Interested Party
24
Whenever the CIA wants to get information out of an enemy combatant, they should plant them between a couple of fifty-plus women talking about what they did―or want to do―with their twenty-year-old boyfriends.
After a solid hour of that, I’m ready to turn my powers of mental influence inward and erase my own memory.
Fortunately, they didn’t get graphic.
Okay, they didn’t get too graphic.
The teachers thank all the kids for their effort and give them a couple stretching exercises to keep doing at home, then spend a few minutes discussing the upcoming dance performance at Woodinville Repertory Theatre.
About half the kids fidget and look terrified. The skinny boy brims with eagerness, while the other boy seems to share Sophia’s opinion of performing in public. Can’t fault any of them. I felt silly doing taekwondo as a kid in front of parents. No one could ever drag me on stage. Hell, I fainted at the fourth grade talent show from sheer anxiety. I’d been supposed to sing, but one look at the audience and the next thing I knew, I was in chair backstage with a teacher fanning me.
I’m a touch more confident now.
Heh, thinking about that talent show makes me realize how shocking it must’ve been for Mom when I got all assertive on the government agents.
Sophia spends a little while talking with some of her friends in the class before bouncing over to me. Other kids disperse to their parents while a group of eight gather by the windows, waiting for rides.
“That was amazing,” whispers Sophia. “I didn’t think anything could shut Mrs. Snow up. She’s so mean.”
We’re in earshot of other people, so I simply shrug. “Gotta know how to talk to people like that. She needed to realize the focus is on Alexis, not on her.”
“Huh?” asks Sophia.
I take her hand and we join the line heading out the door. “That woman wanted Alexis to be a professional dancer not because the kid enjoyed doing it, but because it made her feel important.”
“Oh. I told Megan about you not having any clothes and being outside.”
“I noticed.”
Sophia grins up at me. “I made it up a little. Said your friends played a prank and took your bathing suit.”
“Whew. Had me worried there for a moment.”
“Secret stuff.” Sophia crosses her heart.
At the approach of scuffing boots to our left, I look up at a man and woman approaching us. They’re both in their twenties, the guy blond, the woman with dark brown hair like me, and dressed like grad students.
I don’t quite like the way they’re staring at me, but nothing about their body language gives off an obvious threat. The pair stops a few steps away, right in our path.
“Starbucks is over there,” says Sophia, pointing to the other end of the strip mall.
They smirk at her.
“And you are?” I ask.
Sophia whispers in a tone reserved for alien encounters, “I think they’re hipsters.”
“We represent a certain party who has an arrangement with an associate of yours to procure a specific object,” says the man. “It has come to our understanding that you now possess said object.”
“Let us avoid any unpleasantness.” The woman’s smile couldn’t be more plastic if she tried. “Hand it over and we shall consider the arrangement fulfilled.”
“Sorry. Can’t do that. Not sure where you got your info from, but I wasn’t able to get it from that nightclub. I got caught.”
The woman takes a step closer, eyeing Sophia. “She’s cute. It’d be a shame to get blood on that pink leotard.”
Sophia gasps and clings to me, shivering.
I harden my glare at her. “You even so much as put one finger on my sister, your head’s going into a body cavity. Maybe his, maybe yours.”
The man chuckles. “Oh, that’s cute. I’ve never been threatened by an Innocent before. As if she could even do something.”
“Hah. I know, right?” The woman laughs at me. “It’s about as scary as that little girl saying she’s gonna kick my ass.”
Sophia squeezes tighter against me. “Let’s go home.”
“Not just an Innocent.” The man reaches to brush his fingers over my cheek, but I swat his hand away. “Ooh. Touchy.” He chomps the air at me. “You’re only a couple weeks old. Even if you had a real bloodline, you’re still a little baby nibbler.”
“It’s not me you should be worried about.” I nudge Sophia a little more behind me. “My family is under the protection of Aurélie Merlier.”
The two ‘grad students’ cringe a little and exchange a glance.
“If St. Ives wants the thing that bad, she should buy it from the guy who it belongs to. Now, I gotta get home.”
