Always the Vampire (8 page)

 

 

The afterglow of our loving should have been beacon bright, but I found myself crying softly.

Saber must’ve felt my tears on his chest, because he turned me over and wiped my damp cheek with his thumb.

“Hey, was I that bad?”

“No, that good. Like you were before your trip.”

“So these are tears of sexual ecstasy?”

I gave him a watery chuckle, but my voice caught as I whispered, “Deke, I can’t lose you.”

“You won’t,” he said, nestling me to his side. “We’re going to beat this. We have a prime suspect now, and that’s more than we had this afternoon.”

“What if we can’t find and destroy Starrack? Or get to him before the Void cuts loose to do its own thing?”

“I contacted Jim Crushman in Atlanta. Crusher will put out the word through the merc network, and they’ll contact their informants.”

I pulled back enough to blink at him. “Mercenaries have informants?”

“Human and supernatural. Gnomes mostly, but I can’t mention a particular group. Triton’s note said Cosmil is making inquiries through his contacts, too.” He hugged me close. “If all else fails, we have to hope Lia can track Starrack.”

“Or the Void.”

“Or both.” He kissed my forehead. “Now remind me what you have scheduled with Maggie so I can help you work around your oldmaid duties.”

“Old maid?” I echoed with a playful punch to his ribs.

“You are a whopping 228 years of age.”

“Don’t make me hurt you.”

“Tell me.”

“We have the caterer, the florist, and the cake-tasting meetings tomorrow and Thursday, then the bachelorette get away to Fernandina Beach is Friday evening to Sunday afternoon. And isn’t Neil’s bachelor party Saturday night?”

“Mmm,” he murmured, and kissed my temple.

A lingering kiss that migrated to my cheek.

I cleared my throat. “Then I have the bridal shower here next Saturday.”

“Uh-huh,” he breathed in my ear.

“And the couples shower and barbeque is Sunday at your houhowza.”

His next kiss landed in a place that robbed me of speech, robbed me of coherent thought, and rewarded me with joy.

An hour later, Saber slept. I lingered beside him for a while, basking in a sated stupor. Our joining might have been better than normal, but I’d keep diligent watch for signs of the illness. And pray I never saw them. I would not want to live with the horror of that sight.

Snowball jumped on the bed and curled herself around Saber’s head, which was my cue to get up, toss on a nightshirt, and get to work.

After hanging my costume in the closet, I made a beeline to the living room to work at my laptop. First I read over the list of Council of Ancients members Saber had left on the desk. Hmmm. No wonder he hadn’t found these folks. With names like Gandolph the Seer and Grover the Elf, the only sites that came up in my own search were for
The Lord of the Rings
and fantasy pages.

Next, just because I felt like it, I used Saber’s VPA pass codes to access the private areas of the VPA site. There was zip info on the COA period and not much on the Void, other than a warning that vampires were falling ill and what their symptoms might include. Guess Saber wasn’t fibbing about the VPA being clueless about tracking the Void. Heck, maybe the COA truly didn’t know about the Void or about Starrack being rogue, either, unless Cosmil had alerted them.

With those searches done, Millie’s concern about Maybelle’s reading of my astrology chart nagged at me. True, Maybelle was a dabbler, not an expert, but the woman knew her stuff. If she mentioned something amiss to Millie, it wasn’t an idle comment.

I’d see Maybelle tomorrow night at bridge club, but whether I’d have the privacy to ask her about my chart was iffy. Instead of stewing, I opted to be proactive. I plugged “astrology charts” into Google and turned up over two million results. Not helpful. I typed in “astrology charts disappearing from yours” and got over a hundred thousand listings. I refined the search to “disappearing from your own astrology chart” and got just over twenty-three thousand results, but they all dealt with habits and addictions not disappearing on their own. Duh.

I eyed the sites in the right column and spotted two astrologers who advertised free answers to short questions. What the heck. I shot each of them a note. Never hurts to see what one can get gratis.

Not that I’m a miser, mind you. I’m merely cautious with my money. The treasure that had been secreted in the false bottom of my coffin—or rather the French vampire King Normand’s coffin—wouldn’t last without good management. I’d shared some of the loot with Maggie and Neil, sold a few pieces for capital, and invested. I also had my earnings from tour guiding, but I had expenses just like everyone else.

And, okay, I could shop my checkbook into the grave if I wasn’t careful. Yep, I’m a part day-walking, all night-stalking vampire, and my favorite prey is a bargain at Walmart. However, I’d learned the hard way that, if you find a goody you want in a St. Augustine shop, you’d best buy it on the spot. It will be gone when you go back, and it won’t be restocked.

I’d also learned that St. Augustine businesses appear to operate in a different dimension. If you get what you want three weeks late, you got it a month early. That’s why I put those extra tables and chairs on reserve with the rental company from the get-go.

Which reminded me, I had a list of wedding chores to make. Call rental company. Order more centerpieces from florist. Talk with Daphne about making the wedding cake bigger or ordering a second groom’s cake.

