Authors: Moira Rogers
“You’re so bad.” The levity felt wonderful, but all too quickly it gave way to more pressing practical concerns. “Do you know how these flying machines get airborne?”
He shook his head. “Never seen one that managed.”
“I’ll need a relatively flat, straight strip of land to get up some speed.” Paralee met his gaze evenly. “A clear strip, and quite a bit of speed. If we’re as surrounded as you say, it won’t be easy.”
“There’s a clearing just beyond the station.” He shoved his hand through his hair. “The vampires won’t be able to take us during the day. It’ll all come down to whether or not they’ve got ghouls—and how many.”
“The groups I’ve encountered usually do.” It was too simple to avoid them otherwise. Stick to the sunshine, and you’d get through just fine. Ghouls could walk freely in the light—and drag you back to their masters in the dark.
Merrick nodded. “Ghouls are slow and stupid. I can handle a couple dozen on my own, but they can still slow me down.”
“And ruin a perfectly good take-off.” Paralee tapped the aircraft’s frame. “You know, this was designed to fly low, and these brackets on the front could only have been designed to hold autofiring weapons.”
“Really?” He squinted as he touched the brackets. “A pity they had to abandon it. I reckon it could come in mighty handy next time vampires try to take a border town.”
“As well as now, if you can help me locate the weapons. They’d have had to modify them with remote triggers that can be activated from the control panel inside.”
The lights flickered again, and Merrick groaned and rocked to his feet. “Let me chop up the kitchen table and feed it to the steam boiler. Then I’ll find you some weapons, you bloodthirsty wench.”
“You like me this way, admit it.”
“Abso-damn-lutely, sweet girl.”
She
refused
to blush. Instead, she tossed the wrench aside and wiped her hands on the rough coveralls she’d found. “Just a few more things to check out, and I’ll be ready to test these engines.”
“Good.” He reached down and caught her chin. “We’re going to make it.”
“I know.” They just had to get past the vampires and in the air—nothing to it, provided everything went according to plan.
The real problem was that hardly anything ever did.
#
The plane was lighter than it looked, but Merrick still had to fight to push it to the clearing, especially with death pressing in on him from every side.
The vampires were awake. He wasn’t sure how he knew—hell, he couldn’t
know
, not really—but he’d bet his life on it. Awake and maybe peering down at him from the mountains at his back. Every snapped twig sent his blood surging until he fairly trembled with repressed energy.
At least it made pushing the damn plane easier.
Paralee stood on the wing, one arm stretched into the cockpit to steer the wheels. “I see the clearing. Let’s try to get as close to the hills as we dare, though. The more space I have to work with, the better our chances.”
He grunted his understanding and pushed with renewed effort. Ghouls could be shambling through the trees even now. Or maybe the ghouls would try to shoot them down—a vampire might assume a dangerous crash could damage a bloodhound more easily than a handful of ghouls.
So many ways to die, and he had to make sure none of them befell Paralee.
“Just a little—” Her breath cut off in a rush. “Shit. We have visitors.”
His skin prickled, as if the bloodhound already fought to break free. “How many?”
“Four—no, seven. Eight…” She swore again and climbed into the pilot’s seat of the craft. “Enough to cause problems. We need to get this thing going
now
.”
Eight ghouls weren’t so bad. He had a heavy gun strapped across his back and both hunting knives. “If I clear a path, can you get into the air from here?”
She glanced at him incredulously. “Without you?”
“Plan for the worst, love.” He heaved the plane over a rocky bit of ground and clear of the tree line before ducking under the wing. The ghouls had appeared on the opposite side of the clearing, moving in that halting, uneven fashion that meant their vampire masters were jerking their leashes.
He counted ten, all moving toward them. Then another stumbled out of the trees. “If they keep coming, you
need
to take off. If something happens to you, I’m as good as dead.”
“Merrick, I won’t leave you.” She gripped the steering controls. “Hold them off for a minute. I’ll start the engines and get into firing position. We can use the guns.”
