by Anna Abner
She accepted the insulated backpack, slightly ruffled by his estimation of her appearance. A corpse? Geez, don’t overwhelm me with too much romance all at once, big guy. She went through the contents. A canteen of water. She could handle that. The rest was convenience store snacks. She inspected a bag of beef jerky. Not in a million years.
“I’m a vegetarian.” She seized the canteen but pushed the rest toward Connor.
Thus far on her family history tour, the produce was by far the worst thing—nothing organic, nothing local, lots of frozen veggies. Luckily, her aunt and uncle were willing to cooperate with her, and Aunt Natalie made a swoon-worthy pot of beans with pepper and garlic. It might be the only thing she’d miss about Nevada when she returned home.
“You’re anemic.” Connor produced a red apple and a pack of peanuts. “Eat. Please.”
Ali accepted the snacks because he was right. She’d lost a lot of blood, and she needed to regain her strength. And they were still half an hour from Paradise. Or fifteen minutes considering the way Roz drove.
When they eventually arrived, she must tell her aunt and uncle about Stefan. And it might be easier if she didn’t feel like death warmed over when she did it.
She chewed slowly and watched Connor out of the corner of her eye. She inspected everything from his long legs and strong hands to his soft, worn T-shirt. It had been a long time since she’d felt anything about a man. Trusting people was not her strong suit. She knew, instinctively, that she’d never be able to fully commit to anyone without revealing too much. So, she had put aside thoughts of relationships and focused her attention on work and school. But this wasn’t real life, this was a vacation turned supernatural disaster. It couldn’t hurt to look and enjoy it too.
The moment the fruit and protein hit Ali’s stomach, warmth spread to her arms, legs, and brain. She could do this. So, she dug her phone from her purse and called her uncle.
“Alina? Where are you? Are you okay?” Her uncle’s gruff voice, wired from worry, choked her up a bit.
“Hey,” she said, keeping her emotion in check. The last thing she wanted was to panic him even worse. “I’m okay, but our bus was attacked.” Silence. Ali spoke fast. “I’m coming to you. A couple of good Samaritans are giving me a ride.”
He didn’t say anything right away, which concerned her. Why was he so quiet? Why wasn’t he peppering her with questions?
“Let me talk to Stefan.”
“I can’t.” Ali was going to lose it, and her dad would have been furious to hear her crying in front of strangers. “See you soon.” She ended the call. Two seconds later her phone vibrated against her palm, but she turned it off and jammed it way down into the bottom of her purse.
How was she going to tell her family about Stefan? Should she flower it up? Say they’d fought like warriors? Or say she’d run like a scaredy-cat and hadn’t done anything to protect her cousin?
Ali hung her head, sickened by her own cowardice. And that, on top of all the other emotions coursing through her, triggered a switch. For a moment, she let it build, and then she wrenched back control. Except it didn’t want to go to sleep.
She closed her eyes and visualized. It usually helped. In her mind’s eye, she punched the darkness down behind her ribs and hammered a lid on top. But she was weak from the blood loss, and probably in shock, and the imaginary box rattled.
Pain. It was a last resort, and it always worked. She dug her fingernails, hard, into the palms of both hands.
“Maksim Volk killed your cousin?”
Ali jerked her head up, forgetting for a second that she wasn’t alone. But her control returned, and she carefully retracted her nails from her flesh.
“Yes.”
Connor glanced her way. “Do you, um, want to talk about it, or…?”
“Not for as long as I live.”
“Gotcha.”
Ali gazed at Connor’s rifle. “Have you ever shot anyone? Besides the vampire this morning?”
“Volk?” He leaned forward, but didn’t look at her. “I wish it had been a kill shot.”
“If we passed a suspicious person standing on the side of the road, would you kill them?” There was an edge to her voice, but she couldn’t help it. She’d had a bad day, and it wasn’t over yet.
“I don’t use it for recreation.” He turned and caught her eye. “I kill infecteds. I’ve never confused a vampire for a normal human being, if that’s your question.”
