Starling (Southern Watch Book 6)

by Robert J. Crane

  “Let’s get right to being ripped to pieces by demons?” Erin asked, catching his eye. “How about … no? How about we hang back, wait for this thing to show its face, and give it a good poke with something sharp and holy?”

  Reeve stalled in his approach. He’d been easing forward, but that stopped him right in his tracks. “Uhh … you got a point there, Erin. Thank you.” He’d been building this thing up in his mind, getting impatient, and he’d just about lost his head on that one. She gave him a casual nod, and they both turned back to the shifting wreckage.

  Another noise made it out of the ruin of Mary Wrightson’s house, something softer, something lower, faint, and it took Reeve a moment to realize it was a voice, pushing its way up through the cracks in the debris. “Y’all gonna just stand out there and jabber like a bird in a damned tree, or are you gonna help me out of this?”

  Reeve stood there, eyebrow cocked like a pistol, brain trying to decipher what he’d heard for a second—

  “Shit, Mary,” he said once it broke through, and he was off, throwing that sword back in the sheath and hustling up unsteadily over house wreckage. A piece of wall shifted uncertainly beneath his feet and he stopped himself from keeling over hard, throwing out his arms as he scrambled to get to the moving debris ahead.

  Arch beat him to it, more sure-footed over the shifting landscape of wreckage. He grabbed a piece of concrete a good foot wide and tossed it, then removed a busted sink, staring at it curiously for a half-second before breaking out of a trance and throwing that too, water raining out of it as he cast it aside.

  Others were out there now, Duncan and Hendricks, digging down where Mary’s voice had made its way out of the rubble, tossing aside pieces of her house—busted photographs, a medicine cabinet that showered broken glass shards—and then, as they all heaved aside a segment of wall—

  Out popped Mary Wrightson, covered in white dust and looking about as pissed off as he’d ever seen the woman. Her hair, which she had probably dyed for years, was coated in white drywall dust that extended down her face and her shoulders, giving her a look like she’d coated herself in baby powder—but without the pleasant smell.

  “Took you long enough,” she said, rising out of a small well in the ruin of the house. Reeve stared down into the gapped space she occupied for a second before realizing it was a wooden cabinet, the kind that had probably held the sink Arch had tossed. She’d been literally hiding under the damned sink. Out with her came a sawed-off—beyond illegal—double-barreled shotgun, which she offered to Reeve. He took it, and then she grabbed Arch’s hand and climbed out of the cabinet. Busted shards of wood fell out of the folds of her shirt, and even under the dust he could see she was pissed off. “What the hell were you doing? Holding a damned parliamentary debate?”

  “Well, yes,” Reeve said, handing her back the shotgun once she was out. He damned sure didn’t want to get stuck holding it in case the hellcats came back looking for a fight. Especially since it wouldn’t do a damned thing against their demon shells.

  Mary snatched the shotgun out of his hand, jaw sticking out, lips puckered. Oh, she was pissed all right. Reeve had once gotten a call out to Fast Freddie’s and found Mary there with her late husband—this had been a decade ago, before he’d died—and she was standing over Jacob, her hubby, who was holding a broken jaw, and Larry Knox, who had an ice pack on his head, dazed from a concussion with his eyes all floaty. When he’d asked what happened, the bartender told him that Mary had knocked the living hell out of both of them for getting pissed at each other, then getting lippy with her when she’d tried to settle them down. Larry Knox had been in the hospital for days for observation. Hadn’t talked right for months after that, tripping over his damned words.

  Mary had just stood there, seething. Neither had pressed charges, of course. Probably too damned afraid to. Reeve hadn’t known quite what to do about it, but had seen the aftermath of both Larry and Jacob getting in fights before, and considered Mary’s damage to be infinitely preferable to the two of them crashing through tables and windows and all else in their damned quest for drunken superiority. He wrote that one off as a win and didn’t even book Mary or take her into custody.

