Venom & Vampires: A Limited Edition Paranormal Romance and Urban Fantasy Collection

by Casey Lane

  Instead, here I was a couple hours later, running up the stairs in fear for my life.

  Rounding left at the first landing on the Y-shaped grand staircase, my frantic glance fell down to the open hallway far below. Crowding together with their heads pointing up, I got a quick snapshot impression of my friends and family. They stood there with their mouths hanging open, slack-jawed. I was simply grateful nobody else was following us up the stairs yet.

  Chasing after me, Rod’s legs were like pistons and seemed twice as long as mine, eating up three stairs to my scrambling one. Luckily, I had enough of a head start on him and this was my house. Bounding up and over the last wooden tread, I gripped the bottom of the carved pineapple finial that topped the balustrade. As I had done countless times, I swung myself tightly around the post and propelled my body down the second story hallway of the family wing.

  Flying past closed doors, I flung open the last one on the right. It crashed against the doorstop with a loud “boing” and was springing back when I ran across the threshold into my bedroom. Throwing the heavy door closed behind me, I whipped around to lock it. I caught a glimpse of Rod’s furious eyes and bloody face. He went for me just as the door clicked shut.

  I threw my weight against the wood and turned the deadbolt above the glass doorknob. Bending down, I quickly lifted the cane bolt lock mounted vertically at the bottom edge of the door and twisted, ramming home several inches of the foot long iron rod into the designated circular hole in the floor with a final, victorious thud.

  Leaning my sweating forehead against the secured door, I panted while the big football player pounded on the other side. The deadbolt wasn’t some rinky dink hardware store model, but the best steel money could buy. The cane bolt lock made it nearly impossible to kick the door open without first destroying the door itself. Milled over one hundred years ago from a black walnut stand on the property near the lake, all the doors in King House were solid as rocks. Rod “Ram” Ramaldi could do his worst, but short of exploding the door off its hinges, he wasn’t getting in anytime soon. I was safe for now.

  The sheer stupidity of that thought caused me to moan. I fell to my bare knees in drained exhaustion, shaking with delayed reaction. I fought the urge to throw up from the awful stench rising from my dress and suffocating me. Horrifying images flashed across my brain.

  I had killed people tonight.

  Now that I’d stopped running, flipping out might be next on the agenda.

  I fear nothing will ever be normal or safe again.

  Chapter One

  Scully: “On the old mariner maps, the cartographers would design unexplored territories by simply writing ‘Here Be Monsters’.”

  Mulder: “I’ve seen the same thing on maps of New York City.” -The X Files

  From the beginning…

  To accomplish the goal to begin the new “happier me” chapter of my life, I’d covertly researched to find the perfect hotel bar on the 494 strip in Bloomington. The bar had to meet my requirements of catering to a certain, classier clientele and my desire for anonymity.

  I’d decided on the Radisson Blu Mall of America Hotel for its proximity to the airport. The newer hotel also has the distinction of being the only hotel connected directly to the Mall of America by a skybridge. Normally those would be reasons for me to avoid a hotel, but the Radisson Blu’s predominant clientele during the weeknights were travelling businessmen. Travelling businessmen happened to be my targeted demographic.

  I call it the cruelest example of Murphy’s Law, but most people should at least agree it’s horribly ironic that the hotel bar I picked to start my new life was the same hotel bar arguably ground zero for the end of the world as we know it.

  No matter how satisfying it would be to place the blame on my three best girlfriends for forcing me to go out on this fateful night, it was my own procrastination to keep my word that caused me to be at the Radisson Blu hotel and nothing else.

  Of course, I had no idea about any of that at the beginning of my evening.

  The weird stuff started happening before I even made it inside the hotel while I was sitting in my car in the parking ramp. Procrastinating yet again, my mind had been anxiously streaming random thoughts while admiring my image in the visor mirror. I couldn’t stop staring at my exotically unfamiliar reflection. I rather liked the looks of the gray-eyed, blonde staring back. I confess to having a secret fascination for slutty party girls in the way a lot of women do for their polar opposites, but I still felt awkward as hell dressing like one.

