"I hope so," he said, trying to smile. Mickey sat in silence for a few moments as if he was trying to rehearse the next sentence in his head. Eventually, he dropped his head into his hands, deep in thought. He rubbed his face briskly before peeking over his fingers at me. "I'm booked on a flight back to Belfast tomorrow evening."
"Okay." Now wasn't the time to be demanding, he had enough on his plate. Besides, I couldn't shake the feeling that I would see him again, that this wasn't the end. I'd waited long enough for him, a little longer wouldn't make much difference. "We better make the next thirty-six hours count then."
"Well, well, well," Ferrers said to himself as he inspected the newspaper clipping. Of course, it wasn't an original cutting from the Bethel Gazette but a screen print from the online edition, printed for him by the latest addition to his vampire family, Richard.
Richard was a stockbroker by background but was currently fulfilling the additional roles of researcher and factotum. Ferrers had little interest in technology and preferred that Richard explore digital resources for information on the mysterious and enigmatic Sophie Morgan.
So far, Richard had confirmed that his former neighbour had left the Midlands and had returned to her native South Wales. He'd established where she'd gone to school, who some of her friends were and a possible connection to a residential lettings company in the area. The internet was a wonderful thing. What was still unclear though, was why Ferrers was so interested in her in the first place. If she was that important, why was Ferrers waiting to go after her?
"What does it mean?" Richard asked, intrigued. He was in the habit of printing off a copy of headline articles from the Gazette and other news resources covering South Wales, along with any recent updates of information he'd found on Sophie, and presenting them to Ferrers every morning. He was completely perplexed by Ferrers’ interest in such a boring archaeological find.
"This, my dear boy, is what we look like when we finally leave this world." Ferrers didn't shift his gaze from the sheet of paper he held delicately in his fine, elegant fingers.
"That's a dead vampire?" Richard asked in disbelief.
"Yes," Ferrers replied, turning the picture around to gain a different perspective. “You rarely see us like this of course. Usually, vampires are killed at our own hands, and we are always careful to dispose of the evidence. This reeks of the amateur."
The prospect seemed to titillate him. Ferrers had a long history of successfully dispatching unwanted vampires, having undertaken the role of enforcer to several important families in Europe.
"It's not a professional job then?"
"Most definitely not."
Ferrers placed the paper on the ink blotter on his desk, turned in his leather chair and gazed through the leaded windows out to the rolling, green, Warwickshire countryside. Richard recognised that it was his signal to leave the room. He wasn't offended; he cared little about feelings anymore, or more specifically the lack of them. Since he'd become a vampire, he'd approached most things with a welcome air of ambivalence.
Once alone, Ferrers reflected on the question of what to do with the peculiar Miss Morgan.
Richard had uncovered a lot of good information about her and he noted that he should consider how to best thank him - a fountain pen perhaps, or a puppy? Richard had discovered that she now lived in Wales in what he gathered was a small, industrial town. She had a mother who was still alive. He knew this from a forwarding address that Richard had cleverly obtained from another former neighbour, although they weren't yet sure if Sophie was still living with her.
The most intriguing thing was how Sophie knew about vampires. This was something that he couldn't be certain of, however. He suspected that she had been exposed to a rather unruly gang he had heard about that was operating in Belgium, around the time that Sophie was known to have been visiting there. If he was correct in this deduction, then one of these vampires was now looking for her. What he was at a total loss over was why that vampire, Kasper, a vampire he had turned nearly twenty-four years previously, would be at all interested in her.
It was difficult enough to believe that Kasper was associating with other vampires, let alone hunting a human down. Kasper had rejected Ferrers as soon as he was able to fend for himself. He resented his forced conversion, although Ferrers had done so as it was the only way of saving him from the injuries that had been rained upon him by a street gang. Leave that beautiful boy to die, murdered by common thugs? Never. But why would Kasper then associate with such brutish vampires as the ones which he had heard about? And why was he so bent on finding some young woman? Had he finally embraced his vampiric status? Would he finally return to Ferrers? Or had he found Sophie, and was it his body buried in that muddy wasteland?
