by Lou Harper
Once the initial excitement of the reunion died off, the attention turned to Gabe and Harvey. Stan thanked them profusely, backing up his words with generous embraces. Even Ray’s stance toward Gabe mellowed out enough to express his gratitude and offer his hand. Harvey and Gabe were invited in, but they tactfully declined. However, promises were made to stop by later and recount the events of the day. Handing over the bag of money they had all nearly forgotten about, Harvey and Gabe said their good-byes.
“They really care about Dill,” Gabe said, watching the two vampires ushering Dill into the house.
“Of course they do. Did you think he was just a lunch ticket for them?”
“A what?”
“You know, food.”
It had once crossed Gabe’s mind, but there was no point in bringing that up now.
Chapter Six
Harvey wrinkled his nose at the sight of the bacon next to the eggs on Gabe’s plate. It was four in the afternoon, but when one lived at night, that was breakfast time.
Gabe shoveled another forkful of food into his mouth, chewed and swallowed. “What?” he asked.
“I said nothing.” Harvey batted his eyelids, innocent as a newborn lamb.
Gabe wasn’t fooled. “But you were thinking it.” He picked up a piece of bacon and began to nibble it provocatively.
“Nuh-uh.”
“You said you weren’t militant about vegetarianism, but you’re full of compost.”
Harvey shrugged. “Hey, it’s not my problem; you’re the one who’ll be reincarnated as a pig.”
“I wouldn’t mind being a pig—you eat well, roll around in your own filth all day. It’s a good life.” Gabe grinned.
“Then you get killed and made into sausage.”
“Yeah, but then you come back again, right? So what’s the problem?”
Harvey shook his head, but he smiled. “You’re hopeless.”
“What are you going to come back as? Vampire bat?”
Gabe dodged the kitchen towel flying at his head and shoveled more food into his mouth to hide his grin. He enjoyed yanking Harvey’s chain too much. It had been five days since Dill’s rescue, during which time Gabe had been back and forth between his hotel and Harvey’s place. They’d given their account of the events to Stan and Ray. The two older vampires had been much more accepting toward Gabe. However, Gabe had a vague impression that they and Harvey had still been withholding something from him.
When the doorbell rang, Harvey went to answer it. He came back with a large black envelope.
“What is it?” Gabe asked.
“I don’t know. It’s for you,” he replied, handing it over.
Gabe looked at it, confounded. His full name was written on it with silver ink in elegant script. He turned it over—only to find a red wax seal on the other side. Two letters, VA, also in cursive script were stamped into it. Gabe slid a knife under the flap of the envelope and slit it open, leaving the seal intact. He found a single card inside. Gabe pulled it out and read it.
“What does it say?” Harvey asked impatiently.
“It’s an invitation,” Gabe replied, handing the card over to Harvey, who snatched it and read it quickly.
His eyes went big. “Fuck me till I’m blue in the face, this is from Victor Augustine!”
“So?” Gabe had never heard the name before.
“He’s big cheese. Big vampire cheese. The rumor is that he’s six hundred years old at least.”
“Have you met him?”
“No. Not many do. And he wants to see you tonight. Shit.” Harvey looked anxious.
“Should I be worried?” Gabe asked.
“About what? Oh, that. No. If he wanted you dead, you’d be dead already. Victor is one of your just-do-it kind of guys. I can’t imagine, though, why he wants to see you.”
“What if I don’t want to see him?”
Harvey glared at him with wide-eyed shock. “Are you crazy? One doesn’t turn down an invitation from Victor Augustine. It would be like snubbing Vito Corleone; it’s simply not done.”
“Or you might find a horse head in your bed?”
“You’re so not funny.” Harvey snatched Gabe’s plate and tossed it in the sink. “Get dressed. Hurry! We need to get you something decent to wear.”
“What’s wrong with my clothes?” Gabe protested.
“You have the fashion sense of a drunken marsupial. I’m surprised the fashion police haven’t taken your gay card away. C’mon, chop-chop.”
