Hugging the wall, we watch the door slowly swinging open. Catching a glimpse of someone with red hair entering, we stare in puzzlement. Who the hell is it? Snapping out of our frozen state we return to the back bedroom. The only thing we know for definite is, it’s not Beatrix. Her hair’s brown!
As silently and quickly as we can, we enter the bedroom closing the door behind us as the footsteps ascend the stairs. “Hide,” I mouth, as my eyes widen in alarm.
Glancing around the room, I groan in annoyance. It holds a double bed, night stands, chest of drawers, and a wardrobe. We contemplate hiding under the bed, but it’s a divan and so no space there, and the wardrobe won’t fit us both. I think about hiding behind the curtains, for just a second, before with a grimace I head for the open window. Hefting myself up, I climb out. Grasping the gutter, I swing myself onto the roof and move over to give Jasmine room. A second later, she climbs out and eases the window back into position, joining me on the roof just as the gutter gives a groan of strain. Glancing at each other, we grin. I haven’t had so much fun in ages.
We inch toward the drainpipe to shimmy down, when we hear someone enter the bedroom we’d just left.
The window swings open, and a head pops out. We both freeze, gripping the roof. We hear muttering, and then the window slams shut.
As quietly as possible and with our hearts racing, we reach the pipe. I slide down it and jump on the wall separating Beatrix’s garden from her neighbors. Crouching down, I crawl a few steps forward, making sure no one sees me. Glancing up, I incline my head to Jasmine, who swiftly follows my path.
I’m about to move forward again, when I feel her place a steadying hand on me. Turning, I raise an inquiring eyebrow at her. She points toward the back door mimicking turning a lock. With an inward groan I know she’s right. There’s no point in slipping away quietly, if we let the occupants know someone’s entered the house by leaving the door unlocked.
With a grimace I give her a nod. She lowers herself down and swings her legs over the side, grasping my hands. I help her lower the rest of the way.
Once she’s on the ground I straighten, turn around and crawl backwards until my back is against the wall so I can keep an eye out. I hear movement from both next door and Beatrix’s house.
Tapping two fingers against my leg, I catch Jasmine’s eye and twirl them around in a “wrap it up motion,” before tapping my wrist where I should have had my watch, if I’d remembered to wear it.
With a curt nod and a final twist, she locks the back door and crouch runs toward me, where I once again straddle the wall, lean down grasp her proffered hand, and swing her up. She runs to the end of the wall and jumps into the alleyway with me on her heels.
I’ve just cleared the wall when I hear the back door rattle. Stifling a laugh as Jasmine goes sprawling, I half land on top of her. I jump off her and help her up. We head toward the mouth of the alley with me still laughing.
“It’s not funny, Candi, so stop laughing!” she hisses in exasperation.
With a snort, I try valiantly to get a hold of myself, sobering up quickly as I spy Beatrix heading home. We slip further into the alley’s shadows, silently watching Beatrix talking on her phone, gesturing in annoyance at whatever she’s hearing. For a split second, I think she’s coming into the alley. Glancing around for an escape route, I notice Jasmine looking just as wary as me. We have nowhere to go.
“Beatrix, what are you doing?” a female voice hollers in annoyance, making Beatrix hesitate before she bypasses the alleyway to move toward the voice at the front of the house. I don’t hear her answer. Instead Jasmine and I turn heading as fast and silently as we can farther into the alley and out the other side, along the back of the mall’s car park toward West Bridge, and the long way home.
An hour later we arrive starving, tired, and in desperate need of a drink and the bathroom. Once finished I go to the kitchen feeling more relaxed. On entering Jasmine hands me a mug of coffee. With thanks I accept, taking a reviving sip. Contentedly, I curl my hands around the mug and drink deeply.
“You know, I had wanted something alcoholic to drink, but this coffee is definitely doing the trick.” I grin happily, as I lean against the kitchen counter.
“Glad to hear it.” She smiles. “But what I want to know is, what are you making us for lunch?”
Frowning at her, I try to remember what we have, foodwise in the house. With a grunt of annoyance, I put my mug down and rummage in the fridge, pulling out butter, mayo, ham, and lettuce. Grabbing a loaf of bread from the bread bin, I start making us a sandwich each. “Someone is going to have to go food shopping,” I
mutter as I finish the ham. “And it’s not going to be me,” I add for good measure. I hate food shopping. I pass her a sandwich. Retrieving my coffee and sandwich, I move to the sofa which is still in the kitchen, and plop myself down almost spilling my drink. In silence we eat and once finished, I release a long groan. What the hell is going on around here?
