Bloodlines (Demons of Oblivion) Read online

  Worse still, my stomach was twisting, knotting, aching. Worse than anything I’d ever felt, the hunger was like a worm traveling through me, hollowing me out, bit by bit, until all I could focus on was the pain. The need to eat, the need to...feed...

  It consumed me.

  I had no idea how long I lay there. Sometimes I cried. Sometimes I fought with everything in me to scream, but no sound ever came. My body wouldn’t move, and all I could do was lie awake with my thoughts and memories. The latter were hazy, at best.

  And then one day—or week, or month, or god, it could’ve been year—my voice returned. Soft moans at first and useless, yes, but they gave way to whines, and eventually graduated to a whisper. When I was able to shout at last, the sound bounced straight back at me, piercing my ears.

  I wasn’t simply lying in a dark room—I was confined in a space barely big enough to fit me.

  At times, madness took a hold of me. I remember little of that. But after a while, my muscles obeyed me again. It started with some twitching. Though my progress was slow, it was enough to renew my confidence.

  When I was able to move my arms and legs completely, I reached forward to feel my surroundings; shock rocked me because I punched straight through the barrier in front of me. Stone clattered to the floor and dust hit my face. Light assaulted my vision, blinding like I stared directly in the sun; as I tried to shield my eyes, I lost my balance and toppled onto the dirt floor. Weakly, I pulled myself up and waited for my eyes to adjust to the light.

  Light that wasn’t so bright after all.

  My gaze moved to the two small windows high on the wall to my left. Beyond the cloudy, spider web-covered glass, the waxing moon hung high in the sky.

  A glance around and I wanted to crawl back into my prison. Sarcophagus after sarcophagus sat on stone pedestals around the room. Coffin-less corpses lined the walls’ manmade crevices...

  I was in a mausoleum.

  My feet were stumbling, leading me in a circle, desperate to escape. In my terror, I accidentally breathed in again and retched from the smell. Words wouldn’t form in my head, thoughts had no shape, no sound, but just the instinct bone-deep to get out.

  I bolted from the room and tore down the first corridor I saw. The moonlight was gone, and I had no idea where I was going, but I still pushed on through the darkness. With one hand in front of me and the other to my side, I ran blindly, only pausing when a wall blocked my path.

  I had no idea how I managed to find my way out of there. I repeatedly ran in circles—sometimes ending up back in the room I had awoken in, while other times I just seemed to end up in the same corridor again and again. But finally I found what appeared to be a main room, where there were small windows on three walls, and no more corpses.

  I yanked open the door, expecting freedom at last—nearly salivating at the anticipation of a fresh breeze on my skin and the stink of corpses put behind me. Instead, two terrified-looking children confronted me: a boy of perhaps five and a girl only a couple of years older, both with dark hair and dressed in their night clothes. The girl carried a lantern and she thrust it toward me as the boy cowered behind her. She muttered some curse, which, had I been focusing, I might have understood, but I was too consumed with other thoughts.

  The hunger was back.

  It wrapped not around my stomach, but around my head with cold steel bars. I couldn’t see, couldn’t think, couldn’t feel anything but the coursing of blood in their veins and the beat of their hearts.

  I didn’t know how I snatched the little girl up so quickly that she didn’t even drop the lantern. But I did. My mouth was over her throat and after the horrible pain around my teeth subsided, I bit into her flesh and drank.

  And it was glorious.

  That first drink after being so hungry was the single greatest moment—it was bliss beyond reason, beyond awareness almost. I sighed deeply, felt my shoulders sink in satisfied relief.

  The boy screamed out for his mother, and turned to run toward the house in the distance. The girl’s last drop of blood had barely passed my lips when I was upon her brother. He shrieked and tried to fight me as I drank, but soon his body went limp in my arms.

  Within minutes I had fed from them both.

  Someone burst through the back door of the house, lantern in hand and followed by two others. Who were they—why were they...

