Star, Starland Vamp Series, Book 1 (37 page)

“I see, Verus,” Drake said, stepping toward the door, his eyes flaring. “After all these years! And after all we’ve been through! You turned on me!” But Verus never relaxed his stance as Drake moved closer to the door, raging on like the mad man that he was. “How could you turn against me, Verus? I created you! I gave you immortality! I gave you life!”

Then Verus took a step toward him. “You gave me death and condemned me to this life for your own enjoyment, Titus! You condemned me to a life of constant thirst! Now it’s my turn to condemn you … to Hell, you son of a bitch!”

“Guards!” Drake yelled down the hallway, knowing he was outnumbered, then moved toward the door. Verus darted toward him at vamp speed, and Drake shot him in the chest. Verus’ crimson blood flew from his back and spurt into the room behind him. Then Drake darted down the hall, slamming the door, but I moved across the room at vamp speed, catching it before it slammed shut.

“Stay here!” I yelled at Zac and Annie. “Take care of Rick and V!”

“Star,” Rick said in a weak voice. “You can’t let him escape. Go. And take Annie, Zac and John with you.”

Verus moaned on the floor, turning over. “He’s right, Star. Go after him.”

“I can’t leave you alone, Rick,” I said, tears openly streaming down my face. I glanced at Annie, and she was crying, too.

“Yes you can,” Rick said and our eyes met mine and held, then he turned his attention to Annie. “Now go. Get him for me .. and for V.”

I nodded, wiping the tears from my eyes as sudden rage filled my heart. “Stay with them, Zac,” I said, just as much for him as for Rick.

Then his eyes turned to steel with a fierceness I’d never imagined he’d had. “The hell I will. Wherever you go, I go.”

I nodded reluctantly, then knelt beside Verus. “V? I need one of your weapons.”

Unable to speak, Verus nodded. Then I pulled the Diamond Back DB380 hand pistol from his boot, but left him the Kimber Solo 9 mm from the back of his jeans in case he needed it.

Then Annie leaned down and gave Rick one last sweet kiss as her tears fell onto his cheek. “I’ll come back for you, Rick, I promise.”

“You’d better,” Rick said, trying to smile, but winced, turning serious. “But get him at all costs, even if you can’t come back. I’ll understand.”

Annie nodded, unable to speak, kneeling beside him on the floor. She started to get up when Rick stopped her. “And Annie,” he said, gently touching her arm, “I love you.”

A weak smile lit her lips. “I love you, too.” Then she gave him one last sweet kiss and rose to her feet. She looked at me and nodded.

I knelt down briefly beside Rick and said, “Rick, how can I tell you everything you mean to me?”

Rick smiled, then said, “Don’t. Tell me later.”

I smiled through my tears, then rose to my feet.

“And Star?” Rick said in a weak voice, stopping me in my tracks.

“Yes?” I tried to smile, through my tears.

“Get that son of a bitch … for me.”

I nodded as adrenaline filled my veins, and my fists clenched at my side. I darted out the door with Zac, Annie, and John on my heels.

I turned to face John as we moved at vamp speed down the hallway. “Are you up for this?”

John laughed, then answered, “Do I have a choice?”

I laughed as Annie patted him on the back. “No, not really,” I answered with a smile, then turned to Zac. “Here take this,” I said, giving him the Diamondback hand pistol.

I pulled my Glock from the back of my pants as Annie pulled her Ballistics knife from her garter belt under the hem of her dress.

“Let’s go,” Annie said, taking the lead down the corridor and up the stairs, when suddenly gunfire blasted from an Uzi down the hallway. We ran down the stairwell as quickly as we could, as the bullets followed us, ricocheting off the walls.

I looked up and caught a glimpse of Drake as he darted through a door.

I sighed, then announced, “Guys! We’re going to have company soon!” Then I darted to the side of the door. And no sooner than I said that, the door opened and a red headed vamp with an Uzi came out and looked over the stairwell. Annie grabbed his weapon as John rammed him with his shoulder, sending him flying down the hole in the center of the stairwell.

