WENDY TEAGARDEN AND I climbed the steps to the wooden door under a tattered green-and-white-striped awning. Above the awning, a neon sign, El Pingüino, in white script, cast a cold, inert light into the dark street. An outline of a penguin, complete with top hat, spats, and holding a martini, glowed beside the letters. Taped to the door was a hand-lettered sign scrawled with a broad tip marker: CLOSED TONITE AT 8.
I held the door open for Wendy and we entered a short, dingy hallway. A petite yet well-toned Latina wearing mirrored wrap-around sunglasses, a black leather halter-top dress, and matching open-toed pumps stood before the next door. Her brunette hair, pulled into a bun, contributed to her sleek appearance. She peeked over the tops of her sunglasses and revealed briefly her tapetum lucidum. She smiled and nodded, indicating that we could proceed.
Wendy pushed open a battered metal door, heavily scratched and mangy with hand-sized blotches where the latest coat of paint had flaked loose.
We walked into the lounge. A karaoke singer was mangling “I Got a Line on You.” A row of dim amber lights above the bar illuminated the room. Most of the frayed vinyl stools around the heavy wooden bar were empty. Cigarette smoke curled from ashtrays and mingled with the luminescent ribbon of silvery haze that snaked above the patrons’ heads. A conglomeration of smells-hair spray, drugstore cologne, perspiration, spilled drinks, and cigarette ash-told me that I’d probably have to soak in bleach to get the funk out of my skin.
Wendy waved to the bushy-haired man behind the bar. “Hi, Mel.”
He lifted his head and nodded. The mass of his gray hair wove into bushy sideburns that sprouted from his jaw. Thick muscles and a substantial belly filled out his shirt. Mel’s eyes, like most of those that flashed toward us from the clientele, glowed from the reflection of his tapetum lucidum.
A small microwave on the bar counter pinged.
Mel grabbed a potholder and pulled a 450-milliliter bag of blood from the microwave. He snipped a corner of the bag and poured steaming red liquid over a bowl of nachos already drenched in melted cheese.
A waitress in a pink tube top and black stretch pants squashed her cigarette into an ashtray on the bar and placed the nachos and two bottles of Fat Tire ale on her tray. She took the tray and circled past us. The incandescence of her vampire eyes matched the luster of the fake rhinestone in her belly ring.
Wendy led me to a booth between the bar and the stage. I sat next to her, careful not to peel the duct tape from the vinyl seat.
I was glad that Wendy had asked me out for an evening of entertainment. My investigation was at an impasse. I’d learned that such interludes can allow my subconscious to work on the next step, or at least keep me pleasantly distracted until the next break happens. For now, my worries hovered in the distance.
I took out my contacts. Around me, everybody shimmered from their auras, the vampires in orange, the few humans in red, and Wendy in green.
Against the wall to our right, two men with orange auras stood on a stage, or rather on a slightly raised platform covered with worn and stained carpet. The large mirror behind them was chipped and cracked along the edges. The mirror showed a room with a few humans, though vampires were also present.
One of the vampires operated the karaoke machine, which occupied the top of one table, while the other vampire, bald, with a white turtleneck and black suit, held a cordless microphone and sang. He glanced at the words scrolling across the television screen hanging above him. Long fangs protruded past his upper lip and into the gape of his smiling mouth.
Mercifully the song ended. The vampire hummed the last bars of the tune, became silent, and bowed. A group at the far end of the room clapped and hooted. The vampire acted as if he had treated us to a musical masterpiece, though the best part of his performance was when he shut up at the end.
“The acoustics back there must be better,” I whispered to Wendy. “Because from up here, I’ve heard better notes from a wood chipper.”
The waitress stopped by our booth. “The drinks include rabbit blood. For an extra three bucks, we can make it human. Type o-positive is the special.”
“I’ll take a Dos Equis,” Wendy said. “Hold the blood.”
“Carta Blanca for me,” I added. “With a rabbit blood chaser.”
The waitress nodded and left.
The karaoke crew dismantled their machine before anyone else could wreck our Western musical heritage. Faces in the lounge turned toward a commotion in the back. Six vampires in black mariachi outfits appeared from the rear of the lounge. They carried guitars, cornets, and violins at the ready as if the instruments were rifles. Lights glittered off the spangles sewn to their jackets and trouser seams and the sequins stitched along the brim of their sombreros.
The mariachis got onstage and did a sound check. The leader of the group adjusted the microphone stand and introduced himself and his colleagues as Nahualli. The name of sadistic Aztec clerics who had presided over human sacrifice was now the moniker of this cantina festivity.
The group started with the song “Mariachi Loco,” which got the crowd moving with laughter and shouts of ahu-a.
The song ended and the lights went dark. A single spotlight beamed toward the back of the lounge and illuminated a lone voluptuous figure surrounded by an orange aura. This vampire was so covered with emerald sequins that she looked wrapped in green foil. The spotlight followed her progress through the lounge. The shank of a leg flashed in and out of the slit in her tight dress. Her bosom jiggled like firm pudding. An aromatic banner of perfume trailed her.
The lead mariachi introduced her as “our own chupacabra”-the demon who drank goat’s blood. Smiling seductively, as if her lacquered lips alone could make us all swoon into orgasm, she grasped the microphone. The group started to play Selena’s “Bidi Bidi Bom Bom.” The chupacabra singer bounced her hips in tempo to the music and began to wail.
Couples-combinations of human and undead-took to the floor and danced. The rest of us had to crowd close to converse over the musical din. All the auras modulated into a fuzz of glowing static, a measure of our collective good mood.
