Dead Push (Kiera Hudson Series Two#7) Page 19
“I like the sound of that,” Nik said with a happy smile.
Chapter Thirty
Potter
I heard another blast of gunfire. Pushing Sparky’s corpse off me, I raced to the front of the station. Through the glass doors, I peered out into the night. Kiera screamed again, and I saw her run from the cycle shed. Another spray of gunfire, and bullets whizzed all around Kiera as she desperately tried to make her escape. Taking a step backwards, I then launched myself through the glass front doors of the station. Shards of glass showered up into the night sky and glinted like ice. I landed on the ground, my wings out, claws raised. I brandished my fangs as I scanned the darkness for whoever was trying to shoot Kiera.
Clack! Clack! Clack!
Another scream from Kiera, this time from the rear of the station. With my wings pointed out behind me, I shot into the air and soared over the roof of the station. I could see Kiera running across the fields back towards where we had left the cars. Swooping out of the sky, I took hold of her around the waist.
She screamed again – this time with surprise.
“Hold tight,” I whispered into her ear, launching myself back into the night sky with Kiera in my arms.
Clack! Clack! Clack!
Bullets screamed past us as I corkscrewed through the air. Glancing back at the ground, I tried to get a look at the gunman, but I couldn’t see him. I would get Kiera to safety then come back in search of him. Kiera tightened her arms about me as I raced through the air, my wings rippling on either side of me. She pressed her face against my chest and I glanced down at her to make sure she was okay. She looked up into my eyes, and they were bright. I didn’t know if they shone so brightly with fear or excitement. Her long, black hair billowed out behind her in the wind. Kiera looked beautiful, and in a strange way, it was kinda like falling in love with her all over again.
Soaring over the hills, the cold night air pulling at us, I swooped down and towards the hidden dirt track where Kiera and Sparky had left their cars. I wanted Kiera to get as far away from here as quickly as possible. With my feet touching the ground, I slowly lifted Kiera out of my arms. She stood and held onto me.
Looking up into my face, she whispered, “So it is true, there are winged creatures. You’re one of them.”
So are you, I desperately wanted to say. I couldn’t – I had done too much – changed too much already. I had stopped Kiera from getting shot and killed tonight. How much that would change, I didn’t know, and at this point in time, I didn’t much care. Kiera was safe, and that’s all that mattered to me.
Still in my arms, she reached out and tentatively touched one of my tatty-looking wings with her fingertips. “They’re beautiful,” she whispered as if waking from a dream.
“Kiera…” I started.
“Shhh,” she said, placing her lips over mine.
Her lips felt warm and soft. She pulled me close, and I felt her against me. Kiera’s kiss became more passionate. I tried to ease myself from her, but she snaked one hand around the nape of my neck and kissed me harder. Her tongue slipped into my mouth, and my heart raced. I closed my eyes, then opened them almost at once. There was something wrong. The underside of Kiera’s tongue was covered in silky fine hair.
I pushed her back from me. I looked into her eyes and they were ablaze with orange light. It looked as if there was a fire raging inside her skull. “Kiera…?” I whispered, looking at her.
“Yes,” she smiled.
Then thinking of how I’d been deceived by female wolves before, I said, “You can’t be Kiera. This is a trick… you’ve got to be… Lilly!” I hissed.
“Who’s Lilly?” Kiera said, tilting her head to one side and staring at me with her bright yellow eyes. “Not another woman?”
“What other woman?” I mumbled, trying to play catch-up. If this was another one of Seth’s mind-fucks, he was dead.
“I knew there were others,” Kiera said. “But that’s not why I killed you.”
“Killed me…?” I breathed, looking at her. “Kiera, what are you talking about?”
“I had to prove that I wasn’t the other Kiera,” she smiled, her long, black hair seeming to grow thicker somehow as it blew in the wind.
“Prove what to who?” This had to be a Jack Seth mind-fuck. “Am I being punked here, or what? What are you talking about, Kiera?” Had she lost her fucking mind?
“The Wolf Man told me that if I still wanted to hunt with the wolves – to be one of them – I had to prove I wasn’t the Dead Angel the wolves feared was going to come and destroy them. The Wolf Man said I had the same name as her – that I was identical to her – that he was going to kill me. I begged for my life. But how could I prove that I wasn’t this other Kiera Hudson the Wolf Man spoke of? So he asked me to kill my lover – to kill you, Potter. He said the real Kiera Hudson would give up her own life to save yours.”
“So you killed me – you killed the other Potter,” I said, the pieces of the puzzle clanking together like a boxful of spanners in my mind.
“I ripped his fucking face off and ate his heart while the Wolf Man watched,” Kiera said, a sly smile playing on her red lips. “Only then did he believe that I wasn’t the Kiera Hudson – the Dead Angel – he was waiting for.
“But you’re half Vampyrus… you have wings like me, Kiera,” I said, my heart feeling like she had just ripped it from my chest. But in my heart, which now felt so heavy, I knew she was also half wolf. In this pushed world, Kiera was more wolf than Vampyrus. Lilly and the little girl had been right – this wasn’t my Kiera. She looked like her – sounded like her – but she wasn’t her. I started to walk backwards, putting some distance between us.
“So those lumps are wings then?” Kiera asked, looking revolted by the idea. “That’s what the Wolf Man thought when he saw them. And even though I had killed my lover in front of him, the Wolf Man once again started to believe that I was really this Dead Angel, he so feared. And just when I thought he might kill me once and for all, you showed up in my apartment and I realised I had another chance to prove that I was truly a wolf and have no love for you.”
No sooner had the last of her words passed over her lips Kiera had sprung into the air. As she leapt towards me, her body changed into the form of a giant black wolf. Kiera’s body was now long and sleek, her face wolf-like and pointed with a vicious-looking snout. The black fur that now covered her body glistened in the moonlight.
