I gaped at him, my hands on my hips. “Is everybody a member of the total dick club today, or what? You need to get over yourself, Kristopher DeMon, and accept help from people who give a damn. But don’t worry—if I hold my hand out to a wounded dog and he tries to bite it off, I’m not likely to try it again.”
“This wounded dog appreciates it.” He gave me a very unpleasant smile.
I bent over and snatched the key off the floor and slid it back into my pocket. “I don’t know your story. I’m not sure I want to know it. But there is good in you—I’m sure of it. And if you ever find it, feel free to look us up if you need some help. Like I said, we owe you one. Jerk.”
Chapter 18
I didn’t stick around so he could argue with me anymore. I turned and left the Goth pirate wizard who had imprisoned himself in this lousy little theater as surely as Thierry had been imprisoned in the hotel suite.
Then again, I now knew Thierry could have left any time he wanted to. I wasn’t so sure it was the same with Kristopher.
“Seriously,” I groused as Thierry and I left Club Noir. The area was surrounded with concrete and other seedy theaters and businesses, but not a lot else. The sun was starting to sink beneath the horizon and the heat of the day was finally easing off a little. “What was his problem?”
“Did you honestly think we could help him?”
“I don’t know.” I frowned and looked up at him. “Is it stupid of me that I try to see the good parts in people before I’m forced to see the bad?”
“Stupid, no.” He caught my hand in his and pulled me to a stop. As I turned to him, I realized he was smiling at me, his weariness from dealing with Bernard now gone from his expression. “Naive, yes. Your heart”—he placed his hand flat against my chest—“is very pure, despite all you’ve faced these last months. Don’t belittle how you feel. It makes you who you are.”
“If it constantly gets me in trouble, maybe I should learn and change. Maybe I should look at everyone as a potential threat.”
“You have learned and changed in the time since I first met you. You’ve grown in so many ways.”
“You really think so?”
“I know so.” His gaze slid down the front of me all the way to the ground. “For one thing, the Sarah I originally met would never wear flat shoes like those.”
I looked down at my Keds. “They’re incredibly comfortable. So what if I’m way shorter now?”
He bent over and brushed his lips against mine. “Thank you for standing by me through all of this, for believing in me. You don’t know how much it means to me.”
My previous doubts flew away as quickly as they’d arrived. “I can’t think of anywhere else I’d rather stand.”
“Come, I know someone in the city who can get us an untraceable car and some new identification. We’ll leave tonight—it can’t wait any longer.”
“You really don’t think there’s any other way? We know the truth now.”
“This, unfortunately, is not a truth that will set me free. I’ll get you to safety and then I’ll deal with Markus.”
“Oh, now you’re going to deal with Markus—you’re not just going to avoid him?”
He cast a look at me and I didn’t like the uncertainty in his gaze. I was used to him knowing exactly what to do at all times, even if he didn’t share all the details with me. The doubt in his gray eyes made the ground feel like it was shifting beneath my feet.
He didn’t reply. He didn’t really have to.
There was only one solution here and that was for us to split up. My time with Thierry was coming to an end whether I liked it or not and I had no idea what our future held or if I’d ever see him again.
He was standing right next to me holding my hand and I already missed him.
“Do you think there’s any possibility that Kristopher is the serial killer?” I asked, giving my suspicions a voice. Even though it was dusk, the streets were busier than ever. We’d quickly made it back to the Strip and were headed, apparently, toward a hotel where Thierry had some sort of contact who could help us for a price. Everybody, I’d learned, had a price.
“What makes you think that?”
“I don’t know—emotional distress, lost love, a mysterious curse or magical punishment, bad fashion choices, and that pointy sickle ring of his. To me that adds up to a whole lot of potential for kookiness and instability.”
“It’s possible. But the serial killer is Markus’s problem now. I believe my accusation of murder has removed me as Bernard’s replacement as consultant.”
He was right about that. “So can you tell me now what the offer you couldn’t refuse was?”
“Does it matter?”
“I’m curious.”
“It’s past. I was willing to take the position for several reasons.”
“But not entirely of your own free will?”
His expression darkened. “If I ask you not to press me on this matter, will you do that for me?”
I was frustrated that he wouldn’t talk about it, but this wasn’t the most important thing to deal with right now. “Okay, fine. No pressing. But it’s just another secret you won’t share, isn’t it? You can’t blame me for being curious.”
“There is much of my past I’d like to leave exactly where it is. There’s no logical reason to turn over every one of my rocks to reveal what’s underneath. It’s only a matter of time before you find something you might not be able to deal with.”
“Maybe you underestimate me.”
He gave me an amused sidelong look. “Frequently.”
“I have secrets, too, you know,” I said pointedly, although I was completely lying. I couldn’t think of a single one I had locked away in a dark closet so no one would see the truth. “Big secrets. And you know what? You’re never going to know what they are.”
He still looked amused. “Noted.”
The next moment I felt as if my arm had been yanked right out of its socket as he pulled me off the sidewalk and in through the doors of the Paris casino.
