Gideon Read online

  Gideon spent his other six days counting whatever passed by him or through the straights, even seagulls. He knew how many houseboats and boats were anchored in Sausalito on any given day. He’d count cars, then just red cars, cars with ski racks, cars with barking dogs, cars with women who hiked up their skirts so high he could see all those private parts eternally denied him.

  So maybe SB had a plan. If he did, Gideon would be the last to know, that was for sure.

  Does he even freakin’ know how freakin’ cold it was up there?

  The purple beast veered when the freeway took a sharp turn to the left. The sloppy box-like manufacture of the vehicle was becoming more difficult to control the faster he went. Sticky dark red blood was leaking from the crack at the base of the enormous mobile Blood Bank’s rear doors. Gideon had been tossing back empty bags of plasma after he’d torn off the tops and drained them. After fifty years, the blood still made him hard. Harder than one of those fucking towers, and just as tall too.

  Definitely going to have to do something about that. He’d be in some real pain in an hour.

  He finished a bag and tossed it through the blown-out driver’s side window. He watched through the side mirror as the long red finger of blood swirled in the air behind him until it landed on someone’s windshield.

  To a motorist from behind, it would look like the doors themselves were leaking. The blood began as droplets, but soon cascaded in ribbons and flew in the breeze like little red snippets of flags as the bus swerved.

  Hard to peer through blood-soaked wipers when you’re going at sixty-plus miles per hour, he thought, as he saw drivers behind him deal with the visibility issue, probably thinking they’d hit a bird or some other animal. Scanning his side mirror again, he spotted a vehicle pileup several hundred yards behind him, amidst smoke and steam. It managed to block a California Highway Patrolman. His red light flashed impotently behind the mound of cars acting as a barrier, while Gideon’s bus sped along to relative safety, if that’s what it could be called.

  To infinity and beyond.

  Gideon smiled. This was turning out to be a nice day, after all. Causing havoc lightened his mood. Being invisible for so long actually made him giddy to create such a splash. And how the news media would play this one up. Yeah, it was going to be fun watching all that. He was going to get a motel room in the city, eat In-N-Out burgers and those thick chocolate shakes, watch porno, and pretend some little hottie was going to screw him senseless. Maybe the little unlucky redhead at the back of the bus would survive the ordeal.

  He flashed a cool grin and enjoyed the air whistling in from the vacant windshield he’d kicked out. The ocean breeze tangled with his straggly dirty blond hair, struggling to stay in the ponytail he’d fastened.

  Joy. He realized he actually began to understand what the Guardians called joy.

  They didn’t have a decent sound system on the purple beast, but it did have an aging CD player mounted and swinging back and forth. It was attached with a red and yellow striped bungee cord wrapped around the oversized rearview mirror stem. Somebody probably had to bring their own music to calm the faint of heart as they drew out that wonderful red honey. Keep the customers calm. Get them to give it up for free like that girl at the prom some seventy years ago.

  Now that was a nice night.

  He grabbed for another bag in the egg crate at his feet, roared as he felt his fangs come back to life—longer, whiter, and sharper. He sucked the elixir and then swore as his dick elongated another inch, pushing against the steering wheel, causing the bus to swerve and almost topple. He adjusted himself and continued to drive with new focus.

  Not yet. Can’t crash yet.

  It had been an impulse decision to steal the bus. With his man toys of destruction strapped to his back, he’d been cruising overhead, excited about leaving his perch on the bridge, and all of a sudden it was like the Heavens opened. The purple bus was right there below him, ripe and ready for its voyage into the unknown.

  He’d barked at the male tech who was gassing up the vehicle and then fled on foot, without Gideon having to lay a finger on him. They didn’t have any decent music. Only thing he could find were Phantom of the Opera CDs stashed in a hole in the dashboard. He left the little redheaded phlebotomist hiding in the back as he fired up the engine and streaked off towards San Francisco, the gas line still briefly attached. No need for a fill-up today.

  Today, we’re going to fly.

  He could hear her frantically whispering on her cell phone from the bathroom, as if the cardboard walls of the bus would shield her calls for help.

