Suspension Read online

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  April, 1999

  Newsletter and MoreBuilding a relationship with my readers is the very best thing about writing...

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ALSO BY CLAUDIA SILVA

  SUSPENSION

  Claudia Silva

  Copyright © 2019 Claudia Silva

  All rights reserved.

  To my readers.

  APRIL, 1999

  DYLAN TORRENCE HELD the werewolf's heart in his hand. For the first time, he studied it as if he'd never seen something as fascinating before. He'd held dozens of red organs just like this throughout his career, yet he'd never stopped to marvel at one like he was doing now. Next to his feet, the beast he'd just killed twitched unnaturally as it regressed to its human form. The process, which mainly consisted of bones breaking and reassembling into place, happened every time a beast died while in its wolf persona.

  The battle wasn't over. There was another monster he still needed to fight. The vampire heard it growl behind him but paid no attention to it. For now, its attention was elsewhere, giving him time to get absorbed in the thing that fascinated him. Dylan took the heart closer to his face taking into his system its repulsive scent. He then did something he'd never dared do... taking his tongue out from between his two sharp vampire fangs, he licked it.

  “Oh, my God…” Dylan heard someone gasp close to him.

  Snapping out of his trance, he looked around the office where the battle was taking place. The salmon pink cubicles that had once created a maze for the employees looked like a war zone. To one side, a fluorescent light had become unhinged, balancing from one side to the other, creating a surreal effect. The werewolf hunter had fought and defeated two of the three beasts and was savoring his partial victory when he got distracted by the human voice.

  Turning to his left, he sniffed to pinpoint the location of the human who hadn't fled the room when ordered to do so. Someone had remained and would now be a liability during the rest of the game. How had he missed the scent of sweat and blood so close to him? He must've been so engrossed in his hunt he hadn't noticed.

  Letting the heart drop to the floor, Dylan pushed the desk that hid the human man with one hand and little effort.

  “Agh!” The man screamed in pain as one of the desk's legs hurt his arm. The blood coming out of the wound increased the scent of humanity in the office, calling to both the vampire and werewolf's attention.

  Dylan struggled to stop his mouth from watering as he stared at the frightened employee. Behind them, the growling stopped. The werewolf who'd been busy trashing every computer it could touch turned to locate the human in the room. The beast sprinted in their direction; the man screamed in terror when he realized the monster was now on its way to end his life.

  Dylan glanced at the weakling one more time, hissing at him to shut up through his long vampire fangs. I'll deal with you later, he thought. For now, he enjoyed the man’s look of terror as he realized what Dylan was.

  The fight against the werewolf wasn’t really a fight. Werewolves were predictable in their technique - they had none. It surprised Dylan the monsters still believed they had a chance against him, but he wouldn't miss an opportunity to enjoy a good fight. He lived for these moments.

  Dylan was gifted. He knew who he was and what he was capable of, and he wasn't afraid to use his talents. With one hand he took the werewolf’s neck. Piercing the skin with the strength of his grip alone, he grasped the vertebrae behind it and snapped the werewolf’s neck in half.

  With a loud thud, the last werewolf fell to its knees before Dylan released the rest of its broken body. It had lost the battle before it ever began, though it hadn’t known it. The werewolf hunter feared nothing. Perhaps he believed he was invulnerable. As far as he knew, no other creature on this Earth could best him in battle. He had no equal. He was the ultimate weapon.

  The man stopped screaming, staring in terror at the beast in wolf form a few feet away.

  "You don't want to see this," Dylan told him. If he didn't take their hearts out, the werewolves would heal and attack again. It was an inevitable deed. To a human who had never seen blood, it could be traumatic.

  The werewolf hunter stepped on the monster's chest, pulled his arm back, and reached into its ribs to take out its heart. This time, he didn't stop to admire his trophy; instead, he let it drop watching it roll towards the wounded human on the floor.

  “Oh, God!” the man retched, clearly having a hard time coping with it all.

