by A. Vers
I paused as a niggling of thought filled my mind.
The killer would have gone without a donor bag while they fed directly from the source. Nothing packaged ever compared to fresh. Even I knew that.
All we needed to do was check the blood bank log. Whoever had not fed in the last few days would be our killer. It was simple.
Unbelievably so.
Why hadn’t I thought of that sooner?
“Morgan?” Ames asked, his voice soft.
I peered around, wishing Ryder was here. My eyes locked on Ames. “The nurse’s log, Ames.” He blinked. “We check the log. Whoever hasn’t been feeding from donor blood has been getting it from the humans. We narrow down the list, we catch the killer.”
“Morgan …” His expression glazed a bit. When his gaze snapped back to me, he was trying hard not to grin like a fool. “You’re a damn genius.” He crushed me to him, hugging me hard.
I smiled and pushed back. He let me go, and we rose to our feet.
“We slip into the nurse’s office and check the records,” I said, as we stared at each other. “And with the academy on high alert to protect the students, the last place the professors would think to look for a killer was near the offices—”
“No one would know we were there,” he finished.
My heart began to thunder.
This was it. It was how we saved Lokworth. How we saved the humans.
And how I protected Ryder instead of the other way around.
I tried not to let guilt fill my stomach. But it was there.
Finding out that Ames and I were a fit match in every way weighed at the back of my mind. I had kissed Ryder earlier. And now, I knew Ames and I had been moments from doing much more than a mere feeding.
My parents would have been so disappointed in me. So angry. But I liked Ryder. And from the way he kissed me earlier, he liked me too.
But how did I choose between him and Ames?
I was no longer sure I was a dignitary. Nor that I wanted to be one. Being sent to Lokworth had put all of that on hold. But I was more than what my parents wanted of me. More than my past.
I was a vampire, and I couldn’t change it.
But I could use it.
If it meant saving Ryder, no matter the cost to me, then I would. But what happened after that?
I just didn’t know. And for the time being, I had bigger worries.
So I pushed them all away and followed Ames from my room.
Chapter 31
Ryder
There was a flash of light and numerous slamming doors.
I laid on my bed, blinking at the ceiling.
Shit. What time was it?
“He hasn’t woken up all evening.” A familiar voice pierced the fog in my skull. “He’s pretty battered, but his blood—” The voice faded into several long beats of silence.
“A vampire? He was with a vampire?”
Something thudded loudly, shattering the quiet in and out of my head. Pain returned then. And it came back with a vengeance.
I groaned.
Everything hurt. It was the kind of pain that drove men to a bottle. Or a swift ending.
Light bloomed through the room. I opened my eyes. Something grabbed my shirt front, pulling me upward and shaking me. Every rattle made my vision darken again.
“How dare you consort with a vampire. How could you protect one? You ungrateful shit. Answer me!” Dad hit me hard across the cheek. Blood filled my mouth.
“She saved me,” I gasped. “A bunch of thugs cornered us.”
“So you let her feed you?” he spat.
My veins turned to ice.
Morgan fed me?
When?
Then I remembered the knife, the cut. Blackness. And waking up with the taste of sweet pennies on my tongue. Suddenly the pain in my body made so much sense.
Morgan had fed me. But I was human. And humans could not metabolize their blood. Our systems fought it like a disease, or the flu.
Shit.
And Dad knew. Somehow he knew.
I stared at him, watching the anger in his gaze fade to disgust and then hatred. His fist flew, catching me in the torso so hard my vision snapped. I inhaled sharply. Then wished I hadn’t.
My body caved inward.
“You know what they can do, boy. They hunt our kind.” His voice was colder than I had ever heard it as he shook me. “Why? Why would you betray us like this? Betray your mother?”
I finally spoke through the pain. “Mom ... would’ve never ... wanted this,” I gasped around what felt like a broken rib. Or three.
Dad’s face was haggard and lined in fury. He peered into my eyes, spit in disgust, and dropped me.
My ungainly body bounced on the mattress. Every motion hurt. I hadn’t felt this bad when I fell asleep. And now with this beating, it would only be worse.
“Your mother should’ve let you die,” he ground out.
I didn’t argue. I had thought the same thing for the last ten years.
He growled and stomped from the room.
“He stays here, do you understand?” Dad boomed from the hall. “He does not leave. He does not set one foot inside that damned school. It’s about time I have a talk with the locals, anyway.”
There was a loud bang and the guttural roar of the Jeep’s engine.
“This time you brought it on yourself, boy.”
My head turned painfully to find Aunt Joe in the doorway. She clicked her tongue. “But your daddy will fix it. He will cleanse this town of its vampire infestation. And your little blood drinker along with it.” She walked out and closed the door behind her. There was a click, and I knew they were locking me in.
I stared up at the ceiling through the pain and started plotting how I would get out.
Screw the family.
Screw humanity.
I had to warn Morgan of the hell that was coming her way.
It took everything in me to roll from the mattresses. But when I did, I hit the floor with a muffled thud and lay there amidst my discarded clothes.
