Sucking in San Francisco (3 page)

I walk for awhile and get lucky. A cab in the middle of nowhere. It’s an easy ride through the Presidio’s quiet streets to my friends’ home in Pacific Heights. The mansions stand like watchmen against the night. It’s peaceful. The streets, low traffic by day, are now quiet. The night is something I’ve learned to appreciate since becoming a vampire. I miss the stars, though. As the city has grown the starlight has diminished.

I stop the cabbie at a pillared mansion with carved marble flower boxes that rival the Spreckles Mansion. It’s the only house on the street with all the lights on. The lawns wind around an oyster shell driveway, lined with ornamental fruit trees. I take a running jump up the steps to the massive cherry wood front doors. They are ornate slabs of hardwood, incredibly thick, carved by master craftsmen and installed so that you can open them with a finger’s touch. They’re never locked. There’s almost always someone at home who can kick some serious ass.

People work here - maids, a groundskeeper, and a butler, of sorts, who is on call almost twenty-four hours a day. By of sorts, I mean that he’s sort of a pain in the behind, sort of comical relief, and sort of my cross to bear. I found Andrew at the end of his rope and in need of a job. He had been a waiter in a coffee shop I frequented on Union Street. One day, the building was sold, destined to become a Pilate’s studio. While I’m sure the neighborhood needed tight heinies and ripped abs, Andrew was out of a job. He was sobbing in my coffee when I had one of my brainstorms, more like, Lily-likes-to-bring-home-strays moments. I thought, my friends don’t drink much more than coffee and tea and Andrew knows how to make and serve awesome coffee and tea. Connection-connection. Okay, so I was exhibiting a bit of my spur of the moment, off the cuff, manic tendencies. My three friends rolled their eyes when I told them. Actually, they’re more family than friends. It’s worked out for all of us.

All three of them are home tonight. As I head in, I notice Sebastian, the youngest of the three, in his sexy, wicked jeans, worn in all the right places, suit jacket and button down shirt. He must have already been out and back again. He’s at ease sitting in the library, which is where we usually meet. Helena, my oldest friend, renovated the original house to make the library from two existing rooms, so it is huge. A row of tables lines one end of the room with computers and reading lamps. Numerous books in various stages of examination are on the tables at all times. Huge windows flank an entire wall and the remaining walls are taken up with bookcases and ladders which reach the floor-to-ceiling shelves. Souvenirs from their long lives decorate the room. For most people they would be rare artifacts, but to my family they are merely special items they couldn’t part with. We have to meet here if we ever want to include our leader, Julian, in anything. He is the quintessential book worm and scientist. Helena loves to surf on her iMac under the big, ornately framed-in windows.

Helena, my best friend and ‘mother’, happens to be nine hundred and eighty-six. She’s Mediterranean and looks sun kissed. I was turned in the winter so I am pale as snow.

Julian, Helena’s soul mate and lover, reads La Reppublica, an Italian newspaper, at his desk. He is seven hundred and ninety years old. Shaved head, a virtuous Roman. He’s built like a god. Julian is captivated by humans and has a protective concern for them as much as Helena.

Julian and Helena are drinking their customary tea… sissies. They don’t have the coffee bug like I do. Sebastian sips his drink in front of the fireplace, which is big enough to roast an ox or an entire tree. None of them expect me to be off work yet. I stop by most nights, so they aren’t surprised to see me. They’d love it if I moved in. They keep asking me, I keep holding out. Sebastian calls me stubborn, I call it being independent. I ring Andrew for coffee and sink into the overstuffed, butter-soft leather sofa next to Sebastian.

Sebastian. He is three hundred and sixty-five. Ancient compared to me. Sexy, provocative, engaging Sebastian. The most charming male I have ever met. He has a brooding temperament but he always has a smile for his family. He also speaks with a faint French accent. Love those accents. Why haven’t I hooked up with him? Because he is also the biggest player on the planet. His dark curls and smoldering brown eyes have been in so many beds he lost track of them centuries ago. He joined Helena and Julian as a family two hundred plus years ago. Their kindness proselytized him. He’s smooth, he’s polished, but beneath that pleasant surface lies a very dangerous vampire. If Sebastian thinks one of us is in danger, woe to that threat. I long ago decided to look at him more as a big brother, a big brother who just happens to be able to make women scream his name. Therefore, very much off limits to me and my inexperience.