  Dylan smiled after hearing the human’s heart speed up. Somehow he was enjoying the moment, watching the man fear him as he’d feared the werewolves in the room. Few humans ever witnessed a vampire in action. He was one of the lucky ones. The man screamed again when Dylan bent to offer his hand. When he didn't take it, Dylan grabbed him by the wounded arm to help him up, causing the man to screech in pain.

  “Ow!” The man cried after Dylan let him go.

  “Anything broken?” the vampire asked.

  The man wasn’t interested in his wounds. “Please, don’t kill me,-” he begged. “I have a family. Two girls. I-I can’t die.”

  Dylan frowned as he heard this, pretending he couldn't understand how he could think he was dangerous. If this man had followed instructions when they evacuated the rest, he wouldn't be in this predicament. He deserved to be scared, he needed to suffer for not following the rules. Through his red irises, Dylan studied the man from head to toe.

  “Tempting,” Dylan muttered. The scent of the man's blood called to him. He was hungry. For a moment, he considered draining him of his blood. He could say it was a werewolf who'd kill him when Charles entered the room. No. Charles would know. Besides, it as wrong. He knew he shouldn't kill, no matter how tempting it was. “Not worth it.”

  Shoving him out of the way, Dylan walked to the front door, unlocked it and stepped out of the battlefield. Outside, the men and women from the police department and the Secret Service took one glance at him in all of his vampire glory, covered in blood, and they immediately drew their weapons and aimed at him.

  Dylan stopped, willing his eyes to turn them back into their human brown, and raised his hands in surrender.

  “You can go in now,” he announced casually.

  It took a moment for the crowd to react. When they did, they walked past him to enter the offices behind him. They didn't touch him. They didn't arrest him, nor did they read him his rights.

  Standing there in the middle of the lobby, the vampire closed his eyes to take in what was happening around him; he liked to do that, he liked to hear people working to bring back the peace and quiet after he’d done his job. His job was messy and bloody, but nobody knew how to do it as he could, and he liked it that way.

  They needed him and he knew it.

  It surprised Dylan when someone took his hands behind his back to handcuff him. He didn't stop it. He let the young police officer feel he had control over him. Turning around, he saw Special Agent Charles Lewis with his arms over his chest. He looked disappointed. Charles Lewis was the only human in the room who knew what he was. He was the one who'd brought him there and helped the humans clear the room so he could work his magic.

  “I know you won’t resist the arrest, Agent Torrence,” the human FBI agent said. “We’ll talk at the station.” Dylan kept looking at him. He did as he told him, letting the young officer walk him out of the building. Lewis added, “I know you can be a patient man.”

  Whatever Charles was planning must be only a ruse. He knew no one could force a vampire to stay at a police station. He must know he was hungry after the fight and leaving him alone in a room full of humans was dangerous.

  For
now, he walked to the car knowing everyone watched him. How could they not? He was covered in blood. His suit, his face, his hands. In their eyes, he was a dangerous person, a killer. The young officer opened the door and held his head as he forced him in the car. The hostility was unnecessary.

  When Dylan looked out the window, he saw him. It was the man he’d saved. The one who hadn't evacuated when instructed. He'd been taken to the ambulance where a paramedic was taking care of his wounded arm. On his other side, another police officer was taking his statement. Dylan didn't need to hear what he was saying to know what was coming. Unnecessary rudeness. Neglect. Violence. All words he'd seen on reports about him. And the reports had become more frequent.

  It didn't matter. Leaning back on the seat he thought about the battle. He remembered his every action, analyzed his strategy trying to find a fault. One by one, he played back the moment he took each of their hearts out of their chests. He remembered the taste of the one he’d licked. He remembered the putrid taste, like nothing he'd ever tasted before. It almost made him sick.

  Quietly, he let them drive him to the station.

  The police officer who drove him kept looking through the mirror to take quick glances at him. Dylan couldn't blame him, he was a sight to behold. Then again, the young man couldn't blame him either if he wanted to have a little fun. It always amused him to scare the humans in law enforcement. Once in a while, he smiled back showing his red irises to the unsuspecting men. He enjoyed watching them squirm and then wonder what they’d seen. Dylan knew he could be intimidating; he liked to have his fun. His own twisted kind of fun. He wasn't human after all, was he?

