Blood Shadow: The Vampire Hartwell Page 2

Sharon looked at Gary and nodded in affirmation, “We’re good.”

  “Then we’ll bury the son-of-a-bitch tomorrow night.”

  It was always a struggle to get the hunters to ‘play’ near the water, because it was the one place they knew they weren't safe. Without any special swimming skills - other than the dog paddle and drowning - Thaddeus, Emily, and Cal usually leaned on tactics that leveraged their on- land and air capabilities.

  Every fight started with a move of a scramble, but usually ended with the age, gender and strength-specific pairings squaring off. But, on this night, I went right at Emily and was giving her a pretty good beating when Gary tied up Thaddeus in some old-fashioned fisticuffs.

  That left old friends Sharon and Cal to mix it up, much to my chagrin. The tension between Sharon and Cal was palatable, and I knew it was only a matter of time before they wood hook up – if they hadn’t done so already.

  There was that one time - only a week earlier after I was killed

  - when Sharon met Cal in the woods. They went at it for hours in different forms and, although I didn’t actually see the pairing, the smell of togetherness was all over them.

  While I was planning with my team for the night’s events, I noticed that Sharon was all-too-agreeable to tangle with Cal in the fight. She was no match for Cal’s strength and abilities, yet looked confident in her chances of keeping him occupied while I went to work on Emily.

  It took Cal only a few minutes to get Sharon in a strangle hold – more affectionately called a ‘sleeper’ hold – but he wasn’t really cutting off her air supply.

  “Meet me in the woods again tonight. I’ve been thinking about you all week.”

  Unfortunately for Cal, I was tuned into the frequency of the conversation, while he put the finishing touches on tucking Emily into her dirt nap.

  Dating was obviously a ridiculous double standard in the vampire world, being that Emily and I had ‘tossed the pigskin’ around a few times in the past.

  “You taste particularly delicious tonight, my dear,” I said as I drained Emily’s blood.

  “I detect a hint of bacon in the ‘sauce’ tonight. It would be helpful in the future if you could cut back on the pork products and substitute it with turkey bacon. I’m trying to cut some fat out in my diet.”

  Cal was feeling more amorous than combative on this night. My plan included a Cal-Sharon pairing because I knew of their attraction. It had taken me months to find Cal’s kryptonite, his weakness. He initially tried going after Belinda, but that fire had burned out, and he was no longer acting as a protective husband in love.

  Cal was so focused on Sharon that night that he didn’t even notice me drinking the last drops of his sister’s blood and then dropping her to the ground like a piece of biodegradable garbage. He also didn’t see me charging at him and delivering a violent close-line to his face.

  An unconscious Cal dropped to the ground and I said to Sharon, “Meet you at the bottom,” before I scooped up Cal and flew to the ocean. Once we were in the water there was no way for the hunters to prevent the inevitable from happening. So Thaddeus fought to get loose from Gary, and he was almost free until Sharon came over and the two protectors held him down.

  Thaddeus had no idea what I was planning, but he could see the look of concern on Sharon’s face.

  “You can’t let him so this!” Thad implored Sharon.

  Sharon tried to fight off the tears, because there was no crying allowed when protecting a vampire, but she finally broke down.

  “It’s what he wants.”

  “But is it what you want?” Thad passionately replied.