The Maestro's Butterfly (17 page)

“He’ll get over it,” Gena said, and raised up on her tiptoes to hug him. Adam closed his eyes and lifted her off her feet.

The ground swayed, and Miranda’s lunch came rushing back. She leaned out the car door and let it spill onto the pavement.

“Oh, my God,” Maria said.

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Gena looked at Miranda through the window as she closed the door and leaned back. For a moment, their eyes locked. Then Gena gave her a little smile and turned back to the theatre. Adam got in and started the car.

“Should have put the air on for you. Sorry.”

“Yeah?” Maria said, her voice full of sarcasm.

“You watch it,” he said, looking at her through the mirror. “Or I will leave your butt at the estate.”

“No you won’t,” Maria said. “I’m your lunchbox.”

“See if I won’t,” he muttered. Then he turned to Miranda. “You okay?”

She nodded. “Better.”

“You’re coming, right?” he said.

She took a deep breath and let it out, then nodded. “Yeah. I can’t do this forever.

I can’t.”

“Good,” Adam said. “Okay, girls. Buckle up.”

When they reached the house, he said, “Don’t think. Just stay here. If anyone says anything to you, just tell them I needed to come to the house for stuff for the show—and to change, because I got tired of this monkey suit. Got it?”

She nodded.

“Good,” he said, and went inside.

Miranda felt grateful for the rumble of the car and the air blowing on her face.

She didn’t think she could take silence right now.
Don’t think.
That’s what he’d said.

Don’t think.

Miranda unhooked her seatbelt and turned around to look at the other girls.

“Why are you leaving?”

They looked at each other. Then Maria raised her hand and Autumn’s. “We’re in love,” Maria said earnestly. It was the first time Miranda had heard her say anything without sarcasm. “It’s against Claudio’s rules for feeders to be involved with each other.

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And Adam needs people. So—” She looked at Autumn, who smiled bashfully at her. “It works out.”

Miranda nodded and turned back.

“What about you?” Maria asked. “I mean, you just got here.”

“I didn’t know what I was getting into,” Miranda said.

“It’s a weird way to live,” Maria said. “But it’s not that bad. If it wasn’t for me and Autumn I’d stay.”

“He’s too scary,” Autumn said softly.

“It’s okay, baby,” Maria said. “We’ll be okay now.”

Adam was back in minutes, wearing his khaki travel shorts, sandals and a green Jimi Hendrix T-shirt, carrying his saxophone case and an overnight bag. He had pulled his dreads into a thick, ropy ponytail.

“Let’s do this damn thing,” he said, slamming the door much harder than he had to, and tossing Miranda’s purse into her lap.

She looked at him, startled. “Hey. I haven’t seen this since I’ve been here.”

“Claudio’s door was open,” he said and pulled slowly down the driveway.

“Okay, I got a few things for all of us. We’ll get more later, okay? We’ve just got to get where we’re going.” He turned to Miranda.

“Where are you going, baby girl?”

Miranda furrowed her brow at him. “I, uh, I don’t know. I hadn’t really thought about it. My apartment, I guess.”

Adam looked at her doubtfully, and pulled on to the main road. “Are you sure?

He knows where you live. Me and the girls here are going to disappear. You can come with us if you want.”

Miranda shook her head. “No, we had a—a thing. A bet that I wouldn’t want to leave if I stayed for thirty days. It’s only been three weeks. This is—it’ll be okay.”

He looked at her and sighed. “If you say so. Your apartment it is.”

It was a good fifteen miles to her apartment in town from Claudio’s estate. The 126

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girls in the backseat murmured to each other. Adam hummed to himself and made trumpet noises with his mouth. Miranda let her head loll to the side so she could see out the window when her eyes were open, feeling sick and scared. She told herself it was just the effects of being bitten, but it didn’t help much.

After a few minutes, she turned to Adam to find him making a face at the rearview. “What’s wrong?” she asked.

“That is the weirdest car I’ve ever seen. And it’s been behind us forever.”

Miranda turned. “Ooh, pink Cadillac. Just like the old song.” There was a small blonde girl at the wheel, chewing gum. The girls turned and looked, then stretched out on the backseat. Miranda turned back around and closed her eyes. “I wonder if my car still runs, or if it has abandonment issues now.”

