“Whatever,” she muttered as she finished applying her makeup, put on her shoes, and went into the living room to wait for Vince.
She was looking out the window, wondering where he was, when the phone rang. Lifting the receiver, she said “hello.”
“Hey, darlin’.”
“Vince, where are you?”
“I’m sorry, but I’m running late. I had to go into the city to buy some parts and I got hung up in traffic. Why don’t you go on to dinner and I’ll meet you there.”
“Are you sure? Maybe we should just go next week.”
“No, that wouldn’t be fair to Sarah Beth. You go on and I’ll get there as soon as I can.”
“All right. Hurry.”
Vince hung up, stung by the disappointment he heard in Cara’s voice, but there was no help for it. It was still daylight; there was no way he could leave the garage until the sun went down.
After closing and locking the security door, he went upstairs to take a shower and get dressed. Cat trailed after him. Vince knew it was his imagination, but he would have sworn Cat’s eyes were filled with accusation.
“I know,” Vince said irritably. “I’ve got to end it. And I will, but she wants me to be with her on Halloween. It’s her favorite holiday, you know. When it’s over, I’ll either tell her the truth or I’ll just leave a note and get out of her life forever, okay?”
Cat stared up at him through unblinking yellow eyes.
“I promise, all right?”
With a twitch of his tail, Cat jumped up on the bed and began his daily ablutions.
Muttering an oath, Vince went into the bathroom and closed the door.
Cara had just finished helping Sarah Beth clear the dining room table when she heard the doorbell and then the sound of Vince’s voice as he introduced himself to Sarah Beth’s husband, Dean.
Smiling, she hurried into the living room. “You made it!”
He kissed her on the cheek. “Sorry I’m late.”
“Would you care for something to drink?” Dean asked. “A coke, a beer?”
Vince shook his head. “Nothing, thanks.” He glanced around the room, noting the large beveled mirror over the fireplace. Two dark green sofas faced each other in front of the hearth. A rectangular glass-topped coffee table stood between the sofas. A floor-to-ceiling shelf held a hodgepodge of books, knickknacks, and framed photographs.
“Hi, Vince,” Sarah Beth said, entering the room. “Please, sit down and make yourself comfortable. We’ve got half an hour or so before the movie starts.”
Mindful of the mirror, Vince walked behind the sofa and then sat down, grateful that the mirror was high enough that it didn’t reflect the furniture in front of it. Cara sat beside him. Sarah Beth and her husband made themselves comfortable on the other couch.
“So, Vince,” Dean said, “Beth tells me you’re a mechanic.”
Vince nodded.
“I’ve got an antique T-bird out in the garage that I’ve been wanting to restore.”
“What year is it?”
Dean laughed. “You know, I’m not sure. It belonged to my grandfather.”
“Does it still run?”
“Barely.”
“Well, bring it on by,” Vince said, “and I’ll take a look at it.”
“Great.”
“Don’t get too excited. I can’t guarantee I’ll be able to find parts for it.”
“I hope you can’t,” Sarah Beth said. “That old thing’s been taking up space in the garage for three years. If he’d get rid of it, I could park my car in there.”
Dean shook his head. “Women.”
Sarah Beth made a face at him, then punched him in the arm. “Be nice. We have company.” She smiled at Vince and Cara. “So, what movie do you two want to see?”
“It doesn’t matter to me,” Cara said.
“How about you, Vince?” Sarah Beth asked.
“Whatever you guys want is fine with me.”
“No one asked me,” Dean said, “but I’d like to see that new horror flick.”
“Okay by me,” Vince said. “Ladies?”
“It’s not all blood and gore is it?” Sarah Beth asked.
“I don’t think so, honey.”
When Cara and Sarah Beth both agreed, Dean checked his watch. “We’d better go. It starts in fifteen minutes.”
The horror flick turned out to be a love story, of sorts, about a female vampire in love with a werewolf and the problems they had to overcome. It wasn’t filled with blood and gore, as Sarah Beth feared, but Vince was pretty sure Cara would have objected to coming if she had known what it was about.
He watched it with a sense of wry amusement. He didn’t know anything about werewolves, assuming they existed at all, but whoever had written the script didn’t know a thing about vampires.
It was still early when the movie was over. Sarah Beth suggested they go out for coffee and dessert. While Vince was trying to think of a good excuse, Cara came to his rescue.
Slipping her arm through his, she smiled at Sarah Beth. “Not tonight, Bethy.”
“Gonna have your dessert elsewhere?” Sarah Beth asked with a knowing grin.
“Beth,” Dean admonished, “mind your own business.”
Thirty minutes later, Vince and Cara were cuddling on her sofa in front of a cozy fire.
“I guess the movie was a bad choice,” Vince remarked, stroking her cheek.
“Well, it’s certainly not one I would have picked, but it did have a happy ending, of sorts, if you don’t mind being a vampire.”
Vince grunted softly. In the movie, the werewolf had found a cure for his ailment, the vampire had brought him across, and they had walked off into the darkness, apparently to live happily ever after by night.
“Your parents seem pretty happy,” Vince remarked.
“As happy as you can be living as a vampire, I guess,” Cara allowed.
