Johann joined her.
When she saw him, she hesitated for a second. “Johann?”
He smiled at her.
And in that instant Wolfgang took advantage, kicking hard and throwing Alice off of him.
I looked around. Where was Tom? Trying to fight off the other vampires. I quickly removed my shoes. My feet were so small now that walking in them was impossible. Besides, I figured I might need a couple stakes.
With one heel in my hand, I charged after Wolfgang.
He was fast.
He dodged my attack, grabbed me, and with a force I’d never felt, threw me into the only remaining cross.
The vampire whose name I didn’t know fell with it on top of me, and one of the nails gouged me in the stomach. Water poured out of my gut like a deluge.
Devin quickly ran to me. “Your hair, right?”
I nodded.
He yanked a strand of hair from my head. “I need a needle.”
“Use one of the nails.”
Devin nodded. As quickly as he could, he tied my hair to the end of the needle and in the crudest way possible jammed it into my skin around the wound and pulled it through the other side.
It wasn’t the best stitch in the world, but it worked.
I heaved, trying to push the cross off of me. But with the vampire’s weight, and my strength only starting to return after losing so much water, it was too much.
Devin grabbed the cross and, his face turning red, pulled it off of my body.
“No!” Alice screamed.
I barely got out from under the cross. One of my boots wasn’t far, and something caught my eye.
The crucifix.
I pulled myself over to it and grabbed it. Extending my arm, I tried to focus.
Use your emotions. All your emotions. Anything, Johann had said. I just had to tie my focus to something. Pain. Anguish. Maybe even love—or at least, infatuation.
“You can do it,” Devin said, looking at me. “I believe in you, Nicky.”
That was all I needed. It wasn’t a declaration of love, but it was acceptance… a chance for love, anyway. And that was all I needed.
A torrent of sunlight poured from the face of the crucifix and struck Wolfgang.
Wolfgang screamed as the sunlight boiled his flesh.
Then Alice, with one of my boots in her hand, charged him.
I lowered the cross in time not to fry her, too.
And she shoved my heel into his heart.
Wolfgang fell to his knees and collapsed. But in his hand was Johann’s charred vampire heart. He’d dug it out with his hands, and the sunlight I cast on him burned it.
Alice collapsed to her knees in tears as I struggled back to my feet.
“Suffer not a witch to live!” someone shouted. It was Tom, and he had a gun pointed right at Devin.
“Her heart is bound to you, son?” Tom asked.
Devin nodded. “It is.”
Tom’s hand was shaking. But there was a fury in his eyes. Pure hatred. “Then you leave me no choice, son. With one bullet, I’ll send you both to hell.”
I had no weapons. Nothing I could use. But I had a friend… and maybe he could do something.
“Brucie!” I shouted.
A flash of blue appeared over Tom’s hand.
He squeezed the trigger, and his gun just clicked.
He squeezed it again.
It clicked a second time.
Brucie appeared in his regular form on top of Tom’s gun and blew a puff of cigar smoke into his face. “Firearms. Funny thing, they don’t fire when they’re wet.”
I ran over and grabbed Devin, holding onto him for dear life.
Then Tom screamed as the five vampires, having finished off the rest of the room, piled on top of Devin’s dad.
“I can’t believe he was going to shoot me,” Devin said, shaking his head. “He was supposed to love me… He was my fucking dad! He was supposed to sacrifice everything for me…”
I squeezed Devin tightly. “You’re right,” I said. “He should have.”
He hugged me back, crying into my shoulder. His dad was awful. Despicable. But he was still Devin’s dad. Seeing him die like that…
I can’t imagine.
I never had a dad. No one who was supposed to love me. I could only hope that, maybe, Devin would. And if not him, then someone.
Love is a funny thing.
It wasn’t just Wolfgang’s crazed religious beliefs that had made him a monster. It was lost love. He did what he did to me for nothing more than a chance to have someone at his side, someone I was sure he’d intended to control with his compulsions, who looked like a woman he used to love.
