A paw wrenched the Vektor from my hand. Sean. He put his other paw on my left shoulder while Gullah put a hand on my right. Don’t move.
I had fired four times, five times, I didn’t know. The blood seeping from the bullet holes merged into one crimson stain that covered Bourbon’s chest. His wounds hissed and bubbled smoke. He relaxed and let go of my wrist.
He propped himself on his elbows and gazed at me with sad, dimming eyes. Beat by beat, the crimson stain spread down one sleeve and blood poured out the cuff. Beat by beat, smoke puffed from his chest. Beat by beat, his aura and complexion faded.
Bourbon gasped. His lower back pressed against the floor, then his shoulder blades, and finally, the back of his skull. His mouth stayed open. A rivulet of blood traced the outline of his body. His aura flickered and slowly vanished. Smoke feathered from his shirt.
The werewolves aimed guns at me. Yo-Yo and Rooster aimed guns at them.
Sean stepped close to Bourbon’s corpse and studied the dead were’s face. He handed the Vektor to one of his goons and exhaled a troubled breath. He searched the floor and picked up Wendy’s talking ring.
Angela had transformed back into a woman. The hair receded on her face and torso. Her nose flattened and turned back to a human color. She clutched the side of her dress to keep it from falling open and rocked from side to side to pull the hem to cover the tops of her legs.
I got to my feet, grabbed a cloth runner from a table, and wiped Bourbon’s blood from my hands.
Sean ground his teeth and his sideburns churned. He slipped the ring into his pocket and looked at me, his eyes granite hard and cold. “I knew you’d find out who killed Inga Latrall. That’s why I’ve kept you alive.”
“So you used me to get rid of Bourbon?” All this so-called pride about were loyalty when it was actually a daisy chain of backstabbing.
“That’s how it worked out. Now the Palmetto Clan belongs to me.”
The weres tightened their grips on their pistols. Rooster and Yo-Yo kept their MAC-10s ready to spray the room.
No one wanted to back down, but no one wanted to be the first to die either.
“What do we do, Sean?” one of the werewolves asked. “The vampire killed Bourbon.”
“This is shit,” another were chimed in. “What happens to our cred when word gets out we let a bloodsucker kill a clan alpha?”
“That was fucked up that Bourbon and Jerry killed Inga Latrall,” the first werewolf said, “but that was our punishment to give, not a vampire’s.”
“According to the law,” one of the other werewolves said, “we’re supposed to kill him.”
“What do you morons know of the law?” Angela gathered her high heels. “Felix, Gullah, the rest of you vampires, go before someone farts and we’re all shot to pieces.”
CHAPTER 61
Gullah, Rooster, Yo-Yo, and I backtracked to the hall and down the stairs. We left the werewolves scratching the floor with their claws as they dragged Jerry’s corpse next to Bourbon’s. One of the goons injected them with the serum that shifted them back into human form.
We made it to the kitchen door and out to the side yard with the carport. At any moment, I expected the werewolves to rally and come after us.
Gullah’s human gangsters had dispersed themselves in the garden and along the street. They left their sentry positions and congregated on the sidewalk in front of the house. Broken glass from the windows that Yo-Yo and Rooster had jumped through glittered on the hedges and trees.
Gullah halted beside his Impala, which was parked against the curb and sandwiched between the Escalades.
The tension had ebbed enough for him to speak. “Did you have to kill Bourbon?”
“Seemed like the right thing to do. Now give me my gun.”
Gullah held the pistol like he was weighing his options. He slapped the Webley into my hand.
His forehead wrinkled in dismay. “You’ve put me in a jam. You killed a top alpha in front of his fellow weres.”
“Why is that your problem? Calhoun ought to thank me for what I’ve done. Now he’s got the territory all to himself. With Bourbon dead, that should end this talk of war.”
Gullah handed his cane to Rooster and raised his gloved hand. “Let me explain how seriously the Araneum is taking this situation.” He tugged at the glove, and when the cuff slipped past his knuckles, he revealed a stump instead of his little finger. The end of the stump was wrapped with electrical tape.
