Vampire State of Mind by Jane Lovering Page B

care, sis,’ she said, squeezing rather tightly. ‘I don’t want anything to happen to you.’
    â€˜Not as much as
I
don’t,’ I said, squeezing back. ‘Tell Mum and Dad everything is OK. Tell them, oh, I’m fine, work is fine, you can even tell them that I’ve met a nice man if you like. I haven’t, obvs, but it should keep them quiet for a bit.’
    We smiled at each other, a sisterly smile of complicity, then she left to go visiting and I left to go detecting.

Chapter Six
    It felt odd to be passing through, under the Enforcement-green chequered Incident Scene tape, past the stationary ambulances with their ominously still sirens into the unusually quiet park beyond. Normally this part of York was crowded out with picnickers and visitors to the Museum, but now it was only occupied by little clusters of Hunters, edgily smoking in tight groups and keeping half-an-eye open for
Hello
magazine telephoto lenses.
    â€˜Where’s it all happening then?’ I said, approaching the nearest group. They were locals, Paul Smithed to the eyeballs, discreet little tie-pins proclaiming their identities.
    â€˜You tell us.’
    â€˜That’s what you’re here for.’
    I sighed, and looked towards the only woman in the group, who’d dressed like something out of
The Matrix
, all black leather and dark glasses. Hoping for some kind of female-affinity, I spoke to her. ‘Is it true all the detectors are on the blink?’
    â€˜Are
you
getting anything?’ Her voice was as tight as her hold on her gun, nervous, wound-up. No solidarity here.
    â€˜I’d hardly be standing here talking to you if I could tell a vampire was about, would I? Or is this what it’s all about, use me as a human canary – when I run, you all run?’
    The group followed me as I inched forward over open ground. If there
was
a vampire about – and I couldn’t feel anything at the moment – then it would attack from cover. As long as we stayed away from the bushes and trees, we’d see it in plenty of time and the vamp would be coming at us half-blind.
    Creeping along, I wondered.
Something
had glamoured Harry and Eleanor. Something powerful enough to get past the usual Enforcement screens. Something that knew malfunctioning detectors and mistaken identity could have got the blame for my death. Was that ‘something’ here, now, hiding in the increasing darkness and the ridiculously Gothic ruins that littered the park as though a vampire Capability Brown had designed the place?
    As we moved across the park, other small knots of Hunters joined us, circling slowly on the periphery of our group. From above we must have looked like a very well-dressed puff of smoke, coiling our way inevitably towards the ruins of St Mary’s, which hung against the skyline. A few of the less agile of the Hunters stumbled over the scattered stones, too busy scanning the horizon to watch their feet – which is a nice kind of metaphor for the Hunters themselves.
    â€˜Oh!’ I stopped suddenly, half-under one of the arches and three Hunters cannoned into me from behind. I noticed that the stress of the situation didn’t stop one of them from feeling my bottom. ‘It’s here.’
    The whole group dropped into an instant crouch, guns bristling in every direction. ‘Where?’ someone hissed.
    â€˜It’s not a vampire.’
    And as soon as I’d realised that, and all my assumptions about attack from cover were wrong, it attacked.
    It came from above, took the first Hunter in the shoulder, wrenching him backwards and dropping him to the ground while the others waved their guns around, desperately searching for the right ammo to load against what suddenly wasn’t what they’d been expecting.
    â€˜It’s a demon!’
    I caught a sudden view of it, full face, raising its head to sniff at the air, while the wounded Hunter shuffled backwards,