The nurse gave her a shaky smile. “I know.”
“It’s night now. Can you open the window?”
The nurse walked over to the wall and entered a code on a number pad and a green light came on at the top of the window as a metal cover opened and moonlight filled the room. The woman smiled. “It won’t be long before I’m strong enough to be outside and see the stars. One day we’ll be able to live in the night without shame. One day.”
Darkness.
Joseph blinked his eyes open and the side of his head throbbed with pain. His heart raced, as the scene was flipped upside down. He blinked again and it stayed the same. Then the realization hit him that his vision was perfect but he was hanging upside down. He lifted his neck to see his legs tied to the top of a gambrel. His arms were tied behind his back and he struggled to assess his surroundings in the dim candlelight. But he saw a once familiar figure in a black habit. “Who is there?” His voice was barely above a whisper due to the pain on the side of his head. “What are you doing? Let me down…I don’t feel well anymore.” He coughed. “The blood is going to my head and I can’t feel my legs. My head hurts. Please…”
The old man appeared and moved closer to him; he held a long blade in his hand. Joseph raised his head but he couldn’t hold it up and it bobbed from side to side. “What are you doing? I can’t feel my legs. Please. I don’t feel good.”
The old man moved next to him and crouched by his face, as the other figure hovered around the edges of his sight. “You know what I have to do.”
Joseph bobbed his head to the side. “Please. What? I told him I would not say anything! I kept my word!”
“I’ll start at your Achilles tendon and work my way down…”
He placed the blade at the point of Joseph’s Achilles and carefully pushed the knife into the skin and pulled down as the skin opened up like a blooming flower. Blood flowed freely down. The old man pushed his fingers into the wet flesh closest to the calf muscle and placed his index finger and thumb on the femoral artery. He whispered unintelligible words as the artery pulsed in his fingers. Joseph twisted his neck and looked up but didn’t believe what he saw. The pain in his legs traveled down his body and he began to shake. The throbbing between the old man’s fingers got faster and faster. He pulled up the bloody blade again and sliced the femoral artery as he stepped back.
The blood shot out and down Joseph’s body. He looked up again as the blood rained down on his face and he could taste his own blood. He felt the shock of all the blood spurting from his leg and he shook more and harder and his eyes glazed over and he could barely make out the figure of a woman off to the side with an object in her hand. She approached his face. “You should have never agreed to work for the Claremont campaign,” she said in a voice barely above a whisper. She licked the dripping blood from his face. “I’m already feeling much better. We’re almost there.”
Chapter 24
November
Forty-Two Months After the NOBI Discovery
Hugo Zumthor
Special Agent in Charge of Gloaming Crimes Unit, FBI
I couldn’t get Cian Clery out of my mind. By any measure we had won. Well, excluding the gold heist and me getting sent to the hospital. But hey, I’m the one doing the counting. The score said that Cian wasn’t so pretty anymore. And he certainly wasn’t receiving the adoration he so desired. The agency knew that his pursuit of gold was only one aspect of a larger goal of a then unknown organization.
And then we received a tip. I have a love-hate relationship with tips. It’s very rare that a tip comes in from someone who has no interest in the matter—pure altruism. Most of the time the tipster—whether anonymous or identified—has a justification for the information. And that justification can sometimes determine the fate of the investigation.
The tipster wanted us—specifically the Gloaming section—to know that police in Chicago were investigating missing blood in various hospitals and blood being drained from cadavers in the morgue. You knew that would pique my interest. I contacted my former supervising agent when I first began my career as an agent. His name was Ringo Janowicz and he was kind of an underground legend in FBI circles. He busted Asian, Italian, and Russian mob operations in Chicago for years while making his name doing undercover work. There was nothing this guy wouldn’t do to catch some hood hands-deep in some illegal shit.
Ringo was a great mentor to learn from but kind of an asshole—in all fairness, that’s to be expected—who smoked like a chimney. Not e-cigarettes and vaping—he smoked the real thing. Camel nonfiltered. Every second of his waking life. He didn’t care that smoking was so out of favor and looked down upon in present society. He would light up anywhere and dare someone to make him put it out. I remember going to his apartment a few times and there would be this foggy haze all over the house. I honestly think it was permanent.
He smoked while he was talking, walking, on the phone, in the toilet, eating…Ringo claimed that he started smoking when he was eight years old. I believed it. He used to have this humongous hubcap from a 1950 Ford Fairlane in the middle of his car console that he used as an ashtray. The fucking thing was always overflowing with butts and ash. Every time we used his car I would have to take the suit I was wearing to the dry cleaners to see if it could be saved. Damn thing looked like it had been in a brush fire.
Ringo told me he would pick me up at the airport. Probably in his own car. There goes another suit…
There was something else about Chicago that left me dreading the trip. Agent Webb’s son had moved here after the event to stay with Webb’s sister. I was never good with interpersonal relationships.
That’s one of the reasons I should never have been married. I know that’s a terrible thing to say but no obsessed FBI agent should ever tell another person that they will be with them forever—and will always be there to support them. It’s a lie.
