An Unattractive Vampire (23 page)

“She would,” said the Doctor with increasing fervor. “She would have you believe that you were fine the way you were, that you did not need to change. She, who was so surprised by your appearance. Why so surprised? Because she could not imagine you as something better. She could not see you for who, for what you truly were all along.”

Vermillion glared at Sara. She shifted, looking uncomfortable.

The Doctor’s voice became soft and resigned. “She would hold you down, my dear. Make you common and ordinary and, yes, probably fat again. But it is up to you. If you are content with being merely Rusty, go with her. If not, Vermillion is expected inside the club.”

Vermillion, not Rusty, hung up the phone.

• •

The Doctor Lord Talby put down his cell phone.

“Crisis averted,” he said, watching the security monitors. There was no sound, but a picture was worth a thousand words and the pain of the fat girl’s tears were worth their weight in gold to him.

There was a knock at his door. “Enter,” the Doctor called.

The blond vampiress entered the room the same way she entered the dreams of so many teenage boys—perfectly. Not a hair out of place, not a smudge of makeup astray. Her clothes clung to her body as if they were her skin. Jeans accentuated her legs and hips when she walked, her shirt doing the same for her breasts and abs. The leather jacket was purely for attitude. Talby sat back, admiring the fine job he had done with her.

“Nora, how wonderful it is to see you,” he greeted. “What can I do for you?”

“She wants to see you,” Nora interrupted.

The Doctor frowned. “She has a problem with the accommodations? I was very clear that, as our guest, she be provided with anything she might require.”

“She says what she most requires are answers,” explained Nora.

He stood and stepped up to his mirror and gave himself a once-over. It wasn’t actually a mirror. They didn’t show his reflection. It was a plasma-screen TV with a sensor in it that played a computer-generated rendition of his image whenever it was triggered. He couldn’t check his hair in it, but it did allow him a sense of normalcy. And vanity. It was, after all, a very good likeness.

“As her host, if she wishes to see me, I am at her beck and call,” he said, adjusting his tie unnecessarily. “Please, show her in.”

Nora nodded and, with a perfect sway to her hips, left the room. Talby smiled. They had worked on that sway for nearly a month, trying to get it right. Now it was second nature to her. He was very proud.

The Doctor Lord Talby spent the next few minutes making small adjustments to the room. A file placed here, a portrait adjusted there. He made sure both tea and coffee were available and that the cookies were soft and moist. Small things, really, but it had always been his philosophy that it was the small things that count most.

Talby was straightening his suit when Nora knocked again.

“Hello,” he said, opening the door. “You must be Amanda Linske. Please come in.” Amanda stepped inside. Nora tried to follow, but Talby blocked her entrance. “If you would wait outside, please, Nora.”

“Actually, I’d rather she stayed,” said Amanda.

“Oh, it’s fine. With our hearing, it’s like she’s here with us,” he said, shutting out the blond vampiress. “Besides, you two see so much of each other.”

“Because she’s my jailor,” interrupted Amanda, crossing her arms.

The Doctor ignored her remark. “I’d like to get to know you a bit better myself,” he rolled on. “Please have a seat. Cookie?”

“No, thanks,” replied Amanda, sitting down in the chair offered her. “Shouldn’t you call them biscuits?”

The Doctor laughed. “Yes, of course. Sadly, not everyone has such a grasp on English slang. Most just look at me and wonder why I would offer them a dinner roll with their tea. Speaking of—”

“No, thanks,” she repeated.

“You don’t mind if I—” he asked.

“That’s fine,” she said.

“Much thanks,” he said, fixing himself a cup of tea. “I have tried to assimilate to this country and this time, but sadly I still can’t stand coffee. Every decade, I try to make the switch, but . . . old habits and all that.”

Amanda leaned back, taking the time to study him while he busied himself. He smiled as he stirred. She thought it was a pleasant, handsome smile. There was not a trace of vampire underneath—no fangs, no bloodlust, no look of nefarious intent—just a man making pleasant small talk with her. He moved his chair around the desk and sat across from her.

“Ah, that’s better,” he said, continuing to stir his tea. “First, let me thank you for the information you gave me about Yulric Bile. It was most useful.”

