Whiteout (Aurora Sky

by Nikki Jefford

  The snow had stopped falling, but the wind cut through me right down to my bones. Frigid air filled my lungs. I sucked it in as I ran around to the front of the lodge. The snow at my feet was deep and heavy. The ground covering pulled at my boots, slowing me down.

  If I could make it to the bodies out front, I could grab a loaded weapon off them. Jared had shot Fane. I was going to finish the bastard once and for all. Valerie would have to find herself a new screwed-up boyfriend. Unless Jared had been lying about their liaison. Trouble was, Jared had never been the lying type. He enjoyed boasting about his depraved doings. Just when I thought he couldn’t disgust me more. The thought of him and Valerie getting each other off made me want to vomit into the snow.

  Behind me, I heard the side door slam against the outer wall. I couldn’t afford to turn around and look. I hurtled across the snow in leaps. The less my feet touched the ground, the better.

  Fleeing in the open didn’t make me feel especially good. Jared could shoot me in the back. But I got the feeling he’d rather chase me down and try to drag me off with him for who knew what heinous purpose. I didn’t want to find out.

  My heart gave a leap at the sight of Zack and his buddy’s bodies ahead. I ran for the other guy, who was closest, dropping to my knees on the ground beside him. His fingers were still wrapped around the gun handle and trigger, almost as if he didn’t intend to let go, even in death.

  When I attempted to pry it from his fingers, the gun fired, making me fall back on my ass in heart-racing, ear-ringing surprise. I scrambled onto my hands and knees, successfully yanking the gun free.

  I had it in my hand a mere second before Jared tackled and knocked the wind out of me. So much for poetic justice. Before my back hit the ground, the gun slipped through my fingers. I hadn’t had a chance to lock it in my own death grip.

  Jared’s breath hit my face—a balmy contrast to the bitter wind—when he straddled me against the snow’s damp chill. A disturbing image of him and Valerie entered my head uninvited. There was no coming back from that. If Valerie had slept with Jared, then she was more far gone than I’d ever imagined. It went beyond jealousy, outrage, or revenge. It fell into the category of demented.

  Jared pinned my wrists to my sides as I tried to roll out from under him. His thumbs jabbed into my pulse points and his fingers tightened around my skin in a bruising crush. A small whimper broke through my lips, swiftly carried away by the wind. He was going to break my wrists, and this time there’d be no one around to stop him. I’d already dared him to do it and gotten away with it in the past. Not this time.

  Tears squeezed from the corner of my eyes and leaked down the sides of my face. I imagined the teardrops freezing as they dropped to the ground.

  I tried to kick at Jared and found that he’d effectively secured my entire body with his own weight. He squeezed harder.

  Another whimper tore through my lips—a pathetic sound that made me want to punch the living daylights out of Jared for breaking through my defenses. As the pressure neared bone-splintering proportions, it suddenly eased.

  “You are really trying my patience, Raven,” Jared said. “Unfortunately, I don’t have a medical team at my disposal, and I’m going to need you in working order.” He squeezed my wrists again, causing me to cry out. A malicious smile formed over Jared’s lips. “That doesn’t mean I can’t find other ways to hurt you if you misbehave.”

  “What do you want from me?” I demanded.

  Jared lifted his head, looking down his nose at me. “To restore the natural order of things. Vampires shouldn’t be hunted down by government agencies. We can’t have hunters running around killing our kind. That is why I am going to destroy the agency, one agent at a time. And you are going to help me.”

  “You’re crazy,” I spat. “I’d never help you.”

  A vicious grin twisted over Jared’s lips. The only good thing to come out of his rant was the loosening of his grip over my wrists.

  Jared’s teeth gleamed. “Who said anything about it being voluntary? As long as I have you, Fane Donado won’t touch me. He wouldn’t risk it. Now get up.”

  Jared hauled me to my feet, grabbing me by the back of my coat as he wrenched me from the ground. A renewed sense of panic fluttered through me as Jared maneuvered me toward a snowmachine.

  “How do you expect to get by without the agency’s resources?” I asked, hoping to distract him longer. If I kept him talking long enough, maybe agents would show up and secure the area. Fane said the agency had Ashley’s last known location when Dante took her hostage and ditched her phone. If Melcher was prepared, he’d have more agents in the vicinity on standby.

  Jared gave a derisive snort. “I don’t need their resources. I have my own backing. Believe it or not, most vampires don’t want to be hunted down. It hasn’t been hard to bring large numbers to my side. And I have something better than resources. Information.” Jared tapped his head with his left finger while keeping a hold on my coat with his right hand. “I know all the current identities of agents and informants. Melcher, on the other hand, only has tabs on a fraction of the vampires residing in the region. Alaska will be our flagship state. Once we restore the natural balance, we’ll move on to the rest of the country and world. Vampires across the globe will finally be able to embrace their true nature without fear of assassination.” Jared twisted me around to face him. “In time, you may even come to see it my way. Valerie did.”

  I scowled. “Never.”

  “Doesn’t matter,” Jared said before he pushed me onto the snowmachine. “You’re driving, Raven. Try anything funny and I’ll shoot you in the back.” He pulled his gun out of his holster and lifted the weapon for emphasis. “Now quit stalling and get on.”

  The wind stung my eyes as I gripped the snowmachine’s handlebars and turned the throttle. Visibility was back, but I didn’t have ski goggles to protect my eyes from the wind. Jared’s pelvis pressed against my back as though he was pinning me to the machine with his body weight. I hated having him attached to me like a damn leech.

  “Faster,” he bellowed.

  “Don’t be a backseat driver,” I yelled back. “This is the first time I’ve driven one of these things.”

  “It’s easy, just keep the throttle on high.”

  I fluttered it instead, testing the machine, trying to get a feel for the weight and speed. I didn’t have much time to master snowmachining. What I wanted to do was take a sudden, sharp turn and send Jared flying off in the opposite direction. At the moment, I was still working on driving the thing and staying on top.

  Jared leaned forward, crushing my body against the handlebars as he grabbed the throttle and turned. We lurched forward.

  “Like that,” he said in my ear.

  My chest hurt from hitting the handlebars. Anger ignited and flared through me. I recalled the time he’d gunned his car down the hillside after the killing spree at the tasting. The bastard forced me to beg him to slow down.

  Memories of my car accident came rushing back and flooded me with rage. I saw Jared sneering behind the wheel, ramming into me, crushing my car, my kidney, my lungs—my beating heart! He’d made me what I was. A killer. A freak of nature running for her life.

  And now he wanted me to work with him?

  The hell I would!

  I ground my teeth together as I passed the machine Fane had overturned. That meant we were at least fifteen minutes out of range of the highway. Good. Plenty of time to make my move.

  Fresh snow had covered all of the previous ski tracks, but now that I could see, it wasn’t difficult to follow the path where the road had been covered. It snaked through the woods and across open expanses.

  Seeing a bend up ahead, I eased the throttle.

  Jared leaned with my body when I entered the turn. I slowed the machine down until we were moving at a crawl. As we came out of the bend, the road opened up into a long, straight stretch.

  It was now or never.

  I gripped the han
dlebars and cranked the throttle as far back as it would go. As it shot forward, I stood, holding on tight. With my body suddenly upright, Jared lost his clasp on my waist and had nothing to hold on to when the machine flew forward.

  Eyes forward, I didn’t see him fall backward, blasted off the machine when it propelled down the straightaway. I was still holding on like a bull rider at a rodeo. I did notice extra weight had been shed from behind me. As the speed evened out, I sat down and glanced back in time to see Jared scramble to his feet.

  I faced forward again, bringing the machine to a more manageable speed.

  My brief moment of elevation was rapidly replaced by apprehension. What now? I needed to get back to Fane and Dante, but now Jared was blocking the way. While I mulled it over, a shot rang out.

  Well, that answered that. With Jared firing at me I had no choice but to head for the highway.

  I twisted the throttle as another bullet whizzed dangerously close before being sucked away into the wind. Another shot rang out. I heard a metallic ping as it hit the snowmachine. I didn’t have a good handle on steering. Instead, I twisted the throttle full speed, ignoring the sting against my eyes and cheeks as I blasted across the snow and out of shooting range. Tears leaked from the corner of my eyes. My face seared from windburn.

  The engine cut out roughly, and the machine stopped like a dead weight. The abrupt termination sent me flying over the handlebars and into the snow ahead. The powder cushioned the blow, but it didn’t prevent the wind from being knocked from me.

  My heart hammered out of control as I lay on my back staring up at the gray sky. Once I’d regained my breath, I shot up and stared at the machine in confusion. Why the hell had it stopped working?

  It wasn’t long before I noticed a hole in the gas tank and a trail of liquid behind the machine.

  Really? Really!

  Leave it to Jared to manage a direct hit to the gas tank. I should have considered myself fortunate that it had been the tank and not my leg that he’d hit. I doubted he was aiming specifically for the machine’s gas tank. The rat bastard just had a way of getting lucky, unlike me. Stranded weaponless.

  I looked into the distance, expecting to see Jared on his way down, but there was no trace of him. He must have disappeared back around the bend we’d taken before I dumped his sorry ass into the snow.

  What was he doing? Where was he going? Back to the lodge? Terror gripped me by the throat. How badly was Fane wounded? I couldn’t imagine Jared would be dumb enough to face Fane. Even wounded, Fane had a loaded gun and the shelter of the lodge. If Jared tried to enter the premises, Fane would see him before he ever reached the front door.

  Another thought occurred to me.

  The overturned snowmachine.

  Fane had left the key inside. All it needed was righting and then it would be operational again.

  Again, why? Why was fate that cruel?

  Even though Jared had to backtrack, he’d be on me before I even came close to reaching the highway. I could run for the woods, but he’d be able to follow my tracks now that it was no longer snowing.

  I lifted my face to the sky. “Now would be a good time to bring that blizzard back.”

  The clouds formed a ceiling overhead, but nothing more. I watched for a sign. A single snowflake. Anything.

  A gust of wind whipped by as though to say, “Tough shit.”

  “Story of my life,” I muttered, heading toward the trees. I had to do something other than stand out in the open.

  I glanced over my shoulder, heart dropping at the tracks following my movements across the snow. Strike one.

  The spruce trees were a fair distance off. I’d entered the wide open part of the route when the snowmachine died. Strike two.

  The rumble of an engine stopped me in my tracks. That was quick. It was headed toward me fast. My body trembled as though connected to the approaching machine’s vibrations.

  No. Life was cruel, but not that cruel.

  I had no weapons. No way to outrun it. Nowhere to hide.

  My feet stopped, and I stood motionless. What good was another foot? I turned and faced the approaching sound. I half expected to see the machine flying at me, but it hadn’t emerged from around the bend quite yet.

  I looked around. What did I have? Snow. Lots of it. Crazed laughter burbled up my throat. Sure, make a bunch of snowballs and pelt the bastard with them as he drove up.

  You have nothing. Game over.

  “No,” I said. “I have myself. My body is a weapon.”

  I curled my hands into tight balls. I had my fists. I lifted my arms. I had the sharp, blunt ends of my elbows. I widened my stance. I had legs that would kick, knees that could ram Jared in the nuts.

  I smiled to myself. I didn’t need a gun or a knife. Let Jared come. He wouldn’t shoot me. He wanted me to do his bidding or, at the very least, suffer. He’d try to grab me again. To do so he’d have to get near me, and when he did, I’d attack. I’d turn my brain off. I’d tear into him the way a wolf ripped into prey. I was the wolf, not the rabbit. I wanted Jared to approach, to come close.

  A black speck appeared in the distance.

  “Yes, come,” I said under my breath. “Come and let us end this.”

  24

  Above And Beyond

  I stayed in place, breathing steady, alert and ready.

  The machine roared closer, flying across the snow. My fists tightened. My breaths came in white, even puffs. I braced myself.

