The Cactus Killer (The Inglewood Chronicles)

by Jeremy Croston

  Something about this kid struck me as off. Father, forgive me as I pulled my pocket knife and threw it at him. I don’t like to overestimate my own reflexes, but they are fast. The kid had no chance at avoiding the knife or so I thought. He smiled right before it hit him and faster than I can blink had moved.

  “Inspector Inglewood, I expected better than a sneak attack.”

  “You are a vampire!” It was Liz, who was looking at him with eyes wide open.

  “No daemon, I am far from one of your ilk. I am the creation of years of work from my father!”

  Of course, “Tucker has been injecting you with vampire and werewolf blood, hasn’t he?”

  His eyes glinted red just for a moment. “Yes he has, little by little over the years until he perfected the formula. Now I stand before you, the bringer of justice for the world!”

  This guy was a few cards short of an entire deck but this situation was getting bad fast. Luckily, Reno and the three werewolves came charging into the church. Austin took his eyes off of us for a moment and looked at them.

  “Oh now, this is more the party I was hoping. To test my skills of battle against an elder vampire and two Alpha werewolves will be most interesting.”

  His eyes were glaring at dad and Chaz. Taking advantage of his short attention span and his superiority complex, I pulled Roscoe out and put a slug right into his head. He dropped like a bag of potatoes right in the middle of the church.

  “Victor! What are you doing, son? He challenged us to combat and you shot him!”

  I just shrugged my shoulders and grinned at dad. I looked over at the others. Reno and Billy were laughing, Liz was shaking her head, and Chaz had a stupid smile on his face.

  “Gentlemen and lady, I hate to break up the victory party, but Austin is getting up.”

  Sure enough, following the pointed finger of Pastor Browne, the kid was indeed getting up to his feet.

  “I guess we are going to have to do this the hard way after all. I hope you’re happy, dad.”

  The howling behind me told me he was.

  Chapter 24

  “Pastor, I think it would be best if you waited outside. Billy, would you escort him?”

  “Of course, Vic. Come with me, Pastor Browne.” I felt better without him having to witness this. I turned my attention to the kid getting off the floor. The bullet hole had already closed up.

  “Again, you disappoint me, Inspector Inglewood. My father spoke highly of your character, no matter how misguided it was. First, you throw a knife at me, and then you shoot me.”

  “Sorry if the opinions of mad men don’t bother me. Maybe if your dad didn’t fill you full of the blood of my people, I wouldn’t feel the need to shoot you.”

  As he stood there glaring at me, his eyes turned red again. I looked at his hands and they also were changing, his nails elongated into claws. “Now you see what you are up against. I have both the strength of a werewolf and speed of a vampire. Where others have failed, I will succeed.”

  Even with three fully formed werewolves, two vampires, and myself, I got the impression we might be outgunned. A large Red werewolf with a white streak on his chest walked forward and gave a hair rising howl. He was soon followed by a smaller Red and an even larger Black wolf. The pack had spoken.

  “A challenge then? I accept.” Austin’s evil grin spread across his face, this is exactly what he wanted.

  “Reno, Liz, this is a pack challenge. I need you guys to stay out of this. To interfere would be an insult to our way of life.” I walked up and stood beside dad. I should have been worried, but I wasn’t. The adrenaline felt good.

  “Vic, you cannot! You are not able to transform!”

  I turned back and looked at Liz. “Don’t you worry; I’ve gotten out of tougher scrapes.” When our eyes met, something made her back down. Instead of retorting back, she just took a deep breath and nodded.

  I pulled out my grandpa’s tanto and took my stance. I thought about pushing the issue and extending my claws, but the tanto in my hand filled me with confidence.

  The four of us spread out and encircled him. I figured he would target an attack at me since I was the weak link. I was wrong; he went for Chaz, the biggest and strongest of all of us. Bernard and I were beside him and we closed the gap, but he got to Chaz before we did. His speed was impressive and he eluded all of Chaz’s attacks and elbowed him in the head. The blow was vicious and knocked him down.