  Deep down he knew it was wrong to abuse his power, but he did it anyway. It was like a drug. An addiction. He couldn't stop himself. He hadn't been able to stop himself for quite some time. He hadn't been able to stop himself after the reports began. Things were getting worse, yet he still believed he was untouchable.

  When they parked in front of the police station, the young officer had run to find backup before coming back for him. Dylan was smiling in triumph, but why? Had he succeeded in becoming someone else's nightmare? They would live, he was sure. What wrong could a little fun do? It wasn't like he would hurt them.

  They guided Dylan into the station and to one of the holding rooms where a friendly face awaited.

  Special Agent Charles Lewis was eating a donut out of a white paper bag while he waited for Dylan to sit down. The hand-cuffed vampire took his spot on the metallic chair and stared back at his friend. Finally, Lewis placed the white paper bag in front of him.

  “You should eat something,” Charles suggested.

  Dylan didn’t move, only taking a quick look at the bag before looking disinterested again. “I’m not hungry,” he muttered.

  “Well, I’ve no idea how long you’ll be here, but you better eat something.”

  Dylan said nothing. Glaring at his friend, he turned his head to one side as a sign of defiance.

  “I swear you’re becoming more stubborn every day,” Charles sighed. Dylan was busy ignoring him. “Come on, Torrence, for the love of God: eat.”

  After a few seconds had passed, Dylan turned to look at him. “I’m handcuffed,” he told him. “Perhaps we can take care of that first?”

  Charles Lewis exhaled in frustration. "Fine." He turned to look at the one-way mirror to his right. After a moment, a police officer came in with a key, releasing the vampire from the handcuffs. “Alright,” Lewis said after they were alone in the room again. “Come on, eat a donut.”

  Dylan rubbed his wrists, ignoring the paper bag in front of him. “I told you, I’m not hungry.”

  “Dylan,” began Lewis. “You know why you’re here, don’t you?” The vampire had an idea but didn't want to say it. This wasn't the first time they brought him to the police station in handcuffs. It wasn't the first time Lewis wrote about it in his report. Somehow, the humans didn’t like how he treated them and that was a problem. When Dylan didn't reply, Charles did it for him, “You threatened that lawyer. He saw everything.”

  “Wrong place, wrong time,” Dylan stated. “Besides, it was your job to get everybody out. If anything, it’s on you.”

  “He says you ate a heart.”

  This made Dylan react. “That’s idiotic.” He hadn’t eaten the heart, he'd just wanted to know what their blood tasted like. That’s all. He knew how werewolf blood smelled, but he'd never tasted it before. What was so wrong in finding out? Besides, he was supposed to be alone in that room. No human idiot was meant to see it.

  “Alright,” Agent Lewis leaned back on the chair. “I don't know what happened in there, but this guy says he saw everything.” Dylan turned to glare at Lewis. “Also, he says you hurt his arm. And he’s pressing charges.” Hearing this made Dylan scoff. It sounded ridiculous.

  “I didn’t hurt him.”

  “Really?” Lewis asked him. “He claims you moved a desk - with one hand, I might add - and one of its legs lacerated his arm. He'll need surgery, did you know? And he’s suing you for negligence.”

  “Whatever,” Dylan shrugged.

  Agent Lewis sighed and stood up from his seat. “Fine,” he said in frustration. “You're impossible, you know that? I’ll get you out of here. I don’t want you near these people. I don’t think you’re stable. Not anymore.”

  Dylan narrowed his eyes, trying to understand what that meant. It didn’t make any sense. Hadn’t he just killed three blood-thirsty werewolves? Hadn't he saved the day? They should thank him, not blame him.

  Before Charles Lewis exited the room he insisted, "And eat a fucking donut.”

  The helicopter landed and Dylan didn’t wait for the blades to stop spinning.

