Samantha Moon: First Eight Novels, Plus One Novella

by J. R. Rain

  Instead, I found myself about to nod. My ears rang a bit. And my thoughts were fuzzy.

  In fact, I started to nod, then shook my head vigorously. As I did so, I backed up—but not at the reality of an innocent woman who was being bled in the basement below. But at the horror of my very, very strong bloodlust.

  Yesss, came a single word from the depths of my mind. Yesss, yesss, yesss, yesss....

  Fresh blood. Procured unwillingly. Taken against another’s will was her ultimate craving. Such blood, I knew, would feed not me...but her.

  “No,” I heard myself say, as the hissing continued, a long, slow leak just inside my eardrum. “No, thank you.”

  “Are you sure, Samantha Moon? It was tapped for you and you alone. It will be wasted otherwise.”

  Well, in that case... I wanted to say, but I didn’t.

  Tapped, he had said. Like tapping a maple tree. This should have sounded horrific to me. But it didn’t. No, it sounded intriguing. It sounded...interesting. Tell me more about this tapping business, I wanted to say.

  But I didn’t.

  I rubbed my head, pressed my fingers hard into my temples. She was in here somewhere. Where she was, exactly, I didn’t know. But she was getting bolder, stronger.

  No...she was getting desperate.

  She wants out.

  She wants her freedom.

  Her freedom meant my imprisonment, of course.

  I took in a lot of air and held it and willed her out of my mind, and the hissing, finally, faded slowly away. I expelled the air and looked at the compelled couple.

  “No, thank you,” I said again.

  Behind them, the ghost faded in and out of existence. Once or twice, she looked at me, but she was lost. Lost even before death, I suspected. A runaway, I sensed. Lost and forgotten, even in life and death. How many other such spirits were here, I didn’t know, but I suspected more.

  “Why don’t you go home?” I said to the couple.

  “We are home, Samantha Moon,” said the woman.

  “We are very happy here,” said the man.

  I doubted that. I doubted they even knew what they were saying. I suspected that Hanner’s compulsion was so extensive that she controlled them either from afar, or gave them pre-recorded responses, so to speak.

  “Why were you waiting for me?” I asked.

  “Because our mistress said you would come.”

  I looked at them again. Had they been recently fed upon? Hard to know, since vampire wounds inflicted on mortals—those living, that is—healed almost instantly, as was my experience with Allison. But I was suddenly sure of one thing.

  “She was here recently,” I said.

  They said nothing.

  “Tell me, goddammit.”

  They continued smiling, heads tilted to one side. They both blinked together.

  From below, I heard the chained woman crying up through the floorboards. The bleeder, as they had called her. Bleeders, I suspected, didn’t last long in the house of horrors.

  When Hanner had been here, I didn’t know, and how she knew I would come calling, I didn’t know that either.

  No, I thought. She would have known. Everything she had done, thus far, had been orchestrated to lead me here. But why?

  I looked again at the bloody tissue before them.

  “What’s under the napkin?” I asked, although I suddenly didn’t want to know.

  The woman nodded slightly and straightened her head for the first time. She rested the flat of her palms on the table. She held my gaze. “Mistress has a message for you, Samantha Moon.”

  I swallowed and stepped forward. Curious and repulsed at the same time, horrified yet intrigued.

  What’s wrong with me? I thought.

  “Mistress wanted you to see this.”

  And with that, the woman lifted the napkin. Underneath was a severed finger...a pinkie finger with a ring still attached to it. I knew the ring. It was Danny’s pimp ring, as I called it. An ugly garnet ring, too big for any man to wear with a straight face. He loved that ring.

  Had I any color in my face, I suspected it would have drained about now.

  “What the hell did she do with Danny?”

  “We don’t know,” said the man. “But he is the first.”

  “The first what, goddammit?”

  The finger had been neatly severed, with the use of a knife, no doubt. Blood crusted around the open end. I could see the dozens of dark hairs lying flat across one side, beneath the main knuckle.

