A Rush of Wings

by Adrian Phoenix

  A thought pressed against his shields, a thought belonging to Simone. He opened to her touch.

 

  Rising to his feet, Dante turned around and twisted on the sink’s cold water faucet. He looked into the mirror. In the twilight gloom, he recognized letters smeared across its surface.

  WAIT FOR ME. In black lipstick.

  Dante smiled and touched a finger to the message. Heather’s scent clung to him — lilac and sage — and he didn’t want to wash it away. Not yet. After splashing his face with cold water, he opened the bathroom door.

  Lucien waited for him, golden eyes glittering in the dusk. “Are you going after Ronin?”

  “None of your business,” Dante said, walking past him.

  Dante caught a glimpse of peripheral movement and sidestepped, too late. Lucien seized his shoulders, talons piercing his skin — the pain needle-sharp. He felt the warm trickle of blood down his back. He hissed, but Lucien refused to release him.

  “It is my business,” Lucien said, steel edging his voice. “It will always be my business. You are my son.”

  Dante stared at Lucien, stunned, mind reeling. His son? “Let go.”

  Lucien lifted his hands. Blood glistened on the tips of his talons. “I should’ve told you from the start —”

  “Yeah, but you didn’t,” Dante said, voice husky. “And now it’s too late.” He whirled and strode from the room.

  Dante sprinted down the stairs, muscles taut, heart pounding against his ribs. He struggled for air. He needed blood. He needed truth.

  Penance. Maybe everything he knew and everyone he loved would be stripped away until he paid what was owed.

  He found Simone in the front room, curled up on the sofa beside Von. Her eyes widened and the llygad straightened, brows knitted.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked, handing him the phone.

  Dante shook his head. Tried to calm his breathing. “Oui, chérie?” he said into the phone.

  “Wait for me,” Heather said. Static crackled across her voice. “I’ll be there soon.”

  Would she be stripped from him as well?

  “Don’t. I won’t be here,” he said. His thumb slid across the end button. The phone slipped from his hand, hitting the carpet with a muffled thud.

  In the sudden silence, Dante heard the whoosh of wings, then the ceiling creaked as Lucien perched on the roof. His father. Fallen.

  What are you afraid of, True Blood?

  Rage burned through Dante, poured white-hot through his veins. “Not you, Peeping Tom,” he whispered. “Not you.”

  28

  Convergence

  “Shit!” Heather stared at the cell phone in frustration. “Pigheaded…” She glanced at Collins. “We need to move it. Dante’s heading over there without us.”

  The car surged forward as Collins floored it. “Hope you’re right about the probable cause. If we take Jordan in for questioning, I don’t want him getting off on a technicality.”

  “My research placed Jordan at each kill site,” Heather said. “If we get a DNA sample from him, it’ll match the evidence in every single case.” She dropped the cell phone back into her purse.

  The fire that’d been smoldering within her since she’d awakened beside Dante had flared to life at the sound of his voice. Oui, chérie? She could almost smell him — warm, earthy, and inviting. But underneath Dante’s words, his voice had been strained. Migraine? she wondered. Or was it something else?

  It’s quiet when I’m with you. The noise stops.

  I’ll help you stop it forever.

  Heather knew qualified hypnotherapists in Seattle who might be able to coax Dante’s subconscious into relenting, and help ease his past up from dark depths without pain. She trailed a hand through her hair. With humans, yes. But nightkind? Nocturnal blood-fed predators? The psychology wouldn’t —couldn’t— be the same. She sighed.

  She looked at the briefcase on the seat beside her. Dante’s past. Everything he couldn’t or didn’t want to remember contained in a slim black briefcase. Dante’s past. He should see it first. The fist around her heart unclenched and she drew in an easy breath.

  After they’d dealt with Elroy Jordan, she’d give the briefcase to Dante, tell him what Stearns had said, and then stay with him as he delved into the contents.

  And if Dante was a monster?

  Heather glanced out the passenger’s side window, hands knotted in her lap. The road blurred past, black and endless. She remembered the taste of Dante’s lips, the desolation in his voice at the slaughterhouse. Remembered her promises.

  I won’t walk away from you.

  I’ll help you stop it forever.