They arrived at the address provided in the invitation a whole fifteen minutes early. Harvey made them wait around the corner for ten minutes.
“Arriving too early is as rude as being late,” he proclaimed.
Gabe wore dark gray slacks, dress shoes, and a crisp white dress shirt with a fancy designer label in it. However, he’d refused to put on a tie or a jacket. Five minutes before the appointed time, they finally walked up to the unremarkable doorway. Gabe didn’t miss the discreet security camera above. Harvey pushed the intercom button and stated their identity.
A minute later, a redheaded, buxom woman of short stature opened the door. She beamed at them with a full set of pearl-white teeth and enthusiastically introduced herself as Ellie. She reminded Gabe of a fancy show pigeon. If it weren’t for that tickling sensation just under his skin, Gabe would have never figured her as one of the undead.
“You’re Mr. Vadas, then,” she said, dimpling.
Gabe concurred, and she led them into a lounge-slash-waiting room. It was outfitted with expensive-looking modern furniture, complete with a desk next to a heavy wooden door.
Ellie turned to Harvey. “I’m sorry, you’ll have to wait here.” She ushered Gabe toward the door. “You go ahead. Mr. Augustine is waiting for you.”
Victor Augustine was a stocky man who looked to be forty, give or take a few years. With his oval face and brown hair, he would’ve appeared unremarkable, if it weren’t for his shrewd, pale blue eyes.
“Please, take a seat.” He gestured at a pair of overstuffed chairs.
He spoke in a soft, quiet tone, but everything about his unassuming persona emanated power. Gabe could feel it deep in his bones too—this was not a vampire you wanted to piss off, unless you really meant business.
Gabe sat and took in his surroundings. Bookshelves lined the walls of the large room. Even though it was contemporary, the furniture had an old-fashioned and classy opulence about it. While the previous parts of the house had been brightly lit, the lights were low in here, giving it a cozy ambiance.
Augustine lifted a wooden box from a small table and opened it. “Cigar?”
“I don’t smoke, but thanks.”
“Pity, but, I suppose, good for you.” He took one cigar out, held it under his nose, inhaled its scent, then put it back. “I’m glad you accepted my invitation,” he said, sitting down in the other chair.
“It was hard to ignore, with the black envelope and the seal.”
Augustine gave a benign nod. “That’s all Ellie’s doing. She used to be in theater. I’m afraid her tastes run to the dramatic. However, she’s the best personal assistant I’ve had in a very long time, so I indulge her.”
“I see.”
“If I may say so, I was expecting you to be more dramatic yourself.”
“I’m sorry to disappoint.”
“No, not a disappointment at all. Quite the contrary.”
“May I ask why I’m here?”
Augustine’s lips curved into a small, amused smile. Somehow it made him look infinitely more dangerous. “Because I cannot resist a contradiction. You’ve made it your business to kill vampires, yet you are intimately involved with one.”
“It’s complicated.”
“I’m certain it is. Am I correct in presuming you’ve discontinued your slaying activities, and the events of the other night were an unfortunate aberration?”
“It was self-defense. I also believe that vamp lured my friend Harvey there with the purpose o
f killing him.”
“Yes, I’m aware of the circumstances.”
“I would do the same again, but I’m not looking for trouble, if that’s what you want to know.”
“Good. In that case, I’d like to offer you employment.” Augustine said it with the casual tone of a man commenting on the weather.
It took Gabe a good moment to process the words. “Why?” he sputtered at last.
“To put it simply, you have specialized skills and training, yet are broadminded enough to curb your ingrained urges. It’s an uncommon trait for someone of your talents. I could use such a man.”
“What would your ‘using’ me entail?” Gabe asked warily.
“Nothing that you’re unwilling or incapable to give. I’ll be paying you a retainer, and in exchange you’ll be available whenever I need you. I might ask you to find something or someone, or deliver a message. That sort of thing. Aside from that, your time would be your own.”
“Why would I want to take your offer?”
“Because it would provide you with an income. You’re not a fool; you know you can’t ever lead a regular life again, but there aren’t many employment opportunities for a man like you. Besides, I can give you protection.”
