Dawn's Darkest Hour

Yessette paid the boy no heed. He was too weak to be a threat to her safety. And if there was one thing she knew a lot about, it was male temptation. He'd eat. "I hate to waste food," she said, lazily picking up the knife, smoothing butter across a roll.

God, she was going to kill him. Daniel almost groaned as a dollop of butter melted off the roll and landed in the middle of a gravy ocean with a light plop. His senses were on overdrive. In his imagination, the roast beef was so tender it fell apart and the mashed potatoes creamy as they slid down his throat. Subconsciously, his tongue skated across his lips. "I'll bet you do. Shame to let a human go to waste," he said sarcastically.

Yessette tipped her head and frowned at the boy. He was going to take a little more work than she thought. Eric asked her for so little. Coaxing Daniel to eat was the least she could do. She slid the plate off of the tray and bent low to place the food on the napkin across his lap. "Don't be that way. I can't help what I am," she said in a pout as she pursed her full lips.

Her dress had been selected with care, chosen to show her best attributes. Daniel's eyes bounced between the roast beef and full view of her cleavage as if he couldn't decide which one to devour first. Eric needed just this tiniest of favors from her. Win the boy over. Gain his trust. "Will you try a bite? For Little Yessette?" she asked in an endearing French accent.

The smell of the roast beef right under his nose was too tempting. He hated himself for giving in. That was until he had the first bite in his mouth. HEAVEN! Both he and his wolf moaned in approval as the beef melted on his tongue. The view was none too shabby either, for a dead girl. Daniel swore the dress was cut so low he could see the tips of her toes through the valley of her cleavage. Another part of him stirred along with his appetite. Yessette was all that and more. Unable to resist any further, he dug in with the fork.

Yessette clapped her hands in delight. Eric was going to be thrilled. No doubt he'd reward her handsomely. "You like it!" She flashed a good portion of her shapely thigh through the high cut slit in the dress. Oh yes, Daniel had noticed. This game was fun! He ate. And she rewarded him. "Eric was so worried that you wouldn't. He had a chef brought in to cook especially for you." The chef was now dead in a heap in the basement. But, Daniel didn't need to know that. Besides, they could always find another chef. With all the food she saw, just lying around everywhere, the world must be full of them.

Yessette gifted the boy with a wide smile, tossing her loose blonde waves over one shoulder to reveal the slope of her neck. She set the empty plate on the tray and reached for the decanter of wine. "Eric wants us all to be friends," she said, handing him the glass.

"He's got a funny way of showing it," Daniel said through sips. The wine tasted fruity and sweet, stinging his throat as it went down. He'd never tasted alcohol before. Wasn't bad. Wasn't necessarily good either. A little like Yessette, he guessed. Wine was an acquired taste. After the first few swallows, the bite lessened, and the taste improved. Soon, he was holding out his glass for a refill.

Yessette refilled the glass and sat on the edge of the bed. She crossed her legs and felt the brush of satin fall across her bare thigh. Her foot, clad in a sexy little stiletto she'd picked up in Italy, brushed across his calf. "Oh Eric, he's gruff on the outside. But, on the inside, he's all fluff. Total pussy cat, you'll see." Gently, almost casually, she leaned over to drain the contents of the decanter into the glass.

"A pussy cat with fangs," Daniel slurred. This stuff was going down real smooth now. His lids grew a bit heavy from the effects of the wine. After the second glass, he'd lost count of how much he'd drank. Yessette smelled good, sweet as the wine that rolled across his tongue. Gingerly, he leaned in for a closer sniff. His body was a livewire of activity. Synapses and nerve impulses fired randomly, going completely haywire. He'd never drunk before. And he'd certainly never, ever sat this close to a girl before.

Yessette was everything he'd ever pictured in a woman. She was so opposite from any live girl he'd ever seen before. Almost like she'd stepped right off the pages of the magazines he kept under the bed and landed right next to him. She couldn't be more than a few years older than he. Probably not even old enough to serve the wine she poured with such a free hand legally. Her hair hung well over her shoulders in ringlets of pale blonde. Her eyes were crystalline, clear blue as the ocean on a sunny day. Soft lips, the color of a ripe cherry, pursed seductively, hiding the sharp points he knew was behind them. Her skin would be as soft as the satin of her crimson dress to the touch.

"Oh pooh." Yessette brushed off Daniel's suspicions with a wave of a perfectly coiffed hand. "You'll like Eric once you get to know him." She chuckled softly and rested her hand on his thigh. Daniel was so young, tender. Just beginning to evolve into a man. Beneath the thin cotton of his sweats, she felt hard muscle.

In her day, he would have been a man, destined to work the fields or hunt, scratching an existence out of the earth's harsh surface. People today coddled their young. The boy was half drunk on little more than a sip of wine. "Although, I have to admit, he didn't have too many friendly things to say when he saw what you did to his guestroom."

Daniel sheepishly kicked at a scrap of tattered carpet with his toe. "Serves him right." His head spun dizzily from the drink. Yessette was beautiful. So damned beautiful, too beautiful for the likes of him. His fingers itched to run through the length of her blonde hair and feel its softness. What would her body feel like against his? He imagined himself an international playboy, great only in his own mind. Next to her, he felt like a simpering idiot. She wasn't really interested in him, only in what he had beneath his skin.

"He'll get over it. It's just stuff, but a friend, more valuable than gold." Slowly, she ran her hand up his thigh, stopping just before she got to the bend of his hip. He might be young and inexperienced, but he wasn't an idiot. If she went too fast, he'd realize what she was up to and cut her off before she got a chance to get all the way in. Still, she liked the effect she had on him. The breath he sucked in and held brought a smile to her lips. "Daniel, I'd like for us to be friends. Wouldn't you like that too?"

Daniel blew out the breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding as Yessette slid her hand down to rest on his knee. His groin kicked up hard and fast in protest to the almost encounter with her hand. Friends. Yeah, being friends was good, especially if there were side benefits involved. "I would," he gasped. His mind and body teetered on the edge of something he'd had plenty of practice runs in his head but no real life experience for.

Daniel leaned far over, way far, almost tipping head first onto the bed. Perhaps, the wine had gotten the better of him and he'd lost all sense of inhibition. Maybe it was just Yessette. His lips brushed against hers in a timid, heated kiss that was more like a peck than an actual kiss. He thought her skin would be cold and lifeless, but it was warm and pliable, very, very much alive beneath his mouth.

Yessette found Daniel's inexperience charming, almost puppy dog cute. She held on to his stubble lined jaw and guided his mouth to hers for a proper education. Luckily, he was a fast learner and she didn't have to suffer long. The kiss surprised her. His lips were fueled with a man's passion and wanting, strong and demanding, molding to hers in a commanding, winner take all fashion. She felt the familiar tingle of fangs, sliding free from hiding. She was so close to winning him over for Eric. She couldn't risk Daniel accidentally scraping against them with the tip of his tongue. Gracefully, Yessette ended the encounter. "So, we're friends."

Daniel licked his lips with the tip of his tongue. Tasting her on their sleek surface as he nodded. "Yeah, we're friends." He stretched out on the bed and folded his arms underneath his head, watching her close the door tightly behind her as she left. A blush heated his face. In his mind, he replayed every detail of his first real kiss over and over. "Friends," he muttered, staring up at the white ceiling, unsure whether he wanted to cuss her or kiss her again.

His dad would kill him for consorting with the enemy. Yessette though was something different, unexpected. There was a certain innocent naivety about her that was hard to overlook. She was utterly clueless. Instead of pondering her, Daniel should be concentrating on exactly how he was going to get out of here. Obviously, bruit force wasn't going to work. He didn't know how far to trust Carter or what that alliance might get him, perhaps nothing. He was no closer to a solution than he had been when he first awoke. There were useful things around him. He just had to decide if he wanted to stoop low enough to take advantage of them.

Yessette was trying to play him, using her body as a pawn. What if the tables were turned and he decided to use her back? Exactly how far was he willing to take it? How far was she? Use her. No holding back. The man in him pled the case for goodness and fair play. No matter what had been done to him, two wrongs never made a right. At this point, Daniel couldn't decide. One thing though was for sure. No matter which of his sides was the victor, if he didn't get out of here soon, both sides were so screwed.

Chapter 88

"I want a piece of him," David demanded.

