'A writer! That's amazing. I've always wanted to do that.' Through the glass behind her, the graffiti sprayed there made it appear as if her blonde head was haloed by a blood-red mist. 'What do you write about?'
'Vampires.'
Before he knew it he was standing on the platform watching the train pull out, carrying the beautiful woman away. She waved to him but what he noticed most was the graffiti:
VAMPIRE SHARKZ
☺ They're coming to get you ☺
TWO
From a wonderful night to crap had taken seconds. Ben Ashton now walked along the embankment. The night still burned hotter than a Bangkok knocking-shop. The chimes of Big Ben sounded a shimmering two across a town that seemed hell-bent on enjoying itself until the doomsday. Lights blazed from buildings. Taxis hurtled along the road to the right of him. To the left, the wide stretch of the River Thames was an expanse of liquid darkness. From this angle it didn't even reflect the lights on the opposite bank. It was as black as the pupil in the centre of your eye.
There were no other pedestrians nearby. Only a couple approaching arm-in-arm in the distance. Now was a great time to vent his frustration.
'If it wasn't for bad luck I wouldn't have any luck at all,' he fumed. 'I thought I'd struck gold… and what is it she wanted? Me, to watch her performance with her boyfriend… that's just… just bollocks…'
Ben paused to lean forward against the wall so he could look down into the river. The full tide had swollen it. Its surface now lay just a few feet below street-level so he could see his forlorn reflection gazing right back at him. 'And you know something else, Ben Ashton? You shouldn't be talking to yourself. You know what happens to people who do?'
His own reflection held his gaze. A broad face framed by unruly black hair. There I am, he told himself. A thirty-something writer that feels as if Christmas has just been cancelled. Stupid bugger… Now you're feeling sorry for yourself.
A shape floated by in the water. Even though it was the dead of night he could see enough in the street lights to identify it as a jacket, perhaps chucked into the river by a reveller. Come to think of it, he disliked looking into the river. It was more than dislike, it made him shiver. To look at the Thames creeping blackly along like that seemed to divert some of its cold currents through his own bloodstream; chilling a vein or two. Ben took a step back but the water exerted an uncanny grip on him. When he was as close as this to the river it always snatched him back to the week he'd moved to London, and left his mother's home for good. He'd been high on the exhilaration of living footloose and fancy free in one of the biggest cities in the world - all those thrills and possibilities: they were lying waiting for him to come along and scoop them up in his two hands. That's when he'd walked down here, just like tonight. Full of the joys of freedom, he'd come to this very spot, near Cleopatra's Needle, to gaze happily over the wall into the water.
A corpse had been floating there. It had been naked with the arms and legs stretched out so it formed a white X mark there in the oily, black water. He remembered alerting a group of men nearby, 'There's someone in the water.' Then it all happened so fast. More people appeared from nowhere. A police car arrived. Within moments of Ben shouting 'There's someone in the water', the body had been dragged out on to one of the pleasure-boat jetties.
Ben had stared down at the sopping remnant of human flesh in the street light. Someone had said, 'It's the body of a young woman.' He'd seen the butterfly tattoo on her waxy arm. The tattooed image had pink wings fixed to a green body. He'd seen a pattern of freckles on her thigh in the shape of a palm print. There was a bizarre detail he still remembered clearly. These days he couldn't figure out whether it was some product of the shock; a detail burned into his brain by imagination, as he tried to deal with the horror of this dripping corpse that two hours ago might have been a living, breathing woman, laughing and talking with friends in a bar. But in one of the cadaver's hands that had bunched into a tight fist was a child's plastic doll. Strangely the doll - also naked - and the woman appeared similar. But the woman must have been struck by the propeller of a passing boat because that's where the similarity ended. The plastic doll still had her head.
'Hey!'
Ben's bones nearly jumped free of his skin.
'Ben! Where on earth have you been? I haven't seen you in months.'
Ben whirled round to find a familiar face. 'April?'
'Why the hesitation? Don't tell me I've changed that much… but you haven't seen this.' She touched her short dark hair. 'I had the old mop cut off just after you left.'
