Longest Days (The Firsts) (22 page)

A secondary set of intricate locking mechanisms secured Tamesine’s cell that included passcodes no one had access to but Eillia, Park, Bas, Koen, and Logan.  Remotely, two other first bloods had access, but they would never visit the facility unless necessary. 

The main room of the holding cell was empty.  She must be in the lavatory.  Eillia laid her satchel on a counter near the huge door that locked immediately behind them.  Park walked near to the cell to look around.  A dinner tray lay abandoned on the floor, full of food.   Untouched blood packets had been pitched across the room to rest against the back wall.  Her television remote was shattered under the front Plexiglas wall. 

“She had a rough day,” Park said to Eillia. 

“Surprise, surprise.   I wish we could just go in and access her mind.”

“So do I.  But it will work better if we have her permission and cooperation.  She needs to accept us and believe that we can help her.  Anyway, I have to check with Burne for a moment.  She’s working on one of my projects that has to do with human to vampire conversion.  Can you keep her company until I get back?”

“Sure.  Take your time.  I’ll try to get her to tell me where she’s been the past centuries.”

“Helpful.  Good luck.”

Park left the room just as Tamesine walked out of the bathroom.  Naked.  Glorious. 

Eillia watched her move elegantly across the room and press her body against the front of the enclosure.

“Hi.  I’ve missed you.  Where’s your partner in crime?”

“Park’s attending some business.   She’ll be back.”

“Good.  I want to let you both know that if you want me to be happy here, you need to give me a real live blood meal.  I need warm blood and a hot cock.  Otherwise, this is torture.  That isn’t what you intended, right?”

Eillia smiled.  “No.  We want you to be calm and learn to trust us.  And if I can go without sex, I think you can make it too.  The blood in those bags
is
warm.  Well, it is when it’s served to you.”

“It’s dead!  Vampires don’t drink from plastic bags.  I’ll starve first!”

“Tamesine, do you understand at all what we are trying to do here for you?  And…please put something on.  You’re distracting.”

“Turning you on?  Come in here with me.  I guarantee no one has fucked you like I can.  I’ve been told my tongue is exceptional.   Let me prove it to you.”

“Tempting, but no, thanks.   I can get anything I want in the shower.  By the way, so can you.”

“Can’t get cock.”

“You’re not going to.  Not until you’re safe to let out of here.  So, why don’t we start on that?  How about you tell me where you’ve been all these years when the first blood community thought you were dead?”

Tamesine pushed away from the Plexiglas with a scream.  She threw a tablet computer at the far wall to land shattered next to the blood bags.

“I just want to go home!  I wish I’d never intercepted your dreams.  I wish I’d never gone to Alaska.”

“From where?  Where were you living?”

Suddenly Tamesine turned around and stared at Eillia.  Then she pulled an overstuffed chair up to the front of the cell and sat down, her legs spread, giving Eillia an unwanted view of her privates.

“I lived in a lovely three story beach house in Tasmania near the sea.  I haven’t been there all this time, but off and on, a lot.  I have several favorite blood meal people there.  Any chance of sending for some of them?”

“Not here to sex you, Tamesine.  We’re here to help you get well.”

“Nothing wrong with me.  Except you narrow-minded assholes.  I’m a first blood.  I absolutely do not need any help being one.”

“Do you realize at all that you can’t control yourself?  That you have manic childlike tendencies which are dangerous?  Do you want to come back to your people and regain a normal life?  Until you understand that something is wrong with you, you won’t be able to open up to our help.  Tamesine, there are so few first bloods.   We want to help you get well.”

Suddenly Tamesine sat upright and then got up and walked over to the front of the cell.   She put her head in the air and closed her eyes.  For several minutes she didn’t move or speak at all.  Then her eyes opened and she pinned them on Eillia.

“You have a baby inside you.  I can feel him.   He’s brand new.  I didn’t know first bloods could have babies.”

Eillia’s hands went to her belly immediately out of a sense of protection.  Damn.  Tamesine really did have incredible power.  At this point it was a great concern for their safety.   Tamesine was still a threat and this child meant everything to her.  Maybe she should return home until he was born.

Tamesine threw her hands up against the Plexiglas, her legs wide, frantic.

