by Deanna Chase
***
I awake up all at once, like a cat. Considering I used to doze in bed for hours, I’m not sure I like this vampire side effect. I sit up and glance at my makeshift barrier. It remains firmly in place; no one has tried to get in while I’ve been asleep. Satisfied, I put the table back in its original position and go for a quick shower. Unfortunately for me, Matt is standing, stark naked, in the middle of the room.
He gives me a slow lazy smile. I try to quash my shudder of disgust but don’t quite manage it. I’d have thought he’d be a bit shame-faced after giving into the bloodlust so quickly. Clearly, he’s not ashamed at all.
‘I was hoping for Beth,’ he drawls, ‘but you’ll do.’ He points to the nearest shower cubicle. ‘Let’s get clean.’
My eyes travel down his body and I register that he’s fully erect. I give him and his penis a pointed stare.
‘It’ll take more than that to interest me,’ I tell him with a sniff. Determined not to let him think I’m intimidated, I push past him into another cubicle. It’s not until I’m under the hot scalding spray of water that a thought suddenly occurs to me and I yelp in alarm. I twist round and wrench open the shower door, leaping out.
‘Matt!’
The shower is running in the cubicle he’d gestured me towards. I thump on the door. ‘Matt!’
He doesn’t answer. Shit. I step back and lash out with my right foot, attempting to kick it in. With my bare feet slick from soap and water, I do little damage. I slam my shoulder against the door instead. It doesn’t budge. Cursing, I jump up and curl my fingers around the top edge of the door. There’s about a foot gap between it and the ceiling so I pull myself up and peer over. As soon as I see Matt, his jumpsuit wrapped tightly round his neck at one end and to the shower head at the other, I climb over to join him. His lips are blue and his eyes are bulging, tell-tale shots of red blasting through the whites of his eyes as he suffocates.
I grab his waist and try to haul his body upwards to take his weight. He’s bloody heavy, however, and he keeps slipping down. I start yelling and kicking the door behind me, making as much of a racket as I can without dropping him. I hear someone’s voice on the other side as they try to open the shower door. They have more success than me and it springs open, catching my back and making me fall down and drop Matt’s body.
‘Smeg.’
Beth pushes me out of the way and grabs hold of him. Even without her heels, she’s considerably taller than me so she has more success at holding him up. She still struggles, though, and it won’t be long before he falls again.
I leap up, my hands and arms on opposite sides of the cubicle walls, and shimmy upwards. I reach over for the jumpsuit noose but no matter what I do, I can’t undo it: Matt’s body is stretching the knot too tightly.
I bring my legs up and over Beth’s body and squeeze round Matt’s hanging form. Then I jump with as much force as I can muster onto the shower head. I slam my weight down onto the metal several times until I feel it breaking away from the tiled wall. I pull and pull until I’m falling backwards onto Matt’s inert body.
Beth scrabbles out from underneath him and rips into the jumpsuit with her fingernails, loosening its hold around his neck. Without saying anything, she moves to his face and tilts his neck back while I crouch by chest and begin to pump.
‘Dah, dah, dah, dah, staying alive, staying alive,’ I sing to give myself the rhythm we need to start his heart again. As soon as I finish my final ‘alive’, Beth pinches his nose and breathes into his mouth.
We do it again. ‘Dah, dah, dah, dah, staying alive, staying alive.’
She breathes and I start pumping again. It’s not until the fifth time that he finally chokes and his chest moves of its own volition. I lean back, exhausted, and stare at Beth and then at Matt.
‘Interesting technique,’ she says.
I shrug. ‘As long as it works.’
She glances down at Matt’s face. ‘It doesn’t seem right that he could die like this. He’s meant to be a smegging vampire.’
‘A newly fledged vampire.’
I look up and see Michael watching us, a grim expression on his face. He gestures at someone behind him and two vampires appear. ‘Take him to the infirmary immediately,’ he instructs.
