Wednesday night at the bar was slow, and by midnight, the place was almost quiet enough for Bella to hear herself think. Since she wasn't closing that night, she had already begun her end-of-shift chores. Repopulating the shelves with clean stemware and the proper quantity of liquor was always the bartender's job, and tonight, Bella was also responsible for the trash. One by one, she hauled the giant bags out of their containers and into a Dumpster in the alley while a waitress watched the bar. Christina was a wholesome sort of girl, and on the right day, her saccharine smile and perkiness could bring out the worst of Bella's misanthropy. Nevertheless, a rigorously Midwestern upbringing and abundant tipping were no match for a coworker's sarcasm, and Christina stayed Christina – blonde, cheerful, and eager to please.
Pulling the third load of garbage to the Dumpster behind the bar, Bella stopped for a moment to roll up the sleeves of her shirt, which kept falling down despite her best efforts to keep them out of the way. As she folded the thin cotton fabric into a tight cuff, she glanced out into the street. A nearly-empty bus thundered by, its driver undoubtedly hurrying to finish his final run.
She was about to reach for a bag to sling into the giant metal receptacle when a familiar figure caught her eye. He was on the other side of the street, and had been walking briskly before pausing to light a cigarette. Flicking the lighter impatiently, he kept his eyes fixed on something ahead of him.
She straightened and looked on. After several futile attempts, he shoved the lighter back into his pocket, and continued down the sidewalk, his pace quickening.
Bella stepped away from the Dumpster, and, with a glance back to the bar, decided that she could spare a few minutes.
In the past few days, she had spent more time thinking about her odd acquaintance than she would have cared to admit. For one thing, he wasn't at all what she had expected from a contract killer. While she didn't exactly spend her time socializing with such people, it was reasonable to form an opinion about someone who had chosen this profession, and Edward was decidedly unlike the hitman she had prepared herself for. No obvious tattoos, for one thing, and a surprisingly robust vocabulary. While he wasn't exactly personable, he certainly wasn't thuggish either, and projected an air of sophistication that clashed strongly with Bella's preconceptions. She had even found herself admiring the decor of his apartment.
That is not to say that their interaction had been normal – no, he was definitely strange. Strange and moody and taciturn. He kept doing things that vexed her, like his ridiculous snobbery about what brand of cigarettes she smoked, or his refusal to give her straight answers while demanding his own. And staring at her arms – she still didn't know what to make of that. People often reacted strongly to the sight of cuts and scars, so she was used to gawking, but the intensity of his gaze had been downright disturbing.
Those tendencies, as well as his general lack of congeniality, should have added up to aversion on Bella's part. Yet, there were other things about him that just didn't add up, and had kept her thinking. She wondered why he had been so intent on getting the details of Alice's death. The idea seemed silly, but it was almost as though he were mining for evidence, trying to determine if her story was true. He had even gotten a hold of the police report somehow - surely that was not standard protocol for a professional killer.
Then there was what he had said to her before she left his apartment the second time – that he was sorry. That had caught Bella completely off-guard. She began to wonder what he thought of her, and whether or not he cared. Did he pity her, then? Is that why he had named such a low price?
And he played the piano. Not just that, he played poignant and melancholy songs on the piano... What kind of a hitman was he, anyway?
These were the questions that had been stewing in Bella's mind for the past two days, and now, as she stepped onto the sidewalk after Edward's quickly disappearing form, she thought only of finding some answers.
He was walking very quickly and was already a block ahead of her. She began jogging to keep pace, but took care not to close the distance between them. She kept scanning the sidewalk on both sides of the street, but couldn't figure out whom he could have been following. She did notice that he seemed to be going to great lengths to avoid other pedestrians, pausing behind some and shifting away from others as though maintaining the borders of an invisible cocoon.
Two more blocks like this and Bella was starting to get winded. How the hell was he managing to walk that fast?
Abruptly, Edward stepped off the curb, crossing the street through a gap in the late night traffic, and slowed his pace considerably. She stopped short, afraid of being noticed, and let him cross an intersection before continuing on, now even more cautious.
Seconds later, she halted again. He had stopped in front of a bar near a group of smokers who were milling about the entrance. Again, she noticed that he left plenty of space between himself and the others, but to a passerby he would have looked like just another bar patron stepping out for a smoke. True to form, he leaned against the wall, lit his cigarette (successfully this time) and took a long drag. He continued to gaze straight ahead of him, and the other smokers ignored him as well.
