The Rose Ransom (Girls Wearing Black: Book Three) (51 page)

No matter what happened in this
room tonight, the mission was over. Jill and Nicky might never get out of here.
Renata might decide to kill them both, and if she did, the mission was over.

But even if, by some miracle,
they got away, they would immediately hit the road. Renata had been inside the
Bloom mansion. Their covers were blown. Code Orange.

The mission was over
.

“We’re all waiting,” said
Renata. “Which girl gets the Ransom money?”

“Samantha Kwan,” Jill said.

Renata’s eyes opened wide.
Murmurs of confusion sounded behind her.

“Samantha Kwan?” Renata said.
“And here, all this time, I thought you were a friend of Nicky Bloom.”

Fearing that now might be the
time that Renata decided to have a look in Jill’s mind, she turned her gaze
away, and found herself looking at Kim, whose face went from horrified to
shocked, and from shocked to furious. Somewhere behind them all, in the crowd
of people gathered in the hallway, Samantha screamed for joy.

Renata snapped her fingers at a
servant girl with short brown hair. “Go notify the bank that the Ransom money
is to be transferred to the pot on behalf of Samantha Kwan.” she commanded.

The girl nodded her head and
raced away.

Renata took a step forward. “As
you might imagine,” she said, “there are some formalities to work out. Papers
to sign. Handshakes to make. You know how this works.”

Renata was making no effort to
mask her intent. She spoke of papers and handshakes, but in the tone of her
voice, it was clear she meant something else. She was letting them all know she
was about to kill them.

“Party’s over, everyone!” she
yelled. “Thank you for coming! You may see yourselves out!”

Like obedient lemmings, the
students in the hall turned to leave. Renata stood in the doorway, listening to
their footsteps as they made their way out.

“We’ll just wait until we’re
sure everyone’s gone,” Renata said, stepping even closer. “Then we can finalize
this year’s Rose Ransom.” She looked at Patrick. “You may go,” she said. “Lock
the door behind you on your way out.”

Doing his best imitation of a
vampire slave, Patrick bowed his head and said, “Yes, ma’am.” He walked past
Renata, making for the doors. He closed the left door, then came back into the
room, making like he would close the right one as he left. He pulled up the
doorstop, and followed the arc of the door as it closed, waiting until the last
second before jumping back in the room, his gun raised. Before Renata had any
idea what was happening, Patrick had unloaded half a cartridge in her back.

Jill ran to Ryan, shouting, “Get
down!”

Ryan didn’t listen. Rather than
crouch down, he grabbed Jill by the hand and pulled her behind one of the glass
cases, telling her, “Stay here.” He left Jill behind the case and rushed to the
front, pulling open a case and grabbing a bloody knife.

“Ryan, what are you doing?
Stop!”

Gunshots were flying now in
rapid succession. Patrick had two revolvers out, one in each hand, and was
filling Renata’s back side with bullets. All around them, glass cases were
exploding on impact as bloody bullets came out of Renata’s chest and demolished
the room. Half her torso gone, Renata fell to the floor right as Patrick’s guns
clicked to empty. As he ejected his spent cartridges, Ryan leapt at Renata,
wielding his knife.

“No, Ryan!” Jill cried. “You
don’t know what you’re--”

Even as she lay on the floor,
Renata was still fast enough to raise her hands and catch Ryan’s arms. He
screamed in pain as she squeezed his wrist. The knife fell harmlessly out of
his hands, and she threw him across the room, his body crashing into a glass
case and falling to the ground.

“Ryan!”

Crouching low, Jill scurried
across the room. Ryan was down on his side. His eyes were closed.

“Ryan?”

She touched his face. “Ryan, are
you with me?”

Opening his eyes slowly, he
moaned. His hand reached for his back, and Jill saw that his shirt was covered
in broken glass and blood.

“Can you move your legs?” Jill
said.

Ryan looked at her, confused,
then he nodded his head.

“We’re going for the door while
she’s still down,” Jill said. “We’re getting you out of here.”

“Yeah, okay,” said Ryan. His
words were slurred. His eyes were glazed over.

