Touch of Evil

by C. T. Adams

  I couldn’t exactly blame them. I stand six foot one in my stocking feet, and have long red hair that I usually wear in a tight braid, plus the kind of attitude that makes most people think twice about messing with me. Joe calls it my “tough act.” It’s not an act. There’s a reason they called me the Terminator when I played pro volleyball—a reason why the Thrall consider me a threat. Joe just doesn’t like to admit it.

  I made sure I was the last to exit the car when we reached the terminal, jumping out just as the doors were starting to whoosh closed. Everyone scattered to their various destinations. Nobody lurked. Nobody even glanced at me.

  I stopped in the middle of the floor and opened my mind again. There was nothing but a solid white wall of static. Despite the heavy blazer, I felt chilled. The Thrall usually aren’t active during the day, but the sun wouldn’t be up for a while yet, and their human Herds are always a threat.

  People on the street call the Thrall vampires. Yes and no. They’re not the evil undead of legend. “Thrall” is their own term for the mind control they have over their human Hosts and the Herds. The scientific name for the parasite is complicated and Latin, so people call them either vampires or the Thrall. It’s easier.

  They have a hive mentality, ruled by a group of queens who control individual Hosts and the human Herds. They despise most humans, referring to them as “Prey.” Only a very few humans, perhaps two dozen in the world are “Not Prey.” We’ve earned our place, earned the respect of the queens—usually by dint of killing one of their kind. They have “rules” for dealing with us. Of course, that means there are rules for us to deal with them, as well. Not Prey don’t run, don’t hide, don’t use guns or other distance weapons. If they do, they lose their status. And the status is useful. As Not Prey the Hosts and Herds can’t lie to you, and the queens have to treat you as an equal.

  There is, of course, wiggle room in the rules—usually in favor of the Thrall, who take every advantage of it.

  I earned my title the hard way. I killed the former queen of Denver, but in the process I got bit. Since then, the Thrall have been a constant presence in the back of my head. I hate it, but I’ve learned to cope. Most of the time even the strongest of them can’t cloud my mind—at least, not for long. Still, it helps to have something to listen to. It keeps them from seeing my thoughts. For me, that’s usually heavy metal music. But good old distracting conversation will do nicely. So, when I caught a glimpse of my buddy Leroy, I greeted him with more than my usual enthusiasm.

  “Hi, Leroy!” The big, ebony-skinned guard turned at the sound of his name. He saw my waving hand and smiled.

  “Jeez, Reilly,” he replied in greeting. “Do you live here? Didn’t I just see you a couple of days ago?”

  “Actually, it’s been a week.” I chuckled. Leroy Williams has worked at the airport almost since it opened. You’d think he’d have enough seniority to have his pick of shifts, but I’ve seen him here at all hours of the day and night, always wearing a freshly pressed uniform and a friendly smile. We’d become fast friends one night when we’d both been trapped at DIA because of a blizzard. We’d played what must have been fifty games of cards while we waited for the storm to clear. I’d learned all about his family life while he’d happily taken a fair chunk of my spending money. The guy’s an incredible cardplayer.

  Leroy was wearing a jacket over his uniform. He was either just coming on shift or just getting off. I was hoping for the latter and told him so.

  His chin tipped and his face grew concerned. “You got trouble, girl?”

  “Maybe.” I shook my head to clear it. “Hell, probably.”

  Leroy glanced around the nearly deserted food court. No one looked suspicious.

  But then my tail made a mistake. He’d gotten too close and I felt him. Thrall. Our eyes locked across the huge room. The moment he knew he’d been spotted the shield of static vanished. The Thrall presence slammed into my consciousness. My head buzzed with the sound of a thousand voices and I clearly heard my name. I shook my head to clear it and slammed my best mental shields into place. I could still sense them, but distantly. Fortunately, with the shielding, they wouldn’t be able to read my thoughts.

  Leroy saw my sudden panic. He moved close to me, projecting menace from every pore. His massive bulk of muscle was comforting. When he removed his nightstick and started to twirl it, the host gave one last glare and left. Good.

  If the Thrall wanted something, they’d be back—I knew it. My goal was to make sure I was ready for a fight when they returned.

