Primal Call (6 page)
Authors: Susan Sizemore
“I do. But with you I mean it.”
She was sure he meant it to every woman he said it to, at the time he said it. “You’ll be free to go on to your next project, you mean. What’s up after
Orphan
?”
“You’re a mind reader! Let’s talk about my next project. Our next project, if I can get you to help with the script.” Before she could point out she knew nothing about script writing, James said. “It’s about vampires.”
“Oh, thank God,” Thena breathed.
“You like vampires?” He sounded downright eager.
“I don’t know anything about vampires. Except modern ones sparkle, right?”
“I do not know a single vampire that sparkles.”
“Know a lot of vampires, do you?” She was a little worried about the answer, even though she knew it would be a joke.
“I live in Los Angeles, sweetheart. They’re everywhere. But they don’t sparkle. Well, maybe if they’re wearing a lot of bling.”
“You don’t have to sound huffy about it.”
He laughed. “Point is, I have a treatment for a vampire script I want us to develop.”
“Bleh,” she said. “I’ve never understood the appeal of vampires. They’re the walking dead. They drink human blood. They sleep in coffins. Blood drinking rotting animated corpses have got to smell really bad.”
“I think you’re talking about zombies, love. Except they eat brains instead of drinking blood. Drinking blood is sexy—Bram Stoker taught the world that much about vampires, at least.”
“Do you really want to play a vampire? Won’t wearing fangs be uncomfortable?”
“That sort of thing is mostly done CGI these days. But I doubt I’ll mind wearing fangs.”
“Is this a monster movie? Are you playing the vampire? Or the vampire hunter?” Thena knew she was sounding a bit disdainful about it—a woman who wrote action adventure novels had no right to be a snob. Horror was a perfectly respectable genre, but she wasn’t sure she could write it.
“Maybe a bit of both,” he said. “There are good vampires and bad vampires.”
“In this story?”
“Yes.”
“Okay, I don’t get that.”
“Let me give you the background. Don’t take notes or anything,” he added. “Just think about what I tell you. Let it simmer.”
“So, this is a secret vampire project?”
“For now. Ready? Here goes. Vampires evolved alongside mortals. They’re a different, but close enough to interbreed, branch of the human tree. Vampires aren’t really immortal, but they can live for several hundred years. Vampires are the apex predators, which means there aren’t very many of them. And they do drink mortal blood, but they don’t have to kill mortals. I’m not saying they don’t, but they don’t have to. They can’t turn mortals into vampires, either. Well, there are special cases where mortals can be turned, but it’s very rare and that won’t be dealt with in this film.”
“Saving it for a sequel?”
“Exactly. The vampires are divided into three different cultures. There’s the Families, which are the most numerous. They basically just want to blend into the background and live their lives. There’s the Clans. The Clans have this noble calling to protect mortals while remaining hidden from the mortal world. It’s all very romantic and posh. The Tribes are the bad guys. They’re the ones who’ve given vampires a bad name over the centuries. There aren’t a lot of Tribe Primes left—”
“Primes?”
“That’s what male vampires are called.”
“What are the females called?”
“Females.”
“Not very imaginative.”
“Noted. We’ll work on that. Where was I, love? Oh. There are more males than there are females among the vampires. Partly it’s biological, more males are born than females. But it’s also because the mortal vampire hunters deliberately went after females back before the truce. They were trying to keep vampires from breeding.”
“Because you’re born and not made?”
“Exactly.”
He didn’t notice how she’d phrased the question. No doubt because he was already into the role of this vampire Prime character he wanted to play.
“What about sunlight and garlic and stakes through the heart and all those other things that kill vampires?”
“A stake through the heart’s not going to kill a Prime, not unless it’s made from hawthorn wood—bad allergy to hawthorn. Also allergic to garlic, and silver.”
“I thought it was werewolves that were allergic to silver.”
“I’ll let Mimi explain to you about werewolves.”
“Isn’t she your bodyguard?”
“Yeah, but she’s helping on the script too,” he said quickly. “And sunlight does harm vampires, kills them if they’re exposed long enough. But here’s the twist, love. The vampires invested in a lot of scientific research and came up with medicines that protect them from the light, and all the other things that hurt them. Modern vampires take pills and shots—like diabetics or hemophiliacs—to protect them from the things that can kill them.”
“Vampirism is a disease?”
“It most certainly is not!” He was quite adamant. He sounded almost angry.
“I didn’t mean to offend you, but you said they took medicine—”
“Only the ones who want to live daylight lives. There are some vampires who say the drugs are destroying the species. They won’t touch the drugs. Very old-school nightlife types. There’re arguments that the long-term effect of the daylight drugs aren’t known yet. The drugs are part of the story, but let me get on to the important plot points.”
“All this background is very interesting. You must have been thinking about this for a long time.”
“For years and years. Since I was able to think straight at all, I guess.”
“When was that?”
“Maybe twenty or so.”
According to his official bio James Wilde was twenty-eight. Eight years was quite a while to think through a story, especially one with the amount of world building he was presenting to her.
“Go on,” Thena said.
“Here’s the romance part,” he said. “Every story has to have a romance.”
She sighed. “I take it there will be biting, blood, and sex scenes in this script.”
“You bet there will.”
She remembered the film clip of James naked on the
Orphan
set—though it was never far from her mind, really—and almost groaned in frustrated longing.
“Vampires—who aren’t dead—having sex with each other?”
“Not in this one. The romance is between a Prime and a mortal woman.”
