Blood Games

by Lee Killough

  Amber blinked. “What are you talking about? Leave Ice?” She laughed. “That’s crazy.”

  Raven took her arm. “Come on. He doesn’t need us.”

  “Of course not, but don’t you remember what it was like before we met him? I do, and I won’t go back to that!”

  “We won’t have to. I’ll make us a new life...just the two of us. A better one than with Ice.”

  Garreth groaned. Amber was not going to listen. Raven, give it up and go back to the game plan. Learn where Ice was and set up a meeting for later. If only vampire powers included telepathy.

  Amber frowned. “How could it be better? Are you mad at Ice? Is that it? Because he didn’t come back for you?”

  “No, no.” Raven shook her head. “I wanted you to get away. I hit that deputy so you could. But I shouldn’t have. I’ve learned some things about Ice since. He isn’t what we thought. He’s a fraud and a liar, and--”

  Amber jumped up. “What! What did those cops do to you? Come home with me. Ice can fix you.”

  Raven glanced Garreth’s direction.

  He read her thought in her eyes and groaned. No! Don’t! Follow the plan!

  “Well...” She doodled on the napkin some more. “Okay, sure. Let’s go.”

  Damn it! What the hell did she think she was doing!

  “How do we get there? Walk?”

  Garreth hoped. Walking, much as he hated it in daylight, let him tail them.

  Amber giggled. “Hell, no. Candy has a driver’s license and we got the Mercedes back from the garage.” She pulled a phone out of her shoulder bag and punched in a number. “Candy, can you come pick me up? I’m at Skelly’s. I have someone Ice will want to see.” She dropped the phone back in her bag. “We’ll meet her on that corner over there.”

  Raven sent a glance Garreth’s direction, then at the table, before following Amber. Garreth hurried over to check the table.

  The napkin had writing, not doodles. I’ll take care of Ice ,choir boy. I’ve got the guts. I’ll do whatever it takes to save Amber.

  Damn her! The stupid fool! He plunged into traffic after the girls.

  Before he reached the corner a black Mercedes pulled up and the girls climbed in.

  Now Garreth gave thanks for the traffic. It trapped the Mercedes, holding its speed down enough to let him follow from the sidewalk. Until the car reached the edge of the Plaza. Then it gunned away up Ward Parkway and he could only stare after it swearing in frustration, the vision of Raven and Ice flashing through his mind.

  He hurried back for the Porsche. At least he knew which direction the Mercedes went. From there he had to rely on the blood bond to show him the way.

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Garreth drove with frustration and urgency hissing through him. Unlike a scent trail, the bond tug told him only Raven’s general direction, not which turns the Mercedes took. It pulled him off Ward Parkway into a residential area. After that it left him in a maze. The streets curved between big houses in big yards that always seemed between him the direction he needed to go. While the sun reddened and flattened on the horizon. With every blocked passage, every loop away from the tug, his nerves wound tighter. He cursed more passionately. He dared not underestimate Ice. Had Raven met him yet? Had they had their confrontation or was he too late for it? Would he feel it if she died?

  Then as he felt the sun sliding over the horizon, the tug pulled from beyond a closed iron gate and house with a black Mercedes parked on its circular drive.

  His rush of relief matched that at any sunset. Now he needed to park. The Porsche fit the neighborhood...except no locals parked on the street.

  But he remembered some street parking a little way back, where there appeared to be a party. He turned around and drove back. After pulling in on the closest end, he jogged back to the gate.

  It presented no barrier. Landscaping included enough bushes and trees to give him cover to the house. There a stone terrace stretched across the front and halfway back along one side. On the terrace, windows reaching nearly floor to ceiling showed him a living room on one side of the massive front door, and behind it along the terrace, a library. Rich wood paneling, floor to ceiling bookcases, big leather chairs, a massive desk with a tunnel knee hole, a stone fireplace with weapons displayed from the mantle to the open-beam ceiling...cavalry saber, flintlock rifle, dueling pistols, battle axe, Morningstar.

  He sucked in his breath. Though he had paid little attention to the setting in his vision with Raven and Ice, recognition rang in him. The confrontation happened here. The fire and ice of adrenalin pumped through him. Triumph. Fear. He can destroy you.

