I slammed the Mustang into drive and hammered the accelerator as soon as I was reasonably sure we were going to clear the garage door, which had been in the process of slowly rolling open for the last twenty seconds.
I knew that if there was anyone in the SUV, they would have spotted the door. Sure enough, the black behemoth was moving forward to block our escape as we careened down the driveway, fishtailing out into the street. I spun the wheel to correct the slide, silently apologizing to Megan for the beating she had to be suffering in the trunk.
I floored it, and the 289-cubic-inch V8 screamed as it kept just out of reach of the SUV. The behemoth was trying to clip our rear quarter panel and send us sideways, so it could broadside us and push us to a stop. Whoever was driving the SUV was a professional.
In the rearview mirror, I saw the driver’s hand come out of his window holding a handgun.
“Bryan!”
“What?”
“Do something! Now!”
I took a turn fast, ignoring the stop sign and trusting fate not to put a car in my way. It didn’t, but unfortunately, it also didn’t put one in the way of the SUV, which stayed right behind us.
I heard the sound of gunfire as Bryan unzipped the bag and pulled out the Bushmaster. He began frantically hunting for a clip as he fought to stay upright. I was swerving, trying to avoid the rounds that the SUV driver was sending our way. The Mustang only had lap belts, and Bryan hadn’t even bothered with that. Every time I swerved or took a turn, he went sliding. The only thing keeping him sort of in place was the enormous duffel bag that shared the backseat with him.
We were almost out of the subdivision, and we were going to be hitting some heavier traffic soon. Bryan must have found a clip, because I heard the staccato of 5.56-millimeter rounds. Looking in the mirror, I saw Bryan facing backwards, gun resting on the folded soft-top.
The SUV swerved as spiderwebs erupted in the windshield where rounds hammered through it. Its corner hit a parked truck and it went spinning, crashing into parked cars on both sides of the street before coming to a rest facing the wrong direction. “Ten points!” came Bryan’s voice from the back.
Chapter 24
I swung out onto the main road and headed for the highway. I had no idea how Vargas was playing this, but a bright red ‘66 Mustang convertible was not going to just blend in. If he or any of the neighbors called in our description, we were screwed. The only things on our side were the fact that Vargas sure didn’t have a warrant, and the fact that most of the neighbors were still at work.
“Where to?” I asked Lacey. I was shaking from the adrenaline and feeling sick for having a gun battle through a residential neighborhood.
She looked a little stunned from the events of the past five minutes. “Take 17 south.” I complied, and within minutes we were at a dead stop in traffic. Bryan had just enough common sense to put the assault rifle back in the duffel bag and zip it up.
“Where are we headed?” I asked.
“Donovan’s.”
I looked at Lacey. I couldn’t read her expression. I could only imagine what was going through her head. Her house had just been violated and wrecked, her best friend was in the trunk of a car, and now she didn’t know if she was a fugitive from justice. We were all thinking variations on the same thing.
And we had plenty of time to think about it. The Tuesday afternoon commute traffic was horrible. Throw in an accident where a BMW had tried to cut off a school bus and it was an hour before we were in the mountains, pulling off the highway.
After weighing my options for a while, I finally took my wallet out, which was easier said than done while driving, and found the card I was looking for. I dialed the number, expecting to get voicemail. Instead, I got a heavy Boston accent.
“Cassara here.”
“Detective Cassara?” Lacey’s head snapped around and she stared at me with a “What the fuck?” look.
There was a pause. “So, is this going to be like one of them circular argument things, where I keep repeating my name and you keep asking me if I said it right? ‘Cause if so, I’m going to hang up.”
“No, no, don’t. It’s me, Chance. You remember—from the parking lot? The one where that professor was killed.”
“So, Chance. I do remember you. I remember telling you I was off that case. Got myself a bunch of new ones to take its place. Keeping me busy.”
“Yeah, I know, but, well, I remember you telling me about a Detective Vargas. You said he had taken over the case.”