No light streamed from under my bedroom door. And the house sounded empty, but I knew better. If Dad had gone to talk to the board, the squad would mobilize by tonight. I had only a handful of hours to get out and get to Lokworth.
I grimaced at the thought of even telling Morgan what I was. A hunter. Raised from birth to kill her kind after they killed my mother.
She would hate me. I knew it. But I was the only one who knew what was coming for her. The only one who cared enough about her to try to get her out. One way or another.
Arms shaking, I pushed to my hands and knees. My head began to throb with the effort, but I kept the position and just breathed through it.
That, at least, was the one good thing about being raised by my father. Even when I had been truly sick, he taught me how to push through it. To rise above what would have crippled a weaker man.
So I bit my lip and climbed slowly to my feet.
The world around me tilted, and acid washed up my throat. But I kept from puking all over the wall. Though it was a near miss.
I gingerly pulled my stiff shirt from my body. A single strip of blood darkened wine-red fabric wound around my midsection. Grimacing, I tugged it free.
My body was flawless, not even a scar from the blade the thug used. I took a deep breath.
There was no pain. The damage from Dad’s fist was gone too.
I rubbed my hand over my stained skin. It was a miracle.
No.
It was vampire blood.
That thought took some of my elation at being healed and turned it to ash. I had no idea when Morgan had fed me her blood.
How many hours did this last?
The nausea and fatigue I could work through. That was easy enough. I had suffered worse. But this fast healing? When would it wear off?
No doubt right when I was in the thick of things.
And pissing off my entire squad and the only family I had left
seemed like a great variation of that. But there was nothing else for it.
I took up the half-drunk bottle of water on top of one of the boxes, guzzled most of it, and used the rest to wipe some of the blood from my skin. Best not to scare everyone I met.
After changing, I stuffed my feet into my last pair of boots and went to the door. Trying the handle, I found it moveable, but the door wouldn’t budge. There was no sense beating a dead horse.
I went across the room to the window. The wall was solid against my spine, helping to still the spinning in my head. Pulling at the dingy sheets, I peered out.
The front walk was cracked and Stuck’s SUV and Aunt Joe’s battered truck were still outside. Nothing new there. I searched the darkness. Though I didn’t see anyone, I knew they would station someone outside and in.
But who was where?
I slid between the window and the curtain and thumbed the fragile lock on the window. Nothing. My fingers pressed awkwardly into the sill. It budged upward slowly. I kept scanning and kept raising the sash.
It was almost chest high when something moved in the bushes across the drive. I stilled.
Stuck and James stepped out from the side of the house, hand-rolled cigarettes between their lips. They chatted in low tones, but neither looked my way.
Which meant Aunt Joe was in the hall or somewhere near.
Both large males climbed the narrow steps, puffing away. I waited until they were well and truly tucked into that dark alcove before sticking my head out the window.
The dead bushes beneath the sill scratched at my clothes. Every scrape and rustle was loud in the quiet. My blood rushed past my ears, making my already pounding head double its efforts. I climbed into the hedgerow. Just as slowly as I opened it, I closed the window.
Headlights swept over the street and then the trees on the side of the house. I dropped into a crouch.
Through the narrow branches, Dad’s Jeep pulled back into the driveway and parked. My heart skipped.
He climbed from the interior, a lethal smile on his face and an official looking document in his hand. “Suit up, gents.”
“They gave us the contract?” Stuck asked from the shadowed porch.
Dad waved the paper. “Signed and sealed by the mayor himself.”
My stomach dove for the soil beneath my feet. For the first time that I could remember, the very notion of hunting made me sick.
The mayor was agreeing to slaughter an entire school?
There were kids. Like kids younger than Morgan or myself. Not to mention the teachers and officials. One vampire had killed two humans. They alone needed to be punished. Turned over to whatever justice system they had.
No. This wasn’t hunting.
It was homicide.
I knew the vampires had killed Mom ten years ago. I remembered that night. Finding her with her throat ravaged, and her skin icy.
But she wouldn’t have wanted this. Not for either of us.
Meeting up with Aunt Joe and joining this lifestyle ... It was the worst decision Dad ever made.
Maybe it always had been. Maybe, just maybe, I wasn’t meant for this life. Did I belong in Morgan’s world? No. But I couldn’t let my father take that from her like he had taken my childhood from me.
He didn’t get to choose who got to live or die. It wasn’t up to us.
But warning everyone at Lokworth?
That was up to me.
So when Dad climbed the stairs and headed inside, I didn’t need a moment to make up my mind.
I scrambled to my feet and ran headfirst for the tree line.
Chapter 32
Morgan
Ames and I snuck down the stairs and he peered around the corner. “Clear,” he said, his eyes spinning softly.
We slipped along the wall in silence. The school was still around us. But it wouldn’t remain that way for long.
According to Ames, Headmistress Harrington had canceled class while I was in town. She was scheduled to sit in on a meeting with the local school board this morning. One that may very well decide if Lokworth closed for good.
We needed to uncover the killer before then.
