Blood Sugar Page 2

  “I’m just going to blurt it all out.”

  A confused chortle popped from her throat. “Fine. Make it quick.”

  “I underwent a medical procedure that caused some alarming side effects. My blood is toxic, and I need these under-the-table transfusions to prevent lapsing into a coma. I don’t want to use the V word quite yet, but there are other symptoms that make me think it applies in this case. Changes to my body, new things happening every day. Fangs. Cravings. You see, I think I am dead. Or undead, rather. So perhaps you can help me pass over.”

  Undead? Fangs? The V word, as in vampire? This guy was delusional. Vampires came up now and again in the pages of the trusty encyclopedia of magic she’d scored while thrifting with her mom, sure, but Eve figured the mentions were allegorical. Monsters didn’t roam the streets of downtown Louisville or fly into bedroom windows at night. Heck, she’d never even met another person with gifts like hers.

  “Sounds like you need a malpractice lawyer, not a spiritual guide to the afterlife.”

  “Fine. I’ll show you proof, if that’s what it’ll take to convince you.” Jonnie took a step closer and pinned Eve with his stare. The whites of his eyes darkened. His pupils stretched to vertical slits. Her pulse accelerated, then dropped low, lower.

  Her mind grew foggy and fuzzy. Then it blanked. The air left. Her jaw fell as she stared into his eyes. She could only gawk. Nothing more than his eyes existed in the word. His eyes were all that had ever been or would be.

  Keys fell from her hand and clattered on the ground.

  “Do you believe me now?” His voice spoke inside her mind.

  She felt her head bob up and down like a manipulated marionette.

  “I swear to you I’m not alive anymore, not in the normal sense,” he whispered out loud, enunciating his syllables like each one dropped a bombshell revelation.

  The spell broke. Eve sucked down air, desperate for breath. Her heart did fluttery things, like its beats were catching up after hanging in stasis.

  Spacey and shaking like her blood sugar had plummeted, she pulled it together enough to gather up her keys. Too amazed to be terrified, she scrambled to make sense of what happened. Was he a super powerful psychic? Had he hypnotized her? “What the fuck was that all about?”

  “I’m sorry. I don’t know.” His voice trembled, and he backed away with a palm over his mouth. Raindrops glistened on his lashes like dew on blades of grass. “But I don’t like it. It’s a new development, and it’s driving me barking mad. There’s more. It’s a lot. Help me, Evelyn, you’re my last hope.”

  He knew her given name, meaning he’d done his research.

  “I don’t think I can. And you need to let me help those I’m able to assist. Speaking of which, I have a soul in my pocket who needs to pass over.” Whatever troubled Jonnie, she couldn’t even begin to think about how to alleviate it.

  “Please give it a try, Eve.”

  “I apologize, but the answer is a firm no. Goodnight.” She turned to her front door and resumed unlocking it. Seconds passed without a reply from Jonnie.

  She’d rejected him in his time of desperation. But what could she have done? Without more information, nothing. But damn, failing people in need tore her apart.

  “Jonnie?” Eve turned, but where he’d stood, an empty spot remained. He was nowhere to be seen amidst the darkness shrouding her tree-lined historic neighborhood.

  Well, she tried. Eve let herself inside, kicked off her wellies, and dropped the umbrella in its stand.

  No time to waste, no time to wallow or brood. Clearing her head of the encounter with Jonnie, Eve bolted up the creaky spiral staircase leading to her second floor, then coiled her way around the tighter one that twisted upward to the third level. She dashed down the carpeted hallway and turned the crystal doorknob leading to her sanctuary.

  “Okay, T-Bone, let’s get you home.” In her pocket, his soul pulsed happily at her utterance of his frat-house nickname.

  Jars holding ghosts crowded the surface of her oak vanity. Celtic knots and crosses patterned pewter and ceramic containers in various shapes and sizes. Mom theorized that Eve’s powers came from her Irish heritage, and thus kept her stocked up with sacred Irish artifacts, in other words stuff she found at yard sales.

  A quick check confirmed that the golden lights of other ghosts filled her Irish jars with warm and cozy reminders of life.

