by J. F. Lewis
The bartender kept trying to sell me blood. I wasn’t buying. I make it a practice never to accept bottled blood from strangers. Not since El Segundo. Instead, I watched Rachel eat.
I don’t know why it surprised me, but she had gotten a lot better at entertaining vampires. Little things, like talking through the choice of the next bite of food mean a lot. A good dining companion for a vampire knows how to keep up a dialogue. The façade lets dining instructions be couched within phrases that could pass as normal dinner conversation. “Oh this is all so good, I can hardly decide what to eat next” was code for “What do you want me to eat?” Responding to subtle commands like “that looks like a juicy one” or “have you tried mixing x with y” gives vampires a little control over the meal without making us feel like total freaks.
The appetizer she had ordered was fried mushrooms. The mushrooms were bite-size, but she cut each one in half as she ate and she alternated between using a fork and her fingers. As she bit into each piece, she lingered over the morsel, leaving her lips parted until her teeth actually touched one another. She chewed slowly, savoring the food, letting the expressions accompanying each taste show on her face. Her eyes would half close with pleasure if a bite of mushroom was just right. After the first few she called the waiter over and asked if he could get any horseradish sauce. He did.
When he brought the sauce, she took turns slightly dipping a piece of fried mushroom into it and eating daintily and immersing the entire piece in the horseradish, carefully licking off the excess before it could drip on the table.
There were mistakes. She hurried through a few of the pieces too quickly and she ate more of the mushrooms than she should have before asking if I’d like her to order something else, but I could tell that she had practiced since I’d watched her eat breakfast some four months before.
She must have given it serious thought, studied the voyeuristic nature of vampires in detail. It was as if while I’d been out of the picture for four months, she’d taken a class. I pictured a room full of thralls practicing how to eat for voyeuristic purposes. She would have been at the top of the intermediate class, a real A+ student.
I wasn’t the only one who noticed. She was drawing attention. Some of the vamps looked on with the same vicarious pleasure that I did, but a few looked hungry and more than a few of the human escorts looked envious and angry.
“What do we want next?” she asked, looking over the menu. Even with the phrasing of her question, she showed a subtle understanding. Tabitha would have asked, “What do you want to watch me eat next?” That spoiled part of it, but Rachel understood: she asked for advice, not directions. It was perfectly clear that whatever I suggested was what she would order, but doing it this way sustained an important part of the illusion. It allowed an abnormal act to retain a semblance of normalcy.
“I want to get in to see this Ebon Winter guy and then I want to take you out to dinner. Real dinner. Do you like steak?”
Before she could answer my question, another vampire spoke up. “Eat another mushroom.”
Rachel shrugged, picked up the fork and looked at me.
I shook my head.
“Make the bitch eat another mushroom.”
There was really no way he could have known how touchy I am about how other people treat my companions, particularly my women. The little I did know about vampire High Society told me that an insult to her was an insult to me. That I felt possessive of Rachel even though I knew she had a hidden agenda bothered me, but I tabled that shouting match to myself until I’d dealt with the new moron.
The way I see it, my women take good care of me; they give what I need, blood or otherwise, and they don’t make me feel like a monster or a freak. For the most part, I try to take care of them. When I ran the Demon Heart, I paid for their college, and more. I paid my strippers an annual salary between fifty and seventy-five grand, before tips. They had health insurance with dental and vision. When they left, they knew they could still call on me if they ran into trouble and they knew that I wouldn’t call on them unless they’d said it was okay.
Some of them had already called to ask when I was reopening the club. But now that the club was gone…I didn’t know how I felt about a new one. I don’t want to say that I’ve ever felt like the club objectified women or abused them, because I’ve always gone out of my way to make sure that the Demon Heart helped rather than hindered the girls who danced in it, but now that I didn’t have to worry about filling a rotation…
“I don’t know,” I said, thinking out loud more about the idea of reopening the club, than the asshole hassling us.
Rachel seemed concerned. “Why don’t I just have another mushroom, Eric?”
As I turned to her, I could feel my eyes light up inside. “Do you want another mushroom?”
“N-no,” she stammered, “but what’s the harm?” I think Rachel was a little surprised at my reaction. She must have been worried that I would go all black skin and leather wings. I was mad, but not that mad. She still had a few things to learn about me.
The vampire with a malnourished heroin addict on his arm had more to learn about me than Rachel did, but he probably wouldn’t live long enough. I went from sitting to standing in one pulse of the club’s multicolored lights. In the next flash I was next to him. By the third, he was already on the floor with my foot on his throat. I love it when my powers work well. They can be finicky, but they hadn’t really misfired since I’d re-formed.
He was much slower than me. “Did you say something?” I asked.
Gurgling at me, he tried to push my leg up and lift my foot.
He was weaker than me, too. I looked at his date. “Would you like a mushroom?”
Happy Boy popped his claws and I broke his neck. “If you cut my tux, I’ll end you,” I said. “It’s a rental.” He pulled his claws back in.
His date started to cry. “Please, don’t hurt him. He’s sorry. Aren’t you sorry, Irwin? We’ll leave; we won’t come back. We’ll hang at the park or something.”