"There isn't time for the team to wait for you to arrive in the city." The Great Father wasn't going to hold up a rescue attempt because of David's thirst for vengeance. Such a hunger could end up getting him killed. "We must proceed without delay."

"I couldn't agree more," David conceded. "But, I know the bastard and what he's capable of doing to a human being. I've seen it first hand." Anxiously, he paced the room. His weaponry banged against the middle of his back, jostled by his nervous energy. The last thing he needed or wanted was another death caused by him. "Odds are Daniel is already dead."

"I don't think so," The Great Father said. "Daniel is special. What the vampire wants with him, I have no idea. But, I don't think he's gone to all this trouble to risk killing him."

"What makes one human boy so special?" David asked.

"Who said Daniel was human?" The Great Father countered. "Come, join me in the tech room from there you can assist the team remotely."

David followed the Great Father through a maze of hallways en route to the ops center. His weapons wouldn't do him any good in there. "If they capture O'Sullivan, I want him."

Drew stopped in his tracks and studied David's tensed posture. "Will it help? Will killing him put your demons to rest once and for all?"

David scowled back at the Great Father. More mystical mumbo jumbo shit was not what he wanted to hear right now. He didn't want to question his motives or their potential outcomes. He wanted O'Sullivan dead. Today. Killing O'Sullivan would accomplish something. His death might not bring Rachael back. But, it would ensure that the son of a bitch didn't get a chance to do murder in cold blood again. Justice could be a cold bitch sometimes. "Killing O'Sullivan will make all the difference."

The tech room was a frantic bustle of beeping monitors and computer banks. The vampire operating the wall of keyboards and equipment glanced up at them as David followed the Great Father into the room.

Toby wired the men up with fierce efficiency. After a few keystrokes he had them linked by remote with the recon team. He pulled up maps of the city and panned down to the area David pointed to on the screen. On a separate monitor, he had the exact location displayed in real time. Furiously, he typed in the address and waited for data to spill across the screen. He had every bit of info the address revealed, utility bills, mail deliveries, hell even a blue print of the dilapidated pre-world war II building that had been turned into a maze of low rent cracker jack apartments in 1953 flashed across his monitor. All the pieces of the puzzle of the home and its owners were at his fingertips in minutes.

Michael motioned for the warriors to fan out and surround the building. Sebastian and the team provided by Bianca were already in position. Posted through out the vacant buildings surrounding the target. Her team was poorly trained, sporting only the barest of weaponry and pairs of fangs for defense. But, Sebastian made up for their shortcomings with a warrior's grace. Obviously, the man had received military training at some point. Could have been World War II, the deserts of the Middle East, or even as far back as the Revolutionary War. Michael didn't bother to ask. Some secrets a vampire kept to himself. The mystery of who they were before was usually one of them.

Michael cursed that Hunter hadn't allowed any of the wolves to accompany him into the city or called for back up. They could have used the help. One wolf wasn't enough to cover the neighborhood or the building. Michael understood Hunter's position and he respected it. Of course, Hunter was right not to want to drag his brethren into this. Until he knew what the vampire was after. As powerful as the wolves were, they had a weakness that could quickly become a huge liability. Tranquilizer darts. There weren't enough vampires, even with Bianca's contribution, to save a pack's collective assess if they got into a situation and the shit went down.

The building loomed in front of them. Crumbling brick and mortar made up the exterior. Some of the windows were loosely boarded shut. Others were missing panes of glass entirely. Doors with peeled paint hung on rusted hinges. The steps leading to the main entrance were cracked and jagged with pockmarks of missing concrete. The neighborhood around them was quiet in these pre-dawn hours of night. Michael guessed that even the worst of those in the hood needed to sleep sometime. He exchanged a glance with Sebastian and motioned for the mission to begin.

Marcus didn't like this at all. They got in too easily. He kept his wife Sam close to his side. To deny her to come along on the mission would have been to start world war III in his home. Something he definitely didn't need.

The inside of the building was worse than the outside. Tattered remnants of carpet, decayed with age and moisture muffled their footsteps. The walls drooped with the sad remains of wallpaper weighted down with mold. The hallways were a litter of debris and claustrophobic with the stench of ruin. Obviously, nobody was home and hadn't been home in a long while. Nevertheless, this place was the only clue they had to go by so there was no harm in checking it out.

