"My roommate, Joe, has this lizard that eats those things. He sells the extra ones to pet stores."

She gestured at the poster. "Sounds like a charming guy. That poster his, too?"

"He's all right." He took the bottle back and moved to the couch. "That was stuck up there when we moved in."

She sat next to him, close enough to brush against him as she shifted a little. She smiled to herself.

Yes, my darling. Don't try to resist. I know you want this body, this blood. They'll help me get you and keep you.

She reached for the bottle as he lowered it from his lips. "I suppose now you're going to tell me why those guys chased us in the car."

"They're just a.s.sholes. Probably jealous I was there with you." He smiled. His emerald eyes shone in the dingy apartment's dim light. She stared too long, got caught up in them too much, started to float away from her body. He reached for the bottle. She took a long drink before handing it back.

Shaking her head, she looked up at the poster again, the vampire with its bald head, needle-like fangs, and hands with unusually long nails. "That movie's overrated. It's just a ripoff of Dracula, you know."

He shrugged.

"Vampire movies always have the same problem," she said. "At the end, the townspeople think they've killed off all the vampires, but they miss one who goes on to make more vampires ..."

He laughed to himself. "It's the townspeople's own fault. They're so sure they can tell the difference between 'alive' and 'undead.' Go downtown and look at all the zombies in business suits, tell me which ones are what. You can't."

She nodded. "Yeah. My father wants me to be one of those people. I'd rather be Nosferatu, there. At least I could think for myself that way."

He peered up at it, too. "I don't know if you could. They're supposed to be crazy for blood, right? Like, they can't think about anything else but the hunger. Maybe you'd be stuck like that."

She pried the bottle from his hands, feeling the warm glow spread out from her belly. "But I'd have power over other people, and I'd be immortal."

"Those office zombies wearing ties in the high-rises downtown have power over other people, too, but that doesn't mean they can think for themselves. And besides, maybe the vampires aren't immortal. Maybe they die faster than everyone else, but n.o.body knows because there's so much energy in 'em ... like, all the blood going in keeps them strong, but they burn out, you know?"

"No, that can't be right," she said. "They're not alive at all, so they can't die."

He finished off the Beam. "I'd bet it's more complicated than that. Like, getting fed upon feels really good, and if you're fed on enough, you start to want it, need it. And then you're out of blood, but now you have the power to go get it from someone else. So you go get some. Then they'll come and feed from you again, and you get that feeling again."

"Yes," she whispered, shocked, remembering her own dreams. "That's it. I know that now. You're amazing. It's so cool I finally met someone who understands."

He shrugged.

"So what do you think about the 'invitation' thing?" she asked. "You know, where a vampire can't get at you unless you invite it in?"

He stayed quiet for a moment. "Yes," he said finally. His voice actually trembled. "I absolutely believe that." His eyes looked pained and tiny lines appeared between his eyebrows. It almost seemed like a bit of color had returned to his face.

There was just a touch of desperation in his voice as he explained. "Evil has to be invited in - at least at first. Once you invite it into your life, it makes itself at home - so much that you forget what life used to be like without it." His eyes closed. "Once that happens, it can't be removed. It doesn't need an invitation after that."

Then his eyes were open and the lines vanished from his face. Sara exhaled, realizing she'd been holding her breath.

She put her lips close to his ear, whispering. "I loved the way you talked about the feeling." She snuggled closer. "What does it feel like, my darling?"

Through the alcohol haze she sensed his lips barely touching her neck. She raised her chin. His lips parted ...

And then he bit her! Hard!

She let out a surprised yelp, falling sideways onto the coffee table. She pressed a hand to her neck in shock, gaping at him.

That slight smile was back on his lips. "I'd guess it feels something like that." A tiny laugh escaped from between his teeth.

She laughed a little, too, rolling her head back onto the table and looking up at the ceiling. "That wasn't exactly the feeling I was going for."

"Oh, really?"

She turned back to look into his narrowed eyes. Her dress had hitched up when she'd landed on the table, and it now exposed most of her thigh. Their eyes locked in silence for a moment before she answered. "Really."

He bent over and kissed her. She rolled backwards on the table so that it would accommodate them both. He joined her, kissing down her neck to the throbbing bruise he had left. He kissed her there tenderly, and it seemed there was an electric current flowing from him. Wherever he touched became hot and stimulated. She kissed him back, touching her lips to whatever part of him was nearest; his head, his neck, his ears ...

He groped, finding her breast. She didn't stop him. He reached inside the dress, then inside her bra. Inside her body, her blood gained a will of its own, rushing through her veins, pulsing at the bite mark he'd left on her neck, pooling beneath her skin to answer his touch. It was tempting him, she could tell. Her warm blood was drawing him to her, driving him mad with hunger. She hungered for him, too. She didn't stop him.

She opened her eyes and found herself in his bed. The black dress and hose had been discarded to the floor and her bra was undone. His mouth had found her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. His hand was working its way under her panties. She didn't stop him. This was what she wanted.

Oh, yes. I have you now. And I'll keep you.

He was inside her, moving with a rhythm that matched her pulse. She melted into his hot touch, the two of them flowing into each other as waves of pleasure washed through her.

A cigarette lighter clicked. Alexander was sitting up in bed, blowing smoke toward the square gla.s.s light fixture. Two of its three sockets were empty and the one remaining bulb left the room uncomfortably dim. Alexander looked down at her, smiling with his eyes.

He turned to flick the ash from his cigarette into an ashtray, then retrieved a small mirror with a few lines of cocaine on it from the nightstand. He snorted one line into each nostril with a short straw.

"Want some?"

"Sure."

"Have you done it before?"

