Seize the Night: New Tales of Vampiric Terror Read Free

house’s first floor. They rarely ventured upstairs anymore. This meant that Ally would have free run of the entire second story. The evening of her arrival, after a dinner of hot dogs and potato salad, Ally climbed a steep flight of stairs to discover three bedrooms and a large bathroom awaiting her. She hesitated at the first doorway she came to . . . This one? Beyond the threshold was a canopied bed, a mahogany bureau and matching night table, a red-and-white rag rug to complement the red-and-white-striped curtains. Ally heard a creaking sound behind her, and when she turned, she saw her footprints in the dust on the floor—not just her footprints, but paw prints, too, a complicated skein of them trailing up and down the hallway. And then, in the shadows at the far end of the corridor, peering toward her—so big that Ally initially mistook it for a bear—she glimpsed an immense black dog. Ally felt a surge of heat pass through her body: anadrenaline dump. For an instant, she was so frightened that it was difficult to breathe. She could hear the dog audibly sniffing, taking in her scent. Without making a conscious decision to do so, Ally began to retreat, first one slow step, then another. When she reached the head of the stairs, she turned and scampered quickly back down to the first floor.
    Stan was still in the kitchen, wiping the counter with a sponge. He turned at her approach, greeted her with one of his cherub’s smiles.
    “There’s a dog upstairs,” Ally said.
    Stan nodded. “That would be Bo. I hope you’re not allergic?”
    “No. I was just . . . I didn’t realize there was a dog in the house.”
    “Ah, of course not—I should’ve introduced you. So sorry, my dear. Did he startle you?”
    Before Ally could answer, she sensed movement behind her, very close. Bo had followed her downstairs. He pressed his big head against Ally’s right buttock, sniffing again. Ally jumped, let out a yelp, and the dog scrambled backward, nearly losing his footing on the slippery kitchen tiles. Once more, Ally felt herself go hot—this time from embarrassment rather than terror. Up close, there was nothing at all frightening about the animal. Like his aged master and mistress, he was clearly tottering through his final stretch here on earth. His eyes had a gray sheen to them, and his joints seemed so stiff that even his massive size came across as a handicap. There was Great Dane in him, maybe some St. Bernard, too, but Ally’s original perception remained dominant: what Bo resembled most was an ailing, elderly black bear.
    “Blind and deaf,” Stan said. “If I had any mercy, I’d put him out to pasture. But he has such a good effect on Eleanor. It will be hard to lose him.”
    “He was here by himself? While you were in Boston?”
    Stan dismissed Ally’s concern with a flick of his hand. “Thedoctor comes twice a day when we’re gone. Lets him out. Makes sure he has food and water. Bo doesn’t require much more than that.”
    “The doctor?”
    “Eleanor’s physician. Dr. Thornton. You’ll meet him soon enough.”
    Eleanor’s voice came warbling toward them from the rear of the house, as if by speaking her name, Stan had summoned her: “Ed . . . ?”
    Stan reached out, patted Ally’s arm. “Duty calls.” He tossed the sponge into the sink, then turned and started from the room.
    “Eddie . . . ?”
    “Coming, love!”
    Ally clicked off the kitchen light, made her way back upstairs, the dog trailing closely behind her, panting from the effort of the climb. A quick tour of the three available bedrooms convinced Ally that there was nothing to distinguish one above the others, and so, after a trip to the bathroom (she peed, and when she flushed the toilet, it sounded like a malfunctioning jet engine, a high-pitched hydraulic shriek that seemed to shake the entire house), she returned to the first room she’d glimpsed, with its red-and-white curtains: it felt marginally more familiar. Bo