Night of the Wolves (23 page)

“Yes?”

“Over there. Is that him? Coming to meet you?”

Without waiting for an answer, Alex leaped up on her horse. “Forgive me, but I have to see him.”

She slapped the reins against Cheyenne’s neck, and the mare took flight across the plain.

She was vaguely aware that Linda was shouting something at her, but she was already too far away and couldn’t hear the other woman’s words, and she didn’t care, anyway.

She reached the spot where he stood, reined in and dismounted.

He was wearing a long railroad frock coat and hat, standing with his back to her.

“Father!” she cried, but then the word froze on her lips when he turned, a smile on his face and a sizzle of laughter in his unholy red eyes.

Milo Roundtree’s smile widened as he strode toward her.

C
ODY WASN’T FAR OUT
of town when he realized that the red darkness was descending, and descending quickly. He looked up.

The sun was sinking far too rapidly.

He was suddenly aware of the shadows descending toward him, and he wrapped the reins around the saddle horn and reached for his bow and an arrow. He nocked the arrow, then let the arrow fly. A shrieking sound told him that he’d made a hit, though he had no idea whether it had been deadly or not.

A second shadow swept in with startling speed. He drew his sword from his saddle sheath in the nick of time, and the vampire’s own speed became his downfall, as he flew directly onto the blade, then burst into a spray of ash and bone shards.

Cody kept riding, swinging the sword as the next vampire attacked. He didn’t know if he killed it or only maimed it, and he couldn’t stop to find out. A fourth creature shot down at him, and he drew his pistol and fired directly at the thing again and again. Finally the body fell with a heavy thud ahead of him, causing Taylor to rear. He was almost thrown, but he tightened his thighs around the animal just in time to keep his balance.

“Easy, Taylor,” Cody said soothingly, urging the horse into a gallop again. Because in the distance he could see—

Alex.

And Milo Roundtree, descending on her.

Alex backed toward Cheyenne, hoping to make a run for it, but Milo laughed, raising his hands and calling down the sound of thunder. Cheyenne screamed in fear and bolted away at the speed of lightning.

“Why do I want you so much?” Milo asked himself, more than her, as he drew nearer. “I suppose it’s just that there aren’t many beautiful young women in these parts. Whores, yes, but you’re a rarity, an educated beauty with spunk and style. I know you think you don’t want me, but you will, I promise you that. When I finish with you, you’ll be delighted to be with me. You’ll be craving my company.”

He was almost on her when she remembered the remaining vials of holy water in her pocket and reached for one.

What if it was worthless? What if Linda had fooled her and was really a vampire, after all?

She was wavering. Belief might well be everything.

Just as he was about to touch her, she pulled out a vial and, as she had earlier, opened it with her teeth.

“Only when snow falls in hell could I ever so much as
endure
your company!” she cried, splashing the water directly into his eyes.

She prayed…and then he let out a cry of agonized pain, staggering back.

She turned to run and saw another man approaching, and this time it
was
her father.

“We have to get to the caves,” he told her as she raced up to him.

Linda, looking distressed, was right behind him.

“Hurry up,” Linda urged. “Do you have more of that holy water? You’re going to need it, because Milo’s gang can’t be far behind him.”

“He’ll come after her again—that splash wasn’t enough to kill him,” her father said, hurrying her toward the caves with his hand on her back. “I think the gang has been using the caves on the other side of the mountain.”

Her father, she thought. Her father had a hand on her back. She stared at him, dizzy for a moment, unable to believe what she was seeing.

She had been right; he was a good vampire. There
was
such a thing. He had fought the evil inside him and won. He didn’t need to kill.

“Eugene!” Linda cried. “Look!”

Alex spun around to look, too, and saw that Milo Roundtree had recovered, but instead of striding across the plain, he looked as if he were flying, floating.

Right in front of her eyes, he was turning into a winged shadow.

But even as he started to rise into the preternaturally early darkness, something massive raced across it toward him. The sound of huge wings flapping thundered in her ears, and suddenly the second shadow was descending on Milo.

The shadows met with a scream, writhing together and falling to the ground, and suddenly there were only two men, standing and staring at each other.

Milo Roundtree—and Cody Fox.

“Cody,” Alex breathed. “We’ve got to go back. We’ve got to help him.”

Linda caught her arm. “No, Alex. We can’t help him, we can only distract him.”

“Alex!” her father said sharply. “We’ve got to go. Now.”

She heard another noise now. It was the sound of a hundred wings, rising on the far side of the cliffs. If the three of them didn’t move, there was no doubt that the creatures would see them.

Eugene lifted his arms, as if to protect the women, and he urged them toward the nearest entrance to the caves. “Quickly!” he urged.

Still Alex turned back. Cody was racing toward Milo. He caught him in the midriff, and together they rolled across the ground, engaged in a vicious struggle. In the moonlight she caught the gleam of fangs, and what looked like talons.

What sounded suspiciously like a Rebel yell split the night.

K
NOWING IT WAS LITERALLY
a matter of life and death, Cody focused on Milo, but despite his efforts to close out everything else, he kept thinking of Alex.

He was grateful that she had thought to bring holy water, the only explanation for the burns on Milo’s face.

Furious that she had come out here at all.

Scared to death…

He was sure that had been Eugene Gordon with her, but he still had a hard time believing there was such a thing as a good vampire—one who had been turned, anyway. He had never really trusted that it was possible, not even for his own father.

Milo rushed him so hard they both flew through the air, then fell.

