Chapter 1 #2
I grunted. “Yeah, I’d love it if she could come.
But remind her that one of the vampires is on our side.
He’s got reddish hair and a Klingon sword.
” Tucker and his mother, Shirley, were the only cougar shifters in the area we were aware of.
His mom might be pushing eighty years old, but she’d still make mincemeat of a vampire.
“Let me know and I’ll text her the location.
Even if she can’t be there right away, I’m sure there’ll be some cleanup to help with. ”
“Got it. I’ll let you know.”
We hung up, and a few minutes later Tucker texted that his mother could join me.
She’d arrive twenty or so minutes later than I would, though.
I hoped we were both in time to help Simon.
At the next stoplight I texted the address to Shirley and Tucker, with a caution for Shirley to enter from the rear of the property.
A couple of months ago, Simon had said there were four vampires left who were involved in kidnapping and possibly killing Wonders.
Until I ascertained otherwise, I had to assume the other three were in the house or close by where Simon was.
My phone buzzed with several texts while I drove, but I’d have to read them when I stopped.
The traffic gods were kind, and I made it to the address a little over an hour after leaving home.
Even so, I felt in my gut that I was too late.
I drove by the house, and the front was exactly like my vision—white van, no signs of life.
I turned at the next crossroad and slowed down near the property backing up to my destination.
It was another run-down farmhouse, but this one had a chair on the porch and chickens dotting the yard.
Shit. The next one looked more accessible—no people, no animals, but the yard was completely exposed to the neighbors and the street.
I parked and jumped out, swinging my backpack over my shoulder and shutting the car door as softly as I could.
Ignoring my desire to break into a run, I walked casually toward the house, veering at the last minute to walk around it instead of up to the porch.
The trees were much closer to the house here, so I picked up speed and ran until I was safely hidden within them.
My phone buzzed again. Shit. I pulled it out of my pocket and put it on silent, taking a few seconds to scan the messages.
The usual requests for help from Wonders—they’d have to wait.
Shirley was on her way; Tucker would be here as soon as possible after his shift was over, and.
.. Shane. Shane was one of the East Texas District Monitors, and he was driving from Houston with Ms. Jackson, who had demanded to come here.
Later I’d worry about why a sentient Elven artifact had chosen today to visit. Right now I had other priorities.
I continued as quietly as I could, making my way south and west, hoping to end up at the edge of the woods near where Simon had been in my vision.
I kept my eyes peeled for that other vampire too.
The last thing I wanted was to run into him.
Despite my police training, I was a Seer, not a Hunter.
My skills were geared toward closing my eyes and sitting still.
I wasn’t built to take on a vampire with super speed and strength.
Grunts and cracking twigs came from up ahead. The fight had started. I hurried forward as fast as I dared, pulling my gun from the shoulder holster.
One of them started talking. “You won’t die. You’re like one of those Earth cockroaches, always showing up.”
I could see them now. It’d been the black-haired vampire who’d spoken.
Simon gave him a cheeky grin. “You ever watch that show The Boys?”
What the fuck?
The other vampire hesitated. “What?”
Simon’s body... dissipated. He turned into fog, but not into a cloud like Cal and Greg had described seeing. Simon’s fog became a very small straight line, and he speared into the other vampire’s open mouth.
The vampire jerked back, his eyes going wide. He put his free hand over his mouth and raised his knife to cut into the fog.
Then the fog was gone, and Simon was back in his human form, right in the middle of the other vampire’s neck. I only caught a brief glimpse of the vampire’s head separating from his body before he and Simon both fell to the ground in a heap of blood and gore.
I turned away until I got my nausea under control.
When I felt steady enough to look again, Simon had rolled over onto his back.
He wiped his face and licked the blood off his hand.
Eww. Fuck, I needed to get over his unconventional fighting style and find out where the remaining vampires were.
I holstered my gun and walked forward, not hiding my footsteps.
