The Vampire Who Played Dead Page 4

I caught him up to date on the case, keeping to the facts. And next caught him up on the autopsy report Hammer had faxed to me just that afternoon. A report that included the method of death: multiple stabbings.

  Aaron cringed as if he's burned his tongue. "He was a bastard, for sure. They have him on Death Row?"

  "Yes. "

  "Good. "

  I nodded and next brought up a peculiar aspect of the slaying. "He had used a silver knife. "

  King's eyes narrowed. "A strange metal for a knife. "

  "It was a silver butter knife. "

  "So he grabs the first weapon he sees. "

  I nodded. "Maybe. Except the knife was in the upstairs bedside drawer. "

  "Helluva place to keep a butter knife. "

  "Lots of people keep weapons by their beds. "

  "But a butter knife?" asked King.

  "Maybe the man liked toast in bed. "

  King shook his head. Glendale Boulevard was thick with cars and exhaust. The exhaust wafted over us. It was a sad testament to our city living that neither of us coughed nor waved it away. King said, "Did the husband ever give a confession?"

  "He never spoke to the police. In fact, he never spoke to anyone. "

  "So we'll never know why he kept a butter knife in his upper drawer next to his bed. "

  "Probably not. "

  "And yet he stabbed her. . . how many times?"

  "Seventy-two times. "

  King whistled. "That's rage. "

  "By the time the police arrived, she had been drained of most of her blood. "

  "I would think so. " King shivered and looked sick. I didn't blame him.

  "The husband then staged the scene to make it look like a break in. "

  "Dumb ass. "

  I nodded. "He was arrested within the week. "

  King set his drink down. In fact, he even pushed it away. "So what's your concerns, Spinoza?"

  I took a deep breath and wondered how much I should tell him. I finally decided that I needed to bounce some thoughts off of someone, some slightly disturbing thoughts, and the enigmatic old guy seemed about as good a choice as anyone.

  So I told him about my discoveries inside the casket, about the evidence that seemed to indicate someone had been knocking on it from the inside, and the seasoned detective looked at me sideways for a long time before answering.

  "You're yanking my chain, Spinoza. "

  "No. "

  "And the wood was split?"

  "Directly behind the damaged padding. "

  He was quiet some more and we both listened to a motorcycle rumble by. Not quite a Harley, but it sure wanted to be. When the noise maker was gone, King spoke. "Something must have been hitting it pretty hard to split the wood. "

  "Hard and perhaps sustained. "

  "Are you telling me that you think someone was buried alive in that thing?"

  "I'm not sure what I'm telling you. "

  "Does any of this relate to the silver butter knife. "

  "I don't know," I said. "Maybe. "

  "Silver, as in a werewolf?"

  "Or a vampire. "

  "Silver kills both?" asked King.

  I thought back to my last big case a month ago. "I think so, yes. "

  King leaned forward and there was a wild look in his eyes. Something else flashed at me, some distant memory, or recognition, but I couldn't place it. He said, "Are you telling me that you think Evelyn Drake was a vampire or a werewolf?"

  "I'm not saying anything," I said. "The evidence speaks for itself. So how come you don't look more surprised, King?"

  He looked away, sipping his coffee. "Let's just say this isn't my first vampire. "

  Chapter Twelve

  I waited behind the bulletproof partition while the man in chains sat across from me. He looked at me long and hard before he reached over with his cuffed hands and picked up the receiver. His breathing sounded like something remembering something, as the great poet Stan Rice would say. And when he spoke, his voice sounded distant and hollow, too.

  "Who are you?" he asked.

  I held my business card up against the mesh glass. A cop friend recently told me that a woman had punched through a similar bulletproof glass, but you can't believe everything you hear. Edward Drake leaned forward and read the card, and then leaned back again.

  "I always figured someone would come knocking some day," he said.

  "Why do you say that?" I asked. He asked me to speak up and I did, louder and with more force. Apparently my shyness didn't translate too well through the glass partition.

