The Fixer: A Lawson Vampire Novel 1 (The Lawson Vampire Series)

by Jon F. Merz

  I looked at the clock on the nightstand. I’d been out for over twelve hours. That was a long time for a human. For a vampire, given our increased ability to handle damage, it was a bad sign. If I’d been a mortal, that blast would have finished me.

  It would have finished Talya, I realized.

  "Talya was in there with me."

  McKinley nodded. "We know it was her room, but believe me when I tell you, Lawson, there was no one else in that room except for you. There would have been remains, burned clothing, bones, hell- anything. Instead, all they found was your busted up body."

  "All right. Did Cosgrove hit another nightclub?"

  McKinley frowned. "No."

  "What’s the matter?"

  "Lawson." He sighed. "Cosgrove got one of our own."

  "What? One of us? Who? And why? That doesn’t make any sense."

  "We’ll talk later. You need to rest."

  "The hell. Tell me what happened."

  McKinley looked at the door and then back at me. "It was an elder, Lawson. He got an elder. We don’t know why. We don’t have any clues whatsoever. But he got him good. They found him inside his apartment when he didn’t report for work today. Cosgrove left his guts draped all over the house and his head on a bed post."

  "Jesus."

  McKinley leaned closer. "I want you at the apartment where he got wasted. Try to find out why Cosgrove would have bothered with an elder."

  "OK," I gestured to my bed. "You wanna wheel me over there?"

  He grinned. "When you’re released, Lawson. You can’t do anything for the poor bastard now anyway. We’ll talk tomorrow. Let me know what you find out."

  I grabbed his arm. "I want a guard."

  He pulled back and frowned. "What?"

  "You heard me. Put someone on the door. Someone good. There’s some serious shit going on, McKinley. There’s no way I’m going to lay here like some clay pigeon waiting for whoever put me here to show up and finish the damned job."

  "What kind of serious shit?"

  I clued him in on the failed attack with the wooden blade.

  McKinley frowned. "C’mon Lawson, that could have just been for show. For the robbery."

  "I know what a goddamned robbery looks like and I know a hit team when I see it." I took a breath. "And now Cosgrove hits an elder? There’s more going on than his simple psychotic episodes."

  "More?"

  "I’m not sure how it all comes together yet."

  He flattened the wrinkles in his shirt. "You’re serious."

  I nodded. "Damn straight."

  He sighed. "Okay, okay, I’ll call up a reserve. Got anybody in mind-?"

  "No goddamned reserves, McKinley. Get me someone active."

  "Active? Lawson, you know what kind of waves that’s gonna cause?"

  "I don’t care. You get me someone I can trust my life with."

  "Hey, buddy, you forget you aren’t exactly due to win any popularity contests in the service? You don’t have many friends out there. And even if you did, trust is an almost obsolete commodity nowadays. You got anybody in mind?"

  I thought for a second. "Get me Zero."

  "Zero? You kidding? He hasn’t seen any action in years. He’s a Control like me. You said you wanted an active agent."

  "Zero’s the best. And he’s a former active agent. I want him here. ASAP."

  McKinley sighed again. "Okay, I’ll ring him up. Jesus, this is getting to be a royal pain in my ass. Just try not to die in the meantime, okay? Try to get some sleep."

  Easier said than done. How the hell could I sleep when somewhere out there Cosgrove was stalking another victim, and god knew what else. And then there was the whole matter about Talya. How the hell did she survive that blast? McKinley said she wasn’t one of us. She was human. I didn’t know too many humans who could survive being on ground zero with a huge packet of plastic explosive suddenly detonating close by. No way.

  Too many questions. No answers.

  And man, did my body hurt.

  ***

  It took Zero two hours to get there. I spent the entire time jumping at every creak and squeak in my immediate area. But when he hauled his six foot two inch two hundred and twenty pound frame through the door, I suddenly felt a lot better.

  He stopped short when he saw the bandages. "Anyone tell the museum their Egyptian mummy had a run in with a ketchup truck?"

  "Nice to see you, too, Zero."

