Title: Grey Street
Author: Crazy_Girl_Mary
Email: crazy_girl_mary@yahoo.com
Rating: NC-17
Pairing: female/vamp male
Feedback: It’s a beautiful thing! -crazy_girl_mary@yahoo.com-
Summary: She’s on the run but only when the man chasing her allows it to be so.
Author’s Notes: This is not a sequel to The Long Journey Into Darkness. It just follows the same theme. I hope to make this a series. This part is unlike LjiD because I had a different couple in mind, and I’m going to delve into the occurrences before the fic as it progresses.
I’m including the back story I left out in the first part of the series because I think it tends to the story, being a story in itself, and adds a different aspect, although I liked the lack of back story in the first one and the option for the reader to freely create their own to accord with the characters, so I think in the third and probably final story I’ll have it with no back story again.

Part III: Roses Are Red


We walk down the street, hand in hand, because I’m too submissive at the moment to put up a fight in the middle of a crowded city street. I wonder what kind of couple we appear to be to the passersby. A few hours and the sun will be coming up. Perhaps if I’m good company he’ll forget the time. I know a few moves that might make him forget, have made him forget in the past, but that’s a big might when torture is inevitable. If I’m good, he’ll be kind. I know this from experience, because it means I’ve broken down, and he’s reached that goal he craves. If I’m bad, he won’t be kind at all, and he likes this just as much because it means I still have fight inside. There’s more for him to suck out, more sweet sustenance for him to live off of. No matter what, I always bounce back, like those stupid balloon toys for kids, you punch it and beat it as hard as you can, but it just comes back for more with a smile on its face… it doesn’t know any different.

He stops at a vendor, his fingers weaved through mine, and he uses the other hand to fish out a few dollars, earning him a single long stem red rose and a gracious thank you. He hands me the rose with a disgustingly sincere smile that I know too well is fabricated. Wait until he gets me alone, the smile will have vanished, and there will just be blood. This is his game, and he plays it so well, far better then I could ever hope to counter. Why be cruel when he can be unbearably kind?

He leads me down a set of stairs to an old subway station. It seems like it would be a better place for the homeless and runaways to seek refuge then the naked street but it’s completely empty. A gust of wind blows along the ghost tracks and there’s not even trash or debris for it to rattle along the concrete.

I look up at him, not wanting to speak after so long a silence. He seems to understand, and I know he prefers the silence sometimes too. He nods to an iron door a few yards away and we start towards it together. His hand is still weaved in mine, and my other hand clutches the rose. I don’t want to drop it down here where it doesn’t belong. He stops just shy of the door and turns to me. He pulls a stake out of one of his pants pockets where I hadn’t known he put it and slips it back where it belongs, his cool fingers grazing my thigh. His eyes flare in mine as his fingers run over the lace of my panties temporarily but he pulls quickly away.

“Let’s see if you can’t put that to some good use,” he says and that cruel smile has suddenly returned. I want to ask him what the fuck he’s talking about, what the fuck is going on, but I feel like this is all still a dream, it wouldn’t be the first time I dreamed about him. He turns me to the door, turns the knob lightly, and pushes it open with a creak. There is a narrow hallway, elegantly carpeted and wallpapered despite it’s location. At the end of the hallway I can hear a few gruff male voices keeping conversation.

His hands are firm on my back as he pushes me steadily along. Fear sweeps through my body. He’s given me the stake back because he’s certain I won’t use it on him. Does this mean he’s challenging me? Is he going to kill these men while I watch helpless in spite of the weapon I could wield? These questions are answered when I step into the room and the six men have already turned their attention to our noiseless presence. They glare with evil yellow eyes and ridged faces that beg for a good dusting. A dusting that I’ve mastered over the years. He wants me to deliver?

“Here he is,” one of the vamps says gesturing towards us.

“He’s come through for us after all,” another mentions with a menacing smile as he steps closer to us.

“I have to admit I had my doubts about your honesty, but perhaps an alliance is a smart move…” the leader says slowly. He walks towards me and runs his fingertips along my cheek. I pull away roughly but he’s behind me. What is going on? He plans to offer me up to these vampires in an alliance? Then why would he give me the stake and convey his expectations of a battle to me?