Ames checked the coast ahead. One agile hand motioned to me and we crept down the back hallway. Every door we passed was closed. Dark. I waited for a light to come on. For a teacher to call for us to stop.
Nothing came.
It was like the school had already closed.
I left Ames at the juncture for the nurse’s office where he could better keep an ear out for anyone coming this way.
The room was empty.
Thanks to Ames’ blood, my senses were nearly as strong as his. I still kept every footfall even, silent. At the refrigerator, I pulled down the printed sheets from the blood bank.
I flipped through the pages.
Every name was marked with a check for each day. Every name but one.
Mine.
I stared at the paper.
No. That couldn’t be.
My hands flew as I searched and searched. Again and again I looked through the stack. There was nothing. Every student was accounted for. Even Ames. Every teacher as well.
The only one that had not taken a donor bag regularly was me.
I sagged against the counter. Confusion warred with frustration.
No. That couldn’t be right. I was sure that whoever had killed the students had done so by draining. So they would have no reason to feed. No reason to take a donor bag, unless …
Unless they had thought this far ahead. They knew someone would eventually check the log. So they had taken a bag as they should. Even if they didn’t need it.
Or they were addicted.
Sometimes it happened. There were vampires that enjoyed the rush of feeding so much, they grew gluttonous in the taking.
But that still left me back where we started.
I had no idea who killed the humans.
Grumbling under my breath, I stuffed the log back into the holder and turned to go.
Professor Giroux stood behind me, his dark eyes nearly glowing in the dimness.
I screamed.
The sound cut off fast as his fingers closed over my mouth, and his other hand pressed the long edge of a knife to the base of my throat. I stared up at him.
From so close, his skin had a sour tinge to it. Sickly.
No. Not his skin.
My eyes widened as the damp fabric against my face finally registered. My stomach turned as the world grew hazy.
He tsked. “I must admit, I am disappointed in you, Ms. Read. It took you way too long to check the log.” His eyes glittered. “But I knew eventually that you would. You are too cunning not to. So I have been watching it.”
I didn’t feel cunning. Everything spun and my heart slowed. Far off in his irises, I thought I saw a flash of green then gold. Like my kin have. But there was no way. Giroux was human.
Wasn’t he?
He smiled and there was nothing sane in the motion. “I have waited many years for this moment, Ms. Read. And it is finally here.” I sagged as whatever poison he was using seeped into my body with every rapid breath. He caught me and threw me over his shoulder. The room tilted. “Now, I can get my revenge against the one who killed my wife.”
His words were the last straw.
The darkness that had been hovering on the edge of my vision roared up and swallowed me whole.
Chapter 33
Ryder
I stumbled out of the trees on the South Eastern side of Lokworth. The drive ran parallel to where I stood, and it was still rising high to the school prior. The distant turrets of the academy swayed. Or maybe that was me.
I pushed apart the branches and walked up the driveway. Every step was labored, and my vision darkened on the edges. My body ached like I had a fever. As much as I was sweating, maybe I did.
Shoving a hand through my drenched hair, I tried to push it from my skin. But my hand shook with fine tremors. I clamped my arms together.
>
“Dammit,” I hissed as I walked. “I’m like a damn addict.”
Every movement was jerky. Hard. I had little control over my system. And for someone that was raised to be in perfect control, it was disconcerting.
The uphill climb took what little breath I had, leaving me near bent in half with every step. I peered up past the trees.
The attic window was visible now. For a moment, I considered raising my hand in greeting. But I doubted Morgan was there. More like she was asleep, dreaming … Well, whatever vampires dreamed.
Did they dream?
I shook my head, annoyed at myself. “Focus,” I gasped aloud. And immediately regretted it as I began to cough. I doubled over.
Every harsh bark of sound racked my body until I shook harder. The world around me swam.
“Ryder?”
My head whipped up too fast. I buckled, falling to the pavement feet from the front steps. A tall, dark shape ran down the stairs.
Familiar gold eyes peered at me through the fog.
Ames.
I gripped his suit jacket. But I had no strength in my hands. Or my body. Clutching uselessly at his lapels, I slid down his front in a kind of boneless flop. “Morgan …”
Ames made a sound. “Gods, you reek of—” Then he inhaled. “Ryder? Why do you smell of Morgan? Do you know where she is?”
I tried to look at him. “Here,” I slurred.
His hands found my cheek. Once, twice. He slapped me in twin concussive blows that made my ears ring. “Morgan is missing. Why do you smell of her? Answer me!”
“Fed ... me.”
The gold light in his eyes made my head hurt. “She did what?” His voice was murderous, and so low that I swear it resonated through my heart with the force of death.
“Thug ... stabbed me. Morgan fed me. Healed.” Every word was like sandpaper to my dry mouth. “Don’t ... recommend ... it.”
He made a noise. “I would say I’m sorry for this, but you deserve worse.” I had a moment to wonder what he meant. Then the pain hit me square in the throat.
I cried out.
The burn was excruciating, sapping what little strength I had. I tried to hit whatever was hurting me, but my hands connected feebly with muscle and fabric.
