London Under Midnight (19 page)

    Ben eyed the river with distaste. 'That's exactly what he meant, but what the animal is he couldn't explain.'

    'But who can?'

    'A man said something very similar to Mr Akinedes yesterday. We should head downriver and talk to him.' Ben paused and looked back at the graffiti artist. 'Mr Akinedes. Do you know there's someone else who's been warning about a danger in the river?'

    'Then I'm not alone.' The man was relieved. 'There's a chance we can save more people.'

    'Do you want to come with us and speak to him?'

    'Thanks. But I need to…' He hoisted the can into the air like it was the sword of truth. 'There's still some paint left.'

    Ben waved a farewell as they headed out towards the road to find a taxi. Okay, the notion that something called a Vampire Shark lurked in the Thames was eccentric, if not downright delusional, but so far they had few clues to April's disappearance. At this moment every lead had to be followed up.

    On the pier the man starting spraying the letters in bright red paint.
V-A-M-P.

    He'd just begun drawing the
I
when an arm reached out from the river and swept him into the water with barely a splash.

    

    

    April pointed down a night-time suburban street. 'Raj's house.'

    'Raj's house?' Carter grinned; that glow of intoxication hadn't left him yet. 'Why Raj's house? Who is Raj? I thought we were looking for Ben Ashton?'

    April chuckled; the sense of well-being after gorging on the blood of the would-be muggers left her elated; it was a high that wouldn't end. 'Ben moved. I know Raj, he's Ben's editor. I can get the address from him.' Smiling, she rubbed Carter's back. 'Then we call on Ben, tell him what we know, then he writes it for all the world to know! Clever, eh?'

    'Wait.' Carter stopped her. 'We haven't thought this through yet, have we?'

    'What's there to think? We've discovered something marvelous.'

    His grin clouded. 'But it's like we're forgetting something important.'

    'Carter. The secret to eternal life and happiness - not just happiness, but pure unadulterated joy, was right there under our noses all along.'

    'Just drink blood?'

    'Don't you remember that first mouthful of human blood? How beautiful it tasted? It was so
right
on your tongue.'

    Carter licked his lips, revealing his gold crowns; he remembered that taste again. That glorious, glorious taste. April found her mouth watering, too.

    'When you swallowed the blood you felt the strength rush into your body.' She spoke in hushed tones; this was the voice of someone who'd witnessed a miracle. 'I've never felt so full of life.' She wanted to shout the word. '
Life…
. it's like electricity inside of me. I feel as if I could lift a house or jump as high as the clouds.'

    Despite feeling elated, confusion crept back into Carter's expression. 'But it's not as simple as that, April. You're forgetting something. We aren't the same as we were.'

    'No, we're better. Improved. Enhanced.'

    'But don't you remember your old life? Would you have wanted to swallow blood from a man's body then?'

    'That's before the revelation. We're New-Life now.'

    'No.' Carter wrestled with the problem. 'We know we were attacked and ended up in the river. After that we woke up on the island. Changes took place in our bodies. We were hungry all the time.' The word 'hungry' made him swallow. The man's appetite was returning. 'Now we're back in London and we've killed people, April. Surely, that isn't right?'

    That evangelical zeal to tell the world about the miracle made Carter's argument trivial. 'Listen, Carter. One day a creature started walking upright and became a human being. How did those creatures feel when they first started to speak, or chipped at a stone to make the first axe? We are human beings that evolved into a new life form. Come on, we'll find Ben's address then we'll talk to him. He's clever; he'll find answers to all those questions that are bothering you.'

    She tugged him by the hand along the darkened street. Carter relented, although his expression suggested he still struggled with some conundrum.

    In hushed tones April continued. 'I'll ask Ben to arrange meetings with scientists. Once they see how we've been transformed they'll be convinced.'

