by Sean Hayden
"Were you trying on my clothes?" I tried to sound light hearted. I sounded like a bitch, even to me.
Thompson furrowed his brows. The effect was lost on me. "Kid, you're a fucking mess."
"Yeah, well…you're a big poopie head."
"Yeah, I figured you'd say that. You're grounded."
I rolled my eyes and stood to go get dressed. "Whatever."
He grabbed my arm as I tried to pass. I looked down at his hand and back up at his face. "Ashlyn, I'm serious. You're on leave. I called Reese and I called Marcel. You are off active duty until you get your head on straight."
I couldn't do anything but stare. I thought he was joking around. He still didn't look angry, he looked worried as hell. "Jim, I'm fine," I tried to lie to him and myself. It didn't work.
"Marcel is on his way. Reese is sending over the bureau psychologist. You're to remain in Marcel's care and supervision. That is the standing order. You need to get your head in the game and learn all sorts of vampy stuff. Got it?"
"And what do you get to do?"
"I'm taking some vacation time, too. If you're out, I'm out," he said with a wink.
That sort of sealed the deal for me. It told me how screwed up I really was. If he was going to take vacation time, either the world was going to blow up or he was really worried. I think I would have preferred the whole world blowing up thing. I lost it. I dropped to the floor on my ass and cried. The tears started and wouldn't stop. Wracking sobs shook my entire body and I was helpless against them. I heard Thompson slide down the side of the cabinet and sit on the floor next to me. My eyes were too full of bloody tears to see him, but I felt his arms as he scooped me up and pulled me tightly to his chest. I buried my face in his black suit jacket and cried some more. I did that for another hour before I finally fell asleep with the sun hours away from rising.
Murmuring voices and the sound of the doorbell woke me up. I picked up my phone off the nightstand and ripped the charging cord out of it. Looking at the time, I smiled. It was only 7 o'clock. Then I noticed it was Friday and groaned like a wounded caribou.
"She's up," Marcel and Thompson said at the same time.
"Fuck you, both," I said softly, hoping they wouldn't hear.
"Potty mouth," Thompson called loudly to make sure I would hear.
"Fuck you, fuck you, and fuck you."
I got out from underneath the covers and ignored the laughter from the other room. I walked into the bathroom and turned the shower on as hot as it would go, hoping it would warm me up a little. I'd never felt as cold in my entire life as I did at that moment.
I shut the water off after washing my hair and body. The shower did help a little. Drying off as quickly as I could, I slipped back into my room, dressed, and walked into an inquisition.
Reese, Thompson, Marcel, some guy I didn't know, and another vampire I had never seen before, sat on my couch, love seat, and recliner. All of them stared at me. Marcel looked as worried as Thompson. Reese looked like he was about to cry. The human guy looked like he wanted to ask me something, and the vampire looked disgusted.
"What?"
All of them started talking at once except for Thompson. He knew better. I held up my hand and closed my eyes. Someone needed to invent vampire aspirin. "Let's try this again. Reese, you go first."
"Ashlyn, I know you've been through a lot. But we need you. Quickly. This is Doctor Rosenfeld. He's the bureau–"
"Psychiatrist. Next? Marcel, what have you got for me?"
Reese snapped his mouth closed and tilted his head. Marcel looked angry. "Little one–"
"Next. You, vampire guy. What do you want?"
"To leave."
"Good, go."
"Psychiatrist guy, you don't get a say, so I guess we're done here. Adios, amoebas," I said and walked out my front door. Thompson could lock up. I was going to go see a movie or something.
That was the plan, until Marcel knocked me on my ass.
He stood over me with his arms crossed. I could see the front of the house from my position on my front lawn. The rest of the gang stood in the doorway or looking out the plate glass window. "You impudent little shit."
I almost giggled at how thick his French accent got. It always happened when he was pissed. "We are worried about you and you would rather wallow in misery than ask for help. Well, tough shit. Get up."
