Bloodlust (Frailty Book 2) Read online

  Constance looked on as Ambrose checked for life signs before giving up and resting a hand on the former servant’s chest. “Ferguson. Oh sweet Ferguson. Who has done this too you?” he asked, and the teen found herself genuinely surprised by his display of emotion. For a fleeting instant he seemed human; that he could care and show compassion.

  “Tell me who has done this to you. Speak one more time. That you could talk and tell me so that I could avenge you; so I could wrench every limb from their body and suck out their very soul,” the blood-dealer continued, his rage escalating.

  Yes, he cared, Constance thought. Yet another weakness; a frailty waiting to be exploited.

  An animalistic howl shook the room, and the elder pack-leader turned his burning gaze toward the teen. From all fours he leaped in her direction, landing just in front of where she sat strapped to the chair. Chest rising and falling by driving rage, his hot breath blasted Constance in the face.

  “Talk!” Ambrose growled. “Who did this to my servant? Tell me what has happened!”

  “Um,” Constance began, as she held back a smile and fought to stay in character, “is he dead?”

  Her play at ignorance appeared to do the trick, incensing the night-stalker’s already boiling anger. “Of course he’s dead, Child! Do not mock me! Now tell me, who did this? Was it the demon?”

  “Maybe,” the teen responded and shrugged, causing the chair to creak once again as her body pushed against its bindings.

  As if not having noticed her predicament before, Ambrose visually scoured her, seeming struck further by confusion. His eyes stopped at her arms and shoulders.

  “What goes on here? Who gave you those bite marks?” the blood-dealer asked.

  “Familiar, aren’t they?” Constance replied with a pouting face. You’re doing so well. It’s a perfect performance.

  Ambrose rose back up to a standing position, whipping around from side-to-side defensively. “This is not a game, Girl! What have you seen? Who is responsible for this?”

  “I can’t say,” Constance answered playfully.

  Leaning forward, the man-beast bore in close and locked her in his stare. “You will tell me what has transpired here.”

  Constance swallowed hard in an attempt to catch her breath as pheromones washed over her in waves. Mind clouded and the pack leader’s words pounding in her head, the teen struggled to hold a grip on any conscious control. Thumping hard like a bass drum, her heart strained as if trying to escape the chest it was trapped in, while waves of heat and a cold sweat washed over her body and clashed.

  The effects were horrid and almost intolerable; almost impossible to fight through; almost incapable of not caving in to.

  Almost. She had been under this spell before, though, and prepared for it. Deep down in her core she concentrated on the hunger that boiled. It was a hunger for blood, yes, but it was also a hunger for so much more.

  Yearning for the power she had tasted and desiring the strength, vigor, and potency she had witnessed first-hand being wielded, her willpower fed on the all-encompassing craving. It drove every fiber in her body.

  All that she wanted would be hers. It would be hers! And it would start with the bloated oaf in front of her, blinded by his own confidence and false sense of security. She would have him.

  She would control him. Yes, she would have control.

  Having regained almost full functionality of her body and taking a slow, deep breath, Constance returned to the plan at hand. Meeting Ambrose’s stare once again, she calmly stated, “Well, it wasn’t Roofy that did this.”

  “Enough games,” the elder blood-dealer spat, “you are in no position to refuse me. You must obey your pack-father.”

  “Maybe,” Constance glared, a cocky smile crossing her face. It was time. “But they don’t.”

  Ambrose turned in time to see two male figures emerge from the shadows and roar towards him.

  Things were going perfectly, and Constance applauded her cunning. Caught off-guard by Ferguson’s death and engulfed in his own rage and attention on her, Ambrose had failed to notice the surprise waiting for him – her loyal pack. Neatly tucked away in the same area where they had found Ambrose’s blood-slave dwelling, the two men had been masked by the heavy amounts of concrete, metal, and residual oil and fluids that coated many of the surfaces found in the building;. The same odors that had interfered with my own senses.

