Running From the Night (4 page)

“I see,” she said, and in the blink of an eye, she had closed the distance between them and was right in front of him. Jelani couldn’t remember the last time he’d been caught so hopelessly off guard. No one should be able to move that fast. She stared up at him with those brown eyes and he found himself transfixed. Slowly she reached a smooth brown hand up to stroke his cheek, and if he had been able to, he would have shrugged away. Maybe.

“You really are a handsome one.” She tilted her head just a bit, and for a moment he thought she meant to kiss him. She raised up on her toes and leaned toward him. Just before her lips touched his, they swept past and to his ear. “Death sleeps the day away and hunts you in the night. They will both come for you.” Her lips brushed his ear. He shivered and closed his eyes, trying to hold on to his control. “Beware the night.”

When he opened his eyes, he’d expected her to have vanished like she had last night. To his surprise, she was still standing in front of him. She must have seen the surprise on his face.

“Thought I would have disappeared?”

“It wouldn’t have surprised me.”

“I like being in your presence. I find you, interesting, Jelani.”

“Thanks. I find you, unnerving, ma’am.”

“Ma’am? Does my appearance so reveal my age?”

“What? Well, no. What? How old could you be? Twenty? Twenty-three? And why do women always get bothered by being called ‘ma’am.’ I was taught to be respectful to people; sir, ma’am, that kind of thing. And when I don’t know a woman’s name, I have nothing else to go on but ‘ma’am.’”

She endured his mini tirade, her enticing brown lips stretched into that perfect slanted smile. “Very well, Jelani. I thank you for your gentlemanly manners.” She turned and started away, the tiny bells on her ankles jingling pleasantly. Though her departure was abrupt, Jelani found that his voice abandoned him as he stood fixed, hypnotized by the sway of her hips, and unconsciously admiring her curves. She never once looked back, and in moments, she had rounded the corner and was gone.

“Wipe your chin or you’ll get your jacket wet.” His trance shattered, and he turned to see a woman walking toward him, shaking her head. “She’s cute, but she’s not a steak.”

“No, you don’t understand—”

“I’m sure I don’t.” She kept walking, and then Jelani was alone with unbidden and unwanted dark thoughts.

“And still didn’t get a name,” he muttered under his breath as he turned and continued on his way. “Damn.”

***

Chapter Seven

“You will never believe what happened to me on the way home,” Jelani grunted as he and Daniel held a particularly difficult pose on their respective mats.

“Because the story you told me about last night was so realistic, right?”

“Well, this one brushes pretty close.” They changed positions, each standing on their left leg, backs horizontal, right leg and both arms outstretched in line with their backs. “Tabletop.”

“Tell me after this part is done,” Daniel grunted. After about thirty seconds, they lowered and placed their hands and feet on the floor, bending their bodies in to an upside down
V
shape referred to as “downward dog.” “For the life of me, I do not understand why you want to try and talk while doing yoga.”

“Adds to the challenge.”

“It’s challenging enough.”

“So anyway, I was on my way home—”

“From an amazing kiss …” Daniel interjected.

“Man, don’t even get me started on that unexpected turn of events. Anyway, I’m on my way home, and that girl from last night just sneaks up on me.”

“What? The one that was with that big guy you mentioned?”

“Yeah, dude. She just snuck up and got the drop on me. I don’t know how the hell she did it. Maybe dropped out of a tree or something. Anyway, she starts telling me bits and pieces about what’s going on. She made me nervous. Like she could have pounced on me and there would have been nothing I could do about it.”

“Sounds like you would’ve welcomed the pounce.”

“You haven’t seen her. That was one hunting cat you might not mind being scratched up by.”

Daniel laughed. “If you say so.”

“So anyway, she tells me that I’m a survivor. She says she sees power in me, for a human, at least.” He looked over at Daniel as they lowered to the ground, their palms and lower half of their bodies resting on the mats and upper bodies held upward by their straightened arms. “Upward dog.” “For a human! What the hell am I supposed to do with that?”

“Sounds like you’re dealing with a loon,” Daniel said. “And can we continue this when we’re done? You know better than to talk during yoga.”

Knowing his friend was right, Jelani let it go.

O O O

The sun had just dipped beneath the ocean of English Bay, and the beautiful view of the water from their apartment had gone dark when Jelani and Daniel settled to relax for the night.

“Okay, so to summarize,” Daniel said, handing Jelani a mug of herbal tea, “you went to see a chick flick with a girl who has refined teasing to a perfected art, only to be surprised by a lengthy kiss at her doorstep. You’re on your way home and are caught off your guard by the same girl from last night who apparently feels nothing of the cold weather, judging by what you say she was wearing. Then you end up having what I can only describe as the oddest conversation this side of sanity. And let’s not forget your little encounter at Starbucks with Alisha. So basically, you’ve got three girls gunning for you, and two guys who are literally gunning for you.”

