A Vampire's Christmas Carol

Ben’s back teeth ground together.

Jamison pushed him forward. They started plodding through the thick snow. “She wasn’t just your angel,” Jamison told him as if confiding a big secret. “It’s not like a one angel per person deal. They watch over a lot of folks at the same time.”

Ben hadn’t known that. Mostly because he didn’t know anything about angels.

“I was her charge, too.” Jamison stopped, staring straight ahead. “I used to think death would be my way out. The alpha was so freaking twisted. He cut on us just as much as he did his prey.” Jamison’s hand rubbed over his chest. “But then, maybe we were his prey.” His hand dropped.

Ben’s head tilted as he considered the shifter. The guy’s nose wasn’t bleeding anymore. It wasn’t even swollen.

“We heal fast,” Jamison said, obviously reading the question on his face. “Almost as fast as vampires do. That’s why I didn’t scar, no matter how many times the alpha took the skin right from my body.”

Fuck.

“The past can be hell, and the future…” Jamison exhaled on a rough sigh. “Sometimes, it can be a nightmare, too.”

“I’m supposed to believe that you’re about to show me the future?”

“I’m going to show you the future that could be,” Jamison said carefully. “The real future is what you make it…or haven’t you realized the point of this shit-forsaken night yet?”

Ben blinked.

“And it’s not like I’m doing it on my own. We’ve got a special magic working for you. Courtesy of our angel girl.” Jamison’s gaze hardened. “For the record, I don’t think you’re worth what she’s done, even if you did save my hide ten years ago.”

What she’s done… “What do you mean?” Ben demanded.

“I mean I’d let you rot.” Jamison stalked forward. “If I had been given the choice between—”

“What has she done?” Ben caught the shifter’s shoulder and whirled the guy around.

And he heard a scream. A loud, desperate scream.

“There it is,” Jamison drawled. “Right on time.” He gazed at Ben. “Do you even react when you hear screams anymore? Or do you just not care?”

Ben threw him back and ran toward that sound. As he raced ahead, Ben realized that he could smell…blood…in the air. The scent was too tempting for a vampire. Ben rushed through the trees. He shoved the branches out of his way and he found—

Blood in the snow.

A boy, broken on the ground.

Ben stumbled to a stop. He knew that boy. It was the kid that Simone had shown him in the alley. Cale. The boy’s torn, old shoes had fallen off his feet. They lay several feet away in the snow.

“Told you,” Jamison said as he slowly approached. The guy seemed to be taking his time. “The future can be a nightmare.”

Ben swallowed and managed to ask, “Is this…is this what will really happen in the boy’s future?”

“It’s the future planned now, what can happen.” Jamison’s voice held sadness as he said, “He tried to run, but he wasn’t fast enough.”

Ben leaned over the boy. The kid’s eyes stared sightlessly ahead. Two deep puncture wounds lined the boy’s throat. The kid had screamed—and now Ben knew why the scream had been cut off so abruptly. A vampire had fed on the boy, and when the vamp finished his meal, he’d backed away.

You let him scream, didn’t you?

Then the vamp had broken the boy’s neck.

“He won’t rise, so you don’t have to worry about that,” Jamison told him, voice cold and hard. “He’s just going to get buried by the snow out here. It will be days before anyone finds the body.”

Ben’s gaze snapped toward the shifter.

“The snow plow will eventually come through.” Jamison shrugged. “That’s the way it is for some people. They die, and no one even notices.”

Ben was noticing. The poor kid. Broken in the snow. He turned his head and looked back down at the boy. Just a teen. In someone else’s cast-off clothes. No socks on his feet.

“If he’d stayed in the alley, he would have survived the night,” Jamison said. “I thought you might like to know that bit…”

Ben’s shoulders tensed.

“The restaurant over there had a broken back window. Cale lived in that alley because he could sneak in the restaurant on cold nights. He could fill his belly and stay warm. But the boy was too afraid you might come back, so he ran tonight.”

“I wasn’t the vampire who did this.”

“No, you weren’t. There’s another vamp in town, and you didn’t even notice him. Seems like that happens with you a lot. The whole not-noticing-routine.”

“This future sucks.” Ben’s hands were hard fists. The kid’s eyes were so blank. Ben swallowed and asked, “What was his full name?” Simone had just called him Cale.

“Why? It’s not like knowing will change anything.” The shifter’s hand pushed into Ben’s back. “There’s more to see. We don’t have all night to stare at the dead.”

Ben knocked his hand aside. “We’re not just leaving him in the snow.”

“Sure we are.” That hand came right back to his shoulder.

Ben shoved it off again. “No, we’re not.” Ben looked down at the ground. “He’s—”

Gone.

“We’re looking at the future, vamp. He’s not dead. Not yet.” Jamison propelled him forward once more. “Let’s see what else is waiting for you.”

Ben didn’t want to go anywhere. “Unless it involves Simone, I don’t want to see the future that’s coming.”

Jamison stopped shoving him. “This night isn’t about her.”

“Yeah, well, guess what? I’m changing the rules. From now on…it’s about her.” Because she was alive somewhere in this world. Maybe in heaven. But she was alive. “I don’t go anywhere, I don’t see anything, unless it’s about her.”

Jamison tilted his head back and stared up at the sky.

“You told me that I wasn’t worth what she’d done for me,” Ben nearly shouted at the guy. “I want to know what she did. I want to know what happens to her.” I have to know if she comes back to me.

Jamison’s head lowered. His gaze found Ben’s. “Maybe I can show you her future…and yours. Both mixed together. That won’t break the rules too much.”