  Poor Ferguson never knew what had hit him, not that he could have fought back in his state. More importantly than any physical attack the zombie-like man could have made, though, was the fact that they struck so fast they were able to prevent him from making a distress call to his master.

  Perfection. No, she corrected herself. It was control.

  True, her pack was not seasoned, formidable, or of the numbers as would be needed to actually rid her of the elder blood-dealing nuisance, but that was not the end game anyway. They would serve their purpose.

  Wes Richert, the deranged serial killer with his own insatiable appetite churning beneath the surface, barely containable. The teen had promised him the one thing he believed would quell his demented desires: Detective Laura Stenks, the woman that started him along the path he was on by exposing him to her own unorthodox fetish.

  If only you knew. Devouring your prize will not quench your thirst. It will never fade, only grow and mutate and become increasingly dangerous. But, that is what makes you so perfect. By adding the need to feed that controls a night-stalker, she added her own taint control. It would make manipulating him simple.

  Paired with him was Constance’s other acquisition, Anthony Torres. There was nothing special about the costume shop clerk, and that was what Constance was sure had soured his young personality. It was also the exact reason she believed him to be something that could be molded into becoming special.

  Anthony’s disdain for the trappings of his life that left him floundering in obscurity also lent to his blame of everyone around him. Added to that was his uninspiring physique: scrawny, lanky, pale, and disproportionate. Not the blend of traits that aspired to scaring away bullies or attracting the ladies.

  Physically lacking translated to mentally determined in Constance’s judgment, though. That was all he needed. Turning him provided all the prowess he would need to serve her.

  And serve the two men did, attacking their target with feral ferocity, each looking to impress their den mother. The teen could not help but smile at how proud she was; proud of herself first and foremost. Where her would-be mentor and pack-father had failed, she had succeeded, choosing faithful prospects. Ambrose had underestimated her in every way, and it was about to cost him dearly.

  The elder night-stalker held his ground against the two fledgling man-beasts, though. Teeth found flesh, claws tore, blood spilled, and growls filled the abandoned factory building. To anyone else the scene would have appeared like a slice of Hell on earth, but Constance knew the real Hell was on its way.

  As she watched, Ambrose brutalized the weaker Anthony and tossed him aside, with the younger man landing in a heap near the table. His bony frame looked almost skeletal in the ambient light. Wes did not go down so easy, unleashing in a flurry against the elder blood-dealer.

  Ambrose was unyielding, however, and dispatched the serial killer with a number of devastating blows before sending him across the room and into a cascading stack of barrels placed near one of the exterior walls. Satisfied the two no longer bore an eminent threat, he turned his attention back to the teen.

  “You!” he roared, blood spraying out as he did. With every deliberate step he took towards her, Constance’s smile broadened. A smell entered the air. Strong, durable, and unbending, it surged through her nostrils. There was something earthy to it, maybe like a redwood would smell, the teen imagined.

  The crack of skin and bone against skin and bone shattered the temporary stillness as Ambrose backhanded the helpless girl. His assault was met with defiant expression, accented by pursed, bloody lips. A
vice-like-grip clamped around Constance’s throat. “This ends now,” he threatened.

  Another loud sound erupted. This time it was in the form of the word ‘no’ being screamed by a whole other type of creature; a demonic one.

  “You are so blind and broken,” Constance gasped through the clenched hold.

  41

  Roofy bellowed in emotional pain and anger. Strapped helplessly to a chair was the girl he had failed; the girl he had watched dying; the girl he should have saved. Wet, fresh blood turned her lips a crimson red. Bite marks, just like the ones that desecrated her body in Las Vegas, riddled her arms and upper body. It was happening all over again, and his determination to stop it amped to uncontrollable levels.

  Pure rage fueled a wanton hunger for destruction in the big Russian that he had not known before. There was only one thing that would satisfy it: death.

  “Yes. Yes. Yes!” Apocalypse screamed in an excited delirium in Roofy’s head. “Let me out! Yes! Yes! Yes!”

  “Da,” Roofy agreed, and everything he knew was engulfed in a cloud of flames and blackness.

