Cryptic Cravings (4 page)

At the moment, celebrating our birthdays in a joint party should have been the biggest event in my life. Usual y I’d be obsessed with thoughts of decorating the mansion with bat-shaped bal oons, dark purple streamers, and a monster-size chocolate cake with tiny coffins.

But I couldn’t think of anything else when Jagger and his friends were secluded in the vacant mil , designing its transformation into one of the most cryptic of al clubs. With Alexander’s best friend only a short distance away from the Mansion, in secret, I knew I wouldn’t be able to invite him or the others. It felt like a stake through my heart and made me miserably lonely for my boyfriend’s sake.

The whole birthday celebration was already ripe with drama.

I was dying to know more about the plans for the Crypt and Sebastian’s sudden love for Luna. I had been hoping he’d be the perfect match for either Onyx or Scarlet, but he’d fal en for Alexander’s former nemesis’s sister. Now Sebastian would be hanging out with Luna and Jagger instead of Alexander and me and even going into business with Jagger. It was al happening too fast—even for someone as impulsive as me.

I decided I had a chance to find out more of Jagger’s intentions that afternoon since I would be protected by the sun—I used it to my advantage.

As soon as Becky dropped me at my house after school, I hopped on my bike and pedaled toward the Sinclair Mil . The ride was exhausting, with its curving hil s and narrow, winding roads.

The rocky gravel of the mil ’s driveway made it too unwieldy to ride over even with my thick tires, and I didn’t want to stir any sleeping vampires with the noise, so I walked my bike over the gravel and leaned it against one of the brick wal s. I found a few rusted and locked gates with boarded-up windows.

I went around to the back of the building. This empty factory was historical to Dul svil e, and I remembered learning about it in school. The mil prospered manufacturing uniforms for the war in the 1940s. After the war ended, a linen company bought it but it eventual y went bankrupt. I imagined the noises of the running machinery cranking out uniforms for the war and the voices of the workers. The hours must have been long and laborious. I sweltered at school; I couldn’t imagine what it must have been like to wear a floor-length heavy dress while sewing al day long.

I thought it was hard to have worked at Armstrong Travel filing and making copies in a blouse, pencil skirt, and hose. I was happy I’d been born in the time of air-conditioning.

The red-tiled smokestack, once ful of thick smoke, was now barely standing. What was once home to machines and laborers was now home to modern-day vampires.

I found the entrance that I had watched Onyx and Scarlet pass through. The door was unstable, looking like it might come off its hinges at any moment. I held it steady and gently opened it.

I quietly stepped over discarded materials and around garbage left by others’ sneak-ins as I made my way to the main part of the factory. So far I didn’t see any signs of the makeover I was hoping this empty mil would take on.

Instead of neon signs adorning the wal s and a tiled dance floor, spray-painted graffiti was the only decoration, and broken chairs were cast aside in the corners like litter. I knew the vampire crew wasn’t in this room—the light was too bright for them to hide. They’d need a place dark and big enough to shelter five coffins.

As much as Jagger had been a pain to both Alexander and me, he did make the Coffin Club in Hipstervil e a thriving place for both mortals and vampires to hang out. Jagger had a great imagination and was successful in seeing his vision come to life. And now I imagined how this factory could be transformed, too. I wish I’d thought of it first. But had it been my idea and my venture, the only thing that was sure was that no one would come. With Jagger, he already had vampires inhabiting it and hadn’t done a thing to it.

The sunlight streamed in through cracked, broken, and vacant windows. This would be a hard place for a sleeping vampire to get any shut-eye. Last time we’d discovered Jagger’s hideaway he was holed up in a freight elevator.

But with so many vampires now in his company, that would be too smal for al their coffins.

I found the two-flight staircase we’d once taken when Alexander and I had original y found Jagger here months ago. As I ventured down the rickety staircase, less light streamed in and I dug into my backpack and grabbed my flashlight. My free hand got tangled in several spider-webs.

“Sorry,” I said to a grizzly-looking spider who stared back up at me.