“What is it?” I asked as he walked briskly, almost more briskly than I could keep up with. I was fast now, but this was Speedy Gonzales–level fast.
“Markus,” he said. Only one word, but it was enough to tell me everything I needed to know. He’d spotted Markus, and if the enforcer spotted us in return, we were in deep, deep trouble.
He swore under his breath again, which worried me. The more he did that, the more it meant that he didn’t have everything under control.
“What do we do?” I asked, my throat tight.
“He’ll be looking for us to be together.” We hadn’t stopped walking. We breezed past the slot machines and down a long carpeted hallway. “I don’t want this, but we’ll have to split up for a while. Go somewhere safe. I have my cell phone back from Markus’s men. I’ll call you the moment I have a car and we can leave the city together.”
“How long will that take?”
“An hour. No more than that.”
“I hate to ask, but can’t we just steal a car?”
“We could, but I need my contact for more than just transportation. He will help us in other invaluable ways, too, and he has no affiliation with the Ring, so there’s no risk of him selling us out. This must be done now. Call me if there is any problem at all, do you hear me?”
I nodded, my heart racing. “Okay, fine. I’ll go somewhere dark and private where I can hide out for an hour.”
He stopped walking and pulled me against him. “I’m so sorry for dragging you into all of this, Sarah. I never should have brought you here with me in the first place. I see now it was a terrible mistake.” He kissed me hard before he pulled back and gazed into my eyes for a moment with regret and worry. “Be safe.”
Then he turned and walked away from me. Before long, I lost him in the crowd of tourists and gamblers.
In hindsight, coming to Vegas and playing at being his fiancée slash personal assistant had been a bit of a lon
g shot, I’d admit it. But his admission that it was a mistake left me with a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. All of this still would have happened whether or not I’d been here, so I didn’t think he was blaming me. However, escaping from Markus, and then dealing with the consequences, with a naive fledgling slowing him down every step of the way…
I could see his point.
I was a liability on many levels. I was a problem that had to be dealt with.
No news there.
Still, that “fighter” part of me didn’t want to accept this as the truth. It wanted to yell at him and say that it wasn’t a mistake. That I was meant to be by his side, in good times and in bad. And that he was lucky to have me when practically any other woman would have dutifully gotten on that plane last night and gone back to her safe and secure home, tail tucked between her legs, before getting on with her regularly scheduled life.
I wasn’t that woman. And I might be naive, but I knew what I wanted. I wanted Thierry, secrets and all. I even wanted to help him with his job. Working with Victoria had shown me that being a consultant with the shadowy organization was a valuable position and it served an important purpose: lending a hand to vampires in trouble. Since I’d been one of those vampires for a while now, I saw the value in getting a little outside help now and then. Thierry and me as a team would have done a way better job than Bernard ever had. After all, we would actually care about the people we were sent to assist, not get distracted by pet wives, stolen diamonds, and misplaced revenge.
But that was over now. I’d be placed somewhere safe and given new identification like someone in the witness relocation program.
This was all so messed up. There had to be another answer, I just couldn’t think of it yet.
Keeping an eye on my surroundings, I tried to blend in with the crowd. I planned to go back to my motel room and wait there until I got Thierry’s call.
But then I saw him.
Not Markus, somebody else. Somebody that I didn’t trust for one minute.
Charles moved down the sidewalk just as I stepped outside the casino. His hands were shoved deeply in his pockets and he looked nervously to the right and left as if checking to see if anyone had spotted him.
Victoria was nowhere to be seen. As far as I knew, the little vamp was safely tucked in bed for the night with her teddy bear.
And Charles had ventured out at sunset all by his lonesome.
Staying vigilant to Markus’s potential presence, I trailed after Charles down the sidewalk.
“Are you prepared, my child?” a voice asked.
I looked to my left to see Vampire Jesus standing there in his familiar white robes, a cheery smile on his face that showed off his fake fangs. He thrust a lime green flyer out to me.
“No, I’m definitely not prepared,” I replied.
“It will be soon. All of this will end. Everything you’ve ever known. The day is nigh when the vampires will rule the world and all humans will become their willing slaves.”
I grabbed the flyer out of his hand, stared at it a moment, then crumpled it into a ball and tossed it at his face. It bounced off and hit the ground.
“Get a life,” I told him.
A frown creased his brow. “But, my child—”
“Besides, any smart vampire wouldn’t want a human slave. Way too high maintenance. Now go get a real job, you weirdo.”
I turned my back on him and kept after Charles. He finally slipped into the M&M’s store. I kept following him. I really wanted to know where he went when he left Victoria for long stretches of time.
Thierry said that the serial killer was Markus’s responsibility now, and I totally agreed with that. I’d never wanted anything to do with it; all I wanted was to find out who had Bernard killed. Well, now I knew the answer to that—as bizarre as the answer turned out to be. My plate was clear.
