Penelope Rivers - My Neighbor the Vampire.pdf - Rivers Penelope - terranova.books

My Neighbor, The Vampire

Penelope Rivers

Cover art by Mina Carter © January 2013

ISBN: 978-1-939151-12-4

This is a work of fiction. All characters and events portrayed in this novel

reproduce this book, or portions thereof, in any form.

Sugar and Spice Press

North Carolina, USA

www.sugarnspicepress.com

My Neighbor, the Vampire Penelope Rivers

Chapter One

The smell of fire woke Rusty Robinson from a sound sleep. What on

earth is that? He sat up, and peered out the window of his two-story

townhouse. He didn't see the source of the fire anywhere, but he didn't

like the smell at all. He got up, tore out of his room, and almost collided

with his roommate, Delilah, who stood in the hallway, wide-eyed.

"Two days before I move out, and this happens," Delilah muttered

when their eyes met.

"Do you smell fire too?" Rusty asked.

"Yeah, I do," Delilah said. "But I already looked downstairs. It's not

our house."

"Maybe I should go check on the neighbors," Rusty said. "I should see

if everything is okay."

"Oh, don't," Delilah said. She held onto his arm. "You know what

those people are like. They're strange. I think they make cocaine, and on

top of that, last week, the owner of the house, the creepy older guy, I think

his name is Roger, told me that he wanted to rub my blood all over

himself."

"I'll be back," Rusty said, patting Delilah's arm. "If we were in trouble,

I would want them to help us."

Before Delilah could say anything more to him, he rushed down the

stairs and unlocked his front door. Once on the sidewalk, the smell of fire

grew stronger, and he saw that the lights were on in his neighbor's house. I

don't see any flames, though. Maybe it's nothing.

But he knew that he wouldn't feel comfortable unless he checked it

out. He and his neighbors were not close, but that didn't mean that he

didn't care about what happened to them. He even remembered that they

had a teenage girl staying with them. If only for her sake, he'd knock. If he

didn't get an answer, then he'd call the cops.

My Neighbor, the Vampire Penelope Rivers

He approached the front door of the house and knocked on it. No

response. He rapped on the door a little harder and then felt it creak open

underneath his knuckle. He gasped when he saw what had happened to the

inside of the house.

Books had been torn from shelves, the table had been overturned, and

a window had been shattered. He saw a man lying on the floor, but saw no

blood. Rusty rushed over to the man, flipped him over, and examined him.

To his shock, he saw that there were two dark holes on his neck and dark

blue bruising surrounding them.

A joke. This has to be a joke. But the frigid corpse in his hands said

otherwise.

Even though he was six foot seven and was told that he looked

intimidating with his large muscles, he felt nervous. What good would

come from being a large, intimidating man if he was faced with an

assailant with a gun?

He dug his hand into his pants and pulled out his cell phone. He called

nine-one-one and then heard the sound of static. His mouth opened in

horror as he looked at his phone. He had good phone service. He couldn't

remember his phone ever not working before.

Maybe I should leave and call from my place. With his heart

pounding, he took a step backward. That was when he heard the sound of

a girl screaming.

He swore and shook his head. Whoever was screaming, he couldn't

just leave her there. It didn't matter if the killer was still around or not.

With sweaty palms and a pounding heart, he stepped over the body

while cringing. The smell of fire was strong in the air. He picked up one

of the upturned chairs to use as a weapon and walked around the sofa,

toward the back of the house. Grateful that this house was built identical

to his own, he located the basement and saw that the door was ajar. The

lights were off down below.

He flicked the light to turn it on, but nothing happened. He sniffed and

noted how much stronger the smell of fire was down here, but yet he

My Neighbor, the Vampire Penelope Rivers

didn't see anything.

"Son of a bitch," he said, and then he moved forward. The steps

groaned underneath him.

"Is somebody up there?" the girl said. "Please help me. Please."

With a grunt, he leapt down the final four stairs. He walked around the

corner and saw, to his horror, that a teenage girl was tied up to a chair and

had bruises all over her face. It was the same girl that he had seen walking

home from school. Tears streamed down her cheeks, and her whole body

trembled. The curly hair he had always thought looked so adorable was

lank and greasy, making him wonder how long she'd been trapped down

here.

"Look out behind you," the girl said.

Out of pure fear, he whipped around with the chair in front of him.

The chair leg connected with something hard. He looked down and saw

what he had done. The palest man that he had ever seen sat on the floor,

and Rusty realized that he had knocked him down without meaning to. He

was so shocked about what he had just done that he was frozen in place.

"Help me," the girl said. "Get me out of here before my Uncle Roger

comes back."

Rusty rushed over to her and felt fear fill his heart as the man on the

floor moaned and began to struggle to his feet on a fire scorched carpet.

The man had red eyes. Eyes the color of blood. Impossible. How can

anyone have eyes that color? The man let out a demonic hiss and stepped

in his direction, but then the sound of pounding feet could be heard

upstairs and Rusty looked up. By the time Rusty looked down again, the

man was gone.

The teenage girl screamed.

"You saw him, didn't you?" Rusty asked, looking at her.

The girl peered at him with large, frightened eyes and nodded.

****

My Neighbor, the Vampire Penelope Rivers

Police officers swarmed his house. The teenage girl, who he had

learned was named Monica, sat to his left, and Delilah sat to his right. A

police officer with golden blonde hair and blue eyes looked at him with

weary eyes.

"What you're telling me is that you smelled fire and so you went to

your neighbor's house and saw a man in his early thirties with gray hair

and red eyes?" The police officer raised her eyebrow skeptically.

"Well, I suppose you could say blond hair so light that it looked

almost white," he said, knowing how ridiculous his claim sounded. "I

wouldn't call it gray, and he definitely wasn't old."

"I saw him too," Monica said. "His hair really was like that."

The police officer turned toward her. "You did? I hate to ask this of

you, but it is procedure. I'd like to ask you some questions. If you'd prefer

to do it alone—"

"No," Monica said so harshly that it stunned him. She grabbed Rusty's

hand. "Please, let Rusty stay. After the incident I feel…I feel…"

"Okay, I understand," the police officer said, giving Rusty a fleeting

look. "Mr. Robinson said that he found you strapped to a chair. Can you

tell me what happened?"

"You aren't going to believe me," Monica said.

"Just try me," the police officer said.

Gulping, Monica looked at Rusty with desperate eyes.

"It's okay," Rusty said. "Tell her, Monica. I know it's hard because

your uncle was the one who died, but—"

"No, I'm glad this happened." Monica stared at her trembling hands.

"My uncle is the one who locked me down there."

Eyes widening in shock, he stared at Monica in disbelief. He had

come from a loving family with two parents, a dog, and a pair of siblings.

His family had been near perfect. Pity filled him as he looked at Monica.

"Your uncle locked you in the basement?" the police officer asked,

eyebrow raised. "For what purpose?"

"H-he and the rest of the people in the house were weird," Monica

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