Read The Damned for Free Online

vampires attacked, and we were caught off guard.”
    “Yeah, funny thing,” Jamie said, grunting from his place slumped in a recliner.
    “We keep going on missions like we did before New Orleans,” Jenn persisted. “Someone asks for help, and we go. But it’s not working.”
    “Yeah, funny thing,” Jamie said again.
    “But what about the worldwide resistance?” she asked. “How many groups are there like those in New Orleans, who are trying to fight back with the only skills and tools they have?”
    “Why, you want to get them killed too?” Jamie drawled as he pulled a cigarette out of a pack in the breast pocket of the shirt one of the male witches had given him.
    “Shut up,” Skye said, an uncharacteristic outburst from the group’s peacemaker. “We’d only just started going out as a team for two months before Jenn had to go to California. People around here found out about us and started asking for help.”
    “Your point?” Jamie said.
    Skye’s cheeks were pink. Jenn knew Skye had a crush on Jamie. Skye’s lousy taste in men amazed her.
    “So it makes sense the Cursed Ones heard about us too, yeah? So more of them are showing up at each mission. They’re gunning for us. We’re outnumbered,” Skye said.
    “Well said,” Holgar told her, flashing her a smile. He was lounging on some decorative pillows on the floor.
    Eriko didn’t join the conversation. She was rubbing her shoulder and looking tired and wan.
    Father Juan reappeared with a lacquer tray containing a water bottle, a dark green bottle of wine, and seven glasses. Jamie tapped his unlit cigarette against the cardboard container. Skye glared at the Irishman, who sighed and put the cigarette away.
    “What are you all arguing about?” Father Juan asked.
    “Jenn’s wondering about other groups like ours,” Antonio told him. “During the war there were resistance cells everywhere, struggling to survive, to fight.”
    When Antonio talked about the war, he meant World War II. Adolf Hitler had begun his campaign of terror, and Antonio had brazenly walked away from the seminary in 1941 to join the Free French Forces. He had been called a Maquis, after the thready brush by the same name, where they hid in the French forests . On one of his first missions he had stayed behind to offer a dying compatriot the last rites of the Church, and he had been attacked and “converted” on the battlefield. More than that Jenn didn’t really know. He didn’t like to talk about it.
    “So it stands to reason that there may be lots of resistance cells today,” Jenn put in.
    Father Juan nodded as he set down the tray. “Perhaps it’s time to reach out to these groups. Help them, and maybe get their help in return. At the very least we can try to coordinate our efforts. This is not a local problem. And if one day we could all rise up as one body and take on the enemy perhaps we could win.”
    “Amen,” Antonio murmured, crossing himself.
    Father Juan’s eyes gleamed with the hope that Jenn had lost. He decanted the bottle and arranged the glasses in a semicircle, but he didn’t fill them. He was waiting for the wine to breathe. Jenn’s chest was so tight that she couldn’t breathe.
    “Rise up?” Jamie scoffed. “We can’t even trust the allies we do have.”
    “Maybe we need better allies,” Eriko ventured.
    “And more of them,” Holgar added, in his singsong Danish accent. He quirked a half smile. “Preferably less cranky ones.”
    “Zip it, wolf,” Jamie said, glaring. “There is nothing funny here.” He gave Antonio a pointed look. “Someone told the Pamplona vampires to push up the date.”
    Antonio’s answering stare was icy. “It’s common in wartime to spread misinformation. They may have been planning all along to ‘run the humans’ last night. But I agree. Too often the vampires seem to know about our plans.”
    “Fancy that,” Jamie bit off. “And now we’ve got two vampires livin’ under our