We all looked at John in disbelief.

“Hey! I played three years of football!” John said, with an innocent look covering his face.

We all burst out laughing.

“Way to go!” Annie said, patting him on the back, then checked the amo in the Uzi. “Let’s go!”

I held Zac and John back, stopping them from darting into the hallway, just as a blast of gunfire went off. Annie shot off a gunfire blast down the hallway, covering us as we made our way down the hallway to another room, just as two more vamps with Uzis darted toward us. Zac stuck out his foot, knocking one of them to the ground as I tackled the other with a flying sidekick into his chest. With my Ballistics knife, I cut the vamps head off as blood spurt from his body onto the floor. I looked over and Zac was kneeling on the chest of the other vamp as Annie took his head off, her Ballistics knife in hand.

Just then, another vamp ran toward us, but Annie shot him with her Ballistics knife right between the eyes, sending him quickly to the floor. She grabbed her knife back and the guy’s Uzi, then threw it to John. I quickly shoved my Glock into the back of my pants and grabbed the Uzi off the floor from the vamp I’d just taken down.

I darted quickly down the hallway head on into three other vamps. I kicked one square in the chest with a flying side kick, while Zac shot the head off another. John shot another point blank in the chest, and Annie finished him off.

“We need to find Drake fast before he disappears!” I yelled as we darted up the stairs leading to the great room. Three more vamps headed toward us head on with bloodlust in their eyes. I took down the first, ripping a Chinese throwing star from my belt, I threw it expertly between his eyes, then I quickly beheaded him, while Zac shot the other point blank in the chest. Annie practically scaled the wall and landed on the other vamp, ramming her Ballistics knife through his skull and into his brain. He didn’t move again.

When we came to the landing above the great room, a round of gunfire went off just above our heads. “Hold it right there!” Drake’s baritone voice bellowed across the room. I took a step toward the stairs, but Drake pointed his Uzi directly at Zac’s head. “Star, hold it right there or pretty boy dies!” Two guards flanked him and more than twenty vamps filled the room. 

We froze.

Without turning my head, I said to Zac in a very low voice that only he could hear. “Zac, run. Annie and I will create a diversion so you and John can get out. The Challenger GT is parked around the corner with a small arsenal in the trunk. If I don’t come out in five minutes, blow up the building and take down anyone who runs out.”

“Abbey,” Zac said, “I’m not leaving you, so don’t ask me to. If you die, then I’ll die with you.”

“Put down your weapons and slowly descend the stairs!” Drake interrupted us, then he trained his weapon directly at Zac.

“Zac, you have to go now. Run,” I instructed, talking low enough so only Zac could hear.

“Abbey, I’m not leaving you.”

“We’re out of time, you two,” Annie replied, then she looked into my eyes as a devilish grin lit her lips. “Well, if we’re going down, then let’s go down with a bang. What do you say, Star? For old time’s sake?”

A smiled curled the corner of my lips as I looked at Annie. “Well, it’s not the first time we were outnumbered. And there’s four of us. Better odds than we’ve had before.”

Suddenly John took off, running back the way we came.

“Make that three,” Annie replied, then smiled.

It was just as well. At least one of us would live.

I looked at Zac, then at Annie. “Let’s do it,” I replied, then together, we fired our Uzis at every vamp in the room.

“I want Star and the boy alive! Kill the blonde!” Drake yelled over the gunfire suddenly exploding within the room. Within a second, the vamps rushed us, and we took them all down. Zac ripped the heads off some, then shot another, placing the pistol right between the guy’s eyes. Annie’s karate and jujitsu moves were unsurpassed as she moved with lightning speed, ripping apart the vamps in her wake. As for me, I ripped apart every vamp in my way, blowing the heads off any who got in my way as I made my way purposefully across the room, my eyes never leaving Drake.

Suddenly, Annie was shot in the chest, throwing her to the ground face down, but my eyes never left Drake. Venom filled my mouth in anticipation of the kill. I took my time, killing any vamps who got in my way, as I walked purposefully toward Drake. The corner of my lips curled into a menacing smile, as fear filled Drake’s eyes.

