Longest Days (The Firsts) (3 page)

The client had instructed his team to destroy the building and kill anyone who emerged.  And one other odd order that hadn’t really bothered him at first.  The client had required his team to gun down survivors that emerged after dark…and then behead them.  It was a gruesome task, but Daniel had convinced himself they could do this.  After all, he killed people for a living.   And they would already be dead at that point, what did it matter what happened to their corpse?   Only he had seen her crumpled on the ground, riddled with bullet holes that, amazingly, had missed her lovely face.  Beside her lay a man who had already been decapitated, and it made him sick to his soul.

He wasn’t a sentimental man.  Death didn’t bother him.  Hers did.  So he’d ordered his team to cease the beheadings.  He’d told them to finish the job, but leave the bodies intact.  And he’d left the site with the body of the beautiful Asian woman.  At that moment, he had no idea what he was doing with her.  He just knew he couldn’t leave her there with that carnage.  And he knew he was done with the life.

So he wrapped his flak jacket around her beautiful face, buried her and headed north.  Because he also knew he would never forgive himself and he didn’t deserve his original retirement location in Bali.  Warm, sexy, tropical Bali, where he’d planned to drink, party, and fuck for the rest of his life in leisure.  He certainly had enough money to do so.  It was ironic that this job was going to be his last.  Yeah, he’d stayed too long at the fair.

So here he was in polar bear country, yanking on heavy rope nets in freezing wet conditions with the godawful smell of fish all around him…and drinking himself to sleep every night.  Yeah.  He was well and truly fucked up.

The dreams. 
The fucking dreams!
   Eillia had no idea why they refused to go away and stay away.   But she woke breathing hard and sweating again.  

It had been a year, and they were less often now, it was true, but they still ripped her out of her rest during daytime when a vampire automatically became tired and needed to seek rest.  It usually left her confused for a few moments until she realized she was here in her bed and okay.  These dreams were not like the ones of Hamid that came to haunt her and remind her of his loss.

Her eyes shot to a broken chair beside her bed. She crawled over to it and pulled something from beneath a pillow that covered the top of the wicker seat.  It was a crumpled army green jacket and she slid back against the wall to hold it to her face.  Pressed against her nose, she breathed deeply and tried to inhale the scent.  It was so faint now she could almost believe it had been part of the dream.  The vagueness of his scent was slipping away like Hamid’s image.

She had no idea who he was.  But last year when she awoke after the attack, she’d been buried beneath the ground.  Her confusion had cleared quickly when her memory rushed back.  That night, while attempting to protect her friend’s stronghold from attack, she’d been shot to death.  And her lover Hamid had been shot and beheaded.   Why they hadn’t beheaded her too, she did not understand.  But whoever had brought her here and buried her body could not have known she was vampire. He would never have wasted the time to dig a proper deep grave.

The only clue had been the large flak jacket he’d wrapped around her face.  And a sense of sorrow.   Kindness.  Someone touching her lovingly.  Caressing her hair. 
A memory?

His earthy scent had comforted her for some reason.   But she would never know who he was.  She reburied the jacket under the pillow on the chair and rolled back to hug her own.   Sleep eluded her the rest of the day.             

CHAPTER THREE

Eillia was shaking her head.  “No, no, no,” she said, to back up her negative head movement.

“Come on.  I hate going alone.  A lot of the time I’m the only girl there.  Please.”   Starla moved to right in front of Eillia, who had to step back.  But Starla was relentless.

“Please!  There’s nothing else to do in this stupid ice-locked town.  Please?  Look, if you really hate it, I won’t ask you again.  But you gotta come.  Just this once.”

Eillia felt like it was time to compel the insistent young woman.  But she promised herself she would use that on her only in case of emergency.  And besides, it really did seem to mean a lot to her.  She supposed she could go, just this once.

Starla knew the second Eillia caved.  She launched herself at the stiff woman and hugged her.

“Thank you, thank you!  We’ll have such a good time.  Even if there aren’t any interesting men there, you and I will get shit-faced and dance until morning.”