  As the distance closed, the machine suddenly slowed. At roughly fifty feet, it slowed even more.

  I’d half expected Jared to mow me down or at least come at me full speed and give me another scare.

  I could see him now. Well, not exactly. He had a black ski mask covering his entire face. That wasn’t Jared’s style. My stomach turned. That wasn’t Jared. I was almost sure of it. And if it wasn’t, then who was it?

  At about twenty feet the machine slowed further still. It came to a complete stop ten feet away from me. The engine turned off and the whole world went silent.

  The driver swung his leg around and stepped off.

  Instinctively, I crouched—ready to pounce.

  Once he dismounted, the driver removed his goggles and set them on the seat of the snowmachine. Then he reached under his chin and pulled off his ski mask.

  I gasped as the mask came off.

  Fane.

  “Fane?” I could see him plain as day, but I couldn’t quite believe it was actually him and not some cruel trick of the eye. Finally, my luck had changed. The clouds could keep their snow. Fane was here.

  I wanted to run to him. I wanted to throw my arms around his neck and weep into his shoulder, but my legs had frozen in place.

  Instead, Fane came to me. He walked up briskly, jaw tight. His arms shot forward, grabbing me by the shoulders and pulling me into his embrace.

  “I thought I’d lost you,” he said.

  I swallowed and leaned back to look into his eyes. “What about you?” I asked. “Jared shot you!”

  Fane lifted his arm, pointing out a hole in his jacket. “Grazed my arm. First time I’ve ever been shot. Luckily the bullet kept going.”

  Tears of relief filled my eyes. “Thank goodness,” I breathed.

  “Nothing can keep us apart. Not ever again.” Fane hugged me to him again. The embrace was brief. “Where’s Jared?” he asked.

  I squinted at him. “I was about to ask you the same thing. You didn’t see him on your way down?”

  “No. What happened?”

  “I gunned it after the bend,” I said, pointing the way Fane had come. “He fell off and started shooting at me.”

  Fane hands tensed over me.

  “He hit the gas tank,” I continued, nodding at the dead machine. “Last I saw, he was headed back toward the lodge. I thought he’d go for our turned-over machine.”

  Fane frowned. “I didn’t see it on my way down.”

  “You didn’t?” My eyes widened. “Th
en where did he go?”

  Fane stepped back and folded his arms across his chest, staring at the spruce trees near the bend. “He probably made a run for it when he heard my machine coming down.”

  Wouldn’t have been the first time Jared retreated into the woods. The vamp was like a cockroach that kept getting away and coming back.

  “Damn it,” I said, yanking on my coat sleeves. “What about Dante?”

  “He’s still at the lodge.”

  “We need to get him out of here.”

  Fane ran his thumb over my windburned cheek gently. “We all need to get out of here.” Fane removed his hand and grabbed the ski mask. “Put this on.”

  “You’re driving, you should wear it.”

  Fane held it out. “I insist.”

  Not wanting to waste any more time, I took the mask from his hand. “Where did you get this anyway? You gave me a start.”

  “Sorry about that. I found it in the coat pocket of one of the dead vamps when I was searching for a key to a snowmobile. I knew I’d be riding at full speed and figured I might as well protect my face.”

  I nodded before pulling the ski mask over my head. The cotton felt good against the bitter wind. Fane put on his goggles and mounted the machine. I swung my leg over the seat behind him and wrapped my arms around his waist, squeezing tight even before he started the engine.

  The machine roared to life, vibrating between my legs. We shot forward. I pictured us as two vampires straddling a bullet aimed at the lodge. We flew across the snow, wind rushing past us, Fane shielding me from the brunt of it.

  My body tensed as we passed the wooded area where I’d last seen the overturned machine. It, along with Jared, was now gone. I listened for gunshots. If Jared was hiding in the brush waiting to take aim, there wasn’t much we could do riding by. Hopefully he hadn’t stuck around to attempt an ambush. He thought Dante was dead. Obviously he heard Fane coming down and had fled. He’d have no reason to think we’d turn around and head back to the lodge.