Vampire Innocent | Book 12 | Ancient Vampire Death Cults & Other Annoyances

by Cox, Matthew S.

  Burning boot guy dances around in a circle, stomping.

  I spring up and bite the dude in front of me on the wrist. The pain of vampire fangs causes his hand to reflexively open, dropping the gun. I don’t have a chance to grab for it before burning boot dude shows me his claws—at least the ones on his left hand, which still work. Straight down my back. Ouch to the power of twenty. Worse than having burning oil dumped on me. Not quite as painful as being tied to a chair and forced to stay at a KISS concert. Unfortunately for his friend, such pain makes me clench my jaw. The little bone in his arm shatters in my teeth.

  This, predictably, upsets the guy.

  He grabs the back of my neck. Hell no. I rake claws at his gut, mostly in hopes he backs off before breaking my spine. Blood sprays over my head, but it works—he lets go and jumps back. Smoking boot dude catches me across the chest, slashing from my left shoulder to the base of my ribs on the other side.

  I don’t care how big, bad, and tough a vampire you are. Claws freakin’ sting.

  Screaming happens.

  At least I’m not the only one. I’m screaming in pain. The dude whose hand I almost bit off is screaming in pain. Holden is screaming in pain. We’re like a choir from a Hellraiser movie. Smoky boot swipes at me a few more times, trying to literally rip my face off. I manage to duck and dart around, avoiding the worst of it. He only lands a few superficial slices to my back and sides before opportunity knocks and he’s wide open for a flight-assisted kick.

  Sure, I’m presently barefoot, but hammering a heel bone into an eye socket at vampiric levels of strength is still quite effective. The whole front of the dude’s face smashes inward like a hard-boiled egg dropped on tile floor. I spin out of the maneuver to hover in a standing pose a few inches off the ground, staring at bit-hand guy.

  Like a scene straight out of a Tarantino-directed neo western movie, we both eye the dropped guns in the flattened path of vegetation between the road and the burning Caddy. Screw it. I dive at the one nearest me. He might not have the power of flight but he fakes it pretty well. As much as I’d love to claim victory and sound all cool, dude legit gets to the gun faster than me and fires first. He is, however, using his left hand and the tracer round makes it way obvious he missed.

  I miss as well.

  We both fire a second shot at the same time. He misses again, though I felt the warmth go past my right ear. My second shot hits him directly under the nose; the back of his head blows out. Roughly a two-inch wide section of teeth from his upper jaw are now inside his brain. Ooh… that hurts just looking at it.

  The gun falls from his limp hand. He teeters over backward and lands in the dirt.

  Whew. Holy crap. I’m alive. We won.

  Holden moans in agony.

  Okay, perhaps ‘winning’ here is relative.

  Hey, it’s kinda cold.

  I peer down—at my bare chest. Scraps of my blazer, shirt, and bra are all over the ground. From neck to waist, I look like a hamburger covered in fake grill marks, only they’re red lines.

  Sigh.

  “Dammit!” I stomp. “Again? Seriously?”

  It’s tits-up, luv, not tits-out, says Dalton’s voice in my mind. You okay?

  Mostly. Sore, but they’re all shallow slices. Worst ones are down the middle of my back.

  Aye. That’s where ya lost your kit.

  What kit?

  Kit means clothes.

  Brits are weird.

  He laughs.

  Hey, have you ever heard of Oblivare?

  Aye. Nasty lot. About as close to true monsters as vampires get. The heck are they doing here?

  Beats me. Should I be worried?

  Nah. They’re a little more potent than vampires made the usual way, but nothing to stain your knickers over. According to rumor, they ’ave a bunch of drawbacks of the mystical kind. More vulnerable to that sort of thing. Somethin’ to do with their souls not properly belonging to their body or some such bollocks. Ya believe in that?

  My kid sister has a teleporting kitten with occasionally glowing eyes. Let’s just say my mind is a lot more open than it used to be.

  Grumbling, I rest my hands on my hips and frown at the carnage around me. Yeah, possibly good info to know magical stuff works well on them. It doesn’t help me much. No way am I going to involve Sophia in vampire politics. Self-defense is one thing, but dragging her into a mess? No way.

