Odd Stuff (5 page)

“You smell of Odd Stuff.” Her whispery voice floated around me.

I nodded. I had been bled on by a dirty vampire. I probably smelled pretty funky.

“The store.” She waved her hand in impatience when it became apparent I wasn’t making further conversation. “You smell like incense and sage.”

“Oh! Yeah. I am running it while my friend Mia is out of town.”

“Mia is my friend, too. And yet…I don’t know
you
. Who are you?” One delicate red brow arched at me, and I felt almost compelled to answer her further. 

“Oh, I am her friend from school. Janie Smith—” 

“Oh! Janie! She spoke of you a lot. You are the one who married the lawyer.”

“Yeah.” I took another pull of my Corona. She had a funny accent. 

“You just got divorced and moved here to stay with Mia. She mentioned that.”

“Uh, huh.” And I was so glad she brought it up. I took another gulp of beer. “How do
you
know Mia?” The question wasn’t meant to be rude, but I really couldn’t see Mia, in her floaty skirts, hanging out much at a strip club. 

“My name is Julia. I am Wiccan. We met through the store.” So, Julia was a Wiccan stripper. I nodded. This made as much sense as keeping blood in your fridge for your vampire friend. I was getting the impression that Ohio witches were a weird bunch. I thought about that thought. It was too convoluted, so I let it go. 

Wicca was a way of life having something to do with witchcraft, this I knew because of Mia. I wondered if Julia cast spells on her clients to make them leave more dollar bills in her underroos. I considered asking, but further conversation was inturrupted when all hell broke loose. 

I learned another vampire lesson really quick.

Turns out rinsing the majority of blood off your hair is still not enough to hang with vampires. I mean, Vance
could
have mentioned that in the car, but he hadn’t. So while Julia and I were chatting it up—and I was having deep thoughts about witches—two men came to stand behind us. Not terribly surprising, since we were sitting at the bar, which is why I ignored them.  

They weren’t ignoring us, though. Another stripper came to stand behind the men. They all looked at me like I wore something far more seductive than anything you could buy at Victoria’s Secret. They looked at me as if I
was
Victoria’s Secret.  

Even the woman.

“Hey, guys. What’s up?” Julia showed a bit of leg. Okay, a lot of leg. I already described her outfit. It didn’t leave a lot to the imagination. The tall skinny man closed his eyes and inhaled deeply. 

They paid no attention to Julia. A bad feeling blossomed in my stomach.

So, I took another gulp of beer. It didn’t solve anything, but it put solvent right where the funny feeling was. Vance stalked down the hall with a blond, curvaceous Marilyn Monroe look-alike. Not like a Marilyn Monroe wannabe, like the real deal. Beginning to fume, I could almost feel my face flush in anger. O
f course he wanted to leave me in the car
!
Why hang with the frumpy almost forty year old when you can use her for a ride to get to freakin’ Marilyn Monroe?
 

A voice that sounded eerily like Vance’s spoke in my head. The fact that I was hearing voices in my head so disturbed me that for a moment, I didn’t listen to what he was saying.
Wow, I really am nuts. I am hearing voices.
 

Then processed what he said.
Put the damned beer down and leave, now.
 

Huh? I just paid four bucks for this beer!

Apparently, the conversation went two ways because his answer was in my head before I had completed the thought.
Walk out now, because I don’t know if I am up to beating up three vampires just to save your Type O.
 

My typo? I’m not writing
. 

Type O Positive. They are going to bite you.

Oh.

Not
cool.

The one woman
was
licking her lips in a very disconcerting manner.

Julia tugged at my arm. “What are you wearing?”

“A Pitt State sweatshirt.” I thought that was reasonably obvious.

“Scent! They are very driven by scent.”

“Oh, deodorant. Maybe some left over body spray. Some vampire blood from stabbing Vance.”

“Oh, shit!” Julia took my Corona away. Suddenly everyone sure was damned interested in my beer.

“What are you—” 

“Run. I’ll try to distract them.” She smashed my beer bottle on the bar. 

“Hey! I paid four bucks for that!”

