I was torn between the desire to pull a stake and wanting to run screaming into the night. The warm welcome, as if I was some close friend or family member just returned after a long absence, was not what I wanted or expected.
Christoph elbowed past me and eagerly grabbed another cookie off the plate Mouse was holding. She beamed up at him and accepted his quick kiss as he leaned down to catch her lips before biting into his cookie, then held the plate out to me. Her thick brown hair, streaked in a few places with gray, was pulled back from her deceptively youthful face in a ponytail. I shook my head, not wanting to take anything from the mute vampire’s hands.
Wesley peered in from the foyer, his pale blue eyes glittering unnaturally. Leah, his donor, was hanging on his arm and whispering something urgently to him. The two of them had always struck me as somewhat incongruous together. He was tall and muscled, his hair short and blond, with a neatly trimmed goatee giving his handsome, angular features a roguish cast. She was short and rather plain, soft-spoken, and almost as much of a nervous wreck as Sara’s sister, Janine.
Wesley hushed Leah and gestured me closer, calling out to Mouse. “Hey, it’s your turn. Take over, will you?”
Mouse shrugged, passing Christoph the plate of cookies (much to his delight), and headed up to take Wesley’s place guarding the front door. I stayed where I was, indecisive, as Wes and Leah approached. Now that they were closer, I could hear what she was saying, her whisper-soft voice stuttering around her request.
“Oh, come on. Please say it, Wes? Just once, for me? Please?”
He gave a long-suffering sigh and cupped her cheeks, looking down into her eyes. “As you wish.”
The girl nearly swooned, I swear. Though after he said that, I could see why. The dread pirate resemblance was positively uncanny. With a giggle, she gave him a hug and a kiss on the cheek, then rushed off, barely giving me a glance as she passed. He watched her go with a look of bemused tolerance, shaking his head.
Shoving his hands into his pockets, he wandered closer to me, no doubt to find out what had finally prompted me to return.
I might as well start somewhere. Facing him, Mouse, and Clarisse all at one time would be suicide—they were all ancient vampires, hundreds of years old, though you couldn’t tell it from their current antics—but it didn’t look like I had much choice. Perhaps if I could take him out first, I’d be in a better position to handle dealing with Mouse and Clarisse.
I was not looking forward to fighting with Mouse. I’d seen her move. She was more proficient with a blade than anyone else I’d ever seen, her soccer mom figure and looks otwithstanding. Outside the movies, I hadn’t thought swordplay like hers was possible. With her inhuman speed added to her skill with a blade, she was like a hellish cross between a whirling dervish and a blender set to purée.
The belt was positively itching to get started.
“Did Mr. Royce know you were coming tonight? Why didn’t you just come in through the front door?”
My fingers twitched as I fought the urge to grab a stake. “No, he didn’t. And I didn’t want to be seen.” I literally had to force myself to clasp my hands in front of me to keep from grabbing a weapon. “Is Sara in the apartment?”
He shook his head, frowning. “No, she’s not here.”
My heart did a flip-flop at that. Wes didn’t seem to notice.
“Where is she?” I asked, doing my best to keep my voice low and level so it wouldn’t come out as a demanding scream.
“I don’t know. Mr. Royce didn’t say.”
It felt like my stomach plummeted all the way to the basement. If I’d been walking, I might have fallen over. As it was, I stiffened, losing all sense of balance at his words.
“What?” The word hardly made it out as a whisper. “What did you say?”
Conversation in the hallway died down, the others looking our way, curious. Sensing something was wrong. The silence was so profound, I could hear the sound of a TV coming from somewhere on the second floor, previously unheard over all of the chatter.
They’d done it. They’d done what Royce had promised would never happen. The vampires had hurt Sara. Taken her away. Used her as Royce had intended to use me.
My muscles began to go into spasms of their own accord. Though my first reaction had been sickness and fear for Sara, a righteous anger was quickly burning those lesser emotions away. Wesley stiffened, gauging my reaction with mixed wariness and confusion. Everyone in the hall had fallen silent, watching as I fought and lost an inner battle over whether or not to draw a stake.
The belt won. Wesley’s eyes widened, and he took a single step back as I drew a stake, throwing my head back and arching as I howled a mix of loss, fury, and a righteous need for the hunt.
Much like my battle cry when I had faced Dillon, this sound was never meant to come from a human throat. It rent the air like a physical blade, cutting through the silence and driving the vampires back as if I were chasing them off with crosses and holy water.
It didn’t stop until I ran out of air. And I only waited a moment, getting into position to attack Wesley, who was holding his ears and looking just as stunned as the rest of the vampires in the hallway.
“Jesus, lady,” said Thad from somewhere behind me, “chill the fuck out.”
With a snarl, I launched myself at Wesley, driving the stake forward—directly toward his heart.
Chapter 28
Wesley moved like he’d been expecting the attack. His arm came up to block me, shoving the stake off course and making a play to seize my exposed throat.
If I’d been any slower, any less jittery, I might not have been capable of countering his grab to dance back just outside his reach. He was holding back, or I would have been against the wall or on the floor already. That blow to my arm felt like smacking into a steel cable, and I’d dropped the stake, but the belt stepped in and muted the pain until it was nothing more than a faint ache on the edge of my consciousness.
Though most of my concentration was on the fight at hand, dimly I was aware of the details of my surroundings. Mouse and Clarisse were both watching me with wide eyes. Thad and Sebastian had risen from their seats on the stairs. Christoph poked his head out of Mouse’s door, his mouth full of crumbs.
“Wha’ th’ fu—”
Clarisse got on tiptoe and slapped a hand over his mouth, her gaze locked on Wes and I as we darted and feinted in efforts to gain an advantage. “Oi, lovey, language.”
Wes moved in a blur. Again, without the belt’s help, I would have had no hope of escaping him—but I ducked under his grasping hands and swept a leg out to trip him, sending him stumbling into Sebastian. The two vampires went down in a tumble of flailing arms and legs.
I took advantage of the moment to run to the apartment I’d shared with Sara. I wouldn’t have time to do a thorough search, but maybe there was some clue left behind, something that might tell me what had happened to her or where she was now.
Clarisse’s voice followed me inside. “Looks like betting material, lads. Anyone up for a wager? Usual rules apply.”
If things hadn’t been so serious, I would have been rolling my eyes, particularly as I overheard Thad put fifty bucks on Wes.
The apartment looked the same as it had the day I’d left it. Same furniture, all in the same places as before. No, someone had picked the phone off the kitchen floor and put it back on the counter. My Rolodex was still there.
I went to Sara’s room first.
There was nothing to see. Her things were gone, and there was no sign she’d ever been here.
‘Don’t be a dolt. Use your other senses. What does your nose tell you?’