  I looked down at the lifeless child and dropped the body as I jumped back, horror spiking through my veins. What am I doing? They were only...

  Despite the rational protests that ran through my brain, something wonderful had happened: I was warm. Their blood rushed through me, and for the first time since I had awakened in the dark place, the hunger didn’t gnaw at me.

  The people who came from the house screamed and rushed. A fallen lantern at my feet still burned; they could see the children. I had little doubt.

  Run.

  I raced past the mausoleum, though the fields, into the woods, faster than I should have been physically able to, and continued on until I was sure my pursuers were gone. And then I cried.

  The metallic taste of blood remained in my mouth. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw those children...so tiny...so breakable... But I killed them.

  God Almighty, what have I become?

  ****

  When I awoke for real, back in my apartment, I pushed back with near physical force at the memory of my dream. Or, rather, the dream of my memory.

  Of all the memories I tried to suppress, that was one that wouldn’t go away. Maybe I didn’t really want it to. Maybe I was a masochist at heart. But on the occasion that I did dream—which, granted, was a rarity—that was often the gist of it.

  Grow up, Zar—got more important things to do. It was Friday evening. The clock next to my bed said I had three hours to ready myself for the party. O’Connor would be opening his doors to his guests around seven-thirty, though I hoped to slip in around eight when the sun was in bed.

  I took the hanger from my closet and ripped the plastic away from my gown. Spaghetti-strapped, ruby red, and it fit nicely enough that it showed off my hourglass figure, but gave me just enough room to hide what needed to be hidden—mainly my lock picking kit and the two well-folded satchels I strapped to my inner thigh.

  I started for my tiny bathroom to shower, but paused as I reached the doorway. For a moment I was there, back in my dream, or my memory, or whatever it was called. I was there, for barely a second, and icy cold fear washed over me.

  Just as quickly as the memory came, it faded again. I flipped on the bathroom light and started running the water.

  It occurred to me, however, that no matter how many lights I turned on, I never really left the dark place.

  I wasn’t certain I ever would.

  Chapter Five

  Covens and Quesadillas

  Sean O’Connor’s estate was several miles north of the outer fringe of the city, and once I had my ten million from Mish, I was totally going to get me a fucking “estate.” I mean, it just sounds classy.

  Though I had arrived a half hour after the gathering began, my rented limo came to a halt behind several other cars waiting in the circular driveway. My lateness hardly seemed fashionable when everyone else arrived at the same time I did.

  Twenty minutes ticked by—and I was seriously considering just getting out and walking—when the inner window that separated the front of the vehicle from my side rolled down.

  “Ms. Walker,” the driver called. “Shall I see what is keeping them?”

  “Yes, thank you.” I sighed, a perfected “bored heiress” sounding thing that came naturally because I always thought of myself as A Very Big Deal even without the rich bitch persona. As the driver left the limo to investigate, I pulled a compact mirror out of my small evening bag and put a fresh layer of ruby red lipstick over my full lips, then touched up the smoky shadow over my eyelids. A bit of blush added some colour to my cheeks, and my heart pumped the blood of the man I killed only days ago,
raising my body temperature enough for me to seem human. With any luck I would simply pass for some exotic beauty rather than a cold, pale, undead chick. Should anyone suspect the latter, I might be in some trouble.

  The driver returned looking less than impressed. That might have just been his natural expression, though; I had yet to see a single smile touch his face in the past hour, which is unusual because just about anyone with a Y chromosome, regardless of sexual preference, grinned like an idiot when I was flashing cleavage.

  “Is there a problem?” I asked when he was sitting in the driver’s seat once more.

  “Not really, miss, it’s just that an uninvited couple were trying to sneak in, and so they’re bringing in extra security.”

  “Sneak in?” Ah, shit. I feigned surprise. “Isn’t this invitation only?”

  “Yes and it seems their invitation was a forgery.”

  Oh, damn it. “Really!”

  “Indeed,” he said. “It seems the gentleman tried to bring in a gun and when the weapon was detected, his invitation was checked.”

