Vampire U (3 page)

I blinked.  "Could we 
speak?
  You didn't answer my question."

Mander smiled an indulgent smile that revealed a dimple on the left side of his perfect lips.  My God, he was handsome.  "I came to the journalism building to find you, yes.  Did you get my invitation?"

I remembered the crimson paper airplane that never should have flown to a third-story window.  "Yeah," I said.  "But how did you get it up that high?  There's no way..."

His mysterious smile cut me off, and the deep, distant light in his eyes seemed to glimmer with amusement, as though he knew something that I didn't.  As though he knew 
everything
 that I didn't.  A girl could get lost in those eyes as easily as slipping into a dark forest, caught up in the beauty of a moonlit night right up until the moment that she realizes she's lost, and the wolves are closing in.

With a force of will, I tore my eyes away from his and looked down at his suit.  He wore a vest beneath a double-breasted coat, its rich vermillion texture matched his tie perfectly.  I'd known plenty of oddball guys who thought outdated fashions made them look distinctive, but this was different somehow.  On Mander Deslauriers, the suit seemed right.

"Why are you all dressed up?  Are you a business major or something?"  I asked.

"One must always look presentable," Mander said, sliding past my question as deftly as a thief slipping through an open window.  "Will you be joining us for the Equinox Ball, Danielle?"

I rolled my eyes and groaned.  It seemed like everyone wanted me to go to this damned party.  Morgan.  Jacob.  And now this dapper - if a bit odd - frat boy who had somehow managed to invite me in the strangest possible way.  "I don't know," I said.  "Maybe.  Why did you invite me, anyway?  We don't even know each other."

I felt the pull of Mander's eyes, as subtle and persistent as the moon pulling the tide.  For lack of anything better to look at, I stared at the bulky portfolio in my arms and flicked my thumbnail back and forth over the binder's seam.  Silence stretched out between us, and I got the impression that Mander was waiting for me to meet his gaze.  That pull seemed to stronger the longer he waited, but that had to be my imagination.

"I invited you because you intrigue me," he said softly.

His words startled me, and I looked up.  "Huh?" I said, eloquent as ever.

"From the moment I saw you, I knew I had to meet you.  Hundreds of students will attend our Equinox Ball, but there will be time for us to speak.  In private."

A chill ran up my spine, and I blushed.  "Look, you're cute, but if you think I'm just going to..."

"No," he said.  "Nothing like that.  But Romanus is a strange place, and you would do well to learn more about it sooner rather than later.  I can't say more.  Not here.  Come to the Ball."  He looked past my shoulder and frowned, and I turned to follow his eyes.

In the flood of students pouring through the hallway, I thought I saw something strange in the dim light far down the hall - a wavering shadow there and gone in an instant.  But when I blinked, it was gone.  I turned back to Mander, but he'd disappeared.  I stood on my toes and craned my neck to see past the crowd, but there was no sign of him.  The noise of the crowd came rushing back, and the empty space around me closed in.  People about to be late for their first class bumped and jostled me, but I barely noticed.

My whole mind was on Mander Deslauriers.  I knew I was being manipulated, but Mander had pressed all the right buttons to pique my curiosity, as if he'd known me long enough to understand that I simply couldn't let a question go unanswered.  As though in a trance, I turned back toward the 
Scryer
 office.

Jacob had fixed the printer; now I found him hunched over an ancient PC, squinting at something on the monitor over his glasses.

"I'm going to the party," I told him.  He practically leapt out of his chair, and his face lit up with a triumphant grin.  I didn't mean to stay, but Jacob held me there with his enthusiasm, and I missed my first class as he plotted and schemed to figure out everything I should try to learn at Beta House.