The time for planning and preparation was over. Ferrers needed answers to his questions and he suspected that all the answers lay in the small town of Bethel.
3
Kasper strode out of the airport and stepped on to the concourse. It had been a straightforward journey; the flight from Brussels to Cardiff taking less than an hour. His first trip on a plane had not been a pleasant one though. The plane was tiny, people crammed in, knees touching. The pulse, pounding in the neck of the passenger next to him, had caused him problems for the entire journey. It reminded him of the ‘Tell-Tale Heart’ by Edgar Allan Poe, a guilty reminder that he desperately wanted to eat. He should have fed before he had boarded, but the right opportunity hadn't arisen. The toilets in the airport were always busy and the departure lounge was crowded, despite the earliness of the hour.
When he had arrived at his destination, Rhoose Airport on the outskirts of Cardiff, he fared no better. Rather than a bustling hive of activity, there were few people lurking. He had been one of no more than a dozen passengers watching the carousel turn, its mouth spurting out luggage infrequently. He had eaten a few hours before arriving at the airport so he knew it wasn’t a necessity; he just wanted to.
He peered around at the collection of parked cars sprawled ahead of him. Once a van reversed out of a space, he saw the sign for the car rental business and made his way over, holdall slung over his shoulder. His European driving licence was valid, although the date of birth it displayed had been changed to reflect the youthful appearance he retained. He'd got round to getting it ten years earlier.
One might think that a vampire didn’t have to worry about such trivialities, but such legal documents made it easier to move in the world unnoticed. Kasper also had a selection of credit cards, most of those fraudulent however. He had been unable to keep a regular job down, so making regular payments was difficult. In recent years, he had travelled with less desirable types who had covered their living costs by theft and deception. It wasn't something he was entirely comfortable with, but he had to be practical.
His criminal friends had not taken kindly to his decision to leave them. He couldn't tell them the truth of it, not when he wasn't yet certain himself. Not when he couldn't be sure of their reaction.
It had taken Kasper months to decide to track down his former lover. He had been travelling Europe with a gang of vampires that he'd met in Eastern Europe. With some resistance, he'd been forced to accept that there was safety and succour in numbers. Together, they fed and found a way to get by. The problem with many of the group was that they were less restrained than him. Sometimes they got carried away. When that happened, they had to move on. Kasper understood that he was a hypocrite, a reluctant vampire who had left his own maker out of disgust and shame, and then associated with low life and murderers because he was lonely.
The situation had come to a head when they arrived in Antwerp the previous summer. Three of his nest had gone out hunting. It had been their usual routine, nothing unusual. They'd lure someone out in a dark alley, feed and return. Occasionally, they'd find someone who they'd bring back to the nest, feeding those that had stayed behind. Sometimes they came freely; prostitutes mostly who would sell their blood, as well as their bodies, for th
e right price. Sometimes they were taken by force. As the self-appointed leader in the group, Kasper discouraged this.
On this particular food run, things had gone horribly wrong. The vampires involved, emboldened by the slaughter of a family in a rural area en route to Antwerp, had gone too far. They'd grabbed a girl and almost killed her. She put up a fight and, along with a male friend, had dispatched two vampires. Kasper had persuaded his comrades that they should move on, to swallow thoughts of vengeance in favour of a new place and a new start, perhaps in Holland. Kasper's own maker had been an enforcer for powerful vampire families, the kind that value their anonymity and would wipe out any vampires that threatened it. The massacre of the family was already hitting the headlines; they should lay low for a while and then move on.
He couldn't have known at the time that the girl, who had fought off his comrades, was Sophie Morgan, Julie Morgan's daughter. It was pure chance that when he walked into O'Malley's bar, the location where the vampire's had targeted her, that her photo was on the wall, pinned up behind glass along with Polaroids of other patrons. He hadn’t even known that she was the girl his vampire comrades had attacked. That horrific coincidence had only come to light when he had persuaded his friends to interrogate the bar staff who made it clear they knew her.