As she pulled Ryan to his feet,
Patrick finished reloading his guns, and started firing on Renata again. At
this point, things were moving too fast for Jill to see what was happening.
Somehow, Renata was up. She leaped back and forth across the room, her motions
too fast for Jill to make any sense of them. She was knocking over glass cases
with each jump, and cackling like a witch.

“This is so much fun!” Renata
screamed.

“Everyone get down!” Patrick
yelled as he sent bullets spraying across the room.

Jill pushed Ryan back to the
ground and lay on top of him. Gunfire and glass exploded all around them in a
deafening roar, but somehow, the sound of Renata’s manic laugh pierced the
noise. Her eyes closed, Jill had no idea what was going on, but she knew it
wasn’t good when Patrick’s guns started clicking again. He didn’t have a third
round of ammo.

“Uh oh,” Renata said. “Are your
bullets all gone? I suppose that means it’s my turn!”

What happened next took less
than a second. By the time Jill had pushed herself to her knees, it was already
over. Renata leaped from somewhere in the back of the room and landed on top of
Patrick. She ripped his throat out with her teeth and Patrick fell dead to the
floor.

Renata turned and looked right
at Jill.

“Well,” she said. “What do we do
now?”

Her fangs out, blood all over
her face, her dress blown to pieces, Renata was a terrifying sight.

“Look at you,” she said. “Using
your body to protect the boy. You’re really something, Jill Wentworth. I wish I
knew you better.”

Jill’s eyes scanned the ground.
Glass, bullets, dresses, and knives were everywhere.

“Go ahead,” Renata said. “You’re
thinking of picking up one of the knives. Do it.”

Jill stood in place.

“I want you to pick up a knife,”
said Renata. “It will be more sporting that way.”

Jill remained frozen.

“Pick up a knife!” Renata
commanded, and Jill found herself crouching to the floor against her will. As
her hand reached for a knife, she saw Nicky crouched behind one of the
pedestals, knife in hand, about to make a move.

The vision came to Jill as she
stood up. She would charge Renata from the front, distracting her enough so
that Nicky had a chance to get her from behind. While Renata took care of Jill,
Nicky would have a clear shot to stab her in the heart.

There was no further thought to
it than that. By the time Jill was back on her feet, the knife was raised and
she was charging at Renata. She knew this was the end for her and she did it
anyway. She knew Renata would kill her in less than a second, but she also knew
it was the only chance they had to end this.

Either Jill died right now, or
they all died a few minutes later. It was an easy choice to make. It was the
right thing to do.

Renata smiled as Jill charged,
opening her arms and baring her chest, as if showing Jill right where to stab
her. Jill took the bait. With everything she had, she thrust the knife at
Renata’s heart.

She never made contact. Renata
moved so quickly Jill couldn’t make any sense of it, but one second she was
stabbing at her chest, and the next she was sliding across the floor, having
been flung so hard she crashed into the wall. She had to close her eyes for a
second—the impact of her back against the wall was immense. When she opened
them, she saw Renata standing in the middle of the room, lifting Nicky off the
floor by her neck.

There was a knife sticking out
of Renata’s back. Nicky had made contact, but she missed the heart. Now Renata
had Nicky by the throat.

“You, my darling, were
interesting to me once,” Renata said. “But you’ve tested my patience too many times.
I’m going to enjoy watching you die.”

Nicky’s face was bright red. Her
eyes were bulging. Renata was choking her to death.

“I want you to see something
before you go,” Renata said. “You think you were so clever with your little
computer trick back in Italy. Your little stunt accomplished nothing.
Everything important you erased from Falkon’s computer is hanging safely around
my neck.”

Her right hand still holding
Nicky aloft, with her left hand, Renata reached for the silver pendant around
her neck. As her fingers touched the pendant, a look of panic came over her
eyes.

“No,” she said, lifting the
pendant in front of her face. “No, this isn’t happening.”

Whatever shape the pendant on
Renata’s neck was supposed to be, Jill was certain this wasn’t it. The pendant
Renata was holding in front of her face looked like a broken tooth.

“The bullets!” she said. “My
necklace!”