  42

  A cold sweat broke out all over Laura’s body, and chills rippled throughout her skin. Trembling hands floundered in their effort to retrieve her firearm from its holster or hold her flashlight steady, sending a stream of light bobbing between floor and ceiling, and her voice cracked and squeaked as she attempted to speak. As if being forced to relive one of her many nightmares, it appeared she had been transported in time and place to that fateful night in Las Vegas.

  Struggling to gain control and her grip on sanity and reality as Roofy methodically strode towards the beast-like killer, Laura, gun drawn and leveled uneasily at Ambrose, finally found the strength to yell for everyone to stop.

  Seemingly oblivious to her actions or verbal demands, the big Russian uttered something in Russian, but she failed to understand what it was, as the words were drowned out by Ambrose.

  Releasing his hold on the teen’s throat, Ambrose had turned towards the mountainous ex-wrestler, held up a hand, and yelled out that things were not what they seemed.

  Wait. Wait. Was that thing pleading for rationality from Roofy? Laura was thrown further off-guard. What was she seeing? It appeared he wanted to explain something, as opposed to being on the verge of attacking.

  Things had happened so quickly that Laura had broken the cardinal rule of her law enforcement training. She had failed to acknowledge the clues that the environment was trying to show her. She was reacting emotionally and irrationally instead of proactively. She needed to get control of the scene and quick.

  Scouting the room with trained eyes, Laura shone her flashlight around and looked for signs as to what was happening. A thinly built body lay near the sole source of light in the room, and the unexpected familiarity of the male added to her surprise and disbelief. Was it Anthony, the irritating clerk from Other Self? She was sure of it. What would he be doing here?

  That was it! Laura realized his being there explained the murder scene from the costume shop. Constance had not killed him or kidnapped him for a blood-thirsty snack. The teen had …had what? Mutated him into one of these inhuman things? But then why was he out cold on the floor while Constance was tied to the chair?

  Had he turned on her? Or…the second epiphany hit her like a ton of lead. It was a trap. For who, Laura was not sure, but Ambrose’s reaction seemed to indicate he had figured out the same thing. It was possible they had all been baited.

  Grabbing for his arm, Laura yelled once again for Roofy to halt. The effort was just about as effective as her trying to pull down a full-grown maple tree. Only, the ex-wrestler did not just pull away from her, he swatted her away without so much as an acknowledgement that she was there. The effortless gesture sent her back and off her feet, forcing Laura to recover to a standing position quickly.

  Strength was something the big Russian was not short on, but there was a noticeable difference. I would know. I’ve felt his ferocity first hand. Well, in a manner of speaking. The investigator scolded herself for even thinking about making a sexual joke at the moment.

  Still, their physical encounters were where she had tasted his might, and the small demonstration she had just been given of what he was capable of now was on a whole new level. That knot was back and fully formed in the pit of her stomach, immediately joined by the hairs on the back of her neck standing up.

  A look washed over Ambrose’s face; not fear exactly. No, it was more like an acceptance; an acceptance that something inevitable and unstoppable was about to impact them. His eyes went wide, and he acquired a defensive posture. Laura could not help but think that maybe his openly declared hate and desire to kill Roofy appeared to be getting overruled by a need for survival. Knowing how powerful the man-beast, himself was, she could not begin to imagine how bad something would have to be to cause him to react in such a way.

  That’s what it was, though, that increasingly uneasy feeling that crawled up her spine; a sudden and intense need to survive. That’s what had caused her to take a couple of short steps back. That’s what caused her hands to shake once again. That’s why she had not taken her eyes off Roofy. Something was coming for them.

  Whiffs of sulfur filtered in small spurts throughout the air before finally flourishing and polluting the entire immediate area. The big Russian’s form had begun to transform, as well: a darkness crossed over his skin, nails elongated into longer, blackish claws, already enormous arms appeared to distort and grow longer, and his hulking form slouched.