The wolf's nose burned with the stink of urban decay. The building nor its current state meant anything to the wolf. Indoors was confining and stifling no matter what condition its interior. Carefully, the wolf sniffed along the rotting floorboards. A scent caught in his nostrils. Death. Old death. The sweet stink of weeks of decomposition trekked along his sinuses. The wolf bounded through winding and twisting hallways. Darting around sharp corners and pawed at a door. Through here!

Michael smelled it too. Death. Sebastian had his back. He withdrew a blade and shuffled around the frantic wolf, so much for a quiet entrance. The doorknob groaned in his palm as he turned it and forced the door open. "Son of a...," he gagged on the smell. A human, in a state of decay, perhaps dead a month ago, rotted in a forgotten corner.

This room was pristine in comparison to the building. Fresh paint adorned the walls and carpet, newly laid, padded his feet. The room and its adjoining rooms were empty except for the human. In this part of the city, no one would have noticed the stink of decay or a missing person.

Michael examined the body with the tip of his blade. Rotting flesh groaned from the forced movement of the corpse's limbs. A junkie. Track marks littered the body's arms. Someone who had ventured into the building and overdosed? Michael knelt for a closer look. Bite marks riddled the skin of the dead man's neck. No such luck on the overdose assumption. This person, whoever he'd been had been murdered and left behind as a calling card.

Sickened, Michael stood. "Scour the building. Get what you can and then get the hell out." He spoke into his earpiece, "Toby, I need you to locate the main gas line. We're going to have to engineer a little accident." No one was using this building again. As far as he was concerned, bringing it down would be doing the city a favor.

Toby pecked away at a keyboard. "I'm on it."

The wolf turned and retraced his steps down the hallway. There were a lot of scents, but none of them were the scent he was so desperately searching for. Of his son, or the vampire who had taken him, not a trace.

Dawn cracked through the sky by the time the warriors and Guardians had finished the search. They were no closer to finding the vampire or the missing boy than they were at the beginning of the night. The building had been inhabited at one time, but had sat vacant for at least a month. No trace of its occupants left behind. Michael made a quick radio sweep to make sure everyone was clear. The fire would burn the area clean and reduce to building to a pile of ash. A fitting pyre for the corpse left behind. No matter how lowly or forgotten, everyone deserved a memorial. Michael's thumb flicked a switch, initiating the chain reaction that would purify this one small corner of the world.

David watched the building collapse from the monitor's sleek surface. One ruined building reduced to a heap of rubble in a city filled with them was little consolation. His thirst for justice burned with a greater fury than it had before. He'd been so certain that they'd find O'Sullivan and the missing boy there. "I'm going to the city."

Drew placed his hand hard on David's shoulder and forced him into a chair. "You're not going anywhere." The vampire was hell bent on vengeance. To let him go out on a rampage wouldn't help anyone's cause, especially not his. He'd end up getting himself killed or worse. There were enough rogues running the streets.

"You have no right to keep me!" David struggled against the Great Father's grip. The vampire was stronger than he looked. The harder David fought the stronger the vampire's grip became. "I'm not one of you. You have no jurisdiction over me," he growled.

"We will find him and bring him in."

"For what? Questioning. A lengthy tribunal? Hand holding and singing Kumbaya? I'll go out there, find him, and cut his fucking head off! There, that's your justice, served and delivered. He needs to pay! He murdered Rachael!" David shook with rage, perhaps all the more outraged by the Great Father's calm countenance. "He deserves to die for what he did."

Drew stared the man down. Not many knew it, but he possessed a nasty temper. Hidden beneath his calm exterior roared the heart of a lion that was leashed on a very thin tether. Long ago, he'd learned exactly how far the quest for revenge could push a man. "Don't talk to me about justice, boy," he growled. "I watched an entire nation slaughtered. Women and children murdered for nothing more than the color of their skin and the value of the worthless land beneath their feet. You have no right!" His shoulders quaked with fury.

David leaned back as far as he could in his chair. Quickly, he rethought his position. Maybe, he should stick around until he had his head firmly on his shoulders before the Great Father removed it from them permanently. His lips fish mouthed without words to expel. I'm sorry wouldn't begin to smooth things over.