Apocalypse Happens

by Apocalypse Happens (epub)

  Unfortunately, no one knew where that was. The last person to see it had been a rabbi by the name of Turn-blat. Wild dogs—code for shape-shifters—had killed him, and the key hadn’t been found in his personal effects.

  I’d figured the Nephilim had it. How else had the damn demons flown free? But if they were asking us where it was . . . Well, that threw things into a whole new light.

  “Where is the key?” the varcolac demanded again.

  “Seriously, pal, we thought you had it.”

  “Lizzy!”

  My name ended in a curse as the other varcolac cut Jimmy again. He’d heal; hell, so would I, although I kinda hoped they wouldn’t notice. So far the Nephilim didn’t know all the things I could do, and I’d like to keep it that way.

  “Why would we have it?” the varcolac asked.

  “You killed Rabbi Turnblat.”

  He grinned. “Not me personally.”

  “Then you took the key.” He shook his head; I managed to shrug without moving my chains. “Someone did. You’d better start slapping around the minions.”

  For an instant, doubt flickered along with the yellow flames in the varcolac’s eyes; then he scowled. “We know you have it. The key is with the Phoenix. That is what the rabbi said.”

  I had a feeling the rabbi would have said just about anything when confronted with whatever Nephilim had been sent to kill him, maybe even the truth, but—

  “I don’t have it. Swear to God.”

  The varcolac hissed, and I rolled my eyes. The name of God didn’t hurt them. If it did I’d be singing hymns 24–7.

  “You will tell us. I will make you.” He lifted the golden knife and tried to slice my neck, but the dog collar prevented it. With a sound of annoyance, he reached for the latch.

  “I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” I murmured.

  He ignored me.

  “Don’t!” Jimmy shouted. “She needs to have that collar on. Shit!”

  I shifted my gaze. The muscle-bound varcolac had begun to hack at Jimmy in earnest. “Knock that off!” I ordered.

  The varcolac nearest to me grinned. “And who will make us?”

  “I might.”

  He leaned closer, put his face right next to mine. “You are bound, seer. You will never be free again. You will tell us everything we want to know. You will watch us kill your ‘minion.’ ” His lip pulled back in a snarl. “Then we will satisfy ourselves on your body—all of us, and we are legion. If you are still in one piece, and this I doubt, then we will make you beg to die.” He licked my cheek, and his breath smelled of rot. “Where is the key?”

  “Fuck you.”

  He tried to nick my throat again—exactly what I was after. When his knife encountered my jeweled collar once more, he returned his attention to the clasp, fussed and fiddled, but eventually released it.

  The breeze stilled. Jimmy murmured, “Uh-oh.”

  The change came over me like a flash flood, a forest fire, a tornado—natural but deadly. The collar kept my inner nature contained. Without it, I became the new and improved me.

  Not really a problem when I was killing demons. The trouble came when it was time to put the vampire back into the box. There were very few beings on this earth that were capable of it, and right now one of them was chained to the ground.

  When Jimmy said, “Uh-oh” the varcolac had glanced at him; now the demon glanced back and his eyes widened. Mine must be bright red.

  He tried to scramble away. Before he could, I ate his nose. He wasn’t going to need it anymore. Then I sank my fangs into his neck and drank. Nephilim blood tastes like candy, and the rush . . . pure sugar.

  I tossed the varcolac aside with a flick of my head. He wasn’t dead, but he wasn’t moving either. I yanked my arms upward, my legs too. The stakes came out of the ground with a sifty, sandy shift, and I was free.

  “Free.” What a fantastic word.

  The chains flapped about—striking me here and there, making me burn. I slid my fingers between the cuffs and skin, broke them off and tossed them aside. Sure, that stung a little, but it didn’t last long enough to matter.

  The varcolac leader wasn’t dead yet, an easy fix. I picked him up and yanked his head free of the rest of him. He was ashes before the two halves hit the ground.

  “Who’s next?” I asked.

  “You-you-you’re a vampire,” Jimmy’s captor stuttered.

  “What was your first clue?”

