“Now? No. I’d prefer to explore the town when I can also enjoy some sunlight.”
“As you wish. I was going to give you the evening off so you will be rested for tomorrow.”
“If you don’t mind, I’d rather we do some training. I don’t know how ready I feel for tomorrow. Training will reassure me. And it’ll spare me from thinking too much about what’s ahead.”
“Very well. Join me downstairs when you are ready.”
With that, he stood up and left the kitchen.
I didn’t hurry. For once, he hadn’t given me an exact time to heed, so I could keep him waiting for a bit. I took the time to watch the evening news while thinking about what Phoenix had said about my disappearance. Up to that point, I had the vain hope that someone had been looking for me. It wasn’t as if I wanted to leave my new employment—I’d already settled that issue—but I wanted to know if anyone had noticed my absence. I routinely watched the local news, wondering if I would hear my name or if someone was hoping for my return, but there was nothing.
Even if all signs of an attack hadn’t been covered up, it still might have been the case that no one was looking for me or wondering about my fate. Well, no, I forgot: the IRS would have sought me out. Small consolation.
For a moment, I felt depressed. But that feeling dissipated when I thought about the second chance that I’d been given. After all, Phoenix had given me more attention in eight short weeks than Mr. Plummer, the principal of Griffith High School, had over the course of six years.
Once again on the sunnier side of things, I got ready and then went to join vampire Bruce Lee, who was waiting for me below.
“You kept me waiting . . . if I did not know you, I would say that you did not do it on purpose,” he said with his back turned to me.
He was starting to figure me out. I gave him a big, innocent smile.
“You didn’t tell me to hurry.”
“Get into position,” he sighed.
For two hours, I practiced shooting. The basement was so immense that there was a room just for target practice. I often thought that Phoenix had built secret rooms in this manor. Sometimes, when I had nothing to do, I meandered up and down the hallways, searching the walls for a mechanism or secret lever that would open a hidden room, like the Room of Requirement in Hogwarts. It was a pathetic pastime, but it helped me get to know the place.
I was treated to some shooting practice, with both stationary and moving targets, and I also had to move around to simulate a chase. I don’t know how I managed it, but I hit the bull’s-eye every time. I had to admit that when it came to marksmanship, I was quite ready for the next day.
Exhausted, I raised my arms in surrender. “I think that’s enough. I’m going to bed now.” Just as I was about to leave the room, I reconsidered. “Phoenix, what do you do the rest of the night after I go to sleep?”
“Good night, Samantha,” he said, turning away to clean the firearms.
“Good night,” I sighed.
When I got back to my room and settled into bed, I told myself that all the training Phoenix had put me through was nothing compared to the real work he’d chosen me to do. And all that would start the next day . . .
Before that, though, I was treated to my very first sleepless night.
“Good evening. Are you ready?”
It was seven o’clock. He was wearing a custom-made dark-gray suit, a white shirt, and a black tie. Very elegant. His hair, lightly layered and neck-length, gave him a soft, friendly look that was immediately contradicted by the hardness in his eyes. He certainly wasn’t going to kill the man he had to see, or else he would’ve put on something he could get dirty (you never know with blood), so I didn’t regret my own outfit. I’d picked out a red blouse, a tailored dark-gray skirt (pure coincidence), and red heels. For some time, I’d been training myself during the day to walk in high heels. The skirt had a slight slit on the side, which would facilitate my movements as needed, and my black opaque tights would keep me warm.
I clenched my teeth as Phoenix scrutinized me from head to toe, but after a nod of approval, he led the march toward the door. Silently, I sighed in relief. I grabbed my coat, inside of which was the complete arsenal of a perfect assassin, as well as my handbag, inside of which was the complete arsenal of a perfect assistant.
Phoenix and I got into a powerful black Audi R8 with heated seats and tinted windows. I preferred this car a million times over the Camaro in the garage, whose vivid red would have turned the heads of everyone we drove by, human and zombie alike. No way was I getting in that car.
As we headed out, I was able to catch a glimpse of Scarborough, which I had put off visiting until the next day. It seemed rather elegant to me.
We pulled onto the road leading to Drake Hill, a medium-sized city northeast of Kerington, about an hour away. I wondered how we were going to pass the time. When my parents had taken me to the Williamsburg amusement park, about an hour’s drive from Kentwood, we sang songs or my mother would arbitrate a competition on general knowledge between my father and me. If I won, my parents bought me an ice cream; if I lost, they bought me one anyway. I adored them. Suffice it to say that this ride with Phoenix would not offer the same comfort.
Twenty minutes had passed since we’d left, and we hadn’t exchanged a single word. He needed to brief me on the mission, so what was he waiting for?
Luckily, I didn’t have to wait for long.
“The man that we are meeting is named Kiro. He is an herbalist.”
“Human or vampire?”
“He is human. But I have known him for thirty years.”
I immediately raised an eyebrow.
“So he knows your secret too.”
“Yes, and he understands the stakes very well. He always has his eyes and ears open, so he has become my informant. Now he has information that will likely help with a matter I am working on.”
“What type of matter?”