“I need protection?”
“You’re a slayer. It’s bound to get out. There are many among my kind who will resent the fact, but if they know you work for me, they won’t bother you.”
Gabe thought it over. It was a lot like making a pact with the devil, but Victor Augustine was a man better to have as an ally, or even a boss, than an enemy. “I’ll maintain the right to refuse a job on moral or legal grounds,” he said.
“But of course. There are plenty of gray areas in both those fields, but I’ll leave it up to you to judge.”
Augustine stood up, and, taking his cue, so did Gabe. As he shook Augustine’s offered hand, he knew he’d been dismissed.
“Ellie will sort you out with the practical details, W2 forms and all that nonsense. It’s been a pleasure meeting you, Mr. Vadas,” Augustine said.
They drove to Gabe’s hotel, since he wanted to change into something less formal, despite Harvey’s assurances as to how sexy he looked. In the car, Gabe related the details of his meeting. Harvey listened and made only small humming sounds in response.
“I wish I knew how he knew about me at all and what happened with Dill and that vampire. Do you think Stan or Ray told him?”
Harvey looked uncertain. “Well, the guys have a lot of connections, most I don’t know much about, but I don’t see why they’d go to Victor Augustine. Weird.”
They chewed on that notion in silence on the rest of the way to the hotel.
Once there, Harvey looked around the room. “Très chic,” he said in a mocking tone.
“It’s cheap, and there are no bedbugs.” Gabe didn’t much care where he slept.
“You could move in with me. You know, till you find an apartment,” Harvey said in an off-handed way, not even looking up.
Gabe stared dumbstruck as Harvey dropped his ass on the bed, testing the bounciness of the mattress. “Do you think it’s a good idea?”
Harvey finally looked at him. “Why not?”
“I dunno, because we barely know each other?”
“I don’t know if that’s true. You almost killed me; then you saved my life. That’s more than most couples get to in a lifetime.”
“That’s because most couples have normal lives.”
“Exactly. We’re not normal, don’t have to live by their boring ‘normal’ rules. Anyway, you can move out if it doesn’t work. It’s not like you’ll have to hire a moving van for all your stuff. Meanwhile, you’d save some money.”
“You make it sound so cut and dry.”
Harvey tilted his head sideways and gave Gabe a scrutinizing gaze. “Tell me how you became a vampire hunter.”
Gabe knew he was ready to tell that story. He took the sole chair, spun it around and sat down facing Harvey, but it took him a few moments to collect his thoughts. Harvey waited, motionless.
Eventually, Gabe began to talk. “My parents used to have a little grocery store over in Rogers Park. It was always assumed I would eventually take over the store. That was okay with me—I’d been helping out since I could remember. Everything was going fine, they could go on vacation for the first time of their lives and leave me to mind the business. Then one night driving home, they had an accident on the expressway and were both killed.”
Gabe didn’t want to dwell on the ugly details and was thankful for Harvey remaining silent. He rushed on. “I got kinda depressed after that, and everything else went to shit too. The store had back taxes due, loan payments that my father had neglected to mention. I ended up selling it. Then out of the blue I got a letter from Hungary, from a man claiming to be my uncle. Another thing my father had never mentioned.”
“Weird.”
“Tell me about it. But he sent a plane ticket, and I badly needed a change of scenery, so I thought ‘why the hell not?’ When I met him at the airport, he looked like a fifteen-years-older version of my father—though I later learned that the age difference was only three years.”
“Hard living?”
“For sure. And all the pálinka he drank like water—it’s a local fruit brandy. He was extremely hospitable, took me all over the city, and Budapest is a beautiful place. Then he took me out to the country, supposedly to show me the old family stomping grounds. That’s when he told me about the whole vampire-hunting business, how it was our family duty and all that. Naturally, I thought he was mad.”
“Naturally.”
“Then he proved it to me. That’s when we killed our first vampire. Well, he did. I was busy pissing my pants.” That still counted as the number-one weirdest day of Gabe’s life.
