The Blood Countess Page 3

  (I told you I had to get out of Gretchenville.)

  ‘You can see my uniform?’ the handsome visitor asked, again seeming surprised. ‘How clearly, exactly?’ He looked down at himself.

  ‘Well, it’s right in front of my face.’ Obviously. This guy might be good-looking but he was none too sharp, was he? ‘You are in the military,’ I observed. ‘Or is that a costume?’ He wore a dark cap of some kind, and his dark blue uniform was impeccably tailored, and tapered at the waist, with shiny buttons up the front. It brought to mind the dress uniform of a marine, but that wasn’t it. His uniform seemed distantly familiar, and it set off a thought in me that wouldn’t quite form. I knew it would come to me later. His cap was worn on a slight angle, and I thought it gave him a bit of a movie star look, like he was from an old war film and Humphrey Bogart was about to waltz in.

  The man smiled at me, seeming amused about something. ‘Well, yes I am . . . well, was.’ Then he looked around the room, deciding . . . deciding what, I couldn’t tell. His expression changed. He came over earnest-looking, those luminous blue eyes large.

  ‘Um . . . look, I am sorry to have startled you, Miss. You should forget you saw me. I will, um, make myself disappear,’ he said awkwardly.

  And he did just that.

  My eyes must have fooled me. I could have sworn the stranger actually disappeared.

  ‘But . . .’ I began, and then stopped.

  I glanced at the round bedside clock. It wasn’t digital, but it was one of the few modern items in the room. The hour hand glowed at the two position. Great. It was just past two in the morning the day of my first job interview in New York City and I was standing in my host’s guestroom in my nightie like an idiot, talking to the air. I half expected Celia to come in and see what the trouble was. In fact, I had half expected my mum to come in and hug me and soothe me and put me to bed again like she had when I was younger. I had always had vivid dreams – nightmares, sleep walking, sleep talking – since I was old enough to speak. But now I was far from that childhood home, my mother was long since gone, and if I had strange dreams about hunky military guys showing up next to my bed, well I would just have to deal with it on my own.

  I crawled back into the big bed and stared at the ceiling for what seemed like forever before dreams finally took me.

  I woke from my slumber sometime before my seven o’clock alarm, disoriented. I had, for some reason, been dreaming of beautiful soldiers.

  My eyes moved sleepily over the old-fashioned ceiling and light fixtures above me. This was the first foreign room I’d slept in for eight years, and as my eyes lit upon each new detail I thought I might still be in a dream. The wardrobe. The gramophone. The narrow, gothic windows.

  New York!

  It came to me in a flash, and I bolted out of the huge bed, practically tripping over one of the lace pillows.

  My first morning in New York!

  I parted the curtains, threw open one of the windows and the sounds of the city poured in on me with an exhilarating rush. Well, maybe not quite the exhilarating rush I’d expected. Addams Avenue was actually motionless outside, the residents evidently still asleep, but in the distance, through a light fog, I could see the towering Manhattan metropolis I had been driven through the night before. That was where I was headed. That was where I would find my career.

  I was anxious to make the right first impression at my interview. So anxious, in fact, that the simple task of getting dressed became a disconcerting exercise in indecision, even though I only owned one measly suitcase of clothes. My Gretchenville clothing felt too casual for big New York and my only ‘businesslike’ option seemed sort of boring. In anticipation of this new life I’d bought my first ever suit in the only decent boutique in Gretchenville not one month earlier, but the mirror here in Manhattan told me it wouldn’t do. I had never taken more than thirty minutes to shower, change and make myself up before, but this morning I tried each outfit on, discarded it and then tried it on again after exhausting all other options and combinations. It was humiliating. At seven forty-five I was finally ready, if a little ashamed at the time it had taken. I stood before the full-length mirror of the old wardrobe in my room for one last appraisal and sighed at what I saw. Grey suit pants. Matching grey jacket (yes, the same one I’d worn on the plane). Black square-neck knit top. Flat, ballet-style shoes. I had made some effort to tame my tresses, which now fell down my back with a slight bend, and I had put on light makeup and lip gloss.