“Infecteds are human beings.”
He scowled at her, his expression darkening. “They’re vicious, mindless, killing machines. The deadliest kind of predator. They need blood, and they’re willing to do anything to consume it. That’s not human behavior.”
“Maybe there’s a cure.” She didn’t hear about it much anymore, but ten years ago on the anniversary of the vampire attack, experts crowed about discovering something like a flu shot for vampirism. But time passed, none materialized, and topics changed.
He shook his head. “There is no cure.”
Ali played with fire, and she didn’t know how far she could push either one of these people. The safe thing, the smart thing, would be to sit still and shut up. “There must be something you can do besides kill them.” Her voice was low, nearly drowned out by the roar of the engine and the parched air whipping through the open window. But they heard her because they both turned to stare simultaneously.
Connor answered first. “I don’t know how much you’ve heard about the infection, but it does specific things to your body. One, it needs blood to live. So all you think about is feeding your new addiction. Two,” he held up his fingers, “it elongates your incisors so you can easily puncture flesh. Three, it boosts muscle production so your body is fast enough and strong enough to get to the blood.”
His hands tightened on his weapon, and Ali curled inward the tiniest bit.
“The vampire that attacked you?” He stabbed his finger at the windshield, though the infected was long gone. “He would have bitten open your throat, sucked the blood from your body and then torn out your liver with his teeth. And he wouldn’t have felt any worse about it than a dog does when it kills a cat. In fact, when he finished with you, he would’ve done the same to me and then to Roz. How are you gonna help someone like that?” He shook his head. “You can’t. The person Maksim Volk was is gone forever. The person he used to be would beg me to save him from the monster he’s become.”
Despite Ali scowling at the side of his face, Connor kept up his rant. “Listen, the fact is, if you could convince someone to bring in rubber bullets and tear gas, it would only destroy more innocent lives. People are not prepared for real, live infecteds. These creatures will dig through walls, ceilings, and floors until their fingers are nothing but bones. They will eat through concrete.”
Her anger rose in response to the tone of his voice. She might be just a shopgirl, but she wasn’t a dumb kid. She might know things he didn’t, considering he lived like a cartoon miner in the middle of the desert. Was it so hard for him to admit there might be opposing theories on the infection?
“How is it different than sneaking into a cancer ward and killing patients?”
Connor stiffened, looking ready to lay into her when Roz slammed her hand on the steering wheel. “You know what the worst thing about it is, Miss High And Mighty?” she said. “The government could stop all this.” She gestured to the dusty expanse surrounding them. “They could capture Oleksander and that weasel Volk. The CDC could come in, isolate the infected, and discover a cure. They could restore peace and security pretty freaking quickly, but they don’t.”
Roz speared Ali with a heated stare and continued, “Because no one in Paris or London or New York gives a shit what happens in Nevada. It’s like when tribes slaughter each other in Africa. No one blinks. You’re lucky if the disappearances even get a mention in the news. You think anyone out there is gonna hear about your bus being attacked? Or all the people murdered? No. Because Oleksander can get aw
ay with anything out here. If this were Italy or China, fighter planes would be flying overhead. A cure for vampirism?” She laughed. “As long as it never affects anyone’s bottom line, no one cares.”
Chapter Four
Ali scratched the stitches in her neck through the bandage, nervously, almost compulsively. The vampire slayers looked anxious. Not a good thing. The last time she’d been in Paradise, infecteds hadn’t even been on her radar. Now, through the windshield, she checked every bush, every shadow, and every doorway for signs of one.
“My spider sense is tingling,” Roz mumbled, slowing down. “I’m going out on a limb and saying there’s a forty percent chance of vampire activity in the area.”
“Why?” Ali asked. “What do you see?”
The perfectly plotted neighborhoods of Paradise, Nevada were silent and empty. Far ahead, a mustard-colored vehicle turned west at the crossroads and sped off, but that was the only sign of life. Connor and Roz hardly moved, both watching the yellow car fade from sight.
At the city limits, Roz eased her foot off the gas, steering along the town’s winding streets.
