A Vampyre's Sunrise by Jeff Schanz (good romance books to read .TXT) 📕

“It’s not a secret. Just delicate.”

Tom stuffed his hands in his coat pocket and stepped away from the pile of bodies to pace. He gave Brandt the look of reluctant disclosure. It was a pretty standard facial expression from any Army brass when dealing with disclosures to subordinates.

“Some of it’s classified and it’s a long story. I’ll shorten it up as long as you promise to keep your lips tight,” said Tom.

Brandt snorted a chuckle. “Gimme a freakin’ break. It’s written seven times in my damned contract.”

Tom grimaced. “Sorry. Habit. Ok, so here’s the story.”

Despite the declaration that the story was coming, Tom hesitated, eyes fixed on one of the butchered corpses. He eventually snapped out of his distraction and began.

“We had one of our airborne guys go AWOL a few months back, a little after the time you got out. Corporal Jamir Davis. He had been part of an unsanctioned raid, classified above your pay grade, but let’s just say it happened in a country that’s supposed to be an ally. He turned up as a hostage in a terrorist camp and someone above me decided to negotiate for his release. Well, we got him back and surprise-surprise, he wasn’t grateful. We did some digging and found out that he had been double-dealing, doing jobs for this mullah from the terrorist camp the whole time, and that mullah was associated with your Russian. We tried to arrest Jamir and he bolted. He put one of the arresting officers in the hospital. We’ve been looking for him ever since. Rumor has it he’s an enforcer for whoever is dealing that new power drug that’s so popular.”

“Power drug? The one that’s making people go insane, kill people, and kill themselves?” asked Brandt.

“That’s the one. You know it?”

“Read about it.”

Brandt’s understanding was that the drug made you feel powerful, noticeably stronger and younger, but also had the tendency to make you mentally unstable, feral, aggressive, and ultimately violent. It seemed all too easily connected to Mikhail’s superpower elixir, but as far as Brandt knew, he had all the vials of that stuff. He had never told anyone about them, and had never turned them in. The elixir was made from Lia’s family blood and he didn’t feel anyone else had the right to it, and he didn’t believe any good could come from anyone other than Lia having it. How it was showing up on the streets in badly copied form was anyone’s guess, but he wanted to find out. Brandt kept his composure as Tom went on.

“We thought this might be Jamir’s operation, and maybe someone from The Russian’s old organization isn’t happy that he stole their territory. It’s a guess, but it’s a reasonable one.”

Brandt nodded. There was a trace of elusiveness in Tom’s tone that suggested he was holding something back. Brandt tried to ignore it. “Got any other guesses?”

Tom waggled his head back and forth. “The flip-side argument. That maybe our soldier boy helped do this himself. Maybe he’s working for whoever took over The Russian’s biz and is trying to eliminate rivals. But since The Russian's stuff was opium-based and the power drug is mostly other stuff, that explanation doesn’t make much sense.”

Sense has nothing to do with it.

Brandt surveyed the room once again to see if there was anything else that could offer a clue. He noticed an open door that led to a rear parking lot and thought he saw another body outside.

“Is that another body out there?” Brandt asked.

Tom turned in the direction Brandt was gesturing. “Yeah, one more. It looks like he tried to escape and got caught.”

Brandt began to walk to the back door. “Tell me more about this AWOL guy you’re talking about.”

“Corporal Davis?” said Tom. “Good soldier, tough son of a bitch. The men liked him more or less. I thought he just snapped at first. How he went all the way to the dark side, I have no idea.”

“If he ever met with Mikhail, that might’ve done it. Mikhail may have been a psychopath, but he was persuasive as all hell. Seduced people with enticing promises, had a way of making them buy in.”

“Maybe.”

Brandt knelt next to the corpse that had fallen in the rear lot. Unlike the other victims, this one had all extremities intact. A congealed pool of blood lay underneath the suspected fatal wound in the front of the neck. Since the corpse was face down, the wound wasn’t immediately visible. Brandt carefully turned the body over.

Jesus. The throat was ripped out by something blunt. Blunt but strong. And though the flesh had been torn, there were two distinct furrows at the top edge of the wound, like the instrument used contained two small blades or slender spikes. It wasn’t necessarily indicative of Brandt’s first thought, but he had a legitimate reason to consider… Fangs?

He said nothing.

Tom said, “I think they honestly just got pissed off, grabbed the guy around the throat, then squeezed. That drug will make you a lot stronger for a little while. It might have been enough to tear someone’s throat out.”

Brandt absently nodded as he eased the corpse back to its original position. Seeking speculative connections, he recalled the men he had killed a few months ago who had been juiced up on Mikhail’s elixir. The stuff gave humans the kind of strength and healing ability that only vampyres had. None of those men had fangs. And when he temporarily injected himself with a double dose of the same drug to fight them, he had no vampyric tendencies. Besides the strength and healing, the only other effects were just unbridled aggression and rage. He had no clue how many vampyres might exist in the world, despite being the most knowledgeable human on the subject. Mikhail was the only other vampyre Brandt had ever met besides Lia and her father.

“Got any different theories on this one?” asked Tom.

