by Deborah Noel
“My mind’s not working anymore, Mommy.”
I pulled back from our hug and looked at her with questions in my eyes. ”What?”
“I couldn’t hear you today in my head like I always do.”
“Hmm, well, I was pretty far away and there was lots of noise, maybe that’s why,” I answered inaudibly.
She smiled. “Ok.” She answered back in my mind.
We hugged again, this time both of us squeezed hard and lingered a few extra minutes. I gave her a kiss and told her we could talk about our adventures in the morning. I walked her back to her room and tucked her in.
I came out of her room and bumped into Shane, which made me nearly come out of my skin again.
“Cianna, are you okay?” He held onto my shoulder to steady me.
I drew in a deep breath, “Yeah, bad day.”
“Uh-oh. Had to be pretty bad then; Declan is in the office with the door closed and didn’t answer when I knocked.” He hesitated a moment, then let go of my shoulder. “Are you two okay?”
I let out a long sigh. I brought my finger to my lips to shush him, closing the door to the girls’ room behind me. Shane followed me downstairs. Declan was in the kitchen making some chamomile tea. He walked around the counter, kissed me and handed me my mug before walking out onto the patio, staring off into the woods.
“I’ve never seen him this way,” I remarked to Shane.
“So it’s worse than I thought?”
I raised my eyebrows, “Well, let’s go see.”
We joined Declan on the patio.
“Sam’s on his way. Shane I will need you to do some more artwork for me. Cianna, can you describe the couple to him?”
“Ahhh, you do speak,” I joked trying to lighten things up. It didn’t work. “Sure, whatever you need me to do.”
I sat down next to where Declan was standing.
“Declan?”
“I don’t know, Cianna. I’m trying to figure that out.”
I sipped my tea. “It was sunset, Declan. It wasn’t totally dark just yet. How was it even possible for him to be out?”
He just looked at me, thinning his lips tight together and shaking his head while shrugging his shoulders. Declan still had me blocked. I hated when he did that. Then I realized that that is how he felt for all the years that I had blocked him.
Suddenly Declan stomped his foot, “Damn it, Sam!” He looked over at me and Shane. “What is taking him so long to get here?”
I chuckled to myself knowing that he and Sam where arguing telepathically over something.
Shane grabbed my hand, “Are you ready to share some details?”
Declan turned to Shane, “There was another murder today by a vampire, actually, a double homicide.”
“Declan saw it too,” I chimed in.
Shane’s eyes got wide. He looked to Declan.
Declan only nodded in agreement.
“Ah.” Shane stood up, “I’ll get my supplies.” He moved to the door, stopping to lay his hand on Declan as if to comfort him.
Declan quickly shrugged him off. “Not now, mate.”
Though I knew Declan had put up his wall so I couldn’t get in, I still told him to calm down inaudibly in case he was listening to me.
Shane went upstairs to his room to get his scribble pad and pencils. I got comfortable on the small sofa in the office. Shane came in and sat down next to me.
“Ready?”
I looked over at him, “As I’ll ever be. Sorry about Declan. I’ve never seen him like this.”
“No worries.” He flipped through some pages in his book. When he found a blank one, he set it on his lap and fiddled with his pencils until he found the few he wanted to use.
He stretched out just a little and our legs ended up touching.
“Would you prefer me to move?”
“Nope, I’m fine here I have plenty of room to draw. Would you mind holding these few pencils for me? I’ll tell you which ones I need when I’m ready for them.”
“Sure.”
“I’m ready to start when you are. Same as before. Tell me all you can, remember to include shapes and colors.”
“Okay.” I took a deep breath.
I explained that this time it was a couple, enjoying a sunset at the beach. He asked me to describe the couple first.
The girl was a beautiful young girl that I would have guessed to be early 20s. She wore long brunette hair down to the center of her back. Shapely curves, bright bikini; I would have guessed about 130 pounds, 5’5”. Her eyes were gold and brown. Her skin was a silky tan and she had high cheekbones.
The man was her perfect match. He was tall, stood 6’2”. He was thin, but built, lean. His arms were toned with nice muscles in proportion with his chest and back. He wore his hair tight to his scalp, and it was light in color. His eyes were deep brown.
Before they were attacked.
“What about the vampire?”
I started to shake.
Shane laid his sketch down on his lap and reached over to pat my arm. “If it’s too much…”
“No, I’m fine.”
Shane returned to his pad.
I explained that it was the same one as I had seen a few days before. Same features. His eyes had a more intense crazed appearance to them this time. I also noticed he did have clothing; however it was ragged and torn, barely hanging on his body, making it unidentifiable.
I also saw his manner in killing this time around, not just the aftermath. It was a game to him. The hunt seemed too easy. Though he was able to quench his thirst for blood, he wasn’t satisfied.
Somehow I could tell by the way he left his kill so quickly to come after us.
