He stopped and turned my way. All I could make out was a tall, dark form.
“Outside to look around,” he whispered back.
“I’m coming with you,” Giselle said. Her head appeared as she stepped out from under the bunk. She must not have been zippered in. I could see she had on her skinny jeans and turtleneck. I was sure it had nothing to do with modesty. Giselle had probably been waiting for this moment all along—maybe even lying awake, ready to leap into action.
As my eyes adjusted, I saw that Dante, too, had gone to bed in jeans and a T-shirt. Guess I was the only one who’d gotten comfortable. Well, I could shoot a renegade vamp in my underwear as easily as jeans.
Tommy’s nails clicked over the floorboards.
Everyone was on their feet but me. Giselle strode out of the room. As Dante rummaged around inside his pack, I swung my leg over the bunk’s frame and descended, skipping the last two steps to jump down.
When I turned, Dante was in front of me. A hint of a smile played at the corners of his lips as he looked me over. He had better not laugh at my Sasquatch legs. I hadn’t had a shower in five days, let alone a shave.
Hopefully he couldn’t see the hair in the dark.
By the time his eyes traveled up to my face, his jaw tightened.
“Stay here and shoot anything that tries to get inside.”
I acknowledged this with a quick nod before turning around and bending over to retrieve my jeans from inside my pack.
I could sense Dante hovering behind me until, abruptly, he walked out of the room. There was some shuffling around by the front door as Dante and Giselle put on their boots.
“Tommy, come,” Dante said before the door opened and closed.
By this time I’d pulled on my jeans and socks. Gun in hand, I stalked out of the bunkroom and took my position near the front door.
My chest rose and fell steadily with each inhale and exhale as though in meditation. Zen and the art of killing.
The pistol dangled from my right hand, on standby against my thigh. Unless I heard movement outside the door, I wasn’t going to tire my arm aiming it. I backed up to the wall across from the door.
The minutes stretched on. The furniture and blunt objects along the shelves appeared sinister in the shadows. Staying inside didn’t make me feel any safer. If anything, I was caged in. My ears wandered as much as my eyes. I listened for gunfire, voices, footsteps, anything.
Suddenly, the door inched open, stopped, and moved another inch, followed by another. Dante would never creep back in like that.
My body stiffened as I lifted the pistol and took aim. Whoever was on the other side might as well open the door all the way, because there was no sneaking inside.
Several painstaking inches later, a tall, dark figure filled the center of the doorframe.
My heart fluttered with hope.
Fane! My mind screamed wishfully. He’d found me.
The threat in front of me tramped down the sudden fantasy of a middle-of-the-night Fane reunion.
Fane would never sneak in this way, and he’d never find me in these remote parts. I was on my own.
I kept still as the figure paused at the threshold. I thought for sure he’d see me, but my body melded against the wall, as inanimate as the rustic furniture, suspended in place. Advantage: Aurora. The intruder had no movement to focus on. Whoever it was turned his back to close the door.
Oh freaking joy. I was trapped inside with an intruder. Actually, he was the one trapped and unaware of a gun barrel following his shadow with the unyielding force of a magnet locked on its counterpart.
The figure stopped and seemed almost to sway in place. A click was followed by a circle of light on the floor.
I pulled back the safety on my gun. The light bolted upward, into my face, blinding me. I shielded my eyes with my left hand.
Shit!
Advantage: intruder. I couldn’t see jack squat beyond the explosion of light that zapped my pupils in its laser-like beam.
Despite my current state of blindness, I fired into the light. The shot rang out like a mini cannon, the blast ricocheting inside my eardrums with brutal force.
The beam of light free-fell toward the floor as a male voice hollered, “Son of a bitch!”
The flashlight clunked against the hardwood and went out, plunging the cabin, and everything inside, into a pit of darkness. There was no more deciphering a figure from furniture. I couldn’t see a thing besides the bright white spots that floated across my vision before fading to black.
