Delilah Devlin - My Immortal Knight 04

With only slivers of moonlight to guide his way, Max Weir crept through
the saw palmetto and pine thicket toward a house curtained by vegetative
neglect. He’d forgone the use of the night-vision goggles that most of the
human members of his team wore. On the prowl for a monster, he preferred his
own senses, his own two eyes.

The Special Unit’s stealthy assault was aided by a wind that howled
through the trees, bending the tops so pine needles pelted the team. A constant
low roar, like the sound of the ocean, filled his headset. God or Karma was
with the SU tonight. The wind blew away from the house and its occupants,
disseminating the scents of gun oil and the uninvited humans—they’d never know
what hit them.

A cancer grew inside the small, cinderblock house at the center of the
property. Max had been in this line of work long enough to know what took place
in the nondescript house, but he’d never understand the attraction that brought
humans willingly to the door of a vampire’s den.

Anger knotted the muscles of his chest. Not until the disappearance of
a college student was linked to one of the parties hosted here did the SU kick
into gear. This killing field should have been ringed with fire and its
occupants consigned to hell when the den was first discovered and documented.

But that wasn’t how they operated now. It wasn’t simply enough to find
a vamp and stake his heart to dirt. Now the vermin had to be proven guilty of
crimes by the Masters’ Council before the team got the green light to strike.

“So Dylan, how’d you talk Emmy into sittin’ this one out?”

Max ignored the chatter in his headset. Not long ago, he would have
joined the banter, which eased the guys’ tension as they waited for the order
to move on their target.

“We could sure use her tonight. Emmy’s got a ruthless side to her,”
Phil Carstairs, one of the good guys—a human—continued.

“Toward a doughnut, maybe.” Darcy Albermarle snickered from her
position in the command van. Darcy, once upon a time a friend, consorted with
the enemy now—fucked one of the bastards on a nightly basis.

“Em would take offense to that comment,” Dylan O’Hara replied. “Her
tastes have become a little more refined over the past months.”

Max’s shoulders bunched with revulsion at the sound of the Irish
vampire’s dry amusement. The vamp and his growing coven didn’t belong in the
SU—they belonged at the end of a stake.
His
, preferably.

“Yeah, she’s moved on from doughnuts to the Danish!” Phil said.
“Although, I gotta admit, your wife has no conscience. She’d try to talk the
bastards to death.”

Soft laughter followed. Emmy O’Hara’s penchant for running off at the
mouth when she grew excited was a well-known fact.

Max’s lips twisted in disgust. They acted like the female vamp was part
of “the family” now. Was he the only one of the original unit who understood
how wrong it was to befriend the demons? And worse, let vamps lead a hunt for
other vamps? As far as he was concerned, the only good vampire was a dead one.

“Get set,” Darcy said, her voice suddenly sharp. “Traffic barriers are
in place. Mobile phone jam is on. No one’s driving in or calling for backup.”

Max’s hand tightened on his crossbow, which was already cocked with a
steel-tipped arrow. The first of many, he hoped. He itched for a battle,
something he could pour his adrenaline into.

“Captain says, move in,” Darcy said. “Good hunting, guys.”

“You heard it, men. Team One, circle around the back,” Dylan said.

From the edge of the seedy lawn, the first team raced across the
clearing to nestle close to the house before circling to the back entrance.

After a few tense moments, Max heard a crackle in his headset, then,
“Team One’s in position,” Phil said.

“Team Two,” Dylan said, “wait for my command.”

As if the house sucked in all sound within its vicinity, an ominous
silence settled around the clearing. There was no music, no shouts of laughter
from within, even though a couple dozen people and vamps had to be inside going
by the number of cars lining the driveway and street. This was supposed to be a
party—an orgy of sex and blood sharing.

From the corner of his eye, Max watched Dylan streak across the lawn
and flatten his back against the wall beside the door. Unencumbered by a flak
jacket or heavy armaments, the vamp held only a stake in his hand.

Max tensed, waiting for the signal to rush the door.

Dylan straightened, his head lifting to scent. “Something’s wrong.” His
whisper broke the silence. “Do you get that smell, Quent?”

“Coming.” The second vamp, Quentin Albermarle rushed across the lawn in
a blur of black, his blond hair shining silver in the moonlight. Flanking the
door, he too paused and lifted his head. “That’s not something you find every
day,” he said, his British voice even, yet hard-edged.

“Team, have your pistols ready,” Dylan said. “Safeties off. We’ve a
different sort of monster inside.” Without further explanation, he whipped
around, lifted a booted foot, and kicked the door open.

Max cursed. “Team One, the front door’s been breached. Go, go, go!”
With his crossbow raised, Max charged toward the house, his heart pumping so
fast blood roared in his ears.

“Maybe, we should wait for Dylan’s signal,” Joe Garcia said, easily
keeping stride with them.

Max wished he could ignore the vamp beside him. A twinge akin to pain
reminded him Joe had been his friend. “Why? So he can help them escape out the
back?” he asked, without trying to mask the acid in his tone.

