Northern Bites (Aurora Sky: Vampire Hunter, Vol. 2)

by Jefford, Nikki

  “No, but someone attacked her and then suddenly she’s in Alaska undergoing training.”

  “And you assume Jared did this?”

  “Did Jared recruit Valerie?” I asked back.

  Melcher turned away. He cleared his throat softly. “That is a heavy accusation, Aurora.”

  “Yeah, well, I just witnessed him on a murderous rampage.”

  The driver took a sharp turn. I grabbed the door handle to keep from leaning toward Melcher. I looked out the window after the car straightened out. I knew this road. My mom, dad, and I once biked it to get to the Coastal Trail. Eventually we’d hit Point Woronzof Road. The last time I’d been out this way was with Fane.

  This is where it had all ended.

  It’s where I’d gotten a glimpse of Fane the Vampire. Fane, the predator who chased girls through the woods. Fane, who would have bitten me if he hadn’t been shocked to see bite marks across my skin after he ripped my scarf off.

  But then he’d been so sweet afterwards. He’d answered my questions and given me space. He said he’d never killed anyone and I believed him. Even though he couldn’t bite me, he still wanted to be with me.

  I’d asked for time to think. He asked how much, and I’d countered with, “What do you mean how much time? You have all the time in the world.”

  That doesn’t make the seconds away from you go by any faster.

  What happened to that guy? The nice one? Vampires seemed to have a bit of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde in them. Except in Jared’s case. He was all Hyde.

  “Jared was doing his job,” Melcher answered evenly. “Something he told me you and Miss Ward failed to do.”

  That jerk!

  “We were a little too busy defending ourselves to carry out Jared’s command to execute an innocent girl.”

  Melcher started talking the moment I finished. “I assure you that Giselle Morrel is no innocent girl. Her killing spree has spanned the better part of two centuries, and now she remains on the loose.”

  Lovely. At least she hadn’t seen our faces.

  I straightened in my chair. “Maybe if you’d briefed us, we would have known what to expect. Better yet, maybe we wouldn’t have freaked out if you’d told us Jared was a vampire and you were okay with that.”

  Melcher frowned. “Jared’s status is classified. It appears he could have gone about things a little better, but if you had stuck to his plan, Giselle would have been put to rest and Miss Ward wouldn’t have panicked and taken off.”

  Again, I supposed it should come as no surprise that Melcher didn’t need to wait for me to arrive to have the full bloody scoop on what had gone down. Still, he’d better give me a chance to tell my version. Not that it looked like he cared much.

  “So you’ve spoken to Jared?” I asked.

  Melcher nodded once. “As soon as he woke up.”

  “I suppose you had him released.”

  “He’s on his way back tonight.”

  I wrapped my arms around my chest tightly and stared out my window. The snow-covered trees and mountains across the inlet looked like a scene from a postcard.

  Wish I weren’t here.

  “How did you pull that one off?” We’d left Jared in a house full of bodies practically holding a smoking gun.

  Melcher glanced at me briefly. “I told the police what they needed to hear. Jared is an undercover agent who spent the last year tracking down a family with terrorist ties. He showed up to investigate and they opened fire. He had no choice. The girl got away.”

  How convenient—for Jared. “I’m afraid of him,” I admitted.

  Melcher did the head bob again. “You should be. He’s one of the infected but a necessary evil all the same. Jared started out as my top informant. He knows vampires from centuries back—all around the world. Even with the resources I have at my fingertips, I could never come close to identifying and tracking the vampires Jared has led me to. After he proved his loyalty to this unit, I promoted him to top recruiter.”

  My head snapped in Melcher’s direction. “And it’s never struck you as odd that accidents just happen to occur the moment he’s around?”

  “Accidents happen all the time,” Melcher said calmly. “The world works in mysterious ways.”

  In other words, Melcher had granted Jared carte blanche. I glared.

  “I’ll look into it,” he said. “I’ll even put Jared on suspension while I do. I hold him responsible for last night’s failures. As team leader, it was his duty to get the job done and return with every member of his team.”

