The thoughts are swirling so fast I can’t keep track.
“Maybe he kills this vamp and heads out to get help then gets snatched off the street for his trouble.”
Rayne shakes her head. “Is this boy trained? How could he possibly overpower a vampire?”
I study her face. “Have you ever drunk blood from a willing human before?”
“No. No, I promise—I’d never—I told you—”
“Calm down. I’m just thinking, if you had, you wouldn’t have to ask.” I stop pacing. “When a vampire has a willing donor, something weird happens, they seem to…link. I don’t know what the proper word is, but that’s why humans get such a high off it. It does something to them. And the vampire gets an echo of the sensations. Both sides end up spaced out for a few minutes, especially if the volume of blood exchanged was high. Then the kid could have easily jabbed the vamp with a wooden spoon or even a pencil. Wouldn’t take much.”
Rayne’s eyes briefly flicker silver. “But you don’t know for sure. You’re speculating?”
“It’s as good an idea as any.”
A broad shape, low to the ground, steps out from the shelter of the climbing frame. Two more leap over it, twin points of gold shimmering in the darkness.
I turn.
Three more on the other side of the car, another on top, glaring at us.
“Agent…”
“I see them.”
“He said we had three minutes.”
“I’d say he’s a lying bastard.”
The seven wolves form a ring, hemming us in with low snarls and growls.
“We’re leaving, guys. Promise.”
They advance.
I move closer to Rayne.
“What do we do? What do we do?” Her voice is a panicked whisper.
I fight the urge to roll my eyes. “Don’t panic, for starters.”
“But—”
“You’re a vampire. You just healed a bite on your arm as though it was nothing. Get a grip.”
She nods, trembling like a leaf in the wind.
Too late I spot movement from the corner of my eye. “Duck!”
An eighth wolf springs from the darkness, straight over my head. It slams into Rayne and carries her down, jaws snapping at her face.
I roll, coming up with the gun levelled for more dangers.
There are none. The other seven wolves turn and dash at Rayne, snapping at her legs, her arms, her stomach.
“Hey. Get off her. Get off!”
Her screams are shrill and heavy with pain. Arms flail, legs kick, but the sheer number of wolves is too much.
I squeeze off a shot, but my aim is wide and the bullet sings off the pavement towards the play area. My next shot is worse, striking the ground a bare inch from Rayne’s face.
She screams.
“Get off her, you idiot wolves. She’s no threat to you.”
One swings round to me. Growls.
My feet slip on the pavement, then off the edge, into the road. Against a tyre. My tyre. My car.
I leap into the vehicle and slam the door. The wolf collides with the glass, slobbering all over it, scratching the hell out of my paintwork.
I drop my gun on to the passenger seat and start the engine.
The car responds with a roar, startling the wolves into looking up.
In that tiny gap, Rayne finds herself and thrusts upward with hands and feet. Three of the huge wolves spin through the air like toys, thudding to the ground several feet away. She stands, legs planted wide, arms out.
Blood streams from bite and claw marks all over her body. Her clothes are shredded, her hair a nest, but through it all, her eyes shine bright and clear.
Silver. Lively. Angry.
Rayne ploughs through the remaining wolves like a scythe. Nails and fangs drip blood, while clots of fur stick to her fingers as she battles like a creature possessed. Perhaps she is.
The last wolf, the one still baying at my window, yelps as she grabs it by the hind legs. A twirl on her heel and the wolf is airborne, sailing across the play area.
I clamber out of the car. “Rayne? Rayne, it’s okay. It’s over.”
She shrieks again.
“It’s over. You won. They’re done. Stop.”
Her hands close over my shoulders, fingers digging in. Rayne hefts me into the air like a child and slams my back against the side of the car.
Stars dance across my vision.
My boots flail a full foot off the ground.
“Rayne?” My fingers stretch towards the knife strapped to my wrist. Pause. “Rayne, please—”
She stops, open mouth an inch from my throat. “I—I want—”
Panicked breath clogs my throat. Still I can’t draw the knife. “Rayne?”
“I-I want to make it…make it right.”
Pressure in my shoulders slips away as she lets my body fall. I slide down the car. End in a heap on the Tarmac.
She turns, vaulting the bonnet to flee along the road.
“Rayne? Rayne!”
Shit.
* * *
My gears screech as I take the next bend, the rear fishtailing across dashed white lines. I want to slow down, the rational part of me knows I should, but the SPEAR in me knows better.
The trail of blood I’m following is already fading. Much longer and I’ll have no way of finding Rayne, until she finds a human to munch on.
The expression on her face, the speed, the silver sheen in her eyes, all classic signs of a vampire on high alert, a vampire mere minutes from blood mania.
I take another turn, clipping the pavement on the exit, much to the anger and fear of the woman standing on the edge with her fake-tanned legs on show in ripped fishnets.
Two drops of blood to my left. Another on the right. A smeared handprint on the shaft of a tall street lamp. A car with a dented bonnet. Nothing.
“Damn it.”
I slow, now peering down every side street for more signs.
At a cross road controlled by traffic lights, two cars idle nose to nose in the centre. One has clouds of smoke streaming from the bonnet.
