Pretty When She Kills (9 page)

“Don’t mock me, Van Helsing!” Samantha fumbled with her purse.

“How many espresso shots did you have today?” Jeff asked, watching her shaking hands.

“Uh, four.” Samantha jerked out a folder and slammed it onto the counter. “And two margaritas at Polvos.”

“Did you drive here?” Benchley exchanged a worried glance with Jeff.

“No. I got a cab. So, Jeff, you have to take me home.” Samantha flipped the folder open and shoved it toward Jeff. “I am seeing dead chicks. Okay? Like...really dead.” She pointed adamantly at a printed article from the
Austin-American Statesman
.

Jeff picked it up and read it swiftly. It was a story with which he was passingly acquainted. A young woman went jogging one morning a few months before and disappeared. A picture of a pretty brunette was included and Sam kept poking it with one finger as he tried to read.

“Her! I saw her!”

“Cassidy Longoria?” Jeff glanced up at Samantha. “You found her body?”

“No, Jeff! I saw her Casper!”

“I think she’s saying she saw her ghost,” Benchley offered helpfully.

“Don’t say that!” Samantha shushed him with her hands. “If you say it like that they’ll hear you and start bugging me like they harassed Whoopi Goldberg in that one movie!”

“You mean
Ghost
?”

“Ugh! Shhh.” Samantha pouted, clenching her fists. “I don’t want this to be real!”

“If you’re seeing ghosts, that kinda makes it real,” Benchley answered.

“Oh, fuck you.” Samantha scowled.

“Sam,” Jeff said gently, touching her hand and getting her attention. “You saw the ghost of this jogger, right?”

She nodded, tears still tracing down her cheeks.

“Where?”

“The jogging trail. Under the Mopac Bridge.”

Jeff didn’t doubt Samantha had seen something very upsetting. It was clear that she was distraught and very rattled. Also, a little drunk and on a caffeine high. “Tell me what happened.”

In rather disjointed and sometimes incoherent string of words, Samantha related all that had happened that morning.

“Sounds like a sentient ghost,” Benchley said, his tone very serious. Benchley was the best ghost hunter Jeff knew. He took ghosts very seriously.

“But that’s not the worst of it, Jeff,” Samantha continued. “It was really scary, gooey, and bloody, but I think I felt her there before. Today is the first day I saw her, but I always feel this really super-cold breeze under the bridge. And...and...I’ve been seeing things out of the corner of my eye around my house. When I drove by the cemetery the other day, this old man was sitting on a gravestone and he waved at me. And now I think he’s a ghost. Then I realized that the other day I said hello to this woman walking down my street and my friend, Giselle, who was with me, didn’t see her. I thought she was jerking my chain, but now...now...”

“You think you’re a medium?” Jeff offered.

“Uh huh. Just like that
Lost Highway
chick,” Samantha said with a solemn nod.

“Got that reference, and Patricia Arquette is hot,” Benchley said.

“Tell me I’m not going all Allison Dubois, please, Jeff. Please!” Samantha clutched at his hands, her big eyes imploring him.

“Have you ever sensed or seen anything before the last few months? In your childhood?” Jeff asked. He plucked a pen from the jar and began taking notes on the cover of her folder.

“No, never.”

“When did you start noticing things? Like maybe cold spots, shadows, flashes of people out of the corner of your eye, that sort of thing?”

Samantha stared at him as she pondered his question. Slowly, her eyes grew larger. “That whore!”

“Amaliya reference, right?” Benchley asked Jeff.

Jeff nodded.

“I’m catching on.” Benchley looked proud.

“After I drank from her! When I almost died and you made me drink her blood!”

“Good thing you don’t have customers right now because that would be really hard to play off,” Benchley said.

“Jeff, you made me drink her blood! You said it would heal me! You didn’t say it would make me go all
Ghost Whisperer
!”

“Sam, are you sure? You never experienced anything like that before?”

“Dude, I’m Baptist. We believe in God, the devil, and angels. Not ghosts.”

Jeff rubbed his brow, pondering everything she had told him. “A lot of people do end up coming into their abilities with a near death experience. That could be why you’re now seeing things.”

Samantha rubbed the spot where the sword had skewered her a few months before. “Yeah? You mean it’s not the skank’s fault?”

“Not sure. Let me check on something.”

Sliding out from behind the counter, Jeff headed into the back of the store to where he kept his private collection of books written by previous vampire hunters. The fire safe was tucked into a corner of his office. After unlocking it, he pulled out a few of the leather bound journals.

Benchley and Samantha lingered in the doorway to his office, watching. He sat at his desk and started flipping through the tomes. Rubbing his leg, he rested his artificial leg on a rest under his desk. Every once in a while his stump would give him issues. Today, he was having phantom pains in a foot he no longer possessed.

“So you think it’s really because I almost died?” Samantha pulled on her bottom lip with her teeth.

“It’s totally plausible. Near death experiences place you at the veil between the living and the dead. You hover between the two. So you begin to see both,” Benchley explained as he darted into the office to sit on a stool near Jeff’s desk. He craned his neck to see the journal in Jeff’s hands.

Opening up one of his father’s old journals, Jeff scanned for an entry that had been made soon after his mother’s death. His father’s obsession with vampires had increased tremendously after his wife had been murdered and his son maimed by one particularly nasty vampire. Flipping through pages, he listened to Samantha and Benchley chatting back and forth, but really didn’t pay attention to what they were saying.

He was concerned that Samantha’s abilities appeared to be growing, not receding. Some people had very clear visions of the dead soon after a near death experience, but would eventually lose the ability.

“And you didn’t see her until today? Not even a passing glimpse?” he asked, cutting off Samantha’s summarization of all the seasons of Medium to Benchley.

She adamantly shook her head, her blond hair whipping about. “Nope. Never.”

Returning his gaze to the book, Jeff continued to scan entries. He had a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach and it was only growing worse.

“Oh, shit.” Benchley sat back, his expression fading to solemn. “Jeff has that look.”

“What look? There’s a look?” Samantha leaned over to peer into Jeff’s face. “What’s that look?”

Jeff swatted her pointing finger away. “Uh, my concentrating look.”

“No, that’s his ‘oh, we’re fucked’ look.”

“Bench, you’re not helping,” Jeff said irritably. He found the passage he was looking for and started to read it.

“Lemme see,” Samantha said, lunging for the book.

Jeff caught her hand and gave her his sternest look. He really, really liked her, but no one messed with his stuff. “Samantha, let me do this. Give me a sec. Okay?”

With a frown, tears still in her eyes, Samantha gave him a curt nod.

“Thank you,” Jeff said, then returned his gaze to the elegant scrawl of his deceased father’s handwriting. The sick feeling inside worsened. Rubbing his brow, he glanced toward Samantha. Her green eyes were fearful and she was chewing on her bottom lip nervously. “Okay, there may be a problem.”

Samantha fell back against the wall, clutching her stomach, close to hyperventilating. “Tell me.”

“Apparently, when a vampire gives a human their blood, it can have a variety of side effects.”

“It
is
her fault!”

“Samantha, listen to me!”

“Okay, okay. Listening.”

“When a vampire gives a human their blood it can imbue the human with vampiric abilities in a greatly diminished capacity. Only if the vampire has some sort of unusual ability. My father documented that the mortal servant of a vampire he encountered could toss balls of fire. The vampire master was a pyromancer. Another vampire hunter reported a mortal servant that could control animals.” Jeff paused, waiting for Samantha to say something. Her eyes had widened to the point that there was white all around her irises. “Sam?”

Turning on her heel, she stalked toward the front of the store.

“Sam?” Jeff hurried after her, slightly limping much to his consternation.

Samantha whipped about, breathing heavily, gripping her cellphone in one hand.

“Say something?” Jeff winced.

“Sam, you’re kinda scaring us,” Benchley added coming up behind Jeff.

Pointing at Jeff, Samantha fumed in silence. At last, she let out a cry of frustration.

“Samantha, let me look into it further. Maybe it will fade away.” He lightly took her by the shoulders. Her skin felt soft and warm under his touch.

“That whore!” Samantha screamed. “Oh, my gawd! She did this to me! As if she hasn’t fucked up my life enough!”

Jeff gently brushed her hair back from her face and guided her over to a couch to sit down. “Sam, sit down. Your face is so red.”

