Kitty and the Midnight Hour

by Carrie Vaughn

  I called Cormac back.

  “Yeah?”

  “It’s me. Are you there? What’s happening?”

  “Give me a break, it’s only been a minute. Give me another five.” He hung up.

  Then on the other line, bells jingled as the door opened and closed. Footsteps moved slowly across a linoleum floor. I heard a scream. Then sobbing.

  What was it about Elijah Smith that could make a vampire afraid of him?

  “Estelle. Won’t you return to me? You can regain what you have lost. I’ll even forgive this betrayal.” A calm, reasonable voice echoed like it came from a TV in the next room. It sounded like a high-school social studies teacher explaining a lurid rite-of-passage ritual as if it were a recipe for mashed potatoes. A smooth voice, comforting, chilling. This voice spoke truth. Even over the phone, it was persuasive.

  Elijah Smith, in his first public appearance.

  “What are you?” Estelle said, as loud as she’d yet spoken, but the words were still muffled, filled with tears. “What are you really?”

  “Oh, Estelle. Is it so hard for you to believe? Your struggle is most difficult of all. The ones who hate themselves, their monsters—their belief comes easy. But you, those like you—you love the monsters you have become, and that love is what you fear and hate. Your belief comes with great difficulty, because you don’t really want to believe.”

  I sat down so heavily my chair rolled back a foot. The words tingled on my skin. He might have been talking to me, and he might have been right: I didn’t believe in a cure. Was it because I didn’t want to?

  “A cure is supposed to be forever! Why can’t I leave you?”

  “Because I would hate to lose you. I love all my people. I need you, Estelle.”

  What was it Arturo had said: She is part of me. If she is destroyed, part of me is destroyed as well. Could Elijah Smith be some sort of vampire feeding on need, on his followers’ powers?

  If only I could get him to pick up the phone.

  Yet again, I called Cormac.

  “Yeah?”

  “Has it been five minutes? At least keep the line open so I know what’s happening.”

  “Jesus, Norville. Hang on. There’s an SUV parked here. Three guys are standing guard in front of the building. I don’t see weapons. They might be lycanthropes. They’ve got that animal pacing thing going, you know? Arturo’s limo is parked around the corner. Lights off. Wait, here he comes. He’s trying to get in. I gotta go.” I heard the safety on a gun click, then rapid footsteps.

  I hated this. Everything was happening off my stage. I was blind and ignorant. For the first time, I hated the safety and anonymity of my studio.

  Then Cormac said, “Don’t move. These are loaded with silver.”

  “You!” That was Arturo. “Why on earth—”

  “It’s Norville’s idea. Get your girl and get out of here before I change my mind. You, step aside. Let him through.”

  I had two lines open on a conference call. Two feeds of information culled from static and noise, all of it broadcasting. Outside, nothing. Cormac must have had something big trained on Smith’s goons, because I didn’t hear a grumble from them.

  Then, from inside—

  “Estelle? Time to come home. Walk with me.” This voice was edgy, alluring. Arturo.

  “Estelle—,” Smith said.

  “No. No no no!” Estelle’s denial became shrill.

  “Estelle.” Two voices, ice and fire, equally compelling.

  “Estelle, pick up the phone! Pick up the phone and talk to me, dammit!” I shouted futilely.

  I wished I could talk to her. What would my voice do to the mix? What could I possibly say to her except: Ignore them! Ignore us all! Follow what heart you have left, if any, and leave them.

  She gave one more scream, different from the previous shrill scream of fear. This was defiant. Final. There was a crash. Something broke, maybe a set of shelves falling to the floor.

  A pause grew, as painful and definitive as a blank page. Then, “This is your fault,” said Arturo, his voice rigid with anger. “You will pay.”

  “You are as much to blame,” said Elijah Smith. “She killed herself. Anyone would agree with me. Her own hands are wrapped around that stake.”

  For a moment, I could feel the blood vessels in my ears, my lips, my cheeks. I felt hot enough to explode.

