Dante glanced at me. “Do you eat?”
Rather than answer him, I leaned over the console and projected my voice out the window. “I’ll take two double decker tacos, a nacho supreme, and twenty-ounce Mountain Dew freeze.”
Dante’s face lit up with his grin. “Finally, a chick who understands the concept of road food.”
When I tried to hand him cash at the first window Dante waved my hand away.
“Save it. My treat.”
Wow, I’d never had a guy buy me a meal. But this wasn’t a date. Still, it was a nice gesture. Dante pulled up to the second window where a girl barely older than me handed over our drinks. Dante passed over my frozen Mountain Dew, followed by a paper bag.
“They get it all?” he asked as he pulled out of the drive-through and put on his blinker.
I dug through the sack real quick. “Burrito, churro, tacos, nachos. Yep.”
“Mind handing me the churro?”
“No problem.”
The wrapping crinkled as the churro passed from my hand to Dante’s. The nachos crunched in my mouth when I chewed. I handed Dante his burrito once he finished dessert. He drove with his knees, holding the burrito in one hand while flipping through radio stations with his other until he landed on a top hits station.
We finished our food quickly. Dante tossed the end of his burrito over the seat to his dog, who chewed twice before swallowing the piece whole.
I began sucking down my frosty soda. As we passed under the bridge that took traffic over to Elmendorf Air Force Base, Dante saluted in the direction of the gate.
I laughed. I don’t know why. Maybe the caffeine had gone to my head.
“Ready for your first adventure to Fairbanks, Minnie?” Dante asked.
“Whatever you say, Bullwinkle.”
Dante chuckled. “Good one. What’s your last name again?”
“Harper.”
“You’ve got spirit, Harper, and that’s important in our line of work. We gotta stay sharp at all times even when we draw unlucky numbers or get the wrong side of the coin. I’m afraid we’re not gonna see a whole lotta action this trip.”
Tailing Buck? No kidding.
“Then again this Buck vamp might slip up, and when he does, we’ll be there to take him down,” Dante said.
I nearly snorted Mountain Dew out my nose. “Have you ever met any normal vampires, or does Melcher only send you after the coldhearted killers and village crazies?”
Dante grinned. “Those are my favorite kinds. Normal vampire... what’s the point?”
My fingers slowly went numb holding onto my drink. I set it in a cup holder.
Dante had a way of slurping his drink through the straw that sounded like he’d reached the end of the cup even though it was still over half full.
I slurped in response, and he slurped louder. I had to stop when I laughed, forgetting for two glorious seconds that my life had turned to shit. No, not turned to shit. It had always been shit, but whereas it had been crazy, bad shit before, it had become slightly less shitty, and right back to the land of insanity.
“So,” Dante said, drumming his palms on the steering wheel. “I know Fairbanks. You know Buck. Together we can have this thing wrapped up in twenty-four hours, don’t you think?”
“I think it will take more than a day to observe him.”
“This guy ever bite you?”
“No.”
“Hmm.”
“What?” I asked.
Dante stopped tapping his wheel and turned his head to me. “Nothing. Any other names on the Fairbanks watch list?”
“I don’t have a watch list for Fairbanks.”
“So Melcher only has you keeping tabs on Anchorage’s undead?”
I stuffed the empty nacho tray into the paper sack and stretched back into my seat. “Are you fishing for info?”
“Just making conversation. We’ve got a long drive ahead of us.”
“Maybe I’d rather listen to music.”
Dante turned the music off and shot me a devious grin.
“Maybe I’d rather listen to my own thoughts,” I said.
Dante turned the music back on. “Why not do all three at once? Good teamwork involves communication. I’m not going all the way up to Fairbanks without taking out at least one bad guy, and if you don’t know of any maybe this Buck character will lead us to some.”
I shook my head.
“Not up for it?” Dante asked.
I stuck out my chin. “I’m up for anything Melcher instructs me to do.”
“Perfect! Melcher wants us to rid the world of the demonic plague. That includes Buck.”
I pressed my fists into my thighs. “We can’t go around killing all vampires. That would be like genocide. A lot of them are nice.”
Dante snorted. “A nice vampire. That’ll be the day.”
“How many vampires have you met?” I demanded.
Dante began driving with his knees again so he could count on his fingers. “Let’s see. There was my first initiation kill. Bullet to the head.” He looked sideways at me and grinned. “My first training kill. Knife. My first mission kill. That one also got the knife. My second mission kill. Had to run that one over when he tried to flee. My first interrogation... wait that one was human. My first mission to the backcountry.” Dante leaned toward me. “Harpoon.”
He shrugged when he caught me staring at him. “That’s the way you do things in the village.”
“I asked how many vampires you’d met, not killed!”
Dante’s face wrinkled in confusion. “It’s the same thing.”
“Never mind.”
“It must be difficult getting close to your targets without being allowed to kill them,” Dante said. “I couldn’t be an informant.”
“I like being an informant,” I retorted.
Dante grinned. “Do you like being bitten?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah, I’m sure.” I glared at Dante before turning away. Someone ought to watch the road since he clearly wasn’t.
“Cause I mean, no judgments if you do. I like being bitten.”
I choke-snorted. “You would.” I couldn’t help glancing at Dante. Yep, he was smiling.
“I like knowing my blood is the last thing they taste before they die under my blade.”
My lips curled back. “That’s sick.”
“Yet beautiful at the same time. These creatures go sucking the life out of innocents and then one day they meet me. The curse is broken. Poetic justice.”
“I’m with you on the ones who deserve it,” I said. “But vampires are like humans. Some kill, some don’t.”
“But they all drink blood,” Dante said as though proving a point.
“They don’t have to kill to drink blood.”
“But they have to bite.”
“They don’t even have to bite.”
“Then what’s the point?” Dante took in my expression and began laughing. “You look so serious right now. I’m just toying with you, Minnie Mouse.”
“Sure you are,” I grumbled under my breath.
After a minute of silence, Dante asked, “You and Aurora are friends, right?”
“Yeah.”
“She ever talk about me?”
Was he serious?
“No.”
Dante’s grin widened. “Can’t break the bonds of secrecy. I get it.”
This time, Dante missed my eye role. He’d refocused on the road.
Boy was he barking up the wrong tree. He’d kill Fane in a heartbeat if he knew Aurora had dated a vampire. Moments earlier, he’d admitted to killing vampires for the sole sake of being undead. Fane would be a consolation prize.
My loyalties should have been with Dante, but they landed much closer to Fane.
Dante seemed unreliable, unpredictable, and way too full of himself. Not to mention he had a dog.
He also turned out to be gabbier than a girl. Six hours was a lon
g time to be trapped with someone who wouldn’t shut up. I already had Dante’s kill tally, but he went back and filled me in on all the details. He had a million questions about my undercover work. And as we approached Mount McKinley, he wanted to know what kind of accident had led me to Melcher and my current role as an undercover informant.
“None of your business,” I said.
Dante leaned over the steering wheel as though he was resting against a seatback. “Oh, come on. I told you my story.”
Yeah, an exciting ski adventure that involved a helicopter to the top of a mountain, a snowboard, and a nosedive over a cliff. Nowhere near as personal as slitting my wrists. Maybe I ought to make up my own wild story.
“It’s... embarrassing,” I said slowly.
Dante’s cheeks lifted with his grin. “Now I really have to know.”
“Okay,” I said, stretching in my seat. “I was out with this guy—let’s call him Jeff—driving up and down Minnesota on a Friday night, racing a car here and there, but mostly cruising. Anyway, after a while I got bored, so I reached over and unzipped his pants.”
I flashed Dante an angelic smile when he cranked his head a hundred and eighty degrees in my direction.
“And then?” he prodded.
“And then what do you think? I sucked his dick.” I sat up straighter in the chair, smiling smugly after catching Dante’s devious grin.
“Bad girl,” Dante said. “What happened next?”
“He ran into a light pole. Bam!”
Dante shook his head. “Men always have been hopeless when it comes to multitasking. Did Jeff survive?”
“Jeff was fine.”
“But not you.”
“I barely made it.”
“The agents stepped in?”
I nodded. “Melcher saved me.”
Dante wrapped his fingers around the steering wheel and pulled himself forward. For a moment it looked like he was doing pushups. “Wouldn’t have been a bad way for Jeff to go, but not really fair to you.”
“I made out okay in the end.”
“Damn straight,” Dante said, smacking the steering wheel. “Now you’re one of the elite. Sorry, the transfusion didn’t work out, though. But, hey, at least you have an opportunity to feed information to the hunters. You are still an instrumental part of this organization.”
“I know.” I didn’t need Dante to tell me my role in the policing and extermination of murderous vampires was important.
“So, you and Aurora have the car thing in common?”
“What?”
Dante tilted his head.
Oh, right. The story I just made up. “Yeah, I guess so.”
“But you’re not afraid of cars,” Dante said.
I smiled. “I’m not afraid of cock, either.”
It took several seconds for that to register then suddenly Dante was laughing so hard I was afraid for a moment he might run us off the road. Good thing there weren’t any light poles in the stretch of wilderness between Anchorage and Fairbanks.
Dante’s entire body shook. “Oh, that’s good,” he said when he had enough air to speak. “Aurora should spend more time around you.”
Aurora. Aurora. Aurora. Yeah, I loved my girl and would put my own life on the line any day of the week to protect hers, but the way guys fawned over her—even followed and got themselves killed for her—you’d think she had beer-flavored nipples. And that was the other thing. She probably couldn’t say the word “nipples” or “cock” without turning three shades of red. Guess guys liked the whole unspoiled innocence thing.
Even after having sex with a douche bag jock at Denali High, Aurora acted like a virgin. That girl needed to get laid, like really laid. If Dante thought he’d be the one to do the honors, he had another thing coming. It didn’t take a genius to see she wasn’t swooning over Dante’s obvious attempts to hook up.
Aurora had been bitten by the vampire bug. It was like sex in a messed up way—made a girl feel connected and close to the guy who’d fucked her, or in this case, sucked. It united us to an entire race of creatures who broke through our skin and consumed a small part of us.
I understood it all too well.
After that, men—human men—paled in comparison. We’d been marked for life. I wondered if female vamps would appeal to Dante the way male vamps appealed to me and Aurora.
I could introduce Dante to Maxine, but then he’d kill her so never mind.
“So you’ve never met a female vamp?” I asked Dante.
“Nope. Have you?”
“Of course.”
“What are they like?”
“Some of them are divas, but I’ve never met one who’s dangerous.”
Dante squared his shoulders. “They’re still blood suckers.”
“Yes, they suck blood.”
Dante’s lips twisted into a smile right before he asked, “Has a vamp chick ever sucked your blood?”
“A few times.”
Dante whistled. “You get around.”
“It’s my job.”
Dante lifted his hands off the steering wheel. “Hey, I’m not judging. I’m impressed. I thought Melcher would use Red for that sort of thing.”
“Valerie.” I scowled.
Dante nodded. “Aurora’s not fond of her either. Hey, can’t love all your coworkers.”
Love? I shook my head. “Melcher prefers Valerie in close relationships.”
Dante’s lips curled back. “I’d rather get bit by a hundred different vampires than be in a relationship with one of those things.”
“Things?” I said, not masking the annoyance in my voice. “They’re people, too, and a lot nicer than the average jerk who lives and dies. And you’d be one of those “things” if you were suddenly denied the government’s anti-vamp formula.”
Dante leaned toward me. “Touchy. Getting a little too close to your targets?”
I huffed and pushed my back into my seat. “They’re not all targets. Talk to Melcher.”
“Oh, I’ve talked to Melcher,” Dante said, suddenly sounding serious. “And he made it very clear he wants them all dead. He’s just more methodical about it than I’d be. He wants to start with the worst ones first and work his way down the list.”
A bark startled me. I’d completely forgotten about the big hairy animal in back.
“Tommy needs to take a leak,” Dante announced. He steered the Jeep off the road at the next pull off. “Come on, boy, let’s make yellow snow.”
Dry frigid air filled the car when Dante opened his door. Outside jagged peaks pierced the shadowy sky.
There wasn’t a single street light or sign of civilization as far as the eye could see. It was unsettling and peaceful at the same time. Made me feel safe, out of reach.
Dante kept the Jeep running while he went out with his dog, walking out of sight behind the car. The door behind me opened a few minutes later, and the dog leaped inside, panted a bit, and settled himself across all three seats in back. Dante jumped into the driver’s seat and said, “Ready to roll?”
“Wait. I have to pee.”
Dante dug a napkin out of the fast food bag and handed it to me. “You might want to put on some pants before you go out there.”
I wrapped my fingers around the paper napkin. “I don’t wear pants.”
Dante looked at me dubiously. “Take it from me, frostbite’s no fun.”
“I don’t get cold.” I nodded at his chest. “What about you? You went out in a T-shirt.”
“Yeah, well, I grew up in these parts.”
“Well, I’m half Russian.” Not to mention numb inside.
“So, pee already.”
“Stop distracting me.”
“Want me to hold your hand?”
We stared each other down. I was the first to break, erupting into giggles that turned into full-fledged laughter. My shoulders shook. Dante got caught in the hilarity, and when I saw tears leaking in the corners of his eyes, it made me laugh harder.
&nbs
p; I squeezed my legs together. “I’m going to pee if I keep laughing.”
“If you pee in the Jeep you’re walking the rest of the way to Fairbanks.”
That made me start laughing again. Dante, too.
“I may be laughing, but I mean it,” he said.
“Okay, be right back.” I unclicked my seatbelt, opened the passenger door, and jumped down to the compact snow below. “No looking,” I said before shutting the door.
The cold pricked my bare skin like a thousand frozen splinters. Of course I could feel it, but it didn’t chill me at my core. Cold didn’t bother me. It had its own unique feeling against my skin, just like cotton, silk, or wool.
I didn’t get how people lived in hot places. All that heat would make me want to nap all the time. In the cold, everything was crisp and clear. I felt alive.
I quickly did my thing and hoisted myself back in the Jeep. Dante sped off into the waning light. The mountains turned to shadows in the distance, everything in front of us dimming as though we were chasing the dark.
8
Into the Dark
Fairbanks was covered in ice fog when we rolled in after eight p.m.
“Welcome to the second largest city in Alaska,” Dante said. “She’s a beauty, ain’t she?”
“I can’t see a thing.”
Dante took a deep breath and wistfully said, “Ah, home.”
“Do you have family here?”
“Oh, yeah.”
“Do you ever visit them?”
“Not when I’m on a mission.” Dante leaned closer to me. “Don’t mix business and family, but I am coming back in a couple weeks for spring break.”
“This is where you spend spring break?”
I could see only ten feet in front of me. The yellow dotted lines were the only indication we were still on the road. Good thing the ground wasn’t covered in snow or we wouldn’t be able to tell up from down.
Dante lifted his chin. “Welcome to the real Alaska. We aren’t like you city folks. We’re true survivors up here in the north with nothing but our wits to keep us going.”
I squinted through the fog at a one-story building lit up within. “Is that a Wal-Mart?”
“Yeah.”
I snorted. “How authentically Alaskan of you to have a Wal-Mart right down the road.”
Stakeout (Aurora Sky Page 9