“It’s not worth the risk.” But she was right, to a point. He’d killed people these past five years, but all those dead agents – or whatever they were – never made the news. This guy, if he was telling the truth, and was a civilian…that would hit the media. Even if he just disappeared, someone who loved him would file a missing person’s report and the cops would get involved. They could run from shadow organizations all day, but local cops and a murder of a citizen…that would be the thing that caught them, finally. And then Rooster would go to jail, and the Institute would take Red back, and…
He was hyperventilating. The gun shook in his hand.
His hostage stared up at him, frightened, but not backing down. “You haven’t done anything you can’t take back yet,” he said. “It’s okay.”
Red rubbed the arm that he held in front of her like a barrier, small fingers gentle. “Rooster.” A request, a balm.
Rooster swallowed, and his throat was so tight it hurt. “Who do you work for?”
“I own my own wrecker company. I work out of a garage in Farley. Just twelve miles up, like I said.” He wet his lips and added. “Look, I don’t know who you’re running from” – his eyes made a fast dart toward Red, like he knew the why of it – “and it’s none of my business. I’d just really like to not get shot and I’ll give you a tow if you want. I might be Army, but I’m not stupid.”
Rooster was…trapped. Caught in a place from which he couldn’t shoot his way out – not without putting them at greater risk. And he…was tired. So tired. All the good Red’s healing had done last night seemed to bleed out of him now, carried away on a tide of soul-deep exhaustion.
Like he sensed that Rooster’s resolve was wavering, Jake said, “You can even hold a gun on me the whole time if you want. But your arsenal will have to ride in the back.” He nodded toward the duffels that still lay on the ground.
Red’s hand touched his shoulder, a silent please.
Rooster exhaled in a rush. “Fine.”
8
Farley was the sort of town that Rooster always described as Bum Fuck, Egypt. The kind of town they hurried through, because small places bred tight-knit social circles, places where strangers were noticed.
An aptly-named Main Street took them past a water tower and a tidy row of brick two-story shops, American and Wyoming flags flying at the center of the small, green square. Jake – who’d done a remarkable job of keeping calm during their silent, tense twelve-mile truck ride – finally turned left down a side stride cluttered with small, clapboard houses, chain link fences, and industrial buildings with crumbling facades. He piloted them into the lot of a gas station/garage combo, where several old trucks waited on blocks and a man in a white cowboy hat sat smoking a cigarette and reading a paper beneath the convenience store’s front awning.
“Fucking Mayberry,” Rooster muttered.
“Yep,” Jake said. He backed the flatbed up to one of the garage doors and put it in park. Then he turned a flat, almost bored look on Rooster – who was crammed in the middle seat because he was too protective, and stubborn, and Red loved him for it anyway. “Try not to shoot any of my employees, okay?”
Rooster made a face.
“He didn’t say ‘no,’ so that’s something,” Red offered.
Jake twitched a smile and climbed out of the cab.
When they were alone, Rooster turned to her and said, “Stick by me.” Then, low and frightened, “Please.”
Oh, Rooster. She wanted to stroke his hair, put her arms around his neck and breathe in the scent of road dirt off his throat and tell him it would be fine. Instead, she smiled and said, “Okay.”
He nodded and his gaze flicked out through the windshield, toward Jake who now stood in front of the truck, talking to a scruffy-faced young man with holey jeans and a garage smock. He took a quick, unsteady breath. “Transmission work takes time. Depending on how bad it is – shit, we could be here. I don’t–” He pressed his lips together into a thin, white line. “I dunno,” he murmured. “I just–”
“Hey,” she said, softly, and his gaze came back to her. “What is it you always tell me? This is all we can do, so it’s what we will do.”
He’d told her that time and time again, on rain slick roads, the wipers beating across the windshield; in eighties-era hotel rooms while every set of headlights that skimmed across the wall made her jump; in small towns, and in big cities. He pressed onward, again and again, killing when he had to, always keeping her safe. He’d been a Marine for so long, much longer than the war had actually lasted, and she could see the cracks at his edges. Could feel the way the gaps between healings were getting shorter and shorter. He would break – her unbendable, implacable, too-brave Rooster – and she thought he could sense it, too, the way his hand had shook on the gun before, the way he was willing to put at least a little trust in a stranger.