“Hey, what happened?”
Shaken from the conversation and trading of insurance details, the two drivers look my way. “Something fell out of the sky—”
“Not something, I’m telling you, it was a person—”
“With silver eyes?”
“I know what I saw—”
I gun the accelerator. “Which way?”
They point, still arguing. I miss the rest, guiding my car along a wider main road with two lanes to each side.
Half a mile on, I find her. She’s slowed, but only to the speed of an athletic sprinter, rather than a cheetah.
“Rayne!”
She stops in the middle of the road. Traffic is slow, but enough to be dangerous, cars swerving around her in a flurry of horns, screeching tyres, and fist shakes.
Times like this I’d give a lot for a blue light on top of my car.
Still she hasn’t moved. Standing. Silent. Waiting.
For what?
I pull closer, flicking on my hazards and hoping that’s enough.
“Rayne?”
Silence.
“Rayne, listen to me—”
“Why not drive at me, Agent? Like you did before?”
It takes a moment to pull my thoughts together. “Yesterday? No, this isn’t like then.”
“Isn’t it?” She stares upward. “Everything is so clear like this. I can see every star in the sky, the pits and shadows on that tiny sliver of moon. I see the whites of your eyes and the colours in your hair. I hear your heart. The blood in your veins.”
The car rumbles beneath me and I consider revving it up again. Pressing my foot down like I did before, like I intended to do to the wolves.
My leg trembles.
“I can smell you,” she mutters. “Your hunger, anger, and fear.”
The gun is still on the passenger seat. I grab it and di
ve out of the car, free hand raised to hold aloft my SPEAR ID. Whether it’s the gun or the ID I’ll never know, but advancing cars in all directions squeal to a stop and back up fast.
“Your heartbeat is incredibly fast, Agent. It’s exciting.”
I lick my lips.
My finger tightens on the trigger.
A single ounce of pressure and the shot is clean. She’s right there, not moving. A clear, easy target. A chest shot would end this mess in seconds.
So why can’t I do it?
Blue lights flicker in the corner of my vision. A siren.
I lower the gun. “Rayne, you have to come with me. Please.”
Nothing.
A police car screeches to a stop beside mine. The officer within tumbles out, facing me with one hand extended. The other clutches his chest radio. “Okay, miss, put the gun down.”
“You don’t understand—”
“Nothing is going to be solved with guns, you hear me? Put it down. Nice and slow. Put it down and we’ll talk.”
“I’m a SPEAR agent—”
“That doesn’t put you above the law. You can’t swing a loaded gun around in civilian areas with no supernatural threat in sight.”
“Are you crazy, can’t you see—” But even as I point to Rayne, I know she’s not there. In fact, I can’t see her at all. “Damn it. I need to go.”
“No, you—”
“And you need to get back in your car. Right now.”
The officer frowns. “You don’t give me orders—”
“There’s a mad vampire loose and I need to find it. Get in your car.”
He mutters something into his radio. A coded string of numbers and letters that does nothing but piss me off. “I’ll need to see your license, miss.”
“It’s Agent. And I’m busy.”
“You show me your license right now or else I’ll—”
Rayne vaults over the squad car, arms spread, legs tucked, an eagle in flight. Her landing drives the officer to the ground and she aims straight for the soft, meaty flesh of his upturned throat.
He screams, flails, kicks, and begs.
I level the gun again. “Rayne.”
“Shoot her,” he yells. “Shoot her, shoot her.”
My finger twitches. Relaxes.
“What are you doing? Shoot her.”
Instead, I run straight for them, free hand dipping into a pocket on my belt. Paper packet, marked front and back with a tall cross. Tip the small white disks it contains into my palm and yank at the neck of Rayne’s shredded blouse. The communion wafers smoke the instant they touch her skin, sparking and fizzing like fireworks. The stench of burning flesh stings my nose.
Rayne rears off the officer, twelve feet straight up as though off a springboard. She lands on her face by the side of the road, screeching and clawing at her back.
“Move.”
The officer obeys, scrambling back on his arse, with tears of terror on his cheeks. Wetness fans across the front of his trousers. “Shoot her. Shoot her.”
“Get lost.”
He stops, caught by indecision.
“Go away.”
At last, he’s up and running, back to his car. Within seconds, he’s gone.
“Rayne? You need to snap out of it. Rayne?”
More screaming. Growls. Shrieks of mingled pain and fury.
My fingers tingle. The gun beneath my arm takes on the weight of a dozen blocks of lead.
Draw and shoot. Just like the officer said. Like I should have done last night.
Shoot her in the head. Then fire the rest of the bullets into her chest until the holes ooze black.
My hand wavers, then falls. “Damn it.”
I run back to the car and heave the boot open, searching for my kit bag. On the right, tucked into a pocket beneath the zip, are three long lengths of chain: iron, silver, and steel.
No time to separate them.
Rayne is up again, the smoke is dissipating, and her gaze is trained on me.
My hip slams the edge of the boot. Stars dance across my vision as my head cracks off the door.
She’s fast.
