Skin Trade

by Laurell K. Hamilton

Chapter 11-12

  Chapter 11

  EDWARD HAD MANAGED to get us a big SUV. It was black and looked vaguely menacing. I knew he hadn't asked for the color, but it was perfectly appropriate. I approved of the car, because if we had to go out into the desert or even off road, it would still do.

  "When did you have time to rent a car?" I asked.

  "I was the first one they interrogated. I knew it would take them a while to interrogate three other U. S. Marshals. I knew I had time. "

  I stopped in midstep. "Did you say three other U. S. Marshals?"

  He turned and nodded at me. "I did. " He almost smiled, which meant he was hiding something from me. Edward loved being mysterious. My having seen his family and knowing most of his secret identity hadn't cured him of the habit. It just made it harder for him to find opportunities to surprise me.

  "Who's number four?" I asked.

  He raised his hand. It was a gesture I'd seen him use in the field when he was dealing with people with enough training to know the hand signals. It was the come-ahead gesture.

  There was a small cluster of police near the back of the pinkish-tan building. I'd noticed them, in that cursory way you begin to notice everything in our business: people, palm trees, heat, sunshine. Olaf stood up, and he was just suddenly there. He was half a head taller than all but one of them. Had he been slumping? But it was more than that; he was also wearing a black T-shirt and black jeans tucked into black boots. He had a black leather jacket thrown over one arm, revealing bare muscular arms. He had more color to his skin than the last time I'd seen him, as if he'd been out in the sun more, but Olaf, like me, just didn't tan. Most people with a lot of German in their background have trouble tanning.

  His head was still completely shaved, so that his black eyebrows stood out on his face in stark contrast. He had a shadow of a beard along his jawline, because he was one of those men who needed to shave twice a day to be truly clean shaven. Made me wonder if he shaved his head or was bald. It had never occurred to me before.

  The head, the clothes, the height; it all made him stand out in the group of cops like a wolf among sheep, or a Goth among uniforms. But I'd missed him completely.

  Edward could do that, too. That invisible-in-plain-sight shit. I watched Olaf walk toward us, and admitted that for such a large man he moved gracefully, but it was the grace of muscle and violence contained.

  The violence was helped along with the shoulder holster, with its H amp;K P2000 and extra magazines on the other side of the straps. Last time he'd carried his backup gun at the small of his back; I'd check later. There was a knife bigger than my forearm at his side, tied down to his thigh. Most vampire hunters carried blades.

  He walked toward me all dark and menacing, then he smiled. It wasn't a friend smile. It was a boyfriend smile. No, more than that. It was the smile a man gives to a woman he's had sex with, good sex, and he's hoping to have it again. Olaf had not earned that smile.

  "Anita," he said, and again there was too much emotion when he said my name.

  I had to pause and say his fake name: "Otto. "

  He kept coming until he loomed over both Edward and me. Of course, Olaf was enough over six feet that seven was his next stop, so he loomed over damn near anyone.

  He offered me his hand. In the two times I'd met him, had he ever offered to shake hands with me? I had to think, but no, he didn't shake hands with women. But there he was offering his hand, with that too-familiar smile fading a little around the edges, but still there.

  The smile made me not want to touch him. But Olaf's pathological hatred toward women made the offer of a handshake a big deal. It meant he thought I was worth it. Besides, we were going to have to work together where police could see us. I did not want to start the hunt with him mad at me.

  I took his hand.

  He wrapped his big hand around mine, then put his other hand higher up my arm. Some men do that, I've never been sure why, but this time I knew why.

  I pulled to move away. I couldn't help it. He tightened his grip, let me know he had me, or that it would be a fight to get away. Just an instant of it, a moment, but it was enough to remind me of the last time we'd met.

  Olaf and I had been the ones to take the hearts out of the vampires last time we hunted. They were old and powerful, so you don't just stake the heart. You cut it out of the chest cavity and destroy it with fire later.