“Maybe it’s not as bad as you think.”
She looked up at him, her brow furrowed. “Not bad? Why would anyone want to be a vampire?”
He shrugged. “Maybe they don’t always have a choice.”
“Well, if you were given the choice, what would you do?”
“I’d choose to live.” He didn’t have to think about it; he’d made that choice a year ago. “What about you?” he asked. “What if you had to decide between living as a vampire or dying?”
“I’d rather die,” she said emphatically.
“Are you sure?”
“Of course. At least I think I am.” She thought about her mother and father and what she knew of their life together. Vince was right. They seemed perfectly happy the way they were. She had never heard them fight and rarely heard them disagree. It was obvious that they were still madly in love. Her father brought her mother lingerie on Valentine’s Day, flowers on Mother’s Day and jewelry for Christmas. They seemed to share practically everything and, perhaps most important of all, they would be together forever.
She thought about Vince and how few were the years they would have together compared to the hundreds of years her parents could expect to share, and suddenly being a vampire didn’t seem like such a terrible thing, if the one you loved was a vampire, too.
It was a thought that haunted and intrigued her long after she had bid Vince good night.
It was midnight on the night before Halloween. Cara was walking home when, all of a sudden, she was in her parents’ living room. She glanced around, shocked by the changes that had been made. The walls were papered in dark red, the furniture was black leather, the carpet was white.
Thinking she was in the wrong house, she turned toward the door, only the door was gone. She ran around the room, looking for a window, only there were no windows. Tears of fear and frustration filled her eyes when she realized there was no way out. She was running her hands over the walls, vainly searching for an exit, when her father suddenly appeared behind her.
“It’s time,” he said.
She whirled around. “Time?” she asked breathlessly. “Time for what?”
He held out his hand. “To join us. Come.”
She backed away, her heart pounding in terror when she realized there was no place to hide. With a growl, he was upon her, dragging her toward the sofa.
She shoved her hands against his chest, trying to push him away, all the while pleading, “No, please!”
“There’s no use resisting.” He smiled, showing his fangs, and suddenly it was Vince staring down at her.
“No!” She screamed the word as he forced her head back, exposing her throat. Her nails were puny weapons against his much greater strength. There was a sharp stab of pain as he pierced her flesh. Fear was overcome by weakness as the world went from gray to black to nothing at all…
She woke covered in perspiration, her heart pounding, the blankets on the floor and her legs tangled in the sheets.
She was trembling and she couldn’t stop. It had seemed so real. Afraid of what she might find, she lifted her hand and touched her neck and then, to make sure, she went into the bathroom and turned on the light. She turned her head from side to side, but she didn’t see any telltale bite marks.
She breathed a sigh of relief. A nightmare. Of course, it had only been a nightmare. It wasn’t surprising, she thought, considering the movie she had seen earlier that night and what she had recently discovered about her parents.
Cara was getting ready to go to work the next day when Vince called, “just to say hello.”
They had been chatting for a few minutes when he said, “All right, darlin’, tell me what’s wrong.”
“What makes you think there’s anything wrong?” she asked.
“I can hear it in your voice. Are you mad at me because I missed dinner last night?”
“Of course not. Don’t be silly.”
“Then what is it?”
She hesitated a moment, then said, “It’s nothing, really. Just a bad dream that I had.”
“Wanna talk about it?”
“I don’t know. It was nothing, really, but, well, in my dream, I went to visit my parents. I was in their house and suddenly it didn’t look like their house anymore. The walls were red and all the doors and windows were gone. I was looking for a way out when my father suddenly appeared behind me and told me it was time, and when I asked time for what, he smiled a horrible smile and I saw his fangs. ‘Time to join us,’ he said, and he dragged me toward the sofa and then…this is so silly.”
“Go on. What happened next?”
A nervous laugh escaped her throat. “All of a sudden it wasn’t my father bending over me.”
Vince held his breath as he waited for her to go on. Somehow, he wasn’t surprised when she said, “It was you.”
Chapter 28
Muttering an oath, Vince said, “Hey, darlin’, don’t let it worry you. It was only a bad dream.”
“I know, but it seemed so real.”
“You know how nightmares are,” he said. “Your dad told you I was a vampire and your subconscious remembered it, that’s all.”
“I guess you’re right.”
“I’ll see you later, okay?”
“Sure. Maybe we can go look for Halloween costumes.”
“Costumes?” Vince exclaimed. “For who?”
“For us. We need to shop early, before the good ones are all gone.”
“Wait a minute. What do I need a costume for?”
“To hand out candy on Halloween, of course.”
“You wear a costume for that? I don’t believe it.”
“It’s tradition,” she said. “Mom and Dad always…I just thought…”
“Hey, if you want to dress up, we’ll dress up. What are you going to be?”
“I’ve always been a witch.”
“I’ll bet you make a pretty one, too. So, what do you want me to be?”
“Whatever you want.”
Vince grunted softly. One thing was for certain, he wouldn’t be dressing as a vampire!
He met Cara at her house when she got off work later that night. Together, they drove to a costume shop that stayed open late during the week. Di Giorgio followed them at a discreet distance.
