I wiped some tears from my eyes. "Yeah, I just got the name...Adams."
His expression shifted to blankness. "Yeah?"
"Your family name is Adams." I started laughing again.
He was looking at me like maybe he should have packed a straightjacket, and I laughed even harder. I pointed back at the sign. "The Addams Family."
He sighed and shook his head at me as I kept right on laughing. "Oh yeah...this should be interesting," he muttered.
My laughter died down as the bumpy road opened out into a parking area as large as the lot of our local grocery store. He pulled right up to the front of the house, next to a sports car of European design, a black luxury sedan, a simple two-door coupe, and an oversized 4x4 truck. I could only stare in awe, mixed with a trace of horror, at his parents' home. It was massive. It was impressive. It was as close to a castle as modern vampires in California could get.
The ranch was a couple miles from the base of Mount Diablo, nestled among the rolling foothills. Green trees dotted the valleys between the hills, and tan grass hugged each hill like a second skin. White wooden fences separated different areas of the pastures, and cows of various colors were standing or lying in the fields, enjoying the last minutes of daylight. The drive inclined to the top of one of the larger foothills and the main house sat atop it.
The house was an interesting mix of ancient and new. The upper half of the walls were white plaster and stucco, and the lower half looked like someone had painstakingly pressed individual river rocks of varying sizes right into the home, creating a perfect wall of stone. The roof was red Spanish tile and gleamed in the fading light of the setting sun. The ranch consisted of three buildings, forming a U-shape around what I would bet money on was the pool in the back. The center dwelling was a huge two-story building that was maybe twice the size of Teren's place. At the top of the home, in the center, the roof was raised, maybe twenty feet above the roof around it. There didn't appear to be anything up there, just an empty space, like a covered patio on top of the roof, but I swear, if these were medieval times, that was where the belfry would be.
Huge one hundred-year-old timber, stained in warm honey, supported a thirty foot overhang in front of the main doors, which were also in warm honeyed wood. The two buildings on either side were long and narrow with low, red roofs. The buildings were all connected by covered breezeways with graceful, open arches formed into the sides of the stucco walls. Spacious windows were placed everywhere along the home, the warm light from inside glowing in welcome to us, as if they were trying to calm my nerves along with Teren, who placed his hand upon mine on my lap.
"Ready?" he asked softly, with a smile on his lips.
"No." I shook my head at him and looked back at the intimidating house. "You said your family had a ranch, you didn't say they were the Rockefellers of ranching."
He laughed. "I wouldn't exactly go that far, but we do all right."
I sighed. "Should we honk or something? It probably takes ten minutes to get to the door."
He looked down and smiled. "No. They know I'm here." He leaned over to me and pointed to the front door. "My mom is pacing the entryway, waiting for us to stop talking out here and come in the house." He pointed over to a corner of the main house. "My grandmother is in there, finishing up dinner." He pointed down to what must be a basement level. "My great-grandmother is down there. She'll be up in a few minutes."
I stared at him with what had to be the blankest expression on my face. How could he possibly know all that?
Seeing my face, he explained. "We can all sense each other. Usually, it's just a vague feeling of 'he's in that direction', but the closer we get to each other, the more pronounced it is. While we're staying here, I'll know exactly where they are at all times."
I didn't even know what to say to that. "Just when I think you can't get any odder."
He laughed. "Yeah...inconvenient at times, too. It was impossible to sneak out as a kid, and don't think I didn't try."
I laughed with him, my nerves slightly calmed at hearing a childhood anecdote. It made him seem more like me. "What about your dad? Can you sense him?"
He shrugged. "No. He's pure human, like you, so I have no idea where he is. Knowing him though, he's probably near my mom. They're kind of inseparable."
I smiled and squeezed his hand. "Oh, that's so sweet. Still in love after so long together."
"Yeah, we vamps tend to...stick to what we like." Smiling, he leaned in to kiss my cheek. "We should go inside and say hi. My mom's about to come out here and get us."
I looked back at the door, slightly alarmed. "Oh, can you sense her...intentions?"
Laughing, he moved to open his door. "No, I just know my mom."
He opened his door while I stared at the behemoth of a home ahead of me. I felt like I was entranced by the massive, iron banded double doors looming before me. I couldn't stop staring. I couldn't get out of the car. I couldn't move. Teren's hand caressed my cheek and I started, looking up at him standing in front of my now open car door. His eyes were glowing slightly as the sky around us darkened; without the city lights to mask it, the glow was quite perceptible to me, and I felt myself relaxing into the white depths. I stood without realizing it and he took my hand and pulled me away from the car. Still staring into his eyes, in a trancelike state, I calmly followed him up the granite steps that led to the timbered overhang.
We passed some lights attached to the heavy wooden supports and his eyes returned to normal, their enchanting hold on me momentarily broken. I blinked and looked around at the massive covered entrance to the front doors. Heavy, wooden support beams showed through the underside. There were tiny lights wrapped around them, twinkling in the approaching darkness.
