The Vampire's Consort (Undead in Brown County) (8 page)

She turned her cool blue eyes back to Alex’s face. She trusted him to do everything right.

“Let’s do this.”

“I hate getting dressed up.”

Sam was trying on
the new formal dress that she would have to wear to the vampire ball that Teddy had been planning. She didn’t want to go to some stupid dance; especially if it was going to be all vampires there. But, as usual, she didn’t have a choice about what she was going to do. Everything was already decided.

“You look great, Sam.”

The little girl looked over at her new friend. When Luna wasn’t in her tiger form, she looked like a regular teenage girl. She had long russet colored hair, which she left loose in gentle waves. Her eyes were very green—almost unnaturally green. She chewed cinnamon gum most of the time and loved to blow bubbles with it. But, she managed to look sophisticated despite her gum habit. She certainly knew more about clothes than Sam did.

“I still can’t believe they won’t let you come to the ball.
That sucks.”

Luna shrugged and tossed her thick braid of
light brown hair over her shoulder.

“I don’t care.
It will give me some time by myself for once.” Her large green eyes admired the ivory chiffon dress Sam wore.

“They’re not going to leave you completely alone, you know.”

Sam examined the dress and frowned.

“They don’t trust you yet.”

“You do,” Luna pointed out.

“Yeah, but we’re family.
Sort of.”

Sam pulled the stiff dress bodice down and stepped out of it.
Luna rose from her seat in the dressing room and handed over Sam’s plain brown sweatshirt.

“Yes, we are.
And I’m glad we are finally getting to hang out together.”

“How long has it been since you’ve seen your family?” Sam
said.

Luna sighed and sat back down, crossing her slim legs.

“Three years.
Edinna and her guards picked me up at my school bus stop three days after I turned fifteen.”

“Must have been hard.”

“I guess. I just feel bad for my mom because for a long time, she had no idea where I was.”

“Now she does?
What was her reaction?”

“She was afraid for me, but I don’t think it came as a huge surprise.
My dad was a shifter. And my mom wasn’t sure how she was going to deal with that as I got older. I was shifting back and forth without realizing it. It even happened at school one time. Luckily, I was alone in the locker room when it happened.”

“Sounds scary.”

“It was. But Edinna helped me learn how to control it. That’s part of the reason why my mom is okay with Edinna keeping me for now.”

Sam pulled on her faded blue jeans and scuffed up sneakers.

“Well, I’m glad you’re here.”

Luna grinned and put one arm around Sam’s shoulders. She was two feet taller than Sam, but the little girl didn’t mind. It was just very good to have a real friend again.

“Me, too,” Luna
said.

“Was Luna good company for you today?”

Michael and Sam were sitting on the ivory leather sofa in Teddy’s apartment, watching the credits roll on an old movie musical on the big-screen television. Michael hadn’t seen it before, but Sam had watched it and talked about it often enough that he felt he could recite the lines himself, sight unseen.

“She was great.
I was glad to find out she wasn’t being held against her will. It sounds like Edinna is trying to protect her. Sort of.”

Sam switched off the TV and picked up the book she had been readi
ng before Michael had arrived. She gave Michael a careful look. “Sarah would like Luna.”

Michael sighed.

“I’m sure she would.”

He had yet to really express the depth of his sorrow in front of Sam.
But at night, when all the chaotic noise of the city roared in his sensitive ears, he yearned for the deep, dark quiet of the woods of southern Indiana and the sweet curves of Sarah’s body beneath him. He cursed himself for the consequences of the choice he made.

“How long are we staying at the lake house?
I need to know how much to pack.”

“A few weeks.
I figured you could use some peace and quiet after everything that’s happened. You could take up sailing. You’ve never had a problem with sea sickness, as I recall.”

She nestled up against his arm an
d rested her blond head there.

“Have you called her?”

He hesitated. Michael had called the cabin twice since he’d left but had only hung up when there was no answer after two rings. It was a constant battle in his head, bringing alternate feelings of shame and longing.

“No.
It wouldn’t be fair to either of us,” he said.

He didn’t like lying to Sam, but he couldn’t adequately explain why he’d hung up before the answering machine picked up the call.

The new cell phone vibrated on the coffee table
in front of them. Michael groaned and reached for it. He had hoped to avoid any vampire business tonight, but that obviously wasn’t going to happen. He glanced at the display. It was an unrecognized number.

“This is Michael.”

The voice that answered was a familiar one.

“Long time, no fight.”

“Alex?”

It took a few moments for Michael to grasp the idea that he was actually speaking to someone who might have been in recent contact with Sarah.

“Where are you?”

“Brown County,” Alex said slowly.

A chill went through Michael, flowing through him like a blizzard’s gust.
He hadn’t considered the possibility that Sarah might turn to Alex in her time of need. A fiery spark of anger burst to life in his chest.

“What are you doing there?”

“She wasn’t doing very well. Nelly called me because she was worried. You should have seen this place. It looked like hell. So did she.”

“I don’t expect you to understand what’s happened, but there’s no need to throw a cloak of guilt over me.
I’m already carrying enough,” Michael said.

Alex cleared his throat.

“I’m sure you are.
Is it possible to set up a meeting? Between you and me?”

Michael sighed and covered up the phone as he turned to Sam.

