Gabe laughed. “You look like what’s-her-face from that kiddie movie you made me watch.”
Harvey narrowed his eyes. “You’ll have to be more specific.”
“You know, the chick with the crazy hair and the wizards.”
“Bellatrix Lestrange from
Harry Potter
?” Harvey asked, confused.
“Yes, I think so.”
Harvey shook his head. “You’re hopeless. Come, let me put some makeup on you.”
“No way.”
“You’re supposed to be pasty white.”
“It’s December, and I live mostly at night. I’m pale enough.”
“Fine. At least let me put some black shadows around your eyes. Please?”
“All right, but that’s all.”
Once Harvey was done with him, Gabe surveyed himself in the mirror. If he hadn’t seen the costumed people the day before, he would’ve been worried about getting too much attention.
“Are we ready, then?”
“No, I need a few more minutes.”
“Women,” Gabe grumbled.
He left Harvey in the bathroom to finish up. Noticing the shopping bag on the desk, he took the wristband-watch out. It was really nice, and a good fit with his costume. He put the band on his left wrist. Unfortunately, it disappeared under his coat sleeve, so he took it off. Maybe he’d get the chance to show it off later.
A good fifteen minutes later, Harvey emerged, finally ready to go. He’d put on long fake fingernails—the same shade of red as his lips. His eyes sparkled from behind a wide and wispy strip of black lace. The overall effect was dramatic, sexy and mysterious. Gabe really wasn’t into chicks, but knowing what hid underneath the layers of ruffles thrilled him.
Harvey struck a movie-siren pose in the doorway. “How do I look?”
Gabe grinned. “Good enough to be eaten by.”
“You have a way with words, darling. Now stop fussing about, and let’s go.”
The organizers had secured a number of “celebrities”, and many of the evening’s events centered around them, with photo ops, autograph sessions and the like. Only one of them looked familiar to Gabe.
“Hey, that’s Uncle Herbert,” he said referring to a wrinkled, but cheerful old man wearing a cape.
“That’s correct, pet.”
“That show’s been off the air for like twenty years. He’s holding up well for his age.”
“Sandy Baker’s supposed to be here too.”
“She’s on that show on cable, right? I think I remember.”
Fangs
was one of Harvey’s favorite shows, centered around werewolves but featuring a smattering of other supernatural beings, including vampires. As far as Gabe could recall, Sandy Baker played a small role as Glynne the promiscuous vampiress. Harvey hadn’t rested till they’d found her booth and had her sign his arm.
As the night progressed, the hotel staff transformed the previous autograph signing tables into serving stations, the lights dimmed, music started playing in the background, and soon the milling crowd turned into a cocktail party.
Many of the participants wore their “vampire names” on their tags, and with their help Harvey located a group of people from the vamp website he frequented.
As far as role-playing went, the night became a nuanced production. On the surface, Harvey and Gabe were a couple of nerdy but otherwise ordinary humans, but for the benefit of the handful of real vampires in the crowd, they conducted themselves as a vampiress and her companion. In that role, Gabe acted deferential toward Harvey, letting his
mistress
lead him around the room, as she mingled and made new acquaintances. Harvey expressed ownership by body language. Gabe took to it like he did to their sexy games. Being in the skin of a stranger, he found it easy enough to play submissive.
The gender-bending part was the trickiest one, but Harvey was in top form and obviously enjoying himself. Gabe didn’t think anyone guessed the truth. Considering all the over-the-top and campy performances, the two of them blended in well. Underneath it all, Gabe was mindful of the presence of a few other vampires, but didn’t notice or sense anything unusual.
By midnight, the party wound down, but most of the participants were not ready to put an end to the fun, so they took the elevators down and spilled out onto the gambling floor. Soon costumed men and women sat by the roulette and craps tables. Most other guests reacted with delight, and some wanted to take pictures.
Gabe wondered if they were done for the night when his phone buzzed. The text message said:
com 2 bar
.
“Which bar? There are at least three of them,” Harvey said, stealing a glance.
“We start with the closest one and work our way around.”
The nearest bar was just on the other side of a bank of slot machines. For the first time in the night, Gabe sensed something amiss. He became aware of the clump of vampires in the corner before he could see them. He detected four or five of them, and one was
off
. Like a rancid odor, he drew Gabe’s attention. Gabe surreptitiously squeezed Harvey’s fingers.
