True North (Aurora Sky: Vampire Hunter, Vol. 6)

by Nikki Jefford

  I stomped on his foot, rammed my elbow into his gut, and grabbed for his gun. Jared held on to his weapon with an iron grip. With his other hand, he yanked my head back by my hair. I hollered in pain and outrage, at that moment wishing I had a buzz cut like the soldier grappling with Noel.

  Jared dragged me by the hair toward the front door of the recreation hall. The pain in my skull made me miss the pressure on my arm. My head couldn’t take much more abuse.

  Jared kicked the door open and pulled me inside the cavernous building. It had the same closed-up smell as the bunkhouse, though not as poignant. The space we entered was wide and open. In the dark, I could just make out a set of bowling alleys missing their pins. The sight looked out of place in an abandoned mining town in Alaska. I had to wonder for a moment whether I was hallucinating.

  Jared pulled me over to a set of stairs beside a wall and released my hair. I might have cried with relief if there had been time.

  “Upstairs,” Jared said, pushing me from behind.

  With every step I took, he was right behind me, shoving me as we climbed to the second floor. I twisted around as we neared the landing and threw my arms out to push Jared down the stairs. He grabbed my arm as I did and used it like a rope to keep from falling. The motion threw us both off balance. Together we stumbled and fell sideways against the wall.

  Jared ground his teeth as he righted himself.

  “Quit playing around,” he ordered.

  Playing around? This wasn’t a game. I was trying to kill the bastard.

  “Fine,” I said right before sprinting up the last few steps to the second floor.

  This time Jared didn’t get a chance to grab my arm or hair. As soon as my feet landed on even ground, I ran into a room, nearly tripping over the body of a soldier lying facedown on the floor. I’d all but forgotten the four soldiers Dante had taken out earlier. Their bodies looked like dark lumps strewn across the room.

  I wish it would have made me feel better about Reinhardt, but it didn’t.

  An oil lantern had been left on, the source of the flickering light I’d noticed earlier. It cast a faint glow across the wood table it rested upon, reaching into the large room, but not making it far.

  I jumped over the next body, intent on one thing.

  There, on the table, lay a single hunting knife. Unlike initiation, there was only one choice of weapon. The flame from the lantern reflected off the blade. It was as though the knife had been set out especially for me.

  I ran toward it, half expecting Jared to shoot me in the back. But Jared’s footsteps were pounding on the floorboards behind me, thumping in my ears.

  I pushed my body forward, hell bent on getting my hands on the knife. My legs pumped toward the beacon of light.

  Halfway there, something large and heavy hit my back and propelled me momentarily forward. It was like I was flying, but all too soon I was falling down to the floor. Jared landed beside me, the two of us joining the bodies on the ground.

  Before I could scramble to my feet, Jared grabbed my ankle and pulled me toward him. He probably expected me to try and get away from him, so I did the opposite and flipped around then launched myself at him. He’d gotten to his knees. I shoved him backward, taking immense pleasure when he fell onto his back.

  I scrambled on top of him, grabbed him by the hair, and slammed his head against the floor.

  “How does it feel, you psycho bastard?!” I screamed.

  I felt like ripping his hair out in clumps. Instead, I slammed it back a second time, and a third. Forget bullets, I was ready to bash his skull in with my bare hands after what he’d done to Reinhardt. For all I knew, Noel was dead too. Possibly even Dante. I didn’t know that the soldier he’d wounded hadn’t led him across the snowy plain only to ambush him in the dark. All it took was one bullet, one stab wound . . . one twist of the neck. How many slams of Jared’s head would it take to end the bastard once and for all?

  His shoulders began to shake and it took me a moment to register that he was laughing open mouthed, teeth glinting in the weak light.

  “Got me on my back, Raven. I bet you’ve fantasized about this moment more times than you care to admit.”

  I recoiled at the suggestive tone of his voice.

  “I have fantasized about this,” I said. “Many times.” My voice grew louder. “The moment where I end you.”

