by Sloan Archer
“Well, you said Robert’s fangs were missing, right?”
“So?”
“Uh, so?” she spat. “Hello! Don’t you think it’s kind of a coincidence that on the same night Mathew was murdered Robert goes missing?”
“I guess.”
“And you said that Serena knows about the fangs.”
“No, I said that she might know about the fangs,” I corrected.
“Whatever. So, isn’t it very possible—probable, even—that Serena is behind all this?”
I wanted to believe Liz’s theory. So much. But it seemed too tidy. “I don’t know, Liz. What are you suggesting, that Serena flew to America, found out about my meeting with Mathew, murdered him, took possession of the fangs, came to the house, kidnapped Robert, and then used the power of the fangs to make him break up with me?”
It sounded so insane when I said it out loud. But damn if I didn’t want to believe it.
“Yes,” Liz confirmed. “That’s spot on what I’m suggesting.” She did her defense attorney arm wave again, gesturing towards the area where the lamp had been tipped over. “Come on, Merc! There were signs of a struggle!”
“Yah, signs of a struggle, or signs that Robert and Bitch Face knocked over a lamp while getting it on,” I said bitterly.
“When have you ever knocked over a lamp—in the living room, no less—while having sex with Robert?” Liz scoffed.
“See! That’s what I mean! Robert thought I was boring in the sack because I didn’t go rolling around with him in living rooms, knocking over lamps and throwing around cushions and shit, so he went looking for it somewhere else. But old Bitch Face, well, she sure is the type, isn’t she? Lamp-knocking skank!”
“Do you hear yourself right now?” Liz asked patiently.
“Liz, I want to believe your theory. Honest-to-goodness, I really do. But he sounded so sincere.”
“You don’t think Serena could use Robert’s fangs to make him sound sincere?”
“I guess,” I admitted. “But—and I know this is going to sound pitiful or whatever—but some part of me always expected this to happen. Robert is so amazing! And gorgeous . . . and sophisticated . . . and filthy rich. But who am I?”
“You’re crazy,” Liz said. “That is who you are.”
“Am I though? Seriously, Liz. I can’t even turn into a vampire. I tried—three times, in fact—and it didn’t take. This just happened last month when Robert and I were in Bali, so it’s not like he’s forgotten. He told me that it didn’t matter and that we could work around it, but maybe he’s changed his mind. That’s not so outrageous, is it? Robert wouldn’t be the first man in history to abruptly change his mind about a woman he’d sworn to love.”
Too lazy (drunk) to make it all the way to the bathroom, I staggered over to the counter, grabbed a roll of paper towels, and returned to the table. I pulled a fistful of towels off the roll and honked my nose into it. There were tears and snot all over my face. No wonder Robert wanted to leave me.
“I don’t buy it,” Liz said, but she lacked the same conviction she’d had earlier.
“There’s something else,” I said. “When the VGO were discussing the whole fang-possession thing with Robert and me, they said that it was illegal to possess a vampire’s fangs.”
Liz snorted. “It’s also illegal to speed, and you saw how fast I got over here. Vampires break laws, Mercy.”
“You’re not following,” I said. “The practice of using a vampire’s fangs to control them is viewed by the VGO as vampire slavery, which is strictly forbidden. The very act of extracting a vampire’s fangs is punishable by death.”
“But Serena—”
I flapped a hand in frustration. “Yes, yes, I know Serena didn’t pull Robert’s fangs out herself. But I’m sure that using Robert’s fangs to control him would still get her into a lot of trouble. It’s still a form of vampire slavery, using that power over him to make him do things against his will.”
“So what’s your point?” Liz said.
“My point is, why would Serena risk being put to death—or going to vampire prison or whatever you guys have—all for the sake of Robert? It doesn’t add up.”
“Well, Robert is pretty great . . .”
I didn’t like Liz speaking nicely about Robert up at that precise moment, the traitor. “Yes, he’s great. I know that. But how would Serena know that? If the whole thing is a lie—the bit about Serena and Robert being star-crossed lovers from decades ago—then why would she risk such a hefty penalty for a guy she hardly knows?”
