Vampire Blood (23 page)

“Yes.” Jeff had started to breath normally again, feeling silly at being so scared. Like a child. “I guess I was a little startled.”

The other man put his hand out to him. “I’m Michelson, the owner. This is my wife, Annie.”

“Nice to meet both of you. I’m Jeff Sanders.” He was openly relieved. “I’ve started working with Jenny.”

“Oh, her ex-husband, and you’re helping her?” The man’s eyebrow lifted over one eye.

“Yes, since her dad’s been missing. That’s why they—she—hasn’t been here for a while.”

“Mister Lacey’s
missing?
There was surprise in the man’s voice, but Jeff had a feeling that he wasn’t as surprised as he seemed. Though why it should matter one way or another did occur to him.

Jenny reappeared. “What’s been going on? I heard the commotion out here. What happened to the lights?” She stared around them.

“They blew out,” Jeff explained. “Don’t worry. I’ll replace the rest of them before we leave.”

* * * *

Her puzzled eyes traveled to the Michelsons and afterwards to Jeff’s white face. She moved closer to him. She had the almost irresistible urge to slip her arm around him, only stopping herself at the last moment.

“Why are you holding your neck?” she asked him sotto voce, her eyes still on the Michelsons.

“Cut myself, that’s all. It’s nothing.” The petulant tone told her that was all she was going to get out of him for now, so like the light bulb thing, she dropped it.

“I see you’ve met our employers?”

“I have,” Jeff replied in a strained voice.

Jenny flashed him another questioning look, but said nothing.

She faced the Michelsons. “I needed help, and he’s done this kind of work before. He’s very good.”

Mister Michelson smiled sadly at Jenny. “No need to explain. I heard your father’s missing now, too. Jenny, I’m so sorry. If there’s anything we can do?”

Jenny’s expression froze. “Thank you, but, no, there’s nothing you can do. The police are searching right now. Half the town is, too, and so are we. When we’re not here. I’m thinking of hiring a detective, if we don’t find him soon.” She met Jeff’s tender eyes, and when he took her hand, she let him without saying a word. “We’re going to find him any minute, any day,” she announced in a trembling voice, holding back the tears that threatened. “I know it.”

Mister Michelson wouldn’t meet her eyes, though Annie was gazing at her with a haunted expression. “Everything looks splendid, Jenny,” the woman declared, gesturing around them at the theater.

“How much longer will it be before you are done here, Jenny?” It was Mister Michelson this time.

“Less than a week or so, I hope. Jeff’s a fast worker. I’m sorry I haven’t been here much the last few days. I’m been so worried about my dad.”

Annie stepped up immediately to pat her consolingly on the back.

“Don’t worry so, child. We understand,” the older woman comforted her. “Take your time.”

Seeing Mister Michelson and hearing those words, though, had brought back Jenny’s strange dream of the night before. She looked over at him.

“This might be a weird thing to ask, Mister Michelson, but did you come to see me last night at my trailer? Late? You knew about my father being gone, and you said you were sorry and you tried to warn me of something.”

The guarded way he looked around before he answered, puzzled her. “No, Jenny. What an odd question. We’ve been out of town, and we’ve just come back. I only learned from your ex-husband here a few minutes ago about your father being missing.”

Jeff’s hand tightened. He was scrutinizing the Michelsons closely.

“Then I was right,” Jenny said, almost to herself. “It was only a dream. I’ve been having a lot of bizarre dreams lately.”

“Dreams are funny things, Jenny. Sometimes it’s hard to tell some of them from reality,” Michelson stated offhandedly, as he pulled something from his vest pocket and gave it to her. “I think that’s what we owe you so far. Including today.”

Jenny pocketed it without looking at it. “Thank you. I assure you the theater will be done on schedule, as my dad promised.”

“We need to be going, Jenny,” Jeff insisted sternly.

“I know, Jeff.” She glanced sideways at him.

