by K. R. Willis
“Am I boring you?” he growled. “Well, let’s see if I can fix that.” He slammed me up against the wall, ripping another scream from my tortured throat.
I gathered every last ounce of strength I had, ready to fight him to the death, when I felt something change. The Lorum tingled on my back, reminding me of its presence. I had forgotten all about it.
A thought formed in my head. The Lorum was a metaphysical tie, similar to the one I had with Rya. If I pulled on it, would it suck me back to reality like it had that day with Rya? I had no clue, but at the moment I didn’t care, I had to take the chance. No way would I just hang here and let the Evil One do whatever he wanted with me.
As soon as the thought struck me, I felt the tie to Loukas like a physical thing I could touch. I pictured my hands wrapped around a rope, a rope that tied me to the oldest and scariest vampire known to exist, and pulled with all my might. Loukas must have felt my mental tug because it suddenly felt like I was being turned inside out.
The Evil One looked into my eyes.
I smiled and said in between breaths, “Screw…you…asshole.” It hurt like hell to speak with him squeezing my larynx so hard, but it was worth it to see the look on his face. Loukas gave another gut-wrenching yank on the Lorum.
“No!” the Evil One bellowed as the air shifted and I was sucked into darkness.
CHAPTER 31
Pain shot through me as the concrete floor peeled another layer of skin from my knees. My teeth rattled from the impact. Dammit, I was really getting tired of being tossed around like a ragdoll. It was dark, but a light down the hall illuminated it enough for me to know I had rematerialized outside my cell. Aside from what the Evil One had put me through, the shadowing had been a success.
The lights in the hall came to life and an alarm suddenly blared. Dots formed in front of my eyes as I was momentarily blinded, causing me to blink several times.
I looked to my right, but there were only the other prison cells and a solid wall forming a dead end. With my heart in my throat, I spun and raced down the hall to my left toward the security light and a bend in the hallway that had to lead somewhere.
Just before I reached where the hall hung a left, two guys in green Army fatigues came running around the corner. We all skidded to a halt. The guy on the left was tall and thin with brown hair and the one on the right was shorter and stockier with blond hair. Luckily, they both had their batons drawn instead of their guns. Guess they figured subduing a human girl wouldn’t be very difficult and they probably had orders not to kill me.
“Stop where you are,” Blondie said. He advanced toward me, taking the lead. Brownie hung back a little, prepared to watch and wait while his companion did the dirty work.
A smile lifted my lips. “Yeah, that ain’t happening,” I said, rushing him.
He raised his arm with the intention of swinging the baton. I dropped to my knees, ignored the pain from the impact, slid underneath his arm and came up on the other side of him, right in front of Brownie, who hadn’t expected me. His eyes were the size of silver dollars. Before he could regain his composure, I threw my hands out and hit him in the sweet spot right between the legs. Extreme circumstances called for extreme measures. He squealed like a little girl, grabbed himself, and collapsed on the floor, dropping his baton in the process.
Which was exactly what I had hoped for.
Scooping up the weapon, I jumped to my feet and turned to face Blondie. Pain etched his face as he watched his companion roll around on the floor, holding himself and moaning. Then he snapped out of it and advanced, determined to subdue me and make me pay for crippling his friend. No doubt he’d make it painful.
I backed away, careful not to get too close to Brownie. “You’re gonna pay for that, little girl.” He thumped his baton up and down in the palm of his hand. The smacking sound blended in and disappeared with the sound of the alarm still blaring from somewhere deeper within the building. After taking several steps, almost backing me into the corner, he struck.
He was stocky and broad, making his attack a little too slow. Years of training and physical fitness allowed me to easily dodge out of the way and launch a counterattack of my own. With my sequestered baton, I spun around behind him as I had Sam that day in the dojo, and slammed the baton down on his back as hard as I could. Even over the alarm, which was really becoming a nuisance, I heard the crack of bones breaking. He bellowed as he fell forward and face planted on the floor. Without a second thought, I smacked him on the back of the head just hard enough to knock him unconscious. Blondie sprawled on the tile, motionless.
