Burnt Offerings - Laurell K. Hamilton [77]
“I didn’t know he’d go up in flames like he did,” she said. “A person just doesn’t burn like that.”
“No,” I said, “they don’t.”
“I started to scream and run away from him. My friend came in the door then. People were shouting and screaming. It was awful.”
I stood up. “I bet it was.”
She stared up me, blue eyes sincere but not full of horror for what she’d done. There was no remorse. She gripped my arm suddenly, very tight, as if she could will me to understand. “I had to protect myself.”
I placed my hand over hers and smiled. “What made you think of lighting the liquor once you’d thrown it?”
“I remembered that vampires were afraid of fire.”
“But if you threw a drink in a human’s face and lit it, it would only burn until the liquor was gone. A whoosh and it would be all over. A human would leave you alone after that, though they’d be hurt. Weren’t you afraid that you’d just make the vampire more angry?”
“But vampires are very combustible, you said it yourself,” Vicki said.
My smile widened. “So you knew he’d go up in flames?”
“Yes,” she said, clutching me, willing me to understand her plight.
Dolph said, “I thought you didn’t know the vampire would go up in flames, Ms. Pierce.”
“I didn’t, not until he burned like that,” she said.
I patted her hand. “But, Vicki dear, you just said you knew he was combustible.”
“But you said it first.”
“Vicki, you just said you knew he’d go up in flames when you lit him up.”
“I didn’t.”
I nodded. “Yes, you did.”
She drew her hands away from me, sitting very straight in her chair. “You are trying to confuse me.”
I shook my head. “No, Vicki, you’re doing that all on your own.” I moved away from her while still maintaining eye contact.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” she asked. A little bit of anger peeked through her helpless-damsel act.
“What restaurant was it?” I asked as if I hadn’t been there twenty minutes earlier. Interrogations are so often repetitive.
“What?” she asked.
“What was the name of the bar?”
“I don’t remember.”
“Dolph?” I asked.
“Burnt Offerings,” he said.
I laughed. “A notorious vampire hangout.”
“It’s not in the vampire district,” she said. “How was I to know that it was a vampire bar?”
“How about the picture of Christopher Lee as Dracula on the sign outside?,” I said.
“It was quite late and nothing else was open.”
“In University City on Delmar on a Friday night? Come on, Vicki. You can do better than that,” I said.
She touched the bandage on her neck with a delicate, trembling hand. “He bit me.” Her voice shook, and more tears trailed down her face.
I walked back to her. I put a hand on either side of her chair and leaned my face into hers. “You’re lying, Vicki.”
She burst into tears, hiding her face. I put a finger under her chin and lifted her face. “Damn, you’re good, but not good enough.”
She jerked away from me, standing so suddenly, the chair crashed to the floor. “I was attacked, and you’re making me feel like the bad guy. You’re a woman. I thought you’d understand.”
I shook my head. “Can the universal sisterhood appeal, Vicki. It don’t wash.”
She jerked the bandage from her neck and threw it to the floor. “Look, look what he did to me!”
If she expected me to flinch, she had the wrong girl. I walked up to her, turning her head to one side. It was vampire fang marks, pretty fresh. A neat, nice bite, but there was no bruising, no hickey mark spreading across her creamy flesh. It was just two neat fang marks.
I stepped back from her. “You threw your drink into his face as soon as he bit you?”
“Yes, I didn’t want him touching me.”
“A filthy vampire,” I said.
“A walking corpse.”
She had a point. “Thank you, Vicki, thank you for talking to me.” I walked to the door and motioned Dolph to follow. Zerbrowski stayed behind with Ms. Pierce.
Dolph closed the door behind us. “What did you see in the bite that I didn’t?” he asked.
“If a vamp plunges fang into you but doesn’t have time to feed much, it leaves a hickey. Just like a human sucking on your neck. The fangs aren’t hollow, they just