“What are you doing, finished with work at this time of night, Lil’?” Helena asks.

Julian notices I’m here. He peeks around his paper.

“I had the most interesting night.”

“Do tell and why didn’t you answer my last text?” Sebastian asks. He’s new to texting and is addicted. I spend half my day answering texts from him.

I pull my legs up to sit cross-legged on the couch. “I had a jumper on the Golden Gate Bridge. It was going great on the phone, English accent… yummy. He said he would wait until I got there to talk to him.”

“Oh Lilith, you didn’t. That’s the worst kind of involvement for you to get into with a client. Tell me you called the police, child,” Julian chides, now paying full attention to me.

“I know I should have, but there was something about him. I just wanted…”

“Julian weren’t you listening? ‘English accent’ she was ‘interested’ in him,” Sebastian teases.

“Let me finish,” I say, giving Sebastian a raised eyebrow. “I thought I could handle it.”

Julian and Helena shake their heads.

Helena asks, “Well, what happened?”

“He glowed like a blue light special. Put me in some kind of binding spell and he knew I was vampire.”

They are all riveted and absolutely still, in a way only a vampire can be.

Sebastian clears his throat while turning towards me and says, “You must be joking, ma petite.”

“He had a faint blue glow to him and he knew I was a vampire and I couldn’t move anything but my head,” I repeat as I stand up and move around the room, running my fingers along the spines of books, over the polished table tops, down the heavy brocade of the drapes. Their reaction makes me nervous.

“He accused me of luring him to his demise until I reminded him that he asked me to come and talk to him. Then he evaporated before my eyes. I was hoping Julian might be able to help me out and tell me what’s going on.”

Julian is a shade whiter than his usual light olive skin. So is Helena. Julian is the first to recover and breaks the silence.

“Lilith,” (uh oh, he never uses my full name unless it’s serious and this makes twice in the past five minutes) “it is possible you saw a djinn tonight,” Julian says.

“What?” I say plopping back down next to Sebastian. He pulls me over and wraps his long, strong arms around me.

“There is only one creature that would give off a blue shimmer, enthrall you so easily and also be able to ascertain what you were on sight and that is a jinni. The only problem is that if the djinn are not bound to do someone else’s bidding then it is acting of its free will, and it would destroy one of us as soon as deal with us. I’ve never heard of a jinni who would treat a vampire with benevolence. They are usually bound to one of us. But even an innocent djinn can have a wicked sense of humor. They are best not mixed with.” Julian stares over my head puzzling it out.

“Why was he trying to kill himself? Or was it just a ploy?” Helena says.

“Most likely a sick joke,” Sebastian says. His chest rumbles.

“Could he be the one who staked the others?” I ask.

“No... I wouldn’t think a djinn would mess with staking when he could vaporize his victim,” Julian says, glancing back at me.

I wonder at the coincidence. Stakings start happening and we find a djinn.

Andrew, the butler, brings the coffee and we’re all quiet for a minute, while I make my drink. I fix myself a coffee with heavy creamer and extra sugar. Vampires have a sweet tooth. Though we have a liquid diet, we make up for it with extra sugar. Thank goodness I can’t gain weight or I’d be topping the scales with the sugar I put in my coffee alone. I pull the black cashmere blanket from the back of the sofa over me and snuggle in next to Sebastian. He adjusts his arms around me. I feel comfortable wrapped up with him. He smells like cognac and cigars, hmmm… maybe he hasn’t been out whoring tonight after all. Wait, this is Sebastian we’re talking about.

“Well Chou Chou, I am exceedingly thankful that you are still with us,” Sebastian tells me. His eyes are serious and the look he gives me makes me feel warm.

I smile at him and snuggle in closer.

“Thanks Bast.”

“Of course we are glad that the djinn played nice tonight. It makes my blood run colder just to think how close we came to losing you.” Helena shudders and pulls her wool shawl closer around her. “We wouldn’t have even known what had happened.”

Julian bends forward in his chair, wrinkling his brow. “Now that you’re safe, I want to know what a jinni is doing unbound in San Francisco. I wonder how long he’s been here.”

“I don’t know, but he sounded rather morose on the phone. He talked about being tired of his life. The repetitiveness, day after day. I kind of understood where he was coming from.”

