Bare Bones

by Debra Dunbar

  It was up too high. The only way I was going to do this was if I managed to get to my feet, and I already felt like the room was a carousel on top speed. There was no other choice. These guys were going to kill me. It was a wonder they hadn’t killed me already. So I braced my back against the metal pole and pushed myself upward, legs quivering with the effort. It put me at the perfect spot to rub the duct tape against the jagged piece.

  I’d just gotten to work on my wrists when I heard the squawk of a door and the flick of a switch. A bright light blinded me and I panicked, dropping to the floor and closing my eyes. Idiot. As if they wouldn’t notice that I’d somehow moved across the room from where they’d originally dumped me.

  Realizing there was no way I could fake this, I kept my eyes open and got back to my knees, watching as two sets of legs came down the creaking stairs.

  “Oh good, she’s awake.” Gary grinned. He was still in Travis Dawson’s skin. I longed to punch that grin right off his face, but punching him before hadn’t seemed to have any lasting effects. Neither had shooting him. Beyond the bloody holes in his clothing, he appeared unhurt.

  “She’s moved.” The other boy, Lawton, was in the bass player’s skin. He shifted nervously back and forth at the bottom of the stairs. “We’ll duct tape her to the pole and get out of here. A new city, somewhere different. We can make a 911 call once we’re clear of the state, so someone can come get her.”

  Gary rolled his eyes. “Or we just kill her and leave her here. Who cares if anyone comes and gets her? This place is a flop house. It will be weeks before anyone comes down here and discovers her body. Longer if we throw a bunch of lime on it and wrap it in plastic.”

  I liked the first guy’s idea better.

  “She’s a Templar,” Lawton protested. “You’re crazy if you think they won’t track us down. I know you don’t care about the others, but we’re gonna die if we kill her. That cop knows us. And Templars have magical stuff. They’re like witches. No matter what skin we take, they’ll find us.”

  For a brief second Gary looked concerned, then he shrugged. “Nah. They haven’t done that sort of thing for hundreds of years. She’s not chasing us on a sanctioned mission. She’s doing this on her own. They won’t spend any time or energy hunting us down.”

  He was right, except it was the Elders who wouldn’t give a crap about my death. My family was another thing. I remembered the look on my mother’s face when I’d told her of my demon mark. She’d find these boys and make sure they met their death at the end of her sword.

  “If we let you go, you’ll leave us alone, won’t you?” Lawton pleaded, his eyes desperate.

  I couldn’t give him that reassurance. “You’ve killed people. You’ll kill again. I can’t let that stand”

  I might be signing my death warrant, but I wasn’t about to lie. They’d know it. And I’d rather go down fighting.

  Gary barked out a short, harsh laugh. “Hey, at least she’s honest. Kill her. Leave her body down here.”

  Lawton caught his breath. “Are we going to leave Baltimore? Go elsewhere?”

  “No. I like it here. And I like this Travis kid. He’s in a band. He gets the babes. Guys respect him. Did you see how we opened for Midnight Visitor? That fucking rocked. There’s no way I’m leaving that behind.”

  “Where will we stay? We can’t come back here.” There was an odd look in Lawton’s eyes as his gaze met mine, like he was trying to tell me something.

  Gary shrugged. “We’ve got options. Maybe we’ll just float for a while, or crash at this Travis kid’s place, or at the band practice spot. Doesn’t matter.”

  “Okay.”

  I felt sorry for Lawton, even though he was probably about to kill me. His face was pinched and white, his eyes wild and frightened. He licked his lips, hands shaking as he picked up an enormous wrench from beside the washing machine.

  “Make sure she’s pulverized,” Gary instructed. “Take her skin and ditch it somewhere else. That way it will take longer for them to identify her.”

  Lawton nodded, shifting the wrench to his other hand and wiping the free one on his pants.

  Gary put his arm around the other man’s shoulder. “Your first kill. Sure you can? I had to kill Huang for you and this Strike kid you’re wearing. I’m getting tired of doing all the heavy lifting in this partnership.”

