I stared up at the chain link blockade that prevented me from moving forward. It reached twenty feet high, with a barbed coil of wire spiraled around the top. Was that really necessary? It probably deterred thieves. Or kept the workers from leaving during their overnight shifts. Maybe both.
There was no climbing over, and no strolling up to the front gate. In the movies, a girl could flash a smile, tell a cheesy lie, show some boob, and get anything she wanted. In real life, I wasn’t willing to try the boob thing, and I was a terrible liar.
Not over, not around, but straight through. That was my style.
I pulled a pair of wire cutters from the belt on my thigh and went to work. I knew it wasn’t a typical thing to carry. But most people don’t plan on cutting through fences and spending their late nights on vampire hunts. Since I did, I came prepared. There was also bear-grade pepper spray attached to my belt, and because sometimes a girl gets hungry—a Snickers bar.
The metal fencing bent when I pulled the corner from the post, just enough to crouch down and slip inside. While spotlights lit the open lot and loading area, between the rows of crates was left dark, which suited me fine. Sounds of cranes and forklifts filled the air, leaving my footsteps silent by comparison.
Metal crates were stacked up to five stories high, some less, with huge paths between rows. I stuck to the small alleys with solid cover, squeezing through the openings left between crates.
The first lot was completely ordinary. The second too. It wasn’t until I’d explored the third that something interesting happened.
Back pressed against cold, rippled metal, I inched along in the narrow crack.
CLANG. My chest vibrated with the shipping container. I froze. It wasn’t me. Was it a forklift moving cargo? Was I about to be revealed? I listened.
There were no sounds of motors nearby, no sign that the shipping container was being moved.
CLANG.
The crate jostled once again. Holy shit. There was something inside.
It could have been anything, some illegal exotic pet getting smuggled into the country. It could have been a tiger. But given that this was Scarlet Harbor, my money was on vampires—clumsy ones, because of the noise. Was it possible for vampires to get drunk?
I couldn’t wait to find out what was inside. And as always, my adrenaline kicked up, excitement for the upcoming fight. Or tiger.
I kept my fingers over my knives, as ready as I could be to face the entire group of vampires that were likely inside.
Around the corner, the front of the crate was shut, but not latched. My pulse thrummed as I inched the door open, and shined my flashlight into the darkness within.
It was the smell that hit me first—that of rot, that of death. Light reflected off two sets of bright, yellow eyes. Feet shuffled forward. Arms reached out. That explained the clumsy movements—they were thrall.
I released my throwing knives, two at each of the thrall. Two steps, and both toppled to the ground as my blades hit their marks. Gurgling noises echoed through the small metal space.
Two hands squeezed my upper arms, with a cold, unrelenting grip. I froze. The flashlight clattered to the metal floor. How had I not seen the third?
“Turn around.” His voice was heavy with an Eastern European accent. The fact that he spoke words at all told me that he wasn’t thrall. This was their master.
I did as I was told, taking the time to consider my next move. There was the bear spray on my thigh, and an extra knife.
Even as moonlight poured down over the lot and against his back, his thin face was shadowed in the darkness of the crate. He was tall, like they often were, and wore black, as they often did.
Red eyes glowed as he locked his gaze with mine.
“You picked the wrong shipment to rob,” he said, and put his hands on my middle. It disgusted me, though I forced myself to remain still.
“Your reflexes are exceptional, for a human.”
I said nothing.
“You will walk further inside. You will not scream. You will not run. But you will please me.”
I didn’t want to imagine what he had in mind. So, instead, I grabbed my bear spray and let loose a cloud of thick, stingy mist. I squeezed my eyes shut and backed away.
A solid, heavy mass crashed into my back, and I reached out to catch myself as I fell. Cold metal slammed hard against my face, my hands, my chest. All of the air was forced from my lungs, and I gasped for breath. Knees pinned my body to the floor, his hands on my wrists.
