The Shadow Box: Paranormal Suspense and Dark Fantasy Thriller Novels

by Travis Luedke

  A four-foot wide space ran between his and the neighboring house, what could barely qualify as an alley. The roof of the adjacent building almost aligned with Lockman’s window, about a foot and a half higher than the window's top edge. He snapped the latch on the window and slid it open. A quick check of the alley showed him a group of three figures clad completely in black, from fatigues to ski masks, and even wrap-around sunglasses hiding their eyes. Not a single inch of skin exposed to the California sun.

  They shuffled along the narrow path, headed toward the back of the house. Each of them carried what looked like military issue machine guns, though Lockman didn't recognize their make. Something foreign and probably cutting edge. Dolan would use nothing less.

  The bitter stink of the tear gas rose to the loft. He noticed the girl's black eye makeup running down her cheeks, the whites of her eyes red and irritated. He realized the burn in his own eyes.

  Time was running short.

  He knew he could perch on the windowsill and jump across to grab hold of the next house’s roof. Then he could pull himself up. He’d already tested it before. But no way his new companion could make that jump. More than likely he wouldn’t be able to convince her to even try.

  He spun to face the loft space, his gaze scanning the equipment, looking for some tool to use as a bridge of some kind. The closest thing he could find was the padded plank on his weight bench. But it wasn’t long enough.

  He looked at the girl and tried to deny that recognition he felt when he first saw her. No good. The more he looked at her the more he believed her story and what it implied. Which meant no matter how important it was to homeland security that Craig Lockman escape capture from the likes of Otto Dolan, he could not leave this girl behind.

  “This isn’t going to work,” he said to her, his throat constricting as the teargas continued to rise to their level.

  The girl—how he wished he knew her name—looked out the window. “Jumping out the window? No shit.” She burst into a coughing fit that doubled her over.

  “We’ll have to face them,” he said. He had to fight his own urge to choke on the gathering chemical mist.

  She looked up at him, still coughing, her expression plainly incredulous even through her smeared make-up and watery eyes.

  “You’ll have to trust me. And stay close.”

  “Who…” She couldn’t manage the rest as another coughing fit strangled her voice.

  “’Who doesn’t matter,” he said and took her arm. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you anyway.” He pulled her close to the open window. He quickly checked the alley. All three of Dolan’s men had rounded the corner at the back of the house. The attackers hadn’t considered covering the alley from inside, but he had little doubt whichever direction the two of them took down the narrow path would lead to someone waiting and well-armed.

  “Stick your head out the window and breathe as much fresh air as you can,” he said. “I’ll be right back.”

  She leaned over the windowsill and gasped. “Where are you going?”

  “Gotta get some things.” He pulled his shirt over his nose and mouth, a poor substitute for a gasmask. It would have to work. He needed more than his bare hands to face what Dolan had sent. A couple guns, at least. But based on the attackers’ dress, he had an idea of what else might help.

  He raced down the stairs, past the hissing canister on the living room floor, and into the kitchen. The kitchen lined up with a small dining area where a sliding glass door led out to the square of weeds that qualified as a back yard in these parts of Southern California. As he entered, Lockman stayed low, both to keep out of the rising cloud of teargas and to stay behind the kitchen counter and out of view of the back exit.

  From the cabinet under the kitchen sink, he retrieved a pair of .45 Glocks with a spare clip for each. Both Glocks and the spare clips were loaded, by default, with silver-tipped rounds. Silver had a lot of use back in what he called his Old Life. He had seen no point in abandoning the element in his so-called “decommissioned” life. He might have had to spend the last fifteen years pretending to be an average citizen, but that didn’t mean he had to pretend the world wasn’t full of the nasty things he’d spent his career fighting. Silver would be the new gold if even a quarter of the world’s population knew the truth about what was out there.

