A Vampire's Christmas Carol (2 page)

Carol took a towel from him and began drying
her hair.

He looked at the coat she’d hung on a corner
of the mantel. “You can’t stay here. It’s too dangerous. You can
take time to dry off and warm up, but then you’ve got to go.”

She’d thawed enough that irritation began to
replace fear of freezing to death. “What’s so dangerous that I risk
death by staying here? Is this the Bates motel or something? Does
someone have the plague? Or do you have a crazy wife closeted
upstairs?”

His lips quirked for a moment and almost made
it to a grin before the austere expression took over again.

“Definitely no on the last one, but the
others are too damn close.”

“Okay, is this twenty questions? Are you
going to give me another clue?”

His eyes narrowed. “No. I’m going to tell
you. But you’re not going to believe it.”

“So try me.”

“Okay. Here it is. I’m a vampire. A very
hungry vampire.”

“Um, yeah. Right. And I’m a werewolf queen.
Are you one of those LARP people?”

He looked surprised and then puzzled. “You’re
a werewolf?” His expression changed to disgust. “You’re joking,
yes? What’s a Larp?”

“No. Yes. And it’s a game. Live action
role-playing. The kind where people play characters like vampires
and werewolves and zombies and chase each other around.”

“People play at being vampires?” He sounded
shocked.

“Well, yeah. What are you doing?”

“Not playing.” He stared at her a moment.
“You don’t believe me. I hate to have to show you. I may not be
able to control what happens next. If I don’t, though, you won’t
believe me and you won’t be ready to defend yourself. Pay attention
now and be ready to run.”

He drew a deep breath and closed his eyes for
a moment. The muscles of his face tightened in either pain or
concentration. For a moment his jaw worked in on odd rolling
motion. The muscles of his face tightened up, changing something in
his face to look threatening and dangerous.

When he opened his eyes, a different
person—no, a different creature—looked out of them. Blood-red
lights flickered in the depths, swallowing the blue color, and the
remote expression changed to something fierce and hungry and
menacing as his gaze focused on her. Then he opened his mouth
and—

“Oh my God, are those fangs?” she asked.
“Yikes! They’re either really good fakes or I’m getting seriously
creeped out.”

He said nothing for a moment, but his eyes
went wide and his tongue came out to swipe across his lips. His
breathing grew louder. He took a step toward her, mouth open,
leading with the fangs.

Carol took a step backward. Unless he was one
hell of an actor and had a pair of fake fangs in his mouth that he
could push out and retract on a moment’s notice, this was getting
very scary.

Something flickered in his expression, then
he halted and drew several sharp, deep breaths. He closed his eyes
and his mouth again. When he opened the first to look at her, the
red fire and fierce hunger had disappeared, leaving him looking
even more haggard and tired than before.

“Go for creeped out,” he suggested. “It’s
safer.”

She had to gulp back the obstruction in her
throat brought on by fear before she could talk. “Okay, I think I’m
starting to believe. Which leaves me with a lot of questions.”

“Forget the questions and just go.”

One fear collided with another in her mind.
Freezing to death versus getting chomped by a vampire. One was very
real and she’d already had too much experience with it that night.
The other was a bizarre possibility she only half believed. “You
looked outside lately? I think the sleet is changing to snow. My
car’s in a ditch up the road. My cell phone is dead. You say the
land-line is down. What am I supposed to do? Unless— Have you got a
car? Maybe you could pull me out of the ditch?”

“I don’t have a car.”

“You have a cell phone? One that’s getting a
signal now?”

He shook his head.

“How close is the nearest neighbor? One who
isn’t a vampire. Could I walk there?”

He considered, then went to the window to
glance out. “It’s almost a mile to the Williams’ place. You’d never
make it in this.”

“Well, that’s cheery news for a merry
Christmas Eve. How about if I just find a room somewhere with a
sturdy lock and barricade myself in until it stops snowing?”

“Not an entirely bad idea,” he admitted.
“You’ll only have to worry about it until morning.”

“Right. Vampires sleep during the day.
Where’s your coffin?”

“That’s actually a rather rude thing to
ask.”

“Oh, sorry. I didn’t know.”

