Don’t Worry, I’m Still Here. Here’s a Sample to Prove It.

“A table for one, please.”

The young man working the front of the restaurant paused as he studied Victoria. Subtlety was a skill he lacked. The twenty-something made no effort to disguise his appreciation of Victoria’s shape. A confused, goofy smile spread across his face.

“Really?” he asked.

Victoria arched an eyebrow.

“Is there something wrong?”

Finally, the young man’s senses came back to him. He remembered he was working, and was supposed to be professional with all customers, even the ones he found attractive. His cheeks turned crimson as a look a panic settled in.

“N-No, not at all,” he stuttered. “It’s just…you’re not waiting for anyone?”

She let out a genuine laugh. The boy was cute. With an exaggerated sigh, she gestured to the laptop case she carried at her side.

“Not tonight. This is something of a working dinner. A few web meetings.” She couldn’t help teasing him, just a little. “But thank you for asking.”

“Oh, no! That’s not what I….” He cleared his throat, regaining his composure. “Let’s find you a table.”

Her eyes drifted across the restaurant as they weaved their way around booths and tables. Human life in one of its purest forms was on display. Conversation, laughing, dinner. While she couldn’t eat human food, the scent of it was always alluring. Humanity had come up with fascinating ways to prepare food over the centuries. The aroma in the restaurant blended with the delicious nectar the humans carried in their veins.

Victoria could feel her thirst building. Perhaps the young man leading her to a booth would get more of her than he expected by the end of the evening.

He turned to face her, eying her one last time. Her thoughts drifted to her choice of clothes. A pair of jeans, a loose, turquoise blouse, open-toed sandals. Nothing too exotic or revealing. She looked like any other red-headed, thirty-year-old woman, that needed more time in the sun. It wasn’t her goal to stand out, but for a vampire, that wasn’t always easy.

“Is this okay?” he said, gesturing to an empty booth by the window.

“It’s fine. Thank you.”

Her targets were seated on the other side of the restaurant, but that didn’t matter. She gave the man one last smile as she shimmied across the bench. The setting sun was over her shoulder in the window, bathing her in warm light.

“Your waiter will be right with you.”

Victoria nodded. The young man walked away, his heart still pounding in his chest. She could hear the enticing rhythm, the steady beating of his life. Too many nights had gone by lately with cold blood from a bag. That would have to change soon.

She opened her laptop, simply for appearance, and laughed quietly as she took in the scene. Her latest case had taken her to some unusual places. A late-night stakeout at a morgue. An abandoned amusement park, where two of her persons of interest merely ended up having sex in an old roller coaster car. She somehow didn’t think when she first made the trip to Wyoming that she’d end up at a restaurant.

Her laptop chimed, surprising her. A message hovered in the corner from Zoey, the teenage vampire living with her. She had seen that Victoria was online, and reached out to say hello.

The message was simple.

What are you up to?
Victoria reached for the keyboard, her fingers flying.

Can’t talk now.
A few moments of silence, but it didn’t last. Victoria sighed in both amusement and frustration when the laptop chimed once again.

Kevin and Leese got back together.
Victoria laced her fingers together and leaned her elbows on the table, reading the message several times. Her thoughts went to the young couple, the witch and the human.

A satisfied smile escaped.

Of course, they got back together. She’d wondered how long it would it take.

She liked to think she was above the simple romantic issues humans faced. Do I look pretty? Does he like me? What does he think of these shorts? Relationships were so fleeting, temporary. She’d been alive long enough to know they never lasted. Time made sure of that. Even among supernatural beings.

But connection was what made the world go around. Seeing her young friends, Alex and Cindy, Kevin and Leese, grow and care for one another, warmed her unbeating heart.

Victoria responded with a simple smiley face, and went offline. She scolded herself as she typed the colon and closing parenthesis. She remembered when what she referred to as keyboard slang first began to creep into human consciousness. She swore she’d never be caught typing symbols that disguised themselves as expressions, or LOL.

However, like all things humanity, she got sucked in.

