by J. C. Mells
she couldn’t leave unattended over the break. Worse than that, Reyes, they decorated our house. I might have expected something like this from my gay roommates, but even Nap and Sixten just shook their heads in disbelief before they left two days ago. I’m talking fake snow on everything, a Christmas tree with flashing lights, and twinkly, dangly things hanging from… well… everywhere! It’s a horror show in there right now. I came up from the basement one day and stepped straight into Santa’s Grotto! My parents have the right idea by getting away from it all and high-tailing it to Cabo San Lucas every year. That’s what I should’ve done.”
“Have you finished your whining yet? There went a few minutes of my life I’ll never get back,” Reyes said, this time with exaggerated sarcasm.
“All joking aside, Mr. Vampire-In-The-Making,’ Moused said looking straight up into the security camera above him that he knew Reyes was monitoring, “we can’t eliminate the possibility that this stalker of mine is looking for info on the chip.”
“How would another House even know of its existence, though, Mousey?”
“I know Hendrick inherited a team of world-renowned scientists when we overthrew Dorian. I also know Hendrick is of the mind that it’s not the scientists that are evil, but the man that is hiring them to do his work. But if you wanted to be one-hundred percent certain not a single leak would get out about this particular project, you should’ve fast-tracked me through medical school right after M.I.T.,” Moused answered. “I made the chip but it took a medical team to insert it and its satellites.
“On the bright side,” Reyes replied, “even though it took a medical team to put it in, there are only about three people that actually know what this chip you created can actually do… or rather, hopefully do… once it’s activated.”
“Which is probably the reason why, being one of those three, I have a rival House stalking me,” Moused said with a sigh.
“Hendrick’s giving me the international signal for ‘wrap it up,’ so I’ve got to go. It’s Christmas Eve, kid. Pull that bah humbug stick out of your ass and do something fun with Theo and Amelia. The Gulfstream is ready and set for you at noon tomorrow. You better make sure you’re on it. If you miss Christmas in Nowhere, Pierce will no doubt skewer you with that very sharp sword of hers. She’s been cooking for days and apparently everyone will be there – except yours truly, of course. I’ll still be in lockdown until I can control myself around others.”
“And here I thought it was because she had a strict ‘No Cyborg Vampires’ policy at her Christmas table,” Moused teased.
“Hilarious, Mousey, hilarious. Never fear my little pipsqueaker, ‘I’ll be back’,” Reyes said in his best Schwarzenegger accent.
“If you get any headaches, just remember... ‘it’s not a toomah!’” Moused countered, laughing along with his mentor and friend.
“When you drive into Nowhere tomorrow, remember to check if… ‘the bridge is out, the bridge is out!’ ”
“All right, all right,” Moused said trying to gain some modicum of control over his fit of the giggles in the middle of the ‘World’s Largest Store.’ “Go drink some blood or something and I’ll talk to you in a few days.”
“Bye and Merry Christmas, Mousey,” Reyes said with a snort, as he too tried to control his laughter.
A click sounded in Moused’s ear as they both disconnected.
Have yourself a merry little Christmas
Let your heart be light
From now on
Our troubles will be out of sight.
The song playing had changed, but the bustling crowds coming in and out through the revolving doors did not seem to be lessening any despite the late hour. Late by normal work day standards, not by vampire Retinue standards, of course.
Looking around his immediate vicinity again, Moused couldn’t see his mysterious stalker anywhere in sight. The inside of his tinted glasses flashed, alerting him that he’d just received a text from Reyes.
Reyes: I have her on a north side camera leaving the building about ten minutes ago.
The words flashed across the inner side of his right lens. That particular exit put her across the store from his current position. He sent a text to his driver Spencer to pick him up at the south entrance.
Ten minutes later and Moused was comfortably ensconced in the back of the company limousine as it slowly made its way through the heavy Christmas Eve traffic on Broadway. He grimaced at all the Christmas-themed window dressings, relieved that his ordeal of being forced to negotiate the bedlam and chaos of the crowded sidewalks was now thankfully over.
Pulling out his laptop, Moused brought up the photos of Catrionella Monsignac that he’d sent to himself as well as Reyes. Of the two he’d been able to take; one was a little blurry, and of her looking slightly to the left, most of her body obscured by the frenzy of shoppers passing between them at the time. The second one showed her looking directly into the camera - she couldn’t have known was there - essentially looking directly at Moused.
Piercing dark eyes seemed to stare directly out at him, the right corner of her mouth twitching up into the beginning of what could only be described as a killer smirk.
Yep, Eerie just called in his good friend Scary.
Catrionella sported a short, immaculately straight, bob haircut à la Louise Brooks. Jet-black hair, thick eyelashes framed dark, kohl-lined eyes, and pale skin further complemented the look. Despite this, her clothing took her away from that 1920s vibe and placed her right into the Twenty-First Century. Shiny black vinyl pants, red wool coat with a purple, faux fur-trimmed hood and knee-high, lace-up, five-inch heeled boots completed the ensemble. In human years she looked about ten years older than Moused, putting her in her early thirties when she’d made the Turn.
He began to sift through the information Reyes had forwarded to him about his new assassin stalker – and the vampire House she was a member of. Moused couldn’t help being intrigued. In the five years since he discovered that such a thing as vampires even existed, he’d met none outside of the Segher House – his House now.
“Home or office, Mr. Thurman?” Spencer’s voice asked through the speaker from the front of the car.
Thinking about the winter wonderland waiting for him back at the town house, Moused responded with: “Office, Spence, most definitely the office; and put on some Stones will you, I have a bit of reading to get through before we get there and all this Christmas music is killing me.”