He held out his hand and I took it. He hauled me to my feet and I delivered a punch that threw him across the yard and into the thick oak tree that had been there since the 1920's. I heard a crack and I hoped it was Marcel and not the tree. "Leave me alone, Marcel."
I turned and ran.
I made it six feet before a six-hundred-pound werelion landed on top of me. I sighed. This was going to be a long night.
He had me pinned face first into the grass with a giant paw on each shoulder. I tried to twist but he held me flat. He probably shouldn’t have laughed his little lion chuckle. That pissed me off. I snapped my leg up behind him and kicked him in his lion parts. Suddenly, I could move again. Standing up, I dusted myself off. There were a few grass stains, but I was still presentable enough to go out in public.
"She's just a vampire…and they cannot subdue her?"
I stopped dead in my tracks when I heard him run from the porch full force. It was the vampire who had wanted "to leave." He planned on attacking me from behind and kicking my ass even though I had just laid out a thousand-year-old vampire and a six hundred-pound werelion. I turned around faster than he could get to me and caught his throat in my hand as he wrapped his arms around my chest.
"Quentin, no!" Marcel's warning to the short-bus-riding-vampire came a little too late. He bared his fangs and tried to grab my head in his hands. I pulled him close and tore open a hole in his neck with my fangs.
He went limp as ecstasy fired off every nerve cluster in his undead body. I could feel the pleasure, too, but I did my damnedest to ignore it. We could shut it off and just feed. We could even make our food feel nothing but pain. I hadn't learned those tricks yet. For all I knew I didn't have those talents. I felt it as his orgasm took over. I stopped feeding, pulled away, and tossed him to the ground like an apple core. Ick.
I expected the fighting to stop. It did, but only after Marcel drew a gun and shot me in the head with a silver bullet.
∞ ∞ ∞
I woke up with an even bigger headache, chained to a wooden slab about two feet longer than me. The rest of the room was cold and damp. The whole setup screamed "dungeon." I had to be in the basement of one of Marcel's bars.
"Hello?" My voice echoed off the walls and made my head hurt worse. "Hello," I whispered this time.
I could hear footsteps coming down a set of stone stairs. "Are you awake?" The thick English accent gave away that my keeper was none other than Mr. Shortbus.
"No, I'm not. Can you come unchain me?"
"As much as it pains me to say no, I'm afraid I must insist you remain bound until Marcel returns." I heard his footsteps as he walked away from the door.
I rolled my eyes, figuring that's exactly what he would say. I looked at my wrists encased in shackles. The material looked familiar and I knew without a doubt that they were foamed titanium alloy, meshed with graphite nanofibers. I knew because that's what they used to make V-cuffs. Handcuffs specifically designed for vampires.
Marcel didn't know that I could break them. They were expensive as shit, but he'd get over it. He shouldn't have shot me in the fucking head.
I pulled the chains and heard the alloy groaning in protest. They were thicker than normal, but I had snapped three sets before with little problem. I put a little bit of anger and outrage at being shot and shackled into my efforts and nearly punched myself in the face when the chain gave way. Quentin's footsteps ran back down the hallway.
"What was that?"
I ignored his question. After all, I was still sleeping.
The left one was a little more difficult, but it finally snapped. With both arms
free, I stood up on the table and bent over to break the shackles on my legs.
"Hey! Stop that!"
I looked up and saw the vampire staring at me through the iron bars in the extremely thick wooden door of the cell. I snarled at him and he hastily pulled out a phone and started dialing. I tried not to giggle at the look of sheer panic on his face.
I managed to snap the first ankle cuff.
"Marcel, it's Quentin! She's snapping the cuffs!"
I reached over and snapped the remaining one.
"No! I don't have a gun. What do you mean run? Marcel? Marcel?"
I hopped down off the table and looked at the floor. Thank the gods I'd been kidnapped with shoes on. I held up my hands and looked at the shackles and chains hanging from them. I thought about taking them off, but I kind of liked the effect. I looked at the barred window and Shortbus, or Quentin, or whatever his name was, dropped the cell phone and took off running.
