Assassins Bite (18 page)

“My dear. Step aside while I deal with this scum.” Nosferatu lowered his voice. “I love you, my dear. I do not wish you hurt.”

“Love? Denying me any friends, locking me away?” She turned her glare on Aiden. “You were supposed to save me from this hellhole. You're going to make up for that. Fight him, Aiden. Do what you should have done decades ago.”

Aiden clenched his fists, nodded and stepped forward. Nosferatu frowned. Eloise stepped back, a triumphant smile lighting her face.

As she dragged Ric past him, Aiden hissed, “Syn's fine.” Ric blinked.

Eloise's smile faltered.

Aiden seized Ric's arm and yanked him from Eloise's grasp toward the exit. Eloise shrieked. This time Ric didn't fight.

But he stumbled, then sagged against Aiden. Only extreme concentration and superb muscles kept Aiden from stumbling too. He shifted grips to lift his friend onto his shoulders.

It gave Eloise time to dart in front of the exit. “No! You have to fight for me.”

“I have to get my friend out.” He hefted Ric and prepared to rush her.

“You utter
ass
.” She unhitched the bazooka. “You're not leaving me again!” She plopped the tube on her shoulder and launched the rocket.

Shock rolled cold through Aiden's veins, but he was already moving. He dodged, barely in time. The rocket whizzed past.

It hit Nosferatu. The charge blew a hole in his chest.

The rocket was supercharged. The back blast threw Aiden and Ric into the opposite wall. Aiden hit so hard he bounced off and lost hold of Ric.

Reflex tucked Aiden into a force-expending roll. He came up a few feet short of where he'd started, on all fours, trembling on cracked bones, pain shooting along his legs and back, his ears ringing and his eyes flashing with fiery afterimages.

He closed his useless eyes and brought his nose up, nostrils flared. He smelled blood, Ric's. He centered on the scent and opened his eyes.

A blurry Eloise was hoisting Ric to his feet. Farther away, blotchy Lestats grabbed the limp blob that was Nosferatu and dragged him away.

One of the Lestats hit a button on the wall. Whirling red lights blared warning. An ah-
oo
-gah cut through the ringing in Aiden's ears.

Clang.
A bulkhead-style door slammed down between him and the Lestats. More clangs echoed from farther away, more doors slamming down.

Eloise disappeared the other way with Ric.

Aiden stumbled up, into a stuttering, painful run. The supercharged blast and rock wall impact had shattered his bones and damaged deep tissue. All trying to knit, but his vampire healing was compromised too. Movement jarred his bones, grinding them together, shooting glass-shards of pain into him. He gasped.

For Ric. Panting, Aiden pressed on.

The corridor was a tear-streaked blur. Eloise disappeared around a corner. Aiden grit his teeth and ran, pushing himself to his limit and beyond, but he'd never forgive himself if Ric died when he could have given just a little bit more.

When he lost her he used Ric's blood scent/taste to locate them, down long corridors to a doorway. He bolted through it.

Habit ticked who, what, where. Small chamber. Eloise to one side, bent over a shapeless lump with blond hair. Ric, pale, moaning, wasn't moving any other way, severely injured, perhaps dying.

Eloise rolled him into a hatch. Aiden made a mad dash toward his friend. The sound of a body starting to slide down a chute came from the hatch.

Aiden leaped, desperate to stop Ric.

Eloise turned, arm raised—silver spike in her hand.

His momentum sealed his collision. Only severe torsion averted a slaying stroke of the spike. He twisted his half-healed body as hard as he could, angling his chest away, recracking vertebrae. He gasped through the pain, managed to mostly avoid her, but the tip of the spike slit a hot bloody line through his sleeve and into his arm.

His legs crashed with her thighs, pushing her against a lever. Her hands wrapped around it and she used it to push herself straight.

The hatch clanged closed.

Aiden fell and rolled, coming up on his feet, swaying. She lashed out with the spike, catching him from forehead to cheek. He tried to counterattack. She blew into mist and reformed near the doorway.

Blood ran hot into his eye, down the side of his face. Silver cuts healed human-slow, so he spat on his hand and wiped it. It stung and leaked ichor and only slowly closed. He stood there, panting, gathering his strength to destroy her.

