by Aimée Thurlo
“Did they see you?”
“I don’t think so. I was in a tree, and they never looked up.” Buck sounded calm, despite the danger.
“Did they go to the hogan, the killed one they were at before?”
“Yes. And they have shovels. The man was looking around, though, not digging, while the woman guarded their prisoner with a pistol. I don’t think they know where you hid whatever it was. They keep looking at maps.”
Lee thought about it. Muller or his crewman didn’t have the radiation detectors now, so they were working blind, though they had the area narrowed down, and were looking for places where a hole could have been quickly dug and refilled. Lee had to get back there, and get there fast, before something really bad happened to Diane.
“Leave the area, hataalii, very quietly. Take your dog and walk clown the highway or to a neighbor’s, and get as far away as possible. They might remember you from the other night, and think you might know something they don’t, like where to dig. The tall woman is also a walker of the night, and she is very dangerous. She’s killed two FBI agents already. Take your rifle, but go now, and remember they can see you in the dark, and they can move as fast as deer. They are hard to kill. Only fire or beheading will work unless you can somehow destroy their heart completely. Don’t try to fight them unless you have no other choice.”
“Are you coming?”
“I’m on my way now. Now go before they come searching for you.”
Lee disconnected the call.
He headed immediately for the Interstate. He had to get to Bowlegs’s old hogan, but it looked like he also needed a new plan. He knew the woman was Ingrid Plummer, but was the man with her Muller or Kurt Plummer? If Diane was the hostage, where was the pilot and the other vampire?
Lee drove west down the Interstate as fast as he could push the police cruiser, using his emergency lights to clear the way ahead. Driving on automatic, using his excellent vision and reflexes, he tried to determine how the two Germans had evaded all the roadblocks and arrived back at Bowlegs’s hogan so quickly.
Then he had the answer. Muller probably did know how to fly the helicopter. The vampires could have dumped the pilot once they were away from Grants, then Muller had flown to an isolated home, stealing the van and neutralizing the residents.
Two of the vampires had taken Diane and holed up in the van until dark, while the third, Muller, had flown to Albuquerque, landed, and ditched the helicopter. This would mislead law-enforcement authorities, and they would waste their time searching in the state’s largest city. By then, of course, Diane could be dead. If they dug in the right place and found the plutonium, she’d no longer be needed alive as a hostage against him. And it wouldn’t take them long in any case to realize he was not where he was supposed to be, digging up the box for them.
Lee had no problem getting through the roadblocks, but he had to slow down, be identified, and waved on each time. At least the drive to Grants took less than an hour at the speed he was traveling.
The radio had been crackling with calls from officers checking out suspect vehicles and individuals, and Lee only half listened, but finally he had a call come through for him.
“Hawk, this is Sergeant Edmonds. I have some information that you might find useful.”
“Go ahead, Sergeant.” Lee needed to know what happened to Muller or whoever had piloted the helicopter to Albuquerque. He now seriously doubted the pilot had been on the helicopter for long, and it would have been tricky getting rid of a body once they landed.
“The house-to-house check hasn’t turned up any suspects, but a vehicle was stolen from a neighborhood home just after the chopper landed. That vehicle has now been found, and you won’t believe where.” Edmonds chuckled.
“Okay, you got me, Sergeant. Where was the stolen vehicle?”
“A block from Agent Lopez’s apartment. Think that’s a coincidence?”
“If you believe in them. Any news on the car thief?”
“A man walking his dog saw a tall, fit-looking blond man exiting the car, but the man disappeared very quickly into an alley. The witness thinks it could have been Muller.”
Lee wondered if Muller had been coming to Diane’s apartment, looking for him. If this was the case, then Muller may have just missed finding him. Maybe Lee’s luck was better than he thought.
“I recommend that the area be searched as well. It sounds like something Muller would do. He’d have Agent Lopez’s address, from her car or wallet, or from whatever was taken from Agent Lewis’s pockets after he was killed.”
“A search is already under way. The pilot of the news chopper is still missing, any idea where he could be?”
“If he’s lucky, he’s still alive, somewhere on the ground in the middle of nowhere. I suspect Muller flew the chopper back to Albuquerque, not the pilot, so the German could have just thrown him out of the cockpit. Kurt Plummer and his wife were probably set down somewhere else entirely, with their hostage. They won’t be in Albuquerque.”
“Why are you so sure?”
“Instinct. Muller is smarter than most people. He’d think of misdirecting everyone by splitting up.”
“Doesn’t sound too smart. Now he’s in Albuquerque, completely on his own, then. What’s your twenty, by the way? The connection is fading.”
“Heading to Grants. I have a meeting to attend.” Lee hung up the mike before Edmonds could respond.
Lee tried to puzzle out where Muller could be, but soon realized he just didn’t have enough information. He gave up to concentrate instead on a plan to rescue Diane. He still had to find a way to get her away from two vampires, one a woman who was willing to kill apparently just as easily as Muller did. And that woman must have already known that Diane was the one who had shot her husband before, and her too, when Diane was carjacked. No love would be lost between the two, but Ingrid held all the cards.
The First thing Lee had to do was find Muller’s people and Diane without being spotted. Then he’d decide what to do.
Lee drove past the turnoff that led to the killed hogan and John Buek’s home, and parked on the shoulder a mile down the Interstate. Despite the fact that it was close to midnight, he used skinblock to cover his face and hands, then replaced his state police uniform hat with a baseball-style held cap discovered under the seat.
Slipping out of the patrol unit, he ran down the side of the road embankment, hurtled the four-foot-high fence, then raced across the open meadow toward the trees a quarter mile farther up the slope. He always enjoyed running at full speed, not holding back for tear someone would notice his inhuman pace. Right now, he didn’t care if anyone saw him or not. It was nighttime, and at this hour, almost anything could be explained away as an illusion of darkness.
Knowing that someone would be keeping watch, Lee decided to approach from uphill, which meant he’d be forced to travel an additional half mile or so, rather than running directly to the killed hogan.
He passed within a quarter mile of Buck’s medicine hogan and home. The television was on, apparently. Lee could hear music and laughter. Hopefully, Buck had done that to make the night walkers think he was still around.
Lee stopped behind a tree and watched carefully for signs of movement, but all he could hear was the low ripple of water in the small stream and the rustle of leaves among some of the nonconiferous plants along the hillside.
The color shift of his enhanced night vision made the sky appear gray rather than blue, and all but the brightest colors were washed out slightly by the darkness, but if somebody was out there, watching for him, he couldn’t spot them.
Running uphill again, Lee crossed the twenty-foot-wide streambed in a long stride, landing on the opposite bank with barely a sound. Recalling with an almost photographic memory the route he and Diane had taken across that slope a few days ago, Lee moved uphill at a different angle this time, staying within the trees and reaching the top of the forested ridge about a quarter mile above the hogan.
&nb
sp; Looking across the valley, he could see a faint glimmer of firelight on the opposite slope. He wondered if it was the skinwalkers he’d tricked into searching for the vampires in Grants. If he somehow succeeded in killing Muller and his companions. Lee knew it was his responsibility to go after the skinwalkers next.
He remembered the young woman with the streak in her hair, and how she’d reminded him of Annie. She was smart and resourceful, and that, combined with her shape-shifting ability, would make her especially dangerous. Hopefully, he’d remember the basic evil within skinwalkers, despite her disarming charisma, and not hesitate when he confronted her again. She’d certainly made his pulse race before.
Catching his breath, Lee tried to follow the line of the Interstate west with his eyes and spot his patrol unit, but as he’d intended, it was hidden by a lower ridge. He located Buck’s home about halfway to the Interstate, standing in a clearing that looked much smaller from here. He couldn’t make out any lights now, but that might have just been because of the angle.