  As a jeans and boots woman; I rarely wore dresses and never stiletto heels. Walking from my house to the car in my ridiculously tall shoes, without falling flat on my face, had already been challenging. Then there was the very real possibility of sitting down in this mini dress and flashing the bar because I forgot to keep my legs together. Just thinking about that wasn’t helping my anxiety levels any. As for the cosmetics, I never wore makeup like it was slathered on right now, plus my hair has never been this…big in my life.

  Thinking about hair, I wanted to scratch my scalp but didn’t. God forbid I mess up one strand of the shining platinum hair-do that was sprayed to within an inch of its life.

  Wrinkling my nose, I continued delaying leaving the car, my itchy head a good reason to let my mind drift back to getting prettied up earlier tonight. When my girlfriends had fussed over getting me ready in my bedroom, I’d complained most about this stupid, big hair.

  Jane, single mom, boutique owner, and fashionista, had smacked away my hovering hands. “If you want to be stunning tonight, leave it alone.” I’d snorted at the concept I’d be stunning while Jane sprayed even more crap on my head. She set the giant can aside and lightly chucked my chin with a finger. “Ah come on, honey, lighten up. Your hair’s rocking it.”

  I eyed the long mass of shining curls in the dressing table mirror. I had serious doubts about that. “Yeah, if my name was Sugar and I hailed from 1980s Texas.”

  My other friend, Liz, snickered as she spun me around on the stool to face her. An ex-model, Liz specialized in marrying, but was currently between, extremely rich husbands. On the threat of death, Liz warned me to hold still while she expertly made up my face for the big night ahead.

  I obeyed, but like talented women across the globe, I can talk without moving my lips. “I bet with a good butt of this stiff helmet head, I could severely maim anyone that gets out of line tonight at the bar. Any takers?”

  Jane huffed and Liz laughed, but my third friend, Deb, had jumped at the offer with all seriousness. “Twenty bucks says you can’t.” Deb waved her wine glass, even as a frown of confused worry marred her brow. She was the mother hen of our group. “Wait a sec. Isn’t the whole point of tonight that you act like a woman, not be maiming and head-butting?”

  Aside from being a friend, Deb has run King House and been the resident chef for over twenty years.

  I offered, “I’ll match my twenty bucks against a pan of your Dauphinois potatoes. And don’t fret; our bet is on only if I have to get physical.” Jokingly, I’d added, “After all, I’ve been married since I was eighteen, Deb. How would I know what the hell I may have to do tonight to defend my honor in a bar?”

  Both Jane and Liz laughed in experienced agreement about the pitfalls of the singles scene. Almost fondly, they then reminisced over several incidents in their pasts involving drunks, creeps, and assholes in bars, or various combinations thereof.

  At the look on my face, Jane and Liz had stopped to reassure me that I was meeting a man for a drink, not going solo. Jane got me back about the hair by saying that even I should be able to avoid fisticuffs on a meet-and-greet first date. Liz knocked quickly on my dressing table and warned Jane not to jinx anything. They laughed merrily together and thought themselves quite cute.

  Sophisticated Liz patted my shoulder. “Relax, Acadia. Meeting a man in a bar is the equivalent of taking candy from a baby.”

  That was me, Acadia King, hick farm girl and the fou
rth in our quartet of friendship spanning the decades since grade school.

  I sat mulling over Liz’s snarky advice until I saw Deb avert her head. She tried to hide the tears the words about my years of marriage had brought to her eyes but she wasn’t fast enough. My upbeat mood evaporated instantly. Liz sent an annoyed frown Deb’s way and determinedly changed the subject.

  Rex, my Australian Shepherd who had been patiently watching all this girly stuff from his place on the foot of my bed, yawned over at me in bored commiseration. I gave Rex a fond scratch on his head in total agreement, and dragging my feet, left for my “date.”