I fell in love with Melissa during college, when we had the same political science class—she was probably the shyest girl I had ever met. Eye contact was like winning the lottery. It took more than ten dates to even get a kiss from her. But maybe that’s what first attracted me to her. Even after we were married she still acted in a very constrained manner. I attributed it to her being brought up in a very religious environment. Even after the honeymoon she would shower alone and with the door locked and rarely showed her body naked.
My marriage was in embers when Melissa and I hooked up during a couple of days when I was back home between assignments. I say “hooked up” because that was what it felt like—it had been so long since we were together intimately. And then Melissa became pregnant.
I was happy and sad at the same time. Happy to have something beautiful made out of myself but sad because I probably would miss every important milestone of his or her life—until it was too late. So I left…
I had kept tabs on Agent Webb’s son and his welfare with a few phone calls and by hitting up other agents who were close to her and her family. I couldn’t decide whether to go see him or not. That could only bring up bad memories. I remember thinking of the perfect words. Like most other things, I would probably put it off for another day…
“You think it’s the Gloamings,” Ringo said, blowing smoke out of his crooked mouth.
“Know anyone else who likes blood?”
We arrived at the Cook County morgue, a disturbingly bustling monument constructed for the dead. Abby Jordan, the assistant coroner, met us in the lobby and walked us to her office. Typical government building: carpet frayed, odd smells, and out-of-date furnishings. I felt at home already.
“Sorry there aren’t any chairs,” Abby stated as she sat in hers, tapping her pen on the table as if she couldn’t wait to get this over with. “Budget crunch, you know. And to think I went to medical school for this. I traded down for sure. So…the police are already investigating this.” She sighed. “Why the FBI now?”
Ringo looked over at me, expecting me to take the lead, which brought
up some interesting emotions. It’s always odd for the mentor to become the assistant. I still felt deferential to him in many ways. “The absence of blood would indicate it could have been done by Gloamings. That’s what brings us.”
Dr. Jordan stared at me for a moment with an impassive look before she stood up and led us to the main holding area, where new bodies were brought into the morgue either by the police or from hospitals. “We have cameras here at the loading area but not everywhere in the building,” she said.
“Could have happened before they got here,” Ringo added.
Dr. Jordan nodded. “One of our techs alerted the coroner that every single body in the morgue had been drained of its blood. Then we started taking notes on the bodies that began to arrive, and they, too, were all devoid of blood. We’re not sure how long the bodies had been in that condition.”
“Or if they were made that way here,” Ringo said.
Dr. Jordan shot him a somewhat condescending look. “Fair enough.”
“Okay,” I said. “Email me the logistics of all the bodies transported here over the past two months. We’ll see you soon.”
After we got in Ringo’s car, he lit up a cigarette. “Let’s go talk to the Chicago detective.”
“I’m certain it was Gloamings,” Detective MacIntyre stated as he pushed the table away from his large frame and spread his legs out. “Or someone associated with them.” He took a bite out of his taco in this cramped taqueria in the Pilsen neighborhood of Chicago. I wondered why we would meet here instead of at the station, but right now didn’t seem like the right moment to bring it up. “There’s more here than you think.” He put down the taco.
“Like what?” I asked.
His eyes looked around as if searching for someone. “Let me show you something.”
After five minutes of arguing about which car we were going to take, we finally ended up trapped inside Ringo’s smoke machine. It didn’t take long…
“My God, man!” MacIntyre cried. “Why not just start a fire in here? There’d be less tar and carbon monoxide!”
Ringo ignored him and drove. “Where are we going?”
“Take 290 to downtown.” MacIntyre coughed.
Ten minutes later we were parked in an alley behind the Chicago Theatre. “I’m sure you’re wondering why we’re here,” MacIntyre said.
“That and how many tumors are growing in my lungs while waiting in this car,” I said, turning to look at MacIntyre in the back seat.
MacIntyre leaned forward. “People don’t know this, but there are over ninety miles of tunnels underneath downtown Chicago. They were built to be freight tunnels back in the late eighteen hundreds. They’re not used for anything anymore. At least until recently.”
“What are you saying?” I demanded.
“I think the Gloamings are using the tunnels to take these bodies and drain them of blood. Among other things.” MacIntyre sat back with a smug smile on his face, rubbing his hands together as if he had been waiting to tell someone and now that he had he felt better.
“What’s Chicago PD doing about it?” Ringo asked.
MacIntyre closed his mouth and shook his head for a moment. “I haven’t told anyone.”
“Why not?” I asked.
“Chicago PD is in on it,” Ringo said with a somber smile. “I know it in my bones.”
MacIntyre glared at him and then showed him a satisfied grin. “He’s right. I think some in the department are deep into it. Can’t trust anyone. The money floating out there is way too much.”
“So why the tunnels?” I asked. “Any evidence?”
“Oh, they’ve been careful,” MacIntyre said. “But one of the ambulances that was transporting a couple of dead bodies to the morgue was seen in the tunnel over there.” He pointed out the window. “Only takes one mistake.”