  “What about Valerie?” I asked.

  “I know that she took flight sixty-two to Sea-Tac International, which landed…” Melcher checked his wristwatch. “Twenty minutes ago. This isn’t the first time a member of this unit panicked. She’ll come back on her own or I’ll send an escort. Miss Ward knows the rules.”

  That’s just the thing. I was pretty sure Valerie was playing by her own rules now.

  I leaned forward in my seat, feeling anxious for the driver to turn the car around and take me home. A shower would be nice. So would sleep. If I actually could sleep knowing Jared was on his way back.

  “Have you called Dante and Noel back to town?” I asked.

  “Dante and Miss Harper have come across some interesting information. I’m keeping them on stakeout for the time being.”

  I felt my shoulders sag. I wanted people I could talk to. I wanted my friends back.

  “What about Mike?” I asked.

  Melcher gave me the same blank look Jared had. This was really starting to unnerve me. “Jared claims he found Crist’s cross at the Morrel house, but he didn’t find any link to Mike.”

  “The case is closed, Aurora,” Melcher said in one of his most clipped tones. “It was a double homicide and justice has been served.”

  “But how are they linked? The last time I saw Mike he was at Marcus’s party.”

  Melcher sighed. “I am not at liberty to discuss the details, Aurora, but it is likely Agent Crist was patrolling around Marcus’s townhouse the night of the party.”

  I relaxed my arms and fidgeted with my fingers in my lap. “Did she do that often? Go out on patrol? I didn’t think she was a field agent.”

  “I am not at liberty to discuss Agent Crist’s involvement in our unit, Aurora,” he repeated. “Our work has its dangers. It’s one of the greatest duties on the planet. At the end of the day, Agent Crist was privileged to sacrifice her life in the line of duty.”

  I tapped my leg in agitation. And Mike? What about him? I doubted he’d consider it a privilege to die for no good reason before he got a chance to live his life.

  According to Melcher, justice had been served. I still couldn’t swallow it. Jared had said nothing about Crist or Mike when confronting Henriette and Andre. Wouldn’t he have mentioned it? Maybe whatever past hang ups they had were more important in the eleventh hour than two more dead bodies.

  I stopped tapping my leg. “Jared knew the Morrel’s,” I said. “They called him Xavier. He used to be married to Henriette.”

  “How do you know this?”

  “I overheard them talking.”

  Melcher muttered something under his breath. His next words were as calm as ever. “Since you are already aware of Jared’s connection to the Morrel family, there is no harm in filling you in on a few details. I feel at this point it would be worse not to.”

  Okay, so fill me in. I urged Melcher with my eyes.

  He took a deep breath that came out like a sigh. “Back in the eighteen hundreds, Jared was a vampire in Paris. His name back then was Xavier. Henriette posed as his wife, Etienne and Giselle as their children, and Andre as Xavier’s brother. They were body snatchers.”

  “Body snatchers?”

  Melcher nodded. “Grave robbers. They dug up fresh corpses and sold them to medical schools for dissection.”

  I wrinkled my nose.

  “A body snatcher could make over a thousand francs in a single night. A small
fortune back then. But the Morrel’s didn’t stop at corpses. In their greed, they began murdering people then selling their bodies for even more profit.”

  I shivered involuntarily.

  “This practice was known as burking, named after the Irishman and murderer William Burke. Victims were smothered and suffocated, resulting in a speedy death with no signs of violence. This also produced the freshest possible corpse. In an era without refrigeration, you can begin to understand how a steady supply of fresh corpses was in high demand among the medical community.”

  Yep, sounded like Jared all right. There it was again, that sick feeling in the pit of my stomach.

  Melcher had a similar look of distaste on his face. “Xavier was caught and taken to La Force prison to await trial.”

  “What happened?” I asked, leaning forward.

  “There was a cholera outbreak. Most of the prisoners died. Xavier did not.”

  “And then?”

  “He was released.”

