Hanna placed her hand on the woman's arm. "Why don't you go open up the library, Nina? I got this."
"Let go, Lupita!" Imogen's voice shrilled in the background.
"Self-defense! It's just not right, Hanna," the librarian argued. "Ellie would never have hurt anyone."
"Right on, Mrs. Schlabach!" a young man's voice shouted from behind them. Lucy spotted a blond teen in an Empyrean High football jersey duck back down in his booth.
"You weren't there, Nina," Hanna insisted. "None of you were there. Now, leave it!"
Gary straightened up. "If I'd been there, well, things would have been different," he grumbled uncertainly but backed away.
Janice, apparently unable to help herself, turned to Lucy who sank down in her seat.
"T...raaaaa...sh!" Janice dragged the word out into three slow syllables, making each carry as much venom as possible.
"That's it!" Xochitl lurched out of the booth and grabbed Janice by the blue cotton ball hair. The mayor shrieked as her wig came off her head. Xochitl shrieked in surprise, and Gary shrieked as he tried to ram Xochitl into the bar.
Lucy shot up out of her seat, but several pairs of hands grabbed her from behind and dragged her over the back of the booth.
"Son of a motherfucker!" Lucy spat as her head hit the edge of a table.
Two young men in football jerseys started raining blows down on her. She curled herself into a ball and dropped under the table. One of her teen assailants grabbed for her legs, looking to drag her into the aisle.
Lucy kicked him square in the face. She rolled to the side and weaseled her body up between the table and the booth.
She heard a familiar howl of delight. Scrabbling to her feet, Lucy saw Kai fly through the open window and land on Hanna's table. Long fangs protruded from the boy's mouth. He howled again and flung himself at the stunned football players.
Letting Kai distract the football bullies, Lucy oriented herself for a second. No other threats advanced; instead, most of the patrons sat in their chairs quietly and watched the melee with utter fascination. No one stepped in to help or hinder.
Lucy clocked Hanna engaged in a cell phone contest with the blond librarian. Apparently both women had 911 on the line, Hanna screaming loudly about how her daughter was being attacked. Lucy reeled when she heard Hanna shout the word "Lynching!"
Lucy heard the crash of dishes and pivoted to see Xochitl whirling around on the top of the bar. Xochitl kicked and flung another plate, avoiding the grabby hands of Gary and the antics of Sherry who was preposterously swiping at her with a broom. Lucy heard Xochitl laugh and egg them on with filthy Spanish expressions.
Out of the corner of her eye, Lucy spotted Imogen chasing after Lupe, who streaked through the diner with Janice's pale blue wig held aloft.
Janice sat slumped in a chair by the restroom and pointed. "My hair. The child is getting away with my hair!" Janice groused weakly.
"Time to go!" Lucy shouted to her companions and turned to Molly's customers. "Unless anyone wants to see my Werebeast go full throttle." She pointed at Kai, who had shoved one of the football players into the pie display and was circling the other, delivering calculated kicks and punches to his vulnerable areas. The teenage bully sank to his knees, protecting his face and begging Kai to stop.
As suddenly as it had begun, the brawl stopped. The diners looked transfixed. Xochitl jumped off the bar and walked to meet Lucy and Kai at the front door.
"I'll take care of the cops," Hanna called across the room, while clutching Nina by the wrist. Nina's cell clattered to the floor. "Just go!"
Gary hobbled over to Janice, a red boot print on his left cheek. Sherry hid behind the bar, phone in hand. Lucy could hear her start, "Mom..."
Imogen carried Lupe in her arms, the child yanking the individual strands out of Janice's rumpled wig.
Lucy started to walk out, Kai holding the door for her, but Xochitl hesitated by the gumball machine. She knocked it over deliberately, breaking the round glass top into pieces and sending the candies rolling across the hardwood floor.
"Have at it, kid." She winked at little Lupe.
Xochitl reached into to her jacket pocket, drew out a wad of cash and threw it on the floor.
"Hasta luego, bitches!"
Lucy pulled El Gallo out of the lot and turned toward the highway.
"What the hell, Kai?" Xochitl swatted the back of the boy's head. Lucy glanced over to see Kai cramming himself into a tiny ball on the floor by Xochitl's feet. He pointed to the back window and made low whining sounds.
