Dirk The Savior - Book 3 of the Raven Series

by Rhiannon Neeley

  The women began their purring moans again, stroking each other lovingly.

  “That's it, my lovelies. Get yourselves all nice and wet for Dirk's arrival. And when you come for him, I want to hear it echo off these trees.”

  Both women looked up at him with glittering feral eyes.

  Connor laughed out loud. Dirk would be in for a surprise when he arrived. Connor would let the twins have their way with him for a while—then he would tell them just what Dirk had done to Mitchell.

  That's it, he thought. He would let the twins drain Dirk almost dry, then Connor would intervene, preferring to turn Dirk himself. He couldn't let the twins have all of the Raven blood that flowed through Dirk's veins. He wanted a taste himself. Connor rubbed his hands together. What would make it perfect would be if Casey were there to watch. Connor trained his senses on her. She wasn't far off, trying to stay quiet so that Dirk didn't hear her following him.

  Connor settled back against the tree trunk and dreamed of rivers of free-flowing Raven blood while he listened to the sultry sounds of the women below.

  * * * *

  Drake, stone-faced serious, drove up the gravel road in the direction where Grace had said the mine was located. It had taken him half an hour to get the location out of her without seeming too pushy. He swung around another curve, the back tires of the sedan slewing sideways in the loose stone.

  “Brake,” Holt said firmly.

  Drake hit the brakes hard, the back end of the car sliding again but in the opposite direction. The car rocked to a stop, angled drunkenly across the road. “What?” Drake said sarcastically, looking at Holt.

  Holt pointed to the windshield. “Eyes.”

  Drake looked toward where Holt pointed. Sure enough, there was a large deer—a buck—emerging from the trees. “Judas Priest,” Drake said with a sigh. “You scared the crap out of me.”

  Holt let out a 'hmph.'

  Drake waited, fingers nervously drumming on the steering wheel, while the buck cautiously picked its way across the road then disappeared into the trees on the other side. Drake rammed the car into gear, the tires spewing gravel as he floored it. He was getting anxious. Dirk should have never taken this assignment alone. Not one that involved Connor Fagan.

  Fagan was the meanest of them all. A legend even to his own kind. He killed not only to feed but also for pleasure. And he took great pains to enjoy every second of suffering that he could dish out. The Unkindness had wanted Connor Fagan's fangs added to their collection for years but the vampire had always succeeded in staying two steps ahead of them. Now was their chance. Drake didn't blame John for sending Dirk out as a lone hunter. It was against how they normally operated but Dirk could be very insistent. And John hadn't known what he was sending Dirk into. Drake swung around yet another curve as the road wound its way around and up the mountain. The headlights washed across a glint of metal.

  “There,” Holt said.

  Drake pulled up beside Dirk's car. “Holt, I've never known you to be so talkative,” Drake commented as they got out of the sedan.

  “I'm just excited,” Holt said gruffly. He walked to the trunk of the car. Drake joined him, popping the lid. They each retrieved a black leather bag from the trunk, then Drake locked up the sedan.

  Before they left the scene they inspected Dirk's car. No sign of him. Drake blinked a flashlight on, spotlighting the trail up to the mine. He quickly dowsed the light. “This must be it,” he said. “Let's get busy.” Both men headed for the gate that blocked the trail.

  * * * *

  Dirk had originally set out for the mine, but changed his track. What had he been thinking? The Clutch wouldn't have returned to their lair yet. The night was still young and the hunt was still on. There was more bloodletting to be done. Dirk stopped and listened. Sound carried strangely here. It bounced off of the trees and the rocks, seeming to come from all sides. Concentrate, he told himself. You're losing your focus.

  He knew why. Casey had thrown him for a loop. She had broadsided him with her essence. Dirk was usually unshakeable in his work but now he fully understood what John and Eric had felt when they had met the women who had stolen their hearts. Casey definitely owned Dirk's. His heart, his mind and his soul. Closing his eyes, he pushed Casey from his mind and directed his thoughts to the task at hand. Connor Fagan and his Clutch.