  Tremors wracked Laura’s posture, and she almost dropped her pistol as she fought to keep her knees from buckling. The Russian’s name meekly crossed her quivering lips as she feebly begged him to stop whatever was happening. To her surprise, the nearly inaudible words caught his attention, an effort she instantly regretted making with every last ounce of life in her body.

  All it took was a single glance back over his shoulder; just a single glance with those eyes and smile. It was a demented smile that belied an evil worse than any killer Laura had ever collared. The eyes were a different story, on an entirely other escalated plain of terror.

  Blackened and sunken into their sockets, there was one solitary message that looking into them bore: damnation.

  The demon’s evil laugh instilled soul withering dread, and Laura’s legs finally gave way. On her hands and knees, she watched Ambrose crouch and bristle, screaming, “Look what you have wrought upon us!”

  Arched, the devilish creature answered back. “Yes! Apocalypse is here!” Tearing at Roofy’s clothes, Apocalypse ripped through the outer apparel, leaving just the red and yellow wrestling ensemble that the Russian had been wearing underneath. “The champ is back!”

  A resonance penetrated the building, causing Laura, sitting on her knees on the concrete floor, to grasp her ears and scream in an attempt to shut it out. No words came to her that could describe it; anguish maybe; pain. So bleak was it that her mind conjured images of people being tortured and maimed.

  Blackness, ink and blood-like and thick in nature, oozed in almost every direction from Apocalypse. Not oozing, crawling. Writhing like hellish souls seeking vengeance for being born and condemned, the shadowy specters moved ever closer.

  Laura, on hands and knees, backed herself up, fumbling over Anthony’s semi-conscious body, until she bumped the table. Huddling under it, the detective wept. She wept for her soul as the hope of any salvation slipped away. She wept out of fear of the darkness creeping through her heart. She wept and called out for help. Under the dilapidated wooden table, Laura was once again that little girl being victimized by her mother.

  The tendrils reached the barely cognizant Anthony and began consuming him. Frozen in fright, Laura could only watch as young man-beast, jarred to full alertness by the touch of the specters, scratched and clawed at the evil apparitions leaching onto his panicked form. It did not help.

  His eyes locked with hers. It was a stare she was sure she would n
ever forget as long as she lived, if she did manage to live through the horror that was unfolding. Icy fear dug further into her as she realized what she was watching was probably a premonition of her own horrific fate.

  Anthony wailed and shrieked and begged for help, holding his hand outstretched towards her. No help would come.

  All Laura could do in her reduced state, with her body unwilling to respond even if her mind allowed her to do anything other than stare with petrified horror from her spot, was shake her head from side-to-side. As the blackness covered him and seeped into his open mouth, Anthony gurgled and ceased his resistance.

  How many times had she dreamed of smacking him with a baton and drawn pleasure from the thought? Now, his body decaying before her as if the evil shadow-like creatures were sucking every piece of living tissue out of it, Laura begged for forgiveness from a God she never acknowledged.

  Was there forgiveness for any of them, though, she pondered? Had they all brought this upon themselves, just victims of their own frailties and desires? There certainly were no signs of God in the room, Laura thought. Not that she had ever been a religious person, always believing that faith was bound too deeply in hypocrisy to hold any truth. But now, in the presence of an actual demon, she found herself questioning everything that could be called real. Unfortunately, any appeal for spiritual help appeared to be too late. Things had spiraled way beyond out of control.

  Roofy, at least in the way she knew and cared for him, was gone. Ambrose, as malevolent as he had been, fought against the demon like a wild-animal that had been backed into a corner and might very well have represented their only hope for survival. Anthony was no more than a powdery, pale husk, resembling an old mummy’s carcass that had been exhumed from some long-buried temple. And Constance…

  Constance. Through the faint light, the detective took her first hard look at the bound-up teen. No fear. Not just an absence of it, though; the girl was encouraging someone; egging them on. Ambrose, perhaps? Laura strained to hear over the sounds of the collision between the two inhuman creatures, whose growls and snarls permeated with such savagery that it drowned out everything else.