Moon Shadow (Vampire for Hire Book 11) (16 page)

Chapter Thirty-seven

Kingsley, my hotshot attorney boyfriend, wasn’t such a hotshot these days.

These days, fewer and fewer scumbags passed through his office, and that was all right by me. Early on, I had been having a real hard time respecting him. Kingsley, to his credit, got the picture and cleaned up his business. By doing so, he took fewer high-profile cases, and, as such, found himself less and less in the spotlight. Again, that was all right by me, especially since I had an aversion to spotlights, and tended to not show up in pictures.

I waited outside his office while he consulted with a client. Kingsley charged $1,000 an hour consulting fees. I did the math. That would be $8,000 a day. I did some more fuzzy math. Over a $175,000 a month. Or $2.2 million a year. Not a bad living.

I’m in the wrong racket
, I thought.

So, while I digested the fact that my boyfriend earned more in one hour than I would all week, I found myself in his lobby, flipping through a
People
magazine, occasionally tearing pictures of one Kardashian after another. Funny how the tears were only on the Kardashians. Silly, sharp nails.

I tossed the magazine aside and smiled at Kingsley’s latest secretary. A man this time. A gay man. He glanced at me occasionally from behind his desk, working the phones and tapping into his computer and letting people know, in no uncertain terms, that Kingsley Fulcrum was a very busy man and they would be extremely lucky if he eventually called them back.

Kingsley’s office was, in fact, fully staffed with interns and assistants and clerks. Most were youngish. Some seemed like career assistants. Many seemed bright, and most seemed stressed out. I wondered if Kingsley was a good boss. Did he give them a hard time when they needed days off? Did he pressure them into working late nights, weekends, forsaking kids and family and friends? Was he jovial? Was he in good spirits? Did he joke with them, or laugh at their jokes? Did he take the time to get to know them? Or was he an asshole boss?

Kingsley could be very serious. He had to be. He fought to keep his clients out of jail. He fought to make their stories known. As such, he was an investigator himself, and so were some of his staff, digging deep into police reports, interviewing witnesses, anything they needed to do to punch holes in a prosecutor’s case. Yes, serious stuff. Lives were on the line. Truth had to be discerned. Laws followed, laws bent. Loopholes discovered. Meetings after meetings.

Kingsley, I knew, loved the courtroom. He had a flair for it. I had sat in on a number of his cases. No one, but no one, could take their eyes off him. His own amber irises were hypnotic, and he knew it, and he used them to his advantage. Was he controlling the jury? I didn’t know. Could he read their minds and know what they were thinking? Maybe, although he never admitted to it.

One thing I had learned was that immortal powers were not constant or consistent, even from one vampire to another vampire. And that was probably because we reflected the entity within us. The more powerful the entity, the more powerful we were. I’d also since learned that my attacking vampire—that is, the person who had transformed me—had transferred some of his own power to me. Who he was, exactly, I never did find out. At least, not yet. Additionally, one’s own bloodline could affect one’s supernatural powers. Apparently, I came from a long line of alchemists. Those who fought on the side of good, those who resisted—and subsequently banished—the dark masters. That I had been reborn throughout time as a witch, along with Allison and Millicent, was a whole other story. My current bloodline reached all the way back to a very powerful and famous alchemist, the first alchemist, Hermes Trismegistus. As such, my own family shared the bloodline, which potentially put them in danger. Why danger? Because only someone from Hermes bloodline could open the gates of hell, so to speak, and allow the dark masters back into this world.

I thought of all of this as I flipped through the next magazine, which featured, surprise, a whole new brood of Kardashians. Apparently, they were attacking us in waves.

At the far end of the hall, Kingsley’s office door opened and out stepped a lovely woman in her late fifties, dressed immaculately. She seemed upset. I could poke around her mind to see what was bothering her, but I had enough on my plate. Then again, it might be because she had just forked over a grand to sit across from Kingsley for an hour.

When the big lug saw me, he smiled wolfishly, flashing white teeth and amber eyes all the way down the hall. He waved me in. He shut the door behind me and caught my hand and pulled me into him. All in one perfectly rehearsed motion. This might not have been the first time he’d done this, with or without me. I nearly resisted, nearly pushed him away, until I felt his warmth through his custom-made long-sleeved shirt, and the raw power in his arms and chest, the love in his big, dopey eyes. Oh, and some pretzels in his shaggy beard.

I picked out the crumbs for him. “I can’t take you anywhere.”

“Food and beards go hand in hand.”

My laugh was muffled by about three or four feet of muscle and bone and hair, as I did my best to wrap my arms around him. No such luck. If there was ever a place in this world that I felt safe, it was right here, inside these arms, and covered in all that hair.

