The naked corpse on the table had a black sun tattooed on his chest. The others around him were chanting words Smoke did not understand. His skin crawled. The words thundered in his ears. He backed away. The man on the table sat up. His eyes were green fires that turned pitch black.
The robed men stopped chanting. They’d given life to a deader. The robed men raised their arms and gave praise. “Let the dead rise and serve. Let the dead rise and serve. Let the dead rise and—”
Ka-Blam!
Smoke blasted a hole clear through the deader’s chest. It flopped over off the table and onto the floor.
Instead of fighting him, the robed men let out alarming shrieks and bolted for the doors.
Let them run.
He’d seen enough. Smoke pushed the cauldron over, spilling its contents all over the floor. Whatever was going on disgusted him, turned his guts inside out, and he wouldn’t have it anymore. He scanned the offices for anything useful. Files. Books. Plans. Any clues to where The Drake might be operating. Where Sid might be. On impulse, he’d blown this job wide open.
He found a small leather booklet lying just inside one of the exits. He snatched it up and went out onto the iron balcony. A hail of gunfire erupted from the ground level. Bullets ricocheted everywhere. He found the assault rifle he’d left in the shadows and returned fire. Recon was over. War was on.
He pumped short bursts of bullets down into the tables laden with drugs.
That changed their game plan.
One of the men on the ground level shouted out new commands.
“Protect the merchandise! Protect the merchandise!” the leader said.
The soldiers scrambled, hopped in trucks and vans, and barricaded the goods as best they could.
Smoke ran down one of the metal catwalks. Blasts of gunfire cut off his path. He ran back up toward the offices. He recalled something he’d missed in the moment and went back inside the upstairs office complex. There was a phone hanging on the wall, a landline. He picked up the receiver. There was a tone.
Nothing like a plain old telephone.
He dialed Cyrus’s number and got voice mail. “This is the voice mailbox of Agent Cyrus Tweel, please leave a message. If it’s an emergency, call the FBI hotline at—”
“Figures.”
Smoke left the receiver off the hook and headed toward the back of the room. A huge metal door hung on the wall. The lever for the junction box was there as well. He grabbed the lever and pulled it down. All of the power in the entire facility went out. “Lights out, ladies.”
He took off the robe and slipped back out onto the balcony. Quiet as a mouse, he journeyed down the steps through the pitch black. On the next landing he approached, someone was making their way up the stairs toward him. Smoke punched the man in the jaw and caught him before he fell. Keen-eyed with the help of the glasses, he made his way down to the main floor.
Orders were still being barked out.
“Get some flashlights!”
Seconds later, light beams were shining up into the catwalks, pinpointing their locations.
Morons.
Car engines fired up and pulled out of the building. He assumed it was those strange clerics making haste. He probably should have killed those sickos, but that wasn’t his way. He’d only kill live people when he had to, but the shifters were a different thing. The deaders too. What bothered him now was who was in charge of this operation. That person could provide answers. Certainly, someone knew something about Reginald. He seemed to be top brass.
I’ve got to get something out of this mission.
Boot steps shuffled over the ground floor and started coming up the steps again.
Smoke made his way behind the men guarding the trucks. He found a piece of scrap metal and chucked it up toward the offices. Metal banged on metal.
Gunfire shattered glass and tore out the windows.
“Hold your fire! Hold your fire!” commanded another voice, a woman’s.
Smoke stiffened. His heart beat faster. Toward the middle, a woman moved among the troops with familiar ease. His heart stopped when she spoke again.
“Close all the doors and block all the exits. Whoever the hell is in here isn’t getting out alive.”
Smoke’s throat tightened as he went in for a closer look. Judging by the height and build on the feminine figure, only one person could fit that bill. In the beam of a passing flashlight, he got a quick look at her face. No doubt about it, that was the face of Sidney Shaw.
CHAPTER 20
It can’t be.
Smoke wanted answers. He wanted answers now. He shouted out, “I see him,” and began firing into the rafters.
