Vamp-Hire (14 page)

Nick cocked an eyebrow. “You’ve seen a few up
close?” He knew enough about the man to know he was extremely
averse to violence.

“Oh, go to hell, so they were dead already.”
Lucky smiled wider. “Still counts.” The smile slid off his face and
he said, “That still doesn’t answer the question, even if this guy
is a vampire. What was so special about this girl?”

Nick shook his head. He realized, they
weren’t going to figure it out in this apartment. Maybe he could
call Dolph and tell him what had been jogged out of his memory. His
stomach groaned.

“You hungry or something?” Lucky asked,
looking at his midsection.

“No.” Nick folded his arms low. He’d been all
set to eat about three hours ago, had actually been looking forward
to it. He should have something. It would be good to try to keep
his diet on track. “I should probably eat, though.”

“Help yourself.” Lucky thumbed over his
shoulder toward the kitchen. “Fridge is stocked.”

Stocked by whom was the question Nick didn’t
ask. He didn’t feel comfortable eating someone else’s food without
their permission. That paled in comparison to his discomfort being
in someone else’s home without them knowing. Nick highly doubted
Lucky had gotten here through violence—at least direct
violence—that didn’t mean that the people who slept under this roof
would be okay with them visiting, though.

Nick’s stomach groaned again. There were
bottles of cola on the top shelf. He didn’t particularly like pop,
but despised drinking water. He set a bottle filled with clear
bubbly liquid on the counter. There was also cranberry sauce,
stuffing, a bowl of what looked like gravy and half a turkey
covered in aluminum foil on a platter.

He took everything out and commenced to
making a plate for himself. Once he had nuked a plateful of food he
added two slices of cranberry sauce. Lucky was waiting for him, one
elbow propped up on the table, stroking his pencil-thin
mustache.

“I was thinking…” he began. “You told them
about the dream, right? What you remembered at the time?”

“Yeah.” Nick took a healthy forkful of
stuffing into his mouth. It was… delicious.

“What if they had a good idea you could do
that?”

“I don’t see how. I never met that lieutenant
guy before and I only met Dolph the day before.”

“That’s not what I mean. Had you ever done
that before? I mean, tune into somebody through a dream?”

“No.”

“Okay, so what if that’s an innate ability of
at least some vamps?”

“I suppose that’s possible. I knew a guy at
the Center who could talk to people through his mind. It was really
limited stuff, though. So they brought me in because they thought
there was a possibility I could glean something off the killer. And
with that big hole in her neck, they made a reasonable assumption
he was something more than human.”

“Right. Any chance they were expecting you to
be able to sense something, though? You said you’d already had a
dream. They couldn’t have known about that unless you’d told
someone before. What could they have expected you to learn from a
dead body?”

Nick put his fork down. He wasn’t really
interested in having this conversation right now. “I don’t
know.”

“If they brought you in to take a look they
were looking for you to be able to do something other than a
coroner could do.”

“I don’t think they had a coroner there. At
least they hadn’t done an autopsy yet.”

“How do you know?”

“You know, they do that Y incision thing.
Other than the bite on her neck she was pretty much intact.”

Lucky was staring. Nick was
uncomfortable.

“You ever heard the term ‘necromancy’
before?”

“Yes, and I can tell you I can’t do that. I
don’t know anybody who can, either.”

Lucky sat back a little.

“They tested us for that at the Center.
They’d bring in dead animals every couple days and tell us to tell
them what the animal was thinking.”

“That was just an animal.”

“And they weren’t thinking anything. They
were dead.”

“Even so, they must have thought you might be
able to something and you just so happened to have information
through different means.”

“Okay, Lucky, where is this going? I’m
starting to lose the little bit of the appetite I actually
have.”

“They had you come in for one thing, you
actually came through with another. Don’t be surprised if they
might be curious about what else you can do.”

