Vampire Miami (7 page)

He pulled her toward him and began to sway, his
movement minimalistic in contrast to the heady cacophony of the
music, and she fell easily in step. Couldn’t look away from those
jet black eyes. No iris. No whites. Just smooth and liquid and
utterly inhuman. But his face, his expression. It was still
mesmerized, fascinated, as if he had never seen the likes of her
before. No mockery, no hunger, nothing. Just that annihilating
intensity. A thought came to her through the fog of blank
paralysis, urgent and desperate:
run.

Selah pulled her hand from his and stepped back.
He stopped. She shook her head, unable to formulate a word, and
then turned and dove into the crowd. No dolphin now, no delirious
streak of light plunging and weaving its way through a kaleidoscope
of rainbow colors. Now she was a panicked deer tearing through the
woods, forcing her way out, away from the wolves.

She was drenched with sweat when she burst out
into the nexus, adrenaline fighting the still pervasive influence
of her buzz. She fought for calm, for control, clenching and
unclenching her fists as she looked around. She did not look back
over her shoulder. Instead, she slid through the crowd and returned
to the club entrance, determined to find Maria Elena. Except her
friend wasn’t there. The bouncer stood with his impossibly huge
back to her, glowering at the crowd outside that was straining and
yearning to get in. Selah thought of asking him where Maria Elena
was, but thought better of it and instead faded back into the
club.

Not knowing where to go, what else to do, she
fled into the only place that felt remotely safe: the women’s
restroom. It was crowded, and she walked quickly down along the
line of women waiting impatiently for a stall, and slipped into one
just as its occupant stepped out. She closed the door and locked
it, ignoring the angry cry and curses from the woman who’d been
next in line.

Selah sat and pressed the base of her palms
against her temples as she fought for breath. Squeezed her eyes
shut and saw him again, those strange wide scars smeared across
both cheeks, his skin smooth and dry and a lustrous ebon. Those
wide lips. Those eyes, devouring her. She shivered, and her eyes
snapped open as she tried to dispel the image. She fought to not
think of how his hands had felt on her hips, how they’d moved
together.
God.

She tried not think of Mama B, what she would
say if she could see her now, hiding in a toilet stall in a club on
South Beach. Instead she thought of her father. His pale, lean,
worried face. The kind smile, the exasperated manner with which he
always greeted her latest mistakes and adventures. She thought of
how he smelled when she hugged him, how he would lean back and
listen to jazz each night as he wrote his articles, sometimes
simply staring off and tapping his finger on his upper lip. How his
hand felt on her shoulder when they walked to their favorite diner
each Sunday morning. How hard he worked, or how he insisted on
visiting her mother’s grave once a month like clockwork, though it
had been five years since she’d died.

Selah felt her eyes tear up. Who was she
kidding? She wasn’t tough. She wasn’t this hard girl from the
Brooklyn streets. She suddenly missed him terribly. His common
sense, his quiet voice. He never yelled, no matter how far she
pushed him. Missed how he would think things over before answering
a question, how sometimes he would just watch her when she said
something ridiculous to get a rise out of him. How tired he always
seemed, worn out. By work, by her, by life. Where was he? Was he
hurt? Was he even alive?

Fat tears rolled down her cheeks and she wished
she hadn’t accepted Michael’s drinks. It was cold in the bathroom,
and her clothes were sticking to her, sweaty and heavy. She wanted
to be in her room back home. On her bed, in her pajamas, surrounded
by her things, warm and safe and away from all this.

Somebody banged on the door. It rattled in its
frame. “Come on already! I’m dying out here!”

Selah wiped her face with the back of her hand,
and then grabbed a wad of toilet paper and blotted her eyes. Stood,
smoothed down her shirt, ran her hands over her hair. Pictured his
eyes. Like pools of oil, reflecting the lights of the club but
revealing nothing. She shivered, opened the door, and marched out,
ignoring everybody.

