Beneath a Darkening Moon (41 page)

He walked through the gate and headed for the garage. While he generally couldn’t enter private homes
uninvited, that restriction didn’t apply to houses that had been long abandoned. He could go in unhindered, and do what he was sent here to do.

But Jasper was not in that house alone. Not only did he have the teenager at his command, but his living dead as well. Six against one were not the best of odds, even for someone like him. What Michael needed was a distraction. He slipped past the remains of the garage door and his gaze came to rest on an old gas can. He picked it up; liquid sloshed within.

Jasper hated fire. Feared it.

It might provide enough of a distraction to save Nikki James.

T
HE ROOM SMELLED
awful—a putrid mix of stale urine, excrement, and death. Nikki cupped a hand over her nose and mouth and tried not to gag as she swept the flashlight’s beam across the room.

Something slid away from the light—a hunched, humanoid shape that smelled like death.

Nikki backed away. She didn’t know what hid in the shadows and didn’t really care to find out. She’d learned long ago that some things were best left unexplored, and this was one of those times. Perhaps if she closed the door, the thing would leave her alone. She knew from past experience that all the doors in this old house creaked; it was one of the things that had spooked her as a teenager. At the very least, it would give her some warning if the thing decided to move.

She began to turn away, then stopped. A prickle of warning ran across the back of her neck. The shadows
parted, revealing a tangled mass of long blond hair and pale, naked flesh.

It was female. And human. And yet … not.

What the hell …?

The grotesque figure lunged at her. Fear slammed through Nikki’s heart. Stumbling backward, she threw out her hand and thrust the creature away kinetically. It slammed into the back wall, grunting in surprise. But no sooner had it hit the floor than it was scrambling to its feet, its agility surprising.

Glimpsing movement to her left, Nikki whirled. A second creature ran out of the shadows, its face a mocking image of womanhood. Nikki reached again for her kinetic energy. The heavy steps of the first creature were already drawing close. Sweat—more from fear than exertion—trickled down the back of her neck. She thrust the second creature back through the doorway, then flicked a wrist knife into her palm and spun around. The first creature charged, teeth bared and hands raised like talons. Talons that showed the remnants of red nail polish. Nikki backed away, wanting to defend herself and yet suddenly reluctant to use her knife against another woman—even if that woman appeared dead set on killing her.

Then the second creature came back through the doorway, and the choice was taken out of her hands. She threw the first woman back kinetically, then sidestepped the leap of the second and slashed with the knife. The blade cut through the creature’s skin as easily as butter, and blood sprayed across them both. Nikki blanched and scrubbed at it with the sleeve of her jacket as she backed away.

The creature made no sound, gave no reaction, not
even when her stomach began to peel open and her innards bulge out. She just spun around and charged again. Nausea tightened Nikki’s throat. She swallowed and kept backing away, but her feet wouldn’t move fast enough. The creature lashed out, and the blow flung her backward. Her back hit the wall, the flashlight went flying, and for a moment she saw stars.

The creature made a second grab for her. Nikki scrambled away, but it caught her shoulder and pulled her back. Talonlike fingers tore into her arm, and pain shot down to her fingertips. She gasped, fighting the sudden wash of nausea. The creature snarled, its breath fetid, full of death and decay. Nikki shuddered and slammed the heel of her hand into its face. For a split second, its hold weakened and she reached quickly for more kinetic energy. A sliver of pain ran through her mind—a warning that she was pushing her psychic strength too far. She ignored it and forced the heavy creature away from her. It flew across the room and smashed through the window, tumbling out of sight with a feminine cry of surprise.

Moonlight fanned across the darkness, lifting the shadows and touching the face of the second creature as it lumbered back into the room. For an instant, it resembled Jackie Sommers, one of the four women who’d recently gone missing. But if it was, what the hell had happened to her? How could someone go from an average suburban mom to something that was barely even human in so short a time?

The woman snarled—and any resemblance to Sommers shattered. The creature took one ponderous step forward, then stopped. Nikki readied another kinetic lance. The shard of pain in her head became a torrent.
She was going to have a hell of a headache tomorrow—if she survived that long.

Blood ran past her clenched fingers and dripped to the floor near her feet. She had no choice but to ignore it. One move, no matter how small, and the creature would attack.

So why wasn’t it attacking now? It simply stood in the doorway, shaking its head and snarling softly. It was almost as if the creature was fighting a leash of some kind.

And she had absolutely no desire to find out who—or what—held the end of that leash.

The creature snarled again—an angry, sullen sound. Then it turned and leaped out the nearest window.

The retreat sent a chill up her spine. She waited tensely for something else to happen. The breeze stirred the dust from the shadows, and the heavy silence returned.

After several heartbeats, she sank down against the wall and drew her knees close. For a minute she simply sat there staring at the shattered window, breathing deeply and letting the silence run over her.

Had the creatures survived the fall from the window? Given the reaction—or lack thereof—to the knife wound, it was more than likely that, even if they
had
broken bones, it wasn’t going to stop them. And she wasn’t about to walk over to the window to find out, if only because she had no idea just what they were capable of. For all she knew, they might be crouched down there on the ground, ready to spring up and drag her outside the minute she showed her face.