“Hmm . . .”
“As much as it kills me to say this, Liz, the woman is absolutely gorgeous, with her Bitch Face blond hair, ten-mile-long legs, and sexy French accent that makes each word she speaks sound like a fucking delicious gumdrop. She’s connected and powerful, being in the VGO. And she has money.” I sighed. “She has all these things, so why would she go through all the drama for some stranger when she could easily have any guy on the planet? And what exactly would she be doing with Robert, Liz?”
“Uh . . . You really want me to say what she’d be doing with Robert?”
“You know what I mean,” I scowled. “I don’t even want to think about that, though that’s sort of what I was talking about.”
“Now you’ve lost me.”
I explained, “Serena does not need to hold a man captive with his fangs in order to get into his pants. Had Robert been single when they met—if they did just meet, that is—he probably would have bedded her willingly. And it’s not only Robert. There must be a billion men who’d want to bed Serena without her having to get all creepy and rape-y with them. And that’s what it would be, if she were forcing Robert to have sex with her against his will by using the fangs.”
“Creepy and rape-y?” Liz asked.
“Yah.”
“So, you’re saying that kidnapping Robert for a piece of ass would be extreme.”
“Way extreme, especially if she first murdered Mathew to get the fangs. Consider it for a minute, Liz. Serena killed a human, and then broke about a zillion vampire laws, all for, what, a hot piece of ass?” I shook my head. “No, that doesn’t seem logical.”
4
Liz mulled over what I’d said. I drank more wine.
“I don’t know what Bitch Face’s motivation is, okay?” Liz eventually said. “But some vampires who have everything—vampires like Serena especially—sometimes lash out simply to entertain themselves. A power trip, you know? I may be new to vampirism, but I’ve been around enough immortals to know how they tick.” Liz shrugged. “Or it could be an explanation as simple as daddy issues.”
I said, “You have no idea how much I want to buy in to what you’re saying right now.”
“Then why don’t you? Nobody is stopping you.”
“I don’t want get my hopes up. My heart is already broken, Liz. I couldn’t handle the disappointment if it turns out that you’re wrong and Robert really doesn’t want to be with me anymore.”
“You’re a lot stronger than you think,” Liz said. “And I bet your disappointment will be a lot worse if it turns out that I’m right and you didn’t listen.”
She had a point. “Okay, so say that you are right. I’m not saying that you are, but, hypothetically, let’s say that you are. What would you have me do?”
“You could tell the VGO,” Liz suggested.
“Tell them what?”
Liz sighed with frustration. “Tell them that Serena is using the fangs to control Robert.”
“That’s awfully risky, though.”
“Why?”
“Uh, because if I’m wrong, I’d be accusing an innocent VGO member of kidnapping. And I’ll look like a pathetic jackass. And I would also be making the VGO aware that Robert is no longer protecting me. I don’t trust them, not one bit.”
“Looks like you’re running out of options, kitten,” Liz said.
“I guess I could wait for a couple of days, see what happens.” I paused
to blow my nose into another wad of paper towels. “Obviously Robert isn’t being tortured, even if he is being hypnotized by Serena’s fang juju. And I have no idea where they could possibly be. The two of them have endless money and connections through networks I’ve never heard of. They could be on a rocket heading to the moon right now, for all I know.”
Liz nodded. “That’s a good idea, to wait it out for a couple days.”
“Or I could stop making up crackpot scenarios only to make myself feel better,” I said. “I could face facts. Robert has decided to leave me for a beautiful, rich, perfect Bitch Face who is more on his level.”
“It’s up to you,” Liz said. She’d known me long enough to know that there was no use in debating with me once I’d made up my mind. Or had been drinking copious amounts of wine. “But I agree with you waiting. Like you said, it doesn’t seem like Robert is in imminent danger. If he hadn’t spoken to you I would be saying otherwise, but since he did . . .” She tugged at the ends of her auburn hair. “Okay, so if nothing does change after a couple of days, what are you going to do? If Robert doesn’t make contact and stays missing, I mean.”