Beth stands up. Water is still gushing from the hole in the tiled wall where I yanked out the shower head, and she’s soaked from head to toe. At least she’s still wearing her jumpsuit, I think, suddenly abashed. I’m not usually particularly modest but crouching naked on the slippery tiles in front of them is making me feel vulnerable. Michael hands me the towel that was probably meant for Matt.
‘You’ve only just been turned. For the first six months at least, it’s easy to find ways to die if you want to kill yourself,’ he says.
I take the towel and wrap it round myself. I meet his eyes for a moment; we both know this is no botched suicide attempt.
‘I don’t understand why he’d want to do that.’ Beth is apparently oblivious to our shared look.
‘He drank last night,’ I inform her. ‘I think he wanted to hold out for longer. Maybe he felt like he’d failed.’
Beth’s expression is sceptical but my mind is whirring. Although I found little in her file to suggest she is with the traitors, I’m still convinced she’s wrapped up in all this. It doesn’t make sense that she’d help me save Matt’s life if that’s the case, though. And the blood that Matt drank – it had been sitting unguarded in the social area for at least two hours. Anyone could have dropped O’Shea’s spell into the goblets, and whoever drank would be affected. I wonder what the side effects are on women. I need to talk to O’Shea again.
Troubled, I turn back to Michael. ‘Will he be alright?’
‘I don’t know.’ His voice contains a note of barely controlled rage. If he finds out who’s responsible for this, they will wish they’d never been born. ‘You two should get yourselves cleaned up,’ he says tersely. ‘Your training is due to begin in an hour or so.’
I can’t believe that everything’s going to carry on as normal but I have no idea what the alternative could be, so I nod stiffly. Michael glances at Beth before looking at me for a long drawn-out moment. Then he turns and leaves.
Chapter Eighteen: Love and Blood
When we gather later, the mood is subdued. The news about Matt obviously whipped round the other recruits like wildfire. I note that Nicky’s hands are shaking. I take special care to downplay my part.
‘I heard something like choking,’ I tell them. ‘Something just didn’t feel right. Thank goodness Beth was there or he’d probably have died.’
Beth gives me an odd look but remains quiet. When Ursus enters, he doesn’t have the simmering rage that was evident in Michael, but his body is tense and his words are curt. ‘What happened to Matthew is regrettable,’ he says, ‘but we cannot let it interfere with your own turning. Whatever his reasons for wanting to kill himself, I am sure we’ll find them out when he regains consciousness. For now, you need to focus on your own progress. We have made a counsellor available. You may speak to him later about this appalling turn of events or about your own concerns regarding the change.’
I’m surprised that vampires use therapy – it seems a very modern phenomenon. I suspect that if I start talking about the trauma I’ve experienced over the last few days, I’ll end up a bawling, shaking mess.
‘Bo, your appointment is already scheduled for 3am.’
‘I don’t need counselling,’ I protest.
‘Regardless, you will take it.’ His tone brooks no argument.
My chest tightens. It is an almost impossible situation. I won’t be able to trust the counsellor so I’ll have to skirt around the important stuff as well as trying to appear to open up. Yet another thing to worry about.
Ursus turns on the projector and another PowerPoint presentation beams up, uninspiringly entitled ‘Rules and Regulations’. Despite our anxiety about Matt, there’s a collective groan. We settle in fo
r a long session.
By the time we break for coffee and muffins – because it turns out vampires do eat real food – I’ve realised there’s an element of genius in Ursus’s monotonous lecture. It provides information we need to know and is delivered in such a boring manner that we have no choice but to calm down and stop fretting. More goblets of blood are produced, along with typical teatime fare, although I note that Ria hovers over them as if afraid to let them out of her sight. I bet they won’t be sitting unattended in any empty rooms from now on. I speculate whether she knows the truth about what’s going on, or whether she’s merely been told to stay with the blood without being given a reason.
One of the other recruits, an amiable man wearing glasses who has told me that his back acne has miraculously cleared up since he woke from his turning, eyes the goblets then makes a move towards them. Even though the others are engaged in conversation, everyone glances towards him and watches, some more surreptitiously than others.
