A Vampire's Christmas Carol by Cynthia Eden Read Free Book Online Page B

as Miles shouted, “You’ve got the wrong guy! Please,
please!
It wasn’t me!” 
    “Bullshit,” Ben growled. “He’s a murdering SOB. I should’ve ripped out his throat when I had the chance.”
    “Like you did to the others?” No emotion was in Simone’s voice when she asked this question.
    His muscles locked.  “I’m a vampire. I have to feed in order to survive.” It was kind of his thing.  Ben figured an angel should know that.
    Miles was still begging.  Hell, it even looked like the man was crying.
Did your victims cry, too? Did they beg?
Ben knew they had.
    “You have to feed, but you don’t have to kill. That’s a choice you make.”  Simone took a step away from him.  
    Ben advanced toward that cell. He was nearly right in front of Miles now, and the man showed no sign of being aware of his presence at all.  Ben even waved his hand in front of the guy’s face.
No response.
He glanced back at Simone.
    “You can take from your prey and still leave them alive.”  Simone shifted a bit to the right when a guard entered the area.
    “Leave them alive? And what? Let them turn out like me?”
    Simone shook her head. “A vampire is only made—
usually
—if a human is drained of blood and then ingests some of the vampire’s blood.  There has to be an exchange.”  Her head tilted to the right as she studied him. “But after ten years, you’re well aware of how vampires are made. So don’t try to tell me that you kill them because—”
    “I kill them because they deserve to die.”
    The guard unlocked the cell.
    “They’ve killed,” Ben said flatly. “Tortured. It’s not like I’m hurting innocents.” Were there any innocents any longer? Sometimes, he wasn’t so sure. “I’m taking out the trash.” He was doing a fucking public service. Simone should be thanking him instead of lecturing him. 
    “
You’re free to go, sir
,” the guard told Miles.
    Miles sucked in a deep gulp of air.
    “No.” Ben’s hands fisted. “He killed five women.  Strangled them.  He—”
    “The last attack victim survived,” Simone said, cutting through his words. “But you knew that, of course, because she’s the one who cemented your belief in his guilt. You looked into her memories, and you saw her attacker.”
    Angels weren’t the only ones with special powers. She could fly and enter some damn astral plane.  Vamps, on the other hand…vamps could compel humans. He’d learned that he could gain entrance into an individual’s mind just by using a mild compulsion. Ben could use his power to see the person’s memories. 
    When he hunted, he used those memories to guide him. He saw what survivors had witnessed. “I always punish the guilty.” Because he was dead certain of that guilt. “Jasmine Duncan saw
him.
”
    The guard was leading Miles out of the cell.  Ben hurried to follow the two men. This was a mistake. A huge, fucking mistake. Miles Gavin would just go out and kill again. He needed to be in the ground. He needed—
    “
Daddy!”
    A little, red-haired boy ran toward Miles. The child threw his arms around Miles’s legs and held tight.
    And…a few feet away, another tall, blond man slouched in a chair, with his wrists cuffed in front of him. That man looked up at the boy’s cry.
His face…the man had the same face as Miles.
    “Miles has a twin brother,” Simone said as her arm brushed against Ben’s. “Your victim didn’t know that. Since she didn’t know it, neither did you.” 
    Miles sank to his knees and buried his face in his son’s neck.
    A twin?
    Simone cleared her throat. “His brother stole his name. They shared the same face, so the deception was easy. Alex—that’s his brother—he used Miles’s money, he used his connections, and he took as much as he could from his brother.”
    Miles was holding tightly to the little boy.
    “But there are some things you just can’t take away,” Simone murmured.
    Ben looked over at her.
    Her gaze held his.