  “I agreed to one date. You said the guy was nice. Well, he’s gone now this monster has taken the bus. I’m stuck in the back,” she was saying. “Don’t think he knows I’m here. Please, send someone. I didn’t sign up for this.”

  Gideon smiled. His dick lurched so he slapped it down with another growl. He’d unwittingly found a professional. Talk about his lucky day! If she survived, perhaps she could be an evening snack, and God knew he liked to play with his food first. He hadn’t had a bite of that for over fifty years. Christ, he’d practically been a priest.

  The Phantom CD was at max.

  “I’ll be beside you. To comfort and to guide you.”

  He had a lot in common with the Phantom, he thought, as he entered the Rainbow Tunnel just north of the bridge. He howled through the open windows and heard the echo of his own voice bounce off the arched tube. It would scare everyone inside the structure, but it made his soul turn to flame. He gained on a family in a green Jeep to his right, the dad giving him the once over, not sure what he was really seeing. The driver slowed down and let Gideon pass.

  “Smart fellow,” Gideon mumbled.

  Coming upon the bridge approach, he saw the silver and white skyline of the City, contrasted with the deep blue Pacific Ocean on both sides, dotted with little white sailboats on the Bay side. He swerved to the slow lane. It was such a clear, sunny morning, well before the fog rolled in. His heart raced, thrilled to capacity, as his face and hands began to glow.

  “Careful, little one,” he called out to a well-muscled woman in her early thirties, dressed in pink, bicycling toward the City. He watched her perfect form, her shapely body, her heart-shaped ass, and decided not to sideswipe her. Some people were just too beautiful to waste. Remembering his mission, he punched down on the pedal, sending a billow of gray smoke out the back as the bus lurched and picked up speed.

  He reached down to the floor and pulled up his Carl Gustav 84 mm rocket launcher. One-handed, he aimed it out through the busted windshield, towards the thick cable equidistant between the two towers, the blue open mouth of the bay visible beyond. Holding the tripod of the loaded weapon along his thigh, he pulled the trigger. It hurt like a son of a bitch. He hadn’t been too careful; its vibration took out the strip of metal that used to separate the two windshields. But no matter. The anti-tank projectile preceded his forward movement, hitting the bridge cable dead center, snapping it a few seconds before the bus got there. It also took out a twenty-foot section of railing and part of the roadway. Support cables instantly coiled and waved in the air like snakes after being sprung. One tiny adjustment of the steering wheel to the right, and the monstrous purple bus headed off the bridge through the gaping hole, on its maiden flight.

  He wondered if this was how it felt to be in a dirigible, wafting through thin air with only the sound of the wind whistling through the window holes.

  Time stood still. He saw the cup glued to the dash filled with shuddering pencils, so he tossed them out the driver’s side and watched as they found their own way. He wondered what it would look like, his big purple bus and the pencils and blood flying in the air in free fall. He searched for other objects that might impale him and found none. He wondered if there were any Guardians out there yet, if there would be angelic witnesses to this historic flight. He couldn’t wait to hear the rumors.

  Except now he would join the ranks of th
e fallen—a casualty of trying to be so good for way too long.

  SB really should have known better. It’s not nice to fool Mother Nature.

  The bus took a nosedive, headed straight for the choppy waters of the ocean, and all of a sudden, he was covered with the redheaded female who had practically fallen into his lap. She would have been the first to hit, a projectile headed straight through the windshield, but he held her firm little waist and pressed her back to his chest. He could smell her fear and felt the sigh as she lost consciousness.

  Lovely.

  The impact as he hit the water was shockingly cold, and whitish green, not the deep blue of the bay he had seen when he was watching or sailing through the sky. Shielding his prize with his arms, he rode the bus down like a dagger plunging into the breast of the San Francisco Bay.

  In no time at all, the bus rested on the bottom, touching down as gracefully as a space shuttle landing, first the front and then the rear wheels. He was right. The frame held rigid after all.

  And here they were, two would-be lovers under two hundred feet of water. She was light, and no problem for him. He lifted his bride out of their watery sanctuary like a trophy.

