Chapter 2
Angelique's golden hair lay intermingled with her own red one on the pillow. Megan caressed her shoulders as she drank.
"I wish we could do this more often." Angelique confessed "we get along so well together."
"We tried that once." Megan reminded her. " then you got jealous of me, and with good cause. And then you like men... Specially one that you cannot leave alone, no matter how crazy he drives you."
"It would not have to be that way."
"It will not work. We can be the best of friends, getting to bed every now and then. But as serious lovers it is a different story. You like men. And so do I... And in my case, I need them."
"But it is you that I want."
Megan cursed under her breath "You sound just like Frank Torrance when he fell in love with me. He was so hurt when I turned him down that he fell for that salamander... I only hope that you make a better choice than he did."
Angelique's hands ran over Megan's back, hungrily "What makes you so sure that we could not make it, the two of us?"
"Barnabas" Megan answered bluntly "You cannot leave him alone."
"It is over between us."
'I'll believe it when I see it."
"I can learn not to be jealous of...of what you have to do."
"Angie, Angie, Angie.." Megan shook her head "You can't do that, anymore than I can change my habits. No, this is the best we can have. I like you. You are a good friend. I like you in bed. I like tasting your blood. But you are not what I need, and I am not what you need."
Angelique sulked.
"Just be thankful for what you can have." she said, gathering her clothes again.
"Why are you looking at me that way?" Kenneth asked George in a very bad mood. "Like I was some kind of jerk?"
"Do you feel like a jerk?"
"You think that I was wrong in separating from Julia?"
"As a bachelor I am not expert in marriage and what it takes to keep it alive. But I like Julia."
"But you know that the murder charge was true, even if you tore it up after you got free from Laura's control."
"After Barnabas set me free. As to how I got King to sign it, I might end up losing my badge if he has a mind to it... I do not like to think about it... I want to think that I would have never done it on my own... I could have tried to convert him as I did to Redwolf, but I was... I was ashamed, because I knew that I was betraying Dave."
"Dave was the murder victim."
"Yes. And I can't think of a single instance in which he would have let his name or memory be exploited by somebody like Laura. I knew what he'd say if he knew what I was doing. But I lied to myself. I am not a very convincing liar...
"You were close to him?"
"Very close."
"But then, how could you be so friendly with Barnabas and Julia?"
"Strange, isn't it? But I did not find out about it until after I got to know them well. Oh, I thought of making them pay." he grimaced, remembering how far he had gone in that direction. " But it passed. I just could not hate them."
"Still, it was murder."
"They have already paid for it. They should not have to go through it again. It is usually called double jeopardy."
"You think that they have paid for it?"
"Zeb pistol-whipped Barnabas. He could just as easily shot him if he had wanted. And Julia..." he looked down ashamed of himself. "I beat Julia up. the same way I did with Zeb, trying to get a confession. I stopped, but not before... she never said a word of it to anyone, not even Barnabas."
Kenneth looked at him in surprise. "You?"
"So, when I say that they have paid enough, I know what I am talking about."
Carolyn looked at the books the maid offered her "Barnabas Collins and Quentin's Demon." "Barnabas, Quentin, and the Witch's Curse." "Barnabas, Quentin, and the Nightmare Assassin", "The Demon of Barnabas Collins".
"You found these?" she asked the maid.
"Yes, madam," Lucie said "In that room of the West Wing, the one you told us to keep away from."
"With good reason. If you went into that room you might not come back again. Well, let's see what these are."
There was a note attacked to the manuscripts. She read it.
"Dear Barnabas:
I hope you don't mind my using you as a character in my books. I have been pounding at these, as you see. Evidently the powers that be do not think that these are the kind of books that will release me from this constant toil. I hope that you will look on them more kindly.
Roxanne's all right. So is Blair. She keeps Chris on a short leash.
The Canadians bombarded the Eastern Shore. The White House burned again. The war is not going well at all and the regime is tottering. We may see it fall soon.
Roxanne and I talk sometimes. She does not mourn Quentin anymore and she misses you. She says that once the government falls she will go looking for you, if you'll have her...
If only she was not such an efficient killer I would be overjoyed, but I worry that she has been at war too long and had forgotten how to live in peace... Well, you will have to deal with her, and play it by ear.
Please, Barnabas, read these and let me know what you think of them.
Wish you the best.
William H. Loomis.
Carolyn looked up at Lucie "These belong to Cousin Barnabas" she said, surprised to find no bitterness in her voice as she spoke his name.
"Do you want me to take these to him?"
"No. I will go there myself."
Zeb stood rigidly in front of George "You understand very well what I mean." he said stiffly.
"But I thought you understood that we did not do those things of our own free will. We were caught in a madness.."
"I know nothing except that you beat me and Jessica up, you faggot, and that I will have your badge for that."
George stiffened. "What did you call me?"
"You heard me, Brant. I will have your badge for what you did to Jessica and me."
Weakness was the first thing he felt. Then his efforts to open his eyes met physical resistance.
He had been blindfolded. He lifted his hands to take it off, but they never made it. In mid-movement, they were seized, bound together and used to pull him up from his coffin.
