Read Online Necromancing Nim by Katriena Knights - Free Book Online

more annoyed than threatened. “Fuck off, Russian Asshole.” His words confirmed my suspicions—the Russian guy was speaking through Therese somehow. Damn. Vampires weren’t supposed to be able to do shit like that, were they?
    “Then you have chosen?” Therese asked, still in the vaguely Russian intonations.
    “Yeah, pretty much.”
    “Then you shall face the consequences.”
    “Scary,” said Colin, but before he could finish mocking her a second time, her eyes rolled up and she folded forward onto the table. Her head made a disconcerting clunk as it struck the Formica.
    “Colin…” I started, but he didn’t hear me. Firstly, because I was too freaked out to produce any actual sound. Secondly, because the being formerly known as Therese Wilkins straightened suddenly, bared her teeth and growled.
    She came out of her chair, hands lifted into claws like something out of every cheesy vampire movie I’d ever seen. But her eyes were empty and dead, and she came after Colin—or possibly Sebastian—with a surety of purpose that made me certain she was going to rip his face off and eat it. I couldn’t tell if she was still under the Russian’s control or if this was the raw, primal form of what she’d been transformed into.
    But before she could take more than a step, Colin flung himself across the short distance, feet barely touching the table on his way over it, coat billowing behind him like wings. Or maybe a cape, like Batman.
    Or at least that’s what I thought happened. It happened so quickly my eyes couldn’t interpret the blur of black until everything was over. What I was able to register at the time was Colin’s hands closing hard on Therese’s neck, then a sick, horrific crunching sound as he wrenched her head sideways into an angle as dead as her eyes.
    I stared, wide-eyed, and took a step back before the shock froze me immobile.
    Bob growled and suddenly was on top of Colin, a long, silver blade flashing in his hand. Again, Colin moved in an impenetrable blur. The big knife flashed again, and Bob’s head flew across the room and struck the front of the old white Frigidaire in the corner.
    A strange crackle and snap and a movement just on the edge of my vision pulled my attention back to Therese.
    She’d struggled to her hands and knees, her head still twisted sideways. As I watched, continuing to be completely useless, she wrenched it forward with her hands. The sound was sickly, like tearing off a turkey leg. Once she’d realigned her anatomy, her still-dead eyes semi-focused on Colin.
    She was going to kill him. I don’t know how I knew that, but I did. And as many times as I’d faced vamps intent on my own destruction and handled it just fine, thank you very much, knowing this freakish, zombie-like creature was hell-bent on offing my boss shut down my brain.
    I squeaked. It was all I could manage, and it was enough. Colin turned and saw the threat half crawling toward him, teeth bared, face white, eyes dead.
    Colin gave Sebastian, who was closer, a split-second’s glance, nothing more. In another black and shiny blur, the knife flew from Colin’s hand to land perfectly in Sebastian’s, and flashed.
    I almost saw the blade move; I definitely saw Therese’s head fly, flip, then roll to land on the floor next to Bob’s. Bob’s had already begun to shrink, the skin pulling paper-white against the sharp edges of his cheekbones. Older than he appeared, then, but these days who wasn’t? Neither of the vamps had bled much, surprisingly, but I was grateful for it.
    I closed my eyes a moment, then took a long breath. “Well. So much for sorting things out with Bob.”
    Colin shrugged. “I’d say it’s pretty damn sorted.” He pulled open the creaky-looking Frigidaire and glanced over the bags of blood inside, all carefully labeled, sitting in neat rows. I’m not sure why the sight of them shocked me—I mean, the blood shots have to get filled from somewhere, right? But the sight of all