April's familiar face was a welcome one. Even though he'd been back in London six months he'd convinced himself that he'd never see her again. Now, here she was: April Connor. The same sparkling eyes, the same light-up-the-room smile. Her body-language now exuded a supple confidence that she lacked before. Meeting April Connor by chance at two in the morning would have made his night. What tore the pleasant surprise apart was that she stood arm-in-arm with a tanned man, sporting close-cropped blond hair and gold neck chains. The man appeared every inch a millionaire success story.
'April, it's lovely to see you.' Immediately Ben's words sounded awkwardly formal. He tried to be more easy-going. 'How's life treating you?'
'Great. Oh, I haven't seen you in ages. I can't believe it. Come here, you lunatic.' She slipped a bare arm around his neck. For a second he occupied her air-space, and breathed in her perfume. She kissed him firmly on the cheek. The sincerity of it made his heart beat hard.
'You're looking well.' Hell, that sounds lame, he thought. 'Are you still flogging the mag?'
'No, I'm doing PR for an agency now. So it's Hollywood movies one day, sewer pipes the next.' April gave him a playful punch on the arm. 'But what happened to you? All I got was a text saying you were going to New York and you'd be back after the weekend. Then you vanished.'
'The magazine liked the article I did for them so much they asked me to stay.' The blond man's wide-eyed stare was beginning to irritate him. 'What was supposed to be a five-day assignment became a six-month posting.'
April laughed, marvelling at it all. 'Congratulations. You must have loved being in New York. All those beautiful women.'
'It had its moments.'
'I don't know whether to hug you or strangle you. Why didn't you call me?'
'Someone stole my case with my computer and-'
'Oh, I'm sorry I'm being so rude,' she broke in, still smiling in an outrageously pretty way. 'I haven't introduced you. You'll have to excuse me, we've been celebrating. We just signed for an apartment today.'
Ben's heart sank. 'That's great. Congratulations.'
'And this is Trajan.'
The blond man held out his hand. A handshake every bit as businesslike as Ben expected it to be. 'Trajan.'
Ben nodded.
April continued. 'Trajan, this is Ben Ashton. One of the best feature writers in the world - and craziest man in London. Only he'll never admit to either.'
'April, you should be my agent.'
'Then I could have been rich, not a poor little PR girl.' Her eyes twinkled even more brightly as she said, 'Trajan's in shipping.'
'Container logistics.' Trajan's voice was oddly flat as if reluctant to say any more than the minimum.
'Trajan, everyone used to think that Ben and I were an item… or even married. Imagine that, Ben.'
Ben forced a laugh. 'Imagine.'
'For over a year we were best friends. People couldn't believe there was never anything more to it than that.' She squeezed Ben's arm as if to reassure herself he was really there. 'Ben, what have you been doing with yourself?'
'Freelancing mainly. There's a new magazine that needs-'
'April.' Trajan checked his watch. 'It's getting late.'
'Oh, of course.' She hugged Trajan's arm. 'We're going up to Aberdeen tomorrow for Suka's wedding. Do you remember Suka? She told everyone that she was going on this odyssey to India… overland by car, would you believe?
She got as far as Folkestone, met a schoolteacher in a cafe, and fell in love with him.'
Ben smiled. Is it as wistful as it feels? he wonders.
'Ah, there's fairy-tale romance for you,' Ben said. 'Like a bolt from the blue.'
'I'll say,' she said with feeling.
Trajan awarded his wristwatch another of his wide-eyed stares. 'April?'
'Sorry. Gotta go. Lovely to see you again, Ben. Keep in touch!' She kissed him and for a second he was swimming in a warm ocean of her body heat and perfume. Then she'd gone as abruptly as she arrived.
He murmured to himself, 'Keep in touch? How? I don't have your number anymore.' More important than the how? was the why? For as long as he could bear it he watched April walk away, her arm linked with Trajan's.
'Damn,' he hissed, then trudged in the direction of home.
