King's Blood: Vampire Lust (A Serial Novel, Part 3)

by P. J. Day

  She coughed a little and gave me a cute smile. She patted the empty side of the bed. “You can sleep here tonight.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  With slight hesitation, I laid down next to Holly. I draped my right arm over her warm body, and gave her a small peck on her head.

  “Keep me warm.”

  Her shivers and slight tremors subsided as I gently massaged her scalp.

  Dawn was approaching. I could see an emergent glow through the curtained window. I closed my eyes and held a beautiful woman in my arms, without an urge to bite, without even a hint of lust, just the sudden and unfamiliar feelings of warmth and care, for a person I barely knew. I’ll dabble in these feelings a bit. Yeah, just a dabble.

  Chapter Five

  I felt a deep resonant pressure on my chest, my head, all down through my waist and my legs, the weight cemented me into the bed. Something held my lips apart, like tiny clamps. One by one, stretching and pulling on my cheeks. A shadowy oval hovered over my head, unknown at first, familiar on direct approach. Milton’s gleaming eyes were dark as onyx, as deep as the Mariana Trench.

  “Hello, Jack. Sorry about your unsuccessful night.”

  I couldn’t speak, since my tongue was wiggling freely in space.

  “I want to apologize about the other night. It was, well, very, very messy.”

  My panicked eyes, the only communication tools at my disposal, darted left to right, as I scanned for my exact whereabouts.

  “Your friend is either an idiot or just too damn loyal for his own good.”

  I tried yelling at Milton. Only sounds of incoherence and primal panic were produced, as I continued to be incapacitated.

  “See, there is a giant miscommunication. I mean, I’m trying my best here. Scaring you like we did last time didn’t help. We attempted to marinate into your hopes, dreams, desires and all that did was send us down the wrong path. We tapped into your subconscious, learned a few things about you, but it has made matters worse,” he said, in his squeaky child-like voice, but with the inflections of an intelligent man three times his age.

  There was a faint melody beginning to play in the background.

  “Ignore that, please!” Milton yelled, as he rolled his eyes. “As I was saying, there is some potential here for a mutual benefit. We can tell you things that would change your life, and in exchange you can tell us about the...”

  The melody grew even louder, Forget about your house of cards, and I’ll do mine repeating itself seemingly in a loop, ad nauseum.

  “...dammit, stay with me, Jack. Listen, this can work...”

  The infrastructure will collapse, voltage spikes...

  Surprisingly, Thom Yorke’s haunting snarls sounded extremely intelligible in my imprisoned state.

  “Your REM cycle is a piece of shit, you know that. You average around a couple minutes of it and then it’s over, you wake up...” Milton stated, in rapid frustration. He continued, this time, his voice trailing off, consumed and overtaken by the the song. “The cormorant...the neck squeezed...stay away...” Milton’s voice first relegated to a dull faint, then to nothing, and suddenly, an overwhelming swoosh.

  I woke up drenched. I coughed. My phone played Radiohead’s “House of Cards” for another five seconds, then it stopped. Sure as hell, I never chose that song as a ringtone. Holly slowly rolled over and with squinty, morning eyes asked, “Everything okay, did you have a nightmare?”

  “I hope so,” I said.

  “God, my head,” Holly complained, grabbing her head and slamming it back down on her pillow.

  My phone annoyingly rang again, potentially making me do the unthinkable to one of Radiohead’s most majestic tunes; deleting the fuck out of it from my phone.

  I jumped out of bed, the clock said 7:15 a.m., way too early for my blood. It was Alan. Apparently, this was his third attempt at contacting me, judging from the little notifications given to me by the phone.

  “Where are you?” he asked with a fevered pitch.

  “Does it matter?”

  “Yeah well, I’m standing outside your room and you’re not answering your door. I also can’t hear your phone ringing. Did you leave for L.A., too?”

  Alan’s tone was one of worry rather than the grumpy one I was accustomed to. I also was somewhat concerned that he was a few feet from Ted’s location.

  “No, I’m still in Hong Kong.”

  “Oh, I see,” Alan responded.

  “What’s wrong? I don’t like the tone in your voice.”

