by Jackie May
“I mean, her body was found with her throat ripped out, only there’s no blood at the scene, because there’s no blood in her body. Like it’s been sucked out.”
“By vampires.”
He eases up on the gun. “Right? Is that what you think?”
“I’m saying that’s what you think.”
“I don’t think, I know. Just like I know you’re either a hooker or a vampire, and probably both.”
“Try neither, and definitely not a hooker.”
“Yeah, you said that already. Very first thing when I got in your car was ‘I’m not a hooker.’ It’s like, ‘Oh, is your name also Methinks?’”
“What?”
“Methinks, Methinks! It’s like a famous internet meme or whatever, and she protests too much about the thing that’s obviously true. I’m not a hooker, I’m not a hooker! Then why are you sitting out front of Dario Machlin’s apartment?”
“Dario? You’re here for Dario?”
“You tell me.” He pulls the gun away, and my shoulders can finally relax. After another glance at the shadow figures—yep, still there—he takes a breath, collecting himself. “Vampire or not—”
“Hooker or not.”
“—you have to know something. Last night you got into Underworld, which I’m pretty sure is a hangout for vampires. And you came home with Dario Machlin. You stayed all night.”
“What, so you’ve just been spying on us? Did you peek through his window at any time last night? Because you could have learned some things your girlfriend will appreciate.” I put the car into drive.
He flinches. “What are you doing?”
“I’m taking us around the block. Unless you want to have a chat with those guys?”
He sucks in a breath when he sees that the shadow figures are now on the move toward us. As they pass beneath the light of the street lamp, I recognize them, and yes, they are vamps, and yes, my night just got shot to hell.
“Hey, Detective Guy—”
He shakes my seat. “Can we go?”
“I am going. Do you know why?”
“Because I’m in over my head.”
Dammit, I was going to say that. Who the hell actually admits that about themselves? But I have to say something, so I spit out, “No…because now I’m in over your head.”
“What’s that mean? I don’t…”
“Yeah, no, it’s just from Hamlet, so you wouldn’t…” I pull a lazy U-turn, not so fast that we look desperate to escape. “Look, I don’t know what you want to hear from me. I don’t know where you’re getting all this stuff about vampires. But I can tell you for certain that Dario isn’t a vampire, and I’m not a vampire. We met at Underworld, which is not a hangout for vampires, and…well, you already know, we came back to his place. That’s all, just a hookup, a straight booty call.” I take a left turn past the apartment building.
Detective Guy watches out the back window. “If it was just a hookup, then what are you doing back here tonight?”
“Oh, I don’t know, maybe I like him?”
“And you’re stopping by the very next night? Do you realize how that’s going to look to him?”
“Maybe I forgot something at his place.”
“You gotta wait at least three days, and even then you can only send a casual text.”
“He’s not a killer, is the point! Are we straight now? Dario not a killer. Vampires not existing. And methinks not an Internet meme, but actually William freaking Shakespeare.”
Something catches my eye, and I suddenly leap on the brakes and crank the wheel, sending Crap-pile into a screeching fishtail. Detective Guy smashes into the back of my seat, and there’s a thump from his gun hitting the floor. Cursing, he rummages at his feet. “It’s like the Bermuda Triangle back here. Can we not stop, please? Is it them? Are they coming?”
It’s not them. It’s a pearl black Mustang with stock rims and tires, parked crooked. Nobody in it. The driver-side door is not closed all the way.
I stomp the gas.
“Yes, go, go, go,” he urges.
With tires squealing, I take the next two lefts.
“No, no, no. You’re going in a circle!”
“You have your gun? We’re going back.”
“Can we not, please, because I enjoy having blood on the inside of my body.”
Rounding the final corner, I’m relieved to see that the vamps are nowhere to be seen. “They’re gone, look, but it’s going down right now at Dario’s, so you want in or not?”
No time for him to answer. Crap-pile jumps the curb, tears across the dirt that was once a lawn, skids to a stop in front of Dario’s building, and I’m outside at a dead sprint for the stairs. Three at a time, legs pounding, one flight, two flights, three flights, and that’s when I hear a woman scream, followed by savage barking, the unmistakable sound of a coyote on the rampage.