  “Master wanted you to know that she will systematically kill your entire family until you meet her.”

  “I’m here now,” I said, unable to take my eyes off the pale finger. Oh, Jesus, Danny...

  “Not here, Samantha Moon.”

  “Then where?”

  “She will tell you.”

  “Where is she?”

  “Mistress is busy at the moment.”

  I nearly leaped across the table. Nearly strangled them both. But I couldn’t. They were just the messengers, after all.

  For the first time in a long time, I felt sick to my stomach. “Busy doing what?”

  They both looked at me for a heartbeat or two, and for the briefest of moments, I sensed a small wave of compassion coming from them. But then, that compassion was gone as quickly as it had appeared.

  “She is seeking another.”

  “Another what, goddammit?”

  But they didn’t answer. They only smiled and looked at me and stood together at the far end of the table, heads cocked to one side. As if listening to someone or something I couldn’t hear.

  Chapter Thirty-two

  I was back in my minivan.

  Had my body been any less than it was, I would have been hyperventilating. My hands were shaking as I did my best to dial my sister’s home number without crushing the phone into pieces.

  Now I waited in the dark while the phone rang, the light of the half-moon above coming through the big windshield.

  “C’mon,” I said. “c’mon.”

  Mercifully, thankfully, the call was answered after three rings. It was Jordan, Mary Lou’s husband, a man, I suspected, who knew my secret, although Mary Lou claimed to have never told him.

  “Hi, Sam,” he said pleasantly enough, although I always detected a hint of reservation in his voice.

  “Hi, Jordy,” I said, forcing myself to stay calm. “Can I speak to Mary Lou?”

  “She went out to get some tacos. You can try her cell.”

  I said I would and then asked, as calmly as I could, about my kids.

  “They’re here, playing something called ‘Go, Go, Racer Go.’ Damn game nearly gave me an epileptic seizure.”

  I’d been holding my breath after my question, and expelled it now, perhaps a little too loudly.

  “Is everything okay, Sam?”

  “Yes.”

  He paused. “Are you sure?”

  “Yes,” I said. “I’m going to try Mary Lou now.”

  “Good, and ask her where the hell she is.” He laughed lightly. “She left an hour ago.”

  I nearly hung up on him. I said I would and was soon dialing her number in such a rush that I screwed it up twice, dialing Kingsley both times by mistake. I hung up on him both times.

  I got it right on my third attempt and it rang once.

  “Hello, Samantha,” said a familiar and cold voice. A female voice that instantly shot dread through me.

  The voice, of course, belonged to Hanner.

  Chapter Thirty-three

  “Where’s my sister?”

  “She’s here, Samantha.”

  “If you’ve hurt her—”

  “I have not hurt her, Sam. Not yet. Now, Danny on the other hand, is a different story. Speaking of hands...”

  “What have you done with him?”

  “I remembered your stories, Sam. I remembered how he hurt you and cheated on you and tried to destroy you. Danny is fair game.”

  My stomach dropped. Dan
ny was a bastard...but he didn’t deserve this. He was the father of my kids. A worthless father, yes, but their father, nonetheless.

  “Is he dead?” I asked.

  “Not yet, Samantha. But he will be. Along with your sister.” She paused ever so slightly. “And you, too, of course.”

  I detected a strange note in her voice. Her answers were monotone, automatic. I also detected a slight hiss. “I’m not speaking to Detective Hanner, am I?”

  “You are perceptive, Sssamantha Moon.” The hiss was stronger now, more pronounced.

  “If you kill me,” I said, “then you kill her, too.”

  I was, of course, referring to the demon within me.

  “Not quite, Sssamantha. Our sssister has decided that you are too problematic, too difficult. She wishes to move into a new host. We have the perfect host with us. She looks remarkably like you, Sssamantha. But, we suspect, she will be much more manageable.”

  I ran my fingers through my thick hair. “I must die for her to leave me?”

  “You are a fassst learner, Missss Moon.”

  “Who are you, godammit? Why are you doing this?”