We left the car and made our way into one of the older buildings—a ten-story granite structure that looked to be over a hundred years old. There was an enormous exterior clock above the entryway. The front was engraved with the words “Marshall Field and Company.” MacIntyre explained that many old business buildings in downtown Chicago had basement entry doors to the tunnel network. We made our way inside through the large atrium, and MacIntyre spoke briefly to a uniformed guard. The guard nodded his head and MacIntyre waved at us to follow him past a teak and metal door near the elevators and down two flights of stairs to a small landing lit by one lightbulb swinging from a broken holder. Another door closed off the room.
I took out my flashlight but it was nothing more than a warning sign for trespassers. Then my heart skipped a beat. Ringo pulled out a fluorescent LED UV black light and shined it on the walls and door. They lit up with white streaks from what had to have been cleaned-up blood and other bodily fluids. And written in blood nearest the door handle: “ANOESIS.”
“I’ve seen that word before,” Ringo said.
I jerked my head at him. “Where?”
“Some middle-level drug dealer was caught with pounds of DXM and meth at a house he owned near the South Side train tracks. The train would make unscheduled stops or slowdowns and this guy and his crew would put on or take off large quantities of drugs. We busted all of them. When we had him in the box for interrogation, he wrote that on a notepad.” Ringo looked at me, expecting to hear my tale.
I was too distracted by this new information to get into how I had come across the word written in blood in that Gloaming safe house in Austin, Texas. More than two years ago. No more reliving that day anymore.
We stepped down into the cool air of the tunnel and walked about thirty yards to where the tunnel branched off into three other routes. I could see tire marks and other evidence of occupation, including lights and some wall stabilizers.
“Gosh darn, something has been going on down here,” Ringo said.
“Like I said,” MacIntyre added.
I was already walking back to the entrance door. “I want to talk to that prisoner, Ringo. Right now.”
The United States Penitentiary in Marion is a forlorn combination of linked concrete boxes masquerading as buildings. Too quiet for a prison, I thought as we walked up through the tangle of fenced walkways, which felt more constricting than a ten-foot hedge maze, like the prelude to a nightmare. We found ourselves sitting in a cramped visiting room with a small table between us, with a curved hook in the middle where the chains were attached from there to the handcuffs.
The chains hooked around the tattooed wrists of Jeff Hughes, who leaned back in his chair like a G—or a reasonable facsimile of one. He was probably too young to carry that attitude but he tried desperately to wear it well.
“The fuck I get out of this?” Hughes screamed, flexing his jail muscles with a pull of his chain.
MacIntyre rolled his eyes and glanced over at Ringo.
“We could talk to the U.S. attorney and get you some points off your time,” Ringo said.
Hughes snorted and shook his head in an exaggerated manner. “Gotta do better than that.”
I took a sip of lukewarm coffee. Tasted like shit inside a Styrofoam cup. “Jenna—the mother of your children,” I said.
Hughes bowed up in his seat. “What about her?”
“She can’t visit you because of her being on probation. What if I can make that happen?”
Hughes’s tough guy snarl dropped a few degrees and he stared at the table for a moment. “Okay,” he said. “What you got?”
I pulled out a piece of paper from my pocket and slid it over to him. On the paper was written “ANOESIS.”
Hughes’s face turned white and he looked away from the paper. “That—that’s not me.”
“Tell us,” Ringo said.
Hughes sighed and ran a hand over his shaved head. “You can’t let anyone know the fuck it was me.” He pulled his chains to lean toward me. “Tell me!”
“No one will know,” I assured him.
Hughes leaned back, breathing deep breaths, one after another. “My—my
brother, Scipio. He got caught up in this group—”
“What kind of group?” MacIntyre asked. “A gang?”
“No no no. Some fucking cult.” Hughes looked away.
I glanced over at Ringo, who had his eyebrows raised in surprise. Maybe I was the only one who saw this coming.
“He’s fucking obsessed,” Hughes continued. “All tripped out on the leader of it.”
“Who’s the leader?” I demanded, leaning forward.
Hughes slammed his hands down on the table with a clatter of chains. “I have no fucking idea. Some pretty boy. Always talking about his ‘beauty’ and shit.”
I could feel my heart pounding in my chest like a point guard bouncing a basketball up the court. I needed to call Calvin James and get him on this immediately. The smell of Cian Clery filled my nose and I vowed not to lose that scent for a second time.
“You think it’s him, don’t you?” Calvin James asked as he warmed his hands on a cup of coffee in the passenger seat of Ringo’s car. Snow was beginning to pile up on the roof and I could barely make him out with all the smoke in the car, but it didn’t matter because my eyes were trained on the front lobby doors of the Washington Lofts—a new downtown living space for all the young professionals wanting to experience the city. It was an old 1928 bank building before it was converted.
“Do the lofts have access to the tunnel system?” Calvin asked.
“No—no access. I checked the original floor plans and there hasn’t been any construction. But across the street is the old Chicago Board of Trade building, which has direct access.”
“Anyone heard from MacIntyre yet?” Ringo asked from the back seat as smoke billowed out of his mouth.
“No,” I replied, and that began to weigh on my mind.
“So this guy has to come out of the building to do his business,” Calvin said almost to himself.
A People's History of the Vampire Uprising_A Novel Page 31