Was someone coming for her?
A thrill ran through her body. Maybe it was a vampire! She jumped to her feet, wishing she had her sword. Her gear was back in her apartment, so she'd have to rely on her fists.
The roof access stairwell door opened. The muffled sound of pleading, and elevated heartbeats came from the other side of the roof.
Sabine sighed. Heartbeats meant not vampires. She couldn't catch a break.
A deep voice interrupted her thoughts. "Shut up. You had your chance to play ball. Now you're going to see what happens when you defy us."
Curiosity got the better of Sabine, and she tiptoed along the ledge of the roof, circling around to the front of the stairwell to get a look at the intruders in her sanctuary. She watched as a tall man with broad shoulders pushed a gagged man with tied hands toward the front of the building. Was this poor guy going to get executed? She couldn't just let that happen.
She hopped down to the flat roof, her boots crunching on the small gravel. "Hey guys, what'cha doin'?" Maybe they were play-acting. It was the morning of Halloween, after all.
The big guy turned and pulled a huge pistol from a shoulder holster under his jacket. "Get over here, bitch."
Sabine raised her hands. "If you shoot me, don't you think someone will hear the noise?"
The goon shook his head and released the other man to point at the little canister on the tip of the pistol. "Silencer, stupid. Now get your ass over here."
Sabine strolled toward them, a smile playing on her face. She made sure to keep her lips closed so the goon wouldn't see her fangs.
"You're mighty casual about having a gun pointed at you."
Sabine shrugged. Telling him that this was the forty-third time someone had pulled a gun on her this year might sound too much like bragging. Should she tell him that she was running out of space in her closet for old shoe boxes filled with guns? He probably wouldn't care.
The man with the gag turned to face Sabine. The predawn sky reflected in his eyes as they tried to adjust to the dark and see her. His expression was one of concern, and then shock as their gazes met.
Sabine's heart thumped in her chest. "Oh my God! Dougie?" She clasped a hand over her mouth, and stared in shock. He was no longer the bleach-blond dorky kid she had last seen at High School Grad Night. His hair was darker, almost brown, and he was leaner and stronger. He had transformed into a man.
Her heart thumped again.
Doug's deep blue eyes danced between her and the rooftop door, pleading. Did he want her to run? She couldn't hear his thoughts. That was so unusual that it shocked her for a moment. The goon's thoughts were clear as day. This human named Doug would die, so the pack's existence would remain secret. The werewolf pack. She stepped closer, and Doug shook his head no.
The goon smelled of musk and woodlands, and his smile showed very sharp looking teeth. They looked like an animal's. The guy grabbed Sabine's left wrist, feeling smug.
She couldn't use mind control with Doug watching, so she'd have to do this the hard way. She moved with the speed of thought. Grab arm, twist. Glide under. Pull up. His feet leave the ground. She heard the hammer click and the puff of the silencer, and felt a bullet pass too close to her as the goon rotated through the air. Twist him forward to land face-down, almost two full rotations in the air. She pounced on his back as he hit the rooftop. She wedged a knee against him and twisted his arm up until the joint popped. There. A normal human could have done that, right?
The goon tried to free the gun trapped under his body. Sabine punched him in the nerve at his elbow, numbing his arm.
Doug took off his gag and popped the zip-tie holding his wrists with a quick movement against his hips. He lowered himself so he could get a better look at Sabine, eyes wide. "Sabine? What do you think you're doing?"
The goon nodded, rubbing his face against the rocky tar paper covering the roof. "Listen to the Doc, Sabine."
She speared Doug with a glare, then looked away when she realized her fangs would show when she spoke. Her hair formed a dark wavy curtain around her face. "You don't like the idea of being rescued by a girl?"
The goon tried to toss Sabine off, but she punched him in the temple. His head was a few inches off the surface of the roof, so the force of her punch made his skull bounce off the surface. He groaned into unconsciousness. A drop of blood oozed from his head, and Sabine took a deep breath as she savored the call of the plasma dinner bell. With a growl, she fought back the blood lust.
Doug wrung his hands as he stood, not seeing the fangs or Sabine's fully dilated eyes. "It's not that, damn it! Tony here works for some very bad guys. If they find out you did this, you'll be in worse shit than I am!"
Sabine rolled Tony over and grabbed his gun. With the silencer, it was the size of her forearm. She wondered if Tony was compensating for something.
The smell of Tony's blood intoxicated her. So wild. So different. Like untamed wilderness.
Feed!
She wavered, dizzy from fighting the thirst. She looked away from Doug while trying to retract her fangs. Did he know they were werewolves? "I don't get it. Why are you in deep shit with bad guys, Doug?"
Doug looked down at Tony and then out over the city. He shook his head and shrugged. "It's a long story, and we don't have any time. Tony's partner will come looking for him in a few minutes when I don't end up on the pavement down there."
Sabine shrugged, looking at the glow on the horizon across the bay. It would be dawn soon, and she could feel the old familiar lethargy competing with her thirst. Sabine sensed Tony's consciousness returning, and she released a little of her newest discovery. The dark energy at her core – the source of her vampiric glamour power – burst out and forced Tony to sleep.
"Did you feel that?" Doug asked.
Sabine almost choked, and turned to him. Had he felt her power? She'd used too much energy again. She could never get the right amount. Doug was searching the horizon in every direction, so he hadn't figured out it had come from her. She chose to ignore him and frisked the werewolf. She took out his wallet and read the driver's license so Doug wouldn't know how she knew more about Tony than she should.
"Tony Diamato from Daly City," she read. She put the driver's license and wallet back where she'd found them. She stood and looked Doug over in the dim predawn light. "Let's go inside. Maybe I can help."
Doug shook his head. "I can't go. You don't understand. If I don't go over the edge, they'll hurt Tiana."
Bite the human. Bite the werewolf. Feed. Now.
She almost whimpered, swallowing back the horrific image the thirst had conjured of biting her best friend.
Bite something.
Already on edge, Doug's noble intentions infuriated Sabine. Did he want to sacrifice himself to protect some girlfriend? Talking through his issues would have put her over the edge, so she tried to force her way into his mind instead.
She got static where his mind should have been, and she tried to fight through it and grab a way in. Why was it so hard? She saw his expression change. She could feel that he had understood somehow what she was trying to do.
That never happened before.
Doug's eyes grew wide. "What the hell? Are you trying to read my mind? Since when did you learn how to do that?"
Sabine chewed her bottom lip, surprised at his reaction. She looked down so her hair would hang around her face as she spoke. "Sorry, okay? I just wanted to find out who Tiana was."
"You could just ask, for Christ's sake. She's my daughter."
Sabine stood there stunned for a few beats of Doug's heart. "But... you're only two years older than me! How did you...? When...? Where is she?"
"I'm twenty-seven Sabine. People have children. She's six years old and she's in a car down there with Tony's partner Gus."
"Who's her mother? And where is her mother?"
"Someone I met in college. She bailed after Tiana was born and left her with me." After a pause, he added "It doesn't matter."
<
br /> Sabine couldn't believe her ears. "My Dougie has a little girl?" His back was turned, so she allowed herself a smile.
Doug had always been a nice guy. She imagined that he was probably a great dad. Any dad who was willing to give his life to protect his daughter had to be a great father. "We'll go retrieve Tiana and then we can talk at my place, okay?"
Doug laughed. "Yeah, like you could take on a..."
Sabine eyed him, waiting for him to come up with more. She held her mouth tight. "A what, Doug?"
"...A professional killer."
Sabine raised an eyebrow, gave him a look, and gestured at Tony with a flourish of her hands, including Tony's gun. "I think I can handle it."
Doug wiped his face in frustration.
Sabine ignored him and leaned over the front of the building to look for the partner.
A black Lincoln Town Car with tinted windows idled in the street below. Sabine recognized Gus from Tony's memories as the driver behind the wheel, his head out the window as he watched the ledge. Their gazes met, and she could see Gus mouthing a swear word as he turned off the car and opened the door. He darted across the street faster than she'd ever seen anyone move.
"I guess we'll find out how tough Tony's partner is now," Sabine said, walking over to the roof access door. It stood cracked open, held by the stone the tenants used to block it for rooftop parties. Sabine often thought the landlord should have used one of those arms that closed the door gently, but he was a cheap S.O.B. and spring loaded hinges were less expensive. Sabine pulled the door open as far as it would go, loading the springs.
Doug whispered behind her. "What are you gonna do?"
"I'm gonna show Gus the door."
Sabine listened in amazement at how quickly Gus climbed the stairs. Gus came up the last flight a few seconds later. She pushed hard, and the door slammed shut as Gus reached it.
The sharp sound of breaking bones and twisting metal jarred the early morning air. The impact left a head-sized dent in the door and sent it wobbling back into Sabine's hands. She grinned demurely to Doug as they listened to the gruesome sound of Gus hitting the far wall and bouncing down the stairs. "Let's go get Tiana, shall we?"
Doug gaped for a few seconds, then followed as she trotted down the stairs.
They paused to check on Gus where he had fallen. Sabine smelled that same musky-woodsy scent she had on Tony, and she realized from being close to both that they both gave off a similar type of warm energy. Gus was bleeding badly from his forehead, and his nose looked broken. His leg looked bent at an unhealthy angle as well.
"I think you broke his leg," Doug said, moving past Gus's body.
The blood sang to Sabine. She made sure to look away from Doug. She couldn't fight the craving any longer. She had to get rid of Doug, and quick. "Go get Tiana and meet me in the lobby. I'll check Gus for weapons."
Waiting for the sound of Doug's footsteps to recede down the stairs grated on her nerves like fingernails on a chalkboard. Her body rebelled against her willpower. As soon as she was sure Doug wouldn't hear, she yanked back Gus's sleeve and sank her aching fangs into his arm. She moaned when the blood magic flooded her senses.
Her body jerked as though she'd been struck by lightning.
So different! So much power! After fasting a week, it should feel good... but not this good. She felt tossed in the wild river of energy flowing into her, and grasped at rational thought like a boulder in the midst of rapids. Something's wrong. Drowning in light, her consciousness filled and felt enormously empty at the same time. Hot molten lava baked her synapses and unfolded parts of her she hadn't known existed. Pressure built in her head until it felt like it might explode. She clung to lucidity through sheer desperation, managing to lick the wound closed after only a few gulps. She fell against the wall in a daze.
Time slowed. Space expanded. Sabine felt every life form in the building. Their dreams floated to her. She stared at a bug flying around the fluorescent bulb in the stairwell, seeing it in slow motion as though the wings were beating once a second.
She'd starved herself her whole first year as a vampire, barely drinking enough to stay alive. She had always felt weak and tired, like the day after staying up all night studying for finals in college. When daylight had come and sapped what little strength she had, she'd welcomed the respite.
But now she felt full of life. Overfull. She felt like a kid on Christmas morning. She felt like she could run a marathon. Or climb Mount Everest. In a year of being undead, she had never felt so alive.
With her heightened awareness, she felt Gus starting to regain consciousness long before she heard his animalistic growl. These guys healed at an amazing rate. She snapped out of her haze, and put the suggestion in his mind to sleep. She felt her glamour extend beyond what she'd intended, reaching a dozen nearby humans, but didn't care. She always used the wrong amount.
Sabine staggered to her feet and searched Gus, noticing that his nails were longer than normal, and sharp. He seemed to have sprouted more hair. His teeth were more pointed than normal too. She checked him for weapons and found a pistol just like Tony's, a few mags full of bullets and pair of knives in wrist sheaths.
She strapped the wrist sheaths on her forearms. The tightest setting could still almost slip over her hands. She liked them, and decided to get a pair that fit. The blades were small, throwing style, and looked really cool. She toyed with one of the blades for a minute, admiring it. Her reflection looked translucent in the metal. Her reflection had returned after the resurrection, except when reflected by silver.
A silver-plated knife? Who carries silver plated throwing knives in wrist sheaths? She put the blade back in the sheath, careful not to touch her skin with it.
She bundled the guns into the front of her "Battitude" T-shirt, holding them with one arm against her stomach. She ran down the stairs, feeling light on her feet. Pausing at the door to the lobby, she steadied herself on the wall. She wiped her mouth to make sure it wasn't bloodstained. Her fangs retracted, obeying her at last. She hoped she could pass for human enough to fool Doug. She opened the stairwell door just as Doug carried his daughter into the lobby from the front. The cute little dark-haired girl looked asleep, holding a stuffed bear.
Doug rushed up to the elevator. "Where's your place?"
"Tenth floor" Sabine replied, hitting the call button for the lift.
"No kidding! I'm on five! How long have you been in the building?"
Sabine did the math in her head. Moved to S.F. in April, not wanting to have another birthday in May alone, looked for Doug, then spent a year as a vampire. "About a year and a half. Would I sound like a stalker if I said I moved here to find you?"
Doug looked like he didn't hear her as he tried to watch the stairwell door and the front door at the same time. "Do you visit the other floors often?"
Sabine gave him a questioning look. Her skin felt like it was buzzing, and the cacophony of other people's thoughts roiling in her mind made her dizzy. She took a deep breath and let it out, trying to center herself mentally so she could focus on Doug's question. What was it he asked? Oh, yes. Should I mention that I stop by your door every night? "I haven't really felt like socializing with the other tenants." Between all their random thoughts and wanting to eat them alive, it's better to be a hermit. "Just the roof lately. Why?"
"They'll be tracking us."
The elevator made a soft ding, and the door slid open in slow motion. Doug rushed in with his little girl and started pressing the buttons for every floor.
"What are you doing?" Sabine asked, leaning against the back wall. She tried for casual, even though she felt unsteady.
"Trying to throw off the scent."
"The scent?" So he knows they're werewolves. "So you want to tell me what those guys are?"
"You wouldn't believe me if I told you."
Sabine laughed. "You'd be surprised how open minded I am these days."
He gave her a look as his daughter mumbled something
in her sleep.
Sabine's eyes moved from the girl to Doug, and his worried look. She lifted an eyebrow. "Look, I know what they are. You can be straight with me."
"How do you know?"
"It's a long story. Maybe as long as the story about why werewolves want you dead."
Doug closed his eyes and drooped. "We're in such deep shit."
"We're doing okay so far."
"Luck," Doug exclaimed, trying to keep his voice down. "There are a lot of them. A whole pack. You haven't seen what they look like in wolf form. They kill to keep their little secret. We're so dead."
"Let's agree to disagree on the whole deadness thing."
Doug stared at her, then focused on her eyes. His gaze dropped to her mischievous smile. "Are you drunk or something?"
Sabine shrugged, her mind still spinning from the discovery that werewolf blood was her new favorite drink in the whole world. She made a measurement with her forefinger and thumb, and looked at him through it, squinting. "I might have had a drop or two."
Doug just shook his head and pulled the emergency stop button as the door opened on the second floor. The emergency buzzer was silent, disabled to help people move furniture and stuff. He walked out, rubbing along the walls. "I need you to put your scent on the walls too, trust me."
Sabine suppressed a giggle and played along as they "left their scent" on all the floors of the building. They stopped briefly at his apartment so he could grab a large suitcase. The sun was only seconds from cresting the horizon when they reached her apartment. She ran inside and closed the shutters and curtains as Doug locked the door.
"Do you have someplace I can put Tiana?"
Sabine put the guns on her coffee table and motioned to the bedroom on the left of the apartment. Chad's stuff was gone, and she'd planned to use it as an office from now on. It still had the convertible sofa she'd let Chad sleep on, alone. She breathed a sigh of relief that she had changed the sheets. She unfolded the sofabed and pulled some pillows from the closet.
Reborn to Bite (Vampire Shadows Book 1) Page 3