Untitled Vampire Romance
This is not a complete tale- it is the beginning of something that could become a novel.
Chapter 1
Jenifer Weston sat at the nurse's station, reading her romance novel. Since it was the night shift at Sacred Heart hospital, most of the patients on the ward were asleep. She just had to change a few IV bags now and again, and wait for the inevitable buzzing of someone needing attention. The main attention she provides here is hospice- holding hands with the dying, talking to them, comforting them, and administering painkillers until they depart. Many people find this task ghoulish, or at the least they think of it as very emotionally taxing. Jennifer did not. She was glad to help these people welcome death.
She's been reading a lot lately- working this job for 18 of her 38 years can tend to get boring. Well, this is the geriatrics wing, not the emergency room, so no one would expect a lot of excitement here. It's not that she didn't like her job- she loved it. She has always found satisfaction in helping others, often to the fault of putting their needs before her own.
Jenifer put her novel down and walked to one of the patient's rooms, an old man fast asleep, and checked his IV. She looked out of his room's window, watched the sun setting, and the stream of red and white lights from the traffic on the highway. Far more red ones then white, she noticed. More going away then coming. She absentmindedly twisted a curl of her dark red hair between her fingers, as she stared at the almost hypnotic river of cars, and the lights in the buildings going out one by one. It's like every evening the city empties out to fill the suburbs, and every morning the suburbs purge themselves on the city again.
She did not normally work nights- she swapped shifts with another nurse this week. The other nurse didn't ask her to trade, she did. She felt compelled. She felt the need to go home after dark. No, not a need exactly, but more like a desire. A desire to be out in the city alone at night.
It's not like she has anyone waiting for her to come home. Going home was never the best part of her day. When she is at work, at least she is doing something, at least she feels like she is worthwhile, and has a purpose. At home she just sits there, feeling like an appliance put away in a cabinet. She thought most women like her would get a cat, or a dozen of them, but Jenifer felt that would be too much responsibility. Her human patients come first.
The hours passed, and when her shift was over, Jenifer then grabbed her bag, her coat, her umbrella, her romance novel, and left the ward. She walked down a long, deserted hallway to the elevator, and pressed the down button. The button did not light up- it hasn't in years. You just have to trust that the elevator is coming, and that it's going where you want it to go. When the door opened, she stepped inside, and turned toward the keypad to press the button marked Lobby. She looked up and glanced through the final sliver of the closing doors, and for a brief instant saw the shape of a man in the hallway, looking at her. But when the elevator's glass doors closed, all she saw was the empty hallway rising as the elevator descended.
She left the building and walked down the stairs toward the subway. The subway station was oddly quiet. There were no homeless people sleeping by the ticket machines like there usually are. Very few people were there, and only one person waiting to take the red line. Jenifer stood next to him, trying to look like she was focused on her novel. The man was tall- basketball player tall. He was so tall that his black trench coat looked way too short on him. And the black coat, black gloves, and black hat made the pale skin of his face look deathly white. He looked no older than 30, yet his long straight hair was even whiter then his skin. Despite his unusual coloring, or perhaps because of it, he was strikingly handsome.
The train pulled up, and opened it's doors. No one got off at this stop- and as Jenifer entered, she saw no one was on the train at all. No one but her and the stranger. She sat at one of the seats with her back to the wall, facing the door. He sat near the door, facing forward. He removed his trench coat and draped it across the back of the seat with a single fluid motion, like a dancer performing a routine he had done hundreds of times before. He was wearing a tight black tanktop, which stretched across his slender but well defined physique. His lean muscular arms were bare, and as pale as his face. There were two tattoos on his left arm- a small detailed circular pattern on his shoulder, and a tribal armband across his bicep.
She then realized she was no longer even pretending to read her book, she was just mesmerized by the markings on his arm. She glanced up at his face- long and narrow, but strong and chiseled. She averted her eyes, and flipped a page in her book, as if she had finished the previous one. She noticed the phrase "sudden storm" on the page, and then looked up again- and the stranger was now looking right at her.
Jenifer tried her best to not appear startled- instead, she simply sat as still as she could, and decided she would get off on the upcoming stop and wait for the next train to come.
He spoke.
"Is this your stop?" He asked as the doors opened. His voice was smooth and deep, like soft jazz music. He even gestured towards the way out, but Jenifer suddenly felt unable, or unwilling, to move.
"No." she said. "Not yet." She had no idea why she spoke, or why she said what she did.
The man leaned back, crossing his arms. She felt the man's eyes on her, looking through her. She continued to force herself to look at the pages of her novel, but she could not help but look at him over the top edge of the book. She saw how the new position of his arms made his chest bulge. She noticed that the tanktop was torn at the neckline, by the right side of his chest. It also looked like his black shirt was stained, making it stiff in places, clingy in others.
With a single graceful motion, he rose to his feet. He walked slowly, and deliberately, toward her. She could see the strength of his thighs bulging through his tight black jeans with every step.
He stood right in front of her, and then sat down on the bench beside her. "Hello Jenifer." He said. "My name is Jordon." She felt frozen. His voice, and his eyes, were mesmerizing. "How do you know my name?" With a wave of his hand, he gestured to her name tag, still pinned to the front of her scrubs. "Oh, of course." she said.
"I felt I should introduce myself, since your name tag inadvertently gave me an unfair advantage." During that gesture, he also started leaning in towards her. She felt his breath- not warm, but cool against her neck. He was so close she should have felt the heat of his body, but she felt nothing- like he was not there at all. Just a cool breeze against her neck.
She closed her eyes.
She heard a slight gasp, then her neck started to feel warm, wet, and sticky. She felt warm fluid flowing across her neck, and down the front of her chest. She opened her eyes and screamed.
Jordon was dead. Stabbed through the back, and his blood was all over her, drenching her, covering her. His body fell forward across her lap.
She heard a voice. "Pardon me." the man said, as he grabbed Jordon's body and dragged it off of her. "They don't die in a puff of smoke like in the movies- reality is much messier."
Chapter 2
The stranger dragged Jordon's lifeless body off of Jenifer, and into the isle. He was a big man, early forties, broad shoulders, with brown skin and medium long black hair. His accent sounded middle-eastern. The doors opened. "Grab his feet, will you?" He said, as he began dragging it out the door to the subway terminal. At first she thought he was talking to her, but then he saw two other men enter the subway car, aiding in the removal of the corpse.
The two new men carried the body away, as the first one came back onto the subway car and stood in front of Jenifer.
"You had better let us take you home- walking around like that will draw the wrong kind of attention." Two more men got on the subway car, different men then before. They had sponges and buckets, and proceeded to clean up the blood on the floor and the benches.
Jenifer sat still, looking at the blood all over her. Of course, as a nurse this is not the first time she has been covered in blood- but it was the first time on the subway, and the first time she had seen a murder. She could not compel herself to speak.