His hands grasp my shoulders firmly and I stand strong beneath his hold. The leader smiles at me and then to my captor who speaks suddenly. “Smart move?” he asks lightly. “I think you’re about to learn a little bit about smart moves.” With that he pushes me forward and I have the stake out in seconds and run it through one of the lesser vamps. I hear the leader scream in rage and start towards my subjugator. Save him? Not a chance. I go after the four that are still preparing their attack. They are old, and put up a good fight, and I’m rusty to say the least. I can’t even remember the last time I killed, but that’s far from important when you need to kill to survive. It quickly comes back to me, because it’s a natural part of me. I learned and learned and relearned how to kill these beasts and it’s not something that can be forgotten forever, no matter how hard one might try. That doesn’t mean I can kill him, because I know I can’t.

I stake two fairly easily but the remaining two are working as a team, which makes them harder to kill. They advance as one with hunger on their grotesque faces and I back up to prepare for the counter attack. I don’t plan out the moves my arms take against them, they just come naturally, and despite their intensity, it takes a few movements and side steps to dust the first one, who had managed to wrap his hand tightly around my neck. He had failed in forgetting my free stake hands. After he was eliminated it was only a matter of catching the other vampire in shock before he had the chance to retreat. Moron.

The word still rings in my head, a slight smile to be back in the fight after such a long year plays at my lips but quickly disappears as the iron hands wrap around each of my arms and pin them to my side. With my stake still clutched in one hand, I stand still as a rod preparing for the death I know he holds. His tongue nips quickly on my neck and his breath is cool. I clench my eyes and hope that the death will come quick and be final, knowing I’ll never escape his hold.

But his hands release and I turn reluctantly to face him. Except it’s not him at all, not until the leaders ashes spray the ground and his eyes meet mine. He’s smiling sincerely, and for a moment I could forget his evil ways. He holds out his hand, and I even consider taking it. We shared the same fight and therefore are on the same side. These uncertainties fade and I glare angrily at him, knowing that he only saved my life to reserve the privilege of taking it.

I step back and look down at the ash littered carpet to avoid his friendly gaze and my inadequacies. There on the carpet, crushed and broken, lay the carcass of the once beautiful red rose he gave me. The possible symbolizisms abound. He turns suddenly and makes for the door. Does he expect me to follow? Am I going to follow? I have no idea what his plan are, but I’m sure, by no choice of mine, we will share them.

I wait like a child for his instructions, completely surprised by my own obedience. Maybe I don’t want to run anymore. Maybe I never wanted to run from him in the first place. I take it as a sign that I’m beyond figuring out if I can’t figure me out myself. He could probably explain and justify or attack any thought, action, or feeling of mine. He knows me that well, because he thinks I’m part of him, a late model perhaps, and he may be right.

He walks down the hallway, and I’m still, listening; yet my mind is running. I hear the door close behind him. I stand, confused and numb, staring into space for what seems like hours, before I realize he’s gone. He’s gone, and he’s not coming back. It’s got to be a trick, there’s got to be a catch, a something. He couldn’t just leave me, not to let me go. It wasn’t too long ago he was saying he wanted me, that I was all he ever wanted. Why would he just leave?

Like a spark in my spine I know, and the realization comes with actual physical pain. He would leave if he planned this. He would leave if he had something up his sleeve. He would leave if he had a surprise for me. I don’t know what it could possibly be, but I have some ideas and I run all the way back to my apartment complex, thundering down the street under the dawn. The sun would have him in his lair, or locked away somewhere dark and shaded. He still had time enough to get back to the complex and finish the job he started earlier if that indeed was his aim.

I can hear the police officers from the elevator and I slowly and carefully make my way to Jeanine’s open door. There are a few investigators and uniforms slightly visible jumbled deep inside the apartment, reflecting off of the massive mirror. It seems like only moments ago I was futilely searching for his presence deep inside the reflective glass. One guard standing watch at the open door doesn’t seem to glance twice at me as I pass slowly by. Everyone probably gawks. I would stand out more to him if I didn’t. When I hear Jeanine’s shaking voice trying to explain in a logical way to the police what happened to her, relief wells up in my stomach and I head quickly back to my room.

I know I’ll appear somewhere in her explanation and it shouldn’t be long before the cops are knocking on my door for some sort of substantiation, or lack thereof, to her outrageous claims. I grab a duffel bag from my closet and quickly try and pack it with essentials. I know I have to go to a motel, at least for the night to avoid the cops, but with him on my back it’s only a matter of time before he shows his face again and if I have to run I want to be a little better prepared then last time.

