“I don’t want it,” Angeline said. Her voice was weak.
“Aw come, on, I bought us some cream cheese sandwiches, on that brown bread that you like.” Kathryn rustled the bag and put the two small packages on the table.
“Kathryn, I’m dying. I don’t want any fucking cream cheese sandwiches.”
Kathryn froze and didn’t say a word. Angeline raised her eyebrow, challenging her even from her fetal position on the bed. Angeline never used foul language. On the odd times when Kathryn would slip, Angeline made it a point to cringe and tsk-tsk her.
Seeming to regain her composure, Kathryn sat on the edge of Angeline’s bed. “You don’t have to live like this. You can cure what ails you in five minutes flat. Just say the word and I’ll show you what to do.”
“No.”
“Your stubbornness can only take you so far, Angeline. You really will wither away if you don’t eat something soon.”
“I don’t care.” If she’d felt better, Angeline would have been bothered by her own petulance.
“Then I’ve done all I can.” Kathryn touched Angeline’s ankle, but Angeline swiftly pulled it away. “Let me know if you change your mind.”
“If this leads to my death in some way, I hope you carry that guilt around for the rest of eternity. You’re a monster. A real, live monster.”
“Eh, I’ll get over it,” Kathryn said, throwing Angeline a wink. She sat down and unwrapped her sandwich. “Delicious.”
* * *
On her fifteenth day without any type of sustenance, Angeline began to lose blood. It teared from her eyes in crimson streaks down her face. Her teeth became loose. She had no feeling in her extremities. Her stomach was so hollow she felt like it had folded in on itself.
The Barrington Bedside Motel was probably the third motel they’d been in that month. There was no reason to leave until an employee or neighboring guest started to take too much of an interest. Angeline imagined it was hard not to, especially since she embodied the pale face of death. Not to mention that she was traveling with an ethereal beauty in her own right, and two women traipsing around the countryside without a chaperone wasn’t exactly the norm.
They had talked about getting an apartment, going somewhere warmer. But that had all been before. Since Angeline had refused to hunt for her own food, the only conversations between them were terse and matter-of-fact.
Angeline knew she couldn’t go on like this. Either Kathryn needed to kill her, or she needed to find food. Kathryn was out, performing her nightly ritual of God-knows-what, and showed no inclination to end Angeline’s misery. The agony was proving to be too much, and she chastised herself for being weak. If she could just take the edge off, then maybe she could think clearly again. Decide what she wanted to do. She could have simply walked out into the sunlight, but she found she was unable take such an ultimate step on her own. In the meantime, she had to do something to make the pain subside, even just a little. Angeline dragged herself out of bed, her clothes musty and wrinkled. She looked at herself in the mirror; she was little more than an apparition. She startled at her reflection. She was frightened of herself.
The motel was deserted. Their room was on the second floor, a white metal railing the only thing protecting Angeline from plummeting to the pavement below. She cast a glance toward it, twice, wondering if a fall would kill her. Maybe it would at least maim her in such a way that she would be unable to walk or stand, and someone would find her and do the job for her. It would save her from scavenging for food like an emaciated coyote. But something within her persisted, and she continued making her way toward the flickering light of the motel sign. She was unsteady on her feet and clung to the flimsy banister as she crept down the stairs.
She tried to lick her lips, but her mouth was dry. She limped her way through the clearing in the brush behind the motel. The wind was strong that night, and the creak of the motel sign swinging back and forth on its hinges caused Angeline to shudder. She couldn’t help but snicker at the irony. She was now the thing that people feared lurking in the dark. There was nothing, no man or beast that could pose a threat to her now. In her current state, that certainly wasn’t the case, but she’d seen Kathryn take down a two-hundred-pound boxer like a lion felling a gazelle. It was the last time she witnessed Kathryn kill. She just couldn’t bear it.
She made her way through the sharp twigs and pine needles, searching for something that would make her well. She wouldn’t have admitted it, even to herself, but she was looking for a corpse. She was looking for an animal who’d met their unfortunate demise through the actions of another animal or a hunter with shaky aim. She sniffed deeply for the pungent scent of blood and followed a trail farther into the woods.