"Come on." the middle eastern man said, as he extended his hand to help her up. Jenifer complied, still too much in shock to think clearly.
He draped a coat across her shoulders, not to keep her warm, but to cover the blood. As she held it closed she realized it was Jordon's coat, the one he left on the bench by the traincar door.
He escorted her up the subway stairs, to a van waiting for them. As they entered and sat down on the back seat bench, he introduced himself. "I am Adi Ahmad, and you are Jenifer Weston." She was about to ask him how he knew her name, but one again she remembered her name tag.
Adi looked at her with a kindness you would not expect to see on the face of someone who had just killed a man moments ago. "So, how much do you know, and how much do you want to know?" He said.
"I don't know." Jenifer answered. "What was he?"
Adi smiled. "Good instinct! You asked "what", not "who", showing you are getting part of this. As you suspect, he was not a man. He was a vampire."
"Vampires don't exist." Jenifer could barely get the words out- since the train she felt tired, barely able to keep her eyes open. She was in such a confused state that it was only now dawning on her that she witnessed a group of men murder another man, and she actually got in their van with them. She is in a van with murderers.
"If you say vampires don't exist then fine- vampires don't exist." Replied Adi. "So tell me what you felt as he approached you."
"I don't know." Jenifer thought about it. "I was going to leave the train, and I didn't. When he approached I wanted to leave, but I couldn't. It's not like I was physically stopped, but I felt conflicted. I felt drawn to him and afraid of him at the same time."
"That is called Thrall." said Adi. "It is a form of hypnosis they use to control their prey, not unlike a snake does to a mouse."
"Vampires." Said Jenifer.
"Yes, Vampires." Adi replied. "Who don't exist, even though they do."
"Wooden stake, garlic, no sunlight, turn into bats, immortal vampires?" She asked.
"The reality has been blended with myths- they cannot turn into bats or anything else. They are perpetually people-shaped, I assure you. Garlic is poison to them, but only if they eat it, and only in rather large amounts. A typical meal in an Italian restaurant would not kill them, it would just make them violently ill. Wearing garlic around your neck does nothing. Crosses and holy water do nothing either." Adi explained. "Sunlight will burn them, but not up in flames- it is a slow burn, more like being cooked, and it would take a few hours of exposure for them to die. Sunlight is not a reliable means of vampire pest control. They can walk around in the daylight just fine with the proper clothing, sunglasses, and a wide brimmed hat".
Jenifer sat there, quietly, absorbing this.
He repositioned himself in his seat. "One more thing- they are not 'undead'. What a silly word- something is alive, or it is dead. They are very much alive, and they can be made very much dead. As far as wooden stakes, yes, that will kill them, but that would kill anyone. Anything that would kill a human would kill a vampire- including guns. The exception is disease- they don't seem to get sick, and they age much more slowly then we do."
As she sat, she looked at Adi, and noticed a bronze pendant around his neck, shaped like some kind of wine glass, with wings. "This is the symbol of Sauti Klea. He is the guardian angel of my people." He said this as he held the pendant up.
"Are angels real too now?" Jenifer said, not meaning to sound sarcastic, but she realized it did.
Again Adi smiled. "Well, I like to believe they do." As the van slowed down, Adi said "And on the topic of belief, I believe this is your stop."
The van came to a halt, and the man in the front passenger seat got out, and opened the door to help Jenifer to the front steps of her apartment building.
She fumbled for the key to the front door, and went inside, and entered the elevator. As she entered her apartment, she removed the coat and threw it across a chair, then went to take a shower, where she began to think things through. She hadn't worked the night shift in almost a year, then she gets attacked by a vampire. She felt compelled to work the night shift today. Did Jordon do that to her with his vampire hypnosis? How? Did she meet him before? How could she forget someone like him? There must be lots of women in the city who are out at night, so why her?
After she got dressed, she went to the living room- and there she noticed Jordon's coat. She picked it up, and felt something stiff in the pocket. It was a coaster- it had an illustration of a glass of red wine, with a female little red devil, perched playfully on the edge of the glass. It said "Hell Hole" across the top, and in smaller letters, "5317 Prince Road" across the bottom.
That was when she realized she never told Adi or his men her address before they dropped her off.
Chapter 3
The next morning, Jenifer went to work. She went to the nurse's station, and checked her messages before going on rounds.
Orchid was also a nurse in the geriatric ward. Orchid was a walking, talking bubble of nitrous oxide in a bleach-blond hair-do. Patients who come and go might find her smiles comforting, but her fellow nurses who are in it for the long hall want to slap her silly. Orchid does not wear scrubs like the rest of the medical staff. Her outfit looked more like a "Naughty Nurse" costume from a 1970's porno.
And to make it worse, Orchid is the head nurse for the ward.
"Hi Jen! Rough night, huh?" asked Orchid.
"What do you mean?" Jenifer was afraid last night's events had hit the morning news.
"Just that you look like mister mopey paid a visit, and took you to downer land." Orchid leaned on the counter, and made a little walking motion with her fingers.
"No, I'm fine." Said Jenifer.
"Well good! Cuz you just got a new patient in room 6. Enjoy!" Orchid giggled as she slid a file in her direction and bounced away.
Jenifer went to room 6. There was a thin old man, about 80 years old, lying on the bed. She looked at her tablet, and checked his records- he was brought in a few hours ago, no name or address, and he seems to have amnesia resulting from some form of senile dementia. His body is badly bruised, suggesting he was beaten or mugged, but he did have a wallet, with cash and credit cards.
"If he has a wallet..." Jenifer mumbled to herself.
"The problem is, the wallet is not his." The voice came from Doctor Hans Douglas, who had entered the room behind her. "You were thinking 'if he has a wallet, why don't we know his name?', correct?"
"Yes- but also if he has a wallet, he probably wasn't mugged." She added.
"Quite- but that's more of a police issue. We want to find out who is going to pay the bills." He winked- Jen knew he was not so callous as to be concerned with the billing over patient care. Doctor Douglas is a tall black man, with strong features. Most people expect him to be a big blond German with a name like "Hans", But his mother simply named her twin children after the fairytale Hansel and Gretel. His sister, a psychiatrist also at this hospital, goes by the name "Greta" now.
"The wallet belongs to a 22 year old man named Michael Connelly. The hospital has tried to contact Mr Connelly, but so far no one has replied. We are hoping he's the grandson."
A weak voice came from the man on the bed. "Connelly."
"Yes- is that your name? Is your last name Connelly?" asked Jenifer.
She stood by the side of his bed, as Doctor Douglas checked his pulse and pupils.
"name." said the old man, barely able to get the breath to say the word.
"Jen, I'd like you to draw a blood sample, submit it for a basic metabolic panel." The doctor left the room, on to his next patient.
Jen opened the package on a needle, and prepared to draw the sample. She extended the man's arm, and noticed he had a tattoo- a tribal arm band, not unlike Jordon's. The blood was thin, seems to be anemic. She labeled the sample, and decided to drop it off at the lab herself.
