Stage Fright (Bit Parts) (15 page)

When I couldn’t form the words, he slapped me over and over until I choked out, “I love it.”

“I knew you would,” he told me.  Slowly – lovingly – he sank his fangs into my neck.  He drew out my torture for what seemed like hours, making soft, grunting noises and caressing my cheek while I cried and begged and writhed.  Before he’d finished with me, I’d passed out.

I was crying so hard that I could hardly finish my story.  Isaiah held me tighter, and I clung to him, drinking in his warmth and the smell of his clean shirt and the antiseptic he’d used on his cut.  “It’s okay,” he murmured.  “You’re safe now.”

I believed him, but even with those strong arms around me, I couldn’t stop shaking.  It was like I’d lived through the horror all over again.  I buried my face into his chest.  “You were right.  I shouldn’t have tried to remember.”

“No, I was wrong,” he said.  “You’re brave enough to handle the truth.”

“I don’t feel brave.”  I actually felt dizzy and sick.  Not much different from when I’d woken up in the Cipher’s greenroom.

“You
acted
brave.”

My laugh sounded unhinged.  “Are you serious?  I ran away and hid!”

“First, you faced your fears, and then you fought back and escaped.  Being brave doesn’t mean being stupid.”

I realized that I was clinging to him like a terrified child, but I didn’t care.  In his arms, I felt safe.  Really, truly safe.

“Vampires!  I should have known.”  The signs had been there all along: my weird neck phobia, the way Luquin’s bloody mosaic had freaked me out, even the fact that Geoffrey didn’t want garlic on Elena’s food.  “I’m such an idiot!”

I sat at Isaiah’s kitchen table eating the pizza he had insisted on ordering after my stomach had made an especially embarrassing growl.  The pizza was split in two: half feta cheese, banana peppers, and black olives for me, and half meat lovers for him.  I picked the olives from a slice of pizza and ate them one by one.  “The Bleak Street should post it on the marquee: Here There Be Vampires!”

Isaiah sat across from me, a baggie of ice on his swollen nose.  “Don’t beat yourself up.  Vampires hide in plain sight because they usually glamour their prey into forgetting.”

“I didn’t quite forget,” I said.  “I mean, I didn’t remember the details, but I knew something was seriously wrong.  I could hardly function.”

“Your attack was especially brutal.  I’m guessing those two vamps drained your shine to almost nothing.  Most victims aren’t tapped that low.  People notice its loss, but they’ll attribute the nightmares, depression, and panic attacks to job-related stress.  Then they take some medication and carry on.”

“Aren’t I the lucky one,” I muttered.

“You’re lucky that those two stopped drinking when they did.”  Isaiah regarded me so intently that a shiver traveled down my spine.  “You’re also lucky to have a strong spirit.  Returning to the theater shows you have mettle.”  His eyes softened.  “You should be proud of yourself.  Someone else in your position might have given up on life completely.”

My cheeks grew warm.  “Don’t give me too much credit.  I was a complete wreck the whole time.  I had panic attacks all the time.  I slept with all the lights on.  I cried on the phone to Andrew every day.”

“I didn’t do much better.  Neither did Perry.”

My eyes popped wide.  “You were both attacked?”

“In different places at different times, but yes.  We were both struggling.”  He began rubbing his leg, the one that made him limp.

“Did the vampire do that as well?”

He pressed his lips together in a hard line.  “It wanted to hurt me as much as possible.”

“And that’s why you don’t play baseball anymore?”

“Yes.”

Being forced out of baseball must have hurt him as badly as losing a career onstage had hurt me.  A sympathetic ache filled my chest.  Unfortunately, those kinds of dreams don’t die; they can be crushed, shattered, and buried, but they never die.  “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be.  I’m over it.”

Yeah right, I thought, but didn’t press the issue.

“I wish we’d met earlier,” he said.  “No one should have to go through this alone.”

I smiled.  If I’d been able to lean on that broad chest and have those strong arms around me, I was certain that those panic attacks would have fled long ago.

Isaiah started to say something else when there was a knock at the door.

“It’s just Perry,” he said, rising to answer.  I nodded, trying to hide my disappointment at being interrupted.

Perry’s voice came from the living room.  “What happened to your nose?”  When Isaiah rumbled something, Perry whooped and charged into the kitchen.  “
You
scored a hit on the Outfielder?”  He grinned at me.  “Impressive!”

“The Outfielder?”

Perry straddled one of the kitchen chairs.  “Isaiah and I first met online.  Outfielder was his screen name.  Now, I like to think of it as his superhero name.”  Isaiah rolled his eyes at this, but Perry took an imaginary swing like he was standing at the plate.