  I could piece together the bits of sound I’d heard and guess what had happened. A piece of split wooden shelf, maybe a broken broom handle. Then it was just a matter of aiming, falling on top of it.

  Goddamn it. My show had never gotten anyone killed before.

  Arturo said, “What are you?”

  “If you come to me as a supplicant, I will answer all your questions.”

  “How dare you—”

  “Everyone get out before I start shooting.” That was Cormac, showing admirable restraint.

  Quick, angry footsteps left the room, growing distant. Calm, slow footsteps followed. Then, nothing.

  Cormac’s voice burst through my silence, in stereo, coming through both lines now.

  “Norville? Are you there? Talk to me, Norville.”

  My hands dug into the edge of the table. The plastic laminate surface cracked; the sound of it startled me. When I looked, my fingers were thickening, claws growing. I hadn’t even felt it. My arms were so tense, my hands gripping the table so hard, I hadn’t felt the shift start.

  I pushed away from the chair and shook my hands, then crossed my arms, pressing my fists under my elbows. Human now. Stay human, just a little longer.

  “Norville!”

  “Yes. I’m here.”

  “Did you get all that?”

  “Yes. I got it all.”

  I hadn’t even said thank you to her. Thanks for the interview. I knew better than anyone how much courage it sometimes took just to open your mouth and talk.

  “There’s a body here. A girl. It’s already going to dust. You know how they do.”

  “I should have done more for her.”

  “You did what you could.”

  A new sound in the background: police sirens.

  Without a closing word, Cormac hung up, and I heard silence. Silence inside, silence out.

  Silence on the radio meant death.

  Matt said, “Kitty? Time’s up. You can go thirty over if I cut out the public service announcements.”

  I gave a painful, silent chuckle. Public service, my ass. I sat here every week pretending I was helping people, but when it came to really helping someone—

  I took a deep breath. I’d never left a show unfinished. All I had to do was open my mouth and talk. “Kitty here, trying to wrap up. Estelle found her last cure. It’s not one I recommend.

  “Vampires don’t talk about their weaknesses as weaknesses. They talk about the price. Their vulnerability to sunlight, wooden stakes, and crosses—it’s the price they pay for their beauty, their immortality. The thing about prices, some people always seem willing to pay, no matter how high. And some people are always trying to get out of paying at all. Thanks to Estelle, you now know what Elijah Smith and his Church offer, and you know the price. At least I could do that much for her. As little as it is. Until next week, this is Kitty Norville, Voice of the Night.”

  Chapter 9

  The police couldn’t go after Smith for anything. There wasn’t a body. The only crime they had evidence of was breaking and entering at the convenience store, and the suspect, Estelle, was gone. The Church caravan had pulled up stakes and left town by the next morning. If I hadn’t had the recording of the show proving otherwise, I could have believed that none of it had happened. Nothing had changed.

  The next day, another mauling death downtown, the fourth this year, made the front page of the newspaper. A sidebar article detailing the police investigation included an interview with Hardin’s colleague, Detective Salazar, who happened to mention that one of the detectives on the case had consulted with Kitty Norville, the freaky
talk show host. Did that mean the police were seriously considering a supernatural element to these deaths? Were they part of some ritualistic serial killing? Or did they think a werewolf was on the loose downtown? The police made no official comment at this time. That didn’t stop the newspaper from speculating. Wildly. The press was calling him “Jack Junior,” as in Jack the Ripper.

  Sheer, pigheaded determination got me through the day. Putting one foot in front of the other, thinking about things one step at a time, and not considering the big picture. The life-and-death questions. I stopped answering my phone altogether, letting voice mail screen calls. At least the CDC/CIA/FDA government spook didn’t leave any messages.

  Jessi Hardin left three messages in the space of an hour. Then she showed up at my office. She crossed her arms and frowned. She looked like she needed a cigarette.

  “I need you to take a look at the latest scene.”