“It’s called the seiyakuyubi, Japanese for ‘finger oath.’ After you and I talked in the hotel, a crow delivered a message from the Araneum, advising that I not let you fuck things up between us and the werewolves. They also said I’ve been flip in my attitude as head of the nidus. And to make sure I understood the message loud and clear, they suggested I reply by cutting off my finger. As down payment for the rest of my ass in case things go wrong.”
Gullah winced as he replaced the glove. “You know those message capsules? My pinkie fit inside just perfect. How convenient for the Araneum.”
“I’m sorry about your hand.” I had a lot of ideas about the Araneum, but I never imagined them as a supernatural yakuza.
“You’ve put Calhoun on the hot seat.” Gullah withdrew the rhinestone-decorated sunglasses from his shirt pocket and put them on. Rooster handed him the crystal-topped cane. “Had you killed a werewolf flunky, you might’ve been able to slide out of Charleston without more trouble. But a clan alpha? Doesn’t matter that Bourbon was a rival and got what was coming to him, there’s no way Calhoun can let you get away without satisfying werewolf justice.”
“I’ll deal with Calhoun the next time I see him.” Which should be never. Still, I had the impression of being chained to an anchor that had been pitched overboard. Soon the chain would yank me to the bottom, where Calhoun would be waiting. Until then, I had other concerns.
Gullah asked, “What was that bullshit about a talking ring?”
I told him about the ring and how I’d discovered it.
“Where did Wendy get it?”
“Same place she gets the rest of her magic.”
He tapped his cane hard on the sidewalk, not satisfied by my answer, but that’s all I knew.
“If you had not showed up,” I said, “Bourbon and his goons would’ve killed me and you wouldn’t have these problems. So why did you show up?”
“You need to thank Deliah.”
The ghost? “How so?”
“Remember that woman who attacked you at the costume ball? She dropped her cell phone when you jumped her and her partner. Deliah the haint told me where to find it.”
“Deliah told you? How? What about that business with the haint cloth to keep ghosts away?”
“Come on. You know that’s bullshit. I was in my kitchen taking care of this”—Gullah flexed his gloved hand—“when she came to see me because of you. Seems she’s worried that if something happened, you might not be able to pay back her favor. Has to do with ice cream. Whatever that means. Deliah said that if I didn’t help you, she’d go boo hag on my customers.” Gullah frowned. “Wouldn’t want to ruin my business model.” He waved to the house. “And we showed up just in time. Like the buffalo soldier cavalry, only in this case, the Indians still got us by the short and curlies.”
The cold breeze that had spun through Bourbon’s house? Deliah. She had my thanks. If she asked, I’d eat my way through a freezer full of ice cream.
“What about the phone?” I asked.
“Yo-Yo sorted through its address book and found Paxton.”
“Give me the number.”
Gullah snapped his fingers. Yo-Yo recited the number from memory and I punched the digits into my cell phone.
I pressed send.
Okay, if Paxton answered, then what?
His number rang four times before voice mail picked up. There was no message, just a beep, followed by silence.
I hung up. “He didn’t answer.”
Yo-Yo had his iPhone out. H
is fingers traced across the screen and tapped the glass. He held the phone for me to see. “This app tracks his cell phone.”
Impressive. I put an iPhone on my mental Christmas list. “Where is he?”
“To be more precise about it,” Yo-Yo replied, “where is his phone?” He tapped the screen again. “Across the river. On the Savannah Highway.”
“Which river? East or west?”
“You got GPS on your phone?” Yo-Yo asked.
“Yeah.”
“I’ll text you the address.” His fingertips played on the screen again.
Seconds later my phone vibrated. I answered and loaded the address in my GPS function. A colored map filled the tiny screen of my phone.
At this scale, I couldn’t tell where the address was in relation to where we were. I tapped buttons and reduced the scale to a map of the greater Charleston area.
Gullah kept rapping his cane against the concrete. The rapping stopped. He addressed Yo-Yo. “Let’s add a little urgency to the proceedings. What’s the address close to?”