"There's a black van following us!" Xochitl exclaimed, having glanced out the back herself. "¡Ay carajo! Looks like Lupe's blond lady is driving."
From a distance, Lucy could hear police sirens. She squinted in the rearview mirror to see the black van pull down a side street.
"Not the local Catcher unit then. Or ICE," Lucy wondered out loud. "Keep an eye, Xoch. I think the weather report said something about a shit storm coming our way."
"Let's just get to L.A." Xochitl checked Kai for injuries. "He's fine." She ruffled his hair, and sent him to scramble into the backseat. "But if any other pendejo tries to snatch him, I'm gonna shoot first and forget to ask questions later."
As they continued down Main Street, they were neither stopped nor followed. Lucy started breathing a little easier when she saw the YOU ARE NOW LEAVING EMPYREAN sign.
Xochitl pulled out her phone and started searching something on the screen. She turned the phone toward Lucy. "Look!"
"Driving!" Lucy reminded her. "What is it?"
"Miguel."
"Read it to me." Lucy adjusted the mirror and looked back toward Kai. "How's about you send up the sandwiches Gerri packed?"
Kai started digging through the cooler as if looking for buried treasure.
"Los Lobos Luchadores," Xochitl read out loud.
"The wolf...mmm...?" Lucy tried to piece together the Spanish.
"The Fighting Wolves." Xochitl took two sandwiches from Kai, handing her phone to Lucy as she undid the wax paper wrappers. "Address look familiar?"
Lucy's eyes went to the prominent banner of Miguel's Werewolf Fight Club site. "Shit, that place! Are you okay going back?" Lucy asked, exchanging Xochitl's phone for the unwrapped bacon and avocado sandwich.
"Oh sure. You know, hell sweet home." Xochitl grimaced.
As they hit the open road, Lucy realized she'd never gotten her piece of blueberry pie.
Chapter 30
The Federal Werebeast Defense Mandate (FWDM) recognizes today's unique challenges as regarding the defense of citizens in a post Kyon Virus (KV) world. In an effort to improve the quality and length of life for all, the FWDM establishes federal policy to provide best available measures based on current science and, utilizing an holistic approach, allows individual states the ability to strengthen citizen enforcement up to and including termination with extreme prejudice on a case by case basis. Guidelines should be regularly updated to focus on the identification and reduction of the greatest risks. The federal mandate holds state and local law enforcement accountable for accurate processing and execution.
-excerpt from The Federal Werebeast Defense Mandate
20 months ago
The crisp night air felt good on Xochitl's skin as she sat on the steps and leaned against the wood railing of her uncle Vern's cabin. Stars filled the sky like diamonds, and Xochitl couldn't remember ever seeing so many in all her life — surely not in Los Angeles where the always-illuminated city lights overpowered even the brightest of constellations. It had been three weeks since the team had brought Miguel to Lake Arrowhead, and she felt like she'd barely spent three minutes with him.
The first few days Xochitl had hardly slept, keeping a constant vigil by Miguel's side. Vern had run an IV through Miguel's arm to keep him hydrated, and Xochitl had wiped him down with a wet cloth to keep him from getting bedsores. Miguel had tossed and turned and groaned most of the time, but the chemicals — or whatever th
ose pinche pound scientists dosed him with — had kept him sedated.
Then Miguel had woken up, and all hell had broken loose. He had ripped off his restraints, his IV dragging behind him as he'd clawed his way past Xochitl when she had tried to calm him. It had taken Bob, Vern and Prez to hold him down before Mick had been able to safely shoot morphine into Miguel's IV. Each time Miguel had come to, Xochitl had seen the terror in his eyes. He'd fly into a rage, almost transforming until Vern or Bob would sedate him again. Xochi didn't know what Miguel saw when he looked at her, but she knew he was in agony. And she didn't know how to help him.
Xochitl sighed and grabbed the beer she'd rested on the stoop behind her. She took a long swig of the Belgian ale. The cool beverage tasted slightly bitter but was nonetheless smooth and satisfying.
"Ah." Xochitl wiped her mouth with her sleeve. Through the screen door, she could see Vern and Bob in the dining room going over the pictures Vern had taken at the pound.
