Blood And Guitars

Chapter 12

Chapter 12

As I drove to The Waking Moon, I savored the lingering effects of fresh blood. I’d fed from a woman behind a bookstore just moments before, and then gently sent her on her way back down the alley. Feeding really was easier when I could use the moon-given ability to read minds. I had simply reminded the woman that she was late for dinner with a friend and pointed her in the right direction. She’d hurried off, thanking me for my help.  I pulled up to The Waking Moon and parked in back, taking just a second to sit quietly and center myself, while at the same time enjoying the rush that ingesting fresh blood had given me.

“How’s everything?” I asked as I let myself in the backdoor. Kacie had heard me pull up and was waiting for me near the desk.

“No complaints.” She gave me a wry smile like she was dying to share a bit of gossip. “A couple of hot guys came in yesterday.”

I picked up the sales receipts on the desk and began to shuffle through them absentmindedly. “Yeah?” I asked.

“One of them was looking for you. His name was Trey. Does that ring a bell?”

I looked up at her in surprise. I’d spent way too much time in the last week pondering why this one particular human had been able to charm me. “Trey?”

“He was tall with chocolate brown hair and gorgeous blue eyes. His friend was really cute, too. His name was O’Shea and he had black hair and …”

But I wasn’t really listening as I pulled the image of Trey and his friend from her mind. It was a strange sensation, seeing Trey stand in the middle of The Waking Moon, and I shook my head to clear my mind. I still wasn’t sure why I had gone with him that night at Carlie’s, and more importantly, why I hadn’t even fed from him in the process. I’d just let him walk away and then I’d had to go back out and find someone else to feed from to satiate my need for blood.  “Did he say what he wanted?” I asked, trying not to sound too curious.

“He was looking for you.” Kacie worked on her fingernails with a file. “He didn’t really say why. In fact, he didn’t say much of anything. He just wandered around looking at all of the paintings while I talked to his friend. Then he bought ‘Dusk On The Pier’.”

“He what?” I couldn’t hide the surprise in my voice. Apparently I should have probed deeper into her thoughts.

“The sales receipt should be in there somewhere. I had it delivered today.”

I flipped through the sales receipts in my hand more earnestly until I saw Trey’s name at the top of them. Kacie was right. Trey had shelled out three hundred dollars to buy my five canvas spread of Pier 60. Despite my misgivings about the night I had spent hanging out with a human, it secretly pleased me to know that Trey had paid a visit to The Waking Moon. I was surprised that he’d actually purchased a painting, but it brought a smile to my face, even against my better judgment.

“So, who is he?” Kacie asked.

I looked up and shrugged nonchalantly. “Just a guy I met at a lounge a few nights back. I can’t believe he even came in.”

“Why didn’t you tell me you met a guy?” I shrugged like it was no big deal, but I didn’t need to read Kacie’s mind to know that she wasn’t buying it, although technically what I had said was exactly true. “Well, he’s super cute. Don’t worry. I told him he’d have better luck catching you if he tried back around closing some time. I just hope he brings his friend along.”

I rolled my eyes. “Thanks a lot.”

“You’re welcome.”

I finished glancing through the sales receipts and Kacie took off for the night. Then I walked upstairs into the loft above the gallery. I dropped my purse and keys on the table distractedly and was tempted to collapse on the nearest chair and wrack my brain about Trey, but the fact that I wanted to do that at all was a good indication that I needed to do something else entirely. There wasn’t a lack of work to do, so instead, I busied myself by finding a piece to hang where Pier 60 had been displayed. It didn’t take me long to hang another piece in its place.

Then I went back into the loft, plugged my iPod into the dock in the corner and put on some music while I retrieved my paints. I stared at the large blank canvas laid out in front of me and chewed on my bottom lip contemplatively. Several minutes passed while I tried to think of something else to paint, but the image burning in my mind refused to back off to make room for something more sensible. Without consciously planning it out, I began mixing colors and started to brush paint onto the surface of the canvas with sweeping motions. Within minutes I had the basic shape of a stage that dangerously resembled the one from Carlie’s. And I wasn’t stopping there.

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