Microsoft Word - The Mammoth Book of Vampire Romance.doc (35 page)

opened my arms to show my full blue uniform, utility belt and  all. “You’re a police officer, badge 51476, and have spent the  last five years keeping the citizens of this city safe from the  scum of the earth. You’re honest, trustworthy and kind. Oh,  and–” I  reached out my hand, wiggling my fingers for Tim to  step into the frame. He did so, squeezing my hand, but looking  nervous. “This is your sire, Officer Tim Myres. He’s the man I  love and I trust him with everything I am.” I smiled at him then  and looked back to the camera, red light blinking to show it was  recording. “That’s why I’ve decided to let him bring me over to  become
 
you
. You’re a vampire, but you’re still a cop.  Remember that. Remember
 
me
.”

“Are you sure about this, Syl. You could help me just as

easily by staying human.”

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I shook my head. “Danvers was nearly too strong. It was just his own stupidity that made him vulnerable. Next time I might not be so lucky.” I touched his face and hoped the camera would show what I was feeling inside. “I won’t  lose you again.  And even if that means I have to die and fight to remember you, it’s worth it. I love you, Tim Myers. And after all, we have a city to protect, and a vampire police force to begin.” I pointed at the camera. “So don’t you
 
dare
 
give Tim any less than your best.  I’ll be watching you always, nagging at your brain to do the right thing. Remember that.”

Then I nodded at Tim and squeezed his hands tight. “Let’s do this.” I didn’t know if we could pull it off. Keep me disappeared until I recovered  my memory and still retain my job. But I worked the night shift, so it
 
could
 
work. My career was important enough to try. I
 
had
 
to try. The city was counting

on me . . . on
 
us
. It seems a little funny that my career choice

suddenly included dying  –  but there you go.

Tim’s skin paled again and the fangs came into view. His eyes were both frightening in their intensity and heart-warming in the tears that filled them. I let loose one hand and pulled down the stiff, starched collar with the pretty gold bar. “Kill me,  Tim. Make me a vampire and keep me with you forever.”

He was on me in a flash, throwing me to the floor so hard I hit my head  –  playing it up for the camera so I . . . so
 
she
, would understand what we’d become. He hissed at the camera and then drove fangs into me. The pain was intense, nothing like it had been in bed and I was suddenly afraid, wondering if I’d made the right choice.

But as my struggling grew weaker, his hands so tight on me that my fingers went numb, I heard his voice across my mind and it made everything better.
 
I love you, Syl. I’ll keep you safe until you come back
.

286

Then there was darkness, so deep and rich that it ate away everything that was light, that was me, and I fell into a well that seemed to go forever.

Anger now. Pain and anger. The man holding me ties me to a chair, yells at me to listen and watch. But it hurts to open my eyes. He forces them to open and I see myself and him. Dressed in blue, his long hair half-covering his face. Hate and fear. I can’t break loose.  I scream and fight, but finally give up and snarl, my teeth gnashing, slicing through my lips as I watch the shiny glass. Then a picture appears and it looks like the face in the other glass. I raise my eyebrows and tip my head and so does the figure in the glass. Is that me? I bare fangs and so does she.  Fingers wiggle under the rope and so do hers. Then the woman starts to talk.

“My name . . . or
 
your
 
name is Sylvia Beck. You’re a police  officer, badge 51476, and have spent the last five years keeping  the citizens of this city safe from the scum of the earth. You’re  honest, trustworthy and kind.”

Blink and the woman in the glass blinks, and so does the woman on the screen.
 
Sylvia
. It sounds right, resonates in my head. The man who tied me up is sitting patiently in a chair on the other side of the room. “Sylvia?” My voice is the same as the woman in the picture.

The man nodded. “You’re Sylvia, Sylvia Beck.”

Then the same man appeared on the screen and a flash came to my head, so sharp and intense it made me yelp. Like a dream, it all came back to me  –  Tim’s death, then Danvers and then . . . my own. I watched Tim touch my hand on the television with the same worried look he had across the room. I felt tears come

to my eyes as I ran a tongue along the sharp points of teeth.

287

Sylvia Beck. Peace officer . . . vampire. “Tim. I . . . remember. I remember you. And I remember
 
me
.”

He smiled, and it was a wonderful thing. “Did it help? Did

the tape ease the rage?”

I nodded, because it had. There were still gaps,  such as I didn’t know where I was exactly, didn’t know how long had passed since that night, or recall the room or the names of some of the things I saw. But I recognized my uniform, and remembered Tim. It was enough, because the rest would come.  “It eased the rage. But before we start a police force, come over here and kiss me, Tim. Help me remember everything.”

That warm smile again, showing fangs like me, and more things flooded back . . . memories that might not be real, but
felt
real. He walked over  and leaned down to kiss my lips, sending a jolt of pleasure through me. “I love you, Syl. And you’ll see  –we’ll make it through this. Together we’re going to be the greatest pair of vamps this city has ever seen, and we’ll be the first of those who remember, who keep their humanity and make the world a better place.”

I nodded and offered him my lips again, tucking my fangs safely against the roof of my mouth. “And we’ll love, Tim.  After all, that’s the essence of all humanity.”