"What's happening?" Derek asked, more surprised than angry. "Why...?"
He couldn't finish. A hand covered his mouth, pushing a tennis ball in it.
He was really weak, Delia thought with satisfaction. Angelique had been true to her word. A vampire could be weakened enough so that she could do this to him.
She pulled Derek up with the rope until his feet barely touched the floor, then she tightened even further the binding at his wrists.
Derek made a sound. He had begun to get scared. Delia smiled. He wanted him scared. It made up for what he had had to put up from him.
She opened the penknife absentmindedly over his tight.
"I wanted to tell you to get out." she said with mock calm "but since you are stubborn, I decided to convince you this way. I don't care to have you threaten me in any way."
Threaten her? When had he done that? Was she crazy?
"You see, I can protect myself." she pinched the tight with the penknife. Not hard, just to make him know that she had it.
"I want you to understand that I don't intend to harm you." she continued "but if you ever bother me again..." she moved the knife to his crotch, holding it with only enough pressure to be frightening, not painful. "I will cut you here. Understood?"
What was wrong with her? Why was she doing this to him?
She looked at him, a smile twisting her face. Maybe he needed a better reminded. Something that would keep him fearing her, even after his strength and powers returned. Something that would make him say nothing about this...
And she wished to do more to him. She could smell his fear, and that fear had an exhilarating effect on her. This was better than what she had had before. The erotic effect Derek had on her, as he hung helpless from his wrists was the strongest she had ever felt. She licked her lips, anticipating the delight, then she reached for the whip.
So it had come to this. Getting sued for police brutality...
The irony is that some of it was deserved. He HAD beaten up Zeb and Jessica. And that was not something alien to him. There was a part of him that made him want to rough up his prisoners. He did not indulge it, but he knew it was there.
He knew it was there because once, right at the beginning, he had done it...
...He saw again Julia in the corner of the cell, her face bruised, holding her breath, waiting for the next blow...
He saw himself then, mercilessly. He had stopped beating, not because of pit, but because he was getting tired, because he wanted a breather. And because he wanted to see his handiwork...
...He had been young then, and the words that Willie had let escape had opened up the old wound again...
As Dirk Wilkins had. It was the same old wound. And because of that wound, he had aided Laura...
It was not Dirk Wilkins that he had wanted in his bed, but he was good enough for a while...
He though of Julia again. How she repressed her sobs...At least she had been safe from any rape attempt. But was just his personal preference, not self-restraint... His first official act as Sheriff of Collinsport had been to try to beat a confession out of her.
Part of it was rage at having to give up Barnabas, because by then he had begun lusting after him, and the revelation meant that he was duty bound to forget him. unless it was to hurt him in any way that he could.
He had not truly expected her to confess. Only to vent his anger and his sense of loss.
He saw again the whole scene.
"What have you done, Georgie?"
He had never expected to see Dave again. And never looking at him that way.
"She is guilty. I know what she did to you."
"And you beat her up?" Dave looked at Julia without anger, but also without interest. She turned her face away.
"She deserved it."
Dave looked severely at him. "Is this the kind of sheriff you want to be? Is this how you will interrogate suspects in the future? Is this how you plant to handle your prisoners? If you do, better turn in your badge now."
"It is a special case."
"They are all special cases, Georgie. You begin twisting the law for your own ends, and you are not better than she is. If you go down this path there are two things that will happen. Either you lose your badge and retire in disgrace, or you'll have to make all sorts of deals to keep it. Deals that will make you gag, but that you'll have to keep. All you hoped for when you ran for this office will go down the drain. Is that you want for yourself?"
"But.." he pointed to her. "she killed you."
"So?" he had shrugged. "You are important to me, Georgie. She is not. She is not worth throwing away your whole future for."
Julia had shrunk away at the words.
He realized now that those words had hurt her much more than the beating. He had not confronted her, just ignored her, made her feel insignificant, worthless... But it would only be years later when her hurt would surface again, tearing both her and Barnabas...
In any case, that was the end of that. He had released Julia, who had never spoken of her beating, saying that her bruises had come from a fall. And he had never roughed up any other prisoner, even in circumstances that would certainly excuse it... Not until Zeb...
It was not wholly because of Laura's power that he had done it. There had been anger too and a sense of loss. The old wound was still there...
He had missed Dave. For a while he kept appearing and talking to him, giving him advice and sharing with him. It had been somehow like old times. He did not worship him the way he did when he was a kid. He knew now his flaws and weaknesses, but still he wanted to have him. If not his body, at least by his shoulder, talking to him, laughing with him and at him, telling him what to do, the way it had been years ago...
He knew that had Dave lived long enough, he would have ended the relationship, for his own good, as well as for the desire of a new boy. But it had not happened, and he had gone on missing him, looking for older men that he could pretend they were Dave if he closed his eyes when they made love to him...'
And the sense of loss had become worse because of Zeb's resemblance to Dave. He knew that he was betraying Dave, worse than Julia had done, when he let Laura exploit his memory for her reign of terror. And he could not bear the knowledge. So he had beaten Zeb, to be able to lie himself about it.
And now he would pay for it.