Checking his pistol, Lee started downhill, one careful step at a time. First, he’d head for the area where the plutonium had been buried and ensure that no one else had been digging there. Then he’d try to move in on Muller’s partners.
Diane had become important to him, of course, and he’d do everything he could to save her. But stopping Muller had always been his primary goal, and he knew that any relationship with the FBI woman, even if they managed to both come out of this alive, had no future. She’d been his partner for a while. He’d enjoyed her company and wished her well, but that was all he could afford to remember. He knew now that no matter how much he’d grown to care for Diane, his heart still belonged to Annie, and he thought it probably always would.
Even if Diane cared for him as well, her career was the focus of her life, and she would never turn her back on that to join his hall-assed crusade against the shape-shifters.
A hundred yards and ten stealthy minutes later, Lee heard the thud of a shovel against the earth, then another. Two people were digging, apparently. He inched closer, taking his steps in time with the thud of the shovels as much as he could, stopping occasionally to watch for motion among the piñons and junipers ahead, and to listen.
Lee could hear his own heartbeat, he was moving so quietly. But he knew that taking his time now might make all the difference in getting Diane free, and walking away from all this before morning.
Five minutes later, he looked out at the small ridge that wound itself around the hillside, trying to recall the exact spot under the overhang where he’d buried the box. Over the decades since he’d buried the material, he’d seen nature slowly reshape the entire area. No trace of his work had remained for long.
Taking a step, he heard or felt movement behind him. Suddenly his pistol was jerked out of his hand, and he was struck in the middle of the back. Fumbling downslope, Lee groped for his backup pistol, but a rush of wind told him he’d been too slow.
“Don’t think about trying it, Nez. I have your service weapon, and I can pull the trigger even faster than you can think about it. You’re fast, but I’m faster. Maybe Navajos are just slow-motion vampires. You think?”
Lee turned his head and saw Muller smiling down at him from ten feet away. He was dusty and dirty, and carried a Glock semiauto pistol in his belt. Muller couldn’t know what the hataalii had done to protect Lee from becoming a full vampire. Maybe that knowledge could be used against him somehow.
“Is this where you hid the plutonium, Indian?
“Come on up. Much Schnell!” Muller added loudly.
Lee heard footsteps, and saw Diane first, her hair disheveled and her face dusty and damp from perspiration.
A tall, slender woman with short, severely styled straw-colored hair was with her. Ingrid Plummer, no doubt. She followed Diane by a half-dozen feet, aiming a Glock at her back.
Diane was carrying a shovel. She almost smiled when she saw Lee, but covered for it quickly.
Despite the dirt and sweat, she looked in good condition. Just seeing her alive was enough. But he was careful to hide any expression.
“Your rescue attempt, I presume, Officer Hawk,” Diane said wearily. “Did you bring three wooden stakes?”
Kurt Plummer moved up swiftly from Lee’s left, his movements graceful, like those of a tiger bounding uphill. The dark-haired vampire had light eyes, nearly colorless, and like Muller, he had on a long-sleeved knit shirt with a high crew collar.
Kurt had a Glock identical to the ones carried by his wile and Muller, and Diane’s pistol was stuck in his belt as well.
“How did you manage to get back here so quickly?” Kurt smiled. “I thought you were going to steal a motorcycle and go cross-country.”
“Our Navajo friend decided to give me a ride.”
Lee nodded. “Damn. You were in the trunk of my car, right? That’s why you went to Agent Lopez’s address. You suspected I’d be going there eventually.”
“See, Kurt. I told you he wasn’t completely stupid—for a cop.”
Diane raised her eyebrows at him questioning. She obviously thought he had a plan. He shrugged.
“Run out of ideas, you two?” Muller laughed. “It’s about time. I haven’t had so much trouble, in what, fifty years or so?”
“He came alone?” Ingrid asked, looking around curiously. “I thought you said he wasn’t completely stupid.”
