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  VAMPIRE FIRE

  Vampire for Hire #12

  by

  J.R. RAIN

  (First in the Devil’s Triangle Trilogy)

  Acclaim for the novels of J.R. Rain:

  “Be prepared to lose sleep!”

  —James Rollins, bestselling author of Subterranean and The Sixth Extinction

  “I love this!”

  —Piers Anthony, bestselling author of A Spell for Chameleon and Five Portraits

  “J.R. Rain delivers a blend of action and wit that always entertains. Quick with the one-liners, but his characters are fully fleshed out (even the undead ones) and you’ll come back again and again.”

  —Scott Nicholson, bestselling author of The Red Church and After: Whiteout

  “Dark Horse is the best book I’ve read in a long time!”

  —Gemma Halliday, bestselling author of Spying in High Heels and Lethal Bond

  “Moon Dance is absolutely brilliant!”

  —Lisa Tenzin-Dolma, bestselling author of Understanding the Planetary Myths and The Heartbeat at Your Feet

  “Powerful stuff!”

  —Aiden James, bestselling author of Immortal Plague and Witches of Denmark

  “Moon Dance is a must read. If you like Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum, bounty hunter, be prepared to love J.R. Rain’s Samantha Moon, vampire private investigator.”

  —Eve Paludan, bestselling author of Witchy Business and Bigfoot Island

  Other Books by J.R. Rain

  STANDALONE NOVELS

  Robotica (coming soon)

  Mr. Invisible (coming soon)

  The Pure Cold Light in the Sky (coming soon)

  All the Way Back Home (coming soon)

  Little Wolf (coming soon)

  Winter Wind

  Silent Echo

  The Body Departed

  The Grail Quest

  Elvis Has Not Left the Building

  The Lost Ark

  The Worm Returns

  Lavabull

  Jack and the Giants

  Dolfin Tayle

  Dragon Assassin

  The Accidental Superheroine

  Lost Eden

  Judas Silver

  The Vampire Club

  Cursed

  Glimmer

  Bound By Blood

  The Black Fang Betrayal

  VAMPIRE FOR HIRE SERIES

  Moon Dance

  Vampire Moon

  American Vampire

  Moon Child

  Christmas Moon

  Vampire Dawn

  Vampire Games

  Moon Island

  Moon River

  Vampire Sun

  Moon Dragon

  Moon Shadow

  Vampire Fire

  Midnight Moon (coming soon)

  Moon Angel (coming soon)

  SAMANTHA MOON CASE FILES

  Moon Bayou

  Blood Moon (coming soon)

  Moon Magic (coming soon)

  SAMANTHA MOON ORIGINS

  New Moon Rising (coming soon)

  Pale Moon Calling (coming soon)

  JIM KNIGHTHORSE SERIES

  Dark Horse

  The Mummy Case

  Hail Mary

  Clean Slate

  Night Run (coming soon)

  Hold Tight (coming soon)

  THE WITCHES SERIES

  The Witch and the Gentleman

  The Witch and the Englishman

  The Witch and the Huntsman

  The Witch and the Wolfman (coming soon)

  The Witch and the Hangman (coming soon)

  The Witch and the Bogeyman (coming soon)

  THE PSI SERIES

  Hear No Evil

  See No Evil

  Speak No Evil

  Touch No Evil (coming soon)

  Kiss No Evil (coming son)

  Love No Evil (coming soon)

  ALAN QUATERMAIN ADVENTURES

  The Spear (coming soon)

  The Garden (coming soon)

  The Immortals (coming soon)

  The Cross (coming soon)

  SHERLOCK HOLMES MYSTERIES

  The Missing Shakespeare

  The Lost Da Vinci (coming soon)