  “Adam Dexter. Leonard Hamilton. Mary Kathleen Reilly. Please pick up the white courtesy phone.”

  Ah, hell! I’d forgotten all about the call from Joe.

  “Watch my back,” I hissed as I headed to the phone bank. Leroy took the command literally. He turned his back to mine when I reached the nearest phone and glared at the crowd as though they were all terrorists.

  I went and picked it up, stating my name. I looked past Leroy’s broad back as I waited on seemingly perpetual hold. An abstract sculpture built into the east wall caught my gaze. Stark metal twisted and soared torturously upward to the white tent roof. It had cost the city a fortune, and was supposed to have some deep symbolic meaning to the residents of Denver. Speaking as one of them, it didn’t. But staring at it passed the time as I waited.

  I inhaled slowly, basking in the scent of Leroy’s lemon grass cologne and shaving soap. It was a comforting scent that reminded me of my grandfather for some reason. Finally the line connected.

  “Kate here.”

  “You’re back.”

  It was Joe. He was probably just coming off of his shift in the ER at St. Elizabeth’s Hospital. He sounded as tired as I felt so I bit back a smart-ass remark about stating the obvious.

  “What’s up?”

  “I popped by to water your plants.”

  Oh, please! If he thought a ten minute errand was going to get him off the hook about his half of the bills he was wrong.

  “Okay. Thanks.” My voice was flat and annoyed. I think he was expecting a little more appreciation, but the plants are on automatic misters, which he knows full well.

  There was a long pause. I considered pushing the conversation along. After all, Leroy wasn’t just here for giggles. In stead, I fought down my frustration and forced myself to wait him out.

  “You got a call while I was there.” He was pissed. That much was obvious from his voice. “From Dylan.”

  “Shit.” The word popped out of my mouth. Dylan Shea was my former fiancé. I’d nearly gotten killed saving his life almost six years ago. In a rush of gratitude he’d run off with my best friend and my cat.

  I still miss the cat.

  “What did he want?”

  “I don’t know. He didn’t leave a number on the recorder. He just said he’d call back.”

  Yeah, if I didn’t answer, he knew Joe would be watching the place and would try to wring the reason from him, so he wouldn’t give any info. Joe just can’t help bullying Dylan. He’d said it over and over again while we were engaged: Dylan’s weak.

  The fact that he’s right galls me. Dylan isn’t a Host. No, he’s a step below that: Herd. Read: food. Why he chose that fate is something I will never comprehend.

  “Why call me?” It was a rhetorical question, but not a bad one. Dylan had chosen Amanda and the Thrall. I couldn’t think of a single reason he’d want to contact me. After all, we hadn’t exactly parted on the best of terms. My stomach tightened into a painful knot. What an interesting coincidence—Dylan looking for me right when I’m being followed by a Thrall Host.

  “Katie?” Joe’s rich baritone tried to drag me out of the bad memories. It didn’t work. It just reminded me of another morning with him, when I was deciding whether to hunt down the queen in the daylight, or wait for Dylan to be slaughtered when nightfall arrived.

  That morning Joe had tried to scare me out of rescuing Dylan. He’d dragged me to Dr. MacDougal, the parasitic sp
ecialist at St. Elizabeth’s. I got a long lecture on the Thrall.

  “The queen vampire lays her eggs in the arm vein of a Host human.” Dr. MacDougal had said. “When the first egg hatches, it releases a toxin that temporarily paralyzes the Host so that the hatchling can move freely through the bloodstream up to the base of the brain. Once there, it settles in to live. It sends its primary ganglia to wrap around the Host’s spinal cord and the two secondary ganglia through the nasal passages and roof of the mouth where they break through the skin beside the eye teeth. Hard and sharp, these hollow tubes are used by the creature to suck human blood, and, in the case of the queen, to lay her eggs.”

  Dr. MacDougal made sure that I got to view the autopsy of a dead Host. It was supposed to scare the hell out of me. It did. Because of that lecture I’d taken the precautions that saved my life. As a thank you, I’d bought him a bottle of his favorite, very expensive, single malt scotch.

  “What are you thinking, Katie?” Joe’s voice brought me back to the present.

