Falling to Pieces (6 page)

“But I don’t know anything about you,” I said timidly. “For instance, why didn’t you take me to one of your bars instead of here? Wait—you don’t own this bar do you?” I asked looking around at the stunning art deco styling.

A chuckle escaped his throat. The heat between us was toning down to a simmer with the start of our conversation.

“No—no, I don’t. I wish I did.” His face suddenly screwed up. “Hang on. I didn’t tell you. Ryan—” He bit his name out. “What else did he say?”

“Oh, nothing,” I lied. “I just asked him how he knew you and he said you owned a few businesses, including the place where he worked. It was nothing untoward.”

“Yes, I own three bars and six Italian Bistros. My parents are Italian, and I couldn’t do what I actually wanted to do so it just seemed right.”

This was good. He seemed to be opening up.

“Oh, what did you want to do then?”

“I wanted to join the service. My best friend joined the Marines straight out of school. I was going to go with him.”

“Oh, the military. Why didn’t you?”

“My parents stopped me. It’s complicated, but basically they didn’t want me to die,” he said, his voice edged with regret and bitterness.

“Seems a bit melodramatic,” I said, reaching across and rubbing his arm when he looked away from me.

“Well, I suppose I have them to thank for my business success, so I can’t be too mad with them.” His face portrayed quite the opposite of the words that came out.

“What about you? What’s your story?”

“I don’t think I’ve got one.” I shrugged.

He leaned in closer, his blazing eyes filling my vision completely. “What are you?” he whispered into my ear without any warning whatsoever. His hot breath on my earlobe initially distracted me from what he’d said.

My breath hitched in my throat.

“What are
you
?” I retorted, totally knocked off kilter by his question. “I think I should go,” I snapped immediately. He’d rattled my cage more than once that night.

He moved his free hand and stroked from my knee up the front of my leg, stopping when he reached close to the top, resting his hand on the skin in another display of arrogance.

“You really want to go?”

“I think it’s for the best. Everything’s moving a little too fast for me,” I lied. I just had to get out of here, away from him. I was overwhelmed by thoughts and emotions I’d never before experienced. I struggled with whether I liked them or not. When he’d asked me
what
I was, it was more than I could take. It also implied
he,
too, was something
else
. Was he already aware that I’m not human? Was he trying to make a fool of me? Judging by Thomas’ reaction to his scent, he was something dangerous.

As though someone had switched a light on in Marc’s head, he drew away from me, shuffling over until we were no longer touching at all.

“I understand, I mean—God,” he sighed. “I’m embarrassed to admit this, but I can’t control myself around you. It’s so—so intense.” He shook his head. “I’m sorry.”

I reached out for his arm making his eyes meet mine again.

“I’m sorry, too. But I think I should leave.” I stood up before there was any chance of me doing anything but that.

Marc reached into his pocket and pulled out a small cream card.

“Here’s my card. If you want me…ugh, that sounded pathetic.” The serious expression on his face turned into a coy smile, the corners of my mouth twitched up, as well.

“Well, if you need anything, anything at all, you can get in touch.” He pressed the card into my hand giving me a meaningful gaze.

“Thanks and thank you for tonight. I had a nice time.” I made my goodbye sound more like the conclusion of a business meeting.

I felt shattered from all of the emotions and sexual urges I’d encountered that evening. I just wanted to crawl into bed. I whispered a prayer of thanks that I’d taken a bit too much blood from the teenage boy. It had gotten me through tonight’s heart-racing situations.

I peered down at the card in my hand as I passed through the lobby, seeing Marc’s private telephone numbers and address in italic font. I lifted it to my nose and inhaled his scent. I wouldn’t be using the details it provided, but perhaps I could just have a sniff every now and then. I’d lived too many years alone to start a head-fuck of a relationship now. Marc had too much baggage, as well as too much stuff I didn’t know or understand about him. Maybe he was worth it, but I’d never know the difference.

I got out onto the street, snapping my head to the eyes glowering at me from across the street. I rolled my eyes, as if she’d known I needed another reason not to turn around and run back into the hotel and carry on with the date.

I wasn’t in the right frame of mind to try and lose this bitch again. I surveyed the passing cars, pretending I hadn’t noticed her watching me and breathed a sigh of relief as a cab turned the corner. I waved my hand and got in after the taxi drew to a stop beside me, hastily giving the driver my address.

