Sable Hart, Vampire Slayer (Book 5): Blood Moon Read online

  BLOOD MOON

  A Sable Hart Vampire Slayer Novel

  By

  Megan Hawke

  PUBLISHED BY:

  Hawke Publishing

  This novel was previously published as "Primary Urges."

  Copyright 2011/2017 by Megan Hawke

  Cover by Najla Qamber Designs

  This is a work of fiction. The names, characters, and locations within are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  TABLE OF CONTENTS:

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  List of other titles

  About the Author

  Blood Moon

  A Sable Hart Vampire Slayer Novel

  Blood – that sweet scent revved up my heartbeat.

  I stopped at the police crime scene tape. Headlights and flashing emergency lights provided a well lit area. Even at two in the morning, a good twenty people pressed against the bright yellow tape.

  "I'm here to see Sergeant Longhouse," I said. "He's expecting me."

  With a doubtful expression, the cop looked me up and down. I admit I wasn't particularly impressive to look upon at that moment. Not my fault. I was called in on short notice.

  "Are you his daughter?" he asked.

  "Does he call his daughter in on murder cases?"

  Hey, the smell of blood makes me edgy. He was right, too. I looked like a high schooler in my faded jeans, Don't Mess With Texas t-shirt, pink fleece hoodie, and pink Dallas Cowboy baseball cap. My long hair was even pulled back in a ponytail.

  "Just tell him Sable is here," I said. "But not for long."

  "Sable? Sable Hart?" he said. His eyes widened a bit. "You're Black Heart?"

  I quirked a brow at him and waited. He got real uncomfortable real fast, and then hurried away. Shaking my head, I then looked around. Blood was everywhere. Worse, body parts lay scattered about. Lots of body parts.

  Sergeant Steven Longhouse stepped out of the discount gas station and waved me over. I ducked under the tape, but walked over to the nearest body part. It was a piece of lower leg. A black running shoe still covered the foot. I sniffed around it. Literally, I bent over and took a deep whiff.

  "What happened, Longhouse?"

  "That's what we're trying to figure out," he said.

  Sergeant Longhouse was in charge of the Dallas Police Department's Paranormal Crimes Team. He was the only member, until recently. I've yet to meet the other members.

  "Did someone object to the price of gas?" I said.

  "Funny," he replied. He looked tired. His brown suit was wrinkled and his shoes scuffed and muddy. "That's one of the bigger pieces of the late night attendant."

  "Turf war?" I asked.

  "I'm hoping you can tell us what this is about," he said. "It's worse inside. Come in."

  "Wow, you sure know how to entice a girl."

  I stepped past him and came up short inside the door. I thought it was bloody carnage out front. That was nothing compared to what lay inside. There had to be at least two people torn to pieces inside.

  "How many people killed?"

  "Two," Longhouse answered.

  "Two werewolves, to be precise," Detective Morris corrected. "The night manager and his attendant."

  Morris was Homicide. He and Longhouse were roomies at the Academy. Though Longhouse was white and Morris black, they had a look about them. Both were early fifties, six feet and stocky, with a sprinkling of gray starting to seep into their hair. Longhouse had a paunch, while Morris looked like he worked out. Longhouse tended to be a bit laid back, where as Morris bordered on OCD.

  "Since you called me in, I have to assume you believe a vampire did this."

  "You tell me," Morris said.

  "Do you smell vampire?" Longhouse said.

  "I can't smell if someone is a vampire or werewolf or witch," I said. "I can detect individual scents. But this is a gas station and convenience store, so the air is filled with countless scents. None that I recognize."

  "Why would a vampire rip the bodies up like this?" Morris said.

  I shrugged. "Why indeed? This looks more like a werewolf attack."

  "No, the victims are werewolves," Morris said. "And only the werewolves were killed. The humans were chased off."

  "It was personal, then?"

  "I don't think so," Morris said.

  "This is the third such attack in as many days," Longhouse said. "Only werewolves are killed. And they are torn into pieces, like this."