  “I can do it.” Lawton said, his voice shaking.

  “Good.” Gary patted him on the shoulder. “Because if I find out she’s not dead, then you are. You’re either all the way in or all the way out, and after that fiasco at the bus station and your brief stint in jail, I’m not sure I can trust you. I need to trust you. So it’s her, or it’s you. You heard her. You let her go and she’ll come back after us. I’ll check. And if I see her alive, then you won’t be. Got it?”

  Lawton nodded. “Got it.”

  Gary turned to walk up the stairs and Lawton swung. I dove to the side, rolling and the wrench slammed against the dirt. “Hold still,” he ordered, his voice more firm than it had been all evening.

  “Have fun.” Gary laughed. I heard the squeak of the stairs, the slam of the door, then the impact of the wrench on the dirt as I frantically rolled around the basement.

  “Hold still.” This time Lawton’s voice was a concerned whisper. “I don’t want to hit you.”

  I froze, more from shock than any inclination to comply with his command. He hit the ground beside me with the wrench, reaching out with his other hand to yank the rag from my mouth. I didn’t have a drop of saliva left. The taste of dry fiber and old paint was the only thing on my tongue.

  “Quiet.” He hit the ground twice more, this time putting his back into it. There were dents forming in the hard, red, rocky clay from the wrench. I held still, and kept my mouth shut, wincing and blinking every time the wrench came down. Finally he stopped, cocking his head to listen to something.

  “You need to get out of here fast. I wouldn’t put it past him to come back to check on your dead body.”

  It was my turn to lick my lips. “He’ll kill you if he doesn’t see my dead, skinned body in this basement.”

  Lawton’s eyes glistened with tears. “I’ll lie and say I dumped your body elsewhere. I don’t care. I’m not killing, and I’m especially not killing a Templar. Gary might not care about our family, but I do. I’m not signing their death sentence just because he’s gone crazy.”

  The adrenaline faded with his words and I slumped, once again feeling the pain of my head, my ribs, and the myriad cuts all over my limbs. He was going to let me go. I was hurt but I’d live. I only wished I had the same confidence that he’d live.

  “I didn’t kill Brian Huang,” Lawton said, his eyes earnest as they met mine. “Gary did. Later that night he took my skin—Lawton King’s skin—and hid it from me, forcing me to wear Brian Huang. I’ve been Lawton for ten years. It was…it hurt to be someone else. And now this kid.”

  “I believe you,” I told him. I did. This poor kid was trapped and scared.

  “Gary put Brian Huang’s body in the closet to get back at me because I told him I needed to go home to Brian’s wife and to work the next day. They were expecting me. There was a special exhibit and I had to be there.”

  Trapped, scared, and more than a little unhinged. Lawton was talking almost as though he’d become Brian Huang when he’d put the skin on. Was that what happened to skinwalkers? “It’s okay. I’m going to find him and put him away where he can’t hurt you or anyone else ever again.”

  “You’ll never catch him.” Lawton’s voice was grim as he stalked over to a shelf of painting supplies and knocked it over, prying the lid off a gallon of red and dumping it on the floor. I watched as he smeared the red across the wrench, flinging drops of it onto the walls.

  “I believe you, I really do, but you had to have killed someone in your past. A brother? A sister? Maybe you were really young and someone forced you to do it.”

  “I didn’t kill anyone, not even Law
ton King.” His voice was wooden as he splattered the red paint across the room. “I didn’t kill anyone. Sometimes when people die, and they’re real fresh, we can use their skins.”

  Ew. But I believed him. There was something about this boy—when he was Brian Huang, as well as when he was this Strike guy—that made me believe him. He hadn’t killed anyone. He was just a kid caught in a bad situation with no way out.

  That meant what I’d read about skinwalkers was wrong. They didn’t have to kill a family member to gain the ability. And I still had no idea how to stop them. Either the naming thing hadn’t worked or Gary Jarvett wasn’t really Gary Jarvett. I was at a loss on how to stop and apprehend these two—three if I counted the female running around north of the city as a vampire. But right now, the priority was getting out of this basement and to safety. And possibly getting some medical attention.

