“I got nothin’ against you, buddy,” the vampire grunted as it struggled to point the barrel of gun at Jim’s mouth. “I’m just doing a job, so do me a favor and fucking die already.”
He had pressed the barrel against Jim’s neck, but either he was out of bullets or the gun had jammed because nothing happened when he pulled the trigger. He started to give the gun a pissed off look, but before he could do much else, Jim had flipped him over. While they had been rolling around Jim found one of his hand grenades. He pinched the hit man’s nostrils shut. When the vampire opened his mouth to breath, Jim shoved the grenade in, pulled the pin, counted, then rolled off.
The blast knocked him over. It also took off enough of the vampire’s head to kill it. Sirens were approaching. Jim got up and ran before anyone could stop him. Hours later he was in Newark, and a few days later he found Carol. After that his plans changed.
* * * * *
Carol had the TV set on. The motor lodge offered fourteen cable channels, along with pay per view porn. She couldn’t find MTV, and after flipping through the channels several times and finding nothing of interest, she left it on a religious program. It didn’t matter what was on, she just wanted the background noise, anything to block out the squealing of bedsprings from the neighboring room.
After her first few weeks together with Jim, he bought her a lady’s handgun, a Smith & Wesson .38 caliber revolver. It was funny that it was considered a lady’s handgun since it still had enough firepower to stop a two hundred and fifty pound NFL linebacker in his tracks. It wasn’t pink, and it didn’t have little hearts decorating it, but Carol figured it was because the gun could fit in her purse and only weighed twenty ounces. Whenever she helped Jim lure a predator to feed on, he always insisted that she bring her gun along in case he lost track of her. She now had the gun laying on the bed and stared transfixed at it for what seemed like an eternity, all the while an evangelical preacher from the TV rambled on about how Jesus suffered each day for their sins and if the good people listening could only dig deep into their hearts, and even deeper into their wallets, the lord’s pain could be eased. A hardness froze Carol’s face. Earlier she had cracked open the cylinder and dumped the bullets onto the bed sheet.
Almost from the beginning she’d been wanting Jim to infect her so they could go through this together. Wasn’t that what true love was all about—to share everything each other went through, the good and the bad? He refused to, though, saying that their life together always on the move was difficult enough; that at least if Carol were uninfected she’d be able to drive during the day and run the other errands they needed. She didn’t buy his explanation. They could move from city to city just as easily at night. She knew he was trying to protect her from what he was going through, but as far she was concerned, that wasn’t good enough. She wanted him to share his pain with her. If they were really each other’s soul mates, there shouldn’t be anything between them.
She picked up the revolver. For something that only weighed twenty ounces, it felt heavy in her hand. She slid a bullet into one of the chambers, then spun the cylinder.
If Jim came back and found her dying, he would have to infect her to save her life. No matter all the things that he’d said to the contrary, he would have to save her.
Carol, he’d tell her in that tired voice of his he’d fall into whenever they had this argument, you don’t know what you’re asking me. This is not something I could ever let you go through. Fuck, I can’t think of a worse curse to wish on anyone, let alone something that I would ever inflict on someone I loved with all my heart. Please, let it drop, it’s never going to happen.
Bullshit. If he really loved her as much as he claimed he did, how could he ever let her leave him?
She pushed the muzzle of the gun against her belly, felt the coldness of the steel. There were five chambers. Four empty, one with a .38 caliber bullet. A twenty percent chance. Her muscles tensed as she squeezed the trigger. An empty click, nothing else.
Oh, fuck.
She almost vomited the shots of tequila and greasy burger and fries from before. Somehow she kept it all down.
If he really loved her he would save her. No matter what else, he would have to save her. If the situation were reversed, she wouldn’t think twice. She spun the cylinder again, hearing the metallic clicks. Again, she pushed the muzzle hard against her bare belly. The preacher was rambling on about how Christ loved all of them. She started laughing. It sounded like something that could’ve been coming out of a wounded animal.
Christ loved her, huh? What about Jim? Did he love her enough? Could he let her die?
Her face hardened with resolve. If he could then she didn’t want to fucking live.
