Black Market Blood (The Lazarus Hunter Series Book 2)

  Black Market Blood

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  All the characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons, either living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Published By Rogue Hedgehog Media

  Copyright © 2017 C.K. Martin

  All rights reserved.

  1

  He could hear her heels clicking on the sidewalk, telling his world she was somewhere she shouldn’t be. Only fools and hookers came to this part of town at night. The street light on the corner was out, which meant she couldn’t see him, but he could most certainly see her. Even from this distance, the scent of her cheap perfume filled his senses, failing to fully mask the sour tang of sweat on her skin. It had been a hot day and he knew she would have been out walking since late afternoon. He could smell men on her. Three he could distinguish, but maybe more. At least she was popular. That, he felt sure, was going to count for something.

  She quickened her pace. There was only one thing worse than being in a place like this, and that was being in a place like this moving slow. It was now or never. If she got to the end of the street, back closer to the main drag, then someone was much more likely to see them.

  It was a chance he couldn’t afford to take.

  He stepped out in front of her. His sudden appearance made her take an instinctive, hasty step backwards. He gave his best smile, designed to be comforting and sincere. He had decades of practice, though no lines on his face to show for it. Even so, he could see suspicion in her eyes. A fear she was completely right to feel. She took another step back and he saw she was too world-weary. Too hardened to win over by nothing more than a good looking face and smooth attitude.

  Not enough time. Two choices. He could stick to the plan and make his move, or he could let her go.

  Instinct told him she was the one.

  She turned on her heel, preparing to run. A natural response that flared up something primal within him, stripping all other choices from his mind.

  He gave chase, catching up with her in seconds and clamped a tight, cold palm across her mouth before she could articulate a scream. The muffled sound of panic hit his fingers as he pulled her closer to his body. He didn’t need much time.

  A sharp prick of her skin and he would turn her into a killer, just like him. By the end of the summer, there would be hardly any vampires still walking the streets of New York City. Who cared if there were a couple less humans too?

  2

  Elizabeth sat back in her chair and stretched until she felt every vertebrae give a satisfying crack. She checked her watch and saw it was creeping towards midnight. Friday. The time when self-doubt crept in. For sixteen months, she had agonised over whether she had made the right decision. A small but loud part of her brain was always tempting her. A reminder that there was another alternative.

  She looked at the notes on her screen. She had certainly inherited her father’s formidable research skills. It made the choice to go back to university to read for her PhD a no brainer. If you were picking from the standard list of job options, that was. She didn’t recall the careers advisor ever mentioning the vampire killer/sidekick alternative she also had open to her.

  She pushed her chair away from the desk, annoyed with herself for evening considering it. Research was her strength, not killing.

  If she said if often enough, she might even begin to believe it.

  She attended the same university where her father had been a professor. The main reason for going there was to stay here. In his study, in the house she had grown up in, oblivious to his links with some of the greatest and most dangerous vampires in the world. She reached out and touched one of his old books, its maroon leather bound spine cracked and faded with age. One of the many first editions he had collected during his life. It was all hers now. A beautiful, bittersweet legacy.

  She still hadn’t found the heart to put her own stamp on the room. It remained an old man’s room, all dark wood and antique furniture. The hallmarks of a very British life in academia. He had never smoked, but the smell of cigars would not have seemed out of place. It was like walking into a different era, coming into here to study. His things were where he had always kept them, returned to their rightful place when she’d cleaned the room after his murder. A shrine she could actually use.

  Despite the deep layering of sentiment, she had to allow some practicalities to seep in. For her PhD she needed a decent computer and good internet connection. It looked out of place on the dark walnut desk. Too much empty surface remained, until she became compelled to fill it with books and papers, just as he had once done.

  To change anything else felt like erasing her strongest memories of him. Memories that were more than books and Persian rugs and a comfortable leather chair. Her subconscious balked whenever she thought about changing more and moving on.

  Professor Hastings had left her two very large sets of footprints to walk in. Dual lives of excellence in his public academic prowess and his hidden role in vampiric lore. She was determined to follow the steps that were visible in the light.

  Since avenging his death, she no longer kept her database current. Any murders with even a hint of the supernatural still caught her eye. She’d watched the American business TV channels, hoping to see a piece about MaxiData Corp or Monica. It had happened one time. Seeing a picture of New York’s most powerful vampire leader on her screen was a sharp reminder of the life she had chosen to leave behind.

  It had been her choice. Repeated like a mantra when the loneliness kicked in.

  No one had tried to get in touch with her. They had all respected her attempts to walk away. She had received a Christmas card from her father’s old friend Jack LeTraub, but that was all. Even that contained nothing more than a simple season’s greetings. She had to trust that if she needed them again, for any reason, she would be able to find them. That was the way it worked.