I walked down a darkened hal way. It was straight out of a horror movie. There were no windows here in the sublevel hal way, and I only had a flashlight to show my way. My imagination transformed it into a mental institution, with screaming inmates. Not sure who or what might jump out at me, I had to fight my own wil just to open a door.

I opened a few doors that led nowhere—empty rooms with no sign of life . . . or the undead. At the end of the hal way, I came to the last two doors—one across from the other. At this point I wasn’t sure how much daylight I had to keep me safe. I decided to try the one on the right.

The door was secured, but not with a lock. It felt like something was wedged in front of it from the other side. To me that meant there was something behind it worth securing. I pushed against the door with al my might, and the wedge shifted just enough for me to slip through the opening. I stepped inside and cast my light around the room.

There they were—one right next to the other. Five coffins in a row. The first one, black with band stickers, was Jagger’s. The second, baby pink, was no doubt Luna’s. The third one was embel ished with stickers from countries and cities across the globe, and I recognized it as Sebastian’s. The fourth was black onyx stone outlined in white, and the fifth was adorned with shiny beads. Those were certainly Onyx and Scarlet’s. Each had dirt around it in a circle. Five sleeping vampires, only a few feet away from me.

I imagined creating a custom coffin for Alexander and me—perhaps a double-wide coffin that looked like a huge heart. I wondered if the vampires were lonely in there, isolated from the rest of the world. I felt they must miss seeing each other during the daylight hours. Did they dream like we did or did they always have nightmares? I had to real y contemplate this issue—think about if it was something I ultimately wanted, to be so closed away from another vampire or the outside world.

I knew I should back out immediately, return to the hallway, and close the door. I knew I shouldn’t remain in the room or step any closer to the coffins, but I couldn’t resist the temptation. I tiptoed up to Jagger’s coffin. I paused briefly, then leaned my ear to the coffin lid. I heard the faint sounds of breathing.

Suddenly a thud came from the other side. I was so startled I jumped up and let out an audible gasp. My heart was racing so hard I was sure I’d have to cal a doctor.

I paused, covering my mouth with my hand. I wondered if they had heard me.

Now I knew it was time to retreat. I tiptoed out and did my best to wrestle the wedge back underneath the door from the other side with my flashlight.

I checked the time on my cel phone and, with sunset approaching, realized I had only a few minutes to investigate further. I’d found the coffins and discovered that no plans had been carried out yet. But what was Jagger’s next move, and were there any clues that could help me figure that out?

There was one more door left uninvestigated—the one across the hal from the sleeping vampires. I’d be smart to head to the Mansion and return another time with Alexander. I didn’t have much time to decide, and I was desperate to know what lay on the other side.

I stared at the doorknob. I anxiously turned the handle, but it wouldn’t open. I pushed and pul ed so hard, the knob came off in my hand. As I wrangled it back on, I could feel it catching the latch. I did my best to be patient and opened the door slowly.

The room was dark except for a paper-thin beam of light streaming in through a broken window at least twenty feet from the floor. The smel of dust and mold fil ed the room. Old filing cabinets lined a few wal s and there was an antique wooden desk. A green wine bottle with a Romanian label sat on it. In the corner was an aquarium containing not water but rocks and one very frightening tarantula. Gravestone etchings, including the very ones I’d seen at Jagger’s place in Hipstervil e, hung from the wal s. This must be Jagger’s new quarters. By appearances, he wasn’t ready to return to Hipstervil e in the near future.

I didn’t have much time to riffle through the mess.

I spotted a tube of papers. I unscrol ed them and discovered they were a stack of diagrams. Sticky notes labeled each one individual y, the first, THE CRYPT, the second THE COVENANT, and the third, which was worn and appeared to be an original copy labeled SINCLAIR MILL. I was looking at the blueprints for Jagger’s club.

I examined the one marked THE CRYPT. I wasn’t in the habit of reading blueprints and they weren’t as detailed as I would have imagined. Instead of pictures there were boxes and lines, dotted and thick ones representing different things. I could make out one main room with a large box marked “stage.”

So, was “the Covenant” the mysterious underground vampire club, like the Dungeon was in the Coffin Club? I knew Jagger had mentioned to Sebastian his dream to open the club to vampires. These could be the plans to prove that it was more than a dream.

