The Vampire Stalker

Chapter 11

"WHAT WOULD YOU SAY is the probability that Elizabeth Howard will call us?" Alexander asked.

It was early the following morning, and the highway stretched before us. We'd been driving all night, but Alexander, of course, didn't need to rest. Ms. P. and I had taken turns sleeping in the backseat. Now, Alexander was driving and I sat beside him nursing an iced coffee while Ms. P. snored softly in the backseat.

I noticed that Alexander had used the term "probability." It wasn't a coincidence. To catch Vigo, he would have to think like him.

"You definitely had an impact on her," I replied, remembering the scene in the bookstore. "But you might have just scared her."

"I detect a note of disapproval in your voice, Amy. You believe I took the wrong approach, don't you?"

Usually I found it easier to keep quiet about things that bothered me, but I wanted to be straight with Alexander. "You should have taken a gentler approach. Ms. P. and I would have done the rest." I turned to him. "Has anyone ever told you that your behavior can be a little extreme?"

"I've heard it a time or two." A grin pulled at the corner of his mouth. "But I'm not perturbed by your criticism, since you are already in love with me, Mrs. Alexander Banks eight thousand and twenty-one."

I felt my temper flare. Of all the arrogant things to say!

"In love with you?" I exclaimed, trying to keep my voice down so not to wake Ms. P. "Give me a break! You're the most aggravating guy I've ever met. I'm not in love with you ... and I never was." I spoke the words forcefully, as if that would make them true. But I knew it was far too late to guard my heart against Alexander Banks.

He was silent for several moments, watching the road. "I know. I was attempting to tease you. Perhaps it was a roundabout way of apologizing, if I did, in fact, go to an extreme. It's easy to call oneself in love with a character in a book because he is just a fantasy." His mouth curved without humor. "The real person is harder to accept."
I wanted to backpedal. Had I gone too far? I wasn't trying to say he was unlovable.

"You're not that bad," I said.

"I am inclined to believe you, except that even my dear cousin James calls me insufferable. He thinks I don't want to see him happy." He glanced at me. "What do you think?"

"He's wrong. It's obvious how loyal you are to him. I think James wonders if you want to see yourself happy."

He frowned. "Who says I'm not happy?"

"Hunting vampires can't be very fulfilling."

"Can't it? You don't know how satisfying it is to put a stake through the heart of a vampire who preys on innocent people. The truth is, killing vampires is the only thing that makes me feel anything close to joy. Grotesque, isn't it?"

It was grotesque, but it was also understandable. "After what happened to your family, maybe you can't feel happy unless you're preventing others from meeting the same fate."

"That is as reasonable an explanation as any I could have hoped for. Unfortunately, some would say that makes me misguided. A lost soul. Troubled. Tortured."

"Those are all words Elizabeth Howard used to describe you."

He grunted. "Indeed."

"You must want more out of your life than vampire hunting," I said gently. "Say you kill Vigo and return to your dimension, and James succeeds in having the vampires sign a peace treaty with the humans. Then what?"

"Would that it were so. But it sounds like a work of fiction."

"You must have interests other than vampire hunting. You said yourself that you have an incurable curiosity."