by Vremont, Ann
He gave in to the urge after a few bland questions. “Did you remember anything new?”
“No.” It was a lie. I had remembered another detail about Nestor. There was a name tattooed on his other hand as well -- Oscar.
He changed tactics for a second. “You go back to school on Monday, right?”
“Yeah. School wanted me to wait and finish up taking the first term next year. But my aunt talked them out of it.”
“So today's your last day free of school?”
Sure where he was going with the question, I made a non-committal noise. It was probably the last chance I'd have to see him. There would be a gang war, or some other set of freaks would find something more outrageous to do and he'd be onto a case that hadn't grown cold.
“Do you think you could sit with a sketch artist today?”
“I told you, they were all hair and shadows.”
“Lee, it doesn't hurt to try…”
I closed my eyes, waiting for him to go on. I imagined his body, the way we'd been pressed against one another yesterday. Was he thinking the same thing? He couldn't be, not while he was asking me these questions all over again. Whatever had passed between us the day before was over - for him at least.
“I know you're not afraid, Lee. You were pretty fearless going into that house yesterday.”
I dropped my voice, held the phone tighter to my face. “Because you were with me.”
“Lee, I really want you to do this. Please.” He hesitated as he chose his words, and I trembled waiting for each one.
“Okay. I'll try.”
“Great, I'll send a car around to pick you up, let me see…”
I heard him shuffling through paper until at last he came up with a name. “Officer Henning, she's a couple years older than me, red head, I think…you'll know her from all the freckles.”
“Fine. How long?” I chewed on my lip, trying to keep the disappointment out of my voice. I had expected him to pick me up and drive me home. It was the only reason I had consented.
“Thirty minutes? I have to schedule the sketch artist, don't want to make you wait around for him.”
“Fine.” I repeated tersely. “I'll be ready when she gets here.”
I hung up then and went inside. Elliot was watching television, his eyes glazed over from the pipe he'd just finished off.
“I'm gonna shower quick.” I stepped in front of the television to make sure he knew it was me speaking and not the television. “There's a female cop coming to drive me to the station to meet with a sketch artist.”
“Meet her outside.”
I nodded and his eyes started to slide shut. I turned toward the hallway.
He called me back.
“Baby girl, about the funeral-”
“I told you. Burn her.”
Chapter Nine
I sat with the sketch artist for about an hour and a half with no sign of Danny before, during or after. When the artist was done, the picture looked a bit like Nestor, but with some intentional misdirects on my part. I also told him there was writing on one hand, not both, and that I couldn't read what it said, wasn't even 100% sure that it was writing and not something else.
Still, it was good enough for Danny to send me an excited text by the time I got back to Elliot's to let me know that he had the picture and was running it through the system.
I didn't answer the text. I was in the bathroom, instead, with a paring knife. It is something I had been doing since my second day home, the day I realized all the marks from the attack had disappeared. The first few tests had healed quickly, then slowed as the week went buy. The one I'd inflicted on my calf this morning was gone already.
Blood, it seemed, made me heal faster. That, or I was going crazy and I hadn't healed at all - I was still back in the hospital in a coma or in a nut house.
Provided I wasn't crazy or in a coma, I knew I could see better, too, particularly in the dark. Elliot's house, with the black out liners on the curtains, had been pitch black when I'd walked through it last night and taken blood from his dope head friend. And in the house with Danny, I'd been able to see him when he couldn't see me.
Then there were the times I forgot to breathe - not just seconds or a few minutes, but whole stretches of time. I'd finally timed myself, giving up after thirty minutes of not drawing a new breath.
The phone buzzed on the sink stand, indicating a new text message.
“You there?”
“Yes,” I answered.
“You feeling okay?”
“Fine.” I didn't feel like texting with him. I was still disappointed he had sent someone else to take me to the station and home again.
“You mad?”
I rolled my eyes, waited a few seconds to answer him while I cleaned the paring knife and re-hid it below the sink. Before I could answer, another text came through.
“I guess that's a 'yes.'”
“No,” I texted. “I just thought we could talk about yesterday when you picked me up.”
This time he was slow to answer. I waited about a minute then added, “I still want to talk about it.”
“Not over text, Lee.”
“Then let me call you.”
“Not on the phone, either.”
I growled at the phone, my fingers flying to type in, “Then meet me.”
“Not yet.”
“Why?”
“I don't know what I'll do, Lee, if you start that up again.”
I re-read the message, hope growing in my chest. Then the phone rang, startling me so that I lost my balance where I was sitting on the edge of the tub.
“Yes?”
“Lee.”
“Yeah, it's me.”
God, how Danny waited before going on. I could feel the hard pull of anticipation at my chest, feel need pushing through me, massaging a peculiar life into my limbs.
“You have to trust me, Lee. I want to protect you. But, when I look at you, all my training goes out the window. I feel helpless…” He was talking in a low whisper, his voice rough with emotion.
His voice, the words and emotion they carried, it was like a hand traveling over my skin, raising the fine hairs along my arms and the back of my neck. A tickling tease that made me close my eyes and picture him standing in front of me. I needed him standing in front of me, warm, giving, caring, all the things I knew he would be.