  “There.” Lawton threw the wrench into the corner and dug in his pocket pulling out a cell phone—my cell phone. He placed it by the stairs and began to make his way up. “Better hurry. And leave us alone. I’ll try to convince Gary to leave the city. Just leave us alone.”

  I saw him disappear up the steps and heard the door close. He’d left the light on, and I took immediate advantage of my chance at freedom, scooting back over to the pole and shimmying upward to again saw at the duct tape on my hands. Once they were free, I tore at the strips around my feet, scooping up the cell phone and the wrench as I headed up the stairs.

  The wooden treads creaked and I winced with every noise, unsure that I truly was alone in the house. But when I eased open the door I heard nothing.

  This truly was a flop house. Plywood covered the windows on the outside. The front door had obviously been pried open. Fixtures and plumbing were ripped from splintered cabinetry. The ceiling hung in tatters, the linoleum floor was chipped and scuffed. Rags were piled in a corner. I doubted the skinwalkers used this for more than a dumping ground. Gary seemed far too fastidious to set up home in such a place.

  I wasn’t about to linger. I made my way to the rear of the house, climbing between the two-by-fours blocking the broken doorway and into an overgrown lawn with a dilapidated, rusty fence. Judging from the adjoining backyards, the whole block was vacant. I took advantage of that fact and climbed through the yards, breaking into a painful run once I’d hit the street.

  After a few blocks the adrenaline had once again faded, leaving me ready to puke and pass out on the concrete. I sat against a brick wall covered with graffiti and pulled out my phone, eyeing the street signs and ignoring the curious stairs of the residents. There were messages—some from Tremelay and a few from Dario. I winced and glanced at the sky. It was close to dawn. I knew if I called Dario he wouldn’t be able to get here before the sun came up, and judging from his texts he was hard at work tracking the skinwalker vampire.

  So I called Tremelay. The detective shot off a panicked, incomprehensible stream of questions the moment he answered.

  “I’m okay,” I assured him. “Well, actually I have a concussion and some cuts, and probably bruised ribs, but I’m okay. Can you come pick me up?”

  I gave him the cross streets, relieved that I wouldn’t have to walk all the way back to Fells Point. Not that I knew exactly how to get to my apartment, or to my car. I hoped my sword was still in my trunk. Although anyone who tried to steal Trusty would have gotten a nasty magical shock.

  “I’ll be right there,” Tremelay promised.

  There was one more person I’d need to talk to. Again I looked at the gray tint to the east and dialed Dario.

  Chapter 30

  I’VE GOT A lead on your girl.” Dario’s voice was cheerful. I was about to change that.

  “Let me know how you manage to subdue her because none of the stuff that crappy excuse for a supernatural expert Hakan Garza wrote about worked.”

  There was a moment of poignant silence. “You okay?”

  “Concussion. Bruised ribs. Cut up like a spiral-sliced ham. Other than that I’m okay.” Actually I felt better than I should have. Reaching up, I touched the lump on my head. It wasn’t huge and the skin wasn’t broken. I was beginning to think my unconscious state had been from whatever sleepy spell the skinwalkers used and not the board Lawton had smacked me with. But why hadn’t the sleepy spell rebounded on them? And why was I not dead?

  They could have killed me. They should have killed me. Lawton was the only reason I was still alive and him letting me go could cost him his life.

  “You shot them?” Dario asked. His voice was now gruff and harsh, like he was chewing gravel and ready to rip the head off of someone.

  “The one that was attacking me, yeah. I unloaded the clip. Now, in all fairness to Garza, I didn’t shoot him in the neck. I was worried about missing and having the bullet kill someone on the other side of the wall. Still, it should have slowed him down. He didn’t even flinch.”

  Dario swore. “How physically strong were they? If the humans are greater than human strength, then I’m wondering how powerful this vampire one is going to be.”

  Incredible Hulk with fangs? “This guy was a skinny, tall kid and he managed to take me down. I think I would have held my own if the other one hadn’t hit me in the head with a board. Either way, you might want backup.”