She paused at a sink. Washed her hands, washed
her face. Thank god she wasn’t wearing makeup. Did her best to
tackle her hair. Took a deep breath. All right. Maria Elena would
be back soon. She just had to wait for her. Keep low, stay quiet.
She turned to the door and hesitated. He was out there. Like a
shark swimming through ocean waters. Walking out would be akin to
diving right back into that ocean at night. Her stomach cramped,
but she forced a deep breath down. This is what she’d asked for.
This is what she’d dared when she told Maria Elena to bring her. No
backing out now. She couldn’t hide in the bathroom all night.

Selah stepped back outside into the nexus. Blue
hues painted everything in surreal tones. She scanned the faces
around her. Nobody was searching for her; nobody had scarred
cheeks. Moved to the right. She would find a corner in the lounge
to hide in. One of the recessed seats. She hurried into the
green-tinted space, and immediately slowed down. The vibe had
changed since she’d last visited, grown more sensual and primal.
The music wasn’t for dancing. Couples and groups were lounging on
wide sofas, talking in each other’s ears over tiny low tables on
which their drinks and fake candles stood. A DJ was visible in the
back, nodding his head in time with the beat. Selah wandered in,
navigating around the seats, trying not to trip on any legs, and
found a huge armchair in the back. It was large enough for a giant,
almost a chaise longue, so she scooted right into the back, pulled
her knees in under her chin, and stared out at a vision of
decadence.

Time passed, and the immediacy of her fear
receded. She drowsed, chin lowering, eyes growing heavy. The music
was hypnotizing. People were making out, finding recesses like her
own to get to know each other better. It had been such a long day.
But she couldn’t let herself sleep, fought to stay alert. It was
too dangerous.

After a while, she pulled out her Omni once
more. Found comfort in its brilliant screen. She searched for the
term “freedom fight” and found a long series of videos, articles,
information. She checked a video. Couldn’t hear the audio over the
music, but saw enough to quickly close the feed down. Two men
battering each other to death in a huge auditorium, a large crowd
watching from the seats. She scanned the Wikipedia article. Read
enough to realize that they were lethal fights held here in Miami
at the old sports arena. If you won three fights, you could walk
free of the city. Each fight was to the death. Though it was banned
in the US, the fights were recorded and promoted online. Selah felt
sick.

A message beeped. Jairo. Homesick and tired, she
decided to accept the request. His face appeared on her screen,
earnest and serious. He immediately threw up his hands and said
something inaudible. She turned on the subtitles again.

“Finally!” he’d said. He mouthed something. “Are
you OK?”

Selah shook her head. Jairo hadn’t been her very
best friend back home, but he had been a friend. She thought he
liked her, but whatever. That didn’t matter right now.

“We are all thinking of you,” the subtitles
read. “Missing you like crazy.”

Her eyes teared up again.
God
, she
thought angrily,
all I do is cry
. She blinked the tears away
and tried for a brave smile. Typed out, “Course you do.”

“Where are you? Are you really on the Beach?”
The admiration and fear on his face made her sit up a little.

“Yes,” she typed out. “At a club called
Magnum.”

“You don’t waste any time,” he said. “What’s it
like?”

“Crazy,” she replied. “Here, check it out.”

She had an Alpha connection after all. She put
the Omni on 360-degree recording mode and set it on the table
before her. Leaned forward at the last moment and sent the feed to
not only Jairo but her Garden as well. Let the world see where she
was.

The Omni didn’t change, but anybody tapping into
her feed would be able to move their point of view around and look
at anything they wanted. Zoom in, listen, whatever. She sat back,
crossed her arms. Stared at the Omni. Let Jairo and Scott and
Alessandra get a taste of just where she’d ended up. She felt
absurdly abandoned by them, as if they’d chosen to leave her alone
here. Incoming messages began to beep on the top right of the
screen. She wasn’t surprised. Let them add on to the hundreds
already queued on her Connection Wall. She’d check them later.

Selah looked past the Omni into the depths of
the lounge. It was like a marine grotto, all shifting sea greens
and shadows. She didn’t want to see what half the people were
doing, but she knew Scott would be all over that action like the
sick puppy he was. She searched for black eyes. Didn’t see any.
Curious, morbidly so, she examined the couples who were hidden in
the larger chairs, in the corners.
Were they just making out, or
…?
She tried to see.
Would a vampire feed in public?
The
word didn’t come as easily to her mind as it had before. Not after
that dance. Just the thought set her heart racing.