She was defending him. It made me sick. It always makes me sick to see someone beg. A human pleading for the life of a vampire is even worse. I lifted my foot a fraction, just enough for him to slide out from under it.
“What’s your problem, man?” he said, popping his neck into place. “She’s just a human. What do you care?”
I grabbed him by the throat and cut him off before he got himself dead for real. Why I cared, I can’t tell you. I just did. “The reason you will understand is this: She is mine and I don’t share well. I never have. It’s a childhood malady. Maybe I had too many brothers and sisters and I have a deep need to indisputably demonstrate my ownership of things.”
Anger started building up inside me again and I could feel myself starting to go. Fang’s engine roared in my ears, echoing my anger. I wondered if anyone else could hear it or if this was another symptom of the strange bond we shared. If I lost control in a place like this, with so many people around, there was no telling how many might be killed.
Maybe Rachel was right to be worried. There were probably enough Masters and Vlads to take me down, but not before I caused a lot of damage. Irwin’s girlfriend looked into my eyes and panicked. “Look at his eyes, oh my God!”
Fang hauled ass out of the parking deck back at the Pollux, heading for me. It’s okay, I tried thinking at him, I’ve got it. I think he understood because it felt like he was heading back to the deck.
I snapped out of it, as though calling off Fang had taken some of the steam out of my anger. All the same, I was sure my eyes were glowing purple. “Want to see something really scary?” I asked, but Irwin was already dragging his date out of the club. I turned back to Rachel. She was afraid, too…far too afraid for someone who’d fucked an uber vamp. She’d almost peed herself. Why?
“They’re purple, right?”
Rachel got up. “I have to go to the ladies’ room.”
Biting back a vulgar remark, I walked her to the l
adies’ room and waited outside the door. While I waited, security headed my way. People watched out of the corners of their eyes. They glanced away when I turned to look at them, but I could feel the eyes upon me. A female vamp came out of the bathroom and I smiled at her. “Is there a no-fighting rule here?”
“No fighting, no killing, no maiming, no threatening of any kind. It’s a civilized club,” she scoffed.
I glanced around me. Sure enough, there were little signs posted in obvious places that said pretty much what she had told me. The signs were more ornate and so was the wording, but she’d been dead-on. No wonder Roger had never asked me to come here.
I waited for security and made fun of their little plastic armbands in my head. Andre came out of nowhere and joined the goons sashaying in my direction.
“Winter,” Andre told me when he arrived, “wishes to thank you for enabling him to win the wager he placed upon your entering the club. As he suggested, you managed to last an entire hour before breaking any of the rules that would cause you to be ejected from the club. As thanks, he would like to invite you and your guest to join him for a preejection drink in The Velvet where he hopes you will be able to restrain yourself amongst those who are your equals, if not your betters.”
“Well, fuck you very much,” I replied.
Andre was so taken aback that he physically took a backward step.
“He means we’d be delighted,” Rachel said as she exited the bathroom behind me. Andre looked at me for confirmation and I shrugged. That was one way to interpret what I’d said.
As he led us toward an elevator, Rachel whispered in my ear, “How many brothers and sisters did you have?”
“None.” I smiled. “I’m an only child.” I think.
12
ERIC: FIRST IMPRESSIONS
I liked The Velvet. It reminded me a lot of the Pollux’s decor. Crimson velvet wallpaper and lamps in brassbacked sconces lined the walls. The sconces’ circular rear plates had little snowflakes etched into them. In the Pollux, pentacles had been similarly etched. A collection of intimate booths and vintage-era tables were spread out around a small stage. Dark carpet covered the floors. Wooden railings separated the seating area from the small dance area. There was no bar.
The club could have held around sixty people, but there were only eighteen vampires in it now, each with a human date. Twelve of them were the Master vampires I’d sensed earlier. They were dressed in an array of styles ranging from mob chic to the same metrosexual look Winter sported and they had arranged themselves so that Winter was the center of their attention. One vampire had even pulled his chair around at an odd angle as if he was afraid that showing Winter his back would be disrespectful.
Onstage, Ebon Winter changed songs as I entered. He went into an a capella version of “Love Her Madly” by The Doors and though I disliked him, his voice was like nothing I had ever heard. In comparison, Sinatra’s voice had no character and Bowie sounded bland and safe. Wearing matching white leather jumpsuits, the other Vlad and her date sat at a corner booth. Their motorcycle helmets sat on the floor next to them. I stifled a laugh and let Andre lead Rachel and me to a booth a little apart from the rest of them. It was probably a slight of some kind. Maybe it was supposed to give me a message about not belonging. Either way, I was still edgy from the confrontation upstairs and glad of the distance. The only ways I knew to take the edge off involved killing or screwing and neither seemed a likely option here.
Two of the vampires reoriented their attention on me, only to be silently rebuffed by the other vampires. Winter didn’t miss a beat, but a flick of his eyes made it clear that the two offenders would have to answer for the momentary lapse in loyalty later. Stupid High Society bullshit.
