The Afterlife of the Party

by Marlene Perez

  The other band members looked like they wanted to run, but no one moved. No one even breathed until Jure stopped rearranging his son’s face.

  Travis lay there with blood leaking from a few orifices. He finally lifted his head.

  “Don’t Dad me,” Jure said. “I am your king.”

  Leonard looked at me. “Come with me,” he said.

  I raised an eyebrow. “No.”

  “N-no?”

  Leonard looked confused, but Jure cleared it up for him. “She’s a striga vie, you fool.”

  “You’re going to let all this food go to waste?” he whined.

  Jure grabbed him by the neck and lifted him off his feet, one-handed. “Do not touch them. The redhead is a witch, and my son, who thinks only with his fangs, bit her.”

  “What about the other one?”

  Jure shrugged. “No matter to me.”

  Leonard moved toward Sky. I stepped in front of her. “Try it and see what happens.”

  “Enough, Leonard,” Jure said. “You are wasting my time.”

  “My king,” Leonard said. “I was going to—”

  “Shut up,” Jure Grando said.

  Leonard’s lips snapped shut, and then black blood started to seep from his closed mouth. His eyes bulged, and he let out terrified little squeaks as his lips melted until they were just mangled flesh.

  Gross.

  “Who died and made you king?” I asked.

  “Several people, as it happens,” he replied.

  “So you’re Travis’s daddy,” I said. I’d had enough of bloodsucking losers, and this one looked like the worst of all. “He’s kind of an asshole.”

  Papa Vamp didn’t look like he disagreed with me. He sighed. “He is my son. My only son.”

  “You’re the guy in charge,” I said. “Numero Uno. The big cheese.”

  Jure nodded coolly.

  I could feel anger moving its way up my spine, through my jaw, and into my throat. I was so mad, I could taste it on my tongue.

  “You do not treat women like your personal sippy cups,” I screeched. My face went numb. I looked at Vaughn, panicked. “What’s happening to me?”

  It felt like I’d just gone to the dentist—my mouth was numb, gums sensitive. I was pretty sure I was drooling a little.

  “Tansy, I don’t know how to tell you this, but your fangs are golden,” Vaughn said.

  Leonard started bowing and scraping.

  I felt my incisors with my hand. “Those are some pointy suckers.”

  “You’re a Mariotti witch,” Jure said. There was just a hint of awe in his voice.

  How did he know that? “You say that like it’s a bad thing,” I said. Though it wasn’t like Granny Mariotti ran around hiding it from everyone. The people who knew about her knew the truth, and everyone else probably thought of her as the friendly librarian who always seemed to know exactly which book they needed. Nobody had ever called me a witch in that tone, though.

  He snarled at me, and I jumped back.

  Jure snorted. “Only my son is that stupid.”

  “You said it,” I replied.

  “You have a smart mouth for someone in your position,” he countered.

  I shrugged. “Not the first time I’ve heard that.”

  “I’ll let you live if you kiss my ring and swear fealty.” He lifted his long talons. I wondered briefly if my fingernails would eventually turn into claws. An enormous signet ring was on the third finger of his right hand.

  I wrinkled my nose. “Hard pass. It looks like I could catch the plague from it.”

  He waited, hand in the air, but I didn’t move.

  “If you’re the one who lets vampires do this to girls”—I gestured at Sky—“I’d rather die.”

  “As you wish.” That bloodsucker had just used my favorite quote. He’d ruined The Princess Bride for me.

  He waved his beringed hand, and the doors closest to us slammed shut.

  “Burn the witch,” Jure said. “Burn them all.” Then he vanished.

  “And I thought Travis was a pain in the ass,” I said, just before smoke filled the room.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  I stood frozen at the sight of billowing smoke. I knew we had to get out of there, but I couldn’t leave without the locks of hair or this nightmare would never end.

  I dropped to the floor and crawled around, searching for my clutch.

