Page 68 of Scout’s Honor

The television showed what looked like the outside of a small hospital. On the front steps, a man in a suit held hands with a woman in a white dress. The couple descended the steps, smiling broadly while people in hospital gowns threw rice in the air.

“I can’t fucking believe it,” Jameson growled in the image.

“Holy fucking shit,” Dallas growled next to her.

“What?” Bonhi asked.

“That’s Jane Doe!” Dallas said. “And that’s… what… a doctor? Did they get married?”

The couple rushed to a limousine and got in the back, and it drove off, with JUST MARRIED soaped onto the back window.

“Who’s Jane Doe?” Bonhi asked.

Dallas pointed at a man in a suit watching the car drive off from the edge of the crowd of patients. “That’s Momeyer!”

Bonhi shook her head, not understanding any of it.

Dallas locked eyes with her. “Jane Doe is a woman with amnesia. She’s a patient there. She showed up at Cove Springs a few days ago with a big bruise down her side like she fell from the sky, and we think she’s somehow involved with ‘The Cause’ or vampires. Momeyer is a doctor there and he’s controlled by the vampires.”

“Ohhhh,” Bonhi said as things made more sense.

“Jameson!” Dallas shouted at the image. Jameson didn’t respond, just kept watching the TV. “Flint! Cora! Goldilocks!” No response still. Dallas looked at Warrior Woman, but her face was placid. She held her hand up with fingers splayed, like her body was the magical conduit.

On a whim, Bonhi picked up one of her rock weapons and tossed it into the image. It landed on the floor inside with the four people and they all whirled around.

“Dallas?” Jameson growled, walking their way. “Bonhi?” he said, sounding shocked, peering at them.

“We’re under attack by vampires at a cabin just north of Cove Springs!” Dallas shouted. “We need help.”

The man Dallas had called Flint growled like a bear and said, “We’re on our way.”

Warrior Woman dropped her arm. The image winked out, and the woman herself disappeared.

A female voice screeched outside the cabin and Bonhi and Dallas looked at each other, with identical expressions of urgency.

“Dakota!” Dallas shouted, heading for the door.

Bonhi gripped her knife tightly and followed her mate into the fight.

34—Need You

Outside, more vampires had arrived, looking like dozens of stunt doubles from an old James Dean movie. They shuffled like zombies, some of them showing their pointy little fangs.

“Seriously, why do they all look the same?” Bonhi shouted, as she followed her mate.

“Don’t know,” Dallas said, pitching forward into his jaguar with a snarl.

Dakota was near the far edge of the meadow with a short spear in her hand. She crouched like a wrestler, her eyes on a crowd of vampires. Nearby, two carcasses lay on the ground, decomposing.

Gross. Bonhi gagged. Dallas pressed close to her, and she threaded her fingers in his fur, feeling better.

“Hey bro, hey Bonhi,” Dakota said, not looking their way.

A vampire lunged for her, and she jumped back but an eagle dropped out of the sky, hooking the vampire by its shoulders and yanking it to Dakota. She stabbed it. Red light flashed and the vampire fell to the ground.

The other vampires milled and muttered uncertainly.

Dakota tossed her spear from hand to hand and slowly stalked forward. “What’s a group of vampires called? A suck? A gross? A leech?” She flipped her hair. “Who cares? Soon you’ll be dead.”