Chapter 20

Dane was so glad Jacqueline’s brother had come around. Hunter families were important in a hunter’s fight against rogue vampires and rogue hunters. But Dane was also glad Jacqueline was going to stay with him while they were trying to sort out the issue with these hunters. He drove into his garage and shut the door, and immediately, she was there, hugging him and he laughed. “I hope you feel totally at home here. I feel this is where you belong—with me, protecting me as I protect you.” He just held onto her, loving their connection, both emotionally and physically.

“I do. And when I’m wearing a ring, I guess we’ll have to put my house up for sale.”

“Yeah. If we want to live here.”

“Your house is bigger and has a pool, so definitely. It’s the party house.”

“With you staying here it, it is.”

Princess was standing in the driver’s seat, looking like she was being neglected. Jacqueline opened the driver’s door, took hold of Princess, and carried her into the house while Dane got Jacqueline’s bigger bags.

“You’ve already explored his whole house,” Jacqueline said to Princess.

Dane vanished and reappeared in his master bedroom carrying her bags. Then he was back to the car to get more of her things. She was already carrying Princess’s food and dishes into the house.

“What about our walk? Or do you think it’s too dangerous until the league members take those hunters into custody?” Jacqueline asked.

“I think it would be best if we stay here and give the hunters a chance to round up ‘X’ and his buddies. On the other hand, if we’re walking in the woods and encounter hunters who plan to eliminate us, we can just vanish,” Dane said.

“Unless one of them is an archer.”

“Hmm, okay, then we stay at the house. But we don’t have to feel cooped up here. We can visit the Bremertons at their compound. And we could even go walking through their woods there,” he said.

“I hate feeling like the hunters are putting restrictions on us, more so than they already have,” she said, putting her clothes away in his closet where he had quickly made room for her.

“Yeah, I agree. It sucks. I’ll get all of Princess’s stuff sorted.”

“Thanks. I’ll be right down.”

Then he reappeared downstairs, startling Princess, who quickly greeted him with a rub against his legs. Dane wondered what it would be like to have a dog. Would their sudden vampiric appearances in a new place make the dog bark?

Dane began putting the cat food in the pantry and filled her water dish up. He set up her litter box out in the mudroom off the foyer. Then Dane got on his phone to call Matt. “Hey, brother, we have a new development.” He explained the situation to his oldest brother.

“Ah, hell. You should have called us right away.”

“We weren’t in any danger since Jacqueline’s brother and Tobias were here,” Dane said.

“What about tonight? I mean, if the hunters are after you and the Bremertons, how safe are you at your house?” Matt asked.

“They’ll think I’m alone, but I won’t be.”

“And if they outnumber you?”

“We can vanish, reappear at your home even.”

“Ahh, hell, no. I’m having a date with Marissa. She would have a heart attack at first. Then pull her sword out next.”

Dane smiled. “You’re finally going out with her. Well…if things even get serious between the two of you, she’s going to have to know what she’s getting herself into with regard to one of your brothers.”

“She’s sympathetic to your cause.”

“Being sympathetic and really experiencing being around us, are two different scenarios.”

“True. But really, all of us will land in on your place to protect your backs if you need us to,” Matt said.

“Even Marissa?”

“I’ll talk to her.”

“Maybe this will be the perfect way to break her in,” Dane said. “She might just decide it’s too much to deal with.”

“Then she won’t be the one for me.”

“That’s true,” Dane said. “But she could come around if she got to know us and came to love us.”

His brother laughed. “Well, we’re only on our first date.”

“Well, she might be fine with it. So right now, we’re okay, but if we need to, we’ll call you and get hold of Adonis and he and the others like us can come help us a lot faster and then you can join us.”

“You and Jacqueline want to spend the time together alone,” Matt guessed.

“Yeah, we need it.”

“Yeah, you do. But we don’t want the two of you to be at risk. I mean it,” Matt said.