I kicked the wooden door right where the deadbolt met the frame and it shattered. Pulling it inward, I stepped out of the cell, and picked up the phone.
"Quentin?"
"He's not here right now, but if you'd like to leave your name and number I'll be sure to pass it along before I rip his fucking head off."
"Ashlyn, calm down!"
"You fucking shot me, Marcel. In the head. Why should I calm down?"
"Because I'm trying to help!"
"Help? By how? Ventilating my head?"
He actually had the balls to laugh. "Good one."
I pulled the phone away from my ear and stared at it to make sure it was Marcel. It was. "Meet me upstairs. If you're not here in five minutes I'm leaving." I clicked the end button and threw the phone against the wall. Shortbus could buy a new one.
I was sitting behind Marcel's desk when he showed up four and a half minutes later. He took one glance at the look on my face and slowly closed the door behind him. I half expected him to tell me to get out of his chair. Wisely, he took one of the empty spots in front of the desk.
"Are you a little calmer?"
"Fuck you."
"I'll take that as a no."
He sighed heavily and crossed his legs. Most men, when they crossed their legs one over the other at the knee, made it look very feminine. Marcel did not. He looked hot as hell, but I didn't let that bleed away my anger. I was pissed, and it felt good. It sure felt a hell of a lot better than the guilt and despair that had taken over my entire existence.
"You're an asshole. All I wanted was to be left alone, but no. You and the other assholes had to stage an intervention. Don't ever do that again."
"We will if that is what you require."
"What exactly do you mean by that?"
"It means that you do not get a say, cher. You were acting selfishly. If we have to do something like that again to help, we will."
"Selfishly? How the hell was I being selfish?"
Marcel stood and walked around the desk. He opened the top drawer to my right and pulled out a folded newspaper. I took a gulp of air. Usually when somebody wanted to give me bad news, they did it in the form of a newspaper. Life became infinitely more complicated when it happened. He opened it and tossed it down in front of me, front page up. I reluctantly tore my gaze from his face and looked at the first story.
VAMPIRE PLAGUE HITS CALIFORNIA.
I scrunched my eyes in confusion. "Vampire plague? What the hell does that mean and what does it have to do with me?"
"Read the Article, Ash. You will see."
I did. Apparently a strange and unidentifiable malady had stricken the vampires in most of the major cities in California. Many vampires had simply "expired." I snarled a little. When people stopped living, they "died." When vampires stopped living, they "expired." I stuffed the disgust down and kept reading. The vampires who had survived so far were going mad with hunger, committing suicide, or withdrawing from the world completely. All vampire owned, or run, businesses had completely shut down in the afflicted cities. The Centers for Disease Control had been called in and so far, they have not identified the cause of the sickness, nor can they figure out why it has only affected the cities of San Francisco, Sacramento, Los Angeles, and San Jose…
I stopped reading and looked up from the paper. It hit me. As sure as the bullet to my forehead hit me last night, so did the cause of the sickness. It was me.
The bastard vampire governor, James Greer, had been my last assignment. Somebody was trying to make him dead. They assigned Thompson and me to stop that from happening. To make a long story short, it had been him the whole time. He was staging assassination attempts to gain popularity, while at the same time, killing off all the masters of the major cities and gaining their power. By power, I mean vampires. When he killed them, he took control of the vampires in those cities not only by force, but metaphysically as well. They became tied to, and dependent on, him.
Then, when he killed my Vic, I took his life. The vampires of all those cities became tied to me. It had happened to me once before in Chicago. I killed the master during my first assignment. When it happened, I felt all the vampires of the city tying themselves to me and I forced the power away.
When I fought Greer, we were doing it metaphysically and physically at the same time. I had been too distracted and not only drained his power with my own, but sucked his mortal shell dry in the real world. The transfer of power was utterly complete, and I didn't have time or the strength to push the link away. They had become mine.