“Not yet,” said Brandt. Though he wasn’t lying, he wasn’t going to share speculations, especially dangerous ones. Even if he did want to share, you can’t just tell someone there might be vampyres running around without a hell of a lot of proof. A hell of a lot.

Tom said, “I have the crime scene photos if you wanna take them home.”

“Want? No. But should anyway.”

“Copies are in my car.”

The two men did one more round through the slaughter room, then went out to Tom’s car. He gave Brandt a folder with the photos in it.

“If anything strikes you, let me know. And if I get any new info, I’ll pass it along.”

“Roger Wilco.”

“So, how’s the missus?” asked Tom.

Brandt smiled. “Good. Her helicopter lands at Santa Paula in a couple hours. I can’t wait to pick her up. It’s been several days since she went back out to the island.”

“You two lovebirds still going strong?”

“Yep. She’s my world, Tom. It’s embarrassing, but when she’s not around I feel hollow.”

“Ahh, yeah. I remember those days. Don’t get me wrong, I love Faye, but we’ve gone from cuddling and holding hands to just being happily silent in the same room when we get a quiet minute – which ain’t often anymore. Quiet. God, I miss quiet.”

Tom had two teenage girls. He complained about them, but Brandt knew it was just a façade. Tom loved his girls beyond measure.

Lia had spent most of her life on a quiet island with no human voices around her. All she ever wanted was to listen to Brandt talk to her, or sing to her. He never understood how she could put up with his singing.

“Quiet is overrated, Tom,” said Brandt.

“Says the man with no kids,” said Tom.

He gave Brandt a quick wave, then started his car. As Tom maneuvered to head toward the gate, he lowered his window and leaned his head out.

“Kiss your lady for me,” said Tom.

I’ll kiss her for me. Brandt waved as Tom drove off, then got in his truck and headed out to the distant road.

He hadn’t been entirely accurate in his answer to Tom. Though he and Lia were still indeed going strong, there was something that had been weighing on his mind about her recent moods. In a couple of hours, he could hold her again and maybe it wouldn’t matter. When he held her, nothing else ever mattered.

Right now, something else did matter. Either another cartel was trying to mimic The Russian, or that old cartel was back up to speed. Regardless, they were sending gruesome advertisements to convince someone. And at least one of the cartel members might be a malevolent vampyre. The answer could be entirely different than his guess, but ignorance was dangerous. It was time to seriously consider the contingency plan.

He had toyed with a contingency plan for a while, though never really expecting to need it. But best to be prepared. Suddenly, that plan felt closer to necessity.

You’re being paranoid as usual.

No, I’m not. That throat wound wasn’t an illusion. And if there was a chance that Lia or Brandt was on someone’s vengeance list, then he’d rather be overly cautious than dead. The intense memory of Lia’s lifeless body strapped to a lab table, drained of all her blood for use in Mikhail’s elixir, was something he refused to ever let happen again. There was a guy he knew, another former Army sergeant like himself, who was running a personal security service. Brandt had the number somewhere. It couldn’t hurt to just call and talk to the guy.

Brandt checked the time on his phone. It was a little early to pick up Lia, but whatever. He pressed the gas pedal and got on the interstate heading up to Ventura.

* * * *

A figure in shadow stayed low and still as Dekker’s truck disappeared from the warehouse access road. The watcher knew he was too far away to be spotted, but took no risks. It was his profession to be unseen.

He packed up the binoculars and parabolic microphone, then opened a note pad. Scanning his scribbled notes twice, he was satisfied they were adequate for his report.

The assignment had been to set the stage, then confirm that the ball was in play. He required no further understanding of the plan. That was not his job.

Binoculars stowed and microphone case in hand, he began the hike back to his car.

CHAPTER 2

Brandt watched the helicopter descend from the ash grey sky. An overcast afternoon meant Lia would be more comfortable on the flight back from her island.

The pilot was another of Brandt’s former Army buddies who now ran tourist charters with his chopper, along with some side work on TV and film productions. For a family and friends rate, he ran Lia to and from Makal Island. For those trips, he would deck out the inside of his chopper with UV inhibiting curtains so Lia could still see out, yet wouldn’t be harmed by the sun’s rays. Everyone did their best to accommodate Lia’s unique condition. At least, the condition that everyone believed Lia had.

Brandt and Lia had done some research on severe diseases that involved a person’s skin being hypersensitive to the sun’s radiation. There were quite a lot of them actually, but they chose one called xeroderma pigmentosum, which seemed the most believably serious, and obscure enough that no one knew that Lia’s symptoms weren’t the same. Once Brandt rattled off the serious-sounding name of XP, explaining that it was a potentially fatal skin disease that did not allow Lia to be in the sun’s radiation, there were no more questions and people did their best to help. If only Lia’s need to drink blood could be explained as easily, things would be cake.

The helicopter touched down. Its curtains masked the passenger, but Brandt knew who was in there, and he was surprised that he was trembling in anticipation. He wouldn’t deny that he missed her, but he hadn’t understood that his need to hold her was like drug withdrawal. Maybe he was yearning to hold her