Urban Decay
Darkly Mine Season One
Leona Windwalker
Copyright © 2019 by Leona Windwalker
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are being used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, whether living or dead, business establishments, locales, or events is entirely coincidental.
Cover art created by StudioENP.
Created with Vellum
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
About the Author
Also by Leona Windwalker
1
He was sitting at the chipped Formica counter, twizzling the stool from side to side as he fidgeted. I immediately knew that he was the one I was looking for. Bright clear skin, rosy-cheeked from the chilly wind kissing them, full lower lip and thin upper one, a reasonably straight nose, and sparkling blue eyes, oh my, yes. Pair all of that with the thick, rich mahogany of his hair, and he made the perfect target.
I pulled my cap down lower as I pretended to sip at my coffee the waitress stopped by and frowned, looking at my now cold and still full cup.
“Can I get you anything else?” she asked, frowning. I shook my head, sliding a five across the table to her before darting out of the booth and taking my leave. I didn’t go far, just to the laundromat across the road. It didn’t matter that I haven’t any laundry with me. At this time of night, the all-night laundrette is full of people trying to nap in the seats and on the laundry folder counters. Only two brave souls seem to have any actual washing, and from the car parked out front, this mother and child were living in their car. The kid was sitting on the dirty floor, doing math homework while the mother tried to help him figure out the correct formula to use to solve for x when a train goes fifty-five miles an hour somewhere.
Except for looking up when I first come in, I’m ignored by everyone awake. I sat where I could watch the front door of the diner, waiting for my mark to come out. I wasn’t even there twenty minutes when he did, laughing to his friends as they get into their cars. I stood up as I watched them spill out of the doorway, hands fumbling in my jacket pockets. I pulled out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter, stepping outside to get a better look. I fucking hate the stink of the tobacco filled sticks, but they make an excellent cover. I lit one, smiling to myself as my guy waved as his friends drove off, all except one. That one began walking towards the train station, my target going with him.
Oh, this made things so much easier. I hitched up my collar and began to stroll along. It doesn’t take me long to catch up with them. The train station was nearly deserted thanks to it being a Thursday, but there was still a small crowd of tired people waiting on various platforms for the last trains of the night.
“It was great seeing you!” my mark said to his friend, giving him one of those one-armed man hugs.
His friend thumped him on the back. “You, too, man, you, too. I can’t believe we stayed so late. My wife is gonna kill me.” The friend laughed, releasing him as he stepped back. “Okay, I don’t wanna miss my train.” He turned and left, with only another short wave as he reached the stairs to take him to his platform.
My guy sighed as he rubbed his eyes. I stubbed my cigarette out, being mindful to use the ashcan provided at the platform entrance. The platforms themselves were a no-smoking area, so the damned thing no longer served any purpose. I hurried after him as he strode to Platform Three. I knew the moment he registered my presence; it was always the same reaction. They’d be so wrapped up in what they were doing, they’d take no notice of the man in the jacket and flat cap. Only once isolated from the herd would they begin to be vigilant. With vigilance came scrutiny and with scrutiny, I stood out.
Tweed flat cap and matching jacket, collarless white shirt, and parchment-like skin, I didn’t exactly blend in. But this, too, was in my favor. I’d look up as I did now, and smile at them. They would all relax. My mark was no different. I was just another old guy who liked stuffy clothes. I sat down on the opposite end of the bench he sank onto. He turned his attention to the train arrivals board. We had three minutes until the train came.
When it arrived, I followed him on. The four other people waiting at the platform got onto the car before ours. He and I were alone in ours. I sat down, picking up a discarded newspaper and pretended to read. After two more stops, I moved to the car ahead, taking a window seat. Three stops after that, I spotted him disembarking. I hurried off, following him at a discreet distance. I nearly lost him in the station car park after he paused and looked around. I stopped at a black Volvo and pretended to be looking for my keys. Reassured, he carried on walking. I had to wait a few minutes and he became lost to my sight after crossing the car park. I walked to the exit, waiting, knowing he had to come out this way as it was the only marked exit. I was rewarded moments later by a blue Ford Fiesta pulling up. I knocked on the passenger side window. Startled, he turned his head to look at me, rolling down the window a bit.
“Sorry to bother you, but could you call AAA for me?” I asked, doing my damnedest to sound rueful. “My car immobilizer came on.”
He looked into his mirror; no one was coming out behind him. He placed the car in park, then reached for his phone. The idiot didn’t have one of those hands-free things. That actually made things easier for me, though. “Sure, no problem.”
