Blood Doll Read online

  “Who the fuck were those people?” she nearly shrieked, “and who the fuck are you?”

  “My name is Christian Sterling, and I am probably the only person in that club that doesn’t want you dead right now.”

  “What the hell makes you think I’m going to believe you?” she snapped as frightened tears streamed down her face. It was a bullying move, he knew it as he did it, but Christian turned and crowded into her personal space, pressing her hard against the wall as he raised one hand toward her. For a moment, he held her throat between his fingers, sensing and savoring the strong, rabbitlike pulse there, then lifted his hand and grazed his fingertips across her cheek.

  “Because if I wanted you dead, I’d have drained you dry and left you in a heap on the floor of the club.” She froze, and her scent changed just the slightest bit. Fear mixed with confusion—it was such a heady cocktail. He was so hungry… and she would make a divine meal.

  After several long moments her eyes softened, and her shoulders relaxed. He heard the tiny release of breath as she gave her silent consent that he was telling the truth.

  “I know where your sister is, and if you ever expect to see her again, you will do exactly as I tell you.”

  “She is in that club,” Lana said defiantly. “I know she is.”

  “Yes, she is,” he confirmed, then lifted a hand to hold a finger up before her eyes, “but, you can’t save her on your own.”

  “Save her?”

  “You saw the kid at the door, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “She’s like him.”

  “What? A junkie?”

  Christian shrugged. “In a manner of speaking. Do you have any idea where you just were, Lana?”

  “A nightclub called The Mausoleum.”

  Okay, so she had an idea of her location… but that told him nothing at all about whether she understood her situation or not. Christian was willing to bet folding money that she was as clueless as all those stupid kids outside.

  “Well, yes,” he admitted, “but what do you know if it?”

  “Not much, other than that’s where Sarah’s friends told me she was.”

  In the distance, Christian followed the sounds of the watchers. They were closing in—obviously one or more of the brutes had picked up on her scent. Even his lack of odor couldn’t mask the scents of mortal blood and fear.

  “Then you know nothing, Lana… and they’re following us. We need to go.”

  “Wait a minute,” she said, jerking her arm out of his grip and sliding away, “I am not going anywhere with you until you tell me exactly who and what you are, and how the hell you managed to tear that guy’s head off!”

  Christian sighed and scrubbed a hand over his face. “I understand that you and your sister have little in common, but I can tell you right now that a child’s fairy tale would be easier to accept than the truth. Right now I don’t have time to explain.” From the sound of it, the watchers had less than two blocks to go. “If we don’t leave right now, you and I will both be dead in under a minute. Now please,” he offered his hand to her, “come on.”

  “Do I have a choice?” Lana asked. She sounded frightened again, and worse, the scent of fear emanating from her was growing stronger with each beat of her stubborn heart.

  “Not really,” he replied and grabbed her hand. “Hold on to me and close your eyes.” She hesitated, and rather than scream at her, which he wanted so badly to do, he tucked a finger under her chin and tilted her chin up. “Sarah is my best friend. She needs you right now, and I swear to you that you will always be safe with me, Lana. Now please…we need to go.”

  She nodded and did as he instructed, and with a slight bend to his knees, Christian leaped. The rush of wind was only a momentary setback, but it was enough to rip the breath from Lana’s lungs and keep her from screaming. Before she could take her first breath, he turned from the rooftop where he now stood and jumped to the next. In a dozen quick strides, he leaped again and landed soundlessly on the tarred rooftop of an apartment complex.

  They might be trespassing, but at least here the scent of other people would help mask hers. Loosening his grip, Christian helped her to the ground. She sank to her knees, where she bent over and gasped for breath. The jump had confused their followers, but it wouldn’t take long before they figured him out. She had thirty seconds at most to recover before they would have to move again.

  “What the hell are you?” she croaked, her voice reedy and still breathless.

  “You probably don’t want to know.”