“Well, it pays to give one’s kidnappers what they want,” she retorted. It was much easier to put on a brave face in this vampire’s lair. He, at least, looked like a person.

The Doctor’s calculated smile faded into a calculated frown. “I apologize again for this inconvenience, Ms. Linske. It was not my intention to bring you here. I’m afraid my colleagues”—Amanda heard
minions
in the way he said
colleagues
—“just panicked when . . . Well, you were there.”

“Yeah, I was,” she snapped. “I was there when your gang broke into my house and threatened me and my brother.”

The Doctor raised an eyebrow. “I was under the impression that you had given them permission to enter.”

“Not through my windows,” she said.

“Ah,” he intoned. “We shall pay for any damages to your home or property. In fairness, we were in pursuit of a very dangerous creature at the time.” Amanda scoffed at him.

“Oh, come now. You can hardly blame us,” said the Doctor very calmly. “After what happened in New York? After we learned he had attacked patients at your hospital?”

She gave him the steely glare reserved for when you don’t want to admit someone has a point.

“Naturally, we assumed you and your brother were enthralled or otherwise endangered by the creature you unleashed and thought it best to intervene before
it
could do any more damage.”

“Wait, who said I unleashed him?” Amanda asked, taken aback.

“Didn’t you?” replied the Doctor. Amanda said nothing. “I’ll take that as a yes?”

“How did you know?” she said quietly.

“Retrospection,” he explained. “Since we now know you weren’t under his control, the only reason I can think of for why you would allow such a monstrosity to stay in your home is out of some misguided feeling of responsibility. Ergo, you must have released him. Simple. Incidentally, I am curious how you discovered the whereabouts of our Mr. Bile. I was unaware of his existence, and I do keep an eye out for that sort of thing.”

Amanda thought long and hard before answering. In the end, she thought telling the truth couldn’t do her any harm, but it might buy her some goodwill, or at least, some quid pro quo. “My brother.”

“Ah yes, your brother. Very . . . thorough little lad, I hear.” The Doctor’s smile faltered. Just for a second, and ever so slightly, but it did.

“Yeah, he is,” she agreed, pleased to finally see a flaw in his infuriating calm. “He had a book. Something he ‘borrowed’ from the historical society.”

“
The Journal of Erasmus Martin
,” the Doctor said, finishing her thought. It was not a question. He knew.

“Yes,” Amanda confirmed.

There had been a slight hesitation that held in it the question, how do you know that? He smiled, picking up on that. “I have been looking into the history of Mr. Bile since the incident in New York. The history of your whole town, in fact. Quite fascinating,” he explained. He left out the part about searching the Internet for the Shepherd’s Crook Historical Society’s website. Best to keep the mystery and awe.

“So,” he continued, “you discovered the resting place of an ancient and evil vampire and decided to dig him up in the hopes he would turn you. I must say, Amanda, while your actions are incredibly foolish, they do boast of initiative.”

Amanda gaped, dumbstruck. She hadn’t told
anyone
about that. Well, except a coma patient, but who was she going to tell?

“Why so surprised?” the Doctor asked. “You’ve been camping out at our clubs for over a year now, trying to get our attention.”

“I—I thought you hadn’t noticed,” she said, her brain bogged down by this sudden influx of information.

“My dear Amanda,” he said, getting up and striding over to his desk, “we notice everyone. Even those who don’t know they want to be noticed yet. Now, where is your file? Ah, here we are.”

He picked up one of the folders from his desk and opened it. Had Amanda’s brain been working properly, it would have alerted her to the fact that he had quite obviously taken her record from the top of the stack. However, the logical and cynical parts of her brain were currently closed due to revelations, and any and all thoughts were being rerouted directly through emotions, just as The Doctor Lord Talby had intended.

“You’re parents died two years ago?” he asked, intentionally getting it wrong.

“Three,” she said in a monotone.

“Ah yes,” he replied. He pretended to correct the paper in front of him. “Yes, three years. The death of any parent is quite sad, but both at the same time . . . A car accident, it says here.” She nodded.

