Blood Trilogy (Book 2): Draw Blood Read Online Free PDF

appearance: His uniform is extremely unkempt, covered with stains, ripped in places, and his cheeks are starkly unshaven below his military crewcut. He’s laughing humorlessly at what the large man has just said. The big man steps in behind him, and he’s similarly splashed with blood. His massive forearms are smeared with it. His hair is greasy, thinning.
    “I mean, bodies struck down and … and … inhabited by something,” the cop says as he comes further into the lobby. “And that light, that’s the weirdest thing, right? This red … thing. Like a possession. I’ll probably never understand that.”
    “We all saw it. Believe me, you’re not alone.”
    Michael is listening hard but is thrown into confusion by what this man saying. Squinting under a persistent dull throb, he watches the middle-aged woman make her way through the doorway. She’s dirty blond, just on the verge of heavy, but still attractive—at least she would probably be on a better day. She’s red-eyed, on the brink of collapse. As she steps into the lobby, she says:
    “I need food. And sleep.”
    The large man says, “We should start organizing trips to Safeway, grab whatever food we can find. The cafeteria is already almost wiped out of water.”
    The cop doesn’t appear to hear them.
    “But what about the way they move? Suppose that’s how they move wherever they’re from? On their planet, or whatever? Like their original bodies are used to.”
    What in the hell? Michael thinks as he watches three younger women—all of them exhausted, leaning against one another—follow in behind the more matronly woman. Is this some kind of joke?
    “But that’s their mistake, maybe. They aren’t familiar with our bodies, they don’t know how to work them. And something is keeping them from using them right.”
    “Like what?” one of the younger women says tiredly.
    The three younger women appear to be the same age, and in fact two of them seem to be twins. They’re young; perhaps younger than Rachel. The twins are tall, gangly, and athletic—basketball players at CSU, perhaps. They both have shoulder-length brown hair, moistened by perspiration and then dried in tangles. The other is smaller, meek, blond. She looks wrecked.
    “Well, I don’t know, but it’s probably the same thing that prevented them from knowing that a certain kind of blood would make some of us immune to them.”
    One of the twins says something unintelligible, and the cops shoots back:
    “No, it’s not! Come on. That’s not all it is, anyway. I mean, look at it. Look at that .”
    The cop has about-faced in the lobby, at the window, and gestured out toward the two bodies at the pine tree at the edge of the parking lot.
    Silence, followed by the shuffling noise of the small group coming to a stop in front of the admissions desk.
    “And you heard it. You can still hear it. I’ve never heard anything like that in my life.”
    Michael catches only a few words of what the older woman says. “—is it—when—”
    “I think they’re communicating,” the cop says. “I think that’s what that is. You remember—Bonnie, you remember—when that happened before. When all those bodies were up there, right up there.” He gestures up the stairwell. “Just scowling down at us, ready to jump down and attack, or whatever they had in mind. And then this—this sound happened, and every one of those things stopped. The mood changed. Right? I’m telling you, they’re communicating.”
    The big guy says, “I feel like Scott again when I say that, yeah, if these things are alien, well, of course they’re communicating. I doubt they’d try to take over the world without a plan.”
    The woman named Bonnie says, after an exhausted pause, “If they’re communicating, what are they saying?”
    “Yeah, that’s the question. And I have no clue.”
    Bonnie lets out a shaky sigh, and she says, “Where’s Rachel?”
    Michael feels a rush of relief at the mention of his