Bitten & Smitten

  Thierry’s gaze moved to the tiny man. “Be so kind as to fetch Miss Dearly and myself something to drink.”

  Barry bowed, the little brownnoser that he was. Then he backed away and headed toward the bar. Thierry gently took me by my elbow and steered me over toward a booth.

  “Please sit,” he said.

  I sat.

  He took a seat across from me and met my eyes. “I imagine this is all quite overwhelming for you.”

  “You could say that.” I leaned back and tried to look as comfortable as possible, given the situation. “I thought this was supposed to be a tanning salon.”

  He raised a dark eyebrow. “It is. But as you can see, it is also much more than that. The previous owner believed it to be an ironic joke. A vampire club behind the facade of a tanning salon.”

  “Funny.”

  Thierry didn’t smile.

  I swallowed and tried to chase my nervousness away. “So, you own this place, huh?”

  “Yes.”

  “Cool.”

  Whether or not he also thought it was cool, he made no indication.

  I forced a smile. “Look, I have tons of questions for you about this vampire thing.”

  “So, at last you believe that you’re no longer dreaming?”

  I looked away and concentrated on smoothing out a wrinkle on the red tablecloth. “To tell you the truth, I did think it was all a dream. I was positive of it. At least until something weird happened today.”

  “What happened?”

  I was embarrassed, but anxious to move onto my real questions, so I launched into a quick retelling of the finger-sucking incident. If he found it amusing, he didn’t give any sign.

  “It is to be expected,” he said when I was finished. “Your body craves blood now. You were simply acting on instinct.”

  “It’s an instinct I don’t want. How do I stop it?”

  That comment almost earned me a smile. Almost.

  “You cannot stop it.”

  Barry stopped at our table with two drinks on a tray. He placed a martini glass full of dark red liquid in front of Thierry. “Your usual, master. And one newbie special.”

  He plunked another glass of Gatorade-for-vamps in front of me. Slightly pink water. I gritted my teeth and glanced at Thierry.

  “Do I have to?”

  “No.”

  I looked back down at the diluted blood. “But if I don’t, I’ll get the headache from hell again, right?”

  He paused before answering. “That is correct.”

  “Well, then, down the hatch.” I gulped a bit of the drink. Damn if it didn’t taste fantastic. I was so grossing myself out, but hey, at least it beat sucking on fingers.

  After a moment I placed the empty glass back down on the table and wiped my mouth with the back of my hand.

  “Good?” Thierry asked.

  I shrugged. “I don’t want to drink blood.”

  “Didn’t look like you had much of a problem just now.”

  I glared at him. “You do what you have to do.”

  “Agreed.” His lips twitched, almost smiling.

  Nice to know he was finding me amusing.

  “So, I’m really a vampire?” I said. “For real?”

  “Yes.”

  “But I still have a reflection.” I ran my tongue along my teeth. “And I don’t have any fangs.”

  He shook his head. “Of course not. You are still young—barely a fledgling. These things will take time to develop.”

  I frowned. “So, if this is all actually happening to me, that means everything last night was real, too. Gordon really got killed.”

  “I’m afraid so. I’m sorry for your loss.”

  My bottom lip trembled a bit at the memory. “He was a jerk. But he didn’t deserve to die.” I touched my neck; the bite had faded to nearly nothing. “Why did he bite me?”

  “He shouldn’t have. Not if he didn’t discuss it with you first.”

  “If he’d discussed it with me, I would have said no. For that matter, I would have said no to anything else he had in mind last night, too. Definitely not a love match.” I felt a shiver go down my spine at the memory of what happened. “But that still shouldn’t have happened to him. Poor Gordon.”

  “The hunters are very dangerous.”

  I tensed. “Who are these hunter guys, anyhow? Do they think they’re a bunch of Buffy the Vampire Slayers? What gives them the right to go around killing people?”