Two thunderous gunshots send my heart leaping into my throat, and seconds pass before I realize I’ve stopped running. Dario’s apartment is two doors down. Forcing my legs to move forward, I reach the door just as it flies open and a hysterical, half-naked woman flees the apartment. She screams when the homicide detective nearly runs her over coming up the stairs with gun drawn. He charges past me into the apartment, immediately drawing fire from the back hall. He leaps to the floor behind a sofa as bullets splinter the door and shatter the front window.
I’m still outside, covering my head, trying to hide my entire body behind the metal doorframe. Detective Guy is screaming furiously, but it’s not until the shooting stops that I realize he’s screaming at me. “—not a killer! Not a killer, that’s what you said!”
I suck in a deep breath and shout, “Dario!” But it’s drowned out by more shooting, both sides firing at each other now. Impacts shake the walls. “Dario!” I try again, and this time I’ve managed to land during a ringing pause in the volley. A pause that stretches out long enough that I feel safe peeking my head around the doorframe. “Dario, it’s me!”
Dario’s voice calls out, “Veronica?”
Okay. “No, it’s—”
“Monique?”
“Ohmygosh, it’s Shayne! From last night?”
Detective Smartass says quietly, “And this morning.”
“This guy’s with you?” Dario asks.
I show both my empty hands in the doorway. “Listen, I’m going to come in there now, and everybody’s going to put down their guns. I figure we’ve got about three minutes before police are all over this place.”
After a short pause, Dario says, “You’re joking, right?”
“Yes,” the detective answers for me. “I’d say a half hour, at an absolute minimum.”
Dario agrees. “That’s if somebody has bothered to call 911 over a few shots fired.”
“Which they won’t,” the detective says, and I see that he’s dialing on his cell. He mouths the obvious to me: I’m calling.
“Nobody’s calling the police,” I assure Dario, with a threatening glare at the detective. After a moment of indecision, he ends the call.
A shirtless Dario edges into the kitchen, gun still raised toward the sofa. “What is this, Shayne? You’re police?”
“I’m not police, Dario.”
“I’m police,” Detective Idiot says.
“But this is not a bust.” I leave my cover and walk into the living room. “We’re just here for the coyote, which I assume you shot, since you’re not eaten.”
Dario gestures toward the back of the apartment. “Who the hell is he?”
“Well…” How much to tell him? Keep it simple for now. “He’s from my pack. Those are his gold rims you’ve got stacked in the other room.”
Dario lowers his gun. I’m shocked to see that he looks hurt. “You were just casing me last night?”
“I was coming tonight to buy them back from you,” I explain quickly. “I didn’t say anything about you or where you lived, but the jackass followed me here.”
“Your pack? So we�
��re going to have a problem now?”
“No.” A thought occurs to me. “Unless you’re throwing silver?” Silver bullets would definitely mean we have a problem now.
Dario shakes his head. “No silver. He’ll be fine.”
“Then no problem,” I assure him. “But only…”
“If you take his rims back with you.”
“Either that, or you kill all of us right now.”
There’s a scrambling sound from the detective. Above the back of the sofa, he raises his shaking hand with the gun pointed toward the kitchen. Dario doesn’t even blink. “I ain’t killing nobody.” The gun lowers back into cover behind the sofa. “Just go on then, clear out,” Dario snaps, his eyes never leaving mine. He still looks more hurt than angry.
“I only had two hundred, anyway,” I say lamely. “I know that’s nothing, but…I would have owed you big.” I don’t need to put a lot of innuendo into those words—he knows exactly what I mean, and he knows I’m serious. He takes a deep breath.
“That woulda been my kind of deal.” He manages the slightest hint of a sad smile.
My heart thumps. “Yeah?” I raise my voice for the detective’s benefit. “Even though I came back the very next day? No objection?”
The detective’s voice answers. “You know who might object? That naked lady who just ran out of here.”
