Erin Lee Baker leaned wearily against her front door, tilting her purse to catch the glow from the streetlight as she tried to find her keys. She had been kept after work for the fourth night in a row, three hours after the others had gone home, trying to sort out that damned list of witnesses and decide which ones would be most beneficial to her client. They needed all of them, but that would take far too long and an irritated jury was more dangerous than not hearing from some nobody who really didn't see anything anyway.
She unlocked the door, expecting to be tripped by her cat, Arthur, as she opened it, but, strangely, the cat was not there waiting to go out. Too tired to think about that, Erin Lee dropped her purse and briefcase by the door and threw the deadbolt. She ran her fingers through her short, professional-looking black hair and wondered how she ever thought she could make it as senior partner. She was only twenty-nine, for crying out loud. She knew people who passed the bar the same year she did who were still doing bitch-work for huge firms uptown.
Kicking off her shoes in the hall, she padded barefoot over the thick carpet to the smooth linoleum of the kitchen, where she pulled a Lean-Cuisine from the freezer and threw it into the microwave. Rubbing the back of her neck with one hand, she unbuttoned the top two buttons of her blouse with the other and headed toward the living room to watch some TV while her dinner cooked. She walked into the room and reached for the remote sitting on the arm of the sofa.
Erin Lee screamed and jumped back, her hand flying up to cover her mouth as she fought back her fear. Sitting in the center of the sofa was a man. His face was the color of bleached bone and his eyes were dark, smoldering and shadowed by a heavy brow, but otherwise he was fairly handsome, with thick, luxuriant brown hair that fell straight to his collar, a strong jaw and lips almost femininely pink.
"You scared the hell out of me," she said, trying to calm her racing heart. "Who are you? How did you get in my house?" The man said nothing, but turned his head slightly to look at her. "You better get out of here, my boyfriend will be here any minute."
"You don't have a boyfriend," he said finally, his lips hardly moving as he spoke. "You don't have a roommate or a sister, either. You don't even have any friends. That's why I picked you." Erin Lee felt her mouth go dry. In the kitchen, the microwave dinged. "Your last meal is ready, Miss Baker. I suggest you eat quickly or you might not get to finish desert. I'm not a very patient man."
"Take anything you want, you can have it all." Erin Lee said, her voice shaking. "I have forty thousand dollars in savings. You can have it, just don't hurt me." The man laughed mirthlessly.
"I don't want your money or your things. I just want you." With a cry she turned and ran, expecting to hear him chasing after her at any second. She screamed when a blast of cold air rushed past her and then nearly fell down as she tried to stop. The man was already at the door, standing as if he had been waiting for her. "You can't get away from me," he said. Erin Lee gasped as he suddenly disappeared. She spun around with a shriek as a cold hand touched her neck.
"How did you do that?" she asked, taking a step backward.
"I can move faster than you can see," he said. "Don't fight me and you won't feel a thing." He stepped forward and grabbed her by the wrist, pulling her to him and wrapping his arm around her waist. She let him lead her to the kitchen and sat down at the table without protest. He fetched her dinner from the microwave and set it before her, then brought her a fork and poured her a glass of red wine from the bottle she kept in the fridge. "Eat," he said, sitting down next to her. "No sense dying on an empty stomach." The thought of food made her stomach turn, but Erin Lee picked up her fork and poked at her lemon-pepper chicken breast.
"Why are you doing this to me?" she whispered, tears rolling down her cheeks.
"Hey, hey now, don't cry," he reached over and wiped her tears away with one soft, cold hand. "It's nothing personal, you understand. I'm a vampire. This is just what I do."
"You're a, a what? But, but vampires aren't real." After what she had seen, she should have been able to believe it, but that little voice inside her head that always sounded like her mother kept telling her that this wasn't happening, that monsters like vampires were not real.
"Oh, we're very real, my dear," he said, smiling so that she could see his small, but very pointed fangs. Her fork clattered against the table as it slipped from her limp hand. From somewhere far away, she heard a small scratching and a quiet meow. The vampire stood and walked out of the room, down the hall toward the front door. Erin Lee thought about running, but he was back before she could even get out of the chair. He held Arthur in his arms and slowly stroked the cat's silky fur as he sat back down. "We're not quite what you think, though." he said, picking up the conversation where he had left off. "The liberties writers have taken with the 'vampire myth' have damn near buried the truth in magic powers and catchy superstitions."
"Look, I'll do anything, just don't kill me," she said suddenly, some of the shock starting to wear off. He looked at her for a moment, then slowly raised one eyebrow.
"Anything?" he said thoughtfully, his eyes slowly traveling over her well-portioned body. "What about sexual favors?" She stared at him blankly. "You know, hand-jobs, blow-jobs, anal, that sort of thing." Erin Lee opened her mouth to protest, but nothing came out. "Not yet, baby. I'm not in the mood," he said with a wicked grin.
"I, I can't," she stuttered. Sex was not something she enjoyed, perhaps because she rarely had time, but probably because all the men she had ever been with had been clumsy, selfish bastards who didn't care if she came or not.
"That's funny, I thought you said anything," he said, setting Arthur on the floor. "No bullshit, Erin Lee. If you do this, then I promise I won't kill you."
"I thought vampires couldn't have sex," she said, turning back to her cold dinner and beginning to stab at her chicken again.
