Chapter 5

Jaqueline didn’t have to tell Dane twice that she could be in trouble before he was at her house. He knocked on the door and he could hear her running to answer it.

As soon as she opened it, he took her into his arms and hugged her in a way that said he was there for her. “We’ll get this done. I promise you. My brothers are going to meet us at the house the rogue vampire told you to go to.”

“Oh, wonderful.” She sounded relieved.

There was no way he was going to let her do this on her own. No telling what the rogue vampire wanted her to do. “They will get there faster if they go from where they are. I’m sure you’ll like Matt, Ryan, and Trey. Matt is the eldest of the bunch of us, and always takes the lead when we’re all together. Ryan and Trey are twins—Ryan is the mischief maker while Trey is the serious one, and then there’s me.”

“Oh, you’re the baby of the bunch.”

Despite the seriousness of the situation, he smiled. “Yeah, I get that all the time from my brothers.”

“Well, I’m the youngest between my brother and me so I hear that all the time too.” Jacqueline and Dane climbed into her car because the vampire might realize that’s what she was driving, so Dane didn’t want to take his pickup truck.

“Is that the reason you were out on the case on your own when you were turned? Because you felt you had something to prove to your brothers?” she asked.

“No. My brothers were all on different jobs, but they were nearby, so we knew if anyone needed help, we could call for it.”

“Yeah, right. Like either of us ever had that opportunity.”

“None of us ever thought of that scenario.” Dane hated to admit that he and his brothers had been arrogant in that regard.

“At least they still back you up.”

“That’s what families should do. Same with our friends, but like you, I’ve lost several of my hunter friends over this.” He turned down another street. He tried not to take the betrayal personally, but it was hard not to do it sometimes.

“Some friends, though I can understand when it comes to me because the vampire who turned me could possibly make me turn on them.”

“True, which makes it more imperative that they took him down. I mean, if they’re truly your friends, they’re there for you through thick and thin, not just when it suits them.”

“Yeah, I agree. What did your friends that dumped you say about it?” she asked.

“Nothing, really. I learned hunter parties are coming up that normally I would be invited to and that’s not happening any longer.” He shrugged. “I could be irritated about it, but I figure they’re not worth my attention.” Which wasn’t totally true. It was hard growing up with these hunters as friends, play-fighting, socializing with them, watching each other’s backs. Now they treated him like he was a rogue vampire—the only difference being that they couldn’t terminate him legally.

“What if they’re at a scene that you happen upon? Are you going to help them? Or just let them deal with it themselves?”

“Well, I would help them, unless they threatened me. And then it is their problem. But yeah, despite their abandoning me, I wouldn’t hold it against them if they needed my help. What about you?” Before she answered, he assumed she would step in to help them.

She shrugged. “If there was a reward for the vampire’s expiration, I would help.”

He chuckled. He was sure she would, even if she didn’t get any bounty for it. Then he got a call from his oldest brother. “Hey, Matt, are you there already?”

“Yeah, we’re parked down the street, but we’re watching the house. How do you want to handle this?”

Usually, Matt decided when they would do a job, where, who would be involved, and how, during cases they worked on together. A lot of research was done first, and they did fight the vampires together when they had a rogue crew of them that they had to deal with. This was the first time that Matt had ever asked Dane to tell him how this was going down. Why? Because a fellow friend was involved? Most likely. Maybe also because she and he were vampires now and that might give them a different perspective.

“Hi, I’m Jacqueline Anderson, the huntress turned vampire, damsel in distress,” she said.

Matt laughed. “From what Dane tells me, the only ones in distress are the vampires you’re targeting.”

She smiled at Dane. Yeah, he’d called his brother up to tell him what they’d done tonight together. He didn’t usually check in but after that last fiasco with the vampire who had turned him, his brother had told him if he didn’t call, he and his other brothers were coming after him.

“I’m really not sure how to handle this situation. If this is Heskel, who telepathically communicated with Jacqueline, he’s probably expecting just her. Unless he knows I was with her tonight, eliminating a couple of vampires on hunters’ lists and he hopes I’ll be with her, and he can eliminate me.”

“Because you’re possibly an obstacle to his control over her,” Matt said. “But should she go into the house alone? Shouldn’t we keep her in one of the vehicles until we can take him out?”

“He might not even be there. It might be another situation entirely. We might blow the whole mission,” Dane said.

“I’m going in,” Jacqueline said. “Wait, let me test something out first.” She took a deep breath and said, “Okay, I’m talking to you telepathically to see if I can speak with you from inside the house.”

“Oh, hell, I can hear you in my head,” Dane said, surprised to hear her speak to him like that.

“Yes, but talk to me telepathically so I can get feedback from you and you can tell your brothers what is going on. I need to know that you can do it too.”

“All right. Can you hear my words when I try to communicate like this?” Dane asked.

“Yes. It’s amazing, isn’t it? Okay, I’ll go in, and you stay in the car. I’ll let you know who all is there and what’s going on. If I say I need rescuing, don’t hesitate to come to my aid.”

He really didn’t like that she would be going in alone, but they had to try this her way. “Okay. Matt, she’s going into the house.” He explained about the telepathic communication they had just shared.

“Why didn’t you answer me the first time I talked to you telepathically?” she suddenly asked Dane.

“The first time?” Now he was worried since he hadn’t heard her speak to him like that before.

“Yeah, before you came to the house. I tried reaching you that way and then I called you on the phone.”

“I was in the shower. Maybe that’s why?”

“I hope that’s all it was and that it wasn’t something like we were too far away from each other in the housing development.”

“I’ll just be in the car and we’re right outside the house.”

She nodded, then leaned over and kissed him. He sealed the kiss with a promise to be there for her. Then she got out of the car and headed for the house. It was completely dark, and he really had a bad feeling about this. She knocked on the door, but nothing happened. Then she turned the doorknob and it was unlocked. She glanced back at him, appearing confident, though he had smelled her anxiety before she left the car, and then she went inside.

“I can see, though the whole house is dark. I don’t hear anyone’s heartbeats. I don’t think anyone’s here yet.”

“Okay, keep me informed.”Dane relayed the information to Matt.

“Oh, he’s here, sitting in the dark. I hear his heartbeat now. Steady. Calm. Like a hunter waiting for his unsuspecting prey.”

Like he had nothing to fear. “Is there anyone else there?”

“No, it appears he’s alone.”

It was killing Dane not to go into the house right this instant and rescue Jaqueline. He knew nothing good could come of her meeting the vampire. If he sat tight and did nothing and the vampire murdered her or sent her out to murder someone else and made her a rogue, Dane would never forgive himself.

He rushed to the front door, and it was still open. His brothers hurried to join him.