  Elizabeth walked over to her father’s liquor cabinet and opened the doors. It was as well-stocked as when he was alive. Another thing that hadn’t changed. She was the one who drank from it now, more than she should. It was easy to pour a glass when you lived alone and lost yet another evening to study. She was not the only mature student that still drank like an undergrad. She could have gone out for a drink with the other researchers instead of boozing it up alone. Or even on a date. Those had been sporadic to say the least since her return. Functional, rather than romantic.

  The longest relationship had been a five date affair with a banker that had ended a month ago. They’d met when she’d decided it was time to deal with her father’s estate. Mark had given her advice about what to do with her father’s significant life insurance payout. She was the sole recipient. In the days after the funeral it had seemed a ridiculous sum to insure yourself for. It was only later she understood it was because he thought she might never have time to work. If the tenuous truce between the vampire families of America and Europe broke, then she wou
ld have her hands full keeping things afloat.

  Mark had been charming and professional, more serious than anyone she had been out with before. He was also funny, and they’d had an instant connection. He wasn’t thrilling, but he was safe. He had friends, a good job and he was reliable. He had no objection to the long hours she worked, with the late nights that stole every ounce of her attention. If she did go back to that other life then he would no doubt acknowledge the new routine with bland acceptance. On date five, as she contemplated this lack of challenge, she’d realised what he was to her.

  He was her plan B.

  The unfairness of it made her let him go. She wanted commitment and a quiet life, but she wanted it on her terms. She knew what it was like to love someone and see them die a brutal death. She would be the one to decide when she was ready to take that risk again. After killing so many of their kind, a vampire wouldn’t hesitate to take revenge if they had the chance. In her mind’s eye she saw David, dear dead David, standing next to her father and somehow that was even worse. Both victims of the vampires they’d hunted. Innocent, unknowing Mark didn’t deserve to join them.

  She threw the whisky back in a single mouthful, trying to burn away the image.

  She had to learn to let them go before their ghosts drove her insane.

  3

  Five hours behind in New York, Monica Carletto sat at her desk in the empty MaxiData Corp building. Only a dedicated or desperate few remained, sat at their desk while their colleagues geared up for a night on the town. She was in no rush. The best of the feeding wouldn’t begin for a few more hours. In the meantime, the long, late hours increased her reputation as a vital and committed senior executive. In a terrible economy, MaxiData Corp had done more than stay afloat. It had thrived.

  Hard work paid off. Four months earlier, they’d awarded her yet another major project. Every new opportunity was contingent on keeping the same conditions; she worked the hours no one else wanted and Dennis continued to be her personal assistant. The Board were always more than happy to oblige. She got results. Monica got to keep a life that suited her more nocturnal routine with the man she trusted to protect her by her side. It was the only way she could continue to juggle the high pressure demands of being a successful businesswoman and a somewhat reluctant vampire figurehead.

  Luckily things in the other area of her life had been less dynamic. With no one to challenge or undermine her, she had been largely accepted as the head of the vampire family to which both she and Dennis belonged. Unlike at the office, whispers still persisted about her dedication. Monica did not make herself seen at their communal meeting place every night, like her predecessors had done. There wasn’t time to reassure everyone. She was there only enough to let them know she was still in charge. Since Ivan’s ‘disappearance’ there had been fewer rumblings of discontent. She had eyes and ears in The Cave every night she wasn’t there. If mutinous rumblings amongst the elders began again, then she would know of them soon enough.

  Until then, she revelled in the peace.

  A stack of contracts sat on the desk in front of her. Could they wait until Monday? Probably. If she left now she could be home and changed before ten. There would be time to feed and still go to the club while most people were still there to see her.

  She flicked through the calendar on her phone and realised it had been a month since her last proper feed. Her last human feed. It had taken sixteen months to recover her legendary willpower after the beatings she’d taken during the last coup. Monica felt the spark of pride that she had returned to her previous strength of mind.

  Dennis still teased her about it, with sly references to Elizabeth. He said she had spent too much time thinking like a human and it had made her less of a vampire. The words were spoken with good humour and only when the two of them were alone. He wasn’t foolish enough to undermine her authority in front of others. If anyone overheard such traitorous words she would have no choice but to make an example of him. Dennis had proved his loyalty to her enough that she did not fear his ambitions. Besides, they both knew her quest to conquer the hunger had begun way before her unpredictable ascension to power.

  Without the power of fresh human blood, she would soon become weak. She would compromise her desire for discipline rather than become vulnerable. A leader seldom went unchallenged for long, in either business or the dark and brutal underbelly of society. Some people, Monica reflected, would consider them one and the same.

