Hit List - Laurell K. Hamilton [52]
“They’re coming,” Tilford said.
“I know,” I said. I got to my feet. The SUV roared to life. The three of us ran for the car. I felt the night fall around us like something warm and thick and velvet. I pushed the thought away that it felt like Her. I was just scared, just freaked. It wasn’t Marmee Noir. It was just nerves.
I felt the vampires, felt them freed of the last bit of daytime paralysis. I felt them like distant thunder trembling along my skin, rushing toward us through the trees. It made me run, and I was suddenly ahead of the men. Like moving the tree, I didn’t run human-slow.
I was the first one to the door. I opened it and turned, looking past the other two men, searching the dark shapes of the trees for something that wasn’t trees.
I yelled, “Hurry, damn it!”
Newman slipped and went down, face first into the gravel. Tilford opened the door on the other side, saying, “I’m in.”
I heard him shut the door. I saw Newman scramble on all fours as he got to his feet. There was blood on his face. He’d fallen hard, but I kept an eye behind him, above him. They were coming. Moving like wind that never stirred a leaf, or brushed a twig, like a silent movable storm that was coming just for us.
I yelled, “Newman!”
I moved at the last minute so I was farther away from the open door but he could go straight into the car without fouling my line of sight. He fell into the car.
Edward yelled, “Get in!” I realized he had his window down and the barrel of his gun searching the darkness. Windows would mess up the first few shots. He knew we weren’t going to get out of here without a fight; so did I.
I put my back against the open door, searching the woods, trying to hear something above the engine’s thrum. I thought, Where are they? And just like that, I could feel them on the other side of the road. They were just inside the tree line, hiding in the shadows and the night.
I breathed, “Shit.” I climbed into the truck, shutting the rear door behind me. I had time to say, “Drive!” Edward put it into gear and started backing up at speed. I made Newman move over so I could try for a seatbelt as the SUV slithered across the gravel. I knew right where they were; I felt them standing there watching us drive away. Why were they just watching? My pulse was in my throat. I was suddenly more afraid than I had been a second before.
“They aren’t chasing us, Edward. They’re just watching from the trees.”
“You saw them?” Newman asked.
I ignored him.
“Why are they just watching?” Tilford yelled from the front passenger seat.
“I don’t know.” I slid the buckle of the seatbelt home just as Edward found the four-way with its stop signs. He turned the big SUV in a circle of flying gravel. He got us facing the right way around and hit the gas. The car jumped forward. He had a moment where I could feel him fighting to keep us on the road, and then we were speeding away from them.
Almost at the edge of even my night vision, two figures stepped out from the trees. They stood and watched us go.
“That’s them, isn’t it?” Newman asked.
I nodded, watching the two figures as if afraid to look away, for fear of what would happen if I took my eyes off them. It was silly, almost superstitious, but I watched them stand there until even I couldn’t see through the thickening dark.
“Why didn’t they chase us?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” I said.
“I don’t care why,” Tilford said, and he turned around in the front seat so he could see us both, “I’m just glad they didn’t.”
“They didn’t need to chase us. They blocked the road again,” Edward said.
We all looked, and this time it looked like they’d pulled up half a dozen trees and formed a wall. “That took time,” Tilford said, “and more manpower than we thought they had.”
Edward slowed the car. “Tilford, you’re driving.”
“What?” Tilford asked.
“Anita, cover me. Newman, help her.” He was already climbing out from behind the wheel. Tilford cursed under his breath as he fought to slip