by SK Ryder
And they hadn’t happened in Florida in years.
“Nothing ever happens in Florida,” Jackson muttered.
Potential leads appeared and disappeared on the screens as the Grid examined the never-ending stream of news data in real-time. Valid leads had to be followed up and analyzed. On average, only one in a hundred had a probability high enough to justify action.
“Nothing happens in Florida . . . now.” He ran a finger down the side of the keyboard, thinking. The supposed gang-war had been raging for weeks. But where did it start? And what started it?
Jackson spent half an hour building a new algorithm and two hours poring over the historical data it retrieved. Bit by bit, a new trail of blood and violence emerged from the shadows, winding around the globe. For years.
Until it reached Florida.
Where it stopped.
And exploded.
Chapter 7
Blood Child
Six nights and still Dominic lived. Every sunset found him awake again in his bed, untouched, his veiled invitation to drag him into the sun and watch him ‘smoke’ ignored. He kept the door to his sanctuary unlocked, even tried to leave it ajar, but there the beast refused to cooperate, forcing him to shut it. His sense of smell told him that Cassidy had not so much as touched the door, much less opened it.
It was not for a lack of encouragement. When he encountered her in the evenings, he made every effort to be as disagreeable as possible even though he found himself drowning in the Caribbean-blue depths of her eyes on a regular basis. He provoked her at every opportunity, forcing her to contemplate him, even despise him. He made no promises about repairing the AC and let her resulting complaints go unacknowledged. Condemning the appalling lack of her culinary skills came naturally, and beyond that, her clothes, her habits, her work . . . everything was fair game. He needed her to think of him, puzzle him out on her own, preferably during the day when she could come find him and end him, whether on purpose or by accident it mattered not. Presenting himself as his true self and asking outright was not an option. Her terror would cost him his control and get her killed on the spot. The chosen tool of his imminent demise was fragile indeed.
Once Cassidy’s fury was stoked, Dominic spent the rest of his nights hunting to the point of gluttony. The more blood and terror he consumed, the less the beast was interested in her increasingly familiar presence. It was peace of a sort, the first he knew since being turned. He hadn’t even checked on his automated online searches since that night he agreed to let her stay. Months of scouring the Internet had turned up nothing useful about real vampires and no trace of the cure he once hoped to find.
He was resigned by now that the only way to escape this existence was death. And the certain knowledge that the next dawn could be his last edged every instant with a sweet, almost transcendent clarity that he relished as thoroughly as the hunt. He greeted every night as a treasured gift and every morning with quiet euphoria. Most every morning, as the sun approached the horizon, he lingered by her bed and studied her sleeping face, filling his last conscious thoughts with the woman who held his life in her hands.
Returning from the hunt on this early morning, however, Dominic’s sense of peace evaporated when the cottage came into view. His skin prickled with an instinct he knew to trust.
Another vampire was near.
He let the alarm run through him and melt away, retaining his relaxed attitude on the bike as he rolled across the untended yard. But instead of taking the bike to the shed, he propped it beside the porch to give him easy access to the machete sheathed along the side. Not his preferred weapon, but effective enough should the need arise.
He swung down and removed the helmet and gloves as quickly as he could while still presenting a picture of casual carelessness. His nostrils flared in the still air, sifting the dense brine for any hint of scent that would betray the intruder. There was only the vaguest trace of something that shouldn’t have been there.
Slowly Dominic turned and scanned the shadows, all his senses keyed to the limit. Tiny life forces of nocturnal scavengers went about their business in the shrubbery. None of them had either the size or the white-cold brilliance of a vampiric aura. His anxiety mounted. He felt exposed and vulnerable standing there out in the open. But retreating inside would blind him to the threat. Seconds crept past. He stood perfectly still.
And then he knew.
He didn’t even look to confirm the flash of insight before bolting straight up the cabbage palm that drowsed beside the porch and plowing into the blood-drinker hidden in the tree’s crown. The intruder had hovered right above him and could have dropped on him at any time. Incensed, he grasped the other vampire by the throat and launched them both into empty space.
At close range, he recognized the other’s scent. This was the blood-drinker who had left that horrid mark on Cassidy’s neck. The outrage drove out his fangs and tightened his grip, claw-like fingers digging into the thick neck. He would not suffer this miscreant to live.
They crashed to the ground in a tangle, but instead of pinning his foe, Dominic found himself tearing at nothing but air and sand.
“Such spirit, young one,” mocked a voice behind him. At last Dominic registered something else that fog-shrouded forest scent betrayed. His unwelcome visitor was older and stronger than Dominic by several centuries. His own wintery scent betrayed him as a youngling and would for years to come. This one would have no reason to take him seriously, much less fear him.
Or, for that matter, let him live.
Dominic leapt to his feet, anticipating a lethal attack. The intruder sat on the ground, legs wide before him, his head tilting as he looked at Dominic with soft, unfocused, brown eyes. Most of the rest of his face hid in a ragged beard stained with dried blood.
