Hunters
Prologue
Kane could not believe his luck. In all his years of hunting and prowling, he had never found a woman so exquisite. He pulled back, gazing longingly into her eyes.
He smiled as her near perfect body writhed in the ecstasy he’d now given her. He felt an incredibly strong pull from this seemingly delicate creature, trying to take him back down to her as they lay on the grass. She was completely oblivious to anything, except the sensations he knew must be sweeping through her body.
The rustle of the trees. The crush of leaves across the jogging path. The almost hypnotic lapping of the Trinity River against a nearby boat dock. All of these served to make the intercourse of Kane and the woman, known as Heidi Nguyen, as close to love-making as either had experienced in far too long.
Kane smiled and, in that moment, decided she had to be his. There could be no leaving her to wake up in the daylight, groggy and unsure of what had happened. He knew he’d regret it much longer than she would, if she even vaguely remembered him at all.
Pulling back his lips, he bared his inhumanly long incisors and plunged them back into her throat. At that, she peaked yet again, arching her back and shaking as she clung to him like a second skin. All the while, he drank furiously, with each drop of her blood taking her closer to his world and further from hers.
“So, you like this, do you?” Kane said, pulling back for a breath of air. “Trust me, my dear. You’ll come to love giving this to others very soon.”
He hadn’t known what drove this lovely young woman to suddenly get out of a car on the Main Street Bridge and walk down to the poorly lit jogging path along the river; but he didn’t care. He’d felt her blood pulsing through her veins because she had been angry, possibly at the man in the car. That did not matter now, it was her mistake, and his fortune, that allowed him to pull her into the shadows under the bridge.
Kane never had a problem attracting women. He’d once been one of Europe’s top fashion models, with long wavy hair, a chiseled jaw and muscles like granite, features he kept even after being turned. But, he had only attracted shallow women, who did not have the intellect to sustain the kind of relationship he craved.
It would not be so with Heidi Nguyen. She was beautiful, her body sensuous and powerful. He could feel the intellect flowing behind her almond-shaped eyes. He felt himself blessed by the fates, she’d allowed emotions to overrule that intellect at just the right time for him.
Suddenly, his senses flared, like a four-alarm fire. Someone was coming. He pressed a hand lightly over Heidi’s mouth, melting back into the shadows, nearly becoming one with the darkness. He knew he could easily kill whoever was stupid enough to interfere, but he had someone else to think about now. A cry of help from this stranger, before he died, might elicit the police and force him to abandon his newfound love. No, he needed to err on the side of caution and, if need be, strike at the most opportune time.
Then, to his surprise, he sensed more than one presence. He sniffed the air. Human. He could only wonder why they were on this jogging path, at this ungodly hour; and, he thought with an involuntary shudder, they were walking deliberately toward the bridge. He caught his breath, the silhouettes now producing flashlight beacons to stab into the darkness, playing them across the shadows, toward him.
Impulsively, he leapt forth into the nearest beam, fangs bared, hands now transformed into clawed weapons that could rend flesh as easily as a knife through butter.
“Another fly come to my web?” he said, fiercely. “Or a hyena trying to steal the kill? Which will it be?”
Kane never saw who shot him, but he felt it. The intense pain, as something pierced his thick skin, embedding itself deep into his chest, was nearly unbearable. He could not scream, his mind racing wildly as it fought to comprehend its sudden change in status – from hunter to prey.
“Y-you dare,” he gasped as he staggered back, acting more like a man offended than one who’d been assaulted. “D-don’t you know who I am? We own this town.”
“Yeah, well, we should all have a dream,” a deep, disembodied voice replied.
The pain in Kane’s chest was excruciating. He looked down at the stubby piece of wood protruding from his torso. His usually sharp mind could not comprehend what it was.
His legs gave up and he felt himself falling – he gasped for air and feebly waved a clawed hand at his attackers. Soon, he found himself tumbling into shadows much darker than that from which he had sprung.
Alas, even the thought at having finally found eternal companionship abandoned him, for his final thoughts did not include a wisp of Heidi Nguyen.
Above Kane’s body, the two silhouettes stopped. One stepped forward, into the moonlight, pulling something long and shiny from somewhere on his person. He raised it and, with one swing, made sure Kane would never take the blood of anyone again.
“God, I hate it when you do that, Ryker,” said the woman next to him.
“Show some backbone,” the man called Ryker snorted. “For a change.”
The woman glared at him, but stopped when she heard a moan nearby. She played her flashlight back into the shadows. Cursing, she moved over to Heidi’s body.
She didn’t pay attention as Kane’s corpse suddenly flared up like a match, dying out almost as quickly. Caring only about Kane’s victim, she called Ryker over to her.
“What about her?” she queried, sounding forlorn and sad. “She’s lost a lot of blood. She’s well into the turn. You know we can’t let that happen.”
“No, we can’t,” Ryker agreed. “But she might be one for the doc.”
“Always the pretty ones, right Cantrell?” the female commented, with disgust.
“Au contraire. I saved you, didn’t I?”
Glaring at him, the woman fought the urge to hit him with her flashlight.
“Very funny,” she said finally. “Okay, check her out then. If you think she’s worth salvaging, we’ll take her. But, if she can’t be helped, you’re the one who has to finish her.”
“So I have to do all the work, eh?” Ryker commented. “What else is new?”
Ryker looked down into Heidi’s eyes, feeling pity instantly. He knew she was yet another innocent victim, in a war she didn’t know had been declared. He saw her eyes darting wildly side to side, as if the brain behind them could not handle what was happening to it. Shaking his head, he checked her throat, touched her carotid artery, and looked at her skin pallor.
“I’m truly sorry about this, Miss,” Ryker said. “I really am. But, it’s war and everybody dies.”
As he lifted his obscenely long knife into her field of vision, her eyes stopped darting and grew wide in stark fear. Breaking contact with her almost pleading eyes, he lifted the knife and brought it down toward Heidi’s head. Seconds later, he pulled the knife out of the ground, the blade now clean of Kane’s blood.
He looked down at Heidi, showing no surprise, and saw those beautiful almond eyes rolling up into her head, taking her body into sweet oblivion. He glanced up and across the dark river toward downtown Fort Worth. Standing to his feet, he held his knife up to the moonlight and sheathed it.
“One more down, Riordan,” he said to himself. “And one step closer to you.”