Despite losing the computer, Vern had collected a great deal of intel from Dr. Weisman's office. Among the data found were formulas for a serum the pound scientists had been administering to their captives. Neither Vern nor Bob could make heads or tails of the experiments. Bob had decided he was going to take the information to some of his people later in the week when he returned to "civilization," as he'd called it.
Bob had made a fortune in the "private sector" of security — a merc, but a good merc. Not at all the outdoorsy type, Bob preferred running his very successful security firm from a lofty office in Beverly Hills and letting his men do the dirty work.
"What can I say, I'm a Four Seasons kind of guy," Bob had confessed one night after several scotches. Xochitl agreed. She liked the cabin and didn't mind fishing on occasion, but she was a city girl at heart.
The most helpful information they had gleaned from Weisman's files was the chip she and her cohorts had embedded just under the left scapula of each of their "subjects." That was the word that had stuck with Xochitl.
Subject. That's all Miguel was to these monsters.
Xochi had nearly gone out of her mind the night they'd removed Miguel's chip. Mick hadn't given Miguel enough morphine to keep him sedated, and he had come to just as Bob had been prying the chip out. Miguel, lying on his stomach, arms and legs strapped to the legs of the table, had reared his head up and roared in pain, nearly knocking the dining room table over. In what had seemed like a brief moment of clarity, he'd stared at Xochitl and asked, "Why?" then passed out again.
Lefty had been studying the chip since that night. He'd learned it was the secondary trigger that had tripped the alarm at the pound. Each chip had been encoded with an alphanumeric designation and held detailed biological information down to DNA sequencing specific to the subject. In her notations, Dr. Weisman had called these subjects "Homo-Canis." All the chips had been linked directly to an unknown auxiliary server.
This new information had troubled Vern. When Xochitl had asked why the second server mattered, Lefty had explained that the server could be anywhere. Without Ames' missing computer and the information he'd downloaded to it from Weisman's laptop, Lefty had no way of tracking the secondary server's location. Any additional data on Weisman and the purpose for her experiments on Miguel would remain unknown to them.
Miguel's chip was engraved with the designation HCXY151.
Xochitl downed the rest of her beer.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Lefty round the side of the cabin with Prez and Mick following close behind. She turned toward the men as they approached the base of the stairs.
"¡Vamos, chica!" Lefty threw a denim jacket up to Xochitl who caught it just before it landed at her feet.
"What's up?" Xochitl eyed them suspiciously.
"We are taking you out for some sur-vaay-saass," Mick drawled. His arm nearly healed, the normally laconic man was in better spirits.
"It's cer...ve...za, gringo." Xochitl raised her empty beer bottle. "And I'm good."
"That's swill," Prez chimed in. "Plus we need to get the hell out of here before we all go crazy."
Prez and Mick turned and headed for the parked vehicles at the end of Vern's driveway.
"Come on." Lefty trotted up the steps, took the jacket from her and deftly placed it around her shoulders.
Not bad for a one-armed man.
"Your chariot awaits, my lady." He bowed low and with a grand gesture, threw out his hand.
"Pendejo." Xochitl grinned, shoving Lefty lightly.
"Hey, loverboy, let's go!" Prez shouted from El Gallo.
"Wait, we're taking my car?" Xochi asked.
"¡Órale! That ride's badass!" Lefty dangled the giant rooster key chain in front of Xochitl before jogging off toward Mick and Prez.
"Fine. But only I drive El Gallo!" Xochitl hurried to catch up to her new drinking buddies.
Xochitl, Prez and Mick stood at the counter of a particularly divey bar Prez had somehow found while driving around the Arrowhead area — lost.
The tension was palpable — a lot was riding on this moment. Xochitl eyed her opposition. Her heart thumped in her chest, and her hand tapped nervously on the counter. She pulsated like a stallion waiting to be let out of the gate.
"One. Two. Three. Go." Lefty pounded his hand on the bar.
With lightning speed, Xochitl downed the shot glass of tequila, slammed it on the bar counter, licked the salt on her hand and then picked up the slice of lime, squeezing it between her teeth. "Done!" She yelled, tossing the juiced lime on the bar and raising her hands in the air victoriously.
"Damn, girl." Prez winced at the tartness of the lime. "You can pound 'em back."
"That's because she's Mexican," Mick chimed in as he finished off his lime and signaled the tattooed bartender for another round.