He gave her a smile that didn’t touch his eyes. “Yeah. Okay.”
He slid over to climb out of the driver’s side and reached back into the cab to help her out with the hand that wasn’t hovering near his gun.
Red stepped down onto the cracked asphalt and was greeted by the smell of motor oil and hot pavement, boiled peanuts and fresh-cut grass.
Fucking Mayberry indeed.
~*~
If it hadn’t been the transmission…
A spark plug, a fan belt, a battery, a fuel pump – there were any number of things that could have gone wrong with the truck that could have been fixed in a few hours – or a few minutes – and allowed them to get back on the road. Put that much needed distance between themselves and Evanston City.
But no. It was the transmission. Because that’s how life went.
Rooster cursed softly to himself, clicked off the flashlight, and climbed out from under the truck. Fucking Dodge, he thought, ready to take on the whole damn Chrysler company for letting him down like this. “Fluid everywhere,” he said in response to Red’s questioning look.
The kid who worked for Jake – his name tag declared him Spence – stood with his hands on his hips, expression somewhere in the neighborhood of regretful and told-you-so. “We won’t know what’s going until we open ‘er up, but–”
“Yeah,” Rooster said, grim.
“I’m guessing I’m gonna have to order some parts.”
“Yeah.” He allowed himself a moment – just one – to wallow in his absolute fury. He couldn’t ever decide, in moments like these, if he was angriest at himself, at the Ingraham Institute, or the world at large.
A very dark, very deeply buried part of himself liked to play the what-if game. What if he hadn’t been blown up? What if he’d finished his tour? He wouldn’t have been living in Deshawn and Ashley’s basement; would never have gone to the Institute hoping to get put on a drug trial; wouldn’t have been there for Red to follow home.
But would she have followed someone else? Someone who wouldn’t, or couldn’t, keep her safe?
She sent him a crooked little smile, now, and he hoped she hadn’t developed the ability to read minds. Not that it would surprise him. He took a deep breath and bundled all his dangerous doubts back up, shoved them into the mental closets where they belonged.
He turned to Spence, shame heating his face. “I’m – I’m not much good with transmissions.”
Spence nodded. “Lucky for you, I’m the best. Gimme a couple hours and I’ll know what we need to order.”
“Thanks.”
He locked up his gun cases with the key, not caring if Spence wondered what was in them, then hooked his arm around Red’s shoulders and steered her around to the front of the building.
Jake was in the process of pressure washing his flatbed, and Rooster paused, hanging back a moment. “What’s your read on this guy?”
Red made a surprised sound, and said, “My read?”
“Yeah. I’ve trained you well.” He gave her shoulders a squeeze and she breathed a quiet laugh.
“Okay, well.” Her brows stitc
hed together in thought as she studied their rescuer with Marine-worthy scrutiny. “I don’t think he’s lying. Not really. I believe he was Army. And I don’t think he wants to hurt us.”
“I’m sensing a ‘but.’”
Her frown deepened. “I don’t know. Maybe I’m just paranoid…”
“You and me both, kiddo.”
“…but I think…I think it’s okay. For now.”
“Well, that’s good enough for me.”
She sent him a doubtful look.
“We’ll just be careful.”
She nodded.
Jake glanced up and noticed them, and shut off the pressure washer. “Spence get you sorted?”
With the exception of brief interactions with clerks and waitstaff, Rooster didn’t really interact with people anymore; his social skills were rusty. Still, he knew he ought to be polite – if he couldn’t force himself to be outright pleasant.
“Yeah,” he said, aiming for a neutral tone. “He’s gonna take a look. Probably have to order some parts.” A flutter of panic surged in his belly at the thought. Shit, they were stuck here. He cleared his throat. “Thanks – for your help.” The words felt dragged out of him. He didn’t like having to thank people – owing them.