He nodded. “Anyway, you’ll be safe after
daybreak tomorrow. I’ll be dead then.”

“Dead?” The word came out as a startled yip.
“Aren’t you already dead? Or, I guess that is what happens to
vampires during the day.”

“Sort of, but it wasn’t what I meant.
Tomorrow I’ll die for good. At sunrise.”

“For good. You mean, like, finally? But how
do you know?”

“My hundred years of grace are up tonight. If
I don’t drink human blood by tomorrow morning, I’ll die at dawn.
And I don’t plan on drinking any, which is why your presence is so
dangerous.”

“I don’t— Oh. Temptation?”

He nodded.

“This sounds like kind of a long story. Any
chance of getting a hot drink or something while you tell me about
it? Before I creep off to that locked room for the night? Oh, and
by the way, I don’t even know your name.”

He stared at her for a moment before a flash
of amusement crossed his face then disappeared. “It’s Michael
Carpenter.”

“Nice to meet you, Michael,” she said. “I
think. As long as you don’t go drinking from me. Oh, wait.” Carol
reached under her sweater and pulled out the silver cross she wore
on a chain. “Does this give me any protection?”

His eyes widened. “I didn’t know anyone still
wore those. Not in belief, anyway. But you do believe in it. Yes,
it affords you some protection. But don’t rely on it. Should I get
desperate enough, even the pain it would cause wouldn’t stop me.
It’s entirely possible I could get that desperate.”

“Well, heck, that’s a downer.”

He ignored her last remark and his expression
grew thoughtful. “I think perhaps… There is something you could do
for me. If you would. And it would help preserve you.”

“Oh? What?”

“I’d like you to write down my story. I’m not
sure what I want you to do with it yet. I’m thinking about that. It
might help— Oh, damnation.” He looked beyond her, into a corner of
the room.

Carol turned, in time to see a figure forming
out of what appeared to a grayish cloud of thick dust or mist. The
shape that coalesced had the form of a man, a tall, thin, pale man
with a lean face and glowing red eyes. The rhythm of her heart
notched up to a heavy thump as those eyes focused on her.

Chapter
2

A leering smile warped the mouth of the
newcomer, showing a nasty, almost gloating sort of amusement.
“Who’s your friend, Michael? Looks tasty.” His grin widened,
showing long, sharp fangs.

Unwilling belief started to take root inside
her and grow. This might be an elaborate prank, but she couldn’t
see how they’d managed that smoke-mist effect and couldn’t imagine
why they’d go to so much trouble.

She started to really worry when Michael
said, “What are you doing here?” and even he sounded concerned.

The newcomer’s fangs almost glittered,
reflecting the firelight, as he shook his head. “Michael! This is
your last night. Why do you think I’m here?”

“To continue making my life hell,” Michael
answered.

“Dear boy, no such thing. You’re throwing
away a heaven you barely imagine.”

“You’ve already shown me. Our definitions are
different.”

The creature turned its red gaze her way.
“But what’s this? Michael, you’ve been holding out on me. What a
sweet little morsel you have here.”

“Right,” Michael answered. “And how did you
arrange that, anyway, Antoine?”

The other vampire shook his head. “How could
I have? She’s stranded in a ditch. At least I assume that’s her car
down the road?”

“You know it is. Go away. You’re not needed
here.”

“You don’t want my company on your last night
on this earth? We’ve always had a special relationship.”

“Special in the wrong kind of way,” Michael
said. “No, I don’t want you. Get out.”

Antoine shrugged and turned her way, though
he continued to address his remarks to Michael. “Are you going to
drink from her? No? But it’s a shame to waste such a pretty treat.
If you don’t want her—“ He took a step in her direction.

Almost before she could blink and back away,
Michael was there, standing in front of her, facing Antoine.
“You’ll have to kill me first.”

Surprise spread across Antoine’s face, but it
changed rapidly to a sneer. “Ah, ever the gallant.” The words
dripped sarcasm. “But it will make it all the more satisfying when
you can no longer bear the thirst and the dying and take her
yourself. You’ll be mine just as surely then.”

“It won’t happen.”

