Night's Touch

When he reached home, Anton drove into the garage and hit the control to close the garage door.

Breathing heavily, he sat there for several minutes, his forehead resting on the steering wheel while he relived the horror of the last half hour. For a moment, he had been certain his mother's incantation had worked. She had actually raised his father's body from the crypt, only the creature that had risen from the coffin wasn't his father at all, but some mindless zombie.

Anton had bolted out of the laboratory with the creature right on his heels. Who'd have thought that something so decayed could move so fast? If his car door had been locked, he would have been a goner.

As it was, he had managed to get behind the wheel and lock the door scant moments ahead of the creature. He had started the car and taken off in a cloud of dust and gravel. Just thinking about it was enough to give him the shakes.

He cursed viciously, damning Cara DeLongpre and her whole wretched family. It was all the girl's fault.

She was supposed to be a maiden. How could they have made such a mistake? Anton would have bet his last dollar that she had never been with a man, but if that was true, his father would be here now and his mother would still be alive.

Getting out of the car, he went into the house through the door that connected the garage to the kitchen; then, his mind in turmoil, he moved from room to room, making sure that all the doors and windows were closed and locked.

What would he do if DeLongpre went to the police and reported that he had kidnapped Cara? He told himself there was nothing to worry about, that the vampire wouldn't want to get the police involved, but what if he was wrong? Cara had nothing to fear from the police. And what about the baby? They couldn't arrest him for taking the kid, although he thought they might be able to hold him as an accessory.

Perhaps he could somehow cast all the blame on his mother... But it wasn't the police or what they could do to him that worried him. It was the vampire, DeLongpre.

Damn! Maybe he should just pack up and leave town tonight! Tempting as the thought was, he knew he couldn't go off and leave his mother's body lying in the basement of the lab like so much refuse, and yet he recoiled from the thought of going back.

Guilt roared through him as he recalled the cowardly way he had bolted out of the building, leaving his mother behind. What if she wasn't dead after all? He salved his conscience by telling himself it was the only option he'd had. After all, what else could he have done? Staying would have been akin to committing suicide. This whole catastrophe was Cara's fault. If she had been pure, the incantation would have worked and his father would be here now. Instead, his mother was dead and there was a zombie running loose in the city.

Going into the kitchen, Anton took a bottle of Irish whiskey from the cupboard and poured himself a stiff drink. Like it or not, he had to go back and get his mother's body. He owed her that much, though he had no idea how he would explain her death.

And what of the creature? What if it killed someone else?

Anton took another drink to fortify his nerves. The easiest thing to do would be to bury her body where it wouldn't be found and then leave town, but he couldn't do that, not until he'd found a way to undo what his mother had done. But first, he had to get his mother's body out of the lab.

He refilled his glass, drained it in a single long swallow, and left the house. Climbing into the car, he locked the door before driving out of the garage, his gaze darting from right to left before he pulled out of the driveway.

He kept one eye on the rearview mirror as he drove toward the lab, ever mindful that the creature was still out there somewhere.

He saw the smoke first, great plumes of dark gray smoke drifting skyward on the rising wind. The wail of a siren screamed in the distance.

Muttering an oath, Anton drove around the corner, then hit the brakes, hard.

His father's laboratory was engulfed in flames.