His Vampyrrhic Bride (2 page)

Come to think of it
, he told himself,
I might still be high on the fumes. That’s why I’m chasing some woman I saw in the garden pond.

He realized that the intoxicating vapour might leave his body, if he took deep enough breaths. But it was far too late. Tom Westonby sped around the trunk of a huge oak and found himself face-to-face with the mysterious creature he was hunting.

A sudden violence . . .

‘Are you following me?’ the bewitching stranger asked in a surprisingly soft voice. The tone suggested mild curiosity rather than terror at being pursued by a menacing figure at midnight.

Tom Westonby stood there panting. Not for a moment had he expected her to stop running. He’d thought he’d have to grab hold of her to prevent her escape. For a moment all he could do was stare in astonishment. Her pale blue eyes were as striking as the incredibly light blonde hair. It seemed more like a luminous mist than individual hairs. He judged her to be close to his age. Twenty-three or thereabouts.
And she really is beautiful. Amazingly beautiful.

‘I asked if you were following me.’ Her words seemed more like a pleasant invitation to agree, rather than an accusation. The woman in the white dress didn’t even appear to be annoyed that she’d been pursued. ‘You
were
following me, weren’t you, Tom?’

‘You were on my property.’

‘Oh? Your property?’

‘My parents’ property. I’m clearing out the place before they move their stuff in. They’re planning—’ He stopped himself from saying more. The thing is, he wanted to say more. Her wide-eyed expression gently encouraged him to keep talking.

‘So you’re living there by yourself, Tom?’

‘Wait a minute, how do you know my name?’

‘Do you usually chase girls you’ve never met before in the dead of night?’

‘You were trespassing.’

‘And now you want to prove how tough you are?’

‘No . . .’ But he recalled the hot excitement pumping through his veins as he’d chased her. ‘I just wanted to know what you were doing in my pond.’

‘Your parents’ pond,’ she corrected.

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘Well . . .’ Her eyes fixed on his. ‘Owning that big house, they must be rich.’

‘What’s it to you?’

‘Why don’t you ask your parents to give you the seventeen thousand dollars?’

Tom stared at her in surprise. ‘What seventeen thousand dollars?’

‘You need the rent money, don’t you?’ She gave a knowing smile. ‘And by the end of the week?’

‘Hey.’ His surprise ignited into anger. ‘How do you know about that?’

‘I just do.’

‘I’ve never even met you before.’

‘Well, you have now,’ she said as she turned away. ‘Goodnight, Tom.’

‘Wait! How the hell do you know about the seventeen thousand dollars?’

She silently darted away into the forest shadows.

Tom shouted, ‘I told you to wait!’

He became the hunter again – in furious pursuit of his prey. Dear God, he
would
put his hands on her this time. He imagined how her fragile arms would feel when he gripped them in his muscular fists. Even though the fumes from the green spirit still made him groggy, he ran faster. His heart pounded.

Just wait till I get my hands on you . . .

He’d only just lost sight of the woman when the branches crashed above his head. He heard twigs snapping. Then a heavy object slammed into his back. He yelled as he was flung upwards. For a moment, he flew through the air high above the ground. Pain tore through him.

I’m dying
, he thought in surprise.
I’m actually dying . . .

Moonlight pierced the leaves. Suddenly, there were faces. Dozens of faces. Eyes glared at him.

Then darkness fell. And nothing more.

T
om Westonby opened his eyes. The first words that entered his head were:
I’ve killed her.

The sun blazed down from a clear blue sky. He was lying on the riverbank, and he was hurting all over.

‘I murdered the stranger.’ This time the horror of those words exploded inside his head. Tom lurched to his feet. The sudden movement ramped up the agony. But there were more important things to worry about than mere physical pain.

Because memories of the night before came hurtling back. The woman . . . He’d seen the woman on the lawn at midnight. Then, like a madman, he’d pursued her. He’d relentlessly chased her through the forest.

What was I thinking?
His heart pounded as a growing sense of dread gripped him.
It’s like I was determined to murder her.

His eyes swept over the riverbank. He absolutely expected to see the fair-haired woman in the white cotton dress. His imagination conjured visions of her lying there dead, her arms flung out, eyes staring. There’d be blood . . . Oh, yes, there’d be blood – great crimson pools of it. Blood would smear the grass. Her white dress would be drenched with a violent, screaming red.