I suppressed another growl. Just my luck that the one guy I wanted to forget my age was the only guy who had ever taken it into consideration.
I'd be eighteen in two crummy weeks, but that seemed a long way off. I mean, my life had changed so dramatically in the course of a single night. Anything could happen in two weeks that would put Danny out of reach. I needed to convince him to see me now.
“I'm still scared, Danny. I know it doesn't show…I don't want Elliot to see it, or Aunt Joan or anyone else…just you. You're the only one I trust now.”
And he was the only one I wanted to put my lips to, to drink and grow strong from while we wrapped one another in mutual pleasure.
“You don't have to be afraid, Lee. The detail will stay with you to and from school. I'll post a cop in the classroom, if it will make you feel safer.”
“No,” I answered. “They closed the campus after Army took me. The whole school's gonna be pissed at me because they can't drive to McDonald's for lunch now. And the principal told Aunt Joan I could only come back if it wasn't a distraction to the other students.”
“You'll have an armed officer, then, driving you, waiting outside the school and outside the house.”
“The city won't pay-”
“You're right. Their friends, Lee, off the clock, but cops all the same. They want to catch these bastards that hurt you as much as I do.”
“And when do I get to see you again?” I bit my lip, drawing blood while I waited for his answer.
“Soon. As soon as I know you're safe from...”
He didn't need to finish the sentence. I knew it wasn
't Army he was worried about but his own wants. At least I hoped so. “Danny-”
“Have to go,” he interrupted. “Looks like we might have a hit on the sketch.”
I let the phone slide to the bath mat, my mind running the same thought over and over.
Hell, I hope not.
Chapter Ten
At first, I played fragile with my police escort. As the days passed, the delicacy of my health became real. To stop Elliot from arguing with me, I managed to hold dinner down long enough that he thought I was eating. But when I could finally slip off to the restroom, it came up undigested and with blood - blood I wasn't replacing elsewhere. Cutting Elliot's friend had been a one-time opportunity, or at least a once-in-a-blue-moon opportunity. If it happened again too soon, he or Joan would grow suspicious.
But it needed to happen soon. I was beginning to feel as I had the night of the attack - drained and dying. Ms. Fields, the only teacher at school who seemed to give a shit and not act like I'd contracted the plague, noticed. So did Chris, who had appointed himself my unofficial escort to all but third period, when he was at the opposite side of the school.
My real guards noticed it too and told Danny that I was getting more frail. He called and texted me a couple of times - until I pushed too hard and told him it was because I was love sick. The next day I had to go to the school counselor. Awkward doesn't begin to cover it. I certainly couldn't tell her the truth - that something supernatural seemed to have happened. I couldn't tell her I was crushing on the cop assigned to my case and that, as much as I wanted to fuck him, I wanted to taste him, too, to draw whatever sustenance from him he could spare.
Two weeks passed with me getting weaker, a second week of it with no messages from Danny. The morning of my birthday arrived without comment from anyone at Elliot's.
Cranky and starving, I slid into the passenger seat of the unmarked cop car.
“Morning, Lee.”
His name was Mike. I saw him every third day it seemed. I offered him half a smile while I studied the network of veins at his right temple and tried to keep my stomach from growling.
“Look tired.”
“Couldn't sleep.” I was telling the truth, something that was quickly becoming a rarity. I didn't trust myself to sleep, didn't trust where my thoughts went. I was terrified I'd wake up to find Casey limp and bloodless in my arms. If something didn't change soon I would have to try to sneak out of the house, slip my guard detail and hit the park, hoping to find some passed out meth head asleep on one of the benches. Stooping to that would be sadly ironic - I'd spent the last six plus years refusing drugs and alcohol - almost everyone had wanted to push something onto me, especially Paul, who wanted me drunk so I couldn't evade his sick attempts at seducing me.
“We'll catch them soon, then you'll sleep.”
I managed another smile.
“Really, Lee. Danny's going round the clock tracking down leads. And he's probably the best in the department.” Starting the car, he leaned toward me and lowered his voice. “It looks like they did this at least once in California, but we can't say anything yet.”
I nodded, tacitly agreeing to keep the secret. We passed the rest of the ride in silence. He dropped me off in front of the school, telling me as I got out of the car that Jeff would be giving me my ride home.
“Right.” I waved good-bye, somehow finding my way into school despite my eyes starting to blur with tears. Somewhere deep down, I'd convinced myself that Danny would pick me up tonight.
It was, after all, my fucking birthday.
At least Chris had somehow found out that it was my birthday. He greeted me like usual at the main entrance, but with a bigger smile and a pink and silver striped gift bag behind his back. He wouldn't let me peek, telling me I had to wait until lunch.
I never made it to lunch. Two hours later, I closed the door to my locker, spun the combination lock back to zero and looked up to find a boy with midnight eyes staring at me.
I knew right away that we were the same, only he was much older. The youthful, smooth face meant nothing - he carried his age in his gaze. He could have told me he was as old as the desert and I would have believed him.
