ramblin' gamblin' man

She wouldn’t have been entirely surprised if Bogart himself drifted out of the lounge. White tuxedo jacket, red flower tucked in his lapel. Lined fingers with their scarred knuckles wrapped around a dainty martini glass. Rick in his little bit of paradise in Casablanca. There was no piano though, no Sam tinkling away to play As Time Goes By. Nearly though.

Jo glanced up from the cards she held. Storm grey eyes swept the other players around the table before lighting on the dealer. Twitches here, a drop of sweat there. Easy tells for someone who had been watching people for as long as she had. Unlike the club or Campbell’s, both of which seemed to attract their fair share of the unusual in Mystic Falls, the High Stakes, as one of the other professors had called it when he’d bragged about his winnings, seemed utterly normal. In this town that made it an anathema. In her book tonight, it made it far easier to accumulate a stack of chips.

A small smile creased her lips as she met the croupier’s eye and tapped two fingers on the table. Deal. Jo placed two of her own on the green baize. Discard. She slid the two towards her, bit back any sort of reaction when a 6 and a 10 got her the straight she’d hoped for. Low, but it would hold its own if she was right and the bald guy to her left who was tossing a hundred bucks in didn’t have the hand he seemed to be bluffing over. He’d been the sweater, a single drop that had run down his temple becoming a growing odour of fear sweat. In trouble maybe, but she wasn’t about to lose a hand just to play Samaritan to someone she had no idea about. He wasn’t a friend, wasn’t even the son of a friend, scared and bolting into the shadows in a town where those shadows could quiet easily swallow you up.

Her throat went dry as she tossed in chips to match his bet. The man’s blue eyes widened, then his expression crumpled. It didn’t stop him from sliding his last remaining pile of chips into the centre of the table though. All in. Something she hadn’t expected to be again but when Magnus had needed her and real fear had been tearing at him in a way she’d seen written all over his face when he’d turned up at her door looking for help to find Lincoln Jo had known she couldn’t turn him down.

Expression serious, she slid into a stack to match the man’s. Her fingers held her cards just a little tighter, ready to set them down and take the pot. ”I’ll call. Straight.” The cards were set down on the table. She’d been right, he’d been bluffing. A pair of 8s would barely have been worth remaining in for.

The croupier nudged the pot towards Jo, gathered the cards back up. He was already pushing away from the table on shaky legs. Dark brows hitched as the croupier watched her go to stand too. ”I’ll sit this hand out, but I’ll be back,” Jo promised. She didn’t bother gathering up her chips. They’d be safe here. It seemed as though the owner ruled with an iron fist, no theft, no trouble, not if you knew what was good for you.

Pushing through the crowd, she tried to follow her bust opponent but by the time she was pushing through the knot at the door he was already gone. Jo clutched at the arm of the bouncer on the door. ”A guy came through here a second ago, did you see where he went?” The bowling ball sized head was swivelling when another member of staff slid up. This one was all smiles.

”Ma’am, if you’d like to take a seat again. I can bring you another drink. A Rob Roy was it?”

Jo stared at her. There was a flutter in the woman’s throat that had her frowning. She felt like she’d missed something here. Glancing over her shoulder, trying to look out the door, Jo felt that lurch in the pit of her stomach but the woman was already touching her arm encouragingly. ”Yes … please.” Gratitude that was only skin deep in Jo’s voice.

The trouble that plagued this town was none of her business but what had happened with Magnus’ son had left her a little rattled. More philanthropic than she had been in a long time perhaps. She should’ve just stayed in her seat. Her smile to the waitress was wan but she started back into the crowd, slipping into a seat as the dealer started to deal out another hand. Jo plucked a couple of chips from the pile, went to toss them in for the blind.

The game had changed though, the dealers swapping out some time in her absence, blackjack now not poker and a new figure in the seat to her left. ”Hector.” The name slipped out without hesitation. Not many did when she tried to dig back through the centuries. He had been persistent then, perhaps a little less sure of her and how fast she could get them to Jamaica now. ”In all the gin joints in all the world…” she drawled. ”You walked into this one. I’m beginning to get a feeling about this town. I hope the comment wasn’t about me?” One dark brow hitched, a smile tugging at her generous mouth as she pushed her chips into the centre of the table.

Tagged: HECTOR DACRE * Word Count: 931

Her father had always sworn that the road would lead her home. If she were to become detached from the caravan she should follow the road back. It would not be safe but Cambaluc and her family would be waiting there for her. She’d believed every word from his mouth, feeling that tug in her chest as she had fled from it and her step-mother after he’d ended up in a far too early grave. Had believed every word of it as she’d headed home years afterwards, the man she’d loved, her children and the life she’d built at what she’d believed was the end of that road left behind. A handful of years later she had set out on the road again and Jo had never imagined she would turn back. Death had to come eventually, even for her, did it?

Still as full as the scrap of life that was left in her as she’d been when she had sailed from England then, Jo had found herself turning back at the edge of the Pacific Ocean. Home wasn’t at the end of that road anymore but for what would probably be just a few short years it was supposed to be here.