“Go ahead and get ready for bed.
I’ll be in there in a few minutes to say goodnight.”

The child frowned at him, but headed off to do as he said.

“Is that Sam? Is she okay?”

“Of course she’s okay.
When do you want to meet? We’re leaving New York soon.”

“Two weeks from tonight.
I’ll text you. Where are you going?”

“Teddy’s beach house on Lake Michigan.
I’ll send you directions.”

Michael paused for a half second and asked the question he didn’t have the right to ask anymore.

“How is she now?”

“She’s adjusting. I’m keeping an eye on her.”

“Just an eye?”

“Sarah just lost almost everything she ever really cared about, you dick. Believe me, that’s the last thing she wants right now.”

Alex huffed a sigh.

“And I wouldn’t even try it.
We’re friends, okay?”

“Right.
I’ll be in touch.”

Michael pressed the button to end the call and dropped the phone back onto the coffee table.
His cool blue eyes began their slow change in color, paling to a distinct gray and then to silver. It happened every time his emotions ran high. Only a few of his close friends had witnessed such a thing.

“Oh, Sarah.
I’m so sorry,” he whispered.

Seven hundred fifty miles to the west, in the basement of Sarah’s quiet cabin, a great metamorphosis was occurring. If Michael had known the action Alex had taken in order to save Sarah from her enforced misery, he would have wanted to kill Alex, tearing him apart piece by piece. Such a thing wasn’t possible with a creature like Alex. He was virtually indestructible.

“Just try to relax,” he said quietly to Sarah.

She was lying on a folded up blanket in the middle of the concrete floor, her body curved into the position of a sleeping child.
Her golden brown hair was pulled back into a messy ponytail. The telling bite mark on her neck still looked raw, but Alex knew the blood he was about to give her would make that disappear quickly.

The small knife he held against his left wrist would
be used several times before the deed was done. His wounds healed so quickly that there was hardly time to give Sarah enough blood to change. He thought of all this as he watched her for any sign of resistance.

“Are you ready?” he asked her in the still, damp darkness of the basement gloom.
“I know I’ve already said this a hundred times today, but you can still change your mind.”

She rolled over onto her back and looked at him, kneeling there beside her like some golden-haired prince in a fairytale.
A tentative smile briefly moved her lips. “A thousand times is more like it. I’m not going to back out.”

“This changes everything, Sarah,” he said quietly. “You will never be the same again.
Even if you become human again with magic, the things you go through as a vampire will stick with you.”

“Alex, I know.”

She touched his arm with two of her fingers.

“I’m ready to be one of you.
It’s what I need.”

“It’s going to hurt like hell.”

“
I know
.”

When he looked into her eyes and saw the lack of fear, the anticipation of it all—he knew.
She was ready. He held his wrist above her with the little knife poised to make the cut that would alter her forever.

“It’s been over a year, Marco. I’m ready for the test.”

Katherine Wood, sister to Sarah and daughter of Robert Wood, was sitting with her recovery mentor, Marco
DeBlaine in a little local bar on the south side of Paraty. It was a tourist town about 125 miles south of Rio. Kate and Marco had been there for two weeks.

Unlike the first
month of rehab, Kate was not locked up. She had been given a travel pass on the condition that Marco would constantly be next to her. He was good at sensing her moods, which could fluctuate wildly depending on her hunger level.

Across the table from her, he shook his head with a bright smile, displaying his perfectly white teeth.

“No way.
You know the rules.”

Kate tried to give him her best impression of a sad face, which wasn’t as easy as it had been a year before.
Learning to control her urges had brought a shade of peace to her life. The dimples in her cheeks grew deeper. The sarcasm that fell so freely from her every word when she first arrived at the clinic in Rio had altered into a mild attempt at humor. From the tips of her pink-painted toenails to the calm sea of her ebony eyes, Kate had changed.

There was no Katie anymore.
The bitchy Indiana farm girl turned murdering vicious vampire was no longer present. Marco would have preferred that she hold onto some of that previous attitude, but she no longer found it necessary.

“I’ve been on the wagon for a long time.
Strictly
sangue de porco
.”

Marco’s dark eyebrows rose.

“Pig blood is different everywhere.
What if you get a batch in the states that doesn’t take your fancy?”

She grinned at him slyly
.

“Then I’ll have Norma send me some from down here.”

“Wrong answer, Kate,” Marco said quietly. “Once you leave these shores, you will be wholly independent. You will never return to Brazil. If you lose your way, if you get into any further trouble, the clinic will not host you a second time.”

It was enough to
put a damper on her lighthearted mood. He wasn’t telling her anything she didn’t already know. The moment she’d arrived in Brazil, the damned rules started.

No blood of any kind for a month
. That first one was the hardest. They put her in a cell made of stone, furnished with only a simple uncomfortable cot with no pillow or blanket. The door was constructed of steel five inches thick with only a tiny round pane of glass in the center. No handle on the inside. On the outside, in the depths of the clinic’s quiet hallways, there was a computer desk. That computer controlled the door. Essentially, only the computer could unlock the door once those thirty days had passed. The system was programmed that way for several reasons.

Norma, the
plain-appearing female vampire with the bright pink purse had picked her up from the airport in Rio and had explained on the way to the clinic as Kate stared at the sights of Rio.