The Late Night Horror Show (12 page)

A few dozen yards farther along, she began to perceive the dim outline of a house through the trees. The sight of it spurred her to a faster pace. The house sat in the middle of a sizable clearing in the woods. It came into sharper focus as she neared the line of trees at the edge of the clearing. It was a two-story wood house with a long porch in front. External lights lit up the area around the house well enough that she could make out a narrow dirt road that dead-ended at the clearing. The road wound away into another section of the woods somewhere off to her right. There were multiple vehicles parked outside the house, including an SUV and a jeep with big, mud-flecked tires.
 

The sight of these things brought tears to Lashon’s eyes. Her blind flight through the treacherous woods had brought her to the perfect place. Ahead of her was a real, tangible path out of this nightmare. Someone here could drive her to the nearest hospital or police station. She couldn’t believe her luck. If she had turned in a different direction after her collision with the tree, she wouldn’t have happened upon this place or these people. She might still be fleeing sightlessly through thickening darkness.

I’m meant to live,
she thought.
God wants me to live. It’s fated.

That thought triggered an eruption of grateful tears.

Several people were hanging out on the porch. A few with beers in their hands were standing at one end near a grill. Others were sitting in chairs or leaning on the porch railing. No one had noticed her yet because she still hadn’t entered the clearing.
 

Lashon paused just inside the line of trees, studying the strangers and wondering what she might tell them. Hers was a pretty wild story. If she told them everything, they might think she was crazy. No, clearly some level of fabrication was in order. But she would have to do her damnedest to convince them that some crazy man had been chasing her through the woods. There was real danger lurking out here tonight and they needed to know that.

She let out a breath and took a step toward the line of trees. A sound somewhere behind her made her gasp. She whirled about and scanned the gloom-shrouded woods. She saw trees and the blackness between them. And nothing else. No sign of a masked man in dirty overalls. And yet she had heard
something
. A sharp, cracking sound. The kind of sound, say, that a booted foot might make when stepping on a fallen branch. And although she couldn’t see anyone out there in the gloom, it was possible her pursuer—if he was out there at all—might be lurking behind one of the big trees, waiting patiently for her to turn her back to him again.

It was a creepy thing to think and she tried to dismiss it.

But she couldn’t.

Several moments passed.

And then the sound came again, closer now, from somewhere off to her right.

Fuck this,
she thought.

She spun around again and ran into the clearing.

Chapter Twelve

Kira stared blankly at the stone fireplace at the opposite end of the room and tried to think what she might do next. She didn’t like the idea of just sitting here and waiting for this “Master” person to show up and take another bite out of her neck, but she didn’t appear to have any other options.
 

A significant block of time passed. Perhaps as much as a half hour. Long enough to start feeling bored. Lacking anything else to do, she stood up and walked over to one of the black-painted windows. Nailed shut. An inspection of the other windows showed they had all been secured in the same manner. Seeing this did nothing to calm her nerves. She was a prisoner and there was no way out.
 

She could maybe try to smash through one of the windows and climb out to drop to the ground below. But that would make a lot of noise. The big blond guys would kick the door open and be on her long before she could get outside. She had locked the door from the inside, but the door was made of wood and the lock was hardly imposing. It wouldn’t delay the blond goons more than a second or two. Not nearly long enough. And the guards were far from the only complicating factor. She had no idea how high up this room was, whether it was on a second or third story. It could be quite a drop from the window to the ground below.

It was hopeless. There truly was no way out.

Kira wandered over to the full-length oval mirror mounted on a stand next to the wardrobe. She stared at the image of herself in the tiny blue nightie. She frowned. She hated to admit it, but she sort of liked the way she looked in it. The cut of the flimsy garment emphasized the jut of her breasts and the swell of her hips in a boldly erotic way. She turned a little for a side view of her figure, admiring the flatness of her belly and her slender, toned legs. She had taken up running at the beginning of the latest semester and it had shown some serious dividends in terms of her physical appearance. It was something she had known in a vague way for a while, but until now she had not fully appreciated the extent of the improvement. She really looked kind of…hot.

She felt good about it for maybe five seconds.

Then she frowned again.

Awesome,
she thought.
Congratulations. You turned yourself into a hottie. And now you’ve attracted the attention of a vampire with a naughty nightie fetish.

It was the stuff of kinky fantasy. Unfortunately, now it was also real life. Sort of. She still hadn’t worked out just how “real” this alternate world was. So much about it seemed too ridiculous, like things staged for a cheap movie. The room reminded her of sets from old European horror films she had seen on Netflix. The guards were caricatures of B-movie villain henchmen. And yet, it all looked and felt real enough. No matter how fantastical it all seemed, she was convinced this was no elaborate put-on. Nor was it a hallucination. No hallucination could ever be so finely detailed. All she really knew was that whatever had happened to bring her to this alternate world was beyond her understanding.

She turned away from the mirror and returned to the bed, suddenly unable to bear looking any longer at her sleek and, yes, very lovely body. Just as she was about to sit, she heard the sound of a key being inserted in the bedroom door’s lock. She stared in sudden, wide-eyed terror as the knob rotated. She heard the click of the bolt as it retracted and then the door creaked open on hinges in dire need of oiling.

The vampire strode into the room, pushing the door shut behind him.

Kira’s heart slammed in her chest. She sucked in an involuntary breath and just stood there, shaking like a scared little kid in the presence of a hulking, abusive father. She was in the presence of a for-real fucking
monster
. Oh, he didn’t
look
like a monster. His physical appearance was that of an attractive man in his midthirties. He stood maybe a hair over six feet. He had penetrating dark eyes and a chiseled jaw line, as well as thick, wavy brown hair, a hank of which fell rakishly over his forehead.