"And Polish," Xochitl added. "It's in the genes."
"A Polish Mexican? Never heard of such a thing," Prez joked. "You're Molish."
"Or Plexican," Mick said, sliding three tequila shooters toward them.
Xochi shook her head at Mick. "So what are you? Besides the white boy in a sling, buying the drinks?"
"Gunnar Mickelson, descendent of the great Viking people." Mick beat his chest with his good fist.
Prez, Lefty and Xochitl burst out laughing.
"What are you laughing at, Thomas Jefferson?" Mick shot back at Prez.
"No way!" Xochitl looked at Prez.
"What? He was a great president." Prez grabbed his shot.
"Oh, Prez." Lefty looked as if a lightbulb just went on over his head. "I get it."
"Sweet kid." Xochitl slapped Lefty on the back. "To President Thomas Jefferson." She raised her shot glass in salute.
"To Thomas Jefferson." Prez, Mick and Lefty raised their shot glasses in reply.
All four downed their tequila shots and slammed the empty glasses on the counter.
"Whoo! That's good!" Prez hollered.
"Hey!" The barkeep, whose elaborately painted arms took the place of shirtsleeves,
gave them a disapproving look.
"I like your ink." Xochi winked at the drink slinger.
Xochitl turned away from the bar counter. "Well, Viking Mick, don't forget the beers." She felt the tequila buzz hit her. "I need to sit down."
She collapsed in a chair at nearest table. Her fingers found Styx '89 crudely carved into the wood.
¡Híjole! That's old school.
"How the hell do you find these places?" Xochitl yelled over her shoulder to Prez.
"It's a gift," Prez replied.
Her gaze followed the three men as they took their seats. Prez and Mick, each carrying four bottles of beer, set them awkwardly on the table. But amazingly using only his left arm, Lefty adroitly balanced a serving tray with four beers and a bowl of pretzels. With ease, he placed the tray on the tabletop.
"You're pretty good at that for a one armed man." Xochitl took a swig from her bottle.
"You have no idea." Lefty suavely raised his eyebrow in X
ochi's direction, causing her to spit up some beer.
"No he didn't," Prez said.
"Nice, kid," Mick added.
Lefty sat in his chair, looking very pleased with himself.
Xochitl grabbed a handful of pretzels and popped one in her mouth. The taste of stale hard bread coated her tongue. With nothing to spit mushed pretzel out in, she had no choice but to wash the salty glob down with more beer. "Yuck." She tossed the remaining snacks in her hand back into the bowl.
Relaxing into her chair, she smiled fondly at her companions as they drank and joked with each other. Over the past couple of weeks, she'd gotten to know these guys well. They worked together. Trained together. Ate together. The men had seen her at her worst and had stood by her. They were cocky smartasses. But they were also fine men, good soldiers — real brothers to one another.
"So you all served with Bob?" Xochitl asked.
"Prez did," Mick replied, tossing a stale pretzel in his gob. "I was a sharpshooter in Iraq. Did my tours. Rotated out. Bob's security firm recruited me. Been working for him ever since."
"He was my CO in Desert Storm," Prez said.
"Wait. That'd make you around forty." Xochitl was shocked. She thought Prez didn't look a day over thirty.
"Forty-two actually," Prez said with pride. "Black don't crack."
"And brown don't frown," Lefty chimed in, looking a bit glassy-eyed. He raised his bottle to Prez before taking another drink.
The group howled with laughter.
¡Híjole! I'm drunk.
"What about you, Lefty?" Xochitl slurred and propped her chin on her hand. "Were you recruited by Bob too?"
"Sort of." Lefty cast his eyes to his beer.
"Xochi, you are looking at the 2008 Junior Golden Gloves runner up," Prez proudly announced and slapped Lefty on the shoulder. "Bob was his coach."
"Your coach?" Xochitl asked.
Lefty shrugged but didn't elaborate.
"See," Prez continued. "Pedro here was on his way to the Big Time."
"Could have made it too, if the fool kid didn't go and enlist," Mick added.
"Is that true?" Xochitl put her hand on Lefty's. "You gave up boxing for the Marines?"
The Werewolf Whisperer (The Werewolf Whisperer Series Book 1) Page 34