The waitress brought our drinks, the beer in tall glasses and the blood in a tall porcelain cup. Wendy and I clinked our glasses and sipped.
We sat contentedly and absorbed the homey ambiance. Vampires shared cigarettes, joked, and slapped each other on the shoulder. At the tables before us, chalices rolled their sleeves and cut their forearms with razors or penknives. They let blood drip into the martini and highball glasses of their vampire masters. The chalices’ eyes fluttered and their red auras spread out from them as they swam in the pleasure of their sacrifice.
“Wendy Teagarden,” I said.
She turned to look at me, her expression warm and full of anticipation.
“Don’t suppose that’s your original name?” I asked.
“Oh, I’ve had lots of names through the years.”
“Figured you’d been around a while.”
“You don’t date older women?” Wendy looked about twenty-eight, though I’m sure she was several hundred. Supernatural immortals age well.
She wove her arm into mine and pulled it under the table. Her hand slipped past my wrist until our fingers clasped. With her face fixed on the singer, Wendy nudged against me, crossed her legs and let her ankle drag across my shin.
Since I’ve been a vampire, I never needed a woman to express affection for me. When I had the urge, a flash of tapetum lucidum was enough to get into a vagina. Lust and eroticism, these were tools to manipulate humans. What need did the damned undead have for romance?
Wendy’s interest kindled a forgotten desire within me. A wave of excitement coursed through my body. My aura sizzled. I tried to calm my aura before Wendy noticed the effect she had on me.
Wendy brought her right hand across and stroked my upper arm. My aura sizzled more intently, fueled by anticipation.
She snuggled closer.
My aura radiated as if I were plugged into an electric socket.
A human woman bumped against our table. “Have you seen Ziggy?”
I turned to her and a male companion beside our booth. Because of their red auras I recognized them as the chalices serving Siegfried von Drek, the old vampire I’d met at the Hollow Fang party.
They wore similar white shirts, wrinkled, and the sleeve cuffs unbuttoned. Their glassy eyes cast worried looks at me. Chalices can become slavishly devoted to their vampires and often pine after them like junkies for their dealer.
The man’s eyes teared. “He was supposed to meet us here.” His voice cracked. “We haven’t seen him since Sunday.”
This distraction caused my aura to fade to a safe, even glow.
Wendy relaxed her grasp of my arm and fingers. “Have you tried calling him?”
The woman reached into the hip pocket of her pants and pulled out a cell phone. “Constantly. There’s no answer.”
I resented the intrusion from these addle-brained chalices. “How about going by his house?”
The woman closed her eyes and raked trembling fingers through her hair. She opened her mouth and it took a moment for her reply to croak through her lips. “Ziggy won’t let us visit without an invitation.”
Probably so that these two airheads wouldn’t disturb his interviewing other chalices.
“Do this for me,” I said. “Go by Ziggy’s place. If he doesn’t like it, tell him to take it up with me.”
The woman hugged her companion and kissed his cheek. She panned her head toward the mariachis, as if suddenly aware of the music-it would be like ignoring a freight train-and said slowly, “We’ll do that.”
“Now would be a good time,” Wendy replied.
The woman took the man by the hand and led him out the door.
“They’re as stupid as they are cute,” Wendy said. “Maybe they’ve given up so much blood that it’s affected their IQ.”
“I doubt their SAT scores were very high to begin with,” I replied. “Ziggy didn’t keep them around for stimulating conversation. Then again, for an old pervert, he is being a bit too indifferent toward his pets.”
“Maybe he needs time to recuperate.”
“Ziggy recuperate? Gossip is he buys Viagra by the carton.”
Wendy clasped my arm again and squeezed. “And how much Viagra do you need?”
“I’ve never had cause to use it.”
“Why? Lack of opportunity?”
“You’re talking to a young vampire, a fountain of concupiscence.”
“Is that what you call it?”
“Call what?” I asked.
“When your aura went to full burner a few minutes ago. Didn’t think I’d notice?”
I didn’t want her to know the effect she had on me so I said, “It wasn’t you. It was the singer. The lady chupacabra.”
Wendy released my arm. “Oh.” Her aura cooled to a pale yellow-green. Even a supernatural divinity felt the sting of rejection.
My cup of blood was still warm enough to release a wisp of vapor. I chugged it and washed my mouth with a hearty swallow of beer.
If this was about sex, I’d pull Wendy close and nibble on her neck before working my way to her mouth as I fingered her. But Wendy was more than a mortal woman, she was a dryad with supernatural powers at least equal to my own. And I was certain she was smarter than me. But the real complication was that I liked her and felt energized by her attention the way I’d been before my life as a vampire.
With every passing minute, the moat of silence between Wendy and myself grew wider and deeper. The mariachis churned through their repertoire of ballads. Every song about romantic betrayal and loss raked bitter words over me.
What happened to the simple days when vampires merely prowled the night and sucked on necks? Or did the tales leave out all the the messy details in the retelling? Messy details like this one before me.
I felt pressed into an emotional corner, queasy with the rush of uncomfortable feelings.
My cell phone started to vibrate. Caller ID gave me Bob Carcano’s number.
I pressed the receiver to my ear and answered.
Bob replied, “I’m right outside. Come see me.” His clipped tone relayed his distress.
I grasped Wendy’s hand. “Let’s go. The change in venue might refresh our conversation.”
Bob waited under the awning. His aura burned bright orange and flashed in rhythm to the agitated beat of his pulse. As soon as he saw us, he started down the stairs and across the sidewalk. “Felix, let’s take your car. I’m too upset to drive.”
“Where are we going?”
Bob held up his cell phone. “Ziggy’s chalices called. He’s been murdered.”