Andi stood beneath a light fixture mounted above and to the right of the main entrance. She ran her hands along the decorative brick wall under the light until she located a small crack in the mortar between two of the faded red bricks. With a little effort, she managed to wiggle the lower brick out of the wall approximately two inches. A shallow recess had been chipped into the top of the brick, and in that recess sat a shining, silver key. Andi held the key up for me to see with a triumphant grin and commented, “Right where they said it would be.” She slid the brick back into its proper place and used the key to let us into the building.
Once inside, she closed and relocked the door behind us, securing the interior deadbolts. With no windows or other access for outside light, the interior was pitch black with the doors closed. It was too dark even for my sensitive eyes to make out any of my surroundings. I heard Andi’s hand brushing one wall as she searched for a light switch. There was an almost inaudible click and the building was bathed with a soft overhead florescence. With me close behind, Andi did a quick search of the building, peering and sniffing in every corner and closet she came across before concluding that we were, in fact, alone and safe.
We had spent most of the remaining hours of the night on the trip here, and the sun would be breaking the horizon in less than an hour. Andi sought out a bedroom that she had discovered in her earlier examination of the building. It was actually an office, but a large, comfortable-looking bed had been placed in one corner of the room to provide a soft, warm place to sleep. Beds are not strictly necessary, as I had discovered from several weeks of sleeping on hard-packed earth, but the habits of a human lifetime are hard to break. I learned that Andi was no exception to this rule and she would frequently seek out the comfortable trappings of a living creature whenever she could find them.
I tried to follow her into the room but she stopped me with a hand on my chest.
“Where are you going?” she asked.
“I was just following you.”
Andi brought her hand up to cup my cheek affectionately. “You are always welcome in my bed for sex, Gregory. I require a bit more privacy for sleeping, however. You will need to go find your own room to sleep in today. I will see you tonight.”
She closed the door behind her and I heard the lock being engaged.
Feeling a bit hurt and rejected, but doing as I had been told, I wandered in search of somewhere to sleep; roaming the multiple hallways and searching for a suitable place to curl up for the day. I found no other beds. I did however find a small room that appeared to be some sort of storage closet while exploring the south end of the building. A couch stretched along the full length of one of the walls and I decided that this would be my new home for as long as we needed to stay at this location.
Closing the door behind me, I found myself once more in soothing blackness. I did not bother to search for a light switch. By feel, I found the latch of a deadbolt and locked the door, following Andi’s earlier example. Taking three steps to cross the tiny room, I flopped face down onto the couch where the oblivion of sleep soon claimed me.
I awoke what seemed only moments later to a tapping sound on my door. I opened my eyes and, although the darkness surrounding me was exactly the same as when I had closed them that morning, I knew deep inside me that the day had passed and night had once more arrived. I rose from my couch. It was too dark to see in the closed room, but I moved unerringly for the door, unlocked it, and pulled it open.
Andi stood in the hallway. She wore an ankle-length blue dress that clung to her in the all the right places. She looked refreshed and neatly groomed. I knew in comparison I was a rumpled mess, still wearing the clothes I had fallen asleep in. “You look great,” I said. “I think I need a shower and a change of clothes.”
“I brought our luggage in from the car a few minutes ago. All your stuff is in the two suitcases by the front door.”
The car Andi referred to was her own Toyota SUV. My Pontiac of course was long gone. It was either a pile of twisted wreckage in an impound lot somewhere, or perhaps it was already a cube of crushed scrap metal on its way to some third-world country to be melted down and reused. Either way, its fate wasn’t worth dwelling on. Though I admit had to admit to myself I was going to miss that old, green bolt bucket.
I went to the front door and retrieved my clothes. I pulled out clean jeans, underwear and a button-up shirt then headed for the sole bathroom located in the building to take a shower. The bathroom was a converted public restroom located in the north-east corner of the building by one of the entrances. Urinals and multiple toilet stalls had been removed to create space for a large bathtub that could double as a shower stall. Several sinks had also been removed to be replaced with a wooden armoire stocked with towels, washcloths, a couple soft-looking bathrobes, and a selection of soaps and shampoos.
There was no mirror in this bathroom, either. Staring at yet another blank wall, I wondered if the old stories were true about vampires casting no reflection in a mirror. One missing mirror may have been just coincidence, but two was beginning to suggest a pattern.
Stripping off my wrinkled clothes and piling them onto the counter next to the single remaining sink, I stepped into the bathtub, pulled the shower curtain closed and turned on the water. The cold water that initially hit me was uncomfortable, but not unbearable. I did not shiver or flinch as I once might have. It wasn’t that I didn’t feel the cold, but my autonomic responses to outside stimulus apparently were now permanently set to “off,” and I was able to stand calmly under the freezing spray until it began to warm. As steam began to rise around me, I closed my eyes and soaked in in the pleasant heat. I stayed in the shower until the last of the hot water was exhausted then, feeling clean and refreshed, I dried off, dressed, and went looking for Andi.
