Tears of Blood (The Blood Chronicles) (11 page)

Meghan breathed in, remembering the slight birdlike figure once the bane of Chesca’s existence. She frowned, recalling the petite woman with the strawberry blonde hair and dark eyes who swore her daughter was going to send her to an early grave. Instead, while her friend prospered, her mother remained troubled by dreadful luck.

“I wish she’d find someone who’d love her as she deserves, and give her everything she wants without dying on her.” She murmured, truthfully hoping the best for the woman.

“She probably has,” Chesca supplied with ease. “If she’d stop thinking each husband was my dad, maybe they’d live long enough to keep her happy.”

Despite herself, Meghan laughed. Deep and husky, her humor caused Amado to step nearer, his attention riveted to the slight movement of the muscles in her throat. The slender column of her neck arched and he watched the play of bluish veins beneath the skin, each pulsing with enchanting life.

Thoughts of relishing her blood vanished. Entranced, he savoring her mirth, wishing he could grasp life with both hands and find humor in the most mundane. He closed his eyes, her voice delicately wafting over his frosty flesh and making him long for the past.

She drew him into a silky web he imagined lost and forgotten, he professed. Abruptly, he realized he craved her touch, and her fresh scent, before his mind sank into a forbidden realm from his human existence. Smiling to himself, he contemplated if her lips were sweet. Even as one of the undead, he wanted to enjoy the simple delights of the living. He’d take only a kiss, and the fleeting delight of sinking into her affectionate embrace

“She’d be utterly and marvelously delicious, wouldn’t she?”

The gently uttered words fluttered across the distance, unheard to normal human ears. Amado instantly straightened and his eyes thinned to slits. His nostrils flared as he looked to his side, realizing the demon responsible for his death stood at his shoulder.

“What do you want, Declan?”

“I’ve been patient with you, Gianni,” he breathed, his features as young as they had been in the autumn of 1926.

Grudgingly, Amado envied how easily he blended into the times. His appearance was eternally youthful, and only his clothes changed. Presently, he wore a crisp white shirt, a worn leather jacket, and snug fitting jeans. His hair was slightly longer, but he still was handsome and disarmingly suave.

“You’ve been patient?” Amado echoed the words, sensing there was an underlying tone of lethality in the accusation.

“I’ve waited for more years than I care to count for you to join my forces. Still, you continue to disappoint me.” A benign smile remained plastered to his face. “You were meant to bring in fresh blood to The Sanctum.”

“I’ve tried your world, Declan, when I was new to this existence.” Amado reminded him sullenly. He deciphered what every black fleck in his golden gaze stood for---an innocent life he’d taken needlessly. “Those atrocities you call your colleagues, those forming your vile little organization, don’t interest me.”

“Do you mean the members of The Sanctum? They’ll be so displeased to know you find them repulsive, after all we’ve done for you.” He laughed aloud but the sound was ugly.

“You’ve cursed me, tormented me, and haunted me.” Amado refused to become angered. “Is there any specific reason you consider it necessary to watch my every move? Wouldn’t it have been far simpler to ignore the mistake of my creation?”

“Centuries old bloodsuckers we are, we do believe in preserving our own inner workings and beliefs.” Suaveness, and deliberate unflappability, oozed from Declan’s form. “I’ll draw you into The Sanctum, even if it takes eternity.”

“I don’t have any intent of being a member of your accursed Sanctum!” Amado disagreed hotly, and then paused, struggling to restrain himself. “I don’t care for your evil ways, and prefer to live in my own fashion, away from your vileness.”

“You believe your existence is your own?” Declan’s brief bark of laughter lacked humor. “Shall I remind you that you’re nothing more than a beast, walking on a clearly defined path to Hell?”

“I’m not a beast!” He ground out, and his gaze darkened as he nearly shouted the denial. “I’m capable of changing…”

“What you’ve done since your turning cannot be altered.” Declan’s sinister eyes glittered with frightening life. “The blood running through your veins is mixed with mine and isn’t worthy. Face the facts, Gianni, your soul is poisoned!”