  I’ll never bury evidence no matter how much it hurts.

  * * * *

  Stearns pissed into an empty orange juice bottle, his attention never wavering from the house Thomas Ronin had rented. When he’d finished, he screwed the lid back onto the bottle and set it carefully on the passenger’s side floor. He cracked his window for fresh air.

  The tidy house was a block up and on the opposite side of the street. Stearns had watched it since noon. He’d watched as a man in his midthirties with thinning brown hair left the house in a Jeep, returning an hour later in a white van with black-tinted UV-protected windows. Elroy Jordan. According to the printout he’d swiped from Prejean’s kitchen, Jordan was Wallace’s prime suspect for the CCK murders. He was also one of Moore’s projects.

  No sign of Thomas Ronin, but a sleek Camaro parked in the driveway suggested that the journalist was inside the house. Stearns still wasn’t sure where Ronin fit into the picture. An exclusive story deal? With a freaking serial killer?

  And why not? Stearns had witnessed and participated in stranger, darker things.

  Someone stepped out the front door. Jordan again, but something was spattered on his face and clothes. Hard to make out what in the deepening twilight. Then as Jordan tried several keys in the Camaro’s trunk, Stearns realized the spatter was blood.

  Whatever Jordan had going with the journalist seemed to have ended. In a messy but inevitable way. Playing with serial killers was pretty much like running with scissors; sooner or later you’re gonna get skewered.

  The trunk finally opened and Jordan rummaged around in its interior. After a moment, he straightened, then slammed the trunk lid down. He kicked the Camaro several times, then hammered one fist against the trunk.

  Through the cracked window, Stearns heard Jordan scream, “Fuck!”

  Stearns touched the Glock on the seat beside him. Doesn’t handle disappointment well. Jordan stomped up the drive to the front door, then stopped. He paced back and forth as though uncertain. Afraid to go back in? Stearns wondered. After a minute, Jordan stopped pacing, squared his shoulders, and marched inside the house.

  Glock in hand, Stearns slid out of the Buick LeSabre.

  * * * *

  Gifford drew on his cigarillo, savoring the dark, vanilla-spiced tobacco taste, his gaze locked on the Buick LeSabre parked on the opposite side of the street three blocks down. He blew smoke toward his cracked window.

  Stearns exited the LeSabre, his right arm down, his gun a black silhouette against his leg. He crossed the street, aimed for the house E had disappeared into. Gifford stubbed the half-smoked cigarillo out in the car’s ashtray. Without Wallace he couldn’t stage the murder-suicide gig, but he’d learned to improvise during his years with Johanna.

  Gathering up a paper-stuffed grocery bag, Gifford climbed out of his Taurus. He strolled along the sidewalk, “groceries” crooked in his left arm. He reached inside his jacket with his right, fingers grasping the .45’s grip.

  Let Stearns take down E. I’ll mop up what’s left.

  * * * *

  E thumped the heel of his hand against his forehead. Idiot! Shoulda waited. Where could the bloodsucker have hidden the shit? Not under his bed. Not in his closet. Not in his car.
>
  E walked toward the hall, heart pounding, knowing the goodies had to be in the house. Fucker’d been expecting Dante and woulda been ready for him. Striding down the hall, E paused by Tom-Tom’s door and glanced inside. Blood everywhere. Even on the ceiling. But the bed was empty.

  Heart hammering, E jumped past the doorway and ran to the hall closet. Yanked it open. Rummaged through the towels and sheets, flinging them to the floor as he did. E froze. Had he heard something shuffling? Lurching up the dark hall like a gore-oozing zombie? E whirled, shiv in hand.

  He stood alone in the darkened hall.

  Pulse racing, mouth dry, E returned to Ronin’s bedroom doorway. The thick stink of blood rushed to his head —Ah, smells like sex. He stepped into the bedroom. As he did, he became aware of a scraping sound.

  From the floor on the far side of the bed, dark, bloodstained fingers clawed for purchase on the wall. Bloodied gouges marred the paint.

  E stared, heart leaping in his chest like it wanted out, thinking: It’s Dawn of the Dead time. The dead won’t stay down. Don’t wanna be torn apart and gobbled up by a zombie!

  A mewling sound drowned out the scraping finger noise. E clamped a hand over his mouth and the mewling stopped.