  My fingers tightened in Jared’s hair. As I lifted his head, his arms shot forward, dropping the gun with a clatter. Jared grabbed me by the hips and threw me aside with such force I hit the floor and rolled. As he scooped up his gun and got to his feet, Jared laughed.

  “You think you can keep me down, Raven? You’re as light as a feather.”

  I scrambled to my feet and stood with my fingers balled into fists, acutely aware I was roughly twenty feet away from the knife on the table. Too bad Jared had his gun pointed at me.

  A gunshot blasted from somewhere outside the building. It gave me a start. Jared, being the cold, unfeeling bastard he was, didn’t even flinch.

  “Who’s out there? Who killed these men?” he demanded.

  “I already told you who’s here,” I said. “As to who killed these men, it was Rudolph.”

  Jared’s shadowed face turned darker. A split second passed in which our eyes locked. Then I was running, legs pumping, pounding, racing for the table.

  A gunshot exploded so close to my head my eardrums felt as though they were shattering. A second shot followed. I kept running. If Jared could dodge bullets, it was only fair I be given the same opportunity. Then a third shot cracked. It seemed to hit me instantly. My upper left arm burned.

  Despite being hit, I made it to the table and snatched up the knife. Before Jared had a chance to fire a fourth shot on me, I knocked the table over. The glass lantern crashed and broke over the floor. The flame guttered out, pitching us into total darkness as I dove behind the shield of the table’s thick wood.

  I remained crouched, straining to hear over the pounding of my heart and ringing inside my ears.

  My grip on the knife tightened. The blade wouldn’t do me any good if Jared landed a fatal shot. The one in my shoulder stung like a bitch, but I still felt functional.

  I thought I heard the floorboards creak. There were no follow-up footsteps, at least not any I could hear—not over the sudden blast of gunfire erupting on the other side of the downed table. I threw myself flat on the ground, cringing as the sound continued. My entire body tensed, preparing to take lead. Wood wasn’t bulletproof.

  The gunfire ended abruptly. I lay gasping for breath. Miraculously, I hadn’t been hit. My arm wound was the only part of my body that stung, not counting my head and wrists.

  Footsteps pounded in the distance, nearing and rising, someone coming up the stairs.

  As I forced calming breaths in and out of my lungs, I heard a sound more grating than gunfire.

  Jared chuckled. It echoed through the room.

  “Can’t say that I’m surprised to see you here,” Jared said. “Think you can rush in and save the day, do you?”

  My heart nearly stopped.

  I jumped up, fully expecting to see Fane standing in the dark, facing Jared off.

  But it was Dante who had joined us on the second floor. He stood hunched, as though having difficulty baring his own weight. My lip trembled. I felt rooted in place. Jared stood directly between Dante and me, his back to me.

  I expected Jared to say more, to taunt Dante. Instead, he bounded toward him. Dante raised his gun and another explosion erupted as he fired. Jared’s body jerked slightly, and he made a hissing sound. The pause ended all too soon.

  Jared closed in on Dante. A gun fell to the floor near their feet, I couldn’t tell whose. The two men went at each other with fists and struggled in the semidarkness.

  My feet unglued themselves from the floor as I hurried toward the hulking shadows. Before I made it over, Dante howled in agony.

  I charged.

  As I launched
myself at Jared’s back, he whipped around and slapped me across the face with such force my feet left the ground. I landed on my ass, stunned and barely able to process anything beyond the bright stars exploding all throughout the room in frantic bursts. At some point on the way down, the knife had fallen from my hand, as though ripped away by phantom fingers.

  “Foolish boy,” Jared bellowed. “You couldn’t kill me at Winner’s Creek, nor at that lodge in the mountains. You sure as hell aren’t going to kill me now.”

  I blinked rapidly, trying to clear my vision. I had to get to my feet, damn it. I had to be able to see.

  I tried to stand but stumbled back to the floor when a wave of dizziness spun through me like a tornado created out of a storm. My stomach churned. Everything was dark and hazy, but I could make out objects and figures.

  I needed a minute to regain my senses.

  I didn’t have a minute.