  I breathed in, relishing the fear and uncertainty. When I was like this colors were brighter, smells so much smellier, sounds reached me from miles away as if they were right next to me. I could hear blood coursing through veins, the increase in the swish-swash signaling terror. Anticipating the flavor, I licked my lips.

  I was so strong I could do anything. Kill anyone. I had no conscience, no morality, not a worry in this world or any other.

  “I-I-I’ll kill him.” The varcolac had the knife to Jimmy’s throat. I reached out and snatched the fool by his Adam’s apple—in this form I was so fast my movements became a blur—and tore it out with one sharp yank. The blood washed over Jimmy like a warm spring rain.

  “Sheesh, Lizzy.”

  I licked my fingers. “You’re welcome.”

  As I turned away, what remained of the varcolac burst into ashes, the remnants sticking to Jimmy’s glistening skin like feathers on tar.

  I’ll give the varcolacs credit. They didn’t run. They came at me like an army.

  But they didn’t stand a chance.

  CHAPTER 3

  When the only things left alive were Jimmy and me, I lifted my glistening arms to the moon and shrieked my triumph. Then I looked around for something else to kill.

  My gaze fell on Sanducci still chained to the ground. Though Jimmy had given me this power, that didn’t matter to me when my demon was driving.

  All those old wives’ tales about vampires making other vampires . . . not entirely true. Vampires are Nephilim, but they were created from the mating of a Grigori and a human. You can’t become one just by being bitten. You had to be born.

  Unless you were me.

  As far as I know, I’m the only sexual empath on the planet. In layman’s terms, I absorb supernatural powers through sex. In other words, because Jimmy is a dhampir, I’m one too, and dhampirs become vampires by sharing blood with them.

  Jimmy hadn’t wanted to make me like him. He’d done everything to prevent it. He’d run away. He’d tried to hide. He’d even locked himself up in an enchanted Irish cottage, complete with a golden door and golden bars on the window. Didn’t matter. I’d found him, and I’d seduced him.

  Jimmy was strong. He kept his vampire nature contained. But once a month—beneath the full moon—it got free. And when it had, I’d been there waiting. Long before the sun rose, I was just like him.

  Why had I done it? Because the only way to win this war was to be as ruthless as they were. The supernatural powers and extraordinary strength didn’t hurt either.

  I inched closer to Jimmy, who lay naked beneath the moon. He was so damn pretty. My tongue darted out to wet my lips, snagging on my fangs, which cut the tender flesh. I tasted my own blood and paused for just an instant to enjoy.

  For a vampire, sex and violence, blood and lust, are all rolled together. It’s hard to differentiate between them, and we don’t really want to.

  My body tingled from the adrenaline, from the change, from the food. My skin cool, the blood beneath coursed so hot. Every sway of the breeze lifted the hairs on my arms, my neck, creating a delicious shiver. My shadow fell over Sanducci like a thundercloud.

  His gaze met mine. “No, Lizzy.”

  “Not Lizzy.”

  He winced. “I know.”

  I ran my hand over his perfect chest, his taut belly.

  “Let me go,” he said. “You need your collar back on.”

  “No.”

  His sigh, full of pain, drew me in. I wanted to drink his agony slowly like a fine, expensive wine.
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  “So sad,” I whispered. “Broken inside.”

  Jimmy’s mouth tightened; his eyes narrowed. “Not as broken as you think.”

  I lowered my body onto his. Naked hip to naked hip, breasts to chest, his penis hot against my belly. “I can fix that.”

  I kissed him. He might pretend to be human, but he wasn’t. He never had been. The violence called to him. He couldn’t deny its allure.

  The thought of taking him on the blood-drenched ground, while he was tied, he was helpless, made me so aroused I writhed. In seconds, his penis was not only hot but also hard. He was unable to keep himself from kissing me back.

  My hands glided over him. Down his arms to the manacles at his wrists, down his thighs to the restraints, then back up to the soft, tender flesh where his leg melded into his hip. I became fascinated with the skin there, the vein that blared blue beneath the silvery moon.

  I licked it, and his breath caught. I gazed up his body. His face tense, torn, he wanted this, he wanted me, and then again he didn’t.

