Hard Days Night (The Firsts Book 8) (7 page)

With a sharp nod, Mal pushed Luka out of the room ahead of her.  The Captain watched her smack him on the arm as they retreated through the office.   He smiled, but then turned away and picked up the phone.  This was much more serious than Mal had any idea.  Canzone was on the top of his list. 
Had been for over ten years.  He was brutal and, so far, untouchable. 

Mal was right.  Canzone would move hell and earth to get her if he was inclined.   And it seemed like he was. 
Fuck!

Chapter 5

What affected A
hmose the most was the quiet.  Yes, the ocean rolled outside of the house, and when the surf was up, it could be quite loud, but it was a whisper compared to the roar of the waterfalls that surrounded the village back home.  Add to that the constant chatter of his beloved friends and family, and it made solitude almost impossible.  Here, he could hear his thoughts without the ceaseless interruptions of daily living.  It was exactly what he needed before the next child arrived.

He treasured
his life and those he loved. He had been blessed beyond measure by the universe and Mother Earth.  His family, his people, happy and well.  Starla was nearly the perfect woman, except that she’d chosen Jacob over him, and that was okay too, because Ahmose admitted…he loved the man, too.

But these moments in this isolated place, where he could sink into himself, be perfectly self-aware, self-serving, for just these few days, these he would treasure too.  This time alone provided better healing than all of the first blood magics in the world.  It was just that, with lives so long, there were moments when one just needed an escape.  This, then, now, unexpected grace…was his moment of escape.  It didn’t mean he did not love his life…it meant he loved it enough to, finally, take a moment to take care of himself. 

Lying on a long chair made of some type of ingenious plastic that was incredibly comfortable, Ahmose watched huge white clouds slowly sail past as the sun dropped low enough for a child of the moon to step outside.  His limited tolerance of ultraviolet allowed these moments that were dangerous for the children of the sun.  In Zambia, because of the errant and lush forest they lived inside, this openness was rare, and he scanned from right to left in appreciation for the wide vistas and visible shoreline.  A bottle of local wine sat, half empty, on the glass-topped table beside him.

A breeze picked up his hair, which he’d left unbound. Even clothing was too oppressive, so he wore nothing at all as he stood and watched the distant waterline eat u
p the sun.  Draining a glass of wine, he set the fragile stemware on the railing of the balcony and leaned into the breeze that had been increasing all evening.

“I should feel guilty,” Ahmose said out loud suddenly.

He didn’t.  He had always been there for his people, always would be, but one thing that he had learned from his new brother, Koen, was that you must make time to be happy. 
This
, this strange
vacation
from his life...made him happy.

The night was as perfect as any back home, but the open vista of sky and sea beckoned, and he set the wine glass
back on the table.  A long leisurely swim was what he needed right now, so he hurled over the side of the balcony, the 20 foot drop nothing for a vampire, and enjoyed every footfall in the soft sand as he walked from the house into the warm Pacific waters.  The movement of the waves against his skin felt like soft fingers caressing him, and he closed his eyes to imagine a sensuous woman attached to those fingers.  Sex was essential to vampires, and particularly to one as powerful and masculine as Ahmose, but he had found little satisfaction since his destiny had manifested by making him a father but not a mate.

He was creating the beautiful first blood children that his destiny had promised, but not with the mate he had expected.  He had hoped to find the mother of his children and a woman to love.

Watching Starla’s passion with Jacob made it more difficult to accept this odd turn of fate, but one cannot question the universe.  It gives its gifts as it sees fit and he knew that there was order in the events.  Now, what he needed was the solitude he had found here. He would ask nothing else of the universe at this moment.

With the stars and the moon above, warm buoyant waters beneath him, Ahmose felt at one with the Mother, a sacred relationship that meant everything to him. 
Yet it had been strained for some time now, and he had been terrified he may never get it back.  The relationship with the living planet was the tie that bound everything in his life together and if it had become irreparably broken, he would not be able to be ruler of the children of the moon.  The Mother only knew what would happen with the children’s destiny if that were to occur.  He could not let it be so.

Now, though, calm, content, he felt the tethers reconnecting to his history, to the Mother, to the moon, and thought that mayhap he need not worry…it would all be good in the end.

The swim finished, he felt incredibly energized.  As he walked from the sea, his cock began to fill.  After all, he was vampire and the thing had a mind of its own.  Perhaps he would visit one of the local establishments for socialization and seek a companion for the night.  He had in mind a lovely blonde with a full, luscious figure.  It had been too long.  He slid his hand down the insistent organ.

“All right, all right, perhaps tonight,” he promised it and himself.

After he finished this time of self-indulgence, he needed to check in at home, and then he wanted to continue to search for Lamont and Claude.  Their organization had to be destroyed, quickly and to a devastating degree, so that it could not rise again.   He would not stop until the threat to his family and friends was eliminated.

An oversized thick towel lay over a strangely shaped chair and he grabbed it to dry off.   His eyes moved to the magnificent body of water, and watched the moon bounce its light in millions of fractures, sparkling off of the undulating waves.  
Nothing more than the sounds of the waves rolling onto the shore interrupted his serenity. 

God, this was heaven
.

Once he’d stopped the worst of the dripping, he threw the towel back onto the chair to dry and started back up to the house.  Realizing he was hungry, he would get something before he headed out to find his company.  His hand lingering on his cock, which was serious about its attention, his eyes were drawn to the road, where an odd sound and some movement caught his eye.  It was prudent to make sure he was secure, so he headed towards it to check it out before he went back to the beach house. He was still naked, but nudity did not concern him.

