“I suppose,” Lucien continued, placing his index finger to his cheek thoughtfully, “they feel that they will be more respected. Just like your name is not really Summer Solstice.” He raised his brow knowingly, touching the tip of her nose with his finger. “It is Summer Stone. It’s the same principle with us.”
How fascinating. Summer had learned more about vampires in five minutes with Lucien than she had in her entire life. She hungered to ingest every detail of this mysterious night.
“What about you, Lucien du Charmont? Is that your real name?” “Mmmm, it is.” he replied, inching closer to her until his arm wrapped round her shoulder, and they sat face to face; shoulders connecting, thighs connecting, eyes connecting.
“Good, because I like it,” she said. “It’s fancy.”
Summer placed her hand on Lucien’s knee. She scarcely dared to think of him as a lover. The idea was appealing and appalling at the same time. Perhaps vampires made love in strange ways that she couldn’t even imagine. Then again, perhaps they made love in wondrous ways that she couldn’t yet dream!
“Would you like me to tell you a few things about myself or would that bore you?” he asked.
“Somehow I get the feeling that what you have to say is going to be anything but boring.” Summer pulled a cigarette from her case, rooting in her purse for her silver lighter.
“Allow me,” a voice emerged from behind an orange glow. She looked up to see a vampire offering her a light. She leaned into the flame; slowly dragging on her cigarette.
“I’m Ted,” he informed. “I’ll be your server tonight.”
He was extremely thin and lanky, with an elongated face that reminded Summer of Stan Laurel. He wore black tuxedo pants, a cummerbund and a stiff white shirt that sported illuminated liquor advertisement buttons. One in particular caught her attention. It was a glittering green fairy, blinking to life in one place and then in another. It gave the illusion that she was flitting from one spot to the next on Ted’s shoulder.
“Are you ready to order, or do you need a few minutes?” he asked.
“Brandy, please for me, and the lady will have…”
“I’ll have a Cutty Sark on the rocks, double,” said Summer, scanning the menu, “and how is the Nosferatuna melt?”
Ted screwed up his face and shook his head from side to side.
“Oh, that bad, huh? I think I will just wait awhile to eat.” She closed the menu, handing it to Ted.
“I’m down with that,” replied Ted. “I’ll be back with your drinks in two shakes of a martini.”
Summer surveyed the room. Vampires and mortals alike drank and danced, some mingling together, and some gathering in tightly packed cliques of separation. She noticed ironically, that other than the staff, the vampires were dressed quite normally, while the mortals were often dressed as vampires, as if they wanted to be that which they were not.
Fingers crept along her inner thigh, brushing the skin that was exposed just above her stocking.
“Are you enjoying yourself, Mon petit voyeur?” “Busted,” she admitted, smiling guiltily at Lucien. Summer couldn’t help her fascination with every aspect of this odd place. In her curiosity, she realized that she had been totally neglecting her escort.
“I’m sorry,” she apologized, squeezing his knee. “I feel like a kid at Disneyland.”
She turned to him to explain. “It’s just so weird, because I thought I knew more than the average person about vampires.” She placed her hand on Lucien’s cheek, stroking it lovingly with her fingertips. “I realize now that I’ve always been on the outside with my nose pressed up against the glass, looking in, but never really being a part of it. Now I find I’ve dropped into their world, and I know nothing at all.”
“Well, then, before I strain your ears with the sad story of my life, what would you like to know about the lives of the vampires?”
Summer picked up Lucien’s arm, placing it around her shoulder, and snuggled into him. “Everything, Lucien - I want to know everything.” While his fingertips languidly stroked her bare shoulder, occasionally brushing against her breast, he whispered stories of the vampires into her ear.
“See that mature lady standing at the bar - the cougar dressed in Chanel with the silver hair pulled tightly into a chignon? Her name is Patrice, and vanity is her sin. The story goes, so fearful was she of growing older, that she begged to be turned into a vampire before she aged another day. Now she prowls the city looking for youthful lovers to feed her ego.” Lucien exaggerated a shudder.
