MisStaked (10 page)

"No, he's at home.” He wanted to add, “for the moment,” but didn't want to frighten her with the truth. Instead, he quickly signed the papers to avoid just such an occurrence. When he was done, he slid the paperwork across the desk.

"With the formalities out of the way, this Saturday we're having a little get-together so the team can get to know each other before we head out. I do hope you can make it,” she took the papers and glanced over them.

"I'll be there. It'll give me a chance to see if any of your team has been infiltrated by the undead,” Breathred told her.

Grayson looked shocked by his statement. “You can't be serious. I know every one of them. I handpicked them myself. I've seen over half of them this morning. I expect to meet the rest this afternoon to sign their paperwork."

"If someone doesn't show, let me know.” Breathred hoped she believed him. The professor hired him for his expertise and this was part of it. If she chose to disregard his advice now, he might as well tell her to forget the entire thing.

"If they all show up, what then? Vampires aren't supposed to be able to stand the light of day. Even I know that much."

"Vampires can't, but their thralls can. All it would take is one bite and any member of your team—and I include you in that—would be completely theirs,” he warned.

"And you can tell if someone is a—what did you call it? A thrall?” She didn't believe any of this.

"Not directly, but evil has its own unique scent. I should have little trouble finding them, if anyone is tainted,” Breathred answered, hoping it was true. He would make sure to reread the chapter on thralls in the handbook before Saturday.

"You paint an interesting picture for Saturday night. I only hope your worries are unfounded. In any case I am looking forward to seeing you there.” Dr. Grayson chuckled. “Make sure you bring the chimpanzee. Why not make a circus out of it?"

"I planned to.” Scratching his head, Breathred wondered if she was serious about the circus. If there were clowns, he wasn't coming. He hated clowns. They gave him the willies.

Against his better judgment Breathred knew he would have to bite the bullet and ask his father for the money he needed for the trip. As the manager of the Circle Your Wagons convenience store there wasn't anybody who didn't owe his father a dollar or two. R.J. Petrifunck was always willing to lend a helping hand when someone was short for a gallon of gas or needed a gallon of milk when their money was a week away from coming in. Breathred was banking on his father being in one of his charitable moods when his son came calling. He doubted it would happen, but you never knew. Heck had been known to freeze over every one once in a while.

R. J. Petrifunck saw his son ambling up the parking lot and immediately hid his checkbook. It wasn't that he saw Breathred's visit as an excuse for bumming money. It was just he'd come to know his son over the past thirty some-odd years. Hell, you couldn't even go to Wal-Mart with the boy without having to give him the money to finish out his purchase. His son's skewed thinking on the value of money had cost him over a thousand dollars in loose change over the years. He'd added it up.

"Hey, Dad.” Breathred yelled, as he entered the Quick Stop.

"Isn't it a bit early for you to be out of your basement?” R. J. quipped, looking at the calendar sitting beside the register. “Nope, it ain't funny book day, so what do you want?"

"Can't I come by to see you without wanting anything?” Breathred asked.

"Not that I know of, but there's a first time for anything. At least you didn't bring the stinking-ass monkey with you."

"Stud doesn't stink. He's very hygienic."

"If hygienic means smells like a French
hoor
then that's him to a tee.” R. J. drawled. “And tell him to stop looking at me when I'm on the pot. My shit time isn't a spectator sport."

"Sure thing, Dad.” Breathred groaned, knowing he was losing the battle before it even started.

"Hold on a minute,” his father said, and strode around the counter and threw open the door. A woman tried vainly to pump gas into a new-model Lexus. She was frantically waving at the surveillance camera sitting atop the pumps.

"Lift the handle you dumb sum-bitch!” R. J. screamed from the door. He turned about sharply, nearly knocking Breathred to the ground. “You'd think anybody with enough money to buy one of those high-priced ass-warmers would have the money to buy brains enough to know how to pump frigging gas."

"Uh, Dad, I got a job.” Breathred said out of the blue.

"Wait a minute.” R. J came to a screeching halt at the end of the counter. “Did you just say you got a job?"

"Yes, sir.” Breathred beamed.