  Shut the hell up. That’s no zombie, just a blood-drained bloodsucker refusing to die. You’re a god. Get a fucking grip.

  E nodded. A god. He lowered his hand from his mouth and walked over to the dresser. Jerked open the top drawer. Gold light shimmered and an angelic chorus voiced a triumphant song. Nestled in the folds of silk underwear and pricey socks were the files. E scooped them up, then pulled open the next drawer. Nuthin’. He found the zippered black bag in the last drawer and grabbed it.

  Nails scratched along the wall. E split, running up the hall, through the front room, and out the door.

  When he reached the van, E climbed inside and stashed the bag and files beside his satchel o’ tricks. Now all he needed was Dante. Where was the GPS receiver? E unzipped the black bag and searched its contents — vials of sedatives, trank gun, hypos, handcuffs — all designed with the fun-lovin’ bloodsucker in mind, but no GPS receiver. How the hell would he track Dante without it?

  E thumped his fists against his temples. Pain screamed up from his broken wrist. His stomach clenched. Idiotidiotidiot! Swallowing hard, he lowered his injured arm. Purple, almost black, bruises mottled his swollen wrist. He’d have to make a sling for it later. For the moment, he needed to find the GPS receiver.

  E scrambled out of the van, then froze. A hard-looking man in a jacket stood in front of him, a serious fucking gun in his hand. The muzzle leveled with E’s chest. E dropped to the concrete and rolled under the van. Stop-drop-’n’-roll. Something tunked against the side of the van. Bullet?

  E glanced past his view of the man’s polished black shoes, aware of a sound like an engine at high speed, redlining. On the street, a small black car jolted up and onto the sidewalk, peeled across the lawn, aimed straight for the house.

  E narrowed his eyes against the glare of headlights. The car slammed into the front step. Bashed grill against threshold. The house shook.

  Dante’d arrived.

  * * * *

  Stearns threw himself against Elroy Jordan’s new van as the sports car jumped the curb, tore across the yard and smashed against the house. Steam hissed into the air from the crumpled front end.

  For a moment, Stearns hesitated, then pushed away from the side of the van. An accident? Deliberate? Then a slender figure in black slipped out of the car through the driver’s side window and his heart kicked against his ribs.

  Beautiful white face. Black hair. Leather jacket and chain-strapped black jeans. He jumped with ease over the car’s buckled front end to the house’s warped threshold, surrounded by spikes of blue/white light. Pale hands braced against the wood.

  Stepping forward, Stearns lifted the Glock. “Dante!” he called.

  He fired as the young vampire swiveled.

  * * * *

  The bullet caught Dante in the temple, the impact snapping his head to one side. He crumpled across the threshold.

  “Stop the car!” Heather cried. Collins hit the brakes. She threw the door open and hit the ground running, yanking her .38 from the trench’s pocket.

  Stearns glanced up. Looked at her, then strode toward the MG. Toward Dante.

  “Drop your gun,” Heather yelled, .38 in a two-handed grip. She aimed it at Stearns. “Drop it! Don’t make me do this!”

  Stearns hesitated, then stepped forward, lifting the Glock. Heather fired. Stearns stumbled, dropping to one knee in the grass beside the MG. She ran from the sidewalk to the tire-ravaged yard, gun aimed at her former mentor.

  “Drop it,” she said.

  The Glock tumbled from Stearns’s fingers. Blood stained the shoulder of his jacket. Wincing, he linked his hands together behind his head.

  “Let me finish him,” Stearns said. “If you’ve read the file —”

  “Shut up,” Heather said, gun leveled with his forehead.

  She glanced toward the house. Dante hadn’t moved. He was sprawled across the threshold, haloed by the headlights, black hair spilled like wine across the carpet. A line of blood trickled from his temple across his face.

  Heather looked away. Her breath rasped in a throat gone too tight. Not dead, she reminded herself, not dead. She sucked in cold air, pulled her handcuffs from her pocket. Kneeling behind Stearns, she ratcheted a cuff around one wrist, securing it.

  Collins trotted past Heather to the doorway. “I’ll check Prejean,” he said.

  “Heather, listen, you don’t understand —”

  “I understand that you shot an unarmed man,” she said, voice low, tight. “Now shut the fuck up.”

  As Heather swung Stearns’s arms down so she could finish cuffing him, a man carrying a bag of groceries stopped in the drive.

  “Sir, please move on —”

  The man dropped his groceries. Wads of paper tumbled onto the sidewalk as he drew a gun. Stearns jerked his uncuffed arm free from Heather’s grasp and lunged for his Glock.

  Heart triple-timing, Heather lifted her .38. “Trent! Look out!”

  All three fired.

  * * * *

  Lucien flew, the wind of his passage cold against his face. A different kind of cold rimmed his soul with ice. Through Dante, he’d experienced a brief moment of pain; then his child’s consciousness had winked out. A faint thread of life force still pulsed through their bond, so he knew Dante wasn’t dead. Injured, perhaps critically, but alive.

  On the ground beneath Lucien, skewed headlights pierced the sky. Figures ran. Blood hunger, savage and blind and ancient, stabbed out into the night from the house below. Lucien spiraled down toward the house and its raging occupant.

  Thomas Ronin would never be a threat to Dante again.

  Lucien glided to the ground, bare feet touching wet grass as he landed. His wings folded behind him, then compressed down into their pouches. He strode across the lightless backyard and wrenched the screen door — metal screeching — off its hinges. Tossing it aside, Lucien battered the rear door inward with one fist and stepped inside.

  * * * *

  From underneath the van, E watched as Heather knelt behind the motherfucker who’d tried to kill him, the hard-looking man who’d gunned down his Bad Seed bro instead. Then someone else joined the game. Suddenly, everyone was yelling, shooting, and leaping.

  E rolled out from the other side of the van and, keeping low, crept around the front end; the sight of Dante slumped across the threshold drew him like a perv to porn.

  He wished the best for his lovely Heather and hoped she wouldn’t mind his taking advantage of her nasty situation. He preferred to think it was him she fought to protect and not Dante, since she’d come for him, after all, and not the party-crashing little bloodsucker.

  But, hey, at least now he didn’t have to worry about finding the GPS receiver.

  E paused at the van’s front end,
gaze on the plainclothes cop hunkered down near Dante’s body. He’d twisted around at Heather’s warning and drawn his gun, but before he could fire a single shot, dark bloodstained fingers grabbed him by the shoulders and yanked him inside the house.

  A creepy-crawly anthill feeling shuddered down the length of E’s body. Tom-Tom had gained his feet. Just beyond the threshold, shadows jerked and jittered.

  Bloodsucker or the restless dead?

  E scuttled forward, hunched low, his gaze locked on Dante’s pale face. In the yard, people screamed. Guns fired. Crossing mental fingers for Heather’s survival — the game wouldn’t be the same without her — E sidled up the side of the concrete step. Fluids leaked from the MG’s ruined front end. Steam hissed and spat.

  E reached a shaking hand for Dante’s arm. Snagged him. Pulled. Dead weight. Sweating, panting, E dragged Dante down off the step. He hit the ground with a thud, metal jingling. He shifted his grip from Dante’s arm to the collar of his jacket. Dante’s pretty head lolled. Blood trickled from his right ear, streaking the side of his face.

  Tugging and grunting and burning adrenaline, E pulled his bloodsucker bro to the front of the van. The side doors were still open.

  Something flew out of the house. Heather yelled, “Shit!” More gunfire.

  E partially pushed Dante into the van, then hopped inside and dragged him in the rest of the way. Rolled him away from the doors and eased them shut. Fetching the handcuffs from the black bag, he latched them around Dante’s wrists. He didn’t know how long Dante’d be unconscious, but best not to take any chances.

  He hauled Dante’s body to the rear of the van, lifted his arms, and slid the handcuff chain over a hook installed for that very purpose. The bloodsucker looked damned fine in handcuffs. A natural.

  Grinning, E crawled one-handed to the driver’s seat. He worked the keys out of his pocket. And waited.

  * * * *

  Heather fired the .38 as she threw herself to the side. Something whizzed past her cheek, stinging. Glock in hand, Stearns rolled across the lawn and to his feet. He opened fire. The dark-haired man —unknown subject— staggered back, then fired again.