The Vampire Files Anthology

by P. N. Elrod

  “How do you do that?” he asked, sparing a glance out the back window for the cops’ receding taillights.

  “Native talent.” It hurt my head, especially behind my eyes. I’d hypnotized the cops faster than a stage magician. “It comes with the condition.”

  “Along with the blood-drinking and vanishing act?” Gordy knew all about me being a vampire.

  “Yeah.”

  “Jeeze.” He’d seen me do my special evil-eye whammy on people before, but was still impressed. I asked for directions to Soldier Burton’s place. He gave them, and then settled back in silence for the rest of the ride.

  I knew he had a high regard for my other, less exotic qualities, like being able to keep my mouth shut. Since making it clear I had no interest involving myself in his business and possessing my own reasons to avoid official notice, he trusted me to a degree that was considered unwise by his peers.

  We’d met last August, soon after my murder at the hands of another gangster. At one point while under orders from his boss, Gordy had tried to beat information out of me, but I didn’t hold that against him. It’s a tough world. Besides, after what I’d been put through—dying and coming back—a couple fists in the gut were a cakewalk. Over the course of a few rough jams we’d developed an odd sort of friendship and mutual respect. That’s why I didn’t think twice about helping him move a corpse halfway across Chicago. If he’d dispatched the man himself I’d not have done it, but in that case Gordy would never have asked me in the first place.

  I parked in a dark spot by the service door to ten stories of swank apartment building and cut the motor. Gordy’s plan was simple: Get what was left of Alby Cornish up to the penthouse where Burton lived, then call the cops.

  “I know a homicide dick who’s been itching to lock up Burton for years,” Gordy said.

  Good enough for me. I could now see another reason why I was along: He needed me to get in. I vanished and slipped through the crack between the threshold and the locked doors, which would only open from the inside.

  Once in, I pushed on the bar and Gordy strolled past, carrying Alby’s two hundred thirty pounds on one shoulder with apparent ease. We found the service elevator and took it to the top without encountering anyone.

  “Wouldn’t it be better if Alby were actually in the apartment?” I asked.

  “It would, so long as you don’t get caught.”

  “Fat chance.”

  I did my vanishing act again, this time slipping under the servant’s entry to reappear in a dim kitchen, which was cleaned up for the night and empty. The place was quiet; Soldier Burton was probably off making an alibi for himself. I edged the door open and told Gordy I’d take it from there.

  “You don’t have to.”

  “It’s being practical. If someone walks in I can get scarce, you can’t. Go down to the car, find a phone, then call your tame cop to come over. I’ll be gone by the time he arrives with the cavalry.”

  A reasonable man, he handed the body over, along with the hat. If it weren’t so damned macabre, the whole thing would have struck me as being a fraternity house prank. Things were too serious, though. I could feel the dead man’s weight right down to my core. Not an hour ago he’d been leading a crooked, but fairly harmless life, having a good time with a pretty girl. Now he was a piece of meat heading for the coroner’s knife.

  I kept in mind that the man who had so casually created that meat was somewhere close.

  I’d hoped to find a bathroom and prop Alby on the toilet, but leaving him at the kitchen table would be good enough. Gingerly pulling a chair out, I seated him in it, and damned if he didn’t lapse into the same sprawling posture as in the club’s washroom stall. I placed the hat on his head at a jaunty angle, thinking he wouldn’t mind.

  His killer would pay—and I had no reason to doubt Gordy’s line of reasoning or his word. Sure, he and Burton had a stew going between them over territory, but from what I knew of it, Burton was more annoyance than threat. This business had just upped the ante. Too bad for him that Gordy was a sharper player and had an ace like me in the hole.

  Then the kitchen light flicked on. I jumped half a block, startled by a new player in the game.

  Facing me was a blond angel: soft curves under a satin bathrobe, with a look on her kisser that declared her to be tougher than a keg of nails. Before I fully registered its presence, the revolver in her dainty pink hand spat viciously in my direction, and burning pain exploded above my left knee. My leg stopped working. I pitched over, clutching fire, bleeding, and cursing.

  She didn’t say anything that I noticed; I was too busy trying to stay solid. The lead had gone right though my thigh. The holes were knitting up. The process was fast, but damned painful. My usual reaction to a bad hurt is to vanish, which would instantly heal me, but it didn’t seem a good idea to give in to it while angel-girl was watching. I was in no state to try hypnotizing her. When I was this mad I could snap minds like twigs.

  “Ruthie? What the hell are you doing?” A man’s startled voice called from farther inside the flat, accompanied by approaching footsteps.

  “What do you think? I told you I heard something.” Ruthie Phillips, for I recognized her now, rounded on someone behind her. “You jerk! You said you took care of Alby!”

  “I did take care of him, honey. What’s—” The man came within view and stopped short to gape at me wounded on his tiled floor and Alby at the table gradually going into rigor. Returning the favor, I took in a handsome, no-nonsense mug with about forty years’ worth of strong-armed living behind it: Soldier Burton, