by Cynthia Eden
Maya drew her weapon, motioned for Adam to do the same. She wasn’t going to take any chances. They’d find the entrance to the tunnels, grab the girl, and then run like hell.
That was her current plan, anyway.
She crept past a large outcropping of rocks. Burnished red. Weathered from time.
Adam eased behind her, but he stopped, his body stiffening. The sound of his accelerating heartbeat reached her ears.
She glanced back at him, found him staring at the rocks, a frown between his eyes. “Adam?”
He lifted his gun. Pointed it straight at the rocks. “I heard…something.”
Was he crazy?
His gaze flashed toward hers. “We’re surrounded, Maya.”
What was he talking about? Her gaze searched the area, found only the hard rocks. She still didn’t smell anyone, didn’t hear—
Adam fired his weapon, and the bullet plunged into…a man. A man as red as the rock—a man who seemed to appear from nowhere, a snarl on his face and his arms raised in fury.
Shit. Understanding dawned too late as a chorus of screams erupted from the rocks. Chameleons. Beings who could change their skin and hair color and blend perfectly with their environments, even adapting their scents to match the—
Two red chameleons sprang at her. Maya fired fast with her gun, catching one in the shoulder, then delivering a hard kick to take the other one down.
“Hell, Adam, we…” Her words ended in a grunt as Maya was grabbed from behind by a pair of icy cold hands.
Not another one.
Just how many were out there?
Dammit! These bastards were reputed to be so cold-blooded they could even nearly suppress their own heartbeats.
Even with enhanced senses, it was all but impossible to pick up a chameleon’s presence. Couldn’t see them, couldn’t smell them, and usually couldn’t hear them.
She jabbed her elbow into the jerk’s ribs. He grunted, and his hold on her tightened. Oh, hell, but he was strong.
Good thing she was a hell of a lot stronger. Maya twisted her body, spun around fast, and slashed her lengthening claws down his side. His blood spilled out—red, slightly darker than his flesh. He swiped at her with a fist, but she ducked the blow. Her hands shot out, caught him in an unbreakable grip, then, with a hard toss, she threw the chameleon against the rocks.
His head cracked against the stone with a sickening thud.
Maya whirled back around. The guy she’d just shot stared up at her with bulging red eyes. Then—shit—one eye rotated to check on his companion while the other stayed locked on her.
That was just weird. Maya slammed her gun down onto the side of his head, knocking him out and effectively closing both eyes.
The chameleon who had attacked Adam now lay on the ground, blood dripping from his side, a faint groan slipping past his lips.
She stalked toward Adam, her gun swinging in an arc toward the rocks. “Are there more of them?” She still didn’t know how he’d realized the chameleons were around them, and she wasn’t about to go looking a gift horse in the mouth. Not at that particular moment, anyway.
He shook his head. “I don’t think so.”
She would have preferred a resounding no, but Maya figured she’d take what she could get. She grunted as she stepped over one of the prone bodies. “Guess the vamps up here have upgraded on their day watchers.” Smart. Very smart.
But not smart enough.
Her gaze drifted over the rocks. She noticed a section that was a shade lighter than the surrounding red. “There.” Maya pushed against the slight indention on the hard surface of the stone.
The damn thing didn’t budge.
She hated the sun.
Adam stepped beside her. Put his hands next to hers.
“On three,” she muttered. “One, two, th…”
The rock slid inward with a groan. The corridor it revealed was pitch-black and reeked of death and decay.
They’d found the lair.
Now if they could just find the girl. “Stay behind me, Slick,” she ordered, stepping into the darkness without a single hesitation. “If things go to shit, run like crazy and don’t look back.”
Maya wasn’t sure what they’d find hidden in those tunnels, but she couldn’t rule out the chance that she might not make it out.
Life had always been a gamble. So was death.
She heard the whimpers first. Slow, pain-filled cries in the dark.
Don’t let that be the kid.
Adam tried to shove past her. Maya caught his arm in a steely grip. Ah, there’s the full strength. The sun must’ve finally set. “Take it easy,” she whispered. “We don’t know what’s waiting for us.”
The tunnel they were in was a tall, thin corridor. Maya could see easily in the darkness and she carefully avoided stepping on the human bones that littered the floor.
So that part of the tale had been true.
Up ahead, the tunnel branched in two directions. Maya hesitated, trying to catch the scents from both the left and the right.
The whimpers were coming from the left, and she caught the faintest trace of perfume. A light, sweet scent. Human.
To the right, well, she didn’t hear or smell a damn thing but death from the right tunnel branch.
So she stepped to the left. Crept forward, her gun ready, her heart racing.
She saw a faint light first. A flickering, pale light.
The cries were growing weaker. Not a good sign. There was an old door up ahead, the hinges literally drilled into the rock.
The human was behind that door, and unless Maya missed her guess, the human was dying.
Maya pulled in a deep breath and kicked open the door.
Her gaze swept the room, searching the shadows for any threat, but there was only one person in the cavernous room. One woman.
The blonde lay on the floor, her body curled in a fetal position. Maya knelt beside her, touched the woman’s shoulder.
Ice cold.
The woman’s face was turned away from her and Maya could hear the wheezing of her lungs as she fought to breathe.
It would be a very short battle.
Gently, Maya rolled the woman over, then flinched at the sight of the poor human.
Scratches lined her face, and bite marks ravaged her neck. Her right arm—damn, the flesh looked as if it had been burned in a fire, red, angry, with boils and blisters marring the length from wrist to shoulder.
But that wasn’t the worst wound. No, the worst was the knife wound in her chest. The wound was deep. Too deep. Her blood soaked her clothes.
Maya stroked her face, tried to soothe the pitiful cries.
“She knows where Cammie is.” Adam’s voice. Cold. Hard.
What the hell? Didn’t he see that the woman was dying?
“Ask her,” he demanded. “Ask her about the girl.”
She’d ask, but Maya doubted she’d get an answer. “I need to—”
The woman’s eyes jerked open. Pale blue. “I’m…gonna…ch-change…”
“What?”
“B-be…strong…get…b-blood…”
Maya stared down at the woman’s body, hoping she was misunderstanding. “A girl,” she said, trying to keep the woman’s attention. “Was there a little girl here?”
The blue eyes narrowed a moment. The cracked lips twisted into a sneer. “B-bitch…b-burned…me…just…wanted…taste…”
A taste? But the woman wasn’t a vampire, not yet anyway. Maya gently touched her bleeding mouth, parting the lips.
Filed teeth. Razor sharp.
Not natural vampire canines. They were too small for that—and the edges were a bit jagged.
The woman dying before her had filed her own teeth to look like a vampire.
And, apparently, she’d tried to drink from a child.
“M-mon…ster…changed…b-burned…”
Cammie had caused the burns on her arm? The room was lit with candles, so a mild burn, yeah, maybe she
could understand that, but how had the girl—
“D-deserves…what…sh-she’ll…get…”
A growl rumbled behind her.
“And what will she get?” Maya asked softly. There was something in those blue eyes, something blazing brightly even as the woman faced death.
Insanity.
“Heart…r-ripped…out…” The battered lips widened into a bigger smile. Blood slipped down her chin. “D-drink…b-blood…for…Mas…ter…”
Yeah, she’d been afraid of that.
Maya’s fingers closed over the hilt of the knife. The woman’s heart was stuttering. If she pulled out the knife, maybe—
Icy fingers closed over her hand. “Ch-change…me.”
The woman had lost too much blood. If Maya drank from her—and she’d have to drink before she gave the woman her own blood—the woman with the pale eyes would die instantly.
Maya figured that’s exactly what the vamps who’d left her behind had been counting on. “I-I can’t.” Even if she could, this woman—she was—
“P-promised! I…k-killed…many…f-for…them…b-brought…food…” Her lashes were closing. The wheezing in her chest easing.
“Yeah, I bet you did.” And she’d held a kid captive in this hole in the earth.
A Lure. She’d bet her undead life on it. The blonde had been used as a Lure by the vamps. She’d probably brought in her friends, maybe even family first for them to drink from, and then she’d started luring strangers, humans, into the den.
Had she been sane then? At the start?
Then slowly lost her reason as she witnessed the killings? As she participated in the slaughters?
What a damn shame. All because she’d bought into the promise of living forever.
The woman’s heart stopped, ended on one final, faint beat. Her chest stilled.
Maya released the hilt of the knife. She brushed a tear from the woman’s face and rose—only to find Adam glaring down at the dead body.
“She knew their plans,” he muttered. “That’s why they killed her.”
A definite possibility. Or maybe they’d just decided their Lure wasn’t useful once she’d tried to attack their special prey. Maya began pacing around the room, trying to find any clue—
“She hurt Cammie.”
Her gaze met his. Absolute certainty laced his words. “Looks to me like Cammie got a lick in, too.” Damn, but those burns were bad. “Wanna tell me about that?”
His lips thinned.
“Didn’t think so.” No candle had done that. What was the girl? One of those Igniters she’d heard about? A human born with the power to control fire?
She was getting damn tired of Adam not dealing straight with her. If he expected her to save the girl, he needed to be honest. “Look, Slick,” she began.
“Help!” A high-pitched, desperate cry. A child’s voice, echoing through the tunnels.
Adam spun around, ran from the room.
Shit. “Adam, wait for me!” She lunged forward—
And two chameleons sprang from their cover near the entrance.
They grabbed her, wrestling her to the ground. She fought, kicking, punching.
She had to get out of there, had to go after Adam.
Nothing had better happen to him.
Snarling, she twisted beneath the chameleons and drove her fist straight into the biggest one’s nose.
Cammie’s voice. The cry for help resonated from deep in the tunnels, sounding strangely distorted—but there was no mistaking it was Cammie.
Hold, on, baby. I’m coming.
He ran as fast as he could, not even trying to conceal his presence. He wanted the bastards to know he was coming.
His heart raced as he thundered through the darkness. He was so close to her now, so close.
A faint light shone from up ahead. A trickling glow of illumination, spilling from beneath a wooden door—just like the door of the last room, the door that had smelled of death.
Adam shoved open the door, chest heaving. “Cammie!”
A slow laugh came from behind him. Too late, Adam caught the stench of rotting flesh and decay.
Vampire.
He tried to spin around, but the creature jumped on him from behind, tearing his flesh with his fangs and sinking his teeth deep into Adam’s throat.
The fierce agony whipped through him. This was what he’d expected when Maya bit him. The tearing. The slashing of flesh and the white-hot pain.
The vamp drank greedily, gulping down his blood.
Not like Maya’s bite. Maya.
He’d left her in the tunnel. She was alone, she—
“No!” Adam lunged forward, managing to break free of the bastard’s hold. The vampire’s teeth sliced across his flesh. Blood dripped onto the ground.
Another rumble of laughter.
Adam turned to face the vampire, uncaring of the blood that trickled down his neck. “Where’s Cammie?”
The vampire, a tall, thin man who looked like he was about thirty years old—and he probably had been thirty when he’d been turned—narrowed his black eyes. “Getting ready for Master Nassor.” He licked his lips, muttered, “I thought you’d taste better. Considering what you are.”
“What I am…” He grunted. “I’m the guy who’s about to kill you in the next four seconds unless you tell me where the hell my niece is!”
The vampire took a step back. Another. A smile curved his lips, one that never flickered in his soulless stare. “You’re not the one who is going to do the killing.”
“And you actually think you can kill me?” Adam snarled. “I’ve been on this earth far longer than you can imagine, vampire. And I’m a hell of a lot stronger.”