  But that didn’t mean he wasn’t wary as hell of her every time they met from then on out. He could see it in her eyes too; she knew, but was too polite by half to say so, unless her ire was up. It was sure as shit up now, and once she got done poring over the shotgun, she took Reeve in with one good look and said, “You’re thinking about me busting Larry and Jacob’s heads right now, aren’t you?”

  Reeve just shook his head, keeping his sword pointed forty-five degrees low. Yeah, they were out hunting demons that had ripped apart Mary’s house, and he was still minding his P’s and Q’s in front of her. “Now, why did you have to go and bring that up?”

  Mary had a double chin, and when her mouth settled into a hard line and she looked up at him, he could see where the folds had protected her from the dust; in there, her flesh was almost the normal color. “Because I’m thinking what I did to Larry and Jacob that day is going to be a damned light touch compared to when I get my hands on the things that just smashed my house to ribbons.”

  “You get a good look at them?” Hendricks asked.

  Mary took one look at the cowboy and said, “Where the hell did you dig this boy up? Texas? You bringing in the herds, son?”

  “Yeah,” Hendricks said with a slick grin. “I’m riding herd on the things that just tore up your residence. That and worse.”

  She didn’t look impressed. “I doubt you’re going to do much more than end up a squashed turd in a hat after those things come tearing through your precious little ass.” When Hendricks raised an eyebrow at her, she went on. “Yeah, I noticed. Don’t think it’ll get you anything from me though; I’m too old to give a shit.”

  If Hendricks had a reply to that, he kept it buttoned down, which seemed wise, since Mary was still holding a shotgun and not looking too reticent about using it at the moment. “We should get the fuck outta here,” he said instead.

  “Best idea I’ve heard all day,” Erin said, and once more, Reeve caught a transmission of looks between her and the cowboy—something grudging, almost like she was admitting he was right without having to say it too explicitly. “Since we got a whole lot of no plan for dealing with these things.”

  “Yeah,” Reeve said, echoing them, “let’s head for the hills. Quick-like.” And he waved toward the cars in the circle around them.

  “You don’t have to tell me twice,” Duncan said, and he shuffled toward Hendricks, hot-footing it around the wreckage in the cowboy’s wake.

  “Arch, you want to take Mary with you?” Reeve asked, already starting back toward his car. Pike was waiting there, craning his neck to see what was going on down in the pile. He looked away when he caught Reeve looking at him, pointing his gun uselessly toward the empty, rolling hills beyond.

  “Sure,” Arch said a little tightly. But that was how he said everything these days.

  “You foisting me off on your underlings, Nick?” Mary asked, giving him a narrow-eyed, pissed-off look. “Is this because I voted against you this morning?”

  “Well, that having happened in a quiet voting booth where I couldn’t have known about it until you told me … no,” Reeve said. “But now that I do know, it ain’t highly incentivizing me to change my mind.”

  “You shitbird,” Mary said, clutching the shotgun across her body as she fell in behind Arch. She was taking care not to point it at his back, keeping it well off to the side and skyward.

  “See you back at the station, Mary,” Reeve said, hustling the last few yards to his car and slipping in as Pike jumped in next to him. They slammed their doors at the same time and Reeve started it up.

  “Looks like a successful rescue,” Pike said. He still had his pistol drawn, like he expected something to come through window at him. Not a baseless fear, Reeve knew, after seeing how these hellcats worked.


  “Yeah, we got her out,” Reeve said, “or rather, we got her out, and she bitched at us all for not doing it quicker.”

  Pike just chuckled. “Sounds like a normal day for me.”

  Reeve eyed the Glock in his hand. It was small, looked like one of the new 42s, maybe even a 43. Fancy. “Pistol and all?”

  Pike glanced at the weapon as Reeve put a foot on the accelerator and started them back up the driveway. The others were all moving too, no one wasting a damned bit of time in getting going and getting out of here. “Well, that part’s maybe a little new,” he said hastily and finally holstered the gun, slipping it back inside his waistband. Reeve let out a little breath as the County Administrator did so. Reeve had been around guns his whole life, and didn’t much mind handing someone like Mary a double-barreled shotgun, knowing she’d show the weapon the respect it deserved.