Brownie hadn’t moved either. He still rocked back and forth like a baby who wanted his binky. I had a pretty good notion he wouldn’t be causing me trouble any time soon, so I left him there and sprinted toward the double doors I now saw at the end of the hallway. Upon reaching them, I stopped and peeked through the glass window set into the middle. A couple doors on the left and one on the right, but no one milled about. Guess they figured Brownie and Blondie could handle one human girl, but it wouldn’t take long for them to figure out I was still on the loose and come after me. I hoped to be long gone before that happened.
I glanced through the window one last time, then shoved the door open and made a mad dash down the hall past all the doors. When I reached the end where another set of double doors sat, I looked to the right where the hall branched off, and nearly hollered with joy. An emergency exit sign hung over a door about twenty feet from me. My legs ached as I tore off in that direction.
The bar gave with a heavy push and fresh air welcomed me. It was dark out, but floodlights illuminated the grounds. A chain link fence topped with barbed wire seemed to circle the property, and armed guards screamed and hollered from their posts atop the building and from several sentry towers. I skirted around behind some sort of machinery cabinet, the whir of its motor temporarily drowning out the alarm, just in time to avoid being spotted by a searchlight.
When the light moved away, I eased around the other side of the cabinet. It wasn’t very big, maybe six feet wide by twenty feet long, but it provided me with enough cover to sneak toward the fence in relative safety and get a look at my next big obstacle. It had to be thirty feet tall. There was no way short of flying I would be able to scale it. Endless fence wrapped around to my left as far as I could see, but a massive gate that allowed vehicles in and out opened up about a hundred feet to my right. That was my way out.
With a heavy breath, I backed up so that my back almost touched the concrete of the building and then began my trek toward the entrance. It was cool out, the start of Montana’s winter months not far off, but the grass was still fairly green and soft so my boots made little noise as I crept forward. An ache started to grow behind my eyeballs in response to the ever present screeching of the alarm, which had grown in its intensity over the last five minutes, but I ignored it and pressed on.
Shouts and the sound of a vehicle roaring closer made the air in my lungs freeze. I dove into a little alcove of darkness created by a section of the wall that jutted out about six feet as though a room had been added or enlarged at some point. A military Humvee blew past, the guard with the spotlight illuminating everywhere except my little sanctuary. When their taillights winked out of sight, I heaved a small sigh of relief.
I eased forward, careful to stay in the shadow, and peeked around the corner as another vehicle engine rumbled closer. This time, a smaller Jeep Wrangler-type vehicle appeared with someone manning a gun mounted to the back rack and headed out the gate. Probably to survey the grounds outside the fence in case I, or anyone else, somehow managed to escape the perimeter. Large wheels squeaked as they mechanically rolled the massive gates open, then paused when they reached their widest point, waiting for the vehicle to clear. The Jeep roared through the opening and disappeared somewhere off to my right. Spotlights from the towers chased it, temporarily dousing the area around the gate in darkness.
The gate was still open, but not
for long. This was my chance.
With my heart pounding so hard it hurt, I took one last look around and made a mad dash for the gate. The gears began to whine, signaling the gate starting to close. It wasn’t far, maybe fifty feet away, and the gears were fairly slow at moving the heavy gate so I stood a decent chance of making it if the spotlights didn’t return and catch me. My legs protested as I forced them faster.
A few feet from the gate, movement to my right caught my attention. I hunkered down, trying to make myself smaller out in the open and chanced a look. There didn’t seem to be anything there, so I stayed low and hurried toward the gate. Only a few feet left to go.
Suddenly, something heavy slammed into my right side. It knocked the air from my lungs and sent me tumbling across the grass. Shouts rang out from every direction and I soon found myself lit up like an actress on a stage by all the lights while I struggled to catch my breath. The spotlights made it easy for them to see me, but it also allowed me to get a look at what had sent me to the ground.
