Alba only made it five minutes down Elm Street before finding their upturned car on the side of the road. Their bodies had been thrown so far from the car that Alba hadn’t found them until Officer Riley Montgomery and Sheriff Keith Pitston arrived at the scene, which was actually very fortunate considering their injuries. Officer Montgomery removed Alba from eyeshot of her parents’ remains—what little there was left—and brought her to his car to recover. I kept her company while more officers flooded the scene, examined the bodies, and gathered evidence.
Berry had arrived in his van a few minutes ago. Although they wouldn’t move the bodies for several hours, after all evidence had been collected and photography had been captured, he was deep in conversation with Sheriff Pitston. If the Sheriff’s deepening crease between his brows were any indication, I’d need to snatch another interview from Berry. For the moment, until the activity at the scene settled, I contented myself with interviewing Alba.
I leaned on the frame of Officer Montgomery’s cruiser as Alba huddled in the passenger seat. I tried to keep my interview light and unobtrusive, but I didn’t need to ask Alba questions to encourage her story. She couldn’t stop talking about her parents. I listened and wrote some brief notes, but throughout the entire conversation, I couldn’t help but think, dear God, not another baker.
John and Priscilla were the golden couple, according to their daughter, and their love was why she was still single. They’d taught her to never settle because once she found the right love, she’d have the rest of her life to enjoy it. She’d never settled, so she was alone. Now, being an only child, she was completely on her own.
Alba clammed up after that. She covered her mouth with her hand and just shook her head in shock. I didn’t have the words to comfort her—I knew how deep and sharp grief could stab—so I just sat with her in silence until Officer Montgomery returned. He was in his late twenties, like Alba, and from the looks he was shooting her, Alba wasn’t as alone as she felt.
“Is this woman bothering you, Alba?” he asked
Alba shook her head, but she hugged herself a little tighter and started rocking back and forth from her perch on the passenger seat.
Officer Montgomery turned to me. “If you don’t mind, ma’am, I think you’ve done enough here. Please be so kind as to leave the scene and Miss Dunbar to me.”
“Have I done something wrong, Officer?” I asked congenially. I reminded myself that this was not my turf and reined in my temper.
His face flushed. “If you can’t see what’s wrong here, there’s nothing I can do for you, ma’am. You can teach manners, but you can’t teach morals.”
I raised my eyebrows. “I’m not sure what you’re referring to. I’ve been keeping Alba company. Seems to me like she needed it.”
As I’d hoped, Alba’s name sparked her awareness. She glanced up and smiled wanly. “Hi, Riley.”
“Is this woman bothering you?” Officer Montgomery asked again, pointing at me.
“No, not at all,” Alba said, shocked. “She’s been wonderful company. I’ve never met a better listener. I just can’t believe that—” Alba covered her mouth, and her throat made horrible squealing noises as she tried and failed not to cry.
He placed his hand on her shoulder and squeezed. “I’m sure Ms. DiRocco is the best listener,” Officer Montgomery said, glaring at me. “We’re just finishing up at the scene. I’ll stay with Alba, if you don’t mind.”
“I don’t mind at all,” I said, ignoring the implication that I should leave.
“I’m not askin’ your permission,” Officer Montgomery said, his twang sharpening. “I’m tellin’ you, ma’am. You’ve outstayed your welcome.”
His tone penetrated through Alba fog. She frowned. “You’re being rude, Riley. Why should Cassidy leave? She’s Walker’s friend, and she’s been wonderful company.”
“She’s a reporter, Al.” Officer Montgomery said, as if he were unveiling the man behind the curtain.
Alba nodded. “I know.”
Officer Montgomery frowned. “What do you mean, you know?”
“She told me. She works for The Sun Accord in New York City. Walker brought her here to write a story on crime comparison between country and city life, and she asked if she could sit with me. And that’s what she’s done, just sit with me.”