Love can make us into monsters.
But it can also make us better. And I had to believe that most of the time, that’s what would happen.
I walked over and put my hand on Alice’s shoulder as she knelt beside Johann’s body.
“I had no idea he was still alive,” she said. “I thought he was gone. And then he came back to me just to…”
“I’m sorry, Alice.”
“I’m sorry, too,” Alice said. “What I did to you… I mean, it’s not that different than what Wolfgang did. I turned you into the image of one I loved…”
I nodded. “But you’ve changed. You didn’t let those deeds make you into a monster.”
“I don’t know,” Alice said. “The things I’ve done…”
I looked around the room. Several snarling vampires stood there.
“They won’t come after him,” Alice said. “Not with my heart bound to his. His blood, it’s… not consumable.”
I nodded. “You might have been a monster before, Alice, but there’s one thing that the Order was right about. Even if their view of it was, well…warped.”
“What’s that?”
“Redemption,” I said. “These vampires, look at how they’re looking to you. I don’t know what your plans were, but if you were really hoping to lead vampires differently, if you were hoping to create a clan that does good in the world, that guards justice, I think these vampires could use your guidance.”
Alice nodded as she stood up.
Then I felt a chill strike my body. “No,” I said. “This form… I want to keep it. I…”
Everything about me changed. My legs grew longer. My hands larger.
I ran and grabbed the silver plate I’d had before. “Damnit!” I screamed. My shape from before—everything was back the way it was. Even that… thing between my legs. A tear fell down my cheek. “I was perfect…”
Devin looked at me and shook his head. “Alice’s heart is in me, and her blood is in you. But I think it’s me you’ve now targeted. You’ve become, again, the form of the one I desire the most.”
“But I’m not Nick,” I said. “It was Nick you wanted…”
“It was never Nick I wanted,” Devin said. “It’s you, Nicky. I’m crazy about you, just the way you are. In my eyes, you couldn’t be more beautiful.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Alice spent a good twenty minutes speaking to the vampires that Johann had “resurrected.” They were well-fed at this point, courtesy of the inner circle of the Order of the Morning Dawn. She sent them away.
Trying not to eavesdrop too much—but since these were vampers and it was possible to know how long this little alliance of sorts would last—I couldn’t help but listen a little. In short, she told them that if they wanted to learn a new way to live, to exist as vampires, then they should meet her at her funeral home.
“Are you sure they’ll take you up on your invite?” I asked.
Alice shrugged. “If not, I know a good hunter who can take them down.”
I smiled. “Need my number?”
Alice shook her head. “Not really big on technology. I suppose when you grew up in a time before portable phones, picking up the technology is hard. But I know where to find you. I’ve always known where to find you.”
I raised an eyebr
ow. “You did?”
“After your admirable attempt to take me out at the asylum, I knew I’d underestimated you from the start. Let’s just say I’ve been keeping tabs on you. It’s a lot easier to hide from someone looking for you if you know where they are.”
I shook my head. “I’m sorry about Johann. I never would have… If I knew that Wolfgang had dug out his heart…”
Alice put her hand on my arm. “It’s not your fault. You did what had to be done. And if I’d been the one holding the cross at that moment, if I knew, I would have hesitated. And with Wolfgang, you can’t hesitate.”
“We need to burn his heart.” I looked down at Wolfgang’s charred and staked body. “Do you want to do it, or would you prefer I take care of it?”
Alice shook her head. “No, I need to do it. It has to be me.”
I handed Alice her crucifix. “This belongs to you. It may help.”
Alice nodded. “Thank you, Nyx. But why don’t you keep it? This thing… it reminds me too much of the Order. Of all the things I did in their name for so many years.”
I cocked my head. “I’d gladly keep it. But wouldn’t it be helpful right now to burn his heart?”