  Raven’s cowboy hat sat on a corner of the desk with her glasses folded on the brim. Seconds later Raven herself appeared, pacing from somewhere between the windows to the fireplace and then the desk, hands behind her back with the sling bag swinging from them. Waiting.

  Garreth edged up to the window nearest the desk and gritted his teeth against the flare of fire enveloping him. He reached out to rap on the glass.

  Only to jump back as the door opened. Peering around the edge of the window, he saw Ice stroll in. His eyes shone red. “Raven. News stories said you were killed at that gas stop. How gratifying to find you weren’t. I confess to being surprised, though, that you aren’t in police custody.”

  He sounded, Garreth reflected, like his father...a glossy urbanity just above the frost point.

  Raven beamed with childlike pride. “I escaped. It was like something from a movie. I smashed my hospital window and jumped out in a rainstorm in nothing but a hospital gown. Then I had to hide in a mausoleum and steal the clothes from a corpse so I could hitchhike to Des Moines and shoplift better clothes, scam myself some cash, and...come find you.”

  Garreth grimaced. Watch yourself! Keep it simple!

  “Exactly how did you manage to find me?” Ice reached behind the desk and casually pulled Maggie’s Desert Eagle from a drawer.

  Raven started to step backward as he laid it on the desk top, then stopped. She hiked the sling bag to her shoulder. “Well, I tried to think like you. You need good hunting ground so you’d head for a city. I looked around Des Moines for a bit and you weren’t there so the next logical place was Kansas City.”

  “Really.” Ice stepped toward her. “You won’t mind if I check you for police wires?”

  She gaped at him. “You think I’d lead the cops to you? No way in hell!”

  “Oh, of course not.” The red eyes gleamed. “But let’s just check...starting with your brand new bag there.”

  She shrugged and held it out. Only to recoil, fact twisting. “Bastard! Lying son of a bitch! You didn’t just lie about your age; you’ve been lying about everything! It’s all fake! You’re no vampire!”

  Ice stiffened and stared down at her. “Where did you get a foolish idea like that?”

  Almost the scene in his vision! Garreth hurled himself at the window...and smashed into the wall of flame. The glass seared like a hot grill.

  Inside Raven hissed, “Because I can smell the blood in you, you stupid bastard!”

  “Raven!” Garreth shouted. “Raven!” If only she would shut up, hear him, and call him in!

  Instead she kept snarling at Ice. “You’re a bigger fraud than my father’s ever been! He just covered up his past, he didn’t make it up. He doesn’t parade around bragging on himself and pretending to be something high and mighty! And he’s never deliberately tried to hurt anyone. But you damn well enjoy that, don’t you!”

  Nor did Ice appear to hear. He had gone dead still, his face congealing into icy fury. His voice dropped to a whisper. “That’s enough.”

  “RAVEN!” Garreth tried pounding on the window. His fists never reached the glass. Fire shrieked through him...hissing, searing, consuming.

  “Because you can’t stand the truth!” Her lip curled. “Because you want us gullible little runaways to think you’re the biggest frog in the pond when you’re nothing but a fucking phony, whil
e I--”

  “RAVEN, NO!”

  “--am the real thing!” She stretched her jaws wide, extending her fangs.

  His vision, exactly! And having come, the moment filled him with a blast of foreboding. He can destroy you.

  Raven dropped her bag to snatch up the gun and aim at Ice. She had to hold it in both hands for a secure grip. “Your games are over, Mitchell Craig Blackburn. You’re father wants your head on a platter and I’m fucking happy to--”

  “Sleeping beauty,” Ice said.

  Abruptly Raven went slack. She remained on her feet but her eyes closed and her chin and arms dropped.

  Ice retrieved the gun from a nerveless hand and returned it to the desk top. Then he walked around her shaking his head. “Well. Well, well.”

  Garreth slid back from the window before Ice faced his direction. He barely felt the flames ease. His skin still crawled...with dread now. Being human did not render Ice one bit less dangerous, with Raven helpless. And Garreth Mikaelian, too. He pounded a fist against the stone of the house. Somehow he had to get in!