  He brought his drink to his lips and took a sip before answering me. “The hunters think they are doing a service to the world by ridding it of a perceived evil.” He smiled then, a genuine smile, but not a pleasant one. “They will never be convinced we are unworthy of their attentions. That we are not the monsters they think we are.”

  “How do we stop them?”

  He met my gaze again, and I was suddenly floored by how intense it was, especially now, talking about the hunters.

  “We don’t. We simply avoid them as best we can during the hunting season.”

  “Hunting season?”

  “Yes, the main group of hunters migrate to different parts of the world where vampires have formed communities. Like here in Toronto. There will always be stragglers that stay behind, but the main group moves every few months to another location. Right now it is our turn, and we must be even more careful than normal.”

  “But there has to be a way of talking to them, telling them that what they’re doing is wrong—”

  “No,” he interrupted me. “There isn’t. All we can do is stay away from them and not be careless.”

  “Or they’ll stab us in the heart with their wooden stakes. And we’ll turn into a big puddle of goo, just like Gordon?”

  Thierry blinked at me. “Puddle of goo?”

  “When the hunters killed Gordon, he disintegrated into a big puddle of goo. I always thought vampires turned into dust, but I guess that’s just on TV. Pretty gross, though.”

  “How we die is determined by how long we have lived. If you are careless enough to be slain by a hunter, you will not disintegrate into goo.” He grimaced at the word choice. “You will simply die. Your sire must have been very old. Only then will one decompose upon their vampire death, much like they would have in their natural human grave.”

  “Yuck.” I shuddered. “The hunters sure went to work on Gordon, though. It was horrible. He must have been very hard to kill.”

  Thierry shook his head. “All that is required is a deathblow to the heart with a wooden or silver object. Anything else the hunters do is for their own perverse pleasure.”

  I went silent for a moment, thinking about everything I’d just heard. Being a vampire sounded incredibly dangerous. With very few perks.

  But I just had to look on the positive side. Other than the hunters, being a vampire might not be so bad. There was the whole non-aging thing. I liked the sound of that. Everyone in the crowded, smoky club looked fairly happy to me. They were just like regular people, only they’d be young and pretty forever.

  Thierry watched me in silence for a few moments. “I feel it would be best if you took a job here, at Midnight Eclipse.”

  I shook my head. “I’m not waiting tables.”

  “You don’t have to, if you don’t want to. There’s plenty to occupy you otherwise. Perhaps as a hostess?”

  “Why are you doing this? Offering me a job?”

  He took another drink and made me wait. “You are currently unemployed, is that not so?”

  “Yes, but who says I don’t have fifty people banging on my door wanting me to come work for them?”

  “What is it that you did at your last job?”

  This time I was the one to pause. “Well, it’s not going to sound all that glamorous, but I was a senior executive assistant.”

  Thierry stared at me. “You are correct; that does not sound very glamorous.”

  I chewed on my bottom lip. “Look, maybe I made a mistake coming here, after all.”

  Wh
en I stood up to leave, Thierry reached across the table and grabbed my wrist. “You must stay here. Sit down.”

  Something about the way he said it, as if it were a direct order from the “master” himself, pissed me off. I tried to pull away, but his grip was too strong.

  “I must do nothing. Let go of me.”

  He held on for another second, then released me so quickly that I almost fell backward into the booth. “I am only concerned for your safety.”

  “What do you care about my safety?” I suddenly felt very annoyed. “You don’t even know me. Just because I interrupted your little suicide attempt last night—”

  His eyes flashed, the expression on his face cutting me off from saying anything else.

  “You will not speak of that again.”

  It was surprising how quickly his handsome face shifted into something scary-looking. This was not a man I wanted to be mad at me.

  I swallowed hard and sat back down at the table.

  “Look, I’m sorry. Whatever you want to do with your life is none of my business. All I’m looking for…” I paused and decided to rephrase that. “All I’m asking for is a little guidance.”

