by Kim Cormack
Wait a minute…this was far too easy. With ironic timing she felt a surge of pain as something smoked her across the back of her head. The room wavered and went black. Her last thought as she lost consciousness was, I totally didn’t check the other room.
Lexy heard the hum of conversation as she awoke but remained silent and kept her eyes closed, knowing she could give herself a moment to figure things out if she played dead. Without even opening her eyes she knew her wrists had been restrained behind her back with some kind of tape. It was usually duct tape. This was always a laughable moment. Using duct tape to restrain an immortal was easily comparable to using toilet paper to restrain a mortal. The being behind that decision was definitely not the sharpest pencil in the drawer. There were multiple voices in the room and it went without saying that they were seriously pissed about her murder spree. She listened to the conversation for a minute or two longer and deduced that they thought she was involved in the mass murder of their fellow Lampir but did not know she’d done the deed all by herself. Lexy smiled, knowing they probably knew nothing about anything. She might as well open her eyes and see what she was dealing with. Lexy opened her eyes and grinned. Well, shit. There were at least twenty more fumingly furious Lampir. She knew it had been far too easy. They were busy ignorantly brawling and shoving each other around. Some of them were hissing and gnashing their teeth like wild animals infected with rabies. They were all slightly deformed looking. Lampir were usually quite attractive and eloquently mannered, but not these ones. These monstrosities had spittle flying everywhere. What in hell? This wasn’t how Lampir were supposed to act? She’d known plenty of Lampir over the years and they could easily pass for mortal, but these guys were obviously the missing links of the Lampir species. These things were not normal Lampir. These were something else. Once again they’d sent her into a situation with only half of the story.
Their behavior was more than moderately amusing. They really weren’t paying any attention to her at all. What kind of bad guy doesn’t have at least one person out of what looks like around twenty watching the hostage? Lexy was pretty sure she could just rip the tape off, stand up and stroll right out of the room without any of these infected looking creatures even noticing, but she was supposed to kill them all. That was the job. Maybe, this is an infection within the Lampir species?
A much darker looking version of the robust woman in zebra print appeared in the doorway with fangs, a distorted face and long clawed nails. The beast spat everywhere as she growled, “That’s enough.”
Lexy winced as an unusually large amount of spittle sprayed directly at her face. So, gross. The others were instantly silenced and it appeared that the harmless looking woman that answered the door for her was the one in charge. She’d made a mistake in assuming the woman had been mortal because she’d greeted her at the door. She was far too tired to be doing this today. Lexy met the woman’s hostile expression with a calm one as she casually enquired, “Just out of curiosity, what in the hell are these things?”
The woman in zebra print smiled at her as she hobbled towards her completely deformed by the transformation. One of her legs appeared to be twisted in the opposite direction. With an eerie sweetness in her tone she shuffled closer, stared directly into her eyes and as her pupils became large onyx orbs she whispered, “You will tell me where the rest of your army went.”
She was obviously trying to compel the truth out of her. It was kind adorable. Lexy gave her a strange look and replied, “I’ve never needed an army.”
The woman had begun to jerk and spasm as she paced back and forth. Was this an attempt to intimidate her? The fact that she was wearing a silky zebra print moo-moo made intimidation unlikely but the sight of the material of her moo-moo flowing behind her while she writhed and twisted made her look like a creepy animated Disney villain.
The elderly lady paused directly in front of Lexy, and slowly reached out a deformed savaged gnarly fingertip and stroked her arm with one of her nails. More spittle sprayed directly at Lexy’s face as she hissed, “I will make your death tolerable if you tell me the truth. Where are the rest of your men?”