As she walked down the hall to the elevator, she passed three orderlies trying to restrain an old woman being wheeled in on a gurney. She was screaming, "get off me, get off me! I have to go!" they were trying to tell her to calm down as they were wheeling her into the ward. Jenifer entered the elevator, and as the doors closed she heard the old woman say "the vampires did this!"
Jenifer did not know what to do- should she stop the elevator, go back to the ward? If she tried to talk to her about vampires, taking her seriously, everyone else would think she's nuts. Heck, if she raced over there from the elevator they would think she's nuts.
She continued to the lab, dropped off the sample, asked for a rush job on it, and went back up to her ward. Perhaps she can talk to the patient later, after she is in a room and alone.
Jenifer saw the other patients on her list, gave them their medicines, checked their vitals, and tried to make them more comfortable. For many of the patients on this floor, it's just trying to make it as pleasant as you can before they die. As she went from patient to patient, she checked the other rooms to see where they placed that old woman. She found her- in a private room, at the end of the corridor.
Jenifer entered the room, and looked at the woman. Her chart said "Jane Doe- possible drug seeker." Jenifer went to the side of her bed, and tried to talk to her. "Hello mam?" she said. The old woman's eyes were opened, but she looked heavily sedated. Jenifer started to leave, then she felt the old woman grab her wrist. She was looking right at her, and mouthed "help me".
"Jen, did you mix up your rooms?" Orchid had walked in.
"No," said Jenifer. "I just thought I heard something, so I thought I'd check on her."
"Well that's OK, but I'm here now. You can go back to your own patients." Said Orchid, as she stepped into the room and away from the door, in a way that indicated quite clearly that she meant for Jenifer to use it next.
"Bye-bye!" Orchid said as Jenifer left the room.
The rest of her shift progressed as normal. She had tried to see the old woman again, but every time she walked by that room, Orchid or one or more orderlies were there.
As she continued her rounds, she came to the male John Doe, who she now refers to as Mr. Connelly. She believes that really is his name, since he seems to respond to it. He was awake now, and the back of his bed was elevated, putting him in a seated position.
"Hello Mr. Connelly. You are looking better. How are you feeling?"
He turned slowly toward Jenifer. "I don't know."
"You don't know what? How you feel?" She asked.
He turned away.
Jenifer walked closer to the bed. "Is your name Mr. Connelly?"
"Yes." He said.
"What is your first name?"
"Michael."
"Do you have a grandson with the same name?" She tried to get his attention, but he seemed focused on the window.
"Where am I?" He asked.
"Sacred Heart Hospital." Jenifer replied. "You were discovered beaten and bruised, so the police brought you here. Do you have any family we should contact for you?"
"I don't know." He said. He then turned to look at her. "How old am I?" he asked, in an almost pleading voice, almost tearful.
"We don't know- you didn't have your ID on you when you were brought in. Do you know who this person is?" Jenifer showed him Michael Connelly's driver's license. The old man began to cry.
"It's OK", she said, as she sat at the edge of the bed, and held him. "We will find him. And until we do, we will take good care of you."
Chapter 4
As Jenifer walked into her apartment, her eyes went straight to Jordon's coat, still draped over the chair. The coaster from "Hell Hole" was sitting on the coffee table. Just the thought that their might actually be a vampire nightclub right here, in this city, in the real world...
She went to her closet. Jenifer does not go out often- she doesn't drink, she doesn't dance, she doesn't realy socialize either. Her closet is filled with scrubs for when she's at work, and t-shirts for when she isn't. Then she remembered the clothing her sister left here after her last visit. She had put them in a cardboard box in the back of the closet. Her sister said it would be too much bother to ship them to her, since she'd be visiting again in a few months anyway. She opened the box, and there was this red dress, cut low in the front, and even lower in the back.
"Too much." Jenifer thought, as she dug deeper in the box. She found a nice blue dress- fitted, tapered, nice, shows some cleavage, without dipping down to the navel. The back was open, but again, not too low. She put the dress on, with some matching blue pumps she bought last year and never wore.
"OK, this can work" she thought. But before she goes, she should be prepared, but what? Adi said holy water and crosses were just make-believe, and garlic only works as an ingested poison. Then she figured it out. She went to the junk drawer in the kitchen, and shuffled things around till she found it. A key-chain flashlight she bought at the gift shop of the science museum. This flashlight claimed to have full-spectrum light, just like sunlight. Jenifer tried the flashlight to see that the batteries still worked, and put it in her pocketbook.
She then checked the address on the Internet, found how to get there from the subway stop closest to it. Of course, it was the red line.
She went down to the station, and at least this time it was crowded. It was filled with people- wanting to go someplace, or wanting to get away from someplace. People don't make eye contact on the subway- if the happen to by accident, in a slight glance gone astray, they quickly turn their heads, or glance down. Riding the train is a solitary experience done in large groups. Jenifer used her regular method of distancing herself from others, by reading her book. Regrettably, she is very near the end, when the handsome muscular hero dispatches the villain, rescues fair maiden, and they live happily ever after.
She then looked up and saw a drunk guy throw up in the isle.
It was a long ride. Stop after stop, more people got off then got on. After a while, the car was nearly empty- just four or five people. They called another station. The doors opened, and the last of the passengers left, leaving her all alone on the train. She rode for another five minutes before they reached her stop, at the very edge of the city. She got out, and looked around. This was not the good part of town, to say the least. The street was relatively well lit by the neon signs of the strip joints. Most of the people on the sidewalk were here to sell something, or here to buy what was being sold.
Jenifer walked hurriedly. She passed an alleyway, where a man and a woman were having sex up against a wall. She stopped for a second, then a man approached her to offer her some drugs. She left quickly, continuing on the path she memorized from the Internet.
The place stood out by not standing out. It had no neon signs, just a simple black sign with white letters "Hell Hole" above the door. The outside was a solid dark brick two-story exterior. It had no windows on the first floor, and the second story windows were boarded up. She walked up to the door and knocked.
The door was opened by a huge man with black hair in a buzz cut so short it looked like a shadow across his scalp. His skin was pale, like Jordon's. The similarities end there- Jordon was tall and slender, while this man was gigantic- huge chest over an equally huge gut. This man seemed brutish and simple, not elegant like Jordon. This man also had a circular tattoo with a complex design on the shoulder. It was similar to Jordon's, but not exactly the same.
"What you want, you little meat puppet?" He said. Jenifer could not place the accent exactly, but it seemed like it could be Queens or the Bronx.
"Um, I don't know." Jenifer said.
The man reached forward, and gently stroked Jenifer across the face. His hand continued downward, rubbing her neck, finally resting on her right breast. He smiled as he gave it a squeeze. "Come on in, and enjoy the festivities." He stepped back, allowing her to see clearly into the room, and she walked in.