I try to put these worries aside, if only for a moment, as I quickly slip out into the hallway and to the elevator. I feel like my life has been a nightmare since the fire, and everything before him was my life. Perhaps, I died in the fire, and this is my own personal hell. I slip down into the subway station and take it out of the heart and into the colon of the city to find a motel that’s open and that I can afford. It doesn’t take much. In motels like the Lucky Charm, there’s always a vacancy. I remind myself it should only be a day or two and marvel at how spoiled I became. I came to New York with money unlike anything I’d ever seen before, got a nice big apartment, and a bunch of nice things, and once again I’ll be leaving them all behind. Perhaps this is my punishment? After all there was a time when the Lucky Charm would’ve looked like the Hilton.

I stare out at the neon sign, glowing outside the small window to my room as I lie on my back on the squeaky bed. A lucky charm is just what I need, but I doubt it’s something I’ll find here, in this whole city, maybe not even for the rest of my life, however long that may turn out to be. I resent the fact that my life is in his hands, he wields all my power with expert force, and I’m unable to stop him. I could, I guess, in another world, a parallel universe where his eyes don’t own me, where his lips don’t call me, where his words don’t whip me. I reek with incapability. I hate it, but I don’t know how to change. I thought maybe I had changed but his reemergence confirmed different for me.

The stake in my hand is almost as strong as my anger and determination. My walk and my fist are even stronger and I plan to show him all their anguish and power as I walk past the overgrown rose bushes and into the abandoned building. It looks as though it may have even been a church in a past life, long long ago, candles light the room but the high ceilings remain dark. The striking irony that it is now a vampire’s lair is not lost on me, and I’m sure it wasn’t lost on him either.

He takes pride in his lairs, he likes to live like a king among humans, and there’s no reason he shouldn’t with the power he now wields over the entire city. The entire city save me, I’m the only one who can stop him, the only one who can even come close, and even I needed an invite to this party. He made it clear it was invitation only and I was all too eager to respond.

“Ah, here it is. ‘If you’re half the woman I think you are you’ll show, and you’ll show alone… dress to impress?’” I ask defiantly tossing the letter to the floor.

“I’m impressed,” he says with a smile as he gauges my appearance, “half the woman and then some.”

“So glad you approve,” I answer sarcastically raising the stake.

“Aren’t you a right-to-business kinda girl? I thought we’d get properly acquainted, maybe share a few refreshments.”

“And I left my tuna casserole at home.”

“That’s okay.” His eyes bore through me up and down and I’ve never felt more sized up and vulnerable then in that moment. “There’s plenty to eat here.”

“Well, come and get it.”

He answers my challenge with as much force as he puts into most anything else that he considers his art, as twisted and gruesome as it may be, but I eventually get the upper hand. I’m the light to verse his darkness, so I have to win, that’s the way it works. Surprises are his trademark, so there’s no reason to be shocked but I am. My chest sinks and swells like never before as he pulls away, his weariness well hidden. He would never give up or call time out and neither would I. We are equally matched and it’s all in who wants it more. For him to pull away, there would have to be a catch, a surprise that will restore to him the upper hand and all the odds. Not in my game, I hope.

“Now it’s getting interesting, but not spicy.”

He walks to me slowly like he knows I won’t stake him before he reveals this surprise. “There’s some spice.”

I turn quickly to follow his pointed finger, but the sight has my eyes stuck and I fall right into his trap. One arm wraps tightly around my waist and pins my free arm to my side while the other one fights the stake out of my grasp. He has me, contained inside his arms, well within reach of death and I’m far too noble and heartbroken to struggle.

I stare into the eyes of the little girl. She’s hanging over a balcony high in the rafters of the vaulted ceiling where I can almost see the choir singing a hymn. Her shredded white dress is soaked as red as the roses outside and her dead eyes bore right into mine, begging for the return of her life, begging for me to save her.

He is leaning over my shoulder from behind and savoring the pain, I can taste it in the air myself. “She’s got your eyes,” he says, “I wonder if she’s got your loins.”

I finally scream and savagely pull away if only for the chance to beat him to death. My back slams into a table after a fit of struggles and I can hear the various candles thud or crack to the floor. He looks past me to where the expensive draperies and carpet have caught fire, but I can’t see all that reflecting in his eyes, only hunger.




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