Time was ticking down, but he stared up at her as he pulled his knives. “Promise. You promise me, Paralee. If more come, you’ll get out of here. There’s a border town called Iron Creek. You go there and tell the bloodhound named Wilder Harding that you’re my mate. I’ll find you.” If he lived.
She swallowed hard as her face paled. “I promise.” Then the hoarse whisper gave way to determination, a setting of her jaw. “Clear the way if you can, and I’ll take off. I’ll have better maneuverability in the air than on the ground.”
Anything he tried to say would sound like
good-bye
, especially the words he truly wanted to say. He should have done it back at the outpost, gathered her close and whispered words of love that were too soon to be reasonable, but felt so damn real.
Too late now. His only chance against the ghouls was to kill the lot of them before Paralee had to take off. “I’ll be right back, lover,” he said lightly, then threw himself toward the oncoming enemies.
An engine roared to life behind him, almost drowning out the first ghoul’s screech as it reached for him.
The world snapped into clarity as he slashed the blade of his knife across the creature’s throat and spun to plunge it in a second ghoul’s chest. This was what he’d trained for, what he
lived
for. After sixty years it was beyond experience, beyond even instinct.
He was a bloodhound, one of the first, and he was made for killing.
A shot rang out, then another, and the crank and drone of a second engine joined the first. “The clearing!” Paralee yelled.
He needed to make space for her to build speed. He ducked the next attack, swept up a ghoul and flung him into two others, knocking them both toward the trees. “I’ll take care of it. You go!”
The creatures had started coming in waves, and all he could do was rush them, his knives ready to slash—and distract. As soon as he cleared the way, the engines grumbled, and Paralee guided the craft past him in a rush.
I promise.
A ghoul snatched at his shirt, its teeth bared. There was satisfaction in breaking the thing’s neck, even if gave the one behind him the chance to slice his arm open.
Blood ran freely, and Merrick accepted the pain. Every bruise meant Paralee’s freedom. Every cut meant her survival. He couldn’t just hold them off—he had to eradicate every last one of them. With the vampires trapped in their caves and their day-walking servants destroyed, she would be free to fly to safety.
He sliced open a ghoul’s chest and blood slicked the knife, enough to make it twist in his grip. Not his most efficient weapon, nor were the guns on his back. Slicing through the horde, he broke free for long enough to drop his weapons and his gun belt.
The truest weapon he had was inside him, raging to be set free in defense of its mate, and it was about damn time he used it.
#
The flying machine shuddered and jerked like a terrified animal, and it was all Paralee could do to roll straight down the field without veering off into the thick trees one either side of the clearing.
She pumped the throttle and held her breath until the craft’s speed topped out—and the engines kept purring. She’d half expected them to seize up, and Lord only knew what would happen if ghouls overwhelmed her...
No, she knew. So did Merrick, which was why he’d made her promise to go.
Damn him, anyway.
The trees whizzed by now, so Paralee eased forward on the control stick and exhaled when the tail end lifted a little. She could
do
this, clear the trees and circle around with her guns ready.
Piloting the tiny craft was nothing like being at the helm of her ship. Her ship glided, whereas this thing was like being hurtled out of a damn cannon, flying fast and hard without a lick of the control to which she was accustomed. She’d have to rely on instinct, on the bounce and sway of the machine beneath her hands.
She had to make it work.
The front wheels left the grass, bumped back down and rose again. The wings tilted. She righted them with a gentle correction, but she couldn’t stop the fine wobble that made her stomach lurch. If she’d ever flown one of these goddamn machines before, maybe, but not her first time.
She kept climbing and finally gained enough altitude to turn. When she did, the sight of the field below sent her lurching stomach straight up into her throat.
Dozens of ghouls had converged on a single spot, kicking up grass and fabric. At first Paralee couldn’t tell if the clothes had been discarded or ripped away in a frenzy, and every breath came faster, shorter, until her head started to throb and swim.
Then she saw Merrick. It had to be him, though the beast raking knife-like claws through a wave of ghouls bore no resemblance to the man she’d come to know. He towered over the ghouls, his hunching body covered in fur and his head that of a wolf—though no wolf she’d ever seen was so
large
.
