Rafe's Rules Read online

  There are three more or less reliable ways of confirming somebody’s a vampire, in my experience. Short of actually being chomped by one of the bastards. I call these three ways Rafe’s Rules. There’s a hierarchy to them, based on how easy they are to implement. I intended to test Rule One, the easiest of them all, on Mr Oscar DeVane.

  At a quarter of one, just as the heat was starting to stick my T-shirt to my skin, I saw movement on the driveway of the DeVane house. A black Camaro swung out onto the road, rather carelessly, I thought. Asshole. There were kids on the street. As the car passed me I saw him behind the wheel: DeVane, his suntan and slicked-back hair and mirror shades making him look like a movie-star mobster.

  I fired up the VW and followed discreetly. It wasn’t hard to be unobtrusive; silver station wagons are a dime a dozen in soccer mom land. Once or twice I struggled to keep up, but I knew Columbus and its streets well, and I managed to stay on the Camaro’s tail.

  I followed him all afternoon. During this time he went to a sports shop and bought fishing equipment, spent an hour or so in what must have been his downtown office, then headed back north to a golf course where he presumably played a few holes. I didn’t watch him doing it; I wasn’t interested. I just kept an eye on his car until he came out.

  At six that evening I got a lucky break.

  He headed downtown again and pulled into the parking lot of a Chinese restaurant. Once more I watched his confident walk as he headed for the doors. Brilliant white shirt, chinos, loafers, a sports jacket. He looked preppy yet cool, a difficult combination to pull off.

  He was a damn good-looking guy. It was going to be a pity to do what I had to do.

  I parked across the street and wandered over to the dim sum restaurant, peered in through the glass. The windows were steamed up, the early suppertime crowd already filling the place to capacity. Angry waiters shouted and shoved their way between the tables. In a moment I spotted DeVane, newly seated at a corner table, alone, with a magazine open in front of him.

  I was about to turn away and resume my wait when I saw another solitary figure on the other side of the restaurant. A priest, complete with dog collar, steadily working his way through a bowl of soup.

  Perfect.

  I stepped inside, the heat and noise washing over me. It smelled pretty damned good, but I wasn’t there to eat. Ignoring a waiter who sidled up to help me, I made my way over to the priest. He glanced up as I approached.

  ‘Hello, Father,’ I said. ‘May I have a word?’

  He looked surprised, but indicated the chair opposite. I sat down. He was in his late thirties, his thinning hair combed over his scalp, his eyes magnified behind dense glasses.

  ‘Sorry to trouble you,’ I said, ‘but I wonder if I could ask a favor.’

  ‘How can I help you, miss?’

  ‘Over in the corner –’ I raised my eyes past his shoulder – ‘there’s a man sitting on his own. He’s a friend of mine. His wife died a month ago and he’s devastated.’

  ‘Oh,’ said the padre, looking nonplussed. ‘I’m very sorry to hear that.’

  ‘The thing is,’ I said, ‘he’s shutting everybody out. He won’t talk to me, he won’t talk to his parents or his late wife’s mom and dad. It’s like he’s keeping all this grief inside, you know? And it’s killing him, Father. I can just see it.’

  ‘Most unfortunate,’ said the priest, blinking.

  ‘Father,’ I said, placing my hand over his and leaning forward, urgency creeping into my voice, ‘do you think you could try talking to him? Maybe persuade him to open up? To, I don’t know, see a counsellor or something? He’s a churchgoing man, though I don’t believe he’s been in a while. He’ll listen to you, I’m sure of it.’

  ‘Well, I don’t know,’ said the priest, glancing up at the clock on the wall.’

  ‘Please, Father,’ I hissed, allowing hysteria to tinge my eyes. ‘You might be his last hope.’

  He stared at me for a moment, then nodded. ‘All right,’ he said.

  ‘Thank you so much.’

  ‘What’s your friend’s name?’

  ‘Oscar,’ I said. I pointed him out. The priest began to pick his way between the tables toward where DeVane was sitting.

  Rafe’s Rule Number One. Vampires will always react with fear and hatred to a religious symbol carried by somebody of devout faith.