Sebastian gives me a squeeze. I couldn’t help thinking about the look on Aidan’s face right before he disappeared. It gives me a shiver and Bast tightens his grip on me, as if he thinks I’m cold. Aidan’s behavior seemed to promise another visit, another encounter. I should be terrified, but it was a wicked grin.

If djinn are as dangerous as Julian says, did I want to see him again? I have heard of the Djinn - Vampire war. It must have been horrible. Like dog fighting.

The days must blur together for a djinn. They’ve been around longer than vampires, much longer. I wonder if Sebastian’s pursuit of women is his way of coping to keep away the monotony of our existence. His relentless need to have someone new every night is staggering. The endless stream of women must get tiring for him, in and of itself. I wonder. I doubt that would be a conversation we would ever have.

Julian keeps busy with his constant quest for knowledge. At the moment that includes botany and vampire science. Helena is the same way with her witchcraft and to a lesser degree botany, though she’s been a herbalist for hundreds of years, just not as obsessive as Julian. Besides she has Julian, her life mate, her second half. As she has said before, he completes her.

“I heard tales of the use of djinn during the Crusades,” Julian says in a somber tone. He never talks about his time in the Crusades. I’ve always thought it was too painful for him to bring up. He is a pacifist at heart.

“King Guy of Jerusalem led the Crusade of 1187. It was before my time, but the elders still talked about it. Prince Reynald was with him, a nasty vicious man. King Guy was no better.

They led their band of Christians, a small army, and marched to the Horns of Mattin, without appropriate provisions. A djinn had been planted in King Guy’s retinue to lead them into the madness of thinking they could make the trek. Then he led them in circles in the desert,” Julian says softly. “Wandering in the desert in their armor, without water all day long. By night they were half mad with thirst. Some risked going to the river even though they knew it was a trap, heavily guarded by the Muslims. They were beheaded.”

The fire crackles and spits up embers as a log settles. Sebastian tightens his grip around me as we listen to Julian.

“The next morning the battle ensued with the remaining weakened soldiers. The Christians fought like men without hope and ran the battle lines crazed, weakened by heat and dehydration. The Muslims captured so many slaves that they would trade a man for a pair of shoes.

Soon only Guy and Reynald were left in their tent. Saladin surrounded them and their Knights. Prince Reynald blasphemed Mohammed and was beheaded but Saladin would not kill a king. He put Guy in prison, releasing a mere shell of the man later.”

We are all quiet for a moment. I wonder again how a djinn feels about what he is compelled to do. Do they all have a wicked sense of mischief? But to lead thousands of men to their death… What would they feel about that? I remember Aidan’s outrage at what he believed of my intentions. He didn’t seem malicious.

A soft rain starts hissing against the windows and I pull a book down from the shelf and read for awhile, or at least pretend. Helena and Julian are busy discussing jinni. Helena looks over at me every once in a while and fusses about losing me. Mostly they just postulate why Aidan didn’t destroyed me outright.

Why didn’t he destroy me? Did he sincerely mean to talk to me before he found out who I was? Was it a trap for some unsuspecting human? I didn’t want to think so. I think he must have actually been lonely. Does a jinni feel lonely? Or was this all part of his “wicked sense of humor?” Is he a good djinn or did some evil master order him to do all these horrible things to himself? He said he was free. How can he do his own bidding if he is free, how does that work? God, I love movies like that “Of all the gin joints in all the towns, in all the world, she walks into mine.” Focus Lily. I remember Aidan’s voice. I have some experience with suicidal callers and I believe he was sincerely despondent.

My attention locks on Julian’s words. He says that djinn are very powerful.

“You have to bind them, to put them under your control. An extremely dangerous situation because they will use any advantage they can get to escape their bondage, usually killing the binder.” Aidan called his past “job” slavery in its basest form.

As I relax, my stomach clenches, reminding me I’m getting thirsty. Not thirsty for coffee, thirsty for my next meal. It’s been not quite a week and that’s about my limit. I’ll have to hit up a bar on the way home. The others can go longer, but I am younger and need nourishment more frequently. It’s a myth that we need to feed every night. It’s a myth that we need to kill our meal. We simply need a pint or so and we’re good to go until the next 3,000 miles or in my case, week - whichever comes first.