Beneath the Skin (4 page)

"Three," Merri murmured. "And Gillespie's reeking of J$obar;$van Musk as usual. Maybe that's why his wife left him."

"Christ,
Merri."

"Just saying."

A white-uniformed medic with a neat 'fro and hipster black-framed rectangular glasses paused at the doorway. He nodded at Rodriguez's body. "He ready to go?"

"More than ready," Merri said.

The medic stepped aside as Merri and Emmett walked from the room. They passed the gurney parked in the hall waiting to receive Rodriguez's remains and the blonde female medic standing at its head. She nodded as they passed, a nod Emmett returned.

SB Section Chief Sam Gillespie stood in front of the sofa, his hair buzz-cut to black stubble, the outline revealing a hairline in high retreat. At six one, he stood two inches shorter than Emmett, his skin just a shade lighter than Merri's. Beads of rain glistened on his wire-framed glasses and on the shoulders and collar of his deep blue Gore-Tex jacket. He held the handle of a black satchel in his right hand.

Gillespie's lips stretched into the taut line that he considered a smile. "Thibodaux," he greeted. "Goodnight."

"Chief," Emmett returned, stopping beside the sofa. His gaze fell upon a mug resting on the coffee table. The red letters etched upon its white surface read GROUCH, a mug Rodriguez was most likely sipping from just a few hours ago, unaware that death was climbing in through the laundry room window.

"Chief," Merri muttered as she strode past him to the front door. She flung it open, drawing in deep breaths of the moist air in noisy, drama-queen style. Rain pattered against the front steps and along the crime-scene-taped-off paving stones leading to the front door.

Gillespie
was
a little heavy-handed with the cologne, but at the moment, Emmett was grateful to smell something besides blood and piss and death.

"How's Rodriguez's daughter doing?" Emmett asked.

"Okay, I imagine," Gillespie said. "Her memory's been scrubbed by now."

"Christ," Merri muttered from the doorway. "She's just a kid."

"One who's still alive," Gillespie said,
"because
of the memory scrub. In the bad old days, she would've been turned into another victim of this official and tragic 'burglary gone wrong.' "

Emmett nodded, and shoved his hands into the pockets of his trousers. True enough. Lost time, missing memories, and a few misfiring synapses were a helluva lot better than the cold and permanent alternative.

But nothing said he had to like either option.

"Seems the Bureau has a few rotten apples in the proverbial barrel." Gillespie dropped the satchel onto the carpet. "The daughter positively IDed the suspects as FBI SAC Lyons, SA Wallace, and Dante Prejean--a vamp member of some top secret project."

Emmett whistled. "Wallace? Wasn't she just named as a hero by the Bureau a couple of weeks ago for taking down that serial killer?"

"The Cross-Country Killer--Elroy Jordan," Merri supplied from the doorway.

Gillespie nodded. "She was. But she ran into Prejean during the course of that investigation. It's now believed he corrupted her."

Merri snorted. "If he did, then he was only working what was already inside her."

Gillespie lanced a cold, icicle-sharp gaze her way. "Wallace just kicked her career into the gutter, Goodnight, and after she'd been offered the Seattle SAC position. Her service record was sparkling with intelligence, ability, and drive--full of promise. I think
corrupted by bloodsucker
is as good an explanation as any."

Emmett agreed, but he kept that opinion unvoiced. A rush of cold air smelling of cloves and rain swirled to a stop beside him.

"No offense," Gillespie said.

Merri held his gaze for a moment before asking in a crisp voice, "So what's the lowdown, Chief?"

"We're confiscating all evidence gathered by the SPD and the FBI," Gillespie said, his gaze traveling around the living room, as if envisioning how the scene would be officially reimagined and restaged. "We're making sure that statements already given to the SPD and the feds by the Rodriguez girl and her neighbors vanish."

"Any of the neighbors facing a wipe?" Merri asked.

Gillespie shrugged. "Could be. That's for someone else to decide."

"What kinda TSP was Prejean a part of?" Emmett asked.

"HQ's playing this one real close to the vest," Gillespie replied. "All I was told was that it was a joint project--us and the feds--devoted to the study of sociopaths."

The image of Rodriguez's ravaged throat and empty eyes popped into Emmett's mind.
The study of sociopaths.
A chill touched his spine.

