Vamp-Hire (21 page)

He realized Valerie was speaking and that he
could only hear her out of his right ear. Was this a stroke or
something? His arm felt fine so far as he could tell. Nick made
fists over and over again to confirm to himself his brain wasn’t
shutting down half his body. Whatever she was saying made no sense
to him at all and he managed to turn his eyes up to look at her.
The sounds coming out of her didn’t sync up to the motions of her
mouth.

Nick was looking at her and something else
too. A room not in this house and right in front of him. It was a
restroom with mostly white tiles and dirty gray grout. There were
two stalls to the left and a man blocking most of a urinal directly
ahead. It smelled in here—in there—and the scent further
disoriented and nauseated him.

“Are you hearing me?” the man asked. His
voice was flat and low, young-sounding, maybe Nick’s age. He wore a
gray suit and had black, close-cropped hair. The other thing Nick
could tell through no identifiable sense was he was a vamp.

“I’ll be fine,” Nick said, hoping he wasn’t
shouting at Valerie. “I just need some water. Please.”

He saw her leave through the dulled vision of
his right eye, like the dimmer switch had been turned down on the
world he’d been in a moment ago. This new world comprised of
toilets and air stained with the smell of urine was brilliant and
stimulated all except his sense of touch. The nausea passed as
quickly as it had come, but something browner than urine was
curling into his lungs. Nick didn’t know what this was and he
wanted to make it stop.

“I said, are you hearing me?” the vamp said
again.

“Yes,” Nick said, half aware of his slow
nod.

“Good.” The man remained where he was even
though he must have been finished with his business. “You’ve been
watching me?” It sounded like a question. In place of the tinny
feeling bisecting his brain that had accompanied the nausea, warm
euphoria suffused him. He felt like half of him was floating, the
other half still anchored to the Earth by gravity. It was as
disorienting as it was… pleasurable.

“You have been watching me,” the vamp said.
“You saw what I did… to those people.” It sounded more statement
than question.

“Yes,” Nick said again. “They were vamps.
Like us.”

“Vamps.” The man snorted. “If you ever call
me that I’ll break your neck. Yes, they were like us.”

“Okay. I won’t.” Nick wanted to talk to this
person with as much desperation as he could muster given his state.
“How do you know I’ve been watching you?”

“Because I can feel you. Just like you can
feel me in your head right now.”

Nick felt some mental part of him
withdraw—just a little—reminding him he wasn’t in this person’s
physical presence and giving him mild vertigo as he stared at a
blank white wall in Valerie’s house through one eye and a bathroom
a million miles away out the other.

He didn’t want the euphoric feeling back, but
he felt it sinking in anyway. It was like punching a light breeze
as he fought it.

“You killed that woman. And that man too. And
I think… others?”

“I have killed no one. I set them free.”

“Okay.” No, it wasn’t okay. Nick felt like he
was being shoved into the passenger seat of his own body. He pushed
back and found himself actually gaining some traction. “You killed
them. I saw you.”

“Saw me?” He laughed softly. “No. I don’t
think so. You saw what I saw. What I wanted you to see.” Something
about that last part rang untrue to Nick and it took a couple of
beats of forceful thinking to remind himself that… that what? He’d
lost the track of thought as it had begun and found himself being
lulled back into the pleasant sensation of straddling two
worlds.

“I am coming for you,” the man said. He
tilted his head back and sniffed the air. “I can smell you. I am
getting closer.”

“Why are you killing them?” Nick asked.

“I’m not killing anyone. I told you, I’m
setting them free.” He sounded agitated at the accusation.

“Why are you setting them free?”

“You will soon see. Why don’t you tell me
where you are? I’ll come to you tonight. I’ll set you free.”

Alarm bells clanged somewhere in the back of
Nick’s mind. Even in his hazy state he knew that was an ill-advised
idea.

“No. I don’t think so,” Nick said. “I don’t
want to be set free.” He felt himself pushing back, regaining some
semblance of control of his mental state. He blinked and saw
through both eyes, the sense of nausea returning. The bathroom and
everything in it had turned black and white, which was really only
the room’s lone occupant. The vamp turned around and what Nick saw
almost wrenched a scream out of him.

