The doctor told me Jame was sleeping peacefully and healing well. Well enough Granny Wolfe had joined the hunt, leaving three pack members behind to guard Jame.
The dry morning had turned into a sunny afternoon. Tourists and locals took full advantage of it. Plenty of people walked and played on the beach. Plenty of people wandered into the shops, which were staying open late in hopes of making up some rain-delayed revenue. The town felt the most summer-like it had all year.
There were even kites in the sky.
I still had a few hours before dinner with Ryder at Jump Off Jack, but was too restless to sleep. I went home and changed into my shorts, tank, and running shoes.
A lot had happened in a very short time and I needed to clear my head, think through the details. A quick jog on the beach, alone with my thoughts sounded like heaven.
I stretched at the bottom of my stairs, then took off at a slow, easy pace down the road to the bottom of the hill, past a few houses to the narrow band of green that would take me to the hidden foot trail through bushes and down to the sand.
The late afternoon was warm, the wind just strong enough to cut the humidity. I headed north, into the wind, toward Road’s End. I always ran into the wind so I could have it at my back on my way home.
The steady rhythm of my breath, the thump, thump, thump of my shoes hitting hard-packed wet sand, the shivering hiss of the ocean next to me soothed me, focused my thoughts. The muscles in my shoulders relaxed, my body warming, sweat prickling at my neck, under my breasts, down my back.
I felt like I could run forever.
Breathe, breathe, breathe.
Road’s End had that name for a reason. An outcropping of land reached out to cup the beach and cut it off from continuing north. If the tide was low enough, I’d be able to pick my way over water and rocks, and around the bend to a procession of little pockets of stony coves. But the tide was coming in, and I didn’t want to get stranded on the other side.
So I slowed, paced the curve of land, the rise of stone cliff at my back, and then stood just at the water’s edge, staring out to sea.
Clouds gathered fast, moving ashore with an unnatural kind of speed. Lightning flashed. Thunder rolled. The sudden storm was urgent, as if warning of an even greater danger approaching.
“Thor?” I asked. Rain fell in hard, heavy drops. I felt like I should run. Thunder roared again, urging me to turn home.
I turned. I didn’t even see the man before I was aware of his presence behind me.
But with that presence, I felt fear.
I tipped my head down so I could better see him out of the corner of my eyes as he stopped behind and slightly to the side of me.
“You are a sweet surprise.” His voice was low, cultured, carrying an accent I could not place. But my brain wasn’t trying to place his accent, it was screaming: danger, death, predator.
I had not brought my gun and carried no other weapon. My phone tucked into my back pocket wasn’t going to bring anyone here fast enough to save me.
I suddenly knew I was very much in need of saving.
I had a moment to wish I was connected to someone in some sort of magical way that allowed them to see through my eyes or hear my thoughts to know that I was in trouble.
But I was just a Reed and those kinds of abilities were beyond me.
What does a Reed do? My father’s words echoed in my mind. We face the storm.
Thunder crackled. Lightning shattered.
I anchored myself with the roots of my family that reached deep and strong in this land. Then I turned and faced the man.
Not man. Creature. Vampire, to be exact. Here in the daylight of Ordinary that doesn’t make vampires burn. Here inside the boundaries of Ordinary unnoticed, because all the vampires were gone.
Ancient. He was built a lot like Old Rossi, his silver hair cut in a short, executive style. His eyes were black and shockingly devoid of humanity.
There was a nightmarish smoothness to him, as if all his edges were rubbed down to frictionless curves, as if he had been poured into shape instead of tailored by bones. Snake-like. Fluid.
Creepy as hell.
“Yes,” he said as if I’d asked him a question. “I killed Sven. Sent him to my prideful brother. Still he didn’t come to me. So I took his toy. The one he turned. Poor, breakable thing.”
Ben.
“You will not do this,” I said. “You will not hurt my people, my town.” My words came out even, but my heart was pounding. Hard. I knew he could hear it, feel it.
He lifted his upper lip in a snarl. “Since he will not come to me, you will send him a message even he will understand.”
I backed up and threw my hands in a block.
But vampires are fast. I didn’t blink, but my eyes still couldn’t track his movement. He wrapped one hand up in my hair, yanking my head to the side.
I kicked out, punched. He yanked my head harder, and shook me like a rag doll. I heard bones in my neck crack as my feet left the ground.
I yelled, fought, thunder echoing my anger, my fear.
Vampires are inhumanly strong. And even though I was tough, a Reed, I was still human.
He pulled me to him, wrapping me tight against the hard, cold, slippery length of his body, wrenched my neck bare.
I screamed as agony pierced my flesh, two hot, jagged fangs hooking down into my neck, seeking my pulse.
Every muscle in my body went lax as if I’d just been injected with Novocain.
Turns out being bitten by a vampire isn’t as sexy as some of the movies might make one think. Although that might have something to do with the fact that this vampire hated me and would rather see me dead than show me a good time.
This was not good. Not good at all.
“Listen to me, Reed bitch,” he said, teeth still buried in my flesh. “You are alive only because you are my final message to my brother.” He slowly lifted his mouth from my skin. I was numb everywhere except for where his fangs pierced me.
There I only felt endless pain.
“He brings me the Raueskinna. Or I take everything he has,” his fangs slipped free of my flesh, and I almost blacked out from the agony, “and burn this world to the ground.”
He shook me again. I would have screamed if my body were responding to my mind. But the world had become too heavy, folding down on me in layers and layers and layers. Everything was watery, fading, dark.
I wondered if I was drowning. If the ocean had risen up to swallow me whole.
Cold sand, concrete-hard slapped against my back...
...had he thrown me?
...someone was screaming in the distance.
Sirens.
And not the call-the-sailors-to-their-death kind of sirens.
Police cruiser sirens.
“Tell him,” his whisper echoed in my head. “Or I will tear each of you apart until I find the one who makes him scream.”
~~~
I heard voices. Myra, Ryder, Jean. I knew there wasn’t sand under me anymore, knew I was wrapped in a warm, heavy quilt, a pillow under my cheek. I didn’t know what time it was, didn’t have the strength to open my eyes.
The wash of deep healing spread through me. I wasn’t sure which creature or god they’d gotten to take care of me but it was wonderful. Marvelous.