“I might have said something about someone like that, yeah. But, so kid, you see, us cops, we all get our own phones now. It’s a perk. You know, since they pay us like shit, they figure they’d give us each a phone to make up for it. Hell, we even get a little cubicle to put it in. Even Vargas got one. You should try calling it if you need to talk to him. Though I wouldn’t expect him to answer it. It would be kind of tough for him right now.”
“Yeah, well, that’s the thing. He was just at my friend’s house. I mean, he still probably is. He said he had a warrant, but he didn’t. He wasn’t even in the right city. A cop can’t exercise a search warrant if he’s not in the same city, right?”
He just grunted, but managed to sound interested at the same time.
“So, anyway, Vargas came in with a bunch of guys and a bogus warrant, and I don’t think these other guys were cops. They reminded me an awful lot of the guys Jonathan Powers uses. Corporate security or something. Anyway, they just busted in, and there was a little, um, altercation. And, well, Vargas might have gotten knocked out. And some of the others might have gotten hurt as well. And I just wanted you to know that it wasn’t our fault.”
The line went silent, and for a moment I thought my cell phone had lost reception. Then Cassara started talking again, really slowly.
“So, you see, Chance, that’s funny.” I had a feeling this observation wasn’t actually going to be that funny. I was starting to regret making this call. “See, I just heard that there was this home invasion over in one of them nice suburbs less than an hour ago. Seems a bunch of guys, they, like, busted into this house to steal stuff. That’s kind of the point of home invasion, you see? And, well, there happened to be an off-duty cop who witnessed it. A Detective Vargas.”
“And, see, he was a regular hero. I mean, it was really fortunate he happened to be there, you know? He did, like, the whole hero thing, took them on single-handedly. There was a fight. Sometimes that happens with heroes when they get all heroic. So, during this fight, some people died, including our hero detective Vargas. That happens too. Even heroes die, Chance. It’s the funniest thing; not like in the movies at all.”
“What?” I said. Lacey was looking at me funny. I think all the blood must have drained out of my face, and I was starting to feel a little dizzy.
“So is this you asking to repeat myself again? ‘Cause if so, I’m hanging up.”
“No, no; I mean, when we left, he was alive. I’m sure of it. Some of the other guys maybe weren’t so good, but he was.”
“So, now he’s not. Seems like maybe he, you know, died from his wounds or something. It happens. ‘Cause sometimes, you know, it’s convenient. ‘Cause, you know, then you can’t have embarrassing questions. Okay, so that’s not true. You can have embarrassing questions, just not so many embarrassing answers.”
I was quiet for a few seconds, digesting all of this.
“Seems like maybe someone might be covering something up, you know. Throwing dirt on it and making it go away. Now I think I told you before, I’m a pretty good digger. They can throw it on and I can dig it up. And who knows—maybe if I’m a little bit faster than they are, I could get to the bottom, and, you know, figure out what’s going on. Maybe. I don’t know. Someone could just tell me, so I didn’t have to get dirty doing all that digging.”
“It’s Powers, looking for that thing Professor Stone had. He knows I have it.”
“Okay, that follows. That makes sense.”
“And I can’t give it back to him. At least not yet.”
“So, okay, so I think I’ve got it. You have his stolen property and you don’t want to give it back right now. But maybe later or something. When it suits you.”
“Yeah, that’s it. I just have to keep hold of it a couple more days; then he can have it back. But he’s been trying to kill us, and when I do give it back, he might not be happy with the shape it’s in, and, well, I’m worried he might kill us anyway.”
“Okay. So, what it seems like to me is maybe…I dunno, I could be wrong here, but maybe you’ve got yourself a little, how do I put it? Out of your league? In over your head? Something like that.”
“That’s why I’m calling you.”
“I’m a detective, not a bodyguard.”
