Club Dead

head snapped up and his eyes blazed at me. A terrible hope shone on his filthy face. I held up a finger; I stepped quietly over to the open door to the dormitory, and gently, gently, slid it almost shut. Then I glided behind him, looking down at the chains. There were two small padlocks, like the ones you put on your locker at school, holding the chains together. “Key?” I breathed in Bill’s ear. He had an unbroken finger, and that was the one he used to point at the door I’d come in by. Two keys hung on a nail by the door, quite high from the floor, and always in Bill’s sight. Of course they’d think of that. I put the blanket and stake on the floor by Bill’s feet. I crept across the stained floor, and reached up as far as I could strain. I couldn’t reach the keys. A vampire who could float would be able to get them. I reminded myself I was strong, strong from Eric’s blood.
    There was a shelf on the wall that held interesting things like pokers and pincers. Pincers! I stood on my tiptoes and lifted them off the shelf, trying hard to keep my gorge from rising when I saw they were crusted with—oh, horrible stuff. I held them up, and they were very heavy, but I managed to clamp them on the keys, work them forward off the nail, and lower the pincers until I could take the keys from their pointed ends. I exhaled a giant sigh of relief, as silently as you can exhale. That hadn’t been so hard.
    In fact, that was the last easy thing I encountered. I began the horrible task of unwrapping Bill, while trying to keep the movement of the chains as silent as I could. It was oddly difficult to unwind the shiny rope of links. In fact, they seemed to be sticking to Bill, whose whole body was rigid with tension.
    Then I understood. He was trying not to scream out loud as the chains were pulled out of his charred flesh. My stomach lurched. I had to stop my task for a few precious seconds, and I had to inhale very carefully. If it was this hard for me to witness his agony, how much harder must it be for Bill to endure it?
    I braced up my mental fortitude, and I began working again. My grandmother always told me women could do whatever they had to do, and once again, she was right.
    There were literally yards of silver chain, and the careful unwinding took more time than I liked. Any time was more time than I liked. The danger lurked right over my shoulder. I was breathing disaster, in and out, with every breath. Bill was very weak, and struggling to stay awake now that the sun had risen. It helped that the day was so dark, but he would not be able to move much when the sun was high, no matter how dreary the day.
    The last bit of chain slid to the floor.
    “You have to stand up,” I said in Bill’s ear. “You just have to. I know it hurts. But I can’t carry you.” At least, I didn’t think I could. “There’s a big Lincoln outside, and the trunk is open. I’m putting you in the trunk, wrapped in this blanket, and we’re driving out of here. Understand, babe?”
    Bill’s dark head moved a fraction of an inch.
    Right then our luck ran out.
    “Who the hell are you?” asked a heavily accented voice. Someone had come through the door at my back
    Bill flinched under my hands. I whirled to face her, dipping to pick up the stake as I did so, and then she was on me.
    I had talked myself into believing they were all in their coffins for the day, but this one was doing her best to kill me.
    I would have been dead in a minute if she hadn’t been as shocked as I was. I twisted my arm from her grasp and pivoted around Bill in his chair. Her fangs were all out, and she was snarling at me over Bill’s head. She was a blond, like me, but her eyes were brown and her build was smaller; she was a tiny woman. She had dried blood on her hands, and I knew it was Bill’s. A flame started up inside me. I could feel it flicker through my eyes.
    “You must be his little human bitch whore,” she said. “He was fucking me, all this time, you understand. The minute he saw me, he forgot about you, except for pity.”
    Well, Lorena wasn’t elegant, but she knew where to sink the verbal knife. I batted the words aside, because she wanted to distract me. I shifted my grip on the stake to be ready, and she leaped across Bill to land on top of me.
    As she moved, without a conscious decision I whipped up the stake and pointed it at an angle. As she came down on me, the sharp point went in her chest and out the other side. Then we