“Disappearances in and around Kerington.”
“They’ve been talking about that on the news for months now. Are vampires involved?”
“I do not yet know. I am in charge of finding out.”
“Does it have anything to do with the disappearances in Kentwood a couple of months ago? Two people vanished just about ten days before we met.”
“I cannot confirm that. Many vampires have small side deals here and there, and they do not like people, let alone the angels, interfering in their business. I came across two such vampires while investigating one of these disappearances when we first met. Their reaction toward me proved that they were hiding something, but not that they were involved. When new vampires enter our territory, they have to make themselves known to my employers and myself. I did not know the ones in the alley, but they certainly knew me, so that is another mystery for me to solve.”
“Is that what you do when I go to bed?”
“I slowed down my investigations to train you, but I did not stop everything.”
“All in all, you never stop.”
“Well, thanks to you, I learned to relax with a DVD marathon. And I sleep during the day.”
“If I ask you where, am I going to hit another brick wall?”
“I have a secret room that I use.”
“Why don’t you use the ones downstairs? You’ve sealed off all the windows.”
“Vampires are distrustful by nature. We are at our most vulnerable when we sleep, so we are not foolish enough to sleep in full view of everyone.”
“But what if I need to contact you in an emergency? How do I find you?”
“I keep my cell phone on me. The ring will wake me. In any case, in full daylight, I will not be of much use to you. Unless what you need is a torch.”
“Am I dreaming, or did you just make a joke?”
“How was it?”
“Pathetic. But don’t get discouraged,” I answered, smiling.
He groaned.
“OK, what do you want me to do when we�
��re at Kiro’s place?”
“Take note of all that he says. Do not disregard anything. Even the tiniest details can prove to be important.”
“Very well. Actually, that’s comforting. It doesn’t seem to be a very difficult mission.”
His silence should have given me pause.
We arrived at Drake Hill shortly after eight o’clock. It was cold, and so I appreciated my big hooded coat and my tights all the more. We weren’t in a great neighborhood, judging from the little alleyways and the street lights that could have used some repair. The facade of the herbalist’s shop was impeccable, however, and the front window displayed dozens of different small bottles. Phoenix held the door open for me, and as he did, a bell rang, announcing our arrival.
Kiro walked through a beaded curtain that separated the shop from a private room in back. I evaluated him from head to toe as he approached my patron, all smiles and wide-open arms. He was an old Japanese man, about seventy-five years old, short, thin, and bald.
“Phoenix, it’s been so long!” Kiro exclaimed, giving Phoenix an embrace that, surprisingly, my boss returned.
“Hello, Kiro. How are you? Your family?”
“Oh, everyone is doing well. Same for me, except for my damn rheumatism. I’m not as spry as you. But you can ask Aoki, who’s in the back room—I’m still a lion.”
He elbowed my boss, putting some force into it, a signal of a knowing, masculine complicity. I must have been hallucinating. Where I was only ever treated to a cold indifference, Phoenix was joking around with this old eccentric, who finally got interested in me.
“But who is this beauty? Another of your conquests?”
Kiro ogled me without restraint, even having the audacity to linger over my breasts.
I felt my cheeks turn hot, and I knew I had instantly turned beet red. I opened my mouth to give the lecherous old fool a piece of my mind, but I was interrupted by Phoenix.
“You are mistaken,” he said. “This is my assistant.”
The old man finally deigned to move from my chest to my face, then redirected his attention to my boss.
“As long as I’ve known you, I’ve only seen you working solo. Since when do you trust humans?”
I was waiting for the moment when Phoenix would put Kiro back in his place for talking in such a familiar tone.
“Times change. As for trust, you know well what that means.”
“How is she?”
I’d had enough of his little game.
“Hello? I’m right here. Stop talking about me as if I’m not in the room with you. And mind your own business.”
There was silence and a severe look from Phoenix. Kiro observed me more attentively before exclaiming, “Beautiful and temperamental. Those are the most attractive women, and the hardest to handle.”
“You do not even know,” my boss said, rolling his eyes.
Then I treated Phoenix to a murderous look, which make the old man guffaw loudly.
“You’ve chosen well. She’s a rare pearl,” Kiro said.
Then he finally addressed me directly.
“Shall we make our exchange official, Miss . . . ?”
“Wa—Jones. Samantha Jones.”
Nice job. I’d almost slipped up.
“Miss Jones, please be assured that it’s better to be under Phoenix’s thumb than that of any other of his kind. I’m quite content that he let me live in exchange for the services I render him from time to time.”
“How did you discover his secret?”
“He must’ve told you that I was his informant. I’ve always had a tendency to listen at doors, and I know plenty of people who do the same. They say that curiosity is a nasty flaw, and I paid for it the night I approached Phoenix too closely. The alternative he proposed to me couldn’t be refused, but you know that. And you, how did you find yourself in this situation?”
“Let’s just say that I also got too close to him, but not on purpose.”
I thought about our first encounter, when the big blond had thrown me at him.
Kiro came closer, and I couldn’t help taking a step back, fearing that the old man wanted to touch me.