  I'd gotten the heart tangled somehow on some bit of viscera in the body. He'd offered to help, and I'd accepted. I'd forgotten what he was.

  He slid his hand inside the hole I'd made, so that his arm slid up alongside mine in the chest cavity. It wasn't until his hand cupped mine, pressing both our hands into the still-warm heart, that I looked at him. We were both leaning over the body, our faces inches apart, with our arms up the much longer torso of the male. He looked at me over the body, our hands around the heart, blood everywhere. He looked at me as if it were a candlelit dinner and I was wearing nice lingerie.

  He'd kept his free hand on my arm, controlling how slowly we eased out of the chest cavity. He made it last, and he stared at my face while we did it. For the last few inches of arm he looked down at the wound and not at my face. He watched our arms emerge from the bloody hole just under the sternum. He kept his hand on my arm and forced our hands upward, so that for a moment we held the heart together, and he looked at me over the bleeding muscle.

  He'd stolen a kiss like that, our first and, if I could help it, our last.

  "Let go of me," I said, softly, each word very clear.

  His lips parted, and his breath came out in a long sigh. It was worse than the smile. I realized in that moment that I had become a trophy of that kill. A trophy for a serial killer is something they take from the victim or the murder scene, so that when they see it, or touch it, or hear it, or smell it, or taste it, it brings back the memory of the slaughter.

  I did my best not to show fear, but I probably failed. Edward actually stepped up beside us and said, "You heard her. "

  He turned his eyes behind the sunglasses toward Edward. The last time we'd all been together, Edward had done what he could to protect me, but protecting me from Olaf now wasn't just a matter of guns and violence. Edward had taken my arm that last time, as if I were a girl and needed to be led. It was the first time, ever, that Edward had touched me as if I were a girl, because I was never just a girl to him. He'd put the idea into Olaf's head that he, Edward, thought of me as a girl, maybe his girl. Maybe a girl he'd be willing to protect. I wouldn't have let anyone else endanger themselves for a lie, but if anyone I knew could handle Olaf, it was Edward. Besides, he was Edward's friend before he was mine, so it was sort of Edward's fault that Olaf had a crush on me.

  Now, Edward did it again. He put his arm around my shoulders. It was a first. It also wouldn't help my reputation with the other cops, but I wasn't worried about the cops. All I was worried about in that moment was the man with his hands on my arm and hand. It was such an innocent touch, but the effect it had on him, and on me, was about as far from innocent as you could get.

  Edward put his arm across my shoulders, less than a hug but very much about marking territory. It's something that high school athletes are fond of doing with their cheerleading girlfriends. Again, a fairly innocent gesture, but it was a sign of possession. This is mine, not yours.

  I was so not Edward's, but in that moment I might have volunteered to be anyone's if it would just get Olaf off me. I was fighting off the memory of our last kill together, and it was making my skin run cold even in the Vegas heat.

  Olaf gave Edward the full weight of that sunglass-covered gaze, and then, slowly, he let go of me. He stepped back from us.

  Edward kept his arm across my shoulders and looked up at the bigger man. I just stood there and fought the urge to shiver, and finally lost. In a heat so hot it made it hard to breathe, I shivered.

  It made Olaf smile again, and for
just a moment I had the very clear thought that someday I would kill him. Maybe not this day, or even this time, but eventually he'd cross a line and I would kill him. The thought helped steady me. Helped me feel more myself. It helped me smile back at him, but it wasn't the same smile. His was damn near sexual; mine was the smile, most unpleasant, that has frightened bad guys across the country.

  Olaf frowned at me. Which made me smile wider.

  Edward squeezed my shoulders in a one-armed hug, then stepped back.

  I caught the glances of some of the cops who were outside the station. They'd watched the show. I doubted they understood everything they'd seen. But they'd seen enough to pick up the tension between Olaf and Edward and me. They'd draw the same conclusion that Olaf did, that Edward and I were a couple and it was hands-off.