The ghouls had once been men. Under Merrick’s claws they now resembled broken toys. He ripped through them and discarded them with no thought, as if a hundred might not be enough to take him down.
Blood soaked the ground, but Paralee couldn’t even care, as long as none of it belonged to Merrick. She angled the nose of the craft downward and fired at a small group of ghouls at the edge of the clearing. All but one fell, and she pulled the biplane around with a renewed sense of purpose.
Beneath her, Merrick trampled through another tight knot of ghouls. Their movements had become increasingly disjointed—even from the sky she could tell that their vampire masters had to be struggling to retain control of their creatures in the face of such a monstrous opponent.
Her momentary sense of relief vanished like smoke at the sharp clatter of auto-fired shots. The craft had been plated on the bottom with a light armor, but every machine had weak spots. She returned fire, wincing when the arc of bullets strayed perilously close to Merrick.
He roared at the ghoul holding the gun and crossed the space separating them with three loping steps. The creature tried to turn the weapon on Merrick, who ripped the gun from the ghoul’s hands with one ferocious swipe. Then he spun and charged directly toward her.
There was no time to slow enough to touch down, but it didn’t matter. When his long strides drew him close, he launched himself into the air like gravity had given up trying to hold him. One clawed hand curved over the side of the plane, and the whole thing pitched to one side.
Paralee swore and struggled to compensate for his extra weight. “Can you get in?” she ground out through clenched teeth.
His only response was a grunt and a pained noise. The claws twisted, contracted, and fur melted away. Merrick swung up behind her, his body blood-slicked and bare. “Fuck.”
A nervous laugh bubbled up, unbidden, and Paralee bit her tongue as she pointed the nose of the craft
skyward. “Are you all right? Is that blood yours or—or—”
“Both.” He slid into the spot next to her with another grunt and flexed his hands. “You didn’t leave.”
“You said you’d be right back, didn’t you?”
He chuckled hoarsely. “I suppose I did, lover. Doesn’t make you any less crazy for waiting for me.”
“I didn’t wait for you.” She laid her hand over his for a moment, as long as she dared. She couldn’t look at him or the tears would come, and maybe they
would
die in a fiery inferno, after all. “I saved your ass, is what I did.”
“Damn right.” His voice was rough, thick with emotion, and he reached over to grip her thigh. “I’ll need you until my dying day, but I want you too. I want you watching my back so my dying day doesn’t come anytime soon.”
His tone tempered words that should have sounded mercenary, and Paralee smiled as they topped the foothills and crossed the river. “I hope you know…when we reach altitude, I’m going to kiss the living daylights out of you.”
“Sweet girl, if I weren’t pretty sure we’d crash, I’d do a hell of a lot more than that.”
Plenty of time for such things once they’d made it to safety. She could show him everything she couldn’t say, not yet, and they could talk about things beyond
here
and
now
.
“We have to make it to Chicago,” Paralee mused. She checked her compass, changed course and shielded her eyes against the morning sun. “You owe me a ship, remember? Though I could get used to this little machine too.”
He patted the side of the cockpit and smiled. “Then she needs a name.”
“So let’s call her Merrick’s Destiny.” Paralee leveled out the plane and slid her hand into his. “Just like me.”
About the Author
How do you make a Moira Rogers? Take a former forensic science and nursing student obsessed with paranormal romance and add a computer programmer with a passion for gritty urban fantasy. Toss in a dash of whimsy and a lot of caffeine, and enjoy with a side of chocolate by the light of the full moon.
By day, Bree and Donna are mild-mannered ladies who reside in the Deep South. At night, when their husbands and children are asleep, they combine forces to unleash the product of their fevered imaginations upon the page.
To learn more about this romance writing, crime fighting duo, visit their webpage at
www.MoiraRogers.com
. (Disclaimer: crime fighting abilities may appear only in the aforementioned fevered imaginations.)
Also by This Author
Wilder's Mate
, Samhain Publishing
Crux
, Samhain Publishing
Crossroads
, Samhain Publishing