“Between Wappoo and Oak Forest Drive.”
By this time I’d gotten my bearings. I’d have to go over the Ashley River. Savannah Highway ran almost straight west from the other side of the bridge.
Gullah leaned on his cane. “What businesses are around that address?”
Yo-Yo played with his iPhone. He recited names and when he said, “The Stono River Architectural Modeling and Signworks Company,” Gullah smiled in approval.
“That’s it.”
“How do you know?” I asked.
“That fiberglass crab that about flattened your ass? I’ll bet they make those kinds of sculptures.”
My kundalini noir trembled with anticipation. My fangs couldn’t wait to taste blood.
“So what’s the plan?” Gullah asked.
“Pay Julius Paxton a visit.”
Gullah raised his cane and made a circle motion. “Mount up, kids.”
I wanted Paxton to myself. Alone. For that I needed a car.
Angela limped out of the house and went to her Maserati. She sat sideways in the driver’s seat with her legs extended to the ground. The torn seams on the side of her dress had worked farther apart. Her left breast was on the verge of popping out. She held a cell phone in her lap.
I approached. “Are you doing better?”
Her face was back to fully human. Sweat beaded on her forehead and trickled across her brow to her temples.
Her face was lined with strain. A yellow discoloration showed on her chin where Bourbon had punched her. “What are we going to do?”
“About what?”
“You.” Angela massaged the bridge of her nose. “Sean’s inside talking to Calhoun.” She shook her cell phone. “He told him about the talking ring. All this time Sean’s been working behind Bourbon’s back. He wanted no part of Bourbon’s schemes to start a war but couldn’t turn against him without some advantage. Wendy’s talking ring gave Sean what he needed to undermine Bourbon, but it’s a moot point now.”
“Calhoun should be relieved. The territory is his.”
The frustration spilled from Angela. “You still don’t get it. You’ve screwed everything by killing Bourbon. Calhoun’s got to placate the werewolves and do it quick before Le Cercle de Sang et Crocs convenes tonight.”
“I killed Bourbon because he attacked you.”
Angela blinked uncomfortably. She wiped sweat from her eyes. Or were those tears? “You didn’t have to offer yourself for me. That was stupid. And brave.”
“I know. Stupid and brave are part of my business motto.”
Angela’s eyes crinkled and the corners of her mouth turned up. She was prettiest when she smiled like this. But the smile didn’t last long. “I owe you my life.”
“I’ll take a rain check. Speaking of brave, I have to admire that you were going to give yourself to Bourbon to bring peace.”
“If you knew the whole story”—she dropped her gaze—“you wouldn’t think so highly of me.”
“Which is?”
“If Bourbon turned me down, I was going to kill him.”
“I kill an alpha and it’s the end of the world. You kill an alpha and…?”
“It’s the end of my world. But what’s one death if it prevents a war?”
“It would’ve been your death. That means a lot to me.”
Angela brought her eyes back up. “Felix, why does this have to be so hard?”
Hold that thought. It’s not over yet. I felt the pressure of hunting Paxton down before he got away again. I had the first confirmed location of where to get him. I couldn’t wait much longer. “I need your car.”
“To find Paxton?”
I didn’t say anything. I felt low for thinking this, but if Angela didn’t give me her car, I’d have to take it.
She pulled herself out of the Maserati and handed me the keys. “Calhoun’s on his way here. I have to wait for him.”
“What about the werewolves?” I nodded in the direction of the house.
“Sean?” Angela leaned against me like she was tired of the drama and the violence. Her body was alarmingly hot. “He’s not wasting time taking over the Palmetto Clan. Once he gets his pack alphas in line, he’ll pledge the clan to Calhoun.”
“Sean’s moving fast, like he’s planned this.”
“Were politics is like Thai kickboxing, Felix, but with fewer rules.”
She sniffed the air, a quick nervous sniff as if catching the scent of a distant wildfire. “You better go.”