  They were already convinced that I was fucking all of them, so why did it hurt my feelings to do something that confirmed the rumor?

  I looked at the police looking at us, and found two of the cops who weren't looking at us. The moment I saw them, I knew who the fourth marshal was.

  Bernardo Spotted Horse was standing very close to a female deputy. She had shoulder-length hair tied back in a ponytail. Her small triangular face was turned up to him, all smiles and almost laughing. Even the uniform couldn't hide that she was petite and curvy.

  Bernardo was tall, dark, and handsome, even by the standards that I was used to. His hair was actually blacker than mine, that black that has blue highlights in the sun. He'd tied it back in a braid that trailed nearly to his waist. He said something to the deputy that made her laugh, then walked toward us.

  He was still broad-shouldered and slim of waist, and he'd been hitting the gym regularly. It all showed. He was also American Indian, with the perfect cheekbones genetics can give you. It was a pretty package, and the deputy watched him walk away from her. The look on her face said plainly that if he called her later, there would be a date. But then Bernardo knew that. Lack of confidence with women was not one of his problems.

  He smiled as he came toward us, sliding sunglasses over his eyes, so that he looked model perfect by the time he got to us.

  "That was quite a show you just put on," he said. "They're more convinced than ever that the big guy here is dating you, or wants to, and that Ted here already is. I've done my best to persuade Deputy Lorenzo that I am not in the running for your affections. "

  I had to smile, shaking my head. "Glad to hear it. "

  He got a funny look on his face. "I know you mean that, and let me say that it's an ego blow. "

  "I think you'll recover, and the deputy there looks like she'll be happy to help ease your pain. "

  He glanced behind and flashed her that world-class smile. She smiled back and actually looked flustered. This was from a smile yards away.

  "This is like Old Home Week," I said.

  "It's been what, almost three years?" Bernardo said.

  "About that," I said.

  Olaf was watching us, not like he was happy about it. "The girl liked you. "

  "Yes, she did," Bernarado said. His white T-shirt looked good against the tan of his skin. It was the only thing that ruined what I'd started calling casual assassin chic: black jeans, black T-shirt, boots, leather jacket, weapons, sunglasses. His leather was on his arm like Olaf's, because it was too damn hot to be wearing leather. I'd left my leather in St. Louis.

  Bernardo offered his hand, and I took it, then he raised my hand and kissed it. He did it because I'd let him know I didn't think he was scrumptious, and part of him hated that. I shouldn't have let him do it, but short of arm-wrestling him, there was no graceful way to stop the gesture once it started. He shouldn't have done it because of the deputy. I shouldn't have let him because of the other cops and Olaf.

  Olaf looked not at me but at Edward, as if waiting for him to do something about it.

  Edward actually said, "Bernardo flirts with everyone; it's not personal. "

  "I did not kiss her hand," Olaf said.

  "You know exactly what you did," Edward said.

  Bernardo looked at Olaf, then at me; he actually lowered his sunglasses so he could give me the full weight of his baby browns. "There something you need to tell me about you and the big guy here?"

  "Don't know what you mean," I said.

  "He just reacted like guys react around me and the women they like. Otto's never cared before. "

  "I do not care," Olaf said.

  "Enough," Edward said. "Our escort is ready to go, so everyone in the car. " He sounded disgusted, which was rare for him. Letting us hear that much emotion in his voice, I mean.

  "I call shotgun," Bernardo said.

  "Anita gets shotgun," Edward said, and went around to the driver's side.

  "You like her better than you like me," Bernardo said.

  "Yep," Edward said, and slid in behind the wheel.

  I got in the passenger side. Olaf slid across the seat so he was sitting catty-corner from me. I'd have put Bernardo in that corner, but couldn't decide whether it would bother me more for Olaf to stare at me where I could see him, or to know he was staring at the back of my head where I couldn't see him.

