Tainted Blood
Page 27
Since Russell Cain had other agents loyal to him watching Allison and Jonathon Burton’s house, it was decided that it would be too risky for Marya to go to Allison’s house, so Michelle called her watch commander and told him that Allison wanted to go shopping and that they would be late getting home.
“Oh, and we need to go by and pick up Bitsy McCormack,” Allison said, pulling out her cell phone and dialing without waiting for Marya’s okay.
Marya, who with her new expanded mental abilities had no need for cell phones, just beamed a thought at John that she was bringing home company to their hotel and for everyone to get dressed lest they shock the young women.
* * *
When they were all finally together in Elijah’s suite, extra chairs having been brought in, Michelle sat stiffly on the edge of the group, her hand resting on her purse near her .38 out of habit more than with the thought that it would do her any good if her hosts became hostile.
Sam leaned over and whispered, “You have no need to fear us. We really are on your side.”
Michelle was startled that she’d been so easy to read, but did her best not to show it. She was still getting used to this psychic stuff and so didn’t realize how strange it was that another could read her mind without her permission so easily.
Elijah had been elected to act as their spokesperson and he stood in front of the group and said, “Hello Allison, Bitsy, and Michelle.” He grinned when they nodded their hellos.
He spread his arms, “Here you see before you what is euphemistically called, ‘Elijah’s army,’ and we are here with one purpose in mind and only one—to defeat Theo Thantos and his minions in their attempt to take over the government of our country.”
Michelle glanced around at the rather ordinary appearing group and couldn’t help snorting a short laugh.
“Ah, I see we have a disbeliever in our midst,” Elijah said, though not unkindly.
Michelle shrugged. “I guess so. You see, guys, I know for a fact that Thantos has dozens of new converts, if not hundreds by now. And you’re going to go after him with . . . what . . . ten or twelve people?”
“Oh, but you see, Michelle,” Elijah said, still with a kind smile on his face, “we are not just people. In fact, we are not even just Vampyres like yourself and your young friends here—we are something new in the universe . . . something special.”
“Oh, well pardon me, mister, but you don’t look all that special to me,” Michelle said, her voice heavy with sarcasm and disbelief.
Elijah waved a dismissive hand. “Oh, I have no doubt that we’ll be able to prove it to you shortly, but for now we need to know just how many are there like you in Thantos’s group? How many of his followers actively oppose his plans?”
Allison spoke up, “Not enough to do us any good, Elijah. For the past couple of weeks we’ve been actively reading everyone we come in contact with to see where their feelings lie.” She shrugged. “Most of the ones who are not fanatical about the idea are just . . . ambivalent is the best word I can come up with. They just don’t seem to care a whole lot one way or the other, and they certainly aren’t against the plan enough to put their lives in danger to help us stop it.”
Michelle nodded. “Yeah, but you have to remember, a lot of these people have just been converted against their wills so they have a lot to deal with just being what we’ve all just become.” Crimson tears formed in her eyes and she angrily wiped them away. “Some of us are having a little more trouble dealing with the . . . changes than others are,” she finished.
She glanced around at the group. “No offense, you guys, but I so hate what they’ve made of me and what I’m going to have to do to survive, that I’ve been thinking of trying to find some way to kill myself rather than have to survive by killing innocent people.”
TJ moved to sit next to her and put her arm around Michelle’s shoulders. “I know, dear,” she whispered, “I felt the same way at first. But, I promise you, it does get easier with time, especially if you go on the vaccine Elijah invented.”
“Hey,” Bitsy chimed in, “I don’t know about all that killing other people to survive shit—as for me, I think it’s kind’a cool. But my old man, who wasn’t all that good to begin with, has turned into a real bastard since his transformation. He’s always hitting on me and my friends, and all he can think about is the power he’s gonna have once Thantos has taken over the government.” She shook her head. “If you think he’s gonna be easy to get rid of, then you don’t know old Black Jack,” she said morosely.
“And your father would be General McCormack, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff?” Elijah asked.
“Yeah.”
Elijah nodded, thinking hard. “Who else among the followers do you think are the most committed to seeing Thantos succeed?” he asked the trio in front of him.
After a few moments of whispered consultation, Allison spoke up. “There are several, but the ones with the most power and ability to help him are General Blackmon Taylor of USAMRIID; Brendan Fraser, head of the National Security Council and right hand man to the president; Russell Cain, head of the capitol Secret Service detail; and, of course Bitsy’s father, General McCormack.”
“Those are the heavy hitters in government,” Michelle added, “but there’s also his core group of supporters from various business and media interests that helped get him started. He’s made them what he calls his cell leaders, and I can give you a list of their names and the businesses they control.” She took a clipboard from Shooter and began to write on it.
“What about your father, Allison?” Elijah asked. “Is he committed to this scheme?”
She shook her head. “No. He’s as much against it as we are,” she said, glancing at Bitsy and Michelle. “It’s just that it’s harder for him to act since Russell Cain has him watched at all times by some agents loyal to Cain.”
Michelle looked up and handed the clipboard to Elijah. He read it briefly and then he looked around. “From what I can see, we’ve got about”—he glanced down again and then back up—“ten or fifteen heavy players at the most.”
Allison nodded. “That’s about right, if you mean the most fanatical of his followers. There are others, but if Thantos is eliminated, they’ll probably just go away.” She snorted. “None of the others will have the balls to try and do anything on their own, especially if they see us take Thantos down.”
“So,” Elijah said, thoughtfully, “if we could manage to get these people all together at one time and we hit them with everything we have, we might be able to stop this with one decisive action.”
Michelle chuckled grimly. “If you manage to kill them before they kill us, you mean.”
Allison held up her hand, like a student asking a teacher’s permission to speak. “Yes, Allison?” Elijah said.
“I think I know a way to get them all together in one place.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, tell us, girl,” Shooter said impatiently.
“Just listen to this,” Allison said, and she began to outline her plan.
When she finished, Elijah shook his head and grinned. “Out of the mouths of babes . . .” he quoted, causing Allison to blush a deep crimson.
* * *
Theo Thantos put down his wineglass and rolled on his side, his hand moving to caress Christina’s breast while he moved his head down to nuzzle her neck.
When the phone rang, he cursed and raised his head up. Christina tried to pull it back down. “Just ignore it, darling, don’t stop now,” she said, her voice husky with desire.
He lowered his head, but the phone kept up its insistent ringing.
“Damn! I can’t concentrate with that racket going on,” he said. “I’ll get rid of whoever it is and then we can begin where we left off.”
He angrily snatched up the phone and barked, “This had better be important!”
Jonathon Burton was on the line. “Theo, this is Jonathon. We have to talk.”
“No, it can’t wait, Theo, not unless you want to see all we’ve worked for go down the drain.”
That got Thantos’s attention. He sat up in bed and gave the vice president his full attention. “What do you mean, Jonathon?”
“I have just learned that there’s been a major leak of our plans,” Burton said. “I have a source at the New York Times that informed me he knew all about our plan of a government coup. He wanted to get a quote from me before they went to press with the accusations.”
“What?” Thantos exploded. “Are you sure? Maybe this reporter was just guessing, maybe taking some rumors and running a bluff on you with them?”
“Yeah, I’m sure. The son of a bitch named names and places and dates—way too precise to be just rumors. Hell, the bastard knows almost as much as I do, and he’s planning to go to press with it in the morning unless we do something to stop him.”
Thantos thought rapidly. “How much time can you get me—can you get him to wait by promising to give him an exclusive or something?”
“I can maybe get him to wait one more day if I promise to confirm the details of his story, but I think we need to have an emergency meeting of all of the cell leaders to decide how to carry on from here.”
“No, we don’t need to get them involved, Jonathon,” Thantos said, scarlet beads of sweat forming on his forehead. He was afraid some of the cell leaders would bail if they thought they were about to be put on the front page of the fucking New York Times! “All we need to do is send someone to take care of this reporter before he can spoil our plans,” he said, wanting to rip the bastard’s throat out himself.
“It’s not that simple, Theo,” Burton said, his voice edgy and seemingly on the verge of panic. “For one thing, I don’t know who’s been giving him his information, so I don’t know how many others are involved, but from the details he knows, it’s got to be one of the inner circle who’s turned traitor. We also don’t know who he’s shared his facts with, so killing him might give them the proof they need that he was on to something. I suggest we get everyone together and find out just who the traitor is before it’s too late, that way we can possibly force them to retract their story and tell the reporter they were mistaken. If his principal informer backs down, it might make him pull the story for good.”
“You might be right,” Thantos said, mentally going over in his mind who the weak link might be.
“I’ll tell you what,” Burton said, “You call every one of the cell leaders and tell them there is an emergency meeting of our task force tonight at the Rejuvenatrix Spa, but don’t tell them why. When we’ve got them all together, you should be able to use your psychic abilities to ferret out the informer and find out who else might know about us. When we know that, it’ll be a simple matter to find all of them and eliminate them before they can betray us.”
“You’re right, Jonathon,” Thantos said, thinking the man knew his way around a conspiracy. Guess that’s how he got to be vice president in the first place. “I’ll get right on it and we’ll plan to meet at the spa at midnight in the main auditorium. Once I’ve got everyone together, I’ll go person to person and have them open their minds to me. If anyone refuses, it’ll be a confession of guilt.”
“That’s a great idea,” Jonathon said, as if the entire plan had been Thantos’s from the start. After a short pause, he added, “Oh, and Theo.”
“Yeah?”
“No one but the major hitters need to be called. We don’t want the underlings to think we can’t control things, do we?” He gave a low chuckle, “Or someone else might get the idea he could cross you and get away with it.”
“No, of course not. You’re right, only the original task force members and the important government players will be summoned.”
“Good, and Theo, let me know if anyone in the government gives you any static about attending tonight and I’ll lower the hammer on them.”
“Thanks, Jonathon, and thanks for calling,” Theo said and he hung up.
“What is it, baby,” Christina said, reaching up to try and pull him back down onto her.