Officer Montgomery looked back and forth between us, and whatever he saw, he obviously didn’t like. His face flushed a dark crimson in mottled patches across his cheeks. He stepped in close and tipped his voice to a whisper, but in stepping closer to me, he was closer to Alba as well. “I know your type.”
I raised my eyebrows. “My type? I’m not sure you know me well enough to know—“
“Idon’t need to know you to know where you’re from. You city hot shots think you’re better than us. You’d do anything for a story. You’re taking advantage of a woman’s grief, but I ain’t gonna let that happen.”
Anger, like hissing steam, flashed through me and heated my face. I opened my mouth to to say something I’d regret when a glint behind Officer Montgomery caught my eye. I hesitated. A glowing orb blinked a few yards into the woods, like a mirror reflecting the moonlight. I knew that glint almost better than I knew my own reflection.
I glanced around to see if anyone else had noticed the vampire watching us from the woods, and another movement caught my gaze. Walker was shaking his head at me. He had joined the conversation between Sheriff Pitston and Berry, but my argument with Officer Montgomery hadn’t been as private as I would have hoped. A few other officers were staring at us, most of their expressions disapproving and aggravated. Walker, however, looked furious.
He was shaking his head at my argument with Officer Montgomery. He hadn’t seen the vampire. No one had.
“You’ve worn out your welcome, Ms. DiRocco,” Officer Montgomery said. “I’m telling, not asking, you to leave Miss Dunbar alone.”
Alba’s mouth dropped open. “Riley! That’s completely uncalled for!”
“It’s all right, Miss Dunbar.” I patted her knee and then held out my hand for Officer Montgomery to help me stand. “He’s right. I’ve worn out my welcome.”
Montgomery hesitated a moment before taking my hand and helping me to my feet. He didn’t trust my easy acquiescence, but he wanted me gone badly enough to accept it without question.
“Before I leave, would you mind giving me a statement?”
Officer Montgomery’s face pinched. “You’ll have to speak with Sheriff Pitston about statements.”
I nodded. “I certainly will. Thank you for your help.”
He returned my nod but eyed me carefully as I walked away. I could feel the heat of his gaze as I walked toward Walker’s truck. Had he been Greta or Officer Harroway or nearly any city cop, I would have cajoled my way into squeezing more information about the case, but I didn’t have the clout or notoriety here that I had in the city. In fact, if Officer Montgomery’s treatment was any indication, I was starting from the very bottom of the totem pole, lower even than when I’d started in the city simply because I was from the city. But if I could write a book about anything, I could fill page after page about how to claw my way back from the bottom.
Walker had rejoined his conversation with Sheriff Pitston and Berry. I waited until Officer Montgomery turned back to Alba. He knelt in front of her, giving her his undivided sympathy and affection. While everyone else was distracted by other conversations, I ducked behind Walker’s truck and into the shadowed overpass toward the police tape. I squinted into the darkness beyond the police parameter, scanned the surrounding trees, and waited.
After a minute, my gaze caught the glint again. My eyes were drawn to it, and I could feel the deep, wrenching pull of its mind connecting with mine. Its strength couldn’t compete with anything I’d experienced with Jillian or Dominic, but nevertheless, it rooted deep inside me, shaping my will. It wanted me to step toward it. I could feel the force of its desire stim
ulating the synapses in my brain to move my legs, one foot in front of the other, to walk toward it.
The force of its command was light and coaxing. I could resist if I wanted, but if I resisted now, I wouldn’t have the advantage of surprising it with the depth of my own strength. From experience, that slight advantage could make the difference between bleeding and surviving.
Vampires were willing to sacrifice anything, even their own anonymity, to get what they wanted, and at the moment, with dozens of police officers and emergency personnel to choose from, this vampire wanted me. As prejudiced as Officer Montgomery and the rest of Sheriff Pitston’s team might be, they didn’t know the dark like I did. I could talk a good talk to Walker about being here to report the facts, not to save lives, but when faced with the reflective double glint of a vampire’s eyes staring at me, staring into me, I was glad that mine was the life on the line. I didn’t want anyone else getting caught in the kill zone between me and the vampires.
