The Four Horsemen Series Box Set: Books 1 to 3

by LJ Swallow

  I thrust the torch at him. "Cool. You light the way, and I'll rip the fuckers' heads off."

  A look I don't often see crosses Xander's face. Shock. "Wow, Vee."

  "Yeah." I turn and continue my progress towards the place the cold fear emanated from earlier. Joss senses the souls of demons, but I'm sensing more. Are my empath powers heightened by his proximity? Xander flashes the torch side to side revealing parked cars.

  "You need your knife ready," he mutters.

  "I won't need a knife," I retort. "I'll break their necks."

  "Whatever, Vee." Xander strides ahead of me, and I match his pace. "Hang back."

  "No."

  "You're not used to these situations. Let me handle it."

  I grab his sleeve. "You have got to be kidding me."

  He halts. "What?"

  "I can look after myself."

  Xander shines the light into my face, and I squint before covering my eyes with one arm. "Only if we're around to help."

  A scraping sound in the nearby corner interrupts the flood of words I'm about to spew at Xander, and my eyes follow Xander's beam into an empty space. A tall figure launches towards us. I sidestep and dodge the hands reaching out to me as I back up.

  Xander lunges forward and skewers the creature's chest with his knife. An inhuman scream escapes its mouth and echoes around the car park, but the creature remains upright. He lurches at Xander again.

  Xander holds both palms outwards, arms extended and when the injured figure reaches him, he slams hard, knocking the creature against a pillar opposite and away from us at an inhuman speed. Storming over, Xander raises the knife again.

  A second figure steps from the shadows, and I yell Xander's name in warning as it bears down on him. The flashlight crashes to the floor, plunging the surroundings into a darkness filled with scuffles and growls.

  This is what happened to Ewan.

  This is not happening to Xander.

  The tingle I felt the other night builds in my arms, increasing to a painful shock as my body prepares to launch death at the two creatures. My fingers conjure a crackling white energy, which lights up a small area around me. I jerk my head to the left as another figure appears. Fuck. How many? It charges towards me with a surprising dexterity and reaches out.

  I drop the knife and energy shoots from my palms, as I did when I killed the incubus. But this creature needs more than one hit. The first knocks him sideways, but not to the ground.

  The first time a supernatural creature loomed towards me, the night in my flat, I feared for my life. Now the emotions flowing with the energy are hatred and fury. I will obliterate the whole fucking lot of them.

  Which do I attack first? The one coming for Xander or the one about to reach me?

  I need the other powers. Where the hell is my light?

  I focus harder. Nothing. This triggered with the incubus, why not now? Why the fuck can't I just summon and control my powers? I need more...

  Xander.

  I adjust aye eyes to the poorly lit area. He's on the ground still, readying to defend himself. Darting over, I kick the creature approaching him in the back of the knees. Bone cracks from my strength and it collapses with a howl.

  "Xander!" I hold out a hand and he grips mine. Our eyes meet, understanding, dropping the attempts to outwit each other.

  Instantly, the light explodes from me again with a ferocity twice that at the incubus's place and stronger than the time at Portia's. I pull Xander to his feet, then stand, hand locked in his, side by side as energy manifests into a blinding brilliance. The creatures surrounding us fall to the floor, covering their heads.

  One struggles onto all fours and attempts to crawl closer, but the light around us intensifies.

  "Man, you're really fucking angry," says Xander.

  "They killed Ewan!" A pulse of anger spikes again at the memory, and I'm overwhelmed by the desire to conjure death too. But my hand remains in Xander’s and the need to stay connected to him overrides, to soak up every last iota of the energy flowing between us.

  Joss charges into the area we illuminate and grabs a creature's body. He clenches both hands around the head, and a scream fills the silence again. They're inhuman, death dealers, but the agony in the creature’s voice slices through my head like the knife I dropped to the floor.

  In Joss's hands, the body shrinks and disintegrates to dust in seconds. The other two attackers meet the same fate, letting out the same agonised yells and crumbling into nothing.

  Silence falls.

