Lee tackled him from behind.
Lee wasn’t a runner, not like me. I had wolf in my blood, and he had seal. But seals are master ambushers. He’d been waiting for the chance, and I slowed down the sniper enough to give him his opening. He knocked the sniper to the ground and held him there. They writhed, the gunman struggling to escape and Lee struggling to stay on top of him, digging his elbow into the man’s back, pinning him with his legs. Lee’s teeth were bared, and they may have been a little more pointy than normal.
I grabbed the rifle, threw it, and kicked the handgun away. The guy wasn’t even screaming. Up close, I saw details: he wore black commando gear, close-fitting fatigues, utility belt, leather gloves, combat boots, even a full-face stocking cap, and black paint shaded the skin around his eyes. Hard-core.
“Let him up,” Anastasia commanded. She stood before us, at the sniper’s head, in perfect position to stomp one of her heels through his skull. Not a hair or fold of clothing ruffled, she didn’t look like she’d been climbing trees.
Lee growled, a gruff noise between a bark and a sigh, and the vampire said, “Let go. I’ll handle this.”
Lee leaned away from the sniper, who jumped to his feet as soon as the pressure was off him. The guy was patting down pockets like he was searching for something he’d misplaced—the first sign of panic he’d shown. Maybe he had stakes or crosses stashed somewhere.
Anastasia didn’t give him time. She grabbed his neck with a hand, fingers bent like claws, stepped around him like they were part of some strange tango. He clutched her arm and screamed, a noise of gruff, primal fear. From behind now, she wrapped her arm around his face and snapped. It all happened in a second. He crumpled in her arms.
I looked away. Lee was panting, crouched on the ground, head bent. His skin had taken on a sickly, grayish tone. Blood draining in fear—or near to shifting?
“Lee?” I murmured.
“I’m okay,” he said, his voice rough. He pulled himself back from the edge. His breathing slowed, and his skin returned to its brown human tone.
Anastasia wasn’t breathing at all. She knelt, the sniper still in her arms, holding his body close, his head cradled on her shoulder. I took a deep breath, collecting scents, gathering information. The sniper—he was still warm. He hadn’t started cooling in death—because his heart was still beating. Anastasia had broken his neck without killing him. She’d known exactly what she was doing.
If I’d had the chance, I probably would have just beaten the guy’s head in or ripped his throat out, depending on how far I was gone. Anastasia’s calculating action left a chill in my gut. I didn’t want to have to look in his eyes and see the knowledge of his impending death. I was a coward. I just wanted a normal life, and this was more proof that I wasn’t cut out for a life so red in tooth and claw.
She was murmuring to him, in mocking seductive tones. “Hush there, darling. You played the game and lost. That’s all. You’ll be able to sleep soon enough, so relax.”
The sniper’s body was limp, still. But his eyes were wide, shining, unblinking. Terrified. I gagged on the lump in my throat.
Gently, careful to keep his head and neck still, to keep him alive for the next few moments at least, she peeled off the knit mask, sliding it up his face, then letting it fall off the top of his head.
“Oh my God,” I said, stepping back, hand over my mouth.
It was Ron Valenti. One of the producers of this horror show.
chapter 16
He’d covered his clothing with pine sap to mask his scent. Until we were nearly under him, he didn’t even smell like a person, much less one we knew. If I’d caught his scent moving back and forth earlier, it was because he’d been here all week.
Anastasia took the news without a reaction. She stroked his hair, crooning at him like he was a babe in arms.
Lee snarled, which almost sounded like the hiss and bark of an attacking seal. He started toward the prone figure, but Anastasia turned a sharp, commanding glance to him, and I dared to put a hand on his shoulder. His muscles were hard, like wood.
“So nice to see you again, Mr. Valenti,” Anastasia murmured. “But I must say, Armani suits you better than this look.” Her voice was honey and razors at the same time. A hundred clichés about vampires had their origin in a scene like this.
Valenti groaned, his pain and despair clear.
