by Clare Willis
“You have beautiful eyes. What color are they?”
The bartender snorted, then turned it into a cough.
“Blue?” Jacob tossed two twenties on the counter. “Keep the change.”
“I don’t think so. Azure? Indigo? Slate?” She moved closer, peering at him. Her breath could strip wallpaper.
“Are you a painter?” Jacob asked.
“Interior designer.”
Outside, the woman stumbled on the uneven pavement. Jacob grabbed her by the waist, but once her balance was reestablished he released her.
“May I have your keys, please?” he asked.
“Oh, yeah, they’re in here somewhere.” She fished in her purse and handed him a set of keys, attached to a key ring from Brown University.
Jacob examined the familiar insignia. “Did you go to this school?” he asked.
“Me? No, it’s my boyfriend’s …” she paused. “My ex-boyfriend’s car.”
He flipped the keys in his hand. “I see.”
“You went to Brown?”
The truth was that his father helped to establish Brown University, using the proceeds from slave trading to finance it, but that statement would raise more questions than it would answer.
He shook his head. “I used to own a farm in Providence.”
“A farmer, that’s cool,” she slurred.
Jacob opened the BMW’s passenger door and helped her in, then he slid into the driver’s seat. He had to adjust it—he was taller than the ex-boyfriend. “Where do you live?”
“Haight and Masonic.”
Jacob nodded. “I’ll drive you over and walk back. It’s only a couple of miles.”
“Okay.” She paused, and then spoke again, a bit more hesitantly. “Or we could go to your place.”
He turned to look at her. “You don’t need to do that, Susan,” he said.
“How do you know my name?” she asked.
“You told me.”
“Oh.” She nodded, unsure.
“You’re not yourself. I will take you back home and you can get some rest. You’ll feel better in the morning.”
She pulled him toward her. Her lips were soft, as was her tongue, and sweet-tasting, despite being steeped in alcohol. Jacob often went months between feedings, and he was always surprised at how soft they all were, how utterly appealing, and yet ultimately unsatisfying.
“You should know, Susan, I’m not like other men,” he said.
“Are you gay?”
“You mean do I prefer men for sex?”
“No, I was asking if you’re happy,” she said drily.
“You are teasing me.”
“Or you’re teasing me.”
“I don’t mean to.” He smoothed her hair off her cheek.
She gripped his arms as if she were afraid he would run away, which was, in fact, a real possibility. He was already regretting this encounter.
“Okay, so what do you mean, you’re not like other guys?”
He looked out the window at the dark parking lot. “There are things that I need to do when I’m with a woman …”
She made a phht sound. “Trust me, Jacob, there’s nothing you could want that would surprise me.”
He looked back and raised his eyebrows. “Oh, really?”
“That didn’t come out exactly how I meant it.” She paused, looking embarrassed. “I just meant that I would really like you to …”
“Stop talking.”
Jacob kissed her, pressing her against his chest so hard he heard her bones creak. He started to back off, but she clung to him with the desperation of a drowning woman. The kiss deepened, their tongues entwined. He smelled the leather of the car seats, the briny scent of the bay, and the thick, overwhelming scent of blood. She pressed her fingers into his shoulder blades, drawing him toward her, arching her body so that her neck was presented to him like a present to open. When his fangs entered her she screamed with pleasure. He felt her whole body shudder from her shoulders to her toes.
“Don’t stop,” she begged, but she didn’t know what she was asking for. He took just enough, then gently disentangled himself from her slack limbs. He turned her face so that she was looking into his eyes, and he concentrated on creating the mental channel between himself and the human that would make her susceptible to suggestion.
“When you wake up tomorrow, you will remember going to the Sea Watch and drinking. You won’t remember how you got back home.”
Unlike with Sunni, the glamouring worked easily on Susan. She nodded slowly, her eyes round as saucers, and then slipped into a comfortable slumber as he navigated the quiet streets to her house.
The awkwardness began as soon as the shudders of Sunni’s hard-won orgasm subsided. She lifted Alex Petrie’s hand out from between her legs, only to have him toss his arm over her stomach and pull her into a close embrace.