  “We need to meet with Guangzhou in Guangzhou this morning, Yi has business to attend to in Moscow tomorrow.”

  “You know that’s not possible, right?”

  “We made sure that our transportation has the darkest and most tinted windows, you’ll be fine.”

  “Really?” I asked, deeply unsettled.

  Yet another hurdle on this trip. Well, it was time to suck it up. I needed to be a goddamn warrior. What the hell was I thinking? I didn’t need to be one. I was an immortal warrior. No need to live in fear. I’d meet the sun head on. Okay, maybe not head-on but wrapped up like a mummy, with a little help from Holly’s wardrobe.

  “So, can you make it back here in less than 20 minutes—actually, where are you right now?”

  I covered the phone mic with my hand. “Sweetie, I’m sorry, but what’s the name of this hotel?”

  Holly had covered her head with a pillow, muffled, she responded, “L’Dino.”

  “It’s called L’Dino,” I said to Alan.

  “Do you look decent?” he asked.

  “Yeah, I guess. Girls seemed to like what I was wearing last night,” I said, winking at Holly as she briefly uncovered herself from the brief respite that was the cold underside of her pillow.

  “Also, Jack?”

  “Yes?”

  “I had a talk with Rebecca last night. I want to apologize for my behavior yesterday. Also, I want to apologize on behalf of the company for lying to you guys.”

  “Dude, no problem. Stress messes up with people’s heads sometimes. I was kind of out of line, too. I’m sorry as well,” I said.

  I was pleasantly surprised by Alan’s abrupt change in demeanor. He came off extremely prideful yesterday. I guess he wasn’t a bad guy after all.

  “We’ll be there to pick you up in 20. It’s a long drive, make sure you have your passport.”

  Did I have my passport? I ran over to the chair where my coat was and quickly ran my hands through the pockets. Luckily, it was in one of the pockets inside the coat’s silk lining. “Got it!”

  “Great, we’ll see you soon,” Alan said.

  “See you, I’ll be waiting downstairs in the lobby in 15 minutes.”

  There was no time to take a shower. I also had no toothbrush, cologne, aftershave, or deodorant at my disposal.

  “Holly, is that okay if I borrow your deodorant?”

  Holly snorted, “Sure, if someone asks how you remain so fresh, tell them it’s thanks to Cherry Mischief.”

  I reluctantly applied the deodorant that I snatched from the nightstand. I then noticed a moderately sized black Panama hat laying on top of Holly’s carry-on bag, which was resting against the desk.

  “Are you leaving me?” Holly asked, as she raised herself in bed, hugging her pillow.

  “Yup, that was Alan, there’s a change in plans.”

  “I thought you couldn’t go out in the daylight?”

  “I still can’t, without serious protection, which is why I’m going to politely ask you if you can please let me borrow that wonderfully stylish hat you have resting there,” I said, pointing at the hat.

  Holly had this little elementary school girl chortle whenever I asked or did anything that was counter to my inherent masculinity. If she wasn’t attractive as she was, I would’ve probably been tired of it by now. I hoped, eventually, that she'd see that I was just a goofball at heart.

  I wrapped my scarf around my face, put
on my Ray Bans, and her Panama hat. Not flattering but functional.

  Holly couldn’t stop laughing. “Go look at yourself in the mirror; you look like Jamiroquai and Elizabeth Taylor’s love child,” she said, hardly containing herself.

  “Nah, I’m good. I’ll take your word for it,” I said sheepishly.

  I then pulled the scarf away from my mouth and leaned into Holly as she lay in bed, grabbing her head and pulling her in for a big wet kiss. She quickly put up her hands and pushed me away just a bit.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked.

  “My breath smells like vomit.”

  “So what.”

  “No, Jack, I can’t do that to you.”

  She turned her head and pointed to her cheek. “Right here will be just fine.”

  I gently pulled her in by her bare shoulder and gave her a sweet, uncontroversial, but caring peck. Holly then pulled me in closer, and started sucking on my neck sensually, and passionately. She gently pushed me away and stared deeply in my eyes. “I still want you real bad, so don’t forget to call me when you’re done, got that?” she told me, with a pinch of jest and a dash of seriousness.

