Pretty When She Dies (38 page)

Swinging his head back and forth, he looked over the abandoned town as the truck crept along. He was just thinking it looked rather ominous when his grandmother shouted, “Sergio! Stop!”

He slammed on the brakes and everyone jerked forward. Samantha fell hard into the back of his chair, woke up, and started swearing.

“What, Grandmama?” He looked around frantically, his heart thundering in his ears.

The little old lady threw open the door and tumbled out of the truck.

Sergio shifted into PARK, swung his door open, leaped out and ran after her.

“Sergio! Innocente, no! The sun isn't completely up!”

Sergio heard Jeff jumping down behind them, but he continued to run after his amazingly fast grandmother. He had several crosses around his neck. His revolver and a crucifix were tucked into his back pocket. He wondered if it was enough to fend off The Summoner.

His grandmother reached a discarded cowboy hat lying on the road and snatched it up.

“It's Amaliya's!” She held it out triumphantly.

Sergio heaved to a stop and leaned over, his hands resting on his knees. He seriously needed to work out. His lungs hurt from his short run and he gulped down air.

Jeff caught up to them, followed closely by Samantha. He snatched the hat away and looked at it. “Are you sure?”

“Yes! Yes! I'm sure!” Innocente was breathing a little heavily, but she reached out to grab the hat back, her expression feisty and determined.

“It reeks like-like-” Samantha made a face.

Sergio could smell it, too. “Something dead.”

Innocente drew her hand back and sniffed her fingers. “It's not her.

It's something else. She's not dead.”

Jeff tossed the hat into the nearby bushes that bordered an abandoned motel. Sergio could tell the young man was thinking over the situation quickly. Sergio looked over at the gas station to their right, then slowly toward the motel. He became aware that all four of them were now standing in the middle of the street, the truck idling nearby, staring at the abandoned motel. Probably not their smartest move.

“Shit,” he muttered, and suffered his grandmother's automatic smack on his arm.

“In there,” Jeff decided.

“Yeah,” Samantha agreed.

Innocente drew near Sergio anxiously and he slung his arm down around her trembling shoulders. He cuddled her into his side and tried hard not to show his own fear. He was sure he was not imagining it. Even though the sun was showing over the trees now, the motel seemed abnormally dark and foreboding.

“I really, really, really don't want to go in there,” Samantha said after a beat.

“You and me both,” Jeff answered grimly.

“The dead are in there,” Innocente said sadly. “I can hear them in my head.”

Jeff looked toward her curiously.

“She's a medium,” Sergio answered the unspoken question. “She has always seen ghosts and heard the voices of the dead.”

Lifting his eyebrows high, Jeff said, “Oh.”

“That's creepy,” Samantha decided.

“You have no idea, mijita,” Innocente said sadly.

Jeff began to walk along the front of the motel toward the rural road that cut through the town. Sergio followed and touched Samantha's shoulder as he passed her. She gave him a faint smile.

“There's a Lexus down the road,” Jeff said, and started toward it.

“Stay here,” he said to Samantha and his grandmother.

He hurried to catch up with Jeff before they could protest him bossing them. Despite the vampire hunter's funky looking mechanical leg, he was fast on his feet. Sergio struggled to keep up.

A navy Lexus RX was pulled over into the trees near the hotel and Jeff motioned for Sergio to be cautious. Keeping an eye out for any trouble, they both crept up to the vehicle and peered inside.

“Oh, crap,” Sergio said softly when he saw the body of a young woman. Her blond hair was over her face, but she was obviously dead.

Her head was completely twisted around on her shoulders. Her body was stuffed down behind the passenger seat.

“Window's shot out,” Jeff said, and pointed to the broken windshield.

“Whoa.” Sergio looked around nervously. His heart was beating even harder than before. He glanced back to where his grandmother and the blond woman were standing at the edge of the gas station's parking lot staring toward them. It was getting serious fast.

Samantha began to motion with one hand and he was relieved she was smart enough not to call out. He had trouble figuring out what she was trying to tell them in pantomime, but Jeff seemed to catch it.