  I didn’t answer. Telling Joe the truth wasn’t an option. But, funny thing, just thinking of the Thrall had dropped me back into the habit of not quite lying.

  The silence stretched between us. I could hear his harsh breathing in the background. It was an interesting counterpoint to Leroy’s quiet measured exhales behind me.

  Joe broke the silence first.

  “You’re going to do it, aren’t you? You’re going to talk to him. He nearly got you killed—but that doesn’t matter to you.”

  I shuddered with a chill that had nothing to do with the air conditioning blasting above my head. Oh, it mattered. I’d come very close to being turned that night. The scars on my ankle and the buzz of the hive in my head are a constant reminder of just how close a call I had. I had been saved by preparation and no small bit of luck. I’m Irish. Luck’s in my genes, thank heavens.

  “Kate, are you still there?”

  I realized the silence had dragged on a little too long. “I haven’t made up my mind, Joe. I’ll have to think about it.”

  “Why? Why think about it at all? It’s not your problem. He’s not your problem. Why would you care if he’s called five times? Just let it go.”

  “Joe, I’m tired. I need to get some sleep before I deal with this. We can talk about this lat—” His words finally sunk home. Too much had been going on or I would have noticed earlier.

  My voice dropped a few notes and dripped with suspicion. “Joe, you said you were there when a call came in. That’s one—not five. How would you kno—Joseph Thomas Reilly! You’ve been listening to my answering machine!”

  I’d thrown him off balance and he started to fumble his words. “I . . . he . . . it’s . . . it’s that blasted BEEP, Katie! Why can’t you have voice mail, like a normal person? I tried to just shut it off . . . then I punched the wrong button and . . . and then Dylan called. And . . .” His voice softened. “You’re right, I shouldn’t have messed with the machine.”

  Oh, no. He was not getting out of this with a simple apology. My teeth ground audibly and the tips of my fingers were white from gripping the receiver until the plastic groaned. The fuzzy reflection of my face in the metal phone was twisted with fury. “I cannot believe you, Joseph! Did you go through my mail? Did you write down the license plates of the cars in the garage and run a check on them, too? We’ve been over this . . . how many times now? I’m a big girl. My business is none of yours.”

  I heard him take a deep breath, loud enough that it came over the wire. “You’re right, Katie. I shouldn’t have messed with the machine. But Dylan did call five times. I didn’t erase them, I promise. They’re all still there . . . well, at least I think they are.”

  “You think!” Och! Why couldn’t the Reilly heirlooms have included a whomping big sword to smack him over his thick skull instead of Irish lace and china! Maybe then I’d get through to him!

  It took effort, but I forced my voice back into normal range. People were starting to stare and I could actually see Leroy’s back shaking with laughter.

  “Before you forget—who called?”

  “Um, whats-her-name in 1B called twice about some plumbing things, the diamond guy from Israel called once and said he’d call back. Some guy called about the second apartment—Chuck, I think? Mike asked you to stop by this week, and then Dylan’s five.” I could hearing him counting off the calls on his fingers. “Yep, that’s all of them. But I should have deleted Dylan’s.” He was getting his fire back.

  “Look, I have to go, but we haven’t finished this discussion. Not by a long shot.”

  He slammed the phone down without saying goodbye.

  I hung up my end just as hard. I really did want to throttle my brother, not that it did any good to get angry. Our folks are gone, so he thinks he’s the head of the family. He’s great in a crisis; it’s what makes him a top ER doctor. He’s not nearly as good at the day-to-day grind. We spend a lot of our time butting heads—particularly when he tries to run my life for me.

  Joe has a redheaded temper. My hair is what most people refer to as strawberry blonde. It hovers on that border between blonde and red—which side of the line it falls on depends mostly on how much time I spend in the sun. But while I may sometimes look blonde, my temper is every bit as nasty as Joe’s and I don’t take well to being bullied. I’m more than up to any knockdown, drag-out if things ever got physical. Not that they ever actually have. No, we limit ourselves to verbal sparring matches. I forced myself to count to twenty slowly and calm down. There was no point in borrowing trouble as mum used to tell me.

  “Calm, Katie. Calm.” Calm is not my best thing. My brother Bryan had always been the even-tempered one in the family.