“That group in the corner, the one where the mortals are paired with vampires; those are vampires and their ‘Donors’. Donors are the most pathetic of all creatures. They offer themselves to a vampire as food, but the relationship never lasts. As all servants are wont to do, Donors eventually desire to become like the master. Unfortunately, by that time, their minds are too far gone, and they would make a dangerous and cruel vampire. Rarely does a master turn a Donor.” Summer surveyed the congregation of Donors and Masters. The Donors gazed at their vampire Masters sycophantically, while the vampires drank lustily from their offered wrists and necks. For the first time since entering this den of blood-thieves, Summer felt a cold chill in her bones.
“What happens to them?” Summer asked.
“You don’t want to know.” Lucien shook his head and waved his hand as if to dismiss the offending answer. “If the master is kind, he finishes them off. If he is selfish and uncaring, he abandons them to the streets.”
Summer swallowed hard, her eyes roaming the group of Donors, wondering what would become of each one. Who were these pitiful people, and how did they arrive at this place in their lives? She wondered.
Lucien heaved a heavy sigh. “Sadly, there are legions of these wretched shells walking the world, their minds so damaged and twisted that they become serial killers, sexual deviants, and oftentimes politicians.” Legions? Did he say legions? The implications were staggering.
Summer was woozy at the possibility of so much sickness released into the world.
“Mon chérie,” Lucien warned. “Make note of the faces of the Donors that you see here, because you cannot tell them from other humans.”
Summer scanned the blank faces of the Donors. He was right. There was nothing at all that distinguished them.
“These are very dangerous beings,” he warned. “They seek to possess the power and control that has been exerted on them by their Masters, and they find many ways to feed their craving. Most of the horror unleashed on mankind is at the hands of abandoned Donors.”
The information was a terror and a revelation at the same time. Summer pressed a little closer to Lucien as she turned the possibilities over in her mind. How many times had she watched a true crime show on TV and wondered aloud, “What kind of sick bastard could do something like that?” Now she knew.
Her thoughts were interrupted as Ted placed their drinks on the table. Lucien indicated that they did not need anything else for the moment. She took a long gulp of the amber liquid, trying to wash away the bitter taste in her mouth. She called to mind some of the infamous fiends of the world…Hitler, Dahmer, Manson, Gacy…could they have been Donors?
Lucien tapped her rapidly on the leg, pointing to a corner of the room. “See the group of vamps hustling unsuspecting suckers at billiards - their names are Marcus, Gaston, Dodger and Nitro. They call themselves the Vicious Ones, and I recommend steering clear of them.”
Summer turned her attention to the gang of four. They were young, modern-day vampires, dressed in black leather jackets with an odd embroidered symbol on the back.
One of them knocked over a drink onto the green felt of the pool table, and the others loudly berated him for his clumsiness. On the surface, they appeared no different from any other rowdy gang of miscreants that might be found hanging out in a club.
Lucien then pointed his chin to the bar area where a forlorn, middle-aged fellow slumped over the polished countertop.
“See the puffy-faced vampire sitting next to the barfly?” he continued. “That’s Louie the Lush. He was a drunk when he was turned, and now he feeds only on alcoholics. He waits until his victim is besotted with booze, and then he tames two beasts with one bite.” The stories of the vampires were many and varied. With deepening concern, Summer pondered what Lucien’s story might be.
Whom did he choose to feed on? She didn’t like the thought of him feeding at all. Did she even want to know? She wanted to see him as pure and guiltless, but the sickening reality was that it just couldn’t be. Did he prey on helpless women? Little children? The very thought nauseated her, and she tried to push it from her mind. Surely, he wouldn’t, but she had no way of knowing without directly asking him.
“You see,” he continued. “Vampires tend to retain their mortal natures after they turn. If a vampire was merciful as a mortal, they will also be merciful as a vampire. If a mortal has a cruel nature, he will continue to do battle with those same cruel urges as a vampire.”
