Hunger Page 2

  “I would have done it, Holl. I was going to…kill them.” A gurgle of blackened blood interrupted the thing’s deathbed confession.

  “No, Jayne. No. It’s okay. I would have stopped you.”

  ***

  She was gone. Jayne was gone. And it was all his fault.

  Holly stood and faced the stranger.

  He was dressed like a detective from some forties movie…if the production had the laziest costume department in Hollywood. He was Film Noir walking without a pants press. He wore baggy trousers low on lean hips, a button-up shirt open at the neck enough to hint at the muscled chest beneath and a buff-colored trench coat that was settling back into wrinkled folds at his ankles after the action of moments before.

  If the costume was rumpled detective, the body beneath it was pure action hero. He was a good foot taller than her own five-foot-six inches, but worst of all, he seemed like he was used to using every inch of his body in lethal ways. The wrinkled fabric of his clothes rode his taut, muscular frame as the inconsequential covering it was. It was obvious to her that he didn’t spend time looking in mirrors. He spent time killing and training to kill some more.

  His face was chiseled from stone. The sculptor had spent time on full strong lips and a jaw a model could envy, but those lips were set in a harsh line and his jaw was clenched. A thin scar, just beginning to go white, ran from the outer corner of one brown eye to his cheek.

  He had one hand stretched toward her, fingers up and palm open. The other held his odd wooden blade at the ready. He should have looked like a full-grown man preparing to fight an imaginary dragon. He should have…except the wooden blade he brandished didn’t look like a toy because it was dripping with the blood that had flowed through her sister’s veins. For a creature like her, the pointed wood should have been uniquely terrifying. It probably would have been if she hadn’t been overloaded to the point of feeling nothing.

  “Who are you?” she asked. Her voice was shaky. She couldn’t help it. She had never been a fan of slasher flicks. Being part of one was stretching her abilities to the limit.

  “This isn’t a conversation.” His voice wasn’t shaky. It was velvet-wrapped granite. He could have been addressing the room at large with those impersonal tones. Okay, so not only was his face carved from stone, he was stone through and through.

  Make him see you as a person. Holly remembered that snippet of advice from a self-defense course her mother had made her take her first year at college. She’d spent a year “on her own” before Jayne had followed her to Hollins University. Of course, back then, she hadn’t known what “on her own” was.

  “No, not a conversation, a…a murder scene. But that doesn’t answer my question.”

  “Murder? Exterminating monsters doesn’t qualify as homicide.” He had the nerve to look amused while Jayne’s blood dripped on his shoes.

  “Killing is killing,” Holly argued. “It’s final and over and there had to have been something we could have done for her without going…there.” She looked at the blackening pile of wet ash and felt panic flutter in her chest.

  “That’s what I do.” He gestured toward Jayne’s remains. “It’s not like Vampire’s Anonymous is going to cure monsters with a twelve-step program. I kill the killers and it’s your turn.”

  He took a step toward her and, unbelievably, Holly felt rage instead of terror.

  For the last month, since Dillon had ruined her life, she’d run the gamut of emotion. Terror. Loneliness. Loss. Grief. Rage was new. She embraced it.

  “No!”

  He came in low and hard in a tackle that would have flattened her a month ago. Tonight, she went down but she rode with it, waiting until they skidded to a stop and her head thumped the wall before tossing him off her. She liked the surprise on his face. She didn’t like the growl that rose from her chest.

  “Who am I? Who the hell is Dillon? You and your sister are the strongest newborns I’ve ever fought.”

  He flexed his fingers around the hilt of his ridiculous, deadly blade. Holly tried not to notice the gore drying on its tip as she prepared to meet his next attack.

  It didn’t come. Maybe this was a conversation. He seemed to want an answer.

  “He’s old. The boots and…and the way he talks aren’t an affectation…well, maybe at this point they are, but they weren’t originally.”

  “The wild west? Come on, two hundred years isn’t that old.”

  “Older than a few weeks.”

