Chapter 1 #3
“How about you give me some of your blood to heal me. That’ll give me more time in this world, and I can make a name for myself.
I need to leave something of myself behind.
” He told him no. “What’s it going to cost you to make me a healthy man?
Nothing but a bit of your blood. I don’t know how old you are, but you can’t be all that old.
You don’t look a day over twenty-five years old. ”
“I’ve been around for centuries and centuries. I’m older than this town.” He asked him again what it would cost him to make him healthy again. “Why don’t I go one step further and change you into a monster of the night while I’m at it?”
“I don’t want to be a damned vampire. I just want enough of your blood so that I can see my next birthday.
It’s not that far off. I need to get with my doctor to see how much longer I have to live.
” He told him what he knew. “Six months or less? That don’t seem right, but then what do I know?
The moment he said that I had blood cancer, I sort of turned everything else off.
I should have brought me someone with me like he suggested, but I don’t know anyone that would help me out. ”
Rance could almost feel sorry for the man, but he couldn’t get past the part of him trying to blackmail him into selling him the land that he had. As soon as he turned toward the driveway where one of the few cruisers they had in town was pulling up, he started cursing.
“I didn’t call them.” He asked what they were doing there then. “I have no idea. I might have reached out to someone and told them you were trying to blackmail me, but I didn’t ask him to call the police. That’s all on Brew.”
“I’ve talked to a lot of you guys in the past several days.
None of you are too nice when it comes to hospitality.
You didn’t even invite me into your home.
” He said that he didn’t want him in his home.
“See? Right there. None of you are very nice. I thought that you had to be nice so you could lure some of your victims to your house?”
“I’m in no need for a victim, as you called it.
As I’ve said to you, I’ve been around for a good long time and don’t need to feed all that often.
I can even tolerate the sun better than most. Certainly better than you do.
You’re sunburnt.” He said that because no one would invite them into his house.
“For good reason, too. You’d probably be looking for something to steal when you’re casing the joint.
Move on or go with the police. I don’t care. ”
The police asked if he was bothering him, and he told them that he was trying to blackmail him.
After telling him what he’d said about giving him blood, they ran him in for harassment and trespassing.
Again. Rance suggested that they keep him in jail this time, as it was becoming an issue for him having to tell him no all the time.
“We’ll run him in. Conri said that if he gave us any more trouble, we were to deal with him like we did any other human.
That’s about all he is anyway.” Nodding while they read Hudson his rights and put him in the cruiser, the officer asked if he was going to press charges.
“If you come down to the stationhouse by tomorrow, we can hold him for you.”
“That’ll be perfect. I’ll see you either later this afternoon or in the morning. I’ve had enough of this man.” He had too. This was the third time in two days that he’d had to turn the man away, and that was enough. “Thank you for coming out. I guess Brew called you.”
“He said you were having trouble, and we figured that he’d be out here again.” They both laughed. “We’ll run him in, hopefully for the last time. He’s been bothering Mrs. Warner, too. We had to discourage her from using her gun on him. She’d do it too, she said if he came around again.”
“The old bat said she was going to blow my nuts off of me. What kind of reason would she have to be violent like that? None, I tell you. I was just talking to her.” The officer said that she didn’t want him talking to her.
“See what I mean about hospitality? Not a single person in this town has one bit of it.”
Rance was glad to see him go and thanked Brew for calling them. After closing the connection with him, he set back to work on getting his furniture arranged. Just as he was starting on the living room to get his lamps just where he wanted them, he remembered he had a meeting with his accountant.
He needed to make sure that he wasn’t signing checks that shouldn’t be, and was going to check on his books.
He did this once or twice a year and had never had any trouble with it before.
It was to keep them on their toes and himself too.
He wasn’t going to be broke because some human decided that he liked his money more than Rance did.
Besides, he could find him anywhere he hid, and they both knew that.
He thought that alone was keeping him honest.
It took him nearly three hours to go over his books.
Since he was the only one who could sign checks, he thought things were working out well.
As soon as he finished with that, he decided to take a walk around town and see what he could get into.
There were several houses for sale nowadays, and he thought about investing in the town by buying up a couple of them and turning them into rentals.
He was renting out his condo now that he didn’t need it and thought that was the way to go.
He was making money, and his condo wasn’t sitting empty any longer than it had to.
There wasn’t much going on around town. The kids were still in school for now, so they weren’t running around. He did see a lot of shops with their doors open, and he went into one of them just on the off chance to see if they could tell him about anything else that was for sale.
“My building is going to be for sale as soon as I bury my husband.” He asked when he had died, and she told him that he’d not yet, but she was working on it.
“He’s been a pain in my ass for the last twenty or so years, and I’ve had enough.
I’ve been thinking about pushing him down the stairs, but he’d live on life support, and I’d be no better off than I was before with him lingering for a long time. ”
“Does he know you’re trying to kill him off?
” Rance was delighted with the older woman and watched as she rang up customers who stayed for the story.
She told him he knew that’s why pushing him down the stairs wouldn’t work.
He was prepared for her. “I see. So what other methods have you applied? I’m sure that you’ve used a couple of tricks. ”
“He don’t drink tea or coffee, so I can’t poison him that way.
He don’t even drive anymore, so that cutting his brakes would work.
” He told her that she’d figured out a lot of ways to kill off her husband.
“He’s all right sometimes, but here lately he’s been wanting me to sell this place and be done with it.
I guess I could, but then what would I do all day but to cater to his needs?
I done that when we was first married. I’m not going to fall into that pit again. ”
“Why don’t you just leave him instead of killing him off?
” She said that she signed a pre-nup when he had money, and she can’t get out of it.
Rance wasn’t sure that either one of them had a pot to piss in the way that store looked, but he knew better than to judge a book by its cover.
He’d bet anything that they had more money than sense and were just wanting to go out and spend it like they should have.
“I have an idea. I’ll buy your building, and you can take your time selling all your wares out of it before I take over.
Then you and your husband can have some fun on a trip before you kill one another off. ”
“Deal.” She cackled like a hen that had just found a prize of feed and told him she’d do it.
After they settled on a price, he said that he’d meet her in the bank in the morning, and they could go over the contract and exchange money for the building.
As soon as he was out the door, he realized what he’d done and laughed at himself all the way home.
He’d just bought something for no other reason than he’d been entertained by the woman in the shop.
He thought that he needed to have his head examined.