Upon entering the shop, Vince realized he never should have come. There were full-length mirrors at intervals throughout the store. It took some fancy footwork on his part to avoid them. Fortunately, Cara was too engrossed in looking at costumes to notice.
Vince pulled a pale blue princess costume from one of the racks. “I like this one,” he said, holding it out to her.
“Oh, it is pretty,” Cara said.
“I know you’ve always been a witch for Halloween,” he said, “but if you were a princess, I could be a knight.”
Cara grinned, remembering how Sarah Beth had called Vince her knight in shining armor. “Okay, I’ll go try it on. Why don’t you look for a knight costume?”
“Will do.”
He kissed her on her way, then wandered through the shop until he found what he was looking for.
A short time later, Cara emerged from the dressing room. “What do you think?” she asked, twirling in front of him.
Vince whistled softly. “You look beautiful, darlin’.” The dress was the exact blue of her eyes. The low-cut, fitted bodice displayed a generous expanse of creamy flesh and showed off her delectable curves.
“Thank you. Did you find a costume?”
He nodded.
Cara looked at it and frowned. “A black knight?” She shook her head. “I should have known.”
“You ready to go?” he asked.
“Aren’t you going to try that on?”
“Not now. Come on, let’s get out of here.”
“Where to now?” she asked when they left the shop.
“I should probably take you home,” he said. “It’s late.”
“It’s not that late,” she said, pouting prettily.
“It won’t hurt you to get to bed at a decent hour,” he said. “I’ve been keeping you up pretty late the last few weeks.”
She smiled at him. “I’m not complaining, am I?”
He slipped his arm around her waist and gave her a squeeze. “See that you don’t.”
When they reached her house, he walked her to the door. “Sweet dreams, darlin’.”
“Are you sure you don’t want to come in for a little while?”
“Not tonight.” As much as he wanted to be with her, he hadn’t yet fed and didn’t trust himself to make love to her when the hunger burned within him. Drawing her into his arms, he kissed her, savoring her sweetness, yearning to carry her to bed and satisfy all of his cravings.
Summoning all the willpower he possessed, Vince put her away from him. Another kiss like that and he wouldn’t be responsible for what happened next.
“I’ll see you tomorrow night,” he said and hurried down the stairs toward his car. He could feel Cara’s gaze on his back as he opened the door and slid behind the wheel. Rolling down the window, he waved to her as he pulled away from the curb.
What would she think if she knew where he was going and why? Silly question, he thought. She had made her views on vampires quite clear. He felt an unwanted twinge of guilt for leaving her, yet staying would have been a very bad idea.
Lashed by his hunger, he sped toward The Nocturne. It had become one of his favorite haunts, a place where he could sit and contemplate his future, order a drink, or find prey. Tonight, he didn’t want a glass of lukewarm blood and he didn’t want to think about the future. He wanted to hunt—to find a pretty woman, take her in his arms, and satisfy his hellish thirst.
Arriving at The Nocturne, he parked in the lot, nodded to the man at the door, and went inside.
It was like coming home—the dim lights, the flickering candles, the scent of heated bodies and beating hearts.
He sought out a table in the back of the room, wishing that he could drown the voice of his conscience in a bottle of whiskey, but those days were gone. Unfortuna
tely, there was no forgetfulness in a Bloody Mariah.
Perhaps it would be best for all concerned if he simply left town. No tearful good-byes. No explanations. Just pack up and go. Sure, Cara was bound to be hurt. No doubt she would believe he had just pretended he cared for her so he could get her in the sack; still, in the long run, maybe that would be kinder than telling her he loved her but that they couldn’t have a future together.
Or he could simply tell her that he was a vampire. One thing was certain. No matter what he told her, he was going to have to leave town. He couldn’t stay here. He didn’t have the willpower to be in the same city and not seek her out.
But did he have the willpower to leave?
Cara sat curled up in a corner of the sofa, the book in her lap forgotten. She had gone to bed two hours ago, only to lie awake, wondering why Vince had seemed so distant and why he had left so early. Rising, she had tried to read, but the words made no sense. All she could think about was Vince. Had he tired of her? Was he seeing someone else? It was hard to believe he could be seeing another woman so late at night, but not impossible. The hours the two of them kept were proof of that.
Something was wrong. She knew it, but what? She couldn’t put her finger on anything specific, and yet he seemed to be withdrawing from her in a way she didn’t understand.
She told herself she was just imagining it, that everything was all right, but deep inside, she knew he was keeping something from her. She just hoped it wasn’t anything as horrible as the secret her parents had kept for so long. She blinked back the tears that threatened to fall. The only thing she could think of that would be as devastating as learning that her parents were vampires was discovering that Vince was seeing someone else.
Going into the kitchen, she fixed a cup of hot chocolate, hoping it would help her sleep.
It didn’t.
Later, lying in bed, she stared up at the ceiling, silent tears dripping down her cheeks.
Sitting in the dark at The Nocturne, Vince was all too aware of Cara’s pain, and equally aware that he was the cause of it. With every fiber of his being, he yearned to go to her, to draw her into his embrace and wipe away her tears.
Amanda Ashley - [Children of the Night 02] Page 18