  The patrol car in front hit lights and sirens. Apparently, we wouldn't be wasting any more time. I looked up at the sun in a sky so bright the blue was washed out-like jeans run through way too many washes. It was afternoon, maybe five hours until full dark. Another car followed behind us with lights and sirens. I was willing to bet that I wasn't the only one who thought delaying all the vampire hunters had been a bad idea.

  Chapter 12

  THE CRIME SCENE was a huge warehouse. It was mostly empty, echoing space. Or it would have been if there weren't cops of every flavor, emergency personnel, and forensics all over the place. It was less full than it had been a few hours ago, but still damn busy for a crime scene from the night before last. But, of course, the dead were their own people. Everyone would want a piece of it. Everyone would want to help, or feel like they were helping. People hate to feel useless; cops get that squared. Nothing drives the police more nuts than not being able to fix something, like the ultimate guy attitude. I don't mean guy in a sexist way, either; it's a cop thing. People would linger looking for clues, or trying to make sense of it.

  There might be clues, but there wouldn't be any sense to it. Vittorio was a serial killer who had enough vampire powers to make his less powerful vamps help him get his kicks. A serial killer who could share his pathology with others, not by persuasion but just by metaphysical force. Anyone who he turned into a vampire could be forced to join his hobby and share in his perversion.

  I stared at all the markers where bodies had lain. Shaw had said they'd lost three, but that was just a number, a word. Standing there looking at the markers where the bodies had lain, where the blood had spilled, brought it home more. There were a lot of other markers, marking where things had fallen. I wondered what things. Weapons, spent shells, clothing-anything and everything would be marked, photographed, videotaped.

  The floor looked like a minefield-so many things marked that there was almost no way to walk through it all. What the hell had happened here?

  "Firefight," Edward said, voice low.

  I looked at him. "What?"

  "Firefight, spent shells, weapons emptied and thrown down. A hell of a fight. "

  "If those markers are spent shells, then why aren't there dead vampires? You don't empty this much brass into a space this open and not hit something, esepcially not with the training these guys had. "

  "Even the vampire hunter was ex-military," Bernardo said.

  "How do you know that?" I asked.

  He smiled. "Deputy Lorenzo likes to talk. "

  I gave him an approving look. "You weren't just flirting, you were gathering intelligence. And here I just thought you were hound-dogging it. "

  "I like to think of it as multitasking," he said. "I got infor
mation and she was cute. "

  Olaf began to walk out through all the little markers and signs that forensics had left behind. He moved gracefully, almost daintily through it all. He looked somehow unreal, moving that large body through the evidence markers. I wouldn't have been able to do it without moving things out of place, but Olaf seemed to glide. I spent most of my time around shapeshifters and vampires, both of which could define the term graceful, but it was still impressive, and unsettling, to watch the big man move through the evidence.

  I'd have rather seen the actual evidence and the actual bodies, but I understood not being able to leave the bodies in the heat. I also understood not being able to leave weapons lying around, and you had to take the ammo and casings for evidence in case there was a trial.

  "They always gather the evidence as if there's going to be a trial," Edward said, as if he'd read my mind.

  "Yeah," I said, "but vampires don't get trials. "

  "No," Edward said, "they get us. " He was gazing out over the crime scene as if he could visualize what had been taken away. I couldn't yet. The pictures and video would help me more than this empty space. Then I'd be able to see it, but here was just things removed, and the smell of death getting stronger in the Vegas heat.

  They'd taken the bodies away but not yet cleaned up the blood and other fluids, so the smell of death was still there.

  I'd been ignoring it as best I could, but once the front of my head thought about it, I couldn't ignore it. One of the real downsides to having as much lycanthropy running through my veins as I do is that my sense of smell can suddenly go into overdrive. You don't want that happening at a murder scene.

  The smell of dried blood, decaying blood, was thick on my tongue. Once I smelled it, I had to see it. The blood had to have been there the whole time, but it was as if some filter had been stripped from my eyes. The floor of the warehouse was dark with blood. Pools of it everywhere. No matter how much blood you see in a movie or on television, it's never enough. There is so much blood in the human body, and the floor was so thick with it, it looked like some sort of black lake frozen there on the concrete floor.

