Dead Night Read Online Free PDF

raised.
    Eyeing me with suspicion, he said, “Oh yeah, what college was that?”
    How the fuck should I know? I wanted to say, and even though I was already dead I didn’t fancy a face full of shot. “What was it called?” I said thoughtfully.
    “What did she study?” he came back at me.
    “Music,” I said confidently, knowing this to be true.
    “Liar!” he roared. “You’ve come for her, just like the others.” There was a flash of white light along with a booming sound as I flew backwards through the air.
    I lay on my back in his overgrown garden and my chest felt hot, like a burning poker had been rammed between my ribs. Then, there was another booming noise as Sophie’s father slammed the front door shut. I opened my eyes and stared up into the night sky. The stars seemed to spin above me and I groaned in pain. I placed my hands to the gunshot wound and could feel a ragged hole in my chest.
    “The son of a bitch shot me,” I coughed, as blood rushed up my throat and into my mouth.
    Rolling onto my side, I dragged myself to my knees. I opened the front of the scarecrow’s coat and looked at the hole in my chest. It was black and scorched-looking, and blood pumped from it in a black stream, which ran down over my stomach.
    Leaning forward, I gritted my teeth and forced my thumb and forefinger into the wound. Blood rushed over my hand in a cold stream. Blind, I felt for the tiny lead balls that Sophie’s father had pumped into me. One by one, using my fingers like tweezers, I pulled them out, and I couldn’t help but wonder why the parents of my girlfriends all wanted me dead. Was I really that bad?
    With all the shot removed, I staggered to my feet, the sound of the dog barking from inside the house echoing out across the surrounding fields. With the hole in my chest starting to congeal over, I went back to the front door. But this time I didn’t even think about knocking.
    Raising my foot, I put the door in. It flew off its hinges and shot up the hallway in a spray of splinters. The dog bounded into the hall and raced towards me. With my own fangs out, I snarled back at the dog. Seeing me looming in the doorway, claws raised and fangs glistening, Archie made a whimpering sound and raced away back up the hall.
    “You call yourself a guard dog?” Sophie’s father roared as he came running back into the hallway. Then, seeing his front door lying in splinters and his dog pissing up the lampstand, he looked at me. “What in the name of sweet Jesus is going on -” he started. But before he had a chance to get the rest of his words out of his mouth, I was on him.
    Pinning him to the wall, and with my fangs just inches from his face, I ripped the shotgun from his hands and said, “Is Sophie here?”
    “But I shot you,” he gasped, looking at me as if I were some kind of ghost.
    “And it fucking hurt,” I hissed. “So don’t do it again, it’s not very nice.”
    “But you should be dead!” he cried, and again I could see the fear in his eyes. “You’re a Skin-walker, aren’t you?”
    Then, realising that I should be keeping my Vampyrus form hidden, I looked away and withdrew my fangs. “Yes,” I whispered. “I am a Skin-walker.”
    “I knew it,” he breathed, trying to wriggle free from my grip on him. “You’re just like the others.”
    “What others?” I asked, looking back at him.
    “You know,” he said, sounding breathless.
    “You’re one of them. You want Sophie.”
    “Where is she?” I asked him, tightening my grip, not understanding myself what was really going on. Why would Skin-walkers be looking for Sophie? And what the fuck were Skin-walkers anyway? If I were going to find anything out from Sophie’s father, I would have to get him to trust me, to understand that he had nothing to fear from me, nor did his daughter.
    “You don’t recognise me, do you?” I asked him, lowering my voice, but still keeping hold of him. He’d already shot me once and hadn’t even