A solid black werewolf with honey-colored eyes rose up before me, snarling its displeasure. Lilith. It had to be. The contempt she held for me shined through her wolf eyes. She snapped her teeth at me, growled, then grabbed me by the pants leg, careful not to pierce skin, and dragged me back toward the building I’d just escaped from. Men in military uniforms with weapons pointed at me coalesced all around us, ready to help capture me. Lilith apparently wanted to bring me in on her own because she snarled at them also, commanding them to keep their distance.
Every rock and bump on the ground scraped across my back as she dragged me. She had to weigh at least 200 pounds, and we were thoroughly surrounded now, but I’d be damned if I would go back into my cell without a fight. I reached out with my booted foot and kicked her in the flanks as hard as I could. It threw her off balance, forcing her to release her hold on my leg in order to catch herself.
As soon as she let go, I rolled over and pushed to my feet, ready to Hail Mary and sprint for the gate with everything I had left. But my heart sank when I realized that not only had the gate completely closed while I was being dragged away, but also an armed guard now stood just a couple feet away, ready to subdue me. He narrowed his eyes and took a step forward as I sized him up, but that turned out to be pointless when Lilith hit me in the back of my knees, dropping me to the ground in an instant. She stalked around me, forming a circle by her presence, and the ten or so guards that had joined the action formed a ring several feet farther out. They had me completely surrounded.
Dr. Johnson emerged from the building, Brutus close behind. He stepped up between two guards and frowned when he looked at me as if disappointed.
“I’ve no idea how you managed to escape your cell, but you’re not leaving this facility. We have too many important things to accomplish with your blood. As I told you before, you are our guest.”
I spun on my knees to face him. “Guest?” I scoffed. “I am no more your guest than a turkey at Thanksgiving dinner. I’d rather die than help you create any more weapons against the supernaturals!” I shouted.
Lilith growled somewhere behind me, but it was Brutus who muscled his way in between several guards and said, “Dat can be arranged.” He smiled as he approached me.
“No,” Dr. Johnson said. “She’s too important to our work. Just bring her inside.” He turned and walked away.
Brutus snapped his fingers to the guard on his left, who handed him his weapon. I thought for a brief second as he took the gun that he was going to ignore his master’s orders and shoot me, but then he spun it around and shoved the butt in my face.
With Lilith at my back, surrounded by guards, there was nowhere to go. The pain only lasted a second before everything vanished.
CHAPTER 32
Instead of waking up in my cell, I found myself strapped once again to the same gurney as before. Brutus stood to my left, checking the straps that held me to the table, and Dr. Johnson stood to my right. He leaned over something. When he straightened and turned to me, my blood ran cold. The machine he’d used earlier to draw my blood had been replaced with a rolling tray of instruments. I didn’t recognize most of them, but I spotted a scalpel and knew that couldn’t be good.
The spot on my head where Brutus cold cocked me throbbed in time to my pounding heart. My eyes blurred around the edges and my breath came out in anxious little pants. If I didn’t stop getting knocked unconscious, I’d end up with permanent brain damage, dammit.
“Wha…what are you doing?” I squirmed and pulled against the straps, but again, they held tight.
Dr. Johnson picked up a small alcoholic wipe off the tray and wiped a spot on my arm. My heart rate skyrocketed. Dr. Johnson didn’t seem to notice. “You escaped from a cell with no possible way out. It would seem we missed something.” He reached over to the tray and picked up the scalpel.
Fear slithered into my bones and took root like a morbid tree. I pushed and pulled, kicked and screamed, but the straps wouldn’t relinquish their hold on me. Brutus maneuvered himself next to me in a way that allowed him to hold me down if necessary, but not get hit.
“Don’t!” I threatened, but my words fell on deaf ears. Dr. Johnson pulled at a small section of my skin and sliced off a dime-sized piece of it.
Burning pain erupted from the spot and raced through my nervous system, ripping another scream from my throat. My eyes watered and I batted them to try and clear the tears so I could see. My whole body lit on fire as I watched Dr. Johnson place that tiny piece of me in a vial and cap it. He set that on the tray and picked up a cotton ball he used to staunch the flow of blood from the open wound.