  Smiling despite the urgency of her situation, Eve hustled to her other antique dresser, the one covered in allegedly sacred Nigerian artifacts (stuff Dad scored off online shopping websites). Her supernatural abilities bred loving competition between her weird, wonderful, accepting parents. She bet the ghosts would hang out in old sour cream containers without complaint, but this way her family had a quirky tradition.

  Finding one of the woven jewelry baskets empty, she scooped Travis’s spirit from her pocket, a wad of pale golden light about the size of a glass eye swarming around her fingers. Quickly, she shucked his clingy essence into the box and closed the lid.

  Now came part two.

  Eve sat in the middle of the floor and closed her eyes. A few deep breaths lowered her brain waves to the proper state to access the spirit world. Soon, voices filled her head. So many voices, all speaking at once, blurred together into gibberish. She needed to keep breathing, or according to her big reference book of magical and esoteric things, she could have a brain aneurism.

  A low hum, similar to the “om” chant her yoga teacher used, sounded in her ears.

  “Your name is Travis Williams, and I give you permission to let go.”

  “Are there people where I’m going?” Travis whispered with the typical blend of amazement and fear.

  It touched her how vulnerable folks were as they prepared to pass over. At the end of the day, humans wanted to be with others. Wanted to be loved. And she was grateful, because among her family and friends, she had plenty of love in her life. Plenty.

  “Yes.” She meditated, focusing her attention on making a blue light spark in the void. The light would lead Travis into the afterlife, a place rich with the companionship and affection the dead sought. Eve knew this in her heart.

  A plume of blue fire, the hue so saturated it surpassed the flame on her gas stove, burst into being. “Do you see it?” she asked.

  “I see it.”

  “Follow my voice, Travis. Into the deep.”

  He did, and his essence drifted away from her mind until the fire flared and blinked into nothing.

  She concentrated on her breath until the trance lifted. Her lids wanted to stay down, but she urged them open. A little groggy but otherwise fine, Eve rose, yawned, and strolled out of the sanctuary. Blowing out a breath, she wiped away the cool sweat beading on her brow.

  The threat of the flame changing to red haunted her during ceremonies. It was anyone’s guess what type of mishandling allowed the red flame to ruin a transitioning ceremony. Her reference book called it The Thief, and according to her reading she’d sent poor Lacey to a place of grief and suffering. Extensive research into demonology and door opening hadn’t yielded any answers on how to save the girl. Eve frowned, a sour slosh roiling her insides.

  Entering her living room, she forced the sight of mahogany bookcases, overstuffed furniture, and low lighting to relax her. She hadn’t banished the young woman on purpose. Likely, the girl carried some residual negative energy from the creepy Hollywood cult her parents saved her from before she’d killed herself. These facts, though horrible, tempered Eve’s guilt.

  Nope. Still your fault. Before she could fall down the rabbit hole of obsessing, she curled up on her paisley couch, picked up her vintage rotary phone’s receiver, and dialed her best friend Meg’s number. Her emotional state improved as the dial spun through digits. The heaviness and smooth feel of the inherited retro artifact made for a comforting reminder of her favorite grandfather.

  After one ring, a click came through the line. “Are you calling because you’re finally
ready to try speed dating with me?” Meg teased in a Kentucky twang muted by living in metropolitan Louisville.

  Rolling her eyes, Eve twirled the chunky curlicue cord around her fingers. “I think I have plans that night. Like staying in and pulling out my own fingernails with rusty pliers.”

  Meg huffed. The self-styled matchmaker extraordinaire had been trying to find the perfect guy for Eve since their days at Manual High School. An exercise in futility, but Meg’s stubbornness didn’t let her see that. “I didn’t even tell you which day.”

  “My point exactly.” Eve tapped her temple like Meg could see the gesture. Sparring was part of her and Meg’s love language, and neither would have it any other way.

  “So, what’s up?” In the background, one of Meg’s cats meowed.

  “I had kind of a weird night.” Would Jonnie come back? How would she feel if he did?

  “With a ghost?”

  Eve laughed. What a blessing to have friends and family who supported her gift and didn’t judge.