  Dirk became completely still, his heartbeat slowed, his breathing became shallow. He began to see flickering images in his mind as he scanned the area. A deer silently moving through the trees. A flash of gray wing—an owl in flight. A glimmer of moonlight grazing something blue-black and metallic. Dirk's forehead creased. He hadn't been able to completely grasp that last image before the next shimmered into his mind's eye. A carcass. Bloodied. An animal. The blood black in the darkness of the night. Two pale bodies, moving together, entwined.

  Dirk opened his eyes. The twins. Like a camera lens, he focused his thoughts on them. His heart resumed its normal rhythm, his breathing returned to fill his lungs with the moist mountain air. Then he began to walk. He knew which way to go now. At least where to find the twins.

  Connor wouldn't be far. He had ordered this hunt to be a group event. He would stay close by the twins.

  Dirk frowned again, moving through the trees like a ghost. Why hadn't Connor insisted that he and Casey remain with the Clutch? Was he testing them? What the hell was Connor up to?

  * * * *

  “Found something,” Holt said.

  Drake was impressed. Holt rarely spoke this much. He must really be nerved up about Dirk, Drake thought. He came up beside Holt. Holt was standing over a body that had a branch impaled in its heart. It was the body of a young male vampire. “Looks like Dirk's been busy,” Drake said, nudging the body with the toe of his boot. If all of the members of the Clutch were as feeble as this one looked, they would be easy to dispatch. Except for Fagan. He alone would be one heck of a battle.

  Drake stepped back from the body. Holt had pulled his favorite tool from his pack—a very wicked, very sharp, hand axe. Drake watched Holt as he stood over the body of the vampire. Holt worked fast, his face expressionless, his demeanor completely business-like. A true hit-man if there ever was one. Efficient with absolutely no waste of motion. Holt leaned over and grasped the lifeless vampire by the hair of the head. He pulled, bringing the shoulders off the ground. Holt drew back and with one quick swipe, the head was severed from the body. The body dropped back down with a muffled thud. Holt dropped the head beside the body and stepped away.

  While Holt cleaned his treasured axe, Drake made preparations for the burning of the body. He hated to start a fire. It may tip off the Clutch that there were hunters in the area. The Clutch wouldn't mistake it for a campfire. Burning vampire flesh had its own evil stench. But they had no choice. There were too many animals nearby. They couldn't take the chance of some varmint nibbling on the corpse.

  Dirk was just going to have to hold his own that much longer while they finished the job of disposing of his kill.

  * * * *

  Casey did her best not to let Dirk know that she was following him. But it wasn't easy. The coal oil that she had applied to fend off the insects was now non-existent. She had done enough sweating—thanks to the out-of-this-world sex and trying to keep up with a man that moved like swift, silent lightning through the rough terrain—that it had washed the coal oil completely from her skin. The bugs were eating her alive. Trying to be invisible and swat mosquitoes at the same time was next to impossible. Damn it, she thought. Why does the love of my life have to be a vampire killer? Why am I following him? Why didn't I just take the keys and leave? Casey had never been this torn before. She knew why she couldn't just leave. Dirk was … everything. They had connected before she had even seen his face, when he had answered her call for help. The call she had sent out in her mind. He had become her savior. He was also stubbornly intent on destroying the vampires. Especially Connor. She wondered if his deep hatred of Connor had to do with her.
No, she thought, there's more to it. I can feel it when Dirk thinks of him.

  Casey eased herself around a tree, again in pursuit. She placed each foot carefully, trying not to make a sound that would alert Dirk to how close she was, but her next step wasn't so quiet. She placed her foot down. A twig snapped. Casey froze, one hand resting on the trunk of the tree that she was trying to get around. Holding her breath, she squinted into the moonlit woods. Dirk was nowhere to be seen.

  Casey bit her lip. Just seconds ago, she had seen him moving through the trees ahead. Now he was gone. Casey rose up on tiptoe, straining to get a better view without taking another step and breaking another branch. Where the heck is he? she wondered.

  “What do you think you're doing?” Dirk asked from behind her.

  Chapter Nine

  Casey's lungs let loose. Her scream echoed through the trees, rebounding back from the mountain. She whirled around. Her feet tangled in the underbrush.