  Boring. You look boring.

  I didn’t exactly look like I worked for a glossy magazine like Mia, but at least I didn’t look like a Gretchenville high school student. Luckily, I am blessed with my mother’s figure (slim legs, tapering waist and a ‘very nice’ bust, or so my only ever boyfriend assured me). The grey suit, if not exactly stylish, at least hung on me well. It would have to do.

  Enough already.

  I was famished by the time I entered the kitchen. Waiting on the counter was a note from my great-aunt, left under a key:

  Dearest Pandora,

  Please help yourself to anything you like. I look forward to seeing you tonight.

  Best regards,

  Great-Aunt Celia

  The note’s formality brought a smile to my lips.

  Despite my hunger I decided that I was too excited to eat. I took the key, packed my map in my briefcase along with my résumés and some unpublished articles I’d written, rechecked and pocketed the address for Mia, and set off with an umbrella.

  I was determined to walk.

  Surprisingly – considering my Manhattan map didn’t cover the Spektor area – I had no trouble finding my way into nearby Central Park and then across to Third Avenue. It was as if my feet already knew the way. I took my time, kept to myself and walked the many blocks to the midtown address I’d been given. It took me over an hour, and would probably have taken me less time if I hadn’t been gazing up at the buildings and loud advertising around me. Before ten I was standing outside the address I had been given, warming myself up with a takeaway coffee. The address for Mia magazine was in Times Square, in an area of huge glass and concrete skyscrapers, and for every way that Spektor seemed old, gothic and mysterious, the towers that surrounded me were modern, over-lit and formidably sleek. I dumped my empty styrofoam cup in a garbage bin and ran a hand over my hair. It felt like it had tangled on the walk, so I pulled my brush out of my briefcase and smoothed my hair out quickly, attracting a few strange looks.

  I paused.

  Two women stepped through the glass doors wearing security tags around their necks with the word VOGUE written at the bottom. They seemed to shimmer in the cool winter daylight, all glossy hair, toned long legs and designer clothes. Every inch of them was manicured, groomed and expensive. I looked down at myself, with my second-rate briefcase and umbrella, and the plain grey suit I’d bought in Gretchenville. I didn’t like what I saw.

  Suck it up, Pandora.

  This was my only scheduled job interview in all of New York. I had to be positive about it. I had never really fit in anywhere, and I hoped, no prayed, that this would be somewhere I could finally belong – here in this building with these people. I tried to imagine myself coming here to work, walking through those spotless glass doors and into that large reception area, around which several large light boxes illuminated the latest magazine covers of the various publications with offices inside. Each seemed more glamorous than the next – Style, W, Allure, Glamour, Vanity Fair, Vogue.

  And then there was Mia, with a display in a less prominent position next to some teen titles and a men’s magazine. It was only in its fourth issue, and I liked the new cover. It featured a young woman in a striped shirt and blue jeans. Her pixie haircut was spiked up in all the right places. She wore a leather satchel effortlessly, her stance confident and a little androgynous, thumbs hooked in the waistband of her jeans. Her eyes were outlined like a cat’s, her face beautifully unconventional. Like each of the other cover girls I’d se
en Mia use (I’d special ordered every issue and pored over each page back home), this cover model had a certain je ne sais quoi that appealed to me. More than the celebrities and supermodels on the bigger magazine covers, I wanted to be this girl. I imagined her satchel to be filled with interesting notes, journals, books, perhaps even a camera she used to document her fascinating life. She was anonymous, smart-looking, and yes, cool.

  Mia had a mission statement that included ‘real’ interviews with celebrities (never the made-up stories that filled so many other publications), and rejected overly airbrushed images and pointless articles about how to ‘get a man’. These were just some of the reasons why I wanted to start my writing career with them.

