Jack Kursed (37 page)

Their unknown attackers
fired at them once again. A bullet struck her leg, which stuck out
from the protection of their quickly-disintegrating table shield.
She winced as she tried to reduce her profile, nearly curling into
a ball.

She grabbed Kevin’s shirt
and pulled him close.

"Four men," she struggled to say, and
nodded in their general direction. "Get out of here."

Kevin ducked his head as
more wood shattered around them. The men moved from table to table
and shouted at each other.

"Move in."

"Don’t forget the
laptop."

"She’s done. I know I’ve
hit her twice."

"Leave," Victoria
whispered.

The fear vanished from
Kevin’s face as a sneer took its place.

"Nah. What would you do
without me?"

Kevin stood up from behind
the table and simply raised his hand. The four men stopped for a
moment, surprised, before raising their weapons and firing.
Victoria watched as every bullet stopped around him and fell to the
ground at his feet. The light from above caught his simple quartz
ring, a gift from Rachel, and gleamed. He had the ability to make
any rock a powerful shield.

The men shouted in anger and simply
kept firing. Kevin winced from the pain in his hand, but held
steady.

"Stay here," he said calmly. "Just
give me a second."

He grabbed a salt shaker
and a packet of sugar from the floor, all the while continuing to
take their fire. Moving to another table, he hovered over an
abandoned cup of water. He dumped the salt and sugar into the cup
and gave it a quick stir with his finger.

"The best tricks are the oldest ones,"
he said, tossing the water in the air.

As it landed, the water
changed into a white fog, covering nearly the entire food court. He
smiled as he heard the men coughing and gagging, holding their
fire.

He went back to Victoria and grabbed
her arm. She was already halfway to her feet with a hand to her
throat.

"Are you okay?"

She nodded. "Just need
blood."

"Leave that to
me."

Kevin took her hand and led her
through the fog, scooping up a packet of ketchup along the way. She
looked at him in confusion as he stopped next to a wall and felt it
with his hand.

"Kevin?"

"The Friday’s break room
is on the other side."

Despite the pain in her
leg and numbness in her throat, she smiled. "Have to punch
out?"

"I just need my coat."

He drew a circle with
ketchup on the wall, just large enough to step through. Placing his
hand in the center, the circle vanished, leaving only a portal into
Friday’s break room. Victoria would always be amazed, watching the
things Kevin could do.

Kevin ushered Victoria
into the break room. The five employees currently on shift at
Friday’s huddled and screamed in the corner, along with a few
customers. They all retreated to the break room when the chaos
started, and barricaded the door leading to the
restaurant.

When Kevin cleared the
portal he put a hand on either side and ran them together. The
portal followed his hands and closed, a new trick he’d
learned.

"Kevin?" Anita said.
"What’s going on? Are you okay?"

He nodded. "Yeah, thanks. Victoria,
did you say needed blood-"

She was already moving
across the room, and pinned Kevin’s supervisor against the wall.
She buried her fangs in his neck and drank deeply, savoring the
taste. His eyes rolled back and he clutched at Victoria’s shoulders
as they slowly sank to the floor. The bullets popped from her leg
and neck, the wounds closing behind them.

Everyone screamed and rushed to the
barricade. They fought against each other as they tried to shove
the tables and chairs out of the way.

"Nice," Kevin said. "At least you
didn't start a panic or anything."

Victoria climbed off of
Kevin's supervisor and licked a drop of blood from her fangs. She
didn't feed long enough for him to reach an orgasm, but he lay
there moaning on the floor with an erection. She felt renewed, and
four mortals with guns didn't stand a chance against
her.

She turned and raised an
eyebrow as Kevin slipped into a long black coat that stretched down
to his knees over his uniform. He adjusted it on his shoulders and
cracked his knuckles. He looked like a private investigator out of
a fifties movie, one that worked at Friday's.

"We came back in here for a coat? Do
you have any idea of how ridiculous you look?"

"I know, I know," he said,
frowning.

He opened his coat and
gave her a glimpse of why it was so important to him. There were
items spread everywhere, nestled in many pockets. Markers, a pair
of eyeglasses, vials with mysterious contents, sugar, salt, a
bottle of water. It seemed he had a little of
everything.

"But, you have to admit...this
definitely beats carrying a backpack everywhere."

Kevin reached for a vial
and shook his head at the panicking employees and customers. He
tossed the vial to the floor, sending little beads of glass
everywhere, and a scent that wrinkled Victoria's cheeks.

"What the hell is that-"

The crowd fell to the floor, instantly
asleep. They collapsed on each other, some even falling right on
the barricade. Kevin caught Anita before she could fall. Victoria
did the same with two others, grabbing them before they smacked
their heads.

"It's something I came up
with," he said, lowering Anita gently on her back. "They'll sleep
for an hour, and forget the last five. It came in real handy when I
got pulled over for speeding last week. Don't worry, it only works
on humans."

Victoria was speechless as
he reached into his coat for another item, this time a pair of
eyeglasses. He slipped them on and stared at the wall. She still
had trouble reconciling that the cat-loving teen wearing the goofy
coat was the most powerful supernatural creature alive. His kind
had come a long way from chanting around cauldrons.

"They're in Friday's now, trying to be
quiet. Most of my fog is gone. They don't exactly look like
professionals. How did they shoot you in the throat?"

"Well, excuse me," she
said sarcastically. "And how do you know what a professional looks
like?"