When he saw her photo, all he could see was the likeness to his own lovely Julie, blended with his own. Was it too much to hope that this girl was his daughter? She had Julie's surname, her features, was from her hometown. He had to find out. He had told his comrades that he was leaving them, that it was time for him to go it alone, but that as a parting gift he would find the girl and take revenge. Bloodthirsty cheers had erupted and they had finally let him leave with their blessings and his cut of their stolen loot.
He'd taken some time out, away from the group to prepare for the visit. He’d scribbled down everything that he could remember about Julie and what she had told him. He had it all committed to memory, but he wanted to ensure nothing was overlooked - her parents' names, her birthplace, her school, the types of businesses they ran. He had spent weeks holed up in a hotel, feeding from room service, trawling the internet for information. He knew Julie was alive. He knew that the businesses her parents operated were still running. He had even found the registration of her daughter's birth online. Although confident of much of the information he had secured, he couldn't be certain if the address listed for Julie was still current. Most of the records he had found were six months old or more. A lot could change in six months.
As he walked the gravel path to the car rental kiosk, he considered his next move. Deciding to come to the UK was the easy part. The difficult part was deciding what to do now he was there. The oppressive reality of what he was about to do was overwhelming. Was he going to reveal himself to Julie? To his could-be daughter?
The woman behind the counter ushered Kasper forward. "So, you come far 'ave you?"
"Yes, quite far," Kasper replied, filling in the form with bold letters. “I'll be able to return the vehicle to any of your outlets when I'm done?"
"Uhuh, we just ask you to phone us to make the arrangements first. Sometimes it can get all in a bit of a kerfuffle, expecting cars back in one place and then they turn up in another."
"Yes, of course." Kasper gripped the pen tightly and pushed the nib into the paper hard.
"You got far to go now, have you lovely? Cardiff is it?"
"Not too far. Bethel," Kasper said without looking up. "Does the car come with satellite navigation?"
"We can sort that if you want, you just need to tick the box, alright?"
Kasper ticked the box.
"Course, it's not far like. Follow your nose once you’re on the motorway. Course me, I couldn't find my head if it wasn't screwed on."
Kasper pushed the completed paperwork across the counter, accompanied by a credit card, his driving licence and a slightly tampered with passport.
The woman sucked on her cheek as she examined the documents. "Hear, you take a lovely photograph, don't you? Me, I look like a pig in a wig in my passport."
Kasper's eyebrows knitted together. Janet, that was the name on the badge pinned to her nylon blouse, waddled down to a desktop photocopier at the end of the counter and began copying his passport and driving licence. She returned, stapling pieces of paper together as she walked.
After a brief rummage through a key safe, she produced a single car key attached to a leather strap. Kasper hurriedly took them and put him in his pocket. Janet smiled and waved a handheld payment machine in his direction. Kasper punched in the pin code and withdrew the card as soon as the electronic message told him to.
"Hope to see you again soon.” Janet winked at him, then signalled at the family behind Kasper to come forward and take his place. Kasper didn't waste time with pleasantries. He wanted out of there, to be somewhere he could compose himself and forget about his hunger for a while. The rental agent's voice was so annoying that he’d wanted to kill her for that alone.
Janet the Annoying had been right. It didn't take him long to get to Bethel and the journey wasn't difficult. It was fortunate, as she had given him a car without a satellite navigation system. He could have gone back and asked her, but he honestly couldn't take another word uttered from her frosted pink lips. He had a mobile phone and his tablet computer. He could manage. From his rudimentary knowledge of the area, garnered from his research centre at the hotel, everywhere he needed to go was just off the one motorway that cut across South Wales.
So this was it, Kasper thought to himself, Bethel. The peculiar little town which had birthed his sweetheart. Kasper had never imagined that he'd be there since becoming a vampire. They had talked of him visiting her during those hazy days of summer long ago, when she had possessed the innocence and wildness of youth, and he had owned its fascination for the world and for everyone in it. That was a long time ago. Twenty-three years had distanced those promises. They may as well have been an eternity.