  Decision made, she locked her papers in the safe and shut down her computer. The smell of a fresh hunt on her skin would re-enforce her authority. Her kind responded to the base, primal instincts of survival and power. She spent half of her life trying to escape from that reality and the other half remembering that she never could.

  She picked up her keys and took one last look around the office. The four time zone clocks on the wall caught her eye. Elizabeth would be asleep by now. According to Monica’s sources, she had stayed true to her decision to live a normal life. Monica didn’t resent her for leaving. Elizabeth deserved to be happy, not forced into a life not of her choosing. Monica knew how crushing and constrictive that felt. Besides, for the first time in years, the families didn’t need any kind of mediator. The territories were set, people were happy.

  Let Elizabeth sleep like the human she was, not like a part of the world she would never belong in.

  *

  It was late in the season for the true popularity of a rooftop bar, but Monica preferred it that way. She could feel the breeze and the darkness around her. If hunting was supposed to be natural for her, something she didn’t need to control like they all told her, then this was the closest she could think of to the real thing. It wasn’t without its own challenges, but tonight, this was where she wanted to be. She stood alone, looking out over the sweeping lights of the city she had always called home. A city she ruled, after a fashion, in two ways. Being up here was like playing king of the castle, but she was the only one who knew the game was on.

  Martini in hand, she didn’t need to watch the people behind her to know they were there. The breeze blew the scents around her almost too fast for her to catch, but that made the challenge even more fun. Not that she was looking for a challenge tonight, she reminded herself. Not if she wanted to be over at the club before everyone left. Maximum power wielded in the simplest ways.

  Monica had become as efficient in vampire management as she always had been in project management.

  Just as it worked for her family, so it worked for her prey. She forced her shoulders to relax and breathed low and deeply. The ring on her finger glittered under the fairy lights strung around the rooftop. It caught her eye and not for the first time she lamented how it didn’t go with the rest of her outfit. But the old gold was forged of power thousands of years before and she could only hope like all fashions, it would one day come back around again. It radiated power. They would come, if she stood there long enough and waited, like moths to a flame.

  She smiled. The wait wouldn’t be a long one.

  ‘Hi.’ A voice behind her made her turn, smile already in place.

  ‘Hi,’ she replied smoothly.

  ‘Do you mind if I join you? Sorry, are you waiting for someone?’ The woman looked flustered for a second. Monica reached out and placed a hand on her forearm to reassure her.

  ‘It’s fine. Really. I fancied a drink and this is the place with the best view. I’m happy to share it.’ She moved over and turned back to lean against the rail. A slow sip of her martini. The easy game. The woman stood next to her, no more than an inch between their arms. Monica could smell the booze on her as it failed to mask an undercurrent of hurt and frustration. Interesting.

  ‘I’ve been stood up, you see,’ the woman blurted. ‘I’m Jo by the way.’

  ‘Monica. Who’d have thought that in a city of eight million people it would be so hard to date, right?’

  ‘I’m glad it’s not just me. This was my third failed attempt. In a wee
k. Now I’ve had too much to drink. So I thought the fresh air would sober me up enough to make it home.’

  ‘Up here should help.’ It was a lie. The change in temperature now summer was over would make Jo worse before she was better. ‘Besides, you can just enjoy the view. It’s not the highest, but it sure beats street level for the night.’

  ‘Thank you. I mean, it’s Friday night. Only a loser would get stood up and go home alone this early.’

  ‘Don’t be so hard on yourself. Whoever they were, they obviously didn’t know what they were missing.’ Monica made a show of noticeably admiring Jo’s face and outfit. She really was quite cute, if somewhat naive. Beneath the mask of alcohol and hurt, there was a needy innocence. But she could rock a pixie cut and the swoop of her dress revealed a hint of a tattoo on her back.

  Who said dinner had to be boring?

  Monica realised she had stared a moment too long and a blush had begun to grow on Jo’s cheeks. They both looked away and stared back out over the city again, but Monica’s pull was strong. Their arms were now touching.

  Monica needed to feed. Jo needed a pick me up. As a waiter passed by, she ordered another drink for both of them. It wouldn’t take much more than that. New York was a lonely place, but for an hour, maybe two, they would both find the solace they needed.

  4

  Garth was happy flying solo. It was the way he’d always done things and he saw no reason to change now. He kept to his own mission and he got himself out of his own dangers. More importantly, with Elizabeth gone, he didn’t get himself dragged into other people’s.

  Still, she’d taught him plenty in such a short time. He didn’t have any fancy computer spreadsheets and databases like she did. All he had was a composition notebook he’d picked up from a local store for a dollar. It did what he needed. His cursive was terrible, especially after a long night, so he didn’t fear someone else reading it. They’d give up before they could think he was crazy.