Texas Hold 'Em (8 page)

If she had been human, that was how it would have gone, but she wasn’t. She was fast, and having just experienced a similar move, she expected it.

Instead, she shot out a hand, crushing my calf in her grip as each of her nails buried themselves a half inch into my leg. I felt a tug, then searing pain as she used me to stop her momentum. I unintentionally completed a backward somersault as her nails tore through my muscle, pulling me over to land face first on the floor.

We both slid a foot or two before coming to a stop. The next agony was more of a fiery kind when her teeth sunk into my leg, rending away the muscle. She shot a hand up to grab my thigh and pulled herself up toward more precious bits. I felt like a drumstick under siege by a rabid animal.

I let go of the axe, pulled out my KA-BAR, and with a backward stroke buried it up to the hilt in her back, angling for her heart. The knife wasn’t wood, so it wouldn’t incapacitate her if I pierced it, but when I twisted the six-inch blade as hard as I could, it sure got her attention.

She sprung backwards like a startled cat, taking the knife with her. She landed in a crouch, her eyes burrowing into me as she spat out a bloody chunk of my leg. I was half disgusted, and half happy she hadn’t swallowed it. She grabbed the knife out of her back and tossed it aside. I spent those precious few seconds scooping up the axe and regaining my footing.

My situation was precarious at best. My injured leg couldn’t support any weight, so I balanced on my good one, hefting the axe. I tried to gauge whether I could swing it without falling over.

“Look, guys, watching you two go at it is fun and all, but the fire’s spreading, and we gotta go.”

I turned at Katy’s voice, not registering her fist lashing toward my face. I saw white light when the impact hit my temple, then nothing.

It wasn’t the first time I’d thought I had died. I wondered why death always hurt so much. Shouldn’t the pain have gone away? And why was I sitting? I thought floating—upward, preferably—would have been more appropriate.

But there was no bright light to head toward. In fact, it was rather dark. It occurred to me then that my eyes were shut. I opened them. There was the bright light! But it was too bright, so I closed them again.

Giving up on sight for the time being, I tried instead to move toward the light, but found my wrists and ankles were secured somehow. All I could do was squirm, which didn’t accomplish anything besides making me hurt more. Death was overrated.

My neck hurt even worse than my chest, and they were both overshadowed by the agony in my leg and throbbing in my head. Keeping my eyes shut wasn’t doing anything for the pain, so I willed them open. The light forced me to look down at my blood-soaked shirt for a minute, blinking rapidly until I gradually adjusted to the glare.

Eventually I was able to focus on the source of the illumination through squinted eyes. Alas, no pearly gates gleamed, just a row of spotlights that hung from a bar overhead. Beyond them were aisles of red velvet seats and, above those, a balcony filled with more of the same. Several of the chairs had slashed upholstery and the fabric-lined walls of the room were in tatters. The intact stretches were tagged with a rainbow of profanity and gang signs.

I scanned my immediate area and came to understand that I was, in fact, not dead. Instead I was alive and duct-taped to a wooden chair placed in the center stage of a small theater. I coughed. It was a painful experience; the only upside was that it confirmed I wasn’t gagged.

A clapping sound brought my attention to Katy, who was walking down one of the side aisles toward me. I didn’t know how long I’d been out, but it obviously hadn’t been long enough for her to change outfits. She was still wearing the same gore-covered clothes, although she had at least wiped her mouth. Unfortunately, most of the blood had been smeared across the side of her face. The back of her right hand was caked with the rest of it.

“Star light, star bright, first star I see tonight! Did you know stars are all I can ever see now? No more sun for me. But of course you know— it’s your fault.” She slowly climbed the stairs to the stage. “So how is our star? Feeling better?” She stopped in front of me, placing her hands on my wrists while she leaned in to examine me.

“Fantastic! Any better and I don’t think I’d be able to stand it. Good thing I’m sitting down.” If it was possible, she had gotten even crazier in the short time I was unconscious.

“That’s the spirit!” Her visceral grin turned my stomach.

“Of course, I’d be feeling a lot better if you would let me go,” I said, looking at my wrists for emphasis.

