A Chase of Prey (A Shade of Vampire #11)(19)

“O-okay,” I gasped, clutching my head in my hands, trying to stem the bleeding with my sleeve.

Caleb swerved left again and then screeched the vehicle to a stop. The black truck rushed past us, taking longer to slow down. My whole body trembled as Caleb stepped out of the vehicle.

He disappeared from my vision as he lurched forward into gunfire that shattered the front windscreen. I ducked down as glass rained down on me. I closed my eyes tight and covered my ears with my hands, trying to block out the noises and hear only my harried breathing. But the gunshots were deafening. They were impossible to block out.

Shouts pierced the air. I hoped that Caleb would finish them off soon. The sun would once again be beating down on him, making this doubly difficult.

Stay down. He told me to stay down.

But why is the gunfire continuing? He should have disarmed them already.

When the gunfire continued for what felt like five more minutes, I just couldn’t stay down any longer. I raised my head slightly so I could glimpse over the dashboard.

Three men lay dead and bleeding on the floor. The back of the truck was wide open. Caleb stood inside with another man who was trying to corner him with a machine gun. Caleb rammed into him, knocking the weapon from his hands and slitting his throat. He held the man in front of him as a shield. As he motioned to step back out into the sun, two more men appeared outside the truck and aimed fire.

And then it happened.

A third man still standing outside lurched beneath the bumper of the vehicle and pulled down a lever. The door to the armored truck slammed shut. He fastened the bolt. There was a violent banging against the door. But there were no signs of it opening again.

I blinked, barely believing my eyes. They couldn’t just trap Caleb like that. Why wasn’t he breaking free? “No,” I gasped. “No.”

Wiping sweat and blood from their faces, two of the men turned toward me. I sank to the floor, trembling. I shook my head. No, he’ll escape. He’ll escape.

My heart hammered in my chest as footsteps approached. I cast my eyes about for any sign of a gun, any means of defending myself. But I couldn’t see anything. I huddled further beneath the dashboard. The two men approached the driver’s seat of our truck. I caught the flash of a blade. One of the men tore it into the driver’s seat, cutting all around the fabric and removing it entirely.

They pulled from it a black canvas bag. Unzipping it, they pulled out plastic bags filled with a powdery substance.

They muttered to each other in Portuguese as they examined the bags. Seemingly satisfied, they placed the plastic bags back in the canvas bag and zipped it up again. One of the men picked the bag up and then footsteps walked away. I thought they were about to leave without noticing me, but then the door I was leaning against clicked open. I found myself looking up into the eyes of a tall tan man with long greasy hair. Blood and dirt covered his face and arms.

He yelled out in Portuguese to his friend who also came hurrying over—a shorter man with cropped hair. They both chuckled as they ogled me. The man with long hair reached down and gripped my arm, forcing me to stand.

“No!” I screamed. Lowering my mouth to his wrist, I dug my teeth into his flesh as hard as I could.

He yelped and jumped back, nursing his arm. The shorter man gripped me round the waist and wrestled me to the ground. The banging against the back of the black truck intensified as I shouted. But as I strained my head to look up, there were still no signs of it opening.

The man held me in a chokehold, wrapping my arms tightly behind my back until it felt they might snap from my shoulders. He forced me up again. I tried to stomp on his feet and headbutt him with the back of my head, but he dodged and only tightened his grip on me with each attempt I made.

I screamed again, but immediately regretted that I had. Caleb was in enough torment already—my screaming would only worsen his suffering. It was for his sake that I bit my lip until it bled, forcing myself to stay quiet.

The man shoved me up into the passenger area at the front of the truck and lodged me between him and another man who was waiting for them there. The man I’d bitten took the driver’s seat and started the engine. They continued talking in Portuguese.

“Caleb,” I shouted as loud as I could, hoping he could hear me back there. I wasn’t sure if he would—these walls must be reinforced. But the banging stopped. “I’m okay.”

Okay. If this situation was anything, it was not okay.

I glared at the two men holding me in place. Then my eyes fell on the black canvas bag they’d retrieved from the driver’s seat of our truck. I wondered, had that cursed bag of narcotics not been hidden beneath the driver’s seat, whether they would have bothered tracking us down the way they had.

“You are the Californian girl. Rose.” The man next to me grinned through yellowed teeth. It was more of a statement than a question.

I bit my lip and stared at the ground, refusing to indulge his questions. I guessed Luis’ runaway man had already told them. I wondered why he hadn’t accompanied them. I supposed that Caleb had scared him too much to want to come near him again.

“Well, we ought to get to know each other,” the short-haired man who’d wrestled me to the ground said. “I’m Phillipe.” He pointed to the man on the other side of me. “That’s Guillerme. And driving is Miguel.”

Miguel didn’t bother looking back at me. I noticed with satisfaction that his arm was still bleeding from my bite.