Not like this. This is the Vampire equivalent of dying on the toilet. Rain began to fall on the car wrapped around a tree. A woman was limp over the steering wheel and her forehead rested on the dashboard. The steering wheel wedged into her chest was painted crimson.

Clara's hands gripped the lower half of the wheel (sans airbag, you get what you pay for) and, with bloody tears and a roar, she pushed herself off to the chorus of a hundred different bones snapping. She settled into her seat and let herself heal as she cleaned her face. The watch on her wrist displayed: 2 AM. Friday April 13, 2018.

Clara healed her wounds enough to stand, changed to clean, dark clothes, and walked out onto the side of the highway. The next car decided how the night ended. Get tough. Doesn't matter who it is. Brady Bunch, police, some garbage coterie. Doesn't matter. Release the Beast and roll the dice.

A pair of headlights peaked out from the side of a hill along I-5 an eternity later. They started to slow down as the light caught Clara's figure and soon the outline of a truck drove off road onto the rocky dirt a few feet in front of her. Clara's hand opened and closed.

The engine cut off abruptly. Two shadowmen stepped out of the car and approached. Two heartbeats. One kept a flashlight kept trained on the Daeva's face. The other cradled a sawed-off shotgun. “Looking rough, Missy. Your John toss you out?” The one holding the flashlight called out with a belch as they got closer. Her focused eyes saw the other stranger had his thumb fidget the safety on the shotgun off, then on, off again, until finally deciding on safety on. Clara laughed darkly.

She loaded up two mangled bodies into her crashed car, moved a huge black steamer trunk onto the truck, and then poured what gas could be spared out of her jerrycan onto Dead Asshole and Probably Was A Douche. She then tossed a lit match into the driver's seat. The gas-drenched bodies made good kindling but smelled of Axe and cheap beer even as they burned. Clara hoped into the truck in men's clothes six sizes too big. The light rain turned into a heavy downpour when the truck's engine roared to life. Clara drove slow, hiccuped, and licked at the thick coat of blood running from her lips to her chest. Blood's telling me Dead Asshole died buzzed. She hiccuped again and muttered "excusez moi."

Fortune favors the bold, she thought with a smile before her mood darkened. All it takes is one bad night to end up ash. Need to seriously consider setting down roots.