But if both creatures had been desperate to destroy
her, why did the last one retreat? The desire—maybe even the need—to shed blood had been all too evident in its eyes. Yet it had leapt out the window rather than attack.

Which could only mean it had been
ordered
to. Because whatever lurked in that darkness on the other side of the corridor wanted her for itself.

Moonlight played across the glass that lay scattered around her. Glass that was stained with bright splashes of red. She wasn’t sure if the blood belonged to the creatures or to her, but she knew in the end it wouldn’t really matter.
He
would come for the blood.
He
would smell it and come for her.

Who
he
was, she didn’t really know. Or care. She had to get out of this crazy house. She had to escape, while she still could …

Then the thought stalled. What about Monica? Did she really want to leave the teenager to face her fate alone?

Yes
.

No
.

At sixteen, Monica had barely begun to live. She had so much yet to learn, so much more of the world to see. And yet it wasn’t as if Monica hadn’t already had her chances. Time and again, her willful—and often violent—tendencies had gotten her into trouble, and time and again, her father’s wealth and influence had gotten her out of it. Yet she never seemed to learn. She just plunged headfirst into one catastrophe after another, seemingly hell-bent on a path of destruction. Was it really worth risking her own life to save Monica’s?

She took another deep breath and pushed upright.
Ten years before, while still just a teenager herself, Nikki had left another another teenager just like Monica to his fate. He’d been a hell of a lot more capable of taking care of himself than Monica would ever be, and still he had died. This time around, she was not letting fate get the upper hand.

She eased off her jacket and studied the wound on her forearm. While the three gashes were bleeding profusely, the creature’s talons obviously hadn’t severed anything vital. She could still move her fingers, even if it did hurt like hell. She dug a handkerchief out of her pocket and wrapped it around the wound. She hoped it would stem the flow of blood long enough for her to find Monica and get out of this house.

After putting her jacket back on, she walked across to retrieve her flashlight, only to find that it no longer worked. The reason was easy enough to discover—the battery cover must have popped when she’d dropped it and the batteries had fallen out. She had a quick look around, but couldn’t find the damn things.

“That’s just great,” she muttered, thrusting the now useless flashlight back in her pocket. She’d have to cross the threshold into that utter darkness with only instinct to guide her.

Instinct that had proven somewhat unreliable in the past.

The hallway was quiet, but her gaze was drawn to the far end of the hall. Monica was down there somewhere. But so was the presence that tasted so evil.

She took a deep, calming breath, then walked back to the intersection. A tingle of awareness ran across the back of her neck as she neared the stairs. She hesitated, studying the shadows that hid the staircase.
The stranger had entered the house.
Michael Kelly
, Nikki thought.
His name is Michael Kelly
.

Nikki rubbed the back of her neck. Why could she read this stranger’s mind? And why had he entered the house? Was he here to help her, or did he have something more sinister in mind?

No answers came from the darkness, and the spark of awareness flickered and died. Nikki frowned but continued on. The rapid beat of her heart seemed abnormally loud in the silence. Her senses warned her of another door, even though she couldn’t see it. She ran her fingers along the wall and touched a door frame, then the cold metal of a knob. Stopping, she listened to the silence.

Evil was near, maybe even in the room beyond this door. She clenched the doorknob so tightly her fingers almost cramped and wondered why in hell she was doing this.

Except that she already knew. Monica reminded her of Tommy, the teenager she’d left to die so long ago. To appease his ghost—and to appease her guilt—she’d follow Monica through the flames of hell itself if that’s what it took to save her, simply because she’d been unable to save Tommy.

Swallowing, she opened the door. Laughter greeted her—laughter that was young and sweet, yet somehow cold.

Monica.

The teenager stepped forward, her smile clearly visible despite the shadows that hid her face.

“If you wish to talk to me,” she said, her voice melodious yet holding a touch of menace, “you must follow me first.”

Then she turned and walked into yet another room. Instinct urged Nikki not to follow—told her to run as far and as fast as she could. Told her Monica wasn’t worth dying for.

Yet it also told her that, if she ran, Monica would die in her place. And that was a burden she just couldn’t bear. Taking a deep breath, Nikki followed the teenager.

Straight into the arms of the devil himself.

B
Y
K
ERI
A
RTHUR

T
HE
R
IPPLE
C
REEK
W
EREWOLF
S
ERIES
Beneath a Rising Moon
Beneath a Darkening Moon

T
HE
D
ARK
A
NGELS
S
ERIES
Darkness Unbound
Darkness Rising

T
HE
M
YTH AND
M
AGIC
S
ERIES
Destiny Kills
Mercy Burns

T
HE
R
ILEY
J
ENSON
G
UARDIAN
S
ERIES
Full Moon Rising
Kissing Sin
Tempting Evil
Dangerous Games
Embraced by Darkness
The Darkest Kiss
Deadly Desire
Bound to Shadows
Moon Sworn