I took one halting step and then another into the woods, away from the illusion of protection that the police provided, and toward the vampire.
* * * *
A heavier, denser darkness lived in the woods compared to the train overpass. Its thickness was like trying to see underwater; just when I thought I’d approached what looked like a boulder or tree branch, I’d reach out to catch my bearings and touch nothing but shadows. The reflective glint was only a dozen yards away now. I stumbled uncertainly, and my heart leapt to pound on my eardrums.
The musk of damp dirt, leaves, and pine thickened the air, and for a moment, I inevitably thought of Dominic. As frightened as I was of his power, influence, strength, and intentions, I realized that his presence in the city had also given me a measure of security. Not one vampire had attacked me in three weeks, and I knew it wasn’t because of my own muscle. Dominic’s loyal protection—albeit motivated by his own selfish desires to control me—ensured that I survived the night. Now that I was facing the creatures that bump in the night alone, I appreciated his ability to bump back. I could feel the void of his protection like a tightrope walker performing without her net.
The glint, which had flashed a few yards to my left, streaked mere feet in front of my face. I stumbled, but before I could fall, my back bumped flush against something tall and bone cold. Arms wrapped around my body, but they were distinctly not human. Its knobby joints protruded under its rough, gray skin, like bat claws. One hand bound around my waist, clamping my back to its front. The other gripped my neck, tipping my head sideways with the unbelievable strength in its fingers. I could feel the cutting pressure of its talons rake against my stomach as it held me, but unfathomably, I also felt its reserve. The talons didn’t slice my skin. Its grip hadn’t torn my muscles or broken my ribs. I was still unharmed and whole.
I was playing the human, a performance that had saved me on previous occasions. I knew I needed to act unaware of anything but the smooth, calming limbo the creature was trying to flood through my mind, but I couldn’t help the deep tremble that shook my chest and vibrated through my body like a swift, deadly undertow.
Lips—if you could call the thin skin stretched over its massive fangs lips—kissed the skin beneath my ear. “Be calm, little one.” He spoke and the growling timbre of his voice belied the meaning behind his words.
The swift boil of my anger at being called “little one” helped douse some of my trembling. I deliberately slowed my breathing, so he would think I was under his influence.
He rubbed his cheek against my cheek. “Hmm,” he murmured on an inhale. I felt a tremble course through his body. His talons tightened just short of breaking the skin as he composed himself. “Lovely.”
The slick slide of his tongue flicked out in a hot swipe over my neck. I almost lost my nerve. I clenched my teeth to stop myself from jerking away when his mouth clamped over my carotid in a punishing, penetrating lock. Fangs pierced through my skin, and my knees gave out as he sucked a long, fiery gulp of blood.
Pleasant, soothing pleasure kneaded my body in pulses. Unlike Dominic’s bite, which could blow my mind in orgasm, and Kaden’s bite, which tore through flesh like a rabid dog gnawing its bone, this bite massaged around my body like a cloud. It wasn’t overwhelming or violent, like the other bites I’d experienced. It soothed my aches and worries. I floated in oblivious bliss, and perhaps this bite was more dangerous for its gentility because despite having kept my will, I didn’t want to pull away.
The vampire released the pressure on my neck, healed the wound with a quick, efficient lick, and stepped back from me after only one swallow. I slumped to the ground. From my prone position, I could finally see the vampire behind me. He hadn’t fed yet besides the one swallow of my own blood, but that one swallow hadn’t been enough to transform him back from his gargoyle-like form. His ears stood at attention. His nose was flat and flared, and although his canine teeth were fanged, every tooth in his mouth came to a sharpened point.
Like all the other vampires I’d seen in this form, his body was slim, nearly skeletal, and his legs, which I had to focus on not seeing, were jointed backwards. Vampires were difficult to differentiate in this form, but I noticed a slight difference in his. This vampire, unlike Dominic and any other vampire I’d known, had webbed fingers.
The vampire stared down at me, incredulous.
“You’re a night blood.”