  Live, my dear. Witness my power. He kissed her plump pink lips and blew air into her lungs, feeling her breasts heave into his chest. His desire flamed.

  Holding her firmly, he drilled like a bullet through the water and then punched into the air above, shedding his wet clothes. His once-white wings had now turned black.

  So it’s true. When you fall, they turn. Even though drenched, his new plumage worked perfectly well, in fact, better than his old ones. They were stiffer and larger as he flapped them and felt their thirst for flight. Their response was more immediate as he flexed and released his massive shoulder muscles connected like cables to his neck.

  Holding her tight, he landed on the cliffs at the Marin side overlooking the bridge. He’d pressed her breasts against his bare chest, attempting to keep her heart warm, letting her legs dangle over his thighs. Hoping she was not dead, he was overjoyed to feel her femoral artery pulsing deliciously close to her sex. He let its pumping massage his dick.

  He put out the call telepathically and immediately heard the Guardians coming in full force, frantic and screaming. He loved the cross-chatter as they divided up the soon-to-be victims and made quick decisions who to save and who to let go. They were prohibited from allowing themselves to be seen, which Gideon knew was a huge problem for them. He chuckled.

  Cars fell into the bay like pebbles as the platform pavement between the north and south towers collapsed, sending a cascading shudder all the way to San Francisco. The surprise destruction caused a twinge of regret for the loss of life. He hadn’t intended or thought about that.

  The gap between the two towers looked more like a toothless grin without the roadway between them. The connection between Marin and San Francisco was severed, just like the First Nation had found it some thousand years ago, just as the Supreme Being had made it before the touch of man had joined them.

  He examined the little redhead, holding her lithe body across his lap. He kissed life into her lungs again, and she stirred, making a mockery of the bra that dared to hide her bursting bosom from him. He would burn that device, but later, after he’d tasted her and savored his crime. His disobedience. She would be his reward for a job chillingly well done.

  He’d forgotten how arousing it was to bring them back from the edge of death. It was so completely wicked to play with his food, but the warm glow after having inhaled her essence was making him feel bigger and stronger than ever before. He felt positively ageless. It could almost be called a religious experience—something he’d never expected.

  With a quick thought, her clothes disappeared, just as an overcoat, white shirt and black leather pants appeared for him, constraining his wild cock from scaring her. Her peach mounds, accentuated by taut deep red nipples praying to the heavens, begged to be suckled. His large hand clutched and kneaded her left breast while his mouth savored her right, running his tongue and teeth over her as he tasted the flesh of woman, denied him for so long.

  She was so sexy in her unconscious state, her mouth open, succulently exhaling her scent all over his face. Her silky skin, far from satisfying the burning in his soul, only made him want more. He nipped a little at her neck, just enough to taste a drop of her red goodness. The taste was sweeter than he’d imagined after all these years. He was instantly hooked, addicted to her. An electric shiver traveled from the cup he made with his tongue to hold the precious drop all the way down to his groin.

  No, she wouldn’t be his meal. She would be his executioner. He would plunder her gifts and suffer a fate worse than death: eternity in the Underworld. Death’s warm arms would embrace him while he commanded his body to do things to her, making her beg for him. His cock thickened at the thought of her screaming his name as he took her over and over again.

  He snuck a quick peek at the bridge as she began to stir. The Guardians were flying in all directions, some even colliding, sending white feathers and sparkle dust down into the bay water. He loved hearing their confusion, their ineffectiveness against the slaughter.

  Welcome to my world.

  He looked down at the naked redhead and smiled. He held her jaw tenderly in the palm of his right hand and tucked her closer to him, safe and warm. He could completely ravish her and spoil the view. But at this second, he was feeling magnanimous, taking his time with her semiconscious state, not hurrying to claim her thoroughly. More thoroughly than she’d ever realize she could be taken.

  “Yes, sweet thing. Come back to me,” he whispered, blowing warm air into her hairline just in front of her ear. He could hear a slight ticking sound as the little bubbles of her red elixir traveled down the arteries in her neck, pooling at her sex, making her drunk with her own goodness. “I have you now. No one else will ever touch you again.” He lingered on the word “touch,” which gave him chills.