“I guess then I’ll have to bite the bullet and make some calls to Leopold, the VGO, or Marlena,” I said. “It’s going to kill me, though, the waiting. How will I be able to think about anything else?”
“There’s not much else you can do right now. You’re going to have to behave normally, too, or else it’s going to be obvious that something is up.”
“Good point. I hadn’t thought of that. Though I hardly know what ‘normal’ behavior is anymore.” I chuckled drunkenly.
“You should pick a specific amount of time that you are going to wait, that way you won’t break down and make your calls sooner,” Liz advised.
“That’s a really great idea.”
“Okay, so how about . . . A month?”
“No way!” I shouted. “That’s WAY too long.”
“Okay, sor-ry,” she said, putting her hands up. “It was only a suggestion.”
“What about a nice, round week?”
“A week. Okay, I like it,” Liz agreed. “It will give you some time to step away from the situation.”
After a long moment of silence, I said, “The worst part about all this is that I can’t blame him, Liz.”
“I can!” she growled. “The asshole! Well, Robert is an asshole if he’s actually left you for that skank. But you can’t blame him if he’s under Bitch Face’s fang spell or whatever.”
“Okay, well if he has left me, does the fact that he doesn’t want to stick around to watch me wither and die make him such a bad guy? Sure, I’m young now, but what would things be like twenty, thirty, or sixty years from now?” I took a sip of wine and belched, feeling ill. I didn’t care. Maybe if I hurt physically it would distract away from the pain I felt mentally.
“It might be a good idea to slow it down on the wine there, champ,” Liz said, reaching for the bottle.
I moved the wine so that it was out of her reach. “It would be kind of gross,” I prattled on. “Demented. Imagine me at eighty, all old and frail, shacking it up with Robert. Put yourself in Robert’s position. Would you want that? See where I’m coming from?”
Liz made a face.
I realized my faux pas after I’d already stepped in it, which I guess is what makes a faux pas a faux pas. Yes, Liz could see exactly where I was coming from, because she was married to a human and her situation mirrored mine. Liz was like Robert in the situation and her husband, David, was like me. However, unlike me, David had flat-out refused to consider changing over.
Since Liz hadn’t been a vampire that long, we hadn’t really had a chance to discuss how she felt about David’s refusal to change. I was curious about it, but the topic had never come up in conversation organically. I didn’t know if Liz had even deliberated on what would happen to her marriage as David aged, but I certainly didn’t want to be the one to put the idea in her head if it hadn’t crossed her mind, as unlikely as that seemed. I know I thought about it a lot, but maybe it was something mortals worried about more than their vampire mates.
“Sorry,” I apologized. “I wasn’t thinking, Liz. I’m so caught up in this whole Robert-Serena thing.” I pointed to my wineglass sheepishly. “It’s the booze. Seriously, though . . . That was insensitive.”
“No, it’s okay,” she said. “The strange thing is that I was going to call you tonight to talk to you about this.”
“You were? Why?”
She sighed. “Now I don’t if it’s the right time. You’ve got a lot going on right now. You don’t need me blabbing on about my problems.”
“No, please, I’d be happy to have the distraction.”
“Sure?” she asked.
“I’m absolutely positive,” I said. “But, first, can we move onto the sofa? I can’t feel my right butt cheek.”
Once we moved into the living room and had gotten comfortable, I prompted, “Okay, shoot. What was it that you were going to talk to me about?”
Liz held up her left hand—her bare left hand.
“Where’s your ring?” I asked.
Liz looked away.
“You’d better not be telling me what I think you’re telling me.”
Now she was nodding.
“You and David are . . . ?” I raised my hands to show that I was lost. “What are you guys?”
“Oh, Mercy, I wish I could say that we’re separated, but . . . David isn’t ever coming back.”