  Austin’s biggest weakness seemed to be that he could be distracted easily. While he focused on attacking Chaz, he completely neglected Bernard and me. Right after the elbow to Chaz’s head was delivered, Bernard snapped into the back of his calf and I put the tanto right through his shoulder. He collapsed under the double team attack and when we jumped out of the way, dad landed on him and ripped into his back.

  Unfortunately for all of us, none of this really mattered. In the middle of dad’s attack, Austin started to stand up and shoulder tossed dad right off of him onto Chaz.

  “Is this the best your pathetic species has to offer? I hope when I finish with you guys, the vampires have something better to offer.”

  He looked over and winked at Liz. That sent me over the edge. Faster than I ever drew a gun before, I put two more bullets into him. The impact from the bullets put him back on the ground, face down. I looked over at dad and Chaz and they were getting back to their feet. Bernard was doing okay too.

  “Seems to me, Austin, that this isn’t as easy as you thought it would be. Maybe if you weren’t such a putz you would have a better chance.”

  He was getting up again, but a bit slower this time. Both bullets had gone into his heart, so maybe he did have a weakness. Not one to slow down, I put another one right into his calf. He wasn’t expecting it and dropped back down.

  “You better learn to be prepared for every attack. Your dad might have pumped you full of Holy Water, but he certainly didn’t teach you how to fight.”

  He looked up at me with contempt building in his eyes. “Don’t you dare insult my father! I will bring your heads back to him as a trophy worthy of his place!”

  It sickened me just how much Tucker has twisted his own son. Chaz, Bernard, and dad were grouped behind me. He was staring us down so intently that he never saw Liz’s attack coming. She came in fast with the tanto and like she had with the monster at the old hospital, took his head off cleanly. It happened so fast that he still had the look of contempt in his eyes from his conversation with me. I wasn’t proud of our deception, but it had to be done.

  “Whatever cocktail they mixed up, I’m pretty sure only cutting off the head or severe damage to the heart is the only way to put them down for good.” He had survived four gunshots, numerous bites from a werewolf, and being stabbed.

  “Let’s take this body back to Dr. Tello for examination. Maybe she can tell us exactly what Tucker did to his own kid.” Chaz was already back in is human form.

  “That is a good idea. Maybe this time we can…” My phone started ringing. I looked at it and I knew exactly who this was. “Well Warren, I didn’t think it was possible to sink any lower, but you managed.”

  “Do not talk to me daemon about sinking low. Look at who you consort with. But that is not the reason for my call this time. I just wanted to congratulate you for surviving. I hope you enjoy your moral victory.”

  “We just had to kill your son, you psycho! How could you do that to him?”

  “Austin was just a tool and even in death he serves a purpose. You see he was never meant to survive.”

  This guy was just getting sicker and sicker. “You sent him here to die?”

  “An interesting thing happens when you mix mercury, vampire’s blood, and werewolf’s blood. When the host dies, it gets rather unstable to say the least. Like I said, I hope you enjoyed the moral victory, as mine is fast approaching.” The phone clicked, Tucker had hung up on me again.

  “What did he say, Vic?”

  “Something about how he hopes we en
joy our victory as he sent his son here to die.” I looked down at the headless corpse of Austin Tucker and my ears picked up the sounds of popping. It was barely audible to start, but it was becoming increasingly loud. “Everyone, out of the church now!”

  They all looked at me like I was mad, but I pushed Liz and soon they were all following me. We were about half way out the door when Austin’s body blew up like a bomb. We all dove out of the front, much to the surprise of Billy and Pastor Browne. Fire erupted out of the entrance of the church and soon the entire place was ablaze. It was just like the guy in the mines all over again.