It was a huge rectangular space, filled with people. There was a metal loft all the way around the left, right and back walls, with metal stairs going up to it on the left and right. The styles of clothing were diverse- some were wearing typical nightclub wear, others were in street clothes. Some had the whole Gothic vampire wardrobe done right from a B movie. Some people wore nothing at all, as they milled about the crowd, or danced on table tops. There was a large muscular Latin man standing on a table, wearing white underwear, wet and clingy with sweat. He had a full erection, and parted the fly of the underwear to let it free. Jenifer looked lower, and saw a man in a business suit biting the Hispanic man's thigh. Blood dripped down his leg from where the vampire's mouth was, and a woman caught the dripping blood in her glass as another man was on his knees in front of her, with his head underneath her long flowing skirt. Jenifer turned away, to see a young woman, writhing in ecstasy, lying on a table. One man was biting her side, while a woman was drinking from her inner thigh. Jenifer the felt a cold chill on her neck and side. She turned, and saw a woman with long black hair wearing a green dress standing next to her.
"Hello." She said. "I am Rachel, and this is my happy home. I see this is your first time. Don't be overwhelmed. No one here will do anything with you unless you ask. Or should I say, until you ask. Come, sit with me and have a drink."
Rachel led Jenifer to a large booth in the back, with a thin black lace curtain. The curtain was opened, so the booth did not even have that flimsy bit of privacy. Not that anyone here would care about privacy.
They sat down, and a waiter placed a glass in front of Rachel. He asked Jenifer if she would like anything, and she said no.
"What kind of place is this?" Jenifer said, trying not to sound frightened or repulsed, even though she was both.
"Now now, don't play games. You know very well what kind of place this is." Rachel's voice went down to a loud whisper, "You would not have been able to find it if you didn't know it was here."
"People come here, and you feed off of them. You drink their blood. You are monsters." Jenifer's voice quivered.
"What makes you so sure we are the evil you make us out to be?" Rachel swirled her glass, looking at the surface of the liquid, like a fortune teller might look at tea leaves.
Jenifer tried to appear calm, and strong sitting across the table from the vampire. "You feed off of others. You use others for your benefit."
Rachel, turned her eyes upwards, and looked directly at Jenifer. "So do you. So does everyone. We all feed off of each other in one way or another. Businesses feed off of your money. Politicians feed off of your fear and your hope. Religion feeds off of your ignorance. The poor feed off of your compassion, while the rich feed off of your labor." Rachel returned her attention to her glass. "The only difference is that we are honest about how we feed."
"And unlike what some may have told you," she continued, "We do not feed off of the unwilling. At least most of us do not. Just as you have your criminal element, so do we."
"Hypnosis is not the same as being willing." Jenifer argued. "Why else would anyone willingly let you feed on them?"
"There are advantages to being fed upon." Rachael said. "The intermingling of our saliva with human blood gives people longer life, and superior health. It is also a highly pleasurable experience. And, thrall, or as you put it hypnosis, cannot make anyone do anything they do not want to do. It simply makes them more receptive to the desires they already have by lowering their inhibitions." Rachel stood up, and walked past Jenifer's seat. "For example, you came here of your own volition, knowing full well what you would find."
Rachael walked up to the bar. The bartender held out a phone for her. The whole time she was on the phone, she continued to keep an eye on Jenifer. Now sitting alone in the booth, her eyes panned across the room once again. The people were engaged in sex and feeding simultaneously. Jenifer stood up and headed for the door. The bouncer was going to stop her from leaving, when Jenifer heard Rachel's voice say "let her go."
Jenifer ran out of the nightclub, into the street.
"Leaving so soon?" She heard a man's voice coming from the alley across the street, between two abandoned warehouses. "In a fraction of a second she felt him rush toward her, grab her, and drag her across the street into the ally where he was standing. He pulled down the shoulder of her dress, exposing her breast. Jenifer tried to get away, but he was too strong. She felt his cold breath, like Jordon's and Rachel's. As he leaned in toward her breast, his canine teeth began to lengthen and sharpen.
Just before he could bite, she felt him being torn away from her. His body flew across the alley, tossed by some unknown force. As the vampire struck the wall, it turned, clung to the bricks like a lizard, and quickly crawled up the wall toward the rooftop and ran away.
She then saw the man who saved her. He was tall and stunningly handsome. He had a strong chiseled jawline, with a dimpled chin. His face was wide, with prominent cheekbones. His black hair was messily tossed about, partially covering his large brown eyes. His skin was a rich light brown, like a cappuccino.
"Did he hurt you?" He said to her. "No, not yet." She said. She looked down, pulled up the side of her dress, and put on one of her shoes which seems to have come off in the attack.
"Thank you." She said to him. She looked at his chest, and noticed an amulet shaped like a bird, just like Adi's. "Shall I take you home?" He said. "I have a car. You should not be by yourself in this neighborhood."
"Thank you, yes, please." She clumsily stood up, and as she did she fell forward into his arms. He held her as he walked her to his car.
It was not a van like Adi and his men had, just an old worn Ford Taurus. Vampire hunting must not be a high income profession, Jenifer thought. Once they were in the car, he introduced himself. "I am Antonio." There was a pause for a bit, and then he asked, "And your name is?"
Jenifer was just so used to everyone knowing her name, she forgot- "Oh, I'm Jenifer. Jenifer Weston."
"Where to, Miss Weston?" He asked.
She told him her address, and he pulled the car away from the curb.
"May I ask why you were in that alley so late?" Antonio inquired.
"He dragged me into the alley from across the street." She said.
"From the club across the street?" He asked.
Jenifer nodded.
"Ah." He said.
"What do you mean?" Jenifer asked.
"I suppose one should not judge someone at first glance, but we all do- we form opinions of people as soon as we meet them. You appeared to me to be an intelligent, albeit a bit naive woman out for a stroll in a bad area. I see now that I was wrong."
"Excuse me?" Jenifer said, beginning to be a bit annoyed at her rescuer.
"I mean no offense, it is just that I did not realize you were looking for such an encounter. Perhaps I should not have interrupted."
"He was going to rape me! He was going to kill me!" Jenifer yelled at him.
"It is not likely that he would kill you- even the vampires in the area who are not loyal to Rachel obey her orders, for fear of what those who are loyal would do to them." He said. "He would have raped you, drank from you till you passed out, and then left you there. You would have recovered, as I'm sure you would know if you frequent that place." He asked.
Jenifer quickly said, "No- no I don't. I've never been there before, and I would never go again! I was just curious about... about them."
"Well, you know what happened to the curious cat." Antonio said.
His car pulled up to her apartment building, and she got out. She felt insulted, so she wanted to slam the door, but the man did save her life.
She closed the door gently but firmly.
He rolled down the window. "Here." He said, and handed her a card. She did not know if she should take it or not, but she did. After he drove off, she thought of throwing it away, but she did not.