***
April Connor had to walk briskly to keep up with Trajan. They hadn't intended to stay in the restaurant for so long, but the hunt for a new apartment had been brutal, so when they signed the contracts today it hadn't been easy to stop celebrating. A light breeze rustled the trees along the embankment. The smooth surface of the river became rippled. She heard the slap of a wave against the embankment wall that channelled the river. At this time of night the road traffic had become lighter. There were no pedestrians in sight. No one, that is, other than the dwindling speck that was Ben Ashton.
'Damn, I forgot to ask Ben for his telephone number.'
'April!'
Trajan's fierce grip on her forearm made her cry out. 'Trajan… oh, Trajan… stop it…'
'April… look.'
Sex games. A late-night fuck in a public place. Those thoughts skated through her head. A woman lay back on the wall that separated the river from the road. A large, male shape leaned over her. The masculine image oozed a predatory power.
April stared. Sights of what appeared to be an erotic encounter whirled out of the darkness at her. The woman was aged about thirty. Her curled red hair gleamed with copper glints in the street light. She was moaning, her head rolled from side to side on the wall. Her hands were raised as if she squeezed at something invisible in the air above her.
Now April saw what Trajan had seen. And what had caused him to react by inadvertently hurting her arm. The man held the woman down on the wall. He'd yanked up her T-shirt then he'd pushed his face against her belly flesh. He wasn't kissing or licking. He was gnawing at her skin. With his teeth he'd torn open a gash. Blood streamed from the wound across her white flesh to dribble to the ground. And all the time the man sucked and groaned. It was like watching a starving wretch faced with food for the first time in weeks. And he was gorging. He drank so deeply he grunted as if it hurt him to force so vast a draught of blood down through his throat in one go.
There wasn't much life in the redhead now. She moaned. Her movements were weak. She stared bleakly upward into the night sky.
Then the woman's attacker did something that pushed April's sense of disgust beyond the limits of what she thought she could take. The man ripping at his victim's stomach with his bare teeth was bad enough. What he did next was worse.
'Oh, God, no.' April stopped dead. Even Trajan wavered now, not believing what he saw unfolding just feet away from them.
The brutal figure in front of them had raised his head. He was panting. The blood he drank gurgled wetly in his throat. His pale face had been violently smeared with crimson. He lifted his own face to the sky. He panted faster. His shoulders began to shake. Convulsions ran through his torso, stretching the fabric of his shirt across his back so much April thought it would rip at any second.
Then he snapped his head down at the woman's torn belly. His face struck it with an audible slap. His mouth clamped tight to the wounds, lips forming a seal, then the body convulsed again.
Dear God in heaven, April thought as she rocked back in horror. He's vomiting it back into her!
The pressure of the regurgitation was so violent that crimson fluid spurted from where his mouth met the woman's flesh. April heard the sound of liquid rushing through the man's mouth to surge back through the ripped skin of his victim's belly.
For a while she'd been comatose. A second later she jerked her torso up from the wall, her hands clasped her attacker's head, as her mouth opened into a huge O. The sound that tore from it was half scream, half bellow. A howl of pure agony.
Both April and Trajan had stared at the scene in shock. This shriek broke the spell.
'Leave her alone!' Trajan leapt on the man's back. With hardly any exertion on his part the figure shrugged him away. What happened next was incredibly fast. The blood-soaked attacker stood up straight, pushed his victim over the wail into the river; the splash seemed a tiny sound in comparison to the woman's tortured cry. Trajan ran at the monster. He did not have a chance to land a blow before he was thrown to the ground. His head struck the pavement with such a loud crack that April froze. Meanwhile, cars passed by on the road just a dozen paces away. But nobody stopped. Maybe they thought it was just drunks fooling around. Or maybe they were afraid to become involved. Sometimes it's better to lock the vehicle doors and drive quickly out of harm's way.
Trajan lay flat. His eyes were closed. The brutal figure of a man approached her. There was something about him… The way he walked. Something wasn't right. But at that moment she couldn't identify what it was. Desperately, she looked behind her. In the distance she could still see Ben. She saw the whiteness of his shirt as he walked away.