“So that’s why you had your baseball bat tonight,” I said.  “To kill the vampires.”  I remembered hearing somewhere that wooden baseball bats were made from ash, and – if my horror movie education was correct – ash wood was lethal to vampires.  Therefore, using a bat as a weapon made sense.  Sort of.  As much sense as anything in this strange, new world.

Perry’s smile widened.  “Ah, you finally remember about the vampires.”  He glanced over his shoulder at Isaiah.  “How did that go?”

“She did well.”  The note of pride in Isaiah’s voice made me flush pleasantly.  “How were things at the theater?”

“Quiet.  Not a rogue in sight.”  Noticing my confusion, Perry said, “Rogues are vampires, but without any soul.  If a vamp drains every bit of shine from a human, he’ll have a rogue on his hands.”

I picked at my food, thinking out loud.  “Shine is soul – and it’s what the vampires eat?”

Perry helped himself to a slice of pizza.  “Well, there’s blood, too, of course, but shine is what keeps a vampire acting human.  See, vampires have no souls of their own, and without enough shine, a vampire will go rogue.  If that happens, no amount of soul will bring it back.”

I shuddered at the memory of those crazed beasts, and my fingers twitched in revulsion as if Darryl’s foot was still in my hands.  Suddenly, the pizza lost its appeal, and I pushed it away.  Darryl had been a class-A pain in the ass, and dying didn’t make him a saint.  Still, he didn’t deserve to be vampire bait.  No one did.  “So that’s why they steal our shine.”

“Hedda doesn’t steal it,” Isaiah rumbled.  “When it comes to human souls, she’s very reverent.  She holds herself and her grieve to a higher standard.  They never feed from unwilling victims.”

Perry shrugged as if unconvinced.  “You have more faith in her than I do.  I mean, think of Marcella.”

“She’s changed,” Isaiah said tightly.  “You know that.”

“If you say so.”

To defuse the brewing argument, I asked, “Why don’t the vampires get rid of the rogues themselves?  Why make you two do it?”

“Each grieve has its own code of ethics,” Perry said, “but there’s one rule they all hold to: vampires cannot kill other vampires.  And rogues are considered vampires.  Any vampire who breaks that prime directive better run for his life.”  As Perry spoke, he kept his eyes on Isaiah, as if looking for clues on how much to tell me.  At Isaiah’s nod, Perry continued.  “The only legitimate reason to kill a vampire is if that vampire has killed another of his kind.”

“Since Perry and I are considered sub-vampires,” Isaiah said, “we’re outside vampire law.”

“You must be busy,” I said.  “I mean, how many rogues were at the Bleak tonight?”

“Twelve,” Isaiah said tightly.

Perry shook his head.  “That’s more than we took out in the past two years combined.  The rogue population is growing by leaps and bounds.”  He nodded at Isaiah.  “How’s the leg holding up?”

“It’s tight,” Isaiah admitted.  He rubbed his calf muscle, wincing as he dug in his fingers.  “But it will hold.”

Perry’s forehead furrowed.  “Are you willing to risk that in a fight?”

“I don’t have a choice.”

Perry grabbed another slice of Isaiah’s pizza and chewed thoughtfully.  “Someone must be having themselves a feeding frenzy.  A really
sloppy
feeding frenzy.  Maybe it’s Luquin Astor.”

“Luquin the artist is a vampire?” I asked.

“He is now,” Isaiah said.  “That ‘afterglow’ party at the Muse was Luquin’s transition ceremony.  Turning a human into a vampire is a tricky business.”  Again, Isaiah and Perry exchanged a look.  “It’s why Hedda wanted me there,” Isaiah continued.  “If something went wrong, and Luquin turned into a rogue, I was to take him out.”

I shuddered, remembering the strange groans and grunts coming from the dark recesses of the Muse.  Charles hadn’t been jealous of any lifetime achievement award.  He’d wanted to become a vampire.  I pressed my hands to my head to keep it from exploding.  Everything I’d thought I’d known about life in general and my mentor in particular had fallen apart in only a few minutes.

Isaiah tugged thoughtfully on his lower lip.  “A new vampire like Luquin would have a big appetite, but Hedda is keeping him on a short leash.  He’s only supposed to be feeding from Geoffrey.”

By now, nothing should have shocked me, but this did.  “Geoffrey
Leopold
?  The curator from the Muse?”  When Isaiah nodded, my stomach tightened.  Geoffrey with the madras shirts and ring on every finger was a vampire’s wet nurse.  No wonder he’d been so anxious on Sunday night.

