Twilight Hunger by MAGGIE SHAYNE Read Free Book Online Page B

first and last names, some only one name. There were maybe a hundred entries, as near as she could tell without counting. Clicking back to the top of the list, she began scrolling down it. Then she came to one that made her stop in her tracks.
    Dracul, Vlad (See full bio for alias list.)
    â€œWhat the hell?” Curious, she clicked on the name, and a graphic popped up. A drawing, not a photo, of a thoroughly modern-looking man, with long black hair and unusually full lips.
    The most well known of the species, he was born in Carpathia and transformed, as nearly as we can tell, in his early twenties. Sired by an unknown enemy soldier, probably a Turk. Most recent sighting, May, 1992, Paris.
    â€œMost recent sighting?” She blinked at the screen, her mind not quite digesting what she was seeing. “Ninety-two?”
    Below the graphic, with its piercing eyes and pale skin, were more choices: Known Kills, Known Associates, Known Havens, Full Bio.
    â€œWhat in the name of God is this shit?”
    She hit the back button, clicked on another name in the list, and again was brought to a screen with animage of the per son, this one an actual photograph labeled “taken before trans formation” and a brief bio.
    Josephina Devon. Born in Brooklyn, NY, in 1962. Transformed in the summer of her 30th year, June 1992. Sire: R-532 aka Rhiannon. The vampire
    â€œVampire?”
    was captured by DPI researchers in December of the same year. Held at DPI Headquarters in White Plains, NY, USA. Expired in captivity, 1995.
    Again, the same choices were offered for further information, this time with one notable addition: “Tests Per formed on the Subject & Results of Same.”
    This was not real.
    This could not be real.
    When she clicked on “full bio” she found a document more than a hundred pages long. With details that made her mind spin with the impossibility of it all. When she opened the file that referred to tests performed, she thought she was going to be ill. This person, this woman, had been a lab rat. Held and experimented upon in that very building. In her own town.
    But no. It hadn’t happened, because it wasn’t real.
    There were no such things as vampires. Much less a covert government agency devoted to researching them.
    And yet, here was the proof that there were.
    There were.
    What the hell was she supposed to do now?
    Â 
    The next day, she still hadn’t decided, when the doorbell rang and she answered it to find no one there. Just an un marked manila envelope on the doorstep. Her mother was al ready at work. Most days she left before Max was even out of bed. The odd delivery made Maxine curious, particularly after last night. She looked up and down the street. No strangers lurked anywhere. No suspicious vehicles with tinted windows slid past. The neighborhood was stirring to life. People opening their doors, picking up their morning papers.
    Maxine picked up the envelope, looked at it, turned it over. Nothing. Not one word, not a label, not a stamp.
    Frowning, she went back inside, closing and locking the door behind her. She took the envelope to the kitchen table, opening it as she walked, and she tipped it, dumping the con tents out beside her bowl of corn flakes. Photos. What the hell? She frowned. Polaroids. Three of them. Then she blinked and snatched them up. That was Jason, sound asleep in his bed! She moved it to the back of the pile. The next shot was of Stormy, from the neck up, in her own shower. Maxine swore and looked at the third one. It was a shot of her mother, getting out of her car in the parking garage of the hospital where she worked as an R.N.
    The telephone rang, and she damn near jumped out of her skin. Maxine clenched her teeth, dropped the photos on the table and went to pick up the phone.
    â€œDo you like the photos, Maxine?”
    The voice was a whisper so cold it sent a chill down her spine. “Who the hell is this?” Maxine reached for the