No, I won’t
, Eillia thought.  So, it looked like she was going to join her friend at the local bar slash nightclub, the Wooly Bully, after work tonight.  Even before she trapped herself here in ice-world, she rarely visited those type of establishments.  The alcohol sounded nice, though.  And maybe she
would
enjoy it.  Either way, she was committed now.  It was nice to see the excitement in Starla’s eyes.

After they’d served the last couple, around midnight, Starla led Eillia to her small apartment not far from the Blue Star.

“I have a top that would look so sexy on you,” she told Eillia as they went through the door into her over-warm one room apartment.

Eillia shook her head again.  “No.  I’m fine in this, thanks.”

Starla stared at her.  “This” was a thick charcoal gray sweatshirt hoodie and simple black jeans with heavy snow boots.  Starla wrinkled her nose.  “But what if there
is
someone attractive there tonight?  That’s what you wear to work.  Not out to a bar.  You’re so beautiful, Lia.  Let me dress you up.”

“No, I’m happy like this.  I’ll wait here while you get all dolled up, though.  I’ll just melt into this comfy couch.  See? I’m happy.  Go get dressed.”

Starla knew better than to push her a second time tonight.  She’d already won the first battle in getting Lia to come with her.  Best let it be, and be happy she would not be the only woman amongst several drunken men.  It’s just life was so dull here in winter.   It was too dangerous to try to journey too far this time of year.  So everyone mostly stayed local.  The only people that came through town were fishermen, oil platform workers, and the guys that worked for the weather station.

She glanced into her living room from the “bedroom” concealed behind only a folding screen.  It was nice to have a female friend for once. Lia was so stunning, though.  Starla knew if any interesting men were there tonight, they wouldn’t be looking at her.  She shrugged as she picked out a cute silvery top.  It was okay.  She hoped Lia would stick around.  There was something about her.  Starla didn’t know exactly what, but something special.  Someday, she hoped Lia would confide in her.  What Starla
did
know, for certain, was that Lia was much more than a small town fry-cook.

Daniel pulled in the rigging, soaking wet from melting ice, his muscles struggling against the frigid heavy rope that didn’t want to give an inch.   He grunted and wondered, not for the first time, what the hell was wrong with him.  He had nearly two million dollars in two banks waiting for him.   And here he was in a land of impossible cold doing harder work than anyone on the planet for pay that barely covered his bar tab.   And all because he felt personally responsible for the death of a woman he’d never known and would give anything to have stopped her brutal murder.  But that wasn’t possible, she was gone forever, her lovely life ended in a barrage of bullets that, while he hadn’t pulled the trigger, he might as well have.

So he was right where he should be, here in an unforgiving land because he had done the unforgivable.  His mind took him back to that moment too often. At any moment he began to feel better, breathe easier, her face would come to him in death. 

Daniel rubbed his eyes with fingers he could barely feel.  A headache was crushing his temples again.  Long hard days in brisk cold wind that seemed to freeze the skin on his face and cut into everything beneath.  Now, with winter on them, the sun wouldn’t make an appearance in the sky again for another few months.  The brutal air would become worse.  That didn’t bother him.  It didn’t interfere with his hard work as he tried to atone for his sins…and whiskey blurred nights.

He knew there was a strong storm brewing that would shut down the small town for a few days or more.  He’d head to the Wooly Bully in about an hour to gather a supply of booze to make it through to the end of the blizzard.

The huge snowstorm  predicted for the next day was expected to be a blizzard, so the Wooly Bully was slamming.  When Starla and Eillia came through the door, the loud din hushed some as the men looked up and stopped in their tracks for the two lovely women.   Eillia saw the bartender smack a few of them in the arm with a towel as he made his way to them.

“You ladies like a table?”

Starla smiled at him.  “If you have one,” she said, but didn’t see one that was unoccupied.

“Oh, we have one.  How about here?”  He led them to a three person table against the side wall.  Three men looked up from where they were seated at the table.

The bartender kicked one of them in the foot.

“Scat!  These fine ladies are looking for a table.”

They grumbled as they picked up their mugs and bottles and left.