Anastasia shushed him again, low and purring. “I assume your friend Provost is part of this. Who else? Our dear Mr. Cabe? Was the entire company involved? Did you bring in other hunters? Sell tickets for the chance to bag the prize of a lifetime?”
Valenti’s voice came out a whisper. I could barely hear it. He was struggling to breathe. “No… no… no one… else. No…” Tears leaked from his eyes.
“How many more are out here, Mr. Valenti? How many more are waiting to kill us?”
He tried to swallow. Failed, and a line of saliva spilled out of his mouth. He was dying. I could hear his heart fluttering with effort.
Every breath was a failed gasp. “Two… two…” He answered, because no one denied Anastasia.
“Do they have help from the inside? One of the residents? Odysseus Grant, perhaps?”
“Now wait a minute,” I said, and the vampire threw me that look. I clenched my jaw.
Valenti actually chuckled, or tried to, but he wheezed, then choked, probably on spit pulled into his lungs. He coughed, which made the choking worse. Now he wasn’t breathing at all. Terror pulled his whole face taut; his eyes gleamed.
“Shh, shh there.” Anastasia touched his cheek, murmured comforts, but she couldn’t stop the inevitable. She shifted his body, bent over his neck. Valenti was whining now, a high note of desperation. He had to know what was coming. He probably hadn’t seen himself going this way.
Fangs bared, Anastasia bit into him.
I closed my eyes. Lee made a noise of denial and turned away. The light of the moon shone. Long, straight shadows of pine trees fell over us. The lodge, dark except for the candles and flashlights in the front room, hunched like the cottage in a fairy tale. And somewhere out there, two more just like Valenti were waiting to strike.
Valenti had stopped crying. Anastasia’s quiet swallowing was the only sound. When vampires feed solely for sustenance, they don’t need to kill their victims. A few swallows of blood sustain them, and the victim is none the worse for wear. Anastasia drained Valenti. It took a lot longer than drinking a few swallows.
When she dropped the body, I turned to look. Now he was dead, cooling quickly. His skin was white, ghostly. He wasn’t just dead, but a husk. On the other hand, Anastasia glowed, flush and strong. She straightened, and behind closed lips her tongue ran over her teeth.
Lee said, “He’s not going to come back, is he? He’s not going to turn into… into one of you.”
“No,” she said, the repulsed look on her face telling exactly what she thought of that idea. She glanced at me, scowl still locked in place. I had been staring at her. I couldn’t stop. I would never be able to turn my back to this woman again.
The air smelled sharply of blood; it hadn’t before. I wanted to get away from the odor. “We should get inside,” I said lamely.
“Help me with him,” she said, pulling on the body’s arm.
I paused, then said, “What?”
“His friends are out there, and we’re not leaving him here for them to find. Kitty, get his weapons.”
“But—” I stopped. What could I say? I wanted to get out of here so badly. My senses were on trip wires, turned out to the trees, the clearing in front of the lodge, the wide-open sky and silvery light of the thin, waning moon. Provost and Cabe were out there, probably armed just like Valenti.
Lee went to take charge of the other arm. Together, they hauled the body upright, its arms over their shoulders. The head flopped. I found the handgun, then the rifle, lying where I’d tossed them away, and followed them back to the lodge, looking over my shoulders for whoever else was ou
t there.
They entered the front door, and I followed, closing and locking the door behind me, just as Tina screamed, a short burst of shock.
“Oh, my God,” Jeffrey said at the same time.
Anastasia dropped the body in a heap, startling Lee into dropping his half, leaving it in a lopsided heap on the floor. Not very delicate.
There was a sound of retching—Conrad, it seemed, had rejoined the group just in time to see this presentation. He’d turned away, both hands covering his mouth.
“Is that—” Gemma started the question. Didn’t have to finish.
“Now we know it’s an inside job,” Anastasia said, with false brightness. “Sorry I couldn’t save you any, dear. You’ll get the next.”
“I think I’ve lost my appetite,” Gemma said, grimacing.
