Page 59 of Fanged Embrace
PPS. There’s breakfast on the counter and more food in the fridge.
PPPS. If you do take the window and regret your actions, there’s a house key under the potted plant by the front door so you can get back inside.
I crumpled it up—tossed it through the doorway and out into the hall. Then I felt guilty for littering when I was still, in fact, a well-fed guest, so I hauled myself off the stool and stomped over to pick it up again.
“Smug, slimy vampire fiend…” I tried to keep my grumbling to a minimum and my temper under wraps, purely because my fingers itched to toss the crumpled wad of paper into the koi pond and the fish didn’t deserve that.
I resorted to pacing up and down the hallways, glaring at every statue and portrait that I passed and counting down the minutes until her return. Two hours later, I was still pacing and River had not yet made an appearance.
“Be right back?! ‘Be right back,’ that’s what she said—sowhere is she?”I directed my question at an owl-shaped vase. It had no answers for me, but it stared back with wide, painted eyes that looked rather judgmental and had me bristling under its penetrating gaze. “Oh fuck you, you’re not even a real bird.”
Then it occurred to me that arguing with an inanimate object was probably the first sign of madness, so I turned on my heel and stomped all the way back to the kitchen—keeping my eyes down all the while to avoid confrontation with any more of River’s stupid trinkets.
I had just planted my ass back down on the stool when my phone gave a muffled ring, sending me bucking to my feet again and turning in circles to retrieve it from my back pocket.
I spared no glance at the caller, fully convinced it was River herself with an update on why ‘be right back’ was a blatant lie, and ready to tear into her for leaving without me. “What kind of partner ditches?—”
“Laurie!?”
I stilled at the rough voice barking my name across the line. “Arlon?”
“Laurie, listen.” Arlon was panting and I could hear the clap of his boots hitting the ground like he was running at full speed. “You might be in danger—where are you right now?”
“What?” My spine went rigid, and I glanced around the kitchen like danger was hiding behind the pots and pans. “I’m—I’m at a… friend’s place.”
“You’re not at home? Good. Stay where you are and whatever you do, don’t go back to your apartment.”
That’s when I knew something really bad had happened, because Arlon was well aware that I had no friends and yet he’d brushed past my answer without a second thought. I tightened my grip on the phone. “Arlon, what’s going on?”
“I was tailing a suspect—a surgeon down at Bellevue Hospital. Thought I had him, only he knew I was on his trail.” Arlon was gasping like he’d just sprinted ten blocks uphill. “He led me down an alleyway—cornered me. He was asking about you. I barely got away, I don’t know if he’s still after me….”
My stomach dropped around the same time my vision began to swim. “A surgeon? What did he look like?”
“Tall. Handsome.” Arlon was still running, and I heard the distant rumble of traffic like he was crossing a busy street. “Cold—I don’t know how else to explain it. Something about him was just distinctly off.”
My whole body tensed up and alarm bells screamed to life inside my head. If Arlon had somehow managed to stumble onto a lead—a lead that led tohim, the Doctor, then he was in trouble.
I forced myself to focus, swallowing down my panic as I pressed the phone to my ear. “Where are you right now?”
“Not safe. Don’t come—” Static swallowed his next words, and then the line went dead.
“Arlon? Arlon?!Shit.” I tried to redial but the call wouldn’t connect. Either he’d hit a cell service dead zone or… someone had got to him. My pulse pounded in my ears as I pulled up Arlon’s location. The little blue dot was still moving, patchy but present, zigzagging through side streets.
If what that vampire woman had said was true, the Doctor was hellbent on getting me back—it had to have been him Arlon ran into. And while he certainly wasn’t top dog of the organization, hewason my shitlist. This was my chance. A chance to target one of the higher-ups of the organization.
A direct line to the top.
My feet were already carrying me to the guest room, to my gun—tucked neatly under the pillows. River had handed it back to me last night, after the two of us sipped tea and the lingering tension following my outburst eased off. I could tell it killed her a little to give it back to me, to put the weapon in my hands, knowing what I eventually planned to do with it.
But she’d promised to give it back, and she kept that promise.
I slid my hand around the cold grip, and the smooth metal felt foreign and heavy in my palm. River was well aware that it was no ordinary gun. Stolen from the facility before I escaped and constructed specifically to take out vampires in a single shot. The glyphs etched into the sides made sure of that, lighting up when my finger touched the trigger and infusing a curse into every bullet before it fired off. No wonder she and her coven had confiscated it in the first place.
For a vampire, it was lethal. For a human, it was straight up overkill.
I hadn’t carried it since that night.Since you killed that man.My stomach clenched at the memory and a sickening sense of dread pooled in my gut. But I shook the haze from my head, slipped the gun under my jacket, and tucked it into the seam ofmy jeans at my back. The sharp contours of the muzzle pressed into my skin, prompting a shiver that crawled up my spine.
Checking Arlon’s location again, I noticed the blue dot had stopped moving and bit down on my lip. Whether he’d paused to catch his breath or someone had caught up with him, that was where I was headed.