  “It was a kamikaze mission from the start! They knew if we killed him that his body would blow up and take us with it!” That idiot Tucker had unintentionally tipped us off with his own arrogance. If he hadn’t call, we’d all be crispy critters.

  Pastor Browne was staring at the church, tears coming from his eyes. I think he now knew just how serious the situation was. “Victor, what happened in there?”

  I gave him the cliff notes version and his shock turned to disgust when I relayed the message Tucker had given me. “He sent his own son to die in the hopes that he would kill us.”

  “May God have mercy on Austin’s soul for his father’s delusions. I do not know what help I can be to you, but I would like to join the good fight.”

  “Welcome aboard, Pastor Browne, always a pleasure to have someone like you on the team. You are a good man; this is all Tucker’s fault, no one else’s.”

  “As it is my right, I hereby strip Rev. Warren Tucker of his position in the church and ex-communicate him. In his foolish quest, he has transformed into a monster.”

  Billy came up and put a hand on Pastor Browne’s shoulder. I couldn’t imagine the stress he was going through, Tucker had been his friend. I walked over to the car and dad and Liz followed me.

  “You did well in there, son. I know it bothers you that he forced you to use so much lethal force, but as you told the good Pastor, it is his fault, not yours.”

  “Yes Vic, you have once again shown why you are the one who will bring him in. We have a location now and even more information. Have faith, just like you told me to.”

  I smiled at both of them. “Thanks guys. If some of you want to head back to Full Moon, I’ll stay here with Pastor Browne until the locals show up.”

  “It’s okay boy, Bernard and I can handle this. It’s your turn to take the rest of the evening off.”

  “How will we get home?”

  Dad tossed me the keys to his Armada. “Take Chaz and Reno with you. We will bring Billy and Pastor Browne back in his Navigator.”

  Soon the four of us were on the road back to Full Moon. The night had been tough, but we got what we came for. Warren Tucker was in the Sacramentos and it was time we found him.

  Chapter 25

  “This is nice, but I am trying to figure out what I did to deserve the royal treatment.”

  After we had dropped Chaz off, I mentioned that I was hungry. Liz told me to wait until we got home, that she would take care of it. Once we got home and Reno took his usual post for the night out front, I was instructed to go take a shower. Now I was back down here, all clean, to find a steak dinner prepared for me. The meat was even cooked perfectly, medium rare. Baked potatoes and a cold beer topped off this perfect looking meal.

  “Just because you do not see it does not mean the rest of us do not. You handled the situation at the church befitting a man who leads people not follows. I might be the ambassador of the region, but we are lucky to have you as our chief inspector.”

  “I can drink to that. To us, let’s hope this is the first of many successful cases we work together.”

  I was getting ready to take a drink when I noticed Liz still had her cup in the air. “To us, Vic may this be the beginning of a beautiful relationship together, not just professional but personal as well.”

  “You sure this is what you want? You have a long life ahead of you and eventually I am going to get old and useless.”

  “Well, you already are useless in many ways outside of your investigative skills.” I had to chuckle; she puts things into perspective. “We do not know what the future holds, but the present we can act upon. Here and now I know you are the best thing to come into my life in many lifetimes. I am ready to hold on and fight for that, if you are.”

  Who am I to say no to such a pretty lady? “To the here and now then. I’ll fight tooth and nail to protect us and all of our friends.”

  The rest of dinner was a quiet and peaceful time. Cristof had dropped off a new supply of blood for Liz, so she drank her idea of a Bloody Mary while I polished off just about everything on the table.

  “Have you ever met any of the wolves coming tomorrow, Vic?”

  “No, the other Alphas never pop into town too often and when they do, they only deal with the others. Seeing as I was the Omega for the longest time, even as sheriff, I wasn’t allowed to attend any meetings.”

  “I will never understand the pack hierarchy. It seems very old fashioned, and that is saying a lot coming from me.”

