Camino del Monte Sol, ch. 14 (with OBTS) -- PG-13

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librarian_7
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Camino del Monte Sol, ch. 14 (with OBTS) -- PG-13

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Author’s Note: This story is a collaboration between OnceBitTwiceShy and myself for Champagne Challenge #128: Reader/Writer II. OBTS provided the idea of Josef visiting Santa Fe in the 1920’s, and running into…well, you’ll have to read the story. The settings are as accurate as I can make them, having been in Santa Fe myself many times, and also using various resources on the City Different, as they call it, and its inhabitants back in the ‘20s. There is a thread with a set of pictures and links to places, costumes, cars, posted after most chapters. My thanks to OBTS, not only for the idea, but for her encouragement and input as the story progressed. I don’t own Josef, or any of the historical locations and personages mentioned in the story. Any errors or misrepresentations of fact are mine.


Camino del Monte Sol

XIV. Don Gaspar Street

Stephen Kostan, resplendent in a white dinner jacket, ran one finger inside his starched collar in hopes of loosening his black bowtie just a little. He watched the waiters moving through the room, carrying trays laden with champagne glasses for the well-dressed throng, waiting for the right moment.

The formal black suits and satin evening dresses of the guests were somewhat at odds with the unfinished nature of their surroundings. The room, while perhaps only 25 feet wide, ran back deeply from the plate glass windows of the store front. Currently, the space was littered with scaffolding and ladders, the wide planks of the floor covered with splotched painters’ drop cloths. The new overhead spotlights were only partially installed, wires and fixtures dangling from the old pressed-tin ceiling. Some of the sawhorses had been topped with planks, and draped with linens to serve as makeshift tables for refreshments.

He had to say, he was pleased with the turnout. The cream of Santa Fe society had chosen to accept his invitation, and all the people who had the capacity to become players in Santa Fe’s burgeoning art colony were there as well. Of course, he reflected wryly, that might have as much to do with the relative scarcity of social occasions as it did with any cachet his name had acquired over these past weeks in town.

He spotted Reza across the room. The beaded satin evening gown she wore moved sinuously around her slender form, as she wove gracefully through the crowd, at home among so many old friends. Stephen watched until she caught his eye, giving her a quick smile and raise of his eyebrows to signal his awareness of her.

She laughed in return, a flash of white against scarlet lips, and raised her champagne glass. He hoped she would be as pleased with him at the end of the evening as she was now.

A movement at his side drew his attention, and he turned to find Dorothea beside him, grasping the stem of her own champagne glass. Nervousness and anticipation had painted a hectic blush on her cheeks; he’d rarely seen her, he thought with a fleeting regret, look more enticing.

“It’s almost time,” she said. “As soon as the waiters finish.”

Stephen smiled at her. “Do you know the story of how the champagne glass got its shape?”

Dorothea recognized the attempt to distract her, and accepted it gratefully. “No, but I’m sure you’re intimately involved, somehow.”

He ducked his head, with a private smirk. “Not as intimately as you might think. That would’ve been high treason.”

“Oh?” Dorothea raised her eyebrows. “Okay, now I really am interested.”

“It’s said,” Stephen continued in low tones, “that the curve of the glass,” and he cupped the shallow bowl in his large hand, the stem dangling from between his fingers, “was molded from the breast of Marie Antoinette.”

Dorothea bit her lower lip and looked up at him. “Really?”

He ran his tongue across his lip. “Well, I won’t say that I speak from personal knowledge. But from what I saw…and dresses were cut pretty low in those days…she really should have sued for slander.” Stephen paused, scanning the room. Patrice caught his eye, and nodded. Louise stopped her instructions to one of the waiters to give him a thumbs up. “Looks like showtime, sweetheart. You ready?”

Dorothea took a deep breath. “I guess so.”

Stephen gave her a quick nod. “You’ll do fine.” He stepped forward, clearing his throat and raising one hand to attract the attention of the crowd. As they gradually fell silent, he smiled warmly. “Governor Hinkle, Mayor Closson, friends. I hate to interrupt your conversations, but I do need to say a few words. I promise I’ll be as brief as I can.