When we were done, he pulled away and offered me a drink and I considered, then shrugged. Why not? Kingsley always enjoyed his high end booze, especially here in his office. I secretly suspected the booze kept his clients talking, and kept them on the clock.

“To what do I owe this surprise?” he asked, his hands sliding suggestively down to my waist after handing me a glass of something caramel-colored. Whiskey, if I had to guess. I gripped him by his oversized gorilla thumb and pulled his hand away. I spun out of his grasp and hopped up on the corner of his leather-tooled executive desk.

“I need to know about Franklin.”

“Franklin. My Franklin?”

Interesting way of putting it,
I thought. “Yes,
your
Franklin. Who is he? What is he? How long as he been employed by you?”

He looked at me, then rocked back on his heels, his wing tips gleaming brightly under the florescent lighting. His glass hung loosely in one hand, ice clinking. “Any reason for the sudden interest?”

“I’ve always been interested. It was just never the right time and place.”

“And now is the right time and place?”

“What can I say?” I said. “I’m unpredictable.”

He raised his eyebrows that, I thought, were even bushier since the last time I’d noticed them. The man was a walking, talking hair-producing factory.

“Can I ask what led to you wanting to know?”

Which was fair enough, and so I told him about my attack the night before last, and since Kingsley couldn’t read my mind, I left out much of the gruesome details. I didn’t need to relive that again, thank God. Or get him too worked up. Yet.

As more of the details of my story emerged, Kingsley paced faster and faster in the spacious area before his desk, even shoving some of the client chairs out of his way. One toppled over. He didn’t seem to care. Okay, so much for him not getting worked up. He paced the length of his conference table. I knew he sported an even bigger conference table in another room. I was pretty certain it was attorneys who kept conference table makers in business.

When I finally got around to describing my attacker, Kingsley stopped pacing and stood before me, his shaggy hair hanging forward. A row of untouched law books lined a couple of shelves behind him. Ditch the fancy suit, strap on a broadsword and loincloth, and he could have been Conan the Librarian.

“And you’re okay now?” he asked.

“All healed,” I said. “It’s a miracle!”

“And this thing that attacked you looked like Franklin?”

“Kinda sorta. Built like him, if you know what I mean. Walked like him, too.”

He nodded, although one hairy eyebrow now seemed permanently arched at this point. That was his pissed-off face. It was also his sex face. Trust me, I’ve gotten them confused.

Kingsley nodded and drained his glass, ice cubes and all. Kingsley, I knew, didn’t take kindly to anyone—or anything—beating his girl to smithereens—and I hadn’t even give him the half of it. Little did he know how truly beaten I’d been. Anyway, judging by his arched eyebrow, and the way his hands opened and closed, there was going to be blood. Or sex. But probably blood.

He went over to his desk phone, pressed the red intercom button and told whoever was listening on the other end to hold all calls and to cancel his 2:30. He didn’t wait for an answer. At the bar, he poured himself another whiskey, this time, neat. He knocked it back, poured another, then sat across from me in one of his client chairs, which he filled to capacity and then some. He crossed one leg, absently adjusted the drape of the seam, wiggled his oversized foot once or twice, and finally began his tale:

“I’ve known Franklin for a long, long time...”

Chapter Thirty-eight

Kingsley’s tale:

As you know, Sam, I’m no spring chicken. And neither is Franklin. And neither is, I suspect, the thing that attacked you out at Lake Elsinore. Of course, Franklin would take exception to one of his brothers being called a
thing
, and, by extension, him as well.

What they are, Sam, has all the makings of a great horror novel, which Mary Shelley captured so eloquently and at such a young age, too. Did you know she wrote
Frankenstein
at age nineteen?

Right, sorry, a tangent. Truth is, I’m organizing my thoughts here. I haven’t told this story... ever, actually. This will be my first telling of my meeting with Franklin—and others of his ilk.

Yes, Sam,
ilk
is a word. And yes, old fogeys like me still use it today.

Anyway, Dr. Frankenstein was a real person. He was an instructor at a boarding school in Ramsgate, where Mary Shelley spent about six months of her time. This was as close to a formal education as Mary would ever receive. She benefited from being raised by a writer of high standing, surrounded with books and interesting people who took an active interest in her. Of course, at the age of eighteen, she would marry Percy Shelley, the great Romantic poet; indeed, he encouraged her writing and often edited it. It was while vacationing with friends on Lake Geneva one summer, Lord Byron—yes, another great Romantic poet and good friend of Percy’s—proposed that they all amuse themselves by creating ghost stories.

While the others concocted elaborate and, quite frankly, terrifying stories, Mary found herself unable to play along. In fact, she seemed distressed and disappointed in herself. What kind of young writer was she, if she couldn’t think up a simple ghost story? Percy and Byron came up with tale after tale, regaling their friends around fires, often telling their fictions late into the night. And after each night, Percy would ask his young bride if she finally had a story of her own, and, each night, with some shame, she would admit to not having one.

