by Mandy Rosko
"A woman was found dead earlier today. Looks like a feral tore her neck wide open and left her to bleed out."
Charity gasped, her hand flying to her neck in sympathy. "That's horrible! How could that have happened?"
Mike and Jackie looked at her. She forgot Charity was even there and it looked like Mike did too.
Mike took her arm and led her to a corner where they could speak while another police officer distracted Charity by asking her questions. "I just want to keep you safe. It looks like she was killed before the time you said but the medical examiner is going to check and get back to us after the autopsy."
Jackie shook her head. "But he's not a feral."
"It wouldn't be the first case of a vampire tearing into the neck like that to make the attack look feral when it wasn't."
Jackie massaged her throat and swallowed painfully. She suddenly had a large appreciation for her neck. "And what makes you think he's connected with her?"
Mike held onto her shoulders. "She was a doctor just like Georgette. If you say this guy is cursed then I'll believe you now, but that also means that he was once normal. He could be hunting down doctors, looking for a cure."
"Only to kill them when they say there isn't one." She finished, having a hard time digesting the fact that she might have had a crazed killer in her home, comforted him, offered him her help, and kissed him.
"I think I'm going to be sick." She bent over and fought for deep breaths, the feel of Mike's large hand rubbing her back brought her no comfort.
She'd been so sure, so sure he was just a victim of unfortunate circumstances that she was willing to go along with him, that she had felt guilt for calling Mike in the first place.
What had she been thinking? Stupid, stupid, stupid!
"Do you need me to go with you? Answer more questions?" She prayed he'd just send her home.
No such luck. "That'd probably be best." He pulled a cell phone out of his pocket and handed it to her. "Want to call your mom?"
Jackie took the phone. She didn't want to give her mother anything to worry over, or to nag at because she'd become comfortable in the presence of a man she knew might possibly be dangerous in such a short amount of time, but she needed to hear a warm voice.
Patty picked up quickly.
"Hi, mom."
“Hi, baby. What’s going on?”
Her cheery voice had Jackie fighting back tears. She didn't know why she was crying. Everything was fine now. Kyle was safely away and she was in a room filled with cops.
"Honey, I've been trying to call you. Where are you?"
Jackie wiped her eyes and sniffed. "I'm, uh, calling from Mike's cell."
"Oh! Well, isn't that nice. You kids make sure to use protection now, or not. I could use some grandkids already."
Jackie laughed, then sniffled and rubbed her eyes some more. She didn't even have the strength to fight her about the fact that she wasn't dating Mike. She could barely win the fight against her trembling chin.
"Are you alright? I thought I heard a sniffle." Patty said.
"Yeah, mom, I'm good. I've just been sneezing a lot. I think I'm getting something."
“Probably Karma because you dragged me out of bed today to take your last half of the shift, only to come back after losing your wallet."
"I found it," she said quickly, not wanting to say how she found it, and then suddenly she didn't want to tell her mom that she would need a ride home from the police station.
"Oh, great! At least you won't have to cancel your cards."
"Yeah, mom, about that—"
"But I have some more good news, it made me feel so much better. Your sister is here."
The clock stopped the second her mother mentioned her sister. Her eyes dried up like the inside of her mouth. "Carly's home?"
"Yes! Isn't that wonderful? I was beginning to think she'd forgotten all about us. But she said she's here to visit for a while. Taking a break from touring the world and all that. And she has pictures!"
"Uh, great."
Mike pointed to his watch, signaling that she needed to hurry up.
"Listen mom, I only called to let you know I found my wallet. I'll be over tomorrow to say hi to you and Carly."
"Actually I was thinking she and I would drop by tomorrow and visit you at work. Then all three of us could hang out, and Carly could see how well the store is doing."
Jackie clenched her teeth. The last person she wanted was for her high style, too tall and too thin model sister, the sister that their mother was so proud of, see that she still worked in their mother's little shop because she couldn’t get her own career. "Great, uh, listen mom I have to go. Love you."
"I love you too, and so does Carly."
Jackie hung up and handed Mike his phone. She couldn't help it. Her sister was always a sore subject for her.
"I guess you'll need a ride home?" Mike asked.
Like a starving dog, Jackie jumped at the scraps he offered. "Could you?"
He smiled, eternally patient. "Any time. Now let's go."
FIVE
Jackie answered questions about what she knew of Kyle, what she saw in the alley, and what happened when she kissed him—all four times—for nearly an hour and a half before Mike decided she didn’t have more information than that and drove her home.
He leaned across his seat and looked up at her when she got out of the car. "You alright?"
She nearly shook her head but managed to hold it back, though she had suspected that despite the wide smile she threw on her face and a chipper, "Never better!" He saw right through her.
He hesitated before nodding and letting her walk up to her apartment by herself.
Jackie dragged her feet up the stairs. Yeah, she was fine alright, as long as she ignored the guilt that fed off her insides like termites.
All she could see was Kyle’s face as the police led him out of the library in handcuffs. The look in his eyes that she didn't even have the guts to face as he passed her nearly zapped her into about a million pieces.