Breath hot and damp on my neck. Nails clawing at my cheeks.
“Rayne!”
I swing with the chains. Can’t see which one hits her face, but I make a guess when her cries begin anew.
Back in the bag, fingers closing around a bandolier of rubber balloons.
Again I swing, and the balloons burst against Rayne’s face and chest. The holy water splashes everywhere, bringing up welts, pus, and sores.
Her screams shift from fury to pain, and she drops to her knees, clutching her face.
I’m gasping, panting, wheezing…but alive.
“Help me…” Her eyes beg louder than her words.
Shoot her. Stake her. Wrap her up in consecrated steel and pop her head off.
I sigh, and in that moment I know for sure.
“I’ve got you, Rayne, don’t worry. I’ve got you.”
Chapter Eleven
The Clear Blood Foundation: a five-storey monstrosity in glass, steel, and concrete.
I swing my car against the pavement edge, ignoring the jagged yellow lines beneath me and the parking meter just opposite.
On the back seat, Rayne lies deathly still, skin smoking. Though I tried to avoid it, some of the chains lie against bare flesh, and the blessed steel has already raised red welts on her arms and throat on top of those left by holy water scalds.
My stomach twists in painful knots. “Rayne? Can you stand?”
She lifts her head, wincing as the links brush her oozing cheek. “Agent?”
“You need to get up. You have to get inside.”
“Can’t…see…”
I touch her ankle. “Then follow my voice. Get up and follow my voice. We’re close.”
She slumps against the seats.
Standing outside the car, gazing at the bright golden lights of salvation within Clear Blood, I’ve no idea what to do.
Nothing in my training has prepared me for this.
I can’t leave her to get help, but if I unwrap those chains or try to carry her…
A prickle brings my attention to my left cheek. Flakes of dry blood flake under my fingernails.
Rayne twitches.
I wonder…
I’m toying with the crazy idea when a security guard walks around the edge of the building. She takes one look at me, then the car, and leans into an impressive sprint. “You can’t park there.”
“I have a vampire—”
“This area is for emergency vehicles only.”
“What do you think this is?” I grab her shoulder and force her down towards the open rear door. “Vampire. Blood mania. I need to get her inside.”
The guard frowns. “Doesn’t look much like a vampire to me.”
“Get the doors open and warn the cafeteria we’re coming. There’s only one way I can think of to do this.”
I don’t wait to see if she obeys. Instead, I unfasten the buckles on my forearm knife sheath and roll back my sleeve. The knife, when I draw it, is sharp and light, balanced for throwing even if that’s not my preference. I lay it against my palm. Pray.
At first there’s no pain. The blade bites through flesh without effort and there’s no blood for several seconds.
Liquid red drops well up at either end of the cut.
One tentative step takes me closer to the car.
“Rayne?”
No response.
I lean in and wave my bleeding hand in front of her nose. Closer. Closer.
Her eyes snap open.
Chains creak.
I run.
I’m at the entrance before the first links break. They spin through the air at speed and pepper the main doors. Glass shatters and sprinkles the ground, startling the security guard loitering inside.
“Move!” I shove past.
More glass shatters.
From the corner of my eye I catch sight
of Rayne, struggling to free herself from three sets of chains while following the scent of my blood. Her fangs are longer than I’ve seen them, her eyes ablaze with silver.
I’m not going to make it.
The guard is yelling, someone else is screaming, but my focus is all ahead.
Down the corridor. Door on the left. Three small steps up.
Footsteps behind me, light and quick. Panting. My heart in my throat.
I’m not going to make it.
Another corridor. Turn right. Right again. Left. There.
The swing doors fronting the cafeteria hold fast as I barrel into them. The impact knocks me flat, and Rayne flies over me, her charge thwarted by my fall. The doors burst open, lock and hinges broken under flailing fists.
Crashes, thuds and shrieks follow.
Back on my feet, I peer through the remains of the frame.
At the far end of the cafeteria, Rayne wrestles to free herself from the twisted remains of a long metal table and several benches. Beyond her, using the larger entrance, an orderly line of vampires queue against the wall with raffle style ticket stubs in hand.
One or two of them look our way. The rest stay focused on the shuttered hatch at the front of the line through which a woman in white dispenses tall reinforced pint glasses of thick red liquid.
A table leg smashes into the wall above my head. The mangled table follows.
More broken links from the chains spin across the floor.
“Here”—I wave my arms—“over here.”
Rayne hurls more furniture aside as she wades towards me.
I keep waving, this time staring at the woman frozen in the serving hatch. “Blood bag.”
“But I need to warm it—”
“Blood bag.”
“Where’s her FID—”
“Give me a fucking blood bag.” I’m scooting sideways, measuring the distance between myself and Rayne with the few remaining tables. Four. Three. Two.
The woman darts out the side door of the kitchen, a plastic medical bag held aloft. She spots Rayne and skids to a terrified stop.
I cup my hands. “Toss it.”
My own blood makes my grip slippery, but I catch the bag as it flies at my face. A second later, Rayne is on me, snapping and snarling, mouth aimed for my palm. I shove the bag against her teeth.
Both Ways Page 10
