Chapter 18
Bodies Like Shredded Sardines
Afull day and night passed without incident.
I had not allowed myself a moment to enjoy the beauty of the house or the gardens since I woke here.
I had been too wrapped up with my own internal battle, trying to hold it together in front of everyone.
Worried about Georgie, Sarah, witches, and the grimoire. I needed a reprieve from all that.
The sun peeking through the rolling clouds was warm on my face, but the air was cold.
The fresh scent of damp earth and forest that surrounded the expansive manicured lawns filled my nostrils.
I craved going for a run through the forest, but if I asked Karson to go the response wouldn’t be favorable.
Bleary-eyed, I wandered along the wall, not far from the black iron gates that kept the world locked out.
The rosebushes were mostly stripped of flowers from the cold wind of pre-winter.
But I could see one solitary yellow rose.
Some of its petals were bruised, but they were full and beautiful.
I leaned over, gripping the thorny stem carefully, breathing in the sweet floral scent.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” Leon appeared at my shoulder, his brown hair ruffling in the cold breeze.
I straightened. “I thought you would have gone home by now?”
He shuffled his feet and stuck his hands in his jacket pockets. “Karson asked us to stay.”
“Why?”
A slight shrug of his shoulders. “He was pissed we let you leave the other night. I think making some of us stay might be punishment and probably to keep an extra eye on you.”
Guilt tugged at me. They spent hours out here in the cold as it was. “I’m sorry, Leon.”
He gave me a small smile. “It’s alright, we have plenty to … eat … I’ve hung out in worse places.” His eyes grazed the grounds then fell back on me. “There are worse things to look at too.” He winked. It wasn’t like he was flirting, it was more teasing, like he was trying to make me feel better.
Still, I flushed at the compliment as I turned back to the flower.
“My girlfriend loves them too. She loves all flowers, actually. She always has a bunch of something on the table and incense reeking out the house.”
A rush of nostalgia fluttered through my heart. “Yellow roses were my mother’s favorite flowers.” We covered her casket in them. I breathed in until the sweet floral scent washed away the flare of grief … of guilt. “When I see them, I always think of her.”
His expression softened. “I’m sorry for your loss.” He turned and looked at the sun pinching through the clouds, his breath foaming in the air. “It’s never easy losing someone you love.”
“Does it get any easier? Do you learn to deal with death easier?” I prodded carefully.
“After two hundred and twenty-one years of living and losing more people I loved than I can count, I can officially say each death of someone you love is as hard as the last. Sometimes it seems … harder.”
No matter the years that had passed since I lost my mother, no matter how well I was doing, or how happy I was, sometimes grief seemed to rush up out of nowhere, catching me off guard, and I would find myself devastated all over again.
My fingers trailed over the soft petals of the flower. “I couldn’t imagine carrying all the loss in my heart for an eternity.”
“It is not an easy life being a vampire. People think immortality would be amazing, but very few would have the strength to go on living when just about everyone they love dies.” He drew another breath, and his tone brightened.
“But the way I figure it, you have two choices, you either learn to live with loss, or you choose never to love at all and miss out on all the joy and wonder having someone to love brings.”
“That’s a good way to look at it.”
Leon said nothing. We both just looked at the solitary rose as if it was symbolic of how sad life would be to live alone.
After a while he said, “I better get back to it, before Karson catches me with you and thinks I’m slacking off.
” I watched as he walked across the yard, around the corner of the house, his hands shoved in his pockets, his long-legged strides graceful.
I bent back down and drew in a deep breath of the rose again. There was a flash of movement, a cold rush of wind that was on my skin and deeper, through my blood. Startled, I jerked up, and as I did a thorn ripped my index finger. Leon was back, his eyes peeled toward the road.
Something akin to panic filled my chest. I snapped my hand back, blood beading on the side. Normally the wound wouldn’t bother me, but with a vampire standing beside me …
“Shit.” I jammed my finger into my mouth.
Leon stepped in front of me as a black car pulled into the driveway. “I’m sure it’s fine, but stay behind me,” he said quietly.
Someone had let the car in. Was a vampire in it? Or was it a witch who used their powers to open the large iron gates? I couldn’t ask. I didn’t want to take my bleeding finger out of my mouth.
