"What-?"
"Shh," Lucian hushed him. "Listen."
Decker turned back to the field and listened, picking up the faraway sounds of a man yelling and a woman shrieking in high, alarmed tones. "No!" and then, "No Dani!"
Decker's feet were moving even before the name had died. Aware that his uncle was on his heels, he flew across the field, moving so fast his feet hardly seemed to set down on the dirt as he tore through the plants.
The scene he arrived on was one Decker thought would stick in his mind for a very long time. Dani had an elderly man in jeans and a checkered top pinned to the ground, her knees resting on his shoulders as she held his head still and madly licked at his forehead. She appeared completely oblivious to the man's struggles, and even to the equally elderly woman in a cotton dress who was on Dani's back, trying to drag her off, screaming, "Stop that! Stop licking my husband. Have you lost your mind? Leave him alone!"
Decker lifted the woman off Dani, turned to hand her to Lucian, and then turned back to find Dani had given up on the forehead and was now following the dried blood trail down his cheek to his neck.
"Stop her!"
Decker didn't need that shout from Lucian; he was already catching Dani by the arms and yanking her away from the man she was assaulting.
"No," she moaned, struggling weakly to shake him off. "I want more."
"Dani," he said sharply, spinning her around.
She raised her head, her eyes settling on his face and widening. "Decker," she breathed with relief. "You found us. Thank God. Now you can kill me."
When Dani then sagged against his chest, Decker closed his arms around her. His eyes moved to the elderly man as he got shakily to his feet, and then to the older woman before he asked grimly, "What happened?"
The woman rushed to her husband's side as Lucian released her. Slipping a supportive arm around his waist, she peered at him briefly, and then glanced to Decker.
"I don't know," she admitted, her worried eyes shifting to Dani. "That man must have drugged her or something. She was sick when we broke out of the basement, but then as we were escaping on the tractor she started licking on John. When I tried to make her stop, she tossed him off the tractor like a rag doll and leaped out after him. By the time I got the tractor stopped and jumped out, she was on him like a dog on a bone." She shook her head and repeated, "He must have drugged her. There's something wrong with that girl."
"Leonius," Lucian said suddenly, and Decker turned to see his eyes concentrated on Dani. He'd obviously been reading what had happened from her mind. His uncle shifted his gaze to him and announced, "Leonius took her from the mall and brought her to their house." He gestured to the house visible across the field. "He forced her to drink his blood, and then left her in the basement to make a meal of them while he went in search of another victim for himself, but they escaped."
"Jesus," Decker breathed, peering down at Dani. She was leaning heavily against him, her knuckle in her mouth, rocking slightly and moaning with what sounded like pain.
"Get them to the house and get Dani strapped down. I'm going to their place to wait for Leo," Lucian ordered. He then turned and sprinted across the field toward the house next door.
Decker watched him go, and then tugged Dani's finger from her mouth, wincing as he saw the damage she'd done to it.
"No," she moaned, and tried to raise it to her mouth again, but Decker caught her hand in his and twisted it behind her back as he scooped her into his arms. He managed to trap her other hand between their bodies so that she wouldn't then start gnawing on that one. Dani immediately began to struggle, but he merely crushed her closer and turned to the couple.
John and Hazel Parker, Decker plucked the name from their thoughts as he glanced over the man. He appeared to have recovered from his run-in with Dani. Decker nodded toward the woods ahead and said, "That way."
Nodding, the man took his wife by the hand and began to lead her toward the woods.
Chapter Fifteen
Something cold dripping onto Dani's closed lips stirred her from the exhausted, almost unconscious state she'd worked herself into as Decker had carried her through the woods. Opening her eyes, she found him kneeling over her and glanced around with confusion to see she was tied down to the bed in her room. Since the bed was without a bed frame or headboard, the rope had simply been tied to one wrist, somehow passed under the bed, and then brought up to tie to her other wrist. The same had been done with her ankles. Primitive, but effective, she decided as she tugged at the rope and found the weight of the bed held her in place.
Dani didn't recall how she'd gotten there and realized she must have zoned out for a bit. She remembered fighting frantically to make Decker put her down, or at least just release her hand so she could suck her knuckle again, but he had ignored her as he'd herded the Parkers to the house. By the time they'd gotten there, she'd been really out of it. She had vague recollections of Sam, Mortimer, Justin, and Leigh crowding around them, thought Mortimer had ordered Justin to take care of the Parkers while he went to help Lucian, and then all she could recall were walls and ceilings swimming overhead and now this.
"Open up."
Rolling her head, Dani peered up at Decker, noting that his expression was grim and closed as he held a bag of blood over her mouth. "I don't want-"
The words died in her throat as he tipped the bag of blood, pouring some of the cold, red liquid into her mouth. The moment the cool, life-giving blood splashed onto her tongue, Dani forgot about telling him she didn't want to be an animal like Leo and that he should just kill her now. Instead she opened her jaws wider and swallowed greedily as the liquid flowed in.
It was like a cool cloth on a burn, easing her agony and beating it briefly back, but all too soon the bag was empty and the pain came roaring back like a riot of hoodlums charging up through her body demanding more. Dani was gasping under the attack when the door opened and Sam and Leigh rushed in, carrying three bags of blood each.
"We brought more," Sam announced as the two women rushed forward, their worried gazes on her.
"Thank you." Decker took a bag from Sam and used his teeth to rip off one corner. He then leaned over Dani to tip it over her mouth. She opened her lips eagerly, sighing as the cold blood slid down her throat, taming the riotous crowd inside.