“Thank you. My daughter keeps telling me I need to get one of those Bat phones, guess this just proves her right.” I gave a small chuckle. “Just don’t tell her or she’ll never let me hear the end of it.”
“Do you have their number? If not, don’t worry, I can look it up.”
“Oh, yeah. It’ll be on the card in my wallet.” I reached into my pocket, pulling out a battered wallet. I pulled out a plastic card and he rolled the window down farther so I could reach through to hand it to him. I dropped the card onto the empty seat instead, grabbing his wrist and holding on tight.
“What?” he yelled.
They always acted so surprised. I tightened my grip, two of my fingers over his pulse. It was thrumming from his fear response. I looked him full in the face for the first time. It was then that he saw my eyes weren’t a simple dark brown. They were black as I fed on his lifeforce, the pupils having taken entirely over. My skin plumped and softened, my cheeks pinked, the color returned to my no longer gray hair, and I let his wrist go as the last of his vigor became mine.
“Thanks so much,” I said, watching him slump over. I walked away towards the tracks. I began to follow them back the direction we’d come. I only needed to get somewhere far enough away from here that I could phone a cab without drawing too much notice. A breeze blew, catching an empty plastic shopping bag along the ground. I grabbed it. It was intact and reasonably clean. I shrugged off my jacket, placing it and my cap inside. I ran my hair through my short, reddish-brown hair. Now fed, the whites
of my eyes could be seen, making my dark eyes look merely striking rather than something out of a horror movie.
The tracks crossed a road, which I turned down, spying the still lit sign of a local dive promising topless go-go girls. I made for it, knowing it was close enough to closing time that no cabbie would question picking me up. I pulled out my cell phone and called for a ride. Now that I was no longer hungry, it was time to go home to my beloved.
2
“Laurent?” Michael called, hearing the door. I smiled; he sounded much better today. I walked through the old church we called home, climbing the steps to the balcony long ago choirs stood in to sing. Now it held our bed and Michael’s medical equipment.
“You left again,” he said.
I sat down next to him, leaning in to kiss him on the corner of his mouth.
“I couldn’t wait any longer,” I told him.
He picked at the blanket covering him. “I know. I hate that you have to.”
“But I do. You could, too, you know.”
He shook his head. “I couldn’t. I wouldn’t be able to kill someone like that.” He looked away.
I regarded him sadly. Michael’s ills would all go away if he only accepted this gift. He would be fine once he took his first life; I just knew it. He was stronger than he believed himself to be. I didn’t say anything, though. This was an argument we’d had countless times before. He accepted what I was as long as he didn’t have to see it or deal with it in any way. Still, it pained me no end to see him dying before my eyes as he refused to cross the line.
“I’m no vampire,” he said.
“I’m not either,” I refuted.”No blood drinking here.”
“No, you just drink their life itself away. I can’t steal that from somebody to give myself years I’m not supposed to have. I am selfish enough not to want you to die, though, and leave me all alone.”
Leave him all alone. I swallowed thickly. That was what Michael himself planned to do, die and leave me behind. Just like Tom and Paul before him had. I’d hoped that this time, it would be different. That my love would feel the same overwhelming passion for me that I did him, feel the fire burning too hot to want to purposely bank it when it could go on forever.
I clenched my fists, letting my fingernails dig into my palm.
“I do love you,” Michael whispered.
Then don’t leave me, my heart cried.
“And I, you,” I replied, tamping my own pain down. Michael’s face was beginning to look drawn again. He gave me a weak smile.
“Read to me?” he asked.
A stone filled the pit of my stomach. Not cuddle with me or come to bed, but read to me. Things came into sharp focus, then, and I knew. The sudden look of vigor, already rapidly fading, his worry over me having gone to feed, I picked up the book he’d been reading and opened it to the bookmark. It marked the beginning of a new chapter, so I did not need to ask him where to start. I began to read. He watched me as I read, still sitting beside him on the edge of the mattress. His hand found my knee and rested there, the gesture of affection making the words catch in my throat. I swallowed and continued. His eyes slipped closed, and I knew the moment he fell asleep by the way his expression eased and his chest began to rise and fall, soft breaths puffing from between his mouth. I closed the book and replaced it on the nightstand after moving his hand from my leg so I could stand up. I bent down, kissing those lips of his that still felt magical after forty-three years together.
As if it was the permission he needed, his chest became still the moment my mouth left his. I sobbed as his heart monitor wailed. Gregory came in then, hearing the sound. Without sparing me so much as a glance, he switched it off.