  They'd given us little booties to put over our shoes, and I knew now that it wasn't just the standard reason. Without them, we'd have been tracking the blood of Vegas's finest all over.

  "They didn't feed on them," Bernardo said.

  "No," I said, "they just bled them out. "

  "Maybe some of the blood belongs to vampires. They could have taken their dead," Edward said.

  "In St. Louis he left his people behind as bait, and a trap. He left them to live, or die, and didn't seem to give a damn which. I don't think he's the kind of man to take his dead, if he doesn't protect his living. "

  "What if these dead would have given something away?" Edward said.

  "What do you mean?"

  "If he wouldn't take his dead because it was the decent thing to do, maybe he would take them if it was the smart thing to do. "

  I thought about that, then shrugged. "What could dead vampires tell us that we don't already know?"

  "I don't know," Edward said, "it's just a thought. "

  "How did they ambush a SWAT team?" Bernardo asked.

  "Did the dead vampire hunter have ability with the dead?" I asked.

  "You mean, was he an animator like you?" Bernardo asked.

  I nodded. "Yeah. "

  "No, he was ex-military, but he didn't raise the dead. "

  "That means they went in without anyone who could sense vampires," I said. Then I had to add, "I know they had a practitioner with them, who was among the dead, but being psychic doesn't mean you do well with the dead. "

  "There aren't that many of us who have a talent for the dead like you do, Anita," Edward said.

  I studied his face, but he was looking out over the crime scene, or maybe he was watching Olaf kneeling so carefully among the carnage.

  "I always wonder how you guys stay alive if you can't sense the vamps. "

  He smiled at me. "I'm good. "

  "You have to be better than me, if you don't have my abilities and you stay alive. "

  "Does that make me better than you, too?" Bernardo asked.

  "No," I said, and made it sound final.

  "Why is Ted better than you, but I'm not?"

  "Because he's proven himself to me, and you're still just a pretty face. "

  "I got damn near killed the last time we played together. "

  "Didn't we all," I said.

  Bernardo frowned at me. The look was enough to let me know that it really did bug him that I didn't think he was as good as Edward.

  "How about Otto? Is he better than you?"

  "I don't know. "

  "Is he better than Ted?"

  "I hope not," I said, softly.

  "Why say it that way, you hope not?"

  I don't know what made me say the truth to Bernardo; Edward, yes, but the other man hadn't earned that kind of honesty from me yet. "Because if I'm not good enough to kill Otto, it'll be up to Edward to finish it. "

  Bernardo moved closer to me, studied my face hard. He spoke low. "Are you planning on killing him?"

  "When he comes for me, yes. "

  "Why is he going to come for you?"

  "Because someday I'll disappoint him. Someday I won't be able to keep being his little serial killer pinup, and when he thinks I'm less fun alive than I would be dead, he'll try for me. "

  "You don't know that," Bernardo said.

  I looked out at the lake of dried blood and the big, graceful man moving through it. "Yeah, I do know that. "

  "She's right," Edward said, softly.

  "So, the two of you are planning to kill him, but you'll work with him until he crosses the line. " He spoke very low, almost a whisper.

  "Yeah," I said.

  "Yes," Edward said.

  Bernardo looked from one to the other of us. He shook his head. "You know, sometimes the big guy doesn't scare me as much as the two of you. "

  "Only because you're not a petite brunette woman. Trust me, Bernardo, if you fit his vic profile, you'd have a whole new level of creep about the big guy. "

  He opened his mouth, as if to argue, then closed it. He finally nodded. "All right, I'll give you that. But unless you're going to kill him today, let's get to work. " He walked away from us, but not toward Olaf. He wouldn't help us contemplate killing Olaf, but he wouldn't exactly stop us, either.

  I wasn't sure where Bernardo fell on the good guy/bad guy scale. Sometimes I wasn't sure Bernardo knew, either.