“You know, when I decided to move back here, it was meant to be easy and straightforward.” I continue without waiting for a reply. “No murders, no Grandma going bad, and do you realize how weird it is to say that?” I demand. “And most definitely, no headless corpses, or corpseless heads walking about the place! Oh God, maybe I’ve just gone crazy, and this is some majorly fucked up dream?” I ask hopefully, as I cradle my throbbing head in my palm.
Her laughter interrupts my pity party, and raising my head I send a “bitch, please” glower at her, which only makes her laugh harder. “What are you finding so Goddamned funny?” I growl in frustration.
“Your pity party is what I’m finding funny. Are you seriously trying to say you would rather be crazy than…yeah, okay…well, what about Victor, hmmm?” she demands in obvious relief at finding something good to come out of these admittedly bizarre events.
Looking at her, I study her closely. “Having you back has definitely been worth everything that’s been happening, and yes, meeting Victor has been a most wondrous experience, and I wouldn’t want to not have met him,” I quietly agree with a small smile.
“He really is amazing,” I whisper as a breathless laugh escapes me. At her enquiring look, I smile and admit, “He makes me feel.”
“Feel what apart from the obvious?”
“Just feel. I don’t know. I feel alive and complete. I feel breathless, and as if for the first time I can breathe.”
“Wow, is that all?” she laughs. Then with a look of curiosity reflected in her voice, she asks me, “Does he feel the same way?”
“Yes.” Dragging my feet onto the sofa, I wrap my arms around my knees and rest my chin on top. With a shaky laugh, I admit, “Yes, he does, but I’m not ready to admit how I feel about him.” Seeing my friend’s incredulous look, I smile.
“I’m being serious. I know I’m feeling these emotions because of him, but they’re my emotions, and I’m not ready to share them, and to be completely honest, it’s not as if we really know each other, other than in the biblical sense, you know? What if…what if I get hurt or he changes his mind? I’m not ready to put my emotions on the line.”
“But…Candi, I don’t know how to tell you this. He has a right to know, especially if…”
“Who has a right to know, what?” enquires Victor, as he and Kheda walk into the kitchen, scaring the crap out of me.
I notice the guilty look flashing across Jasmine’s face, and wonder if she’d heard them coming in. Narrowing my eyes at her, I arch one eyebrow in a silent demand. Shaking her head in silent denial and flushing slightly pink at the same time, makes me wonder if she had indeed heard them. I decide to ignore the question for now, and instead turn to Victor and Kheda and change the subject. “Beatrix is alive.” “What? How is this possible? We saw her head, for crying out loud,” Kheda exclaims in vexation as he dumps his shopping bags on the counter, and turns toward us as if to make sure we’re not telling some sick joke.
Victor places his shopping bags on the kitchen table and slowly unpacks them. Every now and again he flicks a glance toward me, while I just sit hugging my legs, contentedly watching with a silly half smile on my face.
Finally, he’s unpacked and put away the shopping. “What exactly happened?” Victor finally asks before Kheda explodes from gaining no information.
“Well, we went to check out her house, and she was leaving it,” I reply with a shrug, as I watch Victor move toward me. With a sigh of appreciation, I finally blink and rouse myself enough, to tell Victor and Kheda everything.
“Are you two crazy?” Kheda demands in horror.
I laugh at his question as it reflects so closely what I had been thinking earlier, but receiving a withering glare from him, I quickly sober enough to say,” No, we’re not crazy, what we are is determined to find out what is going on. I think we should go to the club tonight,” I add for good measure.
“Why?” Victor asks sitting down beside me. “Because, it’s where everything is centered,” I explain slowly as I work things out in my head.
“The night after the first murder, everything was silent, except the club. You said the two vampires who happened to turn up dead, went missing from outside the club. Also Beatrix works at the club, and what with her head turning up at your pub, turning into a bomb, but not really, as it’s on her shoulders very much attached, I think we need to check it out.” Taking a deep breath, I look at everyone. “How many coincidences can there be?”