The intensity of being with Marc had made me forget about Thomas, so upon second thought, I asked the cab to stop down the street so I could sneak in the same way as I had snuck out.

If it truly were Marc’s scent that sent him over the edge last night, what would happen tonight? If he smelled the aroma after one short embrace, the scent would be bounding off me tonight.

The hallway was bathed in darkness as I stepped in. Closing the door behind me, I bent down to remove my heels. A rush of air blew into my face as my feet left the ground, being held in an awkward folded in half position.

“Wha—what the fuck,” I screeched at being carried at speed down the stairs towards the basement kitchen.

I sensed the fact that a vampire had snatched me up, but it wasn’t Thomas. The crunch of breaking bones sickened me as I hit the back wall of a closet. The door slammed shut, the lock turned swiftly after, leaving my eyes to adjust to the darkness and my mind to try and fat
hom what the fuck was going on.

The force of being thrown into the closet had broken my shoulder. I slumped back against the wall instinctively rubbing the area as the healing process began, wondering who the hell had attacked me. The rage began to build in my core, images of me lying on the bathroom floor the previous night began to radiate the rage outwards through my body. Blood raced furiously through my veins, my hands were shaking and my teeth gritted. I’d been attacked two days in a row, in my own fucking house. What the fuck.

I reached out as my shoulder completed the healing process and slammed my fist into the plaster next to a mop bucket out of sheer anger. The plaster chipped off the wall on to the floor exposing the brick beneath.

‘
Locked in the fucking cleaners closet? I don’t fucking think so.
’ The thought bounded through my brain as I rose from the terracotta tiles, ready to break out through the wooden door.

The vampire who’d locked me in here was stronger than Thomas, a lot stronger and a lot faster.

I stepped forward holding back a clenched fist in the direction of the door about to slam out of my prison.

“What have you done to her, Victoria?” Thomas’ voice echoed. He must have been in the stairwell heading towards the kitchen. I relaxed my fist and listened, I wanted to hear what was going to be said.

“Oh, hush now, Thomas. It
is
for her own good. For the greater good, Thomas.” Her accent sounded like the Queen’s English, very proper, like Thomas’ accent.

Thomas has never been very chatty. He’d never spoken of the vampires he’d met over the years. I’d only met a few in America. There aren’t many of us, but we all seemed attracted to being with each other, and it’s unusual for us to live alone. So, I’d never known of this Victoria, whose heels were clicking on the kitchen floor, Thomas footsteps followed closely behind.

“She’s in the closet,” the female’s voice said with nonchalance followed by the clinking noise of glass.

“Go easy with that, Victoria. We don’t want to kill her.”

The female laughed a high-pitched singing laugh. “You mean
you
don’t want to kill her. Frankly, Thomas, I would love to. You are well aware of the trouble this will cause us.”

“Shit,” I mumbled to myself for lack of a better word. I had frozen to the spot, my lips and chin began to tremble. Only one substance that I knew of could weaken a vampire. Absinthe. It could also kill us if given in large enough quantities. Thomas warned me that it was created in the eighteenth century when a Swiss scientist discovered the existence of vampires. They decided to brand it as a drink, get in on the market so anyone who felt threatened would have the opportunity to be able to get rid of us. It’s the first lesson a responsible maker teaches, especially for me because Thomas was aware of my partiality to alcohol.

I’d been told that many vampires had begun to seduce the men in power to enable the banning of the substance. It worked. In many countries Absinthe was banned by 1915 but during the nineties it started coming back into vogue.

My stance was rod straight, the trembling had taken over all of my tense muscles as Thomas and Victoria continued to argue over the dose to serve to me. My mind was whirring...‘
Should I attempt an escape now? No—no, she’ll catch me. She’s fast and strong and it sounds as though she doesn’t care if I live or die. What shall I do? What shall I do?’

My mind went blank as the lock clicked and the door swung open. My eyes widened but my feet remained glued to the spot and my body shook violently.

Victoria’s painted red lips drew back into a sneer. Her blue eyes sparkled and gleamed with apparent delight and her fangs were extended in a show of power. Her hair, jet black, hung in perfect ringlets down to her waist.