Calmly, her hand steady, she squeezed the trigger. Another empty click. This time, though, everything in her stomach came rushing up, and she made a dash for the bathroom. It all came out quickly, easily. Minutes afterwards, her stomach empty and swollen, she gargled with mouthwash, then stood at the bathroom sink splashing cold water over her face. She avoided looking at her reflection in the mirror. She didn’t want to see what she looked like, but could imagine her eyes rimmed with red and her skin waxy and unnaturally pale. Headlights from outside flashed through the room, then died. Carol grabbed one of the threadbare towels from a rusted metal bar and wiped her face dry. She caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror, and broke out giggling at how drawn and tired she looked. She was out of the bathroom and still giggling when Jim opened the motel room door. Their eyes locked for a moment, then she stumbled forward and buried her face in his chest and held him as tight as she could and tried to hide that she was now sobbing.
He put an arm around her thin shoulders and ran a hand through her hair.
“Are you crying or laughing?” he asked in a soft whisper.
“A little of both. Oh fuck, I’m glad you’re back.”
She buried her face deeper into his chest and started laughing more than she was sobbing. Jim lifted her chin upwards and kissed her gently on the mouth. As he pulled away, he gave her a wary look.
“Why is your gun on the bed?” he asked.
“No good reason… just for protection.” She paused, wiping a hand across her eyes. “I thought I heard someone at the door earlier. I probably imagined it. You know, we are in a pretty shitty neighborhood.”
He glanced sideways at the bed, asked her why she had taken four of the bullets out.
“What? Oh, nothing too mysterious. I was cleaning the gun, that’s all. I just finished when you came back and was reloading.”
She knew he didn’t buy her story. In the three years they’d been together, he had always been the one to clean the gun. Before he could ask her any more questions about the bullets, she took hold of his right hand and brought it to her lips and kissed it. It was like kissing ice, but it didn’t matter to her.
“What if some creep had broken in here?” she asked. “What if you came back here and found me dying?”
“Please, Carol…”
“No. Tell me. What would you do?”
He broke free of her and walked over to the bed to collect the loose bullets. He turned away unable to meet her stare.
“Now’s not a good time to talk about this.” He took the drug dealer’s money roll out of his pocket and tossed it on the night table next to the bed. “I had a good night. Over nine grand.”
“Jim, you have to tell me. What would you do?”
He still couldn’t look at her. “What I had to,” he said.
Her legs gave out from under her. It was as if someone had gashed her Achilles heel and her strength bled out instead of blood. Jim rushed over to her before she fell and carried her to the bed.
“Are you okay?” he asked, a worried frown creasing his face.
“Please, Hon, tell me you would save me.”
A sadness filled Jim’s pale grays. Carol’s own eyes were liquid. He nodded. “I would save you,” he said.
Carol pulled him clo
se, kissing him hard on the mouth, her tongue slipping in to touch his. He pulled back as gently as he could.
“Let me wash off the grime from the street first,” he said.
She shook her head. She wasn’t going to let go. He accepted that and let her pull him back to her. Before he knew it they were melting into each other. There was so much passion in her it damn near broke his heart. She was like a narcotic to him, and he let himself get swallowed up by it. At that moment the universe was only the two of them. Barely even aware of it, she was guiding him inside of her. It just seemed like the most natural thing in the world, and as much as he hated to break the spell, he pulled away to put protection on. Then they were back together, his head swimming in the narcotic haze she induced, and her small slender body so feverish that it almost warmed his own body up to a temperature just above that of a corpse.
He didn’t lie to her before. If it ever came down to it, he would save her. Even if it meant losing her—which nothing in the world could be more painful for him—he would save her from ever being infected.
He tried hard not to think about why she removed those bullets and left a single one in a chamber. Christ, he didn’t want to picture what she was doing alone with that gun, or worse, what she thought she needed him to prove.
He closed his eyes and let himself be swallowed up by her heat. There was so much of it.
Chapter 6
It was a quarter past three in the morning when Metcalf eased a stolen Chrysler LeBaron into Dr. Ravi Panjubar’s driveway. At that hour it wasn’t pitch-black, more of a murky grayness, but not enough sunlight to cause any discomfort. Metcalf waited in the car while Bronson cut the electricity to the house, then he got out and stretched before meeting the other vampire by the front door. It had been a six-hour drive to Palo Alto and his muscles had tightened up. He glanced at the other vampire and then at the window panes on the door. When he lifted a fist to punch out one of the panes, Bronson stopped him.