    A cat on the wall shrank back with a hiss as they passed by. For a split-second April glimpsed her reflection in a car's rear window. Her face was a lifeless grey; black rings etched deep beneath a pair of staring eyes. Lips blue, with more blue patches around the mouth; streaks of blood; a spiky mass of hair frames a deathly face. Even though she clearly saw her mirror image for some reason the truth slipped by her as if she'd glimpsed the face of a stranger. All that filled her now was the glow of certainty; that April Connor was engaged on a quest of global importance. Her mind was clear: find Ben Ashton. Then report the miraculous truth of New-Life to the entire world. Simple.

    By the time she pressed the door bell button at Raj's house the first hunger pangs had begun. That's okay, she told herself, I can handle it. I'll eat later. First things first.

    She needed to ask Raj for Ben's address. Come to think of it, Raj will be interested to hear about the miracle, too, and he'll want the world exclusive for his magazine. Not that the money's important. What matters is the world learns about this miracle.

    When there was no answer at the door she rang again. Through a window beside the door she could see the hallway clock. Almost 2 a.m. Raj'll be asleep, she thought. Give him time to answer. He'll be fascinated by what happened to her.

    'No lights, nobody's up,' Carter muttered. He rubbed his hands against his stomach. The aura of well-being had faded now. April became fidgety, too. Her mind kept flitting back to when she sucked the guy's artery. That flood of beautiful blood down her throat. Could do with a little of that now, she told herself.

    'Come on, Raj.' This time she knocked on the door. 'Raj?'

    'Nobody home.' Carter was losing interest now. 'We could leave it for a while.'

    'No. This is important.'

    'Hungry?'

    'No, not really.' She gulped. 'Maybe just a bit, but it can wait. Carter, we have the most important news to hit humanity in thousands of years. When everyone hears what we've discovered the world's going to be a better place - a million times better!' The final statement came out as a snarl. Her sudden appetite had an urgency about it. 'Oh, come on, Raj!' She hammered on the door. 'Raj!'

    Carter ran his fingers through his hair. 'We haven't thought this through. There's something we've missed. This doesn't feel right. We shouldn't go public yet.'

    'You're hungry, that's all. Once we've spoken to Ben he'll sort everything out, just you wait and see.' She pounded the door. 'Raj!'

    A light blazed through the glass followed by muttering from inside; lock mechanisms clicked. As the door opened a tired voice complained, 'Don't you know what time it is?'

    'Raj!'

    The brown eyes in Raj's face went huge. 'April. April Connor! The police are looking for you.'

    'Raj, let us in; we've got to talk to you.'

    'Oh my, what happened to you?'

    April gushed, 'Raj, let us in. You must give me Ben's address. My God, I've got a story for him. Ugh, my hair. I'm sorry, I look a real state. This is Carter. Oh, please let us in
now
!'

    Raj stared at her. She saw the way he scanned her face, then his gaze traveled down her body. 'Your clothes are all ripped, April. And, my God, what happened to your shoes?'

    As if for the first time April noticed she was barefoot. The rip in her dress revealed her bare waist with the bite mark of old. Then Raj regarded her companion with something more than distaste before saying, 'April, my dear, you've been hurt. I'll call an ambulance.'

    'No!' It came as a shriek. 'Give me Ben's address. A miracle has happened. He's going to write the story for the press.' Her eyes traveled from Raj's horrified face to his hand that gripped the door frame. She'd never noticed the way his veins showed through the skin before. They could have been glowing with a light all of their own. Just a moment ago she knew what she'd tell the man. She'd recap what happened to her. The attack on the embankment, being thrown into the river, then washed up on the island; she'd laugh and make a joke of it. 'Can you imagine there are desert islands in the Thames? Well, I was your very own Miss Crusoe.' But all that evaporated now. The only thing she focused on was Raj's hand. The pulse throbbed in his wrist. All that blood rushing through. Although she couldn't bring herself to tear her eyes from that limb of so many wonderful veins she realized Carter stared at it, too. What had been hunger pangs in her stomach went stellar. As she'd experienced before that ravenous craving wasn't confined to her gut. It hurtled outward through her body. Even her fingertips hurt with sheer bloody hunger.

    'April?' Raj's voice had gone far away. 'April, what's wrong? Are you in pain? Who is this man?'

