Bad Blood by Tim Rangnow

Author:Tim Rangnow [Rangnow, Tim]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Vagabond Publishing
Published: 2022-03-03T23:00:00+00:00

TWENTY

A nnie’s eyelids fluttered as the paramedic gingerly dabbed blood from her hair. She had been hit with something, and I hadn’t seen the gash on the back of her head until the EMT found it during his examination of the unconscious woman I’d carried back to the crime scene. I’d been lucky the ambulance was still there.

“This is going to need stitches,” he told me. “A doctor should really look her over, too. You don’t want to mess around with head injuries. We’re heading back to the hospital now, and we’ll take her to the emergency room.”

I opened my mouth to say I’d ride along, but then I saw Mariah in the corner of my eye. Instead, I got the name of the hospital from him. I grabbed Annie’s hand and leaned forward to kiss her cheek. Her eyes tried to focus on me as I did so. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.” She nodded faintly as her eyes began to glaze over.

Watching the ambulance drive away, navigating the police vehicles that clogged the street, was worse than the fight I’d just been through. I winced at the reminder and rested a hand against my side, which was still tender from the pressure of the shape changer’s bear jaws.

“What the hell was that thing?” I asked Mariah.

She shook her head, watching the ambulance leave the scene. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“Come on, Mariah, you have to know something. This thing has been killing Harrison blood donors, and I think it was doing that to lure one of you out. I don’t know if the shapeshifter was targeting you specifically, or if you were just convenient since you could be counted on to show up at crime scenes.”

She turned to me with a pleading look. “I promise, Jack. I know as little about this creature as you do.”

“I find that hard to believe. Uriah brought in his own investigator, which tells me that he knew something bad was coming for him or his family.”

She snorted contemptuously. “If he knows anything specific, he hasn’t shared it with me. I’m still young by vampire standards, Jack. It’ll be decades before I’m included in the inner circle.” She’d told me at our first meeting that vampires had life spans more than twice that of a normal human. Uriah, patriarch of the family, was over a hundred and eighty and expected to lead them for several more decades.

Gritting my teeth, I had to bow to the logic of her statement. “I need to talk to Uriah. This thing just attacked me and my own, so I’m going to take it down. With or without his help, but with would be easier for everyone involved.”

She sighed and lowered her head so that dark curls fell to cover her face. I’d pushed my vision of the supernatural world down hard enough that I couldn’t see her vampire features under the mask. “I’ll try to arrange something. It’s the least I can do when you just saved my life.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.