“He was setting me up.” Carmen stared ahead as we walked.
“How so?”
“Because Jane Doe was Marissa Albert.”
“She was? Why did you lie?” I asked.
“To give me time to figure out what Johnson is up to. They find Marissa’s body this morning and then he comes to my resort looking for someone to ID the body. There are hundreds of hotels, spas, hideaways all over the Keys. He knew who she was from the beginning. Otherwise, why did he come to my resort?”
“How do you figure into this?”
“My guess is that once I identify the body, then the investigation turns to the resort and me. What did I know about her? Why had she come here? It’s a matter of misdirection by Johnson.”
“Because he knew who killed her?” I asked. “If that’s the case, why recover the body?”
“Maybe the body wasn’t meant to be found.” Carmen quickened her pace. When we got to the dock, she gave Thorne the signal to start the engine. Carmen grasped my arm and turned me so our backs were to Thorne. As a chalice, Thorne could be trusted with any vampire secret, but we still took precautions.
She squinted at me. “That’s not all that bothers me. What shook you up in the morgue? Very unvampire-like behavior.”
Here goes. The Araneum told me to keep my investigation of the extraterrestrials confidential. Now I had to violate that trust to keep Carmen’s. Tell Carmen the truth and she’ll have a conniption fit over my not sharing what I’ve known. My dilemma fastened around me like a pair of pliers.
Carmen gestured impatiently. “Well?”
I felt the pliers squeeze. “Marissa was killed with an alien blaster.”
Carmen’s brow lowered. “How do you know?”
“I’ve seen those wounds before.”
“Where?” Her eyes narrowed and crinkled the center of her brow.
I confessed how I’d found the alien Gilbert Odin, the space blaster, and the delivery of his rotting corpse to the UFO. The more details I gave her, the more her eyes narrowed, until they looked like slits. Her nostrils flared and one corner of her mouth twitched. I thought she was going to lunge at me and bite.
Her eyes opened a bit and glistened like hot rivets. “When the hell were you going to tell me?”
“I’m telling you now.”
“Anything else?”
There was no point in holding the rest back. I told Carmen about the message from the Araneum.
Her expression turned from anger to worry. The glint in her eyes dimmed. “You were only doing what you were told. I would’ve done the same.”
“Before Gilbert Odin died, he told me, ‘Save the Earth women.’”
“And who’s supposed to save the Earth women?” Carmen’s voice sharpened with sarcasm. “You?”
“Very funny. But the point is that since we know Marissa was killed with an alien weapon, maybe she’s the first of these women that needed saving.”
Carmen cast a look past me and across the horizon, as if searching for the meaning of what I’d just shared. “Or the first that we know about.”
I added what I knew about the charter plane that had gone down.
Carmen remained quiet and her eyes focused back on me. “And the connection?”
The best I could do was shrug and say, “Don’t know.”
We started for the boat. Carmen’s arm moved in a blur and by the time I figured out what she was doing, she had already slugged my left shoulder.
I rubbed the spot where her punch had landed. “What did I do?”
“Besides bringing me all this goddamn trouble, I’m so goddamn jealous.”
“Of what?”
“Of what?” Her voice rose. She stopped, then moved close to whisper, “Isn’t it obvious? You’ve seen UFOs twice. Once at Rocky Flats and then here. I’d give my left testicle to see a UFO.”
“Carmen, you don’t have testicles.” Though I wasn’t really sure about that.
“And I haven’t seen a UFO either. What’s your point? I’m queen of the space cadets-and nada. You, on the other hand, practically get inside one. Probably a Class Three Sigma the way you described it. Tell me again about the blaster.”
Carmen watched my hands as I described the shape.
“Did you shoot it?”
“No. The UFO took it from me.”
“Using a tractor beam, right?”
“I guess.”
She hit me again. “You guess? You know jack shit about UFOs and it’s you the aliens come to see. Where’s the justice?”
“Don’t ask me.”
