Enchanter (17 page)

“Are we going back inside?” I asked, although I already had
the feeling Brandon was not heading for the entrance.

“No.”

“Why not?” I asked in a near panic.

“They’ll follow us in.”

“They?” Had I just stepped over some invisible line that
sent me straight to an Alice-in-Wonderland-type world?

Because I could not take another step without knowing who
was following us, I yanked my arm from Brandon’s tight grasp and slowed down
enough to glance back. My heart skipped a beat and my entire body went numb at
the sight of the five men, almost identical to the one that had attacked me in
the alleyway near my apartment a few days prior, running after us.

Dear God in Heaven! Are those fangs?

“What do they want?” I shrieked.

No! No! This isn’t happening!

“C’mon.” Brandon pulled on my arm to keep me moving and my
feet obeyed by picking up speed. “We have to get out of here.”

“Let’s just call the police!”

“No!”

“No? What do you mean no?” I wanted to scream, but we were
running too fast for me to have enough breath for a scream. Brandon seemed
intent on making it to his car. He half-dragged, half-pulled me to the car. Trying
to run while wearing three-inch heels did not aid our hasty retreat, but I did
my best. Once we were within arm’s reach of the vehicle, Brandon unlocked the
doors and practically pushed me in. It was evident that he was in a hurry to
flee from the immediate area, and although I still had no idea what was going
on, I climbed inside the passenger seat and shut the door without questioning
him further.

If there was one thing I fully comprehended it was that we
were in danger.

As soon as I buckled my seatbelt, I glanced up to see the
quintet running at full speed toward us. Their unusual gait was one of the
first things to catch my attention. They moved too fast for any normal human
being. Their pale complexion, long white hair, and completely black eyes were beyond
conspicuous and, quite frankly, hard to ignore.

Brandon hurried to the driver-side door and yanked it open,
climbing in and turning the ignition on in less than five seconds. “Hold on!”
Brandon said as he threw the car in reverse and sped out of the parking space.
The way he maneuvered it would have made any professional stunt driver jealous.
Hell, had I not been so utterly freaked out, I would have congratulated him
myself.

As soon as the car exited the parking space, Brandon straightened
the steering wheel, placed shifted to drive and dropped his foot on the gas
pedal. By this point, the quintet had caught up with us and they decided to
step directly in our path as Brandon urged the car forward.

“Brandon! You’re going to hit them!”

“Hold on, Leah!”

Oh, my God! He
wants
to run them over!
“Brandon!”

My words fell on deaf ears. Instead of stepping on the
brakes, Brandon accelerated, forcing the car forward with deadly speed. I was
terrified but unable to look away as the car careened toward the five fang-bearing
men who looked like they had just stepped out of some horror movie. However,
just as the car came within two inches of smashing into them, the men
disappeared into thin air. Terrified, I held onto the seat and squeezed my eyes
shut.

Please, God, let me be dreaming!

No sooner had I thought it than a loud thud sounded from on
top of the car’s hood. My eyes shot open at once and I glanced sideways to see
a concentrated Brandon steering the car out of the parking lot and onto the near-empty
street. The bang came again.
They
were – or, at least one of them was – on
top of the car.

The thought that perhaps I was daydreaming crossed my mind, because
there was no way any of this could be real. Things like these just do not happen.
But a flash of movement to my right forced my mind away from those thoughts and
into the brutal reality that despite what I may or may not want to believe, we
were under attack. Something was materializing right before my eyes and I
watched, completely stunned as it took the shape of a man just outside the car
window.

This is not real! God, it can’t be!

However, the creepy individual hanging from the passenger
side door could definitely argue his existence with me all night long. He was
very real, and no matter how much I wanted to reason with myself or deny what I
was witnessing, I came to the understanding that the five active corpses,
Brandon’s fear, my terror, the life and death chase we were in was all genuine.

“Oh, my God! Brandon!”