He watched her as she did a line. She shrugged. "I did it at a couple of parties when I was really drunk. It just made me feel sort of ... I don't know. Caffeinated, I guess. But that's fine." She snuggled closer to him. "I think I want to stay awake a while tonight."

The bite mark on her neck throbbed.

CHAPTER 3.

The Vampire Coven "SARA? IT'S MUMMY.

"I don't understand why you never return my calls. I don't know what you think I've done to deserve this kind of treatment from you. Now it's almost three in the morning and you're not even picking up the phone, or maybe you're not even there ..."

Sara stared at her ceiling as the machine amplified her mother's sniffle. "You're getting better, Mummy," Sara said. "All in all, I'd say this is a fairly convincing performance."

Mummy exhaled shakily into the phone. "And I'm just so alone right now, and I'm so worried about you. I know you need help, Sara. I do. I want to help." Her voice went up in pitch. Her sniffle was wetter. "I know you're so alone, and I want us to be friends again. And I want my daughter back. I can help, Sara. Please don't shut me out-" She sobbed into the phone.

"Mummy?" Sara said. She'd picked up the phone without thinking. "I'm here. What's wrong?"

"Oh, Sara. You are home. Did I wake you up?"

"Um, yeah. I must've fallen asleep studying."

"Oh, I'm so sorry. I'll let you sleep."

"I'm okay."

"No, no, darling. I'll let you sleep." Her voice rose again, sounding like a disappointed but still hopeful child. "But maybe you can meet me for lunch at Lucinda's next week?"

"Sure, Mummy. If that's what you want."

"Good. I'll meet you there Wednesday at noon."

"Surprise! It's me. I finally found out."

Angie sighed into the phone. "Sara, it's the middle of the night ..."

"Let's see," Sara said. "It's four in the morning here, so in California it must be about ... two? That's not so bad, is it? At least I finally caught you at home." She sighed. "I know what you did."

She paused, letting the words sink in.

"It's not the kind of thing I want to leave a message about," Sara said.

Angie stayed silent for a long time.

"h.e.l.lo?" Sara said. "Is anyone there?"

"I'm sorry, Sara."

"You don't sound sorry. You sound like those people on the phone at the catalog company when they f.u.c.ked up an order. That's all you feel about it?"

Angie didn't say anything.

"So why did you let me keep calling you all these months after you did something so heartless? Did you think maybe I'd never find out and we'd still go on being friends? Did you think it was funny to pretend like there was nothing wrong?"

"I waited for you to find out, Sara." Angie's voice was edgy and angry. "I wanted you to find out, but I couldn't tell you because you're so fragile all the time and I knew you'd fall apart. But you never go anywhere or do anything or talk to anyone, so you never, ever did find out. And it just kept going on like that ... I just stopped picking up the phone."

Sara sat staring at the wall with her mouth open, hardly breathing as tears streamed from her eyes. "Yeah," she said. "I didn't know I was dead, yet." Then, shaking her head violently, she hung up the phone and unplugged it from the wall.

She tries to move.

Her wrists are bound together. Her ankles are, too. But she can lunge forward with her hands and shuffle her knees in a kind of crawl.

Alexander and some other vampire are leading her by a chain around her neck. The bas.e.m.e.nt floor is cold and rough on her knees and palms.

They pull her to a table bathed in eerie red light.

She's on top of the table. Their hoods are up. She's strapped down, the rough wood scratching her and burying splinters in her back.

She yields to the bites. The pleasure floods in as the blood flows out.

She writhes in her bonds, turning to expose herself more completely. The waves of pleasure go on and on.

The vampires turn away.

The vampires are gone. So are the chain, the straps, and the table. She squirms on the concrete bas.e.m.e.nt floor as every nerve desperately cries for the pleasure she promised. The emptiness manifests as unbearable physical pain.

Shaking her head and moaning are useless. She can't wake up.

Sara spooned a "salad" of octopus and a.s.sorted seafood onto a small dish, the smell of vinegar and spices wafting up as she closed the plastic tub again. The dinner rush hadn't hit yet so she could still hear the dishwashers' radio. Terry, the overweight, bearded shift manager, was leaning on her work station.

"Sara, I've already warned you twice about keeping up the pace," he said. "I don't want any problems tonight. Most of the stuff you're responsible for doesn't need any cooking at all- just arrange the presentation and set it for pick-up."

"Okay, Terry," she said. "It won't be a problem. I'll keep up."

"If you want to work here, you'd better." He waddled off.

Alexander placed his own dish for pickup next to her seafood salad and moved with his sinuous steps back to his territory by the stove.

She a.s.sembled smoked salmon, toast points, eggs, onions, capers, and a dollop of horseradish onto a plate. Neil looked through the stainless steel containers the prep cooks had left for him, saying, "Potato. I need a potato over here! Where'd those losers put the ... Ah!" He s.n.a.t.c.hed Alexander's tiki G.o.d from its perch on the exhaust hood. "Here we go."

Alexander pounced on him. "Hey!" he said. "Gimme that!" He reached around Neil's shoulder toward the tiki G.o.d with one hand and smacked him lightly on the back of the head with the other, emphasizing each word. "Give-it-to-me!"

"Yeah," Neil said as Alexander wrested it from him and returned it to its place. "That's just what your dad said when I f.u.c.ked him up the a.s.s last night."

Alexander gestured to the tiki G.o.d. The heat had turned it a dark brown color and a patina of fuzzy grease covered its grimacing face. "Really? Well, that's what your dad looked like when I f.u.c.ked him up the a.s.s last night."

Sara turned back to her work, sighing and shaking her head as she took the next ticket. She placed a few spears of Spanish white asparagus on a plate next to some mixed greens and hearts of palm, blinking her eyes a few times and struggling to stay awake.