"In other words, their monster slipped its leash and they want us to fetch it. Do I have that right, Chief?" Merri said.

Gillespie nodded. "Pretty much."

Emmett nudged the satchel with the brown toe of his Dingo boot. "What's that?"

A wry smile tugged up one corner of Gillespie's mouth. "It's your monster-catching kit. Cuffs, drugs, chains."

"We know how to handle vampires," Emmett said. "Monster or not."

"Not this vampire. He's enhanced."

"Enhanced?"
Merri asked. "You fucking kidding me?" She dropped a hand to her hip, her dark brown gaze direct and challenging. "Why the hell would anyone enhance a vamp? It's not like we need it."

"I wasn't enlightened on that account," Gillespie said. He removed his glasses, held them up to the overhead light, and peered at the rain-spotted lenses. "But I
was
told that adrenaline implants to boost his speed, dexterity, and strength had been installed. So be prepared--he's going to be a helluva lot faster than you'll expect."

The chief had never been a good liar and his little oh-look-my-glasses-are-dirty routine gave away the lie. He knew a lot more than he'd just handed out about the
enhanced
vamp. Emmett tapped a
listen close
finger against the back of Merri's hand.

"Our assignment, Chief?" Emmett said.

Gillespie slid his glasses back on. "Intercept and detain our perps. Prejean is priority one, Wallace priority two, Lyons number three." He slipped a hand inside his Gore-Tex jacket and withdrew a plastic-encased flash drive that he handed to Emmett. "All pertinent data including files, photos, destination, and instructions. Study it on your way to Damascus."

The medics, the blonde in the lead, wheeled the gurney and its dark, plastic-body-bagged contents through the living room and out the open front door, wheels thumping down the steps. The male medic pulled the door shut behind him.

Even through the fog of J$obar;$van Musk, Emmett caught the nostril-pinching stench of blood and death.

"Our perps are in Damascus, Oregon?" Emmett asked, curling his fingers around the flash drive, tucking it tight against his palm.

Gillespie nodded. "We have reason to believe that Lyons might've taken Prejean home. Satellite scans of the area and of Lyons's home in particular revealed Wallace's Trans Am and Lyons's Dodge Ram parked in the driveway."

"A safe bet that Prejean's with them," Merri commented.

"HQ's thought too," Gillespie said as he walked around the sofa to the hallway. He stopped in front of the murder room. "And they've got a good five or six hours' head start, so move your asses. We've got a plane waiting for you at Sea-Tac. Rendezvous with Holmes and Miklowitz at the airport and bring them up to speed. You got stay-awake pills, Goodnight?"

Merri nodded. "I do."

"Good." Gillespie's jacket rustled as he folded his arms over his chest. He stared into the office.

Slipping the flash drive into his trouser pocket, Emmett bent and wrapped his fingers around the satchel's handle. "Chief," he said, straightening. "Is there anything else we should know about the project or Prejean's
enhancements
?"

Gillespie swiveled around to face them, the lenses of his glasses reflecting light, his arms still folded over his chest. "I wish I knew," he said quietly. "Be careful out there. Don't take any chances--especially with Prejean. Hell, not even with Wallace and Lyons. I know HQ wants them alive, but it's not worth your lives. Not to me."

"Might be better to take our time and wait for Prejean to Sleep," Merri said.

"Maybe so," Emmett said. "But then he could hole up someplace we won't find him. So I think moving our asses is our best option."

"Then let's hit the friendly skies and catch us some bad mofos."

"Truth, sistah."

"Be careful," Gillespie said again, voice low. His gaze once again fixed on the office's blood-spattered interior. "And
that's
a direct order."

"Roger that, Chief." Emmett exchanged a glance with Merri as he strode for the front door and the fresh air beyond. Doubt and a frown pinched the skin between her eyes. A dark realization glimmered in her eyes, the same realization rolling around in Emmett's skull.

He and Merri were being ordered into the forested hills of Damascus on a goddamned bureaucratic ass-covering operation without knowing the truth of what they were up against.

A monster waited for them in the forest's dark heart, a monster who savaged a man in his own home, but left his daughter untouched.

A monster named Dante Prejean.