  Ever since I first started going with my mother on her trips to the supermarket as a kid, I’d been fascinated by the glossy magazines in the checkout line. We didn’t have expensive magazines in our town, like Vogue (there was no one there to buy it), but all the pages of cheap glamour thrilled me nonetheless. My father disapproved, of course, but my mother sometimes let me sneak one into the cart. During high school I took a part time job at Bettina and Ben’s Book Barn – a new and used bookstore. It was a great resource for my voracious book reading habit, but they also had stacks of used fashion magazines at the back – fancy ones, if out of date. What I found there was inspirational, but translating couture looks to real life was not realistic. Those kinds of clothes just weren’t available in Gretchenville. And then, sadly, despite being the only bookstore in town, Bettina and Ben’s Book Barn closed. I guess they’d never turned a big profit, and when the online stores took off locally it put them out of business. By then I’d graduated and I wasn’t keen to wait tables or flip burgers, so I gave away my cell phone and became extra careful with my spending while I held out for a writing job at the local paper. (I’d always had to be careful with money. My parents had been thrifty, and Aunt Georgia took frugality to new levels, so I didn’t find it too hard.)

  Amazingly, Celia’s letter came soon after my unemployment, and now here I was about to walk into Mia magazine. It was surprising how things could come together.

  I entered through the sliding doors feeling somehow smaller than I ought. My flat shoes were nearly silent as I traversed the marble floors. The man at the long marble reception neither noticed me, nor responded as I approached.

  ‘Um, hello. My name’s Pandora English, I’m here for Mia magazine,’ I said.

  The man swivelled towards me, and his eyes flickered over my torso. ‘Law offices are on the second floor,’ he muttered. ‘First set of elevators.’ He reached for a visitors tag. He hadn’t met my eyes.

  I shrank into my grey collar. It’s the suit. I should never have bought this stupid suit.

  ‘Excuse me, I am here for Mia magazine, please,’ I said, more firmly.

  He looked at me and, seeing my face, brightened slightly. With a muttered apology he handed me a security swing tag with the word VISITOR emblazoned across it.

  ‘Eighteenth floor. First set of elevators. Return the tag when you’re done,’ he instructed.

  ‘Thank you,’ I replied.

  I found the appropriate bank of elevators and got in the first lift that opened. It wasn’t empty. At the back, a hulking young man was trying to talk on his cell phone, but was evidently thwarted by a lack of reception. He said a couple of words, frowned at his phone, seeming all frustrated, and then held the device in his hand helplessly. When he looked up and caught me gazing at him, he smirked.

  My heart sped up. This New Yorker’s face was charming, as was . . . well, the rest of him from what I could see. He seemed impossibly tall; perhaps six foot six, with the build of an athlete. He had dark brown, close-cropped hair. He was rather easy on the eyes, and mine kept drifting back to him. Before the doors closed, a petite, svelte woman of about thirty got in, dressed head to toe in black and cream, and scented with Chanel No. 5. She looked and smelled expensive. Mr Easy on the Eyes looked her over approvingly, and disheartened at this, I decided to stare at my flat shoes.

  The elevator stopped at the second floor. No one got in. ‘This is you,’ came a cool male voice, just as the doors were about to close.

  I turned. ‘Excuse me?’

  Mr Easy on the Eyes had spoken. At my response, his smile dropped a fraction.

  ‘The law offices?’ he said, seeming a little bored.

  ‘Mia magazine,’ I corrected him. I could have sworn the Chanel lady chuckled.

  Stupid, stupid suit. I look like a law clerk? I resolved to spend my first pay cheque shopping for something more appropriate for my new career.

  The elevator continued to ascend. The Chanel woman got out at Vogue, and as soon as she was gone I removed my grey suit jacket like it was covered in freshly spilled manure. I tried to sling it casually over one arm, and managed to flick the man in the face. A noise escaped his throat and he rubbed his eye.

  ‘Oh, I’m so sorry! Are you okay?’

