Blood Law (18 page)

He didn’t wait to see who responded but laid Alex flat and began CPR. His hands compressed her chest for a five-count, and then he blew into her mouth, trying to encourage her to breathe. “You’re not going to die on me. Not like this,” he mumbled, doing another five-count of chest compressions.

Tony knelt beside him. “I didn’t hear a shot. What the hell happened?”

“It’s a psychic wound. She’s reliving Lipscomb’s death.”

“Holy fuck. What can we do?”

Varik checked Alex’s pulse. It was still there but weaker. She was fading. “Goddamn it.” He snapped the gloves off his hands. “You are
not
doing this to me. I won’t let you.”

“Whoa!” Tony grabbed Varik’s arm as he raised it and opened his mouth, flashing his fangs. “What are you doing?”

“Saving her life,” Varik snarled, jerking his arm free. “She’ll die just like Lipscomb if I don’t do this.”

“There has to be another way. What if I—”

“You’re human. It won’t work.”

“The hospital can—”

“They can’t deal with this! Alex needs a connection to this physical plane.”

Tony chewed his bottom lip, staring at Alex.

“I’m the only chance she’s got,” Varik whispered.

Tony stood and stepped back, mumbling, “Lieutenant Lockwood’s going to have my ass for this.”

Varik bit into the soft flesh of his wrist. His fangs pierced the skin and muscle beneath, puncturing the veins. He ignored the pain as the warm flow of blood filled his mouth. Gently cradling Alex in his arms, he held his bleeding wrist to her mouth as if offering a bottle to an infant. “Drink, baby. Come back to me.”

Alex felt nothing. Darkness blinded her. Silence deafened her. Then she was floating.

She looked down and saw Varik giving someone CPR. Blood stained the woman’s chest and the floor beneath her. His movement seemed agonizingly slow, as if he were working underwater. She watched with curious detachment until she realized
she
was the woman. “What the fuck?”

Looking around, everything in the garage wavered as if she was viewing it through heat waves rising from sunbaked asphalt. Colors were muted, pale shadows of themselves. She saw Tony as he rounded the side of the car and could see his mouth moving as he talked to Varik but heard no words.

A chime drew her attention, and she was no longer floating but standing. The chime sounded like distant crystal bells and filled her with a sense of peace. Something wasn’t right. How could she be standing beside Varik and lying on the ground at the same time?

The chime sounded again, urging her to seek it. She felt weightless. Her feet rose from the floor, and she drifted over the car, leaving Varik behind, searching for the source of the crystalline bells. She landed in front of
the car and heard the chime again. This time it was louder, behind her. She turned.

A man leaned against the trash-filled table. His casual stance seemed ill matched with the formality of the dark suit he wore.

“Daddy?”

“Hey, Princess.” Bernard Sabian’s deep voice still carried the Irish lilt that had never given way to the Kentucky drawl she and Stephen possessed. “It’s been a while.”

Alex nodded, unable to speak.

A smile showing perfect human teeth brightened his pale face.

“Is this real?” she asked, looking around.

“I’m afraid so.”

“Where are we?”

“Beyond the Veil that separates the physical world from the spirit realm. This”—he gestured to the surrounding room—“is sort of a no-man’s-land in between the two planes, the Shadowlands. Anyone from either side can enter it, if they know the way and have good reason to do so.”

“And you have a reason?”

He nodded. “I came for you.”

Her throat contracted painfully, choking her.

The edges of his form shimmered as he closed the distance between them.

“I miss you.” She forced out the strangled words.

He stopped and brushed a lock of hair behind her ear. “I know, Princess. I miss you, too.”

She sobbed and moved into his open arms. The pain of decades of separation left her as they embraced.

He stroked her hair and held her close. “We don’t have a lot of time.”

“I’m dead. We have plenty of time.”

“No, you’re not.”

“What do you mean?” Alex pulled away enough so that she could look up into his face. His dark green eyes, so very much like her own, stared down at her. The sorrow she found within them frightened her. “Daddy, what’s—”

He gripped her elbows and moved her to arm’s length. “This isn’t your time. You’re not meant to die like this.”

“I don’t understand.”

“In a few minutes, you’re going to be back in your physical body, but I have to tell you something first. I need you to listen to me very carefully. Okay?”

