by Susan Stec
His cell phone vibrated on the dresser as the door shut.
Dorius jumped up, taking long strides toward the phone. The mirror over the dresser caught his naked frame. He stopped to admire himself as he flipped open the phone, hit the speaker button and grinned at his reflection. Long fangs glistened in the lamplight as he tossed his hair over his shoulder for a better view of his chest.
His eyes jerked to the phone when he heard the collected voice of his older brother, Marcus. "Dorius, have you cleared up the rogue issue? I assume they are all in custody and you will be bringing them in for judgment when you return?"
"No, we have… a situation here. Not one I can't handle. Don't worry, I don't intend on missing Antoinette's wedding." Dorius rubbed his chest as he watched the muscles expand over his rib cage.
"Good. Because you're the best man, remember?"
"How could I forget?" Dorius smiled into the mirror. "Antoinette wanted me to do the honors instead of you, didn't she? And we both know why, don't we?"
"Don't forget Christopher is ring bearer." Marcus said, ignoring his brother's remark. "Make sure you have a talk with him. We don't want his bad attitude ruining our sister's day."
Dorius took in a deep breath. The mental picture of him dressed in his new black leather tux as he waltzed Antoinette down the aisle fell in a swirl down the gutter in his mind. "Christopher's… missing."
"Damn it, the boy's your responsibility. You didn't let him join in the hunt did you?"
Dorius' chest rumbled. "No, I left him with a friend… who's now dead. Christopher was gone when I got back but the wolf is on it and we'll find him tonight."
"Dorius, you have a habit of forgetting obligations in favor of your self-centered agendas. I expected you to keep your eyes on him, not one of your little tarts. Find him and bring him back in one piece. Do you understand me?"
"Yesss and I would suggest you remember who you're talking to. I handle this side of the business at BAMVC. You handle yours. Do you understand me?" Dorius ground his teeth and broke the connection, glaring at the cell phone.
Who let the dogs out.. Who.. Who…
Dorius hit the answer button. "What's the status, wolf?"
"I just watched the cops pull the body from the lake," Paul said. "It's the same woman as the picture on the driver's license. They should be clearing out soon. There's still a faint scent of Christopher here. I'll phase and find him."
"Exxxxcellent…"
~~~~
Monday morning, all six of us were sitting at the picnic table in the dining room.
Jeni had her hand wrapped firmly around a machete.
JoAnn held a Bic lighter in one hand, thumb positioned and ready, my blowtorch in the other. Four tent stakes sat on the table in front of her.
We sat across from them; four brand new immortals with no more bags of blood.
"Ok, so let's not panic," I said, while mentally chastising myself for not hiding the blowtorch. "We do have a hundred acres with plenty of wildlife, and there are still a few glasses of blood left in a pitcher in the fridge from the deer I bled last night."
"Then why do you all keep drooling over our necks?" JoAnn spat, holding up the purple lighter, her fingers shaking on the trigger of the blowtorch.
"None of you will be sucking on either of us." Jeni fingered the machete.
Zaire growled.
Resi let out a nervous giggle.
Totally unaware of the fight brewing, Mom sat with her bare feet tucked up under her, wearing one of Resi's short skirts. A hot pink tube top hugged her perky new chest. She played with her new blonde curls, gazing at herself in the magnifying mirror in front of her. "Your father was never good in bed, ya know? It was always wham-bam-thank-you-ma'am, and then I had to douche."
I ignored her, focusing on Zaire. She looked about ready to pounce.
"I'm so ready to get me some nookie." Mom just wouldn't shut up.
Zaire licked her lips.
"Nanna, sweetie, will you get your face out of the mirror and listen to me?" Jeni's eyes flashed to Mom before jerking back to Zaire.
Zaire's chest rumbled.
"Resi, I think you should get Zaire a glass of blood," I suggested.
"I don't want any more friggin' deer blood." Zaire's fangs dropped. "JoAnn, you ready?"
"You come near me and I'll use this!" JoAnn had a death-grip on the blowtorch. She flicked the Bic and a long, blue blaze shot six inches into the air, igniting her bangs.