Where are the rest of your men? Now, that was just offensive. Lexy glanced down at where the woman’s razor sharp nail had sliced a trail down her arm. A thin stream of blood oozed from the wound before it closed up. There was a light film of moisture all over her and that was just nasty. Lexy curtly replied, “I’m alone and you’ve found yourself in an unfortunate situation. You’re obviously doing something sketchy here with these backwoods looking Lampir. I’m honestly not even the slightest bit concerned for my safety here but you should be.” Lexy casually tore off the tape that bound her. The woman stepped away from her, appearing to be intrigued by her strength. Lexy stood up and peeled the tape from her wrists as effortlessly as tearing masking tape from a birthday present. She grinned because it was pink camo duct tape she’d been restrained with and that was kind of awesome. Lexy removed one of the wooden daggers from her pants, cleared her throat and announced, “So, I’m going to have to kill you all now. I’d like to say it’s not personal but the truth is that all of this saliva you guys have going on is just annoying the hell out of me.”
The woman in zebra print shrieked, “Kill her!” The swarm of savage beings surged at her and all Lexy saw was a hoard of gnashing teeth and flying spittle as she commenced breaking necks. Once again knowing she was seriously outnumbered and that these wooden daggers always took a minute to work. What in the hell were these things on? They were strong and amped right up. She’d lost count of how many times she’d been chomped on and tossed into walls, and it was only five minutes into the fight. The backwoods Lampir in zebra print rifled her over the plastic covered couch and Lexy landed with a thud on the floor behind it. Shit, she was getting her ass kicked by these freaks. Well, she couldn’t allow that to happen. Lexy stood up, dusted herself off and flippantly stated, “Is that all you’ve got?” Hot damn, she was dizzy. She’d probably lost a lot of blood. It was more than that…It felt like the room was spinning. This wasn’t blood loss. It was something else. Did these assholes have venom? One of them chomped down on her arm. Lexy grimaced as she launched the screeching salivating wasteland looking being across the room just as another tackled her and sunk its fangs into her throat from behind. Shit. She grabbed the salivating beast by it’s head, swung it over her shoulder and as she flipped it, the shocked creature released it jaws. Lexy could feel the warmth of her blood as it flowed from her throat. If they’d hit an artery she’d bleed out before she had the opportunity to finish them all off. Nothing was working out as it was supposed to today. Within two minutes she had them all down and she was valiantly trying to stake them one by one as Frost strolled in dragging zebra print lady’s body behind him.
He declared, “I caught this one trying to escape.”
Lexy stumbled and mumbled, “You’re going to have to kill it.” And she blacked out from a mixture of blood loss, and exhaustion.
The first sound she heard was the humming of tires and the sound of Grey’s steady breathing. Lexy opened her eyes, knowing in an instant that she was on a bunk in Markus’s motorhome. She closed her eyes and went back to sleep.
Chapter 17
Just a little bit of Stalking
Lexy felt something land on top of the covers and she opened one eye, forgetting where she was for a moment. It was a bag with two wrapped up subs in it and Grey wasn’t lying beside her anymore.
Jenna’s voice announced, “Rise and shine, nap time is over my drugged up friend. We’ve already finished the next job. You and Grey have to head back to watch over and probably bail out the five newbies while we travel up north for another job.”
Of course they did. She’d known they weren’t ready. Lexy groggily shuffled around and sat up in bed. It felt like someone had beaten her with a baseball bat while she was asleep. She stretched, glared at Jenna and grilled, “What in the hell were those things? Those were some seriously mes
sed up looking Lampir.”
Jenna grinned and retorted, “They were Lampir that had been infected with Stryk venom. This Lampir had captured a Stryk to use as a guard dog, knowing that Lucien wanted him put down. Their venom is passed by saliva and well, they have a slight spraying problem as I’m sure you noticed. In my dream it sprayed a partially turned mortal, some kind of chemical reaction happened and when the change was complete there was a deformed Lampir with an extra dash of crazy that spit Stryk venom. I had that vision shortly after the five returned. I didn’t realize it was a time sensitive situation or that it had spread as far as it had. Markus told me that you and Grey dealt with a nest a couple of years ago just outside of New Orleans.”
