And I hated that. I really hated it.
But he released me as suddenly as he'd grabbed me, the kiss so brief I doubted that anyone had noticed. We stared at each other for a moment, still so close our harsh breaths mingled. I had no doubt that the desire and anger that raged in his eyes had its echo in mine.
He smiled. It was as bitter and as cold as the kiss we'd just shared, yet still my wolf hungered.
I forced my feet backwards. The sudden distance between us didn't help the ache.
"The manager is closing down the ride, but he'll keep the lights off. Hopefully, the vamp won't realize we're onto him," Kade said, shoving his phone back into his pocket. He glanced from Kye to me and raised an eyebrow. Being an empath, he'd no doubt be picking up all sorts of crazy emotions, but all he said was, "I'll make sure the vamp doesn't escape via the rear entrance. You want to go through the front and flush him out?"
I nodded, spun on my heel, and stalked towards the ride. Kye remained where he was, and I wasn't entirely sure whether I was relieved or dismayed. I might have warned him off, but at least if he'd remained with me, I could have kept an eye on him.
Or maybe that kiss had rattled me more than I'd thought, because wanting to keep an eye on Kye was insane. That man was dangerous in more ways than I could count, and keeping him close was only asking for trouble.
The ghost train ride was a stand-alone building capped by a skull wearing a top hat and holding a megaphone to his mouth. It was easy to imagine he was inviting everyone to roll up and try the ride, though no words came out of his skeletal mouth. There was a long line of people waiting out the front, although one look at the many unhappy faces in the line suggested word had gone out about the delay. I leapt over the metal railing that divided the ride from the rest of the crowds and flashed my badge at the ride supervisor. From within the building came a series of clanks, screams, moans and a multitude of other spooky sounds, all accompanied by the rattle of carriages running on a wooden track.
"The last carriage is going through now," the supervisor said, as another carriage rattled into the station and two teenagers climbed out, both looking somewhat bored. "When that one comes out, you can walk through."
"Have all your people been given the word to clear out?" He nodded. "Just let us know when the coast is clear." I waited until the last of the old wooden carriages came out, then pressed the two-way stud that had been inserted into my ear long ago and said, "Heading in now, Kade."
"The employees are out," he said, his rich tones warming my inner ear. "The place is empty of life."
But maybe not empty of death. I gave the ride supervisor a tight smile, then pushed though a replica of the park's entrance—only this time the smiley face definitely had an evil look to it—and entered the shadowed confines of the ride.
The doors crashed closed behind me, but silence didn't settle in. The staff might have abandoned the building, but the effects were still running. I stood there in the darkness, listening to the noise, trying to detect a whisper of movement. Something, anything, that might indicate the vampire was on the move.
There was nothing.
Frowning, I followed the wooden track around to the right, blinking to alternate between infrared and regular sight, but there was no life to be seen in either mode. A caged piano—complete with fake chopped-off hands playing the keys—came into view. Then, as the track swung around to the left again, there came a series of weird, supposedly ghostly, portraits and murals. I smiled and shook my head. It was a wonder that anyone got scared of any of these things, and yet I could remember screaming at them when I was a kid and here with my brother to celebrate our birthday.
Or maybe I'd been screaming at the thought of being trapped in the park with so many humans.
The darkness closed in again as I continued to follow the tracks. A ghostly apparition appeared on the top of a mural staircase, and it took me a heartbeat to realize that apparition wasn't the work of lights, but rather the red heat of life sitting perched atop the faded artwork.
Only it wasn't human sized. It was bird-sized.
And either that bird had weird roosting habits, or our vampire had been a shifter before he'd undergone the change. It would certainly explain why Kade had been unable to find anything when he'd done the search. A roosting bird probably wouldn't emit much in the way of emotions, and Kade certainly wouldn't have been looking for something that size.
I reached into my back pocket and pulled out my laser, flicking it on as the weapon settled into my palm. As I did so, the bird squawked and took flight. Not flying away, but coming straight at me. The vampire had balls, I had to give him that—especially given a pigeon wasn't exactly as threatening as a bird of prey.
I ducked under his swoop, then twisted around and fired. The red beam flashed out, briefly giving the shadows an eerie glow as the shot clipped the bird's wings. Feathers fluttered downward as it squawked and awkwardly tried to fly down the hall. I fired again, but the bird dropped at the wrong moment, and the laser sliced though the edges of a dancing skeleton. I swore softly and ran after the bird.
"Kade," I said, keeping the creature in sight but not firing, "he's on the run. He's also a pigeon."
"A pigeon? Good lord, that's almost as bad as a seagull. No wonder he became a vampire."
He wasn't getting an argument out of me. A seagull might be one of my alternate forms these days, but I had something of a love-hate relationship with it.
"He's going to have to shift shape to come out these doors," Kade continued. "I'm ready and waiting."
"You always are," I said, ducking under the ghostly tendrils of fake cobwebs.
Kade's laughter rolled through my inner ear. I fired the laser again. This time the bright beam clipped tail feathers before slicing into a bed that came complete with a white draped body hung with cobwebs.
The vampire squawked and fluttered to the ground, landing rather ungracefully on the old wooden track. I slid to a stop and trained the laser onto him.
"Directorate," I said, my voice edged and low. "Whoever you are, shift shape or you'll die in bird form."
He hopped around until he faced me, his beady black eyes glaring somewhat balefully.
"Your choice," I said, pressing my finger against the trigger. The whine of the weapon powering up cut through the surrounding noise, and the pigeon hopped backwards in surprise.
After a moment, a shimmer rolled across his bloody feathers, hiding his form, reshaping it, until what stood in front of me was cloaked in human skin.
Only it wasn't a man, but a boy. A child. A cute, cherub-cheeked child with golden hair and big blue eyes.
A kid this size could certainly survive on a diet of pigeon and seagull blood, although it was still odd no one noticed the steady supply of dead birds.
Then the adorable image shattered when he snarled, revealing teeth that were long and pointed and every inch a vampire's. He came at me, fast and furious, and though I had my finger pressed against the laser, I didn't fire.
I couldn't.
It was a kid, and I couldn't shoot a kid. I didn't want to shoot a kid—even one that was a feral vampire attacking other children.
Surely there was hope for him. Surely there was a chance…
I jumped as a gunshot boomed through the darkness. The breeze of it burned past my ear, signifying the bullet was silver, then the little vampire went down. The back of his head disappeared, splattering a mess of blood and bone and gore across a somewhat macabre collection of dolls with revolving heads.
For a moment, I simply stared, disbelief and horror churning my gut. Then I swung around. Kye stood several yards behind me, his face expressionless, but cold fury in his eyes.