Bella herself ended up next to an ATM, and pretended to fumble through her wallet for a bank card, watching his still form out of the corner of her eye.
Several tense minutes stretched past, and she was becoming more uncertain with each one, convinced that the man in front of her would turn around at any moment and catch her in her foolish game of espionage. She had no idea of what she would do then. In fact, this whole thing had been devoid of any sensible ideas – she didn't even know what she was hoping to discover by following him. And Christina at the bar was surely starting to wonder where she'd gone. She might even alert the night manager out of some misplaced sense of camaraderie, and then Bella would have to explain herself once she got back. Uh, sorry boss... Just wanted to see what the hitman I've hired was up to these days, you know.
Still, she had followed him this far, and her curiosity was only growing. This was not some midnight stroll through the city – his actions were focused and deliberate, suggesting an errand of importance.
While she fidgeted with her ATM card and threw glances over one shoulder or the other, Edward stood very still. Apart from exhaling smoke, or flicking ash from the cigarette's end, he seemed not to have moved a muscle - not to turn his head at the staccato noises coming from the drunk, rowdy men behind him, nor to shift his weight against the hard brick wall. A strong gust of wind swept past, ruffling his hair and clothes, but he remained motionless, as though a part of the very wall he leaned against. The contrast of this man to those behind him was striking - eerily so.
When he did move again, Bella was so startled that she almost dropped the wallet she was still holding. Mesmerized now, she watched him walk up to another group of people who had just come out of a restaurant several doors away. Shoving his hands deep into his pockets, he addressed one of them, a woman who looked to be in her mid-fifties. She seemed surprised and acknowledged him stiffly. After a moment's hesitation, she waved the rest of her party on as they flagged down a taxi. Once alone, Edward said something else, nodding his head toward a nearby alley, and the woman consented. Shoulders hunched forward and hands still in his pockets, he followed her as their forms blended into shadow and disappeared.
Bella's heart had begun to beat faster the moment he stepped away from the wall, and now, she took a long breath to steady the butterflies in her stomach. Shoving the wallet back into a pocket of her denim skirt, she made her way toward the opening of the alley into which the two had turned. The group of smokers was heading back into the bar, and in a moment of inspiration, she stopped one of them and asked for a cigarette of her own. The man obliged, and she neared the alley prepared to use Edward's own disguise against him to eavesdrop on whatever these two had to say to each other.
She heard nothing, however, and a quick peek around the corner revealed an empty backstreet, nearly identical to the one she had dragged garbage to just minutes before. Puzzled now, she crept forward, pulling in a lungful of smoke with every other step.
Partway down the alley, she heard voices coming from a narrow corridor to the right. It separated two mid-rise buildings with less than twelve feet of haphazard pavement, such that the fire escape along one wall nearly touched its counterpart on the other.
A fine beading of sweat broke out on her brow as she flattened herself against a wall and strained to hear the conversation floating back to her through the humid night air.
"...don't understand what you're accusing me of," the woman was saying. "I didn't speak to anyone about you or our meeting. You're the one who recorded the whole thing." Her tone was defensive and flustered.
"And yet... the police came to my door, ask- asking about your ex-husband," Edward replied tersely. His voice sounded strange – strained and uneven, and Bella could hear that he was pacing again. He seemed even more agitated and impatient than he'd been when she last spoke to him, and she found this behavior a bizarre contradiction with the statue he had embodied just moments earlier.
Maybe he wasn't a people person, she thought to herself, and couldn't help but smirk at the idea of a hitman who was.
"Well, what do you want me to do about it?" the woman demanded.
"Clean it up," he said sharply. "Hit and run... whoever you hired is obviously, obviously an amateur."
"Excuse me! As I recall, you refused the job at the last minute, so of course I went to someone else. Someone who had a better reputation than you, I might add. There is nothing to fix. Larry is dead, and if you know what's good for you, you will never mention my name to the police, no matter how many times they come around again!" Her voice rose on the last few words, echoing off the surrounding walls.
"Then you admit it was a hired job?"
"Well, of course it was!" she exclaimed, sounding exasperated. "You think Larry was nice enough to jump under the wheels on his own? He would have lived another fifty years just to spite me. Look," she added sternly, "we're done here. I'm leaving."