“I choose not to spend my days in the shadow of the eternal condemnation you’ve granted given me!”

Declan smirked, his dark eyes glittering. Amado glared at him, hating, and wishing he could end his existence. Instead, he remained silent, biding his time. There’d come a moment in the future, he suspected, where he’d exact his revenge.

Unaware of the vengeful thoughts flitting through Amado’s mind, Declan lifted his face to the night sky. “I took whatever life you had on a night much as this, nearly a century ago.”

“You’re right,” Amado exhaled irritably, his lip curling with disgust. “I lack a life. I’m a shadow, a fiend of the night, an abomination to everything sacred.”

“If it weren’t for me…”

“I would’ve died a weary old man, possibly penniless.” Amado finished cynically.

Declan managed to smile more tightly than before, and Amado slipped wistful eyes to the pair of young women strolling down the sidewalk. He longed to walk with them, to savor their conversation, to forget who he was, and what he’d never be.

“Poor Amado Gianni,” Declan crooned mockingly, following the direction of his gaze. “You’d have died without recognition, impoverished, perhaps in a retired actor’s nursing home on the West Coast. You’d have had nothing but memories of your golden days, when women wanted you for the image you portrayed, and nothing more.”

“Anything’s preferable to this!”

“I gave you a gift, although death was a part of the exquisite wrappings,” He smirked and his malicious eyes glittered in the light escaping the store windows. “As well as the opportunity to know thousands came to you funeral, heads of states, the president, all in tribute. Your memorial service outshone that of your compatriot and fellow actor.”

“The fame, the notoriety, never mattered to me.” Amado retorted tightly.

“Did you forget I made you the greatest film legend in history, more so than that irritating upstart?”

Unable to control his reaction, Amado cringed. Even now, television sets played his films late on Friday nights. New fans celebrated his cinema graphic achievements with annual festivities, and bouquets of white roses blanketed his unoccupied grave on the anniversary of his death. However, at the mention of the man once his rival in Hollywood, he tensed. After every one of these years, he felt the uncomfortable niggle of jealousy rip through him.

“Do you think I truly care for this world you’ve thrust me into?” He asked, his mottled eyes glittering with bloodlust. “Do you imagine I find joy in existing as this creature that I am, remembering my history, knowing I’ve nothing in the present, and an empty future?”

“Stop whining, Gianni, and enjoy every second you’ve been granted.” Declan chastised in a smooth drawl. He drew in a breath, the action unnecessary for one of his disposition, and appreciatively eyed the backsides of the departing women. “I gave you everlasting fame and plenty of time to perfect your atrocious English, so don’t complain.”

Amado’s fury rose and, if the street would’ve been vacant, he’d have lunged for Declan’s exposed throat.

“As it is, I’m too preoccupied with this entrancing little city. If The Sanctum wishes to chastise you for your insubordination, they can do it on their own time. I did my job, I collected you.” He shrugged and a low whistle of appreciation left his lips as the pair of women began to disappear from sight. “I think you’re becoming lax in your old age, my man. You never answered my question, did you?”

“Tell me the truth, Gianni,” he ignored the warning pronunciation of his name. “Isn’t there a wicked part of you thirsting for her? Wouldn’t you savor the taste of that tender morsel, knowing she’d feel the agony and rapture? You couldn’t coax her into compliance, or entrance her with a look. Visually impaired women can’t stare into your eyes, or fall captive to your persuasive charms.”

“I’m warning you…”

“In fact,” Declan continued mercilessly. “She’d experience every moment of the pain as you took her. Imagine, Amado, you could drain the life from her and savor her flesh and fear, all at the same time.”

He grunted, rage simmering beneath the surface, his eyes burning. “You’ll never identify with me, Balthazar. I’ll never be the demon you want.”

