He leaned back with it in his hand. For a moment he wrapped his large fist around it, closing his eyes. He opened his eyes, looking directly into hers, clearly knowing she was watching him.
“This is very old. Why do you have it?”
Now wait, she had taken the risk of getting this menace inside her apartment. She had done it to learn things, not to play any of his games.
Get control.
“Okay, I have a strange smell, so why would this get me in trouble
—
better still, who would it get me in trouble with? Wait, I have seen this on TV shows. Your boss is dying, he thinks that I am the only one who has a item that can be transplanted into him to save him. Do people really believe in that stuff, even old rich people?”
He looked at her, gripping the small gold knife. He didn’t show any emotions, but he tilted his head in a way that she thought might show that he was confused. “Your words do not reflect what you think.” He leaned forward. She could tell that he laid the knife down with reluctance.
Okay, back to simple questions that she could get a good answer for before she kicked him out. Which brought up another question. How did you throw out a two-hundred-fifty-pound six-foot-five all-muscle statue?
“Does your boss need my blood?”
He was picking up another item, a curved brass knife in its own curved case. “No, he gets all he needs from his mate. But his mate would like a sample.”
This time he stayed in the forward position, head down, weighing the feel of the knife in one hand, the case in the other.
This was ridiculous. He was either extremely stupid
—
but she did not think so
—
or he was misleading her.
So let’s take the first part of his answer, the
no,
and go on.
“So who else might want my blood?”
“Rogue nightwalkers.”
She let out a long sigh of exasperation. He looked up immediately. She actually saw his nostrils flare. It was the first time she had seen any movement on that stone face. Something was very wrong here. “Can you smell me?” She asked this in a quieter tone.
“Yes.” He looked back down at the collection.
In the need to get beyond that thought, she decided to go on. She needed to see if she could get anything that made sense.
“Look, we don’t seem to be speaking the same language. Maybe English isn’t your first language. I can detect a slight accent. European maybe? Anyways, I don’t understand. What is a nightwalker?”
“Vampires.”
Now she knew she was working with a fruitcake. A really large one, but she had invited a genuine nut into her home. “Well it is getting late, so I wonder if you could go now?”
He stood up, starting for the door.
Could it really be this easy? Then at the door he turned, leaning against it.
Oh shit
. She remained curled up in the chair.
“You emit no fear of the word Vampire, yet you still emit fear of me. Why?”
She sat very still, not feeling safe at all. “Do you think you can read my mind?”
“No, but you throw your emotions. Why no fear of Vampires?”
She looked at his eyes. It wasn’t so difficult from across the room. She would feel better if he wasn’t leaning against the door. She pulled on her only defense weapon, the one she had used when she was teased as a child about her name, anger. She stood up, glared at him and in a loud voice said, “Because I’m not stupid. There is no such thing as Vampires. So don’t treat me like an idiot.”
That fast, he was across the room and had her back down in the chair. She knew what real fear was as she looked up into his face. He had one hand around her neck, the other on her chest,pushing her deep into the cushions. He had moved so fast she didn’t see it. He was at the door, he was on her. But that wasn’t what brought the full fear to her. It was his face, his eyes
—
the dull black eyes were now amber, actually glowing like candles. His lips were pulled back. She tore her gaze away from his, looking at the mouth. His canines were growing. Not some fake implants
—
the teeth were actually growing, sliding downward past his other teeth. He opened his mouth to allow her to see the full length of those two teeth. She knew they could tear her neck out or puncture to suck the blood until she was dead.
He held her there for a searing moment in which she didn’t breathe. She knew she wasn’t going to live much longer. He slowly backed off. He turned away from her. In a normal manner he went to the door. He went through it and quietly closed it behind him. She heard his weight going down the old stairs, even though his footsteps were soundless.
She was unable to move. She didn’t know how long. She didn’t even think
—
she was beyond thought process. She had just walked into Bram Stoker’s web site or got stuck in the movie
Near Dark
. She was sure if she didn’t move she would wake up as soon as the alarm went off. She could take a shower and get rid of this nightmare.
But in order to wake up she was going to have to get out of this chair, moved into the bedroom, then climb in her bed. That would mean she had to accept the fact of having the face of something very menacing within inches of her own. It meant that she was going to have to accept what he had shown her. Not some crazy made up face with movie tricks, but a face that changed within inches of her eyes.
She would have to accept that not only were there Vampires out in the night, but that he was one. He was watching her, dogging her every step. She didn’t wake up with the alarm, because she didn’t sleep that night. Since it was the weekend, she didn’t go out. She stayed curled up on the couch with the TV on with reruns. She had Chinese delivered that she didn’t eat.
By Monday she was running on empty, but forced herself to go to work. She refused to look around for him. She was grateful she worked with Tony, as he covered for her but, by Wednesday he stopped her at the end of the day.
“Take a couple days off. I can’t cover for you. I don’t want to get something so screwed up that you get fired.”
She didn’t even have the will power to argue with him. She just nodded, left and waited for the bus. She got on the first one that came. She was on it for several stops before she realized she was on the wrong bus. It was going to one of the big malls. That was fine.
She wandered around in the mall, not buying anything. The food court smelled good, as the many types of cooking for the takeout orders were all busy. She didn’t know when she’d eaten last. She went in and got a large slice of pizza topped with a diet drink. She sat down, surprised that she actually relaxed as she watched the people move around. Mostly it was families. There were a couple of big guys, but no one as frightening as her watcher. So he had to stay away from public places. That meant she could go to public places to find some comfort.