"I watch a lot of
TV." He noticed her staring at his glasses. "These things
are
real
fun near
the women's locker room."

His cheeks turned red as
he glanced down at her chest, and quickly turned his
head.

"Oops, sorry."

Despite the four men beyond the wall
trying to kill them both, Victoria laughed. "You are
forgiven."

"Okay, what's next?" he
said, and felt through his coat. "No, I don't want to use that.
That will kill them. I'm guessing you don't want to kill
anybody?"

"I'm not in the best of moods, but
let's avoid killing. For now. Look, Kevin, I can
handle-"

"Ah, this will work fine. Are you
ready? Just stay behind me."

She sighed and shrugged. "Sure, I'm
ready."

Kevin rubbed a liquid from
a vial on a hand-mirror, and then drew the outline for another
portal with a marker. Before setting his hand on the wall, he gave
Victoria one final look. She nodded, and he created the
portal.

"What the fuck?" one of the men
said.

"That's them!"

Kevin held up his ring as
he stepped into the main dining area of Friday's. Victoria stood
right behind him, a hand on his back. She couldn't stop flinching
as the bullets stopped inches from Kevin and fell to the floor. The
men were scattered across the dining room. They no longer had the
element of surprise. She could handle them easily. It turned out
she didn’t need to.

Kevin pulled out a small
flashlight, held it behind his hand, and shined it directly at one
of men. He dropped his weapon and covered his face, like the light
of the sun itself struck his eyes. Victoria had been on the
receiving end of Kevin's blinding trick before.

He held up the mirror over
his head, drawing the attention of the remaining three men. They
screamed in agony as a bright light lit up Friday's, forcing even
Victoria to squint and look away.

When her vision cleared the restaurant
was quiet. The man Kevin blinded was on one knee, still rubbing his
eyes. The other three men lay motionless on the floor.

"What did you do?" she
asked. "Another of your sleep tricks?"

"Nah. They were too spread apart.
So...I captured their souls."

"You...did
what
?"

He turned the mirror
around for her to see. Victoria's mouth fell open when she saw the
three men in the mirror instead of her own reflection. They looked
at each other, confused. Their confusion turned to terror as they
pounded on walls they couldn't see.

"Don't worry, they're not
gonna die or anything. Once I break the mirror, the souls go back
to their bodies. Not an easy potion to make. I don't like using
that spell. The ingredients are really hard to come by."

Victoria knew of Kevin's
power. She'd seen him wield it before, even against her. Jack
Kursed was living proof of what Kevin’s kind was capable
of.

But to see it with her own eyes was
humbling.

"Anyway," he said. "I left that guy
over there for you, figured you might want to question
him."

Victoria pulled herself
together and approached the man. He was still rubbing his eyes when
she grabbed him by the shirt and lifted him in the air.

"What's your name?" she
asked.

"F-Frank."

"Frank, why did you try to kill me and
my friend?"

"We were just following
the leak. We got the call telling us Collins' hard drive was
copied. His laptop's been bugged. The idiot isn't taking this
seriously, doesn't know how important this all is."

"What you're doing, it has to stop.
The virus you guys are playing with, it changed somehow, or the
people you work for changed it. It could destroy a lot of
lives."

"As long as it's the lives
of enemies, that's fine by me."

She tossed him aside, sending him
crashing into a table and chairs and knocking him
unconscious.

"Okay," Kevin said. "Wild vampires. We
can handle this."

"They're not vampires
anymore. Those last pictures I saw..."

"Fine, whatever. Let's go."

"No. Thank you, Kevin. I owe you one.
But I don't want you involved in this. If you got hurt, I wouldn't
forgive myself."

"Are you already forgetting the things
I can do?"

"Of course not. If we were
going up against a human army, I'd want you there. But these are
supernatural beings. Please, just trust me on this."

Kevin thought it over, all
the while twirling the mirror containing three souls in his hand.
He finally rolled his eyes and put a hand on her
shoulder.

"If you need me, call me.
Okay?"

She nodded and gestured to the
restaurant around them. "Are you okay with this?"

"Oh, yeah. Smash the mirror, give them
some of my sleep juice. It's covered."

"Okay, I have to run," she
said, giving him a quick hug. "I have to stop this."

"You owe me a new laptop," he called
as she ran.

Victoria knew she owed him much more
than that.

CHAPTER 17

Jack took the bumps in the
road as carefully as he could. Erica grimaced in pain next to him,
her broken foot bumping around in the truck.

"Sorry," he said.

She offered a smile. "I'm so glad I
let you drive me home."

Erica had spent the past
two days in the hospital. Jack had spent every second with her that
he could. Tiffany took one day off school, but admitted she was
bored in the hospital room with Jack and Erica. She was in school
while Jack drove Erica on the bumpy streets.

"Thanks for hanging out with me in the
hospital. I really appreciate it."

"You've thanked me a
hundred times."

"Don't forget, give me any hospital
bills that come in for Tiffany so I can help pay."

"Stop worrying about it."

"And you've
said
that
a
hundred times," she said with that sexy laugh of hers, stretching
her arms over her head. "I can't wait to get home and take a
shower."

Jack kept a smile to
himself. He was sure her reaction to what he had in mind wouldn't
go over well, but he didn't care. Giving her a glance, it didn't
surprise him she was still beautiful and fun after an accident and
two days in the hospital.