  Letting a Johnny-come-lately like Pike handle a Glock in his presence, though? Something about it gave Reeve little chills down his spine. Maybe that was just the thought of the hellcats descending on the watch while they’d been rescuing Mary Wrightson, though, because once he was back on the road and heading toward town, it felt like he should have been able to breathe clearly again. But he didn’t. Like a catch in his lungs, one that persisted the whole way back to the station.

  *

  “Well, I never,” Mary Wrightson said as she got in the passenger side of Arch’s Explorer.

  Arch waited, then just gave up and said, “You never what?”

  That wasn’t the thing to say. “My house just got wrecked,” she said, and it was clear she was looking to do some unloading. The woman looked like she was wearing whiteface because of the plaster dust all over her, but Arch refrained from commenting on that fact. He doubted it’d help. “And here Nick goes, sending me off with you instead of dealing with me directly.”

  Arch threw the Explorer into gear, and followed behind as Reeve started them out of the gate like he was intending to have a race to get the heck away from the wreck of the house. “You see who’s in the car with him?” Arch asked. He wasn’t too nonplussed by Mary Wrightson’s offputting manner; she’d just lost her house, after all. It’d be strange if her teakettle wasn’t boiling at least a little. She’d probably lived there for double Arch’s lifespan, maybe more.

  Mary squinted ahead, and after a minute, asked, “Is that County Administrator Pike I see?”

  “It surely is.”

  She spat right there in the floorboard of his car, and Arch physically recoiled at the action. Mary Wrightson seemed to realize what she’d done a second later, because she reached out and patted Arch on the arm. “Sorry. Sorry, son. I didn’t mean to do that. It’s just habit, you understand?”

  “It’s your habit to spit in my car when you see the sheriff riding with a county administrator?”

  “No, it’s my habit to spit, period, whenever I see that greasy son of a bitch,” Mary Wrightson said, shaking her head, brushing some of the plaster dust loose onto Arch’s seat. A week ago, he might have cared a lot more about the spit and the dust. “He is a worthless turd, the sort you don’t even dare spread on your farmland for fear it’ll kill your crops.”

  Arch raised his own eyebrow to that. “That’s … quite a statement.”

  “It’s all true, I assure you,” Mary said, patting him on the forearm again with a hamlike hand. “Maybe you ain’t had cause to deal with sumbitches like Pike afore—” She was laying it on thick.

  “Oh, we’ve had dealings,” Arch assured her.

  “Then you know what I mean,” Mary said, finishing her patting of his wrist and relinquishing it. Now she stroked the barrel of her shotgun like she was reassuring herself that it was there, or maybe reassuring the shotgun that she was there for it. It was hard for Arch to tell.

  “Sort of,” Arch said after a moment. “You realize he was the one behind the recall on Sheriff Reeve?”

  Her eyes moved subtly, flicking side to side. “I did not realize that, no. And now I feel particularly foolish having voted for it.”

  Arch looked out at the sun, which was just barely above the trees. “You’ve already been out and voted?”

  “Polls open at six a.m.” Mary Wrightson fluffed her hair, dislodging another mess of plaster dust. “I even got up early and did my hair. Can’t you tell?”

  Arch felt like a bug someone had trained a magnifying glass on during a particularly sunny summer day. “Uhm … why, yes. Yes, I can. It looks … lovely.” The pang of guilt for lying tweaked Arch right in the heart a second later, and he made a face.

  Mary Wrightson just stared at him. “You are a lying sumbitch,” she pronounced. Arch didn’t feel obliged to argue.

  *

  “Look at us,” Guthrie said as the road bucked hard under Erin, the cruiser leaping up onto the pavement as she jerked the wheel sideways, following the convoy back onto the road. “Big fucking heroes again.”

  “We did all right, I guess,” Erin conceded. She wasn’t going to breathe again until they were the hell out of this stretch of woods, watching the loping hills roll outside the window. There was none of that now, just a steady flash of bare tree trunks rolling by outside, sun snaking its way through every crack between them, threatening to blind her until she snatched her sunglasses off the holder on the visor and put them on.