“That was a mistake, my pet.” His voice was acid. A cool line of moisture followed as he dragged his fat tongue across my cheek. I shivered in disgust.
“Now I’ll take everything from you,” he said. “First, I’m going to drain you, drink your blood until the brink of death, just before your heart stops.”
I barely registered his words above the pounding of my pulse. His forehead pressed against the side of my face. I had to move. I had to do something. I wasn’t ready to die. I struggled against his grip, but it was no use.
“Then I’m going to turn you, just not fully,” he said. “And when I’m done, you’ll be like them, a thrall, my slave, little pet. You belong to me, now.”
It wasn’t the most creative threat I’d heard. But it was the most imminent. Vampires were all the same. They used and threw away. Torture, kill, repeat. Or worse. I needed an opportunity. I needed this to end.
He lifted his head from mine, relieving the throb in my brain just enough to think. Then he wrapped his fist in my hair and pulled, jolting my chin upward. His rough jaw grazed my cheek.
Feeling returned to my arm, stabbing needles from the restart of circulation. It registered—he’d let go to grab my hair. My arm was free.
I felt for my belt. Rough and long, I found the hilt of my knife. I grabbed the blade on my thigh and swung behind and above as best as I could, searching for any part of him. My knife found flesh.
The vampire hissed and recoiled, sitting up, and giving me all the chance I needed. I rolled over, and away. He was bleeding, a deep gash in his thigh.
I threw myself onto the bastard, blade pressed to his neck.
Confusion and anger melted to amusement on his face. The red faded from his eyes, leaving his irises a cloudy gray. He looked younger than I’d expected, though this really was my first good look at his face. The little hint of a smile almost made him appear charming, attractive even, a cruel mask to cover the monster within.
“You’re just full of surprises, aren’t you, pet?”
He lifted his hands in mock surrender. No way could I trust him, not even for a second. Only one of us could walk away from this. We both knew that. I was damned sure going to be the one who walked.
“You’ve had training of some sort, I’m guessing,” he said. “And you’ve friends with nice toys. Those contacts aren’t common. You too have come from New York, have you not?”
“My turn to ask questions,” I said, and dug the blade in just enough to show him how serious I was.
He said nothing, and remained still. Good.
“Why is your kind congregating in Scarlet Harbor?” I asked.
“The word is out,” he replied.
“What word?”
“The new queen is weak,” he said. “And Scarlet Harbor is up for grabs.”
I let that sink in a moment. It was the best intel I’d received. I hadn’t even known that the vampires here had a queen. How big was her territory? How many vampires resided in this city? It was possible I was getting in over my head, but when wasn’t I? Adventure made life more interesting.
“Where can I find the queen?” I asked.
“Ulfhednar Estate,” he replied.
And with that, I dug the blade deep into the center of his chest, ending another creature that fed upon my kind for the pleasure of his own.
Next stop— Ulfhednar Estate.
Next target—every bloodsucker in my path.
Chapter Eight
Viole
t
As it turns out, my maps app couldn’t locate an address for any Ulfhednar Estate. Or Ulfhednar anything for that matter. In fact, I had to fight autocorrect that no, I did not intend to type ‘umbrella.’ Perhaps I should have asked the vamp for an address before giving him the pokey end. But, done was done, and the world was a little better for it. No one else would fall prey to that bastard.
I watched the water as I walked back the way I’d come.
Glimmers of vermillion, crimson, and cotton candy pink mingled over the horizon as the sun rose up from beyond the water. Nowhere else had I seen a sunrise quite so red, or so vibrant. At least there was something good about this city. Well, to be honest, I kind of liked the vampire infestation, too. It gave me something to do. So, two points for, and how many against?
There was no bus to catch at the crack of dawn, so I was stuck on foot. I liked to walk as much as the next person, but I didn’t much care for how long it took to get anywhere. And given that anything close to being called an estate was bound to be on the outskirts of the city, I knew it was going to be a long walk.