Resi reached over the table and snatched the blowtorch. JoAnn started screeching, dropped the lighter, wobbled around and then began to slap her forehead.
"Um, smell that flame-broiled-flesh? It's bitchen," Zaire hissed.
Jeni grabbed a lap blanket off the recliner and threw it over JoAnn's head, tossing quick glances at Zaire. "I won't go down without a fight." She swung the machete in a daring arc, the point coming dangerously close to Resi's throat.
JoAnn slid the blanket down off her face, plastering sizzling hair against her pink forehead. The stench permeated the air.
I started laughing.
"We need to set some new ground rules." Jeni was still holding the machete in front of her in an 'en-guard' position.
"Now I have to cut my bangs," JoAnn whined.
"No. You don't," Zaire informed her.
"I like the way my eyes sparkle," Mom said.
"Nanna, sweetie, did you not see your daughter's hair flaming?" Jeni asked.
"She's an idiot." Mom leaned into the mirror and ran a finger over her new fangs. "Let me bite you Jo. Then your hair will grow back."
JoAnn backed slowly over to the couch.
Nonchalantly, I walked to the refrigerator and pulled out the jug of blood. "Have we figured out if we can go out in the sun?" I asked, hoping to end the stand-off. I poured four glasses and passed them around, starting with Zaire. "I mean, none of us have gone out during the day yet. I know you think we can, Zaire, but I'm not convinced."
"I'm damn sick-and-tired of goin' over this. I say we toss your ass out there and chalk that one off our list." Zaire grabbed the glass and scowled at me before she chugged it.
Jeni tapped the machete against her hand, eyeing Zaire. "I say we toss your ass out there, Zaire."
Zaire pounded the empty glass on the table and locked eyes with Jeni.
Mom broke their concentration. "Damn, I like the way my tits reach out for a hand." She adjusted her tube-top over her breasts and pushed her glass of blood toward Zaire.
Zaire growled.
"Oh for Christ's sake. Do I have to do everything?" Resi set her drained glass on the table and headed toward the front door.
"Oh, this is gonna be good!" Mom jumped up. "Do we have any aloe?"
"I do." JoAnn headed for the downstairs bathroom. "And I can use it on my forehead too."
"JoAnn, if she goes up in flames, I don't think a tube of aloe is going to fix it." I ran for the front window, blood dribbling from my glass onto my hand.
The others followed.
Resi was turning circles in the front yard, face lifted to the sun as she sang, "Nibbling on sponge cake, watching the sun bake, all of those mortals laden with blood. Strummin' my new fangs... in some big deer's vein... wishin' for humans and searchin' my so-o-oul. Wastin' away again in Vascular-venison-ville…"
By the end of Resi's little performance, it was clear the sun wouldn't fry us.
Resi came back in with a bad case of the giggles, drank the rest of the blood in the pitcher, after which she promptly headed for her bedroom, Zaire right behind her, grabbing for Resi's ass.
"Well, it's nice somebody's getting some," Mom grunted and picked up a book off the coffee table, then settled down on the couch flipping the pages.
"Mother, do you have to be so vulgar?" JoAnn's eyebrows slammed together on her pink forehead as the girls bedroom door slammed, accompanied by a burst of laughter.
"So we can cross the sun thing off our list," Mom said. "Anybody got any holy water?"
"No, and Zaire said that won't work either." JoAnn pouted.
I grimaced at the empty glass in my hand. "I think if you'd just find us a couple of pedophiles it would take our attention off your damn necks. Zaire's right. This crap is good in a pinch, but… Have you narrowed down any possible human donors?"
"Yes," Jeni said, tucking the machete into her belt.
JoAnn looked up at Jeni from her side of the couch, a book propped in her lap. "Tell them who they are, Jen." She scooted further away from Mom.
"They're owners of an Orlando daycare center, Handle With Care. A husband and wife, both charged for suspicious activity with minors, but they got off due to a screw-up on the part of a young officer that gathered evidence without a warrant. But they're guilty, all right. They closed the day care in Orlando a year ago, opened a new one in Leesburg three months ago."