  She arched, responding to the resonance of his voice. One arm cascaded above her head and then rested. The other smoothed over the muscles of his chest, and he felt the pulsing of her systems firing back to life and the sizzle like a blood stream he’d walked into sometime in his past. She snuggled into the warm jacket he’d divined. Her lips lightly grazed his skin, or did they? Her little pink tongue ventured out tentatively as he cradled her like a baby chick. She was unspoiled and stunning in her confusion, her scent overwhelming him. He bridled himself, adjusted his body so his clothed bulges mated with the soft caverns of hers.

  He knew it wouldn’t last as her consciousness ramped up, beginning with a whirring sound as she tried to return to her normal life. She probably had family, people who would miss her and worry that she was gone. But all that could come later, when she was ready. He was just delaying her, he told himself. Just taking a little of what he deserved for being such a good and humble servant for so long.

  She cuddled closer to him again and sighed.

  “Ahh.” She held his power in her soft inhale and exhale. He watched her press in to him, felt her heartbeat spike, as she squeezed her knees together, curling them up in his lap and pushing a scent toward him that said she was aroused and fully wet.

  Perfect. Live for me. You are my doorway to the other side. I shall worship the ground you walk on.

  He looked back at the bridge. A distant clunk caught his attention as a large truck slammed into a line of empty cars and pushed a green Volkswagen over the edge into the precipice. The little splash it made as it hit the Bay was nearly imperceptible. That was the last one. It looked like the Guardians were all busy.

  Sucks for you.

  A new Guardian came like a jet overhead, crashing into the ocean where the car had fallen. Soon, the little green bug bobbed in the water with someone clinging to the roof. It looked like all had been saved after all. Gideon was glad. He didn’t have it in for humans, just other angels. It wouldn’t be fair for humans to pay the price for his indiscr
etions. It wasn’t their fault.

  Right on cue, his cell phone rang, which surprised him. The golden case vibrated, as if shaking itself free of the water like a dog.

  He expected old SB would have some choice words, although he’d never heard the fellow swear. As Gideon perused the destruction in front of him, he heard sirens and smelled the acrid trace of smoke. Palming her buttocks just enough to elicit another moan from her most pleasurable mouth, he squeezed the nubile young redhead to his chest. This human woman he was going to fuck six ways to Sunday. As the phone continued to ring, he wondered which sin his mentor would be most upset with. Would Gideon even get a chance to explain himself?

  Explain himself? Is there an explanation? he mused as he flipped open the phone. The bright yellow screen showed the familiar series of ten plus signs across the bar of the display.

  His little golden crosses. How orderly and fitting.

  Before he could hear the wrath of the Supreme Being, he flipped the phone closed and hurled it several hundred yards and watched his small missile slip into the ocean without a sound.

  Wish it were that easy to be rid of him. He scanned the heavens. Nothing seemed to darken the bright light of the sun, but it would be wise not to stay exposed, just in case SB’s vengeance took the form of lightning. Gideon still hated fire.

  Except in his soul. The realms of Heaven and the angelic beings there hadn’t quenched his thirst or healed the wound at his core. He was still partially vampire and had no business being angel.

  A square peg in a round hole.

  Did they know he lusted for all of them? Lusted for their angelic blood and the gifts they so teasingly stored under semi-see-through white gowns that drove him crazy? Did his mentor know what a liability he was, a spring ready to release his seed throughout the bright perfection that was Heaven?

  She stirred, and he lapped the threadlike trickle of blood exiting the puncture wound in her neck. He groaned, slamming his eyes shut, inhaling all her wonderful female scents. He felt her fingers move over his left pectoral muscle. He swirled his own breath over her in a glamour that would erase her memory of the last few minutes. When he opened his eyes, her clear green luminous gaze impaled him as if she was not totally human. If she were fully conscious and aware, she’d feel his hardening manhood pressing for sanctuary between the crack in her behind. He was grateful she didn’t move away.