I took that time to search satellite maps of the mansions in the area. There were surprisingly few that had enough land to offer the kind of privacy a queen of vamps would want. And there was only one mansion that had no image record at all. How exactly did she prevent satellites from recording anything? That empty black square, the one that existed, yet didn’t—that was my first stop.
A bus ride, a cheeseburger, a few hours, and some more walking later, I found it. And by it, I mean the Great Wall of China. A ridiculously tall barricade of stone spanned endlessly before me. I considered trying to scale the thing, but the surface was too smooth, the height way too high.
Nope. I’d have to go around.
Up and down rolling hills of green, I followed the edge of the wall. There were no houses in sight, nothing but grass, trees, and a bright blue sky. The view reminded me of the place my parents summered in upstate New York. As a child, I’d always found the summer house boring. What adventure was there to get into in the middle of nowhere? Not enough. A girl was forced to make her own.
There had been the treasure hunt, where I hid my father’s pocket watch out in the woods, about a two-hour walk for short legs from the house. He was pretty mad about that one, especially when the map I’d drawn didn’t land him exactly where I’d buried it. Also, it turned out that the middle of the woods all looked the same to me too, so ‘by the rock’ and ‘at the base of the tree’ didn’t turn out to be great clues.
The watch is probably still buried somewhere out there.
One summer I built a fort, a hideaway to hang out in with my imaginary fairy best friend, Twinkles. That one made my mother furious, not because I was missing all day, but because I came home covered in dirt. I explained that you can’t build a basement without digging, but she didn’t seem to understand.
As an adult, I was now faced with more adventure than child-sized me could have ever imagined. And I just knew that something interesting hid behind the never-ending wall.
By the time I spotted the gate, the sun was on its way down. The only growling to be heard didn’t come from any tiger, only my stomach.
I stayed by the edge of the wall and listened as I crept closer to the estate’s entrance.
The sun sank behind a patch of distant trees, coloring the sky and dimming the rolling fields. If this was truly the place, there would soon be signs of life—well, not exactly life.
Right on cue, I heard the creak of a door. I dropped to the ground. The unkept grass offered cover, as did the growing darkness.
“See you later, guard dude.” It was a male voice that spoke. Then he whistled. It was strange. Not very vampire-like.
The ornate wooden gate swung open, and a metallic thud carried through the air. An engine rumbled, not the purr of something that belonged behind that gate, but a choppy set of squeaks and whistles.
Some kind of dilapidated jalopy drove through the gate, a boxy car that outdated me. It drifted out before the break lights lit and the metal thing jerked to a stop. A blond man climbed out, wearing a t-shirt and jeans. He mumbled something to himself and ran back inside the gates, leaving his car door open, the engine running.
This gave me options. One—follow him inside the gates. But considering the walls, there was little chance of escape when that gate closed. Two—grab the idiot when he came back out. Though he was likely to provide more information than the vamps I’d run into before, there wasn’t much time to get it all out of him before we were seen. Three—get in the car. It would offer better cover, plus I could see first-hand what he was up to. Easy choice.
I snuck over to the car, eyes on the open gate, ears on alert. Any sign of his return and I’d have to switch to plan two. Inside the car, CDs were scattered across the seats and floor, as was a coating of black stains and random pieces of dirty clothing. I considered climbing in behind the seat onto that mess in the back. It was awfully close to where the bloodsucker would have to sit.
I walked around to the trunk, and found it open, not just left open by mistake, but bent and unable to completely close. Perfect.
I climbed in, and pulled the lid as shut as it would go.
“All right, Jude,” the man said. “Let’s get this party started.”
There didn’t seem to be anyone else with him. Maybe he was speaking to the car.
Loud music blasted, and the driver sang, no, yelled along.
“HEY, GIRLFRIEND. COME ON OVER. HEY, GIRLFRIEND. IT’S ME.”