  I gasp in a breath and drop Xander's hand. As I sway, he attempts to catch me, but I'm sick of his implications I'm weaker than him, and I steady myself.

  "I never saw you kill before," I whisper to Joss.

  Joss claps his hands together and black dust falls to the ground, joining the pile between us. "Yeah, I'm more of a 'hang in the background until I'm needed' kind of guy, Vee." He pauses and gives a wry smile. "As you probably noticed."

  Beside me, Xander takes laboured breaths to match mine and bends to pick up the miraculously unbroken torch from the floor. "How's Ewan?"

  "He's okay. The slashes on his chest aren't a great look though. Heath says he should be okay by tomorrow,” replies Joss.

  "I don't know what the fuck that was or where it came from.” Xander kicks the dust.

  "This is fucked up," mutters Joss.

  "I'm not leaving until we've scouted every inch of this place," growls Xander. "Come on."

  "And if there're more around?" I ask.

  He cocks a brow. "I think we've scared the shit out of the bastards. They'd be dumb to approach us again."

  I don't voice my thoughts: I doubt they have logical thought processes.

  I sense Joss and Xander still pumped from the fight, and the adrenaline pushes me to finish this too. But more than that, I'm invigorated, body alive with the power absorbed from Xander and multiplying inside me. I could take on the world, and my insane body would try, given half a chance right now.

  "We still haven't found the bloody crime scene," says Xander.

  "I think we found more than we needed," Joss replies. "If we needed any confirmation something wasn't right about this death, we've got it."

  "Yeah, but before we head back to Ewan and Heath, let's do this."

  We continue around the car park, sweeping the torchlight from side to side ahead of us. I'm wound tight, ready to attack again, but no longer sense anything.

  The far corner contains the last shadows we haven't looked in, and as the beam hits the wall, we know we've found the place. In my heightened state, the horror from looking at bloodied words on a wall doesn't sicken me the way they did earlier, but I can't help the dread scratching at my mind’s edge that the words refer to me.

  "Do either of you sense anything?" asks Xander as he crouches to examine the floor.

  "Not me," says Joss.

  I step forward and touch the wall, close to the dried blood. Who would do this? What evil exists in the world I haven't discovered yet? The atmosphere in this spot contains an imprint, as if the death remains in the air around. Despair and terror permeate the area. I snatch my fingers from the wall and look at the tips, tuning out from what I just picked up as Joss and Xander hold a low conversation.

  What are they looking for? I want to get back to Ewan and Heath to make sure they're okay, and for somebody to tell me what the hell those things were. I glance back to where we left the two guys and notice a crack of light in the doorway to the stairwell.

  "What's that?" I whisper and pull on Joss's arm.

  "Switch the torch off," he hisses at Xander.

  I adjust my eyes in the dark and peer across the car park. The door's open part of the way and a figure stands, half-hidden.

  "Wait there." Xander hands the torch to Joss and points at me through the dark. "And I mean it this time."

  He stealthily moves around the perimeter and heads towards the stairwell, his footsteps inaudible. I shuffle closer to Joss, c
oiled and ready to follow if needed.

  As Xander steps from the shadows, the door slams closed, the figure gone. "Joss!" he shouts and barrels through the door after the intruder.

  Joss follows, and I'm on their heels. By the time I reach the top of the stairs, Xander's on the car park upper level. I blink in the light and focus as a small white hatchback reverses at speed and heads down the ramp, tyres screeching. Xander runs, phone in his hand and stops at the top of the ramp.

  Joss and I glance at each other in confusion as Xander storms back over. "Whoever the fuck that was, I have their car registration."

  "Someone was watching us?" I ask.

  Xander's jaw tightens. "I don't know what shit is going on here, and why this is associated with your online lunatic friend, but I'm going to find out."

  11

  VEE

  On the journey from the car park home, Ewan sleeps and I can't take my eyes off his slashed shirt. I repeatedly ask Joss if Ewan's okay, and he reassures me he is. I hold Ewan's hand, sneakily taking his pulse despite the other guy's reassurances he's okay. His skin's pallid, lips pale, and the laboured breathing alarms me. Is he okay? Is Heath's power to resurrect him enough?