  "Are you sure it's vampires?" I said.

  "Absolutely," he said. "DNA proves that. Beside, all of the attacks happened at gas stations and convenience stores, so were video recorded. So we've seen some of the vampires."

  "Plural? How many vamps?" I said.

  "A dozen, maybe more," Longhouse said. "We're still trying to figure out exactly how many are involved."

  All I could do was gawk. Vampires didn't hunt like that. Vamps were solitary hunters. And vampires did not slaughter their victims. They might kill, but killing wasn't the primary motivation. Plus, it was rare for even a rogue vampire to rip his victims into little pieces. Werewolves, on the other hand, tended to rip their victims to shreds.

  "You seem surprised vampires did this," Morris said. "Why?"

  "I am surprised." I waved my hand at all the blood and carnage. "This is not our primary urge. All we want to do is feed. Feeding doesn't kill, and really, rarely even leaves a mess at all."

  "Ah, but this is done by a pack of hungry vampires," Morris said. "Mob mentality. They did feed on the victims, too."

  "No, this wasn't a feeding. It was slaughter," I said. "And if vampires did this, I would think it was personal. I'd check to see if all the victims are connected in any way, and if they had dealings with vampires."

  "Dealings?" Morris said.

  "Yes. Did they work for a vamp family? Maybe the vamps and wolves are both dealing drugs, or something, and one side or the other is trying to move in on the other's territory," I said. I shrugged, grasping at straws. "This isn't a hungry rogue. Whole families don't go rogue."

  "They do if the alpha goes rogue," Morris said.

  "Alpha? Werewolves have alphas, and there are many in any given pack. An alpha will be leader of the pack, but that isn't a title for them either," I said. "Vampires don't have alphas."

  "What's the leader of a vampire family called?" Morris asked.

  I grinned sultrily. "Lover. Baby. Big Daddy. Sweet thang," I said, and laughed at his frown. "We have no titles either, but the begetter of a vamp family is called a Sire, whether male or female. The Hispanic vamps tend to call their Sire 'Patron.' I've never heard of any vamp demanding to be called by a title, though."

  "What does your family call you?" Longhouse asked.

  "Sable. What else would they call me?"

  "Not 'mistress?'" Morris said. "You are one of the kinky vamps."

  I frowned at him. I tended to wear tight latex and leather. Dane called them my dominatrix outfits. But I didn't consider myself kinky. I only wore them when I wanted to look "vampy," which was a lot of the time.

  "Aren't you sweet
," I said. He got his jab in. Morris was satisfied he'd ticked me off. "Do you have names?"

  "Of victims? Or the killers?" Longhouse said.

  "Both," I said. "Unless you don't want me looking into this on my own."

  "Actually, I don't," Morris said.

  "But I do," Longhouse said. "I want you to find the vampires doing this, and stake them."

  Morris and Longhouse scowled at each other a long second. They might be best friends, but they had very different agendas. Morris wanted to catch the killers and arrest them. He didn't care if they would be vaporized with sunlight the next day, he just needed that arrest to end his investigation. Longhouse had different orders. He was tasked with the job of stopping all illegal paranormal activity. Period. For vamps, that meant staking. His job rarely ended with an arrest, much less a trial.

  "Sweet," I said. I loved staking vamps. "I'll need all the evidence you have, especially pictures, video, names, etc..."

  "You know I can't share classified evidence," Longhouse said. "But I'll e-mail you all of the unclassified evidence we have."

  I shook my head woefully. "You people do not believe in doing anything the easy way."

  "We have to obey the law, Miss Hart," Morris said. "Something I suggest you try for a change."

  I grinned at him. "Wouldn't you just love to snap your cuffs on me?"

  "You can wipe that smirk off your face. You wouldn't like it if I did," he said, eyes narrowing.

  Detective Morris scared me. Had from day one. But what's the use of being all undead if you didn't tempt fate? Besides, taunting and teasing men was fun, especially the ones that didn't like me.