“That was fantastic,” he murmured into her hair.
Fantastic? Sunni squeezed her eyes shut. When she opened them he was still there, his lips pressed against her jaw. She escaped his arm and slid out of bed.
“Yeah, it was great,” she muttered. “Just need to go to the head.”
“The head?”
“That’s what they call it on a boat.”
Sunni closed the door behind her and peered into the tiny circular mirror she’d glued to the wall. Her lipstick was smeared and raccoon rings of mascara circled her eyes. She splashed water on her face and brushed her hair and then sat on the toilet with the seat closed, picking at a hangnail.
“Stupid, stupid, stupid,” she muttered.
It wasn’t just the choice of having sex with Alex Petrie that she was angry about. That was the least of her problems. What had been chasing around in her mind ever since she left the wedding was the encounter with Jacob Eddington. She had certainly never admitted it out loud, to Isabel or anyone else, in fact she hadn’t even acknowledged it in her mind until tonight, but she had been harboring a fantasy about Jacob for over two years, ever since he saved her from being mugged.
That night she’d been working late, plowing through résumés on Craigslist, looking for a replacement for the receptionist she’d just fired. Sunni had come in at ten and found the gallery empty, the door unlocked and the alarm off. At ten fifteen Linda returned from an impromptu coffee break to find that her boss already had her termination letter typed up and her personal items packed in a box. When Linda complained Sunni dragged her by the arm to a painting on the wall. It was tiny, two inches by three.
“Do you see that?” Sunni shrieked. “That painting, which you could fit in your pocket, is worth seventy thousand dollars!”
The apology Linda proffered fell on deaf ears. Sunni posted an ad that morning and by nine that night she had forty résumés in her inbox. She culled out some likely candidates, placed a few phone calls and set up interviews for the next day. At ten o’clock she realized she hadn’t eaten dinner, so she locked up the gallery and bought a slice of pizza at the Blondie’s near the cable car turnaround. Juggling pizza, paperwork, and her purse, she didn’t notice the man until he was right in front of her. As was the muzzle of the pistol he was pointing.
“Give me your purse,” he said.
Sunni knew that in situations like this the best thing to do was hand over the purse. She tried to obey, but her hands were full and she was taking too long. The mugger shoved her hard. The pizza flew into the air and landed on the sidewalk, followed by Sunni. The man bent over and grabbed the strap of her purse.
That was when Jacob Eddington appeared. Sunni figured afterward that she had hallucinated this part, but in her memory Jacob appeared from overhead, as if he’d been flying like Superman, looking for crime to avert. He knocked the man aside, sending him flying like a bowling pin, and then he cradled Sunni in his arms, wiping the cheese off her face and smoothing her hair.
Sunni had the ridiculous thought that she was glad she’d been mugged, because anything that brought a man like this into her li
fe was worth it. He had the deepest, most soulful eyes she’d ever seen, and she wanted to look into them forever. When his hand cupped her cheek the pleasure of his touch was so intense she felt tears spring to her eyes.
“Don’t cry,” he’d whispered. “It’s all over now.”
He’d helped her to her feet and handed over the purse and the sheaf of papers. They’d stood awkwardly looking at each other for a long moment, and as she gazed at the face of her savior, Sunni had a strange feeling of déjà vu.
“Do I know you? “ she asked.
He shook his head. He was very tall, and had dark, unruly hair that touched his shoulders. Sunni felt she needed to say something, anything, to make the man stay, but her brain stubbornly refused to cooperate.
“Well, if you’re all right, I’ll be going,” he said.
“Please don’t go,” was the brilliant line Sunni spouted.
He smiled, and she realized then why people say that the heart is where love resides in the body, because her chest ached in a way it never had before. And then he was gone.
For days afterward she walked home past the pizza parlor, looking everywhere for the elusive man, always thinking that he was just around the corner. And she did see him. The first time was several weeks later. As she was passing through Union Square at lunchtime, swinging a shopping bag from Bloomingdales, she saw him on the corner, waiting to cross Geary Street. She’d immediately reversed course and headed toward him, only to lose him in the crowd as the light turned green.