“First, I’d like to thank you for coming out this evening. I’ve only been in town a short time, and your enthusiasm in joining me in this somewhat—unfinished—venue is much appreciated.” He paused and looked around the room. “I came here as a businessman, and will leave here, all too soon, as, I’d like to think, an adopted son.

“And I will be leaving a tangible piece of my heart here, in Santa Fe.” He turned slightly and held out a hand to Dorothea, to bring her forward. As their hands met, he cut a swift glance down at their entwined fingers, with an entirely intimate grin that brought a deeper blush to her cheek. “I am pleased to announce that my dear friend will be remaining here in New Mexico, and will shortly be opening an art gallery in this space. I give you, Miss Dorothea Jones, and the Three Graces Gallery.” He raised his glass in a toast, to a chorus of applause as the crowd followed suit.

Dorothea smiled at Stephen, and faced the crowd, holding up a hand for silence. She took a deep breath. “Thank you so much for coming out. Of course, you’ll all be receiving invitations to our formal opening, and I hope you’ll join us for that.” She paused and gestured to Patrice and Louise. “Also, of course, we all know that any endeavor like this is dependent on support and patronage, and Three Graces is no exception. What you see here tonight may not be impressive—yet—but I owe it, and the future of this place, to one such patron. I’d ask you to raise your glasses again, to my dear friend and patron, Stephen Kostan.” She touched her glass to her lips, then set it aside on a nearby table. “And I have a presentation, a token of my—of our—regard. Patrice, Louise, please join me. And, Freemont, dear.” As they made their way forward, Dorothea continued, “Three Graces will focus on exhibiting, and selling, the work of Santa Fe artists, and I thought it would be fitting for the very first painting hung on the wall of the gallery should be a gift to Stephen, created here in Santa Fe, by one of our talented local artists, Freemont Ellis.”

Stephen was watching Ellis, assisted by Mruk and Shuster, hanging a covered rectangle on the wall behind him. As Dorothea turned to check their progress, Stephen commented aside to her, “This had better not be a portrait of me.”

Patrice, overhearing, laughed. “Have a little faith, Stephen.”

Finally, Ellis stepped back, his friends fading over to the side. “Ready when you are, ladies,” he called out.

Louise, Dorothea, and Patrice struck a pose, grouped together, and at Dorothea’s signal, Ellis pulled the black cloth from his painting. The Three Graces had been captured in delicate pastels, elegantly dressed and with characteristic expressions. The portrait was stylized, but their personalities shone through, and Stephen knew he could see this painting a century hence, and remember every nuance of the women it depicted. He clapped slowly, and the rest of the guests joined in.

“We told you to have faith, Stephen,” Lou Lou said.

Stephen came to stand in front of the little group, his arms spread wide to encompass all three, and they moved forward to embrace him. He bent his head to kiss first Patrice, then Louise, and finally Dorothea, each full on the mouth. “I’m very pleased,” he said quietly. “Wait up for me tonight.”

He couldn’t help but notice, however, that standing with Nash, Reza was looking like a thundercloud in a beaded gown, her earlier good mood vanished. After a few more words had been spoken to the assembled crowd, he excused himself from the girls, and moved purposefully toward Reza.

When he reached her, she raised a champagne glass and drained it in a gulp. “How lovely of you to give us a moment of your time, Stephen,” she said, her tones acid.

He gave her a lopsided smile. “We do need to talk, don’t we?”

“Do we?”

Stephen nodded to Nash. “If you’ll excuse us, I think we’d better find someplace less public.”

Nash snorted and turned away.

Stephen considered taking her out into the night air, but he decided there were other, possibly better options. “Let’s go,” he said, steering her by the elbow toward a closed door at the back of the room.

She turned, as soon as she was inside the narrow space. Stephen wasn’t sure, from the passion in her eyes, which she wanted more: to fight him or to—closing the door, he reached around her to flip a switch, illuminating the stairwell with a single light bulb dangling from a long, bare wire.