High heels clicked against pavement, and Bella froze, panic-stricken. Any moment now, the woman, and then Edward, would turn the corner and discover her standing there in plain sight. Frantically, she wondered if feigning a drunken sleep, face against the wall, would be enough of a disguise. Her cigarette had nearly burned down by then, and she threw the butt away, preparing to drop to the ground.
The woman paused. "If I ever see you again, Mr. Smith" she said curtly, "you're going to wish you'd never met me. I don't think you've ever fully understood who you're dealing with."
"Oddly enough," came the gruff reply, "I could say the same with respect to you."
What Bella heard next, she did not understand, but the sound of it was enough to throw her into a defensive crouch. Shoes shuffled against gravel, and she heard what sounded like the impact of bodies hitting each other, and then the ground. Grunts and muffled exclamations followed, then the clang of something heavy striking a fire escape.
Then, silence.
Bella realized she had been holding her breath, but was too scared to let it out all at once. Exhaling so slowly that it was almost painful, she strained to hear anything else. Adrenaline coursed through her, and she had to force herself to stay still while her mind struggled to make sense of what was happening.
Why was everything so quiet? They couldn't have just disappeared. If he had attacked the woman, as she strongly suspected he had, then at least he would still be conscious. Was he robbing her? Yet there was no sound of keys or makeup tumbling out of a purse, no clothing being riffled through. Was he just standing there, then? Or had he hit his head in the struggle, and lay unconscious as well?
Should she check? Should she call the police?
No, no, just go. This whole thing is fucking weird, just get out of here!
That would have been the smart thing to do. Instead, a part of her was horrified to find her neck twisting, ever so slowly, to peer around the edge of the brick wall she crouched against. Every sound her body made seemed deafening, though the internal protests which overwhelmed her thoughts were almost as loud.
Stop, don't do it, run away, get away, don't LOOK!!
But look she did, one eye shifting past the brick that blocked her vision. The narrow corridor was surprisingly well lit, more so than the alley it branched off of, and it was definitely not empty. Less than fifteen feet away, Edward crouched against a fire escape, the red tones in his hair nearly gleaming in the light that came from the windows above. He was facing away from her, the profile of his face obscured by shadow. The woman was there, too, lying on the ground in front of him, but Bella could only make out her legs and torso while Edward huddled over her upper body.
She held her breath, and began to shift her weight so that both eyes could focus on the scene.
Edward moved just as she did, his shoulders shifting as his head dipped lower to the prone form before him.
She jerked back, pressing her face against the wall, and listened. Apart from the street noise, she heard nothing, and after a moment, convinced herself that she had not been seen.
What the fuck was going on?
Wincing at every sound she made, Bella reached into the front pocket of her skirt for her cell phone. It was a newer model, both slim and feature-rich, complete with a digital camera. Its little round eye sat at the very top of the case, a design feature that she was suddenly grateful for. Making sure that the ringer was off, she slowly slid the phone along the ground until the camera lens jutted out into the alley. She pushed the record button, infinitely glad that the keypad tones on this phone were disabled by default. The screen flared to life with a miniature, though pixilated version of the scene she had just witnessed. Angling the camera for a better view, she stiffened her arm to steady the image, and studied the screen intently, trying to understand what she was seeing.
He was doing something to the woman (who was at best unconscious) - something which apparently required intense focus. Bella could see now that he was supporting her shoulders and head with one arm, while pressing the other against the pavement for balance. His body was wound into a tight ball as he bent over her, knees nearly up to his chin, and his neck was taut and extended toward her head.
The pose looked uncomfortable and awkward, but he held it perfectly. The only motion she saw was the rhythmic ripple of his shoulders and upper back as his head shifted slightly to and away from the body he held.
It looked as though- no. No way.
It looked as though he was drinking.
Her heart skipped a beat, then began to beat faster.
Drinking? Drinking what? she wondered frantically.
Drinking blood, came the immediate answer.
No, it couldn't be true! Yet, even the poorly rendered image on the screen of her phone suggested little else. She couldn't move, couldn't tear her eyes away, at once horrified and hypnotized by the sight.
She remained there, frozen in place, for what must have been only seconds, but felt like hours.