The week passed slowly, with mornings full of dull classes and afternoons occupied by studying.  I would have been content to curl up with a book in our room at night, but Morgan would hear none of it.  Every evening, she found some reason to drag me out with her.  Twice we met other girls, and I sat quietly while Morgan chattered with them about the upcoming Rush Week.  Other times, it was just the two of us, and I felt more comfortable being myself.  On Thursday night, we shared an enormous pizza and several Dr. Peppers at a local dive, giggling about movies, our professors, and life in general.  Morgan still gushed with excitement over the upcoming sorority rush events, but this time I didn't have to feign interest when she began talking about Beta House.  I had a story to write, and I felt only a pang of regret at what Morgan might say when I published it.

"I'm so glad we're going together!  It's going to be awesome," she told me.  She had beamed when I told her I would come with her to the Equinox Ball.

"Can't wait," I said, trying to sound sincere.  I glanced at the clock on my phone.  "I gotta go, Morgan.  My lecture hall starts in fifteen."

Morgan rolled her eyes.  "What were you thinking, taking a class this late at night?"

"I was thinking I could avoid morning classes and sleep late a couple nights a week," I said.

My roommate conceded the point with a shrug, then popped the last bit of crust into her mouth and washed it down with soda.

We were running late, so I had my Morgan drop me off at the liberal arts building and drive my car back to the dorm.  When I hurried to the lecture hall, a tenured professor named Dr. Lewis Spelling was pontificating about white male privilege from the front of a sparsely populated lecture hall.  The lights were dim, and several heads nodded as students fought a losing battle against slumber.  I slipped into a seat near the back of the auditorium and tried to get out my laptop without making too much noise.

While I set up, someone slipped into the seat next to me, an odd choice given the number of empty seats.  Then I looked up and found Mander Deslauriers beside me.  As usual, he was immaculately dressed, this time in charcoal gray with a shirt the color of an evening sky and a paisley necktie.  All at once, my heart leapt into my throat.  I sat up straighter and tried not to think about how I looked.  My frizzy hair was pulled back in a lazy ponytail, and I wore a ratty old polo and khaki shorts with sneakers, hardly the wardrobe to impress a guy from Beta House.

"I didn't know sociology was a requirement for journalism majors," he said in a low voice.  Professor Spelling cut him a sharp glare.

"It's important to understand how people behave in societies," I whispered.  "The best stories are about people, when you boil it down."  I arched an eyebrow.  "What's a business major doing here?"

Mander grinned.  "Electives.  I thought this would be an easy A."

That surprised me, and I turned to meet his dark eyes.  "There are easier A's than this."

He looked back at me with steady eyes that held my gaze.  I hoped Professor Spelling wasn't watching.  "Perhaps, but I like the company in this class.  I'm glad you're attending the Ball tomorrow."

I gave him a shy smile.  "My roommate's idea.  I'm not much for parties."  I paused, frowning.  "Hey, when we talked earlier this week, you said there were strange things going on at Romanus.  What did you mean by that?"

"Let's discuss that tomorrow night."  Like his dress and his dark eyes, Mander's mysterious smile belonged to a man far older, as though weariness and pain and worn down its sharp corners.  That smile made him oddly attractive in a way his severe good looks couldn't.

To hide the color rising in my cheeks, I turned to look back at the professor, who was grimacing at Mander and me without slowing the pace of his diatribe about how white Europeans had destroyed the world with their imperial oppression.  "I don't think this guy has a soft spot for frat boys," I whispered to Mander.

Mander frowned and nodded.  "You have a point.  If I didn't know better, I'd think he was blaming Beta House for everything from slavery to 9/11.  I should probably drop this class."  He sat silently for a moment, listening, then nodded.  "Yes, I think I will.  Care to take a walk with me?"

I blinked.  "What?  
Now?"

Mander stood.  "Why not?  Surely you don't think he's going to say anything important."  I followed his gesture and realized the professor had stopped speaking.  He stared up at Mander - and me - with a look of apoplectic rage.