I blew out a long breath. “What gave me away?” I asked sardonically. The jig was up the moment he’d tasted my blood.
He cocked his head, and after a suspended moment, he shot me a smile. The smile would have been reassuring if not for the rows of needle-sharp teeth.
“Humor,” he said. “It’s been a while.”
I tensed to move from my prone position. The vampire disappeared and was suddenly beside me, scooping me from the ground and carrying me in his arms deeper into the woods. He dodged between trees and flashed over logs and catapulted over what looked like a small river dividing the forest, moving at that nearly invisible speed that they could all move. The few times Dominic had carried me as he moved at that speed, I tried to focus on something central, like the freckle above his collarbone, to keep my bearings, but focusing on this vampire was more sickening than the world warping in a dizzying blur around us. Focusing on him meant staring at the rough grayness of his chest, the five-inch talons curved under my knees, and the glowing amber of his reflective, nocturnal eyes.
His focus shifted at my perusal, and our eyes met.
I stiffened in his arms. “Shouldn’t you watch where you’re going?”
“Does my gaze make you uncomfortable?” he asked, and he deliberately smiled wide enough to showcase every pointed inch of his teeth.
Of all the vampires to attack and abduct me, I’d found the comedian this time. I shouldn’t complain. Last time, I’d found the serial killer.
“It’s not you, it’s me,” I said, and the vampire snorted. “If we crash into a tree at this speed, you’d survive just fine, but I’d be dead.” I gave him a long look. “The police would have another murder to investigate, and the last thing your coven needs with a serial vampire on the loose is more attention.”
The vampire sobered. “We don’t know who’s responsible for the murders, serial vampire or not. Bex will be busy tonight finding out, but despite the murders, I think she’ll make time for you.”
I blinked. “You’re bringing me to Bex?”
“You know Bex?”
I nodded.
“That’s impossible,” he dismissed. “I know every night blood here.”
“I’m not from here.”
A slow smirk widened his lips. “That I believe.”
The wind whipped my hair around us, smacking him in the face. A deep rattle vibrated through his chest as he breathed in my scent. I watched his fangs elongate and his lips thin like a dog with its hackles raised.
He looked away, ignoring me to focus resolutely on the path in front
of us.
I gaped. “You haven’t fed yet, but you’re resisting me.”
He didn’t meet my eyes this time when he spoke. “You’re not intended for me. You could be just what my Master needs to find herself again. I can’t take that from her.”
“How could I possibly do that?”
“She hasn’t found a willing night blood in years, not since Walker refused her.” The vampire spat Walker’s name like it was something vile. “She must accept what can’t be hers and be content with finding someone else, anyone else, before it tears us apart.”
I opened my mouth to correct him, to let him know that I wasn’t what Bex needed. I already had a Master, and I wasn’t willing. But it dawned on me that the only thing preventing him from feeding from me was his intention to bring me to Bex.
“What’s your name?” I asked instead.
“You may call me Rene.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Just Rene?” I needed to know his first and last name to have a hope of entrancing him.
“Knowing a vampire’s full name is earned, not given.”
Damn it. “Oh. Why is that?”
He smirked. “Asking to know my full name is tantamount to a man asking to see your breasts on a first date. I don’t know you well enough to reveal all of myself, and it’s rude to ask.”
Rene described it like a social nicety, but I suspected the real reason he wouldn’t give me his last name was survival. Knowing and saying a vampire’s full name increased my hold on its mind when I entranced it. Most night bloods couldn’t entrance vampires, but Rene didn’t know that I wasn’t like most night bloods.
“Sorry,” I muttered. “Far be it for me to be rude while I’m being abducted.”
Rene laughed. “Valid point. My name is Rene Roland. What’s yours?”
“DiRocco,” I murmured, deliberately only giving him my last name and determined not to feel guilty for my deception. I was food to him, nothing but meat and blood with a sence of dry humor that he apparently appreciated, but this piece of meat was not being eaten. Not tonight. “Most people call me DiRocco.”
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