  "You're kind of shy, aren't you?" he asked, grinning.

  I shrugged. I never know how to answer that. And my shyness keeps me from opening up too much about it. A catch-22 if ever there was one.

  He kept grinning and said, "Well, anyway, we both know why you're here. "

  "We do?"

  "It's about Evelyn. My ex-wife, of course. "

  "What about her?" I was holding the phone close to my ear, but not too close and not too hard. I could only imagine how often these ear pieces were cleaned.

  He said, "I presume she's missing. "

  I had been in the act of swallowing and suddenly found myself coughing nearly hysterically. While I hacked away, Edward watched me with a bemused expression.

  "Easy, ol' boy," he said.

  "And why would you. . . " I coughed again, "presume that?"

  "Because I didn't kill her correctly, you see. I realized my mistake far too late. "

  "I don't understand. "

  "It's why I stabbed her so many times. "

  "Jesus, what are you talking about?"

  The bemused expression was gone now. It had been replaced with something unreadable. . . but cold as hell. "The knife I used, the knife I had thought was silver, wasn't really silver. It was silver plated. An honest mistake. "

  "I don't - "

  "Oh, I think you do, ol' boy. "

  He was right, but I was having a hard time coming to terms with it, despite my recent past. "You're saying she didn't die because your knife wasn't pure silver. "

  "Exactly. "

  "But I've read the autopsy report," I said. "Of course she's dead. "

  "Oh, I'm sure she appeared dead. They always appear dead, especially if they lose enough blood. "

  "What the fuck are you talking about?"

  "And if they do lose enough blood, it takes them weeks, perhaps even months to recover. And even though the knife was only silver plated, there was undoubtedly enough silver in it to still inflict serious harm. "

  He stopped and looked at me. I was all too aware that my mouth was hanging open. Flashbacks to events of a few months ago hit me again, and hit me hard. What the hell was going on?

  "You're talking about a vampire," I said.

  He grinned. "Could you say that a little louder, ol' boy?"

  Chapter Thirteen

  I glanced at the wire-covered clock on the wall behind me. We had twenty minutes left. I asked Edward to tell me what he knew as quickly as he could, and he obliged.

  Edward first became aware that his wife was something more than human about a year before her death; or, as he put it, her alleged death.

  Listening to all of this in stunned silence, I could only sit back and watch the man closely, looking for any signs of instability. I found none. If anything, he seemed perfectly normal, often speaking eloquently and with touches of humor.

  His wife's change had occurred nearly three years ago, when she had been jogging around the reservoir in Silver Lake one evening. Everyone had warned her against jogging the reservoir, which doubled as an idyllic lake; that is, if you removed the chain link fence, barbed wire and dozens of off-limits signs. But his wife had always been fearless and, really, Silver Lake was mostly considered harmless. The reservoir was nestled among some of the nicer Hollywood fringe homes, often occupied by those who had found some s
uccess in show business.

  One night, she didn't come home. Edward had immediately gone looking for her, circling the reservoir, until he finally found what looked like a bundle of clothing in the bushes. The bundle turned out to be his wife. She was a mess, her neck torn open, her clothing ripped, blood everywhere. How she wasn't dead, he didn't know.

  She was rushed to the hospital where she spent many days recovering. And recovering rapidly, he added.

  "What do you mean by that?" I asked. I didn't read many vampire books. Or watch many vampire movies. I had only a vague idea of what vampires were, and outside of some very strange events a month ago, I would have laughed at the entire notion. Would have. But not now. Indeed, I had seen something during my last case that was still haunting my dreams to this day.

  And now this. . . .

  "It means that she healed far faster than she should have. "

  "What did the doctors say?"

  "Not much, but they were stunned. "

  Someone sat near me, a woman reeking of a lot of perfume. Another inmate was led into the room, shackled similarly to Edward. He sat a few seats down and picked up the phone. The woman sitting next to me immediately began weeping. Edward and I ignored them as he continued recounting his tale.