Budda-Budda-Budda-Budda
The troops scrambled and started to fire.
Smoke snaked through the confusion, crept up on Sid, clamped his hand over her mouth, lifted her off her feet, and dragged her kicking into the deep shadows of the building. He pinned her up against the wall. “What are you doing?”
“Get your hands off me, fool!”
He covered her mouth again. “Keep it down, Sid. What’s going on?”
She struggled with the fierce strength of a wild animal. There was no recognition of him in her eyes at all. She drove a knee into his side, winded back her arm, and clobbered him in the jaw.
He staggered back, holding his chin. It felt like a mule had kicked him. He wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth. “You need to come with me, Sid.”
She gave him a funny look, whipped out a gun, and aimed at his chest. “No, you need to come with me. Hands up!”
Smoke took a step forward.
She shot him in the chest.
Blam!
He dropped to a knee. Fought for his breath. All the air had been knocked out of him. Black spots blinded his eyes. If it hadn’t been for the second skin he was wearing, he would’ve had a hole clean through him. He grit his teeth and started to stand. “Are you nuts? What are you doing?”
“You aren’t dead?” she replied. “Guards! Guards!”
The troops closed in.
Smoke was surrounded by gun muzzles.
“Cuff him,” Sid said.
Smoke studied her eyes as he finished standing. A sharp blow caught him in the back of the head. Stars exploded behind his eyes.
***
Aside from the headache, busted ribs, and the continuous feeling of throbbing pain, Smoke was fine. Eyes shut and body limp, he felt the goons carry him back up the steps and into the offices. Inside, they dropped him on the floor. As best he could tell, there were three people in the room, milling about. Somebody shoved the power lever back on.
Sid spoke first. “Get this corpse out of here before it starts to stink. Looks like we have a replacement for it.”
The men left the room, and the doors closed behind them.
A busy signal could still be heard on the phone Smoke had used earlier. Footsteps walked over to the sound, and the phone was hung up. Silence followed. The quiet. The unknown. The woman who might be Sid was still in the room. He could hear her soft breathing.
Smoke envisioned the scene from earlier. Sid was strong now, much stronger than she’d been before. In the darkness, he couldn’t get a good look into her eyes. There were no answers there. It was her, but it wasn’t. A carbon copy. A shifter? Her shooting him could not have been a bluff. Whoever this was couldn’t be Sid. But she sounded and moved just like her.
Footsteps approached him where he lay on the floor. Fabric stretched from the woman squatting down. Her hands ran over Smoke’s body. She slipped out his knives. Unholstered his guns. She tossed the weapons away with a clatter. Her scent was sweet. Faint, but expensive. It wasn’t a scent of Sid.
“You’re a big one,” the woman said under her breath. She clasped his head in her hands. “Handsome too. What brings you here? Why aren’t you dead? My bullet should have killed you.”
“You should have aimed for the head.”
“What?” she said, rising
up to her feet.
Smoke swept her legs out from under her.
She hit the floor hard.
Hands still cuffed in the front, he got her into a choke hold. With his legs wrapped around her, he pinned her in his grip.
She struggled and fought. Her strength matched his, but he had her. Or it. Or whatever.
“Who are you? Where is Sid?”
Choking, she couldn’t answer.
Smoke eased off.
“You’ll die!” She sucked in her breath to scream.
With a squeeze, he choked off her efforts. Lips to her ear, he growled, “Play nice or you die, shifter.”
“I’m Samone. Not a shifter. Wait, you’re John Smoke, aren’t you. My lover. I can see your face in my thoughts now. My memories. Release me, John.”
“Be quiet.”
She struggled. The tone of her voice changed to something sinister. “I’m a clone, Smoke. A clone of your precious Sid. You won’t hurt me, will you, John Smoke?”
“Tell me where Sid is.”