Lexy replied, “We found a cave and there was a full grown Stryk lying on the ground beside dozens of eggs. It appeared to be dead. Grey burned the cave and we left. We didn’t actually have any experience fighting one.” Lexy recalled the reptilian like eggs in the nest that they’d destroyed.
Jenna grinned as she added, “They have pretty potent venom in their saliva. It actually stunted your healing ability. I didn’t see that happening in my vison. Both Arrianna and Orin had to heal you because we couldn’t risk going anywhere in that town and setting a tomb up for you to heal after Frost told me you’d put down over twenty in that room before he showed up and you didn’t appear to be healing. That’s never happened to any of our Healers before, so we destroyed the other hive without even entering the premises and they were forced to put down a few infected mortals. I thought we might be able to sneak into this town and sneak out without any mortal casualties, but we were forced to call in the Aries Group because we’re going to need a large scale accident to cover this up and we don’t have the time in our schedule to stick around for a couple of weeks to be certain the situation has been contained. We have a ridiculously crazy amount of jobs ahead of us, we’ll be working steady for the next four or five months at least. As of this moment that town and what happens to it is out of our hands.”
Lexy hated leaving anything partially finished. It felt like they’d just done half of a job and walked away leaving a mess behind for the mortals to clean up. She quizzed, “Why did you guys wait this long to wake me up?”
Jenna answered, “We left you asleep because we couldn’t risk dosing you up with their venom again. By the way… How are feeling?”
“Sore, my muscles are throbbing and that’s not normal for me. I’m usually long healed by now,” Lexy replied as she unwrapped the sandwich and chomped into it. This toxin could be used as a weapon on a Healer. She swallowed her mouthful of sub and asked, “You didn’t mention what the venom did to me…did you?”
“Don’t worry, I didn’t say a thing. When I was a child there was a group called the Legion of Aries. They took part in the first mass Correction of immortal children in Rome. You know the story. I was one of the seventeen original children of Ankh saved by the Guardian Azariah. Let’s just say the name The Aries Group doesn’t make me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. They fund us and they’ve done a miraculous job at covering up after us and protecting our identities but out of all of the names they could have come up with, why that one?”
Lexy teased, “Wasn’t Delores Aries the founder and original funder of the group?”
Jenna grinned and replied, “Point taken.”
Lexy had already devoured a whole sub and she had begun the second one. She swallowed her first bite and asked, “So, what’s our next job?”
Jenna smiled as she answered her question, “We don’t want to lose this new second tier, so you and Greydon will be inconspicuously watching the five while they try to complete their first job. Hang out in the background and when things go south you two make sure you grab the new girl.”
Stalking was always fun. “Are they already messing up?” Lexy asked. She couldn’t help but smile because they’d had a mission that very morning and it had gone epically wrong. Discovering a new Healer power stifling repellant wrong.
The motorhome pulled over. Grey pulled back the curtain to the sleep quarters, stuck his head inside and announced, “This is our stop sweet heart. Let’s go and see how are our newbies are doing.”
Lexy grabbed her backpack and Jenna passed her a credit card and said, “They used their credit card at the Comfort Inn. Trinity is already there and Triad is on route.”
She followed Grey out of the motorhome. Lexy smiled as she noticed that they were leaving them by the side of the highway on the outskirts of town with miles of nothing in every direction. Wonderful.
Frost unrolled the passenger side window and hollered, “I’ve called you a cab. They said, ten minutes. Good luck you two and stay out of sight. We’re leaving, we have another job so you might want to make sure they don’t take off in that motorhome and leave you guys behind.”
Grey yelled back, “Thanks for the heads up,” as the motorhome drove away. They stood there watching it as it became nothing but a small speck as it disappeared into the horizon.
In less than ten minutes a cab arrived and they both hopped into the back seat and Grey announced, “We have a room at the Comfort Inn.”