Starla started to say something, but Eillia gave her a look.  After they sat down, Eillia leaned back as the bartender made his way back to impatient patrons at the bar.

“It was only polite.  They will be fine somewhere else.  And this gives you a nice view of who comes and goes.  You’re trolling for a man, right?”

Starla tried to look indignant.

“I’m not
trolling!
  Not exactly.  But if someone interesting comes in…yeah, I’m
looking
.”

“Well, then, this is a good spot.  I’d like some Crown Royal if they have it.  Do you think they do?”

“I don’t know…it’s pretty high quality for this town.  I’ll ask.”  Starla got up and smoothed down the too-tight jeans she’d donned.  They looked nice on her slim figure and left little to the imagination.  She could see they rode against her curves, creating a peek at her shape.  Men liked that, though, so it would serve to entice any man who might be interested in her.

Eillia had no idea what brand of whiskey she was drinking…it wasn’t Crown Royal…but it was doing its job relaxing her.   The best part of the night was watching Starla shine.  She was a beautiful girl.   Long dark brown hair, which she’d pulled up and secured in little waterfalls of curls around her face, deep chocolate eyes, classically pretty features.  And she was getting a lot of attention.   She knew Starla had been worried about her as competition.  She hadn’t needed to be.  Eillia sent a soft

compel to any man who looked at her to either check out Starla or go on with his business.  Depended on whether she thought he might be suitable for her new friend.

But she found herself enjoying the laughter and merriment of people who lived extreme lives in this extreme place, and were gathered here tonight for some companionship.  And maybe a little human contact in the form of sexual gratification.

Eillia downed the rest of her small glass of whiskey. 
Sex.
  She missed it.  The area between her legs twitched as she remembered how wonderful it felt to accept her man inside her and ride him to pleasure.  There was a sense memory ache for what her body craved.  She shook her head and motioned the barkeep over.

“Another one, please,” she said politely.  He shook his head.

“I’ve never seen such a small woman kill that much whiskey.  You’re sure you’re okay?”

“Wonderful.  I can hold it.  So, please.”  He nodded and brought her another.  Of course he had no way of knowing that a vampire’s fast metabolism required more liquor to get the same effect.

It was quite busy in spite of the fact that the population of this town was quite small.  There were a lot of non-locals who worked in the Arctic Circle or passed through, and were getting their buzz on since the expected storm would likely stop everything in its tracks for a while.  The larger city north of them, Barrow, had a “damp” law like much of Alaska which prohibited the sale of alcohol, so Wilkes-Barre, which did not, was a very popular destination for anyone looking for a bar with booze. 

Eillia watched Starla dancing with a handsome young man, blonde, looked like he was of European descent.   Switzerland or Norway, judging by the white-blonde long hair and blue eyes.   She looked excited.  Still, Eillia would check his aura tonight.

She sat back and closed her eyes, pulled the hood up to block her face from view to further discourage male attention.  Eillia used her abilities to journey through her memories to the last time she lay with Hamid.  It wouldn’t come.  Why couldn’t she see his face?   She felt the moisture on her cheek again as she realized that she might never see him again even in her dreams.

Daniel was so shit-faced.  It was a fucking good thing traffic wasn’t a problem around here, because no less than ninety percent of everyone in this place tonight was driving drunk.  Didn’t mean he wouldn’t run into a tree, but head-ons with other cars were rare.  He looked around at the men sucking down liquid gold here tonight.  It would be a long-ass number of days before they could get here again, so they were getting their money’s worth.  Too bad there weren’t more women here to take advantage of the horny, drunk men.  There was a little hottie that was dancing up in an impromptu space cleared by pushing some tables back.  She was adorable, but a little sweet and innocent for the likes of him.

He would never approach someone like her.  Joey D’s mother was more his speed.  She knew the score and she lived for the attention.   She wasn’t looking for a mate.  This lovely girl was.  So he watched her gyrate and laugh with a group of obnoxious drunks trying to match her dance moves and impress her.   He couldn’t help but think that most of them were not really good enough for her either.