Simon jerked his head toward me, his expression wary. I was startled at how young he appeared. Even though I was used to how slowly shifters aged, this guy had to be over a hundred years old at least. He looked maybe twenty-five.
When he met my gaze, his eyes widened, and he smiled like I was the best thing he’d seen all day. He flexed his right hand, which was positioned in a fist over his belly, almost like he was holding something.
What the hell was up with this guy? Hopefully there weren’t any more vampires in the woods to hear us, because I couldn’t stop my frown. “That was fucking disgusting.”
His smile vanished. “But effective. Mostly.” He made a face and let his hand fall to his side, revealing the hilt of a knife sticking out of his gut.
“Fuck!” I ran forward and dropped to my knees next to him. “What do you need? I have a first aid kit, but I don’t think....”
He shook his head. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll heal eventually, but—”
“Oh, right. Vampire.” I yanked off my overshirt and shoved my wrist in front of his face. When Shane had described the rogue vampires’ attack on the dryad grove in Marble Falls, he’d said Simon had needed to drink blood after expending energy fighting. It had to be the same when he was injured.
He pushed my arm away. “No. You’ll need your strength.
The luchd-òl fola will know Tormod is dead.
One of them might come to find out what happened, and the remaining two will be packing up to leave.
” His eyes lasered into mine. “If they get away, they’ll take one or more of the captives.
You have to disable their van.” He jerked the knife out of his stomach with a grunt and dropped it at his side. “This has to end today.”
“Shit!” I wadded up my shirt and pressed down on the wound.
Simon’s eyes had closed and he was even paler than before.
His hair had fallen out of its bun and was spread over the grass in a halo around his head.
Which was a fucking useless thing to notice right now.
“If I go deal with the van, who’ll fight off the vampire that’s coming? ”
His eyes popped open. “I will. But I need to feed from Tormod’s body, if you would do me a favor and bring it over here.”
I looked over at the headless corpse and swallowed down the bile in my throat. “Um, any particular part you need to reach?”
He put his hand over mine on top of the shirt and smiled faintly. “Thigh or groin will have the most blood still.”
I couldn’t help but notice our magics resonating with each other like they were long-lost friends. I pulled my hand away. “Got it.”
I used the dead vampire’s mostly clean pants to drag him next to Simon. Then I picked up the knife, slick with Simon’s blood, and sliced away the fabric on the closest thigh and hip so he wouldn’t have to work to get to the skin. “Uh, do you need me to cut into him for you?”
His eyes crinkled as he smiled. “Kind of you to offer, but no, thanks. I’d appreciate it if you could hand me my mek’leth before you go.” He pointed and I saw the Klingon sword lying in the grass a few feet away. Right.
I went to get it, and when I brought it back to him, Simon had managed to sit up.
“What’s your name?”
“Oh!” I felt my face get hot, which was... weird. “Sorry, it’s Reno. Reno Torres. Um, Cal said he would text you to let you know I was coming.”
He shrugged. “Sorry. I had all my notifications turned off. I was only using my phone to track the van.” He smiled, which made his face that much prettier, even with the blood spattered all over it.
“I’m Simon, but you seem to know that already.
Nice to meet you. Now, if you don’t mind, please go disable the van. ”
Moving as quickly and stealthily as I could along the fence line of the property next door, I mulled over the biggest hurdle I was facing to disabling the van.
I wasn’t a car guy. I didn’t spend my weekends cleaning carburetors or whatever it was Tucker was always doing that involved grease and rolling under the car.
I preferred to spend my free time—at least when I had some—either kayaking in the bay or playing video games in air-conditioned comfort.
What I knew about disabling a vehicle was limited to what I’d learned from movies and TV shows.
If I let the air out of the tires, the vampires could still drive away on the rims. I didn’t have any sugar to put in the gas tank, and I wasn’t sure where the distributor cap was, even if I could open the van’s hood without anyone noticing.
When I was even with the front of the house, I crouched down behind some of the neighbor’s shrubs and pulled out my phone to call Tucker.