  Double damn it.

  “I wouldn’t worry though, miss—they seem to have the situation under control. Security took the couple, and after some extra precautions are taken, everyone will be allowed right in.”

  “Thanks very much,” I said with a smile. The inner window hummed as I powered it back up.

  Shitty shit. Okay, be logical, Zar. So what if the invitation was a forgery. That could mean anything. That could mean some regular person just made it up...it didn’t mean they were checking the blessing attached. I might still be okay on that count. It wasn’t as though the names of the guests were on the invitation—it was just the sort of thing only those familiar with the O’Connor coven would receive. No one would be looking into how I obtained it.

  Probably.

  And then I had the weapons issue to contend with. Since I didn’t think they’d actually be frisking guests—I mean, some things you just do not do when welcoming rich people to your home, and feeling them up was pretty high on the list—I had to assume there were metal detectors of some sort. Probably something hidden in the door frame; I’d seen those before. I didn’t usually carry a weapon unless I thought I’d be needing it, so that wasn’t a concern, but the lock picks would still show. Not too many women keep sharp, steel objects in their garters.

  The vehicles in front of us moved at last, leaving me little time to consider my options. Luckily, I think fast on my feet—or on my ass in a limo, as the case may be. I pulled out the kit of picks and went about rearranging my hair. Though my tresses looked better down, it wasn’t as though I would be picking up guys while I was there, so I forewent cascades of hair, and piled the black waves on top of my head instead. By the time my limo pulled up at the front steps, I had a lovely “swept up” hairdo with some steel lock picks and a tension wrench—all craftily hidden—holding it in place. Now those are some practical accessories.

  As I glided up the main stairs toward the doors, I focused on the conversations of two couples several steps ahead of me.

  “Yes—it looked all right, I heard, but it wasn’t O’Connor blessed,” a tall, middle-aged man said as he lifted his chin to show a bit of contempt.

  His companion was a tiny woman whose neck I could probably snap just by looking at it. “Is that so? They must be checking all of them now, I suppose.”

  “They seem to be. Sean’s not taking any chances...”

  Mishka was a gifted witch, but not that gifted. She couldn’t fake O’Connor magic. This was not good.

  I stood three feet from the door now, too close to turn around and leave without making a scene. I’d just have to go in there and let whatever was going to happen, happen. The worst they could do was detain me, and if I played dumb, I would probably just be released and sent on my merry way. Unless they find the lock picks, dumbass. Right, yeah—I could pretend to be an idiot, but no one is dumb enough to mistake tools of the thieving trade with hair accessories.

  No matter how dumb they thought I was, I’d have to move onto Plan B when I eventually got out: break in and kill anything that moved.

  At last it was my turn at the door. I smoothly reached into my bag and produced my invitation. My smile was sweet and, I hoped, innocent as one of the three tuxedo-clad—but without a doubt armed—guards at the door checked it over. He handed it to the small, middle-aged woman beside him. Dressed in a dark green dress that looked kind of mother-of-the-bride-ish, she had no reason to be standing there with the rest of the security staff unless she was a mystic or a seer or something, meant to confirm the seal’s authenticity. Had I known about her earlier, maybe I could’ve found a way to poison her ahead of time.

  I waited to see her inner, mystical alarms go off. I waited for someone to make a discreet signal for a dozen security officers to surround me. I waited for one of them to give a kind “Don’t make a scene, and come with us” smile, and firmly grab my upper arm to lead me to another room for interrogation.

  Even as the seer nodded her approval and I was told I could continue on into the house, I waited for someone to see I was a complete and utter fake. But it never happened.

  Damn, that Mishka is good.