Suddenly, Edward straightened, and lowered the body he held. He lifted his face to the light, panting, and gulped several deep breaths, letting the last one out with a shudder. Something dripped from his chin to the ground and he wiped at it absently with an open palm. Instinctively, Bella shrank back from him and turned her face away, thrusting her chin painfully into the wall. She bit her lip to keep from crying out, and looked back to the screen on her phone.
Shit. Shit shit shit!
He was looking at her.
No, wait. Not at her, but in her direction.
Don't move. Don't. Fucking. Move.
He had dropped the woman's body and pulled himself up to his full height. He looked tall, taller than she remembered. Every muscle in her body was rigid, and she knew that if he moved toward her, she would be up running for her life.
He tilted his head to one side and inhaled sharply. She held her breath, her heart hammering wildly against her ribs.
Suddenly, a siren blared out behind her, and she heard the screech of breaks as a car slid to a stop somewhere nearby. She blinked in surprise, and when she looked at her phone again, Edward had disappeared from the view. His footsteps hit the ground, heading away from her hiding place. The metal fire escape sounded under his weight, and she could barely make out the faint and impossibly fast steps upward.
A commotion had developed out in the street. The shouts of police and bar patrons interfered with her hearing, and after the soft patter of feet landed on the roof, she heard nothing more. Seconds after he had left the ground, he was gone.
Held in place by fervent indecision, Bella let nearly a minute trickle by. Then, mustering her last shred of resolve, she straightened. Eyes scanning the rooftops to make sure he was really gone, she crept around the building and into the space that he and his victim had just occupied.
The body was gone, too, and she could only guess that he had taken it to avoid leaving evidence. With slow and reluctant steps, she moved forward until she came to stand over the same patch of pavement that he had crouched on.
Shaken and frantic as she was, she had to be sure.
Sinking to the ground, she examined it closely, and found them almost immediately. Three fat red drops glistened dully in the light. They seemed to stare back at her, daring her to deny the truth.
The woman was dead.
He killed her.
He bit her. He drank her blood.
Oh sweet Jesus, he ate her....
Vampire. The word flashed through her mind and leapt from her lips, echoing against the surrounding walls. There had been the news reports, the recommended safety precautions... and she had always been stupid enough to ignore them. Even now, a part of her could not believe what was staring her in the face.
The hitman was a vampire. It wasn't about money for him, it was about a meal.
The woman had been his client, and now she had become his dinner.
Bella shook her head violently from side to side. Why did the woman agree to talk to him alone, to come with him to this alley? How could she have been so foolish? Didn't she understand how dangerous he was??
No, Bella realized, she didn't. They'd certainly met alone before in some other secluded place (like his apartment) and she had probably decided, consciously or not, that if he had wanted to harm her he would have done it already (isn't that what Bella had told herself before going to meet him the second time?) So when he asked to speak in private, the woman would have agreed without much consideration of where she was and who she was with... because she already trusted him.
Like Bella had begun to.
Oh God.
It was a trap. It was all a trap. He didn't care about Alice, and he certainly didn't give a shit about her. It was all lies, all part of his game, part of his... hunt. And she was next. Of course she was. Hadn't he said something about wanting to space his "work" out? Of course... He was biding his time with her, stringing her along before he got hungry again. Then, he would lure her away under some pretense and kill her just like he had killed this poor woman.
Bella was shaking. She pushed herself off the ground and scrambled back to the street. How lucky, how damn lucky she had been to see him walking past the bar, and then to follow him here. She didn't feel lucky... but she was. First, she had been stupid, and naïve, thinking that getting someone killed would be as easy as handing a stranger some money.
Jesus, he could have easily killed her by now. No one would even know where to look for her body... But she had gotten lucky. Now she knew the truth, and she'd be damned if she became his next meal.
"What are you gonna do Bella, what the fuck are you gonna do?" she muttered to herself while flagging down a taxi (no way was she walking back to the bar alone).
She couldn't go to the police - he still had that recording - bastard! He was obviously more dangerous than anyone she had ever dealt with, so she didn't entertain any notions of being able to defend herself. Physical force would not help her; she would have to find some other way to keep herself alive.
Think... come on, think!
She didn't sleep that night, and armed the alarm system as soon as she walked into the house, something she never did otherwise. Keeping all the lights on, she spent the night hunched over her laptop, searching for any information she could find on the modern vampire.
She would figure this out. She would not let the fucker get the best of her. She would figure something out.
