Chapter 12

“Can you hear me, you peers and privy councilors?
I stand before you, naked to the eyes.
I will destroy any man who dares abuse my trust
and swear that you’ll be mine.
The Seven Seas of Rhye.”
-Queen, “The Seven Seas of Rhye“

Julie Andrews; no relation and/or affiliation whatsoever to Dame Julie Andrews, strutted onto the stage, wearing a white lace teddy to the crash of thunder at the opening of Concrete Blonde’s “Bloodletting (The Vampire Song),” looking around occasionally, acting like someone might be stalking her onstage. When the tolling bells gave way to a beat, she bobbed her head to it, no longer seeming to care that someone might be following her.

She looked out at the audience, barely visible since all lights in the room were on her, and found the shape of the man she would be marrying in eighteen hours.

Troy Medina sat up front, a black plastic cape around his neck, and a big plastic medallion that Susan and Brenda, her two friends who’d participated in the first half of her show, had placed around Troy’s neck with their fangs. The two nude women flanked him, pressing their bodies close to his and running their fingers through his hair; occasionally, gently turning his head so that Julie was the main focus of his vision.

The guitars joined the drums. Julie mouthed to the boy next door and her best friend for life “I want to fuck you forever, Master.”

Troy mouthed back a “Fucking love you, Mistress,” to the girl that, the next day, he’d fulfill the promise he’d made at the age of four to marry. He raised his hand toward her like Dracula in an old movie and said “Sleep!” Julie mimed her head being knocked back as if hit by something. When the song screamed, she looked back at him with unbridled lust as it kicked into high and she began her routine. She lost sight of him in the lights.

Contessa Helena de San Finzione entered the bar through the kitchen door. She’d bought the hotel earlier that morning, she was allowed everywhere. A Versace gown and her tiara made her stand out a bit in the t-shirt & jeans crowd that had gathered. Julie’s invitation had said Casual Dress, and except for the tiara; which she’d brought as a whim, the $2000 outfit WAS casual for her.

Helen hadn’t even expected the invitation. It took a while to get to her. So long that she was thinking of sending them a toaster next week, with a snide note about “I guess mine must have gotten lost.” It turned out that Julie hadn’t put her private mail code on the address; so the invitation got sorted into the castle’s regular mail; and had only been found at the last minute. Since she couldn’t get mad at Julie for the error being on her end, she decided to channel those feelings into the perfect Wedding Prank.

As Helena walked toward Troy, she saw Julie’s dance on the stage, slipping the straps off her shoulders. The song got to the part about a crack in the mirror and a bloodstain on the bed. Julie’s number was obviously a scene of her being seduced and turned by an invisible vampire, probably Troy.

Helen spotted a guy filming the routine on his phone and stopped. She took a card out of her purse and handed it to him, looking him in the eye.

“Keep filming and take this,” she commanded him. “When it’s over, email the video to the address on this card. Then tear up the card, delete your video, and forget you made it. I can’t blame you for wanting to stroke to Julie later. Hell, that’s what I’m going to do with your video; but this shit can’t hit the internet, and you don’t look smart enough to keep it to yourself. So, go ahead and remember every detail of her performance, but not the things I’ve told you to do. Forget I was here, too.”

“Oh ... ok, Helen,” he nodded, and Helen realized she’d gone to high school with the guy. Dated him once or twice too. Nobody worth remembering. She also didn’t correct him on the “Helen.”

Being back in Anchorage, she knew everyone would call her Helen except Julie, so it wasn’t a fight worth having. She could be Helen again until she got on her plane home. She left Nobody and approached Troy as Concrete Blonde informed the room that they were going to have a drink and walk around because they had a lot to think about, oh yeah.

Troy was too busy watching Julie’s number and being pawed through his clothes by the two naked women flanking him to notice Helen’s approach. She’d caught part of their number through the kitchen. A damn hot 3-girl scene that she couldn’t have been the only woman who had to fight to not jump on stage and make it four or more herself. Just like she was fighting the urge to go up there now and play the Vampire role in Julie’s strip-pantomime. She was seeing legs of all gender crossing and uncrossing when she turned to him and spoke.

“Hello, Troilus,” Helen said, causing Troy and the two women on his knees to turn to face her. “Thanks for the invitation. How’ve you been?”

Troy spent a moment searching for words. Helen smiled, knowing she’d caught her ex-boyfriend off guard. It was a real smile that remembered how it’d been that first time, with a man she honesly loved beforehand. The Troy Smile. One of her top ten favorite; three of which had been permanently retired. Over the speakers, Concrete Blonde insisted that nothing was there in the shadows down the hall; before insisting that something was, in fact, in the shadows down the hall.

“Um ... er ... Hi, Helen. Susan, Brenda, this is Contessa Helena de San Finzione, my first girlfriend.”

