by J. R. Ward
The slayer froze for a split second, and John whistled between his teeth, the signal for Qhuinn and Blay to come up from behind.
“Time to drop the gun, asshole,” Qhuinn said as he reappeared. Then, without giving the bastard time to comply, he reached out, locked his hands on the slayer’s forearm, and made like he was snapping a stick.
The crack of bones was louder than John’s whistle had been and the result was a limp wrist and a Glock no longer under the enemy’s control.
As the lesser bucked in pain, sirens from far off sounded out . . . and closed in.
John dragged the bastard back to the double doors of the shed, and after Blay opened the way in, he pulled his prey out of sight.
With overexaggerated words, he mouthed to Qhuinn, Go get your Hummer.
“If those cops are coming for us, we’ve got to blow.”
Not leaving. Get the Hummer.
Qhuinn took out his keys and tossed them to Blay. “You go. And lock us in, feel me?”
Blay didn’t waste a second, backing out and closing the door. There was the subtle sound of metal clinking as he reset the chain and then a click as that Master Lock was popped into place.
The lesser was starting to struggle with greater strength, but this was not a bad thing—consciousness was what they were going for.
John flipped the fucker onto his stomach and pulled back on that neck until the thing’s spine pretzeled.
Qhuinn knew exactly what to do. Kneeling down, he put his face right into the slayer’s. “We know you hold a female prisoner. Where is she?”
As the sirens intensified, the slayer managed only a series of grunts, so John relented a little and allowed some air down in those lungs.
Qhuinn drew back his palm and slapped the lesser. “I asked you a question, bitch. Where is she?”
John eased up a little further, but not so much as to offer an escape route. With the added leeway, the lesser shuddered in fear, proving that whereas the motherfucker had been all business with his showy shooting, here during crunch time, he was nothing but a young punk in over his head.
Qhuinn’s second slap was harder. “Answer me.”
“No . . . prisoner.”
As Qhuinn threw back his arm again, the slayer recoiled—yup, although the fuckers were dead, their pain receptors worked just fine. “Female abductee held by your Fore-lesser. Where is she?”
John reached forward and gave his gun to Qhuinn and then, with his now-free hand, he went to the small of his back and withdrew his hunting knife. It went without saying that he was the only one who was going to do any real damage and he brought the blade around and put it right up to the lesser’s eyes. Wild bucking ensued, but the struggle was quickly contained, John’s huge body blanketing what was under him.
“You’re going to want to talk,” Qhuinn said dryly. “Trust me on this.”
“I don’t know no female.” The words were nothing but a hiss, that wind-pipe constricted by John’s forearm.
John gave a jerk backward and the slayer yelled, “I don’t!”
Sirens were screaming now, and out in the parking lot there were multiple tire squeals.
Time to tread carefully. The lesser had already demonstrated a total disregard for the single rule in the war, so whereas with any other slayer you could be sure of silence, that was a not-so-much with Mr. Click-click Bang-bang.
John met Qhuinn’s mismatched stare, but the guy was already on it. Reaching over to a pile of oily rags, Qhuinn snagged one and stuffed it into the lesser’s mouth. Then it was freeze-frame time.
From outside, the voices of the cops were muffled: “Cover me.”
“Roger that.”
As John put away his knife so he could hold on with both hands, there was lots of foot shuffling, most of which was off in the distance. But would no doubt come near eventually.
While the uniforms scattered, the radios in the cop cars provided a chatty sound track to their initial search-and-secure. Which didn’t take long. Within a couple of minutes, the policemen were pooling around the cars, right next to the shed.
“Unit Two-forty to base. Area is secure. No victims. No perp—”
With a quick kick, the lesser creamed a gas can with its boot. And you could practically hear all those CPD gun muzzles come back up and train on the shed.
“What the fuck?”
Lash smiled as the kid’s eyes locked on the Omega. Although everything was covered with robing, you’d have to be a total moron not to realize there was something way off under there—and ding-ding-ding, they had a winner in the cognitive lottery.