Nick shrugged. Dolph had said pretty much the
same. He took a big bite out of the turkey leg on his plate and
chewed. He swallowed and put the leg down. Something about what
Lucky had said to him was sticking in his mind. What had been
special about her? And why had they brought Nick in to figure it
out?

“What if they were testing me? What if they
wanted to see if a vamp could do something?”

“Okay,” Lucky said.

“We had this game we used to play at the
Center. It was a locating game. You’d cover your eyes and try to
figure out where the other person was standing in the room.”

“Were you any good?”

“No. I sucked. This other kid, though,
Willis, he was pretty decent. I think she was a vamp. The dead
girl, I mean.”

Lucky seemed to consider this.

“Any chance your minders knew about the
game?”

“I suppose.” Nick shrugged.

“So if they knew, odds are people in other
parts of the military did too.”

“Yeah, but to what purpose?”

“Think about this. They brought you there to
examine the girl. Instead, you gave them information on the killer.
And then—”

“Then they hustled us right out of there,
almost like they didn’t care to catch her killer.”

“Something still isn’t fitting here. Sure,
she’s some sort of vamp squatter, that doesn’t explain all the
production, though. Either they care or they don’t. Can’t have it
both ways.”

All this supposition was starting to make
Nick’s head spin. He forced himself to eat the rest of the turkey
leg and gobbled the first slab of cranberry sauce. So what if they
were hiding something? So what if they weren’t? Nick had to figure
there were a bazillion conspiracies going on in the world right now
and more to follow.

“Why should I care about any of this?” he
asked.

Lucky didn’t miss a beat. “Because if they
got something to hide, they got reason to pony up.” He grabbed the
other slice of cranberry sauce and slurped it down.

Okay, that was reason enough for Nick to
care.

“How do I know they won’t just shoot me in
the face?”

Lucky rolled his eyes. “Killing people is an
extreme step. And if we’re talking military, we’re talking going
way up the chain before a decision like that gets made. Besides,
it’s way easier to buy somebody off.”

“But I—”

“—don’t know anything. All we’re doing right
now is making guesses.”

Nick sat back in relief. He felt like he
could do just that and come out a little richer for it. However,
his curiosity was itching.

“I still would like to know for sure if she
was a vamp.”

“Then ask.”

“What do you mean?”

“That guy you came with. Ask him if he
knows.”

“Dolph?” Nick thought a moment. Could it be
that simple?

“Yeah, call him. Tell him what you remembered
about your dream. Flat out ask him while you’re talking.”

He nodded. It made enough sense.

“And that other guy, tell him too.” That
didn’t sound like such a great idea and it must have shown on
Nick’s face. “What? How else do you think you’re gonna get any
dough out of this?”

“Well, what do I do?”

“You contact him. Tell him you remember
something. That you can tell Dolph if he’d prefer, but thought it
would be best to tell him first. It doesn’t matter that you already
told Dolph, the guys hate each other’s guts and info probably isn’t
exactly free-flowing between them. Also tell him your information
has monetary value, and that you can’t share this or future
information without compensation.”

Nick couldn’t help feeling this might result
with him getting shot in the face.

“I don’t know. This guy seems… I don’t
know—underhanded. He intentionally pissed Dolph off for no real
reason.”

“How old a guy would you say he is?”

“Mid forties, maybe?”

Lucky nodded. “I wonder,” he said and before
Nick could ask exactly what he was wondering, he said, “Black
draft. On second thought, walk away from this. Forget about the
money.”

“Wait—black draft? What’s that?”

“The Conflict took a heavy toll on the
military. They needed every viable body for the war effort and
offered prisoners with combat experience a deal. Serve honorably
and if they survived they’d have a clean slate. This guy Leonard is
young enough.”

“Come on, that’s not true, is it? I mean,
that would mean that the government set free serial killers and
rapists.”

“And offered them a retirement package if
they stayed on for twenty plus years.”

Maybe nothing so bad as a serial killer,
although it wouldn’t have surprised Nick to learn Lieutenant
Leonard had served time.