“It's Cian's,” he said softly to Sergio. “She says it's Cian's.”

They both looked toward the ascending sun that was slowly pushing back the gray remains of the night. The sound of shattering glass came from nearby and the men ducked down behind the truck. Sergio signaled for his grandmother and Samantha to get out of sight and the women darted off to hide behind a sign. There was nothing they could do about the truck parked across from the gas station.

Looking under the truck, Sergio watched three figures walk through the overgrown foliage to the vehicle he was hiding behind. One of the three was wearing high heels and the other two were wearing battered sneakers. Sergio smelled the stink of death on them and crouched down further. The dead gathered on the other side of the Lexus and opened up the back door. He could hear them moving about, but none of them said a word. He realized they were removing the dead body from the truck.

Well, that was what he thought until he heard a terrible cracking noise, then saw another set of feet join the other three.

Jeff looked sharply toward Sergio and Sergio slowly shrugged, not sure what to think. Together they crept along the edge of the vehicle and watched as the four figures now walked away from the motel into the trees and toward a vast open field beyond the “Y” intersection where the motel was huddled in the darkness of the trees.

“Follow them,” Sergio barely whispered.

Jeff nodded.

Sergio looked back toward the blond girl walking along with the other three corpses. Her head bobbed strangely on her shoulders, but she was up and walking.

The walking dead.

Kind of like a Romero zombie film.

Totally creepy.

Jeff turned and motioned to the two women to hang back then motioned to Sergio to join them.

He was reluctant to leave Jeff, but he realized they would need more weapons and the truck. He'd give it a few minutes, then bring the truck up the road. Sweating profusely despite the coolness of the morning, Sergio ducked down and rushed back to his grandmother and Samantha.

***

Jeff crept after the dead making sure to keep his head down as much as possible. When he entered the field of overgrown grass, he practically crawled as he paced along behind the four animated corpses. Casting his eyes toward the horizon, he could see the sun was now further up and yet The Summoner's servants continued to walk.

This did not bode well for them. It meant The Summoner was awake in the motel behind him.

The four dead were heading toward a distant building that was hidden behind a thicket of trees and not visible from the road that slowly curved away into the Hill Country. A few wild peach trees were adorned with brilliant purple and lavender flowers near it and Jeff could now see it had once been a large farmhouse. Crouching down, he watched the four creatures draw close to the house, one of them stumbling over a fallen fence. Slowly, they maneuvered through the overgrown yard and up into the abandoned house.

Wiping the sweat off his brow, he considered his options and just decided to wait. After around five minutes, the four dead people reappeared and took up positions around the house. It was now obvious they were either guarding or watching the house.

Ducking down, he moved back toward the road until he was back a safe distance, then he ran back to the truck that was now idling near a burned out building away from the motel.

Hurrying around to the driver's side, he gestured for Sergio to lower the window.

“What's up?”

“I think there is a very good chance that one or two of your friends is in a farmhouse out in the middle of a field. I followed the dead out to this building. They went inside, then came back out and took up sentry positions.”

“What if it's The Summoner?” Samantha asked from the backseat.

“I don't think so,” he answered and looked toward the foreboding motel. “The dead came from the motel so my money is on that he's stuck in the there and Cian or Amaliya or both managed to make it to the farmhouse. I say we take out the four around the house and check inside. If we can avoid a direct confrontation with The Summoner, I am all about that.”

“But he's asleep, right?” Innocente's brow was furrowed and she was clutching her massive tote bag tightly. The head of the Virgin Mary statue was slightly sticking out the top.

“I don't think so,” Jeff confessed. “The dead are up and walking and he is controlling them. He has to be awake to do that.”

“Oh, crap,” Samantha said in an awed, yet terrified voice.

“Okay, so we go to the farmhouse, kill the already dead people, try to find sleeping vampires inside, somehow rescue them, and head back to Austin,” Sergio said. “And avoid The Summoner at all costs.”

“Yeah,” Jeff answered.

Sergio pondered this, then shrugged. “Let's do it.”

