Northern Bites (Aurora Sky: Vampire Hunter, Vol. 2) (2 page)

Valerie faced
me. “You moved in on Fane when you knew he was taken.” Her words dripped with scorn.

My mouth opened and closed. She sorta had me there.
I did kiss Fane on a public bus when they were still together. Not that I could have known for sure. People break up all the time in high school. It’s not like I kept tabs on my classmates’ romantic status twenty-four seven. Besides, Fane followed me onto the bus, not the other way around.

Valerie took my silence
as acknowledgement of guilt.

“Nothing to say?
That’s what I thought.”

I yanked open the car door
. “Let’s get this over with so we can go our separate ways.”

Valerie slammed her door shut. Good thing we weren’t trying to sneak up on anyone.
She stormed down the sidewalk. Small wonder she slowed down when I did in front of the house hidden behind a patch of spruce trees.

A set of fresh tire tracks led through the snow to
a rusted Oldsmobile beneath the carport.

I headed straight for the plastic tr
ash bin by the side of the car with Valerie hot on my heels.

“What are you doing?”

I didn’t answer as I pulled the lid off the bin and placed it quietly on the ground. “Look,” I said, nodding into the can.

The vamps hadn’t even bothered
covering the pizza boxes, a whole stack of them, with other refuse. I lifted the cardboard cover.

Not even a slice missing.

Valerie pushed down the cardboard lid with a huff. “We’re not here to go through their trash.” She shook her hair over her shoulders. “Let’s do this.”

Before I could respond, she charged towards the
front porch. So Valerie was the jump in head first kind of girl? Why wasn’t I surprised?

Valerie
knocked on the door.

Five seconds later a young twenty-something man stuck his head out
. His greasy hair reminded me of the uneaten pizza sitting in the garbage can.

He didn’
t say anything, or maybe he didn’t have time.

“Do you believe in Jesus?” Valerie demanded.

She leaned forward with her whole body.
Valerie didn’t have to put on an act—righteousness came naturally to her.

The man looked Valerie and I up and down, his lips forming a sn
eer. “Boy, did you chicks pick the wrong house.”

I stepped forward, waving my pamphlet in front of him
. “I think we came to exactly the right house. Are your parents home?”

He scoffed
at that. “I don’t have parents.”

“You live alone?” Valerie
demanded.

“Me and my t
wo roommates.”

Oh joy. Three against two. And while Valerie’s personality might be toxic, her blood would be no help knocking these creatures out. How the hell was I going to get three vampires to feed on me at
the same time? At least I was all juiced up from the stabbing incident.

Calling for b
ackup would’ve been the smart move, but Valerie had already gotten up in the vampire’s face.

“
I bet you boys could use some God in your lives.”

There’s no way Valerie would want to share this bust. The excitement practically
bounced off her eyeballs.

“May we come in for a few minutes
?” I asked in my best impression of an authoritative voice. I couldn’t have Valerie thinking I was some kind of chicken shit.

The greasy
-haired vampire glanced over our shoulders into the dark yard. The bushy spruce needles blocked out most of the neighbors.

“If you insist.” He pulled back the door and motioned with his arm to come inside.

Valerie and I stepped forward, placing our first foot on the hardwood floor in unison.

The entry led directly into an open dining room. Two young men, vampires presumably, sat at the table sorting through a mountain of mail. One had piercings in his ears, nose, eyebrow, and chin. He shot me a menacing glare.
“What the fuck is this?”

The doorman sniggered.
“These young ladies from the church want to save us.”

“We ain’t the ones who need saving.”

I lifted my chin. “I think you are.”

Pierced guy’s chair scraped the wood floor when he pushed back
from the table. His companion followed suit.

While it wasn’t exactly wise to turn my back on my enemies, I didn’t want to trap myself
between the china hutch and dining table, either. I went for the living room, spinning around in the center as though prepared to deliver a sermon rather than a battle cry. The pamphlet I’d waved in Greasy Guy’s face at the front door crinkled in my hand. If only I could use it to squish them like flies.

Heavy curtains over the living room windows blocked out
any passing cars. Good, no witnesses.

Pierced dude and
Greasy Guy followed closely behind me.

“Now
, where were we?” I asked.

“You were about to beg for your life,” the pierced vamp said.

His tongue ring glinted as he spoke. It made a ‘fuck you, I eat silver for breakfast’ kind of statement.

“No,” I said, shaking my head. “I was about to save you.”

The lips on the pierced vamp drew back so far I could see his sharpened molars.

Jackpot, I
thought, right before the vampires closed in on me.

“You
bitches came to the wrong house.”