Tom Westonby frantically searched amongst the trees.

I’ve murdered her . . . What have I done with the body?

Behind every rock and beneath every bush he expected to see the corpse. Tom’s chest heaved. Panic gripped him. As he hyperventilated, the forest leaves became a vivid green, like dazzling green fire. Desperately, he tried to make sense of the confusing memories of last night.

I caught the woman. We argued. When I realized she’d been spying on me and knew about the seventeen thousand dollars, I got angry, I grabbed hold of her. Then I murdered her.

Tom ran his fingers through his hair. ‘No,’ he hissed. ‘She ran off . . .
then someone attacked me
.’ This recollection brought a surge of relief. He sighed as his muscles began to relax. ‘Someone hit me from behind.’ The more he thought about what really did happen, the more he realized he’d been the victim. ‘Maybe that’s how they do muggings in this part of England.’ He found himself so relieved that he hadn’t slaughtered a stranger in cold blood, he started to smile. ‘It’s obvious. Muggers use a beautiful woman to lure the victim from the house – that’s when the accomplices pounce.’

He scanned the riverbank again. The forest appeared tranquil. There wouldn’t be a body to find. He’d murdered no one. No, he was the victim. A gang of rural muggers had made a fool of the city boy.

Tom’s back hurt most from the blow. The force of the impact had painfully wrenched the muscles. He didn’t think he’d been punched or kicked. Even so, he decided to check his reflection in the river for black eyes and busted lips.

He made his way down the bank where he crouched at the water’s edge. The melody of the river pouring over the stones had a calming effect. His usual sense of well-being returned. Once again he was the twenty-three-year-old easy-going guy with a plan to open a scuba-diving school in Greece – not a murderer facing prison.

Tom Westonby examined his reflection in the water. His dark hair stuck up in tufts. What else can you expect from sleeping outdoors? His brown eyes were clear. There were no signs of being punched. What there was, in massive abundance, were red blotches. Midges had made a meal of his face. Just the sight of them triggered a tide of itchiness. A rash of insect bites covered his bare arms, too. He scooped up handfuls of water to drench his skin. Its coldness helped counteract that hot itch of the bites. The sooner he grabbed a shower the better. Then get to work with the antiseptic ointment.

As he sluiced his face he noticed that the gold chain was still around his neck. He checked his watch. ‘Still there,’ he murmured in surprise.

Quickly, he stood up to yell into the forest. ‘You muggers are crap! In fact, you’ve got to be the crappiest muggers ever! You forgot to take this!’ He pointed at the diver’s watch on his wrist. ‘You are absolutely crapping useless!’

Even as images blazed inside his head of a gang of thugs comically blaming one another for not stealing the expensive watch, another explanation of last night’s events occurred to him. A more rational one.

The jar of green spirit he’d smashed in the basement? He’d been working in those pungent fumes for more than an hour. When he’d finally cleaned up the glass, and the pool of green stuff that reeked so powerfully, it felt as if his tonsils had caught fire; he’d gone upstairs to grab some fresh air at the window. That’s when he’d seen the beautiful barefoot stranger.

Or thought he’d seen her.

By the time Tom Westonby headed home along the woodland path, he found himself grinning.
I haven’t killed anyone. I haven’t been attacked. There never were any muggers. No . . . I was high on fumes. I was like a glue-junkie after a monster sniffing-binge.

As he pushed open the back gate that lead to Mull-Rigg Hall he realized what had really happened last night. He’d been intoxicated by the spirit vapour – high as a solvent-junkie. All this about seeing the woman in the pond had been a bizarre vision generated by inhaling the chemical. After that, he’d gone on a crazy rampage through the forest – all the time, hallucinating like mad.

I must have fallen over one of the boulders down by the river
, he told himself, and the grin got even bigger
. Then I passed out. Just wait until Chris hears about this. He’ll be laughing for a week.

As Tom headed towards the house a stern, male voice rang out: ‘Mr Westonby? I have reason to believe that you have just returned from the scene of a crime.’

T
om Westonby’s heart nearly exploded when he heard those words: ‘
. . . you have just returned from the scene of a crime.
’

He spun round on the path to catch sight of a broad face grinning at him from over the fence.

