Kiera Hudson & The Lethal Infected (5 page)

“Why not?” I asked.

“Perhaps it was because she was human? Perhaps there was something more to it? I can’t be sure,” Murphy said. “But it was a shame Kayla went, because just like her dopey brother, she was good in a fight. Vicious little fucker when she wanted to be. I could tell she got a real kick out of having a good scrap.”

As Murphy spoke of Kayla, I couldn’t help but remember how Kayla’s eyes would light up with a feverish excitement the moment she realised there was going to be some imminent bloodletting. But where were they now? And why wouldn’t Murphy tell me? Did he even know? There was a lot that Murphy didn’t seem to know or remember.

Then looking at him, I said, “Do you feel the same connection with me?”

“From the moment I laid eyes on you, Kiera Hudson,” he said. “The moment I saw you punch Potter right in his arrogant face, I knew we would become the best of friends.”

Then, reaching into my coat pocket, I closed my fist around Murphy’s crucifix. The one he had given to me before boarding that train. The crucifix that had somehow been
pushed
with me. Opening my fist, and not knowing whether I was doing the right thing or not, I let him see the crucifix.

“Was me punching Potter in the face the only reason you think there is a connection between us?” I asked.

As if he hadn’t heard a single word of what I’d just said, Murphy slowly got up from his chair, his eyes fixed rigid on the tiny cross I held in my open hand.

“Where did you find that?” he breathed in wonder.

“Is it yours?” I whispered.

He inched his way toward me, eyes not leaving the cross for the briefest of moments. “Yes, it’s mine,” he said, reaching out and closing his fist around it. I held his hand. I didn’t want to let it go. His skin felt ice cold.

Slowly, he slid his hand from mine and uncurled his fingers. Murphy looked down at the crucifix he now held.

“Are you sure it’s yours?” I asked.

“Positive,” he said.

“Do you remember it?” I asked, hoping that it might spark some memory inside of him. Were my actions dangerous? Could they destroy everything I had hoped to protect? Possibly. But it was a risk I had to take. I wanted Murphy to remember me. In my heart there was a sudden ache that wanted everything to go back to how it had once been before – however bad that had been.

“Yes, I remember,” he said, closing his fist around the crucifix again and placing it into his pocket.

“Remember what, exactly?” I asked.

“Losing it in the office a week or so ago,” he said. “Where did you find it?” He went back to his seat, picking up his pipe and mug of stale milky-tea.

“Under the desk,” I lied, when all I wanted to do was scream at him to remember the truth.

Unable to bear it any longer, I got up from my chair and went to the door. “I’ll see you when Potter gets back,” I said over my shoulder, pulling open the door.

“So what do you remember, Kiera?” I heard Murphy ask before I’d had a chance to step outside. 

Strangling the urge to tell him everything, I glanced back and forcing a smile I said, “Only that it’s my birthday today.”

“Sorry, I didn’t know,” he said getting up. “Happy birthday. Have you anything nice planned?”

“I’m going out this evening to some restaurant with a friend,” I said.

“Which one?” he asked.

“It’s called the Light House.”

“I wasn’t talking about the restaurant,” he said. “Which friend?”

“You wouldn’t know him,” I said.

“Is he a human?”

“Yes,” I nodded.

“Be careful, Kiera,” Murphy warned, just like he used to when offering me some type of fatherly advice. God, I missed that. “Humans and Vampyrus shouldn’t mix. The agency might not like it. Don’t go looking for trouble.”

“One thing I do remember,” I said, “is that trouble comes looking for me.”

Without saying another word, I closed the office door behind me, and headed down the steps to my car.