  I sat back in my chair. “Why not get that hit man, what was his name . . . oh, yeah, Cormac? He knows his stuff.”

  “We got paw prints from three of the crime scenes. I took them to the university. Their wolf expert said it’s the biggest print he’s ever seen. It would have to be a 250-pound wolf. He says nature doesn’t make them that big. The precinct is actually starting to listen to me.”

  “Oh, that’s right. You said you didn’t trust Cormac.”

  “If you could come to the scene, identify any smells, or whatever it is you do, that would at least tell me that I’m dealing with the same killer.”

  “Why don’t you just hire a professional?”

  She unfolded her arms and started pacing. “Okay. Fine. How did you find out that I talked to the bounty hunter?”

  “He told me.”

  “Great,” she muttered.

  “He wants to pool information. He has a point.”

  “Look, at this stage I’m talking to everyone I can think of. I’m even consulting with someone from the FBI Behavioral Analysis Unit.”

  I tilted my head. “You’re treating this like a serial killer case? Not an out-of-control monster?”

  “Serial killers are monsters. This guy may be a werewolf, but he’s acting like a human, not a wolf. His victims aren’t random. They’re well-chosen: young, vulnerable women. I’m betting he picks them, stalks them, and kills them because they’re easy prey.” Oh, that was a choice phrase. “His MO is a serial killer’s MO, not a wolf’s. Or even a werewolf’s. Yeah, I’ve been doing some of that reading you gave me. The wolves usually seem smart enough to stay away from people.”

  “Yeah. Usually. Look, Detective.” I fidgeted, forcing myself to look at her only at the last minute. “I don’t think I can go through that again. The last time really bothered me.”

  “What, did it look tasty to you?”

  “Can’t I be shocked and traumatized like anyone else?”

  Arching an eyebrow skeptically, she said with a heavy dose of sarcasm, “Sorry.”

  I looked away, my jaw tightening. “I suppose I should feel lucky you aren’t treating me like a suspect.”

  “I’m not being nice. It’s a matter of statistics—serial killers rarely turn out to be women.”

  Saved by statistics. “I may know what he smells like, but I don’t know how to find this guy.”

  She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, like she was counting to ten or organizing an argument. Then she looked at me and said, “You don’t have to see the body. Just come to the site, tell me anything you can about it. You have to help me, before more women die.”

  If this conversation had happened at any time other than the day after the show with Estelle, I could have said no. If she hadn’t said that particular phrase in that particular way, I might have been able to refuse.

  I stood and grabbed my jacket off the back of my chair.

  The site of this killing wasn’t far from the other, but the street was retail rather than residential. The victim was a late-night convenience store clerk walking home after her shift.

  The media vans were there again, thicker than ever. The city had a serial killer, and they were all over it.

  “How do they know where to go?” I said. “They must have gotten here the same time your people did.”

  Hardin scowled. Not at me this time, but at the reporters drifting toward us as she parked. “They listen to police band radio.”

  The shouting started before I opened the car door.

  “Ms. Norville! Kitty Norville! What do you think is behind these killings? What are you talking to the police about? Do you have any statement you can give us?”

  On Hardin’s recommendation, I ignored them. She formed a barricade between me and the cameras and guided me to the corner.

  She showed me the first splatter of blood at the end of the alley behind the row of shops. It looked wrong in the daylight. Too bright, too fake. Half a bloody paw print streaked the concrete nearby. The whole paw would be as big as my head.

  The blood started a trail that led into the alley, where a half-dozen investigators worked intently. They blocked my view of anything else. My stomach clenched and I turned away.

  Hardin crossed her arms. “Well?”

  I smelled it, the same wolf, along with the blood and decay. Those smells were connected to him. Like he didn’t bathe, like he wallowed in death.

  My nose wrinkled. “He smells . . . damp. Sick. I don’t know.”

  “Is it the same guy?”