  “I want… to know… Christian,” she said, pressing her fist between her breasts as if she were trying to hold her lungs in. Her heart rate was erratic and bordering on stroke level. “I…I want to know…how we got on…this roof.” He raised an eyebrow at her and unsuccessfully tried not to smirk. Even bordering on a blackout, Lana was an observant one. He pulled her to her feet.

  “I am a vampire. I jumped. Now come on.” He took her hand again and snatched open the access door that lead into the building. She tried to jerk away from him, but he was much stronger, and proved as much. “There’s no point in struggling, Lana. I’m not going to eat you. In case you haven’t noticed, I’m trying to save you from the ones that will…now come on. We’re in a building full of people, and the deeper into it we get, he more it will confuse your scent.” She dug her heels in, but he tugged her wrist and brought her crashing forward into him. “You can scream at me all you like about it later, but right now you need to do as I say, before I pick you up and carry you.”

  Under any other circumstances, the sour look on her face would have made him laugh, but right now he understood. If they caught her, they would kill him too. Lana didn’t argue as he pulled on her wrist again, and together they started down the stairs. Some of the doors opened and faces appeared in the cracks, questioning their presence in the building so late at night, but no one made a move to stop them.

  Soon they were on the street, and the first drift of snow was just beginning to fall. The majority of the fog had cleared, but the haloes of the streetlights on the sidewalk showed a milky film beginning to build on the concrete. It would be another few minutes before the snow began to stick, if it did at all this close to the bay, but once it did they would be safe. Even vampires couldn’t track humans in snow.

  Still, moving at her pace was not moving fast enough. Without asking permission, Christian pulled Lana up into his arms, cradled her against his chest, and began to run. Her eyes went wide again and her face drained of color before she turned and tucked her head into his neck. She began to tremble, though whether from residual fear or the cold, he wasn’t quite sure.

  They crossed the city in a matter of minutes, disappearing into the thin strips of wooded space headed north toward Salem. As Christian ran, the snow grew in intensity, coming down in heavy, wet clumps that clung to his hair and nose. As they touched Lana, they melted. The heat of life radiated from her, pushing back the chill that followed him. He quickly warmed to her temperature, but being the parasite that he was, he would continue to drain that warmth until there was little left for her.

  When he finally placed her on her feet, they stood in front of his house, a small cottage tucked back in the woods. From here, they were roughly halfway between Boston and Salem, well out of the range of the watchers. Behind the house, a generator hummed and every light in every window glowed brightly. Harlan had left all the lights on again.

  “W-where are we?” she asked between chattering teeth. He draped his arm over her shoulders, knowing his death chill would do little to fortify her.

  “This is my home. You will be safe here until morning.”

  “I want to go back to my car.”

  Christian felt his temper rising, but cast a patient glance toward her. “I cannot do that, Lana. You are being hunted.” He pulled a key from his pocket and used it to open the door. “Now come inside before you freeze to death.”

  Lana stopped on the stoop, glan
cing back and forth between the overgrown driveway behind her, and the open door in front of her. She might have been a bit on the reckless side when she entered the building, but she was at least using a bit of caution now. Of course, seeing and being hunted by death could do that to a person.

  “Come on, Lana,” Christian urged, waving her forward. “I swear I won’t hurt you. But I can’t help you if you turn into an ice cube.”

  “I don’t like this,” she said.

  “I don’t blame you. But it’s the only option you have.”

  With great, frustrated reluctance, Lana started forward, careful to hug the opposite door frame so not to touch him as she entered. Her clothes were soaked through with melted snow, and even as she wandered over to the fireplace, he could see her shivering.

  “Stay right there,” Christian said as he closed the door. “Let me go get you some dry clothes. Then we can talk.” He started into the next room, then paused and turned back. “Harlan shouldn’t be home for at least another hour, but if he comes in, don’t be frightened. He won’t hurt you.”

  “O-okay.”