Chapter 1
Jenifer Weston sat at the nurse's station, reading her romance novel. Since it was the night shift at Sacred Heart hospital, most of the patients on the ward were asleep. She just had to change a few IV bags now and again, and wait for the inevitable buzzing of someone needing attention. The main attention she provides here is hospice- holding hands with the dying, talking to them, comforting them, and administering painkillers until they depart. Many people find this task ghoulish, or at the least they think of it as very emotionally taxing. Jennifer did not. She was glad to help these people welcome death.
She's been reading a lot lately- working this job for 18 of her 38 years can tend to get boring. Well, this is the geriatrics wing, not the emergency room, so no one would expect a lot of excitement here. It's not that she didn't like her job- she loved it. She has always found satisfaction in helping others, often to the fault of putting their needs before her own.
Jenifer put her novel down and walked to one of the patient's rooms, an old man fast asleep, and checked his IV. She looked out of his room's window, watched the sun setting, and the stream of red and white lights from the traffic on the highway. Far more red ones then white, she noticed. More going away then coming. She absentmindedly twisted a curl of her dark red hair between her fingers, as she stared at the almost hypnotic river of cars, and the lights in the buildings going out one by one. It's like every evening the city empties out to fill the suburbs, and every morning the suburbs purge themselves on the city again.
She did not normally work nights- she swapped shifts with another nurse this week. The other nurse didn't ask her to trade, she did. She felt compelled. She felt the need to go home after dark. No, not a need exactly, but more like a desire. A desire to be out in the city alone at night.
It's not like she has anyone waiting for her to come home. Going home was never the best part of her day. When she is at work, at least she is doing something, at least she feels like she is worthwhile, and has a purpose. At home she just sits there, feeling like an appliance put away in a cabinet. She thought most women like her would get a cat, or a dozen of them, but Jenifer felt that would be too much responsibility. Her human patients come first.
The hours passed, and when her shift was over, Jenifer then grabbed her bag, her coat, her umbrella, her romance novel, and left the ward. She walked down a long, deserted hallway to the elevator, and pressed the down button. The button did not light up- it hasn't in years. You just have to trust that the elevator is coming, and that it's going where you want it to go. When the door opened, she stepped inside, and turned toward the keypad to press the button marked Lobby. She looked up and glanced through the final sliver of the closing doors, and for a brief instant saw the shape of a man in the hallway, looking at her. But when the elevator's glass doors closed, all she saw was the empty hallway rising as the elevator descended.
She left the building and walked down the stairs toward the subway. The subway station was oddly quiet. There were no homeless people sleeping by the ticket machines like there usually are. Very few people were there, and only one person waiting to take the red line. Jenifer stood next to him, trying to look like she was focused on her novel. The man was tall- basketball player tall. He was so tall that his black trench coat looked way too short on him. And the black coat, black gloves, and black hat made the pale skin of his face look deathly white. He looked no older than 30, yet his long straight hair was even whiter then his skin. Despite his unusual coloring, or perhaps because of it, he was strikingly handsome.
The train pulled up, and opened it's doors. No one got off at this stop- and as Jenifer entered, she saw no one was on the train at all. No one but her and the stranger. She sat at one of the seats with her back to the wall, facing the door. He sat near the door, facing forward. He removed his trench coat and draped it across the back of the seat with a single fluid motion, like a dancer performing a routine he had done hundreds of times before. He was wearing a tight black tanktop, which stretched across his slender but well defined physique. His lean muscular arms were bare, and as pale as his face. There were two tattoos on his left arm- a small detailed circular pattern on his shoulder, and a tribal armband across his bicep.
She then realized she was no longer even pretending to read her book, she was just mesmerized by the markings on his arm. She glanced up at his face- long and narrow, but strong and chiseled. She averted her eyes, and flipped a page in her book, as if she had finished the previous one. She noticed the phrase "sudden storm" on the page, and then looked up again- and the stranger was now looking right at her.
Jenifer tried her best to not appear startled- instead, she simply sat as still as she could, and decided she would get off on the upcoming stop and wait for the next train to come.
He spoke.
"Is this your stop?" He asked as the doors opened. His voice was smooth and deep, like soft jazz music. He even gestured towards the way out, but Jenifer suddenly felt unable, or unwilling, to move.
"No." she said. "Not yet." She had no idea why she spoke, or why she said what she did.
The man leaned back, crossing his arms. She felt the man's eyes on her, looking through her. She continued to force herself to look at the pages of her novel, but she could not help but look at him over the top edge of the book. She saw how the new position of his arms made his chest bulge. She noticed that the tanktop was torn at the neckline, by the right side of his chest. It also looked like his black shirt was stained, making it stiff in places, clingy in others.
With a single graceful motion, he rose to his feet. He walked slowly, and deliberately, toward her. She could see the strength of his thighs bulging through his tight black jeans with every step.
He stood right in front of her, and then sat down on the bench beside her. "Hello Jenifer." He said. "My name is Jordon." She felt frozen. His voice, and his eyes, were mesmerizing. "How do you know my name?" With a wave of his hand, he gestured to her name tag, still pinned to the front of her scrubs. "Oh, of course." she said.
"I felt I should introduce myself, since your name tag inadvertently gave me an unfair advantage." During that gesture, he also started leaning in towards her. She felt his breath- not warm, but cool against her neck. He was so close she should have felt the heat of his body, but she felt nothing- like he was not there at all. Just a cool breeze against her neck.
She closed her eyes.
She heard a slight gasp, then her neck started to feel warm, wet, and sticky. She felt warm fluid flowing across her neck, and down the front of her chest. She opened her eyes and screamed.
Jordon was dead. Stabbed through the back, and his blood was all over her, drenching her, covering her. His body fell forward across her lap.
She heard a voice. "Pardon me." the man said, as he grabbed Jordon's body and dragged it off of her. "They don't die in a puff of smoke like in the movies- reality is much messier."
Chapter 2
The stranger dragged Jordon's lifeless body off of Jenifer, and into the isle. He was a big man, early forties, broad shoulders, with brown skin and medium long black hair. His accent sounded middle-eastern. The doors opened. "Grab his feet, will you?" He said, as he began dragging it out the door to the subway terminal. At first she thought he was talking to her, but then he saw two other men enter the subway car, aiding in the removal of the corpse.
The two new men carried the body away, as the first one came back onto the subway car and stood in front of Jenifer.
"You had better let us take you home- walking around like that will draw the wrong kind of attention." Two more men got on the subway car, different men then before. They had sponges and buckets, and proceeded to clean up the blood on the floor and the benches.
Jenifer sat still, looking at the blood all over her. Of course, as a nurse this is not the first time she has been covered in blood- but it was the first time on the subway, and the first time she had seen a murder. She could not compel herself to speak.
