Taken by the Others by Jess Haines

hands cuffed and feeling so out of it.
    With a great deal of effort, I brought my makeshift weapon closer to the door. I looked up at my crap on top of the chest of drawers, and decided that the only thing I didn’t want to leave behind was my wallet. I grabbed it and shoved it into my pocket just as someone kicked the door open.
    I grabbed up the brass stand and lifted, taking a wide stance to help my balance. A man I didn’t know stepped in just past the door, holding a gun in each hand and rapidly scanning the room. His hazel eyes locked on mine, and I was surprised to see relief flood into them. He tucked one of the guns into the waistline of his cargo pants and held out his freed up hand to me.
    “Shiarra, right? Come on, we’re here to rescue you.”
    Rescue? My wits didn’t want to wrap around that statement right away. I stared rather dumbly for a second, slowly lowering the brass stand I’d been brandishing at him, unable to find my voice or an intelligent course of action to take. When he saw my hesitation, his gaze slid to my throat. I saw little crow’s feet appear around his eyes as they crinkled in concern.
    “Shit, sorry we didn’t get here in time,” he said, glancing back over his shoulder before gesturing again for me to come to him. “Come with me, we’ll get you out of here.”
    Part of me was worried he was here to use me the way Max and Royce intended. Still, this was the closest thing to a shot at freedom I’d had so far and I wasn’t about to turn it away. Maybe Royce was the one who sent him. I dropped the candelabra and shuffled to him as fast as I could, fighting back tears as I took his hand. If he turned out to be another bad guy, I didn’t know what I’d do.
    He didn’t say anything about the handcuffs, barely took note of them, in fact. Instead, he smiled warmly at me, taking my hand and nodding encouragement before heading toward the door. I clasped his hand tightly with both of my own, noticing absently as he was turning away that there was a tiny pin of a white cowboy hat on the collar of his auburn bomber jacket. No way would White Hats work with Royce. Did Arnold somehow get in touch with Jack already? Was Jack the one who sent him to rescue me?
    I was infinitely relieved to see Nicolas slumped against the wall in the dimly lit hallway, his eyes closed and blood streaming from a wound on his scalp. There were a couple of other White Hats, most of them holding guns at the ready, some of them kicking in doors and checking the other rooms.
    The guy who’d taken my hand called out to the others. “Found her!”
    “Great, let’s get the hell out of here. There’s too fuckin’ many of them,” a vaguely familiar voice rumbled out from down the hall. I started when the speaker stepped through one of the busted doors; the huge dark-skinned man who had broken into my apartment with Jack a lifetime or so ago. He came to save me?
    He hefted a shotgun and jerked his head to indicate the direction for the others to go. He grinned at my shock as the guy in the bomber jacket pulled me past him. “Good to see you again.”
    “Guard the rear, Tiny?” the guy holding my hand asked. The larger man–wow, did he call that moving mountain Tiny?–grinned and gestured for us to keep going.
    I hadn’t yet found my voice. This was something of a record for me.
    A group of us rushed headlong through the place, taking a flight of stairs and running down another hall. There were signs of the White Hats’ handiwork all over the place. The acrid smell of gun smoke lingered in the halls. Even in the dim light of candles and gas lamps (didn’t this place have electricity?), I could see bullet holes and bodies scattered on the ground, all vamps, fangs bared in rictus. While many showed signs of having been shot, every one we passed was also staked. One had a metal spike shoved in so deep that it held his limp body a foot off the floor. Projectile stakes?
    A vampire suddenly dashed out of one of