As those feet started to paddle backward out of the farmhouse, Mr. D’s backup slayers flanked the little bastard and caught him by the arms.
Lash nodded to the dining room table. “My father will do him in there.”
“Do what!” Now there was full-on panic, with the kid thrashing like a gutted pig. Which was nothing but good practice for what was coming, really.
The slayers muscled him over and flipped him up on top of the pitted wood, holding him down at the feet and ankles as the Omega came forward amid all the squeaking and flapping.
As the evil lifted his hood, everything went quiet.
And then the scream that came out of the human’s mouth ripped through the air, echoing up to the ceiling, filling the decrepit house with noise.
Lash hung back and let his father go to work, watching the human’s clothes get shredded with a mere pass of that black, transparent palm. And then it was time for the knife, the blade catching the light of the cheapo chandelier that dangled from the grungy ceiling.
Mr. D was the one who helped with the technicalities—positioning the buckets under the arms and legs, scurrying around.
Lash had been dead when his veins got drained; he’d awoken only when a shock that had been generated from God only knew where had tunneled through his body. So it was interesting to see how it all worked: How the blood was emptied from the body. How the chest was split open and the Omega slit its own wrist to drip black oil into the cavity. How the evil called up a ball of energy out of thin air and sent into the corpse. How the reanimation carried what had been given to every vein and artery. The final step was removal of the heart, the organ shriveling up in the Omega’s palm before being put into a ceramic container.
As Lash remembered his own coming-back-from-the-dead routine, he recalled his father dragging Mr. D over to serve as a feeding source for him. He’d needed the blood, but then again, he’d been dead for a while at that point—and was at least half vampire. This human, on the other hand, came awake with nothing more than a gaping, fish mouth and a whole lot of confusion.
Lash put his hand up to his own chest and felt the beat of his heart—
Something was leaking. In his sleeve.
While the Omega started to do depraved things to the initiate, Lash jogged upstairs to the bathroom. Taking off his suit jacket, he folded the thing in half . . . and realized there was nowhere to lay it down. Everything was covered with two decades’ worth of grime.
Christ, why hadn’t he sent someone over to clean the place?
He ended up hanging the jacket from a hook and—
Oh, shit.
As he lifted his arm, there was a black stain right over where he’d put the bandage, and at the bottom of his elbow, there was a wet patch.
“Goddamn it.”
Ripping free his cuff links, he unbuttoned his shirt and froze as he looked down at his chest.
Lifting his eyes to the cloudy mirror, as if that were going to change what he was seeing, he leaned in toward the glass. There was another sore on his left pectoral, of the same flat, dime-size shape as the first. And a third by his belly button.
Wings of panic fanned up a light-headed dizziness and he caught himself on the sink. His first thought was to run to the Omega and ask for help, but he held off—going by the screams and grunts downstairs, there was some serious action happening in the dining room, and only an idiot interrupt
ed that.
The Omega was fickle by nature, but had OCD concentration about some things.
Bracing his hands on the basin, Lash dropped his head as his empty stomach pulled a churn and burn on him. He had to wonder how many more of those spots he had—and didn’t want to know the answer.
His induction, rebirth, whatever, was supposed to be permanent. That’s what his father had told him. He was born from the evil, spawned from a dark well that was eternal.
Rotting in his own skin had not been part of the deal.
“Y’all okay there?”
Lash shut his eyes, the sound of the Texan’s voice like claws raking down his back. Except he just didn’t have the energy to fuck-off the guy.
“How are things going downstairs?” he asked instead.
Mr. D cleared his throat. And still the disapproval made him choke on his words. “I do believe it’ll be ’while yet, suh.”
Great.
Lash forced his sagging spine to straighten and turned to face his deputy—
In a sharp rush, his fangs punched into his mouth, and for a moment, he couldn’t figure out why. Then he realized his eyes had locked on the guy’s jugular.
