AN: I'm posting a bunch of new stories at the same time to gauge interest. I'm going to post a poll on my profile - please vote for the story you like the most because that's the one I'm going to focus my time and energy on currently! Thanks!
Emily had encountered a lot of vampires in her life. They weren't all that common in the States anymore, but she'd travelled enough that they weren't a curiosity for her. Of course, she'd never really made friends with one – that wouldn't have been acceptable in the Ambassador's eyes – but she knew what they were like.
As a general rule, vampires were self-absorbed pricks. There just seemed to be something about the vampiric virus that turned normal people into assholes. Maybe it was the super speed and strength that made them feel superior to humans. Maybe it was the way some people idolized and sexualized vampires. Or maybe it was just their inherent nature.
Not that being an asshole and being human were mutually exclusive... Emily would know because she was both. (Although, she did tend to get mistaken for a vampire, with her pale skin and tendency to wear black.)
When Emily had moved to Georgetown, she hadn't intended to move into the town's predominantly supernatural district. She had, however, intended to move to the town's gay district. The two just happened to overlap...
She'd moved to Georgetown to settle down after too many years working for Interpol. She was burnt out and wanted to do something low-key and with a little less risk of getting shot at. Plus, she'd always wanted to own a bookstore.
Her bookstore quickly became a hot-spot for supernatural beings (and lesbians), which suited her just fine. She spent her days flirting with pretty girls and her evenings making nice with the neighbourhood vamps (it was purely for safety reasons, she maintained, and not because she found vampires attractive).
It was an early November evening when Emily was dusting the section of shelves housing the aging Anne Rice novels that had long since been considered offensive to modern vampire culture and she could never ever sell them because people were too embarrassed to buy them. (She probably should have just thrown them out by now, but she refused to throw out a book on principle.)
She was humming to herself as she dusted when someone tapped her on the shoulder, startling her. Usually at this hour, only a few straggling college students and vampires were coming in – maybe an occasional werewolf – but this woman didn't look like any of the three.
Emily plastered on her most winning smile because the woman was definitely gorgeous (and hopefully a lesbian). "What can I do for you?" she asked, doing her best not to stare.
"I'm looking for Frogs into Princes," she said. "I know it's probably a long shot, but I lent my copy to a student and it's since gone missing." If she noticed Emily's undue attention, she didn't comment, for which Emily was grateful.
Emily raised a brow, curiosity piqued – she could tell a lot about people based on the books they sought and she was very interested in knowing more about this particular request. "That's not one I get a lot of requests for," she mused.
The woman shrugged. "It's one of my favourites, but most people haven't even heard of it."
Emily moved behind the counter crammed into the front of the store between bookshelves stuffed nearly to overflowing to check the computer. She pursed her lips, scanned the logs. "Sorry," she murmured, "Looks like we haven't seen a copy in about six months."
The woman's face fell slightly.
"But... I have a copy you could borrow until we get one in," Emily offered without knowing why. "I mean, if it's urgent..."
"Really?" she asked with a small smile. "It wouldn't be an inconvenience?"
She shook her head, smiled.
It wouldn't occur to Emily until later that she hadn't gotten the woman's name.
Alex Blake kept a low profile. It was intentional...parents tended to be nervous about letting their children too near a vampire. (She knew because she'd watched when, a few years back, one of the kinesiology professors had come out as a werewolf and parents had quite literally picketed to have him fired. He'd had tenure, though, so the university had chosen to instead move him to a research position to keep the parents happy.)
Even though it was the twenty-first century, there was still a lot of misinformation and bad publicity surrounding vampires. Alex would have liked to campaign for their image, but she would like to keep her job more.
She hadn't always been a vampire – she probably wouldn't have gotten a job teaching if she had been. She was actually still a baby vamp – barely three years had passed since she'd been turned – and she was still struggling to figure out her new identity as a member of the undead.
She hadn't wanted to be a vampire. Had actually specifically requested the opposite... It was popular now to have a 'vampire clause' in one's will: people could request that if they were on death's door, a vampire be hired to turn them so they didn't have to die. (It was actually an incredibly lucrative field for an enterprising vampire, with costs running several thousand for a bite.)
Alex, though, had had the opposite clause...
She'd known James was a vampire from the moment they'd met – it wasn't like he'd tried to hide it. She'd had her reservations about dating him (not just because he was a vampire), but he'd ultimately won her over.
Vampire culture had a tradition where, on the one year anniversary of a vampire and human's marriage, the human partner would be turned so they could spend eternity together.
Alex had steadfastly refused. They'd argued the matter, but she refused to back down and ultimately, he'd agreed. He hadn't been pleased that she'd written in her will that he was not to turn her under any circumstances, though...
Then, came the accident.
She'd been stopped at a red light when a drunk driver had careened into her car head-on.
At the hospital, the doctors had all agreed that there was no way she would survive, to make peace with the fact that she was no longer in pain and say goodbye.
James just couldn't do that, though.