Page 49 of The Vampire and the Case of the Perilous Poltergeist

I knew when the men grew closer because I could hear low voices and the crunch of footfalls on the uneven ground. ‘How many?’ I asked quietly.

Connor held up seven fingers; he was a pro at differentiating heart beats.

‘We’ve got to warn Sidnee.’ I looked at the dock but I couldn’t see anything. Even the single light at the edge of it only pierced the fog a few feet.

Connor pointed. An outline of a man appeared, then another, and their voices seemed to float towards us. ‘Why isn’t Anderson answering his walkie?’ one of them asked.

‘He’s probably watching cat videos,’ somebody replied.

‘Nah, he’s only into porn,’ a third said. Disembodied laughter floated in the air.

The man in front suddenly stopped and held up his hand. ‘Silence! Something is wrong.’

They went quiet. Now they were closer, we could see the whole group. They were armed and dressed like the others and they were on high alert. Just then, there was a slight splash as Sidnee emerged from the water.

She walked naked down the dock and seven guns swung her way.

Chapter 35

I started to run to my friend but Connor stopped me. He didn’t look as stressed as I felt: he trusted Sidnee to be okay. I trusted Sidnee all day long – it was the men with the guns I was worried about.

‘Who are you and what are you doing out here in the nude?’ one of the men yelled. The fog was so thick that I couldn’t tell which one spoke.

Sidnee hurriedly tried to cover herself with her hands as best she could. ‘I’m naked because of a shitty prank.’ She stifled a sob. ‘Some bastards stole my clothes. Can anyone see them?’ Her voice was small and wavering. She should have got an academy award.

‘We’re asking the questions.’ The man’s voice was sharp.

She flinched. ‘We were all going skinny dipping but the others got out, took my clothes and ran off. My phone was in my jeans. Can you call for help for me? I’m freezing.’ She shivered hard foreffect, which was a sneaky trick because I knew she rarely felt the cold.

The guns wavered; at a gesture from the one who’d yelled out, they were pointed away from Sidnee towards the ground.

My friend looked around nervously like a naked young woman would do and pointed to the nearest boat. ‘I’m going to check there for my clothes. They have to be stashed somewhere.’

The man nodded and she climbed aboard the fishing boat. Sidnee was shapely and gorgeous, so she had theircompleteattention. Idiots. Her clothes weren’t on the boat because I was still holding them. I hoped she’d use the time to slip back into the water and get to safety.

Once she was on board, the men lost interest: she was some local yokel with bad judgement and they weren’t there for locals. It wasn’t even an issue that she’d seen them walking around with weapons: after all, being visibly armed in Alaska wasn’t unusual when there were bears and wolves to think about.

The men relaxed and walked casually towards the warehouse; their rifles slung over their shoulders. Unfortunately for us, the jig was just up. Once they looked inside, they would declare war and we’d only brought our supernat selves and one knife to a gunfight. We needed to do something, fast.

Connor gestured for us to move behind the men. As long as we were silent the fog and the darkness would hide us, but even with vamp speed I doubted we could take any of them down before the rest turned on us.

Connor grabbed the first man. Putting his hand over the guy’s mouth, he snapped his neck and laid him down carefully on the gravel. I took the next one and silently choked him until he passed out. We were down to five. I knew we wanted to interrogate the leader so we needed him to be the last man standing – and breathing – but he was in the middle of the others.

Fluffy thought faster than we did. He ran ahead silently then stood in the one spot where weak light almost hit the ground. He yipped then limped forward once the men had noticed him.

‘Hey, it’s a dog.’

‘He’s hurt.’

‘He’s wearing a collar. Shouldn’t we try to phone his owner?’ It seemed that even evil henchmen liked dogs.

‘Ignore it. We have a mission,’ the leader snapped.

‘I like dogs more than I like you,’ another man muttered mutinously.

‘Shut up, Humphrey, before Grayson shoots you.’

Fluffy’s distraction was helpful but not quite enough. As they moved past my dog, the leader looked around then stiffened and swore when he noticed that two of his men were missing. With a sharp command, the troops were back to being fully armed and alert as they stood back-to-back and searched the foggy darkness for us.

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