'Ben!' she cried.
Then the stranger's hands were on her. She felt herself picked up, then slammed down on the wall. The force of striking the stonework knocked the air from her lungs. April felt his powerful fingers tear a hole in her dress at her waist.
As she waited for his teeth to crunch through the skin in her side she knew the same would happen to her as the redhead. And there was not one thing she could do to prevent it. April Connor didn't even have the luxury of one final, heart-rending scream.
THREE
'Raj, don't! You'll regret it.' He grimaced as the understanding sank in. 'Never give me paranormal assignments. You might as well commission me to track down Elvis for a come-back special with Glenn Miller, Jimi Hendrix and the crew of the bloody Titanic. Besides, you promised me the film festival.' Ben Ashton glared at Raj's boyish Asian face that always assumed an air of mature gravity when handing out editorial assignments.
'Jack Constantine can cover that. He's mad on Chaney anyway.'
'If Jack ever comes back. Last I heard he's locked away in some love shack with that singer from Cuspidor.'
Raj gestured away the objection as if he lazily waved away a fly in that sweltering office. From the street came the steady roar of traffic. Ben wished he'd stayed in the riverside pub to read up on Lon Chaney's films. Then he could have claimed he was already too deep into research to be shunted into some spook hunt.
All Ben could do was swing into a new strategy. 'Jo Suster loves the occult stuff. Send her.'
'No, Ben. You're the man for the job. You always get a fresh angle.'
'With ghosts?'
'Sure.'
'No way.'
'You can do it.'
'No.'
'You'll wish you had. This story will be big when the global news networks get it.'
'Then why are we bothering, Raj?'
'Because Click This is a brilliant magazine and you are a brilliant writer, Ben.'
Ben Ashton pushed a pile of photographs into the centre of the desk and sat on the corner.
'Make yourself at home, Ben. Be my guest.' Raj eased the photographs safely aside. 'But don't go crushing my cover girl.'
'So… film festival. Where are my tickets?'
'No, you're not going to the festival. Snowdance will have to muddle through without you this year.'
'Then I'll take myself round to Screen. They've offered a monthly column.'
'Ben, don't make me get down and beg. It's not a pretty sight. I g
et all jowly.'
'I don't write-up ghosts.'
'There aren't any ghosts.'
'Damn it, Raj. What have you dragged me in here for, then? I've still to finish your article for "Where The Hell Are They Now?" '
Raj picked up his phone from the desk. 'It's more visceral than phantoms, Ben. I want to show you something.'
'Tickets to Montreal would be nice.'
'Ben, I'm offering you the lead article for the next issue. Plus our premium fee, plus a name check on the front cover.'
'Seriously?'
'And expenses.'
'Hell, you must be serious. You've never given me expenses before.'
'I'm very serious. This is going to be a big story.' Raj's youthful face broke into a grin but Ben realized the boy-wonder editor meant business. And, despite his belly-aching about Snowdance, Ben respected Raj. The guy had a knack of sensing what would grab the public's imagination. He'd turned Click This from a cheesy pop culture magazine into a market leader that had the agencies clamouring to buy ad space.
Raj pressed a key on a mobile phone then turned it so Ben could view the screen.
'If you haven't seen this before,' Raj said, 'you should stop doing whatever's damaging your eye sight.'
Ben looked at the screen. Illuminated there was one of the stone lions that guarded the base of Nelson's Column. Someone had painted the words on the plinth:
VAMPIRE SHARKZ
☺ They're coming to get you ☺
Ben shrugged. 'Of course I've seen it. That graffiti's on hundreds of walls, trains, buses; it's everywhere.'
'When did you see Vampire Sharkz first?'
Ben's shrug grew more expressive. 'About three weeks since?'
'I'd say that. A month at the most.'
'So - it's just the latest fad among graffiti artists.'
Raj pressed another key on the phone. The next picture revealed the same graffiti violating the side of a Harrods' delivery van.