Dark Hunt

by Naomi Clark

  “I’ll see you guys in the morning,” she said, hugging us both. “It’s been an amazing evening.”

  “Amazing,” I agreed, since I was at that stage of drunkenness where all I could do was repeat everyone else’s words.

  Shannon pushed me inside, waving good night to Sun and we made it as far as the sofa before we both fell over. I landed on my bad arm, too drunk to notice and wrapped my good arm around Shannon, pulling her closer to me for a kiss. She tasted of cranberries and vodka. Amazing.

  “I got you a present,” I told her, fumbling to get to my bag.

  “Oh?” She sat up. A shaft of moonlight fell through the window, casting a glow around her pale hair. She looked like an angel and for a second all I could do was stare and be grateful she was mine.

  “Yeah,” I said finally, an idea blooming in my cocktail-filled head. “Tell you what, go and get into bed. Naked. Wait for me, okay?”

  She obeyed and I gave her a minute or two before following. She lay on the bed sheets, skin bare, a smile curving her lips. I had the perfume bottle in hand and her smile grew when she saw it. “You didn’t.”

  “Obviously I did.” I waved the red bottle around to prove it. “So, where do you like being kissed best?”

  She laughed. ”What?”

  “Coco Chanel said women should wear perfume where they want to be kissed,” I told her. “So where do you want to be kissed?” I knelt over her, perfume at the ready. “Here?” I spritzed her throat lightly and leaned in to kiss there, her skin tasting as sweet as I’d thought. “Here?” Her wrists next. She sighed with pleasure as my lips caressed her. “Where else?” I asked her softly, circling her nipple with my fingertip.

  It turned out there were a lot of places Shannon liked to be kissed.

  ***

  Twelve hours later we were leaving Paris. Sun would follow in a week or two, after all her paperwork was sorted. Clémence and Thérèse had waved us off at the train station, promising they’d be over to England for a visit soon. I was surprised at how pleased that made me.

  The train chugged out of the station and before long Paris was behind us. I rested my head on Shannon’s shoulder, inhaling deeply. She still smelled of the Moulin Rouge perfume, but more than that, she smelled like home. A place was I was glad to be heading back to.

  A quick scan of the papers at the station offered no new information about Le Monstre. No more killings, which was good, but no trace of the creature either. At least not that were being reported. I wondered if thoughts of the vampire would ever leave me. There were too many mysteries to it still. I had my Katrina Pagan novel on my lap, a book where vampires were seductive and oddly predictable in their bloodlust. A world far away from the creature we’d fought.

  The train sped on down the tunnel. I stared out the window, seeing nothing but darkness. I tried not to think about anything but home, our bed, my family, Vince’s cooking. But I couldn’t help but think of Le Monstre, vanished from the catacombs without a trace and this long dark road to England. It seemed the perfect escape route.

  “Nobody will ever believe us,” I told Shannon. “If we tell them what it was like, they’ll never believe it. Vampires are supposed to be beautiful and classy and all that.”

  She glanced at my book. “Well, anyone who takes their ideas from that kind of junk deserves to have their blood sucked.”

  I tapped her knee to scold her. “You might like them if you try them.”

  “I’ve had enough vampires. Werewolves suit me fine.”

  I sighed and glanced out the window. “I’ll be glad to be home.”

  “Me too.” She sounded like she meant it, . Our new home, our new city, not the North and our old home.

  “Do you mean it?” I asked, anxiously. I wasn’t really expecting our relationship problems to be solved, given the nightmare week we’d had, but I hoped we’d at least reached a truce on the issue.

  Shannon rubbed her forehead, the motion sending another waft of perfume my way. “We don’t need to pack up and head back north just yet, if that’s what you’re asking,” she said finally. My heart leapt. “After everything that’s happened, I just want a quiet life for a while.” She turned to smile at me. “I hate moving house.”

  Something came loose in my chest and I couldn’t suppress my sigh of relief. “Thank you,” I murmured.

