As the premiere of the play approached, the vampire goons were making regular appearances at rehearsals. Their glowing red eyes distracted and disturbed Abby.
Later that evening, back at Malcolm’s house, she paced the living room. “You have to do something about those guys. If you don’t, I will.”
Malcolm settled in his wing chair. He grabbed Abby’s hand as she brushed by. “Ignore them, Abby. That’s what I’m trying to do.”
“Are you crazy?” Abby glared pointedly at him. “They could destroy you. One false move on that stage, and they’ll be flying to the council. Is that what you want?”
Malcolm ran a hand through his hair. “Abby, have you given serious thought to where your life is heading?”
“Did you just change the subject?”
“No, not at all. Have you thought long term — about us?”
“Constantly. You are my life, Malcolm. I don’t want to live without you, and if anything happened to you, I … ” She looked away before he could see her tears.
Malcolm turned her chin back to face him. “I’ve already been responsible for one woman’s death.”
“You weren’t responsible for Sarah’s death. The war was.” I wish he could let go of his guilt.
“If I hadn’t been part of that war, she wouldn’t have been involved.”
Get tough, Abby. “For a smart man, that’s an idiotic thing to say. You were a West Point-trained cavalry officer. You had to be in the war.”
“True, but I didn’t have to be incommunicado.”
“And disobey orders? That doesn’t sound like the Malcolm I know.” She pointed her finger at his chest. “You can’t live your life on ‘what ifs,’ and you can’t change the past.”
“There you go, acting wiser than your years, again.” Malcolm ran his knuckles across Abby’s cheek.
She caressed his hand at her cheek. “Please, back to the subject at hand. Promise me you won’t do anything to provoke those guys.”
“You mean by being me?”
“I mean by being too much you. I have enough to worry about with Pamela after my job. I don’t need to worry about some vampire council passing judgment on you.”
“I’ll try not to get lost in the moment. I think you call that method acting, right?”
“Precisely, but in this case it’s a dangerous technique. It could get you killed.”
“I’ll be fine. And I’ll take care of Pamela. Just because I don’t use my wiles on you doesn’t mean I can’t make her see the error of her ways.”
“She’s nastier than she looks, so watch out.”
Malcolm reared his head back and laughed. “My dear, I’m a vampire. We wrote the book on nasty.”
• • •
Malcolm spotted Pamela crossing the quad ahead of him. He caught up with her and grabbed her elbow. “I believe you have something of mine.”
“Geez, you scared me.” She squinted through light snowflakes at Malcolm. “I didn’t hear anyone behind me.”
“Maybe you should pay better attention to your surroundings.” He smiled for a micro-second. “Young women have been known to disappear from this campus.” Even he could hear the menace in his voice.
“Thanks for the advice, Professor. I didn’t know you cared.” Her smile was much longer than a micro-second and delivered with lowered eyelashes.
“You haven’t answered my question, Miss Shields.” He hadn’t let go of her elbow and now he squeezed it.
“Ouch.” She tried to brush off his hand, but his grasp was firm. “I didn’t hear a question.”
“It was more of a statement. You have something of mine.”
She blinked. “I do?”
“Yes. The gown you took from Miss Potter’s office belongs to me. It’s a family heirloom.”
“I have no clue what you’re talking about.”
He widened his eyes and zapped her with a shock of vampire glamour.
She froze, her face expressionless. “Come … and … get … it.”
“Excellent. When?”
“Tonight … my apartment … 380 Lincoln Drive … eight o’clock.” She licked her lips.
Malcolm let go of her elbow. “See you tonight.” As he strode away, he looked back over his shoulder to find her glued to the same spot, staring after him. He smiled. She’d shake it off in a minute, though she’d still crave him. Would she greet him tonight in a negligee? The thought wasn’t appealing. He might have glamoured her more than he’d intended.
