“Well, sure, but it’s not that simple. You got away from Magnum last night because your recording was clearly an accident. Suppose we release a second feed and identify you with the Resistance. Guess who would come knocking at your front door the next night?”
“Oh,” said Selah, “right.” Disappointment hit her. It’d seemed like a great plan. “Maybe I could wear a mask, and just say it was me? No, wait. That wouldn’t change anything. People already saw my face in the Magnum recording.”
“Right. That’s what Cloud said.” Selah felt a jolt of adrenaline. Cloud had been talking about her? “He doesn’t think we can use you. Your identity’s been compromised. The vamps know who you are. We can’t risk endangering you or ourselves by working together.”
“Wait,” said Selah. She felt crushed. “You mean, I can’t help at all?”
“Well, maybe you could send us information, or do some background work. But we don’t think it would be smart for you to meet anybody, or be given any sensitive information. It would be too dangerous, to you and to us.” Fox paused awkwardly and grimaced apologetically. “I’m sorry.”
“You’re kidding me?” said Selah. “There’s got to be a way. You won’t tell me anything? But I need to know. You don’t understand. I came all this way—I’ve imprisoned myself in this city—just so I could learn something to help out my dad. You have to help me. There has to be something!” It wasn’t supposed to work out this way. She was supposed to meet up with Cloud, help him out with his most dangerous missions, and in exchange he’d tell her everything she needed to know to blow open the conspiracy that had taken her father. Not send them secret messages about what was happening inside the Palisades and learn nothing in return.
“You know,” said a new voice, lazy and amused from the doorway, “he’s right. It’s amazing how huge a security liability you would be.”
Selah whipped around and stared at the entrance, scrabbling for her pistol as she did so. A slender figure leaned against the frame, arms crossed over his chest, a black silhouette against the faint moonlight.
“Who—” asked Selah, but Fox was already moving. As he extinguished his lighter and darted away, somebody fired a gun. The sound of the shot was explosive, shocking, and Selah fell off her stool as she ducked reflexively, crashing to the ground onto broken plates and glass and losing her gun in the process. Gasping, she looked up, and saw that the figure was gone from the door. She heard a second shot and then a yell of rage. The flash of gunfire had been a stunning blank in the dark, and the air smelled acrid, as if the shot had burned it. A second door opened to the night against the back way, and two figures sprinted through it and away. Had one been the stranger?
She lay still, trying to listen over her heartbeat. Blinked away the dust, and fighting not to sneeze. Silence. Just her breathing, as quiet as she could make it, fear making her want to breathe in short, shallow gasps. Who was that? The footsteps that she’d decided she’d imagined? The silence mixed with the darkness so that they both pressed down upon her. She decided to give it another moment, and then slip out. Go home. Maybe Fox was right. Maybe this wasn’t for her.
After what she gauged was another minute, she felt with trembling fingers across the floor for the pistol. Where was it? Had she dropped it on the bar when she fell? Her fingers crept over shards of glass, splinters of wood, and then across the legs of the high chair. Carefully, gritting her teeth, she used the chair to stand. While doing so, she stepped on a piece of broken glass and it crunched underfoot. She froze, eyes wide, and stared into the black. Colors floated in her vision, but all was still. The oppressive silence continued. No breathing but her own. No sound at all.
Relax. The stranger chased Fox out the door. That’s who he was after. He wanted the Resistance, not you. He’s gone. Just get out, get home, and swear to Jesus never to go out at night again.
She stretched out her arms and searched the top of the bar. Nothing. Frustration merged with her panic and the thought of getting on her knees to search the ground once more was too much. She had to get out. Get away. Carefully she began to walk toward the front door. Each step was horrifically loud, kicking or crunching something on the ground. She moved slowly like a blind woman, heart thudding painfully in her chest, nausea roiling the pit of her stomach. She breathed in shallow, light sips of air. Focused on the door. Halfway there.
A lighter flicked to life. A man was seated at a table to her right. He could’ve reached out and touched her. Selah screamed, leaped back. He watched her, cruel amusement on his handsome white face. His eyes—his eyes were jet black. Selah couldn’t think. Her mind seized and she stumbled back, hands clenched into fists, fists pressed to her mouth. His eyes were perfect pools of liquid night, each reflecting the flame in miniature.
“Hello,” he said in that same cultured, taunting tone. The stranger from the doorway. Black blood stained his chest, had soaked into his clothing, fresh and wet in the lambent light of the flame. It didn’t seem to bother him. Selah took another step away, unable to take her eyes off him, wanting to turn and run but only capable of stumbling back, step by step, away from that ghastly smile, that sick twist of his lips, and those ravenous eyes that held her trapped.
“I didn’t realize there was a second one hidden by the door. Sloppy of me. Foolish, even, to think that only one would come. I’ll be chastised later. Punished for my mistake.” He could’ve been recounting the weather report. There was no real concern on his face. Something else, though. Another expression, a predatory variation of the look men gave her when they gazed at her with lust. “Ah, well. Still, you’re here. All alone. And so beautiful. So young. I’ll have to assuage my sorrow with your company.”