“Then what?”
“Lots of training, followed by traipsing around Eastern Europe, looking for undead. I have to tell you, that part of the world is full of ruins and all sorts of old places. Even the cities have miles of underground tunnels and secret passages.”
“Sounds picturesque—in a dark and creepy way.”
“The undead we met were all foul-smelling monsters, primitive and ferocious. They only had two modes—either sleeping or attacking. It was strange, though, we often found groups of them in deep sleep, almost hibernation. Like somebody left caches of bloodsuckers around for later use.”
Harvey snorted. “Maybe a master vampire bent on world domination. He and his sidekick, Pinky, must be awful pissed at you right now.”
“You’re making fun of me.”
“Only a little, my Angel. So what, if your uncle hadn’t kicked it, would you still be there doing the same old thing?”
It was something Gabe occasionally wondered about too. “I dunno. After my parents’ death I had a lot of unfocused rage in me. The slaying channeled it, and having a purpose got me out of my depression. You know what I mean?”
Harvey scrunched up his face, but it failed to make him any less good looking. “Yeah, I think so. I was plenty pissed after…stuff, but I had friends to help me through. Eventually I moved on. What about you?”
Gabe shrugged. “The anger wasn’t quite there anymore, and I got homesick too. Miklos didn’t like hearing that.”
“Did you have anyone beside your uncle? Boyfriend?”
“Hah! He didn’t even know I was gay. The Old Country is not on the leading edge of tolerance. And my uncle…he wasn’t particularly open-minded. He kept urging me to settle down, marry a nice local girl and father lots of boys.”
“But you didn’t tell him there was no chance of it?”
“In the end, I did.”
“What happened?”
“He clutched his chest and keeled over.”
“Shit.”
“Yup. I killed him.”
Harvey was quiet for a moment. When he spoke, his voice was softer, and he brushed a hand on Gabe’s arm. “He probably had a heart condition already an
d it was just a question of time. Take it from me, healthy people don’t drop dead that easy.”
“That’s probably true, but still…”
“I know.”
They were both quiet for a moment. Then Harvey perked up. “Hey, wait. Why didn’t your uncle have his own kids?”
Gabe remembered how touchy Miklos used to be about the subject. “Couldn’t. Mishap with a vampire when he was younger.”
“Ouch. Those Eastern bloc vampires sound like a nasty bunch. No wonder you’re so aggro.”
“You’re not exactly the picture of serenity yourself.”
“I have a temper, I know. I’m working on it.”
“What’s up with the fangs? I don’t see them now.”
“Retractable. Hurt like a bitch when they were growing out. They descend on their own when I’m angry or horny. Or hungry. I can’t always control them yet—it takes time to master, and I’m still young. By vampire standards.”
Gabe had spilled his story, and now wanted to know Harvey’s, before making a decision about cohabitation.
“Tit for tat. Tell me how you became a vampire,” he said.
“I’ve told you already.”
“Tell me how it really happened.”
Harvey sighed. “You won’t let it go, will you?”
“No.”
“Fine.” Harvey’s eyes lost focus, as if he was gazing inward. “I was working night shift at the hospice. It was quiet. I was just making my rounds when I found three strange men in Mrs. Simpson’s room. She was in the final stages of cancer, totally out of it. One of the men was bent over her. When I stepped into the room and demanded to know who they were and what they were doing there, he straightened up, and I saw blood on his lips. I ran to call security but of course never made it.”
“What happened?”
“They seized me and dragged me out into the stairwell. I fought back, but they were very strong, and there were three of them. I was really scared, sure I would die. They all fed on me till I was close to passing out; then one of them noticed my ID tag and my name—Feng. The asshole misread it as Fang. They laughed. Honestly, the whole bunch of them were acting strange, like they were high. Except vampires can’t get high. The one I caught feeding on Mrs. Simpson suggested that they should turn me. They all thought that was a hysterically funny idea. So that’s how it happened.” Harvey’s tone was flat and unemotional.