When I try to step around them, the woman slides in my way again. “Hang on. It’s not that easy, kid. Your arrangement with Aurélie isn’t our problem. Eleanor will handle any fallout from your little puff princess.”
“I’m not a puff princess,” mumbles Sophia.
The man squats to eye level with her. “Yes you are, and a cute one at that, which is why we really don’t want this to get unpleasant. But Lynn meant Aurélie. She’s an overgrown Barbie doll.”
“I didn’t know Mattel put out a Louis XIV expansion pack,” I mutter.
“Just hand the thing over,” says Lynn. “I hate having to threaten a little kid.”
I smirk. “Easy fix for that. Don’t. Leave her out of it.”
They stand there staring at us for a minute or two as parents and dance students head to their cars and drive away, oblivious to the imminent violence brewing here.
“We can’t do that,” says the guy. “It’s foolish not to use all available leverage available to us to obtain what our boss needs.”
Lynn blurs into a smear of color for an instant before my reflexes kick in and drag her back to normal (but fast) motion. She tries to dart around me and grab Sophia, but I fling myself into her. We crash to the parking lot, rolling over a few times while clinging to each other.
Sophia dashes for the alley to the right of the dance studio, the man walking casually after her, whistling.
The woman grabs a fistful of my hair, pulling and twisting in an effort to throw me aside. Pain washes over my scalp, like my skin’s about to rip straight off my skull. Snarling, I sprout claws and rip open the front of her throat. She attempts a scream, but only emits a wheezy gargling noise. Her grip on my hair releases and she rams her knee into my side hard enough to throw me over three parked cars. The pain of more broken ribs distracts me from thinking about flying. I smack into the side of a big SUV, then collapse to the pavement, sprawled in a puddle of agony.
Sophia screams.
I think Lynn called me a bitch, too, but she’s kinda hard to understand with her larynx dangling out.
“Come here, kid,” says the guy. “I’m only going to hurt you if your sister doesn’t cooperate.”
“No!” yells Sophia. “Let go of me!”
I spring into the air and hurl myself forward from zero to 130 MPH in the blink of an eye, and zoom around the corner into the alley. The dude’s grabbed my sister by the neck from behind; she’s got both arms reaching up behind her head, clawing at his wrist.
My angry roar gives him a half second’s warning before I crash into him at full speed and drill him face first into a dumpster with enough force to dent it. The boom sets off a handful of car alarms. I bounce off him and land on my feet a short distance away while he crumples into a heap.
“Ugh.” He moans. “That hurt.”
I scowl. “That’s the point. Don’t touch my sister.”
Lynn cruises into the alley, most of her throat back where it belongs. I barely manage to duck her flying charge. She stops short in midair and catches me with an insanely fast punch to the side of the head that sends me stumbling into the dance studio’s wall, seeing stars.
“You frickin’ clawed me!” shouts
Lynn.
“Sorry. I’m new at this.” I backpedal, clutching my face. “Is that like a breach of etiquette or something?”
She growls and spins to face Sophia.
My kid sister screams again and runs for cover behind another dumpster.
“No!” I yell, rushing at Lynn.
The bitch catches my arm before my knuckles make contact with her face, and swings me around off my feet. I manage to get my legs up and catch myself against the wall rather than let her mash me headfirst into the cinder blocks. For an instant, I crouch in defiance of gravity, but the wall makes for an excellent launch point. I thrust my legs out, leaping sideways, and hammer my fist down on her nose.
An explosion of blood flies out from under my fingers. In the suspended time state of vampiric reflexes, her entire facial bone structure cracking and undulating becomes gruesomely fascinating. Lynn rebounds away from my hand, slaps into the ground, and slides across the alley into the wall. I don’t have time to even feel victorious before a blurry male figure rushes up and rams a fist into my stomach, lifting me a few inches off the ground.
“Oof!” I yell.