Dario and I both throw our shoulders up and say “Psh!” And that’s when I know I might still have a foot in the door with him, if I give it enough time before knocking again. And, you know, if I can keep Ben and his goons from coming back here and ripping him to pieces.
“He’s in the bedroom?” I ask.
Dario nods. “I’ll get the wheels.”
“Car’s out front…well, on the lawn.” I dig into my pocket for the two hundred bucks.
Dario puts a hand up. “Keep your money.”
I snap my fingers toward the sofa. “You’re still hiding? See, usually when the shooting stops and the two sides come together for some flirty banter in the kitchen, that’s the signal for ‘all clear.’”
Cautiously—first one eye, then the other—the detective raises up, gun still in hand but hanging at his side. This is the first chance I’ve had to make a real study of him. Now look, I know we’ve already established that he’s wearing a white shirt and tie, but that’s not to say he appears corporate in any way. Throw corporate out the window, and now picture a professional soccer player’s hard body with a white dress shirt so finely tailored that it looks painted on. The tie is thin and fashionable, just like his slacks, just like his wedge of blond hair. Okay, so he’s yummy, but there’s a mismatch—he doesn’t fit the style. He hasn’t shaved in days, his sleeves are rolled up, his tie hangs loose around a neck with tattoos visible just above his collar. And the guy’s completely unable to hold still. His emerald green eyes—pleasing, as I said before—watch an imaginary ping-pong match between Dario and me. Very spazzy. I easily decide to like him.
He double-takes at Dario’s enormous shirtless chest and makes an alarmed face.
“I know, right?” I say. “Now come back here and help me.”
“Hold on,” he protests, “I’ve got—”
To interrogate Dario about a dead hooker? Yeah, “No.”
“But I need—”
“No.”
“He—”
“Nope.” Shaking my head. “Trust me, first we deal with my thing, then we do your thing. Body first, always.”
More alarm. “Body?”
“Besides, maybe you want to come back another time for your thing, unless you’re hoping the vampires didn’t hear all those shots?”
Mortified, the detective steals a quick glance at Dario, curious to gauge his response to the idea of vampires. Luckily, Dario appears to be stunned. Good. The detective will take that as one more confirmation that a belief in vampires is insane. But I know that Dario is actually wondering how a human can know about the underworld and still be alive.
Recognizing a great opportunity to bluff with the truth, I say to Dario, “It’s all good. He knows everything.”
“Oh?” Dario has no idea how to respond appropriately.
“Yeah, but the vamps are on to him, so…” I make fangs with my fingers.
“Oh.”
Suddenly wary of the open door behind him, the detective shuffles toward us. “You guys are hilarious. Whose body? Where is it? Why’d you call him a coyote? Why were you asking about silver bullets?”
“Oh, here.” Stepping into the bedroom, I flip on the light and point at the enormous blood-soaked coyote lying on the floor. “Because he’s a coyote shifter.”
Ben’s coyote is like his person—naturally mean-looking. Black streaks angle down in a permanent scowl over yellow eyes that glare even while at rest. At the moment, they bulge wildly with impotent aggression. His coat is thin and ragged, a very dark gray along his back but red on his legs. He’s been shot twice—once in a hind leg, once in the shaggy gray mane. At the sight of the detective, he lets out a roiling growl.
The detective’s voice trembles with awe. “A shifter? Like…half of the time he’s…but he can shift…”
“From a coyote into an asshole, you got it.” I slap Ben’s nose, earning bared teeth and a snarl. In fox form, I’d have to back down from any display of dominance, but right now I need him to chill out, and fast, so I clutch a handful of scruff and jerk his head back to look directly into his eyes. He could snatch my face off with one lunge. “Back down! It’s over, and you’re damn lucky Dario’s a nice demon.” To the shell-shocked detective, I say, “Get on the back, and watch that wound. I’m on the sharp end, so don’t piss him off.”
Together we heft Ben’s coyote—heavier than you’d expect—into the hallway outside the bedroom. “Don’t squirm, Ben. If you get any blood on my jacket, I swear—” I stop us in the hallway, checked by the sound of quick footsteps approaching the apartment’s front door.
