Christmas Consort

Piano Vampire

Lara knew Ridley was in town before she set foot in the bar. The music floating out the front door of the jazz club was only piano and the fingers on the ivories had hundreds of years practice, practice composing, and practice killing. People dressed in holiday gear, some carrying festive shopping bags or wrapped gifts stopped on the sidewalk and looked around for whence the melody came. Many moved on once they identified it. The tinsel decorations and blinking colored lights up and down the street reminded them they had places to be. Others, dressed for clubs or bars where Drake rather than Coltrane was the usual groove, turned aside and entered. Lara blended in with these.

In the quiet bar where glasses tinkled and voices spoke mouth to ear, Ridley sat on the piano bench, eyes closed, moving with his creation and seeing who knew what behind those lids. The band was on a break, the normal noise between sets was subdued, and tendrils of music floated through the air like wisps of smoke, bringing a tear to one eye, or relaxation to a body aged by toil more than time. Billy Joel immortalized the Piano Man, Jackson Ridley humanized the Piano Vampire. He held sway over the room as if they all were breathing in the vampiric breath in his tune.

For the thousandth time Lara wished she held influence over this being. The things they could do together. Beyond the music he was more machine, she thought. Tracking, killing, occasionally rehabilitating. Maybe if he had found her instead of Silas, she could have stayed clean, become content. Without Silas, though, Ridley would have taken her head several times over.

Lara took a small table that sat too close to the band area and had only one chair, the other one pilfered by a threesome. The band returned to their places, and Ridley winded down his piece with their accompaniments joining in. People around the room woke from a stupor.

"Once again, that's my good buddy Jack laying down the tones. Wherever I play till the day I die, you'll be welcome there. Thank you."

Ridley gave a nod and slipped a stool from the raised stage to sit down with Lara. By way of greeting he leaned over and kissed her neck right below her ear. She suppressed a shiver made of her apprehension and the raw sex appeal of his power.

He spoke softly without the need to lean close for her hearing. "You look good Lara. Better than ever I'd say. You've had a guest at the house?"

Can he smell Kylie on me? No, he was referencing Franco, had to be. When he said "look" she knew he meant smelled, that she smelled better than ever. Score one for the wily female, the fringe benefits of bringing Franco home were multiple. Playing games with Ridley was dangerous. He discomfited her and threw her game off. Shooting straight as possible worked best.

"I met a wanderer down on 6th, not a trouble maker far as I or Silas could tell. He'd never consorted, not properly anyway, so I brought him home. And get this, he was blind."

Jackson's eyebrows arched.

"Have you ever seen that before? An actual vampire who has the age to face the sun and whose body is disabled?"

Jackson gave real thought to his answers. She knew he was searching the past for anyone like Franco, searching also for whether or not he had heard tell of such.

"Don't recall any other than loss of limb. No amount of venom or blood will grow back those back. Heard tell of an ear, maybe."

Was he joking? Lara could never tell, and his flat steel eyes revealed little.

He grinned and said, "Could have been a rumor that."

The waitress brought Ridley a high ball and an unopened glass-bottled water. He ordered another of the same for Lara which was high-handed old world chauvinism in her view.