  She kissed me. “Together or not at all,” she told me. ”That’s us, right?”

  I returned the kiss, hoping she could taste my love in it. “That’s us.”

  Bonus Material

  DESIRE BY MOONLIGHT extract

  Curious about Ayla’s favorite literary heroine Katrina Pagan? Wondering how to lay your hands on a copy of Desire by Moonlight by Meredith Greening? Exclusively to the DARK HUNT Bonus Materials is an extract of this delicious pulp novel of the werewolf assassin who takes out vampires for the government.

  A WOLF IN GIRL’S CLOTHING

  The short story A Wolf in Girl’s Clothing takes us back to how Ayla met Shannon...or rather how Shannon met Ayla.

  Desire by Moonlight

  extract

  Meredith Greening

  I Had an hour until sunset. I spent it holed up in my sleazy motel room checking my vampire hunting kit and trying not to think about the weird conversation with Grady. I’d rescued him from that bastard alpha because it was the right thing to do, not because I expected anything in return. I certainly hadn’t expected this sudden proclamation of devotion and I didn’t know how to deal with it. Grady had to understand that our current living arrangements were temporary, that he’d have to find his own place and live his own life. And Thamuz could not know about Grady’s crazy crush on me. I so did not want a demon and a werewolf coming to blows in my redecorated house. I’d only just paid off the kitchen.

  Still, that was an issue for tomorrow. I couldn’t solve my domestic problems from here so I put them out of my head.

  It had been a while since I’d needed my vamp kit—the Division for Preternatural Control had been training specialists for the past year so I could use my talents elsewhere. My polished wooden stakes and vials of holy water were a little dusty after being stuck in a black leather bag for so long. I tested one of the stakes by impaling my stained pillow, figuring the motel owner could never tell the difference, and decided they were still sharp enough to serve. The Donnellys had been adamant that they didn’t want the vampire that turned Kimberley dead, but rather brought to justice. As far as I was concerned, there was no difference when it came to vamps.

  Satisfied with the stakes, I turned my attention to the new toy Finch had sent me. It looked kinda like a flare gun, but Finch’s neat note explained it actually projected UV light, guaranteed to stop a vamp in its tracks for up to thirty seconds. I grinned, an excited little snarl escaping me. I couldn’t wait to try this baby out on a bloodsucker.

  Weapon check done, I dressed for the occasion. My DPC uniform of black leather was going to be hot as hell on a sultry summer night like this, but it afforded me the best protection if it came to a fight and I was pretty sure it would. This vamp had already taken out three police officers and a former Marine—it wasn’t going to go down easy. But then again neither did I.

  Werewolves are tougher than the toughest cops, although you’d never get the cops to admit it. I pulled on the leather, enjoying the cool feel and heady scent, following it with a pair of shit-kicker boots. I’d always wished I could be like She-Ra, kick-ass in high heels, but really? Heels are only good for falling over at the wrong moment, be it in combat or the middle of a date. I wore them only under duress and never gracefully. Give me a pair of steel-capped combat boots every time.

  My phone rang as I finished lacing the boots. I grabbed it without checking the caller ID. “Katrina Pagan.”

  “Kat,” Thamuz growled down the phone. “Why is the runt still in your house?”

  I groaned inwardly. So not the time for this. Tham sounded pissed. Like, fire-starting pissed. I hoped he wasn’t around
anything flammable. “He’s got nowhere else to go, Tham. We’re working on it, okay?”

  “Work faster,” he ordered, an angry rumble in his dark-velvet voice. “I don’t want him there. The place stinks of his musk.”

  I rolled my eyes. “I’m not crazy about it myself, but what do you want me to do? I can’t just kick him out on the street.”

  “Why not? He’s an adult.”

  “He’s a victim of sustained, serious sexual abuse,” I said sharply. “He needs a little compassion, dammit.”

  Tham sneered. “Where I come from, there’s no compassion for the weak.”