“Nineteen, and both parents dead. That must have been very hard for you,” said the Doctor. Amanda did not reply. “At that age, you should think yourself immortal. That way you can do great and impossible things. Or at least, very unwise things. To be so suddenly and rudely awakened to the reality of one’s mortality . . .”

He faded out, letting his words hang in the air for a moment before giving a shrewd, knowing smile. “But that wasn’t it, was it? No, you also have that brother of yours to take care of. What would become of him if something happened to you? Who would take him in? Keep him in check? Care for him? I doubt very much any family would adopt such a strange little boy with all those potential serial-killer interests?”

“I can’t die!” she blurted out, the dam of emotion finally breaking. “I see it every day, car accidents, cancers. Three months ago, a kid younger than me fell down dead from an aneurism. Out of the blue, he was dead.

“It can happen just like that. It did happen. Our parents were fine—happy, healthy. Then they left for a John Mellencamp concert, and we were alone. If something happens to me . . .” Amanda had wanted this meeting for so long, to plead her case to the vampires, and now, she found all her reasons, all her well-thought-out arguments were gone, replaced simply by the core of her need. “I can’t die. I just can’t.”

Perched on the edge of his desk, he leaned forward, and in his most sickeningly empathetic tone said, “What you’ve done, everything you’ve done, is quite admirable. Really, it is. You should be commended.”

He paused, relishing the opportunity to use his favorite word.

“However . . . I’m afraid it’s really not that simple. You see, you are already so . . .” He paused. He had almost gone too far. He backed off what he had been about to say and tried a new tact. “Becoming a vampire is a transformation in spirit, which you have in spades, and also of body. We take what we are—blemished, imperfect, human—and we change. We become perfect. We become beautiful. But the transformation between the two states is important. It gives us strength. Tests our resolve and our dedication.”

“I will do anything,” she told him.

“The transformation I speak of is not just physical. It is not just about good looks and supernatural powers. It is also a transition between two states—life and unlife. You must fully surrender one to enter into the other. You must sacrifice.”

“I’ve given up everything—my friends, my future, everything,” Amanda argued. “There’s nothing left.”

“Except your brother,” he said.

Amanda’s heart sank.

“He is a part of your mortal life and, as such, would need to be shed before beginning your immortal existence. Now, I’m not infallible. I’ve been wrong before. You might be splendidly suited for vampirism, in which case, I would be more than willing to turn you, right here, right now. You would just have to agree never to see your brother ever again.”

It was tempting. To be a vampire. To live forever. To join the young and beautiful creatures of the night in their carefree world of adventure and romance. However awful a person it may have made her, she considered it.

But . . . Simon.

“No.” It was all she could bring herself to say, and even then, it was a barely audible croak.

Talby smiled. “I understand. But you see now, don’t you? Your reason for wanting to become a vampire is the very reason you cannot be one.”

Amanda couldn’t respond. The flood of grief and despair she’d been holding back for three years, with plans and work and responsibilities, was finally overwhelming her. She could not move. She could not think. She could not even muster up the energy to cry.

The Doctor thought it glorious.

“We will keep you no longer than is necessary.” He gently ushered her toward the door. “I promise, once the creature Bile arrives, you will be free to return to your life.”

There was the merest hint at the phrase “such as it is,” at the end of his sentence. Amanda’s sass pushed its way up through the numbness she displayed. “So I’m bait, then?” she retorted in a monotone. “That’s ever so polite.”

“There’s the fierce and independent woman we all want to see,” the Doctor replied, giving her a condescending little punch on the chin. “You just go back to your room and have a good cry. I’m sure you’ll feel better afterward. Maybe with the help of some chocolates or some alcohol. Or some combination thereof.”

At the door, he handed her off to Nora, who gently embraced her new friend. She’d obviously been eavesdropping.

“Nora, see that she has some of the chocolate liqueurs,” he instructed. The Doctor Lord Talby watched them go before shutting his door. He abhorred having to lie. It wasn’t the sort of thing a gentleman should do but, in this case, was necessary. After all, how could he explain to the girl that the only reason he didn’t want to change her was because she was already beautiful? Even thinking it sounded callous.