Alex nodded.

“You have to step down from this investigation.”

“What? Why?”

“I can’t tell you that. I can only tell you that no good will come from your continuing. I never meant for you to walk the path of shadows, as I did.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means that I don’t want to see you hurt, which is precisely what will happen if you continue.”

“I’m not stepping down.” Anger replaced the joy she’d felt at seeing her father. “How could you even ask me to do that?”

“Princess, you have to—”

“No.” She pulled away from him. “I became an Enforcer to stop murders like these—like
yours
—from happening.”

“You don’t understand—”

“Then explain it to me.”

He shook his head. “I can’t.”

“Why not?”

“Alexandra, please—”

The edges of her father’s form wavered, and Alex felt heavy, as though a massive weight had been dropped on her shoulders. She looked around the garage. Colors were brighter, richer, and objects seemed more solid. “What’s happening?”

“I can’t hold you here any longer. You’re transitioning back to your physical body.”

“Alex.”
Varik’s voice drifted up from the back of the car.
“Come on, baby. Come back to me.”

“No! I don’t want to go back,” she cried.

“You have to, Princess.” Her father began to fade. “This isn’t the place for you. You’re not ready.”

“Daddy!” She reached for him, and her fingers slipped through his hands. “What aren’t I ready for?”

“That’s it. Come back.”
Varik’s voice grew louder.

“Daddy! Don’t leave me again!”

“I love you, Princess.” Her father’s voice was little more than a hushed whisper as he faded from view.

She stared at the empty air where he’d vanished. He was gone. Again. Silence enveloped her, and the world melted around her, plunging her into shadows. She spun out of control through darkness until she slammed into something hard.

The bubble of silence collapsed, and sound rushed in with a cacophony of sirens. Lights danced before her eyes in a confusing ballet. Panic clawed at her. Voices surrounded her, menacing in their foreignness. But one voice cut through the confusion.

“That’s it. Come back to me, baby,” the voice whispered in her ear.

The salty metallic taste of blood filled her mouth, and she swallowed. Brief flashes of memory sparked through her mind: A woman with black hair pulled into a tight bun leaned forward and kissed her cheek. A door crashed open, kicked off its hinges. A shotgun aimed at a fleeing figure. The recoil of the blast knocked her back.

She returned to the present to find movement all around her. Voices spoke in a language she couldn’t understand. The sour stench of fear mingled with the coppery smell of blood.

Blood.
That
she understood, and it excited her. All coherent thought fled before a tide of primal instinct.

The source of the blood—her prey—tried to pull away. She gripped it tightly, refusing to let it go.

“That’s enough,” the voice whispered.

She smelled sandalwood and cinnamon. Vampire. A male, and he wanted what was rightfully hers. He couldn’t have it. It was hers. She’d
make
it hers. A warning growl rumbled deep in her throat, and she shook her head. Her teeth dug into fleshy tissue, tearing it. More blood flowed into her mouth in a warm rush.

“Enough!” The prey jerked free.

Alex bolted forward, snarling, and pushed her prey to the floor. She straddled it and plunged her fangs into
the soft tissue of its neck. Blood, sweet and hot, pumped into her mouth. The sharp tang of fear mingled with sandalwood and cinnamon, and she moaned in pleasure, reveling in the heady scent.

Hands gripped her shoulders, her sides, trying to pull her away. Indistinct shouts faded into the background, replaced by two rapid heartbeats.

Her mind focused on the heartbeats.

Alex! No!

A voice shouted inside her head, accompanied by the image of a man lying on a bloodstained floor with her straddling him, feeding. Uniformed police and paramedics pulled at her, trying to pry her away from the man’s—from Varik’s—throat.

Stop!
Varik shouted in her mind.

The two heartbeats overlapped, merged, and became one.

Pain seared her neck. She released him, screaming and clawing at the scar on her neck. The humans surrounding her parted, and she stumbled a few feet away before collapsing to the floor. She gasped for air and choked on the blood in her mouth. Gagging and coughing, she rolled onto her side and curled into the fetal position. Tremors racked her body. Muscles tightened and unclenched in painful spasms.