“Maybe things aren’t so bleak,” Carmen said. “I’ll bet Deputy Johnson knows more than he lets on.”
“I can start with him,” I replied. “I’m going to stay behind and have a chat.”
“Keep him busy. I’ll come back tonight with Jolie and take Marissa’s corpse. I want her to stay missing for a while.”
“Careful, there was plenty of security back there. Lots of cameras.”
“Felix, the night I can’t sneak into a morgue and steal a corpse is the night I’ll start wearing a chastity belt.”
“What about the computer records?”
Carmen showed her fangs. She extended the talons from her index fingers and brought them together. A spark jumped from each tip. Zap. “Jane Doe? What Jane Doe?”
“How did you do that?”
“The answer will cost you, Felix. The poses on pages 29, 46, and 92 of my Kama Sutra manuscript.”
“I’m not that limber, Carmen.”
“Then sign up for Antoine’s yoga class.”
I undid the bowline and tossed it on the boat. Carmen hopped into the fantail. Thorne gunned the engine and the Bayliner rocked backward from the dock.
Carmen faced me and flashed a vampire’s smile of pointed teeth. She looked ready to meet Johnson again. Al dente.
Chapter
11
The Bayliner cruised out of the harbor. Carmen waved good-bye. She joined Thorne at the helm and cupped his butt. No doubt she’d be getting a nooner on the high seas before they arrived at Houghton Island.
I returned to the medical examiner’s office. My plan was simple. Catch Johnson privately, zonk him with hypnosis, and cull the secrets from his brain. But I didn’t know when Johnson would leave and I couldn’t stand around without attracting attention. I circled the building to check for the exits. There was one on the southern side and another in the back. If he used that one, he’d have to come around the building to leave the premises and I’d see him.
I stood in the grassy square outside the entrance. Three palm trees grew in the middle of the square. From the treetops I could view the medical examiner’s office and catch Johnson on his way out. I checked if anyone was watching me-I saw no one-then put my fingers against the rough bark of the tallest tree and walked them upward, pulling my body along. I hid in the center of the dense fronds. If anyone asked, I was checking for tree mites.
I remained in the shadows under the fronds and kept watch. A seagull rode the afternoon breeze and hovered close to me, its beady eyes inquisitive.
Was this gull a friend of the crow and here to spy? I gave the gull the finger. It shifted its head to see if I offered some food, saw that I didn’t, then peeled away for the shore.
At a quarter to five, the day shift swarmed out and headed to the parking lot. No Johnson. He couldn’t have gone out another way without me seeing him.
The swing shift trickled in. The sky darkened and the lamps in the parking lot flicked on.
A little after ten, Johnson appeared. He had changed into a light-colored Hawaiian shirt and dark blue beach shorts. He carried a gym bag. His pompadour looked unusually shiny, as if he had shellacked it. He walked briskly across the square on the far side, about two hundred feet away.
I started to climb from the palm when a man and a woman wearing white lab coats came out of the office. They strolled beneath me to share smokes from a pack of Winstons. With these two belo
w, I couldn’t get down. Though my frustration grew with every moment, I couldn’t do anything except fold my legs and remain tucked against the fronds.
Johnson made a beeline through the parking lot to a red Mustang convertible with the top up. He fumbled with a set of keys, opened the car door, and tossed his bag into the backseat.
Damn, he was so close. I kneaded my fingers in irritation. Below me, the two smokers chatted like parakeets. If this had been a coconut tree, I would’ve beaned them.
Johnson climbed into his Mustang and cranked the engine. The convertible top retracted. Mötley Crüe belted from the speakers. He used the light from a lamppost to check himself in the rearview mirror and patted his pompadour into place. My throat tightened as I saw him preen. All I could do was watch him escape.
The smokers ground their cigarette butts into the mulch and walked back to the office building. About time. I floated down from my perch and started after Johnson.
The Mustang rumbled out of the lot toward the highway. He headed to Key West. I cut across the strips of sand and broken shells along the road, hoping to head him off.