"Come on." the middle eastern man said, as he extended his hand to help her up. Jenifer complied, still too much in shock to think clearly.
He draped a coat across her shoulders, not to keep her warm, but to cover the blood. As she held it closed she realized it was Jordon's coat, the one he left on the bench by the traincar door.
He escorted her up the subway stairs, to a van waiting for them. As they entered and sat down on the back seat bench, he introduced himself. "I am Adi Ahmad, and you are Jenifer Weston." She was about to ask him how he knew her name, but one again she remembered her name tag.
Adi looked at her with a kindness you would not expect to see on the face of someone who had just killed a man moments ago. "So, how much do you know, and how much do you want to know?" He said.
"I don't know." Jenifer answered. "What was he?"
Adi smiled. "Good instinct! You asked "what", not "who", showing you are getting part of this. As you suspect, he was not a man. He was a vampire."
"Vampires don't exist." Jenifer could barely get the words out- since the train she felt tired, barely able to keep her eyes open. She was in such a confused state that it was only now dawning on her that she witnessed a group of men murder another man, and she actually got in their van with them. She is in a van with murderers.
"If you say vampires don't exist then fine- vampires don't exist." Replied Adi. "So tell me what you felt as he approached you."
"I don't know." Jenifer thought about it. "I was going to leave the train, and I didn't. When he approached I wanted to leave, but I couldn't. It's not like I was physically stopped, but I felt conflicted. I felt drawn to him and afraid of him at the same time."
"That is called Thrall." said Adi. "It is a form of hypnosis they use to control their prey, not unlike a snake does to a mouse."
"Vampires." Said Jenifer.
"Yes, Vampires." Adi replied. "Who don't exist, even though they do."
"Wooden stake, garlic, no sunlight, turn into bats, immortal vampires?" She asked.
"The reality has been blended with myths- they cannot turn into bats or anything else. They are perpetually people-shaped, I assure you. Garlic is poison to them, but only if they eat it, and only in rather large amounts. A typical meal in an Italian restaurant would not kill them, it would just make them violently ill. Wearing garlic around your neck does nothing. Crosses and holy water do nothing either." Adi explained. "Sunlight will burn them, but not up in flames- it is a slow burn, more like being cooked, and it would take a few hours of exposure for them to die. Sunlight is not a reliable means of vampire pest control. They can walk around in the daylight just fine with the proper clothing, sunglasses, and a wide brimmed hat".
Jenifer sat there, quietly, absorbing this.
He repositioned himself in his seat. "One more thing- they are not 'undead'. What a silly word- something is alive, or it is dead. They are very much alive, and they can be made very much dead. As far as wooden stakes, yes, that will kill them, but that would kill anyone. Anything that would kill a human would kill a vampire- including guns. The exception is disease- they don't seem to get sick, and they age much more slowly then we do."
As she sat, she looked at Adi, and noticed a bronze pendant around his neck, shaped like some kind of wine glass, with wings. "This is the symbol of Sauti Klea. He is the guardian angel of my people." He said this as he held the pendant up.
"Are angels real too now?" Jenifer said, not meaning to sound sarcastic, but she realized it did.
Again Adi smiled. "Well, I like to believe they do." As the van slowed down, Adi said "And on the topic of belief, I believe this is your stop."
The van came to a halt, and the man in the front passenger seat got out, and opened the door to help Jenifer to the front steps of her apartment building.
She fumbled for the key to the front door, and went inside, and entered the elevator. As she entered her apartment, she removed the coat and threw it across a chair, then went to take a shower, where she began to think things through. She hadn't worked the night shift in almost a year, then she gets attacked by a vampire. She felt compelled to work the night shift today. Did Jordon do that to her with his vampire hypnosis? How? Did she meet him before? How could she forget someone like him? There must be lots of women in the city who are out at night, so why her?
After she got dressed, she went to the living room- and there she noticed Jordon's coat. She picked it up, and felt something stiff in the pocket. It was a coaster- it had an illustration of a glass of red wine, with a female little red devil, perched playfully on the edge of the glass. It said "Hell Hole" across the top, and in smaller letters, "5317 Prince Road" across the bottom.
That was when she realized she never told Adi or his men her address before they dropped her off.
Chapter 3
The next morning, Jenifer went to work. She went to the nurse's station, and checked her messages before going on rounds.
Orchid was also a nurse in the geriatric ward. Orchid was a walking, talking bubble of nitrous oxide in a bleach-blond hair-do. Patients who come and go might find her smiles comforting, but her fellow nurses who are in it for the long hall want to slap her silly. Orchid does not wear scrubs like the rest of the medical staff. Her outfit looked more like a "Naughty Nurse" costume from a 1970's porno.
And to make it worse, Orchid is the head nurse for the ward.
"Hi Jen! Rough night, huh?" asked Orchid.
"What do you mean?" Jenifer was afraid last night's events had hit the morning news.
"Just that you look like mister mopey paid a visit, and took you to downer land." Orchid leaned on the counter, and made a little walking motion with her fingers.
"No, I'm fine." Said Jenifer.
"Well good! Cuz you just got a new patient in room 6. Enjoy!" Orchid giggled as she slid a file in her direction and bounced away.
Jenifer went to room 6. There was a thin old man, about 80 years old, lying on the bed. She looked at her tablet, and checked his records- he was brought in a few hours ago, no name or address, and he seems to have amnesia resulting from some form of senile dementia. His body is badly bruised, suggesting he was beaten or mugged, but he did have a wallet, with cash and credit cards.
"If he has a wallet..." Jenifer mumbled to herself.
"The problem is, the wallet is not his." The voice came from Doctor Hans Douglas, who had entered the room behind her. "You were thinking 'if he has a wallet, why don't we know his name?', correct?"
"Yes- but also if he has a wallet, he probably wasn't mugged." She added.
"Quite- but that's more of a police issue. We want to find out who is going to pay the bills." He winked- Jen knew he was not so callous as to be concerned with the billing over patient care. Doctor Douglas is a tall black man, with strong features. Most people expect him to be a big blond German with a name like "Hans", But his mother simply named her twin children after the fairytale Hansel and Gretel. His sister, a psychiatrist also at this hospital, goes by the name "Greta" now.
"The wallet belongs to a 22 year old man named Michael Connelly. The hospital has tried to contact Mr Connelly, but so far no one has replied. We are hoping he's the grandson."
A weak voice came from the man on the bed. "Connelly."
"Yes- is that your name? Is your last name Connelly?" asked Jenifer.
She stood by the side of his bed, as Doctor Douglas checked his pulse and pupils.
"name." said the old man, barely able to get the breath to say the word.
"Jen, I'd like you to draw a blood sample, submit it for a basic metabolic panel." The doctor left the room, on to his next patient.
Jen opened the package on a needle, and prepared to draw the sample. She extended the man's arm, and noticed he had a tattoo- a tribal arm band, not unlike Jordon's. The blood was thin, seems to be anemic. She labeled the sample, and decided to drop it off at the lab herself.
