The Cost Ch. 02

Taking him upstairs to the master bathroom connected to my room on the third floor, I deposit the man into the large tub reasoning that what I am about to do may get messy. I also need to clean up the mess in my yard and, since the guy may wake up soon, I leave the room for a moment and return with a high backed wooden chair from the library along with some phone cord that I ripped from the wall so that I may restrain him. I do so quickly and go outside.

I go to the end of the driveway first. I open the large double doors on the back of the SUV and put the door that I ripped off inside. After doing the same with the throatless man in the driver's seat of the other, I drive both cars up to my front door and leave the back doors open.

I make quick work of the rest of the men in the yard, porch, and patio, putting them all in the back of the SUV's. I remove my knife from the neck of the one I threw it at and wipe it off on his sleeve. It has sentimental value to me and I do not wish to lose it. I finish with the bodies by driving both cars into my garage, closing the automatic doors. After that, I go to the small gardening shed off to one side of the house in search of a hose. I do not know if I will find one in there; I have not purchased one myself. I am certain that I have seen the gardeners using one, though, and hope that they have left it behind.

I am in luck when I reach the shed. There is a very long hose inside and, even better, a spray nozzle attachment. The clean-up of my patio, walls, and front porch is quick and I go back into the house once I am done.

The brokerage firm I spoke of earlier also handles other business for me. I go upstairs to my room and place a call to my point man at the firm from my cell phone.

"I have been compromised. I need a team sent to my home for clean up." I do not explain and he does not ask questions. He never does.

"Understood."

I hang up the phone. In the morning, a team will be sent to dispose of the bodies in my garage. Since I will also be relocating, they will remove any traces of my presence from the home. I have not been here very long, so there will not be much for them to do. I do not care about the furniture and I have little that I consider valuable here. A jet will also be waiting at the airport within two hours to take me where I want to go and there will also be a package with fresh identification, cash, and new credit cards. I like to be prepared for any eventuality and use of the term "compromised" is a code word that lets my point man know the nature of my emergency, along with the steps to take.

I hear a groan from the bathroom announcing that my guest is beginning to wake. He will not be alert yet, so I use the next few minutes to pack some clothes and other things I may need. Finishing up, I walk into the bathroom.

His eyes widen in horror when he sees me and I realize that I am still bloody with the rifle on my back. I almost laugh, but I remove the rifle instead and put it on the floor. He begins to scream and I regret not having gagged him. I do so immediately after I strike him hard in the mouth to shut him up. I believe that I have knocked a few teeth out.

He is a rather good looking man with blonde hair and green eyes. If the circumstances were different, I might be inclined to hit on him. He possesses a very nice body as well. I lean over and rip his shirt off, exposing his chest. His well defined pecs are slightly covered in fur that travels over his ripped abs down into his pants. He is breathing hard and tries to back away, but I have tied his feet to the chair legs and he is still in a tub, so he does not go very far.

There is a stool in a corner of the bathroom that I pull in front of the tub before I sit so that I may face him. As I said before, I am able to pitch my voice in any manner that I choose. My voice can throb like living ghosts if I do not control my tone. It is very unnerving and I can only attribute it to my great age. My stare is another thing that is unsettling, and dangerous as well. If I gaze too long at a flower, it will wilt and die. It, too, is another thing that I have learned to control. I cannot kill a person with a look, but if I wish it, I can make them very uncomfortable and afraid. I can also burn out their neurons and leave them as mental retards if I give them my unbridled stare. Both are powerful tools for use in impressing my will upon people as fear can be a great motivator. I let my age slowly creep into my voice when I speak and I hold his eyes with mine. He shudders visibly and even more sweat begins to pour from him.

"You and your friends came here to kill me. I will know why soon and you will be the one that tells me. Do you understand?" He nods his head yes and tries to look away from me, but is unable to tear his eyes from mine and I know that he hears my voice as if I were speaking between his ears. Add to that the disconcerting tone of my voice, and I am sure he is extremely afraid. And I am covered in blood still. I will have to shower and change, before I go anywhere.

"I am going to remove your gag now. You may scream if you'd like; my neighbors are too far away to hear and this house has thick walls in any case. Please understand this though. I am not in the mood to listen to your screams and I will be forced to do something swift and unpleasant if you do. You have seen how strong I am and trust me when I say that that is the least of what I am capable of." His eyes are so wide, I am surprised they have not fallen out of their sockets to the floor yet. He does nod again though, so I stand and remove the pair of boxers that I used to gag him. I used clean ones, but I doubt he is of a presence of mind to notice that he had underwear stuffed in his mouth much less be concerned over whether they were clean or not.

He does not scream, for which I am grateful, but his breathing is very hard and I worry that he will hyperventilate or faint. When he speaks, in a British accent, no less, his voice shakes with fear, "What are you?" Quite the international group we have here. Or had, rather.

A goddamned vampire, I think to myself, but I am not here to answer his questions. "Do not concern yourself with that. " I get straight to what is at the forefront of my mind. "Why did you come here and who are you?"

He sneers. "Why should I tell you anything? You'll just kill me." Interesting. The man has pissed himself and he sits before me shaking like a small child but his fear has not overcome his attitude. Well, I never said fear motivates everyone.

I nod my head sadly as I lean over and place a finger on his right pec, observing the nice muscle tone. He must work out religiously. "Yes, it is likely that I will kill you. There are many ways to die, though. I do not claim to know them all, but I do have an active imagination." He screams loudly as I dig my finger into his chest. I have torn through his muscle; blood begins to run down his stomach over his pants as I brush one of his ribs and lightly pull on it. Torture has never been my thing but, being what I am and having been around for as long as I have, few things make me squeamish.