  "You might be surprised," I said. I gave him a sultry look. "You might like it, too. Vampire sex is the absolute best, baby. Ask any fang junkie."

  "Yep," a new voice said from the door. She was a plainclothes cop, about five eight, athletic build, mid-thirties. Her shoulder length hair was dark brown. And she was a werewolf. "A vamp girl can make your dick hard all night long."

  "And you are?" I asked.

  Her aura was huge. She was definitely alpha. I heard the Dallas Police started their own pack. She was the first I'd met. The police tended to distrust vampires, witches, and werewolves, but Dallas was one of the few departments in the state that would hire witches and werewolves.

  "Detective Alison Parker," she said. "You must be Black Heart. I've heard so much about you."

  "All good, I'm sure," I said. "Homicide? Are you Detective Morris's new partner? What happened to Anderson?"

  "Anderson's my partner," Morris said, scowling at Detective Parker. "Ali is part of Steve's team."

  "You're late, Ali," Longhouse said. "Where's Billy?"

  "He's outside checking everything out," she said. She couldn't take her eyes off me. I know, I'm so damned fascinating to everyone. Look at the undead girl. Ain't she pretty? "You're…unimpressive. I was expecting a whole lot more."

  I looked at Longhouse, who seemed just as surprised as me. "What did you tell her? That I was ten feet tall and fangs bigger than a saber tooth cat?"

  "Actually," Ali said. "He's told me almost nothing about you. But I saw all of the media reports on your exploits. Every picture I ever saw of you after your Change was of you in shiny black leather and latex. Very vampy. You look like you should be home studying for finals."

  "I look younger without makeup," I said. I turned to Longhouse. "Longhouse, how many do you have on your new team? Two? Ali and Billy?"

  Parker tensed up. Guess she didn't care for me calling her "Ali." Probably wanted to be friends first.

  "Yes, it's just us three," he said. "Why?"

  "Just wondering. What are their functions?"

  "I'm the wolf, and Billy's the witch," Parker said. "Is that what you were driving at? Yes, everyone here knows what we are."

  "Billy the Witch? Really, wouldn't Willy the Witch be more fun?" I said, grinning at Longhouse. "I'd have so much fun with that."

  "And that's why I no longer go by Willy," a slim, young man said. He stepped past Ali and looked me over. He had short, dark blonde hair and pale blue eyes. I could feel the pall of magic surrounding him. Being a witch, he had a normal looking aura. "I'm Detective Billy Grinstead, and you are?"

  "Sable Hart," I said.

  "You're Black Heart?"

  "If it amuses you to call me that."

  Billy held his hand up, palm out. I tensed. Hey, I don't trust witches. Who does? He closed his eyes and chanted a second.

  "Wow. You're a big girl, aren't you?" Billy said, dropping his hand.

  "What does that mean?" Morris asked before I could.

  "It means, as vampires go, she's powerful," Billy said. He looked me up and down with a more critical eye. "She might look all sweet and innocent, but she can rip your head off your shoulders, juggle squad cars and such. She's an uber vamp, and that's why she scares all of her undead friends."

  "You silver-tongued devil," I said. My eyes narrowed. "Don't try casting a spell at me again. If I even think you're trying to hex me…"

  "Are you threatening a police officer?" Morris said.

  "Threat is such an ugly word, Detective Tony," I said. Oh, that pissed him off. Maybe I should call him Tony all the time. "Witches are a threat to vamps, so we are wary around them. To cast a spell at a vampire without permission is just crazy. I think Billy would agree."

  "Yes, that was rather careless of me," Billy said. He grinned and shrugged. "Sorry."

  "You don't sound sorry."

  "I'm not."

  I smiled. "I like you."

  "Let's keep it platonic," Billy said. He rubbed his neck. "Fangs scare me."

  Morris glowered at me. "Does everything come down to sex for you?"