Oh,
we were at the right house all right. The pamphlet fell from my fingers settling by my feet on the hardwood floor. What did vampires have against carpeting? Or heating? I had to hand it to them for practicality. Great way to save on the electric bill and prevent bodies from decomposing too quickly.

Silver
Tongue socked me across the face. I had no time to duck. I’d been expecting teeth not a fist. My face snapped sideways. Neck realignment would have to wait until later.

I dropped to the flo
or before the second blow connected with my jaw. Kneepads would have been nice, I thought, as pain exploded through my leg joints. The words “Jesus Loves You” looked up at me from the pamphlet, receding as Greasy Guy hauled me up by the shoulders.

Not ten minutes from here, Dante was preaching the gospel to some innocent household waiting to see if they took the bait or shooed him away.

Naturally, I’d get the house with the vampires in it.

I squirmed again
st the vampire holding me.

A bloodcurdling scream ripped through the ho
use followed by crashing glass.

No surprise Valerie screamed like a banshee.
The third vampire staggered away from the china hutch’s splintered glass. Valerie must have shoved him right through the wood frame. She cupped her left eye in one hand and gripped her dagger in the other.

I elbow
jabbed Greasy Guy when he turned his attention to the commotion. He grunted but didn’t let go. His arms circled my chest to get a better hold. With Silver Tongue approaching I had to do something, so I bit down on my captor’s arm as hard as I could. He screamed and let go.

T
ake that, you homicidal, bloodsucking savage
. Bet he wasn’t used to getting bit.

I spit his blood out on the floor. My second taste of vampire blood wasn’t any better than the first
. Two weeks ago, Renard force-fed me blood from his wrist. Now that I’d tried it again, I could say there was definitely something off about the taste of vampire blood.

Not like human blood.

Silver Tongue smiled. “I see the church still promotes violence.”

Before I could answer, he had my arm in a bone-crushing grip. A yelp escaped my lips before I could suppress it. Silver Tongue twisted harder.

Oh
God, he was going to break my arm. Just bite me, damn it!

Right before my bones
felt ready to snap, Greasy Guy yanked me away from Silver Tongue and smacked me across the face. It stung but at least he didn’t punch.

Before I could land a blow of my own, he pushed me backwards toward Silver Tongue. The jer
k laughed and flung me back to his crony who mimicked his laughter and motion. Back and forth they pushed me as though tossing a ball across the room. It reminded me of a nature program I once saw of two killer whales playing with a seal before they ate it.

The next time I landed against
Greasy Guy, I twisted around and dug my nails into his shoulder. He stumbled as he tried to push me away. Before he had a chance to fight me off, I bit straight through his t-shirt to the skin beneath.

“Shit!” he screamed. He grabbed me by the shoulders and shook me. “So you like to bite, do you?”

Without preamble, he leaned forward and bit my neck.

Silver Tongue took me by the arm. “Better say your prayers,” he said into my ear.

He took my earlobe between his teeth and bit down. What started out as a pinch turned into excruciating pain as his teeth pressed through my skin. What if he tried to tear off my entire earlobe? I shrieked so loud I was convinced I would have shattered the glass door on the china hutch if it weren’t already broken.

Greasy
Guy fell to the floor convulsing, but Silver Tongue didn’t notice. He released my earlobe and covered his own ears while I screamed, then leaned back in to bite my neck. I never saw him convulse.

“Motherfucker!” Valerie screamed right before she plunged her
dagger in Silver Tongue’s back.

He fell forward, nearly taking me down with him.

Valerie held on tight to her knife. Once Silver Tongue hit the floor face first, she pushed him onto his back with the heel of her boot. He looked dead, but that didn’t stop Valerie from kicking him in the side.

The greasy
-haired guy twitched on the floor. His eyes widened as Valerie went for him next.

“Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!”
she yelled, once she finished him off.

She had a shiner around her
left eye.

Even though it
hurt, the smile was worth it. “Better cancel that date, Val. You don’t look so hot.”

2

After calling in the cleaners, Valerie and I jostled for a place in front of the vampires’ bathroom mirror.

“Fuck!” Valerie said,
placing a finger on the skin swelling around her eye.

At least she hadn’t been
bit.

I pulled out what I hoped was a clean towel from the cabinet
and wet the corner. I wiped the blood off both sides of my neck. Now that the bites were cleaned up, they looked like red ring marks burned onto my skin. I kept an iridescent midnight blue scarf tucked inside my pocket. I pulled it out now and wrapped it around my neck. It was dark enough to hide bite marks, lightweight enough to stuff inside a purse or pocket.

I looked at Valerie’s reflection in the mirror
, briefly wondering what happened to her to end up working for the agents. Even if I could bring myself to ask, I doubt she’d answer.