Blood Red

The man had stripped off his shirt. The girl was stretched out on top of one of the tombs, her bare torso glistening beneath the moonlight. The man was bent over her, his hand stroking the length of her legs, his lips teasing the bare flesh of her midriff.

“Wait, please!” There was fear in the girl’s voice now.

“Too late.”

“No. No!”

“You’re very pretty…. We could have had so much more fun first. Excitement like you’ve never imagined. Too bad that tonight…well, I’m really am hungry. It’s been a while for me, I’m afraid.”

She was gasping out another protest again. She had just realized she was about to die, Mark knew, and she was trying hard to scream. But terror, as sweet as sugar in the blood, was beginning to fill her, and she couldn’t choke out the agony trapped in her throat.

Now!

Mark inhaled, tensing. She wouldd be dead any second now if he didn’t act. He reached into his pocket. He sprang.

He was in terrific shape, having served with the Marines before putting in several years as a bouncer while getting his own work sold. Even so, as fast as he was, the man sensed his approach. He heard the snarl of rage before he saw the man at the tomb swirl around, ready to meet him, a horrible, twisted mask of fury on his face. He saw the mouth open, the glint of the fanglike teeth in the darkness. Oddly enough, they had a fascinating opalescent glow.

He swore softly to himself. This wasn’t the same man he had been trailing with such dogged determination. It was another, no doubt equally as bad.

His heart sank. And, yet…

This creature was about to kill. He had to remember justice—had to put it above revenge. He couldn’t let his guard down; he couldn’t falter for an instant.

Before he could reach the creature, however, the man gave a harsh laugh of amusement. “Going to shoot me?” he demanded.

“Hell no,” Mark assured him. His vial was full, and it was open. He aimed directly into the face and eyes of his opponent.

It let out a bloodcurdling cry of rage and astonishment as the holy water bathed its features. There was a flutter of shadow and darkness, a weak flapping of wings. It took off and crashed hard into a tomb.

Mark followed it. He drew the small but sharply honed stake he always carried from his pocket, then skewered the mix of shadow and substance and bat wings by the tomb.

There was a burst of misty color in the night. Dust exploding in the air, crimson with the blood of many lifetimes.

The flapping stopped. For a moment there was something of the lumpen and darkened essence of a man by the grave…then there was nothing. Dirt and ash. Dust to dust.

He stood there, just staring, suddenly shaking as he broke out in a cold sweat.

Suddenly the girl started to scream. The sound jerked Mark back to reality, the here, the now. He turned. She was staring at him with wild, tear stained eyes, obviously in a state of total shock..

“Shut up,” he said, sharply but not unkindly.

“He was a…a vampire!” she said. She blinked in disbelief at her own words.

“Yes.”

“You killed him!” she gasped. “But…he was real.” She shook her head. “That’s…impossible.”

“I’m afraid not.

She swayed, still reeling, shaking as if she were suffering from a severe chill.

“He—he really was a vampire?”

Mark could hear sirens approaching. Someone must have heard her scream. “Yes, he was.” But not the one I was looking for, he added silently.

“I don’t…I can’t…believe this,” she said.

“We need to get out of here. The police are coming.”

“Shouldn’t we stay and report…um…this?”

He arched a brow at her. “You’re going to report what happened here?” he asked.

She stared at him, still shaking. “Yes, but…no, it isn’t real, can’t be real, but…”

“It is real.” He was trying very hard to be patient, but time was running out. He sighed. “They won’t believe you, though. We have to get out of here.”

Her jaw worked hard as she tried to form words. At last, still shivering, she said, “Get me over the wall, please?”

“Of course. Head that way.”

He could move like the wind himself—college football—but she was still so stunned that he felt as if he was dragging dead weight. He had to urge her to help herself as he pushed her up the wall, then jumped to safety behind her and brought her back down on the sidewalk.