I found her in the front lobby of the building, but was surprised to discover she wasn’t alone. That first night in our new home, we received a visit from one of the Friends. He had arrived soon after nightfall, sometime during my shower, and after Andi had let him into the building, she had kept him in the lobby until I had come looking for her. Whether that was because she believed the lobby was the best place for our meeting, or because she felt uncomfortable allowing him any deeper into the building we were living in, I don’t know. Regardless of her reasoning, this was the location I was introduced to my second Friend of the Night, and I fervently hoped the meeting would go better than the first.
He was a tall man, heavily muscled, with a deep brown complexion. His face was screwed up into a serious expression and his eyes glittered with determination as they met mine. At first I thought he was staring at me in some kind of macho challenge; showing contempt for me despite the fact he knew quite well what I was. But after a moment, I recognized his gaze for what it was. He was terrified of us. Of me. And like any creature that finds itself in a predator’s den, he was struggling with his natural impulse to turn and flee. The gaze he leveled at me wasn’t defiance, it was the knowledge that if he gave in to his fear and tried to run, he would be destroyed.
He wasn’t wrong.
“Hello,” I said to the man as he continued to lock eyes with me. I just as stubbornly refused to break the contact. “My name is Gregory. Who are you?”
“Naldo,” the man said simply. I thought I could hear a bit of an accent when he said the name, but I could not be certain. Not that I really cared. There were more important things on my mind than whether or not English was his first language. I smiled and said, “What a lovely name. And how are you this fine evening, Naldo?”
“Gregory!” Andi snapped. Her voice was sharp with disapproval. I glanced away from Naldo to look at her. Despite the tone of her voice, I could see a small smile curving at one corner of her mouth. “Stop playing with your food,” she said. Then to my surprise, she actually started to giggle.
With no further comment, Naldo removed his shirt. I saw the familiar scarring around his shoulders and neck from previous bites. I glance
d again at Andi for confirmation that this was for me and not actually her mealtime that I had just walked in on. She nodded. I did not need any further urging. I moved toward him and pulled him into a lover’s embrace.
Afraid that I might kill him like the last unlucky soul I fed from, I forced myself to take a long slow breath to calm myself before placing my teeth to his bared shoulder. The feel of his skin tearing beneath my teeth was both pleasure and torment. I longed to bite deeper, cut into muscle and bite down on bone, but I restrained my impulse and fed from the small trickle of blood that flowed from the much too small wound. This time I took only what I required. What I wanted was to tear open his throat and drink everything that came out, but as I fed I could feel my hunger begin to slowly subside. I did not have to kill him to sate myself, I realized. When I stepped away, I left him dazed and weak, but not permanently harmed.
Andi retrieved a first aid kit I had not previously noticed from one corner of the room. She removed gauze and tape from the bright red and white box then carefully bandaged Naldo’s wound. When she had finished, she caught his chin in her right hand and forced him to look her in the eyes.
“Are you okay?” she asked him. “Did he take too much?”
Naldo stood quietly for a moment in thought, then shook his head in negation.
Andi smiled then released him long enough to pick up his shirt and hand it to him. Naldo struggled a moment as he tugged it on over his head, but he was ultimately successful in redressing himself. With a hand on his lower back, Andi guided him to the front door.
“Thank you, Naldo, for your assistance tonight. I won’t forget it.” She unfastened the locks, pulled the door open and bade him goodbye with a small kiss on the cheek. After closing the door behind him, she again locked us in. I grabbed her around the waist from behind before she could turn back around. With fresh human blood inside of me, I was warm, flushed with energy, and very aroused. I wanted her now as much as I ever had.
“Why, Lover. Whatever are you doing?” she asked, knowing full well what I was asking for.
Laughing at my impulsiveness, Andi pushed me away just long enough to lift her dress off over her head. She was not wearing anything underneath it. She let it fall to the ground beside her before stepping back into my arms.
We made love for most of the rest of that night.
Three days later, she tried to kill me.
CHAPTER 10
As the long hours passed in the dark warehouse, I began to feel claustrophobic again. I paced and stalked every corridor and corner in my new prison over the next couple of nights, like a caged animal who knows there is no way out but is too full of pent-up energy to simply sit down and accept his fate. Andi certainly helped me pass some of the time in a very pleasant manner, but there was also a great deal of time that I was left to my own devices for entertainment. There is not a great deal to do in an empty building.
To keep my mind occupied, I tried counting my steps as I strode the hallways, memorizing the distances before each corner or doorway. Seven steps, turn left. Fifteen steps, left again. Two steps, right, watch out for the chair in the corner. When I knew my route by heart, I closed my eyes and moved blind just to see if I could do it. After a few hours of this mindless exercise – and one successful circuit through the entire building without bumping into any walls – I knew I had to get out before I completely lost my sanity.
I had spent a month locked away in a mausoleum and when I finally got out, I came here. I had just traded one prison for another. There was more space, certainly, but the warehouse was just as much a locked box as the earth-walled pit I had just left. At least when I had been in the mausoleum I was too terrified of bursting into flames if I went outside to reasonably consider leaving. Now, though, I had been in the beautiful, cold embrace of the night. I had stood under the bright moonlight just three days ago and I knew that I could survive it. The only thing keeping me inside this new trap was my fear of Andi. And that too, was beginning to fade.