  He went down the hall into the back bedroom and pulled open the closet. She was a slip of a thing, but surely he had something that would fit her. He rummaged through the shelves, eventually turning up a T-shirt and a pair of running shorts. The socks he grabbed would certainly be too big, but they would help to warm her feet and hopefully ward off any cold she might pick up from being wet for so long.

  Christian hadn’t been vampire long enough yet to forget the horrors of influenza, and if he had any chance of making amends for the atrocities of his life, he had to keep this girl healthy.

  When he returned to the front room, he found Lana curled around herself in front of the fire, shivering hard enough to make her teeth chatter. He made a big deal of letting the door bounce against the wall to signal his reentry. To sneak up on her would do no good.

  “It isn’t much, but at least you can be dry,” he said. She turned her face toward him, and immediately let out a small gasp of surprise.

  “You…you still have snow in your hair,” she whispered. Christian ran a hand along the top of his ruined Mohawk, not surprised when it came away with tufts of white powder stuck to it.

  “So I do… just one of the many drawbacks of no longer being a fully functioning human,” he replied, and started forward. She skittered backward, her face frightened, until her back hit the wall. She let out a squeak, and he stopped just behind the sofa. “I swear I won’t hurt you, Lana. Please take the clothes and go change.” He laid them on the arm of the sofa and slowly began to back away. “The bathroom is down the hall on the left.” She made no move to do as he said, “I will be in the kitchen. I will make you a cup of tea while you change, and then we can talk.”

  Chapter Three

  While Christian was banging around in the kitchen, Lana picked up the clothes and scurried down the hall. With the bathroom door securely closed and locked, she turned on the light and stared into the mirror at her reflection.

  She looked awful. Her hair had long since been pulled free of its ponytail to hang in stringy waves along her cheeks. Dark circles were beginning to appear under her eyes. Her skin was pale and waxy. She still shivered beneath her wet clothes.

  The cold, she realized, was all she felt. With everything that had happened in the last two hours, Lana discovered that a curious numbness existed within her. Each thing seemed to happen in slow motion and with startling clarity, yet she could muster no emotion for anything…except Christian. He terrified her.

  Lana looked down at the T-shirt and shorts lying on the sink. They were clean, at least—a bit big for her, but they would do until her clothes dried and she could be on her way. She glanced behind her to check the lock on the door—still locked—then stripped out of her coat, shirt, and pants. The wet material peeled away from her body like the skin of an apple, landing on the tile floor with a squishy plop. Even her bra and panties were soaking wet, so she removed those as well, then quickly climbed into the dry clothes. She had to roll the shorts up at her waist to keep them on her narrow hips, but the dry fabric was a welcome relief and helped to quell the shivers coursing up and down her spine.

  She heard a kettle whistle at the other end of the house, and though the idea of being alone in a room with a vampire—was he really serious about that, or was he just messing with her head?—terrified her, the thought of hot tea and a possible meal drove her through the door and back down the hall to the kitchen.

  She found Christian sitting in a chair at the dining table. He had changed clothes as well—a pair of black sweat pants hung low on his hips, and a white undershirt molded itself to his body. He was much more well built than she had first imagined…not that she’d had time to imagine those things. The remnants of his wet Mohawk hung in a limp trail along the center of his head, secured in place by a black rubber band at the base of his skull. He sipped from a beer bottle, and a small smile appeared on his face.

  “You could almost pass for vampire yourself, Lana,” he said without turning to her, and lifted the bottle to his lips again. “You are very quiet when you move.”

  “Thanks, I think,” she replied, still lingering in the doorway. She curled her arms around her body, hugging herself for warmth and protection…not that she could do much to protect herself against a hungry vampire. “Thank you for getting me out of there,” she added, and noticed that she had unconsciously raised one hand and begun to fidget with her hair. She forced her hand down by her side. “I really hope you’re going to tell me what’s going on now.”

  “Come drink your tea. There isn’t much to eat, but I made you some toast.” He nodded to the plate sitting next to the steaming mug on the table. “I thought you could use the fortification.”