“You need not fear me.” His English was fluent, but he had an accent she couldn’t immediately identify. It was vaguely European. “I mean you no harm.”

Kira at last managed to swallow the lump in her throat. “I…I don’t think I believe you.”

The vampire peered at her in a quizzical way. “Oh? And why not?”

Kira touched the marks on her neck. “This, for one thing. I do tend to fear men who take actual
bites
out of my flesh.” Her frightened expression shifted, hardening into a kind of fearful anger. “And then there’s the whole abduction thing. Really, I’ve got a whole list of reasons to be afraid of you. Also, what have you done with my friend?”

The vampire laughed softly and took a step toward her.

Kira took a matching step backward.

The vampire ceased his advance and held up a placating hand. “Please. You must relax. I merely wish to talk to you and explain what’s happened and why you are here.”

Kira couldn’t help it—she laughed. “Oh,yeah? That’s gonna take some serious explaining. Because I’ll tell you right now, there’s nothing you can say that’ll make me okay with this bullshit.”

The vampire smiled. “That remains to be seen. All I ask is you reserve judgment and listen to what I have to say. I suspect your attitude toward me will change significantly once you understand the true reasons for your presence here.”

Kira grunted.

Not likely, you bloodsucking freak.

“Whatever. It’s not like I really have a choice.”

Another smile.

But this time he didn’t dispute her assertion.

“Hey, asshole. Another question for you.”

His smile faltered.

Good. Got to you. Finally.

It was nice to see the smug bastard off-balance, if only for a moment.

“Why am I dressed like a fucking whore? Seriously. This is another of those teensy little things that don’t do a whole lot to reassure me about your intentions.”

There was an accompanying dark twinkle in his eyes as his smile returned, a hint of his true predatory nature. Instead of answering her question, he strode across the room to a waist-high cabinet set against the wall between two of the blacked-out windows. The cabinet’s top was comprised of two sliding panels. He pushed these apart and reached inside, pulling out a bottle filled with some type of brown liquor and two cocktail glasses.

He waggled one of the glasses at her. “Drink?”

Kira’s instinct was to decline, but she hesitated. She realized she was thirsty. And a drink of something strong did sound kind of nice right about now. She was trapped in a bizarre and inexplicable situation with no obvious way out. She stared at the bottle and the shimmering liquid within.

She shrugged. “Sure. Fine. Whatever.”

“I’m afraid we have no ice. I could have some brought in if you like.”

“Just pour the fucking drink, please. Um, and some ice and water later would be nice. If you could arrange that.”

He unscrewed the cap from the bottle and poured more than an inch of booze into each glass. After returning the bottle to the cabinet, he approached her again, holding out one of the glasses for her. “Of course I can arrange that. You can have whatever you want.” Yet another creepy smile. “Within reason.”

Kira accepted the glass and took a tentative sip from it. “Um…wow. That’s really good. What is it?”

“A very fine one-hundred-year-old bourbon.”

Kira nearly gagged on her next sip of the delicious liquid. “Seriously?”

The vampire peered at her in that vaguely amused, quizzical way of his. “Excuse me?”

“Come on. You’re seriously telling me I just drank something a century old? You’re shitting me, right?”

“It is the absolute truth, I assure you. I’m particularly fond of this batch. An extraordinarily limited quantity was produced especially for me. This is one of my last remaining bottles. I deem precious few of my guests worthy of it.”

Kira mulled this over for a few moments, rather than instantly replying. Of course, she’d caught the implication that he had been alive a hundred years ago, despite possessing the physical appearance of a youngish man. It gibed with one of the most basic elements of vampire folklore, that of the immortal bloodsucker. She guessed many other clichés of vampiric literature and film would be rooted in reality in this world. Reality, again, being relative. Here, just as in many movies from her world, vampires might fry in the light of the sun, fear crosses, or cringe at the smell of garlic. Or be killed with a wooden stake through the heart or via decapitation. There was no good reason to believe any of this, other than the way things worked here conformed to the way things worked in the low-budget film
Blood Lust
and its countless antecedents. There were probably even actual vampire hunters in this world. Real Van Helsings. Real Buffys. Which, if true, would be sort of awesome.

She found herself smiling at the thought.

The vampire’s expression turned quizzical again. “Have I amused you in some way? I assure you I’m not exaggerating.”

“Say what?”

He nodded at the glass in her hand. “Regarding the bourbon. I truly do almost never share it with guests.”

“Huh. So why did you have it stored in an unlocked cabinet?”

“I had it stored here shortly after your arrival, while you were still unconscious. I knew even then I’d be sharing it with you.”

Kira nodded. “Right. Because I’m special or something.”

He smiled. “Indeed you are.”

Another nod from Kira.

Right. Of course I am. Because I’m the fucking star of this story.

Another absurdity. But it happened to fit in smoothly with all the million other little absurdities coloring her current circumstances, so she could hardly dismiss the notion as nonsense.

An idea occurred to her. It was sort of crazy, but such was the strength of the compulsion that she had no choice but to take the chance.

She held out her glass. “Could you hold this a second?”

The vampire’s expression was wary, but he took the glass. Despite the wariness, there was amusement in his eyes. He was indulging her because he was utterly unafraid of her. And why would he fear her? From his perspective, she was just a helpless human girl.