“You dumb fuck,” she shrieked. “That hatch was my escape. But you shut it, you ass. Now how will I get out?” Her girlish face was smeared with soot, her blazing eyes stark within. “Huh, Aiden? You always know everything. How do I get out?” She waved the spike, her tone strident.

Part of him mourned for the girl she'd been. The friends they'd all been, once upon a time. He blinked blurry eyes—and knew by the acid spilling into his gut that he'd made a fatal mistake. She'd moved. His eyes sprang open and he spun but it was too late.

Pain drove into his back and exploded in his chest, spreading, like his ribs were being crushed. With unsteady fingers he pushed aside the flap of his jacket and looked down in stupefaction.

The point of the silver spike protruded from his left pectoral.

She'd rammed the spike into his back, between rows of grenades and ribs, stabbing him through the heart.

The beating muscle shut down.

Push it out.
He had minutes of consciousness left, but only moments before lack of circulation made movement impossible. He fisted a hand and hammered the silver point, trying to pound it back through his chest.

He hissed. His hand burned like he'd skewered it with live flame. Worse, he'd only slid the stake back an inch or so. It was still embedded in his heart.

His leg muscles buckled and he staggered. Lack of blood flow had already started to deaden his extremities. He plucked numb, ineffective fingers at the hole in his chest.

No. It couldn't end like this. Sunny…he had too much to live for. There had to be an alternative. He reached for his mist…intense pain from the silver spiked his concentration. He snapped solid. He tried to heal his heart around the spike, let the bubbling new flesh push it out. The silver burned the newly grown tissue, searing him with excruciating pain.

Metal hit his wrist.

Eloise had snapped on one handcuff. He fell to his knees, trying to escape the only way he could. Boots thudded dully in his ears, a couple of her lieutenants. At her signal, they surged forward, grabbed his arms and lifted.

He had no breath and his chest was crushing pain but it still took them both. Eloise wrestled the second cuff on him and jabbed the button. Electricity hummed. He stared in disbelief at his cuffed wrists.

One by one his organs and muscles shut down. He tried to suck in oxygen, but his lungs had stopped working long ago. His brain would be the last to go. One more chance. Using all his concentration, his will, and reached for his mist again. He began to spread apart…

The cuffs surged. Electricity zapped him solid.

Trapped.

She'd reloaded the bazooka with a regular charge before setting it down. If only he could get to it…but he couldn't even move.

“We think we can reopen the tunnel, mistress,” one vampire said.

“We must go,” said the other.

“No! I'm not done yet.” Eloise kicked Aiden. “
He's
not done yet. You go open the passageway. I'll be along soon.”

The vampires dropped him on his side, and left. Eloise crooned, “Very soon.”

Aiden tried to move but the only muscles responding were on his face. He locked gazes with her and formed the word, “W-why?” He had no breath to actually say it.

She stood before him, fists on hips, an ugly sneer on her face. “You arrogant fuck. You have to ask?” She circled him. “
You left me
. Again!” She screamed it. “Tried to take Ric from me.
Again
.” She kicked him in the gut. “You crushed me when you left me but I thought you'd come back. I was only ten. I thought it was a mistake. I
waited
for you. We were partners, Aiden, more than partners. But you fucking did it fucking again!”

Aiden couldn't believe it. Elias was right. Eloise had idealized Aiden into something he wasn't and never had been. Deep down she had to know better. He used the last of his conscious strength to deny her words. To force her to see the truth.
You chose to stay.

“
No
.” She leaned over him, her face dwindling in his darkening gaze, her breath playing across his face. “Never. It's
your
fault. Not mine. You left me.
The great Aiden Blackthorne, first among assassins. Not so great now.” Her venomous smile appeared in the pinhole of vision left to him.

Aiden had sometimes wondered how he'd die the final death. Now he wished she'd stop talking and just do it. But he recognized her talking for what it really was—working up the courage to take the life of a male who was once her friend.

“I've learned a few things since you abandoned me, Aiden. Are you proud? ‘Always use the right tools for the job.' I have a stake for your heart, and a blade for your neck.” She flashed a wickedly glinting silver knife. “I also learned if a job is worth doing, it's worth doing well. So I'll make this
hurt
.”