“I agree. If they don’t get these guys soon and we’re afraid the hunters have hired someone else to take us out, either we’ll move onto the Bremerton compound, or we’ll have you stay with us,” Dane said. Sure, he wanted to have the time to spend alone with Jacqueline, but more importantly, he wanted to make sure she stayed safe.

“Okay, I’ll let you go.”

“Have fun on your date.”

“I will.”

Then they ended the call and he smiled when he saw Jacqueline joining him wearing her bathing suit. “This is what I love about your house,” she said, running her hands over his chest. “Your swimming pool.”

He chuckled. “I knew there was a reason you were so taken with me.”

“For sure.” Then she vanished and he heard a splash in the pool. He chuckled and appeared in his bedroom, changed into his swim trunks, then ended up at the pool room. He quickly jumped into the pool to join her.

She paused swimming laps, and he swam toward her. She began swimming away from him and he cornered her at the end of the pool, and she laughed.

“I heard you speaking with your brother.”

“Yeah, he’s pretty upset about what we’re going through. Don’t be surprised if he and the twins show up to watch the house.”

“Well, if they do, we can invite them in. We’ll still have our alone time. And there’s no reason for them to sit outside the house.”

He smiled and kissed her. “I have to say swimming with you has been a real joy.”

“I love being here with you like this.” She kissed his wet shoulder and then his lips.

Then they began to race each other across the pool. But he was listening for any sign anyone was trying to break into the house again like when the thieves did it. He was also aware someone else might show up—of the hunter persuasion. He heard his phone ringing in the house, and he sighed. “I’ll be right back.” He left the pool and ended up on the patio, grabbed a towel, and transported to the living room. He really was getting great at this.

When he reached his phone, he found it was his brother Trey. “Hell, Dane, I can’t believe you’re in the middle of trouble again. Except now as a vampire. Is Jacqueline all right?”

“Yeah, but we worry someone will come after me now, since that’s what the human hunters told us.”

“Then you shouldn’t be staying at your house, Dane! Tobias said you could stay at the Bremertons’ compound, or any one of our homes.”

“If we need help, we’ll call.”

“And that will take how long for us to get there? I wanted to see how you were, but I also wanted to tell you to look at the TV. Jacqueline’s death is on the news. I hope her family knows she’s okay,” Trey said.

“Robert said he would tell them.” Dane hoped he would before they heard the news on the TV, unless Patrick gave them the news himself already that the whole thing was staged. He probably did to let them know not to panic. Dane turned on the TV to watch the news. Princess came over and rubbed against Dane’s wet legs and got her fur all over him.

Then Jacqueline showed up, wrapped in a towel, probably to see who was calling and what was taking him so long to return. She sat next to Dane and watched the newscast.

He put the phone on speaker. “It’s my brother Trey,” Dane said. “Well, it looks real. I’m glad we got out of there before the reporters converged on Jacqueline’s house. They don’t know I was seeing her, hopefully, so they won’t be coming here next.”

“If they do, why don’t you both come to my place?” Trey asked.

“If they know about me, they’ll know about all of my brothers,” Dane said.

“True.”

Dane thought about it for a moment, then said, “If the reporters come here, we’ll ignore them. Hell, if they’re sitting outside, it will make it harder for hunters to break in and try to eliminate me.” At least he hoped that was true.

“Are you going to stay put? I mean, no clubbing, no moonlit walks, no going out at all?”

“Yeah. No rogue vampire missions.” Then Dane smiled and leaned down and kissed Jacqueline.

“I already know that look on your face, Dane. You have something in mind,” she said.

“What are you considering?” Trey asked.

“Clubbing.”

“No way in hell,” Trey said.

“A vampire club.” Dane shrugged. “I mean, hunters wouldn’t go there.”

“Exactly. And you’re hunters.”

“And vampires. It might be time for us to try a vampire club out and see if we get better reception there,” Dane said.

“You can’t even consider taking Jacqueline with you on that suicide mission,” Trey said.

“I wouldn’t let him go without me,” Jacqueline said. “If they see us together, they’ll realize we’re a couple just out on the town for the night.”