“But, see, we’re going to give this thing back to him, you know?” I was even starting to talk like Cassara; my subconscious was trying to stay in good with him too, I guess.
“But you said it would be damaged, like ruined. Maybe he’d rather have it in good shape.”
“It’s not like that,” I said, a little whine entering my voice.
“Yeah, so, see, I’m a detective, and I’m pretty good at getting information out of people; not the best, but pretty good, you know? But the thing is, what’s even better is when people just come right out and say stuff, you know? So I don’t, like, have to go getting it. ‘Cause really, that just pisses me off, you know? Like paperwork. Paperwork pisses me off too.”
“Detective Cassara, you wouldn’t believe me if I told you,” I said, completely truthfully.
“Well, now, maybe that could be the case. On the other hand, who knows until you try, right? I mean, I’ve been a cop a long time. Seen some strange shit. Like honest politicians and well-intentioned criminals. So how about you just tell me and, I dunno, I decide for myself, maybe?”
So I told him. I don’t know how many times I had told the story over the last few days, but however many times it was, it was that many too many. I didn’t even bother cutting out all that much. I mean, I cut out the vampires and werewolves, but I left in the bottle of demons and the exorcism. I finished and waited and worried again that my cell phone had gone dead.
“So, okay, that was pretty weird. But like I said, I’ve been around the block once or twice and, well, I seen a lot of strange things.”
“Yeah, you said that.”
“Okay, so, tell you what, Chance—most people, they might say that you must be, I don’t know, batshit-crazy, maybe? But me, I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt. So it’s a jar, right? An urn or whatever? So I can’t see why someone couldn’t wait a couple of days for it. As long as it’s returned in good shape, right? Pristine?
“So as long as all you’re doing is getting rid of the demons, which everyone knows don’t exist, then it’s not like you’re hurting it, right? ‘Cause you can’t really get rid of things that don’t exist in the first place.
“So, see, when you’re done—when you’re ready to give it back to its rightful owner—I’ll do you a favor. It’s a little one, might not make a difference or anything, but I’ll do it for you. Maybe it’ll help you out. Keep you around a little longer. Who knows? I’ve seen stranger things.”
I hung up and looked over at Lacey, who had been glaring at me the entire time. “What? Cop friend.” I stretched the truth a little.
She shook her head and looked back at the road. “I hope you know what you’re doing, Chance.”
That made two of us.
Chapter 25
I kept following Lacey’s directions, and another thirty minutes of winding along slow mountain roads had us at the gate of a private drive.
The drive itself was so well hidden by trees that I shot past it. Fortunately, no one was behind me, and I sheepishly reversed back down the road as Lacey reminded me that she had told me the turn was coming up. There was a set of black wrought-iron gates set fifteen feet back from the road. Each one had an ornate R on it.
“R?” I asked.
“Stands for Rosewood. That’s what Donovan calls his place.”
A little stuffy-sounding, but I guess people were entitled to call their houses names if they wanted.
There was a box with a button on the driver’s side; that was self-explanatory. What wasn’t obvious was what I was supposed to say. I looked at Lacey for direction.
She gave me a patient look. “Try pushing the button.”
“Yeah, no kidding. And then what?”
“I’ll take care of it.”
I pushed the button and was greeted by a voice, which was, thankfully, easier to understand than your typical fast-food drive-thru teenager. It was asking us politely what our business was.
Lacey leaned across me and answered into the speaker. “It’s me, Lacey. Lacey Hobbs. I have Megan with me. We need to get her inside.”
“And the others?” I looked around for a camera and finally spotted it right above the speaker. CCTV cameras had become really small.
“Bryan and Chance…” She paused and looked at me. I remembered that we had not yet been what you’d call properly introduced.
“Lee,” I supplied quietly, even though the person on the other side of the camera could clearly see that I was in the car.
“Lee,” she relayed to the speaker. “It’s okay; they’re friends of Megan’s.” Nothing happened for several seconds, and I wondered if they were going to let us in. But then the gate silently swung open, and I moved the car down the drive.