"Looks like I'm dropping this class too," I murmured, slamming my laptop's lid shut.  Oh well; sleeping in was overrated.  It would be nice to have nights free to work at the 
Scryer.

Mander scooped up my computer bag with a grin, then offered me his arm.  Stifling a laugh at the unabashedly old-fashioned gesture, I slipped my hand inside his elbow and let him lead me out of the auditorium.

A full moon hung over the campus, casting everything in a silvery light.  We strolled along the sidewalk beneath the twisted branches of ancient oaks.  My heart fluttered with excitement.  I didn't care about Mander's fraternity, but he was far more handsome than anyone I'd dated before, and while his formality might have seemed corny on any other man, he wore it naturally.

He seemed content to remain silent as we walked, but my nerves made me jumpy.  I needed conversation.  "Where are you from?" I asked.

"I was born in Europe, but I've been in the US a long time," he said.

"Oh?  Were you an army brat?"

"Something like that," he said, staring out into the night with a faraway look in his eyes.  Before I could ask for more specifics, he deflected my question with one of his own.  "And what brought you here from Chicago?"

"Scholarship money," I said simply.  "Romanus doesn't have the best journalism school, but I didn't want to be stuck with a big student loan."

Mander's eyebrows climbed his forehead.  "I admire your long-term thinking.  And what is it about journalism that appeals to you, Danielle?"

These weren't the questions of a frat boy who wanted in my pants.  I felt like I was being interviewed for a job.  "I want to make a difference," I said.  "Good journalism is about rooting out the truth, even when powerful people want to keep it hidden away.  'Sunlight is the best disinfectant,' as someone once said."

Mander threw back his head and laughed.  "Louis Brandeis," Mander said.  "Supreme Court Justice in the early 20th Century.  And truer words were never spoken."

I turned to him in surprise.  "You know your history!"

He shrugged.  "More than most.  I admire your sense of direction, Danielle.  I've spent my whole life unsure of what to do with myself."

That sounded a bit morose for a college student.  "Sometimes it's hard to know what you're meant to do until the right circumstances come along," I said.

He looked at me.  "Or the right person."  He let his words hang heavy in the air, and we walked on in silence.  Did he mean me?  I couldn't tell, and I was afraid to assume.

"This is my dorm," I said, both relieved and disappointed that we'd reached the end of our walk.  "I guess I'll see you tomorrow night?"

Mander smiled down at me.  "I look forward to it."

I hesitated for half a heartbeat, wondering if he would kiss me, hoping for it, yet afraid, as if his kiss would carry me over some threshold and into unexplored terrain.  But Mander Deslauriers just smiled and turned away, and I stood in front of the dorm watching him glide off into the night.

"There it is!" Morgan cried, pointing past my nose at a high wall of stone covered in crawling vines.  A gatehouse stood near the street corner, and I pulled in behind a line of waiting cars.  As we waited for our turn to enter, I tried not to gawk.  This was no simple frat house.  The lot where Beta House resided took up an entire city block in the oldest part of Baton Rouge.  Massive moss-draped oak trees loomed behind the fence, ancient and twisted.  I couldn't even see the mansion yet, but the mortared rock wall around the property looked like an army of masons had labored to build it.

"Betas must have some seriously rich alumni," I said.

"Isn't it amazing?"  Morgan's knees rocked eagerly back and forth, almost touching my dashboard.  Her long legs barely folded into my Civic, but her tan thighs looked positively stunning beneath a scandalously short red skirt - red for Beta House, according to Morgan, who put far too much thought into these things.  She'd had her hair done, and blonde curls framed her face in a cascade of ringlets that hovered on the line between elegant and sultry.  From what I'd heard of frat guys, the Betas would descend on her like a pack of wolves.  Then again, Mander was a Beta, and he'd confounded my every expectation.

Mander Deslauriers.  I had so many questions about him, but when I pictured his handsome face, I had a hard time concentrating.  Nothing seemed as important as simply seeing him again.  Perhaps I should have put more effort into my appearance tonight.