There, she found a bird, maybe a raven, maybe a crow, she couldn’t really tell the difference. The bird had no wounds on him, so it was entirely possible he’d just died of old age and Angeline wouldn’t have to interrupt the natural balance at all. She protracted her fangs, a voluntary action she was still coming to terms with, and began to drink.
For a moment, the rush of blood down the back of her throat provided her the bliss she’d been deprived of. She savored it, shooting up a silent prayer to anyone who would listen that the feeling would continue indefinitely.
And then it stopped. Before she knew what was happening, Angeline felt the bird stripped from her hands and she fell backward onto the ground. Kathryn stood above her, irate.
“What the hell are you doing? Was this thing dead when you found it? Answer me!” Kathryn’s eyes blazed fire.
Angeline would have if she could have. Her throat began to burn, and her stomach churned. With one hand, she grabbed her throat, and with the other, she pressed on her stomach.
“You can’t feed from something dead, Angeline. Any more than a few minutes after the heart stops pumping, and the blood becomes poison. Your blood will turn toxic!”
Angeline thought that was a very real probability. The pain she’d felt in her stomach from hunger was nothing compared to the pain that shot throughout her body. She retched, but even the expulsion of the poisoned blood didn’t relieve the pain.
“You need strength to fight this off, Angeline. I’ll let you die. Right here, right now. I’ll do it for you. I can take your pain away. Do you want to die, Angeline?” Kathryn knelt beside her, cradling her head between her hands. “Do you want to die? Or do you want to live?”
Her eyes began to close of their own accord. She could see the trees that surrounded them fading from view, as though her mind had accepted that this was the end. But it didn’t feel like it should have felt. It wasn’t like being swaddled; it was more like being snuffed out. Eradicated. She wasn’t ready. Goddamn it, she couldn’t let go. Angeline opened her mouth, but a sick croak came out instead of anything coherent. She tried again. “Live.”
The next thing she knew, Angeline was in Kathryn’s arms, speeding through the trees at breakneck pace. At least it felt that way. When they finally stopped, Angeline’s head swam. Her vision came into focus. They were watching a campfire, where a young man and a young woman were roasting frankfurters on long sticks over the open flame. Angeline decided they couldn’t have been more than twenty.
“Live, Angeline. Live.” Kathryn’s voice hissed into Angeline’s ear, more of a command than encouragement.
Angeline began to cry, and the tears spilled over her cheeks. She felt her teeth scrape against her bottom lip. For the first time in weeks, her body was responding to stimulus, and she could nearly hear the blood coursing through the couple’s veins. She didn’t want to do it. She didn’t want to cross that invisible line. How could she without loathing herself?
She closed her eyes and leapt. Something feral took over, and when she opened her eyes, she had the young woman on the ground, her eyes panicked and her feet kicking, but even in a weakened state Angeline was able to hold her down. She buried her teeth into the soft flesh of the woman’s neck, right above her collarbone. As the blood
filled her, Angeline felt herself leave her body, euphoria elevating her to a different plane. She could feel herself healing from the inside out. She had the sudden urge to laugh, to scream. But she couldn’t tear herself away from the woman. She drank until there was nothing left.
“You are supposed to always be aware of your surroundings. I took care of the male, but if I hadn’t, I’m pretty sure he would have shoved a torch up your ass. Next time make sure you don’t leave yourself vulnerable.” Kathryn wiped her lips, a tiny dab of red still resting on her chin.
Angeline looked back to the woman. She lay there unmoving, her body twisted unnaturally. “I killed her, didn’t I?” she asked, still on her knees.
“I would say so.” Kathryn jabbed at the body with the toe of her boot. “Yes, she’s dead.”
Angeline picked up the small satchel the woman had left on the makeshift bench they’d been sitting on. Her identification card was crumpled and well-worn. “Margaret Bursley. Authorized to enter the archives building during the normal operating hours.” Angeline read the card aloud and nodded to herself. This wasn’t just a body, an empty vessel of blood to satiate Angeline’s hunger. This was a person. With a name and a job and maybe even a family. A life. “I’m a killer now.”