As she walked down the hall to the elevator, she passed three orderlies trying to restrain an old woman being wheeled in on a gurney. She was screaming, "get off me, get off me! I have to go!" they were trying to tell her to calm down as they were wheeling her into the ward. Jenifer entered the elevator, and as the doors closed she heard the old woman say "the vampires did this!"
Jenifer did not know what to do- should she stop the elevator, go back to the ward? If she tried to talk to her about vampires, taking her seriously, everyone else would think she's nuts. Heck, if she raced over there from the elevator they would think she's nuts.
She continued to the lab, dropped off the sample, asked for a rush job on it, and went back up to her ward. Perhaps she can talk to the patient later, after she is in a room and alone.
Jenifer saw the other patients on her list, gave them their medicines, checked their vitals, and tried to make them more comfortable. For many of the patients on this floor, it's just trying to make it as pleasant as you can before they die. As she went from patient to patient, she checked the other rooms to see where they placed that old woman. She found her- in a private room, at the end of the corridor.
Jenifer entered the room, and looked at the woman. Her chart said "Jane Doe- possible drug seeker." Jenifer went to the side of her bed, and tried to talk to her. "Hello mam?" she said. The old woman's eyes were opened, but she looked heavily sedated. Jenifer started to leave, then she felt the old woman grab her wrist. She was looking right at her, and mouthed "help me".
"Jen, did you mix up your rooms?" Orchid had walked in.
"No," said Jenifer. "I just thought I heard something, so I thought I'd check on her."
"Well that's OK, but I'm here now. You can go back to your own patients." Said Orchid, as she stepped into the room and away from the door, in a way that indicated quite clearly that she meant for Jenifer to use it next.
"Bye-bye!" Orchid said as Jenifer left the room.
The rest of her shift progressed as normal. She had tried to see the old woman again, but every time she walked by that room, Orchid or one or more orderlies were there.
As she continued her rounds, she came to the male John Doe, who she now refers to as Mr. Connelly. She believes that really is his name, since he seems to respond to it. He was awake now, and the back of his bed was elevated, putting him in a seated position.
"Hello Mr. Connelly. You are looking better. How are you feeling?"
He turned slowly toward Jenifer. "I don't know."
"You don't know what? How you feel?" She asked.
He turned away.
Jenifer walked closer to the bed. "Is your name Mr. Connelly?"
"Yes." He said.
"What is your first name?"
"Michael."
"Do you have a grandson with the same name?" She tried to get his attention, but he seemed focused on the window.
"Where am I?" He asked.
"Sacred Heart Hospital." Jenifer replied. "You were discovered beaten and bruised, so the police brought you here. Do you have any family we should contact for you?"
"I don't know." He said. He then turned to look at her. "How old am I?" he asked, in an almost pleading voice, almost tearful.
"We don't know- you didn't have your ID on you when you were brought in. Do you know who this person is?" Jenifer showed him Michael Connelly's driver's license. The old man began to cry.
"It's OK", she said, as she sat at the edge of the bed, and held him. "We will find him. And until we do, we will take good care of you."
Chapter 4
As Jenifer walked into her apartment, her eyes went straight to Jordon's coat, still draped over the chair. The coaster from "Hell Hole" was sitting on the coffee table. Just the thought that their might actually be a vampire nightclub right here, in this city, in the real world...
She went to her closet. Jenifer does not go out often- she doesn't drink, she doesn't dance, she doesn't realy socialize either. Her closet is filled with scrubs for when she's at work, and t-shirts for when she isn't. Then she remembered the clothing her sister left here after her last visit. She had put them in a cardboard box in the back of the closet. Her sister said it would be too much bother to ship them to her, since she'd be visiting again in a few months anyway. She opened the box, and there was this red dress, cut low in the front, and even lower in the back.
"Too much." Jenifer thought, as she dug deeper in the box. She found a nice blue dress- fitted, tapered, nice, shows some cleavage, without dipping down to the navel. The back was open, but again, not too low. She put the dress on, with some matching blue pumps she bought last year and never wore.
"OK, this can work" she thought. But before she goes, she should be prepared, but what? Adi said holy water and crosses were just make-believe, and garlic only works as an ingested poison. Then she figured it out. She went to the junk drawer in the kitchen, and shuffled things around till she found it. A key-chain flashlight she bought at the gift shop of the science museum. This flashlight claimed to have full-spectrum light, just like sunlight. Jenifer tried the flashlight to see that the batteries still worked, and put it in her pocketbook.
She then checked the address on the Internet, found how to get there from the subway stop closest to it. Of course, it was the red line.
She went down to the station, and at least this time it was crowded. It was filled with people- wanting to go someplace, or wanting to get away from someplace. People don't make eye contact on the subway- if the happen to by accident, in a slight glance gone astray, they quickly turn their heads, or glance down. Riding the train is a solitary experience done in large groups. Jenifer used her regular method of distancing herself from others, by reading her book. Regrettably, she is very near the end, when the handsome muscular hero dispatches the villain, rescues fair maiden, and they live happily ever after.
She then looked up and saw a drunk guy throw up in the isle.
It was a long ride. Stop after stop, more people got off then got on. After a while, the car was nearly empty- just four or five people. They called another station. The doors opened, and the last of the passengers left, leaving her all alone on the train. She rode for another five minutes before they reached her stop, at the very edge of the city. She got out, and looked around. This was not the good part of town, to say the least. The street was relatively well lit by the neon signs of the strip joints. Most of the people on the sidewalk were here to sell something, or here to buy what was being sold.
Jenifer walked hurriedly. She passed an alleyway, where a man and a woman were having sex up against a wall. She stopped for a second, then a man approached her to offer her some drugs. She left quickly, continuing on the path she memorized from the Internet.
The place stood out by not standing out. It had no neon signs, just a simple black sign with white letters "Hell Hole" above the door. The outside was a solid dark brick two-story exterior. It had no windows on the first floor, and the second story windows were boarded up. She walked up to the door and knocked.
The door was opened by a huge man with black hair in a buzz cut so short it looked like a shadow across his scalp. His skin was pale, like Jordon's. The similarities end there- Jordon was tall and slender, while this man was gigantic- huge chest over an equally huge gut. This man seemed brutish and simple, not elegant like Jordon. This man also had a circular tattoo with a complex design on the shoulder. It was similar to Jordon's, but not exactly the same.
"What you want, you little meat puppet?" He said. Jenifer could not place the accent exactly, but it seemed like it could be Queens or the Bronx.
"Um, I don't know." Jenifer said.
The man reached forward, and gently stroked Jenifer across the face. His hand continued downward, rubbing her neck, finally resting on her right breast. He smiled as he gave it a squeeze. "Come on in, and enjoy the festivities." He stepped back, allowing her to see clearly into the room, and she walked in.
