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"Kari, talk to me! My gosh, the man is gorgeous."
"Calm down, girlfriend, you're married, remember?"
"I know, I know, but I'm not dead or blind. So, come on, where did you meet him and how long have you known him?"
"I met him at that little art gallery over on Third and Pine a few weeks ago," Kari said, thinking that it was true, in a manner of speaking.
"And...?"
"And what? The man is like a fair-haired angel, a gentleman unlike any man I've ever known, and really sexy."
"No kidding. So, have you...?"
"Tricia! I just met the man."
"But?"
"I can hardly keep my hands off him," Kari admitted. If only he wasn't a vampire! If only she could tell Tricia the truth.
"I can understand that," Tricia said, laughing.
"Well, it doesn't matter. It's too soon after Ben, and...well, it's just too soon."
"He's not from around here, is he?" Tricia asked.
"What do you mean?"
"I mean, he seems like a foreigner, the way he talks, very proper, you know?"
"He's from...Romania."
"Really? I never knew anyone from there."
"Me neither."
"Well, all I can say is, wow, you'd better hang on to this one."
"We'll see," Kari said evasively. "Listen, Tricia, I've got to get back to work."
"All right. Talk to you soon."
"Bye."
"Bye."
Kari hung up the receiver, then stared at the phone. Darn Rourke for erasing Tricia's memories. She really needed someone she could talk to about this whole vampire thing, someone who wouldn't think she was losing her mind.
With a shake of her head, Kari changed the font of the text on the screen, then feathered the adjoining image. She smiled, pleased with the result, but, all too soon, she found herself thinking about Jason Rourke again. Would she see him tonight? Where was he now? Had he found a coffin to sleep in? She shuddered at the thought, and then she frowned. How would he find a coffin in a strange city? He didn't have any money to buy such a thing. Would he steal one or just, heaven forbid, scrounge around in a graveyard for a used one?
After saving her work, she signed on to the Internet, clicked on Google, and looked up vampires. There were thousands of links! Real vampires, vampire history, monstrous vampires, vampires in myth and history, theatres des vampires. The list went on and on. According to one site, a vampire was a creature who rose at night to prey on others, drinking their blood to gain immortality. Reading on, she learned that drinking blood wasn't peculiar just to vampires. Apparently the Aztecs and some Native Americans ate the hearts and drank the blood of their captives in special rituals in order to obtain fertility and immortality. Some of the sites included images of vampires. She perused them with interest. Some depicted the Undead as hideous creatures with bloody fangs and red eyes; others depicted them as bloodthirsty but sensual creatures.
According to Webster's, a vampire was "the reanimated body of a dead person believed to come from the grave at night and suck the blood of persons asleep."
Another site put forth the theory that a person became a vampire because the earth refused to accept the body and heaven refused to accept the soul. No reasons were given for this.
None of the descriptions of vampires painted a very pretty picture. Certainly none of them described the hunky build, long blond hair, and mesmerizing blue eyes of Jason Rourke.
Kari lifted a hand to her neck. He had bitten her and taken her blood. Funny, she couldn't remember it more clearly, but maybe that was a good thing. What would it be like to have to drink the blood of others to live? She had tasted her own blood, of course, but then, sooner or later everyone did that. It was a common thing to lick your finger if you got a paper cut or a scratch. But to drink enough to live on? And someone else's? Yuck and double yuck!
She glanced at the time on her computer. It was almost five-thirty. She had been off the clock for the last twenty-five minutes.
She shut down her computer, turned off the monitor, gathered her handbag, and headed out the door.
Kari's heart was pounding erratically when she pulled into the driveway and cut the engine. The sun was down.
Where was her vampire?
Her vampire? What was she thinking?
Feeling uneasy yet filled with a strange sense of anticipation, she unlocked the front door and quickly closed it behind her. She glanced automatically at the empty space over the fireplace, thinking how bare the wall looked without the Vilnius, then glanced at the shopping bags she had carried inside last night.
She stood in the middle of the living room, listening, waiting, then sighed with disappointment. He wasn't there. She told herself she should be relieved. But he was bound to return. After all, he had to pick up all the clothes she had bought him last night. She grinned inwardly. If they went shopping again, she'd probably have to find a second job just to pay for it all.
Going into her bedroom, she kicked off her shoes and changed into a pair of faded jeans and a baggy sweater, then went into the kitchen, where she fixed a toasted cheese sandwich and tomato soup for dinner. She ate in front of the TV, but her mind wasn't on what she was eating, or on the six o'clock news. Even though Rourke frightened her, she had expected to find him waiting for her when she got home. She was surprised at how disappointed she was that he wasn't there. Maybe disappointed wasn't quite the right word. After all, she had been obsessed with the man--or whatever he was--for over a week. Thinking about that now made her realize just how empty her life had become since she broke up with Ben. She had taken refuge at home, shunning the company of others while she nursed her broken heart. It occurred to her now that it hadn't been broken at all, merely bruised.
After carrying her dirty dishes into the kitchen and putting them in the dishwasher, she went upstairs, changed her clothes again, grabbed her handbag, and left the house. She had been spending entirely too much time sitting at home alone. She wasn't in mourning, for goodness' sake. It was time to get out of the house and return to the land of the living. She grinned. Land of the living, indeed, she thought, and wondered again where Rourke was.
She had always loved dancing, so she drove downtown to her favorite club. She had never gone there alone before, but hey, there was a first time for everything and she needed a diversion. Besides, women today were strong and independent. She didn't need a man to support her, or to give her confidence. Heck, according to a recent poll, the majority of today's women didn't even get married. She wondered what it said about her, that she hoped to become one of the minority.