“We’ll check it out before I leave.”

Miranda gave him directions to her apartment, which was in a neighborhood with winding roads, near Lake Olmstead, over a garage in her landlord’s back yard. Her car was parked where she had left it, and it still ran.

“Want to come in for a minute?” she asked Adam.

“Sure,” he said. He knocked on the back window of Claudio’s car, which he had left running. Maria sat up sleepily and fumbled with the automatic controls, managing to roll the window down a few inches.

“Want to come in?” Adam asked.

Autumn raised her head.

“He’s asking if we want to go in for a minute.”

Autumn plopped back down on the seat. Maria shook her head, let up the window and joined her.

“I’d better not be long,” he said, following Miranda inside. “Are you absolutely sure you don’t want to come?”

“Positive,” she said and closed the door behind them, feeling suddenly and completely awake. There was a tingling sensation in her belly, which spread down 126

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through her legs. She felt herself growing inexplicably wet. She kept her back to Adam and went to the refrigerator, opened it. Something smelled, so she shut it again. “Forgot to throw out the beans,” she said, keeping her hand on the handle. “There is nothing worse than stinky beans.”

“I wouldn’t know,” Adam said. “Look, I’d better go. I’ve got the girls out there, and it’s only a matter of time before Claudio knows we’re gone.”

Miranda turned around and smiled. “May you be in heaven half an hour,” she said, “before the devil knows you’re dead.”

Adam furrowed his brow at her. “Are you okay?”

She nodded and leaned against the counter. “I just want you to kiss me.”

He dropped his jaw and raised his brow. “Oh, no, it’s just—this is just one of those weird effects of the whole vampire bite thing.”

She leaned forward and took his hand. The skin was rough and thick. “Please.

You can change things, so it’ll be you and not Claudio.”

He shook his head and took his hand back, but she moved in on him and slid her arms around him. He looked around frantically. “You’re just latching on to me because I’m the nearest vampire. You’re body knows you’re leaving Claudio and—”

She caught her breath. “Leaving Claudio?” She sobbed. “I don’t—”

He lowered his head to peer down into her face. “Listen, maybe you should come with us. I’ll take you, if you want to be with us.”

She shook her head and bit her bottom lip. “I don’t know what I want, Adam, I just—can you hurt me, just a little, before you go?” She felt pathetic as she looked up at him, but the emotions were just too strong for her to hide the imploring expression she knew must be on her face.

He stared, closed his mouth and shook his head. “I can’t, baby girl. I’m not—I can’t do that.”

She nodded and didn’t attempt to stop the flow of tears.

He pulled away and began looking around. “What’s your phone number? I’ll 128

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call you. Make sure you’re okay. And if you change your mind, then—”

“There’s paper there,” she said, pointing at a sticky note pad on the counter.

He looked at it, and picked up a nearby pen.

“Here,” she said, and wrote the number down, then folded it in half. Then she folded her arms and looked at the floor.

“Oh,” he said. “This is—I’ll call you tomorrow. I promise.”

She nodded.

He pulled her head to him, pressing her forehead to his chest. “I wish you would come.”

“I can’t,” she squeaked, then wiped a tear from her cheek and pulled away. “I can’t explain it. I just can’t. I want to be here. If I can’t be with Claudio I want to be here. And I can’t be with Claudio, because he’s—I’m so confused. I just need a few days to think. Maybe I’ll go back. I don’t know, but I need to think.” She leaned on the stove, farther away from him.

He nodded. “I’ll call you,” he said, then turned and left, pausing at the door before shutting it. She stayed put and let the tears roll down her cheeks, trembling and feeling sick, listening to the sound of Claudio’s sedan backing out of the driveway.

Then, silence.

Then another, louder car.

Miranda looked up and waited for the driver to decide he was in the wrong place and leave, but that didn’t happen. Instead, she heard the sound of a car door slamming and footsteps crunching on the gravel. She watched the door as someone jogged up her steps, clicking his shoes on the bricks, shaking the apartment with his heavy steps on the porch.

Miranda jumped when the knock came. It was firm, insistent and masculine.

She blew out her breath, shook her head and chuckled. “So it begins,” she said, making her way to the door. “I’m here five minutes and already the J.W.s are out in force.”

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She opened the door. It was Jack.