• • •
Abby shook her head at Malcolm’s account of his meeting with Pamela. “Oh, to be a fly on the wall. Could I come with you tonight?”
“She may be glamoured, but she’s not stupid. She’d snap out of it if she saw you.”
Abby removed her gloves and warmed her hands at Malcolm’s fireplace. Staring into the flickering flames, she shuddered.
He wrapped his arms around her from behind. “Cold?”
“No. I was just thinking about how easily you entranced her. You could do that to me.”
He turned her around and held her shoulders. “I wouldn’t.”
“But you could.” She took a step back, bumping the fireplace screen. “It makes me feel like I don’t have free will … that you could coerce me.”
He sighed. “Abby, you never have to worry about that.”
She rubbed her arms. “I want to believe you.”
He turned from her, walking to a window where the bleak winter landscape reflected the abrupt change in his mood. “This is why I’ve avoided a relationship for so many years. I wasn’t sure I could keep myself from behaving like a vampire. It’s our nature to want to bring people under our spell. It’s essential to our survival. If we didn’t glamour humans, and then wipe their memories, we couldn’t feed off them.”
“You know how creepy that sounds?”
“Of course, I do.” He looked back at her, and there was pain in his eyes. “When I rescued you from the Goth club, I could have easily glamoured you into sex. But I wanted more from you, Abby. I wanted you to care for me as a man.”
“I do care for you. I … I … ” How could she put into words the depth of her feelings for him?
“Hear me out. I know you admire my humanity, but you also have to accept that I am not human. And you have to believe me when I say that I will not coerce you … ever.” He ran a hand through his hair. “Damn, Abby, I thought we’d been over this.”
“We had. It’s just that when you told me how easily Pamela succumbed to your glamour, it scared me.”
“Does this scare you?” He opened his mouth, and his fangs extended.
Involuntarily, Abby jumped. She wished she hadn’t.
Malcolm closed his mouth and squeezed his eyes shut. When he opened them, his half squint showed his sorrow. He swiped a hand across his face, and then checked his watch. “I need to go and be a vampire for a while. Will you be here when I return?”
“I’m not sure. I, I … need some time to think.” He’d grazed her neck with his fangs before, so why in heaven’s name did the sight of his fangs frighten her? Hadn’t she accepted his nature?
Malcolm’s tires screeched on the gravel as he left for Pamela’s apartment. Abby almost ran after him, but she didn’t know what to say. Yes, she was extremely attracted to him. He was more than attractive. He was magnetic, sexy, and forbidden. That aspect of him, his vampirism, was both exciting and frightening. There was a whole side of him that she couldn’t fathom and a million reasons why she should run the other way. She could second-guess and analyze, but in the end, it was just her and her heart. Like Pat said, don’t intellectualize feelings.
He’d demonstrated over and over how much he cared. He’d rescued her from the Goth club. He’d put himself in danger by acting in her play, and now he was solving her problem with Pamela. He’d risked everything for her, and what had she done? Acted like he had a contagious disease. And why? Because she thought he might glamour her. Didn’t she trust him? No one had ever made her feel the depth of passion and longing that Malcolm did. With him, the heat inside her became something all its own. And once again, he was out there being courageous for her while she was sitting on her keister.
What could she do for him? She thought about those creepy vampires who had been hanging around the theater, hoping he’d trip up. Malcolm’s way of dealing was to ignore them, but Abby watched them as they took notes on his performance. They were gathering evidence that he was displaying vampire characteristics. One flash of fang, and the vampire council would descend on him like a cannon ball in free fall.
She checked the clock on the mantel — eight-fifteen. If she left for Philly now, she could be back by midnight. She’d formulate a plan on the way. Surely, they’d listen to reason.
• • •
Malcolm pulled up to the curb in front of Pamela’s apartment and turned off the ignition. He squeezed the steering wheel of the truck he’d bought to haul his horse trailer. His life had been uncomplicated when all he’d had to think about was his curriculum and where the next Civil War re-enactment would take him. But it had been empty, too. Devoid of feeling.
