Page 89 of The Undead

No, he thought desperately, it isn’t true, he’s lying, she died quickly and painlessly and peacefully or I would have known. Wouldn’t I?

It didn’t matter. It was the thought of it that horrified him, as William intended. Adam would never know how she died, unless William told him, and Adam could never believe him, no matter what he said. Sylvia would have been an irresistible plaything, satisfying a number of terrible pleasures at once. A special thing.

Adam made a terrible, voiceless sound again, not a hiss, not a scream, not much of anything except pain squeezed out of his throat and over his tongue.

She was dead. William had finally killed her. And he’d keep on killing until the world was empty, in order to break Adam, unless Adam got him first.

Or unless Adam gave up.

Lights flickered below as he gathered Michael up and walked toward the back door. Rebecca Foster had already gone out the front. And it was then that William’s words drifted back to him. “You come before sunrise and I’ll let him go, Adam. You come tomorrow night and you can pick up his pieces.” Adam heard shots fired outride, and heard the car roar to life and drive away. Sylvia’s car.

He’d laughed with her about that stupid car. He’d walked with her down this hall—down those stairs—he’d lain with her in that bed and felt her skin grow hot against him as she’d opened to his hands and his mouth. He still felt her lips saying his name against his skin, but that was all ghostly; all he had left was the blood cool and clotting on his hands, and the silver-black hair William had left at Foster’s house for him to find. It was coiled in strands of silk in his pocket. Maybe later, when he had the strength, he’d hold it to his face and smell it again.

Some weary endless lifetime later. Adam’s life was all before him, and it was so long, and so useless.

There was a human heartbeat below. He listened to it in distant fascination for a minute, then leaned forward and saw her creep around the corner with her gun held two-handed and pointed down as she checked the corners and scanned the room.

“Adam?” she yelled, and saw the blood spilled on the floor in the center of the living room. She’d seen blood before, probably nearly as often as any vampire. Maggie Bowman cross-stepped along the wall to the foot of the stairs. “Adam, goddammit, answer me! Where the fuck are you?”

“Here,” he heard himself say. He was actually surprised, but not surprised enough to move. She came up the stairs very carefully, one riser at a time, until her eyes were level with the second floor where he sat.

“They—” Maggie came up another step. Her gun was still down, but he knew how quickly she could bring it up. A little pain would be nice, Adam thought grayly. Something to take my mind off things.

If he could convince her to shoot him in just the right place, maybe the pain would all be over.

“They took Mike,” she finished. Her voice didn’t break, but it did bend. Adam wanted to shrug, but he was too tired. “What the fuck are you doing?”

“Sitting,” he answered. She achieved the top of the stairs and came toward him, pausing where she thought she was safe.

She wasn’t.

“Did you find Sylvia?” she asked more gently. Something sharp turned over just under his heart, a razor-edged maggot. He didn’t say anything. Maggie continued up the hall toward Sylvia’s room. She made a wide path around him. She paused in the door and stared. “Jesus God.”

Adam wanted to sleep, even though it wasn’t daylight and wouldn’t be for an hour. He wanted the oblivion of light. He wanted to stand outside on the winter-killed grass and watch the sun rise and fold him in a last, loving embrace.

The strength just bled out of him, along with all his anger, leaving nothing but grief. He tipped over to one side and put his cheek against the rough carpet. He didn’t respond when Maggie called his name, or when she came closer.

He didn’t much care for it when she slapped him, no matter how passive he’d become. He grabbed her wrist, very lightly, and shoved her away. She came back and slapped him again. And again.

That time Adam threw her so far down the hall that she almost fell down the stairs.

“Get up,” she said as she climbed to her feet. She still had her gun. “Get up or I’m going to start shooting pieces off you until you do.”

“The police are already on their way,” he said reasonably. She thumbed the safety off her automatic and leveled it at him.

“That’s more your problem than mine, man. Now get your ass up, Adam, I’m not kidding. Michael needs your help.”

“I can’t help him.”

She fired. A hole appeared in the carpet near his leg. He stared at it.

“You’re gonna damn well try. You got him into this. You’re gonna get him out.”

She wasn’t, in fact, telling him anything he didn’t already know. Adam raised his eyes to look at her, and she flinched at what she saw.

“I need to wash my hands,” he said reasonably.

She stood there staring after him as he walked toward the bathroom. He shut the door and locked it, then turned to the sink.

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