Pestilence.
Patrick’s chest squeezed tight at the unexpected thought and an image from his dream smashed through his head. A man in a black suit who didn’t cast a shadow on the sand. A familiar man.
“Stop it,” he snapped, his frustration turning into self-contempt.
He yanked on his shorts and left the room, tugging his shirt over his head as he went. He wouldn’t let normality unravel again. Not again. He’d barely recovered the last time it had happened.
Maybe Ven is right? Maybe you are something—
“Jesus bloody Christ, Watkins, stop it! You’re a lifeguard. That’s it. You’re not some goddamn savior of the human race.”
The jog to work passed in a blur of denied memories and denied images. Memories he didn’t want to dwell on, memories of strange occurrences he’d never told Ven about, strange “accidents” he couldn’t explain but almost cost him his life. Memories of a shadowless man on a deserted beach. Staring at him. Wanting him dead.
Images he wanted to dwell on a lot, too much. Images of the mysterious woman, images of her naked, stretched out on his bed, waiting for him to join her, waiting for him to make love to her until they both climaxed, screaming each other’s name.
The crunch of sand on concrete under his feet snapped Patrick from his torment. He blinked, his attention turning to the empty car park around him and the dawn-quiet stretch of beach before him. He was at work already?
He looked at his watch. 5:07 a.m.
Patrick frowned. Shaking his wrist, he brought it up to his ear. The battery must be flat. He’d left home at 5:05.
The soft, almost inaudible tick tick tick tick of tiny mechanics slipped into his ear and he frowned again, dropping his arm. His watch, it seemed, was working fine.
Normality unraveling, Patrick?
Refusing to acknowledge the squirming tension in his gut, he took the stairs up to the patrol tower’s door two at a time and let himself into the building. He’d punch in and then hit the water. Perhaps all the swimming required to check out the surf’s conditions would clear his head. After that he’d work through the morning’s paper work, pitch the safe-swimming flags and then call Ven. His brother was probably settling in for the day by now, and he wanted to touch base with him.
To ask if he’d found Fred?
Squirming tension twisted through his gut again, lower this time. Almost in his groin. He bit back a groan. His brother had most likely spent the night chasing a paranormal Peeping Tom and all Patrick could think about was the deranged woman herself? ’Struth, he needed a swim. He only hoped the surf was still cold.
It wasn’t. But despite its pleasant temperature, it achieved what he wanted it to. As he swam out past the shallow sandbar of the beach’s eastern end, any thought of the mysterious woman, the shadowless man, the memories he’d long denied vanished, replaced by the calm meditation of stroke after stroke after stroke.
The outgoing tide pulled gently on his body as he moved through the water, not too strong but there all the same. The waves were small and peaky, barely more than six feet, a leftover from the larger southern swell out beyond the shark nets. This would be the ideal patrolled swimming area for the morning. He rotated in the surf, treading water for a bit as he triangulated his position with the patrol tower back on the beach, committing to memory his location and where exactly he would erect the flags.
Turning back to the open sea, he headed toward Backpacker’s Express, the undercurrent growing stronger the closer he swam to the rip. Even still, it was a mild undercurrent. Perhaps the infamous, dangerous strip of water was playing nice for a change.
Swimming directly into its pull, Patrick uprighted himself, treading water to gage the rip’s real strength. He smiled, feeling the current pull at his body with little force. Unless there was a major change in conditions the rip was unlikely to claim any unsuspecting victims today, which meant he and Bluey and the rest of the team might have a relatively relaxed day. Well, as relaxed as any day on a beach populated by over forty thousand people, the majority of which were overseas tourists who’d never set foot on a beach before, let alone—
Something grabbed his right foot.
Hard.
And pulled.
He went under the water, his whole body tugged a good five feet or so below the surface. Cold, salty water surrounded him. The grip on his ankle grew harder. More insistent.
He kicked out, trying to dislodge the—
The what? Seaweed?
Icy fingers sank into his ankle with what felt like needles puncturing his skin.