  Leaning against the cabinets built into the kitchen counter, Lockman reached over his head and opened a drawer. He felt around the random junk inside—nail clippers, sparkplugs, bundle of pens rubber-banded together—until his hand touched the cool metal he was looking for.

  He pulled the crucifix, about the size of a hammer, from the drawer.

  The crucifix went long-end first into his back pocket. He tucked the spare clips in each of his front pockets. The guns stayed in his hands.

  While the archway that connected the living room and kitchen was narrow enough to block most of the teargas from infiltrating the kitchen too badly, Lockman’s throat felt like he had swallowed a box of needles and his eyes burned like cinders in his skull. The thought of traipsing back through the thick of the teargas made him hesitate. He didn’t think he could make it.

  He considered leaving the girl behind again. He could probably fight his way out the back door. It was the most logical option. After all, the attackers had come for him. The worst the girl might have to suffer was the discomfort from the tear gas. Lockman knew State secrets. The country, even the world, couldn’t afford his capture.

  But if she is my…

  He bit the thought down before it could slip, full-formed, into the light. Better to leave it half-realized in the shadows at the back of his mind. If he fully contemplated the possibility, it could hamper his ability to focus on the greater good.

  He peeked over the counter top toward the back entrance and thought he caught a glimpse of a dark figure moving behind the curtains. Seconds to decide his next move. Up to her or straight out to them?

  “Fuck the greater good,” he growled under his breath and duck walked out of the kitchen. Halfway up the stairs he heard the front door splinter, the sound like cracking bones. Then the shattering glass from the back entrance.

  He powered his way up the stairs to the loft, found the girl hanging out the window by the waist and heaving in the fresh air. “They’re in,” he shouted as he approached. “We’re going out.”

  She looked at him over her shoulder. “Out where?”

  He pointed at the window with the barrel of one of his Glocks. The girl’s eyes locked on the weapon in his hand and a deeper shade of fear colored her expression.

  “Do you know how to shoot?” he asked when he reached her.

  She shook her head, her lips so tight it almost looked like she didn’t have a mouth. He reached into his back pocket, drew the crucifix, and slapped the long end into her hand. “Then hold this out in front of you toward the stairs like your life depended on it.”

  Her brow creased, some measure of confusion able to break through her total mask of fear.

  “Trust me.” He jammed each Glock into one of his back pockets and swung a leg out of the window. “When I drop down, you come after me. I’ll catch you.”

  “This is crazy.”

  Footsteps thundered into the house below. Voices, slightly inhuman and distorted, called out “clear” as the attackers moved in and searched for any inhabitants.

  “You’re with me or them.” He didn’t wait for a response before swinging his other leg over the windowsill so that both hung down with his abdomen and hands braced against the sill. Gripping the sill, he lowered himself as far as his arms would allow, then let go and dropped the remaining four feet to the pavement.

  He relaxed his body for the impact and felt only a sting up through the flats of his feet and into his ankles, even managed to stay standing. He looked up to see if the girl was following and heard her scream. Damn. He should have tried lowering her first. The crucifix could stall the attackers—assuming he was even right
about their nature—but they were armed with fully automatic weaponry. They could close their eyes to the symbol and fire enough rounds to take her down if they wanted.

  “Hey,” he called, not knowing her name and thinking he might never learn it now. He had only felt this feeble and helpless once before. Dolan was behind it that time as well, managing to change the entire direction of Lockman’s life. “You have to jump. Just jump. Now!”

  She screamed again, this time the sound cut in half.

  Lockman’s whole body went rigid and cold. He waited a second more for a sign she was coming out the window. Silence answered him.

  No. Not this time. Not again.

  Suicide, his mind answered to what he planned.

  Irresponsible.

  Treason.

  He drew the Glocks and ran around to the front of the house.

  A black SUV with fully tinted windows sat at the curb, all four doors and the back hanging open. His front door hung cockeyed from one hinge like a loose tooth. Bullet holes dotted a mostly straight line along the house’s façade, high, fired at an angle probably from only as far as the cracked sidewalk. It did look like they meant to take him alive. Which gave him a little leverage. Not much. Probably not enough.