  Life rapidly turned strange in the Drake household. His wife seemed to have developed an aversion to sunlight. She was both stronger than ever before and sickly, too. At least, sickly during the day. One night she had come home from shopping. She had purchased three porterhouse steaks and had apparently torn into the packaging on the way home. The steaks were still there but he was certain she had drank the blood that pooled at the bottom of the Styrofoam trays.

  About a month later, with his wife's midnight runs to the store continuing, coupled with her aversion to sunlight - not to mention an alarming number of missing cat posters popping up in the neighborhood - Edward had concluded that his wife had been changed into something supernatural.

  Into something that scared the hell out of him.

  We both looked at the time. Ours was running out. He fast-forwarded one year later when their marriage was crumbling. I asked why he would stay married to something that scared him. He mentioned the kids. He also mentioned something else, something that surprised me, but probably shouldn't have.

  "I knew I had to kill her," he said. "So I was biding my time. "

  "But she was your wife. "

  "She had been my wife. But she had turned into something else. Something not very nice. "

  "I've looked through the police report," I said. "There were many instances in past years of the police coming out. Claims of abuse. "

  Edward shrugged. "Yeah, we fought. And we fought passionately. Did I hit her? Yes, once or twice. I was never proud of it. I sought counseling. "

  "The police paint a different picture. "

  "They had to. They had to explain a series of events that would otherwise be unexplainable. "

  "The detective and prosecutors claimed you abused her, beat her up, accused her of cheating often, and then finally killed her in a fit of rage. "

  "Some of that is correct, but not to the extreme they made it out to be. My killing her was, however, very planned. "

  He had spent many months verifying his suspicions. He needed to be sure. He'd notice she quit casting a reflection. Her photos came up blurry and amorphous, as if she wasn't there. She quickly quit taking photos altogether. He watched her avoid meals, only to come home late at night, satisfied. He watched her avoid all sunlight, claiming she now preferred the night. She slept all day and neglected the kids. Edward feared for the kids' safety. He feared for his own safety. He feared for anyone's safety who was in contact with his wife. He tried to talk about this to her, but she laughed it off. He tried repeatedly until one day she had thrown him against a wall, warning him to back off. She made new friends, too. Creepy friends. Evil friends. Friends he couldn't believe she would permit around the kids.

  And she was cold to the touch. Always so cold.

  Edward had decided he needed to do something about it. He read up on how to kill a vampire. A silver stake or dagger, or anything silver and pointed through the heart.

  Edward lapsed into brief silence and I saw the tears in his eyes. After a moment, he said, "I had loved this woman. I had been crazy about her. But something happened to her. Something wicked. And she seemed to welcome it, revel in it. And she was hurting people, too. I couldn't confirm it, but I knew she fed each and every night. On whom, I did not know. On what, I couldn't imagine. "

  He took in a lot of air. We were down to our last few minutes. Already I saw the guard watching us. He would be coming in any minute now.

  Edward continued. "More than anything, I sensed a great. . . evil coming through her. As if something very dark was now calling her body home. Maybe she could have fought it. I don't know. But it was in her, and this thing didn't give a damn about her, or anyone. "

  "So you decided to kill her. "

  "I had to kill her. To kill it. "

  "So you used a silver butter knife?"

  "Why not? A knife is a knife. It was heavy. Had a thick handle, long blade. I thought it had been pure silver. "

  So one day, with the kids in school, he had come home for lunch from work. He had walked calmly into his bedroom, where his wife lay unmovingly on the bed, the curtains tightly drawn. When she slept, she rarely moved, and, in fact, rarely breathed, if at all. She was dead to the world, and he simply walked over to his nightstand, opened the top drawer, and removed the silver butter knife.

  He had stepped to her side, where he looked down at the woman he had once loved with all his heart. He'd spent only a few seconds standing by her side, when he raised the knife, positioned it over her chest, and plunged it down as hard as he could.

  Chapter Fourteen

  The drive to and from San Quentin had taken all day.