  I smiled and stood up. “We’ll go out tonight, promise.”

  “I’ll be waiting for your phone call,” she said.

  I tipped the Panama hat like a dragged-out Humphrey Bogart and Holly giggled. I exited the room, anticipating stares galore from the hotel guests that were about to wonder about my mysterious and concealed look.

  I stared through the glass doors in the lobby. I hadn’t been outside in the morning sun for more than five minutes since the Northridge earthquake back in ‘94. At the time, I rented a small apartment that was part of a building that was built in the 20’s in Santa Monica. I remember waking up and seeing a small crack at the bottom of the wall that faced my bed, slowly growing longer and wider, riding up the entire center of the wall, plaster and old stucco falling off as the building shook violently, revealing the old bricks that barely kept the complex together. I remember jumping out of bed, wrapped in only my comforter, and bolting through my door. It wasn’t a particularly sharp morning sun, the type that makes you squint as if you stared directly into an oncoming headlight, but still strong enough that it left my face scalded for a week or so. I clearly recalled peeling large swaths of skin off my face that week. It was so bad that the molt ended up plugging my bathroom sink for an entire month.

  At exactly 8:00 a.m. and 17 minutes after my phone call with Alan, the black Mercedes that Alan had approached yesterday at the Peninsula now approached the pick-up spot of the L’Dino. The chauffeur stopped the Mercedes slowly, eventually floating to a stop. The car was so clean, so spotless, that I could actually see the furniture in the lobby reflecting on the side passenger door. Alan opened the back door and stepped out, furiously waving at me to hurry up and get in. I wrapped my scarf nice and tightly one more time around my head. My nose, mouth, and cheeks all completely covered, my sunglasses on snug, and a big ridiculous hat over my head, I ran to the car. My hands began to sting greatly, I quickly put them into the coat pockets. Alan was in the middle seat, Rebecca on the other side, huddled closely between the driver side back door and Alan’s left thigh.

  “Comfy?” I asked sarcastically.

  Rebecca smiled and let out a soft laugh under her breath. She took one look at my hat and said, “I didn’t know they held the Kentucky Derby in Hong Kong this year.”

  I took off my Ray Bans and gave Rebecca a playful scowl.

  I unwrapped my scarf and threw the large hat behind us by the Mercedes’ rear speakers. Alan was right, the tinted windows were dark enough to obscure even the most discreet diplomats, politicians, and mobsters from the prying public, not to mention shield me from the sun.

  “You weren’t wrong, guess I’m safe,” I said to Alan, as I quickly glanced through every window in the sedan.

  Alan and Rebecca were both wearing their best business suits. Rebecca looked extremely sexy with her hair down, but still had a professional flair about her attire. Alan didn’t look like a dressed-down engineer either. He wasn’t wearing a tie, but his pristine, professionally starched white collared shirt, along with his fine Italian suit, gave Alan a “chief engineer of R&D” look. He stuck his fist out at me and looked at me right in my eyes, “No hard feelings?”

  I looked back at him and cocked half a smile. “No hard feelings,” I said, butting my fist with his.

  We all sat in the back of the vehicle like a tightly packed can of sardines. We had no choice, discretion, at this point in time, was a luxury we couldn’t afford to lose.

  “So does anyone know the reason for your PLE?” Alan asked.

  “PLE?” I asked.

  “Polymorphic light eruption?”

  “I still have no idea what you mean by that. English por favor?”

  “Your light sensitivity...Have you been tested for porphyria?”

  I had a nervous twitch in my eyes when Alan started prodding me about my inherent condition. I responded the best I could. “Umm...no one really knows. All the doctors know is that it is rare.”

  Alan then grabbed my exposed left hand and started examining it closely, like a physician.

  “Dude, I’m good” I said, chuckling uncomfortably. Alan was acting more like an M.D. rather than a Ph.D.

  Rebecca then handed me a large manila envelope, exactly like the one they laid at my hotel doorstep.

  “You’re a fast reader, right?” Alan asked, with a wink.

  “Yeah, yeah, I’ll catch up.”