The one outside my door pressed his body to the side of the
car as he stared at me through the glass shield keeping him from touching me.
To my horror, he started pounding on the glass, earning an ear-splitting shriek
from me.

“Leah!” Brandon reached out for my arm and tugged me toward
him. “Unbuckle your seatbelt and climb to the backseat,” he shouted while
trying to focus on keeping the car steady.

I feared that if we did not lose our two hitchhikers soon we
would end up in a car wreck. Brandon was doing a great job remaining calm, but
that could change in a heartbeat. Considering everything that could go wrong in
a matter of seconds, I was relieved that for the time being we were the only
ones on the street.

As far as I could tell, there were at least two individuals
on the car. One on the roof and the other hanging onto the passenger side door.
I wondered where the other three were, but realized that I could not pause to
figure that out when I had an important task at hand: getting as far away from
the creeper next to me as I could. Being that I was in a small, four-door
Honda, that was not going to be easy.

“But I—” All sense of indecision fled the second the man – I
still could not tell how the hell he was managing to hold onto the side of the
car without slipping – started to pound his big fist on the glass. The barrier
keeping him out started to crack at an incredibly fast pace.

I had the feeling that this man was more than willing to
pull me out of the car if necessary. And as I stared into those impossibly
dilated pupils, I feared that had been his intention all along.

Not willing to go down without a fight, I directed my
attention to what Brandon had asked me to do. Unfortunately for me, my damn
seatbelt got stuck again and no matter how hard I pressed on the tiny red
button, it would not budge.
God, no! Not now! Not now!

“I’m stuck, Brandon.”

Without an ounce of hesitation, Brandon used his right hand
to pull me to him and directed my head down to his lap as far as it would go.
Blood rushed throughout my body in an instant, making me feel flushed and
slightly uncomfortable. I couldn’t help my body’s reaction to the embarrassing
position I was put in, and no matter how much I tried to ignore what being so
close to Brandon’s lower body did to me, the inappropriate feeling wouldn’t
leave me alone.

Within five seconds, the passenger side window exploded
inward, splattering the car’s interior with tiny, razor-sharp missiles. The
sound alone forced a scream out of me.

Brandon shouted something I could not understand, but even
as I tried to make sense of his words, a pair of cold, clammy hands equipped
with jagged claws reached out for me. The feel of them running up and down the
side of my body caused me to gag with disgust. When my attacker pulled on my
arm, painfully trying to dislodge my body from the seatbelt keeping it in
place, I realized that my worst fears had come true. This horrific being wanted
to kill me. I screamed, terrified by the man’s determination to end my short
life.

I glanced up to catch sight of my attacker’s body halfway in
the car. I shrieked and he hissed, displaying two impossibly long, sharp fangs.

Brandon wasted no time punching my attacker, struggling to
keep him off of me while keeping from losing control of the car. Determined not
to die any time soon, my survival instincts kicked into full fear and I pushed
and shoved, trying to hurl the man back out the window. My attempts, although
valiant, were fruitless. He was a lot stronger than his decrepit appearance
gave away. No matter how hard or how many times I lifted my upper body and
pushed there was no way to get him off of me.

Irritated by my efforts to dislodge him, the man growled and
lashed out. All I felt was one single blow, but it hurt like hell. I was not sure
of how badly I was injured. But I felt the sting spreading throughout my arm. Warm
blood ran down my limb and I knew the bastard had cut me somehow. I briefly
inspected the damage and gasped when I saw a gash that easily measured four
inches in length. Furious and scared, I yelled and renewed my battle with the
man-beast.

Trying to keep my upper body down while pushing my attacker
off was made even more difficult when the car began to swerve from side to
side. From the sounds emanating from my left, I assumed the other devil had
broken through the driver side window and was probably wrestling with Brandon
for control. The sound of screeching wheels invaded my ears and I knew Brandon
was more concentrated on trying to save me than on driving.

God! We’re either going to crash or these crazy bastards
are going to kill us!