It was a huge rectangular space, filled with people. There was a metal loft all the way around the left, right and back walls, with metal stairs going up to it on the left and right. The styles of clothing were diverse- some were wearing typical nightclub wear, others were in street clothes. Some had the whole Gothic vampire wardrobe done right from a B movie. Some people wore nothing at all, as they milled about the crowd, or danced on table tops. There was a large muscular Latin man standing on a table, wearing white underwear, wet and clingy with sweat. He had a full erection, and parted the fly of the underwear to let it free. Jenifer looked lower, and saw a man in a business suit biting the Hispanic man's thigh. Blood dripped down his leg from where the vampire's mouth was, and a woman caught the dripping blood in her glass as another man was on his knees in front of her, with his head underneath her long flowing skirt. Jenifer turned away, to see a young woman, writhing in ecstasy, lying on a table. One man was biting her side, while a woman was drinking from her inner thigh. Jenifer the felt a cold chill on her neck and side. She turned, and saw a woman with long black hair wearing a green dress standing next to her.
"Hello." She said. "I am Rachel, and this is my happy home. I see this is your first time. Don't be overwhelmed. No one here will do anything with you unless you ask. Or should I say, until you ask. Come, sit with me and have a drink."
Rachel led Jenifer to a large booth in the back, with a thin black lace curtain. The curtain was opened, so the booth did not even have that flimsy bit of privacy. Not that anyone here would care about privacy.
They sat down, and a waiter placed a glass in front of Rachel. He asked Jenifer if she would like anything, and she said no.
"What kind of place is this?" Jenifer said, trying not to sound frightened or repulsed, even though she was both.
"Now now, don't play games. You know very well what kind of place this is." Rachel's voice went down to a loud whisper, "You would not have been able to find it if you didn't know it was here."
"People come here, and you feed off of them. You drink their blood. You are monsters." Jenifer's voice quivered.
"What makes you so sure we are the evil you make us out to be?" Rachel swirled her glass, looking at the surface of the liquid, like a fortune teller might look at tea leaves.
Jenifer tried to appear calm, and strong sitting across the table from the vampire. "You feed off of others. You use others for your benefit."
Rachel, turned her eyes upwards, and looked directly at Jenifer. "So do you. So does everyone. We all feed off of each other in one way or another. Businesses feed off of your money. Politicians feed off of your fear and your hope. Religion feeds off of your ignorance. The poor feed off of your compassion, while the rich feed off of your labor." Rachel returned her attention to her glass. "The only difference is that we are honest about how we feed."
"And unlike what some may have told you," she continued, "We do not feed off of the unwilling. At least most of us do not. Just as you have your criminal element, so do we."
"Hypnosis is not the same as being willing." Jenifer argued. "Why else would anyone willingly let you feed on them?"
"There are advantages to being fed upon." Rachael said. "The intermingling of our saliva with human blood gives people longer life, and superior health. It is also a highly pleasurable experience. And, thrall, or as you put it hypnosis, cannot make anyone do anything they do not want to do. It simply makes them more receptive to the desires they already have by lowering their inhibitions." Rachel stood up, and walked past Jenifer's seat. "For example, you came here of your own volition, knowing full well what you would find."
Rachael walked up to the bar. The bartender held out a phone for her. The whole time she was on the phone, she continued to keep an eye on Jenifer. Now sitting alone in the booth, her eyes panned across the room once again. The people were engaged in sex and feeding simultaneously. Jenifer stood up and headed for the door. The bouncer was going to stop her from leaving, when Jenifer heard Rachel's voice say "let her go."
Jenifer ran out of the nightclub, into the street.
"Leaving so soon?" She heard a man's voice coming from the alley across the street, between two abandoned warehouses. "In a fraction of a second she felt him rush toward her, grab her, and drag her across the street into the ally where he was standing. He pulled down the shoulder of her dress, exposing her breast. Jenifer tried to get away, but he was too strong. She felt his cold breath, like Jordon's and Rachel's. As he leaned in toward her breast, his canine teeth began to lengthen and sharpen.
Just before he could bite, she felt him being torn away from her. His body flew across the alley, tossed by some unknown force. As the vampire struck the wall, it turned, clung to the bricks like a lizard, and quickly crawled up the wall toward the rooftop and ran away.
She then saw the man who saved her. He was tall and stunningly handsome. He had a strong chiseled jawline, with a dimpled chin. His face was wide, with prominent cheekbones. His black hair was messily tossed about, partially covering his large brown eyes. His skin was a rich light brown, like a cappuccino.
"Did he hurt you?" He said to her. "No, not yet." She said. She looked down, pulled up the side of her dress, and put on one of her shoes which seems to have come off in the attack.
"Thank you." She said to him. She looked at his chest, and noticed an amulet shaped like a bird, just like Adi's. "Shall I take you home?" He said. "I have a car. You should not be by yourself in this neighborhood."
"Thank you, yes, please." She clumsily stood up, and as she did she fell forward into his arms. He held her as he walked her to his car.
It was not a van like Adi and his men had, just an old worn Ford Taurus. Vampire hunting must not be a high income profession, Jenifer thought. Once they were in the car, he introduced himself. "I am Antonio." There was a pause for a bit, and then he asked, "And your name is?"
Jenifer was just so used to everyone knowing her name, she forgot- "Oh, I'm Jenifer. Jenifer Weston."
"Where to, Miss Weston?" He asked.
She told him her address, and he pulled the car away from the curb.
"May I ask why you were in that alley so late?" Antonio inquired.
"He dragged me into the alley from across the street." She said.
"From the club across the street?" He asked.
Jenifer nodded.
"Ah." He said.
"What do you mean?" Jenifer asked.
"I suppose one should not judge someone at first glance, but we all do- we form opinions of people as soon as we meet them. You appeared to me to be an intelligent, albeit a bit naive woman out for a stroll in a bad area. I see now that I was wrong."
"Excuse me?" Jenifer said, beginning to be a bit annoyed at her rescuer.
"I mean no offense, it is just that I did not realize you were looking for such an encounter. Perhaps I should not have interrupted."
"He was going to rape me! He was going to kill me!" Jenifer yelled at him.
"It is not likely that he would kill you- even the vampires in the area who are not loyal to Rachel obey her orders, for fear of what those who are loyal would do to them." He said. "He would have raped you, drank from you till you passed out, and then left you there. You would have recovered, as I'm sure you would know if you frequent that place." He asked.
Jenifer quickly said, "No- no I don't. I've never been there before, and I would never go again! I was just curious about... about them."
"Well, you know what happened to the curious cat." Antonio said.
His car pulled up to her apartment building, and she got out. She felt insulted, so she wanted to slam the door, but the man did save her life.
She closed the door gently but firmly.
He rolled down the window. "Here." He said, and handed her a card. She did not know if she should take it or not, but she did. After he drove off, she thought of throwing it away, but she did not.