Broken by Shiloh Walker Read Free Book Online Page A

signified their circle of friendship: white shirts, slim red ties, long skirts with boots.
    And all of them were keeping their distance from Wolfie and the other Queenshill schoolgirls on the bed.
    The three were the only classmates remaining from what had started as a group of seven handpicked vampires who composed the newest Underground class. Little had they known that Mrs. Jones—or Claudia or “the cat” as they had called her—had chosen the lot of them for her own benefit, picking them off one by one every six months to stock her youth-infusing blood rituals.
    And Claudia had been feeding off her charges for years. She hated the girls because of how her vampire lover felt about his darlings, and her rituals must have been all the sweeter for that reason alone. As far as the survivors knew, Wolfie hadn’t even known about the atrocities.
    At least, that was what they were hoping, though Della often wondered. . . .
    Polly, with her strawberry blond bob and athletic, loose-limbed stance, tapped in to a mind-link so she might communicate with her two classmates. How far away do you think the cat is now? She had been asking the same question ever since the girls had attacked Claudia last night.
    Noreen was slyly peeking through the fluffy red hair that covered part of her sprite-featured face, watching Wolfie on the bed, too, but not as obviously as Polly. Certainly Mrs. Jones is gone for good, she mind-said. Far and away from here. We chased her out properly .
    True enough. The Queenshill girls had grouped together after Della had endured dreams about vampires that had come upon her like living nightmares. She had no idea of their origin—perhaps her subconscious had woven together subtle clues about Mrs. Jones and the way she constantly, intensely watched them—but the dreams had led Della to the truth about the cat. And after Della had told the other Queenshill girls about those warped tales, they had ambushed their housematron, forcing themselves into Mrs. Jones’s head to see if Della’s strange visions held any validity.
    They had. And, worse, the girls had seen proof that the old vampire had been murdering their classmates.
    Accordingly, Mrs. Jones had suffered at the hands of the betrayed crowd. Out of control, they had clawed at her skin, chased her down the tunnels, driven her out. Afterward, they had been at loose ends, realizing their folly as well as what Wolfie was sure to do to them now. They also wondered what Mrs. Jones would visit upon them if she should ever return.
    Like Noreen, Della hid behind her own hair, as well as the lilac curtain. The mousy veil of frizz had allowed her to fade into the background so many times, and she needed that security now, as Wolfie occasionally lifted his head to call to them from the bed. Calls that they were hesitating to obey.
    She didn’t wish to look at the vampire girls worshipping every inch of Wolfie’s skin, but she kept doing it. They had exhausted him to sleep at dawn, cuddling with him until dusk had returned to awaken them. There were girls holding his hands, kissing his palms. Girls at his feet, stroking his legs. Girls combing their fingers through his brown rock-star hair. Girls running their tongues over his thighs, stomach, and chest.
    Stacy, the eldest, who had decades over Della, even as she remained an eternal platinum blond sixteen-year-old, had taken charge of the rest of Wolfie, nestling between his legs to love him there.
    Blood rushed through Della, spearing her deep in the belly. Fortunately, the love play would keep him from accessing their thoughts with a master-progeny mind-link; they couldn’t afford for him to see what they had truly done to Mrs. Jones.
    But she feared that, soon, she, Noreen, and Polly would have to give in to his desires. They were the newest of the Queenshill vampires, freshly brought over from the cat’s yearly crop; those who survived her graduated to Wolfie’s main Underground, joining the girls whom the