My eyes travelled down her, she had been in her early forties when she’d been turned and she had embraced the gothic look by wearing spray on leather pants and a black corset that pushed her breasts up into fleshy mounds that spilled over the top.

Thomas stood beside her haunting figure, his lips pressed into a grimace.

“Now, Teagan—” he began, his gaze ping ponging around the cupboard.

“Fuck you, you fucking bastard,” I spat, not allowing him to finish, my fear quickly morphing into the rage. I was still shaking as adrenaline surged through me; my hands had formed tight balls. Whatever they were going to do, they were going to do anyway. I thought I might as well preserve my self-respect by fighting back.

“What the fuck is going on?” I jutted my chin towards Thomas showing my own fangs.

Thomas continued to look everywhere except for at me.

“Come on, Thomas. Have at it,” Victoria snarled, flapping a hand in my direction while raising a syringe filled with a luminous green liquid in the other.

I ran as fast as I could towards her but my attempts to put her down to the ground were futile. Her fingers closed around my throat as she raised me off the ground and smashed the back of my head into the cream shaker-style kitchen cupboard.

She cackled into my face as shoved the needle-less syringe into my open mouth and pushed the plastic plunger down filling my throat with the fiery liquid. My eyes felt instantly heavy, the tension of my muscles ceased as my head lolled forward. I’d let go, consumed by blackness.

***

My eyelids fluttered, instantly realising I had been moved to my bedroom. I had no sensation in the rest of my body. I was paralysed; the only thing that could move was my eyeballs.

“Oh, you’re awake.” I perceived Victoria’s nasal English accent coming from the far corner of the bedroom, close to where the dressing table was.

I failed to respond, trying to summon some moisture to my arid mouth while silently begging my eyelids to remain open as Victoria’s face filled my vision. I forced them wide open with surprise. Her hands were planted on either side of my head, her body pressed parallel against mine, forcing me deeper into the mattress.

“Well, answer me,” she snarled into my face, her crimson painted lips pulled back to bare her sharp incisors. Her eyes blue eyes glowered a mere inch from mine, her hot breath tickled my nose.

“I…I…think you can see I am awake,” I croaked.

I had regained some movement in my neck and I turned my head towards the open door. Thomas stood watching Victoria’s treatment of me. His shoulders slumped and his mouth was turned downwards, even his clothes appeared to be crumpled. He’d never been anything except for immaculately dressed. I gasped having never seen him looking so downtrodden, not in the hundred and fifty years I’d known him.

Victoria raised herself gracefully off the bed and sauntered towards him.

“You had better get your precious daughter some blood, my dear. She’s positively famished,” she breathed in his face seductively. What was it with this woman? Why did she need to be so close to the subject of her speech? Thomas turned and shuffled off down the stairs dropping his head.

Victoria turned back round to face me, curling her lip as she placed her palms on either side of the walnut doorframe, thrusting her ample chest out, this time encased in a red velvet corset.

In a flash she was beside my bed on her haunches, her legs wide apart, her elbows rested on her knees cupping her unchanged expression.

“Why are you doing this to me?” I breathed, barely able to release the words from my throat. “Who the fuck are you?”

She released her chin allowing her arms to fall out in front of her and threw her head back releasing an ear-splitting cackle. Her face dropped forward again, her sickly sweet smile told me she was enjoying herself.

“I’m Thomas’ wife. Didn’t he tell you he was married? He never told you of his wife and maker?” Her tone and her raised eyebrow told me that she knew damn well he hadn’t.

“Where have you been then?” I narrowed my eyes, my face crumpled towards her smooth expression. In one fluid movement she was resting on the edge of the bed, her leather clad legs crossed over each other.

“Thomas and I were married as mortals. My lover, Bartholomew, in the knowledge that we desired, both of us, to spend eternity together, gave me this gift. In turn, before I left Thomas I passed the gift to him. A parting token of affection.”

My eyes widened. I had lived with someone for all this time and had never discovered any of this knowledge.

“What, Thomas
wanted
to be a vampire?”

She shrugged her shoulders stared at nothing in particular for a moment.

“Who would not? We are all blessed. We have eternity to fix the mistakes we make, we can have fun, an endless existence.” She finished her statement breathily.