Conrad had turned back around and looked as bloodless as the corpse. “Do you mean… does that mean… you didn’t… oh, my God!” He stumbled away from Anastasia, even though he was already across the room from her. Couldn’t say I blamed him, but it was still pathetic. Anastasia just rolled her eyes at him. She knelt and started patting down the body, searching all those pockets and pouches.
Odysseus Grant was the only one to regard the corpse without horror. Instead, he wore the pursed lips and creased brow of concentration.
“Can you shed any light on this?” Anastasia asked him, the pointed lilt to her voice even more pronounced.
He said, “Only that it confirms what we already suspected. Though I’m almost impressed. I had assumed they set this up on behalf of someone else. But it’s all them.”
Anastasia collected a pile of odds and ends from Valenti’s person: a box of bullets, a rolled-up wire, a vial of clear liquid—Anastasia put this quickly away from her—and a walkie-talkie the size of a cell phone, turned off.
“Where’s Ariel?” I said to Tina.
“We put her with Dorian.”
I nodded. Wiped my eyes before the stinging got too bad.
“What do we do now?” Jeffrey said.
A horror movie was well under way, and I wanted it over and done with. But no end was in sight. They’d get us all if we didn’t do something. Other than run screaming into the night, at least.
I regarded the group gathered around the crumpled body of Ron Valenti. “The show was a trap. That’s clear. But they’re not just hunting us to kill us. They could have just blown up the house, or fired at us all when we went outside. This is a game. A challenge. They’re setting traps, a different one for each of us. I think they’re going to draw this out, killing us one at a time, because they think we can’t get away. And they think we won’t fight back. But this is a war now. When the others figure out what happened to him, they’ll hit us hard.”
“So what are we going to do?” Tina said.
“I’m getting out of here,” Conrad said. The look on his face was a bit—if I had to put a word to it—feral. Wide eyes, tight jaw, teeth nearly bared. Grant raised an inquiring brow. The rest of us were dumbstruck and silent. “I’m not putting up with this anymore. I’m out of here.”
He grabbed a flashlight and headed for the door. I blocked him. “Are you crazy?”
He shook his head and smiled, but the expression was wild, trembling with terror. He was acting out of panic and desperation. Always a bad idea.
“No. Getting away from here is going to save me. You—you all are monsters. Those maniacs—they’re hunting monsters. That’s the whole point, isn’t it? I shouldn’t even be here. They won’t go after me, don’t you see? I’m just collateral damage. An accident. You all are the real targets. So the farther away from you I get, the better off I’ll be.”
I blocked the door with my arm, keeping him from reaching for the knob. “You want to talk about stories? You know what happens to the guy who runs out into the woods all by himself, don’t you? We’re safer together, Conrad.”
His frown became a snarl. “Being together hasn’t been safe so far, has it?”
“You don’t know that they won’t go after you, too. They’ve already proven they don’t want witnesses,” I said.
“I’ll take my chances. Look, I’ve got my phone. I’ll hike to someplace where there’s a signal and call for help. Let me go.” He raised the flashlight like he was going to use it as a weapon. Maybe he expected me to flinch back. To feel threatened by his panicked little body.
I didn’t twitch a muscle. Stared him down like the monster I was. Between the two of us, I was the dominant one. I didn’t even have to work for it. He cringed, and his eyes went wide, as if some primal part of his brain understood the exchange of body language. He understood that I wasn’t going to let him past—but he didn’t understand why he couldn’t just barge through.
Anastasia touched my shoulder. I turned, drawing away from the door—and Conrad took his chance to swing it open and scramble out.
I called, “Hey—” But Anastasia held me back. And she was right—I really shouldn’t go racing outside with snipers around. But Conrad was gone, into the wilderness, alone.
I turned on the vampire. “What—”
“We’re better off not having to babysit him,” she said.
“Well, that’s damned cold.”
Her lip curled. “You pack animals, always trying to take care of the children.”
“Fuck you.”
She turned on me, dark eyes shining, lips in a thin frown. This time, I had to work to keep my spine straight and not look away.
“We need information,” Grant said, a calculated interruption.