R. J cocked his brow dubiously. “This isn't like the time you opened a lemonade stand in the front yard, cuz ain't nothing worse than watching a thirty-year-old man trying to sell gourmet Kool-Aid."

"No, I'm going to be working for the university. And the Kool-Aid idea would have worked if Stud hadn't spiked the stuff with Ny-Tol."

"Well, it looks like those five-hundred years of college I paid for are finally paying off. So, what're ya gonna be teaching?” his father asked, mentally counting the days until he'd finally get his basement back.

"I won't be teaching. I'm vampire slaying for them,” Breathred answered with a wince.

"Shit fire, and save the matches. Just when I think you got a lick o’ sense you go and screw it up. I shoulda slapped your momma when I had the chance,” R. J said, rubbing his temples.

"But it pays money, which brings me to—"

R.J. scowled. “How much do you need, Buffy?"

"A couple hundred. It's just till we get paid. Then I can pay you back,” Breathred promised.

"You know what? If you didn't waste your money on that super-hero toilet paper, you'd have some fucking cash. Instead you mooch off me and your poor stepmother, and her with a little sister on the way. Do you ever think about us when you go off half-cocked?” his father asked, his neck turning a bright shade of red.

Breathred waited for him to turn around to preach to the beer cooler about dumb-ass children before slipping out the door, barely avoiding a collision with the woman from the Lexus. It had gone better than he thought. He had expected the full treatment. He was walking past the gas pumps when the woman came running from the store. Breathred looked back to see his father jumping up and down on the cola display, and hurried his steps.

The sound of his father's tirade carried to end of the block. Far from disillusioned, Breathred fled before his father could get around to mentioning his son's overflowing collection of beanie babies. This left only two options. After careful consideration he dismissed the first one out of hand. At the most Stud wouldn't bring in more than $62.50, if he decided to throw in the Mini Me costume. Option one painfully shelved, Breathred turned to the most dreaded of money-making ventures.

Two hours later and his comic collection twenty some odd issues lighter, Breathred left Clint's with a little over two hundred and fifty dollars to his name. In spite of his sacrifice, Breathred wasn't even sure it was enough to outfit both him and Stud. Luna would make it work, though. Of that he was more than confident.

With a couple of hours until he had to meet Luna at the Great Northwestern, Breathred, not feeling like going home, decided to walk around for a while. Things were moving so fast he didn't know what to think anymore. After the cat incident, he had thought seriously about forgetting the whole vampire-slaying gig. Then Luna stepped in and changed things. She always seemed to put a spin on his perspective.

Now, he was going to Canada on the greatest vampire hunt of all. Even old snooty Van Helsing couldn't say he'd found the true origin of vampires. Not to say, he didn't have worries. Dr. Grayson was the biggest.

The fact she decided to check up on him set his teeth to rattling. The chance she might discover his true secret was more than an enough to make him want to run to Mexico. Breathred hadn't been joking when he had told her the reason was personal. It was his shame, not hers. Why couldn't she leave it alone?

He absently kicked a can blocking his path. The can skipped across the sidewalk until it clanged into a trashcan sitting close to where he was standing. It was too late to go back on his word, anyway. After signing the papers, the only thing left to do was suck it up and dive in. If Luna and Stud found out, they found out. There was nothing he could do to change it if they did, except for a killing spree.

A look at his watch, told him he had better get going, or there wouldn't be time to grab Stud before getting to the mall. Luna would kill him if they were late. Stud would kill him if he didn't bring him along. The way Breathred saw it—either way it went, he was dead. So he might as well go into it with both barrels cocked and loaded. What was the worst that could happen?

Lewis awoke with the coming dusk. The steady rhythm of Leopold's sleeping came from the casket next to him. The old poof sure liked his beauty rest, Lewis thought as he climbed from the satin-lined tomb. That was for the best, as far as he was concerned. It meant he would be able to slip from the house without Leopold noticing.

It was nearly party time. All he had to do was go pick up the guest of honor. Lewis had been able to follow them long enough to find out they were meeting at the Great Northwestern Shopping Mall, sometime around eight o'clock. The girl had class until seven. That gave him about an hour to round up his muscle.