“I do not hunt your territory.” Dominic snarled to cover his mounting unease. “But this is my lair and mine alone.”
“And you have her.” A gap-toothed grin of childish delight appeared in the grimy beard. “The sweet riddle.”
“She is not your concern.”
“But she is. She is. I have searched for her, you see. So little I saw in her blood. So much more there is to find.”
Not a casual one-time feed then. Nor had this vagrant sent her here since it took him this long to find her. No, this one had tasted Cassidy, chose to spare her, and now claimed her as his. A surprising sense of possessiveness surged through Dominic. All his instincts settled and focused, preparing for battle. He wouldn’t be caught off guard again, nor would it be the first time an older blood-drinker tragically underestimated him.
“You will not have her, vieil homme. She is under my protection.”
“But I must. I must know the answer to her riddle. She is the light that casts the shadows of all our fates. She is the beginning and the end, the life and the death. She is . . . everything.”
The stranger sped up to Dominic and reached for his head with a grip that could have crushed his skull. He jerked back with a guttural growl of warning. His flesh crawled, compacting around his bones as the beast rose.
A manic light glinted in the wide eyes. No trace of fang showed in his beard. “Don’t you see that?” he said with hands outstretched, beseeching, lost in his own madness. “Don’t you sense that, young one?”
The fervent declaration rattled Dominic in ways he didn’t understand. “All I see is a lunatic blood-drinker.”
The old vampire giggled.
Dominic’s flesh crawled. He could not allow this madman to exist another night, knowing of his lair, lusting after Cassidy’s blood. Wishing he had carried his swords tonight, he was about to dart for the crude and clumsy blade lashed to his bike when the intruder spoke again, this time sounding almost reasonable.
“Then you see only the shadows, blood-child.” Scowling, he shov
ed at his matted hair, but made no effort to straighten the stained flannel shirt or ripped trousers. He wore no shoes. “Like all of them. You can’t see the light. The possibility. Magic has come among us and all you want to do is drop me with your blades.”
Blades, Dominic thought, stunned. Not a reference to the single machete, but the two Samurai swords. What else did this stranger know about him? And, more importantly, how?
A hundred other questions vied for space on his tongue, but the one he voiced was, “Who are you?”
“I am Serge.” The old one brightened and bowed with a dramatic flourish. “I am he who sees.” When he straightened, his good cheer vanished. The stare with which he skewered Dominic made his insides squirm.
Merde. Of all the blood-drinkers he had encountered since being forced to join their ranks, the only one who didn’t try to kill him on sight was also certifiably insane. Although this might be an elaborate game this creature concocted to entertain himself before he killed the youngling he assumed to be helpless and turned to the truly helpless human he craved.
“Tell me, blood-child,” Serge said now, his tone no-nonsense. “What is your best skill? To kill others like us . . . isn’t it?”
“Are you asking for a demonstration?”
“But before you joined us, you didn’t kill anyone, did you?” When Dominic was unable to stop the ironic twitch of his mouth, Serge placed a grubby hand on his chest. “Oh. My mistake.” He looked at Dominic with renewed interest, his head bobbling a little side to side. “Your skill with your swords—your sense of strategy—is your gift. It was so when you were mortal. And now it is perfected in you.”
Dominic’s fists tightened at his sides. How did this scatterbrain know about his martial arts training, much less how he used it? How long had he been stalking Dominic? And how had he not noticed until now? “Fils de salope. I never killed anyone with my swords before coming to this cursed existence.”
Serge ignored the outburst. “When I was mortal, my gift was seeing things that would be. And it is this that my sire chose to make perfect in me.” He pinned Dominic with that piercing, mad look again, his hands wringing before him, expectant. “Do you see?”
Dominic scoffed. “You see the future?”
Exuberant nodding.
“Then do you see how I will remove your head with my swords if you do not leave my property and never return?”
The hands dropped to his sides, disappointed. “Ah, blood-child. You won’t kill me. You need me too much.”
“I need no one.”
Serge bobbled his head first to one side, then the other, squinting. “You will. The redemption you seek cannot be earned on your own.”
A moot point in very short order. If this lunatic were truly clairvoyant, he would know that Dominic would soon be ash.
“She is the key,” Serge said, his voice lowering in a way that made the back of Dominic’s neck prickle. He took a step back, his gentle eyes opening so wide they swallowed his shaggy face in unadulterated awe. “And you . . . you are the lock.” Slow shake of the head. Only his lips moved. “The world of night will never be the same.” Suddenly he cackled and clapped his hands together. “You need me, blood-child. Yes, you need me!”
The last word still hung in the air when Serge disappeared, retreating down the beach in a blur. As the tension drained from Dominic’s body, anger flared to take its place. He’d been tempted to believe the madman, though he wasn’t sure why or even which part. Serge was a derelict, lost to humanity and blood-drinkers alike, a fringe element of existence, little better than a ghost or a nightmare.
Worst of all, he had dared to feed from Cassidy.
