Feral Passion

by Stephanie Bedwell-Grime

  Jeremy answered him by shoving the gun harder against his temple.

  “Just do it!” Dante ground out through clenched teeth.

  “Okay, okay!” Xandra held up her hands just in time to stop the shooting from erupting. “I’ll come with you.”

  “Xandra, no!” Dante couldn’t let her do it. He couldn’t let her give herself to this madman so he could continue his grisly experiments. If he did, where would it end? No one would ever be safe. He was a police officer. What good was he if he couldn’t protect the woman he loved?

  No, he thought. It ends here. All his life he’d been in hiding, afraid to get too close to anyone in case they discovered his true nature. Once vampires had been revealed to the world he’d thought he’d have more choices. Instead he found himself still hiding, afraid Jeremy might find him at last.

  With Xandra he could truly be himself. He found the love he’d craved for so long. He wouldn’t allow Jeremy to steal her from him. If it was the last thing he ever did in his tortured existence, he wouldn’t allow Jeremy to hurt her further.

  Below him Xandra took a step toward the catwalk and looked up. She laid her gun on the floor where Jeremy could see it.

  Taking matters into his own hands, Dante moved.

  Jeremy sensed his motion a moment too late. His gun went off, catching Dante in the shoulder, sending a puff of blood and flesh into the air. Pain shot down his arm. Trying to keep his balance, he staggered along the catwalk.

  The police officers sprang into action. Xandra heard the percussive pops of several revolvers being fired. One of the bullets hit Jeremy in the chest. Silver or metal, it didn’t matter. Both could be lethal to the human.

  Jeremy tumbled from the catwalk, pulling Dante with him.

  They hit the concrete with a sickening thud, Dante on the bottom.

  “Get another ambulance,” she shrieked at the officers. “And keep those vamps away from Officer Rodriguez!” She snatched up her gun and ran over to them. Dante lay motionless. For a moment she feared the bullet and the fall had overcome even his vampire constitution, but then he groaned. “I’m okay.” He attempted to push Jeremy’s weight off him.

  Her fingers tightened on the collar of Jeremy’s shirt and she dragged him free of Dante. She yanked his head up. Placing her gun against his forehead, she snarled, “You better be dead, you bastard. Or I’m going to kill you.”

  Blood soaked the front of his clothes, but he stirred and opened his eyes. Those blue eyes, so much like her own.

  “Go ahead, shoot me,” he said, so softly she wasn’t sure he’d heard him right. She leaned in closer, making sure to keep the gun barrel in place.

  “Don’t tempt me.”

  Something flickered in the depths of his eyes. His eyelids fluttered. She was afraid he’d passed out. Suddenly he whispered, “I did it all for you.”

  She stared at him uncomprehending. Just when she thought there were no more cruel surprises he could spring on her, he came out with that. “You did what for me? Made me a monster? Killed my mother?”

  A grimace of regret crossed his face. “She stood in the way of my research.”

  “She stood in the way of your evil!”

  “I wanted you to grow up in a world without disease. If you call that evil, then I suppose I’m guilty.”

  “Oh, you’re guilty all right. You didn’t eradicate disease, you spread a new contagion! You didn’t just make vampires, you destroyed lives by the hundreds, maybe thousands!”

  “Necessary in the advance of science.”

  “Science? You turned those people into the kind of medieval fiends people used to burn at the stake. You sold your secrets to organized crime.”

  “You don’t understand. I had information—secrets I thought would lead to a cure for many diseases. I just wanted to help. And everyone turned their backs on me.”

  Her grip on the gun wavered. He was probably right about that. It was incredibly hard to get a new drug past the testing stage. Shockingly she could understand his misplaced intentions.

  It changed nothing. Despite his benevolent ideas, he’d caused nothing but pain.

  “You didn’t help anyone. Not me, my mother or your wife. You ruined it all.”

  She could still shoot him. It might be worth doing time for. She was contemplating just that when he said, “I’m sorry.”

  His words hit her like a sucker punch. She struggled for breath. After everything he’d done, this was the last thing she thought he’d say.