  ‘I’m fine,’ he said unconvincingly, and looked away. He was indeed tall (were all the men in New York tall I wondered) and he had hazel eyes. One eye was a little red, I noticed. (Oops.) He had the appearance of a jock, all fit and outdoorsy. His jacket smelled pleasantly of new leather and fine cologne, and when his scent hit me I was inside another of my peculiar feelings, seeing with vivid clarity this man’s muscled torso and a hand sliding up his chest – my hand. I sensed as if it were real his warm mouth, his kiss, his hard body under mine . . .

  Oh good grief.

  I gasped.

  ‘Are you okay?’ he asked, and frowned at me. Now he was looking very unimpressed. He must have thought I was crazy. I could only nod. Heat crept into my cheeks. I didn’t even know the man. What was I to make of all that?

  ‘This is my floor,’ he said, and stepped out, seeming eager to escape. ‘I hope you get the job,’ I heard him mutter as an afterthought.

  I winced again, this time at the inference that I looked like a job applicant. I tried to tell myself it was just the visitor’s tag, but I knew I looked like a fish out of water in this building of glamorous media types. Unable to look away, I watched the handsome man walk into the reception area of a magazine office. He was soon silhouetted by twin moons of tanned cleavage featured on the cover of the subtly named Men Only magazine, and that was my last glimpse of him before the elevator doors slid shut.

  I decided that any man who worked for such a publication wouldn’t know anything about women anyway. I didn’t care if I had embarrassed myself, and he thought I looked like a law clerk. And I was sure the strange feeling I’d had didn’t mean anything. It didn’t mean anything at all.

  They aren’t always premonitions, I reminded myself. Just mostly.

  On the eighteenth floor, my introduction at Mia magazine did not exactly go as planned.

  The receptionist informed me that I was not expected, she didn’t know who I was, she didn’t care who I was, and no, I most certainly could not leave a résumé or meet with the editor and show her my work. Helen Markson, my contact, no longer worked there, it seemed. No one had bothered to inform me. I was baffled and deeply embarrassed. This mortifying conversation took place below an oversized version of my pixie-haired cover girl heroine, as if to add further insult to injury. No matter how I tried, the receptionist wouldn’t let me past that cover girl to enter the office. She had no use for me at all. Eventually, I had to leave.

  After composing myself in the ladies down the hall, I recovered the boldness to brave Glamour magazine. I’d come all this way – I had to try, right? The receptionist there took one look at me and said they weren’t hiring. She was, at least, more polite about it. The Chanel woman manned Vogue magazine, as luck would have it, and she wouldn’t let me in the door. She even seemed to enjoy ignoring me through the glass panel, the entry buzzer at her manicured fingertip. I had no interest in trying Men Only magazine, of course, despite feeling like I’d practically lost my virginity to one of their staff in the elevator. (I hoped his ey
e would recover.)

  And that was it. Rejected outright, I returned the security tag without a word.

  Have you ever felt so low you didn’t know what to do with yourself?

  I had nowhere to go, and I took my time getting there. There wasn’t anything to do at Celia’s penthouse except recount my failure, and I didn’t have money to spend on shopping, so I walked around Times Square and gawked until I couldn’t stand all the noise one moment longer. And then I walked some more.

  Walking was cheap, and I discovered I had pretty good instincts for finding my way around this big city, despite my lack of experience. I walked into the Art Deco foyer of the Empire State Building, amazed to see that this famous structure was, after all, also an office building. Offices were listed on the wall. Imagine working in the Empire State Building? The idea was beyond me. I got into one of the elevators behind a small group of chatting tourists and found I was able to smile again after my miserable experience at Mia. As the elevator ascended and my ears popped from the altitude, I recalled black and white footage of Robert Wadlow, nearly nine feet tall, the world’s tallest man, standing atop the world’s tallest building with the then governor of New York. It had left such an impression on me when I was a kid. What would it have been like to be so tall? Of course, Wadlow had passed away at only twenty-two, and this was no longer the world’s tallest building. It wasn’t even the tallest in America, but it was still a wonder of the modern world, and I was here, within it, travelling to the top. I rubbed my hands together.

  Good thing I don’t suffer vertigo, I thought when I stepped out onto the windy observation platform.