That’s when she understood. When she recognized his expression, what lay snarling beneath his amused façade, what burned in his black eyes. Hunger.
Chapter Nine
Selah turned and ran for the door. It was only five yards away, but it might as well have been a mile. In the darkness she crashed into a table, knocked it onto its side, and plunged on, sobbing with rising terror. She tripped, nearly fell, but caught herself and regained her balance, and ran right into the vampire.
He was back in the doorway. Had somehow crossed the intervening space without effort, without sound, so that she ran straight into his arms. Before she could react he embraced her, pressed her against his lean body, her face held against his cold, clammy shirt. His bloody shirt, which was damp and cold despite the blood having just flowed forth from the large bullet hole over his heart.
She screamed and thrust back against him. Could hear him laughing as he held her, held her as effortlessly as if she were a child. She fought to push him away with both hands and felt smooth muscle beneath his shirt. Without warning he let her go and she sprawled backward, crashed to the ground on her ass and immediately skittered away, pushing with her heels until she fetched up against the underside of a fallen table.
He was still laughing, arms crossed once more as he leaned against the doorframe. Indolent, at ease, immensely aroused. She could feel his eyes upon her. Was supremely, horrifically aware of her own pulse, how her heart thumped and pushed hot blood through her veins and arteries. She glanced at the back door. Too far. Could she make it back to the bar and find the gun? To what end? The first bullet had done nothing to him.
He straightened. She knew he would begin to walk toward her at any moment. She shook her head. No. This couldn’t be happening. It couldn’t. She had to stall, to buy time.
“How,” she began, voice catching in her throat, high pitched and panicked to her ears, “how did you find us?”
He merely laughed.
“That was you, wasn’t it, following me before?” She had to keep talking. “I mean, I thought it was my imagination, but it was you. Why were you following me?”
“Oh, but that wasn’t me. It really was your poor, fevered imagination, leaping at shadows. I came straight here. 2312 NW 2nd Avenue, he said. Easy enough to find.”
Selah didn’t understand. “You knew the address? How?”
Mild impatience in his voice now. “We were listening in while you spoke with ‘Fox’ in your Garden, Selah. Rupert installed a very subtle bug after wiping your Garden clean. We simply left it there to record and report on any activity. Simple but effective, don’t you think?”
Selah felt a flicker of fury, that old welcome flame, but it guttered and died as the vampire stepped forward. “I appreciate your attempt to buy time, but your friends aren’t coming back. They never do. Like cockroaches, they scuttle for cover the moment an adult turns on the lights. As he told you, this gunshot wound not withstanding, they do indeed seem to abhor violence.” The vampire took a step forward. “I, however, do not.”
Selah jumped to her feet, and turned to run for the back door, knowing she wouldn’t make it. It was like every nightmare she’d ever had that featured her running at the speed of molasses, as if her legs were knee-deep in honey. She prayed for another gunshot. For somebody to help her.
Nobody came.
Without warning he was upon her, the length of his body pressed against her back, hand cupping her chin, lifting it, pressing her head back against his shoulder, his other arm pinning both of hers across over her chest. A scream fought its way up her throat, but she choked it down, refused to give this thing the satisfaction. Fury caused her to elbow him, to thrash and kick, but it was no use.
She felt his cold lips on her throat, then the delicate pinprick of teeth. Felt them slide through her skin, puncture deep, and her heart stammered, thrilled, was swept away on a sudden river of burning pleasure. Nobody said it would feel so good, her last thought spun away. Nobody.
She relaxed, lowered her arms. His lips were tight on her skin, sucking and licking as her blood came gushing forth, surging up from her dark depths into the glorious incandescence that was his mouth. She felt all sense of self begin to fall away like grains of sand through her fingers. An intense pleasure began to mount deep within her core, between her legs, and it rose urgent and compelling and utterly devastating.
Selah melted into him. Couldn’t think, couldn’t fight. She stopped being herself. There was only this throbbing torrent of pleasure, like a cascade of falling stars passing through her soul, searing her with their passage, burning beautifully through the fabric of her being and torching her as they fell, destroying her forever. And she loved it. Welcomed this destruction, this annihilation of self.
Slowly, she lost all sense of her body. Of his lips, his hands, of everything except her heartbeat. There was only darkness, a vast cathedral space that was the void, and it echoed, reverberated with the steady pulse of heart. Which was slowing. From its sound it had to be the size of a house, each beat tolling out her life, each beat a moment of the future that was dying as its echoes sank into the past. Slower and ever slower.
A part of her realized that she was dying. This was death in all its finality, but there was nothing she could do. A memory came to her of her father’s face as he held her mother on a beautiful day in the park when Selah was only nine, one of her most treasured and happiest memories. A perfect picture, a perfect moment, before the war, just before the world went mad and her mother died. Her heart was beating so slowly now, only once a minute, once every eternity. The end was here. Selah closed her eyes, and allowed the image to fade.
