Vampire Zero (Laura Caxton, #3)(48)

Main floor next. The central foyer was empty. So were the offices—Sister Margot’s office door was wide open and Caxton glanced inside, found nothing. She hurried to the other wing and the big dining hall. The long wooden tables had been cleared off and the rolling carts full of bused bowls and tableware long since trundled away. Caxton studied the long, sharp shadows of the big room with her mini flashlight but found nothing, not so much as a mouse.

She turned to go, not sure where to check next, when a noise made her shoulders jump up around her ears. It was a sound that would have made her jump at any time, but at that particular moment it nearly made her squeal in terror.

It was the sound of a dropped spoon bouncing on a flagstone floor. A jangling, pealing sound, as loud as cannon fire in the still dining hall.

Caxton dashed across the big room and knocked open the door at the far end with her shoulder. Beyond lay the kitchen—a room full of big prep tables and wide sinks, with iron pots and skillets dangling from the ceiling on hooks. Caxton’s flashlight beam shattered as it passed through the hanging pans and griddles and showed her odd-?shaped patches of the wall beyond. She moved quickly to the side of the room and hurried toward its back, where the food was stored in massive walk-?in pantries. Caxton licked her lips. They had suddenly gone very dry. She moved slowly, quietly, toward the open door—then threw it back all at once.

Her flashlight shone down like an accusing finger on Raleigh, who kneeled on the floor, her face upturned and wracked with terror. She held an open jar of honey in one hand. It was her spoon that had fallen to the floor.

“I thought you were fasting in your uncle’s memory,” Caxton said, suddenly very angry. She fought to control herself.

“Do you know how hard it is to eat nothing for three whole weeks?” Raleigh asked, in a very small voice.

“Come on,” Caxton said. She’d had enough of the girls’ after-?hours hijinks. “We’re going back to your room. You’re going to sleep there all night if I have to sit on you.” She grabbed Raleigh’s arm, not too roughly, and dragged her up to her feet.

The girl didn’t pull away from her as Caxton marched the two of them through the dining hall and back toward the main stairwell. Just outside the entrance hall, however, Raleigh grabbbed Caxton’s arm very tightly and shook her head.

“Did you hear something?” Caxton asked. When she shut up and listened for a second, she heard it, too.

“What is that?” The sound changed to a kind of pathetic gagging and hissing that didn’t sound like an animal at all.

Caxton pushed open the door to the main hall and pointed her flashlight beam through, a narrow cone of light spearing through the darkness. It lit up Violet, who was slumped across the bottom steps of the stairway, her arms up in the air as if she were fending off a brutal attack. Caxton swiveled her light to the side a little—and saw Jameson Arkeley’s red eyes burn brighter than the room’s candles as he crouched over the silent girl.





Vampire Zero





Chapter 30.


Caxton raised her weapon and fired right at Jameson’s heart. The shot tore open his black shirt, just a few inches off. The vampire spun around and glared at her, but with her free hand she was already reaching for the amulet around her neck. It felt warm in her hand, which meant it was working. On the stairs Violet writhed and pushed herself up a step. Her face was contorted by fear and her hands were clutching at nothing.

Caxton fired again, and this time hit her target. The bullet clanged off his chest and spun away into the darkness. How was it possible? Jameson’s body curled up like a caterpillar in a fire, but only for an instant. He straightened up quickly—and then he was on her. It was that fast. She felt a cold wind blowing toward her and then she was on the floor with the vampire on top of her, pinning down her gun hand, his teeth pressing against her cheek. He felt cold and wrong and he stank of death. His weight pressed down on her wrist and the tendons there bent and twisted. Her fingers spasmed and then flew outward and her weapon fell away. He snatched it up and threw it into the darkness. He held her there silently while she struggled. He outweighed her by a considerable margin, but it was his strength that truly held her—she might as well have fought off a stone statue. Clamping her eyes shut, she turned her face to the floor and tried to get her free arm up to protect her eyes, but he just grabbed her wrist and smashed it painfully against the flagstones. Her flashlight rolled away across the floor. She could hear Violet gasping and choking on the stairs. She could hear her own breath pushing in and out of her chest. She could hear her heart beating in her throat. Jameson was as silent as a tomb. Then he pulled back a fraction of an inch. Enough to let her roll over on her side. Not enough to get her legs underneath her. “I warned you off,” he said, “but you wouldn’t listen. There’s part of me that still doesn’t want to kill you. Do you believe that?”

She didn’t answer—couldn’t. But then he shook her violently.

“Yes,” she managed to exhale.

“That part,” he went on, “gets smaller every night. The other part of me, the curse, gets stronger. Right now it’s telling me to tear open your carotid artery. To lap at your blood. I can imagine how good that would feel. How good it would taste. It would solve some problems, too. It would make my task easier.”

He was trying to convince himself to kill her, she realized. He was psyching himself up. She had to think of something fast.