  Weapons at the ready, Lockman crept to the porch and ducked behind the shrubbery under the picture window. Sirens whined in the distance. Someone had called the cops, but a quick scan of the street showed no sign of watching neighbors. Gang shootings happened enough in these parts of LA that folks knew when to duck their heads and stay out of sight. Any other suburb, you might have a dozen nosey people or more poking their heads out or even wandering over, just asking to get caught in some crossfire.

  Lockman had never considered such an advantage to living in a shit neighborhood.

  The wait felt like an age. Enough time for Lockman to go back and forth a dozen times about the sanity of trying to save a girl he suspected might be his daughter based on her own suggestion and little evidence to back it up except a feeling that prickled over his scalp every time he pictured her face, that note of recognition even though he’d never seen her before. And he had to admit, it wasn’t just his own face he saw in her. He saw Kate. He saw a whole lot of Kate in that young girl. Take out the piercings and clean up the black makeup—her expression, that cocky I have the world in my palm and plan on playing some ball determination.

  Sounds of movement in the living room. The shuffle of boots through debris. Then the low, snake-like voices behind the masks.

  “No sign of him,” said one.

  “The girl claims he left through the upstairs window,” answered a second.

  The obstruction from the masks made it hard to be sure, but Lockman felt more certain of his original assessment based on their voices. The crucifix should have worked. Should have at least bought the girl enough time to get out the window.

  “Does he know who she is?”

  “We’re questioning her further, but he might not. Even if he did, that does not mean he would still not abandon her.”

  “We’ll all see the light if that’s true.”

  Bolstered by the confirmation of his suspicions—only vamps thought that “seeing the light” was a bad thing—Lockman wiped the sweat off his upper lip with a wrist and checked that he had a round in the chamber of each Glock.

  He swung around into the doorway, brought his guns up, and sighted one barrel on each of the pair standing in his living room. He pulled both triggers in synch and landed one head shot on the vamp to his left. The one on his right dodged, too fast for human reflexes. The silver-tipped round grazed its arm, tearing through the fatigues and exposing a sizzling and smoking wound.

  The vamp on the left dropped to the floor. The hole in its head sputtered and gurgled, bubbles of blood popping inside like boiling chili.

  The surviving creature brought its automatic weapon to bear on Lockman, but Lockman never stopped moving, spinning across the open doorway to the opposite side. He pressed his back against the brick wall. The vamp’s weapon chattered. Chunks from the doorframe snapped and scattered. A splinter nipped at Lockman’s cheek.

  The thing with automatic weapons, you could drain your ammo fast in a single panicked burst of fire. Lockman heard the dry click when the vamp’s magazine went empty. He swung back into the doorway and fired a shot meant for the head, but caught the vamp in the throat instead.

  The vamp’s weakness to silver exaggerated the effect of the round. Its neck exploded like a blood-filled water balloon thrown against a brick wall. Its head toppled to the floor, body not far behind. The headless body still tried to fire the weapon clutched in its hands for a moment before finally giving in to death.

  The battle had brought the attention of the four vamps still up in the loft. All four of them stood at the railing and started firing.

  Lockman jumped backward through the front door and slammed onto the cement slab porch. The impact on his back knocked the wind from his lungs. For a second he didn’t think he could make himself move. Too long since he’d seen action like this. And fifteen years, no matter how much you worked out, aged a person. Suddenly, Lockman faced the possibility he wasn’t as strong as he thought.

  To hell with that.

  He rolled off the porch and into the shrubs, clinging to his guns despite the pain in his back and the thin breath in his lungs.

  The rain of bullets from the loft shredded the living room carpet and the cheap floorboards underneath.

  So much for them taking him alive.