Joe didn’t respond. Since his “death”, he’d remained aloof. Probably
knew Max could hardly stand the sight of him. Still, old habits seemed to die
hard—even when one was undead. Joe looked and acted as he always had. He still
wore the SU’s black uniform and used his issued weapons. The only difference
was he’d left off the flak jacket.

Were all vamps arrogant assholes? A jacket could have protected him
from an arrow or a stake. His cockiness would get him killed.

Not that Max gave a damn.

He reached the door, propped the stock of his weapon on his shoulder,
and then stepped through the door. Sighting down the beam of his crossbow, he
found the living room empty, save for clothing lying in piles among small hills
of brownish-black soot. Vamp remains.

“Shit!” Joe said. “Did they leave us anything to do?”

Max caught himself before he smiled. Joe had always been eager for
action.

“There’s no way those hotshots took care of this alone. What do you
think happened here?”

Max barely heard him. Odors assailed his nose. Singed flesh—the vamps,
he guessed. And something else, wet and musty. He tensed.
It can’t be.

A prickling unease raised the hairs on the back of his neck. He
followed another smell—which grew more overpowering the closer he came to the
source—followed the sound of muffled voices, Dylan’s and Quentin’s, he
recognized as he drew closer. He stole down a hallway toward a brightly lit
space that opened wide into a game room.

Once again shouldering his weapon, he stepped through the entrance. He
found what his nose already told him was there. Human carnage in vivid
splatters that dotted the ceilings and drowned the shag carpet. Opened
carcasses with bowels unstrung like wads of yarn across the floor.

“Holy Mary, mother of God,” Joe whispered beside him. “No fucking way a
vamp did this.”

Max’s body tightened in rejection of the horror he witnessed. For all
his years on the force, he’d never seen carnage on this scale. Shit like this
had never happened before the SU went soft on vamps. A monstrous evil had found
Vero Beach’s leniency too inviting and was making itself at home. Once you
negotiated with one evil…

Like hell he’d let it continue! His finger closed around the trigger of
his bow. Dylan’s back was exposed as he knelt over one body. Damn, but he was
tempted!

“Don’t do it, Max,” Joe said, his voice low, but firm. “My wife would
never forgive me if I let you dust one of her new friends.”

Max trembled with outrage, but he slowly lifted his finger off the
trigger and lowered his bow. Now wasn’t the time.

At Quentin’s nod, Dylan looked over his shoulder. His glance fell to
Max’s crossbow and he lifted one eyebrow in challenge.

“Good choice,” Joe said and slapped his shoulder as he passed him to
squat next to his new buddies.

Max stared at the three of them, thick as thieves. Max could remember a
time when Joe swore he’d rather die than turn—even asked Max to set him in the
sunshine to fry if it ever happened.

“So what the hell did this?” Joe asked.

Dylan cast Quentin a wary glance, before replying softly, “Werewolves.”

“Did I hear you right?”

Max jerked at the sound of Phil’s voice as he stepped through the door.
He’d been so engrossed in the scene before him he hadn’t heard Phil’s approach.

Phil’s eyes widened. “Shit!” His face tightened as he took note of the
bodies strewn around the floor. “The rest of the house is secure. Only dust
bunnies left.”

“When did werewolves move into the neighborhood?” Joe asked, his hands
fisted at his sides.

Phil, his gaze still glued to the floor, asked, “Am I the only one who
didn’t know werewolves existed?”

Max shook himself. He had a job to do. “I’ll start the teams on a sweep
of the area. See what we find.” As he turned to leave, he cast a scathing look
at Dylan and Quentin.

Joe, he ignored.

Dylan sighed and stood up as Max left the room.

“He’s not going to change—voluntarily, that is,” Quentin murmured.

“I know,” Dylan said. “I’ve already made the call to Navarro.”

Quentin nodded. “We can’t let anyone stand in the way of our setting up
a southern council.” He waved his hand at the room. “This only makes it all the
more vital we handle him quickly.”

Dylan glanced at Joe to see his reaction.

The younger vamp was still torn by old loyalties—trying to ride the
fence between his new “life” and his old friends. Joe took a deep breath, his
face a grim mask. “Well, shit. How are we going to keep a lid on this mess?”

*
* * * *

Max pushed through the door of the bar determined that tonight he’d
either get shit-faced or fucked. Which, didn’t matter. So long as he could blow
off the steam that had been gathering a head since the botched mission hours
before. The bar was a regular haunt—only a block from his house. If need be, he
could crawl home. The smoky air, the loud grinding music, and the smell of
stale beer appealed when he had an axe to grind.

The SU had swept the area for signs of the wolves that killed the
vampires before turning on the humans in a mutilating frenzy. Their bloody paw
prints led beyond the house to a gravel road where they’d disappeared. The pack
had made their getaway in cars. This hadn’t been a roaming band’s target of
opportunity, but a takedown.

The grim faces of the vampires telegraphed their worry. He hoped they
were shaking in their boots. Not that the thought of a rogue wolf pack wasn’t
just as unsettling to Max.