“I don’t know and I don’t care. I have my own operation to run. Her body is weak anyway.” She pushed back into him with seductive effort, her voice a playful purr. “Mine is everlasting. Why don’t you play with me and forget all about your little Sidney? I can make you really, really happy. I never sleep.”
“That probably means you never shut up. Just tell me where she is.”
“Don’t be silly. I don’t have to tell you anything. The guards will be back here any moment now, and I’m just going to tell them to open up.”
“Even you can’t handle a bullet in the head.”
“And you can? Hah.” She balled up in a knot of muscle and started to grunt and strain against his strength.
Smoke squeezed harder. His busted ribs burned like fire. His locked fingers started to lose their grip. Samone was growing. Muscles bulged in her renewed limbs. He lost his leverage. Up on her feet, she backed him hard into the wall, jarring him loose of her, and slung him down onto the floor on his shoulders. She stomped at his neck.
He scrambled away, jumped to his feet, and faced off with her.
Samone had become a full six-and-a-half feet of Sid gone ugly. One eye was higher than the other. Her face was a twisted snarl. She was the Hyde to Sid’s Jekyll.
Still cuffed, Smoke said, “So you are a shifter.”
“And a liar.” She looked at Smoke like he was a greasy pork chop. She blew him a kiss. “But best of all, I’m a killer.”
CHAPTER 21
With a pick Smoke had concealed in his clothes, he took off his cuffs and tossed them on the floor.
Samone’s bulging eyes widened. “You are a clever man.”
“That’s sort of the equivalent of calling you an ugly woman.” He backed toward one of the exits. A hand-to-hand battle with the monster woman wasn’t the best idea right now. Not after being so busted up and all. “Why don’t you just make this easy on yourself and tell me where Sid is?”
“It doesn’t really matter. You’ll be dead soon enough anyway. But you are a great candidate for becoming a deader. Or you could just be smart and become one of us.” She stroked her hair and tossed it over her shoulder. “Beautiful, powerful creatures. We can do whatever we want.”
“I’ll pass.” He took a peek out the door. Guards were coming from both directions.
“What’s the matter, Smoke? Nowhere to run?” She winked at him. “Guards! Stay outside! If he comes out, shoot him!”
Smoke had faced enough shifters to know there wasn’t much he could do to hurt the more powerful ones, not without some of the bullets Mal Gunderson made. Like the ones in the weapons Samone had slung clear across the room. His blades were gone too. He jammed his fingers in his pockets, searching for one of the pills.
Samone held her hand out. “Looking for these?” Two pills were in her hand, glimmering with a life of their own. “What’s the matter, Smoke? Did you forget to take your vitamins?” She popped them both in her mouth and swallowed. “Tasty.”
“They’re actually time release capsules and great for acne, which you could certainly benefit from.” He balled up his fists and approached. “Let’s get this over with.”
She beckoned him over with her chin stuck out.
Smoke slugged her in the jaw.
Samone started laughing. “You’re in for a long day, Smoke. Real long.” She slashed at his throat with her long fingernails.
Smoke skipped away, dove back in, and countered. He kicked at her knees and punched into her ribs.
“Now that’s my kind of foreplay,” she said.
Smoke delivered blow after blow that would have punished an NFL lineman. Samone rolled with the punches. She slapped and kicked back. Snarled and clutched. He peppered her, time and time again. A stinging bee. Catching her off balance, he punched her hard in the neck and dropped her to the floor.
Everything has a weakness.
Samone was stunned.
Smoke jumped over her and darted for his guns. When he was inches from snatching one up, a hand with a grip of iron seized his ankle and pulled him down. His fingers stretched for the pistol. Samone’s raw power dragged him backward and yanked him into her arms.
She smooched at him. “How about a kiss? Quit squirming. You’re helpless as a child against me.”
Smoke got ahold of her wrist, twisted it behind her back, and stuffed her face into the floor.
“How did you do that?” she yelled.
“It’s called aikido. Join a dojo and learn it.”
Pinning a wild boar would have been easier than holding Samone down. “You need to be still.”