“A hunter couple who is a team who hunt down rogue vampires and if any of them are in the club you go to?”

“We’ll leave in a flash.” Jacqueline smiled at Dane.

“You’re both playing with fire,” Trey said. “Besides, Jacqueline is supposed to be dead.”

“We wouldn’t do it until the rogue hunters are taken down. It’s just an idea, not that we have to do it,” Dane said.

“I would tell you to take Adonis and more of their family, if you go to a vampire club, but that might be too much of a show of force. I’ll let you go. And tell us for certain if you decide to go and we’ll try and talk you out of it,” Trey said.

“All right. Talk to you later.” Dane said.

“Are you done swimming?” she asked, watching the police chief talking about her death.

“Yeah. That was fun.”

“Did you ever consider the idea that you might be turned when you had to fight a rogue?” she asked.

“No. I always figured that if I lost a fight with a vampire, he would just kill me. It used to be that we all thought that vampires drinking a hunter’s blood would kill them. When they realized it wouldn’t, and they could actually turn a powerful hunter, some of them decided to do that, rather than just eliminate the hunter. Not only did they eliminate the hunter threat to them, but they had a minion to control.”

“But hunters can’t be controlled as well as a human, and their hunter friends will seek out the master vampire and terminate him,” she said.

“Exactly.”

The talking heads on some talk show were trying to second guess what the police were doing with regard to Jacqueline’s murder.

“The police are keeping really hush-hush about this,” the one commentator said on the TV news show. “Do you think that it’s a vampire hit? Or maybe the murderer is someone closer to home?”

“A hunter friend or family member, you mean? That happens with humans for sure, but not with hunters so much. Not that it can’t happen. Or maybe Ms. Anderson terminated a vampire and one of his or her family members wanted revenge. That has been known to happen.”

“Why don’t they wait to see what really happens with the investigation?” Jacqueline asked Dane.

He smiled at her.

“I mean, if there really was a murder. They talk these situations to death, and they don’t know anything. Just to have more TV views. And often they make conjectures that are totally off base. Sometimes that puts some innocent person under the gun and their lives are ruined.”

Dane agreed.

They showed a picture of her home with yellow security tape across the front of the house and reporters converged on the sidewalk in front of her home. “I bet my next-door neighbors are thrilled about this.”

“Are they hunters?”

“No. Just humans. The one on the right is owned by a doctor family, both family physicians. The one on the left—he’s a home developer and she’s a nurse. But look—as soon as one of them drives their vehicle out of their garage, the media is swarming them to question them about me—probably if they heard anything or saw anything.”

“Yeah, I’m glad I don’t live next door to you.”

She laughed. “Who would ever have thought! But if we have trouble, we might have to stage another murder and then your neighbors will have all the issues from that.”

“You know if that happens, it’s possible that the hunters living here might really ban together to catch the rogue hunters,” Dane said.

“That could be.”

Then someone was knocking on Dane’s door, and he grabbed his sword. “You probably should stay out of sight because your photo has been all over the news.”

“I will, but I’ll be listening in.” Then Jacqueline stayed in the kitchen where no one at the front door could see her.

He looked out the peephole and said to her telepathically, “One of my hunter neighbors.” He opened the door and said, “Hey, how are you doing, George?”

“Hey, man, we heard what had happened to you,” George Bridges said. “Sorry that we didn’t come by sooner. But when we heard about Jacqueline Anderson being terminated by human hunters, we wanted to make sure that you know that we have your back. If anyone comes for you, let me know and we’ll be over here in a heartbeat.”

“Thanks, George. I sure am glad to have you as a neighbor and hunter friend.”

“Well, one other thing. I heard you were seeing Jacqueline. She was a great huntress. I’m so sorry to hear it. We also have gotten together to do a neighborhood watch, something we’ve never done before. After humans broke into your place to steal, and then with what happened to Jacqueline, we figured it was time. We assume you’ll be watching out for anyone who doesn’t belong in our neighborhood too.”