“So you say. But you’ve yet to feel the full
clawing of the blood-thirst in your gut, as your body fails and
craves what will keep it alive. Perhaps it will be more fun to wait
around and watch as you lose the fight. I predict it will happen at
a couple of hours before dawn. Maybe before, but certainly by
then.”

“Antoine…”

The other vampire laughed, and his form began
to dissolve into mist again. “I’ll let you enjoy the illusion of
privacy for the moment. But I won’t be far. I’ll hear the screams
and come to enjoy watching your surrender. Au revoir, mon
galant.”

Within moments, he’d broken up into mist and
then the cloud itself faded away.

Carol drew in a deep breath to steady
herself. Why did she feel the danger had lessened? She still stood
in the same room with a vampire—a dying and soon-to-be desperate
one, according to Antoine. Michael hadn’t denied the truth of the
words.

“That was…another vampire, wasn’t it?”

“Antoine. He made me.”

“Made you…a vampire?”

“Technically I’m just an undead. You don’t
become a true vampire until you’ve drunk human blood. I’ve yet to
do so.”

“Why? Or rather, why not?”

“They’re monsters. Forget the romantic
stories you see on television and movies about them. They’re
human-sized parasites. They don’t just drink blood, they kill
people—brutally and cruelly—to take their life essence. They steal
others’ lives to prolong their own. I won’t be one of them.”

Carol shivered as it occurred to her she’d
come close to becoming a victim just a minute ago, and might yet be
if she hung around. Urgh. Which was worse—death by vampire or death
by freezing? What a lovely choice.

“You’re still chilly,” he said, seeing her
shake. “Let me get that hot drink for you.” Michael threw another
log on the fire before he left the room.

Carol moved closer to it. Should she just
leave right now? He’d said the nearest occupied dwelling was almost
a mile away. The odds of her making it even half that far in this
weather weren’t good—and that was if she had some idea which way to
go. He might help her with directions, but it was still late at
night and snowing hard enough to obscure visibility beyond a few
feet ahead. It was covering the roads too, and hiding ditches and
other obstacles. Since Michael, at least, didn’t seem inclined to
kill her right this moment, she was probably safer staying here for
the moment, husbanding her strength for a mad dash should it become
necessary.

Another thought crossed her mind. She went to
the hallway and looked around at all the exits going off it. No one
in sight. No sound of footsteps. But an old-fashioned model phone,
the kind with a rotary dial and a handset attached by a cord to the
base, sat on a side table. She went to it and picked up the
receiver, hoping to hear a dial tone, despite what Michael had
said.

Instead the sound of silence rang loudly in
her ear. Apparently he’d told the truth about the phones being out.
She set it down carefully and went back to the living room and the
fire. She really was stranded here, in the house with a
monster.

A few minutes later, he returned with a tray
bearing two steaming mugs that smelled of coffee, a small pitcher
of cream and a bowl of sugar. There was also a plate of small
sandwiches. He put it down on a side table and gestured her to an
armchair that faced the fireplace. He nodded toward the tray.
“Please go ahead. The food is for you. You’ve got to be
hungry.”

It seemed odd for a self-confessed vampire to
be so polite, especially to someone who had practically forced her
way into his home. But he was right. Tension, fear and the struggle
through the weather to get here left her ravenous.

When she’d put milk and sugar into one of the
cups and carried it and the plate back to a chair, he took the
other cup of coffee, leaving it black.

After finishing the first small sandwich, she
asked, “You can drink coffee? I mean don’t you drink bl—?” She
couldn’t bring herself to say it.

“Blood. Yes. But I can drink anything else I
want. I can eat the same things as you also, but I derive no
nourishment from them. Except for raw, red meat. But I enjoy eating
other things sometimes, just to remember what it feels like.” He
took a careful sip from the coffee cup.

“How have you survived, then?”

“Raw meat, and occasional late night forays
to the neighbors’ cow pastures.”

Carol shuddered. She stared at the little
cheese sandwich she held, wondering if she could still swallow it.
Hunger won and it went down.

After another long sip from his cup, Michael
got up and retrieved a pad and pen from a desk at the side of the
room. He handed them to her and went back to the recliner.