In the last eight hours, Paradise had become a ghost town. Not that it was a bustling metropolis at ten that morning, but now, at six at night, it was deserted. Whether anyone was hiding behind closed doors and pulled curtains was hard to say, but they sure as hell were staying quiet and unseen.
The Ford F-350 cruised by a post office and a Mexican restaurant as if in slow motion. That morning people had gathered to eat and run errands. No one was there now. Everything was wrong, like it had been in the tour bus right before the Molotov cocktail exploded inside. The Twilight Zone had nothing on the Nevada desert today.
Connor fidgeted in his seat. “It’s too quiet.”
“What does that mean?” Her uncle was there. Her aunt and cousins, too. Lord, if you have any sympathy at all…
Ali pointed south at the next street crossroads, and they turned. Her uncle’s house lay ahead on the right. No movement, not even a curtain ruffling in the breeze.
She couldn’t do this again.
Her first night in Nevada, at a hotel in Las Vegas, she’d overheard a young couple question the pretty concierge about vampires kept at a secret base. The woman had smiled and batted her fake lashes. It’s an urban legend. And even if they were, you’re not even headed in their direction. No worries. She’d totally poo-poo’d the dangers.
That bitch. She should have said, Run for your life. Go, now, while you still can.
Connor aimed his rifle at the house. “Roz. Any movement?” Vampires. That’s what he really meant. Do you see any vampires?
“Not yet.”
“My family,” Ali hissed.
They pulled into the yard, and her fear escalated into terror. Ron, her cousin, laid half in and half out of the front door. Dead.
Why weren’t there already police cars and ambulances lining the street? Had vampires eaten the entire neighborhood?
Sod it. Her family was in there somewhere. Ali bolted out of the truck, scrambling over Connor, falling in the dirt and dropping her purse. She didn’t stop to pick it up, but rushed right over her cousin’s body to find her aunt and uncle. She heard Roz and Connor behind her warning her to wait, but she didn’t care for her own safety. Not when her family needed her.
She found her uncle in the back yard, spread eagle on the stone patio next to the fire pit.
“Sully!” She skidded on her knees beside him, half falling onto his chest. “Uncle Sully?”
He blinked and tilted his face toward her, but the puncture wounds in the side of his throat opened and blood seeped out, dribbling into his collar. Blood soaked his shirt, his hair, and the dry stone beneath him.
So much blood. Too much.
He groaned, “Alina.”
“What happened?”
“It’s obvious, isn’t it?” Roz’s voice behind her.
Ali ignored her. “Uncle Sully?”
“Oleksander,” he said, his voice a throaty moan. “He came for you.”
“What?” Her vision blurred. No. Why would Oleksander the Destroyer want her? “That’s not—”
“Your real name is Anya,” he breathed, so quiet no one but Ali could have overheard. “From Nadvirna.”
“What?”
His eyelids fluttered. “Your father tried to protect you. We all tried…”
Ali heard Roz and Connor talking behind her, a tense, rapid back and forth.
“Did he say Oleksander himself?” Connor. “We missed him. Goddamnit!”
“We’ve got to get to a better defensive position. There could be others.” Roz.
“Fuck that. This may be my best chance.”
“No.”
He made a beeline for his rust-colored truck, leaving Roz standing in the yard.
It was such a quick look, tracking Connor’s exit. Up, down. But when Ali glanced back, her uncle had stopped breathing. In the moment they’d distracted her, she’d missed Sully’s final breaths. He was dead.
“Please.” Ali shook her uncle, and his head wobbled.
Ali heard Roz and Connor’s quick footsteps round the house and head for the road, and then the truck door slammed, but she refused to look away from her uncle again. They could kill each other for all she cared.
“Stop!” Roz shouted at her friend.
“I have to do this!” Connor shouted back.
“Don’t be a stupid ass.” Roz must have kicked the truck, or hit it with something hard.
“Keep your eye on her. Don’t go home. Take her to the abandoned gas station we stayed in that time. I’ll meet up with you later.”