  “What exactly are you sorry about?”

  His face crumbled. “I’m sorry I let my pain and my ambition get in the way of my better sense. I’m sorry about your mother.”

  She looked down at him. “You’re not going to get a chance to know me now. Not where you’re going.”

  Damn it all, she’d respected Jeremy. He’d always seemed so strong, so powerful. Now seeing him in this new reality, she thought he just looked pathetic.

  “Enough,” Dante said weakly from behind her. “If he’s not dead, he’s still entitled to a fair trial.”

  Even wounded Dante was still trying to do his job, to be a good cop. She had to admire him for that. She shoved Jeremy aside, holstered her gun and rushed to his side.

  Dante’s eyes opened as she approached. By the glassy, pain-filled look he gave her, she could tell he had to be in agony. “You shouldn’t have sacrificed yourself like that,” he groaned.

  “You shouldn’t have—the bullet wasn’t silver, was it?”

  “No.” He visibly bit back a moan. “But it sure hurts like hell.”

  Not to mention the headfirst tumble from the rafters. She glanced behind them to see if the ambulance had arrived. To find the ground floor filled with moving shadows.

  The feral vampires behaved like hungry animals. Drawn by the scent of Dante and Jeremy’s blood, they lusted after the food they’d been denied. Exhausted police officers battled them valiantly, but they were losing the fight and the horde was getting closer with every second.

  The team leader looked up, following the line of her gaze. His face paled. “Get us more backup,” he screamed. She heard the order being relayed into the radio.

  They formed a circle around Dante and Jeremy. She’d happily feed Jeremy to them, if it meant escaping with Dante alive.

  Out of holy water and with precious few silver bullets left, their situation didn’t look good. She glanced hopefully at the doorway where wan moonlight still shone in a silver shaft. Far off in the distance she heard sirens rushing their way.

  Dante struggled to rise to his feet. He had a bullet wound and likely more than one broken bone. If they could get him the right kind of medical attention, he might be all right. But first, the medics had to get through a ring of feral vampires intent on making them lunch.

  Unless…

  Leaving the police officers to hold the feral vamps at bay, she knelt beside Dante. “Don’t move,” she told him quietly. “Medics are coming.”

  “They don’t have what I need.”

  “I know. But I do.”

  “No.” She barely heard him speak the word.

  Ignoring his protests, she pressed her wrist to his lips. He shook his head.

  “You must,” she told him. “We need your help to get us out of here.”

  He gazed up at her, amber eyes glassy with pain. His lips caressed the sensitive skin on the inside of her wrist. His touch stole her attention. Around them she heard the sounds of battle as Dante’s team tried to hold off the feral vampires long enough for help to arrive. It occurred to her that they really could die there. Somehow her heart was at peace with that. Dante had given her the one thing no one else had: love. In such a short time he’d given her so much.

  In that moment he absorbed her senses. She moaned softly at the feather-soft touch of his lips. Dimly she felt the scrape of his impossibly sharp teeth, and then a moment of pressure and brief pain.

  A wave of pleasure washed over her as he gently sucked her blood. Sh
e leaned against him as he drew strength from her. With her enhanced senses she could smell the blood from the bullet wound in his shoulder.

  His strength returned rapidly as he drew her blood into his body. Too soon he pulled his mouth away. She moaned in protest.

  “I can’t take any more.” He rose awkwardly to his feet. “It’ll weaken you too much.”

  Coming to her senses, Xandra looked around. The feral vampires had taken a heavy toll on the police officers. Several of Dante’s team lay on the ground. Blood glittered blackly in the moonlight. An appalling quantity of it coated the concrete. One of the officers moaned. It appeared he was in the first stages of the change. If the paramedics arrived soon enough, they might be able to reverse the process. If not, it looked like he’d become a permanent member of the vampire liaison office.

  The remains of several feral vampires also littered the floor. The acrid odor of decaying flesh permeated everything. The police had to be running out of silver-plated bullets.