That is, until the fourth night.

It was then that Mary decided to not tell a ghost story; after all, no such stories were coming immediately to mind, and certainly not clever enough to compete with those of Percy and Byron, wordsmiths revered even to this day. No, she had a different tale in mind.

And it wasn’t so much a tale, as a secret. A secret she was finally ready to share.

You see, young Mary had been given a glimpse into a world of horrors—real experiments by a mad scientist she renamed Victor Frankenstein. The man was real, the name wasn’t. Indeed, she’d had the good decency to protect his privacy, even as she exposed his work.

After all, she was desperate; that is, desperate to tell a good tale. Perhaps, in hindsight, she shouldn’t have let the cat out of the bag. Or the Frankenstein monster off the operating table.

But in her need to save face, her very strong desire to be accepted by these great, great poets, she’d created for these masters a horrific tale. Except it wasn’t so much of a tale, as it was real life. It was, in fact, a nearly exact retelling of the real-world scientist she had come to know at a young age, and to love.

He was thirty, and she only sixteen. Even back then, the age difference was just too great. Mary considered eloping, until the good doctor revealed his true self... and revealed his experiments.

***

Kingsley paused and stood and refilled his glass, this time, adding a couple of perfectly cubed, perfectly clear ice cubes from a brass ice bucket. He eased next to me on edge of the desk, leaning a meaty hip against it. His aftershave smelled perfect. He stared down into his glass and continued his tale:

***

His name was, in fact, Edward Lichtenstein.

Edward was many years Mary’s senior. He was from a prestigious Swiss family; indeed, he used his family’s vast resources to build his secret laboratory... and to bribe the local constables and gravediggers and anyone else who might stand in his way.

Yes, I said gravediggers. As you can imagine, reviving the dead required corpses. Hundreds and hundreds of corpses before Lichtenstein finally saw some semblance of success.

It was during those first initial successes that the mad scientist, who was so obsessed with immortality, met young Mary Wollstonecraft. By day, Edward was a highly likable, although distant and eccentric, professor of the sciences. By night, he would hole himself up in his underground laboratory, beneath the streets of Geneva and far from prying eyes, and spend most, if not all, of his nights with the recent dead of Switzerland. Oh, his laboratory was a filthy place, from what I am to understand. Corpses stacked upon each other, rotting and bloating and stinking. But Edward loved them all. After all, each held the promise of eternal life. What was there not to love?

How do I know such things, you ask? A fair question, since I was born nearly a century after Edward and Mary’s fleeting affair. For starters, I have spoken at length with Franklin. After all, my good friend had been one of Edward Lichtenstein’s, aka Frankenstein’s, greatest successes. Additionally, I had met the man. Yes, Dr. Lichtenstein himself. Not surprisingly, he walks among us today, albeit in a very, very different physical apparatus.

Yes, yes, I’m getting ahead of myself. Thank you for pointing that out, Sam. What would I ever do without you? Yes, I suppose I would be shedding on the furniture. No, I wouldn’t be licking myself. May I continue?

Anyway, it took many months of not-so-innocent flirting at the boarding school, flirting from both student and teacher, before things progressed to anything more than a few stolen moments in school hallways, or lingering and meaningless questions after class. Neither was fully prepared—or ready—for the feelings they felt. After all, the good doctor was knee-deep in, well, knees and other body parts. Love wasn’t on his mind—reanimating corpses was. Finding a steady supply of the dead was, too. And young Mary was doing her best not to cry herself to sleep each night; after all, never had she been gone so long from her doting father.

She was lonely and not very good at making new friends. She found comfort in Lichtenstein’s lingering glances and smiles meant only for her. She was thrilled to have his attention, and wondered if other girls had experienced the same, but dared not ask. Even if it was all in her silly little head, it was still much better than the overwhelming loneliness of the boarding school. Of course, Mary had quite the imagination; indeed, she had already concocted a dozen or more stolen moments in her head, each moment in exceedingly unlikely and dangerous places. Each fantasy gave her a thrill and made her want her captivating teacher just that much more.

Her innocent fantasies were about to very much become a reality, and sixteen-year-old Mary Wollstonecraft’s innocence was about to be stolen away from her forever.

***

Although the age difference would pose a problem, Mary, in those days, would have been considered of age to be courted. Edward himself was a bachelor at age thirty. An unlikely romance, to be sure, which was why they kept it private throughout her six months at the academy in Ramsgate. Indeed, the good doctor most certainly would have lost his position had his superiors discovered his dalliance with a student.

Yes, Sam,
dalliance
is still a word. And, yes, people like me still use it. Yes, old people like me. No, I’ve never considered the fact that I might be older than the hills. Or dirt. Now, can I continue? Thank you.

