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  DANCE ON FIRE

  eBook Edition

  ISBN: 9781311960153

  Copyright © 2012 James Garcia Jr.

  Editor: Natalie Owens

  Cover Illustrator: Maria Zannini

  License Notes

  This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of these authors.

  Publisher’s Note

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  For my two boys: Riley and Rian.

   

  “I can do all things through Him who strengthens me.”

  -Philippians 4:13

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  *You can click on the title to be taken to the selection. Additionally, all chapter names will link you back to this table of contents.

  Sunday

  Prologue

  Monday

  Tuesday

  Wednesday

  Thursday

  Friday

  Saturday

  Epilogue

  Author’s Bio

  “It is a perpetual statute throughout your generations in all your dwellings: you shall not eat any fat or any blood.”

  -Leviticus 3:17

   

   

   

  “And any man from the house of Israel, or from the aliens who sojourn among them, who eats any blood, I will set My face against that person who eats blood, and will cut him off from among his people. For the life of the flesh is in the blood…”

  -Leviticus 17:10-11

   

   

   

  “But about the resurrection of the dead-have you not read what God said to you, `I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? He is not the God of the dead but of the living.”

  -Matthew 22:31-32 NIV

   

  SUNDAY

   

  PROLOGUE

   

  May 4, 2008

  11:59 p.m.

   

  The great beast paused in the dark and sniffed the cool spring air as if welcoming in the fragrant bouquet from a glass of fine wine held below his nostrils. Hands casually held inside the pockets of a brown leather coat, long single strands of his dark hair leaping and dancing in the light breeze, head held slightly elevated, he breathed deeply so as not to miss a single delectable whiff.

  After all of these many years, he was close now. Before, he simply had a sense of it; perhaps one might call it a fool’s hope. Now he could smell it, taste it.

  He was very close indeed.

  The breath within him now spent, devoid of any flavor; the beast released it and stole another.

  Cold, penetrating eyes pierced the moonless night as he was on the move again strolling languidly eastward, as if in a hypnotic trance, through the peach orchard. Had he already become intoxicated by the scent? Perhaps not the blood that led him, but what the blood was telling him. His eyes swept across his field of vision obscured as it was by the trees’ thick canopies. With each additional step, more of the approaching town was revealed—multi-colored light, the spectrum of sounds, the differing shapes of buildings. Looking was unnecessary, however. At this moment, he was as finely tuned to the world around him as he had ever been before. Ahead, where the small town met the open country, and where the clues had led him to, a coyote prowled cautiously, desperately searching for a morsel. To his far left was laughter. Actually, it was more like giggling—the squeals of drunken hyenas, intoxicated with the blood and flesh of their kill. Although in the case of these young men, much too young to drink, it was Budweisers that they were killing. He could actually detect the faint sound of the beer sloshing within the long-necked bottles held in the hands of these who probably thought themselves safely undetected among the rows of the raisin vineyard. This night, at long last, after much searching, longing, nothing could escape the beast’s notice.

  He paused yet again, this time kneeling low to the earth that lay below his heavy riding boots. Though quite minimal, the scent of blood was now sweet and heavy in his flaring nostrils and parched throat, awakening a deeper hunger within him, as if that could be possible. The sensation seemed so new to him. It felt so virginal, like that first bumbling attempt at lovemaking; that first night away from home; that first bloodletting.

  Yet, it was none of these. It was the sweet taste of revenge. The beast would have to salve that hunger with something else tonight, he knew, and perhaps tomorrow as well, but not for very much longer.

  Claw-like fingers dug slowly and confidently at the ground until a tiny leg emerged. It was followed by another, and then a shriveled face. They stopped digging and wrapped themselves around the tiny head, where nails all too similar had recently gripped and snapped away the last of the cat’s life. Without a thought, the beast pulled the corpse from the shallow grave. He did not need to search for the wound that had drained the last of the creature’s life, but he did. He longed to see the wound. How could he not? Was this not what had been driving him, filling his days? And now, he would do nothing but enjoy it to the fullest.

  He bent the pathetic little neck back until there was an awful crack. His expression showed little knowledge of the sound of it. When he found the matted place where cold lips such as his had drank, when he could see the bite that had drawn the blood, he brought it quickly to his mouth and blew away the dirt with a sharp blast of dank air. Now he did the unthinkable. He licked the wound, long and slow, like a lover would the breast of his beloved. Then the great beast smiled a horrible thin smile as he looked up from it.

  “At last,” he whispered, nonchalantly dropping the dead cat and gazing up toward the small town before him. He spoke as if to the entire population. “Nathaniel,” he declared, gritting his perfect white teeth as he did. “I have you at last. And when I am through with you the insignificant souls of this place shall gladly hand you over to me!”

  The vampire immediately headed off into town, setting events into motion.