The only two people in the world who knew I was the master of four cities were Thompson and Marcel. Marcel was trying very hard to sever the ties and find suitable replacements in each of the cities. If he didn't, The Council would surely find a way to eradicate me. They didn't like having a threat to their power walking around.
Chances are they were going to come kill me anyway. Before I killed Greer, he sent them a letter telling them exactly what I was and exactly what I could do. If he wasn't already dead, I'd have killed his ass again.
"What can we do?"
Marcel looked down at me and nodded. He knew I had figured it out all on my own. It was a little hard to miss with the blatant clues right on the front page of the Chicago Trib. "We need to make you whole again. Now that you've eaten, the weaker of the vamps will start to recover."
"What about the ones who expired?"
Marcel shook his head sadly.
I started crying.
He lifted me from the chair and wrapped me in his arms. I didn't know how much more I could take. It seemed no matter what I did, it always ended up being the wrong thing. I couldn't even grieve without killing something. That thought stopped my tears in their tracks. Not because I was worried about my crying killing something. I stopped because I'd had enough. No more tears, no more sadness. I felt myself stiffen as the anger returned. Not at Marcel, he had done the right thing and snapped me out of it. I was angry at Greer. I was angry at my father. I was angry at pretty much life in general. If I couldn't morn for Vic and just fade away, then I would take it out on the bad guys.
I pulled away from Marcel and gave him a half smile. "Thanks, Marc. Do you have anything to eat? I'm starving."
"Quentin!"
"Abso-frigging-lutely not. He tastes like shit."
Marcel's chuckle made my half smile whole. He had a bad habit of making half things whole. Like me. "Too pompous for your delicate palate, eh, cher?”
"Just a tad."
"It is not his fault. He has been a vampire since someone found a handsome squire during the crusades and thought it would be fun to turn one so noble into one of us."
Quentin chose that moment to knock softly on the office door. "You needed me, sir?"
"Come in."
He opened the door and saw me. I could see the look of utter distaste on his face, too. I resisted the urge to flick him off and blew him a kiss instead. Marcel cuffed me in the head. It's childish I know, but so was Quentin. "What?"
Marcel shook his head and r
olled his eyes. I grinned back at him. "Go watch the bar and ask Melanie to join us, please."
Quentin nodded and left. I had a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach. "Marcel…"
"Ease, youngling. She is not a vampire. She is one of my employees, one of the Fae. I would not be so callous."
I nodded slowly. I didn't want to tell him it had little to do with the flavor, but more of the gender. It had taken everything I had to be comfortable with Vic and just when it had happened, someone took her from me. I didn't want to fall into despair again, so I steeled my nerves and let raw determination take over.
A few moments later, a surprise walked in. I hadn't realized it, but I had been standing there so taut with anticipation I was almost shaking. I subconsciously expected whoever walked through the door would automatically remind me of Vic simply for the fact that they were a woman. Melanie couldn't have been farther from looking like Vic in every possible way if she tried. I breathed a sigh of relief.
Marcel gave a little chuckle next to me. "Worrying for nothing, little one?"
"You could say that. You planned this didn't you?"
"Oui," he said. "I shall leave you to your meal. Melanie, my thanks."
"My pleasure, Marcel. Hi, I'm Melanie," she said and flashed me a smile as she crossed the room, holding out her hand.
I took her hand and shook it. She was warm like Thompson. I could feel power pouring off her…so different from a vampire. She was short, too. Even shorter than me, but thicker though, and I don't mean fat. She was built like a tank with broad shoulders, muscled arms, and legs that looked like they could crush walnuts between them. Her hair hung past her waist in a mass of brown tangled curls. Her skin softly glowed like bronze under the white lighting in the office. She stunned me with her beauty and power.
I found myself returning her smile. "Hi, I'm Ash."
"I know. I've seen you in here a few times. Marcel said you needed to eat but had…how did he put it…particular dietary requirements," she finished in a near perfect imitation of him.
