Stephen Leather - Once bitten

"What do you mean? Is there someone trying to hurt you?"

She looked even more exasperated. "I can't go out in the sunlight, that's all."

I gave O'Hara a hard look. "You set her up for this did you, Patsy? I thought better of you."

He looked pained and held up his hands. "Hey, Jamie, it's nothing to do with me. Scout's honour.

"Did you hang the bat on my aerial, Patsy?"

"That I did not, son," he said.

"Look, I shitfire sure don't know what you two are babbling about, but I just wanna, like, stay put for a few hours," said Terry, putting her sunglasses back on. "Until it gets dark, you know?"

"And as I've already explained to you, young lady, this is not a waiting room," said O'Hara, looking at me for support. "Your lawyer has fixed your bail, you're free to go."

"I can't go," she cried, and stamped her foot again.

I took her by the arm. "A joke's a joke Terry, but that's enough. I don't know who put you up to this, but it's not really funny any more. I've had far too many vampire jokes played on me over the years." I began edging her towards the doors that led outside. "If you need a lift, I'll happily run you home. But drop the vampire act, OK."

She was still pulling against me, her feet slipping on the polished floor. "Jamie, I'm not joking.

I get a bad reaction to sunlight, honest I do."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," I said. "Any more of this and I'm going to bring out my crucifix."

She stopped dead and I was surprised at her strength. For a moment I couldn't budge her. I couldn't see her eyes because of the sunglasses but I got the impression that she was glaring at me, then she just as suddenly relaxed as if she'd decided to drop the act. "OK, Jamie," she said slowly.

"Have it your way." She let me escort her to the doors and take her out to the steps that led down to the sidewalk. It was early afternoon and the sun was bright enough to force me to shield my eyes as I looked across at her.

"See," I said. "You didn't burst into flames."

She smiled, and then winced, and then I saw the right side of her face, the side nearest the sun, begin to bubble as if acid had been thrown at it. Her forehead began to go the same way, first breaking out into hundreds of small bubbles and then browning like a pancake on a griddle. She put up a hand to shield herself and I saw that begin to go brown and I grabbed her by the shoulder and pushed her back inside the building.

"Jesus, Terry, what's happening?" I said.

She was shaking uncontrollably and I took her to one of the benches at the side of the room and sat her down. Patsy O'Hara came bowling over, asking me what was wrong.

"Is there a doctor here?" I asked him.

"You're a doctor, Jamie," he said.

"A medical doctor!" I shouted at him. "For God's sake, Patsy, I'm a psychologist, I've no idea what this is. Get somebody, quickly."

"Doc Peterson is in testing a couple of drunk drivers," he said. "I'll get him."

He jogged off to the cells while I sat with Terry. The bubbling had stopped but the patches of brown were still all over the right cheek and her hand and there were small pinpricks of blood on the skin. "Terry, I'm sorry. I'm really sorry," I said. She just grimaced.

Patsy came back with Peterson. He pushed me away and sat down beside her, holding her head in his hands and inspecting the damage to her cheek. He took off her glasses and looked at the skin around her eyes and then checked her hand.

"Vitiligo?" he said to Terry.

She nodded.

"Why did you go out in the sun?" he asked her.

She shrugged. Patsy and I looked at each other and it was impossible to tell which of us looked the more guilty.

"Don't you normally wear sun protection screen?" Peterson asked.

"Factor 30," she said. "It's the only way I can go out during the day. But I didn't have any with me."

"You should have borrowed a hat, then. Or stayed inside. You've seen a doctor about this?"

"Of course," she said. "I've had it since as I was a kid."

"Have you tried steroid treatment?"

"Tried it but it didn't do any good. He said the best thing to do is to, like, stay out of the sun."

Patsy went back to the desk. I sat where I was and wished that the ground would swallow me up. Peterson turned to look at me. He was about ten years older than I was, with a great bedside manner which unfailingly put patients at ease. He was a master at handling people, which is why the cops liked to have him in to test the drunks. He had a sympathetic face, oyster-like eyes and a Mexican moustache which he rubbed occasionally. "You seen this before, Jamie?" he asked.

I said no, and he held Terry's hand in front of my nose. "Vitiligo," he said. "It's an immune disorder which stops the skin's pigmentation working normally and makes the skin hyper-sensitive to sunlight. It's not uncommon – about one in two hundred people suffer from it in one form or another."

"I've not heard of it," I said. I looked across at Terry. "I won't forget," I said to her. She smiled ruefully and put her glasses back on.

"Is there anything you can do for her?" I asked Peterson.

"No, the browning will go on its own eventually," he said. "As to the disease, as I said to…I'm sorry, I didn't get your name," he said to Terry.

"Terry," she answered.

"As I said to Terry here, steroids are about the only long-term treatment, but even that isn't guaranteed. The best remedy is just to stay indoors."

He stood up and shook her hand. "Best of luck, Terry. And stay out of the sun, OK?"

"It's a promise, Doc," she said.

As Peterson walked away I turned to her and put my hand on her shoulder. "Terry, I'm so, so sorry. I had no idea."

"You didn't believe me," she said.

"I know, I'm sorry. It's just that the guys here play so many tricks on me you wouldn't believe it.

They make my life hell."

"Jamie Beaverbrook, vampire hunter?"

"That's right. And after a while I guess I think everybody's at it. I apologise, I should have taken you at your word. I won't doubt you again."

"You mean there'll be a next time?" she said, teasingly.

"I hope so," I said.

"Yeah, me too, I guess," she said.

"Friends?" I asked.

"Friends, for sure," she agreed.

The Club The work load began to drop off a bit as the moon began to wane, and I got back home just before eight o'clock to find the red light flashing on my answer machine and a message from Peter Hardy asking me to call him. I did, but he wasn't in so I left a message on his machine. I was impatient to know what he'd managed to find out about Greig Turner and Lilac Time but LA being LA I knew that it could be days before we actually got to speak person-to-person. I microwaved myself a frozen chicken dinner and was sitting at my desk going through some transcripts when the doorbell rang. It was after midnight and I wasn't expecting anyone so I checked through the door viewer.

La-La Land isn't exactly what you'd call a safe haven after dark, even in my part of town, and being gang-raped by a group of bikers high on Angel Dust wasn't my idea of a fun way of spending a Wednesday evening. Paranoid, huh? You should try living here for a while.

There was nobody there, which didn't make me feel any better because that meant one of three things: they'd gone, they were hiding, or they'd gone round the back of the house and were breaking in as I stood with my eye pressed against the front door. Look, just because I'm paranoid doesn't mean there aren't a couple of guys out there with shotguns, OK? I went back to the study and the doorbell rang again. I thought of calling the police right away but decided against it because if I was wrong and if I was over-reacting I knew that it wouldn't be long before tales of Jamie Beaverbrook, the Vampire Hunter who was afraid of the dark, would be circulating among the boys in blue.