Patrick kicked again, dragging his arms through the water in an effort to release the hold on his leg and reach the surface. Jesus, his lungs felt on fire.
What’s got you? What dragging you down?
He didn’t have time to ponder an answer. Whatever it was, it was pulling him deeper.
Cold water pressed against him, filled his nostrils. He blew out a burst of precious air through his nose, the released bubbles churning past his face in a chaotic storm, surging for the longed-for world above.
Fuck, he needed to breathe!
He kicked again, opening his eyes against the briny ocean, desperate to see what had him. Seaweed? Fishing net? Shark?
The dark, dawn water revealed nothing. He could barely see his thighs, let alone what gripped his—
Something grabbed his knee. Something stronger.
Cold terror roared through him. He sucked in a gasp and icy-cold water poured into his lungs.
Christ. He was going to drown and he didn’t even know what the fuck had him.
Focus, Patrick. Focus.
A wave of powerful calm rolled through him, quelling his crippling fear. He kicked, his foot and shin striking something dense and solid below his waist, his trapped leg thumping what felt like a body.
The water churned around him in angry agitation. Became hot. Hot.
He lashed out, picturing his foot smashing against whatever held him.
Something pierced his knee. Nails? Claws? Teeth? A surge of absolute rage ripped through him, hotter than the heavy water pressing against him. He kicked again, the unformed image of his assailant shuddering with the savage force of his blow.
Christ! He needed air! He needed to breathe!
Another kick. Another mental attack.
The hands on his ankle and knee slipped. The water displaced around him, a sudden surge of icy temperature engulfing him from below. He struck out again, dragging his arms through the water, pulling himself toward the surface even as he attacked whatever held him. Picturing its unseen form reeling from each delivered kick.
Air! I need—
He drove his free leg downward, his heel striking something solid and fluid at once.
Another violent surge of icy water rushed past him and suddenly he was free.
He forced his arms and legs to swim, pulling his body up, up, up toward the surface.
Air. Jesus, air!
He broke through, sucking in a long, deep lungful of sweet, dawn air. It filled him with stinging life, charged him with furious energy. He swam, propelling his body toward the beach with powerful, rapid strokes, the empty stretch of sand taunting him with its safety. With every kick of his legs, he felt fingers brush his ankles, tearing his flesh. Trying to snare him again.
Forcing calm into his core, he pictured himself swimming faster. Faster than humanly possible. Moving through the water like a seal fleeing a hungry killer whale. Cutting through the water like a hot blade through butter.
His arms and legs burned, his muscles ached. His lungs felt on fire. But still he swam, his unseen attacker trying to grab his legs, trying to pull him back under. Drown him. Kill him.
Devour him.
Time’s up, lifeguard.
The deafening whisper tore through his head and Patrick let out a roar. NO! His expelled breath bursting from his mouth in an explosion of furious bubbles.
He pushed himself harder, faster through the
increasing waves, growing closer to the beach and the safety of dry land.
Fingers lashed at his kicking feet, but he stayed out of reach. Just.
The sandbar smashed into his chest before he realized he was in the shallows. He shoved his feet into the sand, pushing himself up out of the water to dive over the natural barrier separating the ocean from the beach. Struggling to his feet, he ran through the knee-deep water, stare fixed on the patrol tower, the rising sun’s faint rays reflecting from its polarized windows in shimmering, blinding silver.
He ran through the water, ungainly at first, but growing faster, more sure-footed the shallower it became. He ran, heart hammering, terror turning to molten rage with each pounding footfall, until he was on the beach, the sand sticking to his wet flesh, a prickling second skin he’d never felt so happy to wear.
Staggering further from the lapping waves chasing him up the beach, he turned, staring back at the ocean behind him. Fists clenched, ready to fight. Ready to continue what had begun in the water. Ready to destroy…
Nothing.
Peaceful waves rolled toward the shore with relaxing ease. Nothing burst from their smooth formation. No monster of the deep, no creature from the ocean’s floor.