I rubbed my hands together. "So we can draw straws to see who-"
"JoAnn, are you going to do this, or not?" Mom blurted, her fingers wrapped around a copy of Hotter Than Hell. She studied JoAnn's neck with a wee bit too much enthusiasm.
"I don't know. I can't make up my mind. I've been praying about it all day."
Jeni rolled her eyes. "JoAnn, honey, I think-"
I burst out laughing. "JoAnn - you - you-" I couldn't stop laughing.
Mom asked, "Does God have black sideburns and wear white spandex jumpsuits with sequins on them while he croons, 'Love Me Tender' in your ear?"
I laughed harder.
Jeni hooded her eyes. "There's nothing funny about any of this, Mother."
"Susan, you're going straight to hell and I will not be joining you," JoAnn spat.
My laughter caught in my throat. Get out of my face, JoAnn, before I bite you. Go do the dishes or something. And while you're at it, whistle 'Jesus Loves Me', cuz, he sure as hell doesn't love me. You go too, Jeni. The floor needs sweepin' and you could sing along.
JoAnn shook her head, got up, blinked rapidly, and said, "I think I'll get the dishes done."
Jeni got up and headed for the broom closet. "I'll sweep the kitchen floor."
I about shit my pants when JoAnn started whistling and Jeni started singing along."
Mom locked eyes with me. "Looks like my pretty little hands won't have to wash another dish for the rest of my immortal life. I heard your thoughts, Susan."
~~~~
Chapter Nine
~~~~
After leaving the park Saturday night, Christopher walked to the nearest convenience store and hid behind the dumpster on the side of the building. A middle-aged woman in a battered, baby blue Ford Falcon pulled up, her car clanking and sputtering as she shut it down. She jumped out, grabbed a grease-spotted handbag off the seat and staggered toward the store. Christopher scurried across the lot, hopped in the passenger seat and waited.
The woman walked out of the store, opened her newly purchased cigarettes, lit one, opened the door of her car and stuffed herself into the driver's seat.
"Wha-? Hey, where'd you come from kid? Where's your mother?" She placed her soiled cloth purse between her and the driver's door, staring at him through a smoky haze.
"I'm lost. Can you help me, Ma'am?" Christopher fingered his dirty coveralls.
She laid the newly opened pack of Virginia Slims on the dashboard and sucked on the cigarette hanging between her lips. "Get out of the car, kid." She let out a long stream of smoke with a whooshing noise.
Christopher looked into her eyes and mentally pushed, I need your help, bitch. You're going to make a couple of phone calls for me. Then you're gonna feed me. Got it?
The woman shook her greasy hair, blinked her tired gray eyes and adjusted her baggy, flowered housedress. She shuffled her dirty feet, clad in worn flip-flops, and pushed the key in the ignition. "Sure kid, but I can't take you home. Charlie won't like that." She took another drag off her cigarette, her eyes focused on Christopher.
His smile didn't move. You're not going home. We're going to make those calls from the phone booth over there. Then we're gettin' right back in the car and you're gonna take me somewhere after I get up close and personal with your neck. Do I make myself clear? Christopher pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket.
The woman turned the key in the ignition, put the car in gear, backed out of the parking space and drove up to the phone booth. Her cigarette dangled from her lips as she said, "Sure kid, no problem. Who do I call first?" The woman eyed the piece of paper Christopher handed her.
"The police."
~~~~
"What do you mean you lost the scent?" Dorius yelled into the cell phone. "If you'd stop howling at the moon, maybe you'd find time to do your friggin' job, mutt."
"Cut the shit, Dorius," Paul's tired voice floated into the car from the other side of the speaker.
"Look, I leave for Italy tonight in…oh…" Dorius looked at the Rolex on his silk clad arm. "…four hours…and Christopher's going to be with me, damn it. Sniff again. And this time find him!"
Dorius pushed a button on the side of his seat, giving his long legs more room. He was parked on a side street in Leesburg, watching his team load five immortal rogues into a black Suburban, Christopher's absence painfully clear. He'd hoped they were the ones responsible for his abduction and the death of Angelina. They were not.
"The last place I smelled him was near a Shop-N-Go and then the scent just disappears. You're sure the rogues don't know what happened to him?"