Jake nodded. “Shouldn’t be more than a few days, then. There’s a decent motel here in town. Nothing fancy, but it’s clean.”
Motel. Waiting. Sitting ducks. Rooster nodded and swallowed with difficulty. “Yeah, maybe…where can I get the classifieds? I’ll just buy another truck.”
Jake frowned. “You won’t find anything worth a damn around here. Not with a full back seat and all the mods on your truck.”
Yeah, but it would get us the hell away from here, Rooster thought. “Still.”
Jake looked doubtful. “I’m sure Marty can hook you up with a paper inside.” He jerked a thumb toward the convenience store. “Can’t promise you’ll have any luck.”
Rooster turned that way, towing Red with him. He had to try, at least. The only thing more unforgivable than failing to protect Red would be to stop trying – even if he failed all the same.
9
New York City
The bodies lay beneath white sheets. Harvey made no move to walk her over there and lift up the covers, and Trina didn’t insist. Frankly, just the shapes of them under the drapes was enough to give her the cold chills. The silhouettes weren’t quite…right. Pieces missing. Pieces in the wrong place.
Harvey, drawn and tired, flipped through her notes and stared down at them as she said, “Webb’s not joining us?”
“No,” Trina said, and left it at that. She could have pretended he was still hungover and his stomach too jumpy for the post-mortem, but she didn’t feel like lying to Harvey any more than necessary.
The ME looked up, finally, expression pinched. “You were at the scene. You saw. Cause of death was exsanguination. The victims were hacked apart. Eviscerated. Parts are missing – fingers, mostly, like they were trying to fend off their attackers.” She paused a moment, allowing Trina a brief shudder. “They looked like they were killed by a bear, Trina.”
Not far off. “I–”
“Now look,” Harvey continued, voice hardening. “I know it’s a leap to go from missing bodies to chewed on bodies – oh yeah, there are teeth marks, animal teeth marks – but lots of weird shit is going on around here and you? You’re not even questioning it. Just standing there looking like you’ve got a stomach ache. So this is me asking, unofficially, off the record – as a friend – what you know about all this.”
For a moment, Trina almost caved. In part because Harvey was a competent ally in her day-to-day job, who worked tirelessly to help them catch criminals. And also in part because she was starting to feel like a shaken soda, and wouldn’t it be wonderful to confide in someone? My great-grandfather’s not only alive, but ageless, and also a vampire, and the former tsarevich of Russia turned Lanny into one, too.
‘Cause that would go over well.
Trina waited a beat too long. Swallowed. “Christine–”
“Forget it.” Harvey turned away, disgusted. “Get out of my morgue.”
And yeah. That was fair.
She found Lanny outside, sitting on a low concrete retaining wall that had been backfilled with dirt and planted with St. John’s wort. He looked almost serene, with his shirtsleeves pushed up and his head tipped back, eyes closed. The sun fell full on his face – that rich, hot, baking late summer sun that always felt so good when you’d been trapped in air-conditioned buildings all day – and Trina was struck by the difference in him. Gone were the bruise-dark circles around his eyes, the grayish pallor of his skin. His face seemed fuller, too; the face of a man with healthy eating habits and a regular workout routine. It was only now, when faced with the stark contrast, that she realized that he’d been sliding down for a long time; she should have noticed. She hated herself for not.
His eyes cracked open a slit. “How’d it go?”
“Better that you weren’t in there trying to lick the dried blood off the bodies.”
“That’s fucking disgusting,” he said, and shut his eyes again.
Trina sat down next to him on the wall, forcing herself to push past the prickling unease that told her not to sit too close, getting in tight enough that their shoulders brushed. His arm felt warm through both their sleeves, and she wondered why she’d expected it to feel any different.
Lanny hummed a little sound that was mostly content. “Who’d’ve thought vampires could sit in the sun, huh? Betcha I can eat garlic, too, which is a damn good thing, ‘cause my ma wouldn’t understand if I suddenly stopped coming by for pasta night.”
