Immortal Hunter

But somehow this time was different.

The pull inside her, like a rope tugging hard at the center of her chest, compelled her forward. And how could she not listen to such a strong command? She took another step, and then her head began to clear. She was thankful for her supernatural metabolism. It was burning up the drugs nicely, but...

How had she ended up in her current situation? What had put her in the hospit—

She staggered as the memories rushed back to her in one overwhelming burst.

That thing, the monster that did this to her. The thought of his disgustingly handsome face twisted in a look of pure hatred and malice flashed through her mind. Robert. That had been his name, before the hunters killed him.

She’d been in the hospital because that monster had kidnapped and tortured her, left her for dead. And then David had saved her. The memory of his arms wrapped around her warmed her to her core.

No, she couldn’t think like that.

She shook her head, trying to erase both Robert and David from her thoughts. She shouldn’t be thinking this way. Robert was dead now, and she’d done her best to push David from her mind years ago. David had made his choice. When she’d left, he’d never come after her, so that was that. Sure, he’d saved her, but that was his job. Nothing more. She was certain of it.

Shuffling to the edge of the busy street outside the hospital, she waved her arms, hoping to flag down a taxi. Someone out there needed to be saved, her instincts told her that much, and after the torture she’d so recently been through herself, she couldn’t just leave them to that same horrifying fate. If she could just get a cab to stop, she could follow her instincts. The coldness in the air continued to seep into her body, and slowly her feet tingled to numbness. After several minutes with no taxis in sight, she ran into the middle of the street the minute she saw one barreling toward her. The driver slammed on his brakes and pounded the horn. The sound reverberated in her ears, pulling her further from her drugged haze.

The cabbie rolled down his window. “What the fuck are you doing, lady? Get out of the street.”

She inhaled a deep breath and called back to him over the busy sounds of the city. “I need a ride.” Rushing to the side of his cab, she fumbled her way into the backseat, apparently still slightly dizzy from the remaining Ativan.

The cabbie leaned back in his seat and sighed as he stomped on the gas pedal. “Where to, lady?”

“Listen, this is an emergency, and I don’t have any money on me.”

The cabbie glanced in the rearview mirror, eyeing the hospital gown. “Look, lady. I don’t give free rides. Either you pay or you get out of my—”

Before he could finish his sentence, Allsún shoved her hand in front of his face, releasing another swirling puff of faerie dust. She cleared her throat. “So, about that free ride?”

The man blinked as if in a haze before he said, “Free ride? Sure, I can do that. Where to?”

She smiled. “Head toward the south end of the city, and hurry. I don’t know where we’re going, exactly, but as we get closer, I’ll figure it out.”

The pull deep inside her chest increased with every mile, her senses sharpening the nearer they came to their destination. She marveled at how quickly she had burned off the drugs. Her head cleared more with each passing moment. No wonder they’d had her hooked up to the stuff. She’d probably needed a dosage more appropriate for someone three times her size.

When they reached the edge of the city, the tall buildings and industrial sprawl faded into quiet suburbia. Out here the bright lights of the skyscrapers shimmered from a distance, but the streets were dim, lit only by the occasional streetlight. She directed the cabbie through a series of turns until they were fully surrounded by rows of small brick houses. The view of the city disappeared. She would search all night if she had to. Because maybe, just maybe, she could save someone tonight.

* * *

DISPOSING OF A body was never pretty. The metallic odor of the doctor’s blood invaded David’s nose, and he fought not to gag as the scent mixed with the smell of rotting garbage. The open Dumpster smelled more like decaying flesh than the actual dead guy did. Better get this over with. Lifting the doctor’s corpse, he hefted the limp body into the trash. God forgive him. It went against every fiber of his conscience every time, but he always got the job done. A part of him wished he could call up the guy’s family or at least take him to the morgue, make sure he had a proper funeral, but unless he wanted witnesses, that wasn’t a possibility.

Boy, how much fun would it be to explain to the police that he’d killed a man because the guy was possessed by a demon? That one would really go over well with the cops—about as well as fat-free doughnuts and decaffeinated coffee.

After closing the Dumpster lid, he pulled an old black bandana from inside his jacket and wiped down everything he had touched. He couldn’t leave his prints around. Once he finished, he slipped down the alley, hobbling through several back passageways until he reached his parked motorcycle. A sharp pain shot down his leg with every step, and he winced. Damn it.

He let out a long breath and unlatched the saddlebag on his black 2011 Harley-Davidson Dyna Super Glide, a piece of perfect machinery, if you asked him, and the one beauty who never failed him. He dug around the inside of the saddlebag, then frowned as he uncapped the bottle of hydrocodone. He shook two of the white horse-sized pills into his hand and dry-swallowed them, then placed the prescription bottle in the saddlebag once again. He hated taking the pills, but they were the only way he could operate with his leg as jacked up as it was. At least the doctor insisted the limp and the pain were only temporary, and he’d be healed soon.

Every four to eight hours, depending on his level of pain and the amount of strain he’d put on his muscles, he was reminded of his most recent failures and misgivings.