  “Yes, we are damned, very damned. Which is exactly why we are doing this.”

  “What do you want with me?” I asked.

  “We want you to die, Samantha Moon. And our host, here, your one-time friend Detective Hanner, is just the one to do it.”

  “What have you done with my sister?”

  “She’s here with us, Sam. Sitting quietly in the front seat like a good girl. Like a good future host. We suspect she will be much, much more manageable.”

  “If you fucking touch her...”

  “We will do much more than touch her, Samantha. But first, of course, you must die.”

  I took in a lot of air. I couldn’t get a read on Hanner, as she was immortal. And I couldn’t get a read on my sister, either, as she was my blood relative. Dammit. I couldn’t even get a read on Danny, as he and I had never connected deeply enough to develop that bond, which told me a lot about my ex-husband.

  “What do you want me to do?” I asked.

  “We want you to meet us, Sssamantha. We have a good place in mind for you to die.”

  Then, the demon told me where to go, although this time she sounded very much like Hanner.

  And then the line went dead.

  Chapter Thirty-four

  I was at Allison’s apartment in Beverly Hills.

  It was all I could do not to call Kingsley again. In fact, I had nearly done so as I drove to Allison’s house in a blind rush. Yes, I nearly flew there, too. But the truth was, I wanted the hour drive from Orange County to Beverly Hills to think this through. And I knew I needed the van to bring Mary Lou home and take Danny to…a hospital.

  That drive hadn’t helped much.

  The thinking soon turned to panic, and I didn’t accomplish anything other than nearly killing a half dozen other drivers as I whipped around them recklessly, aiming my screaming minivan to Beverly Hills, and to Allison’s place.

  Now she was sitting at a table with a rolled-up napkin in front of her. A rolled-up napkin with bloodstains. Allison looked sick. She should have looked sick. There was, after all, a severed finger in front of her.

  “This can’t be happening, Sam.”

  I was pacing in front of her. I was alternately wringing my hands and shaking them, trying to come to terms with the fact that a rogue vampire possessed by a hellish demon currently had my sister...and Danny.

  Danny. How the devil had he gotten in on this?

  I didn’t know, but I had his finger and ring in a rolled-up napkin to prove it. And I’d had Hanner answering my sister’s cell phone to prove she had Mary Lou, too.

  “Yes,” I said to Allison, who had, undoubtedly, been following my hectic train of thought. “This is happening.”

  “But I don’t understand, Sam. Why drag you out to...where is it? I’m seeing a tunnel system in your thoughts?”

  “It’s a cavern,” I said, “beneath the Los Angeles River.”

  “Where’s that?”

  “Not far from here,” I said. I had to Google Map it, too, being an Orange County girl myself. “It flows between Griffith Park and Glendale.”

  “You mean that big ditch.”

  “That big ditch was once a natural river, and had only within the past seventy-five years been controlled and cemented.”

  “And did you say beneath the river?”

  “Yes.”

  “What, exactly, is beneath the river?”

  “An old cave network and something that, I think, is a cavern, from the way Hanner described it.”

  “A cavern? Under the river?”

  “Under it or close to it, which is why I need you now.”

  Allison, who was tuned into my mind and following my thoughts almost as fast as I could think them, said, “Oh, gross.”

  “It’s the only way, Allison. I can’t lock onto my sister or Fang or even Danny. And even if I could, my range only goes so far.”

  Her range was, of course, potentially global. In fact, there didn’t seem to be any limit to Allison’s ability to see distantly. Remote viewing, as it was called in psychic circles.

  Earlier, after getting directions to the underground caverns beneath the Los Angeles River, I’d dashed back in the house, where I had found the newlyweds sitting and standing in the same position I had left them in, and snatched the finger and the napkin.

  Now, it was sitting in front of Allison, who’d been staring down at it for the past ten minutes.

  “Please, Allison. I need your help.”