Hard.

Milo had drawn a sword and was already swinging the blade toward Cody’s neck.

Cody rolled just in the nick of time, then jump-kicked Milo as he leaped to his feet. Milo swung the sword again, but once again Cody was able to elude him.

“Fool,” Milo taunted. “You could join me. You could rule the West.”

“I don’t want to rule the West,” Cody said.

“No? Well, you could always join up with your old man. He’s out there somewhere. But you know that, don’t you?”

“I’ll find him one day,” Cody said, dodging the sword. “Without your help.”

“So…it’s the woman, is it?” Milo teased as he spun, his sword scything down, but Cody had anticipated the move and was already on Milo’s other side. He slammed his fists hard against the other vampire’s back, and Milo fell to his knees, but only for a moment.

“What? You think she’ll accept you?” Milo laughed, back on his feet again. “You’re a monster—an abomination. She’ll never love you.”

Cody got in a blow to Milo’s jaw and grunted in satisfaction as he saw blood trickling from the outlaw’s lip.

Milo paused, tasted it, then stared at Cody furiously.

“You could have had the world, but now you’ll die like a dog in the dirt.”

Cody smiled. Not all his tricks had come naturally. Some he’d been taught in the military.

Anger your opponent, because anger makes a man
careless. He himself had been careless, enraged, when he’d rushed to attack Milo barehanded. He wouldn’t be careless again.

“You’ll never have her, Milo,” he said.

“Of course I will. I’ll take her, and that will be that.”

“I’d say ‘over my dead body,’ but actually, mine is a living body. Ever miss that? The pleasures of the flesh?”

“Sneer all you want, Fox, but while you’re fighting me here, my children are sweeping into your precious town.”

“Then your children will die.”

Milo started to rush him, and Cody braced himself for the impact.

But Milo never hit him. He turned to shadow, then rose into the sky.

And headed for the caves.

S
TONES MARKED THE CRYPTS
of warriors, those long dead and those newly lost. Her father led the way past them, deeper into the caves. “There’s a place up ahead that must have been prepared for a warrior…who ended up interred elsewhere. It has a stone I can slide across the opening, and we can stay hidden there until morning,” he said. “I have…stakes there. Protection.”

But they didn’t reach his safe haven. He drew back, forcing the women behind him, as the air before them swirled and coalesced into a menacing black form.

Milo.

Alex’s heart sank. If Milo was here, then…

Milo let out a furious, gnashing sound, half growl, half howl, as he reached for her father and threw him across the cave to slump against the rock wall.

“Linda, get behind me!” Alex commanded.

“No…your father…”

Alex didn’t waste time arguing. She thrust the woman behind her and prepared for what she knew might be the last fight of her life. The Milo she faced now was hideous. His face was contorted in a mask of fury. His lips were drawn back so far that they were almost nonexistent, revealing fangs bared and dripping with a viscous liquid.

Suddenly he was right on top of her. His arms were like a vise as he grabbed her, and she barely managed to reach into her pocket, grasp a vial of holy water and spill it on him.

His flesh sizzled, but he didn’t let her go, only threw his head back and roared, preparing to thrust his fangs into her neck.

Just as she closed her eyes and said a silent prayer, Milo screamed and dropped her. She looked up from the floor of the cave and thought she was looking at a miracle. Cody was there—and alive.

He sent Milo crashing against the rocks on the far side of the cave, near her father’s unconscious body. Loose stones rained down on him, but he shook them off and rose, growling.

Cody was prepared.

Before Milo could react, he half ran, half leaped across the distance between them and drove a stake into Milo Roundtree’s heart.

Milo shuddered and writhed against the pain, teeth gnashing, a horrible animal sound emanating from his throat.

Then, in a sudden flash, he burst into flames.

The stake fell to the floor in a spray of ash.

Cody turned around, tension and rage contorting his face as he drew another stake and started toward her father.

“No!” Alex cried, running to protect her father, who was just regaining consciousness and trying to stagger to his feet. “Cody, no. Please, you have to believe me.”

Cody stopped, and the tension in his features eased, leaving him the Cody she knew—and loved.

He reached out for her, and she rushed into his arms.

He held her for only a second, though, then dropped his arms and focused his attention over her shoulder at her father and Linda, who had rushed to her husband’s side.

“We have to get back,” he said. “Milo is dead, but the attack on Victory is under way.”

“We’ve still got two horses,” Linda said.

“Eugene, take the horses and bring the women. I can get there faster on my own. But if you—”

“Alex is my daughter, and Linda is my wife. I love them, and I’ll guard them with my life—to my destruction,” Eugene said firmly.

“Then let’s go,” Cody said, beginning to transform before her eyes.

She and Linda rode the bay, while her father rode Cody’s stallion, Taylor. They rode hard, continually on the lookout.

But they didn’t see any of the monsters until they reached the edge of town.

The townspeople, along with John Snow and his family, were more than holding their own. As they raced down Main Street, Alex saw that Sheriff Cole and Dave were leading the men as if they were a trained battalion.

Which, in a way, they were.

Target practice had worked wonders.

Arrows were finding their targets, and the screaming of the dying vampires filled the air.

They rode over a dozen of the downed creatures, the horses’ hooves thudding into the flesh of the truly dead and dying, and those who were trying to rejoin the battle alongside their foul brethren.

Alex saw Father Joseph on the boardinghouse porch, splashing the creatures with holy water. Her father dismounted and headed for the porch, and the action slowed as she saw disaster descending.