The Vampiric Housewife (41 page)

    
Rhett let the coward go. He never liked the vampire. But he would deal with him later. It wouldn’t take long to track his ass down and stake him. He had bigger problems on his plate at the moment. He ran back up to the fifteenth floor.

    
“The building’s on fire. We should get out now, sir,” he told his boss. The smoke and hot air wouldn’t injury him, but it would kill the doctor.

    
“No. That’s what they want. Flush us out. Shanahan’s got to be in here somewhere. Find him. I’ll alert the Sangre Fire Department. Go!”

    
The doctor was being irrational, but Rhett wasn’t about to argue.

    
Venjamin picked up a phone. “Ms. Pines? Ms. Pines?” He waited for a reply. There was nothing. He had never paged his secretary before and not received a prompt answer. He could not believe that she would leave the building without him. She must have succumbed to smoke inhalation. Without Ms. Pines he could not call the fire department directly, but they would see the flames and be on their way. Just in case . . .

    
“I thought you arrived to save your husband. I never believed for a moment that you wanted to make a deal. But now I think I underestimated you. You intended to take St. Vladimir down even if it meant giving your own life and your husband’s. But that’s not how it’s going to happen. I was tempted to use you. You see, I’m dying and my illness has made me rash. I thought I could risk using your blood to save myself, bring me immortality so I can complete my work. But you’re tainted. A savage, no better than these walking corpses! The only guarantee I have is in Amelia’s blood. You’re only out to destroy me. I don’t need you.” From the pocket of his lab coat, he retrieved his revolver. “It was Ethan that taught me never to be alone with a vampire unarmed.” He aimed the gun at Valerie’s chest. Her eyes darted around the room. There was no place to hide, no place to run. “Your death will be a loss to science. But sacrifices must be made.” He pulled the trigger. There was a loud pop and everything slowed down. The silver bullet left the barrel of the gun with a puff of smoke. Valerie closed her eyes preparing to accept her fate. Charlie who had been all but nonresponsive suddenly leaped in front of her, chair and all, his eye wide open. He knocked Valerie to the floor. She hit the side of her head, the earring with the GPS fell from her ear and rolled away. The bullet struck Charlie in the chest. He never even hit the ground. Ashes rained down all around her.

Chapter Forty-four

Bloodbath

    
Alessandro stood in the middle of the desert, teeth bared, an axe in each hand, his hair streaked red, blood dripping not only from the blades of his weapons but his chin and hands. In the sand around him laid six corpses in a circle, all of them headless. Dropping his axes to the ground, he retrieved a wooden stake from the jeep and pierced each torso in the heart reducing the bodies to ash as an extra precaution. There was a time in his life when he would have taken the heads as trophies. He had evolved though.

    
With the threat neutralized, he climbed back into the vehicle and headed towards Sangre Valley hoping his friends had as much success as him.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    
Ethan tore through office after office with no sign of Valerie, Charlie, or Venjamin. He found Venjamin’s pristine office. He rifled through the desk hoping to find a clue as to where they where. Instead he found mad ravings about singing blood, blood transfusions, and grandiose ideas of immortality, all saturated in the sickening self-congratulatory aplomb of a deranged man.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    
Charlie was gone. Just like that. No body to hug or mourn. No goodbyes. He gave his life to save hers, and she could never thank him.

    
Venjamin was just as stunned as she was by Charlie’s death. He stared at the ashes. Valerie recovered from her shock quicker than the doctor and struggled to get back on her feet while still in handcuffs. The pearl gleamed on the floor, she went after it tripping and falling on top of it. She cried out in pain and frustration.

    
“Where do you think you’re going?” Venjamin picked her up by the hair. Just as he did, the whole building trembled beneath their feet. The fire must be out of control. Venjamin looked nervously around. The whole building was going to come down.

    
The earring was in her hand. She pressed it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    
The red light jumped to life on Jonathan’s blackberry. She was upstairs, fifteenth floor. He went speeding up the stairs to the lobby. The walls trembled as the rampaging fire weakened the structure, the heat had intensified exponentially, and there was a cloud of black smoke so dense he could hardly see through it. Jonathan was no longer behind the receptionist’s desk but locked in combat with Rhett.

    
Rhett delivered a kick to Jonathan’s face knocking him off balance then swept his feet out from under him with another swift kick. Jonathan went down but managed to latch onto Rhett’s jacket and took him to the floor with him. They wrestled, Jonathan on top using Rhett’s face as a punching bag, but Rhett was able to push Jonathan off and bounced back onto his feet. He picked up the sprawled-out Jonathan and catapulted him across the lobby. Jonathan hit a wall and broke through it. Rhett stalked through the wreckage unconcerned with the flames around him and took Jonathan’s dazed head in his hands. Ethan knew he planned to rip his friend’s head from his body with his bare hands. He couldn’t let that happen.

    
Ethan flew at Rhett like a huge wild feline tackling him to the ground.

    
“Jonathan! Get the flash drive and get out! The building’s coming down!”

    
Jonathan staggered to his feet, grabbed the flash drive, and headed out of the hospital.

    
Both he and Rhett struggled back onto their feet.

    
“I’ve been waiting for this,” Rhett said spitting out a mouthful of blood. “A true challenge.”