  Jonnie’s scent lingered in her nostrils, and the way his dark eyes blazed nagged at her. There was something big about their encounter, something important. Though on most days her mind worked like a bear trap, irksome memory loss bothered her. She’d forgotten a significant detail about their meeting. “No. Before that. I met a famous person.”

  On Meg’s end, a metallic object clattered to the ground. “What? Who?” Surprise raised her voice.

  “You know who Jonnie Tollens is?” Flush crept over Eve’s cheeks. Jeez, listen to her acting like a teenager, gossiping on the phone about hot celebrities.

  A big gasp. “Shut up.”

  “I take it that’s a yes.”

  “You really need to start listening to more than Bach and Beethoven. He’s in that Chariotz of Fyre band, the one with all the pyrotechnics and stuff. They’re playing downtown tonight.”

  Eve sat bolt upright on her comfy sofa. Maybe she could reconnect with Jonnie and apologize for driving him away. “What time?”

  Meg barked out a laugh. “Like, right now. You’re acting weird. What’s going on? Wait. Shut the front door. Is there something you aren’t telling me? Did you hook up with him?”

  The suggestion planted a half-formed fantasy in Eve’s mind. What would his slim figure look like naked? Did he have tattoos, piercings? She squeezed her legs together, attempting to halt a tingling pressure between them. “Of course not. He came by unannounced, asking me about my work with the ghosts.”

  “Whoa. That’s random. What was he like?”

  Eve flinched. What a jerk move she’d made, dismissing him. “He was acting off. Desperate. He’d walked over without an umbrella. It seemed like an urgent situation.”

  Dull pain gathered below her ribs. She had let Jonnie down royally.

  “Weird. Was he strung out on drugs, you think?”

  Snaking the black plastic coil up her forearm, she considered Meg’s question. “I don’t think that was it.”

  “Well, I’m so curious it isn’t even funny. You wanna go loiter by the arena and see if we can catch him after the show gets out?”

  A long shot, but she’d take it if it meant giving Jonnie another chance. Her calling obliged her to use her unique power in service of others. Perhaps he had a dying loved one who needed her assistance. Déjà vu rippled through her mind. He’d said something about someone being not alive. “You’re sure you don’t mind?”

  “You kidding? This is the most interesting thing that’s happened to me all week.”

  Eve would get to the bottom of her beguiling celebrity encounter. “Let’s do it.”

  “Be right there.”

  She set her receiver in its cradle and reclined on her couch. What had he said, done, that was so odd? Drawing a blank, she stood. With any luck, she’d link up with him later. Belly buzzing in anticipation, Eve ran to her bedroom and hurried into a dress.

  Two

  Jonnie wove through the post-show backstage crowd, avoiding sweaty bodies packing wide arena hallways as he made a beeline for the rendezvous point. A ponytail whipped his cheek. The air hung heavy, sharp sweat and woodsy bath products mingling with the chemical odor of electronic smoke. Men and women laughed and chatted, some yelling his name over the recorded music of his band blasting through speakers. Roadies slapped his arms while hauling out equipment, everyone clamoring for attention.

  But he couldn’t be bothered with the after-party. The symptoms had started while Fyre played their last song of the night. According to his personal physician, Jonnie would be paralyzed in an hour, meaning he needed to connect with the doctor and endure a procedure. If the shady fellow was telling the truth, forgoing treatments could cause Jonnie to lapse into a coma.

  If that happened, Jonnie could neither earn money for Cara’s medical care nor die and leave his niece his inheritance. He’d be a useless lump on a hospital bed for God knew how long, losing precious time. Before Cara got sick, Jonnie’s sister and her family moved to Iowa for her American husband’s job. They’d emigrated to a far inferior health care system, and now there was never enough money. But Jonnie could help. And if he got out from under his own burden, he could help even more.

  He shoved open the stadium’s back door and burst into the same wet, windy Louisville night he’d run through in his misguided quest to find solace in Eve. Eve Conley-Adyemi, whisperer to the dead, one of the local crew had referred to her before Jonnie accosted the young lad and grilled him for information.

  At the edge of a parking lot, the Ohio River flowed a couple dozen feet beyond the concrete alcove where he stood. Two of the crew’s tour buses idled at his left.