Despite my body no longer needing to breathe, the gut punch leaves me unable to. The sensation is terrifying; for a precious second or three, the only thing I want to do is breathe―but I can’t. The world spins around me as I clutch the bruise. A jean-covered leg clarifies in my vision; as if by instinct, I lunge at it and sink my teeth into the thigh.
The man howls and grabs my head in both hands, trying to pull me away.
Sophia screams, “She’s getting up! Sarah!”
Damn. Thought I knocked that bitch out. I bite down harder, making the man wail. While I scramble to get to my feet and shove him over onto his back, he jams his thumb in my mouth and pries my jaw open. He’s stronger than me by more than a little, and I instinctively back off before my teeth disintegrate or he rips my whole jaw off.
“Sarah!” screams Sophia.
Still holding me by the head, the man tosses me to the side. My body slaps flat against the wall, and I flop to the alley on my face.
“Just give us the goddamned telescope,” says the man, sounding weary. “This is pointless. Why are you fighting so hard for a piece of junk?”
“Because you assholes threatened my goddamned sister!” I shout.
Sophia emits a horrible, high-pitched shriek of terror.
I shift, staring at the woman dragging my little sister out from her hiding place. Sophia’s dance shoes slide over the paving with no resistance as she grunts and struggles to get away.
“Get off her!”
Growling, I leap to my feet and charge at her, but the guy swoops me from behind and pins my arms. I strain at his grip, but I’ve got as much chance of overpowering him as Sophia does of picking up a dumpster.
“I’m impressed,” says the guy, his breath puffing at the back of my head. “You’re a lot stronger than I expected for such a newbie, especially an Innocent. But, you’re also still weak.”
I kick both legs out, trying to tug myself straight down, but his grip isn’t budging. He collects my wrists and forces my hands together at my chest, immobilizing me except for my flailing sneakers.
Lynn drags Sophia over by one arm, and glares at me. Her throat looks like a macabre candy cane, pale skin with red lines wrapped around it where my claws dug in. “Now,” she rasps, her voice still in tatters, “Where’s the damned spyglass?”
“Abaddon,” I wheeze, past the force crushing my chest inward.
“Bullshit.” Lynn sprouts claws on her right hand and holds them against Sophia’s cheek.
My little sister bursts into tears. “Please don’t hurt me!”
“You like claws, bitch?” asks Lynn, the unbecoming gravel in her voice making my nerves crawl. “So do I. But I don’t think your little sister will.”
Sophia stares at me, pleading. “Sarah… Do something.”
I stomp at the guy’s foot, but he’s holding me up so high I can’t reach.
“I won’t start at her neck. She’s small. It’ll kill her too fast.” Lynn taps a claw to Sophia’s right hand, red from the tightness of the grip around her wrist. “Fingers first.”
“Stop!” I shout, still futilely struggling to get away from this guy. “Aurélie’s going to―”
“Wow, you sound like a little kid,” says the guy holding me. “Mommy’s gonna get you.”
“Where is the damn spyglass,” yells Lynn. “Last chance or I’m gonna hate you for making me mutilate this kid.”
Dumpster Diving
25
Sophia lets out an ear-piercing shriek that could break every window within fifty yards.
Hearing my little sister so terrified sets off an explosion inside me. Snarling, I strain at the arms holding me with total desperation. The rate at which I’m burning energy to make myself stronger almost hurts.
His grip loosens a little. One way to get a guy to let go is to crush his balls. I decide to test that theory out―with claws. The instant I grab a handful of crotch, he squeaks and releases the bear hug, mashing both hands into my back to shove me away as hard as he can push.
The launch throws me into Lynn. I koala around her and use my weight to drag her over backward to the ground. Since my face is already right by her neck, I chomp down and get a blast of disgustingness in my mouth.
Ugh. Another vampire’s blood tastes exactly like blood, only tingly like it’s suffused with an electric charge or something.
Energy.
I’m distantly aware of Sophia screaming. She’s right next to me, but sounds far away. Fighting the urge to throw up, I force myself to suck on the side of this bitch’s throat, gulping down blood as fast as I can. She digs her claws into my back for a better grip, trying to pry me off. Fire like ten hot pokers piercing my flesh makes me scream into the hole in her neck, but I’m fighting for my little sister’s life.