At least I'd let Morgan talk me into wearing one of the numerous cocktail dresses she had stuffed into her tiny dorm room closet.  The dress had felt a bit loose in the chest until Morgan worked some magic with a couple of safety pins.   I had to admit that the tight little black number looked good on me now, at least as long as I didn't stand too close to Morgan.  The glow of a candle is hard to see in sunlight.

"Remember," Morgan said, "Watch your drink.  You don't want some guy slipping you a roofie."  She grinned suddenly and gave me a playful wink.  "Unless he's really hot!"

I knew Morgan was kidding, but when the car in front of us pulled away, a dark foreboding came over me.  I wanted to jam the car into reverse and drive away.  I wondered suddenly if the imposing wall around Beta House was made to keep people out... or in.

But Morgan would be crushed if I chickened out, and besides, Mander was in there.  I tried to ignore my sense of impending doom as I pulled to a stop at the gatehouse.  A young man stepped toward my door, and his broad shoulders threatened to bust out of his white Oxford shirt as he leaned down.  His bright blue eyes glimmered in the steamy Baton Rouge night as he tapped on my window.

I turned to my new roommate as I rolled the window down.  "Morgan, let's watch out for each other in here, okay?"  I knew how nervous I sounded, but I didn't care.

Morgan laughed.  "Don't worry about me, honey."  She shifted her eyes past me to the guy leaning on the edge of my door.  Her eyes sparkled as she met his.  "I'm here to get wild," she said.

I turned and saw a wolfish grin spread on his face as he and Morgan stared at one another.  His eyes reminded me of a stalking cat, full of barely-contained aggression.  I had to force myself not to shrink back.

"Evening, ladies," he said.  His thick southern drawl drew the last word out so it sounded like 
lay dees.
  "Invitation and ID, please."

"Tight security," I mumbled, but I handed him the red invitation that had sailed through our window, then we showed him our Romanus University student ID cards.  He studied both carefully for a few seconds, then nodded.

"Welcome to Beta House's Equinox Ball, ladies.  Just leave your phones with me, and you can go on in."

"Uh, no?" I said, shocked that he would even ask.  I started to protest more, but Morgan's arm shot past my face as she handed him her smartphone.

"Thanks," he told her, fixing his predatory eyes on her again.  "I'm only watching the gate for a little while longer.  Name's Vic."

"Nice to meet you, Vic.  Why don't you find me inside?"  In full flirt mode, Morgan leaned over the armrest to expose her generous cleavage.  Vic's eyes locked on the canyon of supple, tan skin like two homing missiles.

"Uh, I'm not giving you my phone," I said.

"Everybody has to," he said.  "Betas like to party, but we keep a low profile, you know?  Trust me; you don't want pictures of what goes on here ending up on Facebook any more than we do."

I'd seen enough regrettable photos on the internet to know he was probably right, but this seemed extreme.  Besides, Jacob had urged me to snap a few surreptitious photos for my article.  At least the phone confiscation would make a juicy detail.  With a sigh, I dug my phone out of my purse and gave it up.

"Don't worry, darlin'," he said, just oozing southern charm.  "You'll get it back when you leave."  He wrote my name on a piece of tape, stuck it on the back of the phone, and tucked it in a cubbyhole on the gatehouse wall.  "Y'all have fun!" he called, then pushed a button inside the door.  The big wrought-iron gate swung open on a slow, ponderous arc, and I eased the Civic through the gap and into another world.

***

Beta House was a stately mansion of Old World stone with narrow gothic windows like the arrow slits of some ancient fortress.  Spotlights concealed in the landscaping illuminated its facade, and no trees grew within a hundred feet of the house.  We followed a winding drive past the mansion to a lot full of cars.  Sexy young co-eds were strutting toward the back of the mansion in droves, dressed to kill in tight outfits, heavy makeup, and high heels that made their legs and asses look perfect.  I'd never felt so plain in my life.