Alice shook her head. “I don’t like the poetry of it, given his… beliefs. To burn his heart with a crucifix? I’ll be putting him in the crematory.”
Hauling his body all the way back wasn’t likely to be an easy job. Though with so many dead members of the Order, there were vehicles to spare. We’d just have to fish their car keys out of their pockets. Presumably someone had a big van, or a truck…
“We should probably deal with all these bodies,” Alice said. “I have a hearse back at the funeral home. We can pick that up later. People don’t question you when you have a body in the back of one of those.”
I smiled. “Good point.”
Devin was going through the bodies of the Order members, removing their hoods to identify them. He was the only one of us who would know who they were. From the look on his face, it wasn’t an easy task. I mean, he had no love lost for the Order. No more than he did for his dad. But these were the people he’d basically been raised with.
I walked over and placed my hand on his shoulder as he knelt to remove one of the Order member’s hoods.
“Dorcas,” Devin said. “She was a kind woman. Presuming she approved of your lifestyle.”
I nodded. “All the ladies from the quilters’ guild were here?”
Devin shook his head. “I couldn’t find Mina.”
“Why would she miss something like this?”
“She didn’t approve of my father’s insistence to induct you into the inner circle,” Devin said. “And the only reason my dad was so set on it, I think, was because Wolfgang compelled him to do it.”
“Why wouldn’t Wolfgang compel Mina, too?”
Devin shook his head. “I didn’t even know that was his name until you said it. He was always known as His Supreme Lordship and our Holy Father. Bullshit like that. And he really didn’t speak to anyone directly, apart from my dad.”
‘And you and Alice… you’ve been working together all this time?”
Devin nodded. “It was my first hunt. My dad was moving a vamp we’d staked, and I stayed behind the in warehouse where we’d caught him to clean up the mess. You know, since hunting can sometimes be… a little bloody. Anyway, in the middle of scrubbing the floors, Alice appeared almost out of nowhere.”
“She’d been hiding as a bat, I presume?”
Devin nodded. “At that point I was just a low-grade warlock. I’d dabbled in the arts after joining a forbidden coven back in college. I couldn’t do much, really. But Alice could sense something about me. She knew I’d touched the arts. And since she’d spent most of her existence serving the Order, she knew I must be conflicted.”
“So she saw an opportunity?”
“You could say that. I mean, you’d have to ask her. I basically played the spy, listening in on my dad’s phone conversations with the so-called Supreme Lordship. Just a little spell I picked up that enhanced my hearing temporarily. I learned about you. How they were planning to lure you to the Order under the pretense that they could lead you to Alice. I just didn’t realize what the vampire’s motivation was. I mean, I didn’t even know he was a vampire until tonight.”
“She was beautiful,” I said. “Wolfgang’s lost love.”
“I’m sorry,” Devin said. “I know you wanted to stay in that form. If her form was what I desired…”
“No,” I said. “I’ve always appreciated the beauty of this body, it just never felt like me. But I think it’s because I was never loved. I mean, how can anyone love themselves if they aren’t loved by someone else? I didn’t have parents. Not even hyper-religious, judgy parents. The closest thing to love I’ve ever known is my friendship with Donnie, my roommate.”
“Until now,” Devin said. “I know it’s early, but Nicky, I’m falling for you.”
I smiled and, if I could have, I would have blushed. “I think all I needed to know was that I was lovable. That I was accepted. It’s so much easier to love yourself, to accept yourself, when someone else you care about embraces you for who you are.”
“I’m sorry you didn’t have parents who could accept you like that.”
I shook my head. “I’m sorry you had parents who didn’t accept you. At least we have each other now.”
Devin nodded and gave me a hug.
“Hey Nyxie,” Brucie said. He’d just popped out of thin air. “I think we have a problem.”
“What’s that, Brucie?”
“So when you sent me down to the catacombs, there were dozens of vamps down there. Took Johann a while to find a few he knew wouldn’t be a threat.”
“Vampires who wouldn’t have it out for either him or Alice?” I asked.