Her name and title came out of his mouth just as the line “Oh, you were a vampire, and now I am nothing at all” came up in the song. Helen smiled, extended a hand to Brenda, then to Susan.

“I’d claim to still the best, if I didn’t know how good Julie is too. Well, both of you would’ve had to know before that amazing scene as well.”

Troy put an arm around the lighter of the brunettes. Was that one Susan?

“Susan picked the ‘Brides of Dracula’ theme,” Troy said, confirming that she was. “We’re all digging it. I didn’t expect to see you until the ceremony.” He turned 3/4ths of the way toward Susan and tried unsuccessfully to casually say to her. “Susan, hon, this is Helen. Julie and I have TOLD YOU ABOUT HER before. A couple of times.”

Susan nodded solemnly. Concrete Blonde told the room that they had a lot to think about again; and Susan recalled Troy’s comment about knowing only one other person who could Do What They Do, and Julie saying how they didn’t want to teach Susan the secret until everyone agreed that she was entirely ready, because “We’ve ... made a mistake before.”

Susan had some psychological and emotional issues. The only relationship she’d known before joining Troy & Julie’s was an abusive nightmare; and the aftermath needed to be dealt with before the three of them could seriously discuss the matter. Troy hoped she’d picked up the “I’m sorry that the person whom, from what little we’ve told you, you have every reason to think of as The Boogeyman; is here in the flesh, before either of us were ready” tone in his voice.

“Oh, how could I miss THIS,” Helen said, lighting a cigarette so Troy wouldn’t see that she, at least, got that message. “Making that girl your Best Man too? Sappy, but I knew she’d make this party ‘The Place To Be.’”

“I’m pretty sure there’s no smoking in here.” Susan spoke up. The lightning crash in the song timed with it, in a way she couldn’t have possibly planned.

Helen stared into her eyes. Troy tried to break the standoff by getting his head between them and speaking to Susan first.

“Susan, Contessa Helena de San Finzione has diplomatic immunity. She smokes when and where she wants.” He turned back to look Helen in the eye. “One of the more annoying ways she establishes dominance wherever she goes.”

“Now now, Troilus. It’s a wedding, a time for pranks and fun! But yes, I’m afraid for this next part of MY prank, some of that dominance is going to be required.” She gave all three a look that caused them to miss Julie exposing her right breast to the crowd. The crowd hooted for Julie and sang along with the song; informing Concrete Blonde that they, too, had the Ways and Means to New Orleans.

“Let’s all go up to the Honeymoon Suite together,” Helen told them. “I have a surprise of my own planned.”

As the three of them stood and started walking toward the entrance, Helen got a good look at Susan’s body. She suspected that most of the men in the audience were too busy focusing on her face, tits, and pussy to get a good look at the rest of her. Even in the dim lighting; this close, Helen could see the less-than-a-year-old scars and burns on the “unimportant” parts of her body. The upper arms that showed signs of repeated old bruising, because that was a “safe” place to grab hold of a woman when you wanted to shout something horrible in her face. Where they can be covered up with a short-sleeved shirt; because someone might ask a woman about fresh, visible bruises.

Helen unconsciously touched spots on her own arms that the best cosmetic surgeons had removed all trace of, but she never completely stopped feeling. She stopped them as they got to the door, before it opened out into the light of the lobby.

“Wait,” Helen told them as she removed Troy’s cloak and wrapped it around Susan. “Susan, when we get back to the suite, why don’t you just curl up like a kitten on the bed and forget all of this? Just be a good kitty and enjoy a nice kitty nap on the bed until Troy or Julie wakes you to play.”

Susan nodded with a blank smile and wrapped the cloak around her body, her breath starting to come out in little purrs as she began to forget why it mattered that she felt like a sleepy kitty who needed to find a good napping spot.

Helen stroked her long hair and went to see how Brenda was doing. Brenda’s erect nipples were the first thing she noticed. A glance down, and Helen noticed the shiny wet stream down her thigh. Helen’s eyes traced back up her body, to those stiff nipples on top of D-cups to the glazed, lusty smile on Brenda’s studious-looking face and dreamy expression in eyes that weren’t behind sexy glasses at the moment, but looked like they ought to be. Helen admired the long hair that she could only imagine looked amazing exploding out of a bun down her back and shoulders.

“You know what I’m doing to you, don’t you?” Helen asked.

“Yesss,” Brenda slowly breathed out, visibly relaxing. “And it makes me so fucking horny...”

Helen spotted a girl with a long ponytail. She reached for her head and started taking out her hair tie. As the girl turned and looked ready to strike, Helen spoke.

“You want me to have this. You look better without it, you don’t even like this one.”

The girl nodded and grinned as she helped Helen remove it, looking the wrong direction to see Troy’s concern. Helen pulled the last loose hairs off of it before handing it to Brenda.

“You get to make this walk naked. I order you to put your hair in a bun while we head up to the suite. I’ll want to see you take it out at some point too. Up we go now.”