"Not many guys here," I said.

"They're all inside," Morgan said.  "Betas are pretty exclusive.  They don't hang out with a lot of non-Beta guys."

So they don't have to share girls like you.
  I kept my thoughts to myself.  Morgan was too excited, and I didn't want to sound negative.  We got out of the car and joined the throng of women hurrying to the mansion to throw themselves at the Greek Royalty of Romanus University.  I felt ridiculous being among them and tried to remind myself that I was only here for a story.  
And Mander Deslauriers.
  I hated to admit it, but I could hardly get him out of my mind.

We climbed a long flight of wide marble steps to a spacious patio at the rear of the house.  Music thrummed from hidden speakers and a crowd of beautiful young people milled, drinks in their hands, their inhibitions left at the gate with their cell phones.

My first college party almost overwhelmed me in the first few seconds.  I was used to high school parties full of awkward teenagers clustered in nervous groups segregated by gender.

This was Gomorrah.

Bodies rocked against each other to the throbbing music.  The relentless, pumping techno beat matched my heart rate, which quickened as my eyes flitted from person to person in the pulsing red light.  Girls grinded up against young men who could have passed for fashion models.  Hands were on asses, breasts pressed against chests, and bodies rubbed together in a way that suggested that more than one dress would be on the floor of an upstairs bedroom before the night ended.

Morgan slipped away from me almost immediately, melting into the crowd with a delighted squeal as she saw someone she knew.  
So much for watching out for each other,
 I thought.  For a moment, I considered following her, but that would make me look like what I was, a nerdy, insecure fifth wheel.  But I couldn't just stand there, the lone wallflower in a garden of sensual dancers.  Instead, I worked my way through the crowd toward a wide set of French doors.

But if I thought things might be tamer inside the house, I was quickly proven wrong.  I opened the door to find a redhead whose innocent young face made her look like a girl fresh off the farm.  But there was nothing innocent about what she was doing on a broad leather sofa - straddling a Beta who looked like a young Brad Pitt.  He had hiked up her dress almost to the top of her thighs, and her head rolled back, pouty lips parted and panting as the Brad Pitt clone kissed and licked her neck.  His hands squeezed her ass, then slid lower.

I mumbled something that sounded like "excuse me" as I hurried past, blushing.  They didn't even notice me, and I made my way down a long, winding hall where every dark corner held a horny couple - or trio - oblivious to the world around them.  Dress straps hung carelessly from bare shoulders.  Hands cupped breasts, and tongues explored mouths.

I turned my head to gawk at a young woman doing something with her legs that shouldn't have been physically possible in front of a man who grinned at her from the shadows.  Instead of watching where I was going, I bumped into someone and staggered back as though I'd hit a brick wall.

"Sorry, I..."  My voice died in my throat as I looked up past a broad chest into a pair of hard green eyes below a mane of jet-black hair.

The towering Beta fixed me with a ferocious gaze, and I felt like a mouse cringing beneath a diving hawk.  There was something darkly primitive about him, and for a moment, I thought he would simply throw me over his shoulder and carry me off into the dark house.  Instead, he spread his lips in a wide grin that didn't touch his eyes.

"No problem, sugar," he said in a syrupy drawl.  "Name's Alex."  He stuck out a hand, and I glance down at a forearm roped with muscle.  Not wanting to appear rude, I took it.  His skin felt cool, almost cold, and a shiver ran through my body as he enfolded my slender fingers in his.  "Danielle," I told him.

He didn't seem to be listening.  Lust-filled eyes flickered down toward what little cleavage I displayed, making no effort to hide his interest.  "How about a dance?"

"No thanks, I'm supposed to meet a friend," I lied.

Alex chuckled as I squeezed past him, and I felt his eyes follow me deeper into the house.  That shiver ran up my spine again, as though the devil had just walked over my grave.