‘Chester! Are you trying to blow a heart valve or something?’

Chester jerked an oily thumb back over his shoulder. ‘I brought the lawnmower that my dad said you’re renting. The van’s parked on the drive. When I couldn’t get you to answer the door I was just about to give up, then . . .’ He gave a knowing smile. ‘I saw you sneaking back from the scene of the crime.’

‘What scene of the crime?’ Spasms of guilt clenched up his muscles. For one disturbing moment he wondered if he really had killed the woman in white. ‘What the hell are you talking about, Chester?’

Chester vaulted over the fence; he couldn’t keep that big smile off his face. ‘You know what crime I’m talking about.’

‘Oh?’ Tom finally guessed what Chester was hinting.

‘Coming home at nine in the morning? Looking like you’ve been mauled by a she-tiger? You’ve had a night on the tiles, haven’t you?’

Tom smiled. ‘Something like that.’

‘Who is she?’

‘’Ah . . . that’s just for me to know, Chester.’

‘Enough said, Tom. Your love secrets are safe with me.’

Even though Chester’s talk about ‘scene of the crime’ was just a leg-pull, Tom still found himself changing the subject. ‘You say you brought the mower?’

‘Don’t worry, Tom. I won’t bug you about your girlfriend. But you could always bring her to the pub. Tomorrow’s quiz night.’

‘Cheers.’ Once more he changed the subject. ‘Did you bring the chainsaw as well?’

Chester said that he had. They followed the path round the house to where Chester had parked the van.

Tom had known Chester Kenyon for the past two months, ever since Tom had moved into Mull-Rigg Hall. Chester – or Cheery Chester as he was popularly known, on account of his happy nature – stood six foot six, had a mop of curly, blonde hair, and always wore a nigh-on impossibly broad smile. The man was clumsily playful, endearing, and nobody could ever actually bring themselves to be angry with him. He was in his early twenties, and he worked with his father at the village tool-hire store. Come to that, you could get anything repaired at the Kenyons’, from a computer to a combine harvester. The people in small, back-of-beyond communities like Danby-Mask tended to be versatile. Even to the point of being a little self-contained world all of their own.

Tom almost told Chester about accidentally getting high on fumes in the cellar and then hallucinating like crazy as he chased some non-existent woman through the woods. After a moment’s thought, though, Tom decided against sharing the anecdote. Chester would tease him relentlessly for months to come. Chester was a great guy. Tom liked him. However, Chester believed his mission in life was to keep all his friends laughing. And sometimes that would mean endless micky-taking. Chester might be the warmest-hearted guy in the world, yet sometimes he had the sensitivity of a charging bull.

Chester opened the back doors of the van. Tom helped the big man lift the mower on to the drive. After that, he hauled out the chainsaw while Chester unloaded a fuel can.

The gentle giant chatted in that amiable way of his as he dealt with the paperwork. ‘It’s the first time I’ve been back to the house since your aunt died.’

‘I’d never been here before, either,’ Tom confessed. ‘It amazed me how big the place is. It’s a proper mansion.’

‘Dad said your aunt was a good customer . . . always paid her bills early.’ As Chester wrote on the clipboard he glanced round the garden. ‘So you landed the job of getting the house ready for your parents to move in?’

‘It’s a full-time job, too. For some reason the house is full of chairs. You know, the straight-backed kind? I think my aunt must have been a bit nutty about them.’

‘She was a nice lady, Tom. She’d set out the chairs on the back lawn and invite local people to cream teas.’ He held out the clipboard for Tom to sign. The rental agreement was covered with Chester’s big oily fingerprints. ‘I’m glad somebody will be living here again. I’d hate to see the place fall apart.’

‘Lately, I’ve been concentrating on moving all those chairs into the garage, so there’ll be space for the new furniture.’

‘And cutting the grass.’ Chester nodded at the mower.

‘My mother wanted the garden tidying so Owen will have somewhere to play.’

‘Owen?’ Chester’s eyebrows rose in surprise. ‘Owen Gibson? Your aunt’s son?’

‘Yeah, my parents inherited a chunk of my aunt’s money. They also inherited her kid.’ Tom paused. ‘That sounds a bit brutal. I didn’t mean it to come out like that.’