Declan clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth.

“For shame, Gianni,” he scolded roughly. “I held high hopes for you, and dreamed we'd run an empire together.”

“I don’t want an empire with you, nor will I be a part of your infamous Sanctum.” Amado spat. Purposely, he kept his features composed as people turned to stare at the two of them, realizing their conversation was drawing attention. He suspected they made a striking pair, one so dark, and the other light, beneath the glow of the street lamps.

“It doesn’t matter. I’ll allow the elders to handle you in their own way.” Declan responded suavely.

“Why not find a task you enjoy doing, Balthazar?” Amado suggested bleakly. “Why not take up a hobby, move away from killing humans?”

“Are you serious?” He smirked. “I thought, after almost a century, you knew me better.”

“I could hope.” Amado scowled as he muttered the statement. “Perhaps even the hopeless might be worthy of salvation.”

“Is that the real reason you moved to this quaint little city, instead of staying in Chicago?” Declan questioned. “Did you think the fabled Brotherhood would find a way to redeem you, and wash away the innocent blood tainting your wretched soul?”

An involuntary action caused Amado to exhale as he looked at the sky. His nemesis suspected exactly why he had journeyed to Bentham, and the reason was to escape the sins he committed on the darkened avenues of the Illinois city.

Declan Balthazar had been a miserable monster to change him when he did. The older vampire left him soon after his transformation to wander the streets, the need for blood ripping at his stomach. Starving for food, he attacked randomly, leaving a trail of innocent victims behind, and hating every second of his new existence. His unholy sire appeared when he wanted to torment him, mocking, and forever tempting him with a fresh morsel to quench his ever-growing thirst.

During the moments of his anguish, rumors trickled through the streets. He heard the murmurs of outlandish tales, the whispers of a society where even the most cursed could redeem themselves from their damnation.

Hope, despite his curse, made him long for everything else stolen from him.

Amado found solace in those legends and left Chicago behind, seeking the ones capable of making his eternity a more meaningful endeavor. After years of searching, wondering if The Brotherhood of Blood truly existed, they located him. Tentatively welcomed into their secret unit, he didn’t intend to return to the fold to which Declan was a proud and age-old member.

“Do you think mortals believe in redemption, more than those cursed by blood?” Declan inquired mockingly. He turned and scanned the crowd leaving the bookstore, a slow smirk curving his cheek.

“There are those that aren’t lost, and seek to do right.” Amado protested.

“You’re a fool.” He laughed outright, the sound lethal. “At this moment I could take any person I wanted, and there isn’t a single individual that will attempt to save him.”

“There has to be one heroic soul…”

A short and bitter bark of laughter interrupted him and he scowled at the vampire.

“You still hold those damn beliefs some redeemable soul will intervene?” Declan shook his head in disgust. “I’ve walked this earth for more than three hundred years and can tell you valiant individuals become less and less with each passing year.”

“You’re a skeptic, Declan.”

“I’m a realist.” The vampire interjected with a chilling smile. “I could attack and all would turn away, wishing not to be involved. They’d scurry like rats, seeking the safety of their homes, allowing me to feast…”

“Enough!” Amado nearly shouted, his eyes darkening as he ground his teeth. “I’m weary of hearing how much you despise the human race, how you think there isn’t a person worthy of redemption!”

“Ah, there’s that word again.” His mockery was heavy. “You think it’s the answer to the problems plaguing these disgusting mortals!”

“Have you ever sought forgiveness for the blood you’ve taken? Have you ever regretted the unsullied lives you’ve stolen?” Amado managed in a gentle tone, his gaze sweeping the sidewalk and alighting on the pair of women moving away from him.

“Not a single damn day in my life.” He chortled lightly. “I appreciate being what I am, and I relish every drop of blood I steal from the living. I love the fear I inflict, the thrill of the hunt, and the feel of victory.”