He was regarding the Michelsons now with ill-disguised sullenness. “She’s exhausted. The last few days have been terrible for her.”

“Yes, by all means, Mister Sanders, take her home.” Mister Michelson’s face appeared concerned.

Jeff was practically dragging her towards the door. Jenny felt like kicking him.

“Good night, you two,” Mister Michelson’s voice followed behind them. “Nice to have met you, Jeff.”

“Good night,” Jeff said decisively, right before he shoved Jenny out the door into the warm summer’s night.

Later, back at the trailer, while Jenny was rustling them up something to eat in the kitchen, she sulked. “That was pretty rude of you, Jeff. Dragging me off like that. I wasn’t even finished talking to them. What the hell was the matter with you, anyway?”

“You wouldn’t understand, even if I told you.”

She stared at him from across the kitchen. His scraggly hair was longer than she ever remembered seeing it. It curled at the collar of his worn plaid shirt, framed his face and also brought out the strange blue of his melancholy eyes. He still made her heart quiver.

“Try me,” she tossed back.

Jeff tapped a finger on the arm of the chair. He pushed it away from the table, propping his long legs up on another one. Stalling. He lit up another cigarette. Jenny thought he smoked too much and had told him so.

When he didn’t answer, she put down the spoon she was using to make the omelets, came over to the table and sat down across from him.

* * * *

She’d put on baggy clean shorts and a green crop top that made her chestnut-colored eyes seem even darker. Her hair was tied up in a loose bun at the nape of her neck, and the small diamond earrings he’d given her for their first anniversary glittered in her earlobes.

Jeff couldn’t help but be astonished at how pretty she still was. She didn’t look like a woman almost forty years old. She looked like his old Jenny, and for a few fleeting moments, images of the younger Jenny crowded into his mind: a sixteen-year-old Jenny, laughing in the moonlight on her mother’s porch swing; a nineteen-year-old Jenny, hugely pregnant with their child and so beautifully happy, even pinching pennies as they’d had to do; Jenny hunched determinedly over her electric typewriter working on her first novel and smiling that silly little grin of hers as he came in tired from work; Jenny hugging a tiny Samantha, then years later, Jenny weeping, the hurt in her huge eyes, her heart broken, as he told her he was leaving her for someone else. A myriad of Jennys, and he remembered them all. He hadn’t been able to get any of them out of his mind now for years. It’s why he’d come back. God, he’d loved her so. He’d been such a damn fool to leave her.

At that moment, he wanted so badly to reach out and pull her into his hungry arms, but he stopped himself. It was too soon. It might scare her away.

In time.

“Jeff, what is it?”

“Jenny,” he began and abruptly stopped, clasping and unclasping his hands on the table, the cigarette forgotten and burning away in an ashtray before him. Its smoke wisped up in lazy circles to the ceiling. His unruly hair slipped across his eyes, shadowing his face until he shook it back. He couldn’t tell her what he’d really been thinking, so he returned to what they’d been discussing.

“The Michelsons. How long have you known those people?”

“Weeks. Not long.” Her eyes watched his expression sharply. “What’s wrong?”

“Them,”
he said bluntly.

“They are somewhat eccentric.”

“No, Jenny, I mean there is something
wrong
about them. I sense it in my gut.”

Jenny looked away. It was the same feeling she’d had so many times before.

“Jenny, Mister Michelson knew I was your ex-husband, yet I remember distinctly that you never mentioned it to him, in front of me that is. How did he know who I was?”

“I don’t know.” Jenny was frowning, her brows knitting together. “I might have told him about you, I guess, at some time.” The truth was she couldn’t recall mentioning Jeff.

“Well, I don’t like them. They’re not right somehow. I just haven’t figured out how.” He was quiet for a time, then he said, “Let me ask you: when did all the trouble start around Summer Haven?”

“A few weeks ago.”

“How long have they been here?”

