But really, that fit Abner perfectly. He'd turned into a vampire at the beginning of the twentieth century, and he had this air about him that always reminded me of Humphrey Bogart. Though, he had a more youthful appearance and more handsome face than Bogart, with large gray eyes, a strong roman nose, and perfectly coiffed ashy blond hair.
He smiled when I knocked on his open door, and he rose to his feet as Bobby and I came into his office.
"That was a quick one," he said, gesturing to the chairs in front of his desk. "Ottaline already called with the report."
I hesitated before taking a seat. "Was it a good report?"
"Naturally. Ottaline's always happy with the work you do."
"I told Alice when the call came in tonight that Ottaline just wanted to see me again." Bobby was joking, but he wasn't entirely off base. Ottaline had expressed a fondness for him in the past, saying he reminded her of her long deceased son.
"Did you find out anything about the culprit?" Abner had come around his desk and leaned back against it, half-sitting on it. "Ottaline said it wasn't anyone she was familiar with."
"She said her name was Iris Emmanuel. She didn't look very old, so I suspect that she just didn't know how to control her bloodlust yet," I said.
"She did seem to have a particular disdain for humans," Bobby added. "She seemed really disgusted when she thought you were working for us."
Abner frowned. "There has been a recent uptick in anti-humanism. I don't know why exactly, but I definitely think it's something we should keep an eye on."
"I'll be sure to a make a note of it I hear anything," I promised.
"It's always better to be safe than sorry," he said, then turned his attention to Bobby. "At least you had a relatively easy job right before your break."
"If it had been anything more serious than a house call to Ottaline's place, I would've stayed home," Bobby said, but I wasn't sure that was true.
He never wanted to stay behind, and though he usually ended up being helpful, there were some places I refused to take him because he was mortal. I couldn't have his blood on my hands.
"I'm glad you made it out in one piece," Abner said with a small smile. "I should probably let you get out of here so you can get ready for the big weekend."
"Thanks," Bobby said as he got to his feet.
"I'll make a note about Iris Emmanuel and her comments, then I'll wire your payment to you tonight," Abner said, shaking our hands, like he was some kind of insurance salesman and not a seriously skilled hunter of immortals.
IT STARTED THE WAY IT always did, with blue flowers everywhere. They perfumed the air, sweetly but overpowering, and when I opened my eyes, I was lying in the field of tiny flowers, just as I knew I would be.
Sunlight warmed my skin, but instead of draining my energy the way it usually did, it made me feel light and airy. Almost as if I could float away if I wanted.
But I didn't. Instead, I sat up, waiting for her to arrive, but it didn't take long. She walked toward me, her feet barely grazing the flowers as she moved. Her long gown flowed behind her, and her crimson hair was ruffled by a breeze only she could feel. A light seemed to come from inside her, making her pale skin glow, and she moved in an eerie, slow motion way.
"Alice," she said, her voice lilting with an accent. It was clear and beautiful but with a subtle echo, making it sound faraway even when she was right in front of me.
"What do you want this time?" I asked her, as had become our ritual every time she visited me this way.
"You know what I want," she replied simply. "You must find peace for the ones you love."
"Everyone I love seems peaceful to me. And even if they weren't, doesn't happiness come from within? It's something they need to figure out for themselves."
Her full lips pressed into a thin line, and she didn't seem amused by my logic. "Alice. You know what you must do."
I shook my head. "No, I really don't."
"Then you must figure it out. And quickly. Time is running out," she warned me ominously.
"Time for what? What does that even mean?" I tried to stand up, but I was weighted to the ground. The flowers were extending, growing over my feet and hands to hold me in place.
"Hurry, Alice," she commanded.
I fought against the plants, but they held fast. "Why are you doing this?" I asked, but she was already retreating backward, from wherever it was she came. "Who are you?"
But she never answered. Not once in the dozen or so times I'd dreamt of her during the past few months. She'd never told me who she was or what exactly I was supposed to do.
