As Lie The Dead (19 page)

She sobs as she holds him close. Blood covers her face and clothes. She doesn’t seem to care she’s cuddling a flayed corpse, and I realize why when she finally looks up. Fangs glitter in the dim light cast by a bedside lamp, its shade as bloodstained as the walls and carpet. She bares them at us, making no move to attack.

“I tried so hard,” she wails. Human grief paints her words, but she is no longer human. She’s a monster, nothing more. “He wouldn’t let them kill me, and I tried so hard for him, but I couldn’t control it.”

Ash circles to the right, Jesse left. I stay put, and we create a perimeter. She has nowhere to go now except Hell.

The Halfie lifts the dead man’s head and kisses his lips. Ash makes a choked sound. I glance at her, thinking it’s a noise of disgust. No. She’s gaping at the bed, pale, chin trembling. I look at Jesse. He wears a similar expression. I long to knock their heads together and demand to be told what they know. I wait, finding a rare reserve of patience.

“He loved me,” the Halfie says, more to herself than to her audience. “Loved me so much, and this is what I did to him. But his blood … Oh, his blood smells so sweet. It always has.”

Ash takes a step closer, katana at the ready. “Rebecca, when did you get infected?” she asks.

Wide, speckled eyes stare, surprised by the question. “I think two weeks.”

The timeline fit with the neighbor’s story. Rebecca gets infected, her boyfriend tries to help her through the physical and psychological changes in her life. Only she snaps and strews him around the apartment, as her new nature demands. Poor guy, blinded by love. Too bad he didn’t know Halfie infection is something no one recovers from.

“I didn’t want to hurt Bradford,” Rebecca sobs. “I really didn’t. I love him. Love him so much, and I wanted to make him part of me. Wanted to share this new experience, but he wouldn’t let me. Said he’d help me, but he’d never become what I was.”

I stare, confused now. How did Bradford know what she is? So many humans, guided by popular culture and misinformation, still think vampirism is cool. It’s all about immortality and hot sex and lusty things. No one ever guesses just how brutal the change is to a human being, or that true vampires are not human beings at all. Never were. Hell, learning all that during Boot Camp shocked the shit out of me.

“He should have known better,” Ash says. “He should have killed you the instant he found out you were infected.”

Okay, now I’m really confused. I start to ask, only the pieces are sinking into place. Recognition. Knowledge. Consequences. I look again at the dead man’s face, at how young he is. My age. What’s left of his body is toned to perfection, built for fighting. Like us.

“Holy Christ,” I say. “He’s a Hunter.”

As though my voice snaps her back, Ash slashes her blade down and neatly chops off Rebecca’s head. Thick purplish red blood sprays, and she jumps back.
Bodies sink to the bed. Ash stalks past me, not fast enough to hide the tears in her eyes, and into the outer room.

“Stupid bastard,” Jesse says.

I can’t look away from the bed and the sprawled bodies of a man and woman who, quite literally, loved each other to death. “I don’t get it,” I say.

“He didn’t do his job and kill her when he found out she was infected. End of story.”

“No, I get that part.” Hot and nauseated and confused, I look at him. “I don’t get why he didn’t kill her. He knew she was a monster, and that she’d eventually turn on him. We’re Hunters. We’re taught to not fucking trust Dregs.”

He raises a shoulder in a half shrug. “Guess he didn’t see her as a Dreg, just as a woman he loved. Still fucking stupid, though.”

“No kidding.”

“It’s hard to kill someone you love.” Jesse squeezes my shoulder as he passes. “Even when you know it’s the kindest damned thing you can do for them.”

I chew my bottom lip. “Hey, Jesse?”

He turns, thick eyebrows slanting. “Yeah?”

“If I ever get bitten, promise you’ll be kind?”

“Promise.” He tugs a lock of my short blond hair. “Same for me. I don’t want to be one of those fucking things. Not ever.”

“Deal.”

I linger in the bedroom only a moment longer, then join my team in the other room. Time to report it and get the mess cleaned up. I don’t know whose Triad Bradford belonged to, and I don’t envy them the
pain of discovering what he’d done. Or of his grisly demise. Horrifying as it is, it’s also an object lesson for every single Hunter policing the city.

Don’t trust a Dreg, and don’t ever fall in love with one—they’ll only stab you in the back.