“There are kids’ bikes in the garage,” Bronson said.
Metcalf turned a dead-eyed stare on the vampire. “So?”
“Why make this a slaughter? Give me five minutes. I’ll go in first and tie everyone up.”
“You got to be fucking kidding me.”
“All I’m asking for is five minutes. What’s the big deal?”
“Christ. All that is is cattle in there.”
“Five minutes. Please.”
Metcalf’s eyes dimmed. “Two minutes,” he said.
The vampire nodded, then started scaling the outside of the house to the roof, moving quickly and in a manner that made Metcalf think of a squirrel. Metcalf set a timer on his watch, then looked up and watched as Bronson pried open a skylight and slipped inside. Within seconds he heard the anguished high-pitch wail of a dog. Before the timer on his watch went off, Bronson opened the front door and let him in.
“They have a dog,” Bronson said.
“No shit.”
“No shit. A German Shepherd. What a beautiful animal. I left it cowering in the bedroom. I hate seeing them like that. Anyway, here’s the good doctor.”
He stepped aside to show Dr. Ravi Panjubar lying on his stomach, trussed up like a Thanksgiving turkey with his feet and ankles bound behind him with a strip torn from a bed sheet. Bronson had also stuffed more of the bed sheet into the scientist’s mouth. The scientist’s eyes grew wide as he took in Metcalf. He tried to scream but the sound was muffled by his gag. Metcalf watched as the man’s face turned purple, then moved to him before Panjubar could choke to death. He removed the strip of bed sheet from his mouth. Only a hoarse rasping noise was left of the man’s voice, not enough to attract any attention from anyone passing by outside. Metcalf put a hand over Panjubar’s mouth anyway.
“I was right,” Bronson said. “He has two little girls. The oldest couldn’t be more than ten. I tied both of them up before they knew what was happening. His wife also. None of them saw me.”
Metcalf ignored his rambling. What difference would it have made if they did see him? There was nobody who had a clue about the compound, let alone any knowledge of who resided there, and besides, with the physical changes Bronson had undergone, no one would be able to identify him from any mug shot books he might still be in. Bronson had been a petty thief when Metcalf infected him, and had proven useful over the years. He was good at stealing cars and breaking into buildings, but he had grown soft, and besides, penny-ante crooks like him were a dime a dozen. Some time soon Metcalf would trade him in for someone more of his own mindset. Bronson was as thin as a pole, and if you ignored his white hair and oddly shaped head, he could’ve been any other mall rat. With his arms and legs cut off, he wouldn’t take up much space in Metcalf’s private lab, and when the time was right, Metcalf would find a good use for him. He was sick of all the damn bleeding hearts he had surrounded himself with. Thank God for Vanessa. At times he even found himself missing Serena. At least she was one ruthless cold-hearted bitch.
Sighing, he located a good spot on Panjubar’s neck and bit into it. Blood leaked out of the wound, and Metcalf sucked on the fluid and felt the warmth of it against his tongue. This was what was needed to secrete the virus. He bit down harder until the blood was gushing into his mouth.
A clattering of nails sounded on hardwood floors, then a German Shepherd raced into the room, its fangs bared, angry guttural noises coming from it. Almost as if it hit an invisible wall, the dog stopped, then tried to crawl towards Metcalf before turning and scampering away. From another room the dog whined in full agony, letting the world know that it would never forgive itself for its betrayal. Metcalf stopped his feeding. The blood had finished gushing, which meant the virus had spread.
Panjubar lay shivering below him, sweating profusely as if he had a bad case of the flu. Metcalf lifted the scientist onto his shoulder and carried him to the car, then lowered him into the trunk. Bronson had followed Metcalf outside and handed him manacles to secure the scientist’s wrists and feet. After that, they drove to where they’d earlier left their van. After Panjubar was transported to the back of the van, Bronson drove the Chrysler LeBaron away to get rid of it. Metcalf sat in the back of the van with Panjubar. The man was already delirious with fever and it would be pointless for Metcalf to explain anything to him.