  The energy continues to pulse through me, fuelled further by anxiety, but better than the terror the old Vee would've felt. Joss, as ever, places a hand on my knee in an attempt to soothe. But physical contact builds a different sensation inside, a need ready to explode as brightly as I did in the car park.

  I shakily walk from the car into the house, flanked by the guys and with Logan's words back in my head. When I killed whatever the hell those things were, I filled with an overwhelming desire to find more and destroy them too. The energy created by my powers triggering still flows, and now the desire to kill has channelled into a new desire. One with as great a need for release. This building sexual need worries me, and I rush upstairs before the desire takes over my mind as well as my body.

  Fifteen minutes in the shower does nothing to rinse away the arousal, or the crazy scenarios in my head involving all four of them. Omigod, I get worse.

  I lurk in my room in the hope I can sleep this off, but my mind is filled with flashes of light and memories, as if I'm plugged into a power socket. Eventually, my worry about Ewan pulls me downstairs.

  Ewan lies on the sofa in the lounge, watching TV and eating popcorn from a large bowl. The sight arrests me, and I step into the room. He looks around and smiles. "Hey."

  "Are you okay?" I ask.

  Why isn't Ewan resting in bed? He died. His chest was ripped open by the decaying things. Poisoned. He's pale still, but his eyes shine with life, not the dead ones I saw before.

  "I'll be fine. Just need to take a break." He shoves a handful of popcorn into his mouth.

  Take a break? "Does your chest hurt?" I gesture at mine.

  "A bit. We heal pretty quickly so I should be okay by the morning." He scrunches up his nose. "You know, I really liked that shirt. My clothes are on the grungey side, but I draw the line at ripped."

  I approach Ewan and sit on the floor beside him. "How can you joke about this? That was awful!"

  "Occupational hazard." He places the bowl on the floor. "Sorry if it scared you."

  "For a minute, I thought you really were dead, Ewan. I can't begin to describe how that fucked with my head."

  Ewan touches my face. "Hey. Don't. It's okay. Everything's fine."

  But his troubled expression and the silent atmosphere in the house tells me otherwise.

  "Each time I think I've an understanding of your world, it's ripped away." I clutch at his hand, and his warmth reassures me.

  "We're immortal, Vee," he whispers, fingers playing across my cheeks. "Death's temporary. The pain and fear are the same each time, but to be honest, it's more annoying than anything."

  "Annoying?"

  He smiles. "Yeah. I'm more pissed off and concerned something managed to kill me that easily."

  I stroke Ewan's face in return, before gently placing my lips on his. With the soft warmth comes the same desire as the last time I killed, but climbing onto an injured Ewan and dragging his clothes off isn't an option this time.

  Especially with three other people in the house.

  Ewan holds the back of my head and rests his forehead on mine. "Please don't worry about me. Let me worry about you."

  I withdraw because his warmth and scent aren’t helping my situation. "How I feel now scares me, not what happened today. Something remains inside me, and I don't know how to release it."

  A crease forms between Ewan's brows. "You still want to kill? Is that still in your system?"

  My throat thickens. "No. The same as last time I killed. Us. That release."

  Ewan's mouth parts. "Ohhh. Right. Yeah, I may not be up to that right now. I'm feeling better but don't have the energy, I'm afraid."

  He laughs as I give him a playful slap on the arm. "I'm trying to explain to you what's happening to me."

  "Being overwhelmed is normal. We all were at first, when we had no control over our power either. You contain more power than us, and maybe the human Vee can't handle everything?"

  I close my eyes. Why did he need to say what scares me? We're silent for a few moments until I say in a small voice, "Do you think I am what Logan says? Are you suspicious of me?"

  "Vee..." He grips my fingers tighter. "Not for a second."

  "Okay." I attempt a smile as I detect Ewan's anger building. I have enough to deal with, without worrying I'm a malevolent force.

  Instead, I focus on Ewan and the love I have for him. I stroke his face, and as I accept he's survived, my heart heals as he continues to. Within minutes, his breathing shallows as he falls asleep. I don't often take time to study the guys these days; life passes by too quickly to pause, but I take time to appreciate Ewan.