How far away from me had the intruder been when I fired? It couldn’t have been more than three feet. I moved back several inches, but I must still have been facing him. I hadn’t heard him drop to the floor, which meant I’d only wounded or missed him altogether. I listened for breathing, but it was difficult to hear above my own.
Advantage: no one.
Neither of us had the upper hand anymore.
3
Intruder
Frenzied barking erupted outside. It grew louder until Tommy was right outside the door, banging and clawing at the wood to get inside.
The floorboards creaked.
“Don’t move!” I had to yell to be heard over Tommy.
“Tommy, back!” Dante hollered a moment later.
The door flew open and crashed against the wall. Definitely Dante coming inside this time. He pointed his flashlight at the figure, lighting him up from behind. A second beam appeared when Giselle caught up. I scooped up the fallen flashlight, adding a third beam. We looked like a team from Ghostbusters.
From inside the doorframe, Tommy snarled.
“Tommy, quiet,” Dante said.
A low, continuous growl followed Dante as he circled around to my side. With our flashlights aimed high, I got my first good look at the intruder. His tall, lean form had messed with my mind. He even had a thick tuft of hair on the top of his head.
Brown hair, not blond, I reminded myself, disappointed and relieved that I hadn’t just shot at Fane.
It was my turn to shine the light in his eyes. He squinted. His arms lifted, hands blocking the light glaring over his head, fingers free of weapons. The way he’d yelled, I expected him to be clutching an appendage, but he didn’t appear to have taken a hit. Maybe he just startled easily.
“Look,” he said, “I don’t know who you are or why you’re here. I just want my weed and then I’ll let you use the cabin until you find someplace else to squat.”
“Ha-ha,” Dante replied. “We’ve got a comedian on our hands. You’re not going anywhere.”
“How did you arrive here?” Giselle asked. “We didn’t see a vehicle outside.”
Our unexpected guest craned his head to look at Giselle. Her sword looked out of place in the Alaskan bush, or the twenty-first century, for that matter. She kept her flashlight pointed at his chest.
When no response followed, Dante bristled beside me. “Answer the question.”
He looked at Dante with blatant disregard. “Ran out of gas.”
Dante sniffed. “Sure you did. Probably saw our tire tracks in the snow and decided to creep in on us.”
“I’m not the one trespassing,” the man responded. For having screamed earlier, he sounded calm now. Maybe he’d lumbered in stoned and was drifting back into the zone. But the way he slinked inside the cabin appeared more devious than blundering.
“Then why were you sneaking around?” I demanded, getting in on the interrogation.
When there’s something strange in the backwoods, who you gonna call? Vamp busters!
It was official. I’d spent way too much time in the bush with Dante.
“I should be asking you the same thing,” the man said. “However, I also recognize that you’re the ones holding guns.”
“What about you?” Dante asked. “Got weapons?”
“Not on me.”
Dante leaned sideways. “Search him,” he said to Giselle.
Giselle walked over to the table a
nd set her flashlight down, aimed on our captive, before taking up her place between him and the door. Tommy’s growls had died down, but I didn’t doubt that he stood guard outside the door. Giselle’s free arm circled the intruder’s waist, sliding down to his pockets.
“Not shy, are you?”
The comment did nothing to slow Giselle’s hand as it moved down his right leg. She didn’t stop until she was crouched on the ground. There, her hand stilled momentarily. She pulled up the man’s pant leg, removing a revolver from an ankle holster. Giselle checked the other leg before straightening. Seeing her with a gun and a sword gave me a bitter sense of déjà vu from the time she ambushed Valerie and me in my home. At least this time we were on the same side… sorta. It still didn’t make me happy about teaming up with her.
“No weapons on you, huh?” Dante said with a malignant grin.
“Sorry, with all the excitement, I forgot I was carrying my piece.” He smiled.
“Yeah, I’ll bet you did.” Dante’s body went rigid.
Our captive noticed the change in Dante’s demeanor and swallowed his smile. Dante was on him in three steps.