Jenny saw what he was getting at. It occurred to her that Maude had suggested somewhat the same connection the last time she’d seen her. “Jeff, you think the reopening of the theater and the Michelsons have something to do with these animal killings and the disappearances?” Her impulse was to laugh it off, but the laughter died before it passed her lips. “Because they’re a little different? They’ve been nothing but kind to me and Dad. Your suspicions are crazy.” As she uttered the words, other unsettling memories nibbled at her. That dream she’d had; some of the things that had happened when she was around them; the way they made her feel. Not to mention that Jeff was right about the timing. Jenny could pinpoint exactly when the troubles and disappearances had begun— about the exact time the Michelsons came to town.

“Maybe I’m wrong, maybe I’m not. I can’t tell. All I know is that I don’t trust them. Something’s wrong with them. A strong hunch.” Jeff worked his jaw tersely under his skin. “There are evil people in this world, you know. Pure evil and cruel for the kick of it.”

“I know,” she mumbled, distracted by his nearness. She could smell the Old Spice he wore. She’d always loved that on him.

He canted his head and smiled knowingly. “Where’s the nosy writer in you, Jenny? I know it’s still there. Don’t you sense something unusual about them? I mean you’re the one who wrote those horror novels and did all that research on the supernatural. You spent months and months compiling that research.”

“Yes,” she said, smiling slightly. “I remember. There’s boxes and boxes filled with it up in Dad’s attic. In fact, if I recall correctly, you’re the one who first got me interested in the unusual, the supernatural and all the myths that go with it. You helped me collect antique books and information on so-called vampire-killing devices to help me with my first novel. Remember?”

“Yeah, I remember, but you’re the expert.”

“Well, the Michelsons might seem strange, Jeff, but that stuff I wrote about was just fiction.”

“Killers aren’t fiction, though. Killing cults aren’t fiction.”

Jenny’s mouth was a tight slash in her face. “You’ve got a point there. You don’t like the Michelsons, don’t trust them. What do you want me to do about it? I need to finish that job. I promised. Besides, the money’s been damn good, and I really need it. I need it to keep searching for Dad and the Albers.”

“I understand. I think we should finish their damn theater and get the hell away from it and them as fast as we can.”

* * * *

His eyes were burning, his face flushed.

There was something he wasn’t telling her.

“All right.” She stood up and resumed making their supper of bacon omelets and coffee, her mind clicking. It was a good thing Jeff had never met Irene. If he thought Annie and Terry were strange, he’d have a heart attack over their youngest daughter.

Jeff lit up another cigarette.

Jenny beat the eggs and milk and gazed out the kitchen window into the night. A thick fog was coming up; it curled like ghostly tendrils up around the windows.

Coming out of her reverie, she said longingly, “I miss the horses.” In her mind she saw them frisking around in the field behind her trailer. If she listened hard enough, she could almost hear them neighing and nickering to each other. “They were such good company. Made me smile when I was down.”

“Maybe someday you’ll have more horses.” Jeff attempted to cheer her up, just like the man she remembered.

“No, I don’t think so. There’ll never be another Lightning, never another Black Beauty. I really loved those two old nags, so did Dad. God, I miss Dad so much.”
Are you still alive?
she asked silently.
Where are you? Where are you!

Her back was to him, but Jeff must have seen her shoulders shaking, seen her hand come up to wipe at her face, and he’d know she was crying again. He pretended not to notice because he knew she hated weeping in front of other people.

“I’m so sorry, Jenny,” his voice cracked. She could tell by the anguish in it, he didn’t know what else to say.

Neither did she, so she remained silent.

She put the omelets on the table when they were done and settled down across from him. Her eyes were blurred and red. She wasn’t merely tired, she was heart weary, and she could barely keep her eyes open.

“Thanks, Jeff,” she mumbled softly. She began to eat, gulping her food down in big bites.

“For what?”

“For just being here.” She hung her head, so she wouldn’t have to look at him, and sipped her coffee. After a while, when he didn’t say anything else, her eyes rose to his face.