Holly sat bolt upright in bed. The scream that woke her—her scream—echoed in her bedroom. She kicked free of the sheets tangled around her ankles. When her heart rate slowed, she ran a hand through her hair, yawning. “What the hell did I dream?”
Rain beat against the windows. Her bedroom oozed dead-of-night silence, chilled with cold. Shivering, she tucked the covers up to her chin and closed her eyes. An image of a pale, motionless woman with bite wounds on her neck flickered across Holly's eyelids. She jumped to her feet, spilling the goose down comforter to the floor, but a wave of dizziness washed her flat on the bed again. The dull thud of her heart echoed in her veins, and her head throbbed to the rhythm. Her limbs felt heavy, knees weak. She ran a dry tongue over parched lips. The headache was the worst she'd ever had.
“Feel like hell. What did I drink last night?” She massaged her temples. “And what the hell did I dream? It came back for a moment. Oh well.” It seemed the sharp pain in her head had erased the memory before it took hold. “Thank the powers that be I don't have a shoot today. I'll grab Tylenol, a glass of water, and go back to sleep.”
She staggered to the bathroom, rinsed her mouth and rubbed her eyes, but still the face in the mirror blurred. “I look like death on a saltine.”
Grimacing, she swallowed the painkiller, wandered downstairs for water but decided on coffee. As she scooped an organic blend into the coffeemaker, memory struck her. The scoop bounced to the floor, spilling coffee on the black-and-white tile.
“Oh God, Tristan and I argued last night.” She had to talk to him.
Why had she accused him of cheating on her? Dread raised every hair on her body.
Leaving the spill, Holly strode to the living room, drew aside the curtains as dawn crept over the horizon. Damn and double damn. Tristan had made it clear never to phone during the day, that he wouldn't answer. Once she'd tried. His voice mail greeting was terse. “Unavailable. Incommunicado. Don't bother to leave a message. Ring after sundown.”
She didn't care. She had to speak to him, apologize. The sense that something was horribly wrong resonated in her with each ring of the phone. Seven rings.
No answer.
Tears clogged her throat. Gripping the phone, she paced to the kitchen, returned to the living room, totally unconscious of where she was. Hand trembling, she hit redial. Ten rings. Voice mail should have answered.
Bright spots danced in her peripheral vision. Feeling faint, she clung to the door. When her vision cleared, she realized that there was a tall shrouded figure in the darkest corner of her living room. She dropped the phone clattering, shattering. Ignoring the mess, one step at the time, she crossed into shadow, lifted a trembling hand and tugged the green-and-white Ralph Lauren comforter off a bronze of a man and woman entwined―the lovers, Holly and Tristan.
“God no!” Holly dashed for the door, bumping into a table, a brass candlestick crashing and rolling across the old wooden floor.
She bolted into the hall and tripped over the Monday morning news. A weird shiver passed through her, giving her goose bumps. She bent to pick up the paper.
On the front page a color photo and headline, Real Vampires, announced a new exhibit of rare artifacts at the museum. The curator held a nasty looking knife to the camera, but it was the woman’s face that stopped Holly's heart. She knew her―maybe from a film, a model on a shoot, a face on the street—a face on a flyer on a circular table inlaid with mother of pearl.
And the face she'd glimpsed before Tristan leapt from bed, his mouth blood-smeared.
Pain seared a trail through Holly's brain. She inhaled a gasp, pressing her fingertips into her eyes. She had to get upstairs. She couldn't remember what she'd said, couldn't remember any damn thing, but she knew the argument had been a vicious screaming match—on her part—and he'd been silent.
“Oh my God, I told him I never wanted to see him again.”
Two at the time, she took the stairs. On the door to Tristan’s apartment, an orange plastic sign announced:
FOR RENT
TELEPHONE 733-9112
Heart for rent.
“Next time I want a nice normal guy, not an artist but a housepainter or something.” Trailing her hand along the ornate rail, Holly descended, one step at the time, the stairs she'd climbed in a panic a few moments ago.
“Tristan I'll never―I repeat―never think of you again.”