Johnson didn’t waste time putting the pedal to his V-8 engine. The Mustang whipped into traffic.
I vaulted over a guardrail and sprinted on the highway shoulder. A delivery truck whooshed by. I jumped and clung to the rear doors, my fingers and feet holding firm with supernatural sticky force. I moved around the truck to the right side of the cab and stepped on the running board.
The driver, a chubby white guy with a mustache, sunglasses, and a ball cap, leaned against his door. He brought a plastic cup to his mouth. He munched ice and tapped his fingers against the steering wheel in time to country music on the radio. I could’ve done jumping jacks and the driver wouldn’t have noticed me.
Six cars ahead, the Mustang continued in the left lane. I tracked Johnson’s aura, having memorized its outline and wave patterns so I wouldn’t lose him in the night traffic.
I opened the passenger door and got in. “Hey buddy, can I have a lift?”
The driver jerked upright. The truck swerved to the left. The cup rolled from his lap and ice cubes splattered on the floor.
With vampire swiftness, I lifted my sunglasses and plucked his from his brow. “Surprise.” His eyes opened wide, the pupils dilating. His mouth gaped.
Hypnosis should hold him for a minute perhaps. The truck slowed and swayed across the lane. Cars behind us honked. I grabbed the steering wheel and straightened the path of the truck.
I dragged the driver over the bench seat and took his place behind the wheel. I sped up to match the traffic flow.
The driver remained slumped where I’d shoved him against the passenger door. His hands twitched and he blinked. Normally I’d use fangs to keep him unconscious but I couldn’t bite and drive.
So I slugged him across the jaw. “Sorry pal, but I’m on a mission to save the Earth women.”
His eyes rolled back into their sockets and I expected to see them display TILT! like a pinball machine.
I coaxed the truck across the lanes until I was behind Johnson. He kept reading his mirrors, though he seemed clueless that I tailed him in this big white truck, as conspicuous as a beluga whale on roller skates.
Once at Key West, he continued south on Truman Avenue and parked beside a strip joint called Bottoms Up. I pulled over.
Johnson hustled out of his Mustang. Bumps like welts formed along his aura, signaling anxiety. He turned against the car like he was going to pee. Johnson lifted his shirt and checked an automatic he had tucked inside the waist of his shorts. His aura calmed.
Off-duty cops carried guns. Did Johnson check his pistol because he thought he might need it? Against whom? Was he undercover?
Johnson made a brief call on his cell phone. He climbed the short steps to the porch. A doorman greeted him. When the door opened, a roar spilled out, sounding like that rude, fun place between a drunken riot and bedlam. Johnson disappeared inside.
The street was too busy for me to abandon the truck there. I turned the corner and parked in a loading zone. I left the driver snoring behind the steering wheel, his chin hooked over the rim. He’d been such a good sport about this-the hijacking and the punch to the face-that I tucked a hundred-dollar bill under his cap.
I turned the corner when Johnson appeared in a side exit of the Bottoms Up. His aura roiled with excitement. Why the side exit and not the front? He held a cell phone against his cheek and talked with great animation.
I halted and retreated behind the cover of a myrtle bush. He was two hundred feet away and too far for me to pick up what he was saying.
Johnson hesitated outside the threshold of the door. He looked down the street as if checking to see whether someone followed him.
Johnson put his phone away and proceeded at a brisk pace, going west on Windsor Lane. I gave him a minute’s head start. With my contacts out, I would have no problem tailing him.
He cut left and right through the neighborhood, stopping occasionally to pretend he was making a phone call, as he scanned back over where he’d been. I was able to hang back a block and track him by glimpsing his aura. When he halted, I stayed behind the cover of garden shrubs lining the sidewalk. Because of the shimmer of his aura, I could tell he was only being careful, though I wondered why he seemed to be taking these precautions against being followed. Why had he left his Mustang at the Bottoms Up and where was he going?
Had he spotted a tail, meaning me, his aura would’ve flared in alarm. Instead it remained at an even, nervous burn.