  He stared at me for a moment and I could see his anger fade away. “I thought you already knew it all from your friend Anne Rice. And this Buffy person.”

  “That was before I started using my boss’s finger as a chew toy.”

  He drummed his fingertips on the tablecloth. “And what can I expect in return?”

  I leaned back and presented him with my best smile. “My friendship.”

  He took me by surprise by throwing his head back and laughing long and hard. “Your friendship? Now why would you think I’d want, or need, something like that from you?”

  I shrugged. “Just a hunch.”

  “Your hunch is wrong.”

  I wasn’t about to be discouraged. “Okay, then, how about this? Those hunters were going to kill me last night. You saved my life. Therefore, you’re responsible for me whether you like it or not.”

  That sobered him up a bit. He looked me over then, slowly, from my freshly washed, shoulder-length brown hair tucked neatly behind my ears, down my makeup-free face, along the line of my neck, and finally to my Diva T-shirt. The sparkles must have made him snap out of his sudden daze. His eyes flicked back to my face.

  “There is a reason why those as old as I do not sire fledglings.” His voice was serious; any trace of laughter had vanished.

  “You didn’t sire me,” I reasoned. “But you’re free to adopt me.”

  I tried to look cute. Then gave up. I really should have taken ten minutes to put on some makeup. I felt seriously shiny.

  When he didn’t say anything, I became very uneasy. Well, I was sitting in a secret vampire club on the wrong side of town across from a six-hundred-year-old vampire others called “master.” I figured I had a right to feel a little uncomfortable.

  I stood up. Better to leave of my own accord than risk any additional embarrassment.

  “I guess I’ll go now.” I half expected him to grab me again and demand that I stay.

  He didn’t.

  I tucked a renegade strand of hair firmly behind my ear and nodded. “I feel like I’m always saying good-bye to you.”

  Thierry said something, but I didn’t quite catch it.

  I leaned closer. “Huh?”

  He looked up at me. “Then don’t.”

  “Don’t what?”

  “Don’t say good-bye.”

  He glanced around the club. The singer was on a break now, and the band just played without vocals. I waited without sitting back down or heading for the door until he decided to say something else.

  “I will agree to your offer,” he finally said. “On one condition.”

  I tried to hide my surprise. “What condition?”

  He met my eyes, capturing them in his intense silver gaze. “You must leave your old life behind.”

  “What does that mean, exactly, ‘leave your old life behind’?”

  “You’ve seen how dangerous it is to be a vampire. You are not the same person you were yesterday. What you once knew to be reality can be no more. Find a new place to live. Part ways with your friends and family. It’s best you have no contact with them at all anymore. Do what I ask, and you may succeed in avoiding the hunters.”

  I frowned at him. “I don’t know about that. Why can’t I stay where I am and just be extra careful when I go out? What difference would it make?”

  “All the difference in the world.” Thierry stood, towering over me. His forehead was creased from frowning so hard. I wondered if he ever let himself relax and have some fun. Maybe take a vacation somewhere warm and tropical. It was highly doubtful. “The life of a vampire and the life of a regular human are incompatible. It’s too dangerous.”

  I shook my head. “But I feel exactly the same as I always have. Nothing’s changed.”

  “Everything’s changed. You don’t feel it yet because you’re too new.”

  “But—”

  He held up his hand. “But nothing, Sarah. That is my condition. If you are unwilling to do as I request, then I can be of no assistance to you.”

  I didn’t like that at all. My life wasn’t exactly perfect, but I wasn’t ready to give any of it up. It was comfortable and familiar. I was supposed to turn my back on it just because I had a new little substance-abuse problem in the form of pink water?

  Then again, I knew I needed Thierry’s help. If I really was a vampire, then I was positive he was the one who’d be able to help me the most. Also, he was very hot.

  I probably wouldn’t need Thierry’s help for more than a week or two. Just long enough to learn the ropes. Then I’d find a new job and go back to life as usual. No problem. Thierry didn’t have to know that part, of course.