  My teeth grazed the vein, my tongue pressed against it; the blood pulsed beneath, and I couldn’t resist. I drank from him.

  He tasted both tart and sweet. His groan wasn’t pain or fear but lust. I lifted my head.

  “Not yet,” I whispered, my breath brushing across him, making him shudder. “Wait for me.” Then I licked his tip, tested it with my tongue, traced it with just a hint of fang until he cursed and pulled against the chains.

  “Take them off. Let me—” His head thrashed. I found myself intrigued.

  “Let you what?”

  He gave one final jerk against his bonds, and the stakes jiggled, but they held. The scent of burning flesh permeated the air. It reminded me of . . . hell. Not that I’d been there, but I could relate.

  “Let me touch those breasts. They’ve been in my mind for a decade.”

  I lifted my eyebrows. “I’m twenty-five.”

  “What do you think a fifteen-year-old boy has in his head? You’ve had those breasts since you were twelve, even though you did your best to hide them.”

  I’d been mortified to develop early. I’d worn loose clothes and hunched my shoulders. Not only because of my mortification, but also because I knew all too well that a girl in the foster-care system needed to slide through life unnoticed.

  But I didn’t want to think about the past now. Maybe never again. I was strong. Invincible. How did that song go?

  “I am woman,” I murmured.

  “Not really,” Jimmy said.

  I gave his thigh a final lick—the wound had already healed—then straddled him, allowing his erection to slide exactly where I needed it to. “Tell me more of what you’ll do if I release you.”

  His lips curved, though the smile never reached his eyes. “Grab those hips, pull you down, push myself up so deep you’ll remember me for days.”

  “Mmm, and then?”

  “Sink my fangs into your breast, drink from you as you come. The usual.”

  “Yesss.” I took him in, rode him beneath the moon; he lasted a long, long time.

  The chains rattled. “Let me go.”

  I was so close to an orgasm, I listened, sliding my palms down his legs, up his arms, snapping his restraints into pieces. Then I waited, breathless, for him to touch me. And he did.

  His hands at my hips, he pulled me close; then he arched and filled me up. He rose from the sand, his lips took my breast as promised, and he suckled, the rasp of his teeth almost, but not quite, enough to send me over.

  He put his hands around my throat, squeezed just a little. They were rough. I liked how they made me feel. Breathless, on the edge of life and death, blood in the air, on the ground, on me. It didn’t get much better than this.

  “Mmm.” I let my head fall back, my eyes slide closed. “Harder.”

  He wouldn’t kill me. I wasn’t sure anyone could.

  “No problem,” Jimmy muttered, and in his voice I heard something disturbing.

  My eyes snapped open just as the catch of my jeweled collar snapped closed. I let out one furious shriek at the moon, and then I was me again.

  As always, once the vampire was back in the box, I cringed at what I’d said and done and been. My breath caught, a sound very like a sob, except I didn’t cry, had learned long ago that crying did no one any good.

  Jimmy and I were still wrapped together; he was still deep inside me. He was hard; I was wet. Despite the change in my mind and my heart, my body still trembled on the edge of orgasm, and so did his.

  His hands slid from the collar to my shoulders, clenching for an instant. I thought he meant to push me away. I didn’t blame him. What I’d done to him, what I’d forced him to do to me . . .

  I tensed, prepared to move before he made me. I tried to see his eyes, but he pulled me close, buried his face against my breasts.

  “Jimmy—”

  “Don’t talk.” He traced his hands from my shoulders to my hips and cupped them. “Just . . . don’t.”

  I swallowed, tasting things I didn’t want to think about. But an instant later I forgot everything else as his body moved against mine.

  We’d always had this. No matter how much time passed, when we came together we couldn’t help but touch each other, and when we touched . . . sex happened.

  I rocked against him, his hands showed me the rhythm, his breath against my skin, my cheek against his hair; only a few slick movements and I came. As I clenched around him, he did too, shuddering in my arms as the silence twirled around us like mist.

  When it was over, I lifted my head; he lifted his. We disentangled ourselves. Our eyes did not meet. Would it be like this between us forever from now on?