  And grr. I really need to start packing a spare shirt in my purse… which I left at Wolent’s place.

  The night keeps on getting better.

  4

  A Smidge Beyond Bactine

  Looking around doesn’t improve my mood.

  Between gunfire, claws, and head-smashing, all the Oblivare’s shirts are bloody messes, on fire, or shredded. Both Oblivare I shot are burning. Smoking boot guy managed to extinguish his foot, but I tore his shirt to ribbons. The one I dive-bombed has brains and blood all over his T-shirt. Some might think a blood-soaked shirt is better than going topless, but either one is going to make people get in my way and require memory alteration. If both options are gonna demand mind powers, I’d just as soon not touch some other vampire’s blood and brains.

  During the fight, Holden appears to have freed himself from the now-fully-engulfed Cadillac. He’s dragged himself a relatively safe distance away up the channel of flattened bushes. Poor guy is somewhere between Deadpool and Freddy Kreuger. Most of his clothes are gone as well as all of his hair. A few smoking scraps remain of fabric. Tougher materials like his belt, underarm holster, and dress shoes survived; however, they’re kinda embedded in his skin like mushrooms on pizza—at least, where he still has skin and the muscle isn’t exposed.

  Okay, I’m not feeling so bad about some claw scratches. Got off easy, only losing my shirt.

  He pushes himself over onto his back, gives a wheeze, then shudders. Holden no longer even appears to be human at all. He’s legit turned into some kind of medieval ghoul.

  I crouch near him. “Please tell me burns aren’t permanent…”

  “They’re not… just hurt for a while.” He grimaces—I think. There really isn’t enough skin left on his face to read any expression. “I’ll be back to normal in a month.”

  “Uhh, how the heck did you get messed up so bad? Weren’t you fast enough to get out?”

  “Yeah.” He wheezes. “But the car ran me over after I jumped. Dragged me along. I can’t fly.”

  “Sorry…”

  He shakes his head, making the same squishy-crunchy sound as biting into fried chicken. The crispy kind. “Don’t be. I’m glad you got out. You probably wouldn’t have survived this. Do me a favor…”

  “I don’t have any Bactine in my purse. Don’t think they make a bottle big enough for this.”

  “Stop making me want to laugh.” He points a twisted ghoul-claw hand behind me. “Toss those sons of bitches on the fire.”

  “Umm… I don’t feel right deciding to kill them permanently.”

  Holden stares at me. A slight twitch suggests he might be trying to blink in astonishment. Alas, he no longer has eyelids. “I just watched you rip them apart like a wildcat, but you don’t want to kill them?”

  I gesture at them. “They’ll all get back up. This is kinda like playing paintball with better special effects and more pain.”

  “You aren’t deciding to kill them. I am. If you told Wolent they’re Oblivare, he’d order you to destroy them.” Holden spits to the side. “Political reasons my ass.”

  If my opinion matters, says Dalton’s voice in my thoughts, you should do it. They are in no way human. Merely stolen bodies full of dark forces. All the vampire stories where we’re portrayed as mindless savage monsters are from this lot.

  Dalton’s endorsement means way more than Holden’s say-so.

  “Okay. Fine… fine…” I trudge over and grab shot-foot guy. “Where’d the reliquary go? I don’t see it anywhere.”

  “Probably in the car,” rasps Holden.

&n
bsp; I stare at the inferno. “Yeah, well. It’s gonna stay there until that fire is out.”

  “Wolent’s people can get it from the police later. Not a problem.” Holden grunts, trying to sit up, but is in too much pain to do so. “Dammit. Hurry up and toss them on the fire. We need to leave the area before the cops show up.”

  Distant sirens tell me we’ve got maybe two minutes to get out of here.

  Within seconds of me tossing the first guy onto the burning car, bright purple energy briefly appears around the corpse and blows away on the wind. Not too long ago, I witnessed a vampire die permanent death right in front of me thanks to the sun. No weird purple energy. My remaining doubts as to the legitimacy of this Oblivare soul jar thing evaporate along with the energy.