By the time I tucked the list in my binder, my backlog of interior design homework didn’t just beckon for attention, it bellowed. I buckled down and spent the next six hours finishing the projects due, plus the next weeks’ worth as well.

Snowball grumbled when I finally crawled into bed. Saber decidedly did not. Yep, the Saber I knew and loved was back.

Wednesday bridge club is a mixed bag of nuts, as Shelly Jergason likes to say. She’s the one who invited me to the group after we met at the historical society and I mentioned I was learning bridge online. No big stretch since bridge evolved from whist, but it was a boon to be accepted into the group. The two-table club includes youthful seniors, Maybelle and Shelly, and middle-aged movers and shakers, real estate agent Jenna Jones and perennial chairwoman Nadine Houseman. Our youngest members are artist Kathy Baker and elementary school teacher Missy Cox.

And, of course, our pastry chef for Maggie’s wedding, Daphne Dupree. We didn’t talk wedding shop at bridge club, though. Jenna held a grudge that she hadn’t been hired to sell Maggie’s condo.

The dress code is casual, so I wore black cargo pants and a white scoop neck T-shirt. We met at Kathy’s home in the Shores, socializing and admiring her new paintings from six thirty to seven then playing cards from seven until nine on the dot. About halfway into the evening, Maybelle and I both happened to be dummies and in the kitchen alone. I hesitated only a moment before I took the plunge.

“Millie told me you did an astrology chart for me last month.”

“Yes, for the anniversary of your coming out. I’d never run one quite so interesting.” She turned away to pour herself a cup of decaf coffee and motioned me closer. “I admit that the results surprised me enough that I consulted a more experienced astrologer I trust.”

“Millie said I disappeared from my own chart, but I don’t think that’s possible, is it?”

“Not in the way you’re thinking, but there is a rather major transit coming up for you.”

“Which means what?”

Maybelle leaned a hip against the granite countertop. “A transit is a transition. A crossroad, if you will. It’s a time when life challenges may change you so much that you’re nearly unrecognizable as the person you are now.”

The Void. Starrack. Maid of honor. Gee, pick a challenge. A shiver snaked up my spine.

Maybelle patted my arm. “It’s not necessarily a bad thing, Cesca. Certainly, it’s no death knell. No more so than when the death card turns up in a tarot card reading.”

Death card? That wasn’t comforting.

“Maybelle, give it to me straight. Should I be concerned about this transit or not?”

She looked away and bit her lip, reflexive actions of a millisecond that took a dozen years off my afterlife.

“Transits can be tough, and this one could be a bear. You’ll have hard choices to make, and you should be careful in the next few weeks.”

That spine shiver became a full-body shudder. “But the transit will only affect me, right?”

The straw I grasped for dissolved when Maybelle grimaced.

“To be blunt, Cesca, I advise you to guard yourself and everyone around you. I may only be a dabbler, but my sense is that you’re in danger.”

Flipping pink flamingos. Like my life wasn’t complicated enough?

With that grand slam of cheery news, it was no wonder the next hour of bridge passed in a blur. Only Jenna bitched at me for making a bad play, but it was a good thing I’d be calling to cancel out of bridge for a few weeks. That would distance me from some of the people I cared about. I didn’t have specific plans to see Millie and the Jag Queens, so maybe they’d be out of the line of transit fire.

As for Maggie and Neil, I’d just have to do my best to keep them safe.

Then again, I doubted Starrack or the Void would be gunning for humans. Something to ask Cosmil next time I saw him.

I considered then rejected discussing Maybelle’s revelations with Saber. What could he say to reassure me? Nada. When the time came, I’d do my damnedest to protect everyone I loved.

Meantime, I detoured to Barnes and Noble en route home. The Kathys, Beth, and Brad were off for the night, but Jane helped me find an astrology-for-morons book, and I joked with Kristina as she checked me out.

I pulled onto the parking pad Maggie had included in the renovation plans. It wasn’t precisely a period-correct restoration touch, but Maggie’s property spanned two lots. She’d given up some side yard square footage to build a two-car garage and the additional parking space for me, melding the architecture so the small addition looked as if it had always been there.

As I trotted across the front yard toward the side gate, my vampire hearing picked up voices. Not Maggie and Neil, or even the neighbors. No, it wasn’t yet ten o’clock, but most of the neighborhood already slept in the steamy, starry night.

What I heard were the voices of Grant and Jason of
Ghost Hunter
fame, coming from my cottage. Saber and I loved the show, but he had the volume awfully high, vampire hearing notwithstanding.

The lights were off in the front of the house, too. Only that weird television light flickered in the window. The side window toward the back of the house was softly lit, as if by a bedside lamp. Maybe Saber had something planned for me. Like sharing my made-for-two jetted bathtub. Surrounded by candlelight. Yep, that sounded like heaven.

With anticipation singing and parts of me zinging, I hurried to the door and turned the knob.

Only to have the door jerk open under my hand.

I half stumbled, half flew across the threshold, right into a forearm that clamped around my throat.