We’d only taken a little over an hour to deal with the witch. I was sure that it would have been a much bigger task had my aunt not shown up to assist. I’d have to thank her the next time she appeared to me. I would have stayed to thank her, but I got the impression that my aunt wanted to be alone with Megan. Since the two of them had very similar likes, dislikes, and interest, I assumed that they’d be getting to know each other for quite a while.
I smiled at the thought of it.
I decided to go downstairs and enjoy a cup of herbal tea before returning to my bed. I felt far too alert and chamomile tea with lavender always relaxed me to the point of slumber.
I’d been talked into getting a coffee maker that offered single servings. I used it to quickly heat my water. I set my cup containing a tea ball that was filled with a combination of chamomile and lavender leaves on the little platform that the c
Megan used the time that it took for me to fully recover to close the portal that the shadow person was passing through. I would have liked to have witnessed how she did it, but I understood her desire to simply get it done and behind us. She said that she needed time to work on finding a way to release Matilda from the bonds that kept her tied to the house since her normal casting spells hadn’t done the trick.In exchange, Matilda shared with Megan and Evan the various secret passages that were being used by the witchdoctor and his cronies to come and go at will. We were all astonished by the number of them. It was later revealed that the house was used as a hub during prohibition for bootlegging. Hence the many entrances and escape routes.I wondered if Max knew the history of the colorful house that he’d purchased for me. I doubted it. I was certain that if he knew that advanced zombies and werewolves were walking the halls
Dr. Amy Lansbury was a pretty, petite blonde who looked to be in her mid-thirties. Since she was a vampire, I assumed that was the age when she was turned. Her actual age was anyone’s guess.Although her hair was the color of spun gold that glistened as the light caressed it and it looked soft enough to want to reach out and touch, the thing that I found most distinctive about her were her eyes. They looked like green cut glass and so intense that you felt that, when she looked at you, she was looking right into your soul. When she spoke, her perfectly shaped lips moved in a seductive, gentle way. They were in stark contrast to her intense, all-seeing eyes.She spent a few minutes reuniting with Megan. They were old friends who’d been taken down different paths of late and, therefore, they had a lot of catching up to do. Megan explained my situation to her in great detail before I was summoned to the examining
I was a nervous wreck as I walked into Dr. Lansbury’s reception room the following afternoon. I’d driven myself. Although I fully intended to share the information with my girlfriend and my vampire lover, I wanted time to absorb whatever news there was on my own first.My stomach lurched on several occasions and I was barely able to retain my lunch before I was finally called into her private office. Her lips smiled warmly while her intense eyes watched me take a seat.When I was finally settled, she pulled papers from a large manila envelope and began to read the test results to me.She never lifted her eyes from the papers as she said, “On the matter of paternity, Max Orwell is the father. Your bloodwork shows that you are a little further along than I thought. You are approximately seven weeks pregnant.” She heaved a sigh and then focused her cut glass green eyes on me. “Thi
Evan spent the night helping us pack up what we wanted to take to the estate house. It was shortly after midnight when we decided to call it quits. To my surprise, he went to his apartment to sleep. He said that it was because he still had things to do to prepare for his going before the vampire army board, but I guessed it was also because he wanted to put some space between us.I was assured that he loved me by the number of times that he’d said it. The fact that I was carrying Max’s child didn’t diminish that. It was more that he was serious about lessening the vampire bond between us. I could understand his desire to want to be sure of the source of my feelings for him. I even appreciated it. I also felt terrible that he had such little confidence to think that I’d only want him because of the vampire lure. I was eager to prove to him that my feelings were real. If that meant s
To say that the estate house was impressive would be an understatement. I was so shocked by the magnitude of size and wealth that this house portrayed that I was completely speechless. The cleaning crew that I’d hired just hours earlier were impressively efficient. They’d managed to clean up a few rooms for Megan and I to start off using.It was clear that they had an easy month to go before they’d be done getting the place back into a livable condition. It wasn’t run down. Not in the least. It was just so thick with dust after years of sitting dormant that it looked like a light layer of snow inside the rooms that were yet to be addressed by the cleaning crew.“I thought that my house was too big and imposing. I could put three of them in here. Maybe four,” I said with wonder. “Who needs a house this big? Better yet. Why build a house this big?”&ld
The master suite consisted of three rooms and a bathroom. I found the mahogany, French provincial furnishings a little ostentatious for my tastes, but I could live with them.The king sized bed sported a mattress that looked and felt so new that I questioned if it had ever been slept on. The cleaning crew had steamed it on both sides. The bedding for it, including a cotton covered memory foam mattress pad were laid in a neat pile at the end of the bed.I quickly set to making it.By the time I’d put my bed together, I could feel the muscles in my body begging for a reprieve. I discovered a deep, jacuzzi tub in the bathroom that was just begging to be filled with steaming hot, lavender scented water.While I waited for the tub to fill, I breathed in the scented steam that rose from it as I pinned my hair on top of my head. In the corner of the spacious, marble tiled room was a free standing oval mirror
Megan and I took our time exploring the house. Even though we were searching for a suitable place to set up the lab, it didn’t detract from the fun of exploring.One of the first things that we discovered was a dumb waiter that led to a large room on the second floor. Megan called it the ballroom and, since the house was old enough, it may very well have been used for that. Shortly after, we found a butler’s elevator. Since the house had three stories and a basement, we were certain that the elevator would get a lot of use. Before moving on, we checked it for hidden doors like the one in my house had. We were happy to discover none.I checked out the basement. It consisted of a large room and then smaller rooms that ran down a narrow hall. Most of the rooms had concrete floors. One was a furnace room and the others were used for the utilities and for storage. At the far end of the basement ne
We spent the next two weeks focusing on setting up the lab and making sure that the entire house was put in order. Like me, Megan had an aversion to clutter. We didn’t mind if a room was either empty or sparsely furnished as long as it was clean and not riddled with dust. So, while we shopped, lugged from the store as well as the old house, and organized, the cleaning crew was kept busy going from room to room.By the time we were finished and satisfied with the way things were looking, I felt exhausted on both a physical and emotional level.As odd as it seemed, setting up the new lab made me think of Peter. Perhaps it was because I was preparing to do research on the very thing that took him from me. I wondered if he’d made any progress with his research in Africa. It would have proven handy to be able to know his findings and share in his progress. Instead, I was starting from scratch.Megan ma