  “You’re welcome, Torrence!” Charles Lewis yelled at him behind his back, his voice barely audible through all the noise.

  Dylan walked on the path through the forest until he reached the agency’s headquarters, the vampire compound he called home. With familiarity, he opened the door to the building, not stopping until he reached the door that led him to the director's office.

  The three human FBI agents on-call stopped what they were doing to look at him in clear disapproval. Dylan clenched his hands into fists, ignoring the glares and focusing on his objective: the door on the back of the room where the director was waiting.

  “Agent Torrence,” agent Josh Watters, perhaps the most important human in the room, started. “I'll need a detailed report on your last mission.”

  Dylan turned to look at the man who'd spoken resisting a sarcastic reply. Instead, he asked, “Is he in?”

  “Yeah,” the agent nodded, “and he’s not happy.”

  Without stopping, Dylan walked straight to his boss' office.

  Lucius, the director of the vampire agency, looked to already be waiting for him. He sat back on his chair, his hands on his lap. Around him, all the monitors and TV screens which kept him informed on the news around the world were off. He was ready to give Dylan his full attention. The director raised an arm to invite Dylan to sit down.

  Lucius was the oldest vampire Dylan knew. He was a busy man who didn't waste time on trivialities or chit-chat. “Did you feed?” was the first thing he asked.

  Dylan didn’t want to answer; he did his best to avoid looking at his boss. Except, it didn’t matter what he tried to do, he knew he had to answer the question. “No.”

  Lucius nodded, opened the drawer in front of him and threw the energy bar he found there in Dylan's direction. “Eat that, at least.”

  Dylan didn’t want to. He ought to accept it but thought better of it. He wouldn't be humiliated. “I’m fine, sir.”

  “No, you’re not,” Lucius raised his tone. He didn't lose his patience with anyone. It seemed Dylan was his weakness. Taking a deep breath, the director collected himself before saying, “What you want is blood, isn’t it?” Dylan didn’t answer. After a moment, Lucius exhaled again, pointing to a small refrigerator on his left where he stored a small stack
of blood. Dylan looked at it, pensive. He wasn't sure how to react to the offer. Standing up, he finally decided to fetch a bag of synthetic blood from the fridge. Sitting back down, he played with the bag in his hands instead of opening it to consume it. “Drink it,” ordered the director

  Dylan obeyed. He opened the bag and drained it empty. He hadn't realized how hungry he was. In fact, he would run straight to the blood bank once he finished this meeting.

  “Tell me, Dylan,” the director continued, “when was the last time you slept?” Dylan looked at the old man’s grey eyes, but didn't answer. “How long, Dylan?”

  “I don’t remember,” he confessed.

  “Is it weeks? Months?” Dylan felt ashamed, and he hated the feeling. He'd done his best to ignore his feelings for years. It was as if he'd chosen not to care about anything. The only thing he cared about was fighting and ending werewolves.

  “You need to sleep,” the director suggested. “It’s a healthy and human thing to do.” But Dylan wasn’t human, he was a vampire. He didn’t need to sleep. “I want you to eat something that isn’t blood.”

  “With all due respect, sir, I think I can do whatever I feel like doing,” he stated.

  Lucius didn't seem bothered by his tone. He nodded and smiled as if trying to understand a child. “I’m worried about you, Dylan,” he told him. “I worry about your habits and about your attitude.” Dylan listened, struggling to stay seated. “And you’re right, you can do whatever you want as long as you don’t hurt anyone, that has always been the rule.”

  When he heard it, Dylan began a defense no one had asked for. “Look, I didn’t hurt anyone, sir. That man was in the way of-” Dylan had to stop when Lucius raised a hand to quiet him.

  “Tell me,” Dylan could almost predict what the director would say next. It wasn't the first time he mentioned it and he had a feeling this would be the last. “When was the last time you had a partner?”

  “I told you, I don’t need a partner,” Dylan exhaled, tired to have to answer the question again. “I know what I’m doing, sir. I don’t need any help, I-”