  “Man trouble, huh?” I’d almost forgotten about Leroy. He nodded knowingly.

  I shrugged. “Not really. One stupid brother, and one ghost from the past.” I punched his arm lightly and winked. “If you ignore them, they’ll go away.”

  “Some spooks aren’t that easy to shake, Kate.” His voice was soft. It held an edge of regret. When I looked up, his eyes were hard. I thought about asking but I believe that personal demons should remain personal. I wouldn’t want to tell Leroy about Bryan, so I shouldn’t ask his story.

  I sighed and started walking toward the baggage claim area with Leroy at my side. Thinking about my baby brother was not going to improve my mood. Sometime this week I’d stop by Our Lady’s parish and visit Mike—Father Michael—and Bryan. Some days it’s hard to put the title in front of Mike’s name. We’d grown up together. Mike hardly ever called. Hmm, that wasn’t good. I should go there today. It might be something important. Maybe Bryan had gotten hurt, or . . .

  Stop it, Kate! I shook off the brief moment of panic. If it was urgent, Mike would have said so. There was no hurry. Bryan wouldn’t know the difference. I hated that fact, but I knew it was true.

  I moved quickly through the slowly awakening airport to pick up my luggage. Leroy remained at my side. Most trips I just bring a carry-on and the package. Since I knew I’d be gone a week in several different climates, I’d indulged myself and brought a suitcase. It had been almost more trouble than it was worth—almost. I have to admit that having my swimsuit for the pool at the Paris hotel had been nice.

  I edged my way between an overweight businessman in a rumpled suit, his tie at half-mast, and a stroller with a screaming infant. The metallic whirring of the motor took my attention from chatting with Leroy. The carousel began circling with that odd squeaking/grinding noise that is distinctively multi-national. I watched with one eye for my luggage to come out the chute, while keeping my other eye peeled for bad people.

  My luggage is ugly. I make a good living, and could buy pretty stuff if I wanted. But I’d discovered that most “nice” luggage looks pretty much alike. Rather than risk getting somebody else’s bag by mistake, I’d bought myself a used, hard-sided, Samsonite bag in olive green, then proceeded to plaster it with bumper stickers. It’s unmistakably eye
-catching. In all my travels since buying it, the airlines haven’t lost it once. Except that it didn’t come out this time. The final “rattle-flap-shump” gave way to muffled whirring and then the machine stopped without relinquishing my bag.

  I checked the board overhead. This wasn’t my flight! No wonder I didn’t remember the squalling baby. I walked back to the flight display. Yes, this was the right carousel. I settled down for the wait. Leroy agreed to stay to keep an eye on me. It was nice of him and I was grateful for the company.

  It was nearly an hour later when I grabbed my bag from the carousel and stepped out of the way. Jeez Louise! Strip searches in Amsterdam moved quicker than this! Thank God for Leroy’s ever present deck of cards. He trounced me, twelve games to two.

  I slid a quarter in the machine, tossed my luggage in a liberated cart and went to find Edna in the very expensive covered lot near the terminal. Edna is a fully restored fire engine red 1955 pick-up truck. I bought her as a used piece of junk when I was sixteen years old, and have spent many a weekend with my head buried under the hood. Now that she’s restored I’ve been offered quite a lot of money for her—but things will have to get a lot more desperate than they are now before I’d be willing to sell.

  I tossed my bag onto the floor of the front seat and climbed in. She fired up as soon as I turned the key. That was a surprise. Usually I have to coax and flatter the old broad. I cracked the driver’s window enough to shout my thanks to Leroy.

  He turned and raised a hand. “See you next time, Reilly!”

  I watched his broad back disappear into the building before driving out of the parking garage and heading for home and my waiting bed.

  It’s miles and miles from the airport to the city, and there’s nothing like a wide expanse of empty prairie to get your mind working on all the wrong things. I drove through the dark of pre-dawn trying to make sense of everything that was going on. Would the queen of the Thrall have someone tail me? Yeah, if it suited her purposes. There’s very little Monica isn’t capable of. But the big question was . . . why? And was it connected to Dylan’s calls? I couldn’t imagine why my lying, cheating excuse for an ex-fiancé would track me down after all these years.