  Now, it’s widely believed that vampires fear crosses. This is one of those myths that’s partly true. There’s nothing inherently powerful in the crucifix itself, but it acquires its potency when it’s wielded by a Christian who believes in it and what it represents. And the same goes for other religions. A Muslim with a crescent symbol, a Jew carrying a Star of David – any of these will be highly offputting to a vampire.

  I couldn’t very well march up to DeVane brandishing a crucifix and expect him to turn tail and run, because I have no religious faith. Too much cruelty and madness in the world for me to buy into any of that. But my new friend the priest was a holy man, and the silver crucifix round his neck would surely be like Kryptonite to Oscar.

  I half-rose from my seat, craning over the heads of the diners. In the corner the priest had reached Oscar and was talking to him. DeVane looked surprised, mildly irritated at the disturbance, even.

  But he didn’t look repelled, or enraged, or scared shitless.

  Damn.

  I got up and strode out, not looking back till I was out on the sidewalk and able to peer in through the fogged-up windows. The padre was looking back toward his table in bewilderment, as DeVane waved his hand, dismissing him and burying his head in his paper.

  I decided to call it a day. I’d applied Rule One, and DeVane had come through with flying colors. He hadn’t been freaked out by the crucifix. Which meant either that he wasn’t a vampire, or that the priest wasn’t as holy as his garb suggested and therefore that the crucifix he wore had no power.

  Which meant I needed to move on and test Rule Two.

  (As it so happened, three months later, and long after this was all over, I read in the Columbus Ledger-Enquirer that a 38-year-old priest, Father William K. Finney, had been arrested and charged on multiple counts of indecent assault, drug trafficking and operating a Satanic cult in Muscogee County. The man in the picture accompanying the article had thinning hair and mole-like eyes behind Coke-bottle lenses. So no, I guess you could safely say my padre wasn’t after all the most devout of men.)

  *

  I parked the station wagon out on the street and sauntered up the driveway. It was next morning, Sunday. Letitia had gone visiting with some girlfriends – they’d stopped by for her an hour ago, as I’d seen from the vantage point of my car – and as far as I knew, Oscar was home alone.

  My hair was pulled back into a ponytail and I had a University of Georgia cap down over my eyes, which were further hidden behind a pair of cheap shades. A college jersey, baggy jeans and sneakers complemented the ensemble. I looked about nineteen years old, I reckoned, and I’d even stuffed wads of tissue paper in my cheeks to resemble puppy fat. In my hands I carried a flat cardboard box.

  Slung across my back was the bag with the tools of my trade.

  (Just what is in that bag? you’re wondering. Ah, but that will have to wait till later.)

  I pressed the doorbell and waited. After around a minute I heard footsteps and the door opened.

  I caught my breath.

  Oscar DeVane stood there in a bathrobe, his hair wet and tousled as if he’d toweled it in a hurry. His feet had left faint damp prints on the parquet floor behind him. The front of the robe had been carelessly belted and a deep V of hard, taut, muscular chest was visible. His head was lowered a little, his eyes a sharp gray, almost silver, under thick sooty lashes. It was the first time I’d seen him up close and his features were impossibly handsome. Beautiful, even. His nose was thin and straight, his lips curved and full.

  I might have looked nineteen, but at that moment I felt sixteen again.

  ‘Yes?’<
br />
  His voice was a rich baritone, not arrogant but gently curious. He didn’t look at all self conscious. Even with my shades on I felt a jab of nervousness at letting my gaze dart down to his chest, his sinewy legs below where the robe ended, in case he noticed.

  In a moment I realized it was my turn to speak. I wrenched my face into a big, shit-eating grin.

  ‘Hi!’ I chirped, pitching my voice an octave higher than normal. ‘Pardon me for troubling you, sir, but the Girl Guide group I manage, the West River Woodchucks, is doing a fundraiser for homeless animals.’ I’d pulled the name out of the air. ‘We’re baking cookies, and I’d really love for you to sample some.’

  I opened the box with a conjurer’s flourish. They really did look good, if I say so myself. I’d spent my Sunday morning preparing them using my own special recipe.