  One of the officers emptied his revolver. With the last of his bullets, he took down one of the feral vampires, a female. She shrieked in horror as the silver pierced her. Lashing out, she swiped the police officer across the face with her talons, leaving the tracks of her nails in his face. He’d need aggressive treatment to combat the infection. Then the silver worked its way through the vampire’s bloodstream. She screamed again as her body began to decay from the inside. Doubling over, she crumpled to the floor. Her body blackened. Slime ran from her eyes and ears and dribbled out over her chin. She gave the officer one last hate-filled look, then her body disintegrated. The officer raised his gun, but only a loud click sounded.

  Seeing the officer disarmed, the next vampire lunged for him. The officer dealt him a blow with the butt of the gun, but it did nothing to slow his passage. He tossed the gun aside and kicked at the vampire. The feral vamp snatched his leg and bit deeply into his thigh. The police officer screamed, a high keening sound.

  They’d need many more ambulances, Xandra thought, leaping into the fray. Holding onto a nearby pillar, she swung out with her left leg, kicking the vampire away from the fallen police officer. Quickly, she drew her leg back.

  Devoid of holy water and silver, they wouldn’t be holding them off for long. She glanced back at Jeremy’s crumpled body. The one thing she couldn’t allow was one of the vampires running off with him. She didn’t know if it was too late to turn him, but she refused to take that chance.

  Dante swayed precariously, yet still remained standing.

  “Any ideas?” she asked him.

  He surveyed the vampires surrounding them, their glazed eyes glowing red. “Sever their brain stems.” He glanced up just as a feral vampire lunged at him. Still weak, he swung awkwardly.

  “With what?”

  His fist connected with a thump that toppled the fiend to the floor. “A large knife.”

  Xandra took a quick look around. She didn’t see anything that could be used as a blade. She’d come armed with knives, but Jeremy had taken them from her. She’d never felt so naked in her life. “Where did Jeremy put mine?”

  Dante shrugged and shook his head. Xandra glanced up at the catwalk high above them. She might be able to climb one of the metal posts. But that would mean leaving Dante in the line of danger on the floor below, assuming she made it that far.

  Left with only her body as a weapon, Xandra sent another vamp stumbling away with a swift kick. She swept her foot beneath the legs of another. He tripped and landed awkwardly. She slugged him in the head to discourage him from getting up again.

  Feral vampires encroached from all sides. Police officers had reduced their numbers drastically. They were almost evenly matched. But in hand-to-hand fighting, the vampires had the distinct advantage.

  Dante ducked the grasping hands of another vamp. Xandra twisted the creature’s arm and swung him out of Dante’s way. He floundered backward, momentarily disrupting the progress of his comrades. She surveyed the ring of feral vampires surrounding them. How many of the monsters had Jeremy made? It seemed absurd that she might have only moments left of her existence. That fate might take the cruel twist of turning her into what she despised the most.

  Xandra sighed. “Nice knowing you, Dante.”

  He smiled. “Nice knowing you too, Xandra. What ever happens, know that—”

  Blinding light swept through the factory. Police officers in assault gear, bearing canisters of holy water, surged through the doorway. Sirens wailed as more vehicles approached.

  “Freeze!” someone yelled through a megaphone.

  “Over here,” one the officers answered. “We have officers down!”

  Firing into the darkness, the police sprayed the area with holy water and then followed it up with a rain of wood-tipped bullets. Xandra and Dante dove for cover behind the hulk of a broken piece of machinery. Feral vampires fell like dominos. Those still left standing scattered and raced for the shadows.

  It seemed she wasn’t going to die today, after all. Xandra turned to Dante.

  “You were saying?”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Dante offered her a sheepish smile. Taking a look at the carnage all around them, he shrugged. “I’ll tell you later.”

  Outnumbered and overpowered, the feral vampires huddled in the shadows. Jeremy lay where he’d fallen. Xandra could see the shallow rise and fall of his chest. Once in a while he uttered an incoherent moan, then fell silent.