  DEAD DETECTIVE SERIES

  The Dead Detective

  Deadbeat Dad

  THE ACCIDENTAL SUPERHEROINE

  The Accidental Superheroine

  My Big Fat Accidental Superheroine Wedding

  NICK CAINE SERIES

  Temple of the Jaguar

  Treasure of the Deep

  Pyramid of the Gods

  THE SPINOZA TRILOGY

  The Vampire With the Dragon Tattoo

  The Vampire Who Played Dead

  The Vampire in the Iron Mask

  THE ALADDIN TRILOGY

  Aladdin Relighted

  Aladdin Sins Bad

  Aladdin and the Flying Dutchman

  THE WALKING PLAGUE TRILOGY

  Zombie Patrol

  Zombie Rage

  Zombie Mountain

  THE SPIDER TRILOGY

  Bad Blood

  Spider Web

  Spider Bite

  SHORT STORY SINGLES

  Skeleton Jim

  Moon Love

  The Vampire on the Train

  Vampire Requiem

  Ghosts of Christmas Present

  Easy Rider

  Dark Side of the Moon

  Blue Moon

  Vampire Gold

  Halloween Moon

  Vampire Dreams

  Vampire Blues

  Vampire Nights

  Teeth

  The Bleeder

  COLLECTIONS

  Phantasms (coming soon)

  The Sands of Time

  Red Rain: Over 40 bestselling Stories

  Samantha Moon: The First Eight Short Stories

  Dark Rain: 15 Short Tales

  Blood Rain: 15 Short Tales

  Black Rain: 15 Short Tales

  Vampire Rain and Other Stories

  The Santa Call and Other Stories

  The Bleeder and Other Stories

  Chronology

  Primetime

  Naughty or Nice

  Vampire Fire

  Published by J.R. Rain

  Copyright © 2016 by J.R. Rain

  All rights reserved.

  Ebook Kindle Edition, License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Dedication

  To H.P. Mallory, and five years of friendship.

  Vampire Fire

  “They say hell is real. They say the devil is real, too. I say, we are all devils.”

  —Diary of the Undead

  Chapter One

  “You don’t have an aura,” I said.

  “Nor do you, Samantha Moon.”

  I nodded, and thought: Touché. I thought it because I don’t usually like to say “touché,” mostly because I’m not entirely sure if I’m using it correctly, or what it means, exactly. I also thought about the continuous buzzing in my head, in the space just behind my eardrum. Either a worm was burrowing into my brain, or the man sitting before me had just tripped my inner alarm system. I was betting on the latter.

  His name was Buck Taggart and he was as good-looking as they came. Messy black hair. Smooth forehead that seemed devoid of lines. Powder-blue eyes. A plain white T-shirt, snug jeans, ostrich-hide boots. At least, I hoped they were ostrich. With their pale-yellow hue, they looked disturbingly similar to the rarest of the bound books I’d seen in the Occult Reading Room. Books bound in human skin.

  We were at a Jamba Juice, which was my new passion these days. Drinking smoothies, that is. Tammy, the little vixen, had gotten me hooked on
the blended goodness. Never had I tasted such yummy smoothness before this. Now, I was sucking down a chili mango, replete with a half-dozen boosts—because, why not?—and watching the handsome freak sitting across from me.

  An hour ago, Buck had called me to request a meeting. I’d told him I had a one-hour window before I had to pick up my kids from school. I was fully intending to spend that hour at a local Jamba Juice, and told him that he was welcome to join me there, especially if he liked all things delicious.

  Apparently, he liked all things delicious.

  And yes, I’d chosen Jamba Juice over the last half-hour of Judge Judy, which should prove just... how... much... I... love... these... damned... things.

  He watched me as I drank my smoothie. I watched him watching me drink my smoothie. When he’d sat across from me, he had declined my offer for a smoothie of his own, which was fine by me since I wasn’t entirely sure if I had been offering to buy him one or not. To mask the awkwardness, I had suggested that it was his loss. He had only shrugged. I had noted his narrow shoulders under his T-shirt, shoulders that hinted at some muscle, but not a lot of it. I had also noted the proliferation of tattoos just inside his collar, tattoos that extended down to his elbows. Not a full sleeve, as the kids call it today. A half-sleeve. I let him watch me drink until he gave me a reason to set down my smoothie. So far, there was none. One awesome thing about being me is that brain freezes come and go in a blink of an eye.