My arm throbbed and my eyes watered from the pain. I jumped when Dr. Johnson dabbed something on the wound and then placed a Band-Aid over it. He retrieved another item from the tray, and when he stood back up, I swore he held a piece of medieval torture in his hand. It was surgical steel, about six inches in length with a type of plunger on the end. I’d seen something similar on a medical thriller the bad guy had used to remove bone marrow from his victim. What a fitting comparison.
I thrashed almost violently, determined not to let Dr. Johnson use that thing on me.
“Hold her down,” Dr. Johnson told Brutus. “She needs to be still.”
No way. I redoubled my efforts, but Brutus stepped up to the gurney. He pulled the straps across my waist and legs until they were so tight I could barely move, and pinned my arms against my sides with his hands. Panic set in as a sense of being claustrophobic struck me, which I’d never really had before. Dr. Johnson grabbed another alcohol swab to prep the area where he wanted to take his sample.
The coolness of the alcohol pad lifted away and I clenched my eyes shut in anticipation of the pain-filled prick of the extractor, but a loud explosion shook the building instead. My eyes snapped open as shouts rang out in the hall, first loud and then quiet as they ran toward whatever had caused the explosion. Bits of dust sifted from the ceiling and the overhead light fixture swayed.
Dr. Johnson stepped away from me and laid the extractor on the tray. He walked over to an intercom button on the wall and pressed it. “Thompson, report,” he said, voice tight.
A garbled, staticky reply came through the com. “Under attack…vampires—”
The com went dead.
Dr. Johnson looked up, worry and fear clear on his face before he got control of his emotions. “Go,” he told Brutus. Brutus started to protest, but Dr. Johnson held up his hand. “She’s not going anywhere. Go. Find out what’s going on.” Brutus stared at his master for a moment longer, looked down at me strapped helplessly to the gurney, and relented. His mass lifted from me, allowing some of the feeling to return to my arms where he had me pinned, and left the room, leaving me alone with Dr. Johnson.
My thoughts raced. Why were vampires attacking the base? How had they found it? Were they friend or foe? I thought of Leo and my heart leapt. Maybe he had somehow found me. The possibility of it being Leo and Arnaud
, here to rescue me, gave me hope. I turned my attention to Dr. Johnson. “Why don’t you let me go? That’s probably a couple of friends of mine, and they’re not going to be real happy with you. You should cut me loose and make a run for it.” I didn’t really want him to get away, but knew that if it was Leo, he wouldn’t get very far.
He looked at me and smiled. “You’re under the assumption I’m afraid of vampires, my dear.” His words were even, but his eyes told a different story. They shifted restlessly, giving away the fact he was terrified.
“Riiight,” I said.
Inwardly, I panicked. My heart beat so hard I feared I might actually have a heart attack. My whole body felt clammy, and my palms sweated. Even my eyelids felt damp. Please, please, please be Leo and Arnaud.
I wanted to make Dr. Johnson and Lilith pay for everything they’d done. Not just to me, but also to all the supernaturals they’d killed, imprisoned, and performed experiments on. I just couldn’t do that strapped to this stupid gurney.
The door burst open with a deafening crack. Chunks of steel flew across the room and imbedded themselves in the wall. To my horror, Loukas, not Leo, stood in the doorway. His black frock coat was riddled with bullet holes, and his white cotton shirt had blood splattered all over it. His dark eyes quickly took in my predicament and then landed on Dr. Johnson. The scientist turned as white as his lab coat and cowered against the wall. Loukas dismissed him and turned his black eyes on me.
“Well now, what do we have here? Seems someone made my job of killing you quite easy.” He strode toward me, confident, and stopped when he reached the edge of the gurney. Loukas inspected my straps, his skin sizzling when he traced a finger across one of them. “Interesting,” he said and pulled his hand away, the burned spot healing instantly. “Lined with silver for added strength and incapacitation.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Numb nuts over there and his evil team of scientists have developed a weapon using my blood to kill you guys. I told you I wasn’t responsible. At least, not directly,” I mumbled a little quieter. Loukas’ head snapped up and his attention refocused on Dr. Johnson. I had no idea what he was thinking, but I hoped it involved taking Dr. Johnson as payment for what had happened to his people and releasing me.