Now he had feeling … in spades … and where had it gotten him? The woman he loved was repulsed and frightened. It was little comfort that she cared about Malcolm, the man, because his human side was only part of his being. Since he’d agreed to this play, opportunities to exhibit his true nature had erupted at every turn. If he wasn’t on stage, acting the part, he was glamouring a woman. He’d suppressed that ability for more than a hundred years.
Until the twentieth century, he’d glamoured his share of people. Whether women or men, he’d needed to feed. A brief lick over the puncture wound provided instant healing for his victim, and a moment of eye contact wiped the memory of his deed. It was a cold, cruel existence, but at least his victims walked away unscathed and unaware. Not the best rationalization, but he was after all, a vampire.
He assuaged his guilt over Sarah by his dedication to teaching, to making a difference in the world. And in her memory, he vowed to lead a human existence. With that vow came the pledge to imbibe only bottled blood, which had tempered his animal desires … until he allowed Abby to invade his heart. But he wouldn’t trade a minute of the time he’d spent with her. For better or worse, she’d crept into the farthest reaches of his heart, places where the pumping and flushing of blood didn’t reach. Places where nothing could dislodge the love.
Malcolm didn’t know how long he sat in the car, staring at a tear in his dashboard. When he looked up, Pamela was on her stoop, blowing frosty breaths and glaring at him. With a heavy sigh, he opened the door and swung his legs down to the icy pavement.
He grinned as he approached. “It’s cold. Go back inside.”
“I’ve been watching you from the window,” she said. “You’ve been sitting in that car like a statue. I came outside to make sure you hadn’t died behind the wheel.”
“I assure you, I am … here.” Dead, but here. He’d been correct in anticipating her attire. She was shivering in a black, knee-length robe with a plunging neckline and feathers at the hem.
“Come in.” She opened the door with a flourish and led Malcolm inside. “I bought a few sex toys specifically for this occasion. Shall we give them a try?”
Malcolm was incapable of being shocked, but her comment made him take a step back. He had come on too strong with the glamour. “I’m not here for pleasantries, Miss Shields.”
“Please, call me Pamela.” She rubbed against him like a cat in heat.
“Just give me the gown.”
“That old thing? You’re welcome to it. It gives me the heebie jeebies.”
“Why did you take it?”
“I thought it might have some value, since Abby coveted it. But I can’t even take it out of the box. It shocks the heck out of me.” She licked her lips. “Tell you what, you can have your silly gown, but only if you do the nasty with me first.” She batted her eyelashes so fast they vibrated.
Malcolm was completely out of practice with the glamour. With one glance, he’d turned a well-bred woman, albeit bitch, into a horny streetwalker. He scanned her living room, hoping to locate the box that contained Sarah’s gown.
Pamela clucked her tongue. “I see what you’re doing, looking around for that gown. You think you can grab it and get out of here, but I wasn’t born yesterday. I’ve got it well hidden.”
Seems he’d gone far enough with the glamour to make her libido rage, but not far enough to bend her will. “Let’s sit down and talk, Pamela.” He motioned to her black leather sofa.
“I’m all for a little pillow talk, but let’s do it in my bedroom.” She took Malcolm’s hand, but when she tried to pull him toward her bedroom, he wouldn’t budge.
“No, we’ll do it here.” He pushed her to the sofa.
She pouted, but then sat on the sofa and patted the space next to her.
Malcolm sat and turned to her. He took her chin in his hand.
She fluttered her eyes shut and pursed her lips … like a guppy.
“Cute.” Malcolm shook her chin and forced her to look at him. “Pamela, I’m going to tell you how things are going to be. I’m in love with Abby Potter, and I will not bed another woman. You are not half the woman she is, but you have a chance to redeem yourself. Here’s what you’re going to do. You’re going to bring me the gown, and then you’re going to pack your bags and leave Gettysburg. Never come back here. When I walk out your door, you will not remember what happened this evening. You will only know that you have an overwhelming desire to leave.” He let go of her chin. “Now, be a good girl.”
