Jeff Smith stirred and glanced at Don Wallace. The old man was crazy. If there really was such a thing as a vampire, Jeff wanted to take advantage of the opportunity to become immortal. They had killed fourteen so-called vampires, and Jeff was fairly certain a couple of them had been the real thing. No human could have taken the kind of punishment Wallace had so eagerly dispensed and survived so long. Most of the victims definitely had been human, though, Wallace’s enemies. Don had really enjoyed those sessions.
Jeff was also certain Shea O’Halloran was no vampire. He had researched her very carefully. She had gone to a regular daytime school, had eaten in front of other children. She was a bona-fide surgeon, respected in her profession. A child prodigy, all her professors spoke highly of her. Jeff couldn’t get her out of his mind. Her voice, her eyes, the fluid, sexy way her body moved. The crazy old man was obsessed with finding her, and Don always did what his uncle said. Don’s uncle, old Eugene Slovensky, held the purse strings, and the money was considerable. If they found the woman, Jeff was not going to let them kill her. He wanted her for himself.
“Why do you think she’s is this area?” Slovensky demanded.
“She always uses cash, so we can’t follow a money trail, but she often leaves her signature behind anyway.” Don grinned, an evil facsimile of a smile. “She just has to help people in these isolated villages. It’s kind of amusing, really. She thinks she’s so clever, but she always makes the same mistake.”
Eugene Slovensky nodded. “The brilliant ones never have any common sense.” He cleared his throat nervously. “I sent word to the Vulture.”
Don Wallace’s hand jerked, and hot coffee spilled over his wrist. “Are you crazy, Uncle Eugene? He threatened to kill us if we didn’t leave the mountains the last time he saw us. The Vulture is a true vampire, and he doesn’t exactly like us.”
“You killed the woman,” Eugene said, “he warned you not to. I warned you not to. You just had to have your fun.”
Furious, Don hurled the mug across the room. “We’re hunting a woman right now. We’ve followed her for two years, and now that we’re close, you call in that killer. I should have put a stake through his heart when I had the chance. He’s a no-good vampire like the rest of them.”
Slovensky grinned, shook his head in denial. “Not like the rest of them. He hates, Donnie, my boy. He hates with an intensity I have never seen before. And that can always be useful for us. He wants a certain woman this time, the one with the long black hair. He wants her and those close to her dead. He has their trust, and he’ll deliver them into our hands. He may be beneath contempt, a snitch, but he is powerful.”
“All their woman have long black hair. How am I supposed to know the difference?” Don pouted. “Do you remember the kid? The one about eighteen? He hated that kid. He really wanted that kid to suffer.” He smiled with satisfaction. “He did, too. Most of all he hated the last one we caught, the one with the black eyes. He ordered me to torture him, burn him. He wanted it to last forever, and I made sure it did. The Vulture is evil, Uncle Eugene.”
Slovensky nodded. “Use him. Let him think you respect him, that he is the one in charge, giving the orders. Promise him the red-haired woman, too. Tell him we’ll give them both to him if he will deliver James’s murderers. My poor brother James.”
“I thought you said we needed to study her, that she wasn’t as strong as the others and we had a better chance of controlling her. In any case, she doesn’t have black hair.” Don got up abruptly and paced across the floor to hide his expression from the others. It had been far too long since he’d had a woman completely in his control. His body grew hot and hard at the memory of his time in the basement with the last one. She had lasted three delicious weeks, and every moment of it she had known he would eventually kill her. She had tried so hard to please him, done anything and everything to please him.
He wanted Shea O’Halloran in his hands for a long, long time. She would learn respect. The icy contempt in her vivid green eyes would be replaced with pleasing, begging. He fought to control himself, cursed the others sharing the small confines of the cabin keeping him from indulging his fantasies. Don turned his head to catch Smith watching him. His mask slipped into place, his friendly smile. Smith was weak, always whining. He got off watching Don perform, but he rarely had the guts to do anything exotic himself. One of these days, Don resolved he would show Smith just how weak he really was. Their longtime partnership was coming to an end.
Slovensky dragged a blanket around his shoulders. In his sixties, he felt the chill of the rain seep into his bones. He detested these mountains and all the memories that came with them. Twenty-five years ago he had brought his younger brother, James, on a vampire hunt with other members of a secret society dedicated to wiping out the loathsome creatures. They had trapped a vampire, but it had killed James.
Shea O’Halloran was the key to all of it now. He would use her to ferret out his brother’s murderers and deliver retribution, as they deserved. Donnie would put a stake through the Vulture’s heart and rid the world of a detestable worm. And then the society could study the woman, obtain the proof they needed to be finally recognized as scientists, as they deserved.
“How long are we going to be stuck in this hellhole?” Smith demanded.
Wallace and Slovensky exchanged another long, knowing look. Wallace shrugged, pulled out a pack of cigarettes, and shook one loose. “You should know by now never to go outdoors when the land is so unsettled. It means they’re out tonight.”
“Every time it rains we’re locked in? Damn, Don, the least we could have done was get decent accommodations.”
“Stop whining,” Slovensky snapped. “The last thing we want to do is advertise our presence here. They control the locals, bind them to them in some way so that the villagers are loyal to them.”
Jeff turned away from them, staring out at the darkening land. Slovensky was a total whacko. Wallace he had met in college. Don had been everything Jeff was not. Cocky, self-assured, handsome, and tough. Wallace had cornered one of Jeff’s constant tormentors, held him, and encouraged Jeff to beat the kid to death. The sense of power was incredible, and the two of them became inseparable. Don was sadistic, violent. He’d enjoyed watching snuff films, shared the experience with Jeff, and eventually became obsessed with the idea of making them. Jeff filmed Don’s private performances, each of which became a classroom for torture. At first they’d used prostitutes, but twice they were able to lure a student to their warehouse. Afterward, Don was always mellow for several weeks, a month or two even, if the sessions had been to his liking. Jeff knew that the need to kill was riding Don hard now, and anyone close to him had better keep a low profile.
When the older man went outside to relieve himself, Jeff went to stand beside Don. “You ever think what it would be like, the power we’d have if we forced one of them to make us like them?” He whispered it softly to be sure Slovensky could not possibly overhear what he would consider sacrilege. “We’d be immortal, Don. We could have anything we ever wanted. Any woman we wanted. We could do anything.”
Wallace was silent for a few minutes. “We’d need to find out more about them. Most of what I know, the old man and his freaky friends told me, and it’s probably all bullshit.”
“You sure?”
“Superstitious crap. All the people around here are superstitious. They believe these vampires can direct your mind, even shape-change. If they had all these great powers, Jeff, why didn’t they use them when we were having-fun with them?”
Jeff shrugged, disappointed. “Maybe you’re right. But they just hang on to life so long...” He trailed off.
“Hate keeps them alive.” Don laughed in anticipation. “They’re almost as much fun as women.” He looked thoughtful. “But there’s the Vulture.”
The sun gave up its feeble fight, the storm and the late hour completely obliterating its paltry light. The sky darkened still further, and the clouds grew heavier. The wind began to strengthen, driving the rain so that it pelted the ground hard enough to bruise leaves and vegetation. A low moan rose, echoed through grotesquely swaying branches.