“But not invulnerable.” Another low, sinister laugh. Another slow step back. “Even you can die, Brody.”
Where was Maya? Adam had thought she’d left the last chamber right on his heels.
A new fear began to stir in his heart.
Separated. The vampires had separated them. An old ploy, all the better for an attack.
Adam took a deep breath and tried to calm his racing heart. He needed to focus. To be ready for the vampire’s next move.
But he’d heard Cammie’s voice. He knew it had been her. His gaze shot around the room. Landed on a still mound of clothing, blankets.
Every drop of saliva in his mouth dried away when he caught sight of Cammie’s green shirt. The shirt she’d been wearing when she vanished.
“Go on,” the vampire urged. “You might be surprised at what you find.”
He took another look at the mound. He didn’t smell Cammie, even though her shirt was right there. But scents could be cloaked. He, of all people, knew that.
His nostrils twitched as the odors of blood and death swirled around him.
The mound—it was big. Too big?
He took a step forward.
“Go on…”
He snarled at the vampire, but found he was nearly running for the mound. Swiping through the clothes and blankets, hoping that he wouldn’t find Cammie’s broken body, that he wouldn’t see—
A tape recorder.
Her voice had seemed distorted.
Trap.
He was such a fucking idiot.
Adam spun around.
The vampire stood just beyond the wooden door.
He smiled. Then waved. “Good-bye.”
An explosion rocked the room, shaking the floor, sending the heavy rocks that composed the ceiling and the walls tumbling right down on him.
The first chunk of rock hit him hard, catching Adam on the back of the head and sending him falling, facefirst, onto the floor. A roar filled the room as the ceiling gave way, the heavy sandstone breaking apart and plummeting down on him.
The rocks hit him, one after the other, harder, slamming into him, covering his body.
He tried to move, to get up—to run. But the rocks just kept falling, burying him in the rubble.
The candlelight had sputtere
d out, destroyed by the cave-in.
Adam couldn’t feel his back anymore, or his legs, his arms.
The rocks covered him, every inch.
He closed his eyes, struggling for breath.
Maya.
An explosion shook the tunnel. Maya swayed at the impact, grabbing the wall.
What the hell?
The answer came immediately. Booby trap. The vampires must have wired the place for protection.
Well, shit. Dumbass move on their part—the tourists really wouldn’t be able to overlook an explosion.
She glanced back at the room she’d just left. The two chameleons were on the floor, unconscious, but alive. They’d slowed her down, though, and she didn’t know how to find Adam and—
Maya.
For just a moment, she could hear his voice so clearly in her mind.
And she could hear the echo of pain.
Blinding agony, crushing him, all around—burying him alive—
Then, in an instant, their sudden connection was severed.
“Adam!” She screamed his name, not really caring if anyone—vamp, chameleon, human, whatever—heard her. Adam was in trouble.
She began running, going straight ahead, following the reverberations she felt—the shaking walls, the tumbling rocks. She knew it was crazy to run toward the cave-in, but—
But maybe she was crazy, because she was convinced that Adam was in there—that he’d been hurt.
Dust hit her. A thick rising cloud of dirt and dust. She swiped her hand through it, hurried forward. She caught the faint scent of rotting flesh, ignored the sudden prickling of her nape that told her a vamp was nearby.
Adam needed her.
It would be the vamp’s lucky night—if he was smart and stayed the hell out of her way, he’d get out of there alive, or well, undead.
But if he got in her way…
She found the room. Saw the horrible, thick pile of rocks, and knew, knew that Adam was beneath the rubble.
Their blood link was strong, she realized. She’d heard his cry, found him through the maze of darkness.
Damn strong.
Her nails lengthened into claws.
She couldn’t hear his heartbeat. Couldn’t hear him breathing.
Because he wasn’t.
No. “Adam.” His name was a whisper on her lips. He couldn’t be dead. Not so fast.