Pamela blinked a few times, and then looked down at her negligee … and gasped. She scurried to her bedroom, returning in record time with the box Malcolm had requested. “I think this is yours. I don’t know why I had it.” She shrugged, and then crossed her arms over her breasts. “Sorry for my inappropriate attire. I was just practicing some lines from Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, and I wanted to feel the part.”
“You’ll make a great Maggie,” Malcolm said as he walked out the door. He turned to give her one last stare … for good measure. “Goodbye.”
He placed the box on the passenger seat of his truck. Opening the lid, he carefully separated the tissue and breathed a deep sigh when the gown appeared to be unharmed. “Thank God,” Malcolm said out loud. He gently touched the fabric.
His heart sped as he drove to his farmhouse. Would Abby be there?
When his truck hit the gravel of his driveway, he stopped abruptly. Abby’s car was gone. His immediate inclination was to drive to her apartment, but then he sensed her fear. Like the day he’d returned home those many years ago and knew something horrible had happened to Sarah. Abby was in danger.
He pounded the steering wheel with his open palms. He closed his eyes and willed his mind to conjure her location. He got snippets of a neon sign, the smell of bourbon and smoke. And then he knew.
Spinning out of the driveway, he gunned the accelerator and headed to Interstate 95. If he drove like a bat out of hell, he could make it to Night Fright in half an hour. He considered resorting to bat form, but no other mode of transportation would get him there quicker than his truck. If the police nabbed him, he’d glamour them.
He peeled off 95 and was in Night Fright’s parking lot just moments later. It seemed exceptionally quiet. For a weeknight, Malcolm supposed that wasn’t too unusual. Abby’s car was one of only five cars in the lot.
He strode to the bar and slapped his hand on the varnished wood to get the bartender’s attention. It was the same walleyed, vampire bartender who’d been there that first night when Malcolm rescued Abby.
“Uh, what can I get you?” The bartender swept the room with his good eye.
“You know damn well why I’m here. Where’s Abby Potter?”
“Don’t worry. We won’t hurt her as long as she cooperates.”
“Where is she?” Malcolm grabbed the bartender’s collar and pulled him halfway across the bar.
A door behind the bar swung open, but when the vampire who was exiting saw Malcolm, he quickly retreated.
Malcolm followed. The door led to a short corridor. He heard whimpering from a lighted room at the end. His heart leaped. If she was hurt in any way, he wouldn’t contain his rage. He burst into the room.
Abby was sitting in a chair behind a desk, seemingly unharmed. She had a pen in her hand, and a vampire behind her had his hand wrapped around hers, trying to make her sign something. Two other vampires flanked her.
“I’m who you want,” Malcolm said. “Let her go.”
“Malcolm, no!” Abby looked up at him, fear in her eyes. Whatever they wanted her to sign, they hadn’t glamoured her to make her cooperate, which struck Malcolm as odd. But these were young vampires. Perhaps they didn’t understand the nuances of glamour and only used it to feed.
The vampire who held Abby’s hand smiled broadly, revealing yellow fangs that matched his bleached hair. “You’ve been careless, Professor. All we need her to do is sign this affidavit, confirming what she knows. The council will take it from there.”
“I won’t sign anything,” Abby said. She looked at each of her captors.
Malcolm calculated his chances of killing the three vamps in the room and rescuing Abby. Even if he could get her out, he’d have to kill the bartender, too, and any other vamp he encountered on the way out. He couldn’t leave any evidence. Because of his age, he was stronger than these vampires, but his skills at fang-to-fang combat hadn’t been tested for more than a century. Still, he’d do whatever it took.
The bleached blond grinned and bent his head to Abby’s throat.