“Open your mouth. Show me your teeth,” he demanded.
The man’s hands shot out right before he pushed Dante into me. We hit the wall, luckily not the floor, but that didn’t stop Dante’s body from ramming against mine. Anger exploded inside me upon impact.
The man swirled around and lunged at Giselle. Before he could reach her, before Tommy had time to attack, the blast of a gunshot resounded off the log walls, a splintering crack that tore through my eardrums as Giselle fired on him with his own piece.
Through the ringing in my ears, I could make out Tommy’s manic snarl. He shot forward like a golden missile and launched himself at the vamp. The fanger fell backward and caused another loud thump to sound out when his body hit the floor. Tommy clamped his teeth over the guy’s arm. He didn’t fight Tommy off. He didn’t move much at all, though his eyes stared up.
Quickly regaining his footing, Dante strode over and crouched beside the man, thrusting two fingers against his neck. “Dead,” he announced.
Tommy released the arm as though coming to the same conclusion.
Dante turned his head to Giselle. “Nice shot.”
So Giselle’s aim was better than mine. But then again, she hadn’t had to shoot blind.
Irritation flared up my spine of its own volition. I didn’t care how long we were stuck together, I would never get used to the idea of Giselle being on our side.
Dante holstered his gun and pointed the flashlight down. He pulled the guy’s lips apart and shone the light into his mouth. A set of pointy teeth flashed back. My stomach coiled into stiff, barbed knots. There was only one reason a vamp would file his teeth into sharp points, and it wasn’t to nibble on carrot sticks.
Dante stood and wiped his hands on his jeans. “You okay?” he asked, looking at me over his shoulder.
“Fine.”
“What happened?”
“He tried sneaking in through the front door.”
Dante turned full circle to face me. “And you missed?”
My back straightened. “He blinded me with his flashlight.”
Rather than answer, Dante swiveled back to the body and leaned down, grabbing a leg. Giselle set the sword and gun on the table beside her flashlight before taking hold of the vamp’s other leg. She and Dante dragged him out of the cabin.
Fine by me. Let those two handle body disposal. What the heck were we doing taking down vampires anyway? We were supposed to be on sabbatical, not seeking out a vamp house in the backwoods, thank you very much, Dante. Way to lay low. When he said the place would be abandoned, I bet this was what he’d been hoping for all along.
Dante and Giselle soon returned with Tommy trotting in behind them. Dante swiped the palms of his hands back and forth. “That takes care of that. We’ll search the grounds for his vehicle at daylight. Until then, we should rest up.”
Yeah, sure, back to bed. No problem. And maybe in the morning I could whip us up a batch of blueberry pancakes with birch syrup.
I moved into the cabin’s main room and lit the kerosene lantern.
Dante looked over. “What are you doing?”
“You can go back to bed,” I said. “I may as well stay up. I’m wide awake.”
“So am I,” Giselle said.
Dante straightened his back. “Fine, but you should rest while you can. Tomorrow we’re taking a closer look around.” He looked from Giselle to me. “Go ahead and stay up the rest of the night if you want. I’m getting some shut-eye.”
He walked away and disappeared into the bunkroom.
I took a seat on the couch and let my eyes go out of focus as I stared at the wall.
“I’ll take watch,” Giselle said from my right.
“Don’t worry about it,” I answered. “I went to bed early. I’ve had all the rest I’m going to get tonight.”
She hovered by my side. I wished she’d go back to bed. I didn’t want company—certainly not Giselle Morrel’s.
Finally her footsteps receded. I continued to stare straight ahead at nothing. Then I felt a nudge at my leg. I blinked and smiled when I noticed Tommy beside me, his brown irises reflecting in the lantern’s glow.
“Good boy,” I whispered, petting his soft coat.
I continued petting Tommy. My fingers ran through his fur, and my body relaxed into the couch. Eventually he lowered his whole body to the floor.
I lifted my legs and hugged them to my chest.
All movement and sound inside the cabin ceased, and the temperature dropped as the fire died off.