Johnson continued in a westerly direction. When he reached Caroline Street, he stopped and glanced around.
He walked the last block to the marina and got on the dock. He unfastened the lines of a twenty-foot cruiser and got aboard. I kept in the shadows and darted across the marina. A bank of lampposts lit the dock and I couldn’t get closer without being spotted.
Johnson nudged the throttle and drifted from the dock. He turned the running lights on.
The harbor was full of boats and I needed something before Johnson motored out of view. Closest to me was a rust bucket of a powerboat. It was an older hull, the cracked vinyl seats mended with duct tape and the windshield missing one panel. Empty cans and the ragged pieces of a Styrofoam cooler littered the floor.
I checked the tank-it was full-and lowered the outboard Evinrude into the water. The lock on the throttle lever was no problem to break. I reached under the instrument panel, hot-wired the ignition, and fired up the engine.
Johnson cruised past the buoys and out of the harbor. I kept my distance, at least a quarter mile back. He sailed around Wisteria Island and then southwest into the open sea. His running lights blinked off. Against the darkness, his aura was as obvious as a red signal flare. A half-hour later, he turned east, toward a cluster of small islands.
He slowed and beached his boat on the sandy shore of the center island, about three hundred meters wide, with a dense cover of vegetation. I idled my engine and drifted. The surf splashing on the beach masked the noise of the Evinrude.
Two men crept out of the brush, assault rifles at the ready. Johnson greeted them. All their auras burned with worry and excitement. I tried to listen, but against the churning surf, their voices were but murmurs. The three of them melted into the darkened interior of the island.
Now I had these armed men to consider. I motored forward quietly and anchored in a dark little inlet swaddled in mangroves. I stepped off the boat and into the peaty muck. A cloud of bugs settled around me. Swathes of mosquitoes landed on my arm, tickled my skin, and took off. Why didn’t they bite? Professional courtesy, I guess.
I lashed the bowline to a mangrove knee, climbed out of the inlet and onto sandy ground. The mosquitoes must’ve passed the word, because as I moved about, the bugs kept clear.
Johnson and the two other men moved noisily through the brush, fronds, and branches. I followed in the shadows.
They stopped in a clearing. One of t
he other men spoke into a handheld radio. “Bueno. Estamos listos.” He spoke with a Cuban accent. “La noche es bien lindo.”
Of course the night was beautiful, that’s why they carried guns and sneaked around. This was code for what?
Was Johnson here undercover? I couldn’t believe it. The man was sleaze; I could almost smell it on him.
I stepped forward. A palm frond rustled against my leg. One of the men panned his gun in my direction. They hushed and studied the gloom.
I froze until they seemed satisfied no one else was out there. I needed a form better suited to sneaking through the darkness. Like a wolf.
I backtracked and found a clear spot of sand surrounded by saw grass. I took off my clothes, stowed them under a stunted pine, and lay in the sand.
Summoning the transformation, I tensed my fingers, then my limbs. A searing pain racked my body. My bones twisted and re-formed. My spine elongated into a tail. Skin burned as fur pushed through. My jaws stretched and my teeth grew long.
For several moments I lay still, letting the agony subside as I gathered strength and oriented myself in this new flesh.
The air was rich with fresh smells. My hearing caught the tiniest of sounds. I rolled onto my belly and pushed up on my paws. I padded through the darkness. My feet avoided anything that could betray my presence. Leaves and branches brushed silently against my fur.
I circled downwind of the men. They reeked of insect repellent and greasy meat. The odor from their oily guns cautioned me to keep my distance.
The tallest of the strangers gave Johnson a satchel; he opened it and counted piles of the green paper humans hold more dear than life. Johnson looped the bag’s strap over his head. The three got up and headed to the south side of the island, where they stood on the beach. One of the men flashed a hand lamp toward the water. A tiny light answered.
A dark shape pushed a curl of water. The shape turned into a boat crowded with human auras. The men aboard called out to Johnson.
The Undead Kama Sutra fg-3 Page 6