Eyes as grey as the clouds themselves had fixed on the horizon she eventually planned to slip under … until they had fixed on him. Was home really a place if a single person could leave you feeling it so strongly that a fire was relit in your chest? It was a question philosophers and poets had probably tormented themselves with for centuries but Jo didn’t see herself as either. She was an explorer, in an age where there were few untouched spots were left to see. A woman out of her time, doing her best to try and fit into this one.

She could have created a scene at the door as the High Stakes’ staff tried to herd her back into her seat but that wouldn’t have been fitting in then. Jo had trailed back, sinking back into her seat and the game that so far had only served to allow her brain to wander in a way she’d been trying to avoid. The players weren’t cut throat enough to drive it all back – or they hadn’t been before she’d moved.

Jo studied Hector from the corner of her eye, amusement leaving her smiling as she’d tossed the Bogart line at him effortlessly. He certainly didn’t seem in the mood to play Ingrid Bergmann. Other players tossed chips into the pot, leaving her to peel just a single card from her hand to slide back towards the dealer in a discard this time. ”I’m glad to her it. Nobody likes to think they’re lacking.” She certainly hadn’t been once upon a time when he’d tried to charm her into joining his crew. Her refusal then had been taken well enough at least.

Dark brows furrowed, a little bolt of uncertainty hitting her like a lightning bolt to the gut as the waitress bustled in to set the glass down at her side. She’d been parted from Magnus for centuries when she’d met Hector. Had she mentioned something? Did he somehow know Magnus too? The world had proved to be scarily small in this town but surely it couldn’t have been that small. She took a gulp of her Rob Roy to ease the unexpected tightness, protectiveness, that fixed in her throat. When Jo set it down she tipped her head slightly towards Hector and chuckled. ”I’m not sure anybody’s in need of a babysitter … except perhaps you. Do you need a hand with that?” Another nod in the direction of his hand as the dealer slipped a card in her direction.

Peeling it up off of the baize, Jo juggled her cards. Four clubs now, a pair of Queens. Which way did she take a chance? Her fingers tapped her cards lightly as she half eyed him over them. ”Is that who you’re in town for? Lincoln, or … Magnus?” Questions that revealed her own knowledge but perhaps there was no reason to worry about parts of her life colliding here. Mystic Falls did like to live up to its name after all.

Tagged: HECTOR DACRE * Word Count: 710

The saying was usually that duct tape and cockroaches would be the only things to survive the apocalypse. Jo had been around long enough to know that it was instead those who could adapt with the sudden changes in life who would instead remain. She counted herself amongst them, and the man beside her. Like herself and Magnus Hector seemed to have skated through the centuries since she had turned him down without a single mark upon him. Still full of charm, still ready to put his money where his mouth was, albeit on a slightly different stage now. Undoubtedly what they were had been a big bonus, but even if you were blessed with an eternal life it didn’t give you those instincts that would allow you to survive through it.

Thinking back to the man who had scurried away, Jo cast another quick glance over her shoulder. Some were snuffed out before their time, and some looked for what they believed was the oblivion death could bring. She swallowed, hoping that the boy Magnus had taken on as his own was not one of them. He had, it seemed, already become attached and having lost a family once, Jo did not want to see him suffer again.

Her lips curled at Hector as she looked back at him, tucking a lock of dark hair back behind her ear. No, he would not allow himself to appear to be lacking, just as she wouldn’t herself – unless circumstances shook the shields from her. The mental image of the back of Magnus’ car, his arms around her as the dual chills of shock and the rain radiated from her bones, slipped into her mind, leaving heat riding her cheekbones as she glanced at the man on the other side of Hector. ”It would seem as though we’re looking for bigger stakes,” she said lightly. Goading the other players into them more like.

Suddenly feeling as though she would lose her shirt, Jo checked her adjusted hand. Those storm grey eyes watched Hector slip his credit card from his pocket to hand over to the waitress. The last of the big spenders, although there wouldn’t be enough liquor behind the bar to get him drunk. The card set in front of her had Jo sighing. Too close. This hand was almost certainly a bust, not that it was going to stop her. With the two queens she divided them – splitting. Raising a dark brow at Hector, she smirked. ”Are you sure?” Jo looked pointedly back at the bar, then at the chips the man on Hector’s other side had pushed in at his urging.

Jo dragged a finger over the side of her glass, her eyes back on the motion around the table, the little line growing between her brows – although that was no comment on what she would do here. ”That was good of you, especially given the boy’s age. I’m sure Magnus appreciated it.” Her gaze rose from the cards to fix on the side of Hector’s face. She had heard bits and pieces of what had happened to the boy on the night Magnus had found her. His beginnings were difficult, a child almost totally abandoned by his parents, tossed like a piece of meat to the vampires when his boss had grown tired of him. ”Did Magnus tell you about how he found me?” A light question there. It wasn’t as though Hector had known of their connection that first time they had met. It had been centuries after she had believed Magnus had died, although he had been carried in her heart, along with Kaegan and her children.

