My Vampire Bromance

Chapter 4: A Murder on Campus

"Phillip? Phillip?!"

I picked up the phone to hear Jenna's voice on the other end of the line. My cell phone had been ringing off the hook more than halfway home from the college. I had thrown it into the back seat of the vehicle just so I could concentrate on driving. As soon as I closed my car door, I picked up my cell to twenty missed calls and Jenna's panicked tone.

"What's wrong, Jenna?" I asked.

"Oh, thank god you are okay!" She sounded exhausted and stressed.

"Why wouldn't I be okay?" I questioned. If I had picked up the phone on the freeway, there was a good chance that I wouldn't be.

Jenna let out a large puff of air into the phone speaker, "The university sent out an emergency alert. There's been a murder on campus! Someone was found dead on the northwest side. They didn't say whether it was a male or female." She breathed in deep, "I know you usually take that path. You got off so late tonight, and the weather was bad. I thought maybe you were the one the police found. When you didn't answer at first, I thought for sure you were dead!" Jenna's voice broke over the phone as she started to cry. Before I could console her, Clark took the phone.

"Glad to know you are alright, Phillip," he said curtly.

"Yeah," I replied.

"Jenna was going nuts with worry."

I bit my lip as I shuffled in through the front door, still soaked with rainwater, even after the forty-minute drive home from the university. "I was on the freeway," I said to Clark. "It would have been worse if I had picked up the phone and got into an accident."

"True," Clark said.

He sounded relieved, though he didn't say so. I was glad Jenna had him to calm her down. I don't know what she would do otherwise. Other than him, I was her only lifeline. If something happened to me, at least she had him.

"By the way, did you notice anything odd when you were walking back?"

"Odd?" I thought a moment, Victor crossing my mind. He was odd but didn't seem harmful. "Not really, no," I lied. "Why?"

"The university letter said they found the person around eight-thirty tonight. I know you got off work around seven-thirty. That's the whole reason why Jenna's been going nuts."

"Oh wow," I said, not knowing what else to say. "I guess I got lucky then."

I thought long and hard about Victor, the man who walked me back to my car. The man I'd been watching for months now. The women he walked out of the bar with never repeated.

Was it possible that he murdered them?

I mean, maybe? It could be a possibility based on all his allusions to find someone to eat as he walked me back to his car. But if that were the case, why didn't I end up dead?

No, it was merely a coincidence that he just happened to be on campus tonight. I counted myself lucky that he had walked me to my car. That I had made it home safe and alive.

Wait! What if he was the one they found dead?

My stomach filled with dread. There was literally no one else there with me on campus except him. I'd offered him a ride back to his car, and he'd refused. My heart dropped.

"Phillip? You okay, man?" Clark's voice called me back to the present.

I drew in a large breath, "Yeah. I'm alright. Tell Jenna everything's all good. There wasn't anybody there with me the whole time. If there was someone who got murdered, it definitely wasn't while I was there."