Each couple was served by their own steward, and apparently there were several chefs hard at work beyond one of the sets of double doors, because delicious smells wafted in from the kitchen. Our server’s name was Chad, and I was only mildly surprised when he brought a steak dinner to the table. He brought with it a red merlot for Rachel, which even I could appreciate in terms of color and bouquet. For me he brought a draft beer in a frosted mug. He even set it in front of me as if I wasn’t going to have to watch Rachel drink it for me. “Compliments,” he informed us, “of the house.” I’d had some blood booze once. It had tasted like crap, but I almost asked if he could order me some before I remembered that it had been very expensive and I was on a tight budget.
Winter winked at us from the stage. If he’d been a girl, I would have cherished that wink. Since he wasn’t, it made me uncomfortable.
Rachel ate for me and herself at the same time. She did even better than before, and despite the improvement, the show was just for me this time. The other vamps and their dates were too busy watching Winter. I listened to him off and on. I like music to be loud and angry. Skill isn’t the most important aspect of it for me. Again, he was great, the best I’d ever heard, but for me, the radio would have been fine. He switched styles effortlessly, making everything work without instruments, going old school with “Lightnin’ Strikes” as well as music that was either original or too new to have entered my playlist.
“Are you even listening to him anymore?” Rachel admonished gently. “You’ll make him angry.”
“I’m edgy. Maybe it’s all the not killing people. I’m not used to it.”
Before she could comment, the current song ended and soft applause came from the other tables. Rachel clapped, and I joined in halfheartedly. I knew what my problem was. I wanted to get the information I needed from this Winter guy and get the hell out.
Winter flitted over to our booth and beamed at us. “So, how are we doing over here in the rowdy section?” he asked.
“Not bad,” I admitted. “My compliments to your chef.”
Winter gestured for Rachel to move over and he sat down once she had scooted enough to make room for him. This elicited some shocked looks from the other vamps and some hasty reorienting on their part, as if they wanted to make sure I knew they were focusing on Winter rather than me. Winter was apparently doing us a favor by crowding our booth. “Emil is wonderful, isn’t he? Your escort has unique talents, too, wouldn’t you say? I almost stopped singing to watch her eat.” His eyes flashed red right through the blue contacts he was wearing and then faded, revealing a conspiratorial lightheartedness that rang false to me. I wondered why the light hadn’t turned purple when it flashed through the contacts. “What did you think of the performance?”
“It was good. I liked it. I tend to like heavier stuff, though, so I can’t really judge…”
“Good?” he asked carefully. “Liked?”
“He’s not very careful with his words, Winter,” Rachel butted in. “I hope you’ll excuse him.”
“Roger was much better at this sort of thing than I am,” I added. “I’m not trying to be an ass.”
Winter eyed me carefully and then eyed Rachel. “I suppose we can let it go this once…if you’ll tell me how you do it?”
“Do what?” I asked.
“Your eyes.” As he spoke, he reached up and pulled out a contact, revealing a washed-out-looking iris, a typical vampire eye. I knew immediately what he meant, and it wasn’t the funky purple glow I’d sported earlier in the evening. My eyes have always been blue. They were blue in life and according to Marilyn, they are the same color they’ve always been. “They’re blue, really blue. Is it a dye? Some type of implant?”
You’d think he’d have been more interested in what had frightened the folks upstairs when I had started to go off on Irwin, but I gave him the spiel, knowing that, like most, he wouldn’t believe it. “If I knew why I still have human-looking eyes, I would tell you, but they’ve always been that way. To be honest, I didn’t even know that they had stayed blue until Roger pointed it out to me some time in the seventies. I haven’t done a whole lot of mirror gazing since I became a vampire.”
He scoffed at me and rolled his eyes. “Fine, if you won’t tell me, t
hen I have nothing further to discuss with you. Andre,” he called, “see this plebeian out.”
“Wait a minute!” I snarled. “That’s it? I wasted three hours and got all dressed up in this monkey suit just so you could throw me out for not knowing how to give you a pair of bright happy blue eyes? I don’t think so!”
I put my hand through the mahogany table and Winter flinched. When I tried to grab Winter himself, my hand passed through him. He looked solid, but his body had changed to mist. Movie vampires turn to mist all the time, but I’d never met a vampire who could do it, much less one with control like that. I locked eyes with him instead and was stunned to find myself almost drowning in his mind. I withdrew and he tried to chase after me into my head, but I snarled, announcing myself again, pushing him out. The Master vampires started to casually saunter my way and I turned on them with my eyes aglow.
“I came here for information, not to be deliberately provoked in your club and used as a source of amusement! Why did you bet on me, anyway?”
The Vlad in the Elvis jumpsuit stepped forward. “Everyone knows about the blue-eyed vampire named Eric. We all know that you’re supposed to be some kind of badass who’s not to be messed with. One of the first things my sire told me was to stay far away from the Demon Heart and farther away from you.”
“Mine told me that you killed other vampires for sport,” said one of the Master vampires, a short little guy with a shaved head and a Vandyke.
One of the female vamps, an Asian girl with a red wig, stood up. “Mine said you didn’t drink human blood. He told me you only drank from your own get. He said that you had special rooms underneath your club where you kept them.”
“We were curious,” explained Winter. “You sounded monstrous.”
“And this made you want to meet me and play mind games?”