  Claws help me pick up the three remaining ‘unconscious’ Oblivare. One after the next, I chuck them onto the Cadillac bonfire. Heat from getting close enough to throw them dries the blood on my chest into a sticky mess. Ugh. Claw wounds sting bad enough when fresh. The shower or bath I foresee in my imminent future is going to hurt.

  After collecting every recognizable piece of my jacket and shirt, I rush back to Holden, scoop him up in my arms, and fly. No, the clothing isn’t even close to wearable—except the sleeves—I don’t want the police finding women’s clothing and no body to match. Having to mind control a whole bunch of cops after they do some forensics magic to trace the clothes to me is a pain in the ass I’d rather avoid. Maybe I’m giving forensics too much credit, but it’s still better to cover my tracks. Hopefully, Mom’s old high heels in the car will burn beyond recognition. Drat. I should get her a replacement pair.

  Cars and trucks awash in brilliant flashing lights converge on the crash site. Police vehicles, fire crews, and at least two ambulances roll up. Little late for EMTs, but I suppose they’ll be on hand in case someone gets hurt cleaning up our mess.

  Sigh.

  I’m not sure if I should worry more that standing around topless doesn’t feel like a big deal, or killing four guys, evil vampires though they may be, bothers me about the same. Either one should be problematic, or at least make me feel awkward. Does this mean I’m changing or merely adapting to the demands of a new reality? Also, cradling a severely burned ghoul against my bare chest is a totally normal thing everyone does, right?

  Is killing a vampire permanently considered homicide or some other -icide? Bleh. Whatever.

  I need to get home before my parents start worrying.

  5

  Everything Will be Handled

  Flying while carrying a man is not fun.

  Like six months ago, I flew while Ashley hung on my back. She’s my size, noticeably smaller than a dude, and her weight made it impossible to maintain any dignity during landing. Holden might not be the biggest guy, but lugging him across the sky is exhausting. Also makes me feel like an overweight songbird struggling to stay aloft.

  In an effort to avoid face-planting the pavement in front of Wolent’s manor house, I decide to try a new approach. Instead of swooping down to land on my feet like any other time, I stop all forward motion and hover 150 feet or so in the air, then descend straight down like an elevator. See? This is the benefit of taking calculus. Landing in the normal fashion fails to consider the forward momentum imparted to the body in my arms (or on my back), which would push past my center of gravity, thus resulting in the aforementioned faceplant. By stalling all forward momentum in the air, I avoid looking like a drunken figure skater trying a triple backflip.

  “What the…?” mutters Aziz.

  Wolent’s big security guy has one of the most boring jobs in the world. He spends almost every night standing on the front porch watching the grounds. As far as I know, he doesn’t go anywhere unless ordered to. Hope the guy gets a night off here and there. However, he’s a damn effective deterrent. The man is simply massive. One of the reasons he likely contents himself to stay on the property is his size. His proportions are legit inhuman. People don’t have arms the size of an average man’s waist. Some of the other vamps call him the Moroccan Hulk. The name works. As far as I know, he actually is from Morocco originally.

  Despite his ridiculous bulk and menacing appearance, he’s generally soft-spoken and sweet.

  Everyone is super polite to him, too. Any man as big as him would intimidate people, but he also happens to be a Beast. No one wants to be the reason he goes off on a rage-fueled frenzy, but they wouldn’t be. Furies are the vampires who experience abnormal fits of anger at the smallest things. Beasts just go off sometimes without reason. Doesn’t matter how much someone annoys them, they’re not going to explode until that timer reaches zero.

  Though, Aziz did tell me how he manages the problem: meat.

  Go figure. Vampires with a strong affinity to animals can also consume raw meat. Maybe they have to and the uncontrollable rage comes from them not realizing it and only drinking blood? Who knows?

  Anyway, he steps out from under the porch, staring up at me as I sink down to the courtyard in front of the manor house like some kind of Valkyrie maiden bringing a fallen warrior back home. I’m quite a bit shorter and skinnier than them, and I don’t have wings, but it’s gotta look similar.

  Take a bunch of yarn strands and krazy-glue them in a crisscross pattern to your bare chest. Let it all dry, then rip all the yarn strands off at once. If you do that, you’ll understand what it feels like when Aziz takes Holden from me and his burnt body peels the semidry blood sludge from the claw gouges. It hurts so much, flashes of light dance in front of me.

