My sight faded completely. The beating of my heart filled my ears like a tolling of a great bell. I couldn’t feel my body, as if it no longer existed. Blind and deaf, I remained in the middle of nothing, swaying, while above me the undead brought the ceiling down. They dug through the plaster and cement to the framework of steel support beams, holding the five stories of concrete above us. Thin arms grasped the beams and pulled with supernatural strength.

God. I haven’t been very good.

The metal whined in protest.

I could have tried harder. I could’ve been a better person. I stand before you now as I am. I make no excuses.

The beams gave, bending.

Please, have mercy on me, Lord.

In my mind’s eye I saw the enormous beams breaking. I saw tons of plaster, cement, and steel falling down, onto vampires, onto me, burying us beneath the rubble, sealing a tomb from which not even a vampire could get out.

I felt their hate-filled hungry minds vanishing one by one. Finally I could let go. I released the awful burden and the awareness left me.

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 7

SLAYER LAY IN ITS SHEATH ACROSS A NIGHT TABLE, next to a man reading an ancient paperback. On the cover of the book a man in a brown suit and fedora held an unconscious blonde in a white dress. I tried to focus on the title but the white letters blurred.

The man reading the book wore blue scrubs. He had cut the pantlegs midway down his thighs, and faded blue jeans showed below the blue fabric. I crooked my neck so I could see his feet. Big heavy work boots caught the jeans.

I leaned back onto the pillow. My father had been right: there was Heaven and it was in the South.

The man lowered the book and glanced at me. Of average height and stocky, he had dark skin, glossy with an ebony sheen, and graying black hair, cut military style. The eyes peering at me through the thin-framed glasses were at once intelligent and brimming with humor as if someone had just told him an off-color joke and he was trying his best not to laugh.

“Lovely morning, isn’t it?” he said, the unmistakable harmonies of coastal Georgia vibrating in his voice.

“Shouldn’t it be ‘aint it’?” I said. My voice sounded weak.

“Only if you are an uneducated fool,” the man said. “Or if you wish to appear country. And I’m too old to appear anything that I’m not.”

He moved by my side and took my wrist in his hands. His lips stirred, counting the heartbeats, then his fingers lightly touched my stomach. Pain lanced through me. I flinched and drew a sharp breath.

“On a scale from one to ten, how much does it hurt?” he asked, his fingers probing my shoulder.

I grimaced. “About five.”