“Upstairs,” he said. “The door on the left.”

Wheeling around, she marched up the stairs, her French heels making an angry click on each tread. His instinct would have been to precede her into an unknown space, but he did enjoy the view from behind as she climbed.

When Reza reached the door at the top of the stairs, she paused to look back at him.

“It’s unlocked,” he said.

Her mouth tightened, but she opened the door and passed within.

The room was large, and largely empty. Here and there, crates had been left unceremoniously, and piles of detritus from the re-modeling below. The light from two tall windows cast long shadows across the dusty floor.

In her ornate, beaded dress, Reza looked as out of place as Stephen, in his spotless white jacket and sharply creased trousers.

He found a light switch bolted on the wall, and flicked it on with a deft twist of his fingers. “Thea plans to make this are into an apartment for herself,” he said, more to break the silence than anything else.

“She has a lot of work left to do,” Reza responded carelessly, taking in the scene. She fumbled in her small evening bag, looking for a cigarette, and failing to find one. She swore under her breath, then, gathering her anger, looked Stephen in the eye. “So, when were you planning on telling me you were leaving? Or were you just going to vanish in the night?”

“I’d planned,” and he paused for emphasis, “to talk to you before now. But you’ve been avoiding me for the past three days.”

Reza’s face flamed. “There was a reason for that,” she replied. “I thought it might be unwise.”

Stephen combined a laugh with a sharp sniff. “I’m not a beast, you know,” he said.

An elegant shrug answered him, dismissing the subject. “I thought you had business here. I thought that might keep you. Senora Delgado told me you bought that parcel of land. That’s true, isn’t it?”

“Yes. It’s true.” He paused. “But it’s not—suitable, after all.”

“So—what? You buy this land, and go off and leave it? Or do you plan to sell it to someone else?” Her vehemence was bringing color to her cheeks, and a fiery sparkle to her eyes.

Stephen smiled. “Actually, I had another idea. I’ve transferred the deed to—someone who loves the land.” He slipped a hand into his jacket, and pulled a thick envelope from the inner breast pocket. “Reza,” he said, his brown eyes warm, “I found I disliked the idea of disfiguring that valley with buildings. So I’m giving it to you.”

“What?” Reza was stunned. She looked down at the envelope in his hand, then back to his face. Her lips parted, and her expression grew stricken.

Stephen saw the flicker in her eyes that signaled her intent, and before she could raise her hand, he was behind her, with her arms imprisoned by his. The envelope he’d held fluttered unnoticed to the floor.

“Didn’t I tell you,” he growled softly into her ear, “never to try and strike me again?”

She began to struggle, futilely, in his grip. “Let go of me,” she panted.

“Not until you listen to me.” He began moving his hands, using the cool techniques of touch to soothe her. “Why does this make you so angry? I wanted to please you.”

She gave one last fruitless squirm in his arms. “What? You thought you could buy me off? Buy my silence and leave town with a clear conscience?”

He stilled for a moment. “That was not my intent, Reza.” She could hear a soft sigh escape him. “You knew I was only here for a short time. What did you expect from me? What did you want?”

She sagged back against him. “I thought—I thought you might want me to come back to California with you. To be your—one of your—freshies.”

Stephen gave a short laugh. “Razorblade, you weren’t cut out to be anyone’s freshie.”

It was her turn to go still. “Then, I guess, this is it. The goodbye.”

“I had something else in mind for you, Princess.”

“What?”

“You need to think about it, and think carefully, but—give it some time, and if you decide you want it, come to me in L.A. and I’ll turn you. I’ll make you a vampire.”

“Are you serious?” Reza twisted her head, trying to see his face, but he’d bent his head to lay a kiss on her throat. “Why not just turn me now? Why not do it here?”

He chuckled. “I could. If I wanted to release a ravening wolf on that flock of sheep downstairs. And I’m not doing that. Especially not when I have some pet lambs among them.”