  The color had drained from her face instantly when she’s caught on what was inside the napkin. She’d been pale ever since. I was fairly certain she’d yet to look away from the wrapped package sitting before her. Finally, she nodded. “He went through a lot of pain, Sam.”

  “I can imagine.”

  “But...” she trailed off, but I caught her psychic hit just as it occurred to her.

  “Jesus,” I said.

  “Yes, Sam. He’s involved with this somehow. Entangled. Not completely innocent.”

  I shook my head and swore and cursed my ex-husband all over again. My stupid, stupid ex-husband. So stupid that he had lost a finger.

  “He was trying to exact revenge,” said Allison.

  “Did you just say exact revenge?”

  “Yes. I know it sounds cheesy, but that’s the feeling I get. He was trying to get back at you, somehow. To stop you somehow. To control you somehow.”

  “And he teamed up with Hanner.”

  “Or she teamed up with him,” said Allison.

  “He made a deal with the devil,” I said. “Literally.”

  Allison nodded and we both looked down at the wrapped finger. Yes, Danny had paid a heavy price for his stupidity—and his hate for me, but I didn’t have time to think about that now. I had to see what I was up against. I had to see—through Allison’s remote viewing—what the hell was going on.

  “It’s time, Allison,” I said.

  We both knew what that meant. She nodded, then slowly reached forward and began unrolling the greasy napkin. As she did so, she calmly got up, walked over to the nearby bathroom, and wretched for a half minute. She came back, wiping her mouth, gave me a weak smile, and then sat before the still-rolled up napkin.

  She undid it completely...and, after taking a deep breath and visibly fighting the rising vomit at the back of her throat, took hold of the severed finger in both her hands.

  Chapter Thirty-five

  “I see him,” said Allison.

  I saw him, too, but I waited for her to make sense of what she was seeing, for her to focus, to hone in, to get a feel for the place. To, quite literally, slip inside.

  More details came through.

  In her thoughts, I saw Danny in a chair. No, a desk. Perhaps a high school desk, as he seemed to fit in it well enough. Both arms were lying across the flat surface of the desk. Both arms we
re secured with duct tape. Both hands hung over the lip of the desk. Blood dripped steadily from the gaping maw where his right pinkie had been. The wound itself looked badly infected...and old. How long Danny had been down there, I didn’t know. I realized I hadn’t heard from him in about a week. Nothing unusual about that. He saw the kids every other week. And sometimes, he even missed those dates. I’d gone as long as two or three weeks without hearing from the sleazy bastard.

  Danny looked like hell, and my heart went out to him, despite everything. I forgot that he had turned on me...and that his current situation was, apparently, a direct result of him trying to hurt me.

  As I watched him sobbing and shaking, I saw the chains around his bare ankles. The skin was bloody and raw and mostly peeled away. Dried blood pooled around his bare feet. For once, in a long time, the sight of blood did not trigger a hunger in me. The sight of Danny and his wounds, instead, triggered a deep sadness...

  And anger.

  Although I could see what Allison could see, she got a far better picture than I ever could: “I see a big room. Rock walls. Yes, a cavern. It appears natural, although some of it could have been chiseled. Danny is in the room, crying softly to himself. I can feel his fear, his pain, his self-hatred. He hates that he put himself into this mess, hates you even more for introducing him to this dark world. A part of him, a very small part of him, understands that this wasn’t your fault, that your attack seven years ago was unprovoked, that you, in fact, never asked for this. That small part of him is overshadowed by his fear and hatred for you, Sam. He feels abandoned and humiliated and angry.”

  “Is he alone?” I asked.

  “Hold on...”

  And now, Allison’s perspective widened further as she searched the room. She might as well have been an actual bat, swooping around the room. Her remote viewing ability was uncanny. Then again, I didn’t know much about any of this. Maybe her abilities were normal for one who allowed a vampire to feed from her. Maybe the newlyweds in Hanner’s home had such abilities, too.

  Or not. I knew Allison had started out as psychic, and that my feeding upon her only made her more psychic. And, of course, she had been a witch down through the ages. And so had I.