  I stared at Melcher, but he didn’t continue. He could be really maddening at times—like all the time! He leaned forward and caught the eye of the driver in the rearview mirror. Melcher made a circular motion with his finger. The driver turned into the parking lot at Point Woronzof and looped around. “I’ll take you home now,” he said.

  “Do I need to worry about Jared?”

  “Once Jared has been debriefed I am sending him to the lower forty-eight. You have nothing to worry about, Aurora. I can terminate Jared at any time, and he knows it.”

  What? Like some kind of kill switch in his brain? It wouldn’t surprise me. I bet Jared loved that. Maybe Melcher was the one who should watch his back.

  “If you’re up for it, you can go to school tomorrow.” He flashed me a smile.

  I wanted to graduate and all, but I would be lying if I said I wasn’t dreading my return to West with Noel gone and Mike’s letterman jacket still in my locker.

  Maybe I could skip going to my locker the rest of the week. I only had two days to get through. I could make it.

  “Aside from letting Giselle go, I want you to know you did well, Aurora. You didn’t panic. You came home, and that says a lot about your commitment to the program. That is why I am happy to tell you that you’ve been approved for summer training once the school year ends. You’ll even get to go out of state.”

  Did he really expect me to jump for joy over spending my summer stuck at boot camp? “Is this mandatory?”

  “It’s not only mandatory, it’s a step up to official agent status. It also means you’ll be eligible to mentor new recruits after you have a few more missions under your belt.”

  Just how many young AB negative people did they anticipate biting the dust each year? Is that why Jared was being sent away? To speed up the recruiting process?

  I narrowed my eyes, studying Melcher’s unblemished face. Did he believe in the cause enough to actually hurt young people in order to get them in the program?

  Melcher kept smiling. “Don’t worry. You’ll do great.”

  “Where are you sending me?”

  “I can’t tell you that until it’s time to go.”

  “Of course not,” I said with a grumble.

  “And we’ll have you back in plenty of time to start your college classes.” Melcher leaned toward me. “You did still want to go to college, didn’t you, Aurora?”

  “Yes.”

  He sat back. “Good.”

  We drove back in relative silence. I turned my head away from Melcher and stared out my window. My breath spread across the glass in a fog that lingered then disappeared.

  “What if Valerie doesn’t come back?” I asked while we waited for traffic to pass before turning onto my road. I glanced at Melcher. Not that I needed to. I could see the smile on his face in my mind before my eyes ever reached him.

  “If she doesn’t come back, we’ll bring her back.”

  I just hoped that wasn’t why Jared was headed to the lower forty-eight. I wouldn’t wish him on anybody. Not even Valerie.

  As soon as Melcher dropped me off I sent her a quick text. I didn’t know why and I didn’t know if she’d even get it, but it was something I had to do.

  Melcher knows which flight you’re on.

  17

  It’s Complicated

  I woke up late Thursday. Well, to hell with school. One more day wasn’t going to make a difference. As soon as I saw the time on my digital clock, I stuffed my head under my pillow. Third period could go on without me.

  I bit the bullet Friday and went to school. I hadn’t made it past third period when one of Mike’s friends got in my face and yelled, “What happened to Mike? He said he was meeting you at a party and then he ended up dead!”

  I cowered at the accusation in his voice. Me, Aurora Sky, vampire hunter let a high school boy intimidate her in the hallway.

  “I’m so sorry,” I stammered. “I don’t know what happened.”

  “Well, he’s dead because of you.” Such hatred in those eyes. Boy did he know how to make an exit. He said his lines and left, leaving them to linger in my brain like a scar I was stuck living with for the rest of my life.

  People in the hallway stared. Let them. This wasn’t my high school. I had no friends here. I had no life. Just passing through.

  I couldn’t wait to get my goddamn diploma and get out.

  At the end of the day, I waited until the school emptied out to open my locker. I swear that the small metal enclosure had become permeated with Mike’s scent. I yanked his letterman jacket off the hook in the far back and wadded it into my hands.

