Vampires 101 (Twilight Hunters Book 1) A Vampire Romance (5 page)

Instead I asked, “What were you doing in that field?”

“Well what do you think I was doing in there … picking corn?” she snapped, her face twisting into a mask of annoyance.

“Maybe. Why else would you be traipsing around in a cornfield?” I shrugged.

Shadow pursed her lips together and glared at me through narrowed eyes. I was a little startled to see a weird light radiating from her eyes. She was obviously angry.

Placing both hands on her hips, she started yelling. “I came down in the wrong place. That’s why I was in there. And the next time you decide to disappear, you should seriously give me some kind of warning. I’ve been looking for you all night. I haven’t even had time to find dinner yet,” she added.

Hmm, that couldn’t be good. I decided it might be best to keep my distance for the time being. Just incase she decided to vamp out on me. “How did you find me?”

“Well you called me didn’t you?”

Ok then, next question.

“But if you were not already out here, how did you hear me?”

Completely exasperated, Shadow threw her hands in the air. “Vampire! Remember?”

I was still confused. Clearing my throat, I asked another question, but not without hesitation. “Ok, so how did you get here?”

She just shook her head in defeat. “I guess it’s time for the extra condensed version of Vampires 101.”

A lesson in vampires actually sounded like a good idea. Maybe then I could get beyond the,
this can’t be real
, stage.

Shadow took the last few steps to my car and sat on the hood. I gave her a scathing look to convey my displeasure, but she ignored it.

“When a vampire is born, their mortal body dies. In the process of rebirth, the cells go through a mutation. That’s what gives vampires their so-called mystical powers. Our brains work better, and we heal more quickly than humans.”

“Ok so …”

“Just chill a minute and let me finish.” She scowled at me again.

I was quickly coming to the conclusion that vampires that hadn’t fed could get seriously cranky.

“The change in our brains enhances certain abilities … like telekinesis and telepathy.”

“So you are telling me that you use telekinesis to move from one place to the other?” I interrupted.

“Well you didn’t think that we turned into bats and flew did you?”

I just shrugged, not wanting to admit that the thought had crossed my mind a time or two.

Shadow’s features twisted into a grimace. “Bats are such disgusting creatures. I am so glad that part of the vampire myth is nothing but fantasy.”

“You still haven’t told me how you knew I was here,” I reminded her.

“Telepathy! Duh!” she rolled her eyes. “Sometimes a vampire can pick up the mental vibration from someone … basically read them. I heard you mentally calling me, but I couldn’t read you before that. It was like you just totally disappeared from the face of the earth,” she said. “In fact, the only time I can really read you is when you are upset.”

Shadow slid into silence, as if she were contemplating something that had just occurred to her.

Setting the new info I’d just gotten on the back burner to simmer, I asked, “So where have you been? I haven’t seen you for three days.”

She gave me a lopsided grin. “You know I can’t be with you during the day, but I’ve been keeping an eye on you at night.”

“Why didn’t you let me know you were around?”

“The whole purpose of following you is to catch one of them. No way they’re going to show themselves if they know someone’s with you.”

I was still confused and beginning to agree with Shadow’s opinion that I was just abnormally dense. “Why wouldn’t they show themselves to other vampires?”

A blank expression settled over her face. Whatever their reason for so much secrecy, she wasn’t about to spill the beans to me. Avoiding an answer, she asked, “So what happened to you?”

Part of me wanted to keep my experience to myself, if for no other reason than to get back at her for withholding information. Fortunately for her, I’d never been good at keeping secrets.

“I got really sleepy when I was driving home from the Diner. The next thing I knew … I was here. That was just before you showed up.”

Shadow drew her brows together, her own confusion coming through. “Why did you leave work early. I know you weren’t there when I showed up.”

“Jake laid me off.” I let my displeasure with this unpleasant fact come through with each word.

“Oh well,” she said with an offhanded shrug. “That just leaves more time for us to catch those slippery little devils.”

I decided that it probably wouldn’t do much good to try and get more information on those
slippery little devils
, so I asked, “What do you think happened to me?”

“Good question. I have a feeling that if we could figure that out, we might be one step closer to them.”

“Just one question. What do you plan to do if you ever do come face to face with one of them … whoever
they
are?”

A wicked grin spread across her face. “Blackmail … abduction … torture. Maybe all of the above.”

Suddenly I began to have serious doubts about Shadow’s motives, or if I even wanted to be a part of her plans. After all, if they
were
the first vampires, it was a pretty good bet that they were some major badass bloodsuckers.

Most of me was in total agreement with these thoughts. Now if I could just get him out of my head, just maybe I could wash my hands of this whole Dracula subculture thing that I’d somehow gotten into. Through no fault of my own, I might add.

“I’ve got a plan,” Shadow said, interrupting my inner thought process.

“Ok, so what’s your plan?”

Her freaky vampire eyes began to sparkle with mischief, and I immediately had an uh-oh moment. Somehow I just knew that any plan she came up with was probably not going to be good for me.

I could not help but ponder the wisdom of spending money on knee-high leather boots and a black leather skirt, considering I’d just lost my job.  But as Shadow insisted a number of times, these items of clothing were essential to her plan.

“Now what’s this plan again?” I asked while trying to apply eyeliner, though I was making a total mess of it. By the time I was done, I would look a lot more like a raccoon, than the seductive vixen look I was trying to achieve.

“Let me see that,” Shadow grumbled, grabbing the eyeliner out of my hand.