  It didn’t take the police officers long to herd the feral vampires into a paddy wagon outfitted with silver-plated bars on the windows. They loaded Jeremy into an ambulance. Two police officers joined him on the ride to the hospital, just in case.

  The police officers insisted on taking Dante to the hospital as well. He needed medical attention, Xandra told him. He still had a bullet lodged in his shoulder. Reluctantly, he agreed. She went with him.

  Sitting in the waiting room while the vampire specialists worked on Dante, she could hear him hotly contesting that he didn’t require a transfusion of vampire blood, either intravenously or orally. The vampire doctors had refused to let her see Alix, saying that her friend was in a fragile stage of the change and needed to rest. Poor Alix, she thought, and sincerely hoped her friend wasn’t regretting her decision.

  Absently, she watched the overhead television monitors. Their adventures had made the morning news. The broadcast showed scenes of the abandoned candy factory, now practically obscured by a fleet of police cars. She recognized the unmarked cars of the department’s forensics specialists. The scene ought to keep them busy for quite some time. Whatever Jeremy had been doing in those shadowed back rooms needed to be dismantled and examined. The interior of the factory had to be riddled with bullet holes, not to mention the remains of Jeremy’s operatives. On top of that, they still had a number of live feral vampires to contend with.

  She winced as the shot changed to a scene showing Dante and her rushing toward a waiting police cruiser, one with black tinted windows. Still another shot zoomed in for a close-up of Jeremy’s still form being loaded into a waiting ambulance flanked by two police officers in Kevlar vests. The hospital staff hadn’t allowed her to see Jeremy, either.

  Xandra sighed. Sitting back in her chair, she let her eyes drift closed. The sound of footsteps made her sit up straight.

  The vampire George stood in the doorway to the waiting room. It took her a moment to recognize him in the black trench coat that covered him from his neck to his ankles. He’d pulled the collar up tight around his throat and topped it all off with a black fedora. Beneath the coat she could see the toes of an expensive pair of black boots.

  She stood and tried not to sway on her feet. “George.” Her voice came out an appalling croak.

  “Lisa.” His full lips quirked into one of his ever-present smiles. His black eyes sparkled with amusement. “Or should I say, Operative Wheeler?”

  She smiled back at him. “It’s Xandra actually. I’m not an operative anymore.”


  He took her hand. His black leather gloves were cool against her skin. “Nice to meet you for real, Xandra.”

  “Nice to meet you too, George.” She looked up into his intense dark eyes. “I’m really sorry about leading you on like that.”

  He accepted her apology with a nod. In his place she doubted she’d have been that understanding. But George, as she’d told Alix, was a decent kind of guy.

  “I came to see if there was anything I can do to help.”

  Xandra sat again on one of the hospital’s uncomfortable plastic chairs. A sudden thought occurred to her. Hadn’t she told Alix that she might like George? “Well, perhaps there is. My friend was attacked by—by vampires.” She glanced at George. He didn’t seem offended by the term, unlike others of his kind who preferred to call themselves the daylight-challenged or the newly living. “She’s going through the change…and having a hard time of it.”

  “I’d be happy to talk to her when she’s feeling better.”

  “Thanks. I’m sure that would help. I really don’t know what to tell her myself. I don’t know how much time I’m going to have. I’m sure the police department will want to debrief me. And I—” she stared at the instructional tile between her feet, “—I’m not sure how things are going to turn out for me.”

  George caught her meaning immediately. “Don’t worry, Xandra. It’s not so bad being a vampire.”

  She smiled back at him. He stood up. “Well, you know where to find me. Let me know if you think your friend would like to talk to me.”

  “I will.”

  Just then the doors to the examining room burst open and Dante staggered through. A white gauze bandage covered his shoulder and part of his upper arm. Under the fluorescent lights he looked doubly pale. Dark circles ringed his amber eyes.

  The doctor followed him out into the waiting room. “I want it made clear that you are leaving against medical advice.”

  Dante leaned against the wall, making a show of remaining upright and not fooling anyone. “I’ll see that Officer Rodriguez gets home safely,” Xandra said.