  “Awww, there you go minimizing your accomplishments,” Guthrie said. “What’s the deal with you, Erin? You’re so stiff lately. Someone push you off a cliff or something?”

  There was just enough bite in the smartassery that Erin’s cheeks flushed. “I’m not testy about that, so don’t bother poking me over it. I made my peace with what happened there, okay?”

  “So what’s crawled up your ass then?” Guthrie asked. “Seriously. For real. Girl talk.”

  Erin gave her a nasty look. “You’re not a girl.”

  “Neither are you,” Guthrie said. “You’re a full-on woman now. A sulking, pissy one, but still—look at you, a woman, roaring and everything.” She narrowed her eyes. “This isn’t just about the cowboy.”

  “Nothing is about him, dumbass,” she said, then added, “or nearly nothing. I don’t have time to give a fuck about Hendricks right now. Do you not see what’s going on here? People disappearing, houses being ripped apart by herds of demon animals—who gives a shit about the cowboy and his moody ass in the midst of all that? People are dying, Guthrie—”

  “People die every day, sweetheart.” Guthrie yawned, as if to illustrate how pedestrian an activity it was.

  “I’m having déjà vu,” Erin said. “Like I’ve heard this before.”

  “It’s a common theme around here, isn’t it?” Guthrie asked. “When you’re standing at the edge of the abyss, looking down, why would you be talking about anything but the drop?”

  “This isn’t about a drop,” Erin said. “You’re basically arguing that people die, so why should we fucking care about saving people?”

  “Not saying you shouldn’t care, fleshbag,” Guthrie said with a grin. “You’re human. Of course you should care. But you shouldn’t be surprised when you and your fellow meat sacks end up rotting in a few days, weeks, years, whatever. You can feel however you want about it—feel, feel, feel—but it’s what it is. You die. It’s your defining attribute. If you lasted a little longer, maybe you’d understand that fact a little better. Then again, maybe not, because you people feel way more than you think.”

  That caused Erin to burn a little. “You just shit all over everything we are, as people.”

  Guthrie shrugged. “I delivered a cold assessment of the facts. If you got offended by them, that’s your business, and it’s probably because the truth hurts like a kick to the tit. Which, damn, I mean, it does not feel good, does it? I had no idea.”

  “What the hell does that have to do with—”

  “Everything,” Guthrie said. “Your feelings … I didn’t attach any judgment to whether you feeling more than thinking made you better or worse
as a species. I just said if you lived longer, you’d think about it differently. And you went all tomato red.” She pointed at Erin. “Yeah, like that. Does that hurt?”

  Erin tried to control the flush, but failed. “No. It just feels hot. Why are you saying these th—”

  “Because they’re in my mind,” Guthrie said. “I’ve had a lot of time to contemplate the human condition, you know. Sharing them with Duncan is pointless, so … congratulations. I’m guessing by how bad it’s burning you that you think I’m right.”

  Erin turned away from Guthrie. “I don’t … I mean—”

  “You don’t have to answer, toots,” Guthrie said. “Like I said, it’s just an opinion. Probably an accurate one, but who cares? You shouldn’t. I’m a demon, after all, and it’s not like the world rises and sets in my flawless ebony ass crack. You should cling tight to your world view about what gives you value as a species. No point in upsetting your emotional grocery cart right now, especially when you’ve got a lot of shit to do.”

  And with that, Guthrie lapsed into an empty silence, one that Erin swore to herself she wouldn’t break until she had a really good, searing counter argument.

  She still hadn’t spoken by the time she got back to the station.

  *

  Reeve pulled into the station, a goodly portion of the watch’s convoy having bled off by the time he got there. That was, of course, how they worked—mostly people still trying to carve out a little portion of their old lives while dealing with the reality inherent in how Midian was working these days. Volunteer army? Town guard? Something like that.

  “You’ve put together a real impressive rallying force here,” Pike said, nodding along as they bumped into Reeve’s spot at the station. There were a few cars following behind still; Arch, Hendricks, Erin. The old pros were coming in for a meeting … or maybe just because they had nothing else going on at the moment.