  I may even black out on my feet for a moment. Seems like Holden vanished into thin air and Aziz is in front of me offering his black jacket. Seriously, like six of me could fit inside this thing. Well, I say ‘offering,’ but he’s not waiting for me to accept it, already in the process of wrapping it around me. Another security guy carries Holden into the house.

  “Are you okay, Miss Wright?” asks Aziz.

  “Mostly.” I snug the giant blazer around myself. “Thanks.”

  He nods, grinning. “You are most welcome.”

  “Sorry. I’m all bloody.” I fuss at the big jacket. “Gonna stain this.”

  “No worries, Miss Wright. I have a whole closet full of them.” He walks me to the door. “Mr. Wolent is waiting to talk to you.”

  Ugh. Great. This giant blazer doesn’t make me feel any less awkward about a meeting with the boss while topless and bloody. I’m sure he’s seen far worse, but it’s going to take me quite a few more years before becoming so jaded it won’t feel like doing something inappropriate to walk into his office looking like I just survived an air raid on a small village in Baghdad. It’s like disrespectful, embarrassing, rude, whatever, all rolled into one unpleasant emotion.

  Still, I’m being asked to meet him and he obviously knows the state I’m in. Ugh, whatever. Follows Rules Girl is too chicken to protest. I stand around in the giant foyer for a while, trying not to drip blood on the fancy marble floor tiles or blush too hard. Clicking coming down the curved staircase in the next room announces the arrival of Vanessa Prentice. Usually, when I see her, it’s at one of the routine soirees and Aurélie is standing next to me. There’s a teeny bit of jealousy there, about ninety-five percent coming from Vanessa’s side. Sparks always fly between them. Jennifer Ruiz, too, but she’s not as openly jealous as Vanessa.

  They both tend to treat me like the poor orphan waif some high society woman decided to adopt and ‘scrub up’ into being presentable. Wait, no… not quite. It’s not derisive condescension. They don’t object to me being there. It’s merely condescension with a bit of aww.

  At the moment, however, Vanessa shocks me. Her demeanor is entirely normal. No cattiness, no pity, nothing more than a bit of a ‘wow, you had a rough night’ eyebrow lift. Not sure how genuine she’s being, but I’m too tired to question.

  “Come, dear.” Vanessa stops at the bottom of the stairs, waving for me to follow her. “You can clean up and change before explaining what happen
ed.”

  I walk over. “Thanks.”

  Vanessa nods once, then leads me up to the second floor, down a long, lavish hallway to a bathroom bigger than my bedroom. “You don’t need to rush, but try not to take all night.”

  “Okay. Appreciate it. Thank you.”

  The tall, voluptuous redhead gives me the most genuine smile ever to appear on her face in my presence, then walks off. She’s clearly not jealous of me. Also, I couldn’t care less. Looks aren’t forev—wait.

  For us, they are.

  Soaking in a bathtub worth more than Mom’s GMC Yukon is a strange experience.

  The claw marks are still way too tender to enjoy the bath, so there’s no point trying to get comfortable. Pain slows down the process of cleaning up, but I manage to wash off the dirt, shredded bits of vegetation, and blood, then dry off in a reasonable amount of time. The ‘change of clothes’ part turns out to be a red dress Vanessa left hanging on the inside of the bathroom door. It’s probably hers, or at least made for a woman a little bigger than me. Not sure if she chose red to hide blood or because her closet is full of red dresses.

  By now, I’ve stopped bleeding even though some of the slashes look open. The dress hides most of them, except for a few right below my neck. The upper portion of the back is bare, but my hair is long and thick enough to cover the scratches. Yeah, I’m going to be staying inside for a few days or wearing turtlenecks.

  She didn’t bother leaving shoes, but I don’t care. I’m so used to Mom’s rule about no shoes in the house, it feels completely normal not wearing any while inside. I head downstairs to Wolent’s study-slash-office. He’s there, along with Vanessa and—ugh—Stefano Bianchi. Seeing him makes me tense up, but he’s not sneering, rather giving me more of an ‘oh, you’ look. He’s clearly not happy to see me, but active disdain appears to be turned off for now.