His last thoughts were of Sunny.

Chapter Twenty

The evening after I sparred Aiden Blackthorne, I woke in a panic.

The truck terminal. The vampires. Not taking the killing shot.
Dirk
… No, Aiden had said my brother would be okay, and I trusted Aiden. Strange, trusting an assassin I'd only known a few days. Maybe because, in his own way, he was a protector like me. I'd told Mom that Dirk was away on assignment and not to worry because he was fine, and she believed it because I believed it too.

So what was the churning in my gut?

I was just starting patrol, trying to talk myself out of heading past Dawn Truck Lines, when the jangle of my cell phone startled me. I snatched it up. Elena.

“Sunny? Have you seen Blackthorne lately?”

“No, not since last night. Why?”

“I just heard from Alexis Byornsson. She was kinda hyper, talking about her sister and Blackthorne and the Museum Campus—and blood. But when I asked for details she backed off. I called Blackthorne but he didn't answer so I called Alexis's sister Synnove but she didn't answer. Then I tried Blackthorne's bromance Ric Holiday and
he
didn't answer. I don't know what's going on but it feels way off. I don't like it.”

“Let me try Aiden's cell.” I parked her call and contacted the number I'd gotten only last night.

It went immediately to voicemail. My blood chilled.

I clicked back to Elena. “His phone is shut off. What do we do?”

She heaved a disgruntled sigh. “Nothing we
can
do. The Museum Campus is Nosferatu's territory. And while I may not trust the ancient Iowa fucker, I'm not going to deliberately entangle him in a war. We'll just have to wait and see, and hope we can pick up the pieces.”

I hung up. Wait and see? Not if Aiden was in danger. I'd promised not to follow him but screw that. This might be life or death. I left work and ran home, grateful I was plainclothes so I wouldn't have to go inside to change. I jumped in my car and headed for the Museum Campus.

I drove past the Shedd Aquarium three times before sanity kicked in. What was I doing? I had no idea where he was or if he was even really in trouble. Only my gut prodded me and when was Ruffles gut instinct a good thing?

I left Lake Shore Drive, hooked west onto city streets and headed home.

And drove past a parked truck emblazoned with DAWN TRUCK LINES.

Crap. Was my Ruffles gut feeling more than gas this time? I slowed to a crawl, checking my rearview. Nobody in the truck's driver's seat. In the passenger's—a blaring beep made me jump. A dark sedan zoomed angrily around me.

I got the impression of a Thuggoh cap zipping past. Eloise's goons were here.

Well, hell. Ruffles luck was actually good for a change? I followed the sedan. It pulled into an alley and stopped. I parked at a discreet distance and followed on foot. The guy with the Thuggoh cap and a red-haired man entered through a row of townhouses. I crept in behind.

The redhead was talking. “The others are in place. Remember, our job is to block Blackthorne's escape. Leave him to the boss to capture.”

Capture?
Crap.

They went to the basement where they ducked down behind a desk…and didn't come back up. Cautiously, I followed. A hatch lay open, a scary invitation. But damn it, Aiden had given me his personal phone number. Asked me to call him by his first name. He needed me.

I climbed in. No ladder, no bottom. I swallowed hard, pressed my feet against one side, my back against the other, and wriggled down using pressure only. Sounds athletic but I was more Ruffles about it than Bond. I slipped several times, goosing my heart rate stratospheric.

Thuggoh hissed, “Who the fuck is there?”

I lost it, falling from the hole, flailing—splatting on top of the redhead, knocking him out. I scrambled to my feet. The light from above was barely enough to see Thuggoh draw his gun. I spun a hook kick into his head. He went down.

I was zip-cuffing the goons when the alarm sounded.

Things happened quickly then.
Thwipping
like an Indiana Jones movie. A distant
woof
shaking the air. A klaxon. A fire door slammed down behind me, cutting off my escape, nearly cutting off my cute glutei. It also cut off all light. I fumbled out my penlight and switched it on.