  Jared grabbed Dante by the neck and backed him up toward a window. “I have unfinished business with your partner, so do me a favor and buzz off.”

  “No!” I screamed at the top of my lungs as Jared threw Dante at the window.

  Glass shattered. It sprayed out in every direction, as glaring and fragmented as the night’s stars. Dante’s mouth stretched open in horror, and his eyes widened in shock as he flew backward into the night. Outside, a woman wailed, ripping away the last shreds of my heart.

  I scrambled to my feet.

  “I’ll kill you!” I screamed.

  My brain felt ready to explode. Screaming made the throbbing worse. I didn’t care how badly my body hurt so long as Jared died. At that second, it was all I cared about.

  Jared took a languid step toward me, boots grinding pieces of shattered glass into the floorboards.

  “And how do you plan on killing me if I break both your arms?” His eyes flashed with malice. “I did once promise to rip off your wings.”

  My body tensed, ready to spring. I didn’t think it was possible to hate Jared any more than I already did, but right now I felt ready to combust. I was burning up. Sweaty and shaky. Curses, screams, and tears threatened to burst from my mouth and eyeballs.

  I jumped back and searched the floor frantically for the knife I’d dropped or a gun left behind by one of the fallen soldiers.

  Jared didn’t waste time on weapons. He bounded over like a raving lunatic. As he got closer, I noticed his bloodstained shirt. There were holes burned through the fabric. How was it that he was still standing?

  The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end.

  He was a madman. Immortal. There was no stopping Jared.

  Snap out of it, I admonished myself.

  No one was immortal. Not even vampires.

  Too bad Jared was hell bent on proving otherwise. And it was especially too bad the bastard didn’t seem to register pain.

  Another shot fired from outside. I didn’t have time to worry about whether another one of my teammates had been taken out.

  Jared wasted no time when he reached me. His hands shot forward, and he ripped my right arm out of its socket.

  Blinding pain scorched through my shoulder, neck, and arm. My scream left my throat burning. I thought I’d crossed the threshold of pain and anguish, but it was nothing to what I felt at that moment. I fell to my knees and broke into sobs, my right arm hanging limply at my side.

  Like Dante, I was broken. Useless. All hope felt like it had been sucked into a black hole.

  There was no light at the end of the tunnel.

  I sobbed harder. It did a bit of good. It stopped Jared from immediately going for my left arm. I wondered if he knew he’d already shot that one. I thought the bullet had been bad, but not nearly as painful as having my arm dislocated.

  Snot ran down my face. Tears blurred my vision. There was nothing to see, anyway, besides darkness and shadows, and standing in the middle of it all, the devil himself.

  His voice slithered through the gloom and anguish.

  “I tried to be a role model for you, Raven. I even tried to be a father figure, to stand in for the man who abandoned you. But the only thing my kindness has ever brought me is betrayal. I have to accept the fact that I’m not a family man. My life is with the agency. I’m a killer and a recruiter. And I have a lot more recruiting to do, especially with tonight’s losses.” Jared looked around the room.

  He took a step toward me and I flinched.

  “Contrary to what you might think, I do not take pleasure in your misery.”

  “Liar,” I said, hissing through the pain.

  Jared looked down at me with a somber expression as though that would convince me otherwise.

  The bastard sighed.

  “After enough time passes, you reach a point where you don’t feel much of anything. My emotions are fleeting. At least I have that much. You’ve seen Melcher. Nothing left.” Jared beat his fist against his chest. “The only thing he has to hold on to is his sense of purpose. He was much more passionate back when I met him in Paris. A zealot, some might say. Now he goes through the motions. More like a zombie than a vampire. I supposed a purpose is the most anyone can ask for. I suppose it’s all I have now.”

  I stared up at him, suddenly chilled to the bone.

  Jared lowered his head as though in mourning.

  “I am doing you a kindness, Aurora Sky.”

  I sniffed a couple times to clear my nose. The tears stopped. I tilted my head back.

  “You will die today. Fane will see to it,” I said with assurance.

  Jared’s eyes narrowed at my tone.

  “Fane’s not a killer.”