  Dirk caught her in his arms before she hit the ground.

  Casey gripped his strong arms and righted herself, ripping her ankles from the weeds that encircled them. Then, she punched Dirk in the stomach.

  Dirk let out an 'ooofff.' “What was that for?” he asked, grabbing her by the wrists.

  Casey struggled against his hold. “For scaring me half to death.” She jerked but his hold on her was as tight as a pair of handcuffs. “Let. Go.” She looked up to find impending laughter in those cool, blue eyes of his, a huge smile—fangs and all—on his lips. “Just what is so funny?”

  “You,” he said. Then his lips were on hers, stealing her breath and her anger. Casey melted into him. He released her wrists. Their arms slid around each other. When they came up for air, Dirk's face was serious. “You shouldn't have followed me,” he said, his tone firm.

  “I'm here and I want to help you.” Casey looked steadily into his eyes. She was not going to back down no matter how melted her insides became whenever he touched her. He couldn't seduce her out of this.

  After a moment, Dirk nodded. “You will have to do exactly as I say.”

  “Okay.”

  “I'm not kidding, Casey. This is life or death. Or worse.”

  “I said okay.” Sheesh. Wouldn't he just take her word for it?

  “You have proved that you have a mind of your own by not taking the car and getting out of here when I told you to. If you go with me, you have got to listen to me. You could get killed.”

  Casey sighed. “Dirk, for goodness sake, I said I'd listen. It's just that I couldn't let you go back in there without help.”

  “There's help on the way,” he said. He swiped a hand through his hair, pushing back those long dark bangs of his that continually fell into his eyes. “I've got to get back to the Clutch. We've been gone too long. They'll be looking for us soon. And I'd rather that they didn't find Mitchell before I have the chance to make the first attack.”

  “So, let's get going. What are you waiting for?”

  Dirk narrowed his eyes. “Are you going to be good and do what I say?”

  Casey smiled up at him. “What do you want me to do?”

  * * * *

  Connor Fagan was getting tired of waiting. It was taking Dirk much longer to arrive than it should have. The twins were getting bored with each other. They needed a third party added to the mix to get them excited again. They could only do so much for each other before they wanted a male involved in their sex play. Normally, when Connor didn't feel like joining them, he bade Mitchell to quench their desire. Mitchell had never declined. He had been seventeen when Connor had turned him as a gift to the twins. A seventeen-year-old boy always had a ready hard-on. Connor had let the twins choose Mitchell themselves. The twins had made a good choice when it came to a playmate. But Mitchell had been a weakling. And now, Mitchell was no more. Right now, Connor was not in the mood for the buxom redheads' attention either.

  Connor jumped from his perch in the tree, landing on his feet like a cat. Instantly, the twins were at him, hands groping, pulling at his clothes. With one push of his mind, one word—stop—he quelled their lust for him. The twins scrambled back, chastised. Connor reached out, grabbing each by the hair. He jerked their heads back, exposing their long, slender necks. He eyed them, hungry. But they would not stave off the craving that had been eating at him since Dirk's appearance. He wanted Raven blood. “I told you to ready yourselves for Dirk. You will not use me to satisfy yourselves.” He released them violently. The twins landed on their backs on the ground. They quickly found their feet and stood, backing away from Connor.

  Connor shook with need. It disgusted him. He hadn't wanted something so much in centuries but now there were two things that he desired that made his body quake with want. Raven blood. And Casey Delaney.

  Connor concentrated. He rose into the air, a trick he had learned long ago. He scanned the area, searching for either Casey or Dirk's thoughts. Hovering six feet in the air, Connor smiled.

  They were coming.

  * * * *

  Dirk slowed his pace. They were almost upon the Clutch and he still didn't have a definite plan for their destruction. His pack contained the usual tools—stakes and hammer, holy water, sharp implements that could do major damage to a body if used correctly and a hand-held blowtorch with an igniter. The usual vampire hunter tools. But how exactly he was going to approach this situation he hadn't quite worked out yet. The twins shouldn't be too much of a problem. They were strong, that was true. All vampires were. But he knew their weakness. Sex. If he could lure them close enough, he could dispatch them swiftly. Shouldn't be a problem. From what he'd seem, those two were nothing more than sex machines. But what could he do to occupy the main attraction while he took care of the redheads? The main attraction being Connor Fagan.