Deep in Lash’s belly, his hunger grew horns and went haywire, thrashing and gouging his gut.
It happened too fast to stop or question or think. One second he was rooted where he stood in front of the sink. The next he was all over Mr. D, shoving the lesser back against the door, and going hard into the guy’s throat.
The black blood that hit his tongue was the tonic he needed and he drew with desperation, even as the Texan struggled and then fell still. But the fucker didn’t have to worry. There was nothing sexual in the sucking. It was nutrition, plain and simple.
And the more he swallowed, the more he needed.
Jacking the slayer tight against his chest, he fed like a motherfucker.
THIRTEEN
As the sound of the slayer’s boot against that gas can faded, Qhuinn moved down and sat on the SOB’s legs. The bastard might have gotten one kick in, but he was not getting a second chance.
Outside, the human cops gathered around the shed.
“It’s locked,” one of them said as the chain rattled.
“I have shell casings over here.”
“Wait, there’s something inside . . . phew, man, what a stench.”
“Whatever it is, it’s been dead at least a week. That smell—I’d take even my mother-in-law’s tuna casserole over that.”
There was a ripple of agreement.
In the darkness, John and Qhuinn locked eyes and waited. The only solution if the door got popped was to dematerialize and leave the lesser behind; there was no way of moving the weight of the slayer through thin air. But none of these policemen could possibly have the key—so that left shooting their way in as their only option.
And chances were good they’d assume a quick pop just to get into the shed was not worth the paperwork.
“Only one shooter, according to the nine-one-one call. And he can’t be in there.”
There was a cough and a curse. “If he is, his nose is falling off from the stank.”
“Call the groundskeeper,” a deep voice said. “Someone’s gotta get that dead animal out of there. Meantime, let’s head into the neighborhood.”
There was chatter and footsteps. A little later one of the cars drove off.
“We gotta off him,” Qhuinn whispered over John’s shoulder. “Take that knife and let’s do him and get the fuck out of here.”
John shook his head. There was no way he was losing this prize.
“John, we’re not leaving with him. Kill him so we can bounce.”
Even though Qhuinn couldn’t see his lips, John mouthed, Fuck that. He’s mine.
Letting this source of information slide was not going to happen. If anything, the human police could be dealt with mentally . . . or physically if it came down to it.
There was the smooth sound of a knife being unsheathed. “Sorry, John, we’re outtie.”
No! John yelled over his shoulder soundlessly.
Qhuinn’s hand locked on the collar of John’s jacket and dragged him off balance, so it was a case of either letting go of the slayer’s neck or snapping the fucker’s head off his spine. Since an incapacitated lesser couldn’t talk, John released his hold—and caught himself by planting his palm on the cold cement.
No fucking way was he going to let his buddy cheat him out of this.
As he lunged at the male, all hell broke loose. He and Qhuinn wrestled for control over the dagger, knocking into a lot more than a gas can, and the lesser rolled free and sprang for the door. As the cops started hollering, the slayer pounded to get out—
The next sound that made any impression over the din was a gunshot. The chaser of which was a metallic ringing.
The police had blasted off the Master Lock.
From down on the floor, John whipped his arm around to the small of his back, and as he pivoted on his knees, he and Qhuinn threw their knives in sync, their blades traveling end over end across the shallow space.
The penetrations were of such force that even though they went into the slayer’s torso between the shoulder blades, clearly one or both hit home: In a flash bright as lightning and with a sonic boom loud enough to make ears bleed, the lesser went back to his maker, leaving nothing but a smoky stink . . . and a hole the size of a refrigerator in the shed door.
With adrenaline running so high, neither he nor Qhuinn could dematerialize, so they leaped up and back-flatted it on either side of the gaper, staying put as first one gun muzzle then another eased inside.
Forearms were next.
Then profiles and shoulders. And flashlights.
Fortunately, the humans stepped fully inside.