Patrick sucked in breath after breath, chest rising and falling in rapid succession, studying the sea closely.
Nothing except a seagull skimming the surface out over Backpacker’s Express, a lone windsurfer away out in the distance and the rising sun peaking over the horizon in a blinding white slither of light.
He fell to his knees on the sand, shaking his head. What the fuck had just happened? Was he going insane?
He ran a shaking hand though his wet hair, the matted strands clinging to his fingers like seaweed.
Jesus. What was going on?
A seagull squawked behind him. The sound harsh. Frantic.
Patrick closed his eyes for a moment, steadying his breathing. In your mind, mate. Just in your mind. Time to pull your finger out and get back to work.
He pushed himself to his feet, turning to shoo the seagull away.
And saw the sand shift.
Tiny individual grains rolled over each other. Moving. Coming together. Building. Forming…
Patrick’s mouth went dry. Jesus, it’s a monster.
Muscles locked frozen. He stared at the rudimentary arms sprouting from a torso thick and dense and massive, at the hands forming on the end of each one, hands with talons both long and hooked. The sand shifted, like it was alive, a bulge the size of a head spewing from the formation. A head with a gaping maw and sunken, lifeless eyes.
A head that swiveled about until those lifeless pits came to rest on Patrick.
He stared at it, his blood roaring in his ears.
A monster. Looking at you.
The hideous thought unlocked his muscles and he lunged.
Straight for the sand creature.
***
Ven fisted his hands in Death’s hair, the cool, silken strands like molten ribbons threading through his fingers. He growled, plunging his tongue deeper into her open, willing mouth.
She tasted so fucking sweet, those mysterious, secret spices flavoring her scent a thousand times more potent on his tongue. Savage desire surged through him. Controlling him. His demon, his true self, felt her phenomenal, infinite power and reacted to it, roaring so close to the surface his fangs grew longer and his forehead furrowed. His demon felt the terrifying entity that was Death, but he felt a woman. A warm, lush woman with smooth womanly curves and soft womanly bits.
He deepened the kiss, pressing his hips forward. His cock, engorged with blood and stiff with lust, ground against her groin. Fuck, he wanted her. Bad.
Removing one hand from her hair he grabbed her arse and jerked her hips closer to his, tugging her head backward with his other until her neck bowed into a glorious, exposed arc.
He tore his lips from her mouth and placed them on her throat, sucking at the warm, muscled column directly above her pulse. He could feel her indisputable power beneath his tongue, a latent current of utter supremacy that made the tiny hairs on his body stand on end. He’d never felt anything like it. It was raw. Ancient. Timeless. Undefeatable. He knew, before even puncturing her flesh and drinking her blood, he was already addicted to it. To her.
A hand fisted in his hair, brutally hard, whether to pull his head away or hold him to his neck, he didn’t care. He opened his mouth, ready to pierce the wonderful column of flesh, sinew and muscle. Ready to partake of the glorious, frightening power flowing through the veins within.
“Fuck, Steven, what are you doing to me?”
Death’s strangled question sent a ripple of liquid heat through Ven’s core. Fed his lust and his hunger. Mouth filling with saliva, cock rigid, blood burning, he tore his lips from her neck, wanting to see the desire he was positive smoldered in her eyes before he fed from the desire in her veins.
Needing to see it and know it was for him and him alone.
He lifted his head. And stopped.
Everyone around them was motionless. No. Not just motionless. Frozen. Like the population of Kings Cross had been replaced with statues. So lifelike one could almost swear they were once real. He straightened slowly, staring about himself in stunned disbelief, his grip on Death’s hair and arse dropping away. “What the fuck?”
Death gazed up at him, her breath shallow and rapid, her eyes shimmering white, radiant light. “It’s how I get my work done,” she said, voice shaky. Her arms still wrapped his body, a confused frown pulling at her eyebrows. “I’m not governed by human and earthly temporal laws.” Expression growing more puzzled, she pulled away from him, by a fraction. “You try claiming five souls at the exact same moment and see how well you can do it without stepping out of the time phase.” Her hips still pressed to him, she studied his face, her frown growing deeper. “Why…how…how are you making me feel…?” Her eyes shimmered white light and a soft hitching breath caught in her throat. “I…?”
