Kiss of Death Page 0,63

limp again. His skin started to smolder from the silver. "You can't--," she began, and Morley turned on her, his face hard. "It might have dawned on you by now that I can," he snapped. "It might also have occurred to you that this boy is not one of my little flock. Doesn't that make you at all alarmed, Claire?"

"I--"

"It should," he said, "because apart from those vampires gathered in Morganville, there shouldn't be more. Amelie, whatever you think of her, is a thorough sort. Those who didn't agree to participate in her social experiment in Morganville were put down. There are no vampires still walking that I don't know." He nudged the boy with one worn boot. "But I don't know him, or his pack of jackals who just ate my supplies!"

"Pack?" Claire looked up, startled, at another thump and crash from upstairs. Morley ignored her and dashed for the stairs, racing in a blur. There was screaming up there. "Hey, wait! Ate your--supplies--you don't mean--" Morley got to the top of the stairs and disappeared before she could manage another word. "My friends?" she finished lamely, and then blinked, because two seconds after Morley had crossed out of sight, Michael emerged from the shadows up there, with Shane beside him. Michael was carrying Eve, who still seemed unconscious. They came down the stairs fast, and Claire didn't like the tense worry she saw on Michael's face--or on Shane's. "We have to go," Michael said. "Now. Right now."

"What about Oliver? And Jason?"

"No time," Michael said. "Move it, Claire."

"My stake--"

"I'll make you a shiny new one," Shane promised. He sounded short of breath, and he grabbed her hand and towed her at a fast limp after Michael, who was heading down the hall for the broken window where they'd entered. "You all right?"

"Sure," she said, and controlled a wince as she came down wrong, again, on her ankle. But in the great scheme of things, yeah, she was all right--more all right than the people upstairs, from what Morley had said. "What is going on up there?"

"Morley's having a very bad day," Michael said. "Tell you later. Right now, we need to get out of here before--"

"Too late," Shane said, in a flat, quiet voice, and the four of them stopped in the middle of the hall as two vampires glided out of the shadows at either end, blocking them in. One was a shuffling, twisted old man with crazy eyes and drifting white hair. The other was a young man, wearing a football jersey--teammate of the vamp Claire had already staked, she guessed. This one was broader than Shane, and taller. Like the old man, he looked ... weird; crazy, even for a vampire. "Give," the old man said in a rusty, strange voice. "Give."

"Holy crap, that's creepy," Shane said. "Okay, plans? Anybody?"

"In here." Michael slammed his foot against the door on the opposite side of the hall and blew it back on the hinges with a splintering crash. Shane hustled Claire ahead of him into the room, and Michael jumped in after, slamming the door in the faces of the two vampires and shoving his back against it. "Barricade!"

"On it!" Shane said, and nodded for Claire to grab the other end of a heavy wooden desk, which they slid across the floor to block the door as Michael, with Eve in his arms, jumped effortlessly up onto the desk's top and then lightly down as it slid past. "Think that'll hold?"

"Hell no," Michael said. "Did you see that guy?" Eve stirred in his arms, murmuring, and he looked down at her, his face going still with concern. As she restlessly turned her head, Claire saw a matted spot in her hair--blood, almost invisible against the black. "What happened?" Claire blurted. Michael shook his head. "I don't know," he said. "She got on Morley's bad side," Shane said. "He backhanded her into a wall. She hit her head on the corner. I thought--" He went quiet for a second. "Scared the shit out of me. But she's okay, right?"

"I don't know," Michael said. "Well, use your superpowers or something!"

"I'm a vampire, idiot. I don't have X-ray vision."

"Some supernatural monster you are," Shane said. "Remind me to trade you in for a werewolf, bro. Probably be more useful right now." Claire ignored the two of them and moved to the other side of the room. There was a window, but as she unlocked it and threw up the sash--which didn't