The faint expression of concern that had been on Jo’s face melted away as the game grew closer to her. She eased back in her seat, sipped from her glass as the man who’d been goaded by Hector busted, half smiled as Hector crept close with his own cards. Close. As the cards came her way, Jo leaned in to the table, looking as though butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth. Her unpainted nails tapped on both of her queens. ”Hit.” An ace on the queen of spades, a six on the queen of hearts. Closer. She hummed lighter, letting her eyes slide sideways to Hector before she tapped on the queen of hearts again. A card flipped over in front of her, a four. To go again would be foolish. Her eyes were on the dealer’s cards now before she decided. ”Stay.” There was a tension in her body now. ”So you and Magnus are old friends? Comrades?” A story she could get out of Magnus herself, but seeing someone through another’s eyes was a different matter. After Philippa had died, after he had been turned, Magnus had lived dozens of other lifetimes.

Tagged: HECTOR DACRE * Word Count: 805

Confidence, ill placed, perhaps, on occasion, could get you everywhere. It wasn’t a guarantee of success, but when you could hold your head up and lie without a flicker, when you could make it appear as though your legs were not shaking with fear, people were likely to fold to you will. That confidence had carried her across half of Asia and Europe before it had run out in the castle that had kept her grandparents apart as surely as the Great Khan had. There Jo had found it failing her. All that she had believed could happen disappearing like dew in the morning sun, evaporating in an instant. Ananda had been the one to drag her out of there, he had known she would recover eventually and after a few blips in those first few days working in the royal kitchens, she had.

Between them Magnus and Kaegan had been enough to make that slightly cowed teenager puff up again. Theirs hadn’t been the affections of the boys in Cambaluc, they hadn’t wanted the advantage that marriage to the daughter of Jullian Bai would bring, or the blushing stuttering hormonal rush of boys caught on the edge of manhood. It felt ridiculous to compare the times, the world was not the same now as it had been then when war would break out on a nation wide scale every few years. Then manhood came early and it hardened you in ways that the teenagers she taught now wouldn’t understand.

Scar tissue over bones that took a force of nature to shatter. It made you almost invincible.

It was something the man to their side wouldn’t understand. He just saw the confidence exuded from those beside him and thought himself capable of playing on their level. Jo’s smile was softer than the tight one that was on Hector’s face. She may have been full of confidence but back then it hadn’t left her any less blind than this man was.

Confidence and a desire to protect a friend had left her in the hands of the same predator who had already sunk her fangs into that friend in more than one way. She had been so sure she could somehow talk the queen into letting Magnus go. Jo almost laughed out loud now at the confidence that rolled from Hector. She made a small sound of amusement in her throat, she would have no more effect on Hector than she had on Philippa. ”You know they say pride always come before a fall,” she tossed lightly at him. And didn’t she know it. Her attempt at intercession had cost her decades with her children and Kaegan, regrets would not bring them back though. In the end you just had to pick yourself up from that fall and keep moving.

There were many lessons like that ahead of Lincoln. He had but just a year as they were. In time he would see there was more to it than the hunger, opportunities he might not have had if Magnus had merely been able to feed him blood and bring him back to life as he was. The mother in her still felt for the child, as she knew the father in Magnus – denied to him in the end by Philippa’s actions – did. ”Like a foal growing into their legs,” Jo murmured softly. ”At least he has some decent influences in his life to help him do so.” Well, the jury was still out on the club, but the man in charge himself, that she was a little more sure of.

Jo studied him until his gaze ticked to meet hers and then looked away as he did. Magnus had not revealed everything though. She drew on her upper lip for a moment before the smile was back. ”I crashed my car in the woods on a rainy night. It seems like a regular occurrence here, but instead of the sheriff’s people finding me, I got a white knight.” No horse though. No ringing hoofbeats to have her heart leap into her chest the way it would when Kaegan would return after a few days away, or the creak of the door as Magnus would return from months with the King. The purr of the car, the rumble of a voice and home had felt closer than it had in centuries.

This town wasn’t quite home yet, but it had always been the people more than the four walls, and they were growing by the week. A dark brow winged as Hector goaded the man beside her in the wake of her turn. ”A teachable moment at a card table? Who would’ve thought.” This wasn’t a game of beating the other players, although there was some satisfaction to the fact that the human was failing miserably. It would be down to the dealer’s cards now to see if she and Hector walked away with the pot.

Dark hair slid over Jo’s shoulder as she tilted her head. Her eyes were on the dealer and the cards that were flipping through those clever fingers, but she heard Hector’s answer to her question. ”Old covers a lot of ground,” she murmured low. Shaking her head, she pushed her hair back, those grey eyes ticking to him for a moment. ”I lost touch with him for a long time.” If that was a big enough word to cover almost seven hundred years. ”I was still a blushing maiden when I first met Magnus. He and my husband welcomed me to the area, we were close until things changed. We didn’t see one another again until he found me here.” For hundreds of years their paths hadn’t crossed.

The dealer flipped cards – a nine, a five, just enough to tempt them to hit again, an eight – bust!. Johanna’s grin was bright, the clink of chips satisfying enough. She lifted her glass and drained what remained. ”It looks as though our luck has held.” She knew better than to test hers though. This would be her last hand. If just to satisfy her own worries, she would head out, check on the man she had seen practically ejected.

Tagged: HECTOR DACRE * Word Count: 1031