Dracula: Hearts of Fire (Dracula Heart's) (55 page)

    The doorbell rang and Lauren blurred to it and looked through the peep hole. “What the heck, it’s
a
police officer or someone pretending to be.”
Lauren went into his mind and saw
immediately that he wasn’t a vampire.
She opened the door to
Officer
John Clark of the NYPD. “Can I help you officer?”

    “I’m
Officer
John Clark of the NYPD. Are you the red sheriff they call Lauren?”

    “I am.”

    “Can I come in and talk to you
for a minute?
”
He was tall and a little funny looking, his nose was too big for his face,

    “
Come in.”

   The officer stepped in and Lauren closed the door behind him. “This is my fiancé Michael.”

  
Lauren’s gray blue eyes were almost mesmerizing to the officer and he had to look away.
“Nice to meet you Michael.
Lauren,
I’m going to get right to the point. There’
s a rapist running around out there
and he’s bruta
l. Not only does he torture his victims
physically but mentally as well. He tells them that he’s going to rape them a second time before he lets them go. Five victims so far and we have no substantial leads. He wears a mask so the cameras can’t identify him.”

    Lauren could see by the officer’s emotions that this was somehow personal
, his voice was cracking
. “You know one of the victims?”

   
The officer hesitated and he cleared his throat before he could finally speak.
“My wife. She’s now in a mental hospital. I know you’re not supposed to get involved in human mat
ters but is there anything
you can do?
As a vampire you probably have ways of which I am unaware.
”

    Michael felt for the officer. “
Lauren, y
ou’d be great bait in a short skirt.”

    “Officer Clark, I take it you want me to kill this guy?”

    “I won’t say it
the words
.” Officer John did nod affirmatively.
He took out a handkerchief and handed it to Lauren. “He stuffed this into the mouth of one of his victim’s. Forgive my ignorance but I thought that you might be able to get a scent off of it. The attacks are always after midnight.”

   
She
took the checkered handkerchief
and sniffed it.
There
was a combination of two separate colognes on it and she definitely wouldn’t forget that odor.
“I can’t
promise anything, because if h
e’s at all intelligent he would
have moved out of the area.
I’ll squash him like a bug if I catch
him.
”

    “He’s definitely acts human in the video. The attacks are over in less than two minutes and then he runs off.
He doesn’t speed off like you guys; he just runs away.

    “I’ll see what I can do officer.”

    He nodded. “Please
let me know if you do get him
. Here’s my card with my personal number.
I’d like to be able to tell my wife
that he’s never coming back,
no chance that he’s getting out of prison.
”

CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE

    A
LEXANDER AND ABBEY WERE STROLLING
through Tompkins Square Park and had stopped at the elm tree known as the Hare Krishna tree, where on October 9
^th
, 1966 the founder of the
International Society for Krishna Consciousness held the earliest known outdoor chanting of the Hare Krishna mantra outside of the Indian subcontinent. Partakers
had
included the Beat poet Allen Ginsberg.
That particular tree was now considered an important spiritual site.
They spent some time there, and
then
hand in hand
they continued to meander through the park.

  
Arym was out with other vampires, friends of the sheriff, getting accustomed to her new skin.
She had mixed feelings of having been turned into a vampire, but as there was no going back she was trying hard to get used to it.
It was important to fac
e her new reality
and to get on with her life.

    The day was sunny and hot, and Alexander was instantly pegged a red sheriff in his black
leather trench coat
and red badge
.
They walked by people
sunbathing and relaxing on the park’s central knoll, and one particularly good looking blond sat up and stared admiringly at Alexander.
Tessy let go with a single bark
at her
, not as a warning but as a hello.
They found a bench t
hat wasn’t occupied and sat enjoying
the afternoon.

    “The worst day of my life was the day they killed my husband.” She looked into his eyes and then looked away. “What was the worst day of your life?”

    Alexander went back in time to a
cold rainy morning when he had come
home to
find his entire family
killed by vampires, even his little brother Nate.
He had only been a teenager for a couple of weeks when it happened.
“My family was killed by vampires but I really don’t want to go there. It’s a dark place and time that’s impossible to shine any light on.
”

    “
Alexander, w
hat was your most intense physical pain? Probably always the same answer for women that have had children, the pain of childbirth.”

    “Well, when I was human I passed a kidney stone.
I suffered for three days and three nights. It was as if someone was kicking me in the back and in the lower stomach at the same time. I don’t think I’ll ever forget that.”

    A mime stopped in front of them all dressed in white; he was quite good at his pantomime. He juggled five invisible apples, taking a bite out of each one until he had eaten them all.
It was the way he almost fell and contorted his body that was most impressive. Abbey thought that he must be double-jointed.
He did the moon
walk
but wasn’t quite as skilled as Michael Jackson.
Alexander gave him some money and then he immediately tipped his white fedora hat and moved off in search or more currency.

    Abbey pushed her hand through his thick black hair. “The thing that disturbs me most about this relationshi
p is that every single time
they call you out there I really don’t know if you’re coming back. I don’t know if it’s somethi
ng that I can get used to
. Do you ever plan to retire?”

    “I do Abbey, but the world is in such a state of turmoil that I feel I have to do my part
.”

     She nodded and was proud that he felt that way, because without his kind she simply couldn’t imagine what the world would be like; she desperately hoped that the future would be better but so far there was no sign of it. “I know that the world needs more of you guys not less but I worry about you.”

    “I’m looking forward to the day that they don’t need as many of us that’s for certain.”

    Tessy put her head under Abbey hand for her to pet her and she did. “Has Tessy been fixed?”

    “Why, she’s not broken.”

    “Oh ha ha. Has she ever had pups
?”

    “No, apparently she needs a
nother vampire dog to have pups.
”

    Tessy got up on the bench and started to lick her makeup off. “Her tongue is so ruff. Are there many vampire dogs?”

    “She’s the only one that I am aware of. The only one that I know that can make a dog like her is Dracula.”

    “You should get him to make her a boyfriend.”

     “That’s actually not a bad id
ea.” Alexander’s phone
vibrated;
looking at the screen he appeared
concerned.

    “Is it something bad?”

    “It’s never good these days. I have to go but I’ll be back. If I’m gone more than an hour I’ll see you back at the house.”

    Alexander blurred off with the dust flying from his feet.

CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO