Oh, God. She’s going to crash us into the fence.
“Messy, no!” I shouted, trying to hang on to the saddle horn with one hand and pull back on the reins with the other. It didn’t happen in slow motion. Maybe if it had, I would have put more thought into actually turning the horse.
Unfortunately, my yell encouraged her to break into a canter. My right hand shot out towards the top rail of the fence and grabbed it hard as Messenger executed a left turn to avoid the crash. Not prepared for her amazingly quick change of trajectory, I took a nosedive into the ground after hanging for a split second on the top rail of the fence. Having that short hold on the fence took most of the trauma out of the fall, but I was still down.
In shock, I watched as she trotted a few dozen feet away and then turned to look at me blankly. My right shoulder ached, but I didn’t seem to have any other pain. Dead grass and dirt were caked against the crimson fibers of the front of my fleece jacket, and my favorite khaki baseball hat was lying in the wet grass several feet away.
Tears began to blur my sight. I should have known I couldn’t do it. I felt like such an idiot, assuming I could control that horse. Maybe a big dumb plow horse, but not her. Not a real saddle horse with top-notch training behind her. I gripped the bill of my baseball cap and slapped it against my thigh.
“You’re a pain in my ass, horse.” A few tears streaked down my cheeks and into the corners of my mouth.
She snorted wetly and shook her head, rattling the bit and reins. Her breath was bright in the cool morning sunshine. As I began brushing off the dirt from my fall, Jackson came around the side of the barn carrying a rake. Sadie, my Golden Retriever followed energetically.
“Fall off?” Jackson hesitated by the gate, his dark eyebrows rising in concern.
“Yeah. I’m okay.” I took Messenger’s reins back over her head and headed towards the gate.
“You’re not getting back on?”
I looked at him. There were things between us that had gone unsaid for a while. Ever since Michael had been taken, we had both kept our distance. He knew that I was holding a grudge about him being the one responsible for allowing Michael to go. It may have been Michael’s plan all along, but Jackson knew how I felt about him. It was hard not to think that Jackson might have done it in order to keep me for himself.
There was a world of attraction between Jackson and me. It wasn’t just physical. We had both been abandoned by a parent at an early age and suffered for it. He had spent a good deal of his life on a ranch in Wyoming and I had spent all my life on a farm in Indiana. There was a connection between us beyond that as well, but you wouldn’t know it. We only spoke to each other in the polite tone that strangers might use with each other on a public bus.
“No, I’m not getting back on.”
“You should. Now,” he replied evenly. “If you don’t, you may never have the guts to get close to a horse again.”
We came through the gate and Messenger shuffled aside quickly so I could close it again. I walked up to Jackson and tossed the reins to him. “You’re the cowboy. You ride her.”
I went back to the house with tears drying on my cheeks and self-doubt crowding out anything positive inside my head. If I never saw that stupid horse again, it would be fine by me.
He gave me time to cool off. It wasn’t until after dinner that Jackson brought up what had happened. As soon as the dinner dishes were washed and put away, I fled out to the fire pit and got a little blaze going. It had been a long time since I had done that. There was such satisfaction in seeing the first log catch and hearing the crackling of the flames. The wind was low and blowing away from the house, so the smoke wasn’t too bad.
I was bundled up in a heavy jacket, corduroy pants and my hiking boots. It was chilly, but I didn’t really care. My main goal had been to get out of the house and do something that I couldn’t really fail at. So it was a great comfort when the first flames began leaping up the sides of the bottom log before me, blue flame with orange. Once I had it burning well, I settled back into one of the Adirondack chairs placed in the gravel around the fire pit and stared into the flames, attempting to lose myself in the hypnotic movement of the dancing light.
“Sarah.”
I didn’t look at him. “Come sit down.”
There was a stretch of time in which neither of us said anything. Perhaps he was as lost in the vision of the flames as I was. I felt hollow and sad and felt that he might be able to bring me back from it. If I were to let him. In fact, I knew he would do everything in his power to save me.
Turning away from the heat, I finally looked over to where Jackson sat. His hair was shorter. Nelly had been bugging him about it for a week before he had finally had somebody in town trim it up quite a bit. He had pulled it back with a plain black rubber band, but there wasn’t much to hold back now. His hair was shiny, perfectly straight and black as pitch. The color was deceptively intimidating compared to his warm, coffee-colored eyes that crinkled at the corners when he laughed. High cheekbones, classic nose, strong jaw. Awesome body. Had I not fallen so hard for a vampire, Jackson would have been my top choice.
He picked up a couple twigs from the edge of the pit and tossed them in. “Everybody falls now and then, Sarah.”
“I know.”
He paused for a moment before saying cautiously, “It’s not just about the horse, is it?”
I sniffled and tried to blink away the tears that were threatening to spill over my cheeks. Just like always, he knew exactly what was wrong with me. I wrapped my arms around my legs with my knees in my face and hid from him like a little kid. That’s exactly how I felt. I wished that my Dad had been there to see me fall. I wondered what he might have said to try to make me feel better.
“Get back up there, girl. No, let’s shorten those stirrups first. Go on, now. Up you go.”
I heard Jackson sigh. “Anything new from Victoria?”
“Not since Wednesday.”
“At least you know he’s alive. Well… still in one piece.”
“He’s still in serious danger,” I whispered.
“Maybe. But you know that Victoria and Jones will do anything and everything to get him out of there.” There was defeat in his tone. He hadn’t planned ahead. He was being honest when he said that his only concern was making sure that I was safe. Michael didn’t factor into that equation.
He was right about Victoria and Jones. They were both dedicated friends that Michael had saved from horrible circumstances. If between the two of them they could conceive of any way to save him, they would follow through and make it happen. With Victoria’s mind-reading capability and the sheer power and leadership of Jones, they were quite a team. I would never bet against them in a fight.
I felt my cell phone vibrate in the pocket of my jacket and drew it out with cold white fingers.
“It’s Teddy.” I told Jackson before putting the phone to my ear.
“Sarah, the full Council wants to meet you. We are holding an investigative hearing regarding Isaiah.” Theodora’s voice was calm and cool, as always.
My eyes jerked over to Jackson, “Where?”
“Chicago. Next Thursday evening. Can you make it?”
“Yes, if you think it will be safe.”
“We have arranged an escort for you.”
“What about Jackson?” I asked.
“He may be called to testify at a later time. For now, the Council is asking for you alone.”
“Who is the escort? Is it a security team?” I could just imagine a crew of vampire Council henchmen talking into invisible microphones and wearing dark glasses.
“No.” She paused and cleared her throat before continuing. “Alexander has offered his services.”
Alex. It had been a week since I had talked to him on the phone. At that time, he was four miles deep into Yellowstone National Park and had no intention of getting anywhere near any vampires for a very long time. He had known the powers inside him, which made him the in
destructible Guardian that he was might eventually rob him of any ability to feel humility or remorse. He had decided on a sabbatical instead of a bloody push for power. It was the reason we were still good friends after everything that had happened.
“I’ll call you back tomorrow, Teddy. I need to think about this.”
“Sarah? Are you alright?”
“I’ll be okay, Teddy. Just worried about Michael.”
“Take heart, dear. I do believe he will pull through this the same way he’s managed to pull through every other challenge in his life.”
“I hope so. Thank you, Teddy. Goodnight.”
“Goodnight, dear.”
I ended the call and looked weakly over at Jackson.
“Council meeting. They want me in Chicago next Thursday.”
He stared thoughtfully into the growing flames. When he responded, his jaw was taut with unreleased tension. “Could they be trying to separate us?”
A branch snapped behind us and we both jerked in surprise to see a familiar figure striding toward the fire with dark eyes narrowed in suspicion. Katie. Her hair was down; the ebony curls left to dangle casually down the back of her leather jacket. Her face and hands were as white as dove feathers.
“I think you’re probably just being paranoid, Jackson. As usual.”
My sister had undergone quite a personality change since she became one of the undead. She had been directly involved in the death of a hiker, which would have been bad enough, but then people from the vampire community had begun spreading rumors about Katie being a rogue. Which was ten times worse in the eyes of the vampires that we were supposed to protect.
The rogues were vampires who killed without mercy or remorse for their deeds. Soulless monsters, they were supposed to be. I shuddered at the news photos that Jackson had shown me of the kinds of scenes left behind by vampire rogues. It was his newest project. To try to uncover as much information about the vampires still on our land and determine how different they may be from the rogue camp in Arizona.
“You scared us, Katie.” I murmured as I poked at the fire with a stick by my chair.
“So sorry.” She sat down in the chair between Jackson and me with a smug grin. “What did I interrupt? A phone call from Teddy?”
“That super hearing thing is getting really annoying.” Jackson muttered.
Her voice was rich with violence as she replied, “Yeah. And your whole cowboy-saves-the-day routine is getting really old as well.”
“Do you two really have to fight constantly?” I was so sick of the animosity between them.
“It wouldn’t be an issue if your sister would stop blaming me for her turn to the dark side.” Jackson said. I caught the glare he shot her with those serious eyes of his and knew this confrontation wasn’t close to being over, no matter how much I might wish it were.
“I’m going to bed,” I said lowly, rising from my chair. I figured I would let them sort it out. My fears for Michael made everything else going on around me seem inconsequential. It had felt that way for weeks and nothing could shake me out of it. The text from Victoria had helped a little, but it had been several days since I’d heard anything from her.
“What did Teddy want, anyway?” Katie asked, picking up the stick I’d dropped.
Despondently, I looked over at her. “The Council is holding a hearing. They want me there.”
“Interesting.”
Nelly was standing on the back porch, waiting for me to return. She looked agitated and out of sorts, her face a mask of suspicion and fear. I pulled off my hiking boots in the mudroom and hung up my jacket before following her into the kitchen. On the black and white tiled countertop next to the stove, she had laid a plain sheet of white paper and two writing pens. One black and one red.
“What’s all this for?”
“Hush.” She grabbed up the black pen and began writing in quick, concise movements. She finished and turned the paper towards me.
We have to burn these papers in the fireplace after we finish with them.
I stared at her. Was the woman losing her mind? I looked around the empty kitchen and then remembered Jackson’s earlier comment about super hearing. Nelly wanted to tell me something, but she didn’t want Katie to know. That seemed very unusual. She gestured toward the red pen, so I took it up and added to her first statement.
What the hell is going on?
Excited by my understanding of the need for secrecy, she pulled paper back over to herself and wrote more slowly, her grey eyes lit with some unseen motive.
I think Katie has been killing tourists.
I rolled my eyes at her before pulling the paper back and scribbling on it quickly,
No way. She wouldn’t do that. She swore she would stick to the blood bags.
Nelly gestured for me to follow her with a waving hand, leading me back towards the laundry room. She pulled open one side of the small closet in the room, moved a blanket from the top of a box and then pointed inside the box.
Oh no. I could see inside the box held several pairs of jeans crusted over with dried blood. This wasn’t some simple accident from her cutting veggies in the kitchen. Somebody had lost a LOT of blood. It was likely that somebody had died in these clothes. I looked at Nellie, who was wringing her hands and keeping her gaze fixed on the hallway. She was afraid we might be interrupted by my big, bad, murderous vampire of a sister.
“This is really bad, Nelly.” I mumbled.
CHAPTER THREE – Alex
The sunlight reflecting off the lake hurt my eyes. The sun was supposed to slip over the mountains quietly, not go out with a bang and give me a headache. Maybe I wasn’t quite as indestructible as everyone thought I was. With a groan, I moved so the light was against my back. I faced Selena.
She was in the shadows beneath the overhang of the porch, looking irritated and unkempt.
“You should have called me sooner,” I said.
She drained the rest of her brandy and set the empty crystal glass down on the marble-top patio table in front of her seat. Her long legs were crossed, but one foot was moving continually, bobbing up and down in a nerve-racking rhythm.
“I didn’t know until yesterday. Everyone was hoping she would stay clean.”
“She’s murdering people. You talk like she’s a drug junkie.”
She sneered at me. “Please. You know there’s hardly a difference between the two.”
I took a seat beside her at the table and looked out over Lake Tahoe. Selena had bought the place back in the 80’s and preferred the scenery there to all of her other homes. She had a crew of human maids and gardeners who took care of everything whether she was staying there or not. I couldn’t imagine the amount of money it took to maintain a house of that size.
“How many square feet does this place have?”
“Shut up, Alex. I’m extravagant. I know. Let’s talk about what you’re going to do.”
“Have you ever thought that maybe Sarah and Katie deserve to have a place like this?”
The change that came over her was sudden, but it was one I’d seen before. Her eyes narrowed into black slits that blazed hatred and I felt the waves of rage that radiated from her body like fire against my skin. Again, I had seen this before. Ten years before she may have tried to strangle me for making her so angry. But things had changed. I had changed.
I could literally point one finger at her and send out a blast of energy that would kill her on the spot. She wasn’t completely stupid. Self-preservation was a skill she had perfected long ago. So the sudden anger that appeared to be manic and uncontrolled subsided when she remembered who she was dealing with.
Her bright red lips parted and she bared her canines at me. “You don’t know as much about me as you think, Alexander.”
I hated it when people called me that. It’s what family used to call me. But my real family was gone and had been for a very long time. The closest I’d come to having a family again had come from being around Sarah, Nelly and K
atie. Even old Joe, the handyman, had made me feel welcome. He sort of gave me the creeps, but he was a decent old man.
It was Joe who had found me when I first arrived in Brown County all those months ago. Sarah and Nelly had taken care of me when I was at my most vulnerable. As it turned out, that had been the plan to begin with. I had come there with a purpose.
“You want me to go back to the farm.”
“Yes. You will need to get Katie under control. If she can kill strangers for blood, it’s not much of a stretch to think she might kill her own sister.” Her voice was hard as flint and equally cold.
There was a disassociation there that was more than just a lack of motherly concern. I had suspected for a while that the physical differences between Katie and Sarah held some secret truth. Sarah had light brown hair that was smooth and silky. Her eyes alternated between a bright blue when she was upset to a gentle cornflower blue when she was feeling good. Katie was dark-eyed with black curly hair that could rarely be tamed. Sarah carried a little more weight in her hips than her sister did. The bone structure of their faces was also very different.
“Selena…” I wanted to ask her straight out about my suspicions, but she knew what was coming and headed me off before I could utter the words.
“Stop. Don’t ask me questions about them.” She sighed slowly and stared at her empty brandy glass. “Just get out there and get Katie away from Sarah before something horrible happens.”
I stood up. “Where am I supposed to take her?”
“Take her to the island.”
“That’s a long trip,” I said, trying to recall our own journey decades ago. I had been drunk on blood and hating myself intensely when Selena had first mentioned the island she owned in the South Pacific. Getting there was difficult in the best of circumstances. But that was before I had been changed. It was before I’d had Michael’s blood and Sarah’s blood moving through my system, creating untold power and resistance to sickness and death. Oh yeah—except for the sunlight headaches. Very annoying.
The Vampire's Release, A Paranormal Romance (Undead in Brown County #4) Page 2