He murmurs something to Ria and she hands him a glass, her face expressionless. He stares down at it, takes a deep breath and raises it to his lips. He gingerly takes a sip and his eyes widen. In about three seconds flat, he drains the whole thing. His eyes close in ecstasy although nothing else happens. I’m not quite sure what I was expecting. He certainly doesn’t immediately sprout long white fangs and there’s no clap of thunder.
My hands are trembling so I shove them into the pockets of my jumpsuit and turn away. As I do, I see Ursus looking at me. ‘It’s time,’ he says.
I nod, just as I see another one of our little group venture cautiously over to the blood. It’s been less than two days; there are still twenty-seven more to go. Unhappily, I follow the large vampire out.
He leads me towards the back of the mansion. We pass the corridor I discovered yesterday with Nicky and Nell, although this time I avoid pausing to check Michael’s portrait. I’m taken to a large office, complete with Victorian fireplace, vast mahogany desk and comfortable leather-backed chairs. Ursus backs out, closing the door behind him.
I’m expecting to see a friendly counsellor. Instead Arzo is by the window, gazing out from his wheelchair.
‘Are you my therapist?’ I ask him drily.
He turns, deftly spinning one wheel as if he’s been practising all his life, and looks me over, scanning every inch of my body as if to check I’m still in one piece. ‘In a manner of speaking.’
‘I kind of thought you’d be prettier.’
He snorts. ‘So did I. How’s it going, Bo?’
I lift my eyes to his. ‘Pretty bloody awful. You?’
‘You don’t want to know the trouble I’ve had with my bladder.’
‘Yeah, you’re right about that.’ I give him a half-smile. Pity for his situation is not going to be appreciated.
‘I heard about the recruit who tried to hang himself.’
‘Hmm,’ I murmur noncommittally, ‘right after he tried to shag me.’
‘It was definitely the spell then?’
I shrug. ‘What else could it be?’
Arzo runs his hand through his hair. ‘There’s never been anything like this before. It’s crazy.’
I sit down in one of the leather chairs. ‘Did Michael tell you about the theory that there’s a new Family Head trying to usurp everyone else?’
‘Michael?’ Suddenly I feel embarrassed. Arzo must register my discomfort because he dismisses it with a wave of his hand and answers my question. ‘Yes,’ he says grimly, ‘he told me.’
‘It’s got to be a woman. I smelled rosewater at Wiltshore Avenue just before I found O’Shea. And the fact that his spell targets men means it makes sense that a female, who’ll be immune to its effects, is orchestrating all this.’ A thought begins to form but it’s cloudy; before I can fully grasp it it’s gone and Arzo is speaking again.
‘There’s no evidence that it’s contagious.’
‘No, but it somehow makes sense. And Lucy, I mean Charity Weathers, told me it was a woman.’
‘You mean the human who was shoved under the train?’
I nod. ‘I would have been too, if the police hadn’t showed up.’
There’s a glimmer of anger in his eyes. ‘I heard about that.’
I shrug. Foxworthy and Nicholls’ actions seem like they happened an eternity ago. Besides, what was I going to do about it? I tell him about Beth and how it’s possible she’s involved.
He frowns. ‘And yet you say she helped you save this Matthew character?’
‘It could be a double bluff. You know, gain everyone’s trust, make it look like she’s the good guy. Maybe she knew I was on to her and this was the only way she could think of to make me believe otherwise.’ At Arzo’s look, I give a short laugh. ‘Yeah, I know. It seems unlikely to me, too. But there’s something about her that I don’t trust.’
‘So what’s next?’
‘I’m going to continue getting everyone to like me. Especially Beth.’
He starts to chuckle. Affronted, I glare at him. ‘What?’
‘You probably don’t need to try very hard.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘People generally like you, Bo. I’ve never seen you try very hard yet everyone who meets you wants to be your friend.’
‘That’s not true.’
‘Yes, it is. Give me an example of someone you know who doesn’t like you.’