“But—”

He began moving his hands against the skin of her arms again, over the beads and silk of her elaborate dress. “When I bring you into this life, it’ll be in circumstances I can control, where you can learn what you need to survive. Where I can have as many willing donors as you need.”

“I don’t understand.”

“And I’m not sure I can explain.”

Now, when she twisted in his arms, he allowed it. “I want to know more. I want to know everything.” She reached up, laying her hands on his cheeks, framing the planes of his face with her fingers.

He pulled a stray tendril of hair back from her forehead. “I can give you a taste of it, Reza.”

She drew her eyebrows together. “How?”

“Just that. A taste.” He put his right hand to his mouth, using one fang to gouge a scratch along the side of his forefinger. The blood welled up at once, a darker, richer red than human blood, even as the slight wound closed. He offered his hand to her, the way he might offer a perch to a song bird. “My blood.”

Reza looked into his eyes, falling into the warm depths of his compelling gaze. Her lips parted, an unspoken question behind them.

“Trust me, Reza.”

She swallowed, hard, and nodded. Putting her mouth to his hand, he could feel her hot breath against his skin, the feather-light movement of her tongue as she licked away the blood, hesitating at first, then with more force. She had tasted her own blood, from nicked fingers, in the past, and never found the flavor much at all. This, Stephen’s blood, was a strange draught, as heady as the champagne, different from anything she’d ever tasted, and yet familiar as the taste of his mouth on hers. As she swallowed, the room spun around her, and she felt strangely intoxicated.

She sagged against him as the foreign blood absorbed into her system, confused at the new sensations assailing her. Suddenly, the light was brighter, every noise was louder. She could hear her own heart pounding in her ears, like a stampeding herd of cattle. “What’s happening to me?”

“You’re changing. Not permanently, and just a little.”

“Changing into what?”

“What do you think, Razor?” He laughed softly at her. “Changing into a vampire like me.”

He felt a series of tremors run over her, the heat of her body spiking. She hid her face against his chest, trying to block out the world. “Don’t fight it, princess,” he said. “Let it happen.”

“I feel so—so strange.”

Perhaps it was inevitable, that as she lifted her face, and he saw the odd silver sheen in her eyes, the door opened with a bang.

“Reza! What are you doing?” Nash demanded, standing in the doorway. Stephen felt a hard flash of annoyance. The artist had known he and Reza were going elsewhere to talk. He couldn’t imagine what might have set the fool off now.

She looked over her shoulder, smiling as she licked the last of Stephen’s blood from the corner of her mouth. “Oh, Willard,” she said, “I’m just telling Stephen goodbye.” She underlined her statement by twisting back around to kiss Stephen’s throat, and twining a hand up around his neck to pull his head down. She met his lips with hers in a kiss that would have left him breathless, if he had breath to lose.

Finally, she pulled back and slid her tongue across her lips, a lazy, sensual movement that had him anticipating all manner of future delights. Cutting her eyes to one side, she said, “I think I have business to attend to.”

Stephen smiled down at her. “Just don’t bite anyone,” he murmured. “Not yet.”

Her only answer was an impish grin as she turned to walk away.

He watched her go, her walk a newly predatory glide, and suspected poor Nash was in for a wild ride. Although, he reflected as he listened to their footsteps receding down the stairs, it was nothing to what a certain trio of freshies he knew could look forward to. With a few long strides, and a brief dip to retrieve the deed envelope from the door—he could messenger it to her in the morning—he reached the doorway, and clicked off the light, whistling as he went.
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Re: Camino del Monte Sol, ch. 14 (with OBTS) -- PG-13

Post by francis »

Oh!!! He offered Reza way more than I would have expected. The land and the option to become a vampire. This on top of her being angry and hurt, was quite the surprise for her and for me.
I really love the way Thea is handling the new gallery. She has a head for business, a great presence and the idea with the painting was a nice touch.
You really do a great job with the story. I could smell the fresh plaster of the gallery.
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Re: Camino del Monte Sol, ch. 14 (with OBTS) -- PG-13