  He grunted and I wasn’t sure whether my suggestion offended his ego or he was considering how much backup to bring. “Sure you’re okay?”

  Awww. He was worried about me. “No. I need a box of cannoli and a good bottle of Chianti right now. When are you coming home?”

  I practically heard his smile. “As soon as I catch this girl of yours. We’ve finally got the rogue situation under control. The only ones left alive are harmless and we definitely sent a message about hunting on the fringes of our territory.”

  I thought about the two boys, how Lawton seemed trapped in his circumstances, how Gary didn’t care about anyone but himself. Which was this girl? And did I want to risk vampire lives to find out?

  No, I didn’t.

  “If she’s anything like these other two skinwalkers, then don’t worry about bringing her in alive.”

  “Didn’t know you wanted her alive.” Dario’s voice once again was amused. “But of course you wanted her alive. You’re a Templar and she needs to face human justice.”

  If the past month had taught me anything, it was that human justice was flawed and sometimes it needed to come another way. “I just had my rear end handed to me by these two. Don’t underestimate her, and if it looks like she might get away, I’d rather she be dead.”

  She’d killed two vampires and who knows how many people. I couldn’t let her go free to continue killing.

  “Okay. It’s coming on dawn soon, but I’ll get right on it tomorrow night. Hopefully I’ll be back before sunup.”

  I hoped so. Hanging up with Dario, I saw Tremelay’s sedan pull in. He jumped from the car and raced toward me, face full of concern.

  “Ainsworth! You look like a crime scene photo. You sure you’re okay?”

  I repeated my list of injuries and waited while he checked my head and various cuts.

  “What the hell happened?” The detective plopped down beside me, handing me a much needed bottle of water and a couple of aspirin.

  I swallowed the pills and gulped half the contents of the bottle before replying. “I was rooting through the bags in the back room when Gary, the one impersonating Travis Dawson, cornered me. None of Garza’s techniques worked. The guy attacked me with a knife, which may or may not have been coming out of his finger, and when the other one came in, I knew I was in trouble. So I pulled out your gun. Unloaded it in Gary’s chest and it didn’t do squat. Next thing I know I’m on the ground, unconscious, then waking up in the basement of an abandoned house.”

  “They didn’t kill you?” Tremelay asked, incredulous.

  Obviously not. “Yeah. I know. Gary told Lawton to kill me, but the kid let me go. I’m afraid he’s going to pay for that act of charity with h
is life.”

  The detective rubbed his face in his hands. “I lost sight of you when the band broke, and when the gunshots went off the crowd surged for the door. It was a damned mob. By the time I got free and went looking for you, all I found was the empty gun and shells. Oh, and blood splatter.”

  He must have thought the worst. Without thinking, I wrapped my arm around him and gave him a hug, resting my head on his shoulder.

  “I had to preserve it all as a crime scene, report you as a possible victim. I’m so sorry, but I truly thought it was going to be your skinned body we found next.” Tremelay’s voice wavered and I hugged him tighter, even though the movement was killing my poor ribs.

  “I’m fine. I’ve got no idea where these two skinwalkers are, but I’m fine.”

  He sighed and pulled away. “Do you need to go to the hospital? Stitches? X-rays? How hard did that kid hit you on the head?”

  I felt the bump again, finding a second one from where I’d smacked the wall when Gary had thrown me. “Not that hard. I don’t think I need stitches, and I’m pretty sure my ribs are just bruised. Honestly I just want a shower and a nap.”

  Tremelay grimaced. “It might be a few hours before that happens. I need you to come down to the police station.”

  I stared at him with huge eyes. He had to be joking. I’d had the crap beaten out of me, seriously thought I was a goner, and he needed me to go to the station? “Why?”

  He squirmed. “Because the gun was registered to me. I told them I’d given it to you. You fired the entire clip and there was blood everywhere.”

  “At least half of that blood was mine,” I retorted.

  “I reported you as missing, possibly taken by the skinner.”