The more I take, the less blood she has to make herself stronger or faster.
“Stop!” she yells.
Like a feral thing, I snarl, and keep on drinking until the flow is almost nil. Then, I let her throw me aside. I roll over twice and wind up on my hands and knees. All it takes is one little thought about how disgusting her blood tastes, and I vomit all over the alley. I’m not sure if what Dalton said about drinking another vamp’s blood is true―that it could make me her slave―but I don’t want to find out, and it’s way disgusting. Besides, my body definitely does not want it.
After barfing up a viscous puddle of crimson goop, I sit back on my heels and wipe my mouth on the back of my arm. Lynn rolls on her side, cradling her neck and emitting agonized wails past clenched teeth. The guy’s still curled up on the ground, cradling his punctured groin, but it doesn’t look like he’s going to stay down for much longer.
I stagger upright and rush at him, kicking him in the face as hard as I can. His body whirls around like a fidget spinner drifting across the alley. After he rolls to a stop flat on his back, I grab him by the flannel shirt and mash his head into the side of the dumpster over and over again until his skull cracks open.
That should keep him out cold for a while. I toss him up and over the side, into the dumpster. Lynn jumps on my back, which makes my claw wounds flare up. I howl and ram an elbow into her side. She flies off to the left, landing in a clumsy somersault before winding up against the wall with her legs in the air.
Blinded by rage, I charge at her. Again and again, I punch her in the face, chest, and arms whenever she manages to raise a defense. After siphoning off her blood, she’s no faster or stronger than a mortal, though she’s still way tough.
“All right,” shouts Lynn, crossing her arms over her face. “Stop. You win. I give up.”
I grab her throat in both hands and pull her up to make eye contact. Blood dribbles from her nostrils, runs from a cut over her left eye, and wells out of her mouth. “Don’t ever threaten my family again.”
As much as she can move wit
h her throat in my grip, she nods.
With a dismissive snarl, I throw her across the alley into the dumpster. She hits it hard enough that the lid slams closed. Hah.
“Two points,” mutters Sophia between sobs.
I run to her side and scoop her up. “Hey… are you hurt?”
“No.”
She’s trembling. Dammit. I cradle her chin and lift her head so I can stare into her deep emerald eyes. Exception time.
“You’re going to make me forget?” asks Sophia, narrowing her eyes.
“Umm. Well, I was thinking about it. You’re shaking.”
She clings to me. “I’ll be okay. Please don’t play with my brain.”
“You’re going to have nightmares.”
“I know.”
I pat her on the back. “You don’t care?”
“Can I sleep in your bed tonight?”
“Okay.”
“Hey,” says a man.
I look over at a pudgy Hispanic guy in a Starbucks apron. “What’s all the noise back here?”
“Sorry.” I nod toward the dumpster. “Just putting some trash out. Lid got away from me and slammed.”
“Oh.” The guy nods and walks back around the corner.
Whew. I forgot how dark it must be back here. He didn’t notice the huge puddle of blood on the ground. Speaking of which… I really need a meal.
“They’re gonna be mad,” whispers Sophia. “You didn’t kill them.”
“Ugh. Please don’t say morbid stuff. You’re too young for that.”
She raspberries me.
“They won’t bother us again. I gotta get rid of that stupid spyglass. That’s all they care about.”
“Okay,” she whispers.
“Besides. It’s really damn hard to kill us. They weren’t trying to kill me. I guess it’s just how vampires fight. Like a bunch of boys walloping each other until they work out their excess energy.”
“Boys are stupid,” says Sophia in a matter-of-fact tone. “Maybe except for Ryan and Darian. And Sam. No. Sam can be dumb sometimes.”
I chuckle. “Come on. Time to go home.”
She clamps on. “I don’t wanna see. There’s blood and stuff.”
A Beginner's Guide to Fangs (Vampire Innocent Book 2) Page 27