The Vampire’s Lair

Calaphase stared down at me, mouth falling open far enough to see his fangs. A stunned vampire. It was a good feeling, to know I’d caused that. “After all,” I said, smiling more broadly, “I assumed I would drop you off when you appeared without a car.”

Calaphase hissed. “Not very funny,” he said, frowning, embarrassed, though no blush showed in the paleness of his face. “And still not a good idea.”

I kept up the faux innocent smile. “Why not? Oakdale isn’t that far a drive.”

“I don’t live in Oakdale, I live in—” But he abruptly stopped, looking off with a hiss. After mulling things a moment, he picked up the check and pretended to review it, avoiding my eyes, “Look, I appreciate the offer, Dakota, but given the circumstances—”

“Circumstances? What circumstances? Calaphase, what’s happened?”

“Nothing,” Calaphase said, tossing the bill down. “I didn’t mean to worry you. They say they had an emergency protection request for a werekin—for one of our lawyers, actually. I suspect it’s just a ham-handed attempt to force you to give me a ride.”

“Well, that’s sweet of them,” I said, double checking the bill as well. We had gone Dutch, we were both covered, but Calaphase had put a hell of a tip on his half. “But it isn’t a problem. Like I said, I had assumed I’d drop you off.”

“No offense, Dakota, but I would prefer to take a cab,” Calaphase said.

“Afraid I’ll learn the location of your secret lair?” I asked, slipping on my vestcoat.

“Afraid I’ll lure you in,” he said, still not looking directly at me.

“I’m not easily lured where I don’t want to go,” I said.

But Calaphase didn’t respond, and avoided my eyes as we threaded out through the line of people waiting to get in at R Thomas. When he still didn’t look back once we were free of the crowd, I realized he was quite serious. I stopped him in front of the bird cages the owner had set up outside the restaurant and made him face me.

“Calaphase,” I said. “It’s all right. It really is. I’m not afraid of you—well, I am afraid of you, you’re a vampire. But I’m not afraid of what you might do.”

“I do not want to be accused of … influencing you,” he said, still not meeting my eyes, angry at something that must have been in his own memories. “I don’t want another victim, or thrall, or flunky, or groupie. I want you as a … friend. Nothing more.”

“You want me. As a friend,” I said softly. “For nothing more?”

He smiled, still not meeting my eyes. “I think we both know the answer to that.”

“I would like to hear it, though.”

Calaphase looked up at me. In the dim, warm light his hair wasn’t blond, but brass, and his skin did not look pale, it just looked normal. Only his eyes gave him away: gleaming and blue, not filled with hostile power, but sparkling like a movie star’s, clear and direct.

A bird screeched, a parakeet or some other damn thing. We both jumped, then laughed and turned back to walk the steep hill down to my car. “Cute, those bird cages,” he said.

“I always hated them,” I said. “Don’t get me wrong—I love birds. But it’s depressing to see something that’s meant to fly living its life trapped in a cage.”

“That is depressing,” Calaphase said. “And something you can’t easily unhear.”

“Huh,” I said, smiling as the Prius powered up on my approach and unlocked itself as my hand touched the handle—that trick just never got old. “I expected you to say—”

“Something like ‘Humans eat birds.’” Calaphase folded his arms over the top of the car and stared at me. “‘So how is being in a cage any worse?’”

“And so?” I said, practically falling into the car: the parking lot behind R Thomas tilted at a perilous angle. “Why didn’t you say it?”

“Too much respect for you,” Calaphase said, climbing in on the other side. “That’s a line I’d feed a vampire groupie, followed by—” and his voice went deep and Barry White “—‘when a vampire feeds, its meal goes home to its golden cage happy … my pretty little bird.’”

I stared at him, then put the car in gear.

“Not bad,” I said. I preferred my sensitive vamp, but … “Did it work for you?”

Calaphase was staring off into the distance. “More often than I care to admit.”

I took him home—not to the forests and factories of Oakdale, but to the streets and suburbs of DeKalb northwest of downtown. We wove through the forested valleys of Briarcliff Road, passing churches, condos and even a library, all signs of civilization I did not expect near the home of a vampire. Finally we turned off onto Bruce, and climbed a flat-topped hill to stop before a long, low, grey ranch house overlooking the canyon of I-85.

“Surprisingly … sedate,” I said, as we pulled into a carport identical to the one in my parents’ house, which Dad had bricked off and turned into a rec-room when I was twelve. “I expected a mansion, or a fortress.”

“There is a full-sized lower level,” he admitted. “I had it bricked off.”

“To make a rec-room?” I asked.

“No, to keep out the sun,” he said.

“Can I see?”

Calaphase shifted uncomfortably. “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Dakota,” he said, unbuckling his seat belt. My throat constricted as his hand brushed his waist; even his smallest, most innocent gestures were turning me on, and I wanted to see him undo the next buckle, the one on his pants belt. “This is dangerous. I’m a vampire. I prey on mortal women … ”

I reached out and touched his hair. It was soft and smooth beneath my hands, and as my hand dropped I could feel the coolness of his skin, immense strength in his neck, the swiftness with which his head turned, the sudden stiffness as my lips met his. He resisted, only a moment, then relaxed as my hand massaged his shoulders, my tongue brushed his teeth.

“And sometimes they prey on you,” I said softly, leaning back, still caressing that pretty hair, that strong neck. My other hand fell on his crotch, feeling the hardness within, confirming he wanted me as much as I him. Then we were together, a soft explosion of kissing.

We exited on his side of the car, practically on top of each other, smooching, groping, as he fumbled at the lock and got it open. His hands caressed my face, my shoulders, my back. I felt his hands curve over me with his immense strength, sweeping me off my feet.

I laughed. Very few men were large enough to make me feel small, but what Calaphase lacked in height he possessed in strength. Being weightless in his arms surprised me, delighted me, irresistibly turned me on, and I kissed him passionately. He carried me down a wide staircase descending straight from the living room to the lower level, kicking open the heavy wooden door and carrying me into darkness.

My clothes fell away as he walked, and I pushed at his coat, opened his shirt, caressed his chest. At the end of the hall we turned, I swayed in his arms, and he set me down on a soft bed of fur. Normally I’m the active one in my sex life, but this time I just lay there, stretching out luxuriously, predatorily, my tattoos glowing to a rainbow of life—and then with a sharp flare of light Calaphase struck a match and lit a candle.

He stared at me, eyes blue points of light in a face made warm and proud by the flame. He lit a second candle. His coat came off. A third candle came alight. He peeled off his shirt. The fourth candle lit, and he stood at the end of the bed, whipped off his belt, his pants, and stood there, bronzed in the flickering light.

I closed my eyes, and he fell upon me.

He was so tender, and so strong. His hands swept over my skin as smooth as silk, tracing the lines of my tattoos, my skin, my hips—then they seized my hands and pinned them like bands of steel. His tongue touched my lips, my breasts, my sex, until I cried out. Then he moved forward and took me, with the strength of a linebacker, a horse, a mountain.

It had been years since I had a man, almost a decade. Don’t think for a moment that I could be ‘turned straight’ by a man: men and women are just different, and I like them both for what they are. But after so many years the differences were exciting, the tender softness and intimate knowledge replaced by an almost unstoppable force, a freight train of passion.

“Oh, Dakota,” he said, breath hot against my ear. “I love you.”

—

Then his teeth sank into my neck.