“What is it, pet?” Harvey asked.
With a minute move of his head, Gabe indicated the direction. Harvey took the lead, but instead of heading straight that way, he wound their way around the rows of jingling machines till they had a good view of the group of vampires.
Two of the men had their backs turned, but across from them sat a sturdy blond vampire with jaws like a bulldog—he was the one who ruffled Gabe’s senses. A blonde flanked him on either side. They were definitely female, yet with their wide shoulders and thick arms, they didn’t look half as feminine as Harvey.
“Maybe they were bodybuilders before they got turned,” Harvey whispered to Gabe.
“The blond man in the middle—he’s wrong,” Gabe whispered back.
“Like the others?”
“Not as strong. Let’s get closer.”
Harvey sashayed to the bar, with Gabe following half a step behind. By luck, a couple of seats opened up close to their targets. When they sat, Harvey leaned close and whispered “Look,” into Gabe’s ear. While Harvey played the role of sexy siren to the hilt for the bartender, Gabe took a visual sweep of the group. Now that he could see them from a better angle, he realized one of the other men was Hector.
Hector wore his face in an emotionless mask and showed no recognition when their eyes met. Next to him sat a vampire Gabe had never seen before. Gabe would’ve remembered—the guy had dark and dangerous good looks.
Two girls of the pretend-vampire variety rounded up the group. Dark-and-handsome was engaged in a conversation with one of them. The other girl loudly giggled at something the blond vampire had said. Both girls appeared to be rather drunk.
“Here you go.” Harvey nudged a tall glass full of red liquid in front of Gabe.
Gabe took a sip—he tasted cranberry and pineapple but no alcohol.
Harvey draped an arm over Gabe’s shoulder. Their pose conveyed casual intimacy, but Gabe knew Harvey pricked his ears to catch conversation from the nearby table, the same as Gabe concentrated to pick up anything he could with his own senses. And he did—some of the vampires around the table were getting hungry. The skin at the back of Gabe’s neck prickled as if someone was trying to stare a hole into it. From the corner of his eye, he could see Hector stand and saunter to the bar with a few empty glasses in hand. The vamp stood next to them and motioned to the bartender.
While waiting for fresh drinks, Hector turned to Harvey. “You’re from the convention?” Nothing in his tone gave away the fact they’d met before.
Gabe watched Harvey give Hector a radiant smile. “Yes, pretty obvious, isn’t it?”
“Would you two like to join us? We already have a couple of your brethren.” His gaze flickered on Gabe and rested there for one heavy beat.
“We’d love to. Right, pet?” His words sounded more like a statement than a question, but Harvey’s eyes flashed questioningly at Gabe from behind the black lace.
Gabe nodded.
“Oh, by the way, I’m Hector.”
They shook hands. “That over there,” he said, motioning toward the blond vampire, “is Aleksi. With Frida and Greta. The two young ladies introduced themselves as Cinder and Lucinda.”
Gabe stared at Hector, waiting for a sign, any sign, but Hector remained the perfect image of a stranger. Obviously, he could role-play too.
“And who’s tall, dark and handsome?” Harvey asked.
“That’s Ilario.”
The bartender placed the drinks in front of Hector, who paid and took them to the girls. Harvey and Gabe followed. Hector wrestled another table and a couple of chairs closer for them. There was a round of greetings, although Aleksi didn’t stand or offer his hand. Frida and Greta, on the other hand, each held Gabe’s hand longer than necessary. Their interest in him was easy to notice, even without his special senses. However, he was not their only object of interest. Next to Frida sat one of the girls, Cinder—and Frida took every opportunity to touch her. The buxom twenty-something girl had shoulder-length dark hair with red streaks in it. She giggled a lot. Both girls did.
While Gabe did his best to stay in the background and observe, Harvey fell into an easy conversation with the others, especially Cinder and Lucinda.
“Ooh, what you got there?” Cinder asked, pointing at the ink lines on Harvey’s arm.
“Sandy Baker’s signature,” Harvey explained.
“Cool, you could get it tattooed.”
Lucinda leaned over her for a better look. She even brushed her finger over it. “Maybe she’ll get famous one day,” she said.
“Yeah, it’s not like having Christen Solberg’s signature, right?” Harvey agreed.