“You know that the police believe it is a conspiracy of a few hunters who paid human hunters to kill her, don’t you?”

“Hell, no. They didn’t mention it on the news. Is it a working theory? Or do they have something to back up the notion?” George asked.

“I don’t know. I’ve heard through the grapevine that they were hunters.” Even though Dane liked George and whenever he and his family had a barbecue, he was invited, Dane didn’t know who all of Georger’s friends were. What if he was friends with the ones who were wanted for questioning? Then if Dane told him what he knew, it could get right back to the rogue hunters.

“Well, just know that we don’t feel that way,” George said.

“Thanks, that means a lot to me.”

“You’re welcome. Talk to you later, bro.”

“Talk later.”

Then George left and Dane shut the door.

Jacqueline came out of the kitchen. “Do you trust George?”

“He and his wife are nice people, but I really don’t know how they feel deep down about hunters who have been turned. They’ve been busy, I’m sure, but they haven’t once come over and told me that they’re sorry for what had happened to me. Maybe they didn’t know how to approach me about it because they were worried about how I was feeling. I suspect that they finally figured they had to talk to me, considering what had happened with this business with the hunters putting a hit out on you. And I could be next. But I still don’t know if he’s a friend of the hunters we need to have taken into custody,” Dane said.

“That’s what I was thinking. Right now, all I trust are your family and mine, and the Bremertons, and the two ladies in the therapy session. I heard your neighbor say that they were starting a neighborhood watch,” Jacqueline said.

“Yeah, who would have ever thought they would do something like that. Being a community of hunters, we’ve never really worried about break-ins, or anything,” Dane said.

Then there was another knock at the door.

Jacqueline kissed him. “I’m ready, if you have any more trouble.”

“Okay. I’ve never had visitors like this unless they’re family or friends that I know are coming here.” Dane checked the peephole. “It’s five more people that live in our neighborhood—all hunters.”

“As long as they’re good guys and not wanting your head.”

“Yeah, agreed.”

Then she vanished.

He answered the door. “Hey, I guess you heard the news.”

“Can we come in?” Dillion Johnson asked.

“Yeah, sure.” Dane hoped he wasn’t making a mistake by letting them in.

They all came inside, and he offered them sodas.

“We’re good,” Dillion said, and they took seats in the living room. “Your next-door neighbor, George, called us about the earlier break-in at your house, which of course concerns us as a whole. But this business with Jacqueline is horrifying. George said human hunters were involved in her death but that there’s a possibility that our kind might have been behind it.”

“Yeah, we’re sure of it,” Dane said.

“Damn,” Dillion said. “Does anyone have any idea who they might be?”

“The League of Hunters might,” Dane said. “And if so, they’ll have warrants out for them.”

“That’s good, but I would sure like to know who they are, and I’ll help take them down,” Dillion said.

“Yeah, me too,” Josh said.

“I’m with you,” Phillip said.

“Even if you are friends with those hunters?” Dane asked, wanting to see how they would react.

“Hell, yeah,” Dillion said. “If any of us are turned—and we all know it can happen—we can’t become targets of our own kind. No matter who they are, we need to take them down.”

“I agree,” Phillip said. “Friendships are one thing, but we can’t lose sight of the fact that we’re all hunters at heart. Becoming a vampire doesn’t change that. I’m sorry that it happened to you, brother, but I guess you have some cool abilities now.”

“Yeah. Drinking the blood isn’t something I had signed up for, but I’ll tell you, having the other abilities is damn great,” Dane said.

“Can you communicate with other vampires telepathically?” Phillip asked.

“Yes.” Even communicating with the dead. Dane was thinking of Jacqueline.

“Okay, well, we’re here for you. Other than doing a neighborhood watch and making sure people who don’t live here are checked out, what else can we do to watch your back?” Josh asked.

Then there was another knock at the door. Dane laughed. “More neighbors or?—”

“More hired hunters,” Josh said.