Free The Birth of Vengeance (Vampire Formula #1) by P.A. Ross

for my house keys.
    I couldn’t find them. I frantically padded every pocket and turned out their contents onto the table but they were gone.
    “My keys have gone. I must have lost them or they were taken,” I said.
    “What about your Dad?” Jill asked.
    “He will have some; can you drop me off at his workplace instead?” I asked, knowing that he wouldn’t leave work early.
    “Of course,” she answered.
    The three of us got into Jill’s black Mini Cooper. Scarlett and I sat in the back holding hands while I gave directions and Jill drove.
     
     
     

CHAPTER 6
     
    We arrived at the research facility, a large grey concrete structure with a barrier across the entrance and exit, and army guards in a cabin at the side of the barrier. All around the centre a high barbed wired electric fence ringed it. This wasn’t the sort of place you just walked into. I kissed Scarlett goodbye and clambered out of the car, being careful not to hit my bruises. The guards watched suspiciously, as I hobbled over to the cabin, taking in the bruises and blood on my clothes and face. They quickly came to the door of the cabin. I asked to talk with Mr Clarence Watson, my Dad, and they called through without complaint. I explained briefly what had happened, and he quickly came to fetch me. He wore his white lab coat with ID badge attached, black trousers, black shoes and his small rounded spectacles. He spoke briefly to Scarlett and Jill, as he crouched down at the window of the Mini Cooper, and thanked them for taking care of me. I waved goodbye to them, and Scarlett blew me a kiss as a single tear rolled down her face. The car reversed around and drove back off down the road.
    Dad ushered me inside the building out of the cold. We walked through the white marbled floored lobby, around an enclosed receptionist desk and down the endless empty white corridors straight ahead. Offices and other corridors shot off the sides of the main corridor as we walked. The building lay empty, it being late at night and most people had already gone home. The corridors got shorter and the offices smaller as we carried on and Dad asked me what had happened. I relayed the whole story to him, as we passed through the increasingly secure doors further into the centre of the building. He sighed and mumbled something about the youth of today, until we finally reached a lift. He swiped his card again and placed his eye against a reader on the side panel. The lift door opened and we entered. He pressed “B,” for basement I guessed, and we descended into the depths of the building.
    “I will sort out some arrangements to get you home,” he said, “I have to work all night.”
    “I know Dad,” I responded.
    The lift stopped, and we walked along the single corridor past a couple of rooms and then into his lab. The smell of new paint lingered in the air and a single bare bulb illuminated the room. As we entered, I noticed two needles filled with a red substance sat on the side. Dad quickly walked over to them and shoved them in a drawer in the hope I hadn’t noticed, which I wouldn’t have but for him hiding them away.
    “Sit here and don’t touch anything, I am going to make some phone calls”.
    He sat me down in his chair in front of his computer by the side of a large tinted mirror. He looked at the repair work on my face, and then walked into the office next door to make his calls; he needed a fixed line phone this deep underground.
    In the mirror, my reflection revealed the beating I had taken. My black eye had swollen and my nose bruised and bloodied but the majority of pain came from the rest of my body. My legs and back hurt like hell as they had absorbed the majority of the kicks. I shuffled in the chair and tried to find a way of sitting that didn’t hurt. I brushed at the dirt, blood, snot, tears and spit that stained my clothes. I quickly brushed my hair and straightened my clothes as I viewed my reflection, trying to get some dignity back.