“I’m so fuckin’ pissed off!” Samantha cried out. “I don’t want to see...” she paused “Will they all bug me if they know I can see them? Like in that movie?”

“Possibly,” Jeff said.

“Probably,” Benchley said at the same time.

Flopping back on the couch, Samantha stared at the ceiling, her phone cradled against her breasts. “Fuck. My. Life!”

“Let me do some digging, okay, Samantha?” Jeff was worried she was about to blow a blood vessel.

With a soft sob, Samantha threw herself into his arms, her wet face pressed against his neck.

Rocking her gently, Jeff said softly, meaning every word, “I will help you with this. I promise.”

Chapter 9

The sky was a magnificent panorama of purple and pink as the sun set beyond the tall green pine trees enclosing the campground. Pete sat in his old Mustang staring at the big black truck attached to the camper, pensively stroking his black goatee. Glancing down at the card the mysterious stranger had given him earlier in the day, he pondered once again if he was doing the right thing.

The comments from the man named Ethan Logan had made Pete very uneasy. For weeks after he suffered from what the doctor had finally labeled a stroke, he’d experienced difficulty remembering the night he had collapsed in the Dixie Motel. He didn’t even remember why he’d been in the motel room, let alone naked. It was suggested by a few of his friends that Pete had been slipped a drug by a woman in a bar. There had been no drugs in his system and no one had seen him at his regular bar, so that theory was shot. It bothered him that there wasn’t a real explanation for his loss of memory. It had been embarrassing to be questioned by the police. Even more embarrassing that it was evident he had sex with someone he couldn’t even remember. Without being able to recall the event, he wasn’t even sure if a crime had been committed against him.

That whole night had been a blur until he had started to dream. Each time he dreamed, he’d wake with a hearty erection and tears on his face. At first the visions had been hazy with no real discernible details. It was disconcerting to lie alone in his bed sobbing like a baby, but not know why. Then as the weeks turned into months, the dreams began to gradually become clearer. That was when he saw the face of the woman he had loved most of his life emerge out of the murk. He had even started to wake crying out her name.

Amaliya.

Ever since Easter weekend the Vezoraks had all been acting oddly. At first he thought it was because Amaliya had died and her body had not been recovered. But as his dreams continued to gain coherency, he started to wonder.

Tapping his fingers against the steering wheel, he exhaled sharply. “What the hell am I doing?”

Maybe he was being a fool, but he was seriously beginning to wonder if Amaliya was still alive. Maybe Ethan Logan knew more than he was letting on. Pete had mourned her with the rest of her family, but if there was a chance she was out there in hiding, he wanted to find her. Maybe she needed him.

So many maybes.

“Pete, you’re a damn fool,” he uttered, shoving his car door open and climbing out. Pocketing the card, he kicked the door shut and sauntered toward the camper.

Ethan Logan must have been watching him, because the side door of the trailer opened and the tall man stepped out. The cowboy hat and duster was gone, but the man was still imposing. He had strong features and broad shoulders that made Pete believe that Ethan could deliver a crippling punch in a fight.

There was an old grill, a folding table, and a cooler set out on the patio. The coals in the grill were bright red. Ethan’s shirt sleeves were rolled up and his hands appeared damp and freshly washed, so Pete guessed he had arrived at dinner time.

“You found me,” Ethan said in a somber voice.

“Only camping ground around here. I figured you’d be here or parked at Wal-Mart. You weren’t at Wal-Mart, so...”

The corner of the investigator’s mouth quirked up in one corner. “Not bad detective work.”

“Is that what you are? Truly?” Pete asked stepping onto the cement slab the trailer was parked next to.

“Sure am,” Ethan said, slightly shrugging.

“That a Georgia accent?”

Ethan gave him an even bigger smile. “Who’s investigating who?”

“Plates are Georgia,” Pete confessed.

Ethan glanced briefly at the license plates on his truck, folding his arms over his chest. “So they are.”

There was an uncomfortable silence between the two men. Pete fidgeted as he listened to the sound of the insects buzzing in the trees. Shoving his hands into his jean pockets, he said, “Do you really think Amaliya is alive?”

“Do you?”

The man’s keen brown eyes had a way of Pete feeling like he was somehow guilty of something. They were piercing and intense.