  Inside Ice said, “So there really are vampires? And you managed to meet and become one. I wonder how. Not that it matters. You’ve been a busy little bitch this past week. Turning vampire, learning my name, talking to my father, tracking me here. I’m impressed. You have one thing wrong, though; I’m not a complete fake. I know hypnotism...and I’ve made myself very very good at it. I’m always the best at what I do. You know what can be done with hypnotism?” He bent to Raven’s face. “Anything. Post-hypnotic suggestions, for example--” He pointed at her with hands folded into gun shapes. “--are very useful, as we see. I’m happy the command held despite your...transformation. And you ‘servants’ are so suggestible. Tell you to sleep all night and you do, so I’m free to go have a good meal and pick up a real woman to screw. I can even create virtual reality without a computer...a poker game played with dead men, or turn our hotel room into a bar.” He sneered at her. “You were so proud of the show you put on with that piano man. Sex as a public spectacle was something even Teddy Rivers wouldn’t do. But guess what, it wasn’t public, or much of a spectacle. Any two-bit whore could give me a better ride than that.”

  Though she never moved, color surged in Raven’s face.

  “You are right about one thing.” He continued circling her. “The games are over. Now I’m going to do Vampire for real. Listen to me, Raven. When I count to three you’ll wake up and when I say: ‘Here’s my throat,’ you will drink from me and bring me across. Do you understand?”

  Hope flared in Garreth. Do it! Do it! We can make sure he never revives!

  For a moment Raven said nothing, then, in a flat voice: “Yes.”

  Ice smiled. “Good girl. One, two, three.”

  Raven lifted her head.

  Ice sat down on the desk and tilted his head back. “Here’s my throat.”

  She ignored it and sprang for the gun again. “Go to--”

  His backhand, delivered almost vampire fast, cut her off before she finished the curse or reached the gun, and as it flung her backwards onto the floor, he spat, “Sleeping beauty.”

  She went limp.

  Garreth smacked the house again. Damn her! What a time to resist Ice’s hypnosis. Damn himself...turning her so far against Ice he lost control.

  Ice dragged her up by an arm and flung her in a chair beside the desk. “Sneaky little bitch. Aren’t you full of surprises. Did vampire powers let you resist me? At least the sleep command still works. For the rest, well, I guess I’ll have to encourage voluntary cooperation.”

  He left the room.

  Garreth pressed back against the window, into the fire. “RAVEN! Can you hear me? Invite me in!”

  She never moved. Until Ice returned leading Amber by the hand. Then a tremor ran through her.

  Garreth jumped back from the window. The son of a bitch!

  Amber stared at Raven. “What’s wrong with her?”

  He smiled. “Oh, I’m giving her a time-out. Those cops really twisted her while they had her. We need to heal her. Will you help?”

  Amber beamed. “Oh yes.”

  Ice stroked her hair. “Do you love me?”

  She stared up adoringly. “Oh, yes.”

  He put an arm around her. “Do you believe I love you?”

  The silky tone chilled Garreth. He stared at the window, clenching his fists. Since no one invited him in, he had to make it on his own. His gut knotted. Could he? The mind rules, Irene said. All he had to do was believe that. Did the mind always rule? Even against the dwelling barrier? She believed in the power of Holy Water and managed to survive touching it.

  Inside, Amber answered Ice. “Yes.”

  Ice stepped away from her to Raven and leaned down to Raven’s ear, smiling, showing fangs. Garreth heard his whisper. “She loves me. How do you think she’ll feel after I rape her on the desk?”

  Raven turned bone white. Garreth ran for the next window, out of Ice’s line of sight, and pressed into the fire, straining for the glass. Surely he could stand a little pain--well, agonizing pain-- long enough to pass through the window. He just had to believe.

  “You can save her, “ Ice said. “Say yes.”

  Do it! Garreth urged silently. Do what he wants!

  Raven, muttered, trembling. Garreth barely made out the words. “Kill you.”

  Garreth shoved into the fire. Touched the glass. Pressed into the scalding inferno, teeth gritted. It could not stop him. The mind rules.

  “Was that a no?” Still smiling, Ice turned to sweep Amber up and sit her on the edge of the desk. A hand casually pushed her skirt up her thigh.