Shane nodded in agreement without looking up from his drawings. His pencil moved at a quick pace. Once or twice he took a pencil from my hand and replaced it with the one he was using. I sunk into the sofa as he worked. I closed my eyes and relived the evening’s events. I shuddered as I replayed the taunting and begging. I gasped as, in my mind, I saw the vampire crest the mountainside so easily toward us.
Shane abruptly stood up snapping me back from my memories. His sketch book fell to the floor. Shane was sweating profusely.
“What?” I asked startled by his sudden need to be standing.
He rubbed his leg, “Sorry, Charlie horse.”
He leaned over and picked up his book. He took a seat at the desk across the room.
“Tell me more about what you saw as you turned back to look at the mountainside.”
“There was nothing to it. I looked back in time to see him with his hands on the ground, lifting his body up over the edge. It took him no time to get there.
None. Thank God we were as far away from him as we were; otherwise he would have been right on top of us. I could see the fury in his eyes. I saw the blood dripping from his fangs and chin.”
Shane flipped a page and scribbled fervently. He was so engrossed in his drawings he never heard me ask if I could leave.
I quietly left the office and went to see Declan outside on the patio. He was exactly where I left him 20 minutes earlier. I walked up to him. It took him a few seconds to realize I was there. When he finally did, it didn’t take him long to see the tears falling down my cheeks. He quickly gathered me up in his arms.
He caressed my back and kissed the top of my head. “It’s all right now, love. We’re safe now. I’m sorry.”
I pulled back and looked up at him, “You’re sorry?”
“Aye. For putting you in harm’s way.”
“How? You couldn’t have known.”
He slowly shook his head up and down agreeing with me. “Ah, but I should’ve left right away and not given him the opportunity to smell your scent on the air.”
I pouted, “My scent will always be on the air.”
He pulled me in and kissed me.
“Did you finish up with Shane? Was he able to get some good drawings again?
“I don’t know. I didn’t look at
them. He was busy with the last minute details of them.”
“He’s a good artist.”
I agreed and changed the subject. “Sam on his way?”
“Mhm. He trying to track down someone who he was told supposedly did extensive research on vampires.”
“Really?”
“Yes. Oddly enough, there are people who believe in them, from what he has told me.”
“Wow. Go figure.”
I felt myself begin to ease up. I stayed tight to Declan for the next few minutes, feeling a sense of security.
Shane came out to the patio with his latest drawings. They were incredible with details. His pictures had such an uncanny likeness to what I had seen take place before my own eyes.
Declan was speechless.
He captured the vampire as it crested the mountaintop with such detail. The fury and depth of intent in its eyes scared the be-jeezus out of me, again, through Shane’s drawing. The vampire knew it was me and it wanted me. I was sure of it.
Declan studied the pages of Shane’s artistry. He lingered over one or two before looking at the others. Suddenly he let the book fall to the ground, exposing the last image he had viewed.
I heard in my mind, “Cianna, what do you see?”
I looked down at the drawing at my feet. I took in the whole scene itself.
It was of the vampire going in for the final bite that killed the girl. An amplified view of what I saw.
Then I focused on the bottom of the page and took in each minute detail, inch by inch. My mind eliminated everything around me except the replay of the movie in my head that Shane’s picture took me back to.
The beach beneath them was saturated with the blood oozing from her tattered body. Her tanned legs listless; unable to support her limp frozen body had blood pouring from the many gashes in their flesh. Her abdomen looked like it had been raked with the metal teeth of a mason’s tool. Some of the wounds were larger than others. The skin ripped and ragged along the edges of the openings. Crimson liquid seeped unencumbered, no longer held in place to nourish her body. Her arms just dangled from their shoulders, useless, incapable of movement. Her face was partially masked by the wild hair jetting out of the vampire’s head as he moved in toward her neck.
I hovered there.
The blonde streaked brunette hair was matted with blood and sand. It was tightly wound between the long fingers of the vampire, ready to separate itself from her scalp from the tension of his hold.
Her eye, brown speckled with gold dustings was losing the grasp of life as she braced herself for the end she knew was inevitable. With all the strength she could muster, she held what gaze she had left with her man begging for their suffering to end.
I heard him cry out, “End her suffering, I beg of you,” as his voice trailed off in whimpers of the shame he felt for being unable to stop the deed himself; for being at the mercury of such a despicable creature.
I could hear the victorious snickers of the vampire.
Tears blended with blood as they rolled down her high cheekbone.
Her pouty lips separated, inhaling, filling her lungs with her last baited breath.
“Look closely, Cianna,” Declan’s voice echoed somewhere from the back of my mind.
The scene played on in my memory.
The vampire, though his back was to me, seemed to grow in stature and strength in the rush of victory and defeat.
His hair seemed to have a blonde hue, but drab in intensity. It stood straight out of each follicle. It hung just past the nape of his neck. His shoulders were broad and rich in color from being bronzed in the sun. So far different from the paleness I had always thought a vampire was supposed to be. His back arched like a cobra ready to strike. His legs held a perfect muscular shape. His clothing was not unusual for a day at the beach, though torn and tattered.
