this was more like it, mr. x thought as he humped an unconscious civilian vampire up onto his shoulder. he carried the male quickly through the alley, opened the back of the mini-van, and laid his prey down like a sack of potatoes. he was careful to tuck a black wool blanket over his cargo.

he knew his procurement system would work, and upgrading the strength of the tranquilizer from demosedan to acepromazine had made the difference. his instinct of using horse tranqs instead of sedatives calibrated for humans had been correct. the vampire had still required two darts of the acepro before he went down.

mr. x looked over his shoulder before getting behind the wheel. the prostitute he'd killed was lying across a storm drain, her heroin-saturated blood seeping into the sewage system. the dear girl had even helped him with the needle. of course, she hadn't been expecting 100 percent pure h.

or having enough of it pumped into her vein to put a moose into a deep nod.

the police would find her by morning, but he'd been very neat, just like before. latex gloves. hat pulled down over his hair. densely woven nylon clothes that should leave no fibers.

and god knew, she hadn't struggled at all.

mr. x calmly started the engine and eased out onto trade street.

a fine shine of anticipatory sweat broke out above his upper lip. the arousal, all the adrenaline pumping through him, made him miss the days when he could still have sex.

even if the vampire had no information to give, the rest of the evening was going to be enjoyable

he'd start with the hammer, he thought.

no, the dental drill would be better. under the fingernails.

that should wake the male right up. after all, there was no sense torturing the unconscious. like kicking a corpse, that would just be an aerobic workout, and even then, only a mild one. he should know.

considering what he'd done to his father's body when he'd found it.

from the back he heard a flopping sound. he glanced over his shoulder. the vampire was moving under the blanket.

good. he was alive.

mr. x looked back out to the road and frowned. leaning forward in his seat, he gripped the wheel.

up ahead, there was the flare of brake lights.

cars were stopped in a line. a bunch of orange cones were set out. and blue and white flashes announced a police presence.

an accident?

no. a roadblock. two cops with flashlights looking into cars. a sign that read, intoxication checkpoint.

mr. x hit his brakes. he reached into his black bag, took out the dart gun, and fired another two into the vampire to keep the noise down. with the windows darkened and the black blanket as cover, they had a shot at making it through. as long as the male didn't move.

when it was mr. x's turn, he put the window down as the cop approached. the man's flashlight hit the dashboard, casting a glow.

"evening, officer." mr. x assumed a pleasant expression.

"you been drinking tonight, sir?" the cop was your basic middle-aged nobody. doughy around the middle. fuzzy mustache that needed a better trim job. gray hair poofing out from under his hat like a weed. he had all the aspects of a sheepdog except for the flea collar and the tail.

"no, officer, i have not."

"hey, i know you."

"do you?" mr. x smiled more broadly while eyeing the man's throat. frustration made him think of the knife he had in the car door. he reached down and ran his finger over the handle, soothing himself.

"yeah, you teach jujitsu to my son." when the cop leaned back, his flashlight swung to the side, hitting the black bag in the passenger seat. "darryl, come meet phillie's sensei."

while the other cop ambled over, mr. x checked to make sure the bag was zipped up. no sense flashing the dart gun or the nine-millimeter glock he had inside of it.

for a good five minutes, he made nice-nice with the boys in blue while fantasizing about the ways he could shut them up.

when he finally put the minivan in gear, he discovered the knife was in his hand and almost in his lap.

he had some serious aggression to work off.

wrath stared hard at the blurry contours of the single-story commercial building. for the past two hours, he and rhage had been watching the caldwell martial arts academy, waiting to see if it got any nocturnal action. the facility was located at the far end of a strip mall, on the edge of a stretch of woods. rhage, who had cased the place the night before, estimated it was about twenty thousand square feet in size.

plenty big enough to be a center for the lessers.

the parking lot ran down the front of the academy, and there were about ten to fifteen spaces on one side. there were two entrances. double glass doors in front. side ingress with no window. from their vantage point in the woods, they could see both the empty lot and the ways in and out of the building.

the other sites had been dead ends. the gold's gym hadn't yielded anything other than a revolving membership of steak-heads. it closed at midnight, opened at five a.m., and had been quiet for the past couple of nights. the paintball arena was the same, just an empty building from the moment it closed its doors. the best bets were the two academies, and vishous and the twins were across town at the other one.

although lessers could go out in the day, they did their hunting at night because that was when their targets moved around. as dawn got close, the society's recruitment and training centers were often used as places to congregate, but not always. also, because the lessers shifted locales frequently, one spot could be hot for a month or a season or a year and then be deserted.

as darius had been dead for only a few days, wrath was hoping the society hadn't moved on yet.

he felt for his watch. "damn it, it's almost three."

rhage shifted against the tree he was behind. "so i guess tohr isn't showing up tonight."

wrath shrugged, hoping like hell the subject would get dropped.

it didn't.

"that's not like him." rhage paused. "but you're not surprised."

"no, i'm not."

"why?"

wrath cracked his knuckles. "i took a piece out of him. when i shouldn't have."

"i'm not gonna ask."

"wise of you." and then for some absurd reason, he tacked on, "i need to apologize to him."

"that'll be a surprise."

"am i that awful?"

"no," rhage said without his usual bravado. "you're just not wrong that often."

candor was a surprise coming from hollywood.

"well, i sure as hell did a number on tohr."

rhage clapped him on the back. "lemme tell you, as someone who offends folks regularly, there ain't much that can't be fixed."

"i brought wellsie into it."

"not a good idea."

"and how he feels about her."

"shit."

"yeah. pretty much."

"why?"

"because i..."

because he'd felt like an idiot trying to pull off even a sliver of what tohrment had managed to do so successfully for two centuries. in spite of tohr's calling as a warrior, he'd sustained a relationship with a female of worth. and it was a good, strong, loving union. he was the only one of the brothers who'd been able to do that.

wrath thought about beth. pictured her coming up to him, asking him to stay.

man, he was desperate to find her in his bed when he got home. and not because he wanted to take her. it was because then he could sleep beside her. rest a little, knowing that she was safe and with him.

ah, hell. he had a terrible feeling he was going to have to stick around that female. for a while.

"because?" rhage prompted.

wrath's nose tingled. a faint whiff of sweetness, like baby powder, floated by on the breeze.

"get out your welcome mat," he said, opening his jacket.

"how many?" rhage asked, pivoting around.

the sounds of sticks snapping and leaves rustling softly broke the night. got louder.

"three. at least."

"yee-haw."

the lessers were coming straight at them, through a clearing in the woods. they were loud, talking and walking without care, until one of them stopped. the other two pulled up, shut up.

"evening, boys," rhage said, sauntering out into the open.

wrath took the stealth approach. as the lessers circled his brother, crouching, drawing knives, wrath skirted around the edge of the trees.

then he reached out of the shadows and plucked one of the lessers off the ground, starting the fight. he slit its throat, but there was no time to polish off the kill. rhage had engaged two, but the third was about to nail the brother in the head with a baseball bat.

wrath fell upon the undead sammy sousa, taking it down to the ground and stabbing it in the throat. juicy, strangled noises bubbled up into the air. wrath looked around, in case there were more or his brother needed help.

rhage was doing just fine.

even to wrath's poor eyesight, the warrior was a thing of beauty when he fought. all fists and kicks. rapid motion. animal reflexes. power and endurance. he was a master of hand-to-hand combat, and the lessers hit the ground again and again, the length of time it took them to get up growing longer and longer.

wrath went back to the first lesser and knelt over the body. it writhed as he went through its pockets and took all the id he could find.

he was about to stab it in the chest when he heard a shotgun go off.