She finished the pizza but was surprised that she was still hungry. Deciding a smoothie would be good after the calories of the pizza, she stood in line, still fascinated by the shoppers. She took her drink out into the crowds. It was getting late when she remembered she still needed to catch a bus home. No, she would splurge, take a cab. She went to one of the hall plaques and studied it until she found an exit that indicated ground transportation. She hoped this would include taxis as well as buses. If not, she would use her cell phone.
She had to go by the section that had the movies. There was a large crowd, mostly teens. But the moving and shoving was all over the hallway. She tried to stay to the outside of the large crowd, to move around them. She was almost past when she was shoved into a bunch of people. Several cussed, pushing back. Her instinct kicked in. She looked over her shoulder.
A tall man was suddenly turning around. He was looking at her. She could tell his nostrils were flaring. Shit. She started pushing for real
—
she didn’t care about being polite. She only cared about putting distance between her and the tall guy. She was really afraid that she knew what he was, why he was going after her.
She ducked into a store. Without even stopping, she moved through the shoppers, then back out another door. At full tilt, she ran down the main hallway, then turned down another hallway. She weaved back and forth among the kiosks scattered throughout the shoppers. She tried ducking down to hide and found she was at an exit, so she turned to head out.
She didn’t stop, but took off to get away from the bright lights around the exit area. She ran towards the first line of cars, ducked between vehicles. She halted, because the tall guy was in front of her in the dark between vehicles. Damn, these guys were fast.
As he approached her, she reached for the handle of the door of the van, surprise someone had left their vehicle unlocked. He reached out for her and she swung the door, hitting him full with the metal. She turned and ran into the lights behind the parked vehicles, but it didn’t slow him. She felt his hand like a steel vise on her shoulder. She was almost off her feet as he was pulling her back. The pain in her shoulder hit her, almost bringing a scream.
This was what the protector had been trying to warn her about. She was still in the horror movie. Except it wasn’t over.
She was spun around, because the Vampire holding her was spun around. The force of her protector pulling the other off her threw her into the side of the van, knocking the breath out of her. She slid down the side of the van, watching. She was unable to move as she tried to get air into her lungs. Her protector did damage to the other Vampire. He had a knife that he used to slash the thing’s legs, making him unable to run. He turned, rolling him over, looking down into his face.
“You touched her with your hand.” He said this with no emotion, in a monotone. He sliced the thing’s hand off.
She felt tears come to her eyes but through the blur she watched, finally drawing in air to her straining lungs. She heard him still talking to the Vampire on the ground.
“You got her scent. It is the last thing you smell.” He placed a large silver knife on the Vampire’s chest and pushed it in. The horror didn’t stop for her, because the thing on the ground turned to dust. All of him, even the cut off hand, turned to dust on the ground. His clothes just floated down like a balloon with no air to hold it. She slowly started to slide back on the dirty blacktop. She watched him pick up a ring that rolled on the ground. Her protector started going through the pockets of the empty clothes.
She shuddered. Watching him picking the pockets of the non-existent whatever that had turned to dust caused her stomach to churn.
“Wait here, I need to throw these away.” His voice was a growl. He was going away, but he was coming back. She was slowly getting up, looking around, the pain in her body taking her breath away. Where could she go? She knew she couldn’t outrun him. Nobody could. These things were too fast. She started to shake. She felt cold even though the summer night was warm.
He was back. He took her by an arm, lifting her up. When he pulled her out from between the cars there was a black SUV with the motor running. He walked around it and placed her in the passenger’s side, taking care to fasten the seat belt. Then he was in with the vehicle moving.
He parked somewhere close to her apartment. He helped her out of the car, holding her close as he started up the steps. She stumbled on the last step at the lower front door. He simply reached down, put an arm under her legs and picked her up with ease to carry her up the stairs.
When they reached her apartment, the door swung open by itself so that he could enter. He took her through to the bedroom and laid her down on the bed. He went to the bathroom, got a damp towel and brought it back to her, putting it over her forehead. She heard him move out of the room, then he was back. She felt his weight sag the bed as he sat beside her.
“I want to see if he hurt you.” She felt him start to remove her blouse. She started to fight his hands, but he just held one hand away. He ignored the other one, unbuttoned her shirt. He pulled it off one arm and when she feebly struggled, he rolled her towards him to pull it off the other arm. She was left in her bra. He said a word in a language she didn’t recognize, but she knew it was a cuss word.
She stopped struggling and tried to look at her shoulder. There were two large deep scrapes. Already a bruise was forming over the entire shoulder. She leaned back and looked at the ruined blouse. She saw the bloody marks that she hadn’t noticed before.
“I need your blood. I need to store a small amount. My vial was broken in the fight.” His voice was still that quiet monotone. Yep, let’s slice up and turn people to dust then follow up with a nice Chianti.
She couldn’t think. Wait, yes she could, she’d get him something so he wouldn’t use those teeth. “Kitchen drawer, right hand side. Sterile water, replace it with blood.”
She must have blacked out, because she was next aware of him taping a large bandage over her shoulder.
“You have a bruise on your back. No broken skin there. It will hurt. I can take the pain, but you might not want me.”
“I might not want you? You talk funny. I don’t want you. Right. I don’t want Vampires, I don’t want guys lurking around watching me, I don’t want people telling me I smell funny. Okay, while I am still dizzy and not thinking straight, why would I not want you?”