The Mammoth Book Of Vampire Stories Written By Women

I have to stop her. I launch myself at her, pinning her to the door before she's taken two steps. I'm in a frenzy now, I must have her, I can't stop. I savour his blood still in my mouth as I bite down, and then he is swept away by the taste of Meg flooding over my tongue. Ripe and red and salty and

Her head falls back. She clings to me. It is so exquisite that I slow down and draw delicately on her until she presses her body along the whole length of me and I feel her heart pounding and the breath coming out of her in little staccato cries of amazement.

For some reason I can't kill her. My fangs slip out of the wounds they have made and I hold her close as she sighs. I haven't the energy or will to finish it. No, I like her alive. I love the heavy warmth of her body slumping against mine, and her hair soft against my wet red mouth.

We stand like that for a few minutes. Then I feel Daniel touching my shoulder. He has staggered from his bed. "Who are you?" he whispers. His big hand wanders over my arm, my shoulder blade, my spine. It slides in between me and the woman and lies warm against my ribs. He's resting against my back. The three of us, pressed together.

Well, this is cosy.

I am in the garden again when she finds me. I am pacing back and forth on the grass beneath the cold windows of the mansion with the moon staring down at me; and suddenly there is Charlotte. She steps from the shadow of a hedge to walk at my side.

"It's difficult to leave, isn't it?" she says, slipping her cool hand into mine. "What are they like, your family?"

"Interesting," I say. "Rupert, the son, is in love with the delicious housemaid, Meg. How am I to tell him that Meg slips in regularly to service the father? No wonder Daniel has forbidden Rupert to see her."

Charlotte utters a soft, sensuous laugh. "Oh, Antoine, hasn't Karl told you what a mistake it is to ask their names, to become involved in their lives? You know you shouldn't, yet you can't stop. That's always my downfall, too."

Ah now, Charlotte. She is Karl's lover and her presence is all it takes to reveal the folly of Karl's advice. Don't get involved with humans, he tells me? Hypocrite. For he took Charlotte when she was human, couldn't stop himself, couldn't leave her alone. And who could blame him? There is something of the ice-queen and something of the English rose about her. She is the perfect gold and porcelain doll with a heart of darkness. She's like a princess who ran away with the gypsies, all tawny silk and bronze lace. But ask which of them is the more dangerous, the more truly a vampire — it is Charlotte.

She is the seducer. She is the lethal one. You will never see Karl coming; he takes you swiftly and is gone before you know what happened, no promises, no apologies. But Charlotte will worship you from afar, and bring you flowers, and run away from you and come back to you, until you are so mad with love for her that you don't know which way to turn. Oh and then she'll turn on you and take you down, our lady viper, and soak your broken body with her tears.

Not that I was her victim, you understand. But I have watched her in complete admiration.

"Why must it be a downfall?" I ask, annoyed.

"Humans are so alluring, aren't they? You can't go only for one taste. You can't be like Karl just strike and never look back. You're like me, Antoine. You want to play with them, to get to know them, to love them. Is the pleasure worth the pain? I never quite know. You have to do it again and again, to see if it will be different this time."

"It's only a game to me. I don't care about them. I'm doing it for money, that's all."

"Really?" she says. "Then why couldn't you kill them? Why are you still here?"

Charlotte stands on tiptoe and presses her rosy mouth to mine; and she's gone, in a whisper of silk and lilac.

Behind this hedge I find a kitchen garden, where Meg's father lovingly grows vegetables to feed the household. Ah, now I see. He is a man who despises flowers and prettiness, loves prosaic potatoes and beans — just like his employer. The air is thick with the rot of brussels sprouts, the scent of wet churned soil and compost. Through a gap I see the cold shine of the greenhouse, and where the garden meets the servants' area of the house — the tantalizing glint of glass in the kitchen door.

When Rupert discovers that I have not killed his father, he is volcanic with rage.

We meet beneath a line of elm trees. The rooks squawk and squabble in the bare branches above us.

"You liar!" Rupert screams. "You traitor!"

He flies at me, arms going like windmills, but I hold him off. He's useless at fighting, as he is at everything. Perhaps he is a useless artist too, merely in love with the idea of brooding and suffering and being misunderstood.

"Why didn't you finish the old devil off? You only wounded him!"

"I was interrupted."

"What the hell do you mean — interrupted?"