I think about my grandfather. I’m sure he loves me; like is another matter. But I don’t think he likes anyone apart from that damn cat so I don’t suppose he really counts.
‘Boris,’ I say finally. ‘He despised me.’
‘Is that the best you can do?’
‘Michael Montserrat. I tried to attack him.’
‘Under duress,’ Arzo replies mildly. ‘Besides, I think Lord Montserrat likes you very much.’
I have nothing to say to that so I change the subject. There is something else I need to know. ‘Arzo, how hard is this going to be?’
He knows I don’t mean finding the creepy new vampire Head. ‘Harder than anything you’ve experienced before.’
‘Well, gee, don’t sugar coat it,’ I try to joke. It falls flat.
His expression is serious. ‘How do you feel so far?’
‘Tired. I’ve got a headache that doesn’t want to go away. And,’ I lick my lips, ‘earlier when someone else drank, my hands started to shake.’
‘That’ll get worse, Bo. Have you ever seen a heroin addict trying to kick the habit?’
‘Only on TV.’
‘Then you have no idea how rough it’s going to get. Night sweats, hallucinations, your body screaming in pain…’
‘You failed to mention all this before, you know.’
‘Would it have made a difference?’
I think about it. Probably not. ‘Why did you do it?’
He’s silent.
‘Why did you choose not to drink?’
‘I understood the question. I’ve just never really told anyone about it before.’
‘Not even Tam?’
He laughs slightly and shakes his head. ‘No, not even Tam.’ He sighs. ‘There was a girl. Dahlia. The most beautiful person I’d ever seen. We met in the National Gallery of all places.’
I try not to look surprised. I find it hard to imagine Arzo wandering around looking at paintings.
‘Yes, Bo,’ he continues gently, ‘I do have a cultured side. I’ve even been known to read poetry from time to time. Anyway, I bumped into Dahlia in front of Jane Austen’s portrait. She was a huge fan of Pride and Prejudice.’ His face twists. ‘I think she was looking for a Mr Darcy.’
I stay quiet. This is obviously a difficult story for Arzo to tell and I don’t want to interrupt with an inane question that’ll make him clam up.
‘We went on several dates. I knew within five minutes of meeting her that I was in love. Spending the rest of my life by her side was all I wanted.’ Pain crosses his face and he looks away. ‘Then she disappeared. There wa
s no trace of her. She didn’t answer her phone. I couldn’t track her through it because this was in the days before mobile phones. Her family didn’t know where she was and she didn’t show up to work.’ He lapses into silence again.
I watch him for several moments. When it’s clear he’s not going to speak I ask, ‘You thought she’d been recruited?’
He nods. ‘My best friend told me she’d suggested it was what she was going to do. One day, when I’d been working, she’d taken him to look at this very house. So, because I would follow her to the ends of the earth, I persuaded Lord Montserrat to recruit me too.’
‘Michael?’
He nods.
‘Out of season?’
Arzo smiles faintly. ‘I can be very persuasive. And they had the space. For some reason, that was a particularly bad year for recruits surviving the turning process.’
Horrified, I stare at him. ‘Was Dahlia one of those who didn’t make it?’
‘No.’ He laughs humourlessly. ‘No, she wasn’t. She was back out in the real world, eloping to Gretna Green with my so-called friend.’
‘Oh, bloody hell, Arzo. I’m so sorry.’ I reach over to take his hand but he draws back. Pity is a bitch.
‘Of course, I didn’t know that at the time. I just thought I’d made a terrible mistake by turning because she wasn’t here after all. I didn’t drink. It was hell but I damned well didn’t drink. I was going back to get her. Except when I made it to the full moon and became Sanguine instead of vampire and went back out, I found them together.’ His mouth twists. ‘Blissfully happy.’
There’s nothing I can say that’s going to make him feel any better. This is a whole load of hurt that he’s obviously been carrying around for a long time. ‘I can’t believe he didn’t tell you,’ I murmur.
‘My friend?’
‘No. Bloody Michael Montserrat. I can’t believe he didn’t tell you she wasn’t here.’
