know what he was talking about. Then she said, "I know this, Gary."
"And you know that no-one can bite someone who's not a member. Volunteers only. Those are the rules."
"I know the rules," Magdalene snapped, "I made them."
"Good. Just checking." He nodded as though this settled the matter.
"Does this mean you have brought your little friend to join us, Gary?" Magdalene asked waspishly, "I can't imagine why else you would bring her here."
"This was at Mundy's place," said Gary, thrusting the bag at her, "I think it's his."
Magdalene arched an eyebrow at the offering.
"There's a hand in it," I expounded, since Gary had forgotten the important noun. I was also hoping to shock her, just a little. No such luck.
The arched eyebrow was turned to me, but eyebrows don't bother me particularly, no matter how arch they get. Magdalene turned and got Mr Smith to hold the bag while she unzipped it. She dropped the frozen veges onto the bar counter and pulled out the limb in question.
She raised it to her face and sniffed. "Smells like his," she concurred.
"I thought so, yeah," Gary replied.
"Why the bag?" asked Beryl, looking at the pale, all-wrong hand that Magdalene held so matter-of-factly in her own.
"Keep it fresh, of course," said Smith, "Is the old bastard around then?"
"Not at present." Magdalene was regarding the twisted stump of the hand speculatively, no doubt wondering, as I did, what could have torn it off.
The sound of excited voices floated up the stairwell behind me and Magdalene rapidly dropped Mundy's hand back into the bag. Smith swept the bag of peas on top of it. Beryl's head lifted like a cat sensing nearby sparrows and she moved away from Gary. Three steps took me into the gap beside him. He shifted slightly to allow me room and seemed to relax marginally.
"You should put that in the fridge," I told Magdalene, nodding at the bag, "in case Mundy wants it back."
"If he still needs it," she said carelessly.
"If," I agreed. "It'll be interesting if he does and you didn't look after it for him."
She gave me a sour look and turned to Smith. "Take it to my office."
She handed Smith the bag as the voices coalesced into a group of three young people - two girls and a guy. Just kids, really, enveloped in black clothes, dramatic make-up and an air of anticipation like they were off to a rock concert. The boy had a long, lanky grace that made me think, piercingly and painfully, of Daniel. My never-quite-a-boyfriend, not even a whole year buried. Drained of life so that a dead woman could pretend she still had feelings. Of everyone I knew who had died, the selfish bitch who'd killed Daniel was the only one I was wholeheartedly glad was properly, utterly dead.
The guy looked nervously excited while the other two offered words of encouragement. "This is so a-maz-ing, Hamish, honest. There's nothing like it. It's so..." the taller of the girls flailed her hands as a general indication of how so it was.
"Awesome," the shorter one supplied enthusiastically, light brown roots showing under black-dyed hair, "We'll find you someone perfect. Thomas is kickass. I could just die. And Mundy!" She clasped her hands over her heart and mimed it beating out like a cartoon character in love. Like Mundy was some kind of heart-throb movie star. She caught a look of uncertainty on the boy's face. "Oh, you'd prefer a girl, huh?"
"I don't mind," Hamish said, attempting disdain at such petty distinctions.
"It'll be cool," the tall one reassured him.
Magdalene put on her sweet-as-dumplings persona to greet them. The three of them smiled, dazzled.
Idiots.
I hadn't yet been able to work out why so many people came here to voluntarily let the undead drink their blood. It might have been the attraction of the taboo, the sexiness of the danger, the life-affirming thrill of seeing someone come alive with your own hot blood running in their veins. The dizzying physical combination of adrenalin and blood loss. Mostly I figured that people are perverse and this was just another example of how self-deluded we can be.
They weren't all young volunteers either, nor all Goths. One of the regulars was a man of 50-odd, who skipped his blood pressure medication for three days before coming on his monthly visit, knowing that 'his friends' didn't like drugs messing up their experience. I suppose that was one thing about the Gold Bug. It was a proponent of Hugs Not Drugs. Yay them.
The undead I could understand. Blood gave the vampires the buzz they needed to feel almost-alive again, without having to do any killing. Not that they objected to killing but it was all so damned inconvenient these days, having to cover it up and so forth. This was easy and accessible and did not lead to enraged mobs with pitchforks and burning brands.
The whole place creeped me out. I had not been back since I had come last year looking for answers to Daniel's murder, yet a certain worrying attraction lurked at the back of my mind. Sometimes, the idea of coming here seemed therapeutic, for a little of the same reason that helping Gary catalogue his collection was soothing. It might put the horrors I couldn't hide from into their place. Labelled, catalogued, shelved neatly in my head, and that would made them controlled. Sort of.
People do stupid things, thinking it gives them control. I never quite succumbed to that particular folly, though.
The newbie was looking at Beryl the way a nervous debutante in an Austen novel eyes the dashing yet slightly scandalous regimental captain. Beryl, for her part, was eyeing the newbie like the lad was a particularly appetising hors d'oeuvre at the same soiree.
As hideous as I found the whole thing, at least I knew that Beryl was generally very careful in her appetites. The primness wasn't a mere affectation. She tended to be precise and tidy beforehand, but a little kinder once the blood filled her, talking to them while they sipped nourishing liquids and recovered.
Thomas, who the short girl had mentioned, was another matter. He was slick, sleazy and sly, covering it with calculated charm. He had bitten me on my first visit to The Gold Bug, not caring whether I was a member or not.
I considered giving Hamish and his friends a lecture on their idiocy, but I'd tried that before, with predictable results. Scorn and hostility, on behalf of both vampires and suck-buddies. So the anti-blood diatribes went the way of the anti-drug ones, years before. Besides, Beryl had taken her new friend behind the curtains already and the moment was gone.
Gary leaned in close and said quietly into my ear, "Do you want to go now?" I dragged my eyes away from the Jane Austen meets Bram Stoker tableau and nodded vigorously. "We could see a film," he suggested with half a smile, "There's a new one with giant robots in it."
That made me grin. Who doesn't love a film with giant robots? "Sure."
"Kate's not expecting you home?"
"Nah. She's gone off for a long weekend." With her newish boyfriend, the Lovely Anthony, of whom I so far approved.
I was suddenly aware of a large, silk-clad bosom looming in our vicinity. "A date now, is it?" Magdalene managed to put a lot of venom into the query. "Really, Gary, this is no
