Vlad finished his blood bag with a mighty suck and pushed himself up to a sitting position. “Pike knows who the murderer is? That’s good because all this death and dying is really ruining my vacation.”
“No.” I blinked, staring straight ahead. “Pike knows about me.”
I didn’t need to fill him in; the knowing flashed across Vlad’s eyes. “He knows you’re a vampire? Does he know I am?”
I swung my head. “I doubt it.”
“So we have a murderer on the loose, a guy who knows you’re a card-carrying member of the undead. . . . How did he find out? And, he’s not going to go all Van Helsing on us, is he? Because we’d need special approval from the UDA to take him out and you know who handles that paperwork, right? Kale. She’d never approve me. Hell, she’d call Pike and leave a trail of breadcrumbs or Hostess CupCakes right to me.”
I swallowed. “I don’t know how he knows. He just—he just said it. ‘I know what you are.’”
Vlad crushed his blood bag and tossed it onto the coffee table. “Ominous.”
“Vlad, what am I supposed to do about this? A breather knows about me.”
Vlad shrugged, finding the remote control and aiming at the TV. “I don’t know. Kill him, I guess.”
Something washed over me and it took me a good minute to realize that it was pain. I didn’t want to kill Pike. I didn’t want to be what I was.
“I—I need some air.”
Something was welling inside me, pressing against my chest and making my eyes sting by the time I crested the steps down to the apartment vestibule.
And then everything changed.
Two of the ancient windows were cracked open; I could see there was a gentle breeze outside but the air in the vestibule itself was staid and heavy but crackled with a weird, electric energy. I sniffed. The metallic scent was sharp and distinctive and my whole body went on high alert—my fangs sharpening and elongating, saliva rushing toward my tongue.
There was blood in the air.
It stank of injury and heat with just the slightest tinge of something fresh. I took a step. The energy-filled trail stopped dead on the bottom floor landing and so did I, spinning slowly in the darkness, and finally cussing at myself for being a scared little girl. And then I heard the whimper.
It was soft, barely a breath, but there was something in the single syllable that was anguished. I stiffened.
“Hello?”
There was a breath of pregnant silence and then two ragged, heavy breaths. “Help?”
I turned toward the voice. “Where are you? Who are you?”
“Please.” The word tore at my gut and I felt my human side taking over—someone in pain, in anguish—someone reaching out. Because she doesn’t know that I’m a monster.
I swept the thought out of my mind as quickly as it came and closed my eyes, concentrating on the breathing. Ragged breath in, ragged breath out. I took a step. Ragged breath—and suddenly the vestibule was heavy with the sweet metallic stench of blood. A drip of saliva rolled down my throat.
“Tell me where you are.”
“I’m here,” she said, “By the stairs. I—I don’t think I can move.”
I crept along the stairwell and banister. The blood scent grew stronger each step the light grew darker. I was swallowing furiously, trying not to think about how delicate the scent was, how delicious. The way it felt when fangs punctured flesh—warm, soft—like berries popping, flooding your mouth with delicious, rich juice.
My heart thudded and my stomach lurched, growled. I was ready to flee, to run back upstairs and lock myself in my apartment but then—
“Nina?”
Nicolette lay in a heap on the floor, her body impossibly bent, her face fragile and pale. Her thick, cracked lips trembled and moisture surrounded her milky eyes. “Please help me.”
I swallowed and bent down to her, bending my head from the heady smell of fresh blood. I watched my own hand reach out, shakily touch Nicolette on the shoulder, my fingers barely grazing the girl’s torn flesh.
“What happened?” It was my voice, but I wasn’t sure that I had spoken.
“Someone attacked me,” Nicolette said, her voice a low whisper. “Is he gone?”
I looked over my shoulder and rose to my full height. “I’ll make sure.”
I knew that her attacker wasn’t there. I could smell every scent in the vestibule—layers upon layers of Clorox and urine, the cloying, salty smell of humanity coming through day after day and hour after hour—and the sinful, beckoning scent of Nicolette’s fresh blood.
I pushed open the double doors and bent my head out, sucking in lungfuls of night air. Soon I was coughing—and crying. I wanted to help her. I wanted to taste her.
“Is he gone?”
I could hear Nicolette shifting on the floor and I sprang toward her, my arms reaching out, doing my best to gingerly touch her clothes, the banister, anything that wasn’t soaked in her blood.
“Are you okay?”
Nicolette stood now and shakily came out of the darkness. I sucked in a breath.
Her long blond hair was matted, knotted with blood that seemed to come from nowhere and everywhere at the same time. One eye was already blooming with purple bruises and angry red scratches, her lashes disappearing in the swell. Tears rolled down her cheeks and her flesh showed underneath—a pink and delicate contrast to the smudged dirt and dried blood everywhere else.
“Who did this to you?”
Nicolette lurched toward me and crumpled in my arms. I stiffened, feeling the sticky warmth of her blood on my skin and when she started to cry—great, hiccupping sobs—I was able to hold her against me and hold my breath. When it got to be too much I chanced a tiny breath, my nose a quarter-inch above a gash that crossed the side of Nicolette’s head. I recoiled just slightly, an antiseptic stench coming from her unbroken skin.
“I’m going to call nine-one-one.”
I went to reach for my phone but Nicolette’s arm shot out, her hand grabbing my wrist, her grip surprisingly strong. “No, please don’t, Nina. I’m scared.”
I patted Nicolette’s shoulder awkwardly. “Don’t worry, sweetie. Everything will be okay.” I had no idea whether or not it would be—and betted toward the latter when I realized I had left my phone in the apartment. “I’m just going to use the emergency line down here, okay? I’m not going anywhere.” I gingerly began to extricate myself from Nicolette. She whimpered lightly but shifted her weight away from me and I scurried across the tile. My hand was wrapped around the telephone receiver when I heard Nicolette’s bones cracking as she stood. At the same second I turned, something heavy smashed across the side of my head. I felt my skin pucker and gash, felt the crush of my browbone and nose. The sheer force knocked me backward and I heard the clatter of the telephone receiver as it fell to the ground; I felt the cool glass of the door as I slumped against it. A horrid clanging sound reverberated through my skull. There was screaming and—squawking?