  “What are you doing?” Vaughn asked.

  “My purse,” I said. “I have to find it.”

  “We need to go.” His voice snapped me out of my frantic searching just as my hands touched my clutch. I tore it open and took out the baggies filled with hair.

  “Hold these,” I said. I’d need my hands free, so I had to leave my purse behind. I shoved the baggies into the front pocket of his jeans.

  “Let’s move,” he said. Vaughn picked up Sky over his shoulder. I didn’t know what would happen if she started to struggle.

  I tried the only window. The lock was sealed shut.

  “I can’t open it,” I choked out. “We’re trapped.”

  “You can do this,” Vaughn said, but then he started to cough from the black smoke.

  I grabbed a chair and threw it at the glass with all my strength. The chair ricocheted without doing any damage.

  “Again,” Vaughn said. The smoke was so thick now that I could barely see his face.

  I tried to remember what my granny had told me as my eyes streamed with tears. Something about humming? I took a shallow breath, trying not to inhale the thick-as-tar air.

  I hummed a few bars of the “Moonlight Sonata.” Granny had told me that for some witches, music helped to focus the magic. I didn’t feel anything magical, but my hand did start to tingle and then throb. It hurt so much that I thought I’d been burned, but when I checked, my skin was untouched.

  I muttered, “Break, damn it,” and the window shattered.

  Thank god.

  I started to rush toward the fresh air but noticed Vaughn was bent nearly double from coughing. I grabbed his shirt front and held on. “Follow me and don’t let go of Skyler.”

  “Never,” Vaughn croaked out.

  By the time we made it outside, someone had already called the fire department, because I heard the wail of sirens in the distance.

  We’d escaped, but Sky had gone limp and quiet, and Vaughn had an angry-looking burn on his arm. I’d coughed up so much smoke, I thought I was at a Miley Cyrus concert.

  A fire truck arrived, and firefighters started doing what firefighters do. I wished I’d thought to try telling the flames to stop. Maybe I wouldn’t have lungs that felt like a dirty ashtray.

  An ambulance pulled up, and emergency responders started checking us out.

  “What happened?” Skyler asked. Her smoke-smudged skin looked pasty.

  “You’re safe,” I said.

  “It’s so bright out.” She shielded her eyes from the rising sun.

  “Do you know how the fire started?” a firefighter asked her.

  “I don’t even know where I am,” she replied.

  He hustled her off to check her out.

  Vaughn came and sat next to me. He gave me a quick kiss. My mouth probably tasted like ash, but I kissed him back.

  Then I realized that Travis was gone. “Do you still have the hair?”

  Vaughn’s face paled, and he searched his pockets. “Got it.”

  I exhaled in relief. “I have to cast the spell now.”

  He handed me the baggies. Skyler’s hair was already mixed with lavender and rosemary, but I didn’t have any juniper or fennel. Or the filet of fenny snake.

  There was a fast-food restaurant across the street. I started jogging. “I’ll be right back,” I called to Vaughn.

  I burst into
the empty restaurant. “I need a frozen fish,” I said. “Now.”

  The cashier gaped at me. “You don’t want me to cook it first? The microwave only takes a second.”

  “Now,” I replied. “It’s life or death.”

  “Okay, okay,” he said. He disappeared into the back and returned with a small container.

  I gave him a twenty. “Thanks for this.”

  When I returned to where Vaughn stood, I held up the frozen brick. “I’m improvising.”

  A eucalyptus tree was nearby and went over and pulled off a few leaves. It would have to do.

  I mingled Skyler’s and Travis’s locks and the other ingredients. “Release her,” I said in my most commanding voice.

  “Now what?”

  “We cross our fingers and hope it worked,” I said.

  “I know it did,” he said. “We make a good team.”

  I smiled at him. My throat was still burning, but I managed to get out, “We are. And now I’m ready to go home.”