I was going to enjoy this.

But behind me, a voice yelled, “Stop right there, Star, or he dies.”

I froze, not wanting to look. Afraid of what I would see, but my worst fears were realized when I turned my head slightly and saw that a vamp held Zac with his arm wrapped around his throat, using him as a shield and a machete at his neck. That vamp was going to pay.

“He’s dead anyway,” I bluffed, vengeance filling my voice as I took a step toward Drake, looking very much the vampire that I was.

“I mean it, Star! One more step toward Drake and his head comes off!” the rogue vamp yelled meaningfully across the room.

“Then you’ll die, too,” I replied, as my emerald eyes flared, and vengeance filled my voice, “along with Drake.”

The vamp smiled. “I’m dead anyway,” he replied repeating my own words with a smile.

“Star,” Drake interrupted, his lips curled into a smile, “do you really want your pretty boy to die?” Then he took a step purposefully toward me. “Come now, Star, let’s be reasonable.”

And his words struck a nerve. “Those were the words my father said to you long ago … just before you killed him.”

Drake’s voice was low. “That was long ago.”

One corner of my lips pulled menacingly into a half smile. “Not to me, Clark.”

Drake’s smile faded at the use of his past name.

“You’re going down, Drake,” I said, taking a step toward him.

“Not another step, Star!” the vamp holding Zac yelled across the room. I glanced at Annie lying on the floor. She wasn’t moving. “I’ll kill him! I will!”

“Go ahead,” I bluffed, but suddenly a trickle of blood oozed from the edge of the machete at Zac’s throat.

“You don’t really mean it, Star,” the rogue vamp yelled nervously across the room.

“I don’t?” I asked, turning the full force of my eyes on him. “What do you think?”

But then something happened that I didn’t expect. Suddenly, Zac’s body shimmered and shook, his features blurring as his body morphed and changed right before my eyes. Within a second, it appeared that the rogue vamp was holding Drake.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Zac yelled in Drake’s perfect baritone voice.

The rogue vamp holding him was so stunned that he released him, and immediately took a step back, his eyes wide. “What the hell?”

That was all the time I needed.

Immediately, I grabbed one of my throwing stars from my belt buckle and hit the rogue vamp right between the eyes and he fell back instantly. In a flash Zac grabbed Annie’s Ballistics knife and beheaded the vamp without a second thought. Instantly, I wheeled around, and within the flutter of a butterfly’s wing, I pulled my Ballistics knife from my boot and turned to shove it into Drake’s chest, but stopped short when something hit me square in the chest, and extreme pain radiated throughout my body, reaching to the ends of my fingertips.

“What did you do to me?” I asked Drake, as I fell to the floor, unable to move.

Zac darted instantly across the room with Annie’s Ballistics knife raised high above his head, ready to plunge it into Drakes chest, when Drake shot him in the chest with prongs, sending an electric shock through his body, rendering him helpless.

My heart ached as I tried to get up from the floor, but there was no feeling at all within my arms, legs or body, and I could barely speak. At that moment, I never wanted to kill anyone more than I wanted to kill Drake, but all I could do was watch, hoping he wouldn’t kill Zac as a tear slid slowly down my cheek.

But he stepped right over Zac and walked toward me. with vengeance filling his eyes. 

Drake stopped above me as Zac watched with concern filling his eyes. Tears welled up within his emerald-green eyes as he mouthed the words “I love you” from across the room.

“I love you, too,” I answered, then said. “Close your eyes, Zac.” But he just shook his head as tears slid slowly down his cheeks.

Then I turned my attention toward Drake, walking purposefully toward me, and my heart filled with regret. Regret that it all had to end so soon, despite my over 250 some years. Regret that Zac would watch me die. But most of all, regret that I wouldn’t have eternity to spend with him.

Drake stood over me with a sneer lighting his lips. “How do you feel, Star?” he gloated, twirling a knife within his fingertips. He was taking his time.

“Wouldn’t you like to know, Clark?” I asked, forcing the words from my lips along with my breath.