I was intent on scouring it when I realized the light was no longer streaming in through the cracked window.

This meant one thing: The sun had set and the sleeping vampires in the next room were about to rise.

Alexander had to see these plans. He was smart and would know better how to read them. But I couldn’t take them al with me. If Jagger discovered they were missing, who knows what he would do. I pul ed out my cel phone to take a picture of them when I heard a rustling coming from the next room.

I would have to use my flash to take the picture, and I knew it would bring immediate attention to the room I was rifling through.

I only had seconds to decide. Ticktock. Ticktock. It was then I heard a creaking opening of coffin lid doors.

I decided against the photo. I definitely couldn’t take al the plans, but maybe Jagger wouldn’t notice if one was missing. I pul ed away the one on top and rol ed the others back up and bound them with the rubber band. My heart was pounding and the blueprints in my hands were shaking.

I rol ed up the Crypt plans and stuck them in my backpack and replaced the other two exactly where they had been. I grabbed my flashlight and quietly closed the door behind me. I bolted out of the room and tore up the rickety spiral staircase before the vampires had a chance to reach the hal way.

Breathless, I hopped on my bike and pedaled straight for the Mansion.

“You did what?” Alexander exclaimed when I explained the last hours’ events.

Alexander didn’t greet me with the usual hug and sensual kiss. I realized I shouldn’t have spoken so soon.

“I thought this way we could have leverage on their plans,” I said. “Once you see this—maybe we’l know what he’s real y up to.”

“Why didn’t you wait for me?” he asked, shaking his head.

“It was the only way for me to find out info. Under the cloak of sunlight. Otherwise they’d be up and I couldn’t have investigated. We need to know what they are truly planning.”

I took out the blueprint and unrol ed it on the antique dining-room table. I moved it far enough away from the several lit candelabras that wax wouldn’t drip on the paper.

“I don’t see anything unusual here,” Alexander said, examining it like a professional. “It is the blueprint for the club.

There’s the stage, there’s the bar. This is the dance floor. Over here is a door. Not sure where it goes.”

“It seems real y cool,” I said, pining for the club that I wanted to have in Dul svil e.

“But there was another set of blueprints,” I confessed. “It said ‘The Covenant,’ but I couldn’t get a photo of it in time.

I think they are the plans for his secret vampire club. Would Jagger share everything with Sebastian?” I speculated, like Sherlock Holmes. “I don’t think so.”

“There was another set?” Alexander asked.

“Yes. I wanted to look it over—even take it—but I couldn’t. The sun was setting and I didn’t want to get caught.”

“You shouldn’t have taken these—you shouldn’t have been in there in the first place.”

“I know. But can we leave this to chance? Just wait until Jagger opens the club, when we both heard he plans to open it to vampires, too?”

“I wouldn’t put it past him to do something. The Coffin Club was so successful, I can see why he’d want to open another one. But here? It’s too dangerous.”

“That’s why we have to see those plans.”

Alexander reluctantly agreed.

“I want to party at the Crypt so badly,” I continued with a dreamy tone. “But we must stop this underground club and stop him from inviting more vampires to Dul svil e.”

“Raven, we must return these immediately, before Jagger realizes they are missing. He and I have a truce. I don’t want anything to disrupt that.”

I could see how important it was to Alexander to finally have the weight of the Maxwel s off his back. I didn’t mean to start trouble again. I was just trying to make sure that Jagger wasn’t up to anything nefarious. But maybe I was misjudging Jagger’s intentions, like people in Dul svil e misjudged mine.

“And we have to examine the Covenant,” I said to Alexander as I careful y stuffed the Crypt blueprints in my backpack, “just to be sure. I think it holds the real key to Jagger’s plans.”

Alexander shook his head again. He grabbed the keys to the Mercedes off the antique end table and we headed straight back to the factory.

Alexander and I parked the Mercedes at a distance and traipsed through the darkness toward the factory. I would have felt like a scolded child, with Alexander dragging me back to return my stolen goods, but Alexander knew, too, that we had to double check Jagger’s intentions to make sure the club he was building was safe for Alexander’s life in town and for the mortal residents of Dul svil e.