  Oscar’s gaze lingered on my face for a few seconds, and I felt a delicious and quite unexpected tightening at the tips of my breasts as my nipples rose. I didn’t think they’d show through my bra and sweater, but I raised the box of cookies a little higher just to be on the safe side.

  No member of the living dead had ever made me feel this way before. It was disorienting.

  He dropped his gaze to the cookies, a slight frown appearing at his brow as he examined them.

  ‘They look good,’ he said.

  And he reached for one.

  Rule Number Two: garlic makes vampires puke, and also gets them real pissed off.

  Again, this is one of those myths that’s more-or-less accurate. In fiction you’ll see the undead kept at bay by clumps of the stuff. It’s not quite as powerful as that, and they can just about bear the smell of it, but tasting it makes them have a reaction like alcoholics have when they’re on that Antabuse stuff and take a drink. Getting a vampire actually to ingest garlic isn’t easy, as they’re really careful about what they put in their mouths – God knows how they get by in places like Italy or France – which is why you have to disguise it.

  In my case, I’d baked a ton of the stuff into my cookies, using my special secret recipe to mask the smell.

  DeVane raised the cookie to his mouth, his eyes fixed on me.

  I kept the rictus grin planted on my face. Inside, my pulse was climbing, and this time it wasn’t because of the sexual effect he was having on me. Well, not only that. I was tensing myself, preparing for the moment when he’d bite into it, go apeshit, and I’d whip the sword out of my bag and deprive the undead son-of-a-bitch of his head.

  Yep, that’s what I had in my bag. A katana, a Japanese sword, plus a set of stakes and a mallet. They don’t have to be wooden. You take out a vampire permanently by both staking it through the heart and decapitating it. Staking alone leaves it in a condition of suspended animation, so that when the stake’s removed it comes back to life, or undeath, or whatever you want to call it. Lopping its head off can work, but often the body carries on running around like a farmyard chicken.

  The cookie rose towards those ruby lips…

  And paused.

  ‘Are there nuts in this?’ he asked.

  Shit.

  ‘Uh… yeah,’ I muttered through my grin.

  He dropped the cookie back in the box, a smile of regret reaching his eyes. ‘Sorry. I’m allergic.’

  Dammit. I couldn’t very well rustle up another batch without nuts and come back. It would look suspicious. Plus, the trouble was that the secret recipe that disguised the garlic aroma relied upon nuts as one of the ingredients.

  ‘Um… sorry, thank you, sir,’ I mumbled. ‘Have a nice day.’

  I scarpered. So much for Rule Number Two.

  Well, I thought as I headed home. That leaves Number Three.

  And although it’s always more complicated to have to proceed to Rule Number Three, I couldn’t help feeling pleased.

  And more than a little excited.

  *

  MidTown Columbus is where most of the city’s nightlife is. There’s a range of bars and clubs, from flashy tourist traps to seedy dives that wouldn’t have been out of place in 1970s Manhattan. I was a little surprised when Oscar Devane parked his Camaro outside one such dump and went inside. Then again, a vampire was hardly going to avoid the sleazier parts of town because he feared for his safety. Maybe Oscar had a taste for a little darkness, what with having to spend all day in the frustratingly mundane and wholesome atmosphere of middle-class life.

  Whatever. I’d been shadowing him all week, from when he left for work until the time he got home. This morning, Friday, I’d seen Letitia leave the house with a couple of suitcases, giving her husband a peck on the cheek before stepping into a cab. So she was going out of town, and it looked like for a few days at least.

  Perfect. Now all I needed was to contrive an opportunity to get close to him, and test out Rule Number Three.

  Oscar left work at six and came straight home. I’d left off the surveillance of his office that afternoon and returned to my own apartment, where I’d tried out a combination of different looks before deciding on one that was just vampy enough to be alluring, but not one that made me look like a hooker.

  I watched his house for a couple of hours. He was a guy on his own on Friday night. Surely he’d go out, even if only to the movies?

  At half-past eight he emerged. As he got into his Camaro I saw he was dressed in a natty evening suit and was freshly shaved. No movies for him, then.

  The bar he went to was named Buffy’s. How goddamn apt. I’d never been there before. The bouncer, a bull’s body with a toad’s head, looked me up and down. He openly licked his lips.