  “I agree,” I said firmly, and gave him a big smile.

  “Fine. Return here tomorrow night, and I will do what I can for you, Sarah, but I’m not promising anything.”

  “Try not to sound so positive.”

  He nodded with a firm motion of his head. “Now, if you’ll excuse me.”

  And with that, he turned away and walked across the club, then disappeared through a door at the far side of the bar.

  I put a hand on my hip. “Yeah, see you later, too.”

  We’d have to work on the warm and fuzzy. I shook my head and stifled a laugh. I had just committed myself to being tutored by a centuries-old master vampire by giving up life as I knew it.

  My mother would be so proud.

  Chapter 5

  I left Midnight Eclipse feeling a little tense. Maybe more than a little. Sure, Thierry had agreed to help me out, but it didn’t solve any of my other problems. I still had no idea what to tell Amy about why I’d been fired. Should I tell her I’d been turned into a vampire? Would she still want to go on vacation with me?

  Also, should I make up an excuse to get out of being in the wedding? If I did, my cousin Missy would probably find a wooden stake and kill me herself.

  I saw the neon flash of a bar sign across the street from the vampire club. After giving it a moment’s thought, I walked over and went inside. I had to call a cab, anyhow, so I’d just treat myself to a quick drink of the nonblood variety while I waited.

  Sounded like a plan.

  The bar was called Clancy’s. I’d never heard of it before. It wasn’t a high-profile kind of place. Basically, it was a bar with stools, a few high tables, more stools, and a couple of pool tables stuffed in the back. All of this fine decor was covered by a thick cloud of smoke from cigarettes and something a little less legal.

  I went directly to the pay phone and called for the taxi. Then I grabbed a seat at the bar. The bartender, a hulking man who must have weighed close to three hundred pounds, took my drink order. I decided on a Bloody Mary. In the spirit of the evening, what else could I order?

  There was a man sitting a couple of stools away from me who was staring into his mug of
dark amber beer as if it held the answers to the mysteries of the universe. He was alone. Kind of cute, actually. He wore faded jeans and a green T-shirt. His hair was dark blond and a little on the scruffy side. He had a handsome, yet vaguely boyish face. He must have sensed he had an audience because he glanced over at me with deep blue eyes.

  “You look like your dog just died,” I told him. I didn’t normally talk to strange men in unknown bars, unless I had female backup. But I was only going to be there for a few minutes, and I felt chatty after the strained conversation with Thierry.

  “Do I?” he said. “I guess it’s been one of those days.”

  “I hear you.”

  He glanced down at my chest. Normally, I’d be offended, but I was wearing the sparkly Diva shirt. It worked like an arrow that read “Look here.”

  “Nice T-shirt.”

  “Thanks.”

  That earned me a smile from him. A great smile, but his eyes were sad.

  “So what was his name?” I asked.

  “Whose name?”

  “Your dog. The one that died.”

  He grinned at me. “No, no dog. Just family problems, I guess. Nothing terribly interesting. I figured I’d come here for a while to try to drown my troubles.” He glanced down at his beer.

  “You’re going about it all wrong. To drown your sorrows, you have to use tequila. Beer only magnifies them.”

  “Is that right?”

  “Tried and true.”

  His grin widened. He moved over to a stool closer to me. The nearer he came, the better-looking he was. Not as drop-dead gorgeous—no pun intended—as Thierry, but definitely in a highly hot category.

  He extended his hand. “I’m Michael Quinn. But my friends just call me Quinn.”

  I smiled back and shook his hand. “Sarah Dearly.”

  Quinn got the bartender’s attention. “Two shots of tequila, please. With lime.” Then he looked back at me. “So, what’s a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?”

  Ah, yes. There was a line that never got old. I decided to let it slide. “What makes you think that I’m nice?”

  “Are you saying you’re not?”

  “Oh, I am. Very nice. To the right people, that is.”