Post by eris »

Uh-oh, a hot-headed vampire in the making. (I doubt it's the people downstairs that would be in danger so much as the one who had left bruises on Reza at an earlier date...)
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Re: Camino del Monte Sol, ch. 14 (with OBTS) -- PG-13

Post by cassysj »

Oh my that is quite an offer he gave to Reza. I'm with eris that is one hot-headed vampire in the making. Great story.
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Re: Camino del Monte Sol, ch. 14 (with OBTS) -- PG-13

Post by librarian_7 »

Oh, thanks...the story's not quite done yet.

And, I've gotta say...I'm thinking about a sequel.

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Re: Camino del Monte Sol, ch. 14 (with OBTS) -- PG-13

Post by allegrita »

Oooh... that's not what I was expecting, but I like it. :teeth: I think Reza could give Lola a run for the money in a few hundred years... :brow: assuming, of course, that she makes it that long! Because she would most certainly be a hotheaded vamp. I can see her leading Stephen a merry dance! :laugh:
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Re: Camino del Monte Sol, ch. 14 (with OBTS) -- PG-13

Post by jen »

Reza always displayed instincts that would transition well. The seeds of the predator are very present in her nature, How she handles this taste of immortality should be telling.

She will need to temper her instincts a bit, and I don't know if she yet possesses the wisdom or control. Will she be impowered to settle old scores or can she wait. A vampire can afford to be patient, after all.
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Re: Camino del Monte Sol, ch. 14 (with OBTS) -- PG-13

Post by NightAir »

Nash won't know what hit him. His attitude toward vampires may need an adjustment after tonight. :snicker:
librarian_7 wrote:And, I've gotta say...I'm thinking about a sequel.
:teeth: I like that idea.
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Re: Camino del Monte Sol, ch. 14 (with OBTS) -- PG-13

Post by jen »

A sequel seems like a fine idea, especially as there will still be issues from events set in motion decades before in play in the present.

I'm betting that the painting of The Three Graces is hanging in a prominent location in L.A., though not many may get to view it.
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Re: Camino del Monte Sol, ch. 14 (with OBTS) -- PG-13

Post by librarian_7 »

Well, you might be surprised where Nash's nude painting of the Three Graces ended up...and when I get a chance to scan a copy, I'll reveal the location, I promise.

Glad you like the idea of a sequel, NightAir. No idea when it'll come to pass, but I do have ideas in that direction. So it's on my to-do list.

And jen and Alle, yes, I do think if Reza chooses to be turned, Stephen is not going to worry about being bored for some time! It may not be a great love, but it's a wild ride, that's for sure.

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Re: Camino del Monte Sol, ch. 14 (with OBTS) -- PG-13

Post by LadyAilith »

A sequel would be lovely Lucky!

The idea of Reza as a vampire is an intriguing one. I think she'd make a kick ass vamp. She's got the predatory vibe down pat and only needs the fangs to go with. And I think Nash isn't gonna no what hit him!

Thanks so much Lucky! :hearts:
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Re: Camino del Monte Sol, ch. 14 (with OBTS) -- PG-13

Post by francis »

Hmmm, was Reza before or after Jean Harlow? :winky:
I like the idea of a sequel very much. Actually, you could just write a biography of Josef. There might be some days that were too boring to depict, but all in all it would be a lot of ground to cover. :snicker:
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Re: Camino del Monte Sol, ch. 14 (with OBTS) -- PG-13

Post by darkstarrising »

Love the little historic bits you throw into this story- the history of the champagne glass as only Stephen could tell it. He might have been trying to distract Thea with a bit of fiction, but with Stephen, who knows?

Somehow, I think Stephen sees a little of himself in Reza and her potential as a tremendous vampire under his tutelage. But there's something else about her as well, something that draws him to her. Maybe it's her passion or maybe something else, but his offer to turn her speaks volumes for how he feels about her.

Add me to the list who would love to see a a sequel. :rose:
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