I put my arm around her waist and pulled her close. She turned her head and offered her cheek. “When you come back and I’ve got your full attention, I’ll give you a proper kiss.” She slipped free and crossed her arms. “Do what you have to.”
I sat in the car, suddenly unsure. A lot had gone wrong and a lot more could go wrong.
Angela reached for my hand but didn’t touch me. “Take care of yourself. I’d hate to have nothing to show for all this trouble.” She gave a quick squeeze and her fingers sent a reassuring warmth deep into me.
She stepped away.
I started the engine.
Angela stood by the kitchen door and gazed into the distance, looking lost and apprehensive.
I backed up the Maserati. King Gullah and his crew were lined up in their vehicles along the opposite side of the street.
Paxton was mine.
CHAPTER 62
If King Gullah and his goons were at my side when I found Paxton, I’d have to defer to Gullah unless I also wanted to take on his merry little band of gun-toting undead criminals. I had to think of a way to get to Paxton first and by myself.
The idea came. Gullah and company were in three vehicles. I rolled down my window and got my Webley.
I cruised to the first Escalade and aimed at the front right tire. Bang. Bang.
The tire hissed and went flat.
I drove alongside Gullah’s Impala and did the same to his front right dub. I sped up and popped the tire of Rooster’s Escalade.
I rolled my window up and gave the Maserati gas around the corner, throwing a quick look over my shoulder to watch Gullah and his posse spring out of their vehicles.
I got to Broad Street just as the light turned red. I checked the timing of cross traffic through the intersection and gunned the engine. I raced between a Toyota Camry and a delivery truck, narrowly missing an oncoming Buick to the screeching of tires and horns shrieking like curses.
I swerved around more cars, juking left and right over the center lane as I threaded my way through traffic. The next light was also red and I blasted through that intersection.
I was doing seventy on Lockwood Drive. My tires screamed on the ramp to the bridge over the Ashley River. Adrenaline fueled me, like my arteries and veins were full of burning gasoline.
I dodged near misses as I zoomed to the Savannah Highway. I pulled the Webley from my waistband and flicked it open. The spent casings spilled free of the cylin
der. I dug into my pocket for extra ammo and reloaded.
I drove with vampire reflexes. At the edge of my peripheral vision, the world was a blur. In the center, everything was in microscopic detail.
My focus danced from traffic to the buildings and the street signs.
The address numbers approached those I was looking for. A sign on the left announced the Trinity Industrial Complex. Stono River was listed on the sign.
I rode the brakes. The speedometer dipped below one hundred, eighty, sixty. I took the turn into the complex at fifty miles per hour. I kept slowing, bounced up the entrance to the asphalt parking lot, and proceeded at a cautious walking pace.
A chain-link fence with diagonal privacy slats marked the property line. To my right sat warehouses and offices in identical prefab metal buildings. Two semitrailers were backed up to a loading dock at the first building. Inside the bay, a small forklift rolled against boxes stacked on pallets. The sign over the bay said: PIERSON MARINE SUPPLY COMPANY, LLC. A woman’s voice squawked over a loudspeaker: “Marty, line two. Marty, line two.”
Maybe a dozen cars were parked together, although this part of the lot could’ve held a hundred. A row of Dumpsters perpendicular to the fence segmented the lot into more parking areas. Seagulls strutted along the tops of the Dumpsters.
About three hundred meters away, sheds and more Dumpsters delineated the southern boundary of the lot.
The warehouses ran one after another down my right. The address numbers progressed to the one I was searching for. For Lease signs on the buildings explained why the parking lots were empty.
I was next to a busy highway, more business complexes to my left and right, yet the farther I drove on the lot, the deeper the desolation. Empty warehouses with their dark windows stood mute as crypts. Creepy. Forbidding.
As a vampire, I enjoy the solitude of crypts. But these buildings should be teeming with activity. The tattered For Lease banners were like desperate prayers of hope, unheard and forgotten.
The Maserati advanced midway between the fence and the buildings. I wanted empty space around me, a buffer in case I was attacked. As I would be, I was sure.
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