Now, where was I? Oh, yes...

It behooved the young lovers to keep their affair quiet, which they succeeded in doing so. It was in her fourth month at boarding school that Mary and Victor Lichtenstein took their relationship to a whole new level. At her suggestion—which delighted the doctor to no end—she had suggested they meet that night in a nearby graveyard overlooking the city of Geneva... a graveyard the good doctor knew all too well. It was there, under clear skies and a full moon—yes, all details that Lichtenstein supplied to Franklin—that they kissed for the first time, and expressed their love for each other. It was a tender—and proper—moment for them both. That they both enjoyed the solitude of graveyards seemed to bode well for their future. Or so Lichtenstein hoped.

The next few weeks were a blur of continued classroom flirtations, not-so-happenstance encounters in hallways, and late-night rendezvous, usually in the seclusion of the local graveyard. Lichtenstein, feeling love for the first time ever, pushed aside his own work. His own terribly important work.

Never had he felt such a connection with anyone, and so, with the school year coming to a close and young Mary returning home for the summer, he made a very bold move to keep her with him. He planned to ask for her hand in marriage. After all, he was from a good family, with much land and holdings. He was not so terrible to look at, and he had a quick and inventive mind. Just how inventive, young Mary had no idea. At least, not yet.

The pressure was on the young doctor. He knew that his experiments fell far below the accepted norm of the times. Or any times. But he also knew he was close to something big, something unheard of, something this world had not yet seen... the reanimation of a corpse. And not just the reanimation, but the creation of life itself.

Of course, Lichtenstein had never heard of the dark masters. Nor did he know of lost souls actively seeking human hosts. He especially did not know that his experiments were of great interest to those trapped—or banished—on the other side. That in fact, some of his very inspiration had come from these same dark masters, whispering madness into his ears as he slept. He understood none of this. Indeed, he only knew that he was driven to see his experiments through to the end. And he worked passionately, obsessively, sleeping little, if at all, supplementing his income by teaching during the day, and working often straight through the night.

That is, until he met Mary Wollstonecraft. Now, his life had taken on even greater meaning—and more complications, too. What would his beloved think of his experiments? What would she think of him? Would it be possible to convince her of their importance, his importance, that he was truly on the cutting edge of science, and creation itself? Indeed, that he was stepping into the role of God himself?

It was with much trepidation and anxiety that on the eve of her departure, as both of them had expressed their love and their desire to be with each other forever, that he had postponed his marriage proposal in light of showing the would-be novelist his laboratory, located in his apartment basement, nearly thirty feet under the street. The building had been a hotel in an earlier incarnation, and had, at one time, held a vast collection of wine bottles. The cellars in this place were particularly extensive, which was why the good doctor had chosen it. A perfect place to play God.

It was after a particularly moving moment in the cemetery, overlooking the lamplight of Geneva, alone together in the world, each aware that this might very well be their last night together, that Lichtenstein decided to take her down into his basement. He had to show her this side of him. He had to get her to believe in him, in his experiments, in his vision for life itself. He needed her on his side. He saw that now. He saw the benefit of a talented and inspiring woman in his corner. Already his experiments had taken on a fresh angle, which is a weird way to describe the rotting cadavers that lined the old wine cellar.

Perhaps it was too much to ask of a sixteen-year-old girl who was far beyond her years in wisdom and intellect, a sixteen-year-old girl who had a penchant for words—and for the macabre. But his hopes of marrying young Mary, of her being
The Bride of Lichtenstein
—yes, that just came to me—was dashed the moment she set eyes upon his laboratory; in particular, the bodies stacked over ice, the sawing tools and stitching implements, and his surprisingly advanced array of electrical conduits, all of which harnessed the lightning strikes above. Brilliant, really, and far ahead of his time.

Yes, Lichtenstein might have been receiving promptings from the “other side,” usually through dreams, he confessed later. Either way, Edward Lichtenstein was genius enough to build it all.

How long young Mary stayed around the laboratory, it’s hard to know. Surely long enough to absorb the details, of which she would later use to render her famous novel. She eventually fled; screaming, from what I understand, all the way home to her father. She never returned Lichtenstein’s letters and refused to see him when he called upon her the next year.

Alone and miserable, with only the dead to keep him company, he eventually quit his position at Ramsgate and poured himself into his work. Remarkably, at nearly the exact time of Mary Shelley’s publication of
Frankenstein
, Edward Lichtenstein would revive his first corpse. I always suspected Mary Shelley wrote
Frankenstein
as a healing balm, a way to make sense of what she had seen. No, she never went public with her knowledge, and she never spoke to Lichtenstein again. But her book—her snapshot, really—into Liechtenstein’s experiments lives on to this day. And so do the corpses he revived.

The many, many corpses he revived.