It made perfect sense to Summer. People don’t generally change who they truly are no matter the circumstances. A skunk doesn’t become a rose and vice versa. She contemplated her interactions with Lucien, searching for clues to his nature.
Tonight he had been gentle and protective, but there had been moments in the alley where he seemed to enjoy frightening her. Had he been testing her, or did he hide a secret sadistic streak?
The question of his feeding habits hounded her with the doggedness of a bounty hunter. If she was going to be keeping company with this vampire, she needed to know, but she truly didn’t want to know because, once she knew, she would have to decide if she could live with the answer.
“And you?” she broached. “What kind of vampire are you and who do you choose to feed on?”
The question hung heavily in the air. Summer had put it out there, testing the waters. The driving beat of the dance music pounded in her ears as she awaited the vampire’s response.
Lucien withdrew his touch, placing both hands flat upon the table, his eyes clouded as he stared straight ahead. Summer chewed her lip, as the silence grew pregnant with anxiety.
If the question tormented him, she could not tell. His face was impenetrably sphinx-like. She wished now that she could take it back. Her hands began to tremble, and she clasped them tightly together.
Finally, with eyes cast downward he released a leaden sigh and confessed. “Only the lonely - I feed on only the lonely. Those beings that are so bereft of the will to go on, they not only welcome death’s sweet release, they are grateful to me for doing what they do not have the courage to do for themselves.”
He fixed his eyes on hers, the enigmatic orbs now as grey as thunderclouds.
“Those are my prey, Mon petit, and there are a good many of them in this city.”
Summer understood exactly what he was saying. Only the lonely… the familiar phrase reverberated in her head. She knew all too well about the loneliness that hung over this city like a damp blanket. She heard the tales of its effect five nights a week. There were occasions when certain despondent callers would simply cease phoning in. She wondered if their despair had caused them to take their own lives, or whether they had found some happiness and moved on. Perhaps it was neither. Perhaps it was Lucien.
Her heart went out to him, because the subject of his feeding seemed to torture him so. She looked at his face, wondering if it was the last thing his victims saw, and if its beauty comforted them at all.
Lucien remained silent, the muscles of his neck drawn tight. She took a deep breath, and looked into his ever-changing eyes. “It’s okay, Lucien,” she reassured. “I wanted to know, and you told me. I appreciate your honesty.”
He had found the only way he could to cope with what he was, just as she accepted she could never be a vegetarian. She liked the taste of meat, and as long as it was packaged in neat little Styrofoam containers in the market, she didn’t have to think about the animals that it came from or what they endured to give it.
In his case, there was no substitute for fresh human blood, no tidy little vampire supermarkets. He was doing the best he could with the hand he had been dealt. She would not judge him. He was already condemned.
Lucien inhaled sharply and clapped his hands together resolutely. “Enough of that talk,” he said brightly. “You need another drink.” He motioned to Ted. “Let me order for you this time. I want to take you on a journey back through time, and I know just the thing that will help you see more clearly.”
Ted pulled a pen from behind his ear. “Another round?” he asked.
“Another brandy for me and bring the lady a Green Fairy.” Ted cleared away the empty glasses. “One Picasso’s Poison coming up!”
Flight of the Green Fairy
Summer gazed into the goblet at the hypnotic emerald liquid. The pungent scent of anise wafted from its glimmering depths. Her tongue slipped over her lips, moistening them in anticipation.
Absinthe. She had heard tales of this legendary liquor. Her heart quickened, as she grew impatient to taste its forbidden secrets.
Enraptured, she watched as Lucien’s sculpted hands deftly performed the absinthe ritual which she had heard of, but never seen. With a small pair of silver tongs, Lucien plucked a sugar cube and dunked it quickly into the absinthe. He placed the sweet, sticky cube onto a slotted spoon which he balanced atop the goblet rim. Striking a match, he set fire to the sugar. As the absinthe burned off, the sugar dissolved into the emerald liquid forming undulating ribbons of milky opalescence in the thick elixir. When the flame burned low, Lucien stirred the brew with the slotted spoon until the last of the clear emerald liquid transformed into a creamy hue.
