“There are not as many as you might think, Sam.”
“Seems that way.”
“As they say, like attracts like. The dark masters gravitate toward each other.”
“Sounds like a party,” I said.
“A dead man’s party.”
“Good one, Max. So, what’s this about your mother being pivotal to stopping all this craziness?”
“She and one other,” said the Librarian.
“Dracula,” I said, remembering our conversation from last year. Dracula, who was the first vampire.
The Librarian nodded. “Indeed. The son of the dragon.”
I knew my history, limited as it was. Dracul, of course, meant House of the Dragon. Dracula meant, in turn, son of the dragon.
“Very good, Sam,” he said, picking up my thoughts. “There’s something I haven’t told you yet.”
“That doesn’t sound promising,” I said.
He pressed his lips together and looked at me, then looked away, then looked at me again.
And then it hit me. “Oh, no,” I said.
“Oh yes,” he said.
“You’re not going to tell me...”
He nodded. “They were in love, Sam. At least, I think it was love. For all I know, it could have been a convenient bonding. A convenient union of dark masters.”
“Wait, are you telling me...”
“Yes, Sam. The entity that’s within Dracula is and forever will be, in love with my mother.”
“Ah, shit,” I said.
“Ah, shit, is right.”
Chapter Eleven
I met Sheriff Stanley at a coffee shop in a small mountain town called Crestline, gateway into the San Bernardino Mountains.
The coffee shop had probably been any number of shops over its lifetime. The building was old and nestled under a Mexican restaurant that sported, I noted on a chalkboard near the wooden stairs leading up to it, wine-a-ritas.
“First off,” I said to the sheriff, after he shook my hand and I sat opposite him, “what’s a wine-a-rita?”
“A margarita made with wine,” he said. Sheriff Stanley was a young guy who sported an old-school mustache.
I understood quickly enough. “They lost their liquor license.”
“Hard liquor.”
“Are the wine-a-ritas any good?”
“I tried it once.”
“And?”
“I think I vomited a little in the back of my mouth. But then,” he shrugged and rubbed his mustache, “I dunno, they kind of grow on you. I guess they’re not the worst thing in the world. Still, kinda makes my stomach turn a little just thinking about them.”
“Let me get you a coffee,” I said.
“Black,” he said. “Blacker than black.”
“Says the guy who ordered a wine-a-rita.”
“I don’t know you well enough for you to bust my chops.”
I shrugged. “Never stopped me before.”
I slid out of the booth and ordered our coffees.
* * *
Sweet nectar of the gods, I thought.
The gift of coffee might have been the greatest gift that Maximus—and his rings—could have given me. After eight years of not having the stuff, now, I couldn’t get enough of it, especially since the caffeine didn’t have any effect. Nor did alcohol. My body neutralized both equally.
Luckily, my addiction for coffee went beyond the caffeine high. It was the taste. The aroma. The experience. Coffee made me feel human. And humanity is what I needed most if I wanted to keep the thing inside me at bay.
“Should I, uh, leave you alone with your coffee?” asked Sheriff Stanley.
“Now, who’s busting whose balls?”
“Hey, I’m not the one moaning and groaning over my coffee.”
“You would,” I said, “if you had the day I had.”
“Look, Miss—”
“Ms.”
“What the fuck is the difference?”
“Miss implies a woman who’s never been married. Ms. is an indefinite title for a woman whose marital status is unknown.”
“Well, you ain’t wearing a wedding ring. Just those other rings.”
I set the coffee mug down. “Ms. is also an appropriate title for a divorcee, which I happen to be.”
He wanted to say something smart-alecky, or rude, or show me how tough he was since he now regretted owning up to drinking the wine-a-rita. He opened his mouth and I was prepared for more bluster. After all, I was used to such bluster, having spent much of my professional life working in the male-dominated field of law enforcement. Instead, he closed it again and sort of rebooted.
“Sorry about the divorced part,” he said. “I’m going through that right now. It really sucks.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” I said.
He nodded, sighed.
“Any kids involved?”
He shook his head. “Elise and I were talking about having kids, until...”
“Until what?”
“Never mind,” he said. “I don’t know you well enough to burden you.”
I nodded and dipped into his mind and—right there at the forefront of his thoughts—I saw him opening the door to his bedroom and seeing his wife with another man. Then the scene looped again. And again.
“She cheated on you,” I said.
Sheriff Stanley was a young guy, maybe thirty-two. I caught a glimpse of something else in his thoughts. Something he had dreamed about often. I saw three kids running. I saw him playing with them, a sort of game of hide-and-seek. Two girls and a boy. Now, he was rolling in the grass with them. A golden retriever bounded between them, licking indiscriminately. Someone had seen one too many episodes of Full House. Kids were fun, but maybe not that fun. Scratch that. Anthony was a hoot. And so was Tammy, in her way. It’s just that...well, it’s just that it’s not all fun and games.
Anyway, I could have laughed at his innocent, almost naïve approach to having a family. In fact, I might have if I didn’t feel his overwhelming sense of loss. He wanted a family, and he had thought it would be with the woman he’d caught cheating.
He nodded. “That obvious?”
I held his gaze and felt his loss and heard him crying inside. He didn’t know I could hear the sobs that echoed through his memories. “Lucky guess,” I said softly, and reached out and patted his hand.
His aura sort of reached out to me. That man needed a hug in a bad way, but then, it recoiled and he pulled back his hand. “I don’t really wanna talk about it, you know?”