She was so distraught over her
broken pendant she dropped Nicky to the ground so she could inspect it with two
hands. And while Renata gazed at the pendant’s remains, the slave who had
opened the door to this room, the slave who was oddly interested in Nicky, so
much so that he had grabbed a knife and stood in front of her before the
conflict began, appeared from behind one of the pedestals.

Frankie. That was what Renata
called him. Frankie, the towering beast of a boy, moved with so much speed
Renata didn’t have time to react. With three monstrous steps, Frankie crossed
the room, and decked Renata in the face with a punch so forceful it sent her
flying off her feet.

Jill had never seen anything
like it. It was as if, in that brief instant, human and vampire switched roles.
Frankie was the fast one, the strong one, and Renata was the helpless victim.
Frankie’s punch landed so hard Jill heard the bones shatter, saw the face cave
in, and when Renata landed on the floor, Jill knew she was out.

If Renata were human, that punch
would have killed her. Maybe, for a second or two, it did. Maybe her brain was
so traumatized from the blow she was dead when she landed.

Maybe that’s why she was slow to
open her eyes.

Renata out cold, Frankie had
time to grab a knife from the floor. The knife he grabbed was the one Renata
had used in this year’s performance. It was much bigger than the others, more
machete than knife. Holding it in his hands, Frankie muttered something under
his breath, something like
I look out for Nicky and she looks out for me
.

Giant knife in hand, he ran to
Renata, who was just beginning to open her eyes.

Her last words were, “Frankie, why?”

With one powerful swing, Frankie
cut off Renata’s head.

Elisa was her name. A
nineteen-year-old with long brown hair and a light complexion, Falkon found the
girl stranded on the side of the road at the base of the mountain and knew right
away what he wanted to do with her.

Falkon led her all the way up
the mountain and into the mine shaft. They walked along the broken tracks,
arriving at the hole, and he said, “Are you afraid of heights, Elisa?”

“Yes, Master,” she said.

“What about the darkness?”
Falkon said. “Does the darkness bother you?”

“I do not like the dark, Master”
she said.

“Very nice,” Falkon said.
“You’ll do quite well.”

He snapped his fingers and the
spell was broken. The fear that came over her face was so intense that, for a
few seconds, it washed away all the pain and disappointment of the past few
days.

Yes, Nicky Bloom had destroyed
years of research.

Yes, Celeste Allen was dead.

Yes, Sergio had gotten away.
After three nights of looking, he was certain of it. The cowardly vampire who
had hidden himself for half a millennium had disappeared once again.

But he forgot all of that when
he saw the fear in Elisa’s eyes.

“Scream for me,” he whispered.
“As loud as you can.”

He gave her a gentle push and
she fell down the mine shaft. Her scream was the best he had ever heard. A
mezzo-soprano with rich overtones and incredible passion, this girl was truly
terrified and it came through in the sound she made as she plummeted to the
bottom.

She landed with such a loud thud
that Falkon feared she had been killed on impact, but then she let out a little
moan, ever so quiet.

He jumped to the bottom.

“Congratulations, Elisa,” he
said. “I have given purpose to your meaningless life. Before tonight you were
on a slow, agonizing march into old age. I have spared you from that. Tonight
you have the great privilege of becoming food for an immortal.”

“Which immortal?” came a voice
from the darkness. “There are several of us down here.”

Falkon’s blood ran cold at the
sound of that voice. Light and airy, it was a voice he never expected to hear
again.

He turned to see a pair of eyes
looking at him from deep in the darkness. Bright green, piercing, the eyes
practically glowed as they stared at him.

“Daciana,” he said. “You got out
of your cage.”

Another voice, also familiar,
also unexpected, sounded from a different part of the cave.

“November seventh in the year
one thousand and eight,” the voice said. It was Sergio. He jumped down from a
rock on the far wall, landing a few feet away from Falkon. “That was the date
of your creation.”

Falkon smiled. “Indeed it was,”
he said. “I’m so honored you took the time to learn my birthday.”

“A thousand years and some
change,” Sergio said, taking a step closer. “That’s a long time. I can’t
imagine what it must feel like to grow so old.”

“I can tell you a little about
it,” Daciana said. She too was making a slow approach. Falkon’s fangs and claws
were at the ready. It was clear these two meant to take him together.