“You’ve been a killer for a while. You’ve just decided to act on your instincts. It’s your nature. Nothing more. You wouldn’t call a lion a killer, would you? A bear?” Kathryn lifted the body of the young man and placed it onto the fire. “If you can dispose of the evidence, it’s always best to do so. We don’t need the nuisance of police officers searching for a murderer.”
Angeline watched in horror as Kathryn worked quickly and adeptly and placed the body of Margaret Bursley on top of the man. The flames licked higher, engulfing the bodies in their embrace. Angeline had never felt so sick, so ashamed, or so satiated in her entire life.
Chapter Four
Fog Hollow, Massachusetts, current day
Stacey pulled her Honda up to the Gas ’n’ Eats, which was completely blocked off with yellow caution tape and surrounded by ambulances, fire trucks, and police cars. Two police officers were searching Megan’s car. She didn’t have anything in there that would set off any alarms, but it still felt like a violation of privacy. A group of spectators gathered behind the tape, whispering furiously amongst themselves. These kinds of things didn’t happen in Fog Hollow. The last big crime that had taken place was the previous year. Markie Jerczyk had smashed in a few windshields with a bat after his softball team lost in the finals.
“What are you going to tell them?” Stacey asked, scanning the scene.
“The truth, I guess,” Megan said.
“What, that some hot psychopath claiming to be a vampire whisked you away from the scene and healed you with her blood?” Stacey smiled sarcastically.
“Well, I can’t lie to the police! I just hope they don’t think that I’m the nutcase. Do you think they’ll send me to the hospital?” Megan winced at the chaotic scene in front of the gas station.
“Definitely. And they should. Your sweater is covered in blood.”
“Good point. I really don’t want to go to the hospital right now. I’m fine,” Megan said, sounding less than confident. She removed her sweater and draped it over her arms, the bloody section pushed up against her stomach. At least the shirt was black, so the evidence was more of a crunchy patch than a glaring bloodstain. “This is surreal. I can’t believe this is happening. I’m traumatized over being part of a robbery-turned-murder, I was shot and kidnapped, and now I’m going to have to explain the Bride of Frankenstein to these people.”
“Dracula.”
“What?” Megan looked at Stacey incredulously.
“Bride of Dracula. You said Frankenstein.” Stacey shot her a quick grin and then turned back to the scene at the station.
“Seriously. Does it really matter? Okay, I’m going. Don’t leave, they’ll probably want to question you too.”
Megan closed the door behind her and walked up to the edge of the caution tape. “Excuse me? Officer?”
A tall, broad-shouldered police officer approached her with his hand extended into the “stop” motion. “This is a crime scene, miss. Please back away.”
“I was inside when it happened. I saw the whole thing. That’s my car,” Megan said, pointing to her red Escape. The police officers were still searching her vehicle.
“Hold on, please.” The officer walked away and conferred with someone in a suit and tie. The other man nodded and came over to Megan.
“Detective Greg Nolan. State police,” he said, offering Megan his hand. He looked to be in his mid to late fifties and had a kind smile. “And you are?”
“Megan Denham.”
“We were able to see most of what happened on the surveillance footage, though your face was pretty obscured. We’d love to hear your take on what went on here. Why did you leave the crime scene?”
“I didn’t,” Megan said, taken aback. She hadn’t considered the fact that she could be in trouble for fleeing. “I was on my knees when the shooter said that I knew what he looked like, so he had no choice but to kill me.” Her stomach roiled as she pictured the gun pointed at her. “I heard a loud bang, and the next thing I remember is waking up on the outskirts of the Bullseye parking lot.”
Detective Nolan nodded at her, but Megan could see that his facial expression indicated pity. Or maybe disbelief. Either way, anxiety was creeping in.
“How did you get there?”
“I honestly don’t know,” Megan said, running a hand through her hair. “There was a woman with me when I woke up. She said her name was Angeline. She said that she saved me. And then she was gone.” Just saying the words out loud caused embarrassment to heat her cheeks. She sounded like a lunatic, and she was pretty sure the detective viewed her that way too. “I know how it sounds. But it’s true.”