  “Weeks? I figured months. You’re stronger than most vampires are at ten years…and you’ve barely fed.”

  “Jayne said Dillon’s Maker was a queen. She said we were like royalty.” Holly didn’t feel like a princess and she knew she didn’t look like one. Poor Jayne. She thought of her sister’s excitement and ached. Ashes didn’t wear tiaras.

  “And why are you talking instead of ripping out my throat?”

  “He’s going after my parents,” Holly reasoned, not feeling the least bit like throat ripping unless the throat in question was Dillon’s.

  “You need me.” His words were a bizarre replay of Dillon’s earlier demand and she felt a jolt. A similar pull. It would be so nice to need someone again. So nice to let her guard down…just a little. This stranger was obviously some kind of vampire killer. Letting her guard down with him was out of the question. Needing him should have scared her as much as the idea that she could need Dillon. Does it?

  “I need to stop him.” She told herself to focus, to ignore pain and fear. She couldn’t be weak now. She wouldn’t.

  “I killed your sister.”

  The reminder was unnecessary to the point of being cruel. Holly refused to flinch.

  “Jayne died weeks ago. That wasn’t Jayne. Maybe a little, at the end, but not ’til then. She’s been…gone.” She couldn’t stop the moisture that filled her eyes. She was thankful it stopped short of spilling over onto her cheeks.

  “Blood lust. Blood madness. You all have it.” His words were clipped, certain, like he’d just signed her death warrant.

  “Not me,” she whispered hoarsely. The memory of the man in the alley was an ugly reminder that she might be wrong. It was an ugly stain on her eyes beneath the tears.

  “Eventually.” He looked so sure. The bloody knife, the smoke rising from her sister’s ashes, the hunger that gnawed incessantly inside of her…all of it was evidence supporting his certainty.

  “Not. Me.”

  She allowed no measure of uncertainty in her voice.

  “You too. That’s why you have to die.” He didn’t jump to attack. He didn’t. And though she could almost feel the dull bite of pointed wood in her flesh, Holly stood her ground. All that mattered was her parents.

  “Eventually…I’ll buy that. Eventually you’ll kill me.” Suddenly, Holly was certain it was better to humor him than fight her final fight here and now without having the opportunity to save her parents first. It didn’t mean she meant it. It didn’t mean she’d ever make it easy on him to sink the blade. “It’s obviously what you do. But, you’ll need my help to get Dillon first. We have to stop him.”

  “I don’t need a partner.” He gave the last word a sarcastic hint of western twang.

  “You won’t get a vampire like Dillon alone.” Holly wished she’d opted for the debate team instead of pom-poms in high school. If he refused to help, could she kill him? She was stronger than human. Faster than human. She had fangs. But she knew he had an edge. He was a killer. He was hard and harsh and there was a minimalism about him that said his every gesture, every glance, every breath, every heartbeat boiled down to that one simple fact. He killed. Would her desperation outweigh his experience?

  “It would never work. I won’t stand by while you feed, even if it’s on the dregs of society.” The knife never wavered.

  He had seen her feed. She wasn’t innocent. She had felt shame enough in the dark anonymity of the alley. Under the spotlight of his condemnation, she burned. Then, her parents’ fac
es rose from her memories. Their faces overshadowed every sordid moment she’d lived through in the last weeks. They needed her. Still.

  “He was a rapist.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I watch. He almost had a girl in that same alley last night.” Her stomach rolled.

  “You stopped him?” Finally, his eyes widened into something other than a determined stare. Curiosity. It softened his features unexpectedly. It gave her hope.

  “I would have, but she had pepper spray. I didn’t have to do a thing but come back the next night as the victim.”

  “He didn’t learn his lesson.”

  “He’s gone.”

  “Not all of him.” His allusion to the stolen blood made her stomach clench.

  “Believe me, I know.” The knowledge flooded the back of her throat.

  “Even if you’ve got enough self-control left to skip a few meals this isn’t going to work.” His eyes, she focused on his eyes. Surely if he decided to strike, she’d see the decision in their dark brown depths.