When his vampiric status was no longer in any doubt, when he finally realised what was happening to him, what he was becoming, Kasper had known what it had meant for Julie. It spelled danger. He knew with every fibre of his evolving body that he would eventually kill her. It was cruel to cast her aside without a word, without explanation, but the heartache would heal. Sating the urge to rip out her throat would be far more damaging. It would be fatal. He couldn't risk it. He had to put distance between them. He had to understand what was going on and allow her to be free, to build a life, to live.
After Ferrers had bitten him and fed him his blood, a misguided but nonetheless effective solution to his probable death, Kasper had returned to Julie, and to her bed. They had slept together and when he woke, his fever eased by her nursing and their love-making, he had wanted nothing more than to devour her in another way. Still a deep urge - still carnal, primal almost - but different, lethal. He had run to protect her, but had it been too late? Had they made a child that night? Vampire blood was already surging through his body, changing his physiology and functions. How could that even be possible?
He knew it was improbable, impossible even, but he knew that the girl in the photograph was his daughter. Had seen it from across that crowded bar in Antwerp - the eyes, the nose, the curve of the chin. She was all him, and all Julie. It couldn't be a coincidence. And as he stood in the centre of Bethel, he knew that he was right to have come. He needed to know.
Kasper peered through the shop, from what he estimated was a safe distance, and watched the red-headed woman in the smock top and boot cut jeans as she organized balls of yarn and carefully folded fluffy white bed linen.
There you are, Julie Morgan, there you are, he thought.
She had filled out over the years, but only by a little and in all the right ways. Her breasts were a little fuller, her waist a little thicker, her jaw slightly less defined - but she was still beautiful. He hoped that she knew it.
As he stood across the street from her, two pavements, a
busy road, a bus stop and a steady flow of pedestrians between them, he recalled every word she had ever said to him. She'd told him everything about her home life - of her family, of Bethesda the small village where she was raised, her father who was strict but whom she loved, her mother who was quietly strong and powerful, the little shops they ran. It hadn't taken him long to find her once he had got to Bethel - a short walk down the high street. As he stood in front of the shop, he wondered if her parents were still alive; would they make an appearance? Did she live with them? He hoped she wasn't alone.
A shiver ran down Julie Morgan's spine, a cold trickle of whispering fear. She quickly turned and peeked over her shoulder, through the shop window and out to the street. She had the distinct feeling that she was being watched, but there was nothing out of the ordinary, just the usual round of early afternoon shoppers, all bustling to the bus station with their budget carrier bags and limited purchases.
"Don't be daft Julie," she told herself. She had no idea why she felt so jumpy, so on edge; the sensation had crept up behind her without warning. Shaking the embarrassment away, she went back to folding up pram covers and placing them neatly on the display table. They seemed fresh, clean and full of promise. She told herself that, at forty, it wasn't too late to start again.
Kasper Andersen placed his Nikon SLR on the bed next to his wallet and leather jacket. He hadn't taken any photos that day, but out of habit he liked to have the camera near him when he went out during the day. It gave him something to hide behind as he observed the world, and that was something he enjoyed a great deal. As the years went by, his connection to humanity decreased - he could feel it diminishing all the time. He had gone from fighting his condition and resenting his maker, to acceptance and eventually to seeking the company of other vampires for both companionship and for economic reasons. He wondered if he would be like Ferrers in another couple of decades. Studying the humdrum of mankind helped to keep Kasper grounded, helped him cling on to that last shred of humanity that prevented him from massacring everyone in sight for no other reason than that he could. Ferrers had told him that keeping the semblance of a "normal" life would help him function and to stay sane. In hindsight, he had to agree that he was right. He hated Ferrers for that. He hated Ferrers for everything.
Sophie Morgan (Book 2): Death in the Family Page 4
