Heart of Stone by Sonya Bateman

Author:Sonya Bateman [Bateman, Sonya]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2020-04-05T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter 18

Abe must’ve fallen asleep on the couch. He woke up pretty damned fast when Murdoch appeared in his living room with a dead body and started dragging it into the kitchen. By the time I came through, he was sitting up and spluttering, one hand pressed to his chest.

“Sorry,” I said. “Didn’t mean to wake you.”

“Wasn’t asleep. Just resting my eyes,” he said a little defensively, and then leaned forward and peered in the direction Murdoch had gone. “Why is he propping up a corpse at my kitchen table?”

“Uh. We think he’s a witness,” I said. “One I might actually be able to talk to.”

Abe grunted. “Terrific. Guess I’m eating in the living room from now on.”

He pushed himself off the couch, and the two of us headed out to join the bogeyman. Murdoch had plunked down in a chair next to the dead man, who was slumped like a rag doll with his head lying on the table, turned to one side.

I cleared my throat and headed toward the corpse. Hadn’t really gotten a good look at him after we pulled him out. The guy looked around forty, with curly brown hair and waxy blue-white skin the distinct color of death. At least where he wasn’t bruised, bleeding, or covered with black smudges. All his clothes were torn, not just his jacket.

“You think he died in the rockslide?” I said offhandedly, still wondering if maybe he was human.

Incredibly, Murdoch grinned. “Oh, Benji’s not dead,” he said. “He’s a vampire.”

That was when the corpse opened his eyes and lunged at me.

And before I knew it, a pair of what could only be described as fangs sunk into my forearm.

Reacting instinctively, I flung my free hand at him and shouted, “Seabh’fóhs!” The vampire went rigid.

Unfortunately, I’d frozen him with his fangs embedded in my flesh.

“I’m okay,” I said, mostly for Abe’s benefit, since he was on his way to the drawer where he kept his backup gun. It took a little maneuvering, but I managed to wrench my arm free and step back from the unmoving, undead guy kneeling on the kitchen floor. “You could’ve warned me, you asshole!” I shot at Murdoch.

“True. But it was a lot more fun this way,” he said.

I gritted my teeth and pressed a hand over the wounds, drawing on my spark to heal them. “Any particular reason he attacked me?”

“Well, he’s probably desperate to feed,” Murdoch said. “He survived somehow — probably because he’s a bloody cockroach of a vamp — but he’s beat to shit, same way I was.”

“Great.” I got the distinct feeling there was no love lost between Murdoch and Benji. “Let me guess, Fae magic doesn’t heal vampires either.”

“Good guess.”

I sighed and backed up to stand near Abe, who was starting to look a little frazzled. “You okay?” I asked him.

“Yeah, sure. I’m not the one who just got bitten by a vampire,” he said, and rubbed a hand nervously across the top of his head. “Hey, uh, he’s not gonna turn into one now, is he?”

He directed the question to Murdoch, who grunted and stood.

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