“You must be very special for him to choose you to go on missions with him. Do you have a particular talent?” he whispered.
They say that wisdom comes with age. I didn’t know how to answer, so Phoenix did it for me.
“She has a gift for asking indiscreet questions, a bit like you, Kiro.”
This idiot had forgotten about the supersensitive hearing of vampires. He looked sheepish, like a little kid caught doing something stupid.
“We have work to do,” Phoenix said, cutting off our host’s curiosity.
Kiro invited us to follow him into the back room, and we sat down around a small table.
“Can I offer you something to drink, Miss Jones?” he asked me politely.
“No, thank you,” I replied as I took out my notepad.
He sat down with a serious expression on his face and said, “The disappearances in the news are only the tip of the iceberg.”
“Meaning?” asked Phoenix grimly.
“People have only been talking about the missing persons with families, because the families are informing the police about the disappearances. There have also been abductions of homeless people, prostitutes, and junkies, but the journalists aren’t covering them. In Drake Hill alone, there are at least twenty people who haven’t been heard from. So imagine how many there are in Kerington and the neighboring cities.”
Kerington was the biggest city in the county, and despite the millions of dollars handled by a small untouchable elite, Kerington County was poor, and it figured high on the list of national statistics concerning income inequality and meth addiction. Consequently, because the people being kidnapped were those who wouldn’t be brought to the police’s attention, the crime numbers were inaccurate. I shivered.
“It is even more serious than I thought,” said Phoenix. “Do you have anything else for me?”
“Some strange things are happening in Kerington’s industrial zone. An acquaintance of mine warned me that funny things are going on in certain warehouses, but he didn’t know what precisely. In fact, a man in an advanced stage of decomposition was found by the police in an old barrel used for storing chemicals. The man must have wanted to get a closer look. I don’t know anything more.”
“How often are the warehouses used?”
“No one really knows. It’s never the same ones, and the frequency is impossible to determine. All that anyone knows is that the next day, the warehouses are empty and clean. Not a trace of what happened there.” Kiro shook his head before continuing. “Phoenix, I don’t know what’s going on or if it has anything to do with vampires, but no one feels safe anymore. Aoki refuses to take a single step outside after sunset. She’s beside herself with worry and warns the children so often they are worried. As for me, I admit that I stay cooped up too, but I have a business to run. This must stop.”
Phoenix turned to me.
“Samantha, we have finished here for this evening. I need some things from the minimarket two streets back. Here is the list.”
He placed the list on the table in front of me as I tried to quickly scribble down everything Kiro had said about the warehouses.
“Go on. I will catch up,” Phoenix said.
I stood up, nodded at Kiro, who was eying my cleavage again, and walked to the door. Before I walked outside, I heard Phoenix’s advice to Kiro.
“I am going to figure all this out. In the meantime, you and your family should keep a low profile. No need to attract the attention of the abductors.”
When I got outside, I found the streets deserted and dark. I didn’t see any sign of a minimarket. The only explanation was that there was no minimarket. If it had been a long time since Phoenix had last come to this neighborhood, maybe he didn’t know it had closed. I wanted to turn around and go back to Kiro’s shop.
The wind picked up. The li
ght of one of the streetlamps crackled, giving the street a murky look. I tightened my coat around me and kept going.
Down the street, there were two men heading in my direction. My danger alarm signaled that I was about to run into trouble. I hoped it was only two drunkards too tipsy to be a real threat, but their balanced gait dashed that glimmer of hope. Because of that, I crossed my fingers and hoped that they weren’t vampires.
When we passed each other, I heard whistling behind my back.
“Oh, Jack, get a look at the li’l’ lady. She’s lost, right?”
“I don’t know, Tony. Maybe we should ask her if she wants us to bring her home and comfort her.”
Their salacious laughter echoed behind me. I had no illusion about how they thought events would play out when their footsteps became louder as they approached me. Being raped was out of the question. In my previous life, the only thing I would have done was run in the hopes of being faster than my attackers, but so many assaulted women try that option without success.
Then I remembered this wasn’t my previous life. I was not without defense, and I spun around. Surprised, they slowed the pace of their advance toward me.
“Tony, looks like the li’l’ lady is waiting for us. She wants to have a good time too!”
“She’ll see what studs we are, that’s for sure.”
They finally arrived in front of me, and I could see their faces clearly. One was bald and puffy, likely due to the alcohol that he reeked of; the other, skinnier, had pockmarks all over his face. Both had insipid smiles that filled me with disgust, as much for their lewd expressions as for their rotten teeth. Before making a move, I composed my face into an inscrutable mask so they wouldn’t sense my fear.
“Is this how you treat women, gentlemen? Do you have no pride, taking pleasure only by forcing yourselves on women when you could try to seduce them instead?”
Puffy and Pox looked at me, wide-eyed.
“What? What’re you talking about?” said Puffy Tony.
“Have you seen our faces, you bitch? Little ladies like you give us the cold shoulder because they think we’re gross, but we get them back for being . . . what’s the word for it? Yeah, for being hot tea.”
Chronicles of an Extraordinary Ordinary Life Page 8