“Exactly,” Brucie said. “But he found a few. Obviously.”
“And what’s the problem, Brucie?”
“They’re all gone.”
“What?” Alice asked, having overheard the conversation. “They’re gone?”
“Every one of them,” Brucie said. “Someone unstaked them.”
“Not just someone,” Devin said. “It was Mina.”
“Why the hell would she unstake vampires?” I asked. “She’s given her life to hunting them.”
“Because those vampires,” Alice said, “the ones in the catacombs… they have one thing in common. I put them there. And they want to see me dead.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
The vamps that Mina unstaked would come after Alice eventually. Once they fed. The hunter in me wanted to go after them straightaway. But hunting recently unstaked vamps is a challenge. Sure, they’re operating on pure instinct and bloodlust at first. You’d think that without their wits about them, they’d be easier to track.
The opposite is true.
A satiated vampire has patterns. Behaviors they repeat over time. Things I can track. As if I were some kind of supernatural CSI.
But younglings and the recently unstaked… they’re unpredictable. That didn’t mean I wasn’t going to try.
I sat in my apartment, listening to a police scanner while Donnie and her new beau, Caleb, cuddled on the couch.
He just thought it was weird, my obsession with police scanners.
Donnie knew what I was up to.
I casually listened for anything that might indicate a vampire victim and scrolled through my phone checking obituaries. So far, nothing I’d heard indicated a vampire kill. Mature vampires, or those who’ve tamed their bloodlust, rarely kill their victims. They don’t want to catch the attention of hunters like me.
But these vamps, they needed to feed…
A part of the problem was that the old Order’s church was in such a remote area that there was no telling if they’d find their way to the city or if they’d find people on farms and whatnot in the country first.
But I hadn’t given up.
I also put in for a leave
of absence at Leotards and Lace. I needed some time to adjust to my new reality. And to track these new vamps.
Alice was doing her part, too. But she had to be careful. Usually a hunter has the element of surprise on her side. When you’re both the hunter and the hunted, it’s more challenging. You don’t only have to keep your eyes open to track the vamp’s movements. You also have to watch your back.
According to Devin, she’d been laying low. Taking care of necessary business at the funeral home. But mostly hiding at an undisclosed location. Not even Devin knew, exactly, where she’d gone.
Devin enrolled in one of the local community colleges. He thought he might go into graphic design. They had programs.
And he’d moved in with us.
I know, it was fast.
With his father gone, he thought about moving in with his mom. She could have used the support. But she didn’t want anything to do with him. She wasn’t there, at the ritual. But she knew enough about what she thought Devin’s “sins” were that he was the last one she wanted comfort from.
Not to mention, living an hour away from the college wasn’t convenient. And, according to Devin, that house had memories tied to it that he’d just as soon forget.
“Honey,” Donnie said, “you need to turn that thing off.”
Caleb was absorbed in whatever show they were watching. Some kind of sitcom. I don’t know; I wasn’t paying attention.
“I can’t,” I said.
“Girl,” Donnie said, “you’ve got a fine man coming home any minute who wants a little Nicky tonight. And you’re going to sit there all night listening to traffic stops and indecent exposure calls on the scanner?”
I snorted. “You never know if…”
“Bitch,” Donnie said, “I should slap you three ways to sideways.”
I cocked my head. “Is that karate? How do you accomplish a slap like that, exactly?”
“If you don’t turn that thing off, I’ll show you!”
“Donnie, I just…”
Donnie walked over and turned off my scanner.
“Donnie, what the hell…”
“Tonight, no scanners. No obituaries. Don’t tell him I said anything—it’s supposed to be a surprise. But Devin has a whole evening planned. If you blow him off, I swear Nicky, I’ll shove those nine-inch heels so far up…”
Scared Shiftless: An Ex-Shifter turned Vampire Hunter Urban Fantasy (The Legend of Nyx Book 1) Page 21