  He came over to the bed and grabbed my hand and shook it. "Been a long time Lawson."

  "Too long, Zero. Too long. Where you been?"

  "Came as soon as I got the call from, McKinley. Traffic was a bitch. They’re doing construction outside of Hartford. It was stop and go the entire way."

  "They’re always doing construction in Connecticut."

  "Tell me something I don’t know. It’s the official state hobby, I think."

  "Ought to put a requisition in for a chopper."

  Zero grinned. "Sure, we could paint it black and call it Fang One or something else original."

  It was good to have him here with me. Zero oversaw Fixer operations in Connecticut. He was based in Hartford, and while McKinley had been right when he’d said Zero hadn’t seen any action in a long time, there was still nobody else I would have wanted guarding my back during my temporary disability.

  Zero and I went way back. He was my first partner when I graduated from Fixer training. Back then, they paired rookies with veterans. Zero’d been a Fixer longer than most.

  He met me at Heathrow Airport where I’d just finished a trans-Atlantic flight from Boston. I’d had no idea who to look out for, but my orders were simple enough: go to the concession stand, order a coffee and wait.

  Have I mentioned how much I hate coffee?

  Well, this being my first real assignment, I wasn’t about to let a simple dislike of ground beans stop me. I ordered the coffee black and then waited by a table with two chairs.

  Zero waited a half hour before approaching me.

  He came up on me so quickly and quietly that it scared the hell out of me. He dropped into the chair opposite me and grinned.

  "You’re Lawson."

  "Yes."

  He nodded. "You were told to order coffee."

  "I did."

  He nodded. "But you didn’t drink it, did you?"

  I had attempted two or three half-hearted sips and told Zero as much. He chuckled.

  "There will be times, my young friend when you must drink down the worst concoctions you can imagine, all in the name of the Balance. And you know what? You’ll drink them as if they were sweetest tasting nectar ever to grace your lips, and you’ll do it because by the time I’m through with you, you’ll be more of a professional than whatever walked out of the camp." He sat back. "After all, we’re tied to the hip, you and I. My survival is now as much in your hands as yours is in mine." He smiled. "So, don’t fuck it up."

  I’d mumbled an apology, which he dismissed. He gestured over to the other side of the food area. "Do you see those two men in hats? With the dark suits?"

  I looked and saw them. "Yes."

  "The one on the right is Yuri Vasilev, a local KGB gumshoe. The man he is with is Hans Junger of the East German Stasi. They are both bloodhounds."

  "What do they have to do with us?"

  Zero took a sip of my coffee and then replaced it on the table. "Everything, Lawson. They have everything to do with us. We are alike in many, many ways. And even if they are human and we are vampires, there are similarities that go beyond mere flesh and blood."

  "So, I’m supposed to learn from them as well?"

  Zero shrugged. "Perhaps. They are, after all, professionals. And you are an untested green Fixer."

  "But what can they teach me?"

  Zero smiled, finished my coffee in a gulp and gestured for me to follow him as we rose from the table. "For one thing, my young friend, they can teach you how to blend in better. They’ve been watching you since you arrived."

/>   "Watching me?"

  "Heathrow is a major way point for intelligence agents from all over the world. You’ve just deplaned from an American carrier, ordered a coffee and not taken many sips from it. To top it off, you’ve been sitting in the middle of a concession area for thirty minutes without a book or a newspaper, looking around the terminal like a lost puppy. Being the professionals that they are, although in truth it didn’t take much, they picked you out as a potential newly active intelligence agent in the area."

  I felt sick.

  Zero kept talking. "Right now, our pictures are being taken by the man next to the flower kiosk wearing the muted plaid sport coat. Within two hours those pictures will be developed and on their way back to Berlin or Moscow where they will be compared to a huge database of all known Western operatives."

  "But we won’t match any one."

  "No, we won’t." Zero laughed again. "Which means, in all probability, they’ll believe we are new agents and thus open a new file for us."

  "God, I’m sorry."

  "Don’t be, Lawson. It happens to everyone." He sat back watching me. "A lot different from the camp and those field exercises, isn’t it?"