  Another tuxedoed gentleman bowed, took my hand, and ushered me through the main foyer to a set of open doors on the far left. I swiftly surveyed my surroundings as I went. There was the main staircase which led to the northern wing, and an upper floor on the right where I’d find some bedrooms, an office, study, and library. The master bedroom was at the back of the house, just above the pool. Good. I still remembered everything. Hopefully all that information would be in my brain later when I needed to run on instinct. Fancy blueprints on my phone or something might’ve been handy, but it’s been my experience that killing someone for money often led to running for my life, and there’s hardly an opportune time to pull out a map in those instances.

  I came to a stop just as we reached the doors. Beyond them was a large, high-ceilinged ballroom, where about a hundred and fifty guests stood talking in small groups. The usher left me there, and before me was a thin, aging man with a proud stance and a somewhat forced smile. The man of the house—the man with a contract on his head. Mr. Baseball Mitt Face himself.

  Just don’t call him that, Zar. “Mr. O’Connor,” I said in my most velvety voice and with an easy smile. “What a lovely home you have.”

  “Thank you, Ms...?”

  “Helene Walker.” The name came as easily as my own. I probably could have been a kick-ass film star if studios didn’t require me to work daylight hours and I didn’t get typecast as a vampire.

  “Of course,” he said, though I saw a moment of confusion cloud his face. “So nice to have someone from your family grace us this evening.”

  “So very kind of you to invite us.” Just don’t realize that you didn’t, in fact, invite me, old man.

  He nodded, then looked to the next group of guests behind me. Dismissed so casually. Ugh. Guess that was better than him hitting on me, though.

  I continued on into the room. This was so stupid. I could just snap his neck right there and be done with it. The need for a covert assassination seemed unnecessary to me, but Mishka had explained it would look better if a warlock of O’Connor’s status was killed in his home, as discreetly as possible, so I tolerated the minor inconvenience of small talk.

  I scanned the room, committing to memory all the exits, the exact positions of the guards, and the powder rooms. After going through the layout in my mind again, I glanced over at the large, sleek steel clock on the far wall. Not even nine yet. I’d planned to wait until the guests left before I killed the O’Connors, which meant it was going to be a very long night.

  I attempted to converse with several witches and promptly remembered why I hated trying to converse with most witches. They were talking spells and such, so I sipped my bright pink cocktail and listened intently. Or tried to. Even though for three years I’d had Mishka as a roommate, everyt
hing they said seemed foreign to me. I feigned amusement at a joke about some crazy spell mix-up, where the user had confused the Latin root for a particular ingredient, and ended up with a recipe for white dove quesadillas. Before they could request such a story from me, I excused myself and looked for the hors d’oeuvres.

  My second target, Nathan O’Connor, was AWOL, it seemed. Originally, I had suggested to Mish that I seduce the son at the party, thereby giving me free access to him and his father later. It seemed like an easy plan to me, but she insisted it wouldn’t work. Apparently she wasn’t aware of some of my more womanly skills, but perhaps she was right—I ought to keep it simple.

  The sound of the mortals made me want to run around the room slashing all their throats. Literally. I even plotted out what route would let me take out the largest amount of people in the shortest amount of time. Their constant breathing and chatting and laughter...the noises swirled into one awful sound and drove into my brain like a drill. I gritted my teeth and tried to block the sounds out. A full half hour dragged by, and I started fantasizing about mass murder once again.

  “Why, hello,” said a man behind me, and I turned to see the bright smile of someone I didn’t recognize. He had dirty blond hair kept short and stylishly messy, and a pair of thin, wire-framed glasses covered his brown eyes. Usually I went for smooth and gorgeous, but he pulled off the somewhat geeky, but unequivocally handsome vibe well. Young, charming, and—by the look of his designer suit—rich too. Smooth skin, slightly crooked grin, tall and broad-shouldered...if I listened I could hear the pump of his blood through his veins... My vampire heart went pitter-patter, shivers dancing along my spine.

  Yummy.

  No feeding—must assassinate. I had to keep reminding myself I wasn’t there for men or dinner.

  “Hello to you.” I met his hand as he reached out in greeting. His fingers were warm, body radiating heat, and I could imagine curling up in bed with him far too easily.