  Jonnie paced. Sensation drained from his toes. He fixed his gaze on the street leading to the loading zone. Numbness in the extremities ought to cause alarm, according to the doctor. He scanned the road for a glimpse of the black sedan he’d come to know far too well. Hurry up, you bloody ghoul.

  He never should have agreed to that sodding treatment. Youth forever, they’d said. Sounded like a good idea at the time. Endless years to possess the love of his adoring fans. Years to be somebody special for those fans and his band family. Rock stars were supposed to stay young. Shrewd salespeople, heaps more persuasive and charming than the snake he was now stuck with, dangled the promise of basking in the eternal flame of celebrity. But they glossed over the side effects.

  Cars whooshed across the interstate overpass looming above his head. His mobile buzzed in his jacket pocket, the vibration flipping his stomach. Any call could be The Call. He whipped it out, sighing in relief when he saw the picture ID. Some industry person. Not the photo of Cara, smiling despite the medical tubes snaking from her seventeen-year-old body. His brave niece believed she was kicking stage-four cancer’s arse, terminal prognosis be damned.

  But her time hadn’t run out yet, meaning he had time to earn money for her chemo, radiation, and surgeries. Provided Murray Connors showed up.

  A car rolled over a slight hill and slowed to a halt, blacked-out windows giving away its identity.

  “Finally.” Jonnie jogged to the door and fumbled numb fingers against the handle. After a couple of tries, he got it open and climbed in the backseat beside Connors, who wore a cheesy smile on his tanning-bed-baked face.

  “Time for an emergency refresher?” Connors’s meaty hand squeezed Jonnie’s thigh as the driver took off. A ruby jewel on the physician’s tacky class ring resembled a drop of blood. Another round of rain pelted the windshield, a nearby traffic light tinting the clear fluid red.

  His mouth watered. Fuck, he hungered to bite. To suck.

  “Don’t bloody touch me.” Jonnie swatted off the man’s sausage fingers. Though desperate, he’d go comatose before he put his mouth on this sleaze.

  “Relax, man. There is no shame in what we do. I could use a few procedures myself. A little nip, a little tuck. Botox.” Connors took out his phone and used the screen like a mirror, picking at porcelain veneers and fussing with his crown o
f bright blond hair.

  Nausea clenched Jonnie’s stomach. What had he become? No better than some addict.

  “There is no we.” Jonnie glared out the window and scooted an inch farther away from Connors. Water ran down the glass like tears. “And you already look like a knockoff Ken doll. So I say mission accomplished.”

  “Aw, Mr. Rock Star gets cranky if he doesn’t have his meds, huh?” Connors chortled at his own joke.

  He ought to power through his revulsion, push down his fangs, and use them to slice open the wanker’s jugular. Then laugh while Connors bled out and clutched his ripped throat. Jonnie was an evil fiend of the night now, after all. But acting out wouldn’t accomplish anything. Wouldn’t save Cara, wouldn’t kill him. Instead, he tapped his leaden foot, counting off seconds as the sedan pulled into a secluded corner of the parking lot under the highway bridge.

  Jonnie pressed his temple into cool glass while Connors unzipped his supply kit. Some comedy news program played on the car radio, carefree people laughing at dumb gags. A protective seal snapped as Connors prepared materials. Jonnie couldn’t look. Couldn’t look at the physical signifiers of his monstrosity. Instead, he watched waves lap against the hull of a steamboat that sat docked by the shore.

  Connors whistled, a tube popping into place. Plastic clicked, and soon the transfusion machine’s low hum filled the car. Jonnie swallowed a lump in this throat, forcing desensitized hands to yank off his jacket while he stared at the boat. Golden words painted onto the side announced its name as Belle of Louisville.

  Belle. Ironic, how he read a word that meant beauty.

  Jonnie hatefully stuck out his arm. The needle pinched like a bee sting. Needing to put something beautiful into his blackened mind, he brought up an image of Eve’s face. Now there was a beauty. A real belle. Plump lips, big cat eyes, riot of tight dark curls he’d love to tangle in his hands. But subtler elements also attracted him to her. He had a feeling, perhaps nothing more than a fantasy his lonely heart created, that she too was a wounded soul in need of healing.