    
They both lunged at each at the same moment meeting like two great gladiators with teeth bared, ready to rip out the other’s throat. Rhett had the better momentum and sent Ethan to the ground with a heavy thud and landed on top of him giving him the upper hand. But Ethan threw him over him head causing Rhett to crash into the receptionist’s desk. He back flipped on to his feet and without giving Rhett time to recover, he lifted his opponent into the air, twirled him around like a professional wrestler and released him into a fiery wall. The flames leaped onto his clothing consuming him in a blaze. Rhett screamed in agony as the fire devoured the flesh from his bones.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    
The flames had reached the top floor. A sulfuric smoke choked her lungs, the stifling heat suffocating her. Venjamin was coughing and pushing her towards the stairs, his fingers still tangled in her hair, tearing at her scalp. She fought back though. She wasn’t about to let him escape. Not after he murdered Charlie. She didn’t care if that meant sacrificing her own life. As long as Venjamin was dead, her children would be safe.

    
She head butted Venjamin with the back of her skull. He released her hair and clutched his bleeding nose. The scent of human blood was pungent.

    
“You bitch! I’m the one who saved you from a sad, pathetic life in a Romanian village. Your family could have murdered you on any given day. They knew what you were and it frightened them. But I saw that you were special. I saved you Valerie!”

    
“You imprisoned me!” she hissed. “You murdered my husband! You abused my children!”

    
He raised his gun once again. “I chose you for something special!”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    
Ethan had made it to the fifteenth floor. The room was dark and empty except for a vast quantity of medical equipment. Then he saw her, hands cuffed behind her back, hair falling into her face, but she was alive. Then his eyes found Venjamin and the little gun aimed at her heart.

    
“Valerie!” he called out pounding his fists on the two-way mirror.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    
With the speed of a vampire, she rushed him, knocked the gun out of his hand, and pinned him against a window. He was larger than her but not stronger. She kept him pinned with her chest using little effort. Her true strength had finally surfaced. “I promised myself that I’d never kill another human for food. I wouldn’t want your putrid blood in my body. I can kill you without drinking your blood.”

    
“Valerie—“

    
She sank her fangs into his neck and tore out a chunk of flesh; blood spurted out like a busted water main, drenching her in the sticky red liquid. He gave very little fight and she released him from her jaws spitting out the putrefied flesh she had bitten off.

    
“Immortality . . .” he gurgled as life drained out of him. “I was going to get it one way or another . . . I will live through my son, he will never die . . .”

    
Horror suddenly swept over Valerie. “What son? Venjamin! What son?”

    
He gave a weak laugh. “Harry . . .” He laughed again. “You didn’t miraculously get pregnant, Valerie . . . I inseminated one of your eggs with my sperm . . . it was a little experiment incase I didn’t discover a cure to death in time . . . My son . . .” With a final smile he was gone, his mouth agape, his eyes wide and empty.

    
The mirror on the wall exploded into shards and Ethan emerged from the debris.

    
“Valerie!”

    
She let Venjamin’s body slumped to the floor and slowly turned around. Her face and neck were soaked in blood as she looked up at him with those violet eyes. She had killed the man who threatened her family, yet somehow Venjamin still won.

    
“Are you alright?” he asked cupping her face in his hands and inspecting her for wounds. “Where’s Charlie?”

    
With her eyes she led him to the chair and the pile of ash on the floor. He just looked at it without comment.

    
“We have to get out of here. It’s going—“

     
A sudden explosion rocked the building, but it hadn’t come from inside the hospital. They both turned towards the window. The circular perimeter of Sangre Valley was collapsing into the ground, one house after another like dominos falling. The kids’ school, the Blood Market, their old house, all reduced to rubble. Marie and Bobby. Betsy. Lisa. All those vampires down there, the innocents who had no idea their lives were a lie, dead or trapped in the wreckage.

    
Ethan didn’t leave her time to ponder the fate of her neighbors. He flung her over his shoulder and whisked her down fifteen flights of stairs skipping three or four steps at a time. The ceiling beams crashed down around them. With each flight the heat and smoke intensified.

    
They reached the lobby; they were almost out, but Ethan stopped. Slowly and carefully he set Valerie down.

    
“What’s wrong?” she coughed, a hand over her mouth. Blocking the door stood Rhett, his clothes hanging off him in blackened shreds, the skin he had left was charred black like burnt meat, the rest of him was the raw red of muscle and blood. The whites of his eyes and teeth were blinding. The fire hadn’t killed him. It had only angered him.

    
Rhett attacked, strong despite his injuries. He knocked Ethan into a fiery wall. Ethan’s jacket caught fire. He pushed his attacker away then tore the jacket off before the fire could spread to his clothes or flesh. He went after Rhett with vengeance, both exchanging blows. Rhett’s fist met Ethan’s jaw, Ethan’s fists pummeled Rhett’s ribs. Rhett knocked Ethan’s legs out from under him. He fell with a heavy thud, the floor bending beneath him on the verge of collapse. Rhett was on top of him, his hand clawing at Ethan’s chest, his nails tearing through his shirt and digging into his flesh. He was aiming for Ethan’s heart. Ethan cried out unable to push Rhett off of him. His fingers had reached the bones of his ribs. In seconds he would have Ethan’s heart in his hand. Suddenly a flaming piece of wood protruded from Rhett’s chest, and he dissipated into a pile of ashes. Valerie stood over him, her silver handcuffs broken and dangling from her wrists like bracelets, a burning ceiling beam in her hand. She dropped the wood and pulled Ethan to his feet. Together they ran out of the building.