I needed freedom to move around. I needed to interact with other people, hear their voices and feel their touch. I needed … I needed to hunt.
Hunger stole over me as I imagined the feel of skin cutting beneath my teeth and the warm gush of blood from a new wound. And the blood was not enough, I reluctantly admitted to myself. I wanted to feel the fear and panic of struggling prey. I wanted the taste and smell of terror as I fed. As I killed.
Frustrated beyond the ability to stay calm, I began to prowl the building for Andi. I wanted to speak with her; to beg her to let me outside. After a few minutes of finding only vacant rooms, anger began to fester inside me, as if Andi were purposefully hiding from me. I knew she was still in the warehouse. She had always advised me previously if she were going out for any reason and I had no reason to think she would change this pattern. Forcing myself to pause and calm down, I tried to think where she might be. There had to be a more logical way to find her rather than pull open every door in the building and poke my nose into every closet. I had already tried the room she normally slept in, and the bathroom had been equally empty. What other rooms did she frequent? How was I going to find her without searching every square inch of the massive warehouse?
An idea struck me. I took a long, deep breath, inhaling through my nose and sampling the scents around me. Andi’s smell was everywhere, the hints of vanilla and lilac from the soaps she favored, and the heady perfume of her blood and sex. Although her presence was all around, I discovered as I moved through the various hallways that her scent waxed and waned depending on the direction I traveled. Rather than checking every door then, I needed merely to follow my nose. Like a bloodhound, I let the trail lead me and within moments I had located my quarry.
One corner of the building had been fashioned into a series of four offices. Each of the four abutted against the others, and they all shared the western outer wall of the warehouse. There were, of course, no windows or doors here leading outside, keeping the rooms dark during daylight hours. Andi had settled herself in the corner office, the largest of the four, and currently sat behind a massive metal desk watching the only functional computer monitor in the building and tapping occasionally at a keyboard with her right hand. Wearing only a white pair of panties and a black pullover sweatshirt, she reclined casually in a red-vinyl desk chair. She was curled into one corner of the large chair with her left elbow braced on one arm of the seat and one long, bare leg draped over the other chair arm. Her hair tumbled loose behind her in a gold cascade over her shoulders.
The computer monitor faced away from me and I could see only the pale light of the screen flickering on Andi’s face. Curious, I moved around the desk to stand next to her, where I could see that she was playing a game of Solitaire on the machine. She looked intently at her game as she clicked her way through the card deck with no obvious move presenting itself.
“I think I’m done,” she said with a small frown. She let her right hand fall away from the keyboard and her left arm moved to drape comfortably around my leg. “Are you bored, too?” she asked, the fingers of her hand lightly stroking my thigh.
Her touch, as always, electrified me. Her dark eyes found mine and my thoughts began racing to the point I almost forgot why I had sought her out in the first place. “Yes,” I agreed. I focused on my growing claustrophobia and the need to get outside rather than the other urges she was now planting in my head. I thought about the hunger that had pushed me to seek out Andi in the first place.
“I want to hunt,” I told her.
“Of course you do,” Andi said huskily. Her hand moved up to cup the growing bulge in my pants. “Why don’t I help you out of these clothes and we can talk about hunting later?”
“No.” I forced myself to take a step back, hoping a small amount of physical distance would help me regain clarity. “I want to hunt. Tonight. Right now.” I tried to sound firm and determined, but the words rang desperate in my ears. My voice was thin and weak, and I instantly hated myself for
it.
Andi laughed. “You’re not ready, yet.” And she reached for me once more.
Although part of me wanted nothing more than to just melt into her embrace, the memories of my recent mindless pacing of the hallways strengthened my resolve. I shuffled back away from her another step. The laughter melted from Andi’s face and the black irises of her eyes glittered now with a darker emotion.
“You’re not ready,” she repeated. The words were flat and her tone held more than a hint of warning that I should not pursue this conversation.
I ignored the words, and the warning. “Don’t you want me to start learning how to take care of myself?” I asked. “If all I do is stay where you put me and let you take care of me, then I stay helpless. I don’t want to be your pet, Andi.” This time I moved toward her, pleadingly reaching a hand out to touch her shoulder. “I want to be your equal.”
She slapped my hand away with enough force to hurt. She was on her feet in a blur almost too fast for me to see. Although the top of her head only reached my chin and she had to look up to glare at me, she managed to give the impression of towering over me. She growled. “I forbid you to leave.”
She forbid me? Forbid?
She gave no reason. No explanation. And she spoke with the certainty of a parent dictating terms to a five-year old; leaving no question that I must obey. And like that five-year old, I dug my heels in out of sheer stubbornness and spite. Unreasoning anger flowed over me, washing away the awe and fear that normally kept me under control. There was only room for my rage now. I was tired of hiding; of being told what to do without any understanding of what was happening to me. “I’m not a child,” I told her. The words sounded petulant in my own ears, but I refused to back down. I had started this confrontation and I was determined to finish it. “I won’t be ordered around anymore and you have no reason to keep me locked up in here. I don’t care if you want me to go outside or not, I’m walking out that door.”
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