  My temper rose, my beast infuriated by his dismissive cruelty towards another werewolf. “Well I guess that’s the difference between you and me, Thamuz. I take care of people. I pride myself on it. I may not be wild about Grady crashing with me, but that’s the way it’ll be until he’s back on his feet. If you can’t get that through your thick demon skull, that’s your problem, not mine.”

  “Dammit, Katrina!” he roared, so loud I actually had to hold the phone away from my ear. “The boy is obsessed with you. It’s painfully obvious and I don’t want him around you!”

  “Jealous?” I smirked.

  He roared again, incoherent now, just pure rage. I winced. Okay. Not the best time to pick a fight with my lover. I sighed and tried again. “Look, Tham, you’re being irrational. After everything Grady’s been through, a sexual relationship is going to be the last thing on his mind. He just needs some stability and normality for a while, okay? And it’s my house so it’s my call. You don’t have to like it but you do have to accept it.”

  He fell silent, so deadly quiet that for a second I thought he’d hung up. Then, finally, he spoke again. “This discussion is not finished, Katrina.” And then he did hang up.

  I sat down on the hard motel bed, cursing viciously. Why did he have to be such an alpha dick? He didn’t own me and what I did in my own home was my business, not his. Hell, knowing how furious it made him that Grady was there just made me want to keep Grady around. I can be perverse like that.

  I tossed my phone aside and resolved not to think about it. Night was falling and I had a vampire to kill.

  ***

  Small towns like Chesterbury all look the same after dark. Sure, there might be a bar or two open, filled with locals chewing over gossip and scandal, but mostly people just stayed indoors and kept to themselves. That was especially true right now, when everyone knew there was a vampire on the prowl. It made my life a hell of a lot easier. On my first vamp assignment my crew had to fight off a local mob as well as the nest of vamps they were trying to kill. It got ugly. I had the scars to prove it. Never underestimate a farmer with a pitchfork, that’s all I’ll say.

  But Chesterbury’s residents were smart; the sheriff had listened to my advice and enforced a curfew, so now, an hour after sunset, the town was as still and quiet as the grave. I stood outside Al’s Convenience Store, letting my sharpened senses adjust to the flurry of scents and sounds filling the thick night. I’d come to know the scents of Chesterbury well over the past two days—hay from the fields around the town, the warm, musty smell of sheep that had my inner wolf drooling, as well as the mix of petrol and the busy, hurried humans common to any town or city.

  But under all that, slight but for me unmistakable, was the cold scent of dead flesh and old blood. The vampire.

  My wolf bristled, recognizing a natural enemy in that scent, and all my hunting instincts screamed at me to shapeshift and go after the bastard with tooth and claw, the way it was meant to be. There was no honor for the wolf in fighting with guns and holy water. That was cheating. Hell, my human self agreed—I wanted the pleasure of sinking my fangs into the vampire, rending him limb from limb for his crimes, for the lives he’d taken and ruined. For a second I trembled in the shadows, torn between the two halves of myself. It was always this way when my blood was hot, my passions flaming. Between the vampire and his victims, Grady and Thamuz, I was in flames and the wolf was seductive, offering an easy escape from the pressures and tangles of my human life.

  But no. I resisted, holding firm to my human shape. DPC protocol meant that I had to at least read the vamp his rights before I staked his black heart. I couldn’t do that in wolf form and I didn’t want to have to lie to Commander Knox again. After the Santa Fe mess, he was unlikely to go as easy on me.

  UV gun in hand, I headed west from Al’s, towards the edge of town. I passed the Donnellys’ house on the way and paused briefly, sniffing around the back and front yard to see if Kimberley or her maker had been back since she’d turned. But their scents were faded, their trail cold. It occurred to me for the first time that I might be taking down two bloodsuckers tonight, not just one. There was every chance Kimberley was still with her maker. It had been a week since her attack—by now she’d be in control of herself, presumably, learning to hunt and kill. An irresponsible maker might leave her to her own devices, let her make her own way in the world, but a newbie vamp wouldn’t last long alone and there’d be a trail of mauled bodies leading anyone right to her. No, I had to assume that they were together. If I hadn’t been so distracted by Grady, I would have figured that out earlier and planned for it.