Friday, 5:45
P.M.

I don’t remember passing out, but waking up proved an unforgettably disgusting experience. Smells hit me first: odors of food long since spoiled and left to rot in the oven-temp heat of some container. Too many to identify and nearly joined by my own vomit. Close by and almost as stomach-churning as the restaurant waste was the distinct stench of blood. Too strong and too much to be just mine.

Twisted uncomfortably and lying on solid corners, damp plastic, and any number of squishy things, I tried to move with little effect. Blinking didn’t help matters much. I wasn’t blind, just in the dark. More plastic and rot pressed down on me from above, pinning arms and legs and torso in place. My stomach burned. My limbs ached. I wasn’t convinced that I was facing up.

Motherfucker. Phineas stabbed me and dumped me in a trash bin.

“Fuck!” The shout barely echoed in the close quarters of my rotting tomb.

I tested toes and fingers—check. Flexed muscles everywhere I could manage, and aside from bumps and scrapes from being tossed into the damned trash, only my abdomen was seriously injured. Couldn’t have been in there long if I could still feel the small wounds. That was the good news.

The bad news: I hadn’t a clue how far down I’d been buried or if I could dig my way out. Death by Dumpster-induced heatstroke was not what I wanted on my tombstone. Not that I’d get a tombstone. Hunters never did. Anonymous cremation for anonymous lives. No way in hell was I going out like that.

Cell phone. I wiggled my ass as best I could. Felt the familiar lump. Elation was immediately tempered by logic. Okay, fine, I had the phone on me, but both arms were currently pinned beneath an unknown poundage of used napkins, plastic cups, and yesterday’s lunch special.

Sweat trickled down my forehead and stung my left eye. My right arm had more mobility than the left, so I finger-creeped it closer to my body. More plastic, more oozy mess. From the stretch of my shoulder, I guessed it was at a forty-five-degree angle from my body. My elbow snagged on something hard and sharp. Shit.

The air I had was quickly growing stale, heavy. Teleporting from an unknown starting point to an unknown exterior was beginning to seem like an acceptable risk. Better than smothering beneath a mountain of trash. Dying now meant I’d miss out on grinding Phin’s face into the pavement.

His earlier words came back:
No matter what
happens or what they say, I need you to trust me to protect you
. Ha! Fat lot of fucking good that had done me. If this was his play to get in good with Black Hat and his Merry Band of Dreg Terrorists, he’d better come out of that meet with solid information. Something we could use to take them out and keep them out.

Unless he helped them take us out first. The voice of my Boot Camp instructor rang clearly in the back of my mind, reminding me that it was foolish to trust Phin. No matter how handsome he was, no matter how well he could spin words into gold, he was still a Dreg, still unworthy of my complete trust. He could easily lead Kismet, Baylor, and the others into a trap. Kill the rest of the Triad forces in one fell swoop.

My stomach twisted; my heart jackhammered. Fuck no.

I jerked my right arm toward my body. Flesh ripped with scorching agony. Tears stung my eyes. My hand found a small pocket of space near my hips. I shifted a little, angled my arm, and pushed. The trash lifted a bit, but not enough. I tried again—same deal. I screamed in frustration.

Muffled voices made it through my tomb. I screamed again, no longer caring who found me. I needed out. Out of the heat, the stink, and the ever-crushing pile of refuse bearing down on my chest and legs.

The side of the bin thundered. Metal squealed, punctuated by a crash-bang! Pinpricks of light appeared above. The lid was off. They’d heard me, whoever they were. I shouted again.

“Down there,” someone said.

Bit by bit, the trash was removed and weight lifted. The pinpricks became shafts. Cooler, fresh air wafted down, making the odor of spoilage much, much worse. I retched but didn’t vomit. The garbage bag above my head finally lifted away. Sunlight glared, blinding me. I slammed my eyelids down, a soft whimper catching in my throat.

“There,” another someone said. “She is wounded.”

“You doubted it?” the first someone asked. “The scent of blood permeates this place.”

I knew that voice. No longer muffled, the familiar tone and cadence was the most beautiful thing I’d heard all day. I forced one eye open and squinted past the glare. A shadow fell as she moved sideways, blocking the offending light.