“A story just about vampires wouldn’t be very popular, I suppose. You need a human protagonist for the audience to identify with.”
“You obviously haven’t seen the
Underworld
movies.”
“I told you I don’t like vampires, Jimmy.”
“I am so going to change your mind.”
He gave a low, wicked laugh that sounded so filthy it nearly gave her an orgasm. How did he do that?
“Back to our tale of love and adventure,” he said. “Have I mentioned that the vampires are telepathic? And so are some humans in this world.”
“You don’t have to convince me about psychic humans. My Aunt Maria—Never mind. Go on.”
“There’s a thing that happens to vampires, it’s called Bonding. It’s a psychic and physical link that forms with their soul mates—and yes, vampires believe in souls. Not all vampires find their bondmate, but when they do there’s nothing that can stop them from being with this person, be they vampire or mortal.”
“What if the mortal in question says no?”
“They can’t, if they’re a true bondmate. A bonding is a two-way forever mating. It’s true love. Why would anyone want to fight a bonding?”
“Dramatic purposes,” she answered. “You have to have conflict in a story.”
“‘Course. Have to have conflict. What? Excuse me, love.”
She heard a brief, muffled, conversation, and caught mentions of lighting problems and tests. After a few moments, James came back to the phone.
“I have to do movie stuff now.”
She didn’t want him to go. “I’m enjoying your version of vampires—but we haven’t gotten to the plot yet.”
“Soon.” The word was a promise. He hung up.
Thena gazed out over the peaceful landscape for a few minutes, her thoughts far away from her quiet, regular life. Her head was abuzz with images of vampire heroes and all the bits of cultural baggage they brought with them that James had detailed to her.
What sort of story could she make of this? Could
they
make of this, rather. She wasn’t used to collaborating. She didn’t know if she could do it. He made her want to try. James was making her want to try to feel and think all sorts of things she wasn’t used to. Well, not
making
her. It wasn’t like he was some telepathic force of will drawing her under his domination. He made her feel—brave. Yeah, that was it. She wanted to fly because of him.
She’d worry about the falling part later.
Right now, he wasn’t the only one who needed to get back to work. She left the porch to return to her computer. The words didn’t appear on the screen all by themselves.
###
The lighting people were gathered around the director when James came onto the set. There was yelling going on. James was surprised, as this had been a friendly, civilized, and efficient set during the shoot. It was a pleasure to work on
Orphan
, even when all he really wanted was to get the job over with.
Apparently, he wasn’t wanted just yet. James considered calling Thena back, then thought better of it. She needed time to absorb what he told her about his real world. She needed to think. And so did he—about his job. He walked over to where other cast members were waiting. He’d been spending far more time than he should in his trailer. He made himself make pleasant conversation and listen to pleasant conversation. What sort of an actor would he be if he couldn’t fake interest in anyone but his bondmate for a while?
He wondered how much longer he would have to live with Athena thinking James Wilde was faking interest in her? He heard longing to trust, and fear of trusting his intentions, every time he heard her voice. Blast her strong shields, and the insecurity that told her Wild Jimmy Wilde wasn’t the man for her. Working on both was proving a delightful challenge. But if he didn’t get to touch her soon, taste her—
Down boy.
“Yeah,” he said to something. “You should do that,” to something else.
Somehow, while he kept thinking about his bondmate, he talked and laughed with the actors and techs who stood around waiting for the argument on the other side of the set to wind up. It didn’t.
After a few minutes, James jerked a thumb at the altercation. “What is that about?”
“An electrician apprentice screwed something up. Now, there is or is not a safety issue, depending on which side is yelling at the moment,” one of the crew answered.
“Why—”
The explosion interrupted James’s question. An arc of white light sizzled toward the ceiling.
A fireball erupted on the other side of the soundstage.
James had the man on the floor and his burning clothes beaten out even as the man’s scream cut through the air. Primes moved fast.
It only occurred to him that maybe he’d moved too fast after he stepped back to let the set’s medic have a look at the man he’d helped. He hadn’t thought, just acted on instinct—instinct being far too close to the surface in his current state.
There were flames, smoke, people shouting and rushing around, piles of equipment between the scene of the rescue and everyone else—maybe no one had seen him move across the set like a…vampire.
Please don’t let that have been caught on camera
, he hoped.
The Shagals will have my ass out of town by nightfall if those moves show up on the Net.
Of course, if he was exiled from LA, he could finally get to see Athena.
The AD came running up . “How’d you do that, dude?”
“The fire’s out, but the studio fire department’s on the way,” the chief electrician said as he knelt next to the medic. “Are you okay, Sam?” he asked the victim.
Sam was sitting up, and trying to fend off the eager medic, who wasn’t used to getting the chance to do a lot of work. Sam looked up at James. “Thanks, Jimmy. You did that stop, drop, and roll thing on me pretty good.”
“Did I bruise you?” James asked. “I think I tackled you harder than I meant to. Please don’t sue me.”
Sam laughed. “I won’t. If you don’t tell anyone I screamed like a girl.”
“Deal.”
James had set his cell phone to vibrate. His hip pocket suddenly began to throb madly.
###
Thena opened a new word processing file and stared at the blank screen. The beginning was the most terrifying and the most fun part of writing. She wiggled her fingers over the keyboard. Her head was full of all the things James had told her about his movie script vampires. So much background, but so little story. What to do? Whose story to tell? Okay, the hero would have to be a vampire, a Prime as James called them. A human heroine then.