  ‘Go right in, honey.’

  The place was crowded, dark and noisy as hell. Nevertheless, heads turned when I stepped inside. That was good. I wanted to be noticed.

  I was wearing skin-tight leather pants, thigh-high boots with heels that weren’t quite stilettos but were getting there, and a black lace top with red half-cup bra that pushed everything up to create an impressive cleavage. I’d applied a deeper red lipstick than usual, and even added a little mascara to my already black lashes. I moved through the fug and beer smell to the bar, tossing my hair back to make it ripple.

  ‘Tequila.’

  ‘Yessum,’ the bartender said to my chest.

  The first of them moved in within thirty seconds. My height, my age, a gym freak if ever I saw one with a face made small by the unnatural thickness of his neck.

  ‘On me, babe.’

  ‘Thanks,’ I said, ‘but I’d prefer to pay for my own.’

  Beside him, two of his friends laughed and dug him in the ribs. He shifted closer down the bar. I could smell the liquor on his rancid breath.

  ‘Aw, come on, babe,’ he wheedled, slurring a little. ‘It’s just a drink.’ And he hoiked himself up on to the barstool next to me, his thigh brushing against mine.

  ‘Take a walk, pal,’ I said pleasantly.

  His face darkened. He thrust it close to mine. I could see his eyes were a little unfocused. Maybe that’s how they always were.

  ‘’S your problem, bitch?’ he snarled.

  I felt myself tense. Taking him down wouldn’t be a problem; I could do it in a few seconds and he wouldn’t know what hit him. But I didn’t want to. It would spoil the setup.

  And as if he’d read my thoughts, Oscar DeVane appeared close behind us, between me and the meathead.

  ‘Everything all right here, miss?’ he said, barely raising his voice and yet audible over the hubbub.

  The big guy swiveled to stare at Oscar, dropping his eyes to his suit and his polished shoes. ‘What’s your problem, asshole?’

  Oscar didn’t say anything, just gazed into the idiot’s face. The big guy stared back belligerently, hauling himself off the barstool to face off. Then something changed in his expression. A flicker of uncertainty in his eyes turned rapidly into fear.

  ‘Come on,’ he muttered to his companions. ‘This place blows, anyhow.’

  I watched his back as he moved away, his buddie
s frowning at him incredulously. Then I turned to Oscar.

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘Don’t mention it.’ His mouth was wry, his eyes probing mine. I returned his gaze, feeling a slow heat spread from my belly up into my chest and down through my pelvis.

  My my, I thought. If vampires can be as sexy as you, Mr Oscar DeVane, I might just consider becoming one myself.

  I kicked the heel of one boot against my other shin, hard, making me wince. Stop thinking like that. It’s what he wants you to think. What they all want, him and his kind. It’s their charm. They’re trying to seduce you into joining their ranks. Don’t go there.

  In a voice like molten chocolate - God, listen to me - Oscar said, ‘I know this might be unwelcome after what just happened, but may I perhaps buy you that drink?’

  And so it started.

  Cut to a half hour later, and we’re together in a booth, which manages to be private, intimate even, despite the crowdedness of the place. I’m leaning in close across the table to hear him above the noise. He’s touching the tip of an index finger to my wrist, making some remark about bone structure that doesn’t sound corny even though it should by rights. I notice he’s removed the wedding band he normally wears.

  I let the words flow smoothly over me, ignoring their content, concentrating instead on his face. I marveled at how human he looked. In the past I’d been up close and personal with these beings, but there’d always been something slightly... off about them, something that betrayed them as other in a fundamental way. Maybe it was a coldness deep in the eyes, or a deadness to the skin tone. But I saw none of that in Oscar. He could have been a suave, tuxedoed James Bond across a croupier’s table in a Monte Carlo Casino. There was a vitality, a heat, pulsing beneath his skin that made me respond in a primal, female way.

  Maybe Letitia, his wife, was wrong. Maybe I was wrong. Maybe he was fully human after all.

  Well, I was going to find out tonight, once and for all.

  ‘Another drink?’ he asked, tilting his glass. I shook my head.