Undying. V.K. Forrest

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ then continued in the direction he had originally set out. His tongue lolled, testing the night air.

      He only had time to circumnavigate the meeting place once before he had to get into place prior to Romano’s arrival. As he peered over a rock, taking care with his footing, he silently cursed Regan. His partner had not been himself for the last year. This was not the first time he had not shown up at an appointed time and place on sept business. Arlan had been trying to cover for him longer than he knew he should because he was Fia’s brother.

      Thoughts of Fia made him smile. At least on the inside. He didn’t think dogs could really smile.

      Arlan loved Fia Kahill. He had been in love with her for at least a thousand years, but it was unrequited love. Or so she said. Right now she had a boyfriend. A human boyfriend. She told Arlan that although she and Arlan were occasionally lovers, she wasn’t interested in a relationship with him. With any man in the sept. But Arlan was sure he was slowly working a chink in her iron resolve, had been for at least a century. Fia loved him. She just didn’t know it yet.

      So…to protect her, he protected her kid brother. As did Fia’s other brother, Fin. As did other young men in the sept.

      Arlan wondered now if he had been remiss in not calling Regan’s shortcomings to the attention of the council. His irresponsible behavior was not only affecting him now, it was affecting others. It was affecting the sept’s ability to do its job efficiently. They could not afford to have one of their own so far out of step.

      Maybe it was time Arlan talked to the council, or at least Fia. It was time he stopped trying to talk to Regan. The warnings had obviously gone unheeded.

      Arlan shifted his weight on his haunches and eyed the place where Romano would come for his money. It was a good spot for a man dealing in the human slave trade to make a transaction. The cover of darkness. No police around. Few people present and those who were would turn the other way if they saw anything suspicious. There would be no good citizens loitering in the shadows of the Areopagus, waiting to give their statement to the authorities.

      Arlan smelled the human before he heard the footfalls. The stench of his evil flesh pierced the air even sharper than the intense, smoky aroma of his cigarette.

      This was, indeed, an excellent place to commit a crime. But it was also a dangerous place for a man being hunted by a dog.

      Or a vampire.

      Chapter 2

      Macy stood at the picture window and stared into the darkness. Into the nothingness. It was a little after midnight. She had a prestigious assignment for Home & Garden tomorrow. She should be asleep. But she couldn’t sleep.

      Not tonight. Not when she knew he was out there, restless. Agitated. She could feel his anxiety building and knew that when it reached its peak he would act.

      She hugged herself. In the dark, there was barely a glimmer of her own reflection in the glass. A soft, humid breeze drifted through the pines, filtering through the open windowpanes.

      She lived alone. The nearest house was half a mile away. She did not lock her doors at night or close her windows.

      A death wish?

      Macy studied the magnolia tree in her front yard. Her mother had always liked magnolias.

      There had been a branch of magnolia blossoms on her mother’s white coffin. No lilies or gardenias or the usual funeral flowers. Only magnolias.

      Daisies on Mariah’s.

      Peonies on little Minnie’s.

      No flowers on her father’s coffin. He hadn’t been a flower kind of guy.

      Macy walked away from the window that had never had the drapes pulled on it since she rented the cottage outside Charlottesville, Virginia, more than a year ago. She had nothing to hide. Her soul had been bared to the bitter world a long time ago.

      She walked barefoot, in nothing but a pair of panties and a men’s ribbed sleeveless T-shirt, through the dark house. It was only June but June was hot in Virginia.

      The rooms were quiet except for the sound of her footsteps. She had no cat or dog to keep her company. She hadn’t had a pet since she was fourteen.

      Fritz had been sent to the pound. No one ever knew what happened to Snowcap, her sister’s white Persian cat. Lost in the confusion of the police cars and emergency vehicles, Macy supposed.

      Macy exhaled, fighting the dark cloud settling over her. As much as she hated herself for it, she couldn’t stop thinking about Teddy.

      She guessed he was thinking about her. That was why she couldn’t sleep. There was this crazy, weird connection between them. Had been for as long as she could remember. And she couldn’t escape it. It was like cancer, a cavernous, black hole eating her from the inside out.

      She wandered through the living room into the office. When she had rented the home, the landlady had said the cozy room would make an excellent spare bedroom for family or friends. Macy had no family left. No friends.

      The Apple logo on her open laptop glowed, but the room was as dark as the others in the house. The open window as naked.

      From here, she could hear an owl hooting.

      She sat down in her chair and flipped on the lamp. Soft light glowed in a circle on the old oak desk she had found at a yard sale. She hadn’t bothered to refinish it, just removed the center drawer and added a keyboard drawer. When she was here at the cottage, which wasn’t all that frequently, she liked to use a full keyboard, sometimes even an additional monitor connected to her laptop. It gave her a better sense of proportions in the pictures she shot.

      She touched the drawer and it glided out. She tapped the mouse beside the wireless keyboard and the laptop screen lit up. She had an instant message.

      He had been waiting for her.

      Her stomach tightened. He always seemed to know when she was awake in the middle of the night. Worse, she knew when he was.

      You there?

      The cursor pulsed.

      She could feel him waiting.

      She glanced at the dark window. He said he watched her. She had never known if he meant literally. Was tonight the night he was out there? Would tonight be the night he took her life and ended the last fourteen years of agonized waiting?

      She looked back at the laptop screen.

      Maybe tonight would be the night she took a stand. Maybe tonight she would ignore him. Maybe she’d even threaten that if he contacted her again, she would call the police.

      It was an empty threat, of course. It would be nearly impossible to track him to a computer, to a location. He traveled for his work, too. He IM’d from Internet cafés, hotel business offices. Even truck stops had Internet access for their customers now. And when he contacted her from home, he said he used different laptops that he bought and sold regularly on the Internet. The stark truth was that even if she could convince the FBI that he was the nutcase they were looking for, it would be nearly impossible for them to track him down through his Internet use. The police would never find him. He knew it. She knew СКАЧАТЬ