The tunnel stretched before me, empty. Gun fist atop my penlight fist, I tiptoed forward. Feet rang ahead of me, too far for my beam to catch, a fast trot overlaid with the hissing glide of a stumbling walk. Going left to right. The adrenaline eating my veins urged me to hurry. But this was a vampire's lair. I forced myself to proceed with caution.

An eternity later my beam caught a chamber entrance. I nearly stumbled into it before I heard her.

Eloise.

Damn it.
If she saw me before I could get off enough shots to punch her heart…I smashed the point of the penlight into my jacket, nearly goring my solar plexus. I froze, not even breathing, though my heart continued to hammer until my ribs felt like dust. As the seconds passed without me getting dead or dismembered, I took a cautious breath and opened my ears.

“I was young. Helpless. You knew that.”

She was
monologuing
. Her distraction probably saved me. I turned off the penlight, muffling the tiny click with my jacket, then I peeked through the doorway.

Her shadowy form moved in a circle—courtesy of a red exit light above me, I could see. Again I had a moment of recognition. She was small and quick like me, although a bit more graceful with a better haircut.

“Why did you abandon me?”

Left alone like me too, but without a mom and brother to adopt her. Sympathy swamped me.

Then I saw what she circled. Or who. My breath froze.

Aiden lay helpless at her feet, a nasty open wound in his chest, the tip of a stake just visible in the wound, as if he'd tried to pound it backwards. Pale, not breathing. Shock and fear poured ice into me. It was physically painful for me to see him like that. Sympathy died.

She was
nothing
like me.

“We were partners, Aiden. More than partners.” As if she hadn't done enough damage with the stake, she waved a throat-slitting knife.

That wasn't for capture. She was going to kill him.

Where were his friends? His backup? No one here to stop her.

I was his backup.
I slid my hands together, dark penlight and gun pointed at her form, my thumb set to click on the light so I could target her heart.

I paused. The light would also reveal my location. Could I squeeze off four shots before she stopped me?

My hands dropped.

But if not the gun, what? Bellow like Jonesy? Criminals didn't respect my authority, much less vampires. Berserker rage? It had saved me once, but hurt someone I loved. Besides, even my dark side might not stop a creature depraved enough to deliberately kill her friend.

Circling, she passed a big green tube resting on the ground. She raised her blade, flashing red, over Aiden's prone body. “I'll make this hurt.”

A horrible anger blazed through me. I ran into the chamber and snatched up the tube—some part of me had filtered “bazooka” but at that moment all I knew was
weapon—big one
.
I barely fit it to my shoulder before I fired.

It exploded front and back. My ears rang.

Eloise dropped, half her ribcage gone. I didn't know much about vampire healing, but hopefully she wasn't recovering from that any time soon.

Aiden didn't move.

He was dead.
My diaphragm took a head-on collision with an iceberg. I couldn't move.

His eyes slit open on me.

He was
alive
. I dropped the tube and ran to him. Aiden's irises slid to his side before his lids shut.

Telling me the stake was priority. I jumped over him and fell to my knees, wrapping both hands around the silver stake. I drew on every bit of strength I had and pulled.

It came free unexpectedly. I landed on my backside, the bloody stake glued to my fists. I shook it off like slime. It thumped to the ground. Breathing hard, I recovered my sanity and realized I'd thrown away a weapon. Gingerly I picked it up again, moving my Glock to my ankle holster, and tucked the stake in its place.

A muffled crackling pulled my gaze to Aiden. His ribs were visibly straightening under his weapons vest. He started breathing and his skin flushed red before fading to its normal hue. By the time he blinked and sat up, the only things visible from his fatal wound were the holes in his jacket and vest.

“Thanks.” He twisted to me and lifted his cuffed hands. A light glowed. “Button.” He rasped it.

I pressed a thumbnail onto the recessed button and the glow died.

He exploded into a cloud of mist. The cuffs dropped to the floor. The mist pillared, rising into an erect column before imploding into Aiden. Immediately he staggered.

I leaped to my feet and caught his arm. Blurted, “You should have trusted me.”

“What?” He didn't look too good but he straightened from me.