  “There’s only been one since the change.” It was a whispered admission, but her eyes were defiant. The challenge for him to do better in her place was unspoken, but there nonetheless. He ignored it.

  “I can take out your Maker…alone.” His fingers flexed around the knife.

  “Can you? You haven’t even taken me.” Holly raised one eyebrow in a bolder challenge than she would have thought possible given the look in his eyes. He narrowed those eyes and she felt a chill of adrenaline flow down her spine.

  “Because I listened to that message.” Again, he flexed his fingers as if he was eager to get back to work. He was a stone-cold killer, but he had heard her mom and dad…and that was stopping him?

  “How many…have you killed?”

  “It isn’t healthy to count…one hundred thirty…one,” he answered, flicking his gaze to where her sister’s corpse lay in a dissolving heap. The blade was still in his hand, but with the other hand he rubbed the back of his neck. If she wasn’t a monster, would she be able to see the muscles relax beneath his skin? Was it actual sight or animal perception? She didn’t want to know. She spoke instead, keeping it human.

  “The sun will be up soon.”

  “I could kill you while you sleep.” This time he twirled the knife in his fingers, a thoughtful fidget.

  “You could, but you won’t. You know I can help you.” She was going to trust him. Some instinct, or maybe simple exhaustion, made her think he wouldn’t kill her…yet. The sky outside had turned charcoal gray. Her limbs were growing heavy, leaden. “He’ll have a head start, but even Dillon can’t walk in the sun.”

  Holly turned her back on the knife in his hand and walked to her room. Automatically, she shoved a rolled up towel at the base of the door and stumbled to bed. She didn’t bother to turn the lock. There was a time to fight and a time to regroup. And there were times when you couldn’t choose which. The rising sun was against her. There was nothing she could do but close her eyes and dream about tomorrow. She had to believe she was finally going home.

  Chapter Two

  He was able to flash a real badge. He killed monsters now, but he’d once had another job. He had been beginning to get the hang of dealing with the almost-monsters—the drug dealers, the wife-beaters, your basic garden-variety freaks and geeks—when he’d found out that his life as a rookie cop didn’t scratch the surface of a very real hell on earth. It had taken the death of his partner to open his eyes.

  Jim Oakes had been a legend. Six weeks shy of retirement he’d taken Winters beneath his aging but steady wing. He was true blue. The kind of guy that could spend thirty years in and among the scum of the earth and still come out the other side unjaded. Hiding a Boy Scout beneath an adult exterior, Oakes wasn’t naïve, but he was committed. He believed in the law. And he had done good in his lifetime. There were honest people alive because of Jim Oakes, just as there were dishonest ones behind bars because of him.

  Winters had idolized the old man. No way around it. He had loved him like a father.

  And the night a vampire had sucked Jim Oakes dry was the night that Jarvis Winters in his current incarnation had been born.

  The Spinnakers were beyond being impressed by badges. He didn’t blame them. When he’d tried to tell the truth about the night Jim was murdered, he’d been put on probation and under psychiatric evaluation. The law Jim Oakes had believed in with his whole heart had failed him in the end. They marked his death down to an attack by a very large man on PCP, even though there had been barely a drop of Jim’s missing blood found at the scene.

  So, yeah, he thought he understood where the Spinnakers were coming from. They thought he was only another cop who would fail them. He refused to allow himself to think that maybe they were right.

  “No trace. Not in three weeks. They tried to tell us the girls had run off to Europe following that band they went to see.”

  He tried not to notice how much Mrs. Spinnaker looked like the daughter he planned to kill. The very attractive, very alive mother with her plump cheeks and sparkling eyes was a blunt reminder her offspring would never get the chance to age so gracefully. Even in the midst of her grief, she was a lovely woman. He stopped himself from imagining the vampire waif lovely and alive.

  “Jayne…maybe. But not Holly. And they’ve both disappeared.” Mr. Spinnaker was in a wheelchair and he gripped both wheels with white knuckles as if he planned to roll around the world looking for the girls himself.