He snarled and grabbed her wrist. “Go wash your hand and get dressed. We’ve got work to do.”
Chapter 38
It was half an hour past midnight before Theo Thantos had everyone gathered together in the main auditorium of the Rejuvenatrix Spa.
He jumped up on the stage at the front of the hall and began to pace back and forth as he talked. “I’ve called you all here because we have an emergency.” He stopped and stared out over the audience. “There is a traitor among us!” he shouted, glaring out at the people sitting in front of him. He raised his hand and pointed at the audience. “And tonight we’re going to find out who it is and make him or her wish they’d never been born!”
Before anyone could respond, a voice called from the side of the stage, “I’m afraid that’s not exactly true,” John Ashby said as he strolled onto the stage, a long katana resting on his shoulder. He smiled at Thantos’s openmouthed amazement and he looked out at the people sitting there, watching the drama unfold as if it were a play staged for their amusement. “There is not a traitor among you,” Ashby called, his voice rising and his face becoming flushed with emotion. “You are all traitors,” he finished.
As the people in the audience stirred and looked from one to another, some with embarrassment, others with anger, he gave a slight shrug, “And for that crime against your country, you all must die!”
“Bastard!” Thantos screamed and he started to change into his Vampyre form even as he leapt across the stage at John with his arms extended and his fingers drawn into claws.
John didn’t even bother to change; he just whirled around, swinging the katana with both his hands on the hilt like a baseball bat. The razor sharp blade sliced through Thantos’s midsection while he was still in midair, cutting him almost in half.
He screamed as he fell to the floor of the stage, his entrails steaming in the cool night air as they exploded from his body to writhe and coil on the floor like a nest of snakes that had been disturbed.
John ignored the shouts and screams from the people in the auditorium as he strolled over to where Thantos lay with his arms trying to hold his guts in his body. Thantos was whimpering and groaning in pain as he futilely tried to stuff his intestines back into his abdomen.
John stared down at him without pity and shook his head. He looked up and glanced at the audience, where the people were scrambling and stumbling and fighting as they clawed at each other trying to get to the exits and escape this madman up on the stage.
“So goes all traitors,” John yelled, and he knelt and grabbed Thantos’s hair in his left hand and pulled his head up. With one quick motion, he cut the monster’s head off and held it aloft. Thantos’s eyes moved back and forth over the crowd and his mouth opened and closed, but no sound escaped from his lips.
At this signal, Elijah’s Army streamed in from the side doors, katanas, pistols, and shotguns in their hands. The members of the crowd who’d managed to get out of their seats drew back in the face of this group of Vampyres, whose shotguns and pistols exploded again and again in a cacophony of sound as they proceeded to cut the audience members to shreds.
Brahma Parvsh grabbed his mate, Christabel Chordewa, and held her in front of him as he tried to change into his Vampyre form. TJ cut Christabel almost in half with a point-blank shot from her shotgun. When her body hit the floor, TJ dropped the shotgun and whirled around and swung her katana in a whistling arc through Brahma’s neck. His head toppled off his body and landed on Christabel’s lap, where the blood fro
m her wounds slowly covered it.
Augustine Calmet pushed Gabrielle de Lavnay out of his way when she moved too slowly up the aisle, trampling her underfoot as he scrambled toward the stage, hoping to jump up there and exit the back door.
Shooter leveled his Desert Eagle 50 caliber pistol and squeezed the trigger. The Glaser Safety Slug entered the base of Augustine’s skull and exploded, turning his head into a fine, red mist that hovered foglike over the stump of his neck for a few seconds before the body collapsed into a dead heap.
Russell Cain jerked out his Glock 9 mm and managed to get several shots off as he changed into his Vampyre body. The 9 mm slugs hit Sam in the gut and doubled her over, clouding her eyes with pain.
Cain, his change complete now, rushed over to her and grabbed her head in both his claws and strained, trying to tear it off her neck.
Sam straightened and grinned at his feeble efforts. She grabbed his wrists in her hands and with her new strength, bent them back until they snapped like dry twigs under a boot. Cain screamed in pain and dropped to his knees. Sam then took her short sword and lopped his head off with one short stroke.
Christina, who’d been sitting in the front row, leapt up on stage and tried to run out the back door, jumping over her mate’s dead body without a backward look. As she loped past John, already changing into her Vampyre form, she came upon a female Vampyre with brilliant red hair waiting in front of the exit as if she knew Christina would try and run away.
Marya stood with her katana in her hands, grinning around long, dripping fangs as Christina slid to a stop in front of her.
“Let me go, Marya, and you’ll never see or hear from me again . . . please don’t kill me,” Christina begged. “It was all Theo’s idea to kill you. I had nothing to do with it.”
Marya laughed low in her throat. “You’re not only a coward, but you’re a lying coward,” she said mockingly.
She took her time and moved the sword up and back as she readied it for the killing blow. She wanted Christina to see it coming.
“Bitch!” Christina screamed as Marya’s blade whistled toward her in the semidarkness. Her scream was cut short by the cold steel of Marya’s katana slicing through her neck.