The car was a stock-standard Chevrolet. The windows were tinted so I couldn’t see in, but it was hardly a vampire’s style of transport. At least not the ones I’d seen.
Leon’s shoulders relaxed and he stepped to the side. “You can take your finger out of your mouth. Blood doesn’t bother me.”
I took it out and blood beaded again, so I jammed it against my jeans as we walked back toward the house. “Who is it?”
“I’m not sure, but he’s only a human.”
We stopped as the car pulled to an abrupt halt. The door opened and a man with thick gray hair and a stern expression stepped out. He was wearing a casual tan-colored jacket, blue shirt and black slacks. He held two folders in his hand.
He had detective written all over him. He reminded me of my father, except my dad was thin and dark-haired. The man slammed the door closed.
“Hello,” I called out.
He halted, his eyes widening at the sight of me. I was probably looking disheveled from lack of sleep. His eyes moved from me to Leon and back again.
He scowled. “Who are you?”
“I’m Amy and this is Leon.”
“Lester.” He held out his hand for Leon to shake then turned to me. I lifted my hand but realized it was still bleeding, so I apologized and used my other hand in an awkward back grip to shake his.
A vision of bodies covered in blood, sprawled on the ground, struck my mind and hurled the breath from my lungs. I yanked my hand back from him. The only question burning through my mind was, did he find them like that?
“What’s your last name, Amy?”
“That would be none of your concern, Lester.” Karson appeared at the door. He stepped down the stairs, flicking his eyes to Leon. “Thank you, Leon, I can handle it from here.”
Leon bobbed his head and walked back around the corner.
“To what do I owe the pleasure of seeing you?” Karson handed me a plaster without taking his eyes from Lester as he took hold of my elbow, guiding us into the foyer. We halted not far inside the door.
Lester’s eyes narrowed. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing turning a fucking drug addict into a vampire?
Do you know how many goddamn deaths that thing has caused?
We have bodies stacked like shredded sardines.
” As he shoved the folders at Karson, I noticed half a dozen small, circle-shaped scars on the back of his hand.
“I can assure you.” Karson remained remarkedly calm as he took the folders. “I did no such thing.”
Monique and Michael came down the stairs. Karson darted his eyes to my cut and scowled.
“What seems to be the catalyst of your angst, Lester?” Michael asked, the epitome of smooth as he handed me a white hanky.
“Amelia, perhaps you might like to go upstairs and sort your injury out,” Karson ordered.
“No, sorted,” I said mildly, holding up my freshly wrapped finger.
Lester shifted on his feet. “My angst, Michael, is I have spent the last two fucking nights cleaning up bodies. Some drug-addicted crazy bitch wiped out a whole swarm of people. Trying to keep it out of the press, trying to placate the powers that want all your fucking heads.”
Monique and Michael looked between each other.
Karson arched a brow. “Perhaps you could contain your language in the presence of ladies.”
Lester gritted his teeth and red flushed his cheeks. “Oh yes, because fucking language is more fucking important when people are being fucking murdered!”
“He has a point,” I muttered under my breath. Karson threw me a look that would have curled hairs. I merely shrugged.
He blew out a breath and opened the folder.
I edged closer and peered over his arm. It looked like a war zone.
There were bodies and blood everywhere. Necks were torn into like a pack of wolves had attacked them.
Blank eyes forever frozen. One boy with a knife tattoo on his neck had his stomach torn to shreds, intestines gurgling from his ravaged body like hot dogs.
Beside him, lying in a pond of red, was a detached head, his mouth open, a red tattooed teardrop below his eye like the image was a dire premonition.
Another lay face down, naked, and he had a wooden handle protruding from his blood-covered ass.
I staggered back, turning my head away and fighting not to gag.
“Those ones we found decomposing under a bridge.” Lester ran his hand through his hair. “Probably killed the night prior.”
Karson showed as much emotion at the images as stone. He handed the folders to Monique and Michael.
“That’s a vampire’s work alright,” Michael agreed.
“Rather brutal and very messy work,” Monique said, like she was discussing a kitchen after cooking. She passed the folders back to Lester.
“If you didn’t turn her, then who the fuck did?” Lester snapped.
“I can assure you I will find out, and I will dispose of both the cause and the vampire. How do you know who the vampire is?” Karson asked.