  “You are enjoying your smoothie,” he said.

  “More than you know.”

  “Would you call your need for a smoothie an obsession?”

  I thought about that. “Yeah. My new obsession.”

  “Is a smoothie obsession common?” he asked, and, yeah, the question sounded strange to me, too.

  “If not, it should be.”

  He nodded and a hint of a smile touched his thin lips.

  I checked my cell. There was an unread text from Allison. It was going to stay unread for now. Texts from Allison tended to be needy and, well, boring. That is, unless she was off on one of her witchy adventures. Then, shit got real—and got real fast. At present, she wasn’t on a witchy adventure. She was undoubtedly sitting on her couch between psychic hotline phone calls, and bored.

  I said to the man sitting across from me, “I’m picking up my kids soon. I suggest you speak your piece, whatever that means.”

  He nodded once. The gesture opened the collar of his shirt a little more, and I saw a little more of the tattoos. And from what I could see, they were as creepy as hell: horns and fangs and blood and spikes. There were skulls and tombstones.

  “I’m looking for a man,” he said. So far, he hadn’t given me a name, and I wasn’t asking. At least, not until I was done with the smoothie.

  “Now we’re getting somewhere,” I said, coming up for air. No, I didn’t need air to survive. But I needed air to suck.

  “Should I wait until you are finished so that I can have your undivided attention?”

  “Do whatever the hell you want,” I said.

  “Whatever the hell I want. Yes, I kind of like the sound of that.”

  Except I didn’t. And I didn’t like the way his eyes kind of flashed, too. Maybe they had reflected the sun or a passing car’s window, but I was certain they had flashed with an inner fire. Hard to tell in the bright of day.

  I said, “But if you’re going to be creepy about it, then jump on your Harley, or whatever the hell you came in here on, and take a ride.”

  He nodded. “My apologies, Samantha Moon. I don’t mean to come across as creepy. I just feel at home with you.”

  I didn’t exactly take that as a compliment. That this bad-boy dirtbag felt comfortable around me just might have been a sign of how far I’d descended.

  “Fine,” I said. “So, what kind of freak are you?”

  He grinned at that. “One of the freakiest.”

  As he spoke, I couldn’t help but note that the detailed dragon tattoo that had been above his elbow was now below his elbow. And where I had previously seen its triangular head along the outside of his arm, it was now peeking at me from just inside his arm.

  As I wondered what life would be like in a padded cell, I said, “Don’t leave a girl hanging. What are you? Vampire? Werewolf? A hybrid of some sort? As in, you drink blood but can’t stop licking yourself?”

  The man flashed what he thought was a killer smile. To me, it looked terrible. No warmth. No laugh lines. No humor. Nothing but emptiness. “No, Samantha Moon. I’m none of those.”

  “Fallen angel?” I suddenly asked, mostly because I didn’t know what the hell else was out there. I checked my cell phone. We had five minutes remaining. Good timing, too, because I’d just come to the end of my smoothie. Hashtag sadness, as Tammy would say.

  My last guess got his attention, and he cocked his head a little to one side. As he did so, the dragon’s head appeared around his elbow again, having done, I was certain, a full revolution around his arm.

  “You’re getting warmer, Samantha Moon.”

  I swallowed. Hard. I’d seen some freaky stuff in my time, but I was certain I’d never come face to face with a demon before. Right here at a Jamba Juice. In the sunlight, no less. On a Thursday afternoon.

  He looked at me some more. I looked at him. In my peripheral vision, I noted the dragon tattoo creeping lower and lower down his arm. I reached for my Jamba Juice cup, then remembered it was empty. All over again, I was sad that it was empty. The ringing in my ear had picked up some, too. Not obnoxiously so, but it was letting me know that here be monsters.