I was still half-asleep when I began fighting against the blankets that wrapped around me. Then I felt Jack's hand, soft and reassuring on my arm, and I finally relaxed back onto the bed.
"Was it that dream again?" Jack asked groggily as he sat up.
Matilda - his massive fluffy white Great Pyrenees - began whining in concern, so he leaned over to pet her. She lay on the bed beside him, curled up in a mass of blankets and pillows. An old injury to her leg and her advancing age meant we had to have a small stepstool next to the bed for her to climb up, but she slept with us every night.
"Yeah," I groaned.
He looked back at me. "That's the second time this week, isn't it?"
"I don't know," I lied.
I tried to pretend like having reoccurring dreams about some weird woman with blue flowers making cryptic warnings wasn't getting to me. I'd only told Jack about it because I kept waking up attacking the covers, but I downplayed it as much as I could so he wouldn't worry. There was no sense worrying about bad dreams, right?
I looked over at him, sitting shirtless in our bed, with unable to hide the concern in his eyes. With perpetually tan skin, an easy smile, and wild sandy hair, he looked more like a beach bum than a vampire. While his body hadn't aged past twenty-four, and he still had plenty of boyish charm, he'd begun to mature in recent years.
Although Jack was still as handsome as he'd ever been - with a perfectly chiseled torso that still managed to take my breath away when he took off his shirt - there were subtle changes to him. His soft blue eyes weren't quite as light anymore, darkened by time and responsibility and all that we'd gone through in the past.
He was still quick to laugh, and his arms were a constant bastion for safety and comfort for me. But the reality was that he was older now. We both were. We'd been together for nearly six years, building a life with our own expectations and roles. He loved me and trusted me completely, but sometimes, those emotions would clash.
And I could see that conflict in his eyes now, with his mouth pressed into a thin line, so his whole expression was one of grim resignation. He knew there was something more going on with the dreams than I was telling him, but he also knew that I wanted to take care of it myself, so he wanted to try to let it be.
"What time is it?" I asked, changing the subject.
He paused scratching Matilda to glance over at his phone sitting on the bedside table. "It's just after two in the afternoon."
"I should get up," I lamented. "People will be here soon."
"We do have a very long weekend ahead of us."
No sooner had I stood up then Milo threw open our bedroom door. His dark eyes were intense, and his normally smooth brown hair was standing up all over, like he was a mad scientist.
"Good, you're awake," Milo said so rushed it all came out as one word. "There's so many crises going on right now."
"Define 'crises,'" I said calmly, since I had spent the last three months putting out my brother's alleged fires, which had once amounted to his bow tie not having the exact satin sheen he'd hoped for.
"Mom said her and Leif's plane is delayed," he said. "The florist sent me a picture of the flower arrangements, and they are a much grayer shade of blue than we'd talked about."
"Grayer shade of blue?" Jack asked with a raised eyebrow, and I held up my hand to silence him before he made Milo's meltdown any worse.
; "It was supposed to be Blue Frost, but these are definitely Snowcloud," Milo insisted with a frantic tremble.
"Okay, okay," I said as soothingly as I could. "I just woke up, so I'm gonna go to the bathroom, and you go out there and take a few deep breaths, and I'll be right out there to help you deal with everything, okay?"
He nodded reluctantly. "Okay."
Once Milo had left, closing the door behind him, I rubbed my temple and muttered, "This is why I don't ever want to have a wedding."
"We could always go to the justice of the peace," Jack suggested, but I had already disappeared into the on-suite bathroom.
A few years ago, we'd talked about getting married, but for me, there really didn't seem to be any point. Since we weren't mortal, we forged all our paperwork, so the wedding certificate would just be a fraud.
Jack had given me immortality, and we were bound together by our blood. No ceremony or piece of paper would ever supersede that.
In that bathroom, I had just finished brushing my teeth when Jack came up behind me. He wrapped his arms around my waist and kissed my neck, so I leaned into him, relishing the way his heart thudded slowly in his chest.