Chapter Nine

I drove through the town. I didn’t want to go back to my room yet. It was still only early afternoon. I was hungry and my head thumped with everything I had learned from Murphy. But how much had I really learnt? It seemed that I had more answers than he did. My intention had been for my friends to be
pushed
back so they could be happy together with those they loved. Instead, it seemed that they had all been displaced in some way. The only sense that I could make of it was that these were not my friends; that I had come back into a different layer – different from the one my true friends had been sent to. I hoped that, but in another way I didn’t. Even though Murphy had told me very little, I knew at least Kayla and Isidor were both in this world. But where were they? If I could find them, perhaps they would know more. Murphy had hinted that Kayla hadn’t liked Sophie. Why had that been? Had Kayla sensed that something wasn’t quite right and had gone looking for answers with Isidor? I would never know unless I found them. There was only one person that might know the answer to that question.

Finding a parking spot on the main high street, I pulled over at the kerb and killed the engine. Taking my phone from my pocket, I went to my contacts list. I had three numbers now: Potter, Lois Li, and Nev. I pressed Lois Li’s number with my thumb. There was no dialling tone. All I could hear was a faint clicking, which was followed with the same automated voice I had heard before.

“The Agency is now closed. Please try again later. Sorry for any inconvenience caused,” the voice said.

I ended the call, stuffing the phone back into my pocket. “What’s the point of adding the number to my contact list if you never answer the goddamn phone,” I hissed.

Looking through the windshield I could see that I had pulled up outside a small bakery. Climbing from my car, I went inside and bought myself a sandwich. The weather was warm, so taking off my coat and throwing it over my arm, I meandered through the narrow, cobbled streets checking out the shops while I ate my sandwich. Holiday makers passed me by on the streets, eating ice cream and cooling themselves with cold drinks. Again, I couldn’t help but wonder how different the Ragged Cove appeared in this
where
and
when
. It all seemed too good to be true. And perhaps it was. For I knew that only a few streets away stood the offices of The Creeping Men – a secret agency which enlisted the help of supernatural creatures like me to hunt down other creatures that didn’t want to play by the rules. They wanted to kill the humans they secretly lived amongst. Was that why the agency seemed so opposed to Vampyrus and human mixing. I had always known it to be forbidden, but that had been the laws set down by the Elders, and they were gone now. I had destroyed them. Perhaps the rules weren’t so stringently adhered to in this new world. Potter was mixing it up with Sophie. Perhaps I should pray the agency tighten up the rules – and quick – before Potter and Sophie got married. Perhaps their marriage wouldn’t go ahead, perhaps this Lois Li would put a stop to it? Perhaps that’s how Potter and I end up back together. Perhaps that’s how we get married and have a daughter just like Jack said we did…

…perhaps that was all just a dream, Kiera…

Perhaps I should just be content with my lot. Couldn’t things be worse? I knew that they could be. I had lived through a lot worse. How bad were things anyhow? I had come back to a place I knew. A place that was better than I had known it before. My friends – of sorts – were here and I was working alongside them once more. Maybe Kayla and Isidor would come back from wherever they have gone. They might not remember me, but I certainly remembered them and would never forget. Perhaps then, like I had decided not to go looking for my parents in this new world and be content with the happy memories I had of them, I should do the same with my friends. Treasure for always in my heart how I once knew them to be, and embrace the new friendships they had offered. After all, wasn’t this what I had wanted? Hadn’t all of this been my choice in some way or another? Shouldn’t I just accept my lot? It was my birthday after all. A new year and new start for me. Perhaps for the first time in my life I shouldn’t go looking for answers, I should just
see
things as they first appear to be.

But even as I headed toward a shop where a dress that hung in the window had caught my eye, I knew that it wasn’t in my nature not to go searching for the truth – however dangerous the truth might be.

“I won’t let you leave the shop without it,” the assistant said. “The dress looks beautiful – you look beautiful.” She almost seemed to dance about me as she gently tugged at the straps over my pale shoulders, then leaning down to ruffle the hem. “The dark blue really compliments the colour of your hair. Are they highlights, dear?”

“No, the colour is natural,” I smiled.

“Really?” the woman frowned, then smiled, like she didn’t know if I was teasing her or not. “I’ve never known anyone to have natural blue hair before.”

“It’s a genetic thing,” I smiled back at her.

“Of course it is, dear,” she said, preening the dress again, then turning me around so I could see myself in the full-length mirror attached to the shop wall.

