Werewolf Nights (The Pack Trilogy Book 2) (14 page)

The Vampire With The Golden Gun

The Huntress Trilogy Book #1

by Chanel Smith

(read on for a sample)

Prologue

The breeze was cool and moist and it felt fresh on Veronica’s face, bringing with it the faint smell of orange blossoms and Californian buckwheat; both of which she loved. It was somehow the perfect requiem to the purpose of her visit to the cemetery yard in Whittier that night and as she sat perched atop the steeple of the mission-style building staking out the grounds below her, she felt a wave of purposefulness sweep over her.

There was no way of her knowing how long she would be waiting out there in the night air and the darkness, so she had been sure to feed early and feed well on the fresh supply of hemoglobin that she had picked up from a local supplier a few days before. He was a good, reliable source. A conscientious old Chinese vampire in San Francisco’s Chinatown, he ran a few of the last remaining underground blood dens in the western hemisphere. Once a week, Veronica took a quick trip north to collect her supplies and indulge in a little of the secretive ‘Chinese Tong’ atmosphere that existed in Mr. Tan’s many opium rooms.

Veronica loved the dark underbelly of San Francisco’s trendy sub-culture; the drug scene, the music scene, the gothic supernatural scene that didn’t seem to exist anywhere else in that magnitude besides New Orleans. She felt at home there entwined with strangers dressed in black vinyl on the low leather settees in the darkened basements. While some made love, others got high, and while some fed, many were fed upon. It was symbiotic and undemanding and it drew her in constantly. But her time with Mr. Tan was done for the week and here she was staking out a cemetery, waiting to attend to her latest mission.

A few weeks prior, an elder vampire by the name of Fariha de Sanabria had been sent to the ‘Final Death’ by an unknown killer. The rumors on the street had it that a human had done it. The more she pried, the more Veronica picked up tidbits about the whole affair. It was becoming common knowledge among the L.A. vamps that there was a renegade killer operating in the area. A man who tracked down vampires, broke into their places of abode and gunned them down with a crossbow. A crossbow with silver tipped arrows. Apparently he was damned good, too. He had caught Fariha in the open and impaled her to a tree with an arrow through the heart. Right in the middle of a park over in Yorba Linda to boot.

Fariha’s demise hadn’t bothered Veronica in the least; in fact, she had been more than just a little relieved. The three hundred year old Moor had been as skilled a fighter and killer as they came, and Veronica had not been looking forward to the day when she would have encountered her. And she would have eventually done so, because Fariha was a coven maker and that type of shit did not go down well with modern day vampires.

She ‘stole’ people from their human lives, feeding on them until they were too close to death to deny her. So, of course when she asked them if they wanted to live or die, they chose to live. To live the life she would give them. She had made a record six progeny in the last year and, in the opinion of most of the elder vampires, she was doing a piss-poor job of educating them and keeping them in line. They now saw her and her growing coven of hooligan fledglings as a threat. Why else was she procreating? So the human hunter had dealt with Fariha, and now Veronica had assigned herself to deal with Fariha’s children.

It wasn’t long after midnight that the six dark figures emerged from the crypt below a broken down, neglected mausoleum that seemed to hide in the shade of two weeping oak trees. Veronica caught the scent of death on them and cocked her head to one side as she took a head count. They were finely dressed in what she could only envision was authentic vintage clothing from Fariha’s wardrobe. The leather of their jackets, corsets and pants was aged, yet supple and luxurious; the brocade silks of the skirts and vests shone with gem-like colors and fine needlework. Veronica counted six baby vampires.

They were weak, vicious, starving. It was hunting time and they were working themselves into a mad frenzy. They had gained a bit of a reputation of having no moral standard and no self-control. Since the death of their maker, the pain of her loss seemed to have driven them into further depravity because of late, children, passersby, joggers, commuters, baby sitters… no one had been safe. They killed without discrimination, not even bothering to seek out the feeding houses and blood banks in the area.

Veronica would be sure to wipe them out.

One of the males paused on their way toward the cemetery gates and sniffed at the air as if he had caught the scent of something strange. It took him and the others a few minutes to come to the conclusion that their senses were correct, but that was all the time it took for the Huntress to make it all too late for them. Veronica floated swiftly down from the high steeple and landed soundlessly on the ground behind them. She quickly arranged herself into a position from which she would be able to move among them in a perfect arc. She unsheathed her silver-bladed Katana and the mahogany silver tipped stake and, in the blink of a human eye, she had powered through the group, removing every head clean from its shoulders and driving the wooden spikes straight through every heart.

She twirled one more time and as the tails of her long black coat came to settle around her calves, Veronica looked up and watched the six headless figures burst into flames simultaneously among the headstones of the Rose Hills Memorial Park. She smiled as she walked out of the gates, sheathing her weapons at her side.

***

San Juan Capistrano. The city is the site of the Catholic mission for which it is named, Mission San Juan Capistrano and after Giovanni da Capistrano, a Franciscan saint from the Italian region of Abruzzo. Within its limits can be found one of California's oldest residential neighborhoods, Los Rios. It is the home of the oldest in-use building in California, the Serra Chapel in the Mission. Despite all its rich history, the area is probably best known at present for being the home of both the first vineyard and the first winery in California.

It was also the locale of Johnston McCulley's first Zorro novella,
The Curse of Capistrano
, published in 1919, which was later renamed
The Mark of Zorro
after the success of the film of the same name.