"I love you," he said softly.
I turned around to face him, and he kept his arms around my waist, holding me to him. "I love you, too."
"This is going to be a really long weekend. But we'll get through this the same way we get through everything."
"And how's that?" I asked.
"Poorly timed jokes, clandestine make-out sessions, and drinking so much blood that we're totally intoxicated," he replied with a smile.
I leaned in to kiss him, but Milo shouted for me from the other room, so I settled for a quick peck on the lips.
"Duty calls," I said as I slipped out of my boyfriend's arms. "But I'm holding you to the make-out session later."
OUR APARTMENT WAS RIGHT IN the center of Amsterdam, across from the famed Bloemenmarkt, which sold flowers year around so our place always smelled wonderfully of tulips and narcissuses and whatever else they were selling.
It was a minimalist modern place, with two bedrooms, three bathrooms, and a very small kitchen, which worked out well since only one of us actually ate food. Two, counting the dog, but she mostly just ate kibble.
Floor to ceiling windows lined the exterior walls, with an angled rooftop veranda that jutted out toward the canal below. The patio had a wonderful garden with plenty of flowers and a few patches of grass, perfect for emergency bathroom breaks for the dog.
We things cool yet casual, with simple furnishings in the grand living room. Our style tended to be clean lines, which went with the marble fire place and dark wood floor. A few brightly colored oil pastel drawings added a pop of color to the stark walls.
That was, until Milo and Bobby started planning their wedding six months ago. Now it looked like a bridal shop had exploded, with decorations and linens and stationary covering every square inch.
It was the day before their nuptials, and somehow Milo still hadn't decided what shoes he was planning to wear. He'd narrowed it down to two choices (supposedly), but for some reason, there were at least a dozen shoes strewn about on the dining room table.
Milo stood on one side of the table, frantically lifting up one shoe after another, while Bobby and I stood on the other side, doing our best to calm him down.
"I like the one that you're holding." I pointed to a faux-leather shoe in his left hand, which only made Milo wrinkle his nose in disgust. "Or not."
"Just wear whatever is most comfortable," Bobby suggested, and I could tell by the tightness in his voice that it was taking all his energy to not sound completely exasperated.
Milo glared at him, his brown eyes growing stormy. "I'm going be looking at these pictures forever, so I want them to be perfect."
"And they will be perfect." Bobby softened, and he walked around the table to Milo. "What makes them perfect is how much you and I love each other, and that's going to come through in the pictures, and really, that's the only that matters anyway."
Milo had his arms folded across his chest, but he took a deep breath and let his arms fall to his sides. "You're right."
"I am right more often than you give me credit for." Bobby reached up and cradled Milo's face in his hands, and he leaned forward so they rested their foreheads against each other. "I love you, and it's going to be a beautiful day."
Bobby and Milo weren't exactly meant for each other - not the way vampires were, where their blood bonded them inextricably together - but it was impossible to deny how much they cared about each other. In the nearly six years they'd been dating, they'd only grown closer and stronger in love, and honestly, I couldn't imagine the two of them not being together.
Still, despite their connection, I had had some initial reservations about their wedding. Namely Bobby's refusal to turn. Despite being in an intimate relationship with a vampire, Bobby had no intention of becoming one himself.
While Milo looked exactly like the stunning teenager he'd been when they met, Bobby had clearly aged into a handsome twenty-five-year-old young man. I could only imagine the problems this would cause in the future, not to mention the fact that Bobby's life was so much shorter and more fragile than ours.
Six months ago, the night Bobby had proposed to Milo, I had taken him aside afterward. It had been cold, but we'd been standing out on the balcony as the snow came down.
"So...." I leaned against the railing, watching the snow fall into the canal below us. "I'm happy for you..."
"But?" Bobby was beside me, but he stared back into the house, where Jack and Milo were celebrating with champagne flutes filled with bright red blood from the fridge.