Malcolm backhanded him across the face. “Don’t touch her.”
The vampire snarled, and then a lascivious grin curled the corners of his pale lips. “Or you’ll do … what?”
“I shouldn’t have to tell you that my blood is ten times richer than yours, which makes me ten times stronger,” Malcolm said. “That thin stuff streaming through your arteries is like Boone’s Farm to my Bordeaux. I could take you all out in a matter of seconds.” More like half a minute, but intimidation couldn’t hurt.
“Now, hold on, Professor.” This from the vampire who’d opened the door. “We all value our immortality.” He smirked. “We’re not here to off anybody, but since the little lady knows your secret, we can’t let that go unnoticed by the council. Humans are forbidden to know about our world.”
“Wait a minute, fellows,” Abby said. “I’ve gone along with this charade because I always enjoy good role play, but what ‘secret’ are you talking about?”
The vampires stole quick glances at each other.
“Don’t play dumb,” Mr. Bleach said. “You know damn well that the professor is a vampire.”
Abby let out a hoot. “Right, and I’m Marie Antoinette. Look, I can appreciate you like to have a little fun, and I’ll admit that the professor makes a great vampire, but he’s acting. I hate to burst your black bubble, but I don’t believe in vampires. I know you guys think you’re the real thing, and I’m not one to pass judgment on your idea of a good time. It’s a free country, but if you don’t mind, I’ll get my jollies elsewhere.”
Malcolm could do nothing but stare at her, nor could the other vampires in the room.
“What do you think of thith?” The third vampire displayed his fangs … with a lisp.
Abby rolled her eyes, and then yawned. “Look, this has been fun, but I’ve got classes tomorrow, and I need to get home.” She rose from the chair and stretched. “Thanks for the entertaining evening.” She looked around her. “I must have left my purse at the bar. I’ll just get it on the way out.” She pointed to the door, and then walked out of the room.
Malcolm made eye contact with each of the vampires before turning to leave.
“Just remember, Professor.” Mr. Bleach tapped him on the shoulder. “We’ll still be watching you.”
• • •
Abby didn’t slow her forward momentum. She swung her purse from the barstool to her shoulder, walked out Night Fright’s main entrance, and then broke into a trot to her car. She had no doubt Malcolm could handle himself with those goons, and when she heard someone else come out of Night Fright, she stole a glance over her shoulder. Malcolm motioned for her to get in the car.
Once she was on 95, her cell phone chirped, displaying Malcolm’s name. “Was that a close call or did we have some wiggle room?”
Malcolm chuckled. “Hard to say. Those guys can’t assemble a critical thought between them, so I half expected one of them to either lunge at me or sink their fangs into you.”
Abby shuddered. “I’m just glad I didn’t have to swear on my mother’s grave that I don’t believe in vampires. She wouldn’t have appreciated my taking her name in vain.”
“Not to mention that she isn’t dead.”
“True.” Abby sighed. “Thank God.”
“You were brilliant — and brave.”
“A girl does what she has to do, and I wasn’t up for witnessing a blood bath. You would have killed those guys.”
“I’d do anything to keep you safe, Abby. You are everything to me.”
“I know.” Her voice shook.
“You created your own cyclone back there. You see now what I mean when I call you ‘proactive?’”
“I suppose. The thought just popped into my head that I could fool them. Now that it’s over, it seems surreal.”
“Promise me you won’t take a chance like that again. You were brave, but it wasn’t the smartest move.”
“I know. I didn’t think it through before I hopped in my car. I thought I could reason with them.”
“They don’t reason. Sure you’re okay?”
“I think it’s finally sinking in.”
“Do you want to pull over and let me drive? I can pick the other car up later.”
“No. I’m all right. I just want to go back to your house. And get naked.”
“You’re starting to sound like a vampire. Near-death experiences are an aphrodisiac.”
“Must be the company I keep. Oh, wait, I don’t believe in vampires, remember?”