I stood and looked at myself. It was the first time I had seen myself in a dress for as long as I could remember. It was a dark navy in colour, with straps over the shoulder. It was cut fairly low over the chest, but not too low. The dress stopped just above my knees. I had taken off my boots and was standing barefoot. I thought that the heels I had arrived wearing in this world would match the dress perfectly. 

“I wish I had your figure,” the woman smiled at me over my shoulder and patting her hips. She turned me around again and took another look.

“I’m not sure,” I said. It wasn’t that I didn’t think the dress was pretty, it just felt a little odd wearing it. For so long now I had hiked about in boots, denims, and my long black coat, that anything else made me feel as if I was wearing an unfamiliar skin.

“Not sure!” the woman cried, throwing her hands to her face. “You look astonishing!”

I couldn’t help but think the term
astonishing
was somewhat melodramatic, but the woman was just trying to be kind and make a sale.

“Okay, I’ll take it,” I smiled, a bubble of excitement bursting inside of me. I couldn’t remember the last time I had treated myself to anything. It felt good. 

“What’s the special occasion?” the woman asked.

“It’s my birthday today,” I smiled. “I’m twenty-one.”

“Twenty-one!” the woman cried, somewhat over the top. “My twenty-first birthday seems like just a distant memory now. Married and divorced twice in that time. They were both pigs. But I’m happy now. Got me a toy-boy.” She winked back at me. “Going anywhere nice in your new dress?”

“Just out for dinner,” I told her.

“With your boyfriend?” she smiled knowingly.

“He’s not my boyfriend,” I smiled back.

“He will be once he sees you in that dress, dear,” she said, ushering me back toward the changing room. “Any man would be a fool not to see how beautiful you look wearing that dress.”

Perhaps I should wear it in the office when Potter returns
, I thought to myself, closing the door on the changing room.

I parked outside the Crescent Moon Inn and fetched my shopping bags from the backseat. After leaving the shop with the dress, I went a little mad. And why not? The agency had kindly donated a credit card to me, and if I was going to stay in this
where
and
when
for a while I would need some new clothes, underwear, and other little luxuries, like some new perfume. It was my birthday after all, I smiled, heading into the inn. I looked about but I could only see one other person – a pretty looking woman sitting alone in one corner writing in a notebook. She wore a short-sleeved dress and I could see a black tattoo in the design of a flower at the top of her right arm.

“Good evening,” someone said.

I looked up to see a stranger behind the bar. The man was huge with a mop of unruly curls for hair. His complexion was ruddy and he wore a red checked shirt. The sleeves were rolled up to his elbows, showing off his powerful looking forearms. He stood and cleaned some wine glasses with a white cloth.

“Where’s Phebe and Uri?” I asked, heading for the stairs that would lead up to the landing and my room.

“They’ve had to go away tonight,” he said. “They asked me to stand in for them. My name is Jeremey.”

“Hey, Jeremey,” I smiled, wondering if he too was someone from the Agency I had yet to meet. Was he just a temp or
something
more?

“If there’s anything you need, just holler,” he said.

“Thank you,” I said, turning my back and heading up the stairs.

I stopped outside my room, and balancing my shopping bags on one arm, I fished around in my coat pocket for the key to my room. It was then I realised I needn’t have bothered. My door was already open. With the tip of my boot, I eased it open and stepped cautiously inside.

“Hello?” I called out. I could see at once that my room was empty. Placing my bags down, I closed the door and went to the bathroom. It was empty. Who had been in my room? Someone who had a key – as the lock wasn’t busted and I could see that it hadn’t been forced at all. But why would anyone want to come into my room? I had nothing of value. The sheets hadn’t been changed by either Uri or Phebe as they still lay in a tangled mess at the foot of my bed where I had left them that morning.

It was as I picked up the bags of shopping and carried them toward my bed that I noticed something had been placed on my desk – something that hadn’t been there when I’d left my room that morning. Placing the bags on the bed, I turned back to the desk and picked up the bottle of Lot 13 that had been left for me.