"I know that you love Milo, and it makes sense to me that you want to be with him." I took a deep breath, choosing my words carefully. "I guess it just seems odd to me that you want to commit to marrying him, but you don't want to commit to being a vampire with him."
Bobby laughed then. "Not wanting to be a vampire has nothing to do with commitment. It's just not something that I want for myself. It's great for you guys, I get that, but the idea of living forever and drinking blood all the time... It just never really appealed to me."
"How can immortality not appeal to you?" I asked. "Nobody wants to die."
"Some people want to die," he corrected me. "And not just suicidal people, either. I only have one life, and I want to make the most of it, but I also don't want more than I have. Doing this one round right is enough for me. I don't need forever."
Jack's eldest brother Ezra had once told me that it was death that gave life its meaning. Knowing these moments couldn't last forever is why they were so special. And there were some sacrifices to being a vampire. Like never being able to have children or a family, not in the traditional sense. Watching everyone you around you grow old and die. Human food tasted disgusting, and sunlight was grueling bordering on painful.
But in the end, it all seemed worth it to me, because of the things I gained. Immorality. Superior strength. Heightened senses. And most importantly, being with the man I loved forever.
"What about Milo?" I asked softly.
Bobby exhaled. "Milo is my one and only. But I know that I'm not his. Someday, his blood will react to whoever he was meant for. And that's okay. Because I only want my one lifetime with him. It's more than most people have, honestly, and it's enough for me. So, it has to be enough for him, too."
Now, the day before their wedding, I knew that Bobby was right. One lifetime with a love as great as theirs was more than most people ever had.
A KNOCK AT THE FRONT door drew me away from helping Milo finally decide on a pair of shoes, and honestly, I was grateful for the reprieve.
Matilda bounded to the door, barking in excitement, and as soon as I opened it, she leapt at the visitors. I barely had a chance to register that it was Ezra and Mae before the dog was covering them in kisses.
"Oh, I know," Mae purred, crouching down to properly pet Matilda. "I
miss seeing you every day, too, my love."
While Mae entertained the dog, Ezra turned his attention to me. His dark mahogany eyes were as warm as ever, and something about his presence always seemed to calm me. He smiled broadly, and before I could say anything, he pulled me into a hug.
"How are you, Alice?" he asked, his deep voice made even richer by his British accent.
"Good. Very good," I replied quickly, and he released me. "How are you?"
"We're doing quite well," Ezra said, but tousled his dark blond hair and wouldn't meet my eyes when he said it.
"Things are good," Mae chimed in, straightening up, and Matilda loped on out of the front entrance to find someone else to pay attention to her.
"You look good," I said, which was only half a lie.
Mae, like most vampires, would always look beautiful. She had a wonderful softness to her features, like a delicate petal of a flower that blooms only with the exact right amount of sun. But her eyes - a lush golden color, similar to honey - had a sadness about them that never completely disappeared. Not anymore. But it seemed to have lessened some since I last saw her.
"Your hair looks nice," I said, motioning to it.
She normally wore her light brown hair in waves that cascaded past her shoulders, but now it was cut into a stylish pixie. It was lovely, but it made her look smaller and more vulnerable, but also lighter, almost airier than before. As if a weight had been lifted off her.
"You like it?" she asked hopefully. "I needed a change."
Every time I spoke to Mae since we'd left Minnesota, that what she's said. She needs a change or she's making a change or it's time for a change. She's clinging to the hope that if she alters the exact right combination of things, she'll be happy again.
But the shroud of depression that had descended upon her wasn't something that she could easily shake. The loss of her children - the ones she had that she never got to raise, the ones she could never have since becoming a vampire, and the tragic, complicated death of her great-granddaughter - had left her with a hole in her heart that nothing could seem to fill.
"Milo and Bobby are in the living room," I said, gesturing toward the rest of the apartment behind me. With Milo's level of anxiety, he could definitely use Mae's mothering, and it would give her some place to get all those urges out.