Temporary Monsters

Chapter 5

  I’d only been in my apartment for about three seconds when there was a knock at the door. I reached instinctively for my gun, remembered again that I wasn’t wearing it, and opened the door anyway.

  It was Sandra. She looked excited. I figured she must have the wrong house, and told her so.

  “Oh, let me in, you broomhead.”

  I stepped aside and watched her zip down the hall. She was carrying a stack of newspapers. From the lurid photos and blaring headlines, I guessed they were tabloids.

  “Did you get a paper route?” I asked, following her into the kitchen. “It’s really a good thing for you. Gets you out of the house, earns you some extra cash. And think of all the exercise you’ll get.”

  She gave me a light slap and dropped into a chair. She spread the papers out on the table. “Look at these,” she said.

  I had already seen them on my way home, but I looked anyway. Hollywood North had run a special evening edition. In my experience, the only thing that works faster than the media is the trash media. Though sometimes I can’t even tell the difference between the two. It was their business to turn molehills into mountains, and once again they had come through with flying colours. In his “exclusive report,” Horace Parsons made the death of Jimmy Logan sound like the crucifixion. A young actor cut down in his prime by a low-rent private investigator, who claimed to have seen Logan transform into a vampire. That word “claimed” disturbed me a great deal. I felt my knees start to tremble, so I sat down.

  Sandra reached across the table and squeezed my hand. “God, Felix, you’re as white as a ghost.”

  “Ugh.”

  “He didn’t give you any choice.” She squeezed my hand harder. “You know that, don’t you?”

  I nodded mutely.

  “He killed two people.”

  “I know, Dee.” I winced. “Sorry. Habit.”

  “Forget about that. I came over to apologize to you.”

  “That’s funny. I was going to apologize to you.”

  She gave me a look. “What do you have to be sorry for?” she said. “Saving my life?”

  “It wasn’t exactly the lunch I had planned.”

  “I think everyone who was in that restaurant today feels the same way, Felix.”

  “I guess so.”

  I didn’t know what to say. I had expected her to be upset, maybe even angry, and seeing that she was neither turned me into a stammering idiot. It was like our first date all over again.

  “Well, I’m sorry you had to be there. How about that?”

  “Fair enough,” she said with a curt nod. A moment later she grinned. “You know what they’re calling you? The Fearless Vampire Killer.”

  “Oh yeah? Polanski would be proud.”

  “I’m proud of you.”

  I raised my head and looked into Sandra’s eyes.

  “I don’t want to be married to you,” she amended. “But I’m proud of you.”

  “I’ll take it.”