A surge of unadulterated hunger roared through Ven at the somehow primitive sound, so forceful and heady he almost sank his fangs into her jugular immediately. He was so fucking hungry on every level, and she was so fucking delicious and potent and willing…
Fresh saliva flooded his mouth and he almost moved. Almost.
White eyes flickered to pale, ice blue. “Steven?”
He sucked in a deep breath, forcing the intoxicating taste of her scent from his mind as he stared down into her face. Hell, he’d thought he’d wanted her in the strip joint, but that was nothing compared to this. He’d never wanted a woman so bad, but she wasn’t just a woman. She was Death and he’d found her with his only brother in the middle of the night.
No matter how much he wanted her, how ferociously he hungered for her, he still couldn’t betray Patrick. Death had come to his kid brother in the middle of the night and Ven still didn’t believe it wasn’t to take his soul.
Staring into her face, his body screaming in denied pleasure, his demon screaming in denied release, he slowly lifted his arms and wrapped his fingers around her wrist. “Return me to real time, Reaper,” he growled, removing her hands from his hair and lowering her arms to her side. “Now.”
She studied him, her frown fading, her forehead smoothing. A strange, ambiguous expression crossed her flawless face and then she stepped backward, eyes unreadable, chin tilted. “I’m beginning to wish I’d never met the Watkins brothers,” she stated before, with a soft sigh and a shake of her head, she vanished.
Ven blinked.
People walked and pushed and hurried past him, hookers and tourists and businessmen alike. Pushing past him as if they’d never been frozen in time. Darlinghurst Road was once again a living, breathing strip of sin. He looked about himself, doing everything in his power to remain calm. He was hungry and confused and angry as all hell and Death had just played him for a fool.
He glared at the pedestrians before lifting his head to the sky. Shit. It was almost
day break. He needed to get home, no matter how hungry he was, no matter how horny he was, before he became a charred hunk of ash.
He began to draw an image of his home high on the Bondi Beach hills into his mind when a voice almost tore his head apart. Patrick’s voice.
Fuck! It’s trying to tear me in two!
Chapter Five
The creature swung its massive head, staring at him with pupiless eyes. Its maw stretched wide, revealing jagged teeth formed by tiny grains of sand, glistening with moisture in the rising sun’s faint light. Teeth, Patrick didn’t doubt, more than capable of tearing into his flesh with hideous ease.
He didn’t halt his sprint. Whatever it was, it wasn’t fully formed yet. That meant it was vulnerable. He hoped.
He smashed into it, driving his shoulder into its gut. Millions of grains of sand bit into him in a million pinpricks of scalding heat and he let out a loud roar. He heard a wild squeal shatter the quiet of the beach, felt the scream of furious pain deep in his soul. Before his mind could register the unreal fact his shoulder was sinking into a writhing, animated mass of sand grains, he burst through it, like a desperate man barging through a living dust storm.
He stumbled to a halt on the other side, spinning about to stare at the creature, disbelief and dismay making his gut churn.
It was reforming. Bigger. Wider. Almost half the size of the patrol tower, blocking out the sun’s infant rays, shrouding him in its cold shadow. Its head swiveled toward him, sightless eyes drilling into him with terrifying intent, its mouth stretching wide to reveal teeth more jagged and pointed than before.
Patrick swallowed. “Oh, fuck.”
The creature lunged at him, a hideous pillar of living sand and sea. It smashed into him, its fingers sinking into his chest and hip as it drove him backward.
He lost his footing, his heel dropping into a hollow in the beach, and he stumbled, arms flailing in an attempt to keep his balance. If he fell he was done for. There was no way he could beat this thing on his back.
Death, The Vamp and His Brother Page 8