He stood up from the table and his head felt
heavy. He must have swayed because Lucky was suddenly standing
right next to him.

“You okay?”

“Yeah. I feel weird, though. So tired.”

“That’s not a surprise with all the turkey
you ate. Go wash your hands and lay down on the couch. I’ll take
care of your plate.”

Nick ambled his way to the bathroom. It was a
small apartment and the only other room was the bedroom. The door
was shut and he was interested in seeing what was in there. Not
more than he needed to close his eyes, though.

He used the toilet and washed his hands as
quickly as his heavy limbs would allow. Lucky had the TV on an
all-music channel, playing something called ‘Walking Through
April’. At first Nick had wanted it turned off, the music was so
soothing, though, all he could think about was how soft and
inviting the couch looked.

When his head hit the cushion he barely felt
it.

* * *

He is inside the room with his kill. Voices
come from another room. He has not come for them, though. The one
he wants sits a mere few feet away.

He has been particularly quiet. It is his
Skill. He can walk right past people and not be seen. However, this
one feels him. He turns to look and sees no one there.

“Hello?” his kill says. He turns back to what
he is doing. He approaches until he is standing directly behind his
kill. He looks over his shoulder, still not seeing him.

He leans down, letting his kill feel his hot
breath before wrenching his head aside by his blond hair and bites
into him.

The kill screams and he bleeds him. He drinks
in the kill’s panic, his fear, as his kill struggles helplessly in
his powerful grasp. The kill screams again when he bites even
deeper, driving the fangs through his carotid artery. No matter,
his work is done.

The kill's acquaintances pound at the door.
There are only moments before they are in. His Skill will not work
now, they will be in too excited a state to miss him. He pulls his
mouth away, picks the kill up by his neck and hurls him at the door
as they break in.

They see him and he cannot resist hissing at
them before they charge. There are bars on the window in front of
him and he tosses the desk aside and punches through the glass to
grab them. They are momentarily in shock, but in another second or
two they will charge. He cannot kill them, though he has more than
enough strength to kill more than twice as many humans easily. He
wrenches the bars left and right until they pull out of the brick
wall, letting them drop out of his hands and onto the ground
below.

He looks back at them one final time. The
first one enters. He holds back, the others right behind him, not
believing he has anywhere to go.

“You’re dead,” the first one says. “You got
no place to go unless you can fly.”

The guess is better than they know. He turns
away from them, lifting his face to the sky. He takes a deep
breath, filling his lungs, then breathes deeper, filling the sacs
that have grown along the outer lobes. He pulls himself through the
window and plummets, the earth rushing up to meet him.

Chapter 4

Wednesday

Nick jolted awake.

He opened his eyes and saw his hands in front
of him, fingers splayed like he was warding something off.

“Good morning,” Lucky said, walking past.
“You sleep loud.”

“What do you mean?” Nick asked with a
gravelly voice.

“Well, you were mumbling for a while. I think
you were drinking or something and then you hissed.”

Hissed?

Bits and pieces of his dream trickled back to
him. He had been in a room with someone, he’d bitten the person,
then he’d… jumped out a window?

That didn’t make sense.

“I think I dreamed about the killer
again.”

Lucky sat down on the recliner. “What do you
remember?”

Nick told him about the man in the room and
how he (the killer) had bitten the man, thrown things around the
room and then jumped out the window.

“Is that it?” Lucky asked.

Nick was mildly offended. So far as he knew,
Lucky couldn’t channel into anyone else’s mind.

“What do you mean, ‘is that it?’”

“I mean, what else can you recall? Were you
in a house? Was anybody else there?”

“Come to think of it, there was someone else
there. At least three people. They were angry at me, well, you
know, him. At what he had just done to their friend. I don’t think
it was a house. I remember feeling nervous that jumping out the
window might not work out the way I—he—wanted. But that doesn’t
make sense. Even if he survived the fall, he would be injured. And
those guys, they probably would run outside and catch him.”