As I analyzed the vision of him, I realized he was nothing like what I had been trained to think a vampire was in all of Hollywood’s movies. He looked no different than any other human. He wasn’t pale. He didn’t sparkle in the sunlight. In his glory he was a horrid monster. But what about when he was out of his killing zone, in a normal everyday setting?
My body stiffened. That thought alone made me shiver to the depth of my soul. How could anyone tell him apart from any other person if he was normal?
“Focus,” Declan whispered in my mind.
I looked back to the picture. The wounds on the girl’s body jumped out at me.
I darted my eyes to catch Declan’s. I opened my palm and traced the fading scar.
He smiled at me.
Chapter Sixteen
Declan knew my mind.
“Shane, I need to run an errand.”
Shane nodded to Declan. “I won’t go anywhere, mate.”
He kissed the top of my head as he walked past me. “I’ll be right back.”
Declan departed with hesitation. He knew what I needed, the crime scene pictures and my notes from the Castle.
Shane didn’t question.
I took a seat and stared off into the woods beyond the garden.
I must have drifted off into a state of unconsciousness. The distant howl of a wolf startled me. Shane looked up from his work. He put his book down on the chair beside him and rose from his seat. He walked out into the yard.
He stood with his back to me for a few minutes, searching the darkness. Finally he stretched his arms above his head and arched his back, loosening his muscles. Turning back toward me, I watched him clear the expression from his face.
“Can I get you something to drink, Cianna?”
“No thanks.”
He walked past me into the kitchen.
I canvassed the tree line. Flints of speckled reflections dotted along the route I checked. Fireflies drifted up from their slumber in the grass to decorate the sky. I thought I caught evidence of eyes low in the woods, watching me, as Shane returned to take his seat beside me. I looked again to where I saw the shapes but found nothing staring back. I shuddered.
A firm hand grasped my shoulder. I gasped.
“Kid,” Sam greeted me. “Little jumpy?”
I sighed in relief, looking up at my uncle.
“Rough evening, Uncle.”
Shane offered his drawings, “Here’s a visual aide.”
Sam flipped through the pencil-drawn pictures.
“Wow.”
“Brutal,” I sighed. “The way he ravaged their bodies was surreal.”
Sam tilted his head to the side. “But?”
I was surprised Sam knew I had reservations.
“The hunt seemed too easy for him. He didn’t seem to be satisfied.
Not that I should know that.”
“Hmm, interesting concept, Cianna. What leads you to that assumption?”
“Couldn’t tell ya, Sam, just the way the whole thing sits in my gut.”
Declan was true to his word and returned with a box. He placed it in front of me, on the edge of the lounge chair.
“Sam.”
“Declan.”
“Shall we retreat to the office?”
“I’ll grab a couple beers from the fridge on my way.”
Shane took the moment of silence to excuse himself.
Suddenly I was alone on the patio, left to confirm my thoughts with the pictures. I moved to the rectangular glass table. The night air was still, allowing me to spread the pictures out across the table.
An examination of the photos confirmed our suspicions.
The wounds of those that fought years ago for their lives matched those that I watched the blood-sucking creature inflicted on a couple of lovers a few hours ago. I had taken the time to put a ruler next to each gash-wound, in both length and width, and take pictures. I also took close-up shots of each opening.
As I looked now, it was amazing to me how the sliced fleshed of one victim resembled that of a different victim. Like a seriated edge of a knife that was used over and over by a serial killer on his differen
t prey.
It all made sense to me now. No human DNA was ever found at the murder scenes. The carnage was animalistic. The brutality of the torn torsos at some scenes, the absurd amount of blood, the unnatural torment of the victims were caused by the thrill of the kill, a vampire kill.
But I had never seen any bite marks on the bodies. That would have been a dead give-away.
Five long haunting years now left one question unanswered; was the vampire who currently held my scent in his grasp the one responsible for the murders that had remained unsolved all this time while keeping me from restful slumber?
Why were there always more questions?
The events played out before my eyes over the last couple of weeks had left me drained. I was exhausted.
I neatly piled the photos back in the box and took them into the downstairs office. To my surprise Declan and Sam were not in there.
Nor were they in the family room.
I checked the piano room. Empty.
My heart began to beat faster and fear heated my ears.
The kitchen I had passed through twice held no one to calm me. I quickened my pace to the living room.
Nothing, no one.
The front door ajar caught my eye before I sprinted up the stairs. Shane was standing out at the end of the driveway. He turned to face me quickly.
“You look tired, Cianna,” he commented in a raspy voice.
“I am. Where are Declan and Sam?”
“On the side of the house, I think.” He motioned and offered no further explanation.
Something struck me as odd, but I didn’t know what.
“Thanks.”
Instead of walking out the front door and around to the side, I backed into the house, all but closing the door tightly.
An uncomfortable feeling made me temporarily sick to my stomach.
Declan was behind me instantly, with his hand gently against my lower back.
“Tired, love?”
I only nodded.
He ushered me upstairs. He held me tight for an extended time.