“Psst. Your fly’s down.” As the cops turned on Qhuinn’s smart ass, John unsheathed both his SIGs, and with a quick cross-strike on those heads, CPD’s finest were seeing stars and sinking down onto the floor.
Which was precisely when Blay showed up with the Hummer.
John jumped over the policemen and hightailed it down to the SUV with Qhuinn right behind him, those New Rocks the fucker insisted on wearing positively pounding the earth. John gunned his way for the rear door, which Blay had popped, catching the handle and flipping himself inside as Qhuinn slid into the backseat.
As Blay took off, flooring the engine and blasting out of there, John was glad they’d had to tango with only one set of cops—although sure as shit the other two badges would be back ASAP.
They were heading north toward the highway as John clawed his way into the backseat . . . and relocked his hands around Qhuinn’s throat.
As they went back at it, Blay shouted from up front, “What the fuck is wrong with you two?”
No time to answer that. John was busy squeezing and Qhuinn was trying to give him a black eye—and succeeding.
Sixty-something miles an hour. In and around downtown. With a possible ID on the Hummer if either of those cops had come to enough to focus his peepers while Blay got them out of Dodge.
And a brawl going down.
Later, John would realize that of course there was only one place Blay could go.
By the time the guy pulled into Sal’s parking lot—in the back of the restaurant, where there were no lights—John and Qhuinn had both drawn blood. And the fight ended only when John was yanked out of the door by Trez—which suggested the redhead had phoned ahead. Qhuinn was handled with similar muscle by iAm.
John spit to clear out his mouth and glared at all of them.
“I believe we’ll call this a draw, boys,” Trez said with a half smile. “What do ya think?”
As John was released, rage made him shake. That slayer could have been the one thing they needed to crack the locale . . . the story . . . the anything. And because Qhuinn had insisted on wasting the bastard, they were no closer to where they had to be. Plus there was the fact that the lesser had died so easily. Just a
prick in the heart cavity and he was home free—or at least back to the Omega.
Qhuinn wiped his mouth on the back of his hand. “For fuck’s sake, John! You think I don’t want to find her? You think I don’t give a shit? Christ, I’ve been out every night with you, looking, searching, praying for a break.” He pointed his finger straight out. “So get this straight. The pair of us getting busted with a leaking lesser by a bunch of humans is not going to help us. You want to tell Wrath how you rolled with that one? I don’t. And if you ever put a gun in my face again, I will fuck you up no matter what my job is.”
John didn’t trust himself to respond. One thing was clear, though—if he didn’t have the hope of something turning up at Benloise’s St. Francis place, he would have been tearing shit up no matter who tried to stop him, Shadow or otherwise.
“Are you hearing me?” Qhuinn demanded. “Am I clear to you?”
John paced around, hands on his hips, head down low. As his temper started to cool, the logical side of him knew his buddy was right. He was also very aware he’d temporarily lost his damn mind in that shed. Had he really put a forty in his friend’s puss?
His sudden clarity made him sick to his stomach.
If he didn’t stitch it up here, he was going to have more problems than a missing female. He was going to end up dead, either because he was sloppy in combat or because Wrath gave him a serious case of boot-up-the-ass-itis.
He looked over at Qhuinn. Man, the hard expression on that pierced face was right close to an edge a friendship couldn’t go back from—the kind of thing that didn’t have to do with Qhuinn being a tough guy, but rather John being the kind of asshole no one wanted to hang out with.
He walked up to the male and wasn’t surprised when Qhuinn held his ground in spite of the throw-down in the car. When he stuck his hand out, there was a long pause.
“I’m not the enemy, John.”
John nodded, focusing on that tattooed tear beneath the guy’s eye. Retracting his palm, he signed, I know that. I just . . . I need to find her. And what if that slayer was the way?
“Maybe he was—but the sitch got critical and you’re going to have to choose yourself over her sometimes. Because if you don’t, there’s no way you’re ever going to find out what happened. You can’t search for her from inside a coffin.”