“Hey, hang on.” I heard him speak to someone, then he came back on the line. “Everythin’ okay?”
I kept my voice as low as I could. Tucker’s shifter ears would hear me. “Not yet. Can you tell me how to disable a van? Silently, if possible. I don’t know if it’s locked.”
“Does it look old or new?”
I examined what I could see of it. “Old, I think.”
“If you’re lucky, you’ll be able to open the hood without needin’ the key.”
“You mean stick my fingers under the hood in front until I find the latch?”
“Exactly. Otherwise you’ll have to open the driver’s door and find the hood release button.”
That sounded time-consuming, and the van might be locked. Fuck. “Okay, say I get the hood open. What then?”
“Just open it far enough to stick your hand in there. Yank out any wires or hoses you can reach, and remove any caps or fuses you feel.”
Shit. “The van’s parked facing the house. I’m not sure I can get the hood open without them seeing or hearing.”
He blew out a breath. “It’s the most effective and fastest option. If you want to be quiet, you can’t slash the tires, because the inner tube will burst. Lettin’ the air out through the valve will take too long.”
“Shit.”
“Yeah, you can try blockin’ the exhaust pipe, but whatever you put in there will most likely get blown out by the air pressure when the engine turns on.”
I looked around. “Would rocks be heavy enough?”
“Only if you wedge ‘em in there really good.”
I resisted a hysterical giggle at the innuendo my brain wanted to make. Refocusing, I frowned. “It wouldn’t be airtight.”
“No, but the van’d have trouble getting’ very far. If you can open one of the doors, you can remove the fuses. But you’ll need to find out where the fuse box is, and that might take a good minute.”
I ran my hand over my face. “Fuck. I’ll start with the exhaust and see how I feel about opening the hood.”
“Please be safe.”
“Thanks. You’re the best, Tucker.”
“You’re buying the beer later.” He hung up.
I found some decent-sized rocks almost under my feet next to the fenceposts, so I grabbed some likely-looking options and stuck them in my pants pocket.
I crept around the fence and braved a run to the vampires’ house, my hand clamped over my pocket to keep the rocks from clacking against each other.
I crept along the front of the house, ducking under the windows and hurrying past the front door, until I could sprint to the rear of the van.
I took a photo of the license plate and sent it to Tucker just in case. Then I pushed three rocks into the van’s tailpipe as hard as I could without making a ton of noise. I wasn’t sure they’d stay, but it was better than nothing.
I heard raised voices in the house. Fuck. I crouched down by the rear passenger tire, the one furthest from the windows, and held my breath until the voices went quiet. The front door didn’t open.
If I was going to try to raise the van’s hood, I needed to do it sooner rather than later.
Wishing I believed in Tia Esperanza’s religion, I crab-walked forward until I was next to the front tire. Peeking over the hood, I couldn’t see anyone through the windows. Hopefully the vampires were occupied at the back of the house.
I didn’t let myself think, I just jumped to the front of the van and felt under the edge of the hood for the release lever. Yes!
The hood popped open with a small thunk, but unless the vampires in the house were listening for it, I didn’t think they’d have noticed.
I held the hood up only as high as I needed to get my left arm inside, then I started pulling on things.
Some stuff I couldn’t budge, but other things came loose.
I counted in my head, resolving to be done after thirty seconds.
Except right as I counted out twenty-nine, I found what had to be a fuse box.
Ten extra seconds scored me a handful of fuses.
I lowered the hood but didn’t bother latching it. Even if the vampires noticed the van had been messed with, they still wouldn’t be able to drive it.
The yelling in the house started up again, and I could make out the words, “Move it! Come on!” I pocketed the fuses and ran for the side of the house, intending to head around the corrals and back to the trees.
The vampires would see me if they looked out any of the back windows or if they came out the front and went to the passenger side of the van. They were faster and stronger than I was, and if I didn’t make it to the trees before they saw me, I was screwed.
I gave up on being stealthy and ran.