“I’ll call the ambulance,” he said as he unclipped the oxygen sensor from Michael’s finger and switched that machine off, too.
I nodded numbly.
“I had to feed,” I told him, hating how hoarse my voice sounded and the prick tears making my vision blur.
“I know you did. You were looking old. You know you can’t do that. We have to feed at least once every six weeks. Now, I need to go make this call, and then I need to see our guest out.”
Fuck. It was that time again already.
“Please tell Father that I’m sorry to have delayed things.”
Gregory nodded. “Of course, I will. You know his opinion on the matter.” Then he stepped out of the room and went downstairs to make the call and tend to the matters of our guest.
Guest. Now that was a laughable word, but it’s what we called them. They came for Father, of course. Our father, in the sense of who created us, not in biology.
“Yes, he was in-home hospice care. Stage four brain cancer,” Gregory’s voice drifted up.
I lowered Michael’s side of our bed, then walked over to mine and climbed on, rolling onto my side to face him.
“You left me,” I accused him, my voice sounding as broken as I felt. I buried my face into his chest, smelling the scent of his soap and the fragrance of the detergent and fabric softener his pajamas and our blanket had been laundered in. The sweetness of decay was already corrupting the beautiful scent of him. I knew it would come, it always did, yet my heart shattered into a million more pieces than it already had. My tears fell faster, my sobs tearing from me as if I sought out to drown the lack of the sound of his heartbeat and the whisper of his breaths.
I saw death regularly. I certainly meted it out enough times, but this death, it was different. All others paled into insignificance before his ending as it joined the submerged agony of Tom’s and Paul’s passings. I was still there when the paramedics arrived. Gregory, already having slipped away to the parking garage next door to send Father’s guest on, brought them upstairs. He pried me away so they could do their thing. It was futile, there was no bringing him back, but I knew they had to try. I watched, my mind understanding the veracity of this but my heart grasping onto the small straw of hope that they’d bring him back. Truly back, not just with a heartbeat. Then I could snatch him up and take him to Father, where he could fix this. That didn’t happen, of course, and they gave me a pitying glance as they bundled him away on the gurney, his face covered.
Why had I listened? I should have realized he wasn’t going to change his mind of his own volition. I should have just done it and waited for him to forgive me once he felt better. He would have, I just knew it. With the pain gone and his youth restored, he would have at last understood that life was for living with the one you love, not allowing it to end just because it was the way of things for the rest of mortals. They were not the privileged ones, the ones chosen to walk among them as their civilizations rose and fell. I might be among the youngest of our Family, at less than two hundred and fifty years old, but I understood this. We watched, we fed, we chronicled. Our kind had been here since the beginning when the first humans met one of Father’s kind and struck the very first bargain. From cars to skyscrapers to space habitats, we’d been there for it all and would be there when they left this planet, taking us with them. But not Michael, now not ever Michael.
“Come, Laurent, Gwen says you’re to come home with me. There’s nothing more you can do for him. They’re just going to go through the motions there again and log the time of official death. You don’t need to be there for that.”
I didn’t, but part of me wanted to. My traitorous heart, it reached out with its last sliver of hope against all the odds. I knew he was right, though. We’d gone through this with Paul. Tom, now he was another matter. Him they’d sent straight on to morgue, but then the back of his head had been blown clean off by the shotgun blast that ended him. If he’d been immortal like me, the Family would have sent Uncle Stefan’s sons to collect him from the morgue and bring him to the funeral home they ran as a cover for when one of us suffered an unfortunate accident. There Tom would have rested until Father arrived to heal him enough that a source of nourishment brought weekly would be enough until he was whole enough to revive on his own.
But Michael had been one of us in affection only, and he was dead. The gone and never to be revived kind of dead. I could do nothing else for him except have him cremated as he’d wanted.
“Okay,” I said, allowing myself to be led to Gregory’s waiting car. “Thanks.”
3
Michael hadn’t remained close to his blood relatives, so I didn’t bother notifying them. Why should I? They’d shunned him as a young man when he took up with me and never bothered with him since so why should I tell them? They’d only have wanted to know when the funeral was and if he left them any money if they even gave two shits at all. Not that there was a Funeral for them to come to cry their fake ass tears while moaning how now things could never be made right between them. I’d had him cremated; his ashes turned into polished stones I had set into a ring I now wore on my right hand.
Urban Decay: Darkly Mine Season One Page 1