So eventually he’d conceded, and a month later he’d made another appointment in the hope there was something the quack could do for him.
Samson blinked and wiped away the memories of the last nine months. Tonight was his birthday. He would try to have some fun.
As he strode from his wingback armchair to the wet bar at the opposite end of his elegant sitting room; his movements were fluid, his body tall and muscular, yet slender.
Samson poured himself a glass of his favorite blood type and downed it like a human would a shot of Tequila—minus the salt and lime. The thick liquid coated his throat and eased the thirst, dulling his hunger for other pleasures in the process. Good; no other pleasures would be satisfied tonight.
Same as the last two hundred and seventy-six nights.
Not that he was counting.
Only his thirst for blood had been stilled, the rest of his body’s needs, while temporarily subdued, would go unmet. Sometimes he wished he could get drunk and forget about everything, but unfortunately, being a vampire meant he couldn’t get drunk like humans did. Alcohol had no effect on his body. What he’d give for a little numbness right now.
He had expressly told his pals not to get him any presents or throw him a party. Of course he knew it was futile and only a matter of time until they would be at his door. Like pilfering barbarians, they would invade his home, raid his secret stash of quality drinks—consisting mostly of high-priced O-Neg—and waste his waking hours with old stories he’d heard a hundred times.
They’d given him a surprise birthday party when he’d reached the two-hundred mark, and it would be no different today, on his two hundred and thirty-seventh, with pretty much the same cast of characters.
In anticipation of the inevitable invasion of his privacy, he had dressed in dapper black pants and a dark gray turtleneck. Except for his signet ring, he wore no jewelry.
The clangor of the phone tore through the quiet of his home. He looked at the clock on the wall and saw that it was shortly before nine o’clock. Just as he’d thought, the boys were on their way.
“Yes?”
“Hey, birthday boy. How is it hanging?”
Not a good choice of words, definitely not.
“What is it, Ricky?” Despite Ricky’s Irish heritage, he had adopted many California expressions and now sounded more like a beach-boy-surfer-dude than the Irish lad he was deep down.
“I just want to wish you a great birthday and see what you’re doing tonight.” Why Ricky had to keep up the pretense, Samson really didn’t know. Wasn’t he aware that his surprise birthday party was already out of the bag?
Samson cut to the chase. “When’s everybody coming?”
“What do you mean?”
“What time are you guys going to surprise me with a birthday party?”
“How did you know? Never mind. The guys wanted me to make sure you were there. So don’t leave the house. And if our other surprise arrives before us, keep her there.”
Not again. He should have known. He bit back his anger.
“When will you guys ever learn that I’m not into strippers?”
Never have been, never will be.
Ricky laughed. “Yes, yes, but this one is special. She’s not just a stripper. She does extras.”
Would he be up for extras? Very unlikely.
“I think she’ll do something for you, you know what I mean. She’s good, so give her a chance, will you? It’s for your own good. You can’t go on like this. Holly said—”
Samson cut him off. So much for having some fun tonight. “You told Holly? Are you fucking nuts? She’s the biggest gossip of the underworld! I told you in confidence. How could you?” His nostrils flared, and his eyes narrowed. With his fangs suddenly protruding from his mouth, he could have scared a champion wrestler from here till Tuesday. But Ricky wasn’t a wrestler, and he wasn’t scared easily. Not even till Monday.
“Careful how you talk about my girlfriend, Samson. She’s not a gossip. And besides, she suggested that stripper. She’s a friend of Holly’s.”
Perfect! A friend of Holly’s. Sure, this was guaranteed to work!
Samson still fumed, but recognized it was too late to call the whole thing off. “Fine.”
He slammed the phone down, not giving Ricky a chance to elaborate any further. Great! Now that Holly knew about his little problem, soon the entire underworld of San Francisco would know. He’d be the laughing stock of every party, the butt of every joke.
How long would it take her to spread the news—a day, an hour, five minutes? How long until the snickering behind his back started? Why not take out a one-page ad in the SF Vampire Chronicle himself to save her the trouble?