  Halfway down the hall I saw a big plastic wastebasket. I clutched the jacket to my chest then dropped it in the moment I stood over the trash bin. I looked over my shoulder. Why did it feel as though I was disposing of a body?

  Outside, my mom waited at the curbside for a change. I got into the car and yanked the door closed behind me. “How was school?” she asked.

  “Sucky,” I said, staring out the front windshield.

  “At least it’s the weekend.”

  Yeah, so? I kept staring out the window. Mom did her loop around Benson Boulevard. “Taco Bell again?” I asked.

  “I have a lot to deal with right now,” she said defensively. Her voice went back to normal when she rolled down her window and ordered a taco salad, Mexican pizza, and nachos. “What would you like?” she asked in her even voice.

  “I’m not hungry.”

  “You need to eat something.”

  “Maybe I should drink blood instead.” Mom wasn’t the only one whose mood was slipping. I felt myself going to a dark place. I’d been there before, and it never did me any good.

  Mom added a bean burrito and a pink lemonade freeze to the order. Right, cause I really wanted to drink something with the word “freeze” in it.

  Once we were home I changed into my running gear. Instead of going through the woods, I ran down the street to the bike trail across the road. I had my ear buds in but no music playing. I jogged up to the corner were I’d had my accident then paced along the curve, staring at it from every angle.

  I could still see it in my head: the frosted trees along the road, the oncoming vehicle, my dashboard, the windshield…then nothing.

  I pictured Jared driving along a couple seconds later, happy to see another person about to lose her humanity.

  “Another One Bites the Bust” by Queen started spinning through my mind.

  I ripped my ear buds out, but it kept going. It was all in my head.

  Mom had The Vampire Diaries on when I returned home. The pink lemonade sat on the kitchen counter where she’d left it, the slush slowly turning to liquid, condensation dripping down the side to form a wet ring. I took a shower, blew my hair dry, and stuck my ear buds in and listened to music while carefully applying makeup. Nothing too heavy duty. Just a bit of eyeliner, shadow, mascara, and lipstick. I left Dante’s bear claw in the top drawer of my nightstand.

  I dialed Marcu
s and stared at my phone for several minutes before hitting send.

  “Black beauty,” he answered.

  I took a steadying breath. “Hi, Marcus. You wouldn’t happen to be throwing a party tonight?”

  Marcus chuckled then stopped. “It’s Friday.”

  I’m pretty sure that meant, what do you think? “Great, so you don’t mind if I show up?”

  “Are you coming alone?”

  Oh God, I didn’t want to have to talk about Mike. Marcus probably already had his hopes up. If I told him Mike had died after stopping by he might take it as a personal affront again and try to hunt down the offender. My lips twitched. It would serve Jared right if Marcus went after him. Jared had tried to pin it on the party host, after all. If anyone could take on Jared, I’d put money on Marcus. He’d killed Renard for abducting a guest. Jared had actually killed a guest—Andre.

  “Yes.” But I didn’t plan on being alone for long.

  Mom wasn’t too happy when I told her I’d called a cab so I could go “check on something for work.”

  Or when I told her not to wait up.

  I called Fane from the cab. I didn’t even hesitate. Valerie was right. It was time to wear the proverbial thong. I’m sure this isn’t what she had in mind, but she’d skipped town and taken her threats right along with her. Not that it mattered anymore. Not if Melcher already knew about Fane and wanted him alive for information. Like Jared. I doubted Fane would work for Team Vampire Hunter if Melcher approached him. I’d just have to hope Melcher never gave him an ultimatum.

  “Aurora Sky,” Fane answered in his mocking tone.

  “Hello, Fane,” I replied back. “I’m just on my way to Marcus’s. It would be great to see you again. I so enjoyed our last meet up.”

  “Are you drunk?” Fane asked suddenly, his voice changing.

  “No, but I will be,” I said, and hung up. I turned my phone off before dropping it inside my purse.

  If Melcher could fraternize with vampires and bend the rules, so could I.

  I threw my arms around Marcus as soon as I entered the palace. He let out a deep laugh and patted my shoulder. “Rough week, my pet?”