288

D ancing  with the

Star

Sus an Sizem ore

T
 
here are plenty of people who come into the

Alhambra Club for the things we regulars can offer.  It’s a nice place, not flashy on the inside, hard to spot from the outside. You have to want to find the place and search for it through friends of friends of friends. If you’re a mortal, that is.  The rest of us have used it as a hangout for the better part of a century.

There’s a television set over the bar, a big, flat-panel model, always playing with the sound off. I wasn’t paying attention to it because I was engaged in seducing a handsome young man with far too many body piercings for my usual taste. I mean, if you want piercings, I’m perfectly capable of providing them for you.  But, he had nice eyes and a lovely voice, and the place wasn’t all that full of human patrons this evening. A girl goes with what she can sometimes. I wasn’t all that hungry, so I wasn’t trying too hard. I wasn’t paying attention to the TV, but my friend  Tiana was. I was surprised when she came up and  put her cold

289

hand on my shoulder, because she isn’t normally rude enough to  interrupt me when I’m working a fresh feed.

“Did you hear? There’s been a twelve=car pile up on  Mulholland.”

This isn’t the sort of thing that would normally interest me, but her  excitement got my attention. I shifted my gaze to the television. It showed a scene of fire and carnage spotlighted in beams of white light shooting down from circling helicopters. A crawl on the bottom of the screen was showing statistics about the dead and injured and the amount of emergency rescueequipment called to the scene. A blonde windblown gorl reporter was excitedly talking about the same things.

Beside me, Tiana was starting to breathe heavily. I wasn’t sure who was getting off on the disaster  more, my friend or the reporter.

I looked back at Tiana. “So?”

Her eyes were glowing, not quite the death-eating electric blue she gets when she’s feeding, but her pupils held pinprick sparks of anticipation. “You want to go have a look,  Serephena?” she  asked.

Normally I wouldn’t have been interested, but the pleading in her voice got to me. Tiana’s been my best friend for a very long time. If you know what we are you wouldn’t think she and  I would have that much in common. I’m a vampire and she’d  –well, all right  –  she’s my ghoul friend. I feed on the living, she feeds on the energy of the dying. But we both like to shop.

“Maybe there’s a dying movie star out there I can latch on  to.” She said. She rubbed her hands together. “A producer  would be even better.”

290

I know what that sounds like, but it really had more to do with psychic power levels than celebrity stalking. There are a lot of high-energy types in show business, a lot of people who are psychic and don’t even know it.

I got up and telepathically told the pierced boy that we’d never met. “Sure,” I said to Tiana. “It’s been a slow night. Let’s go have a look.”

It was gruesome up on Mulholland Drive. Tiana ate it up  –literally soaking the energy of fear and pain in through her pores. It was the scent of blood that got to me, but not in a good way. There’s no fun in spilled blood. I need to take blood from the living, breathing source, to taste it fresh and hot, with the heartbeat still pulsing through it. And preferably from a volunteer, because we live in modern, humane times. Unlike some of my notorious forebears I do not get off on pain. The blood on the crash victims gave off a sick scent that rolled my stomach, but I did find hiding in the shadows and watching the emergency crews work exciting. Hey, I’m as interested in all that forensics and rescue stuff as anyone else who watches the geek-TV channels, but this was ‘live and direct’ like Max  Headroom used to say on the television show nobody but me probably remembers.

It was interesting,  but after a while I glanced at the sky and sighed. The night was getting on. “Had enough yet?” I asked.  “You’ll outgrow your size-two clothes if you feed much longer.  Besides, it’s an hour to sunrise.”

Tiana came out of her happy trance and turned glowing  blue

eyes on me. “Oh, sorry, I lost track of the time.”

291

“No problem,” I said, and took her arm to help her walk  away, knowing from experience that she was drunk and dizzy  from feeding.

Help me! Where are you
 
?

Here
 
! I shouted to the voice in my head.
 
Where
 
–

“Seraphina!”

I looked up into pinpoints of blue light. Tiana. I was on my knees and she was standing over me. The fierce pain in my head blocked out most thought, but I knew our positions were all wrong.
 
I
 
was supposed to be helping
 
her
.

I wanted  to run into the wreckage behind us. But when I

stood my legs were too shaky. I glanced back. “I  ”–

Tiana shook my shoulders. “We have to go. Sunrise,” she

said.

That was one word I understood in all of its myriad implications of pain, suffering, death. I  had to go. Now.  Whatever had just happened I had to get home. I took Tiana’s hand and we ran together.

I have a nice studio apartment, where I sleep on a daybed in the huge windowless bathroom. The bathroom door is reinforced and has a strong lock, panic-room style, and the building, which I own and rent mostly to my sort of people, has state-of-the-art security. So normally I have no reason not to sleep very well. Normally I don’t dream, either. I go to sleep. I wake up. It all happens so quickly . .  . normally . . .

292

The path was made of brick, laid out in a chevron pattern It was lined with rose bushes and night-blooming jasmine. The air was so fragrant I could taste it. The stars overhead formed a thick blanket of light brighter than I’d seen them for a very long time.

“I need to get out of the city more,” I said, and continued

walking towards the music in the distance.

I was wearing a dress, the skirt long and floaty and pale blue, sprinkled with a pattern of glittering crystals that mirrored the  sky. This was not the slinky, black sort of garment I favoured, but it felt right, feminine, beautiful.

I was wearing, honest to God, glass slippers. Cinderella?