However, if it was Charles, I couldn’t just sit back and let him keep killing people, could I? The answer to that rhetorical question was a big fat no. I wasn’t going to take him down and perform a citizen’s arrest or anything if I found out I was right, but I could pass along word to people who could do something about it—even if it was an anonymous tip to Markus himself. While I didn’t like Markus and he scared me deeply, I knew he was a damn good enforcer and would take care of the serial killer problem swiftly and permanently.
There was a door at the back of the chocolate-themed store that Charles opened up and walked through. When I reached the door, I pushed it open a few inches, trying to hear something—talking, screaming, I wasn’t sure.
I couldn’t hear much beyond the buzz of customers behind me in the store—and yet, farther down the hall there was a murmuring. Voices. Several of them.
A hand clamped down on my shoulder and I barely stopped myself from doing my best banshee impression.
A large bald man smiled at me. His hand was about the size of an oven mitt. “You don’t need to be afraid.”
My heart thudded against my rib cage. “I don’t?”
“No, it’s fine. We’re all in this together.” He had fangs. He was a vampire, too.
“We are?”
“Yes. Come along, then, I’ll help you. The others will be glad you’ve decided to join us.”
I gulped. “They will?”
“I understand the urges. We all do. Now, don’t make a fuss. It’ll all be better soon.”
Oh my God. What had I just walked into? A serial killer party in the back of a chocolate store? I was supposed to be somewhere safe waiting for Thierry’s call and now I was being led along a dark hallway to face my doom. I never planned to venture out of the main store where it was safe, but now it seemed too late. I really would have much preferred to learn the truth about Charles from a happy and healthy distance.
“Oh, I don’t know.” I tried to sound calm. “This doesn’t feel right. I think I want to leave.”
“We all said that in the beginning. It’s only together that we can make sense out of everything. Trust me.”
Trust him? I’m thinking…no.
He pushed open a door at the end of the hallway and six pairs of eyes turned and stared at me, including Charles’s. His gaze widened.
“Sarah,” he said with surprise. “What are you doing here? How did you even find out this place exists?”
The big bald man patted my arm in a friendly manner as he let go of me. I wasn’t immediately attacked and torn into small bloody pieces, which was a relief, so I decided my only chance to get out of here was to play along.
“You know, word gets around,” I said as calmly as I could. “And here I am.”
Charles shook his head. “I had no idea.”
“Right.” I glanced around at the others. Including Baldy and Charles, there were four men and three women. “No idea about what?”
“That you were one of us.”
That was highly debatable.
Seven members of this group. And there had been seven murders to date that I was aware of.
Oh boy.
A woman approached me. She had a neat blond bob and looked like a professional—a lawyer, maybe. She wore a pantsuit that gave her a very Hillary Clinton look. “New members are always welcome. Please, everyone, have a seat and let’s get started. Don’t forget, there’s coffee available to you all at the back.”
I uneasily took a seat in a metal chair. Charles sat down next to me. He had a Styrofoam cup full of coffee. He gave me a small grin. “Sorry I’ve been kind of rude to you. I appreciate you looking after Victoria while I’ve been dealing with stuff.”
“Dealing with what kind of stuff?” I asked cautiously.
“This kind of stuff.” He glanced around the room. “It’s been a tough month for me, so I’m here a lot, like three times a day, which is way more than the others. But they’ve been helping me deal with my issues. I know Victoria told you I used to be a hunter.”
“She did…,” I said slowly. What else had Victoria shared with him? My guess
that he was still hunting…only it was humans now?
“It’s rough. But we need to deal. We need to accept what we are and make peace with it any way we can, even when it’s difficult. Especially when it’s difficult.”
“I couldn’t agree more.”
This felt off somehow. When I’d entered this room, I’d been utterly convinced it was full of vampires who were indiscriminately killing humans and leaving their bodies in the open all over town. But I wasn’t starring in a Stephen King movie and a serial killer meeting seemed extremely unlikely. So what the hell was this?
“Welcome everyone,” the blonde said. She stood at the front and everyone’s attention went to her. “Thank you all for coming out to our Thursday evening meeting. My name is Dolores and I am addicted to blood.”
“Hi, Dolores,” the group chimed all together.
Charles leaned toward me. “It’s easier to deal with our addictions when we have people who understand what we’re going through. Don’t you think?”
I just nodded as the truth of where I’d found myself became abundantly clear.
This wasn’t a serial killer strategy meeting.
This was a meeting of Bloodaholics Anonymous.
Chapter 19
The members of the group each got up in turn, introduced themselves, and related their story about how they’d faced difficulties. I could only equate it to Overeaters Anonymous more than Alcoholics Anonymous. You could abstain from booze completely, but someone addicted to food still had to eat to survive. Ditto vampires and blood.
Charles admitted to having impulse problems. He was spending heaps of money at blood banks, including Blood Bath & Beyond, to literally feed his cravings, and he longed for a day when he could drink like a normal vampire.
Finally, it was my turn. I stood on shaky legs, incredibly relieved by what I’d learned so far. But I still needed to play along. I didn’t think anyone would be too thrilled to find out that I’d been faking.