  I had about an hour and 20 minutes to know everyone and everything about this company. If it was my responsibility to make Yi comfortable enough to let us in to tinker with their servers, I also had a responsibility to get comfortable with Guangzhou Jiyin Engineering. I had to know what direction they wanted to go as a company, and I also needed to know the direction they wanted to go globally. Using our software, Guangzhou had bigger plans in store, it was up to me to decipher it through good, old-fashioned charming.

  I opened the large manila envelope and slowly pulled out a black and white headshot. It was of a Chinese man, who displayed a glowered visage, with an uncharacteristically large brow ridge for an Asian man, with a slight protruding thick lower jaw. There was also what appeared to be a tattoo on his neck. I skimmed through the file that was paper clipped to the photograph. “Havens Ling...Havens Ling? Havens? What the?” I said to Alan, with a slight chuckle.

  “Yeah, doesn’t sound Mandarin or Cantonese, maybe Mongol?” Alan asked.

  “He has a tattoo on his neck, and he’s also their chief engineer? Are they hiring Triads to do some shady shit, too?” I asked.

  “Believe it or not, this guy knows his stuff,” Rebecca interjected.

  “She’s right. Apparently, this guy is like the number one fungal resistant engineer in all of China,” Alan said.

  “He looks like an MMA wrestler. Maybe he was a Buddhist monk. I’ve seen Buddhist monks with tattoos before.

  “Whatever, I’m sure he’s interesting.” I looked over at Rebecca, “Does he speak English?”

  “Barely.”

  “Great,” I said.

  As I began looking through more of the information contained in the envelope, I had a sudden realization. I forgot to call Ted to see how he was doing and how his little meeting went last night. I pulled out my phone and sent Ted a text message. I held the phone close to my chest, I didn’t want Alan or Rebecca snooping at my typing. Is everything ok, I typed. Don’t call...text...I added. As soon as I was done, Alan looked at me. “Once we cross the border into Guangzhou, you’ll need to give me your phone.”

  “What?” I asked, perplexed at the strange demand.

  “Rald has instructed me to do this,” Alan added.

  “Not again, really? I thought this kind of stuff was over with.”

  Alan looked remorseful and wasn’t trying to be a prick this time. “It’s for security reasons. China is ten times worse at the whole sno
oping thing. I wish it weren’t true, but these are direct instructions from the U.S. State Department, actually.”

  “The State Department?”

  “It’s not what you think, they don’t know we’re doing this. It’s just an advisement, since technically, we are still conducting business,” Alan said.

  I didn’t want to call Ted, who supposedly was in Singapore and I’m sure Alan would want to speak to him over the phone, possibly putting Ted in a precarious situation. As we drove down the congested, main highway out of Hong Kong, I sat snug in the back seat, nervous and hoping Ted would send me a text reply. And fast.

  Chapter Six

  Fifty minutes passed on the G4 highway leading into the heart of Guangzhou. We came upon a bridge over the Pearl River. It had been around 25 minutes or so since we crossed into China at the Lo Wu border crossing. It was a smooth transition, the sleek car most likely helped things a bit, too. We gave the customs attendant in a booth our passports, and with a head nod and a flick of the finger, he let us through in around 30 seconds. China loves its current injection of capitalism; three Americans in a Benz; it can only mean another transfer of wealth and production from Cleveland to Panyu.

  The city was enormous. Daunting, in fact. Guangzhou’s topography seemed relatively flat, which gave it an air of perpetual growth. Factories spread out as far as the eye could see. A patchwork quilt of pollutants draped over the city in a brown haze, like a proud byproduct of unrestrained progress and growth, unshackled by concurrent regulations of morally relativistic societies that could impede a people hell-bent on the future, who see themselves as a whole rather than a one.

  “Goddamn, it’s like staring into a anachronistic past, isn’t it?” I said to Alan and Rebecca.

  “Anachronistic?” asked Alan.

  “Yeah, it’s like Dickens meets Philip K. Dick. It looks too industrious to be healthy, don’t you think?”

  “You’re right, how can people put up with breathing this shit?” Alan said. “Thank goodness we live in a cleaner country.”