I stopped walking and looked over at Teren; he was eyeing me with a curious expression. I smacked his arm in irritation. "Don't do that to me."
He laughed and backed up a step. "I told you I couldn't turn it off, and it was calming you down, so I just let you feel mellow. Wouldn't you rather have it that way?"
I smacked his arm again. "No! It's designed to make your prey feel mellow." I pointed at myself. "I'm not prey. I don't want to mellowly walk into certain death!"
I clamped my hand over my mouth as I realized that we were only twenty feet or so from the front door-from his mother. His mother with the vampire-acute hearing. He laughed again and grabbed my hand, pulling me the rest of the way to the door.
He raised his hand to knock, but the doors swung inward before he even had a chance. A blurring flurry of arms and hair encircled him and I stepped away; a surge of fear sliced through me at the suddenness of the movement.
"Mom," he muttered, sounding very much like an average human guy embarrassed by his mother's over-the-top affections.
"Sorry. You've just been gone so long and...we worry."
His mother pulled away from him and I felt my mouth opening in surprise. I took another step away from them and tried to process what I was seeing. She was beautiful, but I had been expecting that-Teren was unbelievably attractive. She had long, black hair that, except for the two pieces in the front braided down the back, flowed around her with a life of its own. Her eyes were the same pale shade of blue as her son's and her skin had the olive tone of someone who didn't quite tan, but spent a lot of time outdoors. She wore deep blue jeans with a green and blue checked button-up shirt tucked into them. She looked very much the picture of a rancher's wife. That wasn't what had me gaping though. It was her face-her flawless, lineless, perfect face. She looked no older than Teren; she could have been his sister and not his mother.
I suppose it shouldn't have shocked me, given the fact that she was even less human than Teren, but it did. I was sure, as that perfect face turned to regard me, that I looked a lot like a deer caught in headlights. That thought did not thrill me, as I considered how appetizing that look probably was to her. I forced my mouth closed and jerked the corners of my lips up into a tight smile.
As she pulled away from Teren, an older man approached her from behind. Placing a hand upon her lower back, he reached his other out to Teren. "Hi, Dad," Teren said warmly as he clasped his hand and then gave him a swift hug.
Teren's dad surprised me too. He was a tall, middle-aged man with dark brown hair, speckled with gray, and intelligent brown eyes. He was attractive in a distinguished way, but he really looked nothing like Teren. It would seem that more than just vampirism was passed along by Teren's mother; Teren looked just like her. Teren's father pulled away from his son and joined his wife in studying me. He was still a big, strong-looking man with a sturdy frame and a mostly-still-fit body, although his stomach had a slight paunchiness to it. He wore faded jeans with a basic blue shirt tucked inside, and a belt buckle the size of my fist. He looked very much the role of a successful rancher.
The older man and his impossibly young looking wife, waited patiently for Teren, who slipped his arm around my waist and introduced me. "Mom, Dad...this is Emma Taylor. Emma, these are my parents, Jack and Alanna."
"Hello," I said quietly as they both looked at each other for a second. Then Alanna's arms were around me and she was hugging me tight. She was cool to the touch and a shiver went down my spine. I worried, for just the slightest second, that she was inhaling me and imagining sinking her teeth into the exposed area of my neck. I instantly berated myself for pulling my hair up into a ponytail before we left. I quickly dismissed the concern though. If she was thinking that, I couldn't stop her, but I was pretty sure she wouldn't take it any further than a thought with her son standing right beside her, so, no point in worrying about it.
Alanna pulled back to gaze at me with that flawless, young face and her pale eyes danced with un-concealable merriment. "We're so happy to meet you, Emma," she gushed, as she clutched my upper arms. She swooshed a hand behind her at the open front doors. "Please come in and make yourself at home." I murmured a thank you and glanced at Teren; he was beaming at me. He nodded his head in encouragement, clapped his dad on the shoulder, and entered the house. His mother wrapped both of her arms around one of mine and ushered me into the house after them.
It was not the vampiric ranch house I'd been imagining. It was idyllically beautiful-classic, but modern. The large entryway was as big as Teren's living room and the focal point of the room was a marble statue of a nak*d woman in the center. Looking at it more closely, I could see it wasn't just a statue, it was a fountain, only the water was coming from the woman's eyes and flowing down her body to the basin she was standing in. It was breathtaking.
Alanna pulled me past it, and I gazed at the numerous paintings of Californian vistas on the walls. Most were rolling hills, or mountain ranges with cattle in the foreground, but the most impressive piece was on the far side of the magnificent statue. It was a huge painting, taking up almost the entire wall, depicting a glorious sunrise, or perhaps it was a sunset? Either way, there was a longing in the painting that pulled at my heartstrings.
We walked past the painting, following Teren and his father, Jack, as they talked animatedly over something. I thought I heard fishing and baseball, and figured his dad was probably pleased as punch to have a little testosterone back in his house overflowing with women....vampire women.