  But even as I said the words, I knew I wasn’t going to be able to leave and forget those other girls, even if I wanted to. We’d drive Skyler home, where she’d be safe with Granny, and then we’d figure out a way to stop these monsters, even if it meant telling Granny the truth.

  That I knew she’d lied. That I knew my mother was alive.

  But none of that was going to happen. Because when I looked around to tell Skyler it was time to go, I couldn’t find her.

  “Where is she?” I asked. The last time I’d seen her, she was being examined by a cute EMT. But the EMT was talking to a firefighter now.

  “Maybe they put her in the ambulance?” Vaughn suggested, but when we asked around, nobody seemed to know anything.

  I slumped over, shivering in the night air. The spell hadn’t worked.

  Of course it hadn’t. I’d used a frickin’ Filet-O-Fish.

  I wanted to scream.

  “Don’t cry,” Vaughn said. “Maybe there’s another explanation.”

  I brushed away the tears. “I’m not crying. Smoke got into my eyes.”

  “What now?” Vaughn asked, taking my hand.

  I looked at him pleadingly. “She couldn’t have gotten far.”

  “Maybe we shouldn’t…” Vaughn trailed off when he saw my face.

  “Don’t say it, Vaughn,” I warned. “She’s our best friend.”

  “You almost died.”

  “But I didn’t,” I said. “I won’t.”

  …

  We searched the entire city, but Travis and the rest of The Drainers had vanished. We returned to the hotel, smelling of smoke and adrenaline. My phone rang while we were still in the parking lot. My grandmother was calling.

  “I thought you were going to check in with me,” she said.

  “I’ve been a little busy,” I said. “What do you know about Jure Grando?”

  There was a pause, and then Granny replied, “Why are you asking?” Her voice was sharp.

  “He’s Travis’s dad,” I said. “And he just tried to burn me alive.”

  “You need to come home right now,” she said.

  “I’m okay,” I said. After I managed to calm her down enough that she wasn’t jumping into her car and coming to Diablo, I asked again, “Have you heard of him?”

  “Yes,” Granny said. “He’s the king of the vampires.”

  “And he’s a shitty one,” I said.

  “So I’ve heard,” Granny said.

  “Tell me everything you know.”

  Granny sucked in a breath. “Are you sure you want to hear this?”

  “I don’t have a choice.”

  “The vampire world is divided up into realms,” Granny said. “Kingdoms. Jure’s in charge of the California realm. And he has a bad reputation, even in the vampire world.”

  “Bad how?” How much of an asshole did you have to be to get a bad rep with vampires?

  “He’ll kill anyone who gets in his way,” she said. “Supposedly, he killed his own mother. The only things he cares about are wealth and power.”

  “Granny, I know now that the monsters in the dark are real,” I said. “I need to know how to fight them.”

  She sighed. “I just… I wanted to keep you from all this.”

  “I know,” I replied. “But you can’t. I have to help those girls.”

  I heard Vaughn shouting my name.

  “I’ll call you back later, Granny,” I said and hung up.

  “Look.” Vaughn pointed to the side of the hotel, and there it was: the tour bus was parked a block up. I never thought I’d be so happy to see that mobile petri dish.

  “Quick, they’re pulling out,” I said. “We need to follow them.”

  Bobbie Jean and her white pickup screeched around the corner of the hotel parking lot and pulled to a stop beside us. “Get in,” she said.

  “What?”

  “You’re chasing after your girl, aren’t you? I know where they’re heading. We’ll talk on the way.” Bobbie Jean’s blond hair was frizzy and unwashed, and her clothes were wrinkled like she’d worn them for a few days. “Get in or I’m leaving without you.”

  What was the real story between her and Travis? I had a feeling she wasn’t telling us everything. I didn’t trust her, but what choice did I have?

  Vaughn looked at me, and I nodded. I took the middle while Vaughn slid in next to me.

  “I saw Travis hustle her into the tour bus,” she explained as she started driving. “The rest of the band was with them. But that’s not the bad part.”