“Whoa, wait a minute. David left you?” I squawked. Well knock me over with a feather. That, I had not seen coming. David worshipped the ground Liz walked on. Or so I’d thought.
“Yes,” Liz said with a nod. “He did.”
“But you guys can’t be done! You were, like, The Couple. You were the couple that represented everything other couples should do right! And you guys just got married!”
Liz looked like she was going to cry.
I really was a jackass, wasn’t I? It was like was running down a list of the absolute worst things you could say to a person to make them feel bad about their divorce. “Sorry. I’ll shut up now,” I promised. “Sorry. I was shocked.”
“No worries,” Liz assured me with a sad smile. “I can hardly believe it myself.”
Figuring that I’d said plenty, I kept my trap shut and waited for Liz to continue.
“Things were perfect between David and me when I was human,” Liz said. “I thought we’d be together forever.”
“So did I. What did it, then? There was no, uh, cheating or . . . ?” I couldn’t imagine who would be less likely to cheat: Liz or David. I couldn’t see either of them being that deceitful.
“No, it was nothing like that. It just . . . It all went pear-shaped after I became vampire.”
I asked, “In what way?”
“For starters, David has always wanted to be a father. You know me; I’m not too wild about kids, right? I don’t hate them, but I could take them or leave them.”
“Right. You and I are on the same page on that one.” I’d pretty much resigned myself to the notion of not having children, being with a vampire. Things might change, though, now that I’d been ditched.
Liz said, “Back when David and I first started dating I was hesitant about getting involved with him, because of the kid thing. Every time we were out in public and I’d interact with a kid—say hello or something—I swear I could feel him sizing me up as a mother.”
“Weird.”
“Totally,” she agreed. “But then as I grew to love David, I started to change my mind. It wasn’t that I necessarily wanted kids, but I figured, hey, if it happens, it happens.”
“Sure.”
“David was over the moon after I told him that I’d mull over having kids.”
“But now that you’re a vampire . . .”
Liz shook her head. “I can’t have kids—it’s physically impossible, right? Of course, this is a fact that doesn’t trouble me in th
e slightest. Like I said, I was on the fence about having kids anyway.”
“But David is bothered,” I gathered.
“Bothered isn’t a strong enough word. He was absolutely beside himself when I told him that I could no longer get pregnant.”
“What did he think, that you were going to have a vampire baby?” I scoffed. “I’d figured out that vampires were infertile long before Robert assured me that they are. How could he not automatically realize such a thing?”
Liz twisted her lips to one side of her mouth. It was her unique expression of concentration. “I honestly don’t know. Maybe David was deluding himself. Maybe he thought if he didn’t seek clarification then it wouldn’t be true.”
“Ah,” I said. “Sort of like, if I ignore the problem it will go away.”
“I guess. But I’m immortal now. My inability to procreate will never go away. I find it staggering that David assumed that this was an issue that would just—” she raised her arms to her side and cocked her head “—work itself out. We’re talking about me not being able to have a baby, not us going through a rough patch over finances or something.”
“That is pretty unbelievable,” I agreed. “He was like those three monkeys—”
“Exactly! Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil.”
I didn’t want to be too horrible towards David, which meant that I had to at least try to remain impartial until I got all the facts. He was a solid guy and I respected him as a person. And he’d always been good to Liz. “You told David about the no baby thing prior to your wedding, right?”
“Of course I did!” Liz exclaimed. “I wanted him to go in the marriage fully aware of what he was signing up for.”
“Then this one’s his bad, isn’t it?”
“I suggested adoption, but he wasn’t having that. He said being a kid these days was tough enough without having a vampire for a mother.”
“Ouch. That’s harsh,” I said.
Liz sighed. “There were some other things, too—things maybe David hadn’t thought through before we got married. In all fairness, living with a vampire is hard.”
“You’re telling me,” I agreed. Sourly, I added, “But it looks like I won’t have to worry about that for much longer.”
