We started across the room to the front windows.

​

I asked the question even though I was pretty certain of the answer: “You expecting company?”

​

“No.”

​

We peered out through the grime covering both sides of the largest window pane. What we saw wasn’t good news.

​

Four SUVs – each large enough to hold five or six people; each jet black; their interiors hidden by tinted windows. Every side-window was drawn up tight, preventing any glimpse of our new arrivals.

​

I turned to Pearl: “Guns. Now.”

​

She headed over to a duffel bag near her armchair, and retrieved both firearms. Pearl kept the Ruger and its replacement clips. I was given the sawn-off and its box of cartridges.

​

Outside, the four cars had been parked for ten seconds now. The faint vibrations of their engines had died, telling me all ignitions had been turned off. Yet no one emerged. I began calculating distances and possibilities.

​

The closest two SUVs were ten feet from the front door. If regular humans emerged, we could shoot them and have a good chance of making kills. The two vehicles behind were about twenty-five feet away, but still in range. Were these guys amateurs? Why hadn’t they parked further away and approached on foot? They could have come at the house from multiple directions and overwhelmed us in a coordinated sneak attack. Their odd strategy didn’t fit their choice of vehicles. The SUVs looked armoured to my keen eye, and no doubt had bulletproof windows too. Amateurs wouldn’t come in such powerful, well-protected transports.

​

Thirty seconds now. No sign anyone was ever going to leave the cars.

​

“Keep watch,” I told Pearl, and I headed over to the rear windows.

​

I was five feet from the glass when a bullet blasted through the central pane and thudded into the side of my couch.

​

A heartbeat later, a second bullet blew a fist-sized hole in the middle pane of the front window. It gave the room a matching set.

​

“Snipers,” I said to my companion.

​

Still upright, and making no attempt to avoid attack, I continued to the back window and looked out.

​

“For God’s Sake, Mr S, will you get down?” Pearl rasped. She was already crouched below the front windowsill.

​

“They weren’t aiming at us. They were showing us they had the front and rear covered.”

​

My gaze scrutinised the garden and what lay beyond. The sniper wasn’t hidden in the grass – he (or she) was outside the twelve-foot-hedge. Four large trees could be glimpsed above the hedging cordoning the garden, and up in the middlemost I saw the marksman. He had a perfect view of all the rear windows and doors, and was over two hundred yards away, far beyond the range of our weapons. I waved to the asshole, to let them know they were spotted.

​

“We’re not getting outside, at least not during daylight.” I paced across the room to rejoin Pearl. My keen vision glimpsed the front sniper, up another tree beyond the far side of the road. I gave this one the finger. “And they probably have night-vision gear to use after it gets dark... Has there been any movement from the cars?”

​

“No,” she returned. “And I don’t think there will be, not until nightfall. My gut feeling says they’re vampires.”

 

*     *     *

 

What she said made immediate sense.

​

My first assignment for Pearl’s organisation had led to the death of a Vampire Lord and his coven. I imagine it was enough to make me marked for death by the fanged undead.

​

So: Plant a human sniper front and back to contain us in the house. Arrive in armoured cars and wait until darkness came to break in and slaughter us. Simple, but very effective.

​

I considered testing whether the glass was bulletproof on one of the nearest cars, but it would waste either a bullet or a shotgun cartridge, and I felt certain we might be needing all the ammunition we had later. Instead, I looked across at Pearl, and looked hard.

​

The façade of tough cheerfulness was cracked. Her face appeared somewhat drained and her eyes held uncertainty; the lips were a taut line in front of clenched teeth. Pearl’s hands weren’t shaking, but she held the Ruger and clips tight, whitening her knuckles. She expected to die before dawn, or worse, be taken for prolonged torture... torture which, if they turned her into one of their kind, could last centuries.

​

I snapped questions, wasting neither words nor time: “Sat-Phone?”

​

“No.”

​

“Ever killed before?”

​

“Once.”

​

“Good. Got any useful superpowers?”

​

Her eyes narrowed at this dumb query. “Only sarcasm.”

​

“Oh, I know about that. You use it on me... Okay, you want to know the plan?”

​

“How can there be one? We can’t escape.”

​

“We don’t want to escape. We’re gonna kill every motherfucker who comes in here. Sound good?”

​

“You can hardly move,” she retorted. “There are at least fifteen or twenty of them out there.”

​

I shrugged. “Fine. They’ll expect to overwhelm us easily. It gives us the advantage of surprise.”

​

It’s a pity the words didn’t hold as much faux confidence as I’d hoped.