  “Thanks,” she said again, but still didn’t move from the doorway. She couldn’t bring herself to do it.

  “I’m not going to eat you, Lana.” This time the smirk on his face was accompanied by a chuckle. “Not unless you ask nicely.”

  “What is that,” she replied with a snort, “some sort of vampire humor?”

  “No,” he said. “That’s my warped sense of reality. Vampire humor would require me to put on a cape and tell you I wanted to suck your blood with a bad attempt at a Romanian accent.”

  “Thanks for the heads-up, Dracula.”

  “Anytime, sweetheart.” He took another sip of his beer, and Lana watched, enrapt, as his throat muscles worked to draw the liquid down his throat. Maybe it was the undead thing, but there was something very attractive about him…beyond the normal, physical prettiness.

  The ultimate predator, she thought.

  “Come get your tea before it gets cold, and I’ll tell you everything you want to know about the last six months of your sister’s life.”

  Tea…she wanted that tea. It was the desire for something warm to push away the chill that drove her into the kitchen and up to the table. She picked up the cup and sniffed—chamomile, an odd thing for a vamp to keep—then lowered herself to the chair and picked up a triangle of toast.

  “I haven’t talked to her in almost a month,” Lana said before biting into the toast. Her stomach growled in happy acceptance as she chewed.

  “Not many people have,” Christian said, his expression turning dark. “Unless you’re one of The Mausoleum’s elite, that is.” He finished off the drink and tossed the bottle into the trash can across the room. It hit the bottom of the empty can and shattered. Lana winced at the sound, unbelievably loud in the quiet house. “Remember the kid at the door of the club?”

  “There was something wrong with his eyes,” she replied, remembering the freakish sight of him, and sipped her tea.

  “That’s a side effect, and the easiest physical way to tell a scab from an addict.”

  “A scab?” Lana questioned. Christian sighed, and fixed her with a hard gaze.

  “Look at my eyes… what do you see?”

  “Lots of color.
They don’t look normal.”

  “Exactly,” he said. “I was not lying when I said I’m a vampire. That’s how I tore the watcher’s head off. That’s how I leaped to the top of a seven-story building. That’s how I brought us to the woods outside Salem in less than fifteen minutes.”

  “So what do you mean by ‘scab’?”

  “A scab is a human—more or less—that is addicted to and completely dependent upon vampire blood. They are still human, but suffer from the vampiric bloodlust. They are not vulnerable to sunlight, they do not have vampiric strength, and once a person becomes a scab, there are two choices: turn or die.”

  All feeling left Lana’s fingers, and the teacup went crashing to the floor. Bits of ceramic skittered across the floor, radiating out from the puddle of liquid. In a moment, Christian was around the table, his hands on her shoulders to keep her from slumping to the floor behind the cup. A wave of nausea passed over her, followed quickly by a swirling blackness that threatened unconsciousness.

  When Lana was able to grasp her surroundings again, she was lying on the sofa in the main room, and Christian paced the floor in front of the fireplace. She stirred, causing him to pause and glance back at her.

  “Welcome back,” he said, and took a seat on the chair opposite the room. Lana muttered something in response, but even she wasn’t quite sure what it was, or if it was even a discernible language at all. Christian smiled again. “Think you’ll be okay to hear the rest?”

  The world spun around her as Lana sat up. She grunted and swiped a hand down her face. On the coffee table in front of her sat another cup of tea, still steaming. Christian was nothing if not thoughtful. She immediately threw her hand against her throat, searching for puncture wounds.

  “I didn’t bite you,” he said, chuckling.

  “Good to know.” She cleared her throat and reached for the cup. “You’re going to tell me that my sister is a scab,” she said, pausing to take a sip. “You said earlier that she was just like the guy at the door.” She took a second sip of the tea, and the world steadied a bit. “Now all you have to do is tell me how to get to her.”