“Then drink, Scoville, and be mine.”
Scoville cupped Christian’s hand in both of his, holding it reverently as he leaned forward to lap up the blood. He licked Christian’s palm nearly clean, then followed the flow of red up to his wrist, where he latched on and began sucking.
Christian imagined that he could feel every tug of Scoville’s mouth from his vein all the way to his heart. This was going to cost him before the battle was over. He needed all of his strength for what was coming, but he couldn’t simply let Scoville die. He wasn’t Anthony. He lifted his other hand, ready to tap the vamp out, to tell him that it was time to stop . . . When suddenly there was a surge of power nearby.
“Scoville,” he said urgently. “Enough.” He disengaged without waiting, holding his wrist, and squeezing the two sides of the wound together. It would heal fast, but not fast enough. Not for what was coming. “Marc,” he said, turning to his lieutenant. “I need to wrap this right now.”
Marc nodded and ran for the chopper, which was still on the ground, rotor still turning. There was a first aid kit in there. Christian had noticed it on the flight over. Marc disappeared into the helicopter briefly, then jumped down with the white metal box in his hand. He opened it and set it on the wall. Scoville had slipped all the way to the ground and now sat there, breathing slow and heavy, almost as if he was drugged. Which he was, in a way. Christian only hoped he’d come around before Hubert attacked.
Ripping open a roll of gauze, Marc wrapped Christian’s torn wrist, layer after layer, using almost the entire roll, before he ripped the material off and dropped the roll back into the box. Tearing the end in two, he tied off the bandage, then looked up to study Christian carefully. “Are you good to go?” he asked.
Christian nodded, flexing his hand and wrist as he yanked his T-shirt sleeve back down. “It takes more than this to knock me out of a fight.”
“That’s good, because if what I’m feeling is right—”
“It is,” Christian confirmed.
“Then hell itself is about to descend on us.”
Christian agreed completely with Marc’s assessment. Hell was indeed about to descend on them, and all he had to fight it with was Marc and a blood-drunk Scoville. “I’ll take Hubert,” he told Marc. “You and Scoville—” He looked down at the sated vampire. “You ready to fight?” he asked.
The vampire sucked in a deep breath, shook all over like a wet dog, then climbed to his feet slowly, but with surprising grace. “Ready and willing, my lord,” he said, his voice gravelly but strong. “Let’s kill those fuckers.”
“Fuckin’ A,” Marc agreed.
Christian smiled, despite the grim circumstances. “I don’t know what Hubert’s bringing to the fight, but I guarantee we’ll be badly outnumbered. So we fight as a team, covering each other’s backs. Once Hubert shows his face, I’ll go after him. We have a history, and he’ll want to settle it. I was supposed to be fighting with him, not against him. But no one checked with me first. I had no interest in gaining the South for him when I wanted it for myself. That didn’t make him happy. So I think he’ll want a one-on-one. That means I shouldn’t have to worry about his other vampires coming at me while we’re fighting, but stay alert in case I’m wrong.”
Marc didn’t look happy about the plan, but he nodded his agreement. Scoville’s nod was more matter-of-fact, a warrior obeying orders. Christian was his sworn lord now. That two-minute ceremony was all they needed. Everything else was irrelevant.
“Do we have any guns?” Marc asked Scoville. “Those would help even the odds.”
He grunted an affirmative, but said, “Guns aren’t the problem. It’s ammo. We used everything we had in fighting off Hubert’s creatures. Have you seen those fuckers? They’re vampires, but not like anything I’ve ever seen. They’re like—”
“Zombies,” Christian supplied, and Scoville nodded.
“That’s exactly it. It’s like they’re alive, but not. Like they don’t have a mind of their own.”
“I don’t think they do. I’ve seen Hubert do this before, though on a smaller scale. The poor souls he turned had no purpose other than to serve him.”
“Fucking creepy is what it is. But they’re effective. They swarm like insects, simply overrun you until you can’t even move. We must have killed thirty or forty of them, injured more, but it didn’t stop them. As long as they could crawl, they kept coming.”
“But you killed some of them, and they’re too new to dust when they die. Which means they carried away their dead,” Christian observed thoughtfully. “Hubert didn’t know you had survived, and he didn’t want me to see the bodies. Maybe he feared I’d retreat right away to wait for reinforcements, and he doesn’t want that. He wants me here, with no one but Marc to back me up.”
“And me,” Scoville reminded him.
“But you’re supposed to be dead.”
“I nearly was, and I’d prefer he didn’t get another go at it. So let’s talk ammo. We can probably salvage four mags, thirty rounds each. The weapons are MP5s. You know how to operate one?” he asked Marc.
“Of course,” Marc said, his tone conveying his insult at the question. Marc had been in the military when Christian found him, and he remained a military man, through and through. Even though he was a vampire now, with power and strength he’d never had as a human, he still kept up on human weaponry of all kinds, big and small.
“Had to ask,” Scoville said, by way of apology. “Let’s see what we can round up.” He turned for the deserted building and Marc followed.
Christian remained outside while the two of them disappeared into the outpost. He kept a mental eye on Marc. Scoville had sworn to him, but Christian didn’t fully trust him yet. Not with Marc’s life. Standing in the yard, he studied the battlefield, hands braced on his hips. The outpost was in a desolate area, with no other structures for miles on all sides. He could see the dim lights of a single structure in the distance, probably industrial from the number and location of the lights. Far beyond that were the much brighter lights of Laredo. It was unlikely anyone would come from there to investigate. He hoped not, because humans could only die in the coming battle, and this wasn’t their fight.
Turning his head to look in the other direction, Christian saw nothing but endless black desert, dotted with clumps of cactus in the moonlight. There were plenty of low hills out there in the darkness, more than enough to hide an army. Christian opened his senses to a cautious probe, but he was immediately swamped with the life force of so many vampires that he couldn’t count them all. And hiding behind them, or driving them forward, was Hubert. Christian knew Hubert well. He and Mathilde had been friends of a sort, and Christian had spent decades in Mathilde’s court. He knew the taste of Hubert’s power, the feel of his mind. And he had no doubt that it was Hubert he’d be facing tonight.
“Marc,” he called, then waited until his lieutenant poked his head through the open doorway.