As soon as she brought the eyeliner up to my eye, I began backing away. All of a sudden I had some major survival instinct going on, as in surviving Shadow’s attempt at a total makeover.

“Would you quit that?” she scowled. “At this rate the sun will be up before we even get there.”

“Sorry. I have really sensitive eyes you know.” I took a deep breath and tried to relax, hoping beyond hope that Shadow knew how to apply makeup without putting my eye out.

“The plan?” I asked again.

She’d already outlined it a couple of times, but truthfully, I’d barely been listening to her. I quit listening about the time I heard,
room full of vampires
.

“Really Cassie? Did your parents ever get you tested for ADD? If they didn’t, they should have.”

“Well excuse me!” I shot back. “I’m a little nervous. It’s not like I go hang out with vampires everyday.”

“Yeah, I guess not,” she smiled. “The plan is …  we go to the Sundown Club,”

“Which is really a vampire nest in disguise.” I piped in.

“Right … and we are going there because you’ll be in danger there.”

“I’m not getting how that is beneficial,” I interrupted again.

“Well if you give me a minute I’ll explain. I figure that he’ll sense you’re in danger and come running. Just like he did the other night.”

Stepping back, Shadow examined my face and smiled, apparently satisfied with her handiwork.

“Ok, but what if he doesn’t? Do I just offer myself as a light snack for your ghoul friends?”

“Cassie … you really have no faith in me do you?” she asked, her mouth forming into a deep frown. “I’m not going to let anything happen to you.”

“Oh right! You’re going to save me from a room full of vampires … many of them probably male vampires.”

“That is just so chauvinistic! And coming from a woman even!”

I shrugged. “Just saying.”

“Well you have to learn to trust me if we are going to be working together.” Shadow stepped back and motioned toward the mirror. “Take a look.”

Though
working together
was exactly how you’d define what we were doing, when spoken aloud, the working with a vampire thing didn’t sound at all sane.

I stood in front of my large bathroom mirror and stared at the reflection of someone I didn’t know. Very quickly I came to the uncomfortable realization that the whole Goth look wasn’t for me.

The eyeliner did its job, as far as highlighting my eyes, but for some reason it made the green specks in my hazel eyes look like glitter. The result was that, well they glittered. My chestnut brown hair didn’t go so well with the pale white makeup she’d applied to my face. The black lipstick made me look dead, or like I’d gone way to long without oxygen.

The black leather skirt and silk shirt was a little tighter than what I was used to. It made my skin look even paler than it already did. Basically, the overall result was that I looked like someone that was making a clumsy attempt at passing for a vampire.

“You’re kidding right?” I stared at Shadow’s reflection in the mirror. That’s when in dawned on me that I could actually see her reflection in the mirror too.

Guessing my train of thought, she answered my question before I could ask. “That thing about a vampire not having a reflection is just another crap myth. We have souls, they are just trapped in this ugly existence.”

I was a little stunned by the pain in her voice. For the most part, it seemed that she took her predicament in stride, but the more time I spent with her, the more I began to realize that wasn’t the case at all. For Shadow’s sake, I hoped that they did have some way of reversing the vampire disease, as I’d heard her call it.

Clearing my throat, I voiced my doubts again. “You don’t really think this getup is going to fool real vampires do you?”

“Of course not,” she said with a roll of her eyes. “They’ll hear the blood pumping through your body before you even get in the door. But … at least you won’t go in there looking like a nerd and embarrass me.”

My eyes widened in astonishment. “Hey wait a minute Neon Girl!”

It was the first time I’d used her nickname out loud. Judging by the sour look she gave me, it was evident she didn’t like it. Well that was just too bad. If she could call me a nerd, I could call her Neon Girl.

“I spent $200 on this stuff because you said it was essential to the plan.”

“Well it is!” she stated in her own defense. “Just imagine how he’s going to drool when he sees you.”

Oh no way!

She didn’t actually think that I should go out of my way to attract some phantom guy, who may or may not actually give a damn. Taking a closer look in the mirror, I decided that it really wasn’t too bad. At the very least, I did look different.

Oh well, it worked for me.

I decided that since I’d already spent the money on the clothes, I might as well go through with it. “So let’s get this done then,” I told her.

* * *

I willed myself to take a deep breath, despite the fact that every dirty little detail of my life was flashing before my eyes. We stood at the top of a narrow concrete staircase that led to the lower level of a brown brick building. The place looked like it was at least a thousand years old, give or take a few hundred years. There was no way to see inside, but I knew from the loud music that there was some serious partying going on.

Nothing made me cringe worse than a house band doing a major injustice to an AC/DC song, and that’s exactly what was happening. Oh well, there was no helping it. I had serious doubts that the band would listen to any critique from a side of beef, marinated in a light - flowery perfume, which is exactly what I felt like as we descended the stairs.

If the music weren’t loud enough to give me a migraine, the flashing strobe lights would probably do the job.

“Take it easy,” Shadow whispered. “If I’m right, about the time you are being sized up as a potential feeder, he’ll show up and save the day.”

“Or night,” I put in needlessly.

The strobe lights made the crowd appear to be moving in slow motion, which only added to the sinister atmosphere. At first glance there didn’t seem to be anything particularly different about the Sundown Club. There was no doubt that it had a definite Goth tone - the interior of the club was decorated like some dungeon of torture. There were metal cages, with a number of people that appeared to be locked inside of them.