Nicolette was freezing. The wind battered her as she made her way to the docks. Driving conditions were far from optimal and she didn’t want to risk a cab taking her because of any less than desirable activities her master may ask her to undertake. The less witnesses the better. Being attractive (she knew she was, she was a model after all) and covered in tattoos she tended to stick in people’s memories longer than her master would have liked. More than once he had reminded her of this with the callously given warning that if she became known to be linked to him her usefulness was at an end regardless of what Dominique might like. She believed him. He’d been working on his hobby as he’d told her.This ties into the RP http://www.mooncalfstudios.com/pathofth ... 14&t=26898
Even now, months after meeting him and being forcibly immersed in his macabre world, a world where flesh was but a canvas in ways tattooing and even scarification artists would balk at, she still felt queasy when she was nearby while he turned formerly living people, human beings, into books, clothing, canvases to paint on and other such inanimate objects. It was perverse and made all the more horrifying by the fact that he didn’t even seem to enjoy it like a maniac is supposed to. He would sit back and critique his work and then ask her opinion as if asking her how a meal tasted that was cooked by someone else. He had a certain detachment about the entire thing that was even more disturbing than the grotesquery he engaged in.
Her fingers were starting to feel numb even though they were gloved and stuffed deep in the pockets of her thickly-lined faux-fur coat. It was never this cold in Paris. She was truly starting to hate Harper Rock, Ontario, Canada, all of it. She would happily turn her back on this place, blind them with *** and never even think of returning given half the chance.
A car drove up slowly alongside her while she was lost in her own thoughts. So consumed was she by visions of freedom, a fantasy that could never be, that she didn’t notice the vehicle until it was right next to her and a voice emitted from a barely rolled down window. A male voice. “Hey there girl, what the hell are you doing out in this weather? You’ll freeze to death! Hop in, I’ll give you a ride!”
She looked over to the dark sedan, a mid 2000’s model she guessed, a Monte Carlo maybe? She knew she shouldn’t get in. There were a million good reasons not to get into a car with a strange man in the middle of the night during a blizzard with no witnesses in Harper Rock, a city known to be full of disappearances, serial killers and, if you were in the know as she was, vampires. Then again there were a million great reasons not to freeze to death on the streets of Harper Rock too.
Her caution was about to win out even against the cold as she hesitated a moment, weighing the chances of ending up a frozen carcass buried under a mountain of snow and likely not to be found until spring versus the chances of sliding into the car with a psychopath and possible ending up the same way, but being warm at least for the last few minutes of her life. She was just about to turn down the offer when a female voice flowed from the window “Come on hun, we’ll give you a lift.”
Nicolette knew women were less likely to be serial killers, but she wasn’t sure if they were more or less likely to be vampires. Still, the fact that there was a woman in the car too made her decision a little bit easier. Besides, Trahir said there was a note for her in his jacket pocket. At his boat. At the docks. She could have the two drop her a block or two away and walk there from where they let her out.
She reached out and opened the driver’s side rear door and slipped inside. Risk assessment, she figured. What could happen to her that was worse than what her master was already doing.
“Where you headed sugar?” The woman in the passenger seat turned to look at Nicolette and smiled.
Nicolette gave a smile back. She’d always found smiles contagious. No matter how bad something seemed, a reassuring smile always brought one to her own face as well. Thinking of the area around the docks she answered “The Dragon Gate Inn!” It was close enough to walk to the docks from and she didn’t need to give these two her real name.
She glances into the rearview mirror at the driver’s reflection, saw his brown eyes alternating between her and the road. His features she would describe only as average. Nondescript. His lineage traced back to Wales, Scotland, Ireland, maybe even France. It was hard to place. The woman next to him though was striking.
“What’s your name hun?”
“Um… I’m Audrey,” Nicolette lied. The less these people knew the better. If only for their own safety. If Trahir asked her if anyone saw her she would, by dint of supernatural compulsion, be obliged to tell him. Just by getting into the vehicle she had put not just herself, put them at risk too. She felt a pang of guilt over potentially harming these two strangers who had done nothing but help her.
“Audrey huh?” The woman’s smile widened slightly. “My name is Jane and the big quiet guy there, that’s my brother John. It’s a pleasure to meet you.” She extended her hand toward Nicolette and the tattooed beauty reached out and shook it. “Look, we just opened up a new business, a modelling agency of sorts. You wouldn’t happen to be looking for work would you Audrey?”