  "Yes. Yes, it is."

  And it was. But Zero took me under his wing until I wasn’t a greenhorn any longer. We saw a lot of shit in Europe and the Middle East where there had been some attempts to split from the Council and establish another organization, independent of Council control.

  Naturally, that hadn’t sat too well with the powers that be. Zero and I were dispatched to put the leader down. We walked straight into an ambush and almost died in the process. If it hadn’t been for Zero, I would have never lasted a second. But he brought me through it, in spades.

  He’d retired from field work a long while back, choosing to run ops the way McKinley did in Boston. He’d had a long service record so the Council granted his request. And while he may have been out of action, he still looked exactly the same way I remembered him: in great shape and able to kick mucho ass.

  And that was what I wanted.

  With Zero watching over me, I could at least get some sleep.

  He looked me over again and prodded one of my bandaged legs. "For crying out loud, Lawson, didn’t I teach you anything about hotel rooms?"

  "You said they were nifty places to get laid in."

  "I also said they were prime ambush sites, you knucklehead."

  I smiled. "Must have missed that lesson."

  "No shit." He picked up my chart and spent five minutes examining it. "Doctor one of ours?"

  I nodded. "So says McKinley."

  "Good. At least I won’t have to bother with curious doctors and nurses." He pulled a chair up to the bed. "You want to tell me what the hell happened?"

  I filled him as best as I was able to, which in truth wasn’t much. He said nothing for a while, just frowned. Then he walked to the window.

  "Get some sleep, Lawson. We’ll talk when you wake up."

  So I did.

  Chapter Fourteen

  I woke up in the back of Zero’s black Chevy Tahoe as we cruised down Beacon Street toward Kenmore Square. I sat up and rubbed my head. It still ached like the bastard child of a whiskey, vodka, sake, and beer orgy.

  "Welcome back, friend."

  He smiled in the darkness and I clapped him on the shoulder. "Everything okay?"

  He nodded. "Doc says they got most of that crap out of you. Most of it. He couldn’t be completely certain. You’re in no danger, of course, but you’ll probably be able to tell when it’s gonna rain in the future. That and metal detectors might be a problem for you."

  "Damn, I was hoping for x-ray vision."

  "Ingrate. He said everything else checked out. He also advised that you stay away from hotels for a while."

  "Everybody’s a goddamn comedian."

  Zero chuckled. "That’s it, shoot the messenger."

  I watched Commonwealth Avenue zip past us. "Where we going?"

  "Buddy of mine runs a bar in Allston. We need to have a drink and a long talk."

  I checked myself over while he drove. My clothes had been replaced, thank god, courtesy of McKinley who knew my sizes. Aside from my pounding head, I felt pretty achy, but all things considered, things seemed to be working all right. Probably wouldn’t be back up to full operational capacity for a day or two. But it was better being out of that hospital than in it.

  Zero parked just off Harvard Avenue and we threaded our way through the Wednesday night crowds until he pulled me into a little recessed bar, just off the main thoroughfare.

  "He keeps the joint understated. Doesn’t really like catering to the college crowds."

  "Make a fortune if he did."

  Zero shrugged. "Never been real interested in making money." He yanked open the heavy wooden door and we went inside.

  It was a dark, musty, old world bar that brought you right back to a different time. A faint smell of peat hung in the air and off in the corner I could see bright flames jumping inside a stone hearth. Smoke hung heavy in the room from a hundred cigars, pipes, and cigarettes. As we entered, heads turned, checking us over. The noise level dropped momentarily, but picked up as soon as we passed the nonverbal inspection.

  Zero led the way to the bar, a thick plank of oaken timber polished to a bright sheen by the arms of thousands of patrons over the years. From out of the gloom a short, squat man appeared. Judging by the girth of his forearms, the thickness of his neck, and the barrel shaped chest, I knew his past included time in the Navy, most likely in the SEALs.

  He chuckled as he came up to us. "Well, well, well."

  Zero grinned. "How are you my friend?"