Jackie pulled her keys from her purse, trying not to make much noise in case Mrs. Harlen across the hall heard her and came out to ask about the man she'd allowed into her apartment.
She wasn't even mad enough at the older woman to demand her spare key back.
Jackie let herself in and switched on the light, half expecting Kyle to be waiting in the dark for her. There was no one. Her apartment remained silent and empty as though he’d never been there in the first place.
She sighed at the sight of the finger holes in her drywall, then pulled her garlic spray out of the wall and shook her head at the hole. That would need to be fixed, but only after she got a good night's sleep.
"I did the right thing, I know I did," she muttered, stripping off her clothes and heading for the bathroom and the hot shower that awaited her there.
But if she did the right thing, why didn't she feel like she did? What was wrong with her? She had no attachments to him, didn’t know who he was or even how much truth there was to his story. She should feel no guilt whatsoever.
Especially if what Mike said was true, but even if it was, that didn't make Kyle guilty, just a suspect.
She stood in the shower and soaked for some minutes before getting out, wrapping a yellow towel around her torso and another in her hair before she went to her room. She didn't have the energy to put anything on for bed so she crawled under the blue covers as she was and tried to sleep.
A tingling itch she couldn’t describe immediately took control of her body. The tingling turned to pulsing deep inside her, producing heat under her skin. She tossed and turned, unable to find a comfortable spot and incapable of holding still. The covers became entirely too hot around her that eventually she kicked them off.
She sat up and rubbed her face in the dark. The towel came undone from her hair that now hung damp around her shoulders, cool at first but then it too became hot. The towel around her middle hung limp about her hips and sh
e threw that away too.
She breathed deeply, gasping occasionally for air while her breasts shivered and heaved, her core swelling and pulsing. He wouldn’t get out of her head, only this time it wasn't the look of betrayal she was seeing, or even the kisses he forced on her, but now she saw him pinning her to the floor, kissing her neck while scraping his pointed fangs along her flesh, massaging the breasts that wouldn't stop shaking.
Dammit those were her hands. She pulled them away and shoved them into her hair instead, then gasped. Where was this fantasy coming from? Where was this sensation coming from?
When Fantasy Kyle settled between her spread legs and removed her panties she fell back on her pillows.
Everything turned black.
***
Kyle gripped his hair with both hands, his right leg jumping up and down beneath the table as he tried to pay attention to the questions being asked. But he couldn't get the image of Jackie out of his mind.
He should be furious with her for what she did. He was furious. But that didn't stop the amazing images from invading his mind. He began to sweat with the effort it took to keep his body from reacting to them.
The last thing he needed was to become aroused while being questioned about murder. What the Hell was wrong with him?
Finally, just as his little mind adventures began heating up, even more so than he thought was possible, one of the detectives tossed some pictures under his nose. The fantasy vanished and his jumping leg stilled.
Kyle looked through them without lifting them from the table. They were horrifyingly real images of a dead woman lying in her own blood. "This is the girl you think I killed?"
"Didn't you?"
Kyle scowled, but knew better than to show any other emotion or anger that could rile the detective up. Detectives didn't care if the suspect became insulted during the questioning process, they had a job to find a killer and a little annoyance on the suspect’s part was the least of their problems.
"No." Kyle said flatly.
The detective, Jason Miller, leaned on the other side of the table with his fists knuckle down on the metal surface before taking a seat in the chair where he'd hung his jacket. The sleeves of his white shirt were rolled to his elbows and his weapon in its brown leather holster was exposed. The man was taller than Kyle by at least two inches, older by at least three years—which Kyle figured made him thirty-five—shaved his head bald and sported a stylish dark brown goatee.
There was a long two-way mirror to Kyle's left, and he wondered who else was listening in on this conversation. How close were the legal systems from the world he knew to the world he'd stumbled in? What were his rights? They certainly sounded the same when he was being read them while having handcuffs slapped on his wrists. No one mentioned anything about a lawyer, but surely there was more to it than that.
"Her name is Margaret Clayton, a young plastic surgeon. Tell me what you see," he said, waving towards the pictures.
Kyle saw a dead woman with her eyes wide open, dressed as if she was expected to make an appearance at a popular club. Short skirt, high heels, and enough jewelry to make her sparkle even in death. Her neck was twisted awkwardly and large chunks were ripped from both sides of it. Other pictures showed similar rips along her legs, arms, and one on her hip, right through the shiny fabric she wore.
This time he had trouble keeping the anger from his voice. "You think I did this?"
Detective Miller shrugged, all professional. "By your own statement, and that of the woman you attacked in her apartment—"
"I didn't attack her."
Miller ignored him. "You were on the verge of becoming a feral only last night. You would know the behavior of ferals considering the fight you put up against them, and it must have been some fight, I’ll give you that. Those suckers are tough."
"But as you can see, I'm fine now so obviously I didn't do this." Kyle tapped his finger against the pictures of the dead girl. He looked at them again and cringed before shoving them away from him.
Not a nice way to die.
"That's true, it does appear you are the victim of a curse, which will be looked into, since, as you must know, curses are illegal."