"STOP! GOD, I'LL TELL YOU! JUST STOP!"

I pull my finger from his chest and sit back expectantly while he calms down. My tone returns to normal and I let the heat go from my eyes. "How you die is entirely up to you. Please answer my questions."

He is breathing harder, if that is to be believed, when he answers, "We were hired. I don't know why. Most of us are ex-military, some just free-lance killers for hire; none of us have worked together before, but the man who hired us said we would all be needed if we were to succeed." Hmm. So the person who hired them knew that I would be dangerous to send them in such numbers.

"What did this man tell you about me? Who is he?"

He looks at me bitterly, "He told us you would be dangerous." His lower lip quivers, "That you would be fast and strong." He takes a shuddering breath and continues, "We were not instructed to kill you, but to capture you and take you to a jet that would be waiting at the airport. Our job would be finished at that point, so I do not know where you were to be taken. We only met the gentleman once, right before we flew out here. He did not give us a name, but he is in his mid-forties, early fifties perhaps. Rather bookish looking fellow, going bald. He paid us half upfront and told us what we would need to know, then left. I don't know anything more about him." A bullet in the head, I think, might incapacitate me long enough for them to capture me. But they could not know that and, having their istructions not to kill me, would probably not chance shooting me in the head. This fact is reassuring because it means they do not know the extent of my capabilities. A small reassurance, but a reassurance nonetheless.

This man does not sound familiar to me and it sounds like he is telling me the truth when he says that he knows nothing more about the guy. I have a very good ear for the truth, so to speak. It takes a very rare individual to be able to pass a lie off to me and I read people like open books. I am not psychic, but emotions are easy for me to detect.

I continue the questioning and ask how he was contracted for this job. He tells me, and it is nothing of use, so I decide that the jet at the airport may be the only lead I have left to follow.

"We were told to be at the airport by no later than 3:15 or the jet would take off and we would not receive the rest of our pay. None of us thought it would be a problem." I look into my bedroom at the clock on my nightstand. It is 3:25 now. He looks down at his bleeding chest and begins to sob softly, "How are you able to do these things? What are you?"

My face hardens and I ignore his question again, "You are going to die now. I am sorry that it has to be this way." I reach for his head and he begins to scream.

"NO! Please! I don't want to die!"

I clutch the back of his head with my left hand and with my right, I stroke his cheek, placing my finger over his mouth until he begins to quiet.

His words closely resemble my own; they are what I said to Ash many years ago. His answer was given in jest, but my tone is far from playful when I respond. "Then you should never have been born."

His eyes widen and he opens his mouth to scream again, but I clamp my left hand over his mouth. With my right hand, I use my thumb nail to tear into his neck, opening the carotid artery. The flow is steady as I lower my mouth to his neck and drink.

When I changed long ago, I hated having to do this. A person can become used to anything in time, though, and I am no different. I soon embraced what I had become, and worse, reveled in it, going a step further to become a monster. It was a long time before I realized what I had become. The loathing of what I do, and did, along with the realization of the loss of everyone I love, drove me to my first suicide attempt. I have even tried starving myself and, for almost five months, I refused to drink from anyone. Sure, I can go years now without feeding, but back then I had to feed almost every day to sate my craving. Starving myself did not kill me obviously; it only caused me to suffer horribly and needlessly. So I began to feed again. Only when I absolutely had to, though. The effects of starvation on a vampire are not pleasant, for me or others. Suffice it to say, I am not a nice person, among other things, when I am extremely hungry and anyone who crosses my path will likely not live to tell of it. Really, it is better for everyone that I do what I must.

The man's breathing slows, then stops completely a couple of minutes later. I finally lift my head and release him, using two of my fingers to close his eyes. His body, I leave for the cleaning crew in the morning.

**********

I think about the information I have received as I shower in one of the bathrooms on the second floor. Before showering, I placed another call to my point man in New York and told him to find out what he could about the jet and who chartered it. Perhaps he will turn up something; he is a very capable man with many skills. He assures me that my own jet will be waiting for me at the airport within the hour before we hang up.

I am troubled by the fact that the bald man knew enough about me to tell the team that I would be dangerous, as well as fast and strong. Twenty armed men is a lot to send after a person who appears to be just out of their teens and I wonder at what else he might know. The fact that I was to be captured and not killed leads me to believe that this man may know that I cannot be killed. Or perhaps they want something else from me, something they need me alive for. I am not sure which is the more disturbing of the two.

I have my bag over my shoulder and am about to get into my Porsche when I remember that Shane and I are supposed to go out in just a few hours. I know in my head that the commonsensical thing to do would be to just get into the car, go to the airport, and leave as I originally planned. This man will not stop after only one try and he will send more people when these do not return. I have only known Shane for one day. Not even a whole one, at that. Logically, I know all this.

But I do feel strongly for the guy already. What I feel is a mystery, even to me, right now.

I get into the car and drive. Leaving Mountain Brook, I turn right, onto Highway 280. The airport is maybe fifteen, twenty minutes away. At this hour there is no traffic, so I know it will not be a problem getting there. And by the time I do, my plane should be ready to go.

*

Let me know what you think, good or bad! But if its bad, give me specifics so I can at least know where I messed up. Thanks for taking the time to read this folks! Also, I tried to answer as many of the e-mails that I could from the first chapter, but for the ones I missed or did not have a return address for, thanks for all of the support and the kind words!

Buck