“Guess most of the old myths were wrong,” Trina said, hearing a hollowness in her voice.
“Hey, do you think I can walk into a church without lighting on fire? Maybe I can still go to Mass.”
She didn’t answer right away, turned to glance at him, and found that he was smiling at her, the expression more than a little bitter.
“These are the kinda questions I gotta ask myself, you know?” he said, voice bitter, too. “Can I still pray? Can I see my reflection to shave in the mornings? Can I still” – his breath hitched – “be with you without wanting to drink your damn blood?”
She sucked in a breath.
His smile twitched, fell, and he glanced away.
“Yeah,” he muttered. “It’s hard for you to even wanna sit here with me, isn’t it?”
Her pulse throbbed in her temples, caught painfully in her ears, like they needed to pop. They were valid questions, all of them. But she thought of Nikita, of how he was nothing like Rasputin. Thought of Alexei, the entitled prince. And poor sweet Jamie, who hadn’t asked for any of this.
She took another breath, this one deep and measured. “I can see your reflection in the grill of that car right there,” she said, pointing to the Cadillac parked in front of them, “so that answers that question. And for the rest of it. Lanny, the thing that happened to you was physical. It changed the way your body works – maybe even what your body needs – but it didn’t change your mind. Or your heart. You’re still you. Just…healthy.”
“And required to drink blood.”
“Think of it as medicine. Like insulin for a diabetic.”
He barked a short, startled laugh. “Holy shit.”
“Maybe it’s even something you can inject. We can ask Nikita. Then you wouldn’t have to feel like it was actually blood.”
“You’re serious?”
She shrugged. “Why not?”
“Because it’s fucking weird,” he said, frustration bleeding through.
“Yeah, but it’s your life now.”
He sighed.
“We’ll figure it out.”
He gave her a sideways look from the corner of his eye, expression hard to read. He shook his head and glanced out toward the parking lot – and bumped her shoulder with his. “So feral werewolves are a thing and they’re in New York e
ating people.”
It was a relief to change the subject. “Apparently.”
“What’re we gonna tell the captain?”
Trina glanced over, startled. “We.”
He shrugged. “You said I was still me, right? So I’m still a cop. Just, maybe…” He curled his hand into a fist in his lap, turning it over, examining it with sudden, intense focus, brows tucking low. “Maybe a cop who’s a lot stronger.”
~*~
Jamie was an only child, but he thought this must be what it felt like to be someone’s younger brother, tagging along for the ride, no one asking for his opinion about anything. It was annoying, sure, but he wasn’t the sort of person who liked to make a fuss. He was generally content to go with the flow and deviate when he had the chance.
Except right now he was a brand-new vampire with a lot of fucking questions, and was apparently sitting next to a member of the long-dead Russian royal family.
Okay.
“They’re hunting us,” Nikita said, grimly, on the other side of the booth.
“Who is?” Jamie asked.
Alexei scoffed. “Coincidence.” But when Jamie glanced over at him, he looked pale. His lower lip trembled, fractionally, as he took a breath.
“No,” Nikita said, voice hard. “It’s not. Your little protégé” – he spat the word – “decided to go on a turning binge.” He gestured to Jamie, and Jamie felt his stomach grab unpleasantly. He wanted to be offended, but he certainly hadn’t asked to be turned.
As if sensing his distress – and didn’t dogs, wolves, sense that sort of thing? – Sasha sent Jamie a fleeting smile.
“The video of Chad walking out of the morgue is all over the Internet,” Nikita went on, scowling. “And then feral wolves try to find Lanny? That’s not a coincidence, and you know it.”
Alexei shrugged and sipped his coffee, eyes a little wild.
Around them, the restaurant hosted a modest afternoon crowd, a mix of students and businesspeople eating craft burgers. (Sasha had picked the place, saying it was one of his favorites.) There was local art on the walls, and James Brown playing softly over the sound system, and Jamie might have enjoyed it if they weren’t discussing being hunted by werewolves who ate people.
Red Rooster (Sons of Rome Book 2) Page 12