It was in a forgotten grotto below the old mission that Veronica Melbourne now sheltered. She had solemnly accepted some help from one of Mr. Tan’s many trusted colleagues to find the place after several disconcerting discoveries of her previous nests. There was nothing more frightening for a vampire of any disposition, than the thought of being discovered and brought out into the light of day as they slept helplessly.

As she sat on the edge of her twin-sized cot and looked around the dark, damp room, she sighed heavily.

I live like a fucking rat!
she thought.
I really need a paying job, and fast. Maybe if I had a steady stream of income, I could afford a nice, light-tight apartment near the Haight-Ashbury in San Fran. That would be awesome!

Veronica sighed again. She knew many vampires in the California supernatural community, but she didn’t know of even one who lived like she now did. She vaguely remembered being told by an elder vamp about how they acquired property and wealth and managed to live fairly well-to-do lives without having to work a day in their ‘second life.’

She shook her head.

Stealing from the dead has got to be just about as much bad luck as speaking ill of them.

She decided that she preferred the holes in the ground under churches that she had been reduced to than glamoring some dead person’s attorney into adding her to their will or, even worse, some bank teller into keying thousands or even millions into her checking account, knowing full well the poor employee would be subjected to federal investigation and subsequent incarceration for it.

No way, Jose!

But then again, she had always been a prideful girl.

Chapter One

A few days later, Veronica sat in a street side café in the shopping district on Old Town Calabasas, sipping a room-temperature drink and doing her favorite thing; celebrity watching. The waitress attempted to approach her table for what must have been the third time since she had sat down and Veronica noticed when Ryu, her usual waiter, held onto the girl’s elbow to stop her and shook his head discreetly. A few moments later, he went over to her table carrying a small box.

“This came in for you today by courier, Miss Melbourne,” he said, smiling confidently.

Damn, he was so fucking hot. There’s just no way he doesn’t know that!

She took her time looking the man up and down, feasting on him with her eyes, even as her fangs began to tingle and the crimson saliva filled her mouth.

She swallowed hard and barely managed to reply, “Thank you, Ryu.”

Veronica took the box and put it down on the table beside her. As curious as she was about its contents, she returned her gaze to the Asian-American man that was consuming her attention. His arms were long and muscular and completely covered in full sleeves of colorful
yakuza
style tattoos. She looked closer and noticed that there were traces of black line and colored images peeking out from just above the stiff collar of his white starched work shirt as well.

I wonder if he’s wearing one of those full suit tattoos I’ve heard so much about?

It was difficult to find even the most enthusiastic human canvas who would commit to that these days. Outside of the pain, there was the sheer expense of it to consider too. His right arm showed the brazen defiance of the oriental phoenix as it twisted up his arm, surrounded by flames and petals that were falling from the blooming branches of
sakura
trees. The left depicted the curving undulating body of the dragon engulfed in billowing clouds and images of Taoist gods and goddesses herding and feeding flowing streams of colorful koi fish.

Beautiful.

Ryu handed her a delivery form and a pen and after a quick glance over it, Veronica signed it and handed it back to him.

“Another ‘Bloody Scary’?” he asked, to which she nodded affirmatively before he turned and headed back inside the café.

‘
Bloody Scary’! How amusing! It looks like a Bloody Mary, but it’s really just blood with a plastic stalk of celery in it! And it was served at an appetizing body temperature. Human body temperature, that is.

It was a bestselling drink on the after-hours menu at the Beast café. The proprietors and the night staff at this particular restaurant were what she considered paranormally sympathetic. They were in the know about all kinds of beings of her particular condition – the undead condition – and provided a place where supernatural beings of all types could dine, imbibe and socialize under the guise of appearing quite ‘normal.’

Don’t be so shocked… its Calabasas. You didn’t really think all these beautiful creatures that you worship as celebrities from the other side of the television were human. Did you? Come on, get real!

She picked up the glass and drained it just as the waitress appeared and placed the fresh glass in front of her. It was still warm to the touch, a little bit of style that they had at the Beast which Veronica was ever thankful for. Other places served the hemoglobin chilled, just as it was best preserved. She had heard that some vampires even drank it that way. She, on the other hand, preferred it as close to coming from the vein as she could get it, and that meant it got a cursory zap in the microwave before making its way to the table. Before the new girl could offer her a menu for the umpteenth time, Veronica waved her away and turned her attention to the box on the table. She sliced the tape open with a razor sharp fingernail and pulled the flaps apart.

Inside was a flat, black box which she pulled out and laid on the table. She pushed the two metal clasps open and lifted the lid, her curiosity getting the better of her. On a bed of black velvet, Veronica found a beautiful Beretta BU9. She had always wanted a compact pistol like that. It was the perfect conceal carry weapon; tiny but powerful and certainly deadly. But there was one strange thing about the firearm and she mulled it over in her head as she ran her long, cold fingers over it, lifting it from the case to feel the heft of it in her hand.

The gun was coated in solid gold plating.

As she sat there admiring the weapon, suddenly a soft voice seemed to whisper in her ear.

“Welcome to the club,” it said.

Veronica whipped around in her seat trying to see where the words came from but there was no one in sight. She sniffed the air tentatively, nothing out of the ordinary. Just humans, supes, weres, ghosts, vampires. The usual. She shook her head, raised her nose higher into the gentle breeze that was blowing and took a deep breath.

Hmmm. There’s something else too. What is that? Talc?

Quickly, she placed the Beretta back in the box and noticed a small, black, manila envelope. She took it out of the box and turned it over in her hand. The seal was wax and red. The insignia on it was of an open-mouthed gargoyle.

Who seals envelopes with wax anymore?