"They haven't seen him. There's no recollection of Christopher in any of their minds," Dorius growled as he watched the last body tossed in the back of the Suburban. He fiddled with his leather bolo, fingering the large turquoise stone hanging from it.
"Did you…"
BEEP…
"Hold on Paul, I have another call coming in." Dorius hit a button on the cell phone and growled, "Talk to me."
"Daddy, can I come home now?" Christopher's sarcastic voice filled the car.
"You little shit! How did my mate die? And this better be good."
"Fuck you, Dorius. I did all I could. Check out the evening news?"
~~~~
The evening news blared in the background as we all settled in front of the television while keeping weary eyes on each other.
"I started a list of ground rules," Jeni announced, her little black book in her lap. "And the first thing on the list is-"
"Don't worry Jennifer, you're off limits. You've made your choice clear." Mom looked at JoAnn and licked her lips.
"Don't even think about it." JoAnn hugged the armrest on her side of the couch. "Why don't you go suck on something outside?"
"The first thing on the list is no biting without consent. Do I make myself clear?" Jeni said.
"Aw, come on. Give me an F'n break, man," Zaire snapped. "Make up your mind, JoAnn." She sat in the recliner by Mom's side of the couch, her long legs stretched in front of my mother's path to my sister.
"All of you get away from me or I'll grab that blowtorch." JoAnn pointed at the picnic table.
"Sweetie, you have fetus bangs already. You sure you want to play with fire again?" I sidled slowly around the coffee table, heading for her side of the couch.
"So, what's with the cut on your wrist, Aunt JoAnn?" Resi sucked in her lower lip, sounding like Hannibal Lecter. She slowly sidled up near me.
I whipped my eyes in the direction of JoAnn's wrist. How the hell did I miss that?
"All right you coffin hugging bimbos, back off!" Jeni warned, getting up from the fireplace hearth.
JoAnn pushed the wrist in question under her butt. "I just wanted to see if I could…well… I licked it and it wasn't that bad, actually, but-"
I took another step closer. Resi eased up behind me. Mom's fangs puffed out her upper lip. Zaire leaned forward in her chair.
Chief Inspector Simms of the Tavares police department has disclosed they are now looking for two elderly women in the brutal slaying of a young woman pulled from Tavares lake Sunday afternoon. The woma
n was murdered in what can only be called the most gruesome crime scene in the history of Tavares. The police received an anonymous tip that two elderly women, believed to be in their late fifties, one blonde, one a redhead, both around five feet tall, left the scene shortly after sunset Saturday in a black Jeep Wrangler. If anyone has any information on the identity of these women, they are encouraged to call the Tavares Police Department. The number-
Everyone's eyes in the room were riveted on the television as they flashed a telephone number across the bottom of the screen.
Jeni broke the silence. "Well, isn't this is just dandy?"
"That little shit!" I spat.
"Susan, I am not going to jail for you!" JoAnn yelled. "I'm claustrophobic."
"I didn't touch the damn woman!" I noticed my mother edge closer to JoAnn.
"Yes you did!"
"I did not. The kid killed her. I can prove it! Where the hell is my cell phone?" I put another foot forward. Resi took up the slack. My mother's eyes bounced in our direction and she slid her feet in front of Zaire's.
"I don't believe you! And… and, I don't know where the phone is, darn it."
"JoAnn, I won't go to jail, you will." I said. "Do I look fifty? No, I didn't think so. So you better find that phone or there is another solution." I edged a little closer, my fangs did the little dropsy thing, then quickly retracted.
Zaire blatantly shoved her legs in front of my mother’s.
"I am not making a hasty decision because you lost your temper, darn it!" JoAnn's brows slammed together and her eyes jutted from one side of the couch to the other.
"You don't want to go to jail, do you?" Resi sidled closer. "Who will put flowers on Tootles grave?"
"All right, everyone freeze!" Jeni yelled.
A loud rumble emanated from my mother's chest and before we could stop her, she jumped over Zaire's legs, pounced on JoAnn and sank her incisors into her throat.
JoAnn let out a yelp.
Jeni gasped.