  The barrage ended after an inhumanly loud shout from inside the house. It sounded like a cross between an eagle cry and a bear’s roar, but with a voice.

  “Stop!”

  The silence that followed was so absolute, Lockman could hear the blood flowing in his ears and the rattle in his lungs as he tried to regain his breath. The distant sirens were less distant.

  “Craig Lockman,” the same vamp called, his voice not as loud, but every bit as inhuman. “We have your spawn. Obviously, you know that or you wouldn’t still be here. My men are hungry. Do you want us to feed on her?”

  Lockman didn’t bother answering. Bargaining with vamps, especially those under the employ of Otto Dolan, would get him nowhere. Instead, he stayed crouched between the house and the shrubs and thought through the situation. He’d downed two in the living room. At least four remained upstairs. Maybe five since he didn’t see the girl and one of them had to be holding her. That made a total unit of seven vamps. A perfectly capable taskforce to take in one man, even excluding their supernatural prowess. But an odd number. A number that felt wrong.

  The hot barrel pressed against the back of his neck proved that feeling right. “Drop your weapons,” said a serpentine voice behind him.

  Chapter Three

  The seams of Kate’s life had started to split again. She felt those seams tear almost like her insides were coming apart. Eventually, she would be left empty. She pressed her fingers against her mouth. God, get a hold of yourself.

  Alec sat at the kitchen table with her. Would hold her hand when she let him. Would sigh sympathetically when she looked at him. But he didn't glance at the clock as often as she did, didn't seem to feel the gravity of each passing hour.

  “It's after noon,” she said. “How much longer are we going to wait?”

  “Last time she was gone two full days before she came back. The time before that was a day and a half. She's only been gone since yesterday.”

  She stared at him, hoping her expression showed how ridiculous a thing that was for him to say.

  He squirmed under her scrutiny, looked away. “Kate, I'm just saying. She's holed up with one of her so-called friends and she'll come back when she misses regular meals, clean clothes, and a comfortable bed. Just like before.”

  Her face grew warm. “So I should go about my day, not worry about a thing?”

  “No.” He heaved another one of those sighs. How come she had never noticed that annoying tick bef
ore they got married? “But if we call the police, drag them into this again, and Jess shows up, we'll look like fools.”

  He tried to take her hand, but she pulled away. “I'm not worried about looking like a fool. I'm worried about my daughter.”

  He leaned back in his seat and played chagrined.

  To Kate it came across false, condescending even. It was one of those rare times where she wanted to scratch his eyes out. How dare he belittle her feelings?

  “I'm worried, too.”

  “Not worried enough.”

  “Look, I'm not going to panic every time your daughter pulls a stunt like this. You might be blinded to her faults, but what she really needs…”

  “What, Alec? What does she really need that I don't give her?”

  His shoulders sagged. “You'd give her the world, Kate. No matter what. You'd give her everything except the discipline she deserves.”

  Kate felt her face muscles tighten, her jaw set. She spoke through clenched teeth. “When did you become the expert parent? I raised her on my own for ten years before you were ever in the picture.”

  “Don't. This shouldn't turn into that kind of argument. We're together now. I'm here. Jessie is both our responsibility.”

  “Except, I don't live up to your parental expectations.”

  “I didn't say that.”

  “Practically.”

  “Don't put words in my mouth.”

  “Don't tell me how to raise my daughter.”

  She said it before she could take it back, with that slight-but-obvious emphasis on the my. Now it sat out there between them, as ugly as a hocked up glob of phlegm. His rigid expression showed none of the hurt she expected. Either he was holding back his feelings or he really didn't care.

  You're staking your marriage to a solid man who’s done nothing but help you on this petty argument?

  She exhaled slowly. “I'm sorry.”

  “Forget it.”

  “That was mean. I just wanted a reaction out of you.”

  “I know.” One corner of his mouth twitched, almost as if he meant to smile and caught himself. “That's why I didn't.”