He appeared every once in awhile, always at a distance, and by the time she reached the spot where she’d seen him he was gone. She and Isabel had talked about it, and they both agreed that the man must not have seen her any of those times, and that when he did finally notice her he was going to come straight over and introduce himself. Then the relationship that should have started with the mugging would finally begin. She had harbored that fantasy until today, at the wedding, when she came face-to-face with the mystery man and everything had gone entirely and completely wrong.
She closed the door to the head and walked through the gently rocking boat to the berth. Alex was lying on his back with his mouth open, snoring. She shook his shoulder. When he opened his eyes she smiled apologetically.
“I’ve got an emergency I need to attend to,” she said.
“Oh no,” Alex sat up, rubbing his eyes. “Is there anything I can do? ”
“It’s not that bad,” Sunni said, feeling guilty. “We just need to leave now.”
Chapter 4
As Richard ambled through the quiet lobby of the Mandarin Oriental Hotel, he paused to admire the collection of rare orchids on display in the atrium. At two o’clock in the morning the hotel was operating on a skeleton crew, just one drowsy bellhop and a receptionist surfing the Internet. Neither of them raised their heads as he walked to the revolving door. He felt a brief second of panic as the glass cage trapped him, which was relieved when the doors slid around and disgorged him on the other side.
After turning up his overcoat collar and slipping on a pair of deerskin gloves, he strolled along Powell Street. Now that all the restaurants were closed for the night the briny scent of the bay hung heavy in the air. Richard’s nose twitched with distaste. Many years ago, at the start of his vampire life, he had been trapped for weeks on the open ocean in a sailing ship with a broken mast. Luckily the cargo was human, so he didn’t starve, as did almost everyone else on board. But it had been a terrifying experience, and he didn’t care to be reminded of it.
He turned the corner and paused in front of Sunni Marquette’s shop. Her name was etched into the gleaming plate glass window. He wiped away a smudge with his soft leather glove. Silently he named some of the artists inside: Giacometti, Matisse, Picasso, and Renoir. Richard’s nostrils quivered as he breathed in his second favorite scent in the world—money. There was a lot of it invested in that gallery, although he wasn’t sure yet what was the source. But if he played his cards right perhaps he’d have the money as well as the woman. That would be a lovely lagniappe, as New Orleans people put it.
He was feeling very pleased with himself. Very pleased indeed, and also a bit peckish. He looked up and down the street, assessing his options. He could go to a bar, a nightclub, perhaps a house of prostitution. Or he could simply walk into the park across the street and wait for a shadowy figure to approach, offering drugs, sex, or intending to mug him. Then he could take what he wanted and leave the husk where it fell.
A glaring neon sign caught his eye, advertising a club called Emerald City. He eyed the mammoth doorman and the line of slender young boys and girls in skimpy clothing waiting to have their IDs checked. He wouldn’t fit in at all, he surmised, which would make it all the more interesting. He strode swiftly up the street, bypassed the queue and went directly to the doorman. A few of the more adventurous boys grumbled, but when he turned around every eye was downcast.
“Sorry, we’re full right now,” the doorman said. “You’ll have to wait until somebody comes out.”
Richard pinned the man with his gaze and watched his fleshy face grow slack.
“You would like to invite me to go in right away. ”
“Please go in right away.” The doorman swept the curtain aside for Richard to step in. He removed his gloves and checked his coat in the cloakroom before proceeding into the dark cavern. The humans, with their inferior eyesight, couldn’t tell that the Emerald Club was a stark concrete warehouse, the walls punctuated with velvet curtains that covered more concrete. A very good sound system circulated music like air throughout the room. Richard paused to locate an advantageous spot to watch the goings-on. He spied a lone stool on the short side of the L of the bar where he could put his chair to the wall. Unfortunately a college fraternity type was sitting on Richard’s stool, with two friends standing nearby, all drinking bottles of beer. Richard slipped unobtrusively behind them, and then waited for a moment, all of his attention focused on the seated gentleman. In a few seconds the man turned to his friends.