“Fane,” I whispered into the silence.
The flame inside the lamp flickered as though touched by a sudden breath.
“I miss you so much.”
My eyes glazed over as though hypnotized by the pinprick of light. I didn’t sleep so much as fade into oblivion, a hazy dream state in which none of this was real.
I’d wake up in my old bed, in my old home. I’d go back in time to when Fane and I were together. Before the blackmail. Before Jared and Giselle. Before Dante’s kidnapping. Before Valerie handed Joss over to the agency.
I wouldn’t wait for Fane to ask me to run away with him. I’d say the words first. We’d change our names, along with Mom’s and Gran’s. I’d leave my home state in a heartbeat. I’d leave my country in exchange for freedom. I’d do it for my family. For Fane.
Together, we’d disappear.
4
Search Party
{Fane}
She was gone again. Vanished without a trace in an unforgiving land where disappearances were nearly twice the national average.
I stabbed the compact snow with the steel tip of my trekking pole. Beside me, Rex, my travel guide and eyes and ears in the small coastal town of Seward, kept pace.
An icy chasm halted our progress. The deep blue crevice loomed abruptly over the glacier’s edge, plunging into ridges of ice that could easily grind bone and mash organs into pulp.
I held a certain affinity for this opaque mass that, like me, had been around for centuries.
Cold I could handle, and handle well. I’d become impervious to its penetrating grip long ago. Cold was life. It was preservation.
What I couldn’t handle was having Aurora Sky repeatedly wrenched from my life. There were worse things than separation… like not knowing where the hell she was. Like the time she took off for boot camp before I had a chance to share my suspicions about her blood. Those six months had driven an ice pick through my heart, especially knowing I only had myself to blame. I had hurt her. I had driven her away. Then she returned. Just when I thought I had a chance to make amends, I found out I was too late. She was with her hunting partner, Dante. The same partner she’d ditched me for the first time I screwed up.
How many more times would she put her neck on the line? Play the martyr? Abandon me?
With a sharp turn, I continued a
long the shelf nature had beaten into the landscape over the centuries. The crampons, strapped securely to my boots, bit into the frozen ground. I walked flat-footed, allowing each serrated point to pierce through snow and ice.
On either side of the white-and-blue-speckled range, wide fissures formed wrinkles across the dense ice field for miles.
There was no sign of Aurora here, but it was the first lead I’d received since she disappeared two weeks ago.
I didn’t care how many glaciers I had to cross. I’d climb every goddamn mountain in Alaska if I had to. But I would find her and when I did, I’d bind her, shackle her, lock her up, and swallow the key. The chivalrous European approach to courtship hadn’t worked. It was time to go caveman on her wild, unpredictable ass.
Damn her stubborn vampire hunting hide. Noel had said Aurora ditched me for my own safety and would return with her former partner in no time.
Right. Because when had any of Aurora’s plans ever gone smoothly? I’d never known a bigger disaster magnet in all my years.
It felt more like months, not weeks, since I’d ripped through the streets of Anchorage trying to track Aurora down before she got away.
The moment I realized she had taken off, I had commandeered Noel’s convertible and torn through town searching for a red Camaro with black rally stripes, but by then it was too late. There’d been no sign of Aurora or the Camaro until yesterday when Rex spotted the car being towed into Seward. He’d chatted with the tow truck driver and learned the vehicle had been seen abandoned in the Exit Glacier parking lot.
Searching the area was a long shot, but I’d explore any possibility if even to find a footprint where Aurora once stood.
Rex’s footsteps crunched alongside me.
“We can keep going, but there’s no indication that anyone’s walked this far.”
My hackles rose. “As long as there’s a solid path, we walk. We walk until it is no longer possible to continue forward without nose-diving face-first into a crevice.”
Rex put a hand on my shoulder. “My friend, I will accompany you as far as you wish, but if you truly want to find this woman, you must turn around.”
Whiteout (Aurora Sky Page 3