“No.  Don’t leave.  I want to see the baby vampire.  Don’t take him away!  Please.  I’ll be good.  I’ll be compliant and let you mind-rape me.  Just…don’t take him away.”

She didn’t know what to do.  This was the first time Tamesine had responded to anything.

“I can’t let anything hurt him.  I can’t trust you.”

“I would
never
hurt him!   I promise you.  Eillia, I promise I wouldn’t let anything happen to the lovely baby boy.”  She slid down on her knees and there were tears in her eyes.  “He likes me.  Eillia, your son likes me.  He doesn’t want you to leave me, either.”

Eillia was standing now, her hands still wrapped protectively around her middle.  “I will stay.  But you have to promise to let us try to help you.  If you give us shit, or frighten me, give me any reason to worry, I’m taking him away.  I won’t risk him for anyone.  Not anyone, you understand?”

“I do.  I won’t.”  Tamesine drew a ragged breath.  “If I’m good, if I get well, can I hold him some day?”

“Um.  Well, let’s see how things go.  You must work very hard with us to try to get well.”

“I’ll be the perfect student.  Go on, get in there.  It’s a mess, though.”

Eillia smiled.  “I’m sure it is.  Tamesine, I think we may be alright.  Park is so strong, you know that, and we are really excited to help you.”

Suddenly Tamesine’s head went into the air again.   She began to shake her head. 

“No, no.  He’s here.  He’s going to kill us all.  He’s going to kill the baby.  Eillia, you have to let me out.  That weasel faced vampire has a bomb!”

“Alvin?  Alvin’s here?  He has a bomb!?”

“He does.”  She closed her eyes again, and when she opened them, she was really upset.

“He’s killed Park.  He hasn’t taken her head yet, but he will.  You have to let me out!I have to help the baby.”

Eillia shook her head, panic settling inside her gut.  Could she believe this?  She tried to reach out for Park’s life force.  It wasn’t there.  It didn’t mean she was permanently dead, but it didn’t mean she wasn’t.

“I’m going out there.”

“Not alone!  He’s just a measly vampire but he’s serious!  He expects to die.  You know when someone is this serious, when they have nothing to lose, it’s chaos!”

Eillia could not believe she hadn’t brought her mobile phone in with her.  
Of all the days!

Okay, well Koen would know his daughter’s life force was gone, wouldn’t he?  He had to be attuned enough, surely, to feel her missing.  And Bas.  He would know if his wife’s life force disappeared. Wouldn’t he?
  Unfortunately, she knew that if a first blood wasn’t actively reaching for another first blood’s life force, they wouldn’t know if it had changed.  She tried to send a telepathic message to either of them even though it wasn’t really her talent.    She sent the message to both men that they were under attack and needed them immediately.  But she had no idea if they received it.  Well, there was only one choice.  If Park was in danger, she had to go to her.

Tamesine was shocked when Eillia opened the door that Alvin could not.   And watched her walk out into the huge warehouse room into whatever danger he had waiting for her.  The huge door closed automatically behind her, sealing Tamesine in.

From her place in the protected cell, Tamesine heard an explosion.  It rocked her floor and then everything was quiet.  She was crazed, trying to find some way to get out of the cell.  But she knew she was well and truly trapped.  She couldn’t help Eillia.   She couldn’t help the baby.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Eillia was thrown back against the outer door of Tamesine’s cell.    Blood dripped from her head, her ears were ringing, and something was wrong with her right leg.   She struggled to stand, her hands curved tightly over her belly, her mind and heart racing.   Reaching in with her spirit amulet, she felt for the baby.  He was okay.  Her body had protected him.  For Eillia, in this one moment of time, that was the only thing that mattered.  A moment later, she thought of Park and Burne and made herself stand. 

A debris cloud fogged the large room so densely she could only see a few feet in front of her, but her first blood instincts led her to Park, who lay another twenty feet away, bleeding and unmoving.  She didn’t have to check her vitals to know that she wasn’t breathing.   At least the bastard  had not taken the final blow of removing her head,  so she knew she’d be okay.  If Eillia could get her to safety.  As she bent to pick up her body, sharp reports announced he was firing at her.  Bullets bounced off metal cabinets nearby and buried themselves in the wall behind her.  And then one found its way to her chest.  It tore a hole straight through, forcing her to the ground again.  Then she heard his voice come out of the cloud of smoke.