  He leaned in towards Zero and grasped his hand, pumping it three times before letting him go. "I’m well, you ungrateful son of a bitch." His eyes narrowed. "I haven’t seen or heard from you in years. You coulda been dead, man."

  "You know the work. You know the hours."

  The man nodded. "Got three divorces to prove it, too." He leaned in closer. "What brings you back?"

  Zero inclined his head. "Business, always the business."

  The man tossed his thumb over his shoulder. "Gotcha. Grab a table in back. I’ll bring some drinks."

  We wove our way through the crowd and found our way to the rear of the bar. Several roughly hewn wooden tables stood on massive legs. Zero pulled a chair out and eased himself into it. I slid into the chair opposite.

  The bartender appeared and with him came two bowls of what looked like beef stew and two ceramic steins of a dark frothy German beer. I took a sip and found it was Dortmunder.

  "Difficult beer to get here in the States."

  Zero took a long haul on his and smiled. "Difficult, yes. But not impossible." He pointed at the bowl. "Eat some food, Lawson."

  It smelled delicious and I could see the huge chunks of potato and carrot floating amid the sea of thick sauce and beef. I took a small spoonful, but could manage very little. My head hurt too much.

  We sat there for another five minutes, drinking and allowing our eyes to become accustomed to the darkness of the bar. When Zero had something to say, it was best to just let him get to it when he felt the time was right. Prodding him never accomplished anything. He was always careful. Calculating.

  It took ten minutes before he cleared his throat and got a fresh stein of beer before he turned to me.

  "You’re after Cosgrove."

  I nodded. "Got the termination order this time. It’s official."

  He nodded. "You think so, huh?"

  "What’s that supposed to mean?"

  He frowned and took another drag. "Lawson, if I asked you what the most important aspect of our job is, what would you say?"

  "The Balance. Maintaining the Balance. Any new recruit would tell you that."

  "Exactly. Our whole reason for being Fixers, our sole purpose if you will, is to ensure the preservation of the Balance. If we fail, if the world of humans discovers our existence, if the secret
leaks out…we’ll be destroyed. Despite all our power, despite our advantages, we would be destroyed. We have our limitations after all."

  "Agreed."

  He took another long drag on his beer and belched. "What if I told you that some of the members of our community felt that maintaining our secrecy was no longer necessary?’

  "I’d say you needed to get out of Connecticut more often."

  "Even still," said Zero, "there are some who feel just that way. In fact, there are some who want to form a partnership with humans."

  "A partnership? This isn’t a corporate merger. Don’t be ridiculous."

  "I wish I was. But I’m not." He leaned closer to me. "I have heard rumors, only rumors, but persistent rumors from all corners of our community. An alliance is being formed. Slowly, cautiously, to be sure, but an alliance nonetheless. And Cosgrove is the man forging the path."

  "Well, I can see Cosgrove being that insane, sure, but why? What does he get out of it?"

  "What he’s always wanted I would guess," said Zero. "Rule over the vampires. A virtual dictatorship. The good scenario is this: in exchange for the supposed safety of the vampire community, he would most likely allow experimentation on us. Study. The humans would be beside themselves with curiosity to study us, find out what makes us tick. How we exist. After all, we represent another branch in human evolution. One of the proverbial missing links as it were. We’d be potential guinea pigs."

  "Jesus."

  "Not only that, but the humans would allow access to some of the blood supply. It would ensure our cessation of the hunt; it would enamor the vampires to Cosgrove. He’d be seen as a savior."

  "What about the hunt? What about the old ways?"

  Zero sighed. "There are some who see them as an anachronism, Lawson. Some want the hunt to stop altogether. Given the pace of technology, many feel having to hunt for blood is more an insult than a necessary skill. They see humans able to buy whatever they need at a grocery store and want the same. The hunt represents a time many want to forget. They’re in favor of a more peaceful existence. A co-existence, as it were."

  "But our very nature demands the hunt," I said. "You can’t just stop thousands of years of heritage and tradition."

  "You can if you’re Cosgrove. Believe me, Lawson, he means to do it. The signs are all there." He paused again.