Lewis had made it a point to talk to them just before dawn. The wannabee toughs were all for it. From the looks of them they had never been in anything close to a rumble, unless you counted Mortal Combat for the Xbox 360. The newbies were nothing more than cannon fodder, anyway. Hell, the damn monkey could probably take them out. Lewis just needed them to distract the girl long enough for him to grab the virgin.

Leopold started mumbling in his sleep. Time to scoot. He wanted no part of having to help his master pick out his ensemble for the night. The last time he stuck around, Leopold gave him an all night dissertation on the finer points of Italian tailoring. That, my friends, was just too much information for a Naw-'leans boy to have to assimilate on an empty stomach.

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If you have only ordered the first half of this course, you can kiss your ass good-bye.

To call the Great Northwestern a mall should be enough to earn whoever called it such, a nice libel suit for even daring to utter such a blasphemy against the shopping industry in general. It wasn't that the place hadn't had at one time earned the right to be called a mall, but those days were long past. Now, it existed as the sole providence of speed walking grandmothers and Goth kids, who saw the G. W. as a rebellion against the establishment of the larger and newer malls represented.

The place was still a great place to shop far from the hassle of large unruly crowds. It had all the prerequisite stores that made the act of shopping worthwhile. The mall had a Sears & Roebuck, a J. C. Penney and a Starbucks. It even had a newly-opened Gap now catering to the neighborhoods surrounding the shopping complex. Despite its seeming prosperity, the Northwestern was dying a slow death. It was just that the place had little to sway shoppers away from the flashier places across town.

To Breathred though, it was heaven—pure and simple. The mall was less than two blocks from his house, which only reinforced this notion in his mind. Despite his undying love, mall security saw him in a different light or rather they saw Stud in an unsavory light. This was due in part to Stud's first visit there.

Before the incident that forever changed the young simian, Breathred had decided to show off his new acquisition. What better place to do this than his home away from home? He really just wanted a corndog, and was afraid to leave the monkey on his own with the poo-throwing and all. So, he bundled up his new friend and headed off.

Looking back, Breathred wished he could change almost everything about the long ago day, beginning with going to the joke store. It had just opened, which instantly drew Breathred's attention. The window promised everything from gag gifts to magics fresh from the Orient. How could he resist?

Stud was a perfect gentleman until he saw the animatronics ape. Then, it was on. Stud broke free from his grasp and went berserk. Breathred tried frantically to grab the little ape, as he jumped from display to display, taunting the inanimate gorilla. The gorilla's refusal to respond to Stud's badgering only seemed to inflame the chimpanzee. Before Breathred knew what was happening, Stud had jumped on top of the gorilla's back.

Crazed and foaming at the mouth, Stud tore into the polyester fur. From amid the rows of fake dog vomit and floating handkerchiefs, Breathred and the store manager advanced on the rampaging primate. Stud saw them coming and was ready for them. For his trouble the manager received a face full of something better left unmentioned. Breathred, a little quicker than the other man, ducked, avoiding the steaming missile meant for him. After the first salvo Breathred hugged the carpet and inched forward on his elbows.

A group of wandering geeks let out a startled scream as they entered the store. Stud's head popped up at their cries. He bared his teeth in their direction, warning them away from his prey. It was the opening Breathred was looking for.

He jumped toward his hysterical monkey. Getting one hand on its neck, Breathred ripped Stud free from the mechanical gorilla. He fell to the floor with the writhing chimpanzee in tow. Stud moved in a thousand different directions at once. It took everything Breathred had to keep him captive.

Once Stud had worn himself out, Breathred took in the carnage. Gondolas were overturned. The floor was littered with merchandise. In the background Breathred heard a babble of Aramaic coming from the manager. Breathred couldn't understand what he was saying, but it couldn't be good.

Then, he turned his eyes to the source of Stud's rampage. It was much too late for the great ape. Aside from the obvious de-furring, it had also suffered a most emasculating violation by the maddened chimpanzee somewhere in the middle of the one-monkey melee.