“Too bad our only lead is dead,” Lee said, nodding at the corpse.
Grant regarded the body a moment and seemed to come to a decision. “I need space. Move these chairs out of the way. Tina, there’s a bag in my room. Like a briefcase, black, locked. Can you bring it to me? Don’t look in it, just bring it.”
She seemed like she was going to argue. Lips pursed, she hesitated. But Grant didn’t acknowledge her and wasn’t open to argument. She went upstairs. By the time she returned with the bag, we’d pushed back the chairs and coffee table, giving us a large space in the living room.
“Anastasia, help me with him.” He went to Valenti’s head and directed the vampire to his feet. Amazingly, she didn’t argue but did as he asked. They arranged Valenti on the hardwood floor in the center of the space. Anastasia quickly backed out of the way.
“Grant, what are you doing?” I said.
“Just watch. Tina, Jeffrey, stay right there, inside the circle. Tell me everything you sense, everything you hear.” He took the bag from Tina, and she seemed all too happy to get rid of it—she’d been holding it by her fingertips.
Pausing a moment, Grant looked at each of us in turn. “Don’t say anything. No screams, no words, nothing. You won’t like this. But we need information.”
“What—” Tina started, but Grant silenced her with a single shake of his head.
“Do you have a better idea? Is his spirit forthcoming enough to talk to either one of you?” They shook their heads. Tina inched closer to Jeffrey and took hold of his hand. They stood shoulder to shoulder.
Grant got to work.
He pulled out a red votive candle, set it by Valenti’s head, and lit it, bathing the body in gold light, giving it a false semblance of life. The dead eyes stared. Next he took a piece of chalk from the bag and drew a circle, starting at Valenti’s head and moving clockwise. The chalk circle encompassed the body and about five feet all around it. He enclosed Jeffrey and Tina within the circle, as well.
Next he sprinkled some powder over the candle, and a sharp smell, burning sage, drifted out. My nose itched, and I sneezed. I tried to hold it back. But it didn’t seem to interrupt the proceedings.
Chalk in hand, Grant drew symbols—at the body’s head, feet, left and right hands. This was ceremonial magic. I knew the signs, had seen similar rituals—a circle often meant protection or a barrier. Symbols, light, incense. I had a very bad feeling about this. I
was standing at the wall; I couldn’t back up any farther.
The last item Grant drew from his bag was a round mirror. This he set on the floor by the candle. Light from the candle reflected off it, a spot of brightness.
Grant knelt by Valenti’s head and said, “Ronald Valenti. I need to speak with you.” A few moments passed, a few quickly thudding heartbeats. “Valenti. Hear me. You’ve been a very bad man, but here’s your chance to do something right. Speak to me, Ronald Valenti.”
Grant was right. I didn’t like this. But I didn’t interrupt.
The mirror fogged over. The light dimmed.
“Tell me what I need to know,” Grant said in a whisper.
The body’s eyes blinked.
Jeffrey drew a sharp breath. “It’s back. His aura’s back,” he whispered.
“What color?” Grant said.
“Dark. Muddy.”
“Ronald Valenti,” Grant hissed at the body. “Who else is working with you? Where are they? What is your plan? Show me in the mirror.” The magician looked at the fogged mirror. I couldn’t tell what he saw in it, if anything.
The body blinked but otherwise didn’t move at all. If it had started speaking, I probably would have run. Grant must have seen something, because he studied the mirror, jaw set.
Then his gaze shifted back to the body. “Just one more thing. Why? Why do this?”
Again, I couldn’t see what the mirror showed, but Grant seemed to be fascinated by what he saw in it.
Grant didn’t ask anything else. When he was satisfied, he put his hand over the corpse’s face, closing the eyes. “Ronald Valenti, I’m finished with you. Rest now. Depart this place. Finish your journey onward. And may you rot in a fitting hell.”
A breath sighed through the room, as if a window had blown open, and the candle went out, all on its own. Tina gasped—she and Jeffrey were holding each other tightly now.
Kitty's House of Horrors Page 17