She reached in her panties and pulled out a twenty and stuffed it in my hand.

Eww, crotch money.
I stuffed it in my pocket anyway.  

Vance had nearly made it across the room, but a stripper stopped him in mid-stride… He climbed onto the stage to evade the stripper as the patrons boo-ed him.
Run!
he yelled in my head. 

“Run!” yelled Julia, cutting her arm with the broken bottle.

“Oh, you are going to need to put something on that—” 

Just then, one of the men dove at me. “Yipe!” I decided maybe it was time I got out and ducked under his arm. I dove for the door and ended up ducking and sliding on my knees to avoid a pool cue.
Thank you, softball coach of long ago.
Things crashed behind me, but I didn’t look back because something grabbed at my hair. The bouncer towered in front of me, legs braced and arms crossed. I could hear him say, “What the—” 

I yanked away from the man who had my hair and lost a little hair in the process. The rest of my hair fell down in my face and everyone in the bar froze. I pushed enough of the dark blonde mass out of my face to see what was going on.
I need a hair cut.
Okay, I knew my hair didn’t look good. I mean, it had partially rinsed out vampire blood in it. What do you expect? But the reaction of the club seemed disproportionate to this. 

Turns out a lot of vampires were there, like more than half the club worth. And all of their heads swiveled toward me. I guess when my hair fell down the smell of rotten vampire was stronger. Which kind of made sense. When I wash it and pull it up, it smells stronger of shampoo when I let it down. 

Vance was at my side and punched the guy who had just lost his grip on my hair. Everything went back to fast forward. I got a glimpse of Julia with someone dangling off her arm at the bar. Then the crowd surged again and I lost sight of her. 

“Run!” The bald, eagle tattooed, bouncer gave me a push toward the door. 

“Run!” shouted Vance, aloud this time.

So I ran. Out the door and into the parking lot.
There! The car!
 

Footsteps pounded behind me, and I realized that I had lost ground by pausing to find the car. I ran as fast as I could, but the footsteps were close on my heels. The window was down, and I dove through it, head first. My hands clawed into the seat as soon as I felt it. I pulled frantically at the seat in an attempt to get me into the car and behind the wheel. 

Instead, something stung my ass.

Shit.
Leave it to me to get my first vampire bite in the ass.

I reached up and laid my hand on the horn, blasting it through the lethargy that was attempting to take over my senses. And then I didn’t care. Turns out what they say about vampire bites being erotic…

Oh, yeah.

It was like a hot fudge sundae was melting in my mouth as I lay in the sun on some tropical beach
and
got a massage. It was
good
. Then Vance got there and ripped the guy off me and pushed me the rest of the way into the car. He slid in the driver’s seat while I tried to sit up. 

We squealed out of there like a bat out of hell.

I sat up and looked out the windshield. Everything appeared fuzzy and far off. I looked at Vance, while he steered the car at breakneck speed. Vance was clear. Very clear. He was the only thing I was able to focus on with out the image jiggling.  

And he smelled nice. Sort of a soapy, steak smell.

I smiled at him.

“Crap.” He glanced at me, then back to the road. “Blood lust.”

I furrowed my brow then remembered to clear it. I
am
almost forty, you know. “I thought that was when you wanted blood?” I distinctly remembered that from some vampire book or movie. I don’t live in a cave. Pop culture, I get.
I don’t take it seriously, so I don’t believe in vampires.
Didn’t, I corrected. I had just been bit in the nether regions by one. I might want to rethink that. Anyway, I had heard of blood lust and couldn’t see what it had to do with why Vance looked so serious just now. 

“Or when you are turned on because of blood loss or receipt.”

“Huh?”
Whatever.
He looked really,
really
good in the light from the streetlights.

“You are suffering from a rush of…I think, endorphins? Whatever the brain releases that says ‘have sex,’ that chemical is flooding your brain right now.” 

“Okay.” I reached out and slid my hand into that gorgeous hair of his, close to his scalp so that I felt the heat from his head, too. 

“Janie, just put on your seat belt. It will wear off in a minute.”