In place of a face the man had static, like
from a television not turned to an actual channel.

“I see you,” the vamp said. Nick felt his
arms and legs crab walking him backward even though he’d had his
back to a wall a moment before. He lost his balance and fell onto
his back, nearly dislocating the two middle fingers of his left
hand.

He lay there, panting and staring up at a
yellowish-brown spot on the ceiling. Valerie must have had a leak
in the roof. Nick realized from the work he’d done on his own house
a few days ago he could probably fix it. Maybe when it warmed up
outside again.

Nick felt then smelled the heavy-hot breath
of a bitter-sour mouth much closer to his face than he would have
cared for. He turned his eyes and saw Barney standing directly over
him. The dog poked its head back into the bedroom, turning his
brown-eyed gaze away from Nick. Barney closed his mouth with a
quick slurp of his tongue before letting it drop open again.

“Get out of my house,” the dog said.

Well, it hadn’t actually spoken. He hadn’t
actually spoken, it had been more of a grunting-whining noise and
Nick had understood it just as easily as if the dog had spoken the
King’s English.

Nick propped himself up on one elbow as
Barney turned back for his pillow in front of the television.

“What did you say?”

Barney regarded him before slumping back onto
his pillow. He made another noise in his throat, short and semi
high-pitched.

“Leave,” Barney said, “or I’ll bite you.”

Nick was rising off the floor by the time
Valerie had climbed the stairs. He had no idea what had taken so
long to get a glass of water; he also didn’t know how long he had
been sitting on the floor talking to the vamp in the bathroom.
Perhaps time had sped up in his head or maybe Valerie had examined
her glasses until she found one clean enough to serve him.

Nick guessed the latter. Either the glass had
a yellow tint or the water did. He shook his head when she held the
glass out to him.

“I have to go.”

“What about my vamp?” she said. Her voice had
resumed its former tenor and cadence. Gone were the clipped words
and semi-southern accent.

Nick was surprised he did have a solution to
her problem. He didn’t know the reason for the blood on the floor
and now could sense that one of his kind had spent a significant
amount of time in her home. It was glaringly obvious now.

“Put some chocolate out for him,” Nick said.
“The fancy kind. Then feed him if he’ll eat.” Nick didn’t want to
believe the vamp in the walls was a feral; he’d seen many of those
when he was in the Pens and had been told they would never see the
light of day. It was odd for one to live inside the walls of a
stranger’s home.

Unless…

“Valerie, did you move into your home
recently? Like within the last few years?”

“Yes, I did. Why?”

“Did you have Barney with you when you moved
in?”

“Yes, I did. Why?” she said again.

Nick turned into the bedroom where the dog
lay on his pillow. He figured a way he could do this and not seem
like a complete psycho.

He got down on one knee about three feet away
from the dog. Barney sighed and it sounded to Nick’s ears like he
was annoyed. He didn’t bother moving his big head or even looking
in Nick’s direction.

“Barney,” he began in a cartoonishly cheerful
voice, “I’m about to leave. Oh, you’re such a good boy.”

The dog gave him a look as if to say ‘what
are you doing?’ but ‘said’ nothing. Nick went on speaking to him in
that over-the-top happy voice, sensing that even Barney took it as
condescending.

“Where was that scary man when you and
Valerie moved in? Where was he, fuzzy-wuzzy?” Nick almost got
carried away with the act and leaned in to nuzzle the dog and
Barney warned him off with a short, throat-clearing growl that
needed no translation.

He got the point. Barney played along,
turning halfway onto his side, exposing his soft belly. Nick
obliged by scratching his chest and repeated his question in an
even cutesier voice.

“This is his home,” Barney said. “He came
here before us and his smell was here before then. Like he left for
a long time and came back.”

Barney spoke with a series of groans and
Valerie was none the wiser of the actual conversation occurring.
“Oh, he really likes you,” she said. “He never talks so much. Not
even to me.”