  Some nights you just can’t catch a break.

  I moved on, picking up a fresher trail from the vamp at the corner of Whaler’s Street, the main road through town, and followed it toward the outskirts where cute little cottages gave way to barns and fields. The musk of the sheep was much stronger here and once again my hunting instincts flared up. Years of self-discipline kicked in and I forced my wolf self to ignore the easy prey in the fields. We were after much more challenging, rewarding game.

  Moving alone through the darkness, I felt good. There was no moon but my night vision more than made up for it. A light wind ruffled my thick black hair and the silence of the town meant every sound of the night was sharp and clear. Owls swooping down on mice, foxes rustling through the hedgerows, crickets whirring in the long grass. It was a beautiful night to hunt the undead and I sank into it, letting go of every other thought and worry. I had a clear line on the vamps now—Kimberley too. Yes, I’d stake her too. I had to. The Donnellys had already said goodbye to their daughter; I wouldn’t feel a shred of guilt over putting her down if it meant saving other lives.

  Out on the old Cattle Drive Road, the farm buildings were ruined and rundown and the scent of vamps was overwhelming. Their lair was somewhere nearby. These ramshackle old barns and outhouses made for perfect dens—far enough out of town to be private, but close enough that the bloodsuckers didn’t have to wander far to hunt. I wondered how long the maker had been holed up out here in the countryside. Vampires weren’t roamers as a rule; they found a city, staked out their corner of it and stayed there. Unless they were forced out by another vamp, they didn’t venture far and countryside killings like those in Chesterbury were pretty rare, simply because they were so hard to cover up. The government may have accepted shapeshifters, but the rights granted to us were still withheld from vamps because, ultimately, you didn’t make friends with things that wanted to eat you. With the New Blood political faction pushing for vampire rights, the bloodsuckers were working hard to present a civilised image to the world. Vamps like this one undid all that good PR.

  Good thing I was here to mop up the mess. Not because I thought vamps deserved better treatment. But because, sometimes, there was a deep satisfaction to be had in killing something.

  I vaulted over a low wooden fence into a barren field that might once have been ripe with golden corn, but was now bleak and lifeless. Fitting, really. A hundred yards away, an old cattle shed wafted the scent of rotting wood and undead flesh on the cool night wind. I circled around, putting myself upwind of the shed. Vamps didn’t have the same keen sense of smell that shapeshifters did, but they were still predators. I wanted to keep the element of surprise. I kept to the shadows, moving with silent expertise, the UV gun in one hand, a stake jammed in my b
elt. My little pouch of holy water vials was hooked on the belt too. My senses were on high-alert, my wolf ready to rumble. I grinned, knowing to any onlookers I’d appear feral and wild. Good. That was how I felt.

  I stole up to the barn, listening of any signs of life—or unlife—within. There was a faint scuttling and I smelled rats. I peeked my head through a hole in the old wood that was the size of my fist. It took a second for my eyes to adjust to the absolute dark within the shed and at first, when they did, I thought it was empty. Then I realized what I’d mistaken for a pile of old feed sacks was actually a person. Well, a vampire. It huddled against the far wall of the narrow building, head bowed, arms hugging knees. It was a submissive posture by anyone’s standard and I was guessing this was Kimberley. So where was her maker?

  There was only one way to find out.

  I stalked round to the shed door, gun at the ready, and kicked in the splintered wood with one good shot from my shit-kickers. The wood cracked and gave way and the vampire in the corner shrieked in surprise, leaping to their feet. Now I could see she was definitely Kimberley Donnelly—she had her mother’s fair hair and delicate looks. Her eyes blazed vampire-red though and she hissed at me, baring her fangs.