  I slanted an annoyed look at him. I wasn't the one that brought up platonic.

  "No. I like football, too," I said, tapping the brim of my cap. I headed for the door. Billy stepped aside. Really, more out of politeness than fear. Ali, though, didn't move. I think the girl was copping an attitude. I got that a lot from wolves. "Send me what you can, Longhouse. I'll poke around and see what I can scare up."

  "Will do. You just make sure you keep us apprised of everything you find," he said.

  "Don't I always?" I said, and grinned when both he and Morris frowned at me. I stepped around Ali. "Bye-bye."

  The four of them watched me as I went to each of the body parts and sniffed around. Then I jumped up onto the roof. The small crowd gasped. Until that moment, I don't think any of them suspected I was anything but a normal girl.

  "There's a chunk of meat up here," I said.

  It wasn't marked in any way. There was no scent of anyone being up there, either. The piece of bloody meat was so big it had to come from a thigh or buttocks.

  I picked up the vampires' scent behind the gas station, and followed it over one block to a 7-Eleven parking lot. It vanished there. So they must've gotten into a waiting vehicle.

  Steering clear of the gas station, I headed back to my car. The whole situation had me baffled. Why would vampires commit whole scale slaughter? The police did bring up one possibility. If the head of a vamp family did go crazy he could, and probably would, drag his entire family into that insanity. A dozen or more vampires were a large family. And that wasn't even counting the mortals in the family.

  "If the police are using security videos to count the vamps, then some of them could be mortals," I muttered. "But if they are only counting the DNA samples of vampires at the crime scenes, then it really is a big family."

  Even if the head of a family went insane, it still didn't make sense. Vampires didn't act like that. And if insane, why only attack and kill werewolves? No, this didn't look like brutal robberies and murders, it looked like a vendetta. And that was even scarier. They could start a war between vampires and werewolves.

  Chapter 2

  My house was well lit when I got home. Dane's battered old jeep was parked behind Sabrina's gray Mustang. Desiree's car was in the detached
garage, with Gabe's Hummer parked in front of the open garage door. I hit the remote clipped to my visor, and the garage door next to it opened. I parked by Mustang in my usual spot.

  The house was a two story Victorian, with deep porches front and back and painted a pale yellow with white trim. Pretty standard. The neighborhood was a mix of older Victorians, Georgians, and new construction. There were a lot of people with more money than taste, who bought beautiful old homes just to tear down and build mini-mansions which all but filled the lots.

  Hitting the buttons to close both open garage doors, I stood in the driveway and reached out with my senses. It was almost 3:30 AM, so all of my neighbors were asleep. Yeah, I could tell. For once my little family was nice and quiet. Gabe, Desiree, and Sabrina, especially, could get a bit rowdy. My family was all gathered in the same room inside. No one else was around.

  The back door was unlocked, and I walked straight into the kitchen. "I'm home!"

  "Yeah, we heard," Gabe said. They were all in the family room, which was attached to the kitchen. I smiled at their grinning faces. "That damn Mustang must have the engine from Hell."

  "Yeah," I said, grinning. I loved my car. It was fast. "Where's Heidi?"

  "How should we know? You're the one linked to her," Dane said.

  I Changed Heidi into a vampire. We had a connection that couldn't be broken, but I didn't like to use that connection to spy on my friends. I could feel her every emotion, know when she was happy or sad. And I could find her. Our link was like a homing signal to each other.

  I opened up to Heidi. I felt her. She was having fun, which meant she was in bed with someone. I guessed she was going at it with at least one man. I closed it off before I became aroused. She wouldn't be coming home that night.

  "I was called to a crime scene by Sergeant Longhouse," I said, opening the fridge and pulling out a plastic bag of blood. That got everyone's attention. I paused to snip the corner off the bag, and poured it into a tall glass. Then I put the glass in the microwave and set the timer. "Vampires killed a pair of werewolves."

  "Vampires?" Dane said. "How many are we dealing with?"