  “Yeah.” I still didn’t want to look at the body. I couldn’t. “This is worse than the last one, isn’t it? He’s getting more violent.”

  “Yeah. Come on. I’ll drive you back.”

  She’d parked around the corner. I stood at the car door for a moment, breathing clean air before I got in.

  I caught Hardin watching me.

  “Thanks,” I said. “Thanks for not making me see it.”

  “It really gets to you, doesn’t it?”

  We got in the car finally, and she pulled away from the curb.

  I said, “With the last one, the one that I saw, I could work out how he had done it. He wasn’t shifted all the way to wolf. He could get the leverage to knock her over at the same time he ripped into her. I don’t like knowing that I could do something like that.”

  “Being physically able to do it and being inclined to do it are two different things. You don’t seem like the type.”

  “You only say that because you haven’t met Ms. Hyde.”

  She eyed me with a mix of curiosity and skepticism at that, her brow furrowed and her smile uncertain. She dropped me off with the usual message: Call me if you find out anything. I promised I would.

  I worked late. The building was dark and quiet when I left. Once again, it was just me, the late-night DJ, and the security guard. I hadn’t slept well last night, and tonight wasn’t looking any better. I didn’t really want to go home, where I’d worry myself into a bout of insomnia.

  I planned on walking back. It would make me tired and maybe numb my brain enough to sleep.

  When I stepped out of the elevator and into the lobby of the building, I smelled something wrong. Something that didn’t belong. I looked—a half-dozen people were waiting there, some standing, some sitting on the sofas pushed against the wall.

  They smelled cold. They smelled like the clean, well-preserved corpses they were.

  The elevator door closed behind me, trapping me.

  Pete, the night watchman, was sitting at his desk in the back of the lobby. Just sitting there, hands folded calmly in front of him, staring straight ahead, not blinking, not noticing anything. The vampires had done something to him, put him in some kind of trance.

  “Katherine.”

  I flinched, startled at the sound of his voice. Arturo stepped to the center of the lobby, into the spot of illumination formed by the security light. It was like he’d designed this stage himself and timed his entrance perfectly.

  Arturo appeared to be in his late twenties, handsome and assured, w
ith shining blond hair swept back from a square face. He wore a black evening coat, open to show the dinner jacket and band-collar dress shirt underneath. He looked like he’d stepped out of an Oscar Wilde play, except that he moved too confidently in the modern era, looked too comfortable in the office lobby setting.

  His entourage, three men and two women, moved from the sofa and the shadows to fan out around him, lending their own intimidating presences to his authority.

  If vampires ever spend less time playing theatrics and living down to their stereotypes, they might actually take over the world someday.

  One of the women was Stella, from the nightclub. She stood a little behind Arturo, frowning imperiously, like a statue. The other woman held Arturo’s arm and leaned on his shoulder. She was lithe and pretty, dressed in a corset and a long, chiffony skirt, an image plucked from another century. She touched him like she couldn’t bear to be parted from him.

  The men stood on the fringes like bodyguards. Rick was among them. When I caught his gaze, he flashed a smile, seeming terribly amused by it all.

  They all remained still, staring at me with detached ennui. That didn’t mean they weren’t paying attention.

  “What do you want?” I tried not to sound scared, but my heart was racing and my gaze kept shifting to the glass doors and the street beyond. I tensed my feet, wondering if I could make a run for it.

  “To thank you.”

  I blinked. “Why?”

  “For helping Estelle. And for helping me. At least, for trying to.” He smiled thinly and tipped his head in a small bow.

  His words brought it all back, and I felt drained all over again. I rubbed my face and looked away. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what else I could have done. I didn’t want it to turn out like that.”

  “I know,” he said, his voice soft. Without the pompous edge, he sounded almost kind. He straightened, discarding that hint of another self, and smoothed the lapel of his coat. “You might also like to know that any grudges toward you I may have acted on in the past are no longer a consideration to me.”

  I had to think about that for a minute. “You’re not going to try and have me killed? No more threats?”