Dressed in black from head to toe, white hair pulled back in a tight braid, Isleen gazed down at me. She and two other female Bloods stood around me in a half circle, actually inside among the garbage. Her glimmering purple eyes took stock of my now-exposed body before looking right at me. “It pleases me that you are not dead,” she said.

Laughter bubbled out of my throat, as much from relief as shock. “Pleases me, too. Now get me out of here.”

Her two helpers looped steel-strong arms beneath me and lifted. My stomach wound shrieked at me, but I focused on my legs. Getting them to move, supporting my weight, and ultimately climbing over the lip of the sunbaked Dumpster. Two male Bloods waited in the alley, arms extended to help. I vaguely recalled
losing my balance and falling. Being caught and lowered to the ground.

I rolled sideways and dry-heaved until my chest ached. Spat out what little liquid was still in my mouth. Good thing I’d skipped lunch.

“… another body,” one of the male Bloods said.

Alarm bells clanged in my head. “Who?” I gasped.

“Unknown male,” Isleen said. “Early twenties. His throat has been slashed.”

I tried to remember something about the puppy-man that the female Blood had kept near her. “Long-sleeved shirt?”

“Yes. Arlen, take her to the van. We must not linger here.”

It occurred to me to protest. One of her men scooped me up, and I fell against his chest, exhausted. Didn’t recognize the alley or the back of the building connected to it. A black van was parked at the end, back doors open, windows tinted. They were going to love having me inside, smelling up the place.

Tiny hammers thudded against my temples, announcing an impending headache. I closed my eyes for a minute, intending only to ward it off. The gentle sway of the van woke me again, sometime later.

I was lying on a soft blanket, covered by another. The gentle pressure of a bandage covered my shredded elbow. More pressed against my abdomen. I blinked through the dimness. Isleen sat on the floor by my side. She snapped open a moist towelette and wiped my forehead.

“How did you find me?” I asked. Croaked was
more accurate. My mouth and throat were almost completely dry.

“I received a message from Eleri,” she replied. “You met her briefly this afternoon.”

My mind reeled. “You’ve got a spy?”

“Of course. She was also told to kill the human by her side.” So he’d been human after all. Interesting. “Eleri had no choice if she was to continue her assignment. Once she was able, she communicated your whereabouts. She told me you both were dead.”

“I probably should be.” Was that concern in her voice? Nah. “I guess Phin knew right where to stab me, so he missed vital organs.”

“Apparently so. Do you trust the Therian?”

Geez, did everyone know what they were really called?

“If you mean Phin, then …” I wanted to say yes. Something stopped me. He could have easily stabbed me in the chest, the heart, any number of places more immediately life-threatening. Instead, he’d chosen a place that wasn’t, probably banking on my being able to heal from the wound. Burying me that deep in a trash bin wasn’t nice, but that could have been Black Hat’s idea.

At the end of it, though, I was alive.

Isleen sighed. “Humans always have difficulty expressing trust for us nonhumans, I have noticed. He could have killed you, but he did not.”

“I know.” Didn’t mean I’d readily turn my back on him again. “Why are you investigating this?”

“As I have said in the past, we have no issue with the status quo. We do, however, have issue with those
who seek to change it. Humans may not be our friends, but you are our allies. I do not wish to see anyone else—Therian, goblin, or Fey—come to power in your stead.”

“Me, either. That mean we’re stuck working together again?”

She smiled. “It would seem so. After you receive medical treatment.”

“Don’t need it.”

“Evangeline—”

“It’ll heal, trust me. Faster than you think. But I won’t say no to a shower and clean clothes.”

“Good, then I will not have to insist.”

Deadpan delivery, no hint of her previous smile. Good Lord, that might have been a joke. A vampire telling an actual joke. One more entry on today’s list of Things I Never Thought I’d Do or See.

She took me to a small motel in the northernmost neighborhood of Mercy’s Lot. A single-level, white-walled place with twelve rooms and twice as many parking spaces. I showered in a cramped, stained tub with generic white soap and those tiny bottles of shampoo that barely create a lather. It got rid of the stink and sweat and blood.

Clean clothes and a first-aid kit had been left on the toilet seat. Black jeans, red tank top, sneakers—almost identical to the outfit I’d worn the first time I met Isleen. It made me smile. I also realized, as I dressed, that my ankle sheath was gone. Probably taken off me before I was dumped into the garbage.