  “Bobbie Jean, just spit it out,” I said on a sigh.

  “Jure was with them, and they’re headed for the ranch,” she said.

  “A ranch? Where?”

  “North of here,” she said.

  “How do you know all this?”

  She wouldn’t meet my eyes. “I told you,” she said, “I’ve been tracking Travis since the band left Texas. I found out a whole lot about his daddy, too. None of it good.”

  I caught Bobbie Jean checking Vaughn out and wanted to growl “mine” like some Neanderthal. Or maybe lick him. Skyler’s brother, Davis, used to lick the cookies so nobody else would want one.

  Instead, I let my incisors go down and flashed my gold fangs at her. She nodded once, like I’d said what I’d been thinking aloud, and returned her eyes to the road, where they belonged, instead of all over my guy.

  “Tell me more about this ranch,” I said.

  “Jure’s place, real private,” she said. “It’s up north a way. Where he takes the girls.”

  “You mean the Sundowners? Or maybe the Bleeders?” I was trying to ignore the ominous way she said it.

  “Not them,” she said. “The other girls.”

  “Don’t they have enough?”

  “I don’t want to worry you—” she started to say, but I interrupted her.

  “That phrase has never made anyone worry less,” I said. “Please just tell us.”

  “The ranch is where the girls go in, but they don’t come out. And we only have until sunset to get there.”

  There was something she wasn’t telling us, but I didn’t have time to push her right now. Sky needed us.

  Bobbie Jean drove with her knuckles white on the steering wheel. “The ranch is a long way north,” she said. “You two may as well get some rest.”

  Vaughn wrapped an arm around me. I snuggled in. “You make a good pillow,” I told him.

  Vaughn and I had been up all night, and though I was too amped to fully sleep, I did doze.

  It was already dark again by the time Bobbie Jean eased her truck onto the shoulder. “We have to walk the rest of the way,” she said.

  “There’s nothing around here,” I said. We’d stopped along a desolate part of the road, with nothing to s
ee except a few horses and cows grazing in the fenced-in pastures. “Except endless space.”

  “In space, no one can hear you scream,” Vaughn quipped.

  I nudged him. “You’re not helping.”

  “Follow me,” she said. We hopped a fence and then started walking. It seemed like we walked for miles without seeing anything but ancient oaks, tall grass, and placid bovines, but we finally came to a long driveway. An iron gate guarded the entrance. There was a mailbox next to it, but you couldn’t see the house from the end of the drive.

  I dropped back, and Vaughn did the same. “Do you think it’s a setup?” I grabbed his hand.

  “Nothing would surprise me now,” he said.

  “Stop talking,” Bobbie Jean said. “Any closer and they’ll be able to hear us.”

  She seemed so different from the bubbly girl I’d met in Los Angeles.

  “Is something wrong?” I asked.

  “Yes, many somethings are wrong,” she said.

  Through the trees, a Spanish-style mansion came into view. We were still far away, and there were only a few security lights on, but I made out a red tile roof and an enormous fountain near the crescent driveway.

  The structure was luxurious, but it looked odd to me; lopsided, even. Then I realized there weren’t many windows, and the ones it did have were disproportionately small for the size of the house. It looked like…a prison.

  The house itself was shrouded in darkness. But in the driveway were several black limos.

  “Looks like Jure’s having a party,” Vaughn commented.

  Bobbie Jean flinched.

  “What do we do now? Walk in the front door and say hey?” I didn’t really have a plan, but I couldn’t leave Sky.

  “I know another way in,” Bobbie Jean said.

  “You seem to know a lot about this place,” I observed.

  “I was here with Travis once,” she said.

  “I thought you said you met him in Austin?” I asked.

  “Something like that,” she hedged. “Anyway, the kitchen has a back door. Nobody ever uses it.”

  “Vampires don’t eat?” I asked.