Scott G. Mariani - The Cross

Discarding Utz’s comparatively feeble 9mm on the bench, she took one of the matching Desert Eagles from their wall rack, snatched up a loaded magazine and rammed it into the grip. She slipped on her well-worn calfskin shoulder holster, clipped the pistol snugly into place against her left side, and headed back into the bedroom, using the remote to close up the weapons store behind her.

She selected a long suede coat from her wardrobe, put it on and looked at herself in the mirror. Fashionable without being too distinctive. In her job, it was important to blend into the human crowd – and the coat hid the gun perfectly. Alex nodded to herself and trotted back down the spiral staircase. She grabbed her handbag and VIA ID from the table in the hallway.

Sixty seconds later she was riding the lift down to the neon-lit underground car park. Her sleek black Jaguar XKR fired up with a throaty blast that echoed through the concrete cavern. She reversed hard out of her parking space, hit the gas and her tyres squealed as she sped up the ramp and out onto the deserted night street.

She cut westwards across the city. The VIA offices were twenty minutes’ drive with a human at the wheel. She’d be there much sooner.

Chapter Eight

Wallingford

Around midnight

Once the strip of light under his bedroom door had gone dark and he could hear the rhythmic snores of his da through the wall, Dec crept out of bed. He was fully dressed again, though this time he’d had no intention of falling asleep that way.

He paced across the dark bedroom and, as quietly as he could, unzipped the sports bag that contained his prized new acquisition. After his visit to the Wallingford public library earlier that day, he’d driven straight to the computer superstore on the edge of town and picked out a shiny new laptop.

Nigh on four hundred quid, courtesy of Barclaycard. He’d worry about the payments later. If his ma and da found out what he’d done, they’d give him hell. But you couldn’t be a modern-day pro vampire hunter without your own state-of-the-art computer, and he was proud of his new piece of kit: the very first item – and by no means the last – in the inventory of Dec Maddon & Associates, Vampire Hunters Ltd. He didn’t know who the associates were going to be yet, but it had a good ring to it.

The second vital piece of equipment he’d acquired was the fifteen-year-old Audi parked outside in Lavender Close. On his return from the library that day, Dec had – with some difficulty – managed to persuade his da to loan him one of the knackered old runarounds the mechanics used at Maddon Auto Services until his VW Golf was back on the road. The Audi rattled like a tin can full of marbles and smoked like a factory stack, but it was wheels. Couldn’t hunt vampires without wheels.

Dec lifted the laptop out of his bag, laid it softly on his bed and pulled up a stool to sit on. He plugged in a pair of earphones before turning on the machine, angling the screen away from the door so its glow wouldn’t be seen from outside. Where the ancient library computers had struggled to download anything bigger than a few bytes, the fancy new machine zipped online with incredible speed. Dec googled up the URL for Errol Knightly’s website, www.theylurkamongstus. com, and clicked.

The screen momentarily blacked out, plunging the bedroom into darkness; then out of the blackness a pair of sinister red eyes materialised, staring at him. Dec swallowed, uncomfortably reminded of his nightmare.

Beneath the eyes, an animated line of script appeared in crimson font. Dec’s earphones filled with creepy, chilling music and a deep voice narrating the lines as they appeared in turn before dissolving away into a gleaming red pool.

THEY LURK . . .

THEY WAIT . . .

THEY WANT YOUR BLOOD . . .

AND THEY’LL COME FOR YOU . . .

TONIGHT

Dec’s jaw dropped open. He shuddered.

Then a hand landed on his shoulder and he almost fell off his stool. He whirled round, ready to let out a scream of terror.

He’d been so transfixed by the website that he hadn’t noticed his brother creep into the room. He tore off the earphones and flipped on his bedside lamp. ‘ Christ , Cormac!’ he hissed furiously.

‘What’s this?’ Cormac demanded, pointing at the screen.

‘Shush. Keep your frigging voice down.’

‘Where did you get this computer? What are you doing?’

‘Fuck off,’ Dec rasped at him, shutting the lid of the laptop. ‘Leave me alone.’

‘Still going on about fuckin’ vampires , Dec? Is that why you’ve started wearing that cross again?’

‘They exist. They’re out there. And I’ve got to do something about them, so I have. Or else . . .’

‘Or else what?’

‘You don’t want to know,’ Dec said darkly, a quaver to his voice.

‘Catch yourself on, bro.’ Cormac jerked his chin at the curtained window, in the direction of the house next door. ‘Listen. I’m just as gutted about that poor wee girl as you are. But friggin’ vampires . . .?’ He shook his head. ‘You keep goin’ on about this stuff and Ma and Da are going to have your scrawny wee arse put away in the loony bin, so they are. Look at the state of you – big dark rings around your eyes like a friggin’ panda.’

Dec pointed a warning finger at him. ‘You’ve got no idea what’s happening, Cormac. None of you have.’ He snatched up the laptop and started bundling it back into his sports bag.

‘Where’d you get the dosh for that thing, anyway?’

‘None of your business,’ Dec muttered, slinging the bag over his shoulder and heading for the door.

Cormac stared after him. ‘Fuck d’you think you’re off to this time of night, wee man?’

‘Keep out of it, all right? I fucking mean it, Cormac.’

‘Right. Right. Steady, bro,’ Cormac said, backing off.

Dec tugged open the bedroom door and listened for a moment to the steady snores coming from his parents’ room. Satisfied that they were safely asleep, he padded down the stairs, let himself silently out of the back door and carried the sports bag to the Audi. He was watching his parents’ bedroom window as he started the rattly motor. No lights came on. He drove off.

On the edge of Wallingford was a quiet lane with a layby where truckers sometimes parked up overnight. The layby was empty. Dec pulled into it and killed the Audi’s engine.

He was definitely going to need a proper office. He didn’t think the credit card company would stump up for that though. Better start doing the lottery, and hope he’d more luck with it than his folks did. He slid across into the passenger seat, unzipped the sports bag and laid his laptop across his knees. Thankful that he’d paid that bit extra for mobile internet connection, he went back into Errol Knightly’s vampire hunter website. The inside of the car flickered with the glow from the screen as he clicked from page to page of the site.

‘Have you been feeling unwell?’ one section asked in bold capitals. ‘Lethargic? Not quite yourself? Having strange dreams? IF YOU THINK YOU MAY BE THE VICTIM OF A VAMPIRE, PERHAPS YOU ARE. Click here to find out how WE CAN HELP YOU or to order one of our special vampire protection kits. All major debit and credit cards accepted.’

‘This is so cool,’ Dec said out loud. Clicking open another page, he came across the video segments that he’d been unable to access on the public library computer. When he saw that one of them consisted of a recent satellite news channel interview with the man himself, he went straight to it and maximised the image to full size on the screen.

Errol Knightly was seated in a plush TV studio armchair across a low table from the pretty, rather elfin blonde interviewer. For effect, a lit candlestick stood on the table, next to a glossy hardback copy of Knightly’s bestseller They Lurk Amongst Us .