Konrath, J.A. - DRACULAS (A Novel of Terror)

“Postpartem hemorrhage?”

“That’s what Nurse Herrick called it.”

Jenny looked down at the blood still pooling on the cement between Stacie’s legs.

“She’s bleeding again,” Jenny said. “Had they stopped it before?”

“I think so.”

“Can I hold my baby?” Stacie whispered.

“Sure, sweetie.” Adam laid their daughter in the crook of Stacie’s arm.

Jenny said, “Could I speak with you for a moment, Adam?”

“What about this bag?”

“It’s okay. You can put it down.”

He laid the blood bag on the concrete and followed Jenny for a few feet toward the edge of the roof. Clayton and Bolton were struggling to push an air conditioning unit that was bigger than a refrigerator in front of the door to the hospital.

Jenny stopped and took both of Adam’s hands and said, “I am so sorry, but I’m afraid your wife isn’t going to make it.”

Like someone had shovel-punched him in the gut.

Jenny continued, “It probably jarred the clots loose when you carried her up from the birth unit.”

Adam felt a rush of emotion coming on.

Fought against it.

“How long does she have?”

Jenny just shook her head. “Go be with her.”

Adam turned away from her, stared down at his wife lying on the helipad, stroking Daniella’s head with her fingers. He had never been more scared, including the previous hour.

He walked back over to his family, sat down beside his wife.

“She’s beautiful,” Stacie said.

“She looks like you. Your eyes for sure.”

Clayton and Bolton were muscling another unit toward the door, metal scraping against concrete. Thought he could hear inhuman screaming echoing from inside the hospital.

He laid his hand against his wife’s forehead—cool and sweaty.

Closed his eyes. Prayed harder than he’d ever prayed in his life.

“I’m so cold, Adam.”

He started unbuttoning his black shirt.

“I hope you won’t lose your faith over this.”

He wondered if she meant her death, if she knew it was imminent, or everything else.

“Of course not,” he said, wondering if he was lying to her.

Stacie looked down into the face of her daughter, and as Adam pulled his arms out of his shirtsleeves and laid it across Stacie’s chest, she said, “You’ll tell her about me?”

“Stacie, stop, you’re gonna be—”

“I know what’s happening,” she said.

He could barely get the words out. “Every day, darling. Every day. I love you, Stacie. I love you so much.” Tears streamed down his face.

Her eyes were going glassy, filling slowly with a kind of stunned emptiness.

“Stacie! Do you hear me?”

She turned her head, and stared up into his eyes, one last and fading beat of lucidity.

“I know you love me, Adam,” she whispered. “You know I love you?”

He nodded.

“I’m scared, Adam.”

He laid down beside his wife as the demons started beating against the door, their faces turned toward each other, staring into Stacie’s eyes as the life inside them drained away.

Jenny

JENNY turned away from the dying woman and her newborn. Yet another tragedy in a night filled with them.

She pushed her emotions back, maintaining the guise of a professional, and looked for Randall. He and Clay had finished barricading the door and now Randall stood alone, staring off into the sea of blinking, flashing emergency lights. Jenny walked over and stood next to him, slipping her hand into his, welcoming the familiarity of his calluses.

“Do you think we’ll be rescued?” she asked.

A silly question, because there was no way he could know, any more than she did. But Jenny wasn’t seeking an answer. She just wanted to hear his voice.

“I’ll make sure you and the kids get safe, Jenny.”

His voice was cracking, and he looked away from her.

“Randall? What’s wrong?”

He coughed and covered his mouth, but not before something fell from his lips and bounced onto the tar-papered roof.

A tooth.

“Oh, Randall…”

He stared at her, his eyes hooded, his pupils already starting to enlarge.

“I won’t hurt you,” he said. “I won’t hurt you or the kids. I’ll…I’ll throw myself off the building before I let that happen.”

He tried a pathetic smile, and more of his teeth dropped out. Jenny watched, revolted, as new ones breached the gums and began to grow in.

Clay was walking over.

“Randall, I need your help guarding the barricade…holy fuck!”

Clay raised his weapon, pointing it at her husband’s head.

Without thinking, Jenny stepped between the men.

“No!”

“Get out of the way, Jenny! He’s—”

“He’s my husband! You’re not going to kill him, Clayton Theel!”

Randall made a grunting sound, then doubled over and dropped to his knees. Jenny shoved Clay’s gun away, and crouched next to Randall, keeping her arm around his shoulders.

“Jenny, you need to step away from the dracula.”

“I know Randall. He won’t hurt me. Will you, Randall?”

Randall violently shook his head. “Won’t…hurt…no one. I…can…fight it.”

Clay reached for Jenny, grabbing her arm, tugging her away. A millisecond later, Randall was on his feet, getting inside Clay’s aim and grabbing the deputy by the throat.

“If I…lose…control…kill me. But…until then…fuck…off.”

Randall released Clay, who immediately pointed the gun at him again. Once more, Jenny interceded, protecting Randall with her body.

Clay stuck out his jaw. “My girl, Shanna. She said if we find that Moorecook guy, we might be able to find a cure. His blood could have a vaccine, or antibodies, or something.”

Randall cried out as his teeth tore through his cheeks. Then came an ear-splitting sound of screeching metal.

“They’re here!” one of the boys screamed.

Jenny looked at the roof entrance, hoping she’d see cops and the military and rescue workers flooding in. But it wasn’t the good guys. It was the draculas, pushing open the door, the air conditioning units scraping across the roof.

Randall pulled her tightly against him.

She felt his hot breath on her cheek, his warm, bloody drool dripping onto her neck.

“I…love…you…” her husband whispered.

Then he picked up his chainsaw and limped toward the oncoming horde.

Stacie

IT was like someone dimming the lights from inside her head.

No pain, but so dizzy.

She could still sense her daughter lying asleep in the crook of her arm, though she couldn’t feel a thing.

There was noise all around her, but Adam—sweet, wonderful Adam—his voice cut through, lips pressed against her ear.

“I will extend peace to her like a river.”

Thinking, I cannot be dying. This is not happening. I’m a mother now.

“And the wealth of nations like a flooding stream.”

Please God, undo this.

“You will nurse and be carried on her arm and dandled on her knee.”

There’s so much I want to experience.

“As a mother comforts her child, so will I comfort you; and you will be comforted.”

Nothing to do but latch onto his voice as the darkness flooded in and unconsciousness loomed like both the heartbreaking end and the answer to so many questions.

“When you see this your heart will rejoice and you will flourish like grass. Peace like a river, Stacie. Peace to you. I love you Stacie.”

His voice fading.

“I love you Stacie.”

She could feel herself slipping, and she didn’t fight it anymore.

“Always, Stacie.”

Randall