I hadn't meant to say it but once started I realized how important it was. “You should have told me about this. Trusted me to have your back.” I glared at the broken form of Eloise on the floor, a little less broken than it was a moment ago.

He barely glanced her way. “I fight my own battles. Let's go.” He slid his arm around my shoulders. I wrapped mine around his waist. We stumbled for the exit.

We
did, together; he talked big, but he wasn't up to walking on his own, though the only thing that mattered now was getting him to safety.

We got less than a yard.

“The fuck?” Four big males swarmed the doorway, three vampires with the bat insignia on their arms and a tattooed human—pointing a machine gun at us.

Aiden pushed me aside as the human opened fire. I shouted but Aiden shimmered and the bullets ripped mostly empty air. A couple knives clattered from Aiden's mist to the ground.

His hand appeared around the gunman's throat. He'd misted behind the guy. The firing cut as Aiden lifted him. A twist and toss threw him across the room. “That's for daring to aim a gun at her.”

My heart warmed until, in a fast, coordinated attack, two vampires grabbed his arms and the third hacked a knife into his neck.

Aiden twisted but it was already done. Blood oozed around the embedded blade, black in the red light.

The vampire pulled the knife free. Jets pulsed from Aiden's neck.

Ignoring his pumping lifeblood, he threw off one of the pair that held him. The vampire hit the wall and slid to the ground, groaning.

The knife-wielding vamp was winding up for a second chop. As the spurts ebbed, Aiden blocked the attack, but he was pale and slow—and the knife-wielding vamp was already winding up for a third strike.

I was Aiden's backup.
Even untrained against vampires, I was better than nothing, but only if I didn't freeze. I grabbed the stake from my holster and, thanking everything I knew that I was a Meiers Cornersian and had played darts at Nieman's, I threw as hard as I could at the vampire's skull.

The stake sank, point-first, into the vamp's ear. He screamed and dropped to the ground.

Aiden pivoted with a fist to his remaining captor's face. The vampire crumpled and fell.

But Aiden was in a bad way because instead of following up, he bent over, panting. The vampire he'd punched started scuttling away.

Without straightening, Aiden whipped out a blade and
shooped
. He groaned then did the same to the knifing vamp. Badly wounded and still worth ten of them.

“What is
in
that knife?” I said. “Tiny lasers?”

“Incentive.” He glared at the vampires. “How dare they threaten you?”

“Exactly how I feel about you. Let's take Eloise and go…? Damn it.”

The first vampire had recovered. He scooped up Eloise and darted out. I got an arm around Aiden and we limped after them.

By the time we reached the earthen tunnel it was open, but Eloise and her vampire were gone. Aiden muscled me up the hole by sheer willpower. I spewed into the office, amazed at his strength but more amazed at how dirty I was.

He leaped out after me. “You will
never
do that again.” He grabbed my shoulders, undermining his tough-guy stance by leaning on me. “Do you hear me?”

I gaped into his angry black eyes. “I just saved your life. Twice.”

“What if those vampires had seen you alone? What if
Eloise
had seen?” His face constricted as if hit by pain. “She's insane. And I was lying there, helpless! I couldn't have done a thing. She'd have sucked you dry…” He trailed to a whisper then swallowed visibly.

“Right. Would this be before or after she sliced your head off with that silver knife?” A shiver wracked me.
I'd nearly lost him.
My stomach hollowed out at the realization. I shook my head. “Let's get the fuck out of here.”

He almost yelled some more. He wanted to. But I tugged and he stumbled against me, and I gripped him tightly and we dragged each other upstairs. If I had my way we'd never let go.

My only thought was to get to my car and get away. So I was surprised when we hit the night air and he stopped.

“What?”

“A friend was here. I must find him.”

“Can't Ric take care of himself?”

If he was surprised I knew about Ric, he didn't show it. “Normally. But he was injured.” He looked away, his expression reluctant. He didn't like whatever he had to say next. “Please, I…I need your help.”

Any resistance melted. “Of course. Where do you think he is?”

He shut his eyes. When they opened they were bright red. He pointed east. “That way.”

“Back inside the townhouse?”

“No.” He hobbled south along the alley. At the sidewalk he struck east. Despite his wounds, he set a quick pace.