Then, without cause, it began to beat once more, began to beat with sudden and new vigor. Began to beat to a growing tempo that rose in speed and power until it seemed like a hundred war drums surrounded her in the darkness—which was not true darkness after all. Selah opened her eyes in the void and saw stars, constellations, no longer falling but hanging in space with beautiful brilliancy. She was high up and everywhere her heart boomed out its imperative. Looking down, Selah saw the surface of a vast black ocean, stretching from horizon to horizon and rippling with its myriad waves.
She began to fall. Began to plummet toward its surface, feet first but then she turned so she was a speeding bullet, eyes wide and tears streaming behind her as she shot down with terrifying speed. Her heartbeat was now a violent crescendo, a smear of sound, and Selah felt amazing, had never felt so ecstatically alive. She opened her arms, welcomed the impact, and at the very last, closed her eyes.
She hit the ocean.
And awoke into a darkness that was no longer absolute.
She was lying on the floor. The vampire lay but a yard from her on his side, hissing as he breathed in short gasps. Eyes wide with terror. Blood smeared across his lips and chin.
Her blood.
Selah felt luminous. As if she were radiating moonlight, here in this dark room. Her body vibrated with energy, with electric potential. She lay still, not understanding what had happened, not caring. She could make out details now in the bar with painful clarity. See the chairs and tables where they lay, the mess of broken glassware on the ground, the shadowy depths of the room beyond. She turned her gaze upon the vampire. His fine-boned features writhed with despair. Tears of blood gathered in his eyes, brimmed, and then spilled over.
“What have you done? ” he cried, voice cracking with terror.
Selah sat up, as lazy and languorous as a cat. She stretched, one fist behind her head, the other straining toward the ceiling. Felt the long muscles of her back uncoil. Good lord, she felt good, she felt marvelous.
“What have you done to me?” said the vampire. He drew his knees to his chest, shivering and jerking as he did so.
Selah ignored him. She couldn’t focus on any one thing. Moving slowly, like a ballet dancer taking her first steps onto a grand stage before an expectant audience a million strong, she walked across the floor, so light that she felt she could slip the bonds of gravity with one burst of energy, one glorious leap. She walked to the door and stood within it, gazing out at the street.
What beauty. The great moon had risen high and painted the world with its delicate silver hue. She feasted her eyes hungrily on the street before her, drinking in the sight as if she had never truly used her eyes before. A thousand details, a million facets to the world. Everything sharp and detailed and true. She reached out and touched the iron doorframe, ran her hand down it gently, feeling each and every metallic sliver and fleck of rust against her palm.
The vampire cried behind her, working himself out of his numbed fear and into deep, chest-wracking sobs of pain and perhaps even joy, a cascade of alien emotion beginning to pour forth from his depths, as if a frozen core had cracked deep within him and was finally pumping forth.
Selah stepped outside and lifted her face to the moon. She was invincible. She was the night; she was anointed by the beauty of the world. A part of her demanded to know what was happening, but she ignored it. Ignored everything but this dark majesty that cloaked her.
Selah saw the gleam of smooth steel but a few blocks down the street, and realized that she was staring at a motorcycle. It was a Japanese roadster, its electric blue and white paint muted under the light of the moon, half hidden down an alley. Selah turned and walked back inside. Moved with confidence to where the vampire lay, where he shivered and stared at her in confusion and consumed with harrowing wonder, and reached into his pocket. He didn’t fight her, didn’t resist. She drew forth his keys and without a backwards glance walked outside and down to the bike.
His ride. He must’ve come out here as soon as the sun had set. She brushed her fingers along its length, its organic curves. Beautiful, a gorgeous machine. She slung one leg over the seat and sat, slid in the key, turned it, thumbed the on switch, and gunned the throttle. The engine rumbled powerfully to life, the muted purr of a great lion. She imagined fire curling in its belly, a fire similar to her own. She straightened out the bike, heeled the kickstand back, and turned the accelerator. With a shattering roar like a thousand panes of glass hitting the road all at once, the bike leaped forward, almost bucking her off, but Selah laughed and leaned in low and kept the accelerator turned all the way.
Buildin
gs blurred past. The hot, humid night air shrilled past her ears. Dead traffic lights. Abandoned cars that were little more than obstacles to veer around. The motorbike responded as if it were part of her body, its great ponderous weight turned somehow into air and darkness beneath her. Hunched over the bike she kept the throttle down. Didn’t even bother looking at the speedometer. She was going too fast, and it was still not fast enough.
For the first time in her life, she had some kind of power. For the first time ever, she had an edge over the world, and she didn’t want to let it go. Years of being ignored, being insulted, of being told that she was no good, would never amount to anything, would never be a success. Years of people pretending to see through her, of friends cutting her down, of boys insulting her when they weren’t trying to get in close at the parties. For the first time, she had something overwhelmingly powerful, and even though she didn’t understand it, was growing terrified of it, she exulted in the fact that it was hers and hers alone.
With a yank she pulled the bike off the street and onto the sidewalk. Telephone poles whirred past, a newspaper box was smashed aside, glass shattering. An obstacle rushed toward her, a car driven up onto the curb, and she wrenched the bike back onto the street. Almost lost control, almost felt the tires slide out from beneath her, but she pulled it back into line with the sheer strength that flowed through her limbs.
Vampire Miami Page 10