  Our clothes were nearby—a little torn, a lot bloody. We’d left the car on the road maybe a quarter of a mile east. In the trunk we kept clean jeans and shirts, a jug of water, some towels.

  We’d done this before; we knew what would happen. If we lived, we’d look like the lone survivors of a mass murder. We’d need to clean up before we could find a hotel and then . . . clean up some more.

  Jimmy snatched our things, and I followed him to the car. He still wouldn’t meet my eyes.

  “Are you going to be like this forever?” I asked.

  Jimmy dug the key out of his pants, hit the button for the trunk, tossed everything in. “Forever? Doubtful.”

  “A week, a month, a year?”

  “I don’t know,” he said quietly.

  “Nice job, by the way.”

  He frowned, but he didn’t glance up. “Glad you enjoyed it.”

  “I meant pretending to be into it, then snapping the collar on.”

  “Someone had to.”

  And that someone was usually him.

  In the past we’d always had love, shared memories, Jimmy and me against the world. Now, I wasn’t so sure what we had and it bothered me.

  “You hurt me too,” I murmured.

  A few months ago, Jimmy had been possessed by his demon of a vampire father. Jimmy had kept me as a sex slave, drunk from me until I nearly died, until I wanted to.

  “You think I don’t remember?” Jimmy’s fingers clenched on the open trunk of the car. “You think I don’t hate myself still? But you of all people should know what it’s like to be forced to do things you don’t want to. To have your body betray you while your mind screams, ‘No.’ ”

  I did know. I also knew I’d had no choice.

  I took a step forward, and he took a step back. “Let it be,” he said. “You got over it; I will too.”

  I wasn’t sure I’d gotten over it. But I’d gotten past it. I understood that when he’d done those things, Jimmy hadn’t been Jimmy. Unfortunately, when I’d seduced him I’d been more me than I was now.

  We washed up as best we could with the water and the towels. Basically cleaning our faces, necks, hands and arms, leaving the rest for later.

  Jimmy tossed me some clothes. I put them on without looking at them, but Jimmy’s made me
smile. He wore one of his T-shirts.

  Jimmy’s “cover” for his globe-trotting demon killing was portrait photographer to the stars. Someday—if we weren’t all dead—he’d be able to collect his greatest hits into a few coffee-table books. He was a genius with a camera. Almost as good as he was with a silver knife.

  His pictures had graced magazine covers, book covers, posters, CD cases, once even Times Square. Up-and-coming rock bands, country western wannabes, fresh-faced tween queens and steroid-puffed future action stars knew that if Sanducci took their photograph, they had arrived.

  Jimmy liked T-shirts. He wore them with jeans, dress pants, sports coats, tuxedos and sometimes nothing at all. The true sign of becoming the “it” guy or girl or the band of the century was when Sanducci was photographed in your shirt.

  Dozens arrived at his postbox every month. He donated them all to charity. He only wore the shirts of those he’d actually photographed. But that never stopped anyone from sending the garments.

  Tonight his shirt read: NY Yankees. I hated the Yankees. The reason I smiled? Jimmy knew it. Needling me about the Yankees was another of Jimmy’s favorite things.

  I was a Brewers fan. Milwaukee was my hometown. Had been since Ruthie brought me there at twelve. It was the only place I’d ever been happy, and right now I missed home like a piece of my heart.

  “When did you do a shoot with the Yankees?” I asked.

  Jimmy cast me a surprised glance, then glanced down with a puzzled frown. The expression made my heart hurt worse. He hadn’t known what shirt he’d put on. He hadn’t been needling me at all.

  “When they won the division.” Jimmy shrugged. “Last year?”

  “Or the year before or two before that. It ain’t hard to win if you buy every damn prospect.”

  “I’m not gonna argue baseball with you tonight.” He sounded so tired.

  I turned away, watched the remaining mounds of varcolac ash shiver and shift, then drift off into the night. “I shouldn’t have killed them all. I should have kept one alive to question about the key.”

  “You think you’ve got any restraint when you’re like that?”