Kyle kept himself from folding his arms since he didn't want to look defensive. "Actually, I wouldn't have known that considering five months ago I never knew any of this existed."
He nearly rolled his eyes at himself. Good way to not look defensive, idiot.
Detective Miller let out a bored sigh. "Be that as it may, the point is that this woman wasn't killed by the bites, despite how gruesome they look."
Kyle's eyes widened, he leaned a little farther into the table and looked back at the pictures. "Her neck?"
Miller nodded. "Very good."
"But that still doesn't prove anything. I've never even seen this woman before. Why would I want to kill her?"
"Perhaps she refused to help you."
"What?"
Miller leaned against the table and folded fingers together. "C'mon, you can talk to me about this. A man like you, scared, new to everything you're seeing and experiencing must be looking for a way out. Looking for a cure. Isn't that why you broke into Miss Moore's apartment?"
Kyle didn't like where this was going, and it irritated him to no end being spoken to like a liar and a delinquent. "Her landlady let me in," he said, unable to keep the sarcasm from his voice. "Vampires can't get in anywhere unless they're invited."
Miller swiped a hand over his hairless head. "So you do know a thing or two about vampires. Doesn’t matter because you're not really a vampire, are you? Either way you probably could have gotten in with or without Ruth Harlen's help."
Kyle couldn't believe it. They were just looking for any excuse to make him look guilty.
"And you were so eager for a cure that when Miss Clayton told you what anyone else would have told you, that there is no cure for vampirism, that changing your face and skin would do nothing, you killed her. You made it look like another feral attack and went and found Jackie Moore."
Kyle stood, knocking over his seat. "No!"
At that moment the door opened and the large man Kyle recognized from the library—the one in the cowboy hat who was standing rather close when talking to Jackie—stepped inside.
Red hot jealousy bubbled inside him like boiling water. He didn't understand where all this was coming from. Sure Jackie was a beautiful woman and all, but he barely knew her, definitely not long enough to form any sort of emotional attachment. If she was dating this man then it was no one's business but her own.
So what was wrong with him then?
Cowboy’s eyes were on Kyle before he spoke to Detective Miller. "I just got the call that Georgette Sash woke up. We need to go and see her." He looked at Kyle again.
He immediately knew what they were going to say before they said it. "Let me guess, I'm staying here."
The other man shrugged with a half a grin on his face. "Sorry, but until she confirms that you had nothing to do with her attack, you're staying here."
"But when she does confirm it I'll assume that flimsy story Detective Miller here gave me won't be enough to hold me."
"As of right now, no, it's not. He and I are going to compare your story with hers. By the time we finish, Forensics should be done going through your motel room. Until then, these nice gentlemen are going to take you some place cozy.
These nice gentlemen turned out to be two police officers in uniform, and by some place cozy he figured they meant a lonely little cell just for him.
Kyle went with them quietly. He didn’t want to give them more of a reason to be weary of him or his intentions in the city, and when he was safely locked away he began wondering why the name Margaret Clayton sounded so familiar to him.
***
Jackie couldn't keep her mouth closed all day, she couldn't stop yawning even when the store was at its busiest. During the slow time when the shipments came in and she had to sit there with her clipboard, making su
re all the right things were delivered and that any mistakes were sent back, she nearly fell asleep. She almost wished her little fantasies about Kyle would come back so she could have something to keep her awake.
But the life like fantasies that aroused her out of her sleep enough times to make her wonder what was wrong, and to make her lose sleep, were not with her now.
Oh, she recalled them with great pleasure and even a secret smile, but her imaginings today were nowhere near as core-tingling erotic as they’d been last night. Was there something wrong with the fact that she enjoyed fantasizing about a man she didn’t know?
She poured herself a cup of coffee—even though the pot went cold long ago—to give herself the jolt she needed. She spread both hands over the mug and muttered the incantation to heat the liquid inside. Not too difficult, just a simple little—
The mug exploded in all directions and cold coffee spilled everywhere. Jackie jumped back to keep it from getting on her shoes.
She sighed. Why couldn’t she do one little heating spell without making something explode? Now she had to clean it and go without.
The bell over the door tingled. Jackie threw away the coffee soaked paper towels and went up front. She stopped, her neck clenching for patience. Not a customer, her mother, looking healthier than ever, glowing even, walking in with Carly on her arm.
Her sister stood tall and elegant next to Patty, holding her hand and surveying the entire shop behind giant sunglasses that Jackie could see her own rumpled reflection in.
Carly grinned her wide bright red lips at her and opened her arms to reveal a stylish little red dress under a thick fur coat. Though Jackie thought it might be a fake since the last time she saw her sister, Carly had been on the verge of becoming a PETA activist.
However, she wouldn’t put it passed her sister to have just thrown away the idea of becoming an activist because it was too bothersome.
"Jackie!"
Jackie walked to the other side of the counter and into her sister’s skinny arms, suddenly feeling very unattractive in her baggy grey sweater, faded jeans, and sneakers. Somehow, with her lack of sleep, she’d forgotten her mother and sister were coming to visit.