“On the video, we saw the gunman take aim at you after shooting the clerk, and it did look as if he shot you. Your body jerked forward and we saw what appeared to be blood seeping from your stomach. And then the video went black. Our guys are trying to figure out why that happened and if anything can be recovered. We weren’t sure that you made it but figured you must have crawled out of the place or something. We’ve got some people combing the area. We’re waiting for the dogs to arrive so they could pick up your scent. But you don’t seem to be hurt?” Detective Nolan raised his eyebrows.
Megan shivered, clutching her sweater between her fists. She took a deep breath and held the sweater up, the bloodstain dried and stiff.
“Jesus. We need to get you to a hospital. Officer Brent here is going to ride with you.” He snapped his fingers at a nearby policeman. “Once you’re checked out, we’ll continue our discussion at the police station where it’s a little warmer and a bit more comfortable. Does that sound okay to you?”
He was talking to Megan like a child. She didn’t care. “Yes, that sounds fine. I don’t really have any noticeable wound from the gunshot. I think it just grazed me.”
“Okay, well, let’s have a doctor confirm that, shall we? Brent! Get her to Valley, would you? After we know what’s going on there, we’ll meet up at the Fog Hollow station.” Nolan pointed to the ambulance parked just outside of the caution tape.
Brent nodded and gently took Megan by the elbow. She stopped and turned back to Nolan. “The shooter. Is he, uh, dead?”
Nolan’s gaze drifted to the truck, and Megan’s along with it. She saw the shooter sitting in the driver’s seat with his head nestled between the two headrests. His neck was covered in something dark. His mouth was wide open. Megan fought the impulse to scream. For a fleeting moment, she thought she might be sick. Or faint. She turned away quickly.
“Yes,” Nolan said. “He’s dead. How did you know that?”
“I didn’t. That woman, Angeline. She told me he was dead. I don’t know how she knew.”
Nolan whispered something to Brent. “Okay. Would you be abl
e to describe this woman to a sketch artist?”
Megan swallowed. “I guess so.” Brent nudged her toward the ambulance. Megan obliged, walking silently along with him. It felt like a dream. She’d left work just three hours earlier, annoyed with her boss for giving her a weekend assignment. The woes of a real estate appraiser had never felt as insignificant as they did when Megan was loaded into the back of an ambulance, two dead men and swarms of first responders less than fifty feet away.
“Wait,” Megan said. “Let me just tell my friend where I’m going.” Megan could see Stacey behind the wheel of her car with her arms in the “what’s going on” flail. Brent nodded, but followed behind her. Megan felt a little bit like a criminal.
Stacey opened her car door and stood, resting her arms on the roof. “Where are you going?” She looked at Megan and then at Brent, and then at Megan again.
“They’re taking me to the hospital after all.” Megan shrugged. “It’s probably for the best, considering.”
“Okay, I’ll follow behind the ambulance.”
“No, Stace, really. Go home. It’s so late, and you know how long emergency room waits can be. I’m fine, I promise.”
“Are you sure? Seriously, Meg, I don’t mind.”
Megan shook her head. “If I need you, I’ll give you a call.”
Stacey hesitated, but eventually nodded. She sat in her car and watched them until Megan could no longer see her. Megan didn’t want Stacey sitting around for hours while they tried to figure out why the woman who was shot wasn’t really shot.
After they’d arrived at the hospital and about ten different people had examined and x-rayed Megan’s body, the nurse closed the curtain around her bed and Officer Brent let her know he’d be right outside. It was the first moment she’d really had time to think since she’d pulled into the Gas ’n’ Eats earlier that night. A lifetime ago. If only she hadn’t forgotten her keys on the counter, she’d be in bed, sound asleep, Merlin curled around feet. If only she’d gotten gas that morning, like she’d planned on doing, she wouldn’t be wondering if the whole thing with Angeline had been a hallucination. But no, she’d run out of time. Getting coffee had been more important that getting gas. And the coffee had only been mediocre. Not enough sugar.
In the Shadow of Darkness Page 3