Robert, that sadistic skinwalker, had tortured the only woman David had ever loved. Kidnapping and torturing Allsún had been pure fun and games for Robert, and because the sicko had torn up David’s leg, leaving him with a limp, David had been humiliatingly unable to save Allsún himself and had been forced to watch as his friend and fellow hunter Jace McCannon did it for him—but not before Allsún had incurred the kind of physical and mental damage she might never recover from. Sure, he’d been the one to actually get Allsún out of the building and to safety, but Jace had been the one to kill Robert.

If only David had been stronger, a better fighter, he could have bested Robert to begin with, and Allsún would have remained safe. He would never forgive himself for all the pain she’d endured. Her suffering was his fault for not protecting her.

He knew nothing good would come from blaming himself, but it didn’t matter. The guilt was enough to hurt him until the day he died. But hell, he had already failed her in so many other ways, what was one more thing added to the list?

A muffled buzzing noise broke his train of thought. His phone was vibrating in the pocket of his jeans. He slipped his hand underneath the edge of his leather bike chaps and pulled out the sleek new phone—courtesy of his fellow hunter Shane Gray. The name “Damon Brock” flashed across the screen. His division leader calling could only mean one of two things: either there was another bitch-fest meeting he would have to attend or a demonic possession had been reported.

Having grown up in Rochester, David had the advantage of knowing all the rabbis in the city, so once he had grown old enough to begin his work as an exorcist, the rabbis had introduced him to the pastors, the priests and the imams, until he had an entire network of holy men aware of the work he did. When people figured out a family member was possessed, their religious leader was always the first person they called. Any time a parishioner reported a possession, someone in the network called Damon or reported it directly to David.

Sure, the system wasn’t perfect, but it definitely helped David find the monsters. He had been called in a few times for some druggies who had taken one too many tabs of the brown acid and were spouting all sorts of demonic bullshit, but for the most part the system worked.

Knowing he couldn’t avoid Damon’s call, he finally hit the talk button and pressed the phone to his ear. “Yeah?”

“Father O’Reilly called. Someone needs you,” Damon said without so much as a hello. Cold and straight-to-the-point, as always. He wasn’t one to fool around with pleasantries, especially where the Execution Underground was concerned.

“What’s the address?” David asked.

“South side of the city. Almost out in the suburbs.” Damon rattled off the info.

David quickly committed the address to memory, pulled out the keys to the Super Glide and mounted his bike. “What’s the situation?”

“A woman from O’Reilly’s parish called him,” Damon said. “She’s certain her husband is possessed by the devil. The Father heard her scream, and then there was a gurgling followed by...nothing.”

“Poor old bastard was probably scared shitless.” David shoved back the bike’s kickstand with the heel of his boot and jammed his key into the ignition.

“There’s a meeting tonight. Come here once you’re finished.”

“Anything else?” David asked.

Damon hesitated before he said, “You know I don’t agree with your theory that there are going to be more murders, but O’Reilly said to tell you the family had an infant.”

“Shit.” Without another word, David hung up the phone.

He turned the ignition key, and the engine rumbled to life. Within moments he was zooming through the streets, cutting in and out of traffic. He needed to get there—and fast.

This night was going great. One dead body was bad enough, and now he had another possession and a bitchfest meeting to boot. Somehow he doubted things were going to get any better.

He didn’t care what the other members of the Execution Underground said or that Damon didn’t support his theory; something big was about to go down with the demons in Rochester, and he was determined to find out what that was. It had been two weeks since the infant girl’s murder, and he’d been expecting more to come. Since he’d found the victim, Rochester’s demons had been quiet—way too quiet for his comfort. He’d never seen such a drop in demonic activity in all the years he’d been hunting. Since the decline in possessions, a feeling of dread had been slowly building inside him. Something in his gut told him these past two weeks had been the calm before the storm.

Beyond the sheer horror of the baby’s death, something just wasn’t right about the situation. Demons rode humans like disposable cattle, but they didn’t kill them for sport. They used them for pleasure, to get their rocks off and escape the hellfire for a while, and if the human happened to die in the process of their twisted games, so be it. But they didn’t set out to kill normal humans, and there was no way a demon would have a good ol’ time possessing a sixth-month-old baby. The little girl’s death was more than collateral damage. Demons were sick dipshits to begin with, but it took a special kind of evil to kill an infant.

Initially, he’d had no leads on the case. During an examination of the infant’s corpse, he’d found little indication of what type of demon had orchestrated the murder, let alone its motivation. Demons left messes behind them, but this one hadn’t. That set off more red warning flags than heroin track marks on a cheap hooker. Those warning signs told him one thing: something bad was about to go down. His best guess had been an Abyzu. The awful little shits were known for preying on infants, using their life force for energy and power. But Abyzu’s, who did set out to kill, weren’t common—at least not since the decline of so-called SIDS.

The whole case was a mess. No evidence, no indication of what was to come, just a dreaded gut feeling things were about to become even messier.

CHAPTER THREE

WITHIN FIFTEEN MINUTES David reached the address. Shutting off the ignition and setting the kickstand, he parked his bike on the street several houses away. He quickly jogged toward the house, ignoring the shooting pain coursing through his leg.