“Leah! Lean back down!”

“I’m trying,” I shouted.

“Lean down and cover your eyes.”

I had no idea why he wanted me to cover my eyes, but I was
too concerned over the amount of blood I was losing to argue, so I leaned as
far down as the seatbelt would allow and watched in complete awe as Brandon
lifted his right hand over my body and shoved it directly toward my attacker’s
face. Had I not been there and seen it with my own eyes, I would have never
believed what I saw next.

A bright blue, flame-like light emerged from within
Brandon’s palm. As soon as it grew in force and intensity, dispersing through
the man’s body with the speed of a lightning bolt, my attacker literally fried
and turned into black ash. His shrieks of pain nearly caused my eardrums to implode.
Once the body was completely reduced to embers, I watched in mute horror as it scattered
as if someone had thrown an ashtray into the car.

“Hold on, Leah!” Brandon exclaimed as he tried to regain
control of the car before it careened into a nearby tree.

I sat up only to have my entire world go black.

****

The next thing I knew, Brandon had opened the passenger side
door and was helping me out of the car.

“Where are we?” Disoriented, I glanced around only to see
vaguely familiar settings. I had no idea what had happened, why I felt so weird,
or how I got to be with Brandon at such a late hour.
Did he kidnap me?

Although I was not immediately aware of my whereabouts, I
was conscious of the immense pain in my forearm and the blood dripping from it
in rapid torrents.

“Home.”

“Which home? Yours or mine?” I asked as I placed my injured
arm—which was wrapped in white cloth— over my chest. Just below my elbow, a
strip of the same cloth was served as a tourniquet to stop more blood from
pouring out.

 Confused, I glanced up and noted that although Brandon still
wore his suit’s jacket, he wasn’t wearing a shirt.
When did he take it off?
And how long have I been unconscious?
“What the hell happened?”

He did not answer me and, instead, picked me up into his
arms, carried me up the stairs, turned to his right, stopped in front of a
wooden doorframe, and used his set of keys to unlock the door to
his
apartment.

“I’ll take care of you, Leah.” His voice was strained with
emotion. It was obvious he was worried about me, and furious too, but I had no
idea why.

“How did you manage to open the door without dropping me or
the keys?” I asked as he carried me inside his small apartment.

“You’ll be all right.”

“I certainly don’t feel all right,” I admitted.

The world kept spinning every few seconds and I felt as if I
was about to pass out.
Am I drunk? Or am I drugged?
Panic’s ugly face
started to creep up on me and I was one second short of accusing him of rape.

“Brandon?”

“Yes?”

“What happened?”

“Don’t you remember?”

As if his voice was enough to trigger the upsetting memories,
I was instantly bombarded by flashes of the scene that had taken place just a
few minutes before.

“Oh, Jesus!” I gasped out. “They attacked us!”

Again I was met with silence as he used the heel of his
loafers to shut the door before rushing me to the kitchen. Gently, he set me on
the floor, removed the makeshift tourniquet and bloody shirt and tossed it on
the kitchen floor before pulling my arm to the sink just under the faucet. He
turned the knob on and cold water immediately splashed over my huge cut. The
first spurts were agonizingly painful and I cried out, but at least it washed
the blood off enough for me to see the extent of my injury.

The gash was not only long, but deep enough for me to see
clearly into the muscle. I almost fainted at the sight, and only Brandon’s
strong hold on my waist kept me from tumbling to the floor. Nausea spread
through me almost immediately and my head began to spin once again.

“You’ve lost a lot of blood,” Brandon whispered as he struggled
to apply pressure on my arm to keep it from bleeding further.

“I think you’re right.”

“You need to sit before you fall down.”

“What I
need
is an explanation.”

He did not say a thing as he picked me up once again and
carried me to his bedroom. Once there, he laid me on the bed and propped my
back against multiple pillows while instructing me to keep applying pressure to
my arm. Even though I did not have much strength left in me, I tried to do as
he instructed.