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Queen Asteria! I'd never have thought it, but it made sense. "You might be right. She's protective, and she knows we're in danger. And dropping in on her with a few dead demons hasn't exactly put her mind at ease." I glanced at Roz. "No doubt she told you all about it, so don't even ask. I don't want to think about Bad Ass Luke and his cronies."
Roz laughed, throaty and deep and I suddenly was all too aware that I was in the presence of another demon who, like me, walked between shadow and flame. "I wasn't going to. All I care about is hunting down Dredge and destroying him."
I shifted and headed up the hill toward the morgue, Delilah's Jeep keeping pace right behind me. "What will you do after he's dead?"
"Go back to doing what I do best, I suppose," he said. "Seducing women in the night. What else is there?"
"You ever think about putting some of your talents to use for the greater good?" Roz was helpful. We needed to know more about him, but I could see him becoming a strong ally in our fight against Shadow Wing.
"No, but I might be open to suggestions," he said, looking through his bag. "I've got seven stakes. That should be enough. I hope."
"Three more victims. Three more chalk marks on the board. I wonder if the female contingent of our four newborns are the culprits. After all, Dredge and the men were busy kidnapping Erin." I found it odd that nobody had noticed any of Dredge's cronies wandering the area. They would look just as out of place as he did, but the two vamps who helped him kidnap Erin had been our newborns. What was going on?
"You think he's trying to build a master nest here?" Roz frowned. "If he can form a big enough one, then he can hive them off. Maybe he's looking to take control of the area." He paused for me to answer but before I could speak, he waved toward the park. "Something's going down over there. I can feel it."
He was right—something nasty was going down. The scent of blood hung so heavy in the air that it seeped through the closed windows of the car. I skidded to the curb and thrust open my door, hitting the bricks before I had time to say a word. Roz was close behind me. I heard a screech as Delilah's Jeep skidded to a halt near ours, but I was already on my way into the park on the corner lot intended to beautify the area.
As I lightly skimmed the ground, my heels making the barest clicking sound, my fangs extended. The smell of vamps filled the air—that unmistakable fragrance of blood and death and hunger.
The park was half a block square, and filled with fir and maple and weeping willow. I dashed into the dark, following my nose. At this point, I could hear the last gasps of someone dying.
Strike someone, and make it a mob, I thought as I broke through into a small clearing shrouded from the view of the street. Our gang from the theater was there, having a heyday. Two women lay on the ground, each with her very own hunka-vamp leaning over her. The two females were holding a struggling young man between them. He looked around fifteen and he'd already been bitten. As I watched, he went limp in their arms.
"The master said take them with us this time!" one of the women yelled as they spotted me racing toward them. "Let's go."
"What about this bitch?" asked one of the men. His name was Bob. I recognized him from the morgue photos.
The other shook his head. "Leave her. Dredge said she's all his."
I poured on the speed as they tossed their victims over their shoulders and took off running. "Follow them!" I yelled back to Roz as I dodged trees and leapt over rocks trying to keep them in sight. They were fast, but I was faster, and I managed to get within arm's reach of good old Bob, who was struggling to keep hold of the plump matron hanging over his shoulder.>"You said they're vampires. How do you know? What did they look like?" I was clinging to a nebulous hope that Erin had been dragged off by a bunch of FBHs who maybe wanted to rob her. It was a ludicrous hope, but one that would make it much easier to save her.
Tim dashed my hopes though. "They were standing in front of the big mirror, over there." He pointed to a three-way mirror Erin had set up in the main room of the lingerie shop. "The only one I could see was Erin. None of the men showed a reflection. Are there any other creatures that don't show their reflections?"
I closed my eyes, trying to come up with something that would give us hope. "Maybe… a few spirits but… no, Tim. Chances are good that you're right and vampires kidnapped her. Tell me what they looked like. You said three men? Are you sure there wasn't a woman with them?" The four newborns from the theater—the only ones we knew about who were still out there running around—had been two men, two women. Unless the guys had ditched the girls and taken up with a third male vamp, it didn't seem likely it was them. Newborns nesting together tended to be cliquish.
Tim frowned and I could tell he was trying to remember every detail. Erin was his closest friend, and he was hurting like hell. The pain oozed off him like motor oil, burnt and thick. I also suspected Tim was feeling a little bit guilty over hiding out rather than trying to stop them. Sometimes doing the smart thing didn't track as doing the right thing.
"The one who was holding her was stocky, short… He had a buzz cut. The second man was… I don't know… ordinary. Those two looked like they belonged here, today, in this world. But the third… he scared the hell out of me."
I looked up into his eyes. Raw fear. Primal terror. And I knew, right then. "He was tall, with long curly dark hair, wasn't he? And he had a five o'clock shadow and wore black studded leather, didn't he? And you knew, just by looking at him, that you were looking into the face of hell."
Tim nodded, eyes widening. "Yeah, how did you know?"
"Did he say anything?" My stomach felt ready to leap into my throat.
"Just two words. He said, Take her. He's evil, Menolly. I swear to you, I was so scared just watching him that I almost pissed my pants. I wanted to help Erin, but… he looked like he'd eat me up and spit out the bones. I lost my nerve. I hid, damn it. I hid and didn't do a damned thing!"
As I stood back, letting Delilah move in to comfort Tim, I knew then that Dredge had Erin. At least for now. It had to be Dredge. He fed off of fear, and when you looked in his eyes, you knew your life was over, that you'd lost the battle and the punishment was about to begin…
"What's your name, girl?" His voice cut me to the quick. Ice cold, and I knew no tears would work on him, no amount of begging would get me out of what he had planned. "Tell me your name."
Even though I knew better than to give my name to a vampire, I couldn't resist the command. "Menolly," I whispered. "Menolly D'Artigo."
Dredge leaned over me, the crooked smile on his face filled with dark delight. He slid one sharpened nail along my cheek, stopping just before he drew blood. "Well, Menolly D'Artigo, I'm about to carry you up to the highest mountain. There, I'll drop you into the abyss and watch you fall, and fall, and fall."
He ripped open my tunic and my nipples hardened in the cold dampness of the caverns. I heard whispered laughter from around the room and realized we had an audience. Murmurs reached my ears, catcalls and suggestions, but Dredge waved them away. "Patience. We have all the time in the world."
Leaning down, he slowly licked me from breast to navel.