“If I see you again, I will kill you,” Dominic promised below his breath.
He pushed the bike around the cottage and into the shed. As he snapped the lock into place on the door, he decided to stay close to home for a while. He had fed well enough this week. He could afford to spend a few nights hunting down and eliminating this threat before it got any closer to Cassidy.
On the porch, he dug the house key out of his pocket. Since she insisted on locking the front door and every downstairs window, he carried this now to avoid a repeat of his awkward trip through her bedroom that first night. As he slid it into the lock, he hesitated.
She is the key. You are the lock.
Somewhere deep inside him, a chord vibrated.
Don’t you sense that, young one?
Shadows shifted around him. Dominic shivered. He turned the key and stepped inside. The door swung shut in his wake, muffling the sounds of the night and wrapping him in a cocoon of her quiet breathing and drowsing heart. He extended his senses toward her, his fellow refugee, his chosen executioner, and felt . . . something. Like a tug at the base of his heart.
Dominic bedded down in his sanctuary and waited for the day to claim him, perhaps for the last time. “Cassidy est la clé,” he whispered. Yes. She was the key. To end his suffering. If—no, when—she could . . . unlock his mystery. His lock.
She is the light that casts the shadows of all our fates. She is the beginning and the end, the life and the death. She is everything.
“Absurdité.” He would kill that irritating old bastard and be done with him—if Dominic survived the day. If he didn’t . . . Serge would be free to indulge his insanity on Cassidy.
He dragged his leaden limbs back to the door. There the sun almost had him again, but Dominic made it back to his bed before collapsing. This time he was certain his door was locked.
Chapter 8
Being Human
Cassidy was desperate. The night couldn’t get here soon enough. Yet the heat and light of a sweltering summer day lingered far into evening. The drawn drapes and the fan spinning at maximum above her prone form didn’t even make a dent in the agony. An invisible ax lay buried in her forehead.
It was without a doubt the worst migraine of her life.
Little wonder it should hit her now, the way the last week had gone and with this one shaping up to be more of the same. Nothing changed for her at the Gazette except the increasing amount of helpless frustration she swallowed with no one to let off steam to. She had even tried to talk to Jackson whose regular calls puzzled her as much as they reassured her. At least someone thought about her enough to check in, even if it turned out he had no idea about how she really felt or why. His glib solution to her problems—drop everything and let him take care of her—set her teeth on edge.
More sympathetic was Samantha, Jackson’s half-sister, who was proud not to be born a Striker. She made no secret of her contempt for the family’s privileged existence and expressed great pleasure at Cassidy’s willingness to confront the Striker patriarchs—which, she confessed, was more than she could say about baby brother.
“Follow your heart, sweetie,” was Samantha the yoga instructor’s sage advice. “You’ll find the life you’re meant to have even if you can’t see it yet.”
Cassidy would have to take her word on that since these days she saw nothing beyond her precarious employment situation and a roommate who tormented her at will. Even though their paths only crossed after Dominic woke and before he left the house, those brief encounters were fraught with tension. It didn’t matter what she did to try and keep the peace, he went out of his way to irritate and criticize her, always with a side of haughty French attitude. Any night now he would tell her how to breathe. No wait. He had already done that when they first met.
“Air conditioning, you bastard.” Cassidy groaned and gasped at the pain radiating through her skull. “How can you live in the tropics and not have air conditioning?” Unbelievable that this was still an issue. He continued to brush off her complaints with an offhand remark about looking into it sometime soon. Enough was enough. As he requested, she had told the agency that the AC functioned after all once s
he figured out the controls. Tomorrow she would call back, report it broken for good and demand immediate repair. To hell with his privacy issues.
On the upside, she only had to deal with him about an hour a day, if that. Otherwise she had the place to herself. Plus, with that chip on his shoulder, there was no risk she might start to ‘like’ him, God forbid. One flippant comment, one arrogant glance, one whiff of cigarette smoke—especially the damn cigarette smoke—and that was the end of any accidental daydreams those striking good looks might have inspired. Civil conversation was beyond the Frenchman, and Cassidy had almost reached the point of ignoring all the sniping—with one exception. She’d left a copy of the paper containing her Valieri case write-up lying around. He read it and found it lacking. The argument that she only did her job as told didn’t impress him.
“Congratulations,” he said with a careless shrug. “You are living up to their low expectations of you.”
The words rankled every time she recalled them, which was often. He knew nothing about her situation, the challenges and biases she faced, and yet, a small voice in the back of her mind dared to wonder if there was a grain of truth there. Jackson expected her to accept his unexpected proposal, and so she had. When he all but showed her the door to leave, she bolted through it without argument. And her job? Writing obits, answering phones, and making coffee was as exciting as anyone felt she ought to get. And so it was.
“No, it’s not,” she croaked. All she needed was half a chance, and she would surprise them all. She had to wait for it—like for everything else—and she would be ready. And I don’t care what you think about it. You’re a total stranger and a colossal pain in the ass.