2
THE PERSISTENCE OF LOSS

LAFAYETTE, LA
Eleven years ago

Chloe bounces out of the bedroom she shares with the other girls, wearing the purple Winnie the Pooh shirt he nabbed for her from Walgreens. Grinning, blue eyes bright, she throws her arms around him and hugs him. She smells like strawberries and soap and her red hair smells like baby shampoo.

"It fits, Dante-angel! It's perfect!"

He laughs and hugs her back. "It looks great on you."

"Do you want to practice reading?" she asks, releasing him and smoothing her hands down her new Pooh shirt. "I got some books from the library today. One is called
The Scarecrow Walks at Midnight.
It looks a little spooky."

"Spookier than Winnie the Pooh's adventures?" he teases.

"Winnie the Pooh isn't--oh!" Chloe giggles and smacks him on the shoulder with the plushie orca in her hand.

Dante grins. "Did you learn anything new in math that you could teach me?"

Chloe tucks Orem the Orca under her arm and considers. "Just more multiplication stuff."

"I like multiplication stuff."

Chloe's face screws up into her
ick-gross
expression. "Yuck."

"I see that you like it too."

Hands on her hips, Chloe sticks her tongue out at him.

"Wanna go to the park first? I'll push you on the swing."

Just as Chloe opens her mouth to answer, another voice carries in from the front room, the accompanying foot treads punctuating each word. "Boy, you got work tonight, you. Time to get yo' ass downstairs."

Those words scour the happiness clean from Chloe's face. Her blue-eyed gaze seems to age while Dante watches
--
no longer eight, but a wary forty. She hugs Orem against her chest.

It's okay,
Dante mouths to her. A smile ghosts across her lips. He turns around.

Papa Prejean stands in the hallway in white T-shirt and khakis, his belt loops empty, an amused gleam in his hazel eyes. "Now why ain't I surprised to find you with Little Ms. Feisty, huh, boy?"

Dante's gaze tracks down to the belt folded in Papa's hand. He steps in front of Chloe. "I'm going. Ain't gonna need that."

Papa looks down at the belt in his hand. "Oh, this ain't for you,
p'tit."
His gaze slants past Dante. A chill ripples the length of Dante's spine. "Seems someone didn't vacuum the parlor like Mama asked."

"I was gonna," Chloe says.

"I was talking to her and held her up, so punish me," Dante says.

Papa laughs, his voice cigarette-smoke rough, then coughs. "How'd I know that too? I ain't gonna let you do it this time, boy. How's she ever gonna learn to obey if you always take the belt for her, you?" Papa shakes his head. "Ain't gonna mark you up before your clients get here, anyhow. Get in the basement,
p'tit.
After you're done, I think I'll give you the belt anyway since you're so hellfire eager for it."

"No!" Chloe shouts. "It's not his fault!"

"Shhh, princess. It's okay."

Amusement gleams in Papa's eyes again. "Aw ... ain't this sweet? Y'all wanting to protect each other from what y'all got coming."

"Get that
p'tite marmaille
in here, Papa!" Mama Prejean shouts from the front room. "I want this parlor vacuumed
tout de suite.
You can beat her lazy ass later."

"Looks like you get a reprieve, you," Papa says, nodding his chin at Chloe. "Go do what Mama wants. I'll deal with you later, me." His gaze flicks over to Dante. "You too."

Ice rims Dante's heart. He has an uneasy feeling that as soon as Papa cuffs him to the bed in the basement, Papa's gonna march upstairs and beat Chloe. Beat her while he's cuffed and unable to do anything but listen. That's gonna be his part of the punishment.

Dante whirls, hooks a hand around Chloe's biceps, and
moves.
She squeaks in surprise. Papa shouts and yells as he and Chloe blur down the hallway, into the brightly lit kitchen, blowing past a startled Mama, then out the back door into the night, screen door slamming behind them.

"We're flying!" Chloe breathes. "You
really
are an angel!"

"Ain't no angel. Ain't flying." But the houses blur past Dante as he zips down narrow Catherine Street, surprised by his own speed.

"Where we going, Dante-angel?"

"Dunno," Dante says. The cool night feels good against his face and smells of wet pavement, boiling crawfish, and rain-heavy roses. He swings onto Johnston, then blurs down to Lewis, heart pounding, a wild hunger knotting his belly. He tightens his grip on Chloe's arm.