Guilty Pleasures

Edward came to stand beside me. His face looked almost its normal color. He took hold of the lid and I readied the shotgun.

He lifted and the whole lid slid off. It wasn’t hinged on.

I said, “Shiiit!”

The coffin was empty.

“Are you looking for me?” A high, musical voice called from the doorway. “Freeze; I believe that is the word. We have the drop on you.”

“I wouldn’t advise going for your gun,” Burchard said.

I glanced at Edward and found his hands close to the machine gun but not close enough. His face was unreadable, calm, normal. Just a Sunday drive. I was so scared I could taste bile at the back of my throat. We looked at each other and raised our hands.

“Turn around slowly,” Burchard said.

We did.

He was holding a semiautomatic rifle of some kind. I’m not the gun freak Edward is, so I didn’t know the make and model, but I knew it’d make a big hole. There was also a sword hilt sticking over his back. A sword, an honest-to-god sword.

Zachary was standing beside him, holding a pistol. He held it two-handed, arms stiff. He didn’t seem happy.

Burchard held the rifle like he was born with it. “Drop your weapons, please, and lace your fingers on top of your heads.”

We did what he asked. Edward dropped the machine gun, and I lost the shotgun. We had plenty more guns.

Nikolaos stood to one side. Her face was cold, angry. Her voice, when it came, echoed through the room. “I am older then anything you have ever imagined. Did you think daylight holds me prisoner? After a thousand years?” She walked out into the room, careful not to cross in front of Burchard and Zachary. She glanced at the remains in the coffins. “You will pay for this, animator.” She smiled then, and I had never seen anything more evil. “Strip them of the rest of their weaponry, Burchard; then we will give the animator a treat.”

They stood in front of us but not too close. “Up against the wall, animator,” Burchard said. “If the man moves, Zachary, shoot him.”

Burchard shoved me into the wall and frisked me very thoroughly. He didn’t check my teeth or have me drop my pants, but that was about it. He found everything I was carrying. Even the derringer. He shoved my cross into his pocket. Maybe I could tattoo one on my arm? Probably wouldn’t work.

I went out to stand with Zachary, and Edward got his turn. I stared at Zachary. “Does she know?” I asked.

“Shut up.”

I smiled. “She doesn’t, does she?”

“Shut up!”

Edward came back, and we stood there with our hands on top of our heads, weapons gone. It was not a pretty sight.

Adrenaline was bubbling like champagne, and my pulse was threatening to jump out of my throat. I wasn’t afraid of the guns, not really. I was afraid of Nikolaos. What would she do to us? To me? If I had a choice, I’d force them to shoot me. It had to be better than anything Nikolaos had in her evil little mind.

“They are unarmed, Mistress,” Burchard said.

“Good,” she said. “Do you know what we were doing while you destroyed my people?”

I didn’t think she wanted an answer, so I didn’t give her one.

“We were preparing a friend of yours, animator.”

My stomach jerked. I had a wild image of Catherine, but she was out of town. My god, Ro

It must have showed on my face because Nikolaos laughed, high and wild, an excited tittering.

“I really hate that laugh,” I said.

“Silence,” Burchard said.

“Oh, Anita, you are so amusing. I will enjoy making you one of my people.” Her voice started high and childlike and ended low enough to crawl down my spine.

She called out in a clear voice, “Enter this room now.”

I heard shuffling footsteps; then Phillip walked into the room. The horrible wound at his throat was thick, white scar tissue. He stared around the room as if he didn’t really see it.

I whispered, “Dear God.”

They had raised him from the dead.

Chapter 47

Nikolaos danced around him. The skirt of her pastel pink dress swirled around her. The large, pink bow in her hair bobbed as she twirled, arms outstretched. Her slender legs were covered in white leotards. The shoes were white with pink bows.

She stopped, laughing and breathless. A healthy pink flush on her cheeks, eyes sparkling. How did she do that?

“He looks very alive, doesn’t he?” She stalked around him, hand brushing his arm. He drew away from her, eyes following her every move, afraid. He remembered her. God help us. He remembered her.

“Do you want to see him put through his paces?” she asked.

I hoped I didn’t understand her. I fought to keep my face blank. I must have succeeded because she stomped over to me, hands on hips.

“Well,” she said, “do you want to watch your lover perform?”

I swallowed bile, hard. Maybe I should just throw up on her. That would teach her. “With you?” I asked.

She sidled up to me, hands clasped behind her back. “It could be you. Your choice.”

Her face was almost touching mine. Eyes so damned wide and i

“Pity.” She half-skipped back to Phillip. He was naked, and his ta

“You didn’t know I was going to be here, so why raise Phillip from the dead?” I asked.

She turned on the heels of her little shoes. “We raised him so he could try to kill Aubrey. Murdered zombies can be so much fun, while they try to kill their murderers. We thought we’d give him a chance while Aubrey was asleep. Aubrey can move if you disturb him.” She glanced at Edward. “But then you know that.”

“You were going to let Aubrey kill him again,” I said.

She nodded, head bobbing. “Mmm-uh.”

“You bitch,” I said.

Burchard shoved the rifle butt into my stomach, and I dropped to my knees. I panted, trying to breathe. It didn’t help much.

Edward was staring very fixedly at Zachary, who was holding the pistol square on his chest. You didn’t have to be good at that range or even lucky. Just squeeze the trigger and kill someone. Poof.

“I can make you do whatever I please,” Nikolaos said.

A fresh spurt of adrenaline rushed through me. It was too much. I threw up in the corner. Nerves and being hit very hard in the stomach with a rifle. Nerves I’d had before; the rifle butt was a new experience.

“Tsk, tsk,” Nikolaos said. “Do I frighten you that much?”

I managed to stand up at last. “Yes,” I said. Why deny it?

She clapped her hands together. “Oh, goody.” Her face shifted gears, instant switch. The little girl was gone, and no amount of pink, frilly dresses would bring her back. Nikolaos’s face was thi

I stood there, staring at the floor, fear like a cold rush on my skin. I waited for something to tug at my soul. Her power to roll me under and away. Nothing happened.

Nikolaos frowned. The little girl was back. “I bit you, animator. You should crawl if I ask it. What did you do?”

I breathed a small, heartfelt prayer, and answered her. “Holy Water.”

She snarled. “This time we will keep you with us until after the third bite. You will take Theresa’s place. Perhaps then you will be more eager to find out who is murdering vampires.”

I fought with everything in me not to glance at Zachary. Not because I didn’t want to give him away, I would do that, but I was waiting for the moment when it would help us. It might get Zachary killed, but it wouldn’t take out Burchard or Nikolaos. Zachary was the least dangerous person in this whole room.

“I don’t think so,” I said.

“Oh, but I do, animator.”

“I would rather die.”

She spread her arms wide. “But I want you to die, Anita, I want you to die.”