“Drink quickly,” he instructed, “before it cools.”
Summer put the goblet to her lips and drank deeply of the exotic concoction. It possessed a peculiarly bitter, yet pleasant taste. Its exquisite fragrance filled her head.
After a moment, her backbone relaxed as her mind grew clearer, a sense of bliss overwhelming every cell. The world assaulted her all at once. She breathed sounds and heard colors. Scents produced a sensation of lightness or of weight, roughness or smoothness, as if she were touching them with her fingers.
Summer felt a strong sense of empathy towards everyone and everything.
She leaned against the cool leather of the booth - Lucien’s arm draped across the back - and she rested her head in the crook of his elbow. His hand cradled her shoulder, drawing her closer. She melted into him with the sense of their energies merging and mingling, as if two were becoming one.
Awash with a most delicious tranquility, her head lolled to one side, and her half-lidded eyes dropped drowsily downward. She passively noticed a single perfect bead of the enchanting elixir lay on the swell of her breast, oozing ever so slowly towards the crease of her cleavage. Turning toward Lucien, she saw his eyes fixed upon the errant droplet as well. Encircling her waist with his arm, his lips parted, and he retrieved the sweet syrup with the tip of his tongue.
A current of sexual energy ignited in her breast, crackling down the center of her torso, and detonating in her pussy like a Fourth of July sparkler.
The heat of her body rose, and she knew that it was more than the absinthe diffusing through her bloodstream. Despite the warm flush rising on her neck, she trembled as their eyes met.
With a feather-light touch, his fingers flitted over the mounds of her breasts, tracing the edges of the deep neckline of her dress. Her breath caught in her throat as she arched her back, her body eagerly greeting his touch.
Lights from the dance floor swirled through the darkness of the club and seemed to wrap them in garlands of living colors. Lucien drew her tightly to his body. She pressed her cheek to his. His skin felt cool and smooth. Her fingers entwining his hair, she yielded her neck to him and urged his mouth towards the vulnerable spot. With lingering kisses, his mouth caressed her neck, sucking at the flesh, but never piercing it.
Every m
oment was an eternity; every sensation brought such pleasure that she wasn’t certain her body could contain it.
Lucien’s fingers crept beneath her skirt and stroked the supple skin on her inner thigh; his cool touch against her warm flesh like fire and ice. She felt unmoored from herself, adrift from her body. The sights and sounds of the club faded into nothing more than background noise. She was aware only of his touch upon her thigh, and she longed for him to explore ever higher towards the moist heat between her legs.
Summer parted her thighs, urging him onward, but his hand stroked her thigh and nothing more. The scent of his desire, drenched in deep purple and patchouli, leached in long, grasping fingers from his pores. Could he smell her lust as well?
The music from the club oozed into her ears, bouncing around her brain. She visualized the notes swirling round in her head as his fingers danced over her sensitive flesh.
“My name is Lucien du Charmont,” he hummed.
To her awakened senses, his voice sounded like chocolate, but tasted like marzipan. “I was born to nobility in the area known as Charmount, into the class of Noblesse d’eplée in the year 1761.” The cadence of his voice was soft and dreamlike, like a bedtime story. Summer shut her eyes, allowing his voice to transport her to the countryside of eighteenth century France.
“My Chateau was a wide, white fortress of stone. Thirteen cerulean turrets stretched into the clouds above the great courtyard, where fine carriages and prancing horses clattered on limestone slabs.”
So vivid was the vision that she truly seemed to be standing in the courtyard. The white chateau shimmered like the surface of the sea at sunset. Mullioned windows reflected a cloudless sapphire sky, while carriage wheels rolled across the stones with a gravelly grind. The rhythmic clip-clop of hooves carried her into a time in which she had never lived, but for this moment felt hauntingly familiar.
Only the Lonely Page 5