“Hi,” he said, leaning with his arm high on the doorframe. He wore a black polo and off-white slacks. His ears stuck out from his curls, giving him a sort of endearing goofiness that mixed strangely with the danger she saw in his green eyes.

“Can I come in?”

She tried to look past him to his car, but he moved in the way. “I,,uh—”

“Thanks,” he said, and pushed past her, taking her arm in his hand and closing the door.

She pulled away. “What are you doing? Get out of here!”

He was too fast, and had her against the wall with a hand clamped over her mouth before she could react.

“Do not scream,” he said around his fangs, which were now a little longer than the rest of his teeth.

Miranda shook her head. He moved his hand and stared down at her with his mouth pursed, nostrils flared and breathing heavily. “What are you doing?” she asked.

“I’m claiming you,” he said. “My brother and I had a bet. He said you’d want to stay with him after thirty days. I said you wouldn’t. If he bet me, I’d fund his show. If he lost, I’d get you.”

“Wait—that’s—you can’t do that. I didn’t agree to that.”

He pressed tightly against her. He had a full-blown erection. “Really?” he asked. “What makes you think that matters? You think we ask people? We’re vampires, Miranda. We take what we want. And I want you.”

With that, he held her still and lowered his head, biting her roughly. She cried out and pushed at him, but he was immovable. He drank, and drank, until her vision grew cloudy and everything went dark.

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Miranda didn’t know where she was when she came to. She couldn’t focus her eyes. Her neck itched.

Slowly, she began to recognize blurry movement across the room. Shapes began to form, and there was a face—Jack’s girl Katie in a black-and-white schoolgirl skirt and a blonde pixie wig, chewing gum. Her feet were bare.

Miranda looked around as the girl came to stand over her curiously. She was on a bed, her wrists tied together at the headboard, her feet free and bare. She panicked, and began to flail her legs uselessly and pull against the ropes, which tightened and cut off her circulation.

The girl stood up and looked over her shoulder. “Jack!” she called. “She’s awake!”

“What’s going on?” Miranda asked. Her hands had really begun to hurt. “What’s he trying to do?” Her voice shook. She could hear her heart beating furiously, and wondered if she was in danger of heart failure.

Katie gave her an appraising look but didn’t speak, scurrying away to curl up in a chair at Jack’s approach. He was still in the black polo and off-white slacks, so Miranda assumed she hadn’t been here for too many hours. For the first time, she noticed the thick leather belt he wore. She tried not to look at it.

“What are you doing?” she asked. Her breath came out in short bursts. “Where is this?”

“My house,” he said. His voice was quiet and calm. He sat on the bed and leaned over her to loosen the ropes just a little. “Don’t struggle so much. You’ll hurt yourself.”

Miranda looked around. It was an old house, with large-plank hardwood floors in need of a polish, long red curtains and dingy paint. A floor lamp burned in the corner.

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No light made its way around the curtains, so she thought it was probably night. The whole place smelled of old paper and old wood.

“Where?” she asked, almost afraid to hear the answer.

“New Orleans,” he said. “We drove all night. It’s about, what, four in the morning?” he asked Katie over his shoulder. She looked up from a magazine and shrugged.

“Katie doesn’t talk much around strangers,” he said. “But you won’t be a stranger for long.” He reached out to touch Miranda’s chin.

“You can’t do this. It’s kidnapping.”

“I thought I explained all this to you,” he said, his expression growing serious.

She watched as he unbuttoned and unzipped her jeans, shivered when his fingers grazed her abdomen, horrified both at what he was doing and her body’s response. “This is how it’s done.”

He grasped her jeans and her panties and tugged hard. She flailed her legs just a little, overcome by the chills covering her flesh and the heat between her legs.

He picked up one foot, then the other, removing the wadded clothing, and tossing everything to the floor.

He ripped her top away with one hand. The fabric bit into her back before tearing. She sucked her lip and whimpered.

Then she was naked.

When he unbuckled his belt and took it off to loop it in his hand, she swallowed and looked frantically at his eyes. “What are you going to do?”

He ran his other hand down the length of the belt, squeezing the loop with a smirk, then tossed it onto the mattress and opened his own pants before mounting her. He entered her and fucked her deliberately, carefully watching her expressions, smirking.