The engine clunked, and whatever else was in the trunk rolled into me. It was big and heavy, and hopefully not a body. The trunk lid bounced open and shut, as the estate shrunk into the distance.
There was no turning back.
Chapter Nine
Walter
A blistery gust blew across the courtyard, rustling the tails of my coat back away from my legs, and tumbling a single sheet of white paper across the grass. Coeds, bundled up in scarves and sweaters, puffy jackets and tall boots, raced between buildings for warmth. None looked in my direction—to the shadows of the matured oak. There would be nothing for them to see if they had. They were so fragile, herded like animals by something so trivial as wind. Modern day comforts made their kind weak. Every year that passed, it grew more difficult to find worthy prey. But that wasn’t what had brought me back to the university.
The white page flattened against my shin. I reached down and looked at the picture. Blond girl—the third missing in a week. There was no point in wishing for an alternative explanation. These were his hunting grounds. The victims all looked alike, the same as the girl he’d killed. It was Noah, and therefore my responsibility to end.
Mechanical thunder boomed, louder and louder. Then a screech followed. I knew exactly what that meant.
The yellow-brown vehicle swerved across the otherwise tranquil grass. When the metal box came to a halt, Charles climbed out.
Passersby stared, stopping in their paths. Charles had much to learn about subtlety. This was also my responsibility. As of late, everything appeared to be.
“Hey, Walter,” my progeny said. “I appreciate you bringing me in on this. I can’t wait to see you kick this guy’s ass.”
His smile was a ray of sunshine in the darkness of this life. It was what had drawn me to him, what had convinced me to turn him. It was a decision I regretted at least once per night.
“I get that this is Noah’s feeding ground and all, but how exactly are we supposed to find him? The university’s a big place.”
“I already have,” I replied, then started walking.
“What, like with vampire senses or something?” he asked, and wiggled his fingers in the air as if ‘vampire senses’ was a cryptic reality. He knew very well what our strengths were, our weaknesses. I’d taught him better than to suggest such nonsense, or so I’d thought.
I said nothing in response to his ridiculous notion.
“Bein
g old lets you see through walls, read people’s minds, fly.” He looked at me, and his smile faded. “Don’t tell me you can freaking fly…?”
I kept walking.
“Walter?”
“No,” I said.
“So there is something you can’t do,” he said, “other than have a nice conversation. But that I already knew.”
I pulled open the door to the dormitory. Charles walked in.
“So it’s the see-though-walls thing?” he asked.
And again, I wondered if it was worth it. Had there ever been a young vampire so slow to learn?
“No,” I replied.
“Can some of us do that? Really really old guys?” Charles asked.
“Maybe.”
“Cool,” he said. “I want flying to be my superpower. Maybe mind reading, though that could get awkward.”
I passed by my progeny and walked down the stairs. He kept talking, though I was done listening. We walked the length of a long hall, and when we reached the end, I held my finger to my lips.
“Oh,” Charles whispered. “Is this it?”
I nodded, and swung open the double doors. Inside was storage room, with stacks of chairs lining the walls, spare desks piled in the center of the tile floor. And there, in the corner, Noah scrambled to his feet.
Flesh blood dripped from his lips, and his eyes were just as red. The girl at his feet was blond, just like the rest. He’d broken his word, which was no surprise, just disappointing.
“Oooooh,” Charles said, tilting his head to the side. “Caught red-handed. Red-fanged.”
“So it seems,” Noah said.
The girl’s heart still beat, just barely. I could hear the faint thrum. Without a transfusion, she would not survive.
“You were warned about this already, man,” Charles said, his voice pleading. “You can’t kill ’em. Why’d you do it?”
No explanation was required. I could see it in his eyes. It was all over him—the defiant stance, the insatiable thirst. It was his nature, and the law was foolish. I knew, because he was just like me.
Hunted: A Vampire Paranormal Romance (Vampires of Scarlet Harbor Book 2) Page 4