Jelani tried not to laugh at the grim assessment. “I’d say that sums it up quite nicely. The way that girl made me feel, I was considering getting the hell out of the country.”

“The country …” Daniel looked at him. “And go where? The States?”

“Hell, no. Too close. I was thinking the Caribbean. Plenty of black folks, and sunlight and heat. Not conducive to these people coming after me.”

Daniel laughed. “What? You’re not seriously considering moving?”

“At this very moment, not really. But the idea is in the back of my mind. I always trust my gut, and right now my Spidey-sense is tingling.”

Daniel took a sip of his tea. “I think you’ll be fine. Just keep a low profile till the cops come up with something to catch the killer.”

“Yeah,” Jelani said. “I just gotta hope they work fast before the bastard finds me.”

“You can take care of yourself probably better than they can.”

Jelani shook his head. “You didn’t feel that iron grip. You weren’t one-handedly thrown twenty feet and more uphill.” Jelani shook his head and sipped his tea. It felt good and warm going down. “I don’t ever want to see either of them again. Trust me, you wouldn’t want any part of these cats.”

Daniel looked into his eyes and nodded slowly. “I believe you. Not really going for the supernatural thing, but I believe you on this, at least.” He smirked. “Well, you’re lucky you can work from home. There’s not going to be any mo-cap projects for another month. You can do all your web programming right here.”

“And why would that be a good thing? Locking myself up on house arrest?”

Daniel shrugged. “Well, if they’re vampires, they can’t come in without being invited, right?”

“Wrong.”

Suddenly Daniel was hurled from in front of Jelani, across the room, to crash through the window and was swallowed into the night. In his place stood the blond man from the previous night. His teeth were bared, and he stared balefully into Jelani’s eyes. “I hope you enjoyed your last day of life, human. My troubles with you will be over in a second.…”

Jelani’s fists snapped out in one-two combinations, straight, roundhouse, uppercuts. His footwork was precise, and his kicks were fast and perfect. And he might as well have been shadowboxing. The blond man avoided every attack without having to touch him. He had an amused expression on his face.

“That’s right! I like to work for the kill! You’re a little slow, but it’s the effort that matters, right?”

He jumped right into Jelani’s reach and grabbed him by the neck, lifting him off his feet with one hand. That grip was impossibly strong, and slowly it squeezed. Jelani knew this guy could have snapped his neck instantly if he’d wanted to. He used his thumb to turn Jelani’s head to the side, and then peered hungrily at his neck. “Mmm. Looks good.”

Jelani’s eyes narrowed and his vision was starting to darken. He kicked the man in the groin, slapped his hands over his ears. He repeatedly slammed the butt of his hand into the attacker’s chin. His effort yielded no result.

“Wow! You’re a fighter!” he said, and Jelani saw the tips of his canines dip just below his upper lip. His blue eyes started to fade into that horrible milky white.

Desperate, Jelani thrust his thumbs into the other’s eyes. That got a result, and he was dropped to the floor.

As soon as his feet hit the floor he was coughing and stumbling away, then out the door and running down the hall.
You’re damn straight I’m a fighter
, he thought as he rounded the corner and went through the door to the stairs. Grabbing hold of the rails, he took the stairs several at a time, and was in the lobby. His spine rattled when he heard the scream from the stairwell. He’d driven his thumbs into that guy’s eyes with enough force to put them out! How was he still after him?

Jelani was out the door and sprinting into the night, unable to believe what was happening. Daniel, who had become his first, and best, friend since he’d moved to the city, was undoubtedly dead, and now a vampire was after him! There was no denying it now. That was exactly what that guy was. And how did he get into their apartment?

Jelani put those thoughts away and replaced them with survival. He had to find a place with a lot of people. Surely that thing back there wouldn’t try anything in front of a lot of witnesses. He turned up Georgia Street and sprinted for his life. In seconds, he was in the middle of other people as they milled up and down the street, oblivious to the death that may well be walking beside them.

“Where do you think you’re going?”

Jelani’s blood turned to water. He looked to his right and saw the blond vampire walking right beside him. “Why are you worried about it?”

That received a laugh. “Planning on hanging out around lots and lots of people all night? Maybe stall out till daylight? You think I can’t kill you in the middle of ten people or a million?”

“You’re not all over me right now.” Jelani saw a knot of people ahead and quickened his pace to catch up, the vampire in stride with him the whole time. “What do you want with me, man? If you were worried about me giving you away, you could have just let me go. I hadn’t gotten a good look at you anyway.”

“Don’t be an idiot. Whether you got a good look at me or not, I’m not taking that chance. If I get rid of you, then the Hunters may get off my back.”

Hunters. Jelani had seen and felt the strength of this guy, and if these Hunters could make him afraid, then Jelani didn’t see much hope of making his way out of this alive.