He was taller than me, maybe six feet, with a blend of features between Mexican and Native American. His hair was black as mine, but ultra-straight and stopping at his shoulders.
He handed me a cell phone, the screen displaying a picture. I looked down, saw that it was a photo of Casey going into her babysitter's house, wearing the clothes she'd left in that morning.
“I don't want to hurt you, Lee. I just want to talk to you.”
I stared at him, trying to figure a way out of this that didn't involve me going anywhere with him or Casey dead.
“She's dead if you don't come with me,” he whispered.
“Who are you?”
He smiled, flashing an unmistakable but discreet glimpse of fangs. “You can call me 'Oscar.'”
“Let me get my backpack, Oscar?”
Not answering, he reached in front of me, spun the combination to my locker, and then pulled my backpack out. Dipping into the front pocket, he fished my cell phone out then tossed the bag to me. As I fumbled to catch and shoulder the bag, he stripped the battery from the phone and pocketed both pieces.
I stared, mouth open, at his little trick of knowing my locker combination and how he'd zeroed straight in on my cell phone.
“Magic, Lee.”
He started in the direction of the gym, motioning for me to follow. At the exit, we blended into the students heading for the track around the football field. A few minutes later we separated from them. He headed for the fence near the canal and one of the few trees that lined it. As we neared the fence, I could see that someone had pulled the joining chain links back from the post.
There was a motorcycle parked on the other side. Climbing on, he handed me a helmet. The gesture seemed utterly ridiculous considering that he was likely lying and had every intention of killing me. I put it on anyway and sat behind him. The bike moved forward and I jerked, straightened a leg and touched my foot to the ground.
“You're kidding me, mija.” Oscar looked over his shoulder at me, the black eyes hidden behind sunglasses now. “Wrap your arms around my waist.”
Swearing at him under my breath, I obeyed. I looked behind me, watching the school grow distant and thinking that, even if I wasn't dead come Monday, I'd sure as hell be suspended.
Oscar drove to another empty house. This one had a realtor's lock box on the front door and a sign in the yard. He popped the gate to the back and pushed the bike in. The sliding glass door from the living room onto the back patio was unlocked. He opened the door and motioned me inside.
The interior was clean - the walls bright with no signs that Oscar or the others had been in here before. Of course, the bodies could have been stacked five high in the back bedrooms for all I knew.
When he shut the sliding glass door, I turned to him. “This is a lot of trouble to go through just to talk to me.”
Stopping about three feet from me, his gaze skipped up and down my body as he answered. “Can hardly have a conversation standing around in front of the lockers - me without a hall pass and all.”
There were ceiling-to-floor drapes on the sliding glass door and he closed them. “Tell me, Lee, would you have come if I'd shown you a picture of your uncle? Your other cousin?”
The house's last owner had torn the dividing wall out between the living room and kitchen and I walked over to the sink. There was a water filter on the tap and paper cups stacked to the side, alongside a real estate listing.
I poured a glass and took a sip while I stared down at my hands and willed them to remain steady. “Let's just get down to whatever it is you want.”
“Okay, mija, take you're top off.”
I dropped the cup, water spilling across the counter.
Oscar started laughing so hard drops of blood formed at the inner edges of his eyes. “It's okay, Lee. I
was just joking - I've already seen you naked.”
I shook my head, my gaze transfixed by what looked like tears of blood. “You weren't in the house.”
“No. But that culo Army was and he…well…”
He didn't finish, just wiped his thumb across his lower lip.
When I kept staring at his face, he brought a hand up to his cheek and brushed at one of the drops of blood. “I forgot. You still cry little girl tears, don't you, Lee?”
Oscar brought his red, wet fingertip to his lips and slowly licked the drop of blood away. “Pretty soon, you won't even have that.”
Stepping around the counter that separated us, he grabbed my arm. “You're dying. Do you feel it?”
I did, but I wouldn't admit it to him.
“The guys, they wanted to hunt you down, take you out. I told them you'd be dead in a week, maybe two, anyway.”
He snapped his teeth at me for effect. “You won't even live long enough to earn your blood fangs, mija.”
“Why is that?” I tried to look him in the eyes but couldn't. I knew that, if I did, I'd see he was telling me the truth and I was still trying to believe he was lying. Who wants to be dead at eighteen?
“No new blood in you, for starters. You're dry as my abuelita on her wedding night, Lee.”
“So you're only going to let me live because I'm dead anyway. You're too kind, Oscar.”
He smiled at that and stepped closer. “Nah, I don't want you to die.”
"Your brothers do."
"Fuck them. Make them gods they still act like god damn sheep with their lame ceremonies."
Scary-assed, blood sucking sheep, maybe.
He brushed his nose along my hairline and then dropped his face to my neck. Hearing him inhale, I felt his lips brush my neck and ear.
“You're something of a freak among freaks, you know that?” He grabbed my other arm and kept me from pulling away. “The way you turned, you shouldn't have. No amount of our blood should have saved you, but it's like your body knew the blood, wanted it.”
He backed me up against the counter and pressed his body tight against mine. “And yet you haven't had any since, what, the hospital?”