I hear Dario say, “What the hell’s this?”
“Where are they?” replies a man’s voice.
“In the bedroom. I took care of it.”
“Did you?” A challenge.
“Yeah,” Dario challenges back with a firm voice.
My heart lurches at the metallic ratchet sound of a gun’s bolt release, and in the next instant the apartment explodes with automatic gunfire. A hail of lead rips through the place, shaking it like a passing freight train, popping glass, impaling furniture and kitchen appliances. There must be two weapons firing at once to throw so much spray.
Two steps ahead of us, the corner of the hallway thunders with a dozen impacts and a storm of drywall shrapnel. I reroute us into the bathroom and lose my grip on Ben while trying to shut the door. All three of us go down hard. The detective kicks at the door, shutting it. The barrage doesn’t let up until I’ve scrabbled on top of the toilet and opened the bathroom window out to the fire escape. I freeze when all goes silent, except for the ringing in our ears and the hammering of my heart. I hear movement from the front room, a muffled voice, some rummaging.
And footsteps in the hall. Heading straight for us.
Ben struggles to raise himself but hasn’t got the strength. Beside him, still sprawled on the tile floor, the detective slowly raises his gun at the closed bathroom door. The longer we wait, the closer the steps get, the more his hands shake, so much that he’s likely to miss a shot, even at point blank range. The steps brush carpet right outside the door and stop. There’s a pause. I’ve passed hours before that felt shorter.
Then thunder. The gunfire is so abrupt, so deafening, that we all flinch hard—the detective drops his gun—but no bullets hit the bathroom door.
The bedroom. He’s firing on the bedroom door.
Don’t have to tell me twice. With the gunfire drowning all sound, we hurry to haul Ben’s limp body through the window, dumping him onto the metal grating of the fire escape. The detective hops down, and I’m backing out the window when the firing stops
. Fighting panic, I ease myself down and sidestep away from the window just as the bathroom door is thrown open.
“Out here!” the man’s voice shouts. After some sort of response from inside, he replies, “Bring it! Let’s go.”
The detective makes signs for going down the fire escape, but I wave him off, pointing frantically to the landing above us. Up! Up! Ben isn’t moving anymore. His eyes have rolled back. No time to worry about that now. Working silently, taking light steps, holding our breath, we carry him up the stairs. We’re still in plain view when a large black duffel bag is thrown out the window, hitting the metal grating with a dull thunk.
I make a face—Go, go, go!—and we gain the landing just inches above the window as a hooded man climbs out, followed by a second hooded figure with gloves and another duffel bag. Both have assault rifles slung over their shoulders. Most interesting to me—even if it’s no surprise—is the underworld I feel in them. Much stronger than the familiar current coming off of Ben, the feeling surges as both figures pause to look down over the railing. The sensation leaves with them, their heavy boots clanging on metal steps all the way down to the alley below.
The detective falls down and rolls onto his back. He releases a long-held breath with a string of expletives.
“Quiet,” I hiss.
“They’re three floors down.”
“And there are plenty of things that could hear us from twice as far. Just keep your mouth closed and stay here with Ben until I get back.”
“What, no,” he protests with whisper shouts. “What if he wakes up? My whole face fits in his mouth.”
“Just don’t die,” I snap as I hurry down to the open window. “I need your help getting him back to the car.” I climb down onto the toilet, immediately spotting what I came for. Ben’s pants are draped over the side of the bathtub. So he broke in through the window and undressed here before shifting. No wallet or keys in the pockets. He’d thought this through. With Ben’s pants retrieved, I should bolt, but there’s one more thing I have to do. Don’t really want to. But have to.
I tiptoe into the hall, stopping at the shredded corner before the kitchen. I strain my ears for sound. Please, God, any sound. There is only silence in answer. On a three count, I peek around the corner and my eyes instantly go to the kitchen floor, where I see one of Dario’s thickly-muscled arms lying in a slick of blood. A breath leaves my lungs. I let my head fall to rest against the wall.