We went at least a hundred yards before the trees opened into a huge manicured lawn. A series of different-colored rose bushes ran the length of the drive from where the lawn started to the main house, which was a magnificently tacky Victorian gingerbread monstrosity. It was three stories high, with wraparound porches on two floors, two towers, and a widow’s walk on the roof. There was even a gazebo on the lawn, and what looked like a large garage to the side of the house.
Now, this at last was something I expected. I mean, vampires should live in big old mansions. Of course, this one was a bit too cheery with its yellow paint, white trim, and green roof, but still, it was a start.
As we approached, I could see small rectangular windows set in the stonework along the bottom of the house, confirming that it had a basement, a rarity back in Texas. I wondered if there would be coffins. In all my experiences with vampires the past six months, I had yet to see a single coffin. I was actually disappointed in a morbid way.
I pulled up in front of the house, noting that its heavily tinted windows were all shuttered from the inside. The massive wooden front door opened and a tall grey-haired man walked out, wearing, I kid you not, tails. He looked like a butler straight off an old movie set.
“Shit! This place is da bomb,” said Bryan from the back. “Do they have a pool?”
“Yeah,” said Lacey. “A big one in back.”
“Sweet. The two of us will take it for a test drive.”
“I didn’t bring a suit.”
“Me either, babe—that’s the point.”
The butler said, “Follow me,” and motioned to the garage.
He walked alongside the car as we ambled toward the garage. He pointed a remote at it, and one of the four hardwood double-space doors rose open. The inside of the garage was two cars deep, and I could see that most of the spots were filled by a breathtaking collection of expensive cars. I pulled the Mustang forward into the empty spot next to a pristine red Porsche 911. The garage door started closing, and I got out and went to the trunk. That’s when I saw the two holes: one to the left of the gas cap and another just below the first and further left. The SUV driver had hit us.
Lacey saw them too, and I could see the concern well up on her face. I put the key in the lock and turned it, throwing the trunk open just as the garage door shuddered shut.
Megan lay there, curled up. One hand pressed a red shop rag against the back of the bullet holes. I could see blood covering her dress where the bullets had
hit, and her hand and part of the arm holding the rag were covered with third-degree burns where sunlight had shone in. Blackened, scorched skin had sloughed off in places. Her bare ankle was bruised and discolored where it had been broken.
Her eyes fluttered open, and she looked into mine and smiled. “Are we there yet?” Looking at her, I felt sick. I reached down and lifted her out of the trunk. Holding her in my arms, she seemed even smaller than normal. She couldn’t have weighed more than a hundred pounds.
I turned to look at the butler with a “now what?” expression.
He looked at Megan, then at me, and said, “Follow me, sir.” So we did. The man went to the back of the garage, to a row of shelves filled with motor oil and other car parts. He pressed something under one of the shelves and a section moved aside. He flipped on a light and revealed a stone stairway leading down. We descended to a passageway that led two ways: one toward the main house and the other to somewhere else on the grounds. We walked down the bare stone hall. It looked like it was probably built at the same time as the house. It was illuminated by bare corkscrew-type fluorescent bulbs every ten feet or so. At least the vampires were energy conscious.
Megan had buried her face into my shoulder. I noticed Bryan had been staring at her burns as truth slowly chipped away at what was left of his reality.
We came to another staircase, spiral this time, and the butler started to climb it. The passage continued down and ended at another staircase that also led up. We went up after him, and came though a secret door into a large pantry stocked with canned goods and other regular food items you’d expect to find in a standard human-filled household. The pantry opened onto a modern commercial kitchen. I didn’t ask what they used it for.
The butler went to an oversized fridge, extracted three units of blood, and handed them to me. I adjusted my hand and took them. He bowed his head slightly and turned to leave.
“Thanks…?” I let it drag, hoping he’d fill in the name.
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