  “Holly would have called,” Mrs. Spinnaker explained. “She kind of kept us up to date with what they were up to.”

  “With generous discretion when it came to her sister’s activities,” the father added.

  “Jayne’s wild?” Images of charred flesh turning into ash were hard to ignore while he looked into Mr. Spinnaker’s eyes.

  “No,” the mother said.

  “Yes,” the father said at the same time.

  “It’s only that she’s the youngest. She wants to stand out and be noticed.” Mrs. Spinnaker assured him.

  Unspoken was the fact that anyone would have a hard time being noticed with a sister like Holly Spinnaker around. He’d have to have been blind not to notice what she must have been like alive and well. There was pictorial evidence of it all over the Spinnaker living room. Of course, both girls were represented, but he could see the difference in the size and number of trophies. It looked as if the waif had always been on top of the world with a huge white smile. He was surprised how easy it was to jive the image of an athletic, tanned teenager in the pictures with the little vampire he’d left sleeping in Roanoke. Somehow the ghost of her former self remained.

  “Holly wouldn’t have let Jayne do something that crazy. I won’t believe it.” Again, the dad looked frustrated, thwarted by his inability to solve the mystery and by the authorities’ unwillingness to listen.

  Winters had faced down a hundred killers thirsty for his blood, but this was worse. He could feel their hope. It blanketed the air of their house with heavy, expectant optimism. He had already killed this Jayne they loved with exasperated patience. And before it was all said and done, their golden girl would die by his hand as well.

  “With your approval, I’m going to set up surveillance on your home. The focus has primarily been near your daughters’ loft and around the campus. I’d like to keep an eye out here just in case.” Just in case I get a chance to kill the fastest vampire I’ve ever seen and your once-perfect daughter too.

  “We’ve already offered to cooperate in any way that we can,” Mr. Spinnaker noted, his impatience obvious.

  “We gave the police a key to the loft,” Mrs. Spinnaker soothed. “We’ve only been once ourselves. It’s so…deserted.”

  Winters wondered how a cop went from rookie to righteous monster killer, to a person who could plan the death of a daughter right beneath the nose of her unsuspecting parents, all in the space of a year. Not daughter. Monster. He’d never had a hard ti
me remembering that before. He wouldn’t go soft because he was looking at the picture of a smiling blond teenager on the mantel behind the Spinnakers’ heads. He wondered how quickly a girl could morph from healthy young woman to waif, to killer, to fiend. And that helped.

  ***

  Holly scooped the last of her sister’s ashes from the floor and filtered them carefully into the champagne bottle Jayne had saved from her twenty-first birthday party. She couldn’t leave them where they lay. Nor could she stay near them when she was finished.

  The stranger was gone and she was still “alive”. As she showered away imagined sister dust and dried blood and leftover dishwashing liquid, she knew where to find him. He had left her address book open on the table. It was good that he hadn’t waited. She only took the time to clean herself because she didn’t want to frighten her parents any more than she had to. Dillon was fast and brutal.

  She remembered how nervous she’d been on the night of the concert when he had joined them in the mass of people circling the stage. Repeatedly, she’d been pushed and jostled and thrust up against him. Even with the music pounding from towering speakers and the sound of shrieking fans filling her head, Dillon had been noticeable. His rock-hard form different than the other softer bodies she brushed against. It had been the intensity in his eyes that had frightened her, though. His lack of interest in the stage seemed ominous.

  Jayne, of course, had been nothing but wowed by his attention when he’d followed them to their car. It didn’t help he looked better than the performers on stage.

  Like a rock star with a hint of cowboy style, he had been wrapped in worn leather and sexy attitude. Even Holly had found him attractive, though before that night she would never in her life have given a second look to a guy with bleached blond highlights and diamond studs in his ears. There was something about his light blue eyes or something in them. They attracted and made you nervous at the same time. Jayne loved it. Holly hadn’t, not so much.