Metcalf sat for a moment, then took a pint bag of blood from a cooler and squeezed it into his mouth. That was the problem with infecting someone, the quick taste of blood left you wanting much more. Maybe it was an effect of the virus secretion. Whatever it was, Metcalf could’ve gone through a dozen pints without being satisfied. He fought back the urge and had just the one pint. He watched Panjubar squirm for a while, then took another pint bag from the cooler and forced the opening into the scientist’s mouth. Once Panjubar tasted the blood, he blindly sucked down the full pint, making Metcalf think of a newly-born piglet. The feeding eased Panjubar’s spasms. Metcalf left him to go up front.
Metcalf drove to a prearranged location. Bronson emerged from a thicket of shrubs where he’d been hiding, and jumped quickly into the passenger seat. They continued from there to a parking garage in downtown San Jose, then both vampires joined Dr. Ravi Panjubar in the back of the van. Another two hours and the sun would be coming up, and it would be brutal to try to head back towards Los Angeles then, even with dark shades and wide brimmed cowboy hats. Later, when it was dusk again, Metcalf would drive back to the compound.
The two vampires sat in silence, the only noise being the soft moaning from their newly infected brethren—or a newbie as Bronson liked to call them.
“It’s going to get hot back here,” Bronson said, breaking the silence. His face looked strained as he stared at Panjubar squirming on the floor. “Stuffy too. How about us cracking open a window?”
Metcalf didn’t bother answering him. If he opened a window someone passing by would be able to hear Panjubar’s moaning. Bad enough Bronson was as soft as a sponge, but he didn’t have the fucking brains to figure somethi
ng like that out? He focused his stare on a spot across from him on the van’s wall and tried to remain perfectly still, trying hard not to think about how the other vampire’s voice was affecting him like nails on a chalkboard. Bronson must’ve given up waiting for an answer. Outside of the soft moaning coming from Panjubar, for the next ten minutes there was mostly silence. Bronson interrupted it by fidgeting. He took a pint of blood from the cooler and made a face to exaggerate his disgust.
“If you can believe it,” he said, “before you infected me I was a vegetarian. Big cosmic joke on me, huh?”
Metcalf didn’t say anything. If Bronson had looked carefully enough, he would’ve noticed a muscle twitching along Metcalf’s left eye. He would have also seen that Metcalf’s hands were clenched at his side. Bronson’s display of disgust grew more exaggerated as he emptied the pint bag into his mouth. Metcalf kept his stare frozen straight ahead. After some more minutes of blessed silence, Bronson had to comment about how watching what a newbie went through was the part he hated most about these trips.
“Damn, you can already see his head changing shape. That’s gotta hurt. It gives me the willies thinking about it. Kind of like I can feel it in my balls.”
Metcalf turned his dead eyes to Bronson. The other vampire wilted under his glare.
“Not another word,” Metcalf breathed softly, holding up a finger for emphasis.
Bronson nodded and looked away, his knees bouncing up and down nervously. Metcalf closed his eyes, waiting for dusk, but also half-hoping Bronson would say one more word.
* * * * *
Hayes rested his forehead against the tile wall in the shower and found himself grimacing every time the hot water hit his dick. Damn, it hurt. Either Chelsea bit him down there or she scratched him up something fierce with the silver stud that she had stuck through her tongue. Aside from his dick, he felt like shit. Every square inch of him. He wished he were still in bed, but he had too much he needed to do to allow himself to sleep late. After leaving Chelsea’s apartment, he went back to his motel room and set the alarm for eight in the morning, which gave him less than three hours of sleep. Groggy, his head throbbing and his throat feeling like he swallowed a mouthful of sawdust, all he wanted to do was crawl back under the covers, but such was the life of a dedicated PI. He was too close to Jim to let himself slack. And, as he always liked to tell himself, things could be worse. At least she didn’t give him crabs. There was no chance of that with her being as clean as a whistle down there. He had never been with a woman with a shaved pussy before, and he wasn’t sure he liked it. It seemed kind of creepy, almost like he was a pedophile, and would’ve much preferred if she had had a nice soft red bush, but fuck it, even though he had twenty years on her, she was still several years past legal—and kinkier than any woman he had ever hooked up with. She completely wore him out. Of course, all the rum and cokes and ecstasy they mixed probably contributed more to the way he was feeling than his lack of sleep and the marathon session she put him through. With the ecstasy still cruising through his system, he had a tough time focusing his thoughts, almost as if his brain was wrapped in a wool sock. At his age, what the fuck was he thinking?
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