I HAD ONLY SECONDS before Dragan would hammer the stake through my rib cage. My mind clutched desperately for an opportunity to escape annihilation.

Dragan stood to my left and Petru to my right, both men even with the opposite ends of the pipe I was chained to. The slack in the overhead cable let me pivot with the pipe across my shoulders. My feet had enough purchase on the floor for me to get a strong swing. Certain that they were about to finish me, and that I had no choice but to die at their leisure, the vânätori relaxed their guard.

Wendy and I made eye contact. Her big frightened eyes begged for help.

I’m trying, baby.

I swung the left end of the pipe toward Dragan and cracked it against his skull. His knees buckled, and he fell over the table, upending it. The candles tumbled to the floor and landed in the trash littering the room.

I immediately jabbed to the right and caught Petru across the nose. One hand came up to protect his face and the other readied the mallet to hit me. His eyebrows cinched angrily and his eyes narrowed. Our eyes locked long enough for me to hook him with vampire hypnosis.

Teodor yelled, “Don’t look into his eyes”-but too late.

Teodor started for me, dragging Wendy by her chain tether. She pulled against him and kicked him across the back of one knee. His leg folded and he collapsed. The electric baton fell from his hand and clattered on the floor. She jumped on him and bashed him on the head with the steel links binding her wrists. Teodor writhed and bellowed in pain. He jerked his arm around wildly, backhanded Wendy and knocked her off him. He staggered to his feet.

I jangled my wrist chains and commanded Petru, “Undo these.”

He clasped the key ring clipped to his belt loop. Blood dripped from his swollen nose. His obedient gaze remained fixed on mine. He groped for the lock on the chain and inserted the key.

“Hurry up,” I said.

The chain rattled loose. My feet sank to the floor and my legs bore my entire weight. I was free. My wrists and neck ached where the links had pressed into my flesh. I snatched the mallet from Petru. “Hold still.”

He did as I commanded and stood comatose before me. I walloped him on the forehead, leaving a circular imprint on the front of his skull. His face quivered, and his eyes rolled up into their sockets. He teetered like a plank and fell straight back.

Teodor was almost on me. Wendy picked herself up and lunged at him. Teodor spun about and grasped the chain around her neck. He shook her and cursed. “I’m going to kill you, demon witch.”

“You first.” Wendy flailed at him with kicks to his shins.

I flung the mallet at Teodor. Sharp pains zippered up my back where Petru had whaled on me with the rebar.

The mallet bounced off Teodor’s skull. His head wobbled and he fell toward Wendy as if they were going to embrace.

Dragan lay next to my feet. I reached around him, picked up my pistol where it had fallen and took aim at Teodor’s back.

I couldn’t risk shooting him without endangering Wendy. At this range, the bullets would go straight through him and into her. Grasping Teodor by his collar, I smacked him on the temple with the butt of the SIG-Sauer. His eyes bugged out. He gasped and went slack. Wendy released her hold and backed away to let Teodor slam face first against to the floor.

I scrambled to find the keys on Teodor’s belt and opened the locks on Wendy’s chains.

She kicked the unconscious Teodor in the head. “Sayonara, you son of a bitch.”

Fire burst from under the table and a wave of smoke rolled against the ceiling.

I pulled Wendy away. “Teodor will get his later.” Together we moved for the front door and cupped our hands over our mouths to filter the smoke. The ache in my back cramped my right side and I limped beside Wendy.

A gunshot boomed, then again, and again. Dragan lay prone by the space heater. He jerked the trigger of a revolver and sprayed the air with bullets.

Shoving Wendy toward the door, I drew my pistol up and loosed one round at Dragan.

I missed.

But the bullet ruptured the propane tank of the space heater. A fiery blast knocked Wendy and me onto our backs. The SIG-Sauer bounced out of my grasp. Smoke swallowed us. Flames licked my skin. I didn’t want to die. Not now. Not roasted like a chicken. Both of us scrambled onto our bellies and crawled through the acrid smoke, bumping against the walls and furniture until we found the front door. We rose to our feet, staggered outside, and sucked in the clean, cold night air. Heavy snowflakes from the blizzard melted on our skin. The pain in my back ebbed and I hobbled alongside Wendy.

We scooted clumsily across the icy snow to the corner at the right and started down the hill. A mound of snow covered my Dodge.

Wendy folded her arms tight across her chest and hunched her shoulders to keep warm. A plume of vapor trailed from her mouth. Her flimsy scrubs didn’t offer much protection from the chill.

I took the keys out of my pocket and peeled off my barn coat. I offered it to Wendy. Without breaking stride, she shoved her arms into the sleeves.

Behind us, flames and smoke poured out of the garage. The three vânätori crawled, wheezing and coughing, out the back door and into the fenced lot behind the garage.

“Damn, these guys are as hard to kill as cockroaches,” I said, feeling the threat of danger return. I wished I hadn’t lost the SIG-Sauer.

We reached my car and both of us raked snow off the windshield.

“So what’s the plan, Felix?” Wendy asked. “We lead Carmen and the other vampires here to finish these guys off, right?”

“No.” I paused to catch my breath. The frigid night air scratched the inside of my throat. “We go to Rocky Flats.”

Wendy stopped brushing the snow. “What?”

I dug ice from the door lock with my keys. “I need to confirm what Dragan said about the nymphomania.”

“You mean his story about a spaceship?”

“Not just any spaceship-It’s the UFO from Roswell. Didn’t you notice how my aura changed colors from the red mercury?”

“I thought it was a trick.” Wendy resumed brushing away the snow. “What at Rocky Flats will prove that?”

“They’re hiding something in the trailer bound for New Mexico.”

She stopped again. “The UFO?”

“We’ll see.”

Dragan stumbled to the fence. He was a good hundred feet away, yet too close.

I yanked the driver’s door open. Snow cascaded over the interior. “Hurry. Get in.”

A shot rang out, a dull thud through the hiss of the snowfall.

Something stabbed me in the small of my back. An unbelievably fierce pain, followed by an overwhelming weakness, forced me to my knees.

Dragan clung to the fence with one hand, his other hand jerking the revolver. Click, click, click.

Wendy rushed around the front of the Dodge and cried out, “Felix.”

Blood seeped down my skin against the inside of my shirt. I paused to gather strength to stand up and hand her the keys. “You’ll have to drive.”

“Where did you get hit?”

I took a baby step toward the car. “It’s nothing a vampire can’t handle. By the time we get down the mountain, I’ll be fine.”

She nudged me through the driver’s door. I crawled over the center console and unfolded myself in the passenger’s seat. Every movement was an exercise in agony. Turning my head to hide any expression of pain, I leaned against the door and hugged myself to fight the cold. Lucky shot on Dragan’s part. And lousy luck on mine. I was hurt bad and getting worse. I should’ve felt my recuperative powers kick in-I’d been shot before-but this time I felt nothing but pain and a draining weakness.

Wendy let the Dodge coast backwards for a few feet then turned the front toward the bottom of the hill. She twisted the ignition key and the engine cranked over immediately. Good old DieHard battery.