A laugh off in the distance pulled her back to the restaurant. She took a deep breath, focusing on why she was alone at a booth in the first place. She’d been away from home too long. One case after another, it felt like. An insane doctor killing werewolves in Oregon. An angry werewolf running loose in Idaho. Now, more madness in Wyoming. She couldn’t wait to go home to her mansion, see her friends once again. Enjoy the luxuries that only a four-hundred-year-old vampire could earn.

But not yet. There was one more case to tie up. More humans, doing inhuman things.

Leaning forward, she closed her eyes, and just listened.

It had taken decades for Victoria to truly hone her enhanced senses. Hearing things she didn’t want to, not hearing things that she did. It was a mess. Any vampire could hear better than a human, but it took practice, training, control, to truly get anything out of it.

She started as she always did, by doing something that others thought of as surprising. She let everything in, didn’t try to block anything out. A waiter dropped a tray of dishes in the back. Another waitress gently flirted with a diner. An exhausted, frustrated couple tried to keep their toddler under control. A woman moaned in discomfort as she sat in the bathroom, dinner apparently not agreeing with her.

Victoria cut through the sounds, forced aside the clanging silverware and clinking glasses. She pulled out the conversations, the words. One couple argued about their in-laws. Two couples were in the middle of laying down the rules for swapping partners. One family debated on what movie they would see after dinner.
“I’m not sure I can be a part of this anymore.”

She recognized the voice. A woman, in her early forties. Victoria had been watching her for the past few weeks, taking notes, learning her habits. There were still so many things Victoria didn’t know. The case started out simple enough. The vampire population in a fifty mile radius around Buck, Wyoming, was beginning to dwindle. She thought it was merely petty warfare, at first. Newborn vampires fighting over territory. But in her investigation and research, she noticed two of the missing vampires had a common contact between them.

“Karen,” her male companion said. “You know I can’t talk too much about it. But…we finally made a breakthrough. It’ll all be over soon.”

“I don’t think I can do it.”

“We just need you to lure in one, maybe two more. They trust you. We can’t do this without you.”

“I won’t let another one of those monsters drink from me, Adam.”

“Why? What happened? You hated them a month ago. Now, you’re feeling sorry for them? Did you forget what they—?”

“I didn’t forget.” Karen’s tone turned dangerous. “I’ll never forget. But…I don’t know. I thought I’d feel better. I thought I’d be making a difference.”

“You are.”

“It doesn’t feel like it. I feel horrible.”

“Karen—”

Adam reached for her hand. How Victoria knew that, with only her ears, she didn’t know herself. It was something that came with the senses. When she was focused, in the zone, it was almost as if she were right there with them.

“Listen to me, I’m not sure if the others…will just let you walk away now.”

“Are…you threatening me?”

“No. God, no. Karen, I’m trying to protect you. I don’t want anything to happen to you. Just get us one more. I’ll talk to them, let them know you’ve done your part, and you’re done. But one more.”

Silence, as Karen thought it over.

“Okay. One more. But then I’m done. I can’t start over if I’m always doing this.”

“Great. I’m glad—”

“Ma’am? Are you okay?”

The new voice cut in, very close to Victoria. It was the waiter, seemingly hovering over her. She tried not to get angry. He was merely showing concern for a woman who seemed to be in pain, leaning over the table with her eyes shut. But he distracted her, nearly pulling her senses back.

“I’m fine,” she said quietly. “Just some water, please.”

“Are you sure? You look—”

“Water.”

“S-Sure.”

The waiter walked away. Victoria’s ears went with his footsteps, marching across the restaurant. She tried to focus once again. She reached out, listening.

Karen and Adam were gone.

Standing at her booth, she saw the pair leaving, already near the front door. It was her first glance of Adam. Slightly younger than Karen, sandy blond hair, a deep tan. He looked like he belonged at a beach playing volleyball, but obviously the human had many secrets. He had a hand on the small of Karen’s back. Were they intimate? What was their relationship?