They got out at the lobby and found out that their room had already been paid for. All they had to do was take the keys. Their room was on the first floor and it was a splendidly seventies looking suite with sexy mustard yellow shag carpeting and all of the bathroom fixtures were baby blue. They spent the remainder of the afternoon figuring out where Trinity was staying and they were on the third floor directly above the five newbies. They had both the main picture window cracked open and they had a clear view of the little cement alcove by the office from their bathroom window. The restaurant was on the other side of them this was the perfect room to keep tabs on the others, and if they didn’t leave the room until it was imperative, they wouldn’t have to risk being seen. Lexy recognized Trinity’s conversation immediately. It was Thorne, Jakob, Glory and Frey’s voices. The two of them peeked through the curtains as they passed and then dashed to the bathroom to see if they were headed upstairs. Kayn and Zach were standing in the area in front of the office. Oh, no. With quick thinking they began the steamiest make out session in front of the office. It looked like they’d successfully pulled it off as Trinity continued talking and the group began to scale the stairs. Lexy looked at Grey. There was a problem…they didn’t stop their steamy make out session after Trinity walked away. They switched positions and it appeared as though neither of them was at all capable of rational thought. Kayn must have inadvertently used Frost’s ability. Kayn began to fumble with the button above Zach’s zipper. Oh, shit…should they stop them? The pheromones Kayn had siphoned off of Frost were working overtime. Lexy looked at Grey and he shrugged. Of course he was fine with letting them go at it while under the spell of Frost’s ability. That dirty stinker. If the passion filled, make out session had started as a distraction it definitely wasn’t anymore. There was pillow talk and everything going on.
“I want you so bad,” Zach whispered against Kayn’s hair.
A random passer by hissed, “Call the number on the door and get a damn room.”
They shoved away from each other. That snapped them out of it. Oh, thank goodness. Lexy thought she was going to have to blow her cover and douse those horned up teens with a hose. Kayn covered her mouth with her hand. Zach leaned back against the wall and slid down it until he was sitting in the corner on the cement with his face in his hands. Kayn did the same against the other side of the wall. They were both obviously trying to calm themselves down.
Zach gave Kayn a weak smile and whispered, “That’s one powerful ability you’ve borrowed, Brighton. Five more seconds and I would have taken you right here in public. Without any ability for rational thought, I might add. Do you get to keep it, or does it go away?”
“I honestly have no idea,” she whispered. They sat there, just staring at each other, both of them confused over what had just happened between them.
Zach struggled
to stand up and chuckled, “My legs feel like they’re made of Jell-O. For future reference, that’s how you kiss a guy.” He gave her a roguish smile and held out his hand to help her up.
She took his hand and stood up. Kayn grinned at him and said, “You didn’t do so bad yourself. That would be what has Melody so hot and bothered.” She brushed her shirt down and then stepped forward and began to wipe the lipstick off of his face and made an attempt at fixing his hair. He shook his head and began to wipe off the lipstick that was smeared around her lips with his thumb, and then he patted down her hair a bit.
Zach grinned and teased, “If you’d kissed me like that earlier, we’d still be in the bathroom.” He stared at her for a second before he started back-pedaling, “We were drugged by your ability. I was just kidding about the bathroom thing. We’re friends. We are always going to be friends. Just friends. I know that. Just like I know that in this life we’ve been given, sometimes we’re going have to do things we normally wouldn’t do. This doesn’t have to be a big deal if we don’t make it one. We kissed and it was hot, but we did it so Trinity wouldn’t see us. There was a method to our madness. On a happy note, you calmed yourself down faster this time. If they’d sensed the pheromones they’d be down here already. We’ll just go back upstairs, tell them what happened and figure out another way to get into the room.”
Kayn smiled at Zach and responded with a slow nod. They climbed the stairs and once they were out of ear shot Grey chuckled, “Consider me impressed, I didn’t know our little Zackie boy had that in him.”