I grew more and more nervous as I made my way down a narrow hall, wondering what kind of depraved gathering I'd stumbled into, but then I stepped out of the dark, claustrophobic hallway and into the airy, open space of the grand ballroom.  Dozens of Betas and young women mingled here, but the music was softer, and the young men and women conducted themselves with an air of sophistication and restraint.  The hedonistic display I'd just walked through felt like a misremembered dream, and the music from the rear of the house was just a soft buzz.  When my eyes fell on the bar, I breathed a sigh of relief.  I needed something to take the edge off.

The bartender was yet another Beta brother, but he flashed a charming smile as I approached.  "Get you something?"

"Red wine, please," I said.

He nodded and poured me a glass of something dark and lustrous.  "Enjoy."

I drained half the glass in a single swig, and the sharp, dry flavor hit my taste buds.  When the gentle warmth of a light buzz rushed to my brain, I let out a little sigh and started to wander around the big ballroom, my eyes gliding from couple to couple.  Even putting aside the immense wealth, the tight security, and the dozens of girls who had thrown their inhibitions to the wind, there was something 
wrong
 here that I couldn't quite put my finger on.

I tried to compose a story in my head, but a bunch of people making out and dancing close together was hardly newsworthy on a college campus.  I needed something meatier.  Mander had insisted on talking to me when we'd met in the journalism building, but he refused to say why.  He'd suggested that strange things were happening at Romanus University, dangling the hint in front of me like a piece of red meat.  Could he help me find the missing pieces of a puzzle I could barely see?

Something pulled my eyes up to the room's high ceilings, where a dark fresco depicted erotic scenes that looked uncomfortably similar to the couples groping in the halls.  A long balcony spanned the room's perimeter, its walkway concealed in the shadows behind a rail of wrought iron.

Standing at the rail, Mander stared down at the party, immaculate in a black suit and a silk tie that stood out like a vivid red slash.  When I saw him, a wave of intense relief swept over me, like a woman drowning in dark water when her flailing hand grasps the side of a lifeboat.  I immediately felt a flare of irritation; I wasn't some moon-eyed girl to fall head over heels for the first frat boy to pay attention to her.  But Mander wasn't like the rest of these guys.  Or so I told myself.

He turned his gaze to me a moment later, as though he'd only been waiting for me to notice him.  Pinpoints of light from the chandeliers sparkled in his dark eyes, but his smile was warm and welcoming.  He gestured toward the far end of the ballroom, where I saw a narrow staircase tucked into a dark corner.

I made a beeline for the stairs, but Alex, the tall brute from the hallway, blocked my path.  "If you're going up there, you need a brother to accompany you," he said.

I swallowed, trying not to show fear, but Alex seemed to sense my unease, to feed on it.  He stepped closer, filling my nostrils with a primal odor that made me think of lust and violence.  A wild thought flashed through my head - an image of me ripping off Alex's clothes and straddling him as his thick fingers tore at her dress.  I blinked, shocked that such a thought would even occur to me.  It felt as though someone else had hijacked my brain.

Alex glared at me, and his lip curled up in a snarl as I stepped back.  He closed in until we stood just inches apart, our bodies almost touching.  His eyes burned with intensity, locked on mine like a cobra about to strike its prey.  "I could take you up there," Alex said, his voice soft and soothing.  "Or we could go someplace else... someplace private."

"I..."  My voice sounded faraway, numb.  I wanted to say yes, to let this big frat boy take me wherever he wanted.  Do whatever he wanted.  Then another voice cut like a razor through the cobwebs that lay over my brain.

"She's with me, Alex."

A dark cloud of rage rolled across Alex's face as he turned to the staircase.  Mander Deslauriers stood on the landing, his hands behind his back.  Mander's relaxed posture reminded me of a panther lounging on a branch as he faced his larger fraternity brother, but his eyes were sharp, hard, and steady.