  “You’re right,” I said. “But I am.”

  I pulled back my left arm and rammed the palm of my hand up Jared’s nose. A sickening crunch sounded on impact followed by a scream. Blood spurted from Jared’s nostrils as his hands flew to his face. I didn’t waste time. I turned and ran for the stairs.

  One arm hung uselessly at my side. The other stung and burned. I couldn’t use either to propel me. It was all up to my legs. Good thing they were powerful and long.

  A body lay in my path five feet away. I leaped into the air and sailed over it, landing with as much grace as a ballerina. The remainder of the distance was clear. I might have made it if a gun hadn’t blasted behind me and hit me in the back of my leg.

  19

  Nevermore

  Pain burned through my right thigh. The shock of it caused me to stumble and fall. My kneecaps hit the floor with excruciating force. I tried to throw out my palms, momentarily forgetting my dislocated arm. The impact my right arm took landing on the ground made me howl in agony.

  Footsteps started toward me. Jared would have no difficulty finishing me off this time.

  My body felt tired and heavy, fused to the wood floor. I’d failed to take down Jared. There would be no Christmas with my family and Fane. No gondola rides in Venice or kissing atop the Eiffel Tower. No travel adventures of any kind. That all really sucked, but nothing infuriated me more at that moment than my failure to put an end to the vampire who had forced me to this juncture in the first place.

  His footsteps continued toward me, unhurried, which set my teeth on edge. He had no reason to hurry.

  As Jared approached, a second set of footsteps creaked over the floorboards. At first I thought I was imagining it, but they were definitely different, lighter and faster than Jared’s heavy steps. They seemed to be rising out of the darkness. Suddenly, they stopped.

  “Hey, dickhead. Stop hurting my friends.” The voice belonged to Noel.

  I lifted my head to be sure my ears weren’t playing tricks on me. Roughly three feet away from my face, I saw a pair of skinny black Spandex-clad legs firmly planted in a shooter’s stance.

  “You got away,” Jared said, his voice muffled and nasal. “Bravo, Minnie Mouse. Bravo.”

  I heard him clapping. Only someone as twisted as Jared would applaud at a moment like this. The applause continued. It was the last sound I heard Ja
red make before gunfire thundered over the noise.

  It rang out again and again from above my head. My body thrummed with each blast. My ears rang. The bullets didn’t cease until Noel had emptied her clip.

  Although the shooting stopped, the ringing in my ears continued.

  “Bravo, indeed,” Noel cried out. “Getting the jump on Jared definitely deserved a standing ovation.” She guffawed. “People are always underestimating me.”

  I rolled onto my left side, groaning. It took a great deal of effort to sit up.

  “Is he dead?” I asked, staring into the gloom. “Is Jared dead?”

  I didn’t see Jared standing, which was a good sign. But I hadn’t heard him fall during the maelstrom.

  “Better make sure,” Noel said, moving toward him.

  “Wait,” I said.

  Noel stopped and raised her brows.

  “I’ll come with you. But first, can you give me a hand?” I held up my left hand and grasped Noel’s, wincing as she helped me to my feet.

  Once I had a standing view of the room, I scanned the floor for the knife. After spotting it, I picked my way around one of the dead soldiers and crouched down until I was low enough to grasp the hilt with my left fingers.

  As I grabbed the knife, Noel helped herself to a gun off the floor. She pulled the clip out to check that there were bullets then snapped it back in place.

  We circled Jared, each taking a side. As I approached closer, I could see his eyes were closed and his nose was sticking out at a funny angle. His torso was riddled with bullet wounds.

  As soon as the tips of my boots were inches from his side, I crouched down.

  Noel closed in from the other side and pointed her gun at Jared’s head.

  I shook my head and mouthed, “I’ll do it.”

  Noel nodded but kept the gun aimed on Jared. Wise woman.

  My knees throbbed in protest as I eased onto them. I shoved the pain aside, intent on one thing. I lifted the knife over Jared’s heart.

  I’d never killed a vampire left-handed.

  There was a first time for everything.