The Guinevere Hotel stands surrounded by the facades of half-rebuilt buildings. Sullivan Stephens, holding a hammer and wearing a tool belt, directs a team with tin stars on their chests. Jane enters the street. She watches the workers rush about new banks, shops, schools, and churches as Stephens hobbles as fast as he can to keep up atop a wooden leg. She gives a whistle and sets down a tray of cold beers.
"How's it going out here, Sheriff?" Jane asks, offering Stephens a stein.
"Pretty well, Mayor," Stephens speaks. Sheriff Stephens points to some beams being erected across the street. "Tell me, does that look straight?" Jane squints. She picks up one of the beers and downs it in a single gulp. She nods.
†
Streaks of light and heat stream into the Guinevere. Tables and chairs, some polished and some rough, fill the floor. Men, some polished and some rough, fill the chairs. Helena sits on stage, strumming a tuned guitar. Cassidy tends bar. Julia kneels with a little girl, producing a coin out of thin air. The girl claps. Giggling, she runs to her mother. Her hair long now, Emma picks up the child. She hugs her as she jokes with a man in a uniform. Katterina, taller, older, clears Emma's table.
"Getting hitched sure made you a crappy waitress," Katterina sighs.
"Anymore lip and I won't leave a tip," Emma spits.
Katterina and Emma both laugh.
The red-headed woman heads over to the next table. Katterina serves a cowboy a drink. The drunk takes it and grabs her as she passes.
"Hey, girl, how about a peck?" The cowhand asks.
"Let me go!" Katterina snaps.
"You'll like it," the cowboy grins. "I can pay you twice what you're worth." The woman grunts, but the man persists. The lush's fingers find their way up her thigh. "If you don't give me what I want, I can always take it. I'm being nice to you, but I don't have to be."
"Neither do I," Katterina speaks with a hiss. She takes the man's hand, bending it back until there's a crack.
†
A wolf walks across rippling heat and burning sand.
YOU ARE READING
Lourdes: A Vampire In The Old West
VampireThe year is 1877. The reclusive vampire Lourdes has gone West to escape the temptation of the growing American nation; however, what he presumed was a pure land of only sky and sand turns out to be filled with vice and worse - more of his preternatu...