  His face is soft with sleep, pain and tension gone. I smile and brush hair from his forehead and kiss his skin. One muscled arm dangles over the side of the sofa, ink visible at the shirtsleeve edge. Ewan's chest rises and falls beneath his shirt, and I struggle to believe anybody can heal the damage I saw.

  But he's not anybody. My Ewan is the Horseman who died and lived again; my gruff, tattooed guy who sleeps as peacefully as a child.

  I kiss him again, and he stirs, mumbles something, and continues to sleep. One thought follows me as I leave the room to find the others.

  What happens if I die?

  In the kitchen, I walk straight to the cupboard above the kettle and pull out the whiskey bottle Xander and Heath stash up there. No amount of tea in the world can cure how I feel right now. Grabbing a nearby tumbler, I pour whiskey and then drink in one gulp. Ignoring the burn and strong taste, I pour and knock back a second drink.

  "Want some ice with that?" asks an amused voice.

  Heath walks over and picks a second glass from the cupboard. He takes the bottle from me, fills his glass, and sets the bottle out of reach.

  "I didn't think you like drinking?" He drains his glass too.

  "No, but after this afternoon I bloody need one." I pour more and attempt a decorous sip. Will alcohol drown out the fire in my body? In the past, heavy drinking knocked me unconscious. I could try that method to avoid embarrassing myself.

  "I saw you with Ewan. Is he feeling better?" asks Heath.

  "Less dead, that's for sure. Can I have another drink, please?" Heath purses his lips, and I ignore him, take the bottle, and refill my glass. "What the hell happened today, Heath?"

  "We're trying to research what attacked us but can't find anything. When Ewan's up to it, he can help search online. He's better at finding this shit."

  "Were they zombies?" I blurt. "I bet they were zombies."

  Heath sips his drink. "Nah. Zombies don't exist."

  "Don’t exist yet! What if they're an experiment gone wrong? Or some kind of—”

  "Vee, honestly, they're not zombies. You said you felt something was wrong when we were in the car park. Maybe they’re something
demon reanimated. I don’t know. Joss couldn't detect them as demons, but you could tell they weren't human. Was there any demon vibe to them?"

  I blink. "What the hell is a 'demon vibe'?"

  "Inhuman. Evil. Destructive. Ready to kill a Horseman."

  I slam down my glass. "Why do you all make a joke of this?"

  Heath circles his finger around his glass and stares down at the contents. "Because if we don't, we won't cope with the reality." He looks up. "It fucking scares me too."

  My frustration dampens down at the trouble in his eyes. I never noticed before, but Heath's pale too; his bright eyes duller and darkened by circles.

  "Are you okay?" I ask him.

  "There's a cost to using our powers, Vee. We try to use other methods because it's bloody exhausting sometimes. If we don't use them often, there's no big deal, but it takes its toll."

  Then why do I feel the opposite?

  "You know what scares me the most?" he says, voice low. I shake my head. "I'm the one who can resurrect, but what happens if I die?"

  His words squeeze my heart. "But you can't die, Heath. You're Death."

  "How do we know that's true? I've always managed to stay alive, but I've been close to dying."

  Heath's seen his friends die and escaped death himself, and saving Ewan has taken something out of him. In a way, today hurt Heath as much as Ewan, on a deeper level.

  I set my glass down too and wrap my arms around Heath. "If you do die, I bet I can help out. You know, with my mad powers."

  He laughs and wriggles against my breath touching his ear before winding his arms around me. "I bloody hope so."

  "I'd do everything I could to keep you alive," I say against his cheek.

  Heath moves his face so his mouth meets mine, and with the whiskey taste comes the pull from yesterday. He grips me close, and I push my mouth against his, parting his lips with my tongue, eager to unleash some of the buzzing inside. My attempt to push him against the kitchen counter fails, but he doesn't stop my hand from sneaking beneath his shirt and dragging nails across his back. Heath pulls my hips against him, hands on my ass and my grip on him tightens.