    'Raj,' she panted. 'Let me in.'

    'I'm going to phone for the police,' he told her.

    'Let me in,' she snarled. 'I'm hungry!'

    Carter pushed by her to lunge at the hand that he knew would be crammed with rich, red blood. He snapped those gold-tipped teeth at his victim. Raj was just that bit faster. Carter's teeth clamped on the door frame and ripped away a foot-long splinter.

    April saw her next move. It'd take only a moment. Push open the door, pin Raj against the wall then take her time to chew on that delicious wrist of his. She could open a vein then suck the goodness from his body. With all her heart she yearned to feel how she did just an hour ago when she blazed with euphoria; that was a precious time; she wanted to feel that way again when she fell in love with the whole wide world.

    April pushed at the door to open it. Silvery links snapped taut in front of her eyes.
A chain? Why a chain?
Already the hunger was so intense she couldn't understand that Raj had automatically slipped on the security chain before opening the door. Now it was the only thing that stood between him and his destruction. Carter beat at the door, too. He wanted in. He craved the editor's blood. Their attempts to break down the door were thwarted when Raj managed to slam it shut. Bolts snapped home.

    Raj was shouting, 'Try and keep calm, April. Something's happened to you. I'm calling the police…'

    'Carter,' she snapped. 'Break a window. We've got to get in there. Carter?'

    Her companion had raced from the garden. She saw that he chased after a drunken man - a lovely well-built man - who was tottering along beneath the blaze of street lights. She started running in that direction too, fearful that she might lose her share of nature's riches.

    

    

    At five minutes past two that sultry morning Trajan walked beside Ben as they left the taxi that had carried them from where they'd talked to the graffiti artist.

    'If the man was mad,' Trajan said, 'why should we make too much about this Vampire Sharkz business?'

    'Mr Akinedes isn't mad. He suffers from Obsessive Compulsion Disorder; that means he completely understands his compulsions are irrational, only he has no power over them.'

    They turned off the main road into a park that ran beside the Thames. Nearby, the formidable square structures of Tower Bridge rose into the night sky where they gleamed in the floodlights. Beyond them, the thousands of lights of London still burned brightly even at this hour.

    In the gloom Trajan's head appeared as a bobbing smudge of blond as he asked, 'Then did he mean there's a dangerous animal in the river; perhaps something that's escaped from a zoo? Did that attack April?'

    'Don't have me speculating yet, Trajan. I want to compare Mr Akinedes' story, irrespective of how bizarre it sounds, with what Elmo Kigoma knows.'

    'The man in the boat? If he's still here. The last I heard the Mayor had plans to evict him from the park.'

    'Oh, he's still here. Elmo's built from tough stuff.'

    Elmo Kigoma was, indeed, still in the riverside park but he was no longer alone. Ben groaned at what he saw. 'Damn…' There, in the muted gleam of street lights shining from the road, were a group of at least ten figures. They'd clustered around the boat that appeared to float above ground, the pole that supported it rendered invisible by the shadows.

    'The guy's got trouble this time.' Ben moved faster.

    'Wait!' Trajan caught his arm. 'Wouldn't it be better to call the police?'

    Ben fished out his phone. 'If it turns nasty - I mean really nasty - call the cops; but only as a last resort. If they come roaring down here we won't get a chance to talk to Elmo alone. And stay here; you've already cracked your skull once this week.'

    After pushing the phone into Trajan's hand he ran toward the aerial boat. By now, the group of men had begun to push at the vessel's pole. They were clearly trying to topple it. The tiny plywood craft swung back and forth as if tossed on a stormy sea. A silhouette of a figure hung on tight to the mast of the boat.

    These are stupid odds, Ben told himself as he ran along the path. One against ten? They've been drinking, too, so it's going to be tough reasoning with them.

    The men chanted, 'Out the boat! Out the boat!'

    'Give someone else a turn, y'old bastard!'

    Their laughter was sadistic; they'd worked themselves up an appetite for hurting someone.

    'Come down here, y'wanker - y'can kiss my arse.' One of the men bared his backside at the hermit in his boat.