“C’mon, Chance, how stupid do you think I am? Christian is up in Austin dealing with vampire politics or whatever, but he’ll be here before dawn, and he’s going to be thrilled when he learns what I caught! Do you think I’d risk a surprise like this by giving you an opportunity to escape?” She stood up, thankfully releasing the weight she had been applying to my wrists.

“After I hand you over to him I’ll be zooming up through the ranks. Did you know with vampires, age is kind of a status thing? The older you are, the more powerful, or at least tougher. But Christian tells me I have what it takes to go far, and fast, despite my age. Spunk—that’s what he calls it. What do you think, Chance? Do you think I have what it takes?”

“Well, Katy, you have definitely become more…focused.” When she was alive, before her sister’s death, it had been all popularity and the latest fashions with Katy. Her attention flitted from one fad to the next. She had given new meaning to the term “flighty.”

That changed after Kristi was killed. I had never seemed someone so intent on one thing, and one thing only. Her world was killing vampires. Now it seemed she had aspirations for joining the vampire hierarchy. She had become a butterfly, one insane metamorphosis after another.

“Exactly. I know what I want, and I go out and get it!” She put her arms behind her back and walked out of sight behind me. If she had been holding her axe, I would have thought that decapitation was imminent. Instead, she whispered in my ear. Her cool lips brushed against me and sent goosebumps down my arm.

“Christian wants you dead, you know. But that would be such a waste, don’t you think?” She ran a crusty finger affectionately across my cheek. Her touch ceased when it became clear I wasn’t going to answer her, and she slowly walked around to the front of the chair.

“Well,
I
think that would be a waste. I’m going to ask him if I can keep you. What do you think of that, Chance? You and me, together forever. You had my sister; now, tell me that you never wanted to try me. After all, everyone always said I was the prettier one.” She finished her loop and straddled my lap. She crossed her wrists behind my neck and moved in close. The smell of rotting meat was sickening.

I did my best not to betray the nauseous feeling she was causing, or the intense pain in my leg. The last thing I needed was to tick her off and stoke the crazy. Trying not to breathe in too deeply, I whispered, “How could I resist?”

She beamed, and then leaned forward to kiss me. Her hands cupped the back of my head, preventing me from pulling back no matter how hard I tried as she kissed me hard and deep. I suppressed a gag at the taste of putrefied blood. When she started grinding against me, I panicked. It might be dangerous to piss her off, but no way was I going where this was headed.

I did what I could to struggle until she pulled away, her hands clamping down on mine, pinning them even more securely to the chair.

“What’s wrong, Chance? Don’t you want me?” It came out as a growl; her hands began to crush my wrists.

I wanted her about as much as the gaping crater in my leg, but decided to be diplomatic and play the faithful boyfriend card. “Of course! I mean, I always have, but what about Kristi? She was your sister, Katy! I was with her first, and you and I…. Well, it would be wrong. I don’t want to betray her memory.”

“She’s dead, and I’m not. Not really, anyway.”

So much for that angle. I switched gears, trying what I hoped was a sincere-sounding voice.

“True, but it’s not just that. I found someone else. Out in California. And you know me—I’m a one-woman kind of guy.” Okay, so I’ve been juggling two, but telling her that wasn’t going to help me any.

“Oh, yeah? So what’s this new girl’s name?”

“Toni.” I’m not sure why her name jumped to mind. I couldn’t decide if it was because I wanted it to be her, or because I wanted to protect Megan.

“Tony, huh? You batting for the other team now?” When she got up, it was all I could do to suppress a shout as a new wave of agony roared down my leg. Katy reached into her front pocket and fished out a phone.
My
phone. Shit.

“No, it’s short for Antoinette.”

“Cute. Let’s see if we can find this Toni, shall we? Maybe the two of us can chat. Clear the air. You know, work it out between us girls.”

“Leave her out of this, Katy. She hasn’t done anything.”

“C’mon, Chance, what do you think I am, a monster? I mean, it’s not like I have an axe to grind or anything.” She giggled at her joke as she scrolled through the contact list on my prepaid phone. “Not many numbers here, Chance…. Found it! Toni. No pic, though. Aw, is she fugly?” Katy’s face scrunched with faux pity.

