steal her girlfriend.”
“Well, you kind of are.”
“It was a stupid idea coming here, Pete.” Now that we were here, that was clear. What did I expect to happen? Did I think that Jean would see me and instantly change her mind, realize that she made a mistake and profess her undying love for me? She probably wasn't even there.
“I don't even like jazz. And I certainly don't like vampires. So what am I doing in a jazz bar run by a vampire?” I was talking to myself, and once I'd started babbling nothing could stop me. Not even Petr tapping me on the knee to get my attention.