Jeff hurried around the truck. His leg throbbed a little but he ignored it. He had a job to do and he intended to do it. As he slid up into the backseat, Samantha looked toward him, her eyes wide with fear and excitement.

“You okay?” she asked, and touched his shoulder lightly.

He was surprised to feel a slight shiver inside of his belly and he suddenly blushed. “Yeah.” He looked away from her and felt immensely awkward. Of course it was probably the adrenaline, but the concern in her expression had touched him. And he'd be stupid not to notice she was a very pretty girl.

Frowning, he redirected his thoughts. It was time to kill...no rescue...the vampires. He reached down and unzipped his bag and pulled out his baseball bat. Against the dead minions, this should work just fine.

“Mine,” Samantha said, and snagged it from him.

He looked at her, startled, but her grim expression shut up his protest. With a slight bob of his head, he reached in and grabbed a machete.

“Mine,” Innocente said, and held out her hand from over the back of the passenger seat.

Jeff sighed and handed it over. He reached down and pulled out another machete, this one smaller than the first.

“Mine,” Sergio said from the front seat.

“Oh, give me a freaking break,” Jeff exclaimed.

Sergio grinned over his shoulder at him. “Just joshing you,” he said. “I got the truck.”

And before Jeff could ask what he meant, Sergio gunned the huge 4x4

vehicle and it roared into the field.

***

Samantha held onto the back of the driver's seat for dear life as Sergio maneuvered the big truck. The fence had long ago collapsed and the truck easily roared into the field. The four people inside were jostled around as the truck bounced and growled through the overgrown grass. A few times they hit something big and were thrown about, but the truck kept going straight for the old farmhouse.

The four dead minions turned slowly as Sergio found an old ruined drive and drove up over the rough terrain. It was severely potholed from numerous storms and Samantha fell into Jeff a few times. They hit one so hard, she hit her head on the roof. Jeff quickly pulled her close and checked to see if she was okay. She shoved him off and said she was okay, but her head ached now.

She wasn't even sure what Sergio planned to do until they hit the first dead minion of The Summoner. It was a blond woman whose head was listing horribly to one side. She looked like something out of a zombie movie. The truck barreled into her body and flung it aside.

Samantha whipped around to see the woman's body hit a tree and fall to the ground. To her surprise, it struggled to get back up.

Sergio swore in Spanish as he whipped the truck around and aimed for two men rushing toward them. They were both more alive in appearance than the blond woman, but Samantha saw their dead eyes just before the truck hit them. The two bodies were flung backward and landed hard on the ground. A woman with a pink dress and high heels rushed toward the truck, a tree branch gripped in one hand. She struck the back passenger window and Samantha screamed as broken glass rained in on them. Sergio slammed on the brakes and they were all thrown forward.

Innocente muttered something in Spanish, wrenched her door open, and leaped out.

“No,” Sergio exclaimed and grabbed for her, but missed.

Samantha shoved her door open and jumped out, wielding the bat.

Immediately, she was confronted by the dead women clutching a branch in one hand. Sam swung the bat hard at the dead female. The impact reverberated through her arms and into her body and the woman in pink spun away from her.

Innocente came around the front of the truck and struck the woman with the machete. In eerie silence, the dead creature raised the tree branch she had clutched in one hand to strike Innocente. Samantha clenched her jaw and raised the bat over shoulder and slammed it down on the dead woman's head. There was a sickening crack and the woman's head split open. Turning slowly, the dead woman looked at Samantha with a blank expression. Her face was split and her neck was slashed open from the machete. Utterly calm and silent, the dead woman raised her branch again. It was then Jeff appeared and slammed his machete hard into the woman's throat. It knocked her back onto the ground and Jeff braced himself, feet apart, and commenced to hack the woman's head off.

Gagging, Samantha whirled around in time to see the first woman staggering toward her. Her head was falling over on her shoulder and her body was struggling to move.

“They're still moving!” she screamed

Sergio dove back into the truck and shifted into reverse. Gunning the engine, he drove backward at a fast clip and slammed into the advancing woman. Her body fell back and the big wheels of the truck rolled over her.