I let out a strange gurgling noise in my throat and wrinkled my nose, causing Victoria to reach out at lightning speed and clasp her hand around the front of my neck.

“Would you rather he had left you for dead? Left you in that disgusting backstreet in Dublin, my girl?” She released her grip, moving her hand away. “You
are
an ungrateful one,” she huffed. “You have allowed your maker to exist without taking him to your bed. You have gallivanted around London with, with an, uuugggh. You are nothing short of a disgrace. I wish Thomas had let me kill you. You are worthless little minion. A trouble maker.” She had nodded her head at the doorway with every sentence as though I was not worthy of being looked at by her.

My frown deepened as I searched her face for a meaning. Take Thomas to bed? What the fuck was she on about? He had always been like a father to me, not a lover.

“
What
have I gallivanted around London with?” I struggled to make my words heard because my throat was so dry. My nerves were tingling, letting me know the numbness was starting to subside. I slid my head over the pillow to crane my neck and peered down to inspect myself, realising I was still wearing the white dress I had been in when I’d been attacked. My wrists were bound together with thick steel chains and secured with a heavy padlock.

“You need not concern yourself with that,” she said, wrinkling her nose in apparent distaste.

“What day is it?” I asked, realising my thirst for the first time since I had woken.

“We put you out two days ago to allow Thomas and I time to arrange your passage back to America. You cannot stay here now. You will cause us all too much trouble.” A dreamy gaze spread over her face as she said his name.

“What about Thomas?”

“He will stay here with Bartholomew and I.”

I snorted. ‘
Wouldn’t wanna’ be at that party
.’ I raised half a smile.

“Thomas won’t live without me.” I shook my head and shot her pitying glance.

“Oh, but he must, he has been summoned by The Assembly. They insisted he return to England to take over from a member who wished to retire. Thomas is English, an English vampire. He must perform his duty to his government.”

“What the fuck are you talking about, lady?”

Victoria smacked her lips together when she heard my curse.

She flinched when she saw Thomas appear in the doorway cradling a large wine glass containing thick dark liquid. He gasped when he caught sight of my face, quickly turning away from my scrutiny. Victoria reached up and snatched the glass from him causing droplets of blood to spatter onto the snowy white bed sheet.

“Are you mad?” She furrowed her brow. ”We don’t want to strengthen her too much.”

“No, no, of course not my darling. How silly of me.” He shook his head, pinching the bridge of his nose. Thomas has been forty-five when he was turned in 1670. Something had changed over the past few days, while I’d been in a drug-induced stupor, because something had made him look his full three hundred and forty three years. I couldn’t quite put my finger on what it was, perhaps his demeanour?

He pressed the glass to my lips for a moment. I tried to gulp the blood down but he drew back. His expression remained flat and uncaring. I widened my eyes trying to speak to him without words, begging him to help me.

“Thomas,” I said his name in a soft tone, “tell me, my precious father, what have I done to deserve such wretched treatment?” This approach had always worked for me in previous years.

“My child, you have dabbled in a situation you cannot possibly fathom.” His tone mirrored mine, his lips were pressed into a hard line but his eyes shone. If he could produce tears, he surely would have.

“Come now, my love,” Victoria said softly to Thomas, stroking his arm. I snorted in utter disbelief. Victoria seemed as gentle as a cactus. I was suffering her pretence.

Thomas and Victoria turned and walked out of the door. He peered back at me, his eyes filled with sadness before he allowed his gaze to flicker to the glass that he’d left on the bedside table. His eyes bounced back to mine and he repeated the gesture. My lips curled into a smile. He closed the door softly.

I listened to the pair descend the stairs. I looked down at my chained hands and prepared to heave my weakened body off the mattress. I cried out as I finally achieved an awkward sitting position. I dug my heels into the mattress and swivelled so that I faced the edge of the bed, hooking the backs of my ankles over the mattress as leverage to shuffle my ass towards them. Getting there, I placed the soles of my bare feet onto the thick carpet allowing them to support my weight as shuffled along the bed towards the glass. I bent my head down lapping at the liquid, reaching into the glass with my dry tongue. Drips escaped my hungry mouth, dribbling down my chin, spotting and expanding into blobs on the front of my white dress.