Nick ignored her, wanting to get an idea of
the vamp before he left. “Was all that blood scary, boy? Did it
scare you?”

“It was his blood,” Barney said. “Someone
hurt him, another person like you. She put poison in his
blood.”

She?

It was surprise enough that the vamp had been
attacked by another vamp. That had immediately conjured images of
the killer the military was looking for. He’d been male, though.
Nick couldn’t have been any more certain of that. He’d spoken to
the killer and been inside his head. He’d—

—wait a minute. Each time he’d been inside
the killer, every sensation stroking his own senses, even his
emotions—excitement, fear, bloodlust—in tandem with his host for
lack of a better word he’d known the person in those few
moments.

He hadn’t been inside the body of the vamp in
the restroom, he’d been behind him. For a moment Nick thought it
might have been remote viewing, seeing inside the restroom from
some unattached point. Had Nick not had cause to think about it, he
might have forgotten the detail and assumed that was exactly what
had happened. He had been tied to something physical, something
that had actually been there. Nick remembered the feeling of
curiosity and amazement. Even the euphoric feeling had not been his
own.

He had been seeing through someone else’s
eyes. That person had been careful to not hold up a hand, look down
at himself, or at any other point in the restroom that might have
given him away. This second person had been male, not the female
Barney had indicated.

Which meant there were at least three people,
three killers.

Nick realized he was still stroking Barney.
The dog was eyeing him suspiciously.

“Three of them,” Nick mumbled.

“Three of who?” Valerie said. He had
forgotten she was behind him.

“Uh, in the walls,” he said. “There were
three. Two left.”

“You can tell all that from walking in the
room?”

“No,” Nick said and smiled. He didn’t have
the heart to tell her that her vamp was more than likely dead,
rotting inside one of these walls. “Your dog told me.”

Valerie pressed five twenties into his hand.
Immediately, thoughts went to Lucky. He felt guilty about how they
had finished things. Nick had been angry and he still felt
justifiably so, though he admitted he had been wrong too. It hadn’t
been only Lucky to have treated him like a child. That had dated
all the way back to the Center and had been building up,
unbeknownst to Nick, ever since.

He considered calling him, and thought better
of it. The next thing he needed to say to Lucky was ‘I’m sorry’ and
he felt the need to do that in person. Even if he’d been wrong,
Lucky didn’t deserve some of the things Nick had said. Maybe he
could take a walk over to the Big Pig and find him there.

So much had happened today. He should
probably head home. Nick didn’t think he could count on staying at
Lucky’s tonight and with Dolph in the hospital anyway it was a safe
bet he could stay at his actual home, in his actual bed. The
thought put a little extra pep in his step as he headed east.

He didn’t let himself get too lost in
thought. Now that he knew there were people looking for him who
wanted to do who knew what, he had to be aware. What had been so
offensive to him a short while ago was now palpably missed. He kept
looking over his shoulder, hoping to see Ti on a motorcycle,
expecting to see a black limousine or a white truck.

It wasn’t paranoia if you knew people were
really out to get you.

Sundown was coming soon and that helped hurry
him along as well. Nick wasn’t silly enough to think he couldn’t be
kidnapped or attacked in broad daylight, but under cover of night
the two possibilities carried more weight, like the likelihood was
exponentially greater.

He watched each person he passed with
suspicion. Most paid him no mind, occasionally, though, he saw
someone watching him back. A woman and her young daughter passed
him slowly on the sidewalk. He thoroughly expected the two to
cross, being aware of how out-of-place he must have looked. He
wasn’t dressed properly for the cold, probably looked as paranoid
as he felt, and he was a vamp. Sure, he knew that in the space of a
few seconds people couldn’t tell that, but he felt like he
attracted extra attention for that fact alone.

Nick wondered if he should actually go home.
What if someone was watching him? Someone he was not able to see?
People were trained to do this sort of thing without being detected
by the people they followed. They followed in shifts or something
like that. A man behind him for a few blocks who would turn down a
street at the moment Nick would begin to suspect, and very shortly
after a woman would replace him, or an old couple, or a car.