“Who?” asked Gabe.
Harvey shook his head. “He plays Morgan the sexy werewolf.”
“Mmm…Morgan,” Cinder and Lucinda moaned in unison.
The chatter veered to the discussion of Morgan and then other alluring members of the TV show. It had a large cast. The main input from Frida and Greta was prompting the girls’ talk. Not that they needed much prompting. Aleksi made the occasional slimy innuendo that seemed to amuse Cinder and Lucinda to no end. Hector made sure they never ran out of booze.
Sitting so close to Aleksi made Gabe’s skin itch. The guy being a sleaze ball didn’t help. The way his gaze crawled over the two drunken girls would’ve been considered indecent in a cathouse.
Aleksi beamed his lecherous smile at the girls. “So, are you bloodthirsty vampires?”
“Very.” Cinder bared her fangs and hissed. Lucinda followed her example. Seemed like they sported the same kind of fangs Gabe had—only he’d removed his hours ago.
Aleksi leaned over the tiny table and took a hand from each of the girls into his own. “If you get hungry, you can suck on me all you want.” His voice oozed with the crude double entendre.
Gabe wanted to gag, but Cinder and Lucinda shrieked in delight.
Aleksi flashed his greasy smile around the table. His gaze landed on Harvey. “How about you, do you suck too?”
Gabe felt the spike of Harvey’s annoyance, but didn’t see the slightest trace of emotion on his lover’s face. “No, I only dress up as a vampire, sorry.”
Everyone around the table knew the statement to be untrue, except the two drunken pretend vamps. Gabe knew Harvey said it as a joke to rebuff Aleksi’s tasteless flirting.
Aleksi didn’t slow down so easily. “I’d love to know you out of your costume.”
Gabe wanted to wipe the smirk off the face of the slimy bastard.
“You’d be disappointed. I work at a library—very dull, I’m afraid,” Harvey said, sidestepping the latest innuendo too.
Aleksi’s leer didn’t falter. “You’re too pretty to be a librarian.”
Gabe was visualizing his fist smashing into the vampire’s face. Harvey must have picked up on it, because he put an arm around Gabe’s shoulder.
Aleksi’s eyes flashed. “A wholesome boyfriend you have. He must be a real
treat
.” With that he turned his attention back to Cinder and Lucinda.
The bodyguards, though, they kept eyeing Gabe as if they were of the same mind as Aleksi about Gabe being a treat.
“So where are you from?” Ilario’s question came unexpectedly.
“Wade and I are from San Francisco,” Harvey answered for both of them.
Ilario gave a nod of acknowledgment. He had handsome, vaguely Latino features, with an added hardness that lent him an air of severity.
“How do you like Vegas?” he asked.
“It’s very different. Like the whole town is partying 24-7.”
Aleksi cut in. “Speaking of partying, why don’t we move this one to higher grounds?” His lips twisted into the shape of a smile—at odds with the coldness of his eyes.
The rest of his entourage took his words as an order and all gathered up. Harvey and Gabe followed suit. Hector offered his arms to Cinder and Lucinda. Neither of them looked like they could walk straight without help. Gabe didn’t much like it and tried to catch Hector’s attention, but the vampire took no notice of him.
Gabe had figured already that the glitzy hotels and casinos on the strip had a side most visitors never saw. You needed a substantial crew and infrastructure in the back to keep the front working. It didn’t come as a surprise that there were also areas accessible only to a privileged few. Greta’s key card opened an unmarked door and gave access to an elevator requiring the same card to operate. They disembarked into an underground passage tall and wide enough to drive a car through.
Aleksi walked up front with Greta and Frida flanking him. Behind him, Hector practically carried the two unsteady girls. Harvey and Gabe followed, with Ilario bringing up the back. A couple of huge guys guarded the doors at the end of the tunnel. They not only let them through without question, but even held the doors open. Another elevator shot them back up to the twenty-seventh floor but in a different hotel. A much more exclusive one, from the look of things.
Two vampires guarded the suite outside and two more waited inside. Gabe looked around—the entryway was bigger than the whole apartment he shared with Harvey in Chicago. Beyond that lay another, even bigger room, complete with a half-circle brown leather sofa big enough to seat twenty, facing a fireplace, a wet bar, more sofas, chairs and assorted furniture. And that was only the beginning.