Behind a row of low bushes, Cheeto smacked Moonpie in the mouth.

“What the fuck?”  Moonpie yelled as loud as possible while trying to whisper.

“Look, he heard you. I told you not to answer your fucking cell.  Now, he’s coming.”

“So what.
Claude wants us to whack him anyway. Let’s just get this done.”

“Not while he’s watching us.  He’s too quick.  Just shut up and lay down, maybe he’ll go back.”

The two big men dropped down and tried to blend into the grass.

Cheeto kept his nine-mil palmed just in case. 
Fuck,
this was going wrong
.

Moonpie had always been
a loose cannon.  He hadn’t wanted to bring the asshole, but Moonpie was the only one available, and Claude said he wanted this job done post-haste.  So he’d accepted him as his back-up.  Looks like it was a mistake, but it was too late now to change it.

In his other hand, Cheeto fingered the ax that Claude had sent with him.  He was freaked out by this whole situation, but Claude had promised him that if he didn’t hack off the guy’s head, then the guy would rise again and kill him.  And while it seemed impossible that it could be
true, Cheeto had always been superstitious, so he wasn’t taking any chances.

Lifting his head, he didn’t see anything.  He scanned the area, the target was nowhere in sight, so he must not have heard them after all. 
Thank the fucking gods! 

“I think we’re clear.  Let’s get the fuck out of here, regroup, and come back when
we
have the element of surprise, not him.”   Cheeto smacked Moonpie on the arm as they stood.

Moonpie shook his head, with a low whistle.  “Yeah, ‘
cause that is the biggest scary-ass dude I have ever seen.”

Cheeto puffed his cheeks out.  “You don’t know the half of it.  Let’s go. 
Quiet and quick.”

Moonpie and Cheeto were nearly to their car, left parked for a fast getaway on the edge of the street, when a voice behind them stopped them in their tracks.

“What, not staying for the party?”

Cheeto’s blood froze, and on instinct, and because he was terrified, he whirled and fired.

He saw the huge vampire’s look of shock as his body keeled backwards, landing flat on the sand at the edge of the beach.

“Oh, fuck!  That was him!  You got him!”  Moonpie yelled.

“We got
to hack his head off,” Cheeto spit out suddenly.

“Huh?  Is that why you have the ax? 
Yeeks, gross.  That’s on you, dude.  I ain’t hackin’ off any heads tonight or fucking ever.”

“Claude says he’ll come back if we don’t. He’ll come back and come after us.”

“What?  Fuck that.  Look, you got him right in the middle of the forehead.  That dude’s done for good!  Let’s go.”

“No, I’m going to do this.”

Moonpie waved at Cheeto as he walked away.  “Do it quick.  I’m gonna be in the car.”

Cheeto walked back over to the man that Claude had told him was a vampire, and looked down at him.  That was just shit, right?  
Wasn’t no such thing as vampires
.

Standing over him, Cheeto admitted he
was
a big-ass guy.   And ripped to hell and back.  A body that perfect, yeah, if anyone was a vampire, he might be.

  He had to do this because he was terrified that if he didn’t, the guy would show up in the dark and
tear his throat out. 

Lifting the ax, he lined it up to the guy
’s throat and started to bring it down, when an ATV flew through the sand.  It’s bright lights shined right on Cheeto, ax raised, the dead man at his feet.

“Hey, what the fuck is going on?”

The aggressive voice came out of the darkness as a big blonde guy, surfer-type, dressed appropriately in Hawaiian-print shorts, came towards Cheeto and the dead, maybe dead, vampire.  Behind the blonde guy, several other guys had jumped from the vehicle to follow him.

Fuck his luck!
  Cheeto hesitated only a second longer, looked down at the corpse, and ran for the car.

This would have to happen another time.

The car sped out, throwing gravel as it disappeared down the road.

The guys from the ATV arrived at the body.

The blonde guy dropped and looked at Ahmose, naked, lying flat on his back, as perfect a masculine specimen as he’d ever seen. 
Except for the perfect round hole dead center in his forehead.

“Billy, hey,
call the cops,” he said to one of the guys behind him.  “This guy’s done.  Did any of you get the license plate of that car?”

JUST UP THE ROAD

Luka had chosen the bedroom to the front of the small beach house.

“That freaking roar would keep me awake.”

Mal laughed as she dropped her satchel on the bed in the room that faced the sea
, then went over to open the French doors to let the sound of the waves in.

“You live in the city. It’s a freaking roar all the time.”

“Yeah, well, different kind.  Anyway, I can’t wait until morning so I can take my boogie board out.”

“You live near the ocean, and you
don’t surf?”

“Do you know how big those waves get?  And no, I don’t. I fell off a surfboard when I was ten and nearly drowned.  So don’t laugh, okay?”

“Aw, Luka, sorry, buddy.  No, I’m not laughing.  But I am fucking starving.   What did you bring?”

“Beer and chips.
  Potato and tortilla.  Cheese.  More beer.”

“You’re kidding me, right?”

“No.  I got essentials.”

“You were supposed to get supplies. 
Food, for crying out loud.”

“Potato chips aren’t food?”

“Not in any cookbook in the world.  I guess we’ll have to go out.”

“No, Mal, not our first night here.  I tell you what, how about you start a fire in that fire
-pit, I’ll head out, get some groceries, and pick up an extra-large pepperoni for tonight.”