  “If it’s not broke, we don’t fix it, right? Besides, it is all we know. If you took away how we lived, what would we have? A bunch of wolves running around all pretending to be the Alpha. At least the way it is keeps order.”

  “How convicted you are to your causes is one of your most charming personality traits.”

  “I feel the same way about you. I know you had some bumps in the past and I may have judged you too harshly at first, but look at who you are now. You’re certainly not broken, so there is no need for me to fix you.”

  She started laughing at me and it went on for a few minutes. I didn’t know if this was a good thing or a bad thing. Finally, she caught her breathe. “You are terrible at talking to women. But your sincerity is breathtaking.”

  “I guess that is all I need, huh?”

  She rolled her eyes at me, which happens quite a bit. “I have no idea what I am going to do with you, besides keep you around for a long time.”

  “I can live with that. I hope the pay is better than what Argent’s paying me.”

  “The pay is good and the perks are not too bad either.”

  Good pay and perks? What were those things? “Argent is so cheap with his employees that when he walks by, your can here the pennies he’s pinching scream.”

  “Do not worry about that. The vampire council owns the high rise our offices are in so you even have an apartment waiting for you. It is not nearly as nice as your house, but you will not have rent to worry about.”

  “Will I get to come back and visit whenever I want?”

  “Of course, especially if you do not mind me coming too. I enjoy this little town. Plus, we will only be a little over four hours away, if I am the one driving.”

  If we made it in one piece. “I’m sure mom and dad would love to see you too. You melt the old man’s heart for some reason.”

  “He just knows what is best for his son, that is all. And your mother is wonderful. I could talk to her all day long as she just tells the best stories about you.”

  I didn’t even want to know what mom had told her. Later I would have to set some ground rules with these women. I looked at the clock on the stove and it was almost midnight. “I guess we should get this cleaned up and call it a night.”

  “Go on to bed, I will handle this. I am still fine on my rest.”

  “I have a quick question for you. Is all this day work really good for you?”

  She seemed to contemplate the question before answering. You could see the gears turning in her head. “The sun does not ignite us into flame obviously, but for the younger vampires, the ultraviolet light it produces makes us very lethargic. As we get older and we build up our strength and resistance, we start to fight that off. Reno, for example, can normally tolerate dusk and dawn before falling victim.”

  “Ahh I see. So the older you are, the better you can control your own body?”

&
nbsp; “Precisely. For Cristof and I, we now have full control over ourselves and can move about normally. I do not prefer to spend this much time in the daylight, but for this case, I will do anything.”

  “I sleep more than most of my pack because I don’t transform and go on the runs. They say the transformation provides an incredible boost of energy, but unfortunately, I have to do it the old fashioned way.”

  “Do you feel like you have missed out on life?”

  “I never felt bad for myself, but I always felt like I was a failure for my dad. As pack Alpha, I could only imagine the embarrassment he felt when I didn’t transform on my changing night.”

  She looked at me with some pity in her eyes. I hated that. “Your parents seem to love you very much, I doubt they were disappointed.”

  “My grandpa basically took one for the team. He didn’t have long left in his life, but as the retired Alpha his word had tremendous pull. He told the pack that his last wish before moving on was for them to accept me for who I was. Even after he passed away, they honored his wish, even if some resented me.”

  “Like you said to me earlier, the past makes us who we are. It takes someone very special to prosper like you have. It has given you the proper mix of toughness and compassion.”

  It was my turn to blush a little bit. She gave me one of her know-it-all smiles and finished her drink. Not knowing what else to say, I offered to at least take the dishes into the kitchen. I also tried to help wash them, but she shooed me out and told me I had done enough for one day. Before I went upstairs, she had one more question.

  “What time are we supposed to go to the mayor’s office to meet with the contingent of Alphas?”

  No one had said anything about that to me. I fired off a quick text to dad and copied Liz on it. “I guess we will see what dad says. Chances are I will fall asleep before he responds, so it will be up to you, boss lady, to follow up.”