“Okay,” I agreed and cheerfully ignored his request. Sliding closer to him, I grazed my teeth against his jawline. He pulled back.
Spoilsport.
Not daunted,
I nibbled on his earlobe and traced my lips down his neck to catch the healed flesh that I stabbed earlier. Why had I stabbed him anyway? It was much more fun to taste his skin. He pulled back again. Our eyes locked. 

He swerved the car into the BP and parked, somehow without loosing eye contact with me. Catching me at the waist and he pulled me to him. I sat half on him, half on the steering wheel when he took possession of my lips.  

The kiss was better than a hot fudge sundae on a beach with a massage. I
was
the hot fudge. I melted into his arms. He was somehow stronger than anyone who had ever held me. His hands delved into my hair, pulling it and me closer. His lips covered mine and moved with mine. When his tongue slipped between my lips, I moaned a little and moved in his lap. His mouth roamed across my face to my ear. Down my neck. Teeth brushed the sensitive skin at the nape of my neck causing me to shiver in need. And then I remembered he was a vampire. “What are you doing!” I smacked at his head with my hands. 

He sighed and replaced me onto my seat as if I weighed no more than a doll. “Kissing you back.” He hit his face into the steering wheel. 

“Why would you
do
that? What the hell is wrong with
me
tonight? First I am stabbing people, now I am kissing people—” 

“I told you, blood lust. You get bit, or bite someone, and it releases something in your body that makes you want to…finish the job. I understand that it affects everyone differently. You have a low tolerance, I guess.” 

I glared at him. “If I ever get bit in the ass by a vampire again, please, hesitate to take advantage of the situation.”

“If you had stayed in the damned car, you wouldn’t have been bit in the first place!” He slapped the dashboard with his open palm.

“If you had told me that your stinking, rotten blood would make the vampires go buggy, maybe I would have stayed in the freaking car!” I slapped the dashboard just to show him two could play that game. I was in the mood for something that involved heat and I wasn’t getting it, so angry was heat. Angry worked for me. 

“If you hadn’t stabbed me, you wouldn’t be wearing my blood to begin with!”

Valid point.
I didn’t care for him to have those when I wanted to be angry. “Well, if you hadn’t been in the kitchen and looked like a monster, I wouldn’t have stabbed you!” 

“Firstly, I couldn’t help but look like a monster. I was trying to recover from someone
else
trying to kill me.” He leaned toward me, getting louder by the word. “Second, you didn’t try to stab me when I looked like a monster, as you so
lovingly
put it—which makes no sense because I always look like a monster—hello! Vampire! Anyway, you tried to stab me when I looked just fine—” 

“You were still filthy!” Apparently he wanted to be angry, too.

“Maybe I was wrong! Maybe you are nuts!” A muscle in his jaw ticked a stacatto tempo.

“I must be because I kissed
you
!”

“God, you are frustrating!” He glared at me then leaned over and kissed me again. I got kind of loopy again, but not nearly so bad. I think this time was entirely him-based rather than any lingering effects of getting bit in the ass. 

When he stopped and looked at me, I thought I sounded quite calm. “And if you keep doing that, I am going to stab you
again
.”

.

CHAPTER Three

We swapped seats, and I got back onto Route Twenty. I breezed through the light that led back to the harbor and headed toward Saybrook. Vance sat silent and still. Vampires, or at least this one, sure could sit still. Guess that comes from the whole
dead
thing. After a few minutes, though, the silence got to me. “I still don’t see why you would pull over and kiss me. I mean, I have a good excuse, but you were of sound mind and…” Heat infused my face as I remembered how sound his body felt. 

“You are my type and there is something else off about you. Mia didn’t mention it, but there is something…” He trailed off, and I ignored him. I very carefully did
not
think about anything that might be off about me. “Ah, learning to get past the mind reading thing already. Fast learner.” 

I tried not to look smug. “What do you mean, ‘your type?’ You mean because I’m a blond?” 

“Type O Positive. I am a sucker for type O’s”

I chuckled.
Sucker…hehe, from a vampire.
“And you can smell that?” I absently wondered aloud when he still didn’t add anything. “You can smell my blood type?”