  Now, the man before me smiled bigger than anyone should ever smile, like ever. The corners of his lips curled up and up, and I was reminded of the body-hopping entity in Washington State, an entity that had possessed an entire family.

  “You’re a demon,” I said.

  The thing before me shook his head and continued smiling. If anything, the smile had grown in size, now stretching from ear to ear. So. Damned. Creepy.

  “No, Samantha Moon. But you are close. Oh, so close.”

  My minivan was parked just across the way, just a hop, skip, and a jump. Except something was telling me that there was no escaping the thing in front of me. At least, not in a minivan.

  With a sickening, nauseating, and terrifying dread—and feeling more fear than I had ever felt—I suddenly knew, without a shadow of a doubt, who or what was sitting across from me. How I knew this, I wasn’t sure. Maybe the burning eyes. The smiling. The confidence. The living tattoo.

  “You’re the devil,” I said.

  And his smile grew bigger still...

  Chapter Two

  I reached for my phone again, and, with suddenly shaking fingers, I brought up the text message app—my family used WhatsApp these days, if only to confirm when and if my daughter received and read a text.

  I suddenly found it nearly impossible to control my fingers as I texted: You need to pick up your brother.

  Two red checkmarks appeared on the screen—one to indicate I had sent the message, and one to indicate the target device had received the message. Step one completed. I waited. While I waited, I refused to look up or acknowledge the person sitting across from me. My peripheral vision—which seemed to be enhanced these days—suggested that he had quit grinning like a fool. Or like a maniacal serial killer. This was probably good. No one should smile like that, ever.

  My heart beat slowly, deliberately, powerfully, rocking my body, thumping in my ears, nearly drowning out the buzzing in my head, my internal warning device. I swallowed, noting that my throat was dry for the first time in ten years. A second or two later—an eternity, really, when you’re sitting across from the devil—the word “Online” appeared on my screen, indicating my daughter had logged on to WhatsApp. Step two completed. Next, the two red checkmarks turned blue, indicating that my daughter had read my message. Step three completed.

  Got you, I thought. I loved this app. Of course, it was usually step four t
hat caused me headaches. That was, her responses. This one was no exception.

  No way. I’m busy!!!

  No arguments, young lady.

  He’s like a mile away!! Maybe two miles!!

  Then you’d better get started.

  I’m with my friends, Mom. MY FRIENDS!!

  They’ll understand.

  FINE!!!

  Thank you, sweety.

  I hate you.

  Love you, too.

  Oh my God!! You make me like so mad!!

  I also like ‘made’ you. Like in my womb.

  Eww! Gross. Goodbye!!!!

  Grinning, I clicked off the phone and set it in front of me. For a nanosecond, I’d forgotten just who I was sitting across from. That was, until I looked up into the handsome face—and the dead, unblinking eyes. The dragon tattoo was now down around his wrist.

  “Sorry about that,” I said, my voice squeakier and higher-pitched than it had been in a long time. I hadn’t felt this rattled in quite a while.

  “Kids,” he said, tilting his head toward me ever so slightly.

  How he knew I was texting my daughter, I didn’t know. That the devil even knew I had kids was disconcerting at best. That there was even a devil in this world was a terrible, terrible, unreal, and messed-up thought. Then again, I had seen angels and demons and highly evolved dark masters. A part of me suspected I might have even met God, too, in a Denny’s a long time ago, but that could have just been wishful thinking. Hell, I was friends with immortals and alchemists and witches. I’d channeled St. Germain and sat in the presence of she who might be Mother Earth, or Gaia. Why wouldn’t there be a devil, too?

  Because I found the idea of hell was just too far out there, even for me. Then again, wasn’t I being eternally punished, too? That is, if one would call my life a punishment. After that latest round of texting with Tammy, maybe it was.

  All these thoughts and more crossed my mind as I sat there in the shade, outside of Jamba Juice with a nearby Target sitting across the far side of the expansive parking lot.