Before I could answer, we were interrupted by the entrance of the schoolmarm and a vamp I recognized from the ambush at the ranch. He was short and stocky, with brown skin despite never seeing the sun, black hair, and a mustache. He wore jeans, cowboy boots, and a John Deere t- shirt. Like some hero from a Western, he was what one would call “weathered-looking.”

The hero image melted as soon as he spoke. “Great, he’s awake—now can we kill him?”

“Not yet, Martin. Christian wants to speak with him first. In fact, he’s heading down here from Austin as we speak,” said the schoolmarm. She, at least, took the time to change her clothes. She now wore a clean, pressed grey skirt identical to the last one and a similar tight-fitting wool sweater in white rather than pale blue.

“Tell Christian to use a medium,” said Martin, taking a step forward.

“No one’s killing him. He’s mine,” Katy said, searching for what I could only assume was her axe.

“
Excuse
me?” said the schoolmarm.

“I found him, and I’m keeping him.”

“Oh, Katy. I’m afraid you’re rather overstepping your place, dear.”

“Screw you, Sylvia. I’ll overstep all over
you
if you get in my way.”

“Our little girl has developed quite a temper, don’t you think, Martin? But she’s right, no one’s killing him. Yet. We can, however, hurt him a little,” the schoolmarm said. “Tap him, Martin—Eric needs blood. I think it’s only fitting this one donates his, since he’s responsible for Eric’s misfortune.”

Martin picked up a discarded liquor bottle from the floor, busted the top off with his hand, then shook it upside down to get rid of any nonexistent remainder of booze. He came toward me with the makeshift jar and I tried unsuccessfully to hop backwards. I cried out in pain as my chair toppled sideways and I crashed to the floor on my bad leg.

Katy cut Martin off, putting herself between us. “Back off, scuzzball. No one’s tapping him but me!”

“Fine, you want to do the honors?” Martin held out the makeshift jar to Katy, who smacked it out of his hand, sending it down to shatter on the floor. I closed my eyes as a couple of stray pieces of glass bounced off me.

“That’s not what I meant! Find some other blood bag for Eric. I told you, this one’s mine.” I had to give it to Katy—outnumbered and significantly out-aged, which in vampire terms meant overpowered, she still wasn’t backing down.

I tuned them out and looked for a way to escape while they squabbled. No luck. The place was obviously abandoned, and, being a theater, was probably soundproofed well enough so that if I did scream, no one but my captors was likely to hear it. By this point, Katy was screaming louder than I could anyway.

Examining my immediate predicament, I found that what the duct-tape job lacked in professionalism was more than made up for by enthusiasm. Someone had used a lot of the tough silver stuff to make sure I wasn’t going anywhere.

I did a quick inventory of my belongings. My guns and knife were missing, obviously. And Katy clearly had lifted my phone. My front pockets seemed empty, which meant my keys were probably gone as well. I was pretty sure I could feel my wallet in my back pocket, which was a relief; it had a couple of grand in it. Assuming, of course, they hadn’t taken the cash out of it and put it back. The thought made me sad.

Nothing I had on me was of any particular use. I was about to suffer from a wave of serious despair until I spotted the glass remains of the broken liquor bottle on the floor next to me. If I could somehow manage to get to one of the larger pieces, I might be able to use it to cut myself free.

Then what? After that my plan fell apart. My leg was literally shredded from what Sylvia had done to it. If I did make it out of this, I was probably going to limp forever, and at the very least I was going to need a rabies shot, or whatever the vampire equivalent was. So even if I made it out of this chair, I wasn’t going anywhere fast. Certainly not fast enough to outrun vampires.

The sound of Martin backhanding Katy brought my focus back to my captors. Her defiance had finally worn out the other vampire’s patience.

Katy’s head recoiled, then snapped back faster than my eye could catch. Her eyes promised murder. A trickle of fresh blood ran down from the corner of her mouth, creating a vibrant river over the crusted dried stuff.

Her expression was furious, and by the way she held her hand, I got the feeling that if she’d had her axe, things would have gotten a lot more bloody very quickly. Instead, like the kid she used to be, she stomped her foot, wheeled around and stormed off.

Martin chuckled, said something off-color about Katy’s ass, then stared down at the shattered glass and shook his head. He glanced around, and not seeing another suitable container, looked at Sylvia.

“Can’t we let Eric drink from the guy?”