They came to Pacific Centre Mall, and Jelani followed a group of people through the glass doors, the vampire right behind him. They went down the escalator and into the food court, where Jelani took a seat at one of the tables in the middle, surrounded by people. The blond vampire sat down right in front of him and smiled.

“So, what time you got?”

“Don’t wear a watch,” Jelani answered.

The vampire grinned at him, showing just a hint of the tips of his fangs. “I give it, hmm, about six, six thirty. So you’ve got about two to three hours before this mall closes. After that, where?” He snapped his fingers. “I know. Why don’t we go to a twenty-four hour coffee shop and have cup of Joe while you wait for the sun to come up?”

Jelani stared at him. There were no coffee shops nearby that were twenty-four hours, at least not close enough for his comfort. How long could he find groups of people to follow? And he dare not try to go to a nightclub where it was dark enough for this guy to rip out one of his organs and be gone before anyone was the wiser.

“Look,” the vampire leaned in close, and Jelani leaned away. “I’ll make a deal with you. If you just find a nice discrete place for me to kill you, I won’t feed on you, and I won’t try to turn you either. It’ll be quick and painless.”

“Promise?” Jelani said, a fleeting moment of sarcasm catching him despite his situation.

The vampire narrowed his eyes. “I will kill you, maggot. There is nothing you can do about it and no way to avoid it. I’m just giving you the option of it being endlessly excruciating with the possibility of you stalking the night forever, or a quick and painless end. Do not mock my generosity.”

“Generosity?” Jelani huffed a strangled laugh. “I don’t mean to be rude, but you’ll have to excuse me if I have trouble recognizing the kindness of someone sitting across from me who has killed my best friend and is offering me an option as to how I want to die.” He looked around at all the milling people and spotted two security guards passing by, not fifteen feet away.

“You will be dead before the sound escapes your mouth.”

Jelani looked back to see the vampire staring dangerously at him. “If that were true, you would have already killed me.”

“No. I haven’t killed you because I don’t want to attract too much attention to myself. Trust me, I can easily kill you now, take out both security guards, and be out of here. Now, the reason I haven’t done that is because I couldn’t do it quickly enough to avoid the resulting screams and panic it would cause.”

“Our friends the Hunters,” Jelani said, and the vampire nodded.

“I would prefer this business to be a little more discrete. But if I even think you’re going to call out for help, I will put an end to you and take my chances.”

Jelani wished he had his knife, or some kind of weapon, but he hadn’t the time to grab it on his way out the door. The vampire rubbed his eyes.

“I have to give you credit. That little eye gouge thing actually hurt. You are by far the toughest kill I’ve had.”

“Thanks,” Jelani said dryly.

The other man leaned forward, and Jelani saw hunger in his eyes. “You play it cool, but I can hear your heart. It’s pattering like a sparrow. I can hear the blood roaring through your veins.” He drew a long intake of breath through his nose. “I can smell the fear laced in your blood. Gives it a much better taste. Sweeter.”

Jelani was horrified. How could he get away from this guy? What could he do? His eyes darted this way and that, hoping for some opportunity to present itself.

“Ah, ah, ah,” the vampire said, shaking a finger at him. “You want to be responsible for some of these innocent people dying? You’re getting desperate, aren’t you? I can tell. At first you thought there was a chance to get away from me, that this might all just die down and go away. Now you know you’re dead, and you’re starting to panic. Now you’re wondering if you should take your chances and scream out for help. You’re asking yourself if I’m really that fast. Can I really snap your neck before you cry out? Can I really kill you and escape? Am I bluffing? Are there enough people between here and Chapters for you to make it there without me killing you?”

Jelani’s heart skipped a beat. He had been thinking of going to Chapters Bookstore. The place didn’t close till eleven o’clock, and that would buy him a couple hours to figure out what to do next. Could vampires read minds?

“Right now, you’re wondering if I’m reading your mind. No, I’m not. But when you’ve hunted and killed as many as I have, you learn that every condemned prey has the same thoughts.”

The food court was beginning to clear, and Jelani thought it might be a good time to go. He stood, his unwanted companion standing with him.

“So you’re going to try to hang out at the bookstore after all?” the vampire asked, walking beside him. They might have been two friends walking through the mall.

“Why not?” He looked at the other man. Blond hair, blue eyes, medium build. He had a scraggly but friendly look that suggested he was just that guy around the corner. “So how old are you? You know, how long ago…?”

“When was I turned?” the vampire finished for him. “Not that long ago, actually. It was back in nineteen ninety six; sixteen years ago, and not a long time at all as far as we keep track.”

“Was it a painful thing, to be turned?” They passed the escalator in front of Sears and came in step behind a handful of people.

“The bite is painful, but the time it takes for you to either turn, or die, is a lot more painful.”

“Why is that?”

“We can go off someplace quiet and I can give you a firsthand experience.”