  When Dirk thought of Fagan, his anger almost consumed him. He wanted to take his time with Connor. Make him suffer as he had made Dirk's mother suffer. It wasn't like Dirk to feel this way and that angered him even more. The fact that Connor could incite such hatred in him that he couldn't think straight needled him to no end. And he needed to keep his wits about him to be able to get himself and Casey out of this in one piece.

  What really pissed him off was the fact that the only thing he could think of to keep Connor busy while he killed the twins was Casey. Casey could garner Connor's full attention easily. Connor was enamored with her. How could he put Casey in that position? Take a chance on Connor turning her? She was so close to becoming one of them that it sent ice through Dirk's veins.

  He wouldn't do it. He couldn't. He couldn't put her in that much danger. He was just going to have to think of something. Damn, he thought, where the hell was his backup? Dirk could see through the trees that he and Casey were almost upon the twins. The two redheads were lounging on the ground, their backs against a fallen tree, quietly talking. Both of them were naked, their hair disheveled. The ground beneath them was covered with tall grass that had been pressed down as if a lot of action had taken place. It looked almost like a comfortable bed of new grass. Dirk could even smell it, the blades broken, releasing their fresh green scent. But there were other odors mixed in. Death, blood and the musky scent of the twins' arousal. Dirk did have to admit one thing. Even though the twins were monsters, the moonlight was kind to them.

  Dirk felt a small hand on his shoulder.

  What do we do now? Casey asked, the message sent directly into his mind.

  He turned toward her and looked into her eyes. The dark chocolate brown looked almost black, her pupils hardly distinguishable. Communicate only this way. Don't speak and guard your thoughts. They may pick up on you, Dirk answered, using the connection of their psyches.

  Casey nodded and squeezed his shoulder.

  Dirk turned his gaze back toward the clearing where the twins were. Connor was nowhere to be seen. That's odd, Dirk thought. He quickly scanned the area in the immediate vicinity.

  * * * *

  Connor followed the scent of burning vampire fle
sh. He moved through the trees, using the upper branches. Whoever was burning what had to be the remains of Mitchell would most likely be traveling on the ground. Connor did not want to make his presence known to them. He moved silently and quickly, jumping from branch to branch, floating between the jumps. It was good to be a vampire. He so enjoyed his powers.

  Within minutes, he was at the burning site. He perched above them, the stench stinging his nose. Only burning vampire flesh could set off a reaction in his body. There were two men below. One was kicking ashes over the dying flames, putting out the fire that had consumed the last of Mitchell. The other stood like a statue watching. Connor smiled. Ravens. A feast in the making. Now, to draw them all together. Somehow, he would lure them back to the mine. To a place where he could take his time, savoring their rich blood as it rolled over his tongue. The two began to move off, heading in the direction of the mine. Connor raised an eyebrow. Maybe he wouldn't have to lure them after all. Maybe they would just deliver themselves to him. So much to do, so little darkness left, he thought as he moved back toward where the twins waited. He still had things to do there. Things to do with Dirk. And with Casey.

  * * * *

  Dirk picked up on four others in the area. Two were a bit down the mountain and heading in the direction of the mine. Dirk's forehead creased as he directed his thoughts toward the two down the mountain. A sense of relief filled him. They were his backup. He recognized Drake and Holt's brain waves. They were searching for the mine. Perfect. Dirk would get Connor back to the mine and surprise him with not one Raven, but three. Dirk turned his mind back to the other two he had sensed. He'd contact his cousins when he was on his way to the mine.

  He focused on the other two that were off to the left. It was two men, he could tell. Their thoughts were of guns and beer. Hunters—but not hunting vampires. That had been the image that he couldn't make out earlier. The one of moonlight on blue-black metal. It was their guns that had given off that blue-black shine. Dirk frowned. The idiots were coming this way, heading straight into the arms of the twins. They were walking dead men and they didn't even know it.