  Now that I was alone in the parking ramp of the hotel with no friends peering over my shoulder, I critically examined my image in the visor mirror. Liz had outlined my eyes in smoky black. I looked downright sultry. The false eyelashes looked glamorous, but man, they blew to wear. All the way driving here, I was afraid to blink. I worried they’d get tangled up with my lower lashes, blind me, and cause me to do a header into an overpass wall.

  Puckering full red lips, I tried to smile flirtatiously. Failing that, I attempted an alluring expression. Flipping the visor shut with a snap, I decided to stick with my usual unsmiling face and hope for mysterious. The point of tonight was to be attractive, not chase a man off in fear. Men were notoriously frightened of clowns, which was what I felt I looked like when I smiled with the gunk caked on my face.

  Yes, I felt one part clown, one part cheating whore, and all parts a complete fool for ever agreeing to do this tonight, but I’d given my word to the girls.

  “Well, shit on a shingle,” I swore a loud softly at that inconvenient reminder. I could lie to a lot of people if I had to, but not to them.

  I delayed more by mentally reconnoitering the route to the elevators and into the hotel. The second floor hotel parking ramp was packed full of parked vehicles. Not that I bothered trying to score a space up close. Rather than drive my truck tonight, I’d borrowed Deb’s Toyota Prius. I purposely parked in the shadows of the far off row along the back concrete half wall. My little sortie was all about remaining inconspicuous. I was going to keep my word to my friends in my own way and then get my butt back home.

  This was when the weird stuff I mentioned before began to happen. I spotted a sizeable group of people a couple of rows over stumbling towards the elevator area. It was yet another good excuse to stay in the car while I waited for the group use the elevator ahead of me.

  I may not personally enjoy all the trappings of fashion but I’m still a woman, so I judged their hair and clothing to pass the time.

  Short hair slicked to the side from a straight part, the men all wore black dress slacks, black ties, and black oxfords. The women’s hair hung long and loose, and so did their black skirts. I was envious of their sensible flats. The entire group all wore buttoned-down shirts. I could smell the Clorox; every dress shirt gleamed so white.

  What piqued my interest was the whole bunch appeared to be wasted. It didn’t jive with the dressed alike thing they had going on that brought to mind a doorbell ringing, religious cult.

  “Must of drank too much of the Kool-Aid tonight,” I murmured, chuckling snidely. The more I watched them stumbling along while dragging suitcases and bumping into each other, the more convinced I became that they were all drunk off their asses.

  Idly wondering which one was vehicular homicide waiting to happen, I leaned forward to peer around. A Radisson Blu airport shuttle bus sat further down my row. Parked rather sloppily on the horizontal across three spaces, the lights inside the shuttle softly glowed through the open side door. I didn’t see a driver. Somewhat relieved, I figured the bus was how all the drunks arrived. I turned back to watch the group’s weaving progress.

  I winced sympathetically when one of the men slammed his knee into the cement base of a support column. Too bad he was so wasted. He was kind of cute from what I could see. He careened off in the general direction of the others, thrashing his arms angrily. Nope, he definitely wouldn’t cut it for tonight. It would have been great to save myself a trip into the hotel bar, but a belligerent drunk wasn’t attractive under the best of circumstances; James Franco’s doppelganger or not.

  Deciding they should be long gone by the time I reached the elevator, I grabbed my black leather purse. Jane had tried to insist I carry a silver clutch that matched my shoes, but I’d laughed in her face. Those tiny purses hold squat and I’m a country girl. I never go out alone without my gun, not at night near The Cities, and especially not the Mall of America. The gigantic shopping center was probably crawling with sex offenders and degenerates from all walks of life.

  For ten o’clock on an October evening it was absolutely beautiful out, so I left the sweater shrug on the front seat where Jane had thrown it in irritation at my noncompliance over the purse. The silver fabric scratched and I hated the wispy thing. Even Jane had to agree a bumpy rash on my chest would be a turn off for some pickier men.

  In my tight, short dress, I awkwardly swung both legs together out of the small car, until I could stand.

  “Okay, okay, I can do this, think of a bike,” I muttered under my breath for the umpteenth time. “Act like a lady and don’t cuss. Just survey the bar, pick the target, and take the candy from the man baby.”