“Dudes, check out the honeys on the dance floor. Three of them, and they’re dancing with each other. Let’s go check it out.”
The bigger one, as he lovingly nuzzled his beer, said, “Aw, man, I bet they’re dykes.”
The first man, now standing, answered, “No way, they’re too hot to be dykes. Let’s go before someone else bogarts them.”
They all drained their beers and headed for the dance floor. Richard commandeered the now vacant stool. The bartender came over immediately, leaning close so that he could hear the order.
“Would you kindly pour me a Stoli martini with two olives?”
The bartender deftly mixed the drink, spinning the bottle once for effect, then slid the glass over. Richard nodded politely, positioned the glass squarely on its napkin and looked around. The smells were overwhelming. He had never been in a place where people bathed so much as in modern America, but still they exuded a million strong aromas. Especially in clubs like this, which were full of the desperate smell of the chase. Cigarette smoke, sweat, deodorant, hot breath, perfume, greasy hair, cologne, intestinal gasses, blood. A room like this reminded him of Bangkok, where he had spent time both in the 1860s and 1970s. In Bangkok people lived on the streets in the humid atmosphere, cooking, bathing, defecating, praying. The only smells from Bangkok that were missing in this nightclub were dried fish and incense.
He had to concentrate to separate one odor from another in this overheated human soup, but soon he was able to zero in on what he was looking for. Over in the corner near the dance floor, but not on it, were two single women. Both were in their late twenties or early thirties, a bit too old for the Emerald Club. He could tell everything about them from their expressions and their posture. They stood facing out but shoulder to shoulder, indicating that they were available but protecting each other, egging each other on. The one on the right came here a lot. She was looking for the elusive Mr. Right in all the wrong places. Richard honed in on
the one on the left, the reticent one, the one who didn’t believe in second chances. Her girlfriend had put her up to this, lent her a sexy red dress, encouraged her to apply extra makeup and put up her hair. He could tell she wasn’t comfortable with herself this way. She looked awkward but attractive, her brown eyes large and round, her naturally curly hair escaping its tightly coiled arrangement. Under the spaghetti straps of the dress her shoulders glowed, as pink and soft as a newborn piglet.
He put the drink to his lips and let a little liquid rest on his tongue. He tasted the oil and salt and Italian sunshine in the olive, and then the sharp rustic tang of the vodka. The Italians take an inedible, bitter fruit and make the delicious versatile olive, while the Russians pour chilled lighter fluid down their throats without benefit of mixer. So many different cultures, so many different approaches to life.
He turned his attention back to the woman in the short dress and rehearsed the impending scenario in his mind. When he approached her she would be surprised, pleased that someone so attractive would choose her, but wary of his intentions. Maybe he would buy her a drink, maybe dance with her to a slow song. He would spread his palms on her back, sense the undulation of her hips. Through his fingertips he would feel every vulnerability that a delicate woman contains, each knob of her spine held in place by tiny sinews, so easily broken, the rivers of blood flowing north and south from the heart, entering all the little tributaries where her hopes reside—the hands, the eyes, the nose, the mouth. He would lean down, speak soothingly into her ear, his lips just touching her hair. His words would form gossamer chains, holding her in place with the force of her own dreams. She would surrender up all that she was and ever would be on the strength of a whisper. She would trust him, although she had no reason to do so. It was the nature of women.
Except for Sunni Marquette.
Even though he continued to watch the one in the red dress, Sunni filled his mind. He had known when he first saw her, all those years ago, that she was different. It was in the tilt of her chin, how she held her shoulders at right angles to her neck, the way she could meet anyone’s eyes without flinching. It wasn’t that she could never be won over, that she was unassailable. But she would have to choose him, not the other way around. Perhaps she could be had, but she could not be taken. There was a spark in her that was unquenchable, even if she was too naïve to realize it.