  It was late when I arrived back at Roxi's apartment in Hollywood. She curled her naked body around me, resting her hand on my bare chest and her cheek on my shoulder. Her tan leg slid over my thighs, sending a shiver through me. I automatically curled my arm around her.

  These days I didn't have much interest in sex. But Roxi did. Enough for both of us. And even though she was only half asleep, I knew that she was giving me an opening. I patted her hip like I would a puppy and some of her electrified energy dissipated. A moment later she was snoring lightly.

  Edward had gone on to describe some of the more gruesome details of his murder. Or attempted murder, as he put it.

  His first stab didn't kill her. In fact, seventy-two stabs later and she was still kicking, still fighting, until most of her blood finally drained down into the bed sheets. The silver plating had done enough to incapacitate her, but not enough to kill her. Edward was certain that had he tried to stab her with anything other than a silver knife, she would have killed him.

  But she had lost enough blood to appear dead, enough to satisfy a medical examiner.

  "But that's not why you're here, is it, Spinoza?" he asked, as I saw a guard coming toward us. "You're here because she's gone missing. "

  "How do you know?"

  "Call it a hunch. Be careful, Spinoza. Here be monsters. "

  And that's when the guard arrived and took him away. He went willing, but he kept his eyes on me until he was finally led out the heavy door.

  I lay in bed with my hands behind my head.

  I've been staying more and more at Roxi's apartment. We've been dating now for about three months and, surprisingly, things were going well. Somehow, someway she put up with all my melancholy, shyness, and sometimes impotency. It's a challenge to make love when your heart is shattered.

  But Roxi was showing me something, albeit slowly and sometimes painfully. She was showing me how to love again, and for that I was eternally grateful.

  Edward had told me something else, something he had overheard his w
ife say one night when she was talking to a group of her weird friends. . . friends, he suspected, that may or may not have been entirely human.

  He had overheard his wife mention that another woman, another mother of two, had been attacked in Orange County, no doubt by the same vampire. Edward had vowed to hunt down this mother in Orange County, as well.

  As I lay in bed, with Roxi curled up next to me, I briefly considered why a vampire would purposely turn two mothers into vampires. I decided rather quickly that I had no clue, but I made a mental note to keep an eye out for this mother of two in Orange County, whoever she was.

  Times like these, I thought, are why people drink.

  I rolled over and rested my hand on Roxi's naked hip, smiled, and finally drifted off to sleep.

  Chapter Fifteen

  I awoke with a gasp in the middle of the night, after dreaming that a creepy caretaker, the coffin maker, had been watching me from the dark shadow's of Roxi's room.

  At least, I hoped it was a dream.

  I looked now and we were alone. Thank God. I lay my head back down on the pillow and pulled Roxi's wonderfully warm body to me. She came willingly, mewing slightly in sleep, and I only grudgingly fell back to sleep with my eyes fastened on the far corner of the room. That is, until I could no longer keep my eyes open. . . .

  When I awoke in the morning, with Roxi still sleeping hard and the morning light creeping through the edges of the blinds, I knew where to go next.

  To meet the one man who, I thought, might have heard the knocking, too. The one man who could have inconspicuously dug up Evelyn's body.

  The creepy caretaker, of course.

  The man of my recent dreams.

  I got dressed and hit Starbucks and was soon on my way to Forest Lawn just as the morning sun appeared in the east, over the Eagle Rock hills, and shining its morning glory.

  I was acutely aware that as I awakened with a reasonably fresh cup of coffee, there might be a hidden race of the undead slipping now into a very deep and dark sleep.

  Traffic was surprisingly brisk.

  Shortly, I was driving through the open gates of Forest Lawn and over to the maintenance building located on the east side of the sprawling cemetery.

  It was a Tuesday morning, and a handful of cars were parked here and there. As I parked and exited my car, a nearby Latino woman was walking slowly between the rows of grave markers with a small bouquet of flowers. She looked lost and grief-stricken.