“It’s the price of his position,” Perry said.  “Hedda set him up with the gallery, and in return, he does what she tells him to.  All her humans do that.”

I glanced from Isaiah to Perry and back again.  “What do you get in return for being her enforcers?”

“Something very, very valuable,” Isaiah said, his eyes serious.

“Your Jeep?”

“Please,” Perry scoffed.  “The Outfielder would never sell himself so cheaply.”

“Holy Comics?”

Perry rolled his eyes.

I swallowed, wondering what prize Hedda had used to entice them.  “What?”

“Season tickets to the Bleak Street,” Isaiah deadpanned.

I snorted.  Then my snicker turned into a laugh which turned into crazy hilarity.  I nearly fell out of my chair.  Tears ran from my eyes.

When I finally got myself back together, Perry said, “Don’t knock it. 
The Scent of Ketchup
was actually a pretty good play.  I managed to stay awake for the entire first act.”  This sent me over the edge again.  Even Isaiah was chuckling.

“Thanks.  I needed that,” I said, wiping my eyes.  “It’s been a really long day.”

“And if the rogues keep appearing, it may be a really long night,” Perry said.

“Something’s going on,” Isaiah agreed.  “I just wish I knew whose messes we’re cleaning up.”

Perry grabbed a third slice.  “What about Victor?”

Isaiah shrugged.  “I doubt the head of the Stuyvesant grieve would be that sloppy.  He might feed on unwilling humans, but he’d never turn someone rogue.  Besides, Hedda’s hooked him up with enough blood donors to keep him satisfied.”

Willing victims like Tabitha who had traded a night with Victor for a walk-on part in a Broadway musical.  And Darryl...  Suddenly, I saw that afternoon’s events in a new way.  “Victor was playing Ten Minutes of Heaven with Darryl in the bathroom this afternoon.  At the time, I thought they were…erm…being intimate, but now I’m guessing that Victor was taking Darryl’s soul because afterwards, he gave Darryl a part in his play.”

“Was Darryl the guy we found dead in the parking lot?” Perry asked.

“Yes, but he left the theater on his own two feet,” I said.  “He looked dazed, but otherwise okay.”

Perry sighed and ran both his hands through his hair.  “Okay, so it isn’t Victor, and that puts us back at square one.  Terrific.”

I frowned.  “Can’t you ask Hedda?”

“If a member of Hedda’s grieve was giving her trouble, she’d never tell us,” Isaiah said.  “Hedda guards her secrets very closely.  Especially now that Victor is snooping around.”

I recalled what I’d learned that morning.  “Charles said that Hedda was indebted to Victor.”

“The Stuyvesants are a very powerful grieve.  No doubt, he was responsible for turning Hedda into a vamp.”

“Does that make him her boss?”

Perry grabbed a pen from his pocket and drew three, concentric circles on the empty pizza box.  “We’re in the dark about a lot of this, but from what I understand, the grieve system works like nesting dolls.”  He wrote LUQUIN in the innermost circle, HEDDA in the next circle, and VICTOR in the outermost one.  “See, any human that Victor turned into a vampire would answer to him as would any vampires that vampire created.  Each vamp is indebted to their maker who, in return, is indebted to
his
maker.”

“So if Luquin Astor tried to create his own grieve, Luquin’s vampires would have to answer to Luquin
and
Hedda
and
Victor?”

“Exactly.”  Perry dropped the pen and groaned.  “Unfortunately, that’s as much as we know.  Like I said, Hedda keeps nearly everything from us.  If we had a spy on the inside, we could get a grip on the situation instead of having our asses handed to us.”

I studied Perry’s chart.  “Where does Bertrand Peabody fit into this?”

Both Isaiah and Perry stared at me.  “Bertrand
who
?” Perry asked.

“Charles said Hedda used to be married to him,” I explained.  “In fact, he said, Bertrand made her who she is just like Victor made Bertrand who
he
is.  Which, I assume, means Victor turned Bertrand into a vampire, and Bertrand turned Hedda.”  I drew another ring on the pizza box in-between Hedda and Victor’s.”  That would make the chain of command: Luquin, Hedda, Bertrand, and Victor.”

Perry’s jaw dropped.  “And you know this…how?”

“Like I said, Charles told me.”

Perry’s eyes popped wide.  He grinned and pumped his fist in the air.  “Yes!”

“No.”  Isaiah’s voice rumbled like thunder.

“Are you crazy?” Perry asked.  “Do you realize what we have here?”