“Easy, easy.” Varik’s voice was both a whisper in her mind and a deafening shout in her ears. His hands on her bare shoulders were like cold fire, soothing and burning simultaneously. “She needs a blanket.”

There was movement to her left as she struggled to
escape his grip. She felt him pull her back against his body, against his warmth. She shivered. “What …”

“Shh, it’s okay,” he said in that echoed whispering shout. “You’re okay.”

The weight and warmth of a blanket surrounded her, invited her to explore its depths. Her eyes closed, and the thought of sleep flitted through her mind in a voice that mingled Varik’s with her own. The sensation of rising into the air pulled her eyes open.

Varik was holding her as he climbed into the back of an ambulance. He laid her down on the stretcher and sat on the small bench beside her.

She seemed to be in two places at once. She looked at him but saw herself lying on the stretcher in her mind. “Varik,” she croaked and grabbed his blood-soaked shirt. “What … happened?”

The doors slammed shut, and a paramedic jammed a needle into her arm. The siren wailed to life, and the ambulance lurched forward.

Alex felt a warm rush in her veins as the IV began flowing. Her eyelids drooped, and she fought to keep them open.

Varik’s voice whispered in her mind.
Blood-bond.

She tried to scream, to lash out, but couldn’t move. Her eyes closed, and she once again drifted in darkness.

He whistled as he opened the gates to Jefferson High School’s football field. He unfolded a map and used the truck’s headlights to illuminate it. The positioning of the body had to be precise. If it wasn’t, all his work
would be meaningless. He’d carefully chosen the sites. All were equidistant to a central point, to the focus of his rage.

He stuffed the map in his coverall’s pocket and climbed into the truck. He drove onto the field to the selected spot by the bleachers and parked. Using an old gas station receipt, he spat out the gum he’d been chewing since he left the Holy Word Church’s prayer meeting and dropped the sticky wad into the truck’s ashtray.

The Holy Word’s weekly meetings offered him cover as well as served as cover for the Human Separatist Movement’s strategy-planning sessions. While he wasn’t an HSM member, he agreed with much of their beliefs, even if he did prefer the philosophy championed by two other anti-vamp groups, Blood Brothers and Kill All Bloodsuckers—“Kill ’em all and let Satan sort ’em out.” While HSM preached separation between humans and vamps, Blood Brothers and KABS both wanted to see vampires eradicated, believing them to be an affront to nature and to God’s design. Violent confrontations between the groups and vamps were common, especially in larger cities.

He continued to whistle while he opened the camper’s hatch and dropped the truck’s tailgate. Lugging a vampire’s corpse up to the top row was going to be a bitch, but he didn’t have to report for his shift until ten. He had time.

“Hammer … stake,” he muttered, checking the contents of a backpack he’d thrown in with the corpse. It was too risky to leave the stakes in the vamps’ chests when he transported them. One wrong bump and the
corpse could shift and dislodge the stake or, worse, break it. If a stake broke, revealing its secret too soon, he and Claire couldn’t be reunited. Timing was the key. Sabian had to know he’d done what she couldn’t—avenge Claire. Sabian had to be present, and she had to believe he’d taken away that which she held most dear. Her world had to be shattered, the same as his had been. Only then could he and Claire finally be together again.

Of course, trusting that the Enforcer bitch would figure things out in time was a gamble, but a necessary one. She’d made him suffer for far too long. He wanted to return the favor.

He shouldered the backpack, grasped one end of the tarp secured around the corpse, and tugged.

The body inched forward, and he tugged again. He repeated the process until it reached a tipping point and gravity took over, dumping the bundle onto the field. The impact loosened some of the bindings, revealing a pallid foot.

He scrambled into the back of the truck to rummage for the coil of rope he always kept handy. If he looped the rope under the corpse’s arms and made a rough harness, lifting the body up the bleacher stairs would be much easier.

As he squatted in the truck’s bed, he glanced out one of the camper’s side windows and froze.

A flashlight bobbed along the fence lining the opposite side of the field. The light paused and cut in his direction, and he heard the squeak of a gate’s rusty hinges.

He mouthed silent curses. Sweat beaded on his
upper lip and dripped down his temples. He’d watched the school’s nighttime security guard’s routine for weeks, learning the pattern. The guard wasn’t scheduled to check the athletic area until much later.