Fade Into Black - Shadows of the Night 5

Chapter 40

Hi,

Okay, the last chapter was pretty action-packed and we don't really know what happened. Some questions will be answered in this one though! :-)

I hope you like it! Any theories as to what happened? Is Alexander right?

Lara

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Chapter 40

ANDY

The streets whirled past me like a spinning, checkered carousel. I still wasn't sure what exactly happened at Marrok's keep. Fabrice and George both vanished with vamp speed and there wasn't a thing I could do about it. When I made my way back to the street, Alexander and his vamps had packed up. They vanished into their assortment of black, sleek cars within minutes after Fabrice's attack. – A hastily executed escape strategy, was my first thought. But no, it looked like they were chasing after the devil himself in person. Why in cars? And who exactly were they going after? Fabrice? I had no idea, less time to figure it out. I might be chasing them for nothing. I didn't care.

I'd wrapped a cloth around my neck – a makeshift bandage to stop the bleeding. Never a good idea to stay around vamps with a bleeding wound. My leather jacket was fully zipped up. It would have to do, for now. My bike vibrated, roared underneath my legs, wind in my hair. I smiled, gritted my teeth against the razor-sharp night air, and accelerated.

The vamps stopped somewhere in the middle of the city, not far from the outer edges of Crimson District. I parked my bike in one of the side streets and followed.

My throat was dry, the cold night air scraping my lungs raw. Shadowing the head vamp wasn't exactly a walk in the park. I ran down another passage, following them, while switching back and forth between normal and second sight.

By the time our position became familiar enough for me to understand where the head vamp was headed, Victor Crawford's mansion was just a corner away.

Why Victor's mansion?

I followed the narrow alleyway and plunged back into second sight, turning the corner. I faltered in my steps.

Fuck. Too close.

I blinked. I was too slow, or too late. There was a clusterfuck of dark auras ahead and I almost stumbled right into them.

Dammit, what was I? A fucking rookie?

I stopped, pressed my back against the wall. Closed my eyes for a moment, then slowly eased forward again, craning my neck. We were in front of Victor's mansion – or whatever remained of it.

The building stood there like a set of broken teeth jutting out into the night sky – a battle-tested soldier, making a last stand. No yellow police tapes, no leftovers of an investigation the human police would have conducted, had the victims been human.

No one liked to meddle in vamp politics. No one wanted to end up standing between the head vamp and something he wanted. The TF3's existence in itself was an oddity in New York's political jungle. I didn't see them investigating this like they usually would. And I was pretty sure that was exactly what the head vamp wanted.

Less than thirty feet away and in front of the mansion, Alexander's vamps were standing in a semi-circle, facing what had to be Victor's coven members. Their home had been attacked by the rogues one night ago. Five vamps truly dead, and yet, Victor's vamps were standing here, impeccably dressed, not a hair out of line. Was it all just for show?