Victoria dropped a fifty-dollar bill on the table and gathered her laptop. She passed her amusing companion working the front. He smiled at first, then frowned in confusion, noticing her short meal. She returned the smile and gave him a wink.

Karen and Adam stood in the parking lot. He held both her hands in his. Her gaze wandered as he talked. She seemed embarrassed, peering at the ground as much as looking at him.

Victoria pulled her phone from her laptop bag and held it to her ear. She didn’t bother dialing a number, but instead shifted her hearing, reaching out across the lot. Not being inside the noisy restaurant, it was much easier to eavesdrop. A family of four smiled as they passed and went inside. The youngest, an energetic boy, pointed a plastic gun at her and made shooting noises. Victoria played along, throwing a hand over her heart and pretending to be shot. She blended in perfectly with the small crowd outside waiting to eat.

“—will be fine. Just trust me.”

“I do trust you, Adam.”

“None of this would have been possible without you. You know that, right?”

Karen turned red.

“Thank you.”

“After this is over, maybe you and I could go out to dinner.”

“We just did,” she said, laughing.

“No. I mean like a real dinner.”

“I’d like that.”

Adam leaned in for a quick peck on the cheek. They went their separate ways, with Karen stealing a peek over her shoulder. It wasn’t the most riveting of stakeouts, but Victoria finally had a new lead, as well as some new information. After weeks of watching Karen lead a rather unassuming life, Victoria now knew she was luring vampires. What exactly she was luring them into, that was still a mystery.

But Adam could answer those questions.

Victoria headed for her rental car, on the other side of the restaurant. Karen was already in her car and driving away. Victoria glared at her as she passed. Karen’s motives were another mystery, but the typical human reaction to discovering a vampire was usually hate and fear. It sometimes took a lot of effort to change that.

She’d just opened the car door when she heard a voice.

“Yeah, it’s me. I hate to say it, but Karen…we won’t be needing her anymore.”

Victoria peered over the parked cars. She could barely see Adam, standing next to his own car. He held a phone to his ear as he leaned across the hood, as if he didn’t have a care in the world. She couldn’t hear the other end of the conversation.

“No, no. I don’t want to do that. Look, just get a couple of the guys, and take care of it. Tonight. And Mike…make it quick, okay? She’s a good woman. She doesn’t need to suffer any more than she already has.”

Adam hung up. He sighed as he played with his phone, turning it over in his hands. He was deep in thought, his expression full of remorse.

He slid behind the wheel.

Victoria nearly growled. Adam was her new lead, and it was her intention to follow him.

But Karen’s life was in danger.

Conflicting thoughts swirled in her mind. She considered herself a good person, but wasn’t above doing the occasional bad thing to achieve a good deed. She’d killed, many times before. Was Karen worth saving? Who knew how many vampire disappearances she was responsible for?

But Victoria had gotten to know the woman.

Karen liked romantic comedies, and was a sucker for feta cheese. She was quiet, kept to herself, and after working as a secretary at a doctor’s office, enjoyed curling up on the couch with her two dogs. She liked to go biking, and was debating on starting an online dating account. Victoria laughed to herself as she watched through the window, as Karen made several attempts at creating a profile, and taking ridiculous selfies.
Victoria had been wrong before. Even after four centuries, she still made mistakes. But she didn’t get a sense that Karen was truly a bad person.

Adam started his car. If Victoria wanted to follow him, she’d have to move quickly. She had no backup. Kevin, the powerful full-blooded witch that spent some evenings in her kitchen, cooking potions and steak, was normally only a magical phone call away. But Victoria had sent her stone off to Alex, at his request. She didn’t even ask why.

Adam stopped at the exit to the restaurant. She had to make a choice.

“Shit,” she muttered.

Adam turned right, while Victoria turned left. She watched his car disappear in the rear-view mirror, still wondering if she was making a mistake. The small town of Buck’s roads were still unfamiliar to her, but she could navigate to Karen’s house quickly enough.

She picked up speed and ran two red lights. Hopefully, she wasn’t too late.