Samone continued to fight against him. “Or what?”
Still maintaining his leverage, he said, “Be still.”
“No!”
Smoke dislocated her shoulder.
Samone howled.
Not wasting any time, Smoke abandoned the stunned shifter on the floor and fetched his guns and knives.
Samone was on her feet again, facing him.
He lowered one gun barrel on her. “I’d keep still if I were you.”
Shoulder sagging, she transformed back into the form of Sid and said with an enticing smile, “You won’t hurt me, will you John?”
“Take one more step and you’re going to find out.”
Her pretty eyes narrowed. She came one step forward.
Ka-Blam!
The bullet tore clear through her shoulder and spun her around. Eyes filled with terror, she screamed as she dashed out onto the balcony. “Guards! Guards! Kill him!”
Feeling the walls close in, Smoke picked his special sunglasses up off the floor and grabbed the handle on the power box. “Here we go again.” He yanked it down. Everything went black.
Armed like an assassin, quiet as a panther, and deadly as a ninja, he tore through the oncoming ranks in the blackness. A good throat punch disrupted anyone. A sock in the temple. A gunshot in the leg. A jab in the ribs. On a mission, he left the guards in disarray. He hit the ground level and used an assault rifle to break all the lights so they couldn’t come back on.
Chaos erupted in all directions.
Perfect.
Using all the explosive elements to his advantage, Smoke found his way to a weapons cache and loaded up with a couple of light anti-tank weapons.
I love these things.
He scurried back up onto the metal staircase, opened up one tube, and got a good view in the dark through the special sunglasses of the weapons and drugs that hadn’t been loaded yet. He lowered the weapon on his shoulder, took aim, and fired. The rocket soared. Millions of dollars and months of planning exploded. Smoke pitched the empty rocket tube away and readied the other. He turned around and launched the rocket into the offices above. The entire facility shook.
Ka-Boom!
On the move again, he grabbed a Kevlar helmet and pea coat, blended in, and headed outside. Guards were going in all directions, but there weren’t as many as there had been. Smo
ke knifed through the night and loaded himself into a humongous yellow dump truck, an earth mover with wheels ten feet tall. He turned over the key, put it in gear, and stomped on the gas.
“It’s Tonka time.”
CHAPTER 22
All smiles, Smoke plowed through the building. The massive truck crushed everything in its path. Cars. Drugs. Weapons. Vans. He ran it all over. Men tried to climb up in the truck, only to fall off with a hole in them. Smoke was in a zone. A zone of destruction. And he’d had enough of The Drake and all of their foul games. Sid or no Sid, it was time to send them a message. He was coming.
He plowed through the walls, leaving dust and debris in his path. Running over the last pile of drugs and ammo, he smashed through another wall and headed outside. The sun was rising. If there were any Drake soldiers left, they had fled. M-16 ready, he got out of the cab and headed down the giant truck’s front stairs.
Here they came, the deaders that hounded the salvage yard, the one covered in scrap metal armor and the others in grease monkey suits.
Smoke filled their chests full of lead.
Budda-Budda-Budda-Budda
They collapsed on the ground, twitched a few times, and moved no more.
“Woohoo!” said a voice from above.
Smoke spun around.
Samone was on top of the dump trunk and restored to her monstrous form. She jumped.
He went for his gun.
She landed right on top of him and plowed him into the ground.
He fished the gun out of its holster.
She wrenched it free and tossed it away. “No more of those bullets, sweetie.” She punched him in the face. Whack! She yanked him up by his shirt and got in his face. “Some good news, though. Those time release pills you gave me? They’ve kicked in. I feel great!”
Smoke punched and kicked with instinct and precision. It didn’t help.
Samone—quicker, faster, and stronger than ever—pounded and bludgeoned him with fist after fist after fist.
Ka-Blam!
The Supernatural Bounty Hunter Files: Special Edition Fantasy Bundle, Books 6 thru 10 (Smoke Special Edition Book 2) Page 8