“You can’t fight him alone!”
He sped off, sand and gravel pelting the side of the house.
Swearing under her breath, Roz marched across the yard, halting six inches from Ali’s hip. “Do you have a working vehicle?”
“In the garage,” she answered, keeping her eyes on her uncle. She wouldn’t look away again. “Keys are in the kitchen.”
“Good, let’s go.”
“I’m staying here.” There was so much to do. Overwhelming things. Search for survivors. Alert the police. Bury her family.
Roz grabbed her upper arm in a death grip and yanked Ali to her feet. “No. You’re not.”
“Let me go,” Ali hissed, tears threatening. She was a hair’s breadth from breaking down completely. The pain inside her, the cube of emotion she kept bolted down behind her ribcage, threatened to crack open. She would burst with it, be consumed by it.
She inhaled deeply, and then held that breath, locking her emotions away. It worked, for the moment, but her control was spotty today.
“Leave me alone.” Her voice shook.
“I don’t have time to stand here arguing with you! You’re coming with me because Connor’s trying to kill himself, and I can’t do everything by myself. So suck it up, and let’s go. Now.”
When a massive and unexpected coronary event had taken her father’s life six weeks earlier, Ali had missed it. She’d been at work in the jewelry shop and gotten a call that her dad was gone. Not sick, not in danger. Gone.
One moment she was part of a family, and the next she was alone.
Ali dug in her heels and yanked her arm free, sending Roz off balance. “I’m not going anywhere.” There was no way in hell she’d run off with this bitch and leave her family to rot. Not gonna happen. “Thanks for the ride, but good-bye.”
Roz glared at her, both fists clenched. For a second, it looked like she was going to hit her. And Ali didn’t care. She’d been hit before and by bigger fists. Besides, she didn’t think she could differentiate one pain from another anymore. Because pain was all she felt.
Roz exhaled one long breath. “Fine. But if I help you, do you swear you’ll come with me?” Not waiting for an answer, she stowed her gun. “Give me a hand.” Bending, she lifted Uncle Sully by the arms.
“Don’t,” Ali pleaded, taking a step toward them.
> “It’s either this, or we let him swell in the sun.”
“My family…”
“Is dead.” Roz dragged him away, his heels bouncing over the threshold before disappearing inside the house.
Ali couldn’t watch. Reality had morphed into a waking nightmare. That morning she’d been so bored she’d actually agreed to tour the Hoover Dam. Just to have something to do. How warped her life had become in one afternoon.
Her lunch threatened to make a reappearance, and she stumbled into the front yard, trying to draw enough air. Breathing seemed impossible.
“Not so fast,” Roz said, emerging from the house smelling of gasoline. “Connor said to watch you, so don’t wander off.”
Ali doubled over. So much for keeping her food down. She threw up in the grass, again and again, until she was aching and empty.
“Anything in here you want to keep?” Roz called from the kitchen doorway.
Ali covered her face with both hands, unable to grasp the girl’s words or form a coherent response. English had become a second language.
“My clothes,” she stuttered. “My luggage is in there. My plane tickets.”
This morning her aunt had promised to make a fresh pot of beans for her. Had Natalie started it yet? Were veggies cut and laid out on the kitchen counter? Were the beans already soaking in the crock?
Someone nudged her, and she looked up, confused.
“Your stuff is gone,” Roz said without any sympathy at all. “I found the guest bedroom, but it’s been ransacked. Whoever did this took your things.”
Why, was all she could ask herself. Why would anyone do this to her or her family?
Her pretty mouth a thin line, Roz handed Ali a book of matches. “Be quick.”
What did she expect her to do with those?
“Come on.” Roz pulled her to her feet. “We’re almost done.”
“I can’t,” she stuttered, but she took the matches.
Roz guided her toward the house. “Don’t wuss out on me. It’s your family, your responsibility.” She gave her a final nudge.
“We can’t burn them!” She tried to push the grotesque imagery from her thoughts, but all she saw were pools of blood and body parts. “We have to call the police.”