“I heard most of what he said on the radio, but didn’t risk getting out of the trunk when he stopped somewhere along the way. Where was that, Officer? It didn’t smell like a restaurant or a gasoline station.”
“That was the state police district office. They wanted to know what was going on. I didn’t tell them you were vampires, of course, they’d have put me on parking-meter duty. But the FBI did send a few cars to follow me, and they can locate my unit using a global-positioning device under the front seat.” Lee tried to sound as matter-of-fact as possible. Part of what he said was true.
“Good. I wonder what these light-fearing people will do when the evil sun comes up and they have no place to hide. That van gets pretty small after eight hours inside.” Diane tried to sound sarcastic, and it was working.
“Well, what do you think?” Kurt asked.
Muller looked at his watch. “We have a bit of time before it gets too light to stay outside. We can assume he’s lying, otherwise he’d have a hard time explaining his obsession to kill and mangle our bodies. He came alone. My guess is that most of the officers in New Mexico are still searching in the Albuquerque area.”
“We can take the time to finish blocking off the hogan. It’ll be better than that old van, and the Navajos won’t come around, not to a place where someone has died. Right, Nez?” Kurt waved his gun at Lee.
“Unless they follow the Anglo way, like me. There are several Navajo police officers in the area now. They’d search a hogan, even a killed one. It’s their job.”
“He’s lying. Let me convince him to tell the truth.” Ingrid aimed her pistol at Diane’s leg.
“Don’t fire your weapon. Everyone within miles of here will hear that, and sooner or later, cops will be checking his patrol unit out on the Interstate.” Muller snarled at Ingrid. “We don’t want any more attention drawn to us.
“But you can use your knife,” he added with a smile.
Ingrid nodded slowly, and her eyes went cold.
CHAPTER 20
Stop! Lee knew he needed to stall them for a while. Soon, they’d be forced to wait until tomorrow night if they wanted to avoid being easily spotted by law-enforcement officers on the few roads in the area. “I lied about there being anyone following me.” For once, he hoped he had been followed. “I have a secret of my own to protect too, remember.
“And there’s no location device in my patrol unit,” he continued, having successfully diverted their attention from injuring Diane. ‘Think the state would put up that kind of money just to find a cop car? We’re not supposed to get lost in the f
irst place.”
“Quit stalling and show us where to dig, or I’ll start carving on your friend here.” Ingrid touched the side of Diane’s neck with the blade, and Diane froze, careful not to react and provoke her.
“It’s right around here somewhere, I think. But the ground has eroded a lot since 1945, and I can’t be sure. It was dark and I was half dead when I buried it, and that was a long time ago. It may take hours of making test holes before I locate the spot. Why don’t you use the radiation detectors you had before?” Lee looked back and forth along the embankment. He really couldn’t remember exactly where to dig, of course, but knew a shallow trench along the edge of the overhang would probably locate the spot easily enough.
“They had to leave them at the house they blew up with the grenade, Hawk,” Diane said, disgusted with him. “You’d think someone as old as you would have developed some intelligence. Just show them where to dig.”
“Oh, we’re not going to be the ones digging, you and your extremely lucky partner will be doing that,” Muller said, looking at Kurt and Ingrid and laughing. “Now, ii you want to live to see the sunlight, Agent Lopez, use that shovel.”
“Where? He never showed me the spot. All I know is that it’s somewhere on this hillside. Unless he lied to me too.”
Ingrid pressed the knife blade a little deeper.
“Okay.” Lee nodded. “I’ll start digging, but not until you promise to let her go once you have what you want. Tie her up somewhere if you want so she won’t get free until you’re long gone. You can use me as a hostage for your getaway. I’m more durable,” Lee offered.
“I’ll consider it, depending upon how quickly you prove you can locate the box.”
“We have two shovels. You can both dig,” Plummer said with a harsh laugh. “How about it, Ingrid?”
Muller nodded, and the woman vampire stepped back, placing her knife in a sheath and her pistol in her belt before she walked back down the hill to retrieve the tool.