“Think I can’t take you?!  Game changer, bitches!  I’m filled with your original vampire blood.  Damn that stuff ignites!!  I may not be as powerful as a full first blood vampire right now, but I feel fucking invincible!   I’m coming for some more, pretty lady.  If you want to survive, get out of here.  Because I
am
drinking from Bas’s woman!”

He’d fed from a first blood?  Who?  
Eillia’s mind searched for possibilities.  There was only one.  Logan.  He must have attacked him on his way out of there a little while ago.  That’s how he got in. 
Shit!!
  The feed made him significantly stronger than normal.  And a much greater threat.  Still, if she could get up, get to him, she’d snap his neck and end this.  Her eyes searched desperately through the almost opaque air.  Where was he?  Her superb hearing kicked in and she followed a slight scraping to her right and shot to the spot in vampire time.  He was gone.  Oh, god, she had to get back to Park. 

A second burst of speed nearly destroyed her leg, but she made it back to Park’s side in time to receive a blow across her shoulder blades with something sharp.  The deep cut from the ax put her down immediately, pain and blood trapping her on the ground for a split second.  At least he’d missed her neck.  She was back up and faced the dark form bending over Park, sucking wildly at her throat.  She threw herself on him and grabbed his neck, twisting quickly.   Her hold was weak due to her severe injuries, so he was able to pull free to grab the ax near his right hand and lift it above his head. 

Eillia reached inside for her last bit of strength and froze him.   He froze with the ax over his head, seconds from ending Eillia’s life forever.  She shoved herself backward just as two hands grabbed her and pulled her away from the hideous statue-like man who had nearly murdered her.   Again.

Koen swept her up in his arms and carried her out of the smoke into the clear cool night air outside the doors.  Eillia was choking out the ingested debris from the damaged air.   When she could focus, she saw Logan outside the door.  Dead.  Beheaded. Tears welled from pain much deeper than any injury to her body.  Then her eyes moved back to the door and she sighed in relief as she saw Bas carry Park out and bring her over next to her.

“Is she okay?”

Bas shook his head, his jaw set in anger.  “Not now.  But she will be.  Fuck!  Her second death in a year.  He dies this time.”

“Without doubt.  It’s over now.  I’ll be right back with his head.”

Koen vampire-raced into the building to return with the ax dangling from his hand.

“Where’s his fucking head!?”  Bas asked, Park’s  dead body curled tight in his arms.

Koen’s eyes were hard and his mouth grim.  “Still on his neck.  He’s gone.”

Eillia shook her head in disbelief.  “Not fucking possible.  I froze him.  He should still have been…”  She trailed off.  Then swore again.  “He was drinking from Park.  He already had first blood in him from Logan.  And with her super powerful blood, it probably let him override my freeze.  Koen, we have to find him.  Tonight.  Logan is dead forever.  That bastard killed him like he did Hamid.  He can’t get away again!”

“We’ll find him.  He won’t get out of France alive, I promise.”

She struggled to get up.  “Cairine.  What if he’s gone for her?”

Bas relieved her mind right away.

“She’s in the safe-room beneath the villa.  Not only is it impenetrable, but he won’t even be able to find it.  Park’s spelled it.” 

Eillia was dead calm and still.  Her eyes moved from Koen, to Bas, to Park.   She struggled to stand, and Koen came to help her.

“You can’t go after him.  You’re ripped to shreds.  You need blood and time to heal.”

“I’m not going after him.  Neither are you.”  She paused and started limping forward.  “Help me, Koen.”

“What are you doing?”

“I’m sending the dogs.  We can’t find him like she can.”

“Eillia, no.”

“Yes.  Tamesine is our best chance.  We had a breakthrough tonight.  I don’t know that we can trust her.  But I know she wants him dead.  I know she can track him when we can’t.  Help me, Koen, or I’ll crawl in there on my hands and knees.”

He shook his head and picked her up in his arms.  Eillia looked at Bas.

“Bas, Burne is in there somewhere.  Please check on her.”

He nodded and disappeared with Park in his arms.  He wouldn’t let her out of his sight again until that asshole was dead.

Eillia unlocked the outer door to Tamesine’s cell so Koen could carry her inside. 

A frantic Tamesine was still pressed against the front of the cell.