  The fire of the sun seared him. Garreth forged into it. The mind rules.

  Raven almost lifted her head. “Bastard.”

  This time the other two heard her. Amber frowned in puzzlement. “Don’t you want us to heal you?”

  Ice cocked his head. “They really did a job on her. I think she needs a big shock to break free. What do you think of object rape, Raven?” He picked up the Desert Eagle.

  Raven bared her teeth and shifted as if trying to stand up.

  Amber stared from the gun to Raven to Ice in puzzlement. “I don’t understand.”

  “Let me demonstrate.” Ice pulled Amber back flat by the hair and shoved the Eagle’s barrel up between her legs. He pinned her lower legs with his.

  Amber screamed.

  Push. Believe you can push through the pain. Go, you dumb flatfoot! Now!

  Raven snarled and rocked in the chair.

  Ice banged Amber’s head on the desk. “Shut up, bitch!” He raised his voice as her scream became a shriek. “This is all Raven’s fault because she won’t give me what I want, and if this gun accidentally goes off, what a big hole it makes. Innocent blood will be on her head.” He smirked over his shoulder at Raven. “We can even make it Biblical, in honor of your father.” His voice went sing-song. “This is Amber’s blood shed for you...unless you take and drink from me in the hope of my resurr--”

  Howling, Raven jerked forward out of the chair and flung herself Ice.

  Through! Garreth charged Ice, too.

  Ice froze in surprise. In that moment Raven chopped the arm holding Amber’s hair. Garreth hauled him backward by his belt, spinning him across the room into the fireplace. The gun flew out of his hand across the carpet. Amber threw herself off the desk, screaming hysterically, and shrank into the knee hole.

  Raven started to dive for the gun. “You blasphemous son of a bitch! Let’s see how big a hole this makes in you!”

  “No.” Garreth staggered in front of her, cutting her off. The fire had not extinguished with entering. It remained strong as ever, making every movement, every breath, agony. “Leave him to me.” He struggled to talk. “Get Amber out of here. ”

  She gaped at him. “How did you get in? No one invit--”

  “Go! Now!” He could not fight the pain and deal with three people.

  Raven stared hard a
t him, then pulled the hysterical girl into her arms. Hugging her close, crooning reassurances, she ran for the door.

  Ice struggled to sit up. “Sleeping--”

  “Not again!” Garreth shouted it to drown Ice’s words.

  Ice glared at him. Blood trickled from a graze on his forehead. He had lost a contact lens, leaving him with one eye blood red, the other pale icy blue. Fingering his forehead, he climbed to his feet. “Who the hell are you?”

  “The law.” Every breath scorched Garreth’s lungs. “You were half right; Raven led a cop to you.” Ignore the pain. You can bear it. “Though I’m not here in exactly an official capacity.” It surprised him how even his voice sounded with fire scorching him...and the scent of Ice’s blood battering him. A scent, a pull, telling him beyond any hope of mistake, that the albino had drunk his blood, too. Bile rose in Garreth’s throat at the thought of a bond between them. “I’m the officer driving the car you ran off the road.” He picked up the Desert Eagle. “The officer whose partner you killed.”

  Ice tensed, staring intently at the gun. “That guy was dead.”

  “Not exactly.” Fire raged through Garreth’s bones.

  Ice’s gaze rose slowly from the gun...up to Garreth’s face. He sucked in a breath. “You. You’re the one who brought her over.” Light blazed up in the blood and ice eyes. “Bring me over, too.”

  His naked lust nauseated Garreth. “Not. A. Chance.”

  The lust turned to rage. “I’m right for it! I’m a hunter! I deserve it! I certainly deserve it more than that stupid little cunt!”

  The flames of trespass fused with Garreth’s anger into incandescent fury. He aimed at Ice. “Mr. Blackburn, you have a foul mouth. You don’t deserve anything except to die.”

  “For what?” Ice lifted his chin. “Encroaching on your territory? For being a mere human who dares to hunt like you do?”

  “For being a vicious piece of scum who’s brought everyone nothing but misery and pain. But most of all, for killing my partner.”

  Garreth expected him to go defiant or defensive, or show fear, but the albino stared at him blankly. “Why do you care about that? She was only human, wasn’t she?”