“No, Kiera!” I roared, leaping out of her way.
She hit the ground, her long, bushy black tail whipping to and fro as she turned to face me again.
“Don’t make me kill you, Kiera,” I said, tears standing in my eyes.
“You won’t kill me,” she snarled. “You can’t kill me because you love me. The Wolf Man was right. The love you and this other Kiera Hudson have for each other will be what kills you.”
Kiera bounded towards me, and swiping one giant claw through the air, she cut four jagged tears across my chest. I pushed her back and cried out in pain.
“Don’t listen to this Wolf Man,” I tried to reason with her. “He isn’t who or what you think he is.”
Kiera leapt at me again, her eyes bright and full of rage. I rolled back my fist and punched her straight in the snout. Yelping and howling, she flew backwards into the side of her little red Mini. Scrambling onto all fours, Kiera looked back at me as she leapt onto the roof of the car. “He told me to bring you up here tonight and kill you. If I did that, then I would be free.”
“He doesn’t have the faintest fucking idea what true freedom is!” I roared at her. To see Kiera like this was agony. “He isn’t a wolf. He’s a Vampyrus like me, and he wants to rule you. He wants to rule everyone. That isn’t freedom.”
“Liar!” she howled, leaping from the car at me.
I dropped, and raising my claws into the air, I dragged them down the side of her body. I could of driven my claws deep inside her – killed her – but I couldn’t. I didn’t have it in me to
kill Kiera. I knew there would be good inside of her. There had to be – she was Kiera Hudson.
“Kiera, listen to me,” I shouted, as she rolled over in the dirt. She was panting heavily now as blood gushed from her side, matting her black fur together. “The Wolf Man is called Luke Bishop or Elias Munn… he has many names and faces… but one thing for sure is that he will kill you.”
“Why?” she snarled.
“Because the other Kiera Hudson… the Kiera I love… she won’t ever give up the fight. She won’t ever be beaten. And somewhere deep inside of you, you are the same. Bishop will see that in you, and he will destroy you, Kiera.”
She rose up on her haunches before me, her eyes locked with mine.
“Please, Kiera, you don’t have to do this… you’re breaking my heart,” I whispered.
I looked into her eyes, and the brightness seemed to fade. It was like something I had said had made a connection with her.
“You don’t have to be like the other wolves, Kiera,” I breathed, sensing that the fight had gone out of her. “You might not be the Kiera Hudson I fell in love with, but you are the same. I know it.”
Kiera lowered her claws and looked at me.
She opened her jaws to say something…
Clack! Clack! Clack!
Kiera jerked forward and I caught her in my arms. She howled in pain as she started to change. The soft black hair that had covered her body fell away, revealing the real Kiera hidden beneath. Her hazel eyes were open as she looked blankly up into my face. I cradled her in my arms and held her tight, and it was then I saw the circular red bullet hole in her forehead. A line of thick, black blood trickled from it and down onto her cheek. It looked like she was crying tears of blood.
“Kiera,” I cried, holding her lifeless body to my chest.
A shadow fell over us. I looked up to see a hooded figure standing before me. In one hand was a gun, and in the other there was a camera.
“You shot her!” I cried. “You killed her!”
Slowly, the photographer pulled back the hood.
“No!” I gasped, seeing the photographer’s face. “Why did you have to kill Kiera?”
“To save your life, Potter,” the photographer said.
Dead Lost
(Kiera Hudson Series Two)
Book 8
Coming Soon!
‘Vampire Seeker’ (Samantha Carter Series) Book 1
Now signed with a major publisher.
Released 15th August 2013
Pre-order your copy now!
Amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/Vampire-Seeker-Samantha-Carter-ebook/dp/B00DI7HOWY/ref=la_B004RQ06AW_1_23_title_1_kin?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1375603772&sr=1-23
Amazon.co.uk: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Vampire-Seeker-Samantha-Carter-ebook/dp/B00DI7HOWY/ref=la_B004RQ06AW_1_22_bnp_1_kin?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1375603568&sr=1-22
Also available by Tim O’Rourke
‘Vampire Shift’ (Kiera Hudson Series One Book 1)
‘Vampire Wake’ (Kiera Hudson Series One Book 2)
‘Vampire Hunt’ (Kiera Hudson Series One Book 3)
‘Vampire Breed’ Kiera Hudson Series One Book 4)
‘Wolf House’ (Kiera Hudson Series One Book 4.5)
‘Vampire Hollows’ (Kiera Hudson Series One Book 5)
‘Dead Flesh’ (Kiera Hudson Series Two Book 1)
‘Dead Night’ (Kiera Hudson Series Two Book 1.5)
‘Dead Angels’ (Kiera Hudson Series Two Book 2)
‘Dead Statues’ (Kiera Hudson Series Two Book 3)
‘Dead Seth’ (Kiera Hudson Series Two Book 4)
‘Dead Wolf’ (Kiera Hudson Series Two Book 5)
‘Black Hill Farm’ (Book 1)
‘Black Hill Farm: Andy’s Diary’ (Book 1)
‘Doorways’ (The Doorways Trilogy Book 1)
‘The League of Doorways’ (The Doorways Trilogy Book 2)
‘Vampire Seeker’ (Samantha Carter Series Book 1)
‘Moonlight’ (The Moon Trilogy Book 1)
‘Moonbeam’ (The Moon Trilogy Book 2)
‘Witch’ (A Sydney Hart novel) Book 1
‘Yellow’ (A Sydney Hart Novel) Book 2
You can contact Tim O’Rourke at
www.kierahudson.com Or by email at kierahudson91@aol.com