A couple of large men appeared in the doorway to
the room. They were alert, clearly not here to have fun. Selah
scooted back, and then as they entered the lounge and began to make
their way purposefully toward her corner, she snatched up her Omni
and shoved it in her pocket. One of them was the bouncer from out
front, while the second was a lean Hispanic dude wearing sunglasses
looked at everybody with a harsh, sour-looking face. They knifed
through the lounge, indifferently kicking legs out of their way,
and Selah shrank even further back into her chair. They were coming
right at her.

She looked around in a fresh bout of panic,
searched for a new place to hide, to bolt to. What had happened?
Before she could formulate a plan, they’d reached her and stood
towering over her chair, blocking out the rest of the room.

The Hispanic guy held out his hand. “Give it
over.”

“Give what?”

“Whatever you’re using to connect. Don’t make us
take it.”

Her Omni? She hesitated and pulled it out. It
was still recording. He snatched it out of her hands. Examined it,
and then expertly turned it off. Not just off, but powered it all
the way down. Slipped it into his pocket, and then nodded to the
bouncer who leaned down and grabbed her by the wrist and hauled her
roughly out of the seat.

“Hey!” she yelled, yanking back on her arm. “Get
off me!”

People were staring. Frightened, eyes wide,
their sultry moods shattered by the sudden violence, their latent
and ever-present fear rising to gleam in their eyes. The Hispanic
guy was already marching back to the door. The bouncer gave her a
shove, nearly knocked her sprawling, and forced her to follow.
Selah did so, rubbing her wrist, heart beating like a runaway train
again.
Oh god,
she thought.
Oh god
.

They led her brusquely through the lounge, back
into the nexus. Selah entertained the wild idea of making a break
for the entrance, a sudden dash in the hopes of finding and then
hiding behind Maria Elena who would explain it all, but the
bouncer’s hand never strayed far from her shoulder—and in truth,
she was too scared. What if she only got in
more
trouble?
She let them lead her through a narrow door she hadn’t noticed
before into a cramped corridor beyond.

The music was immediately reduced to a muffled
bass beat and Selah wrinkled her nose at the acrid stench of
cigarettes and the tang of wet, rusting iron. The Hispanic guy led
her past a couple of doors and into a cramped room that was little
more than a drain in the floor and cinderblock walls. A mop rested
inside a bucket in one corner, but that was it. The bouncer shoved
Selah inside, and she stumbled in and caught herself on the far
wall. Turning quickly, she pressed her back against the rough
concrete and stared wildly at them both. She half expected them to
simply lock the door and turn out the lights, but instead the
Hispanic man crossed his arms and studied her, eyes as cold as
those of a dead dog.

Selah met his gaze and stared right back. He was
wearing a form-flattering black suit, which made him look compact
and trim, and his goatee and moustache were manicured with what
looked like obsessive care. Selah welcomed the pang of contempt she
felt for how much effort he’d put in to keeping that thin little
thing looking good. But his eyes were hard and his manner was hard.
No sympathy there.

It hit her then. She couldn’t call the cops.
There
were
no cops. She couldn’t get help. There was nobody
who could come. Mama B was miles away behind a locked iron door,
and Maria Elena had no idea that she was back here. Whatever was
going to come, she would have to deal with it alone.

“What’s your name? Where’s your ID?”

“I don’t have an ID,” she said, his tone
arousing her old anger.

“No ID? Then what? Who are you?”

“My name’s Selah Brown. I just arrived today. I
was deported from …” It felt weird to say. “From the States. The
US.”

“Deported, huh?” The man was scanning her.
Clearly didn’t believe a word she was saying. “You got anything on
you then? Passport? Papers that show your entry date?”

No. She’d left those with Mama B. She shook her
head.

“How convenient.” There was a knock on the door,
and a skinny white guy stuck his head in. His face looked like a
weasel that was forcing itself in through too small a hole. “Here,”
said the Hispanic guy. “Take a look at this. See what you can
pull.” He handed the other guy her Omni.