  I took a cautious step on the skyscraper high heels but cried out, “Yeow!” I stopped and squatted a little, rubbing the inside of one burning thigh. “Jesus Christ Almighty that hurt!”

  From sitting in the car so long, I had gotten sweaty. With that first step I think I ripped off the top layer of skin where the sensitive flesh of my bare upper thighs touched. The wispy crotch of my new underwear was damp, too, and felt oddly stretched out. It was currently riding up my butt crack and the lace chafed like a burlap string.

  “Oh, isn’t this fucking great,” I grumbled, digging around under my dress to adjust things best I could. Still, chafing or not, along with the silver purse and the sweater shrug, refusing to wear pantyhose was about the only other decision I didn’t regret tonight.

  I locked the car, hitched my purse strap up, and attempted walking again. The tightness of the dress and the tall shoes caused my steps to be short and mincing. I felt like a total idiot.

  Short, uncomfortably tight dresses and heels like stilts; it would be a cold day in hell before men dressed liked idiots this way to attract women.

  With that thought, I pulled out my phone and sent a quick text to my gay cousin Sean. In it, I conceded he was right in our recent debate when he stated that women are, by nature, martyrs and masochists.

  I looked up and my attention was snagged by a tall couple approaching the elevator. Half of the drunks were still milling around, waiting for the next car.

  The tall couple, a man and woman in their late forties, had their arms around each other’s waists. They were talking and laughing, obviously having fun together. I saw the man teasingly tickle the woman in her side while she, laughing brightly, pushed his hand away.

  The tall couple’s horsing around brought a small smile to my lips, but it also nudged the black hole that had taken up permanent residence in my chest where my heart used to be. I’d been fighting against the strong pull of this darkness every day since Lawson died over two years ago.

  The people who care about me in my life have been predominantly fooled into thinking I’m coping well with my loss and healing. It’s because I’m a good actress and a better liar. When I have to go out, I wear a composed mask in public. But over the last months, I’d begun avoiding dealing with people as much as possible.

  I tried burying myself in my work. I used to love my work and thrived under the hectic pressure of running King Farm with Lawson, as well as my own smaller businesses on the farm. Alone now, the enormous responsibility of the huge farm was another burden weighing me down.

  Besides, it didn’t matter how hard I worked myself into mental and physical exhaustion, or how many people cared about me, I couldn’t seem to give a damn about much of anyth
ing or anyone, least of all myself. I felt isolated, and that black hole of despair greedily consumed more pieces of me every day.

  Without Lawson, sad cliché or not, my life was empty and had no meaning.

  In other words, I’d been a walking poster child for clinical depression due to extreme grief, but way too hardheaded to see a professional or pop some pills.

  Every day I coached myself I could ride it out one more day. People lose people they love all the time and managed to have happy lives again. If I got through just one more day, life had to start looking up somehow, sometime. That catechism went on week after week in my mind, and while life had trudged on, it never seemed to get much better.

  Three people weren’t fooled by my coping mask. Liz, Jane, and Deb had been standing off on the sidelines, silently supporting me and respecting my grief. But you didn’t have to be an Einstein to read their faces, and the more depressed I’d become, the less silent they were.

  They worked on me until I agreed to start trying to have a life again. The girls understood how devastated I was to lose the man I love, they all loved Lawson, too. However, they said my grief was getting unhealthy and had to stop. Logically, what they said was necessary for me to hear. Lawson spoiled me when he was alive, but if he could, even he would be the first in line to tell me to cut the BS and get squared away.

  I was thankful for my friends and intended to try harder, but part of me resented them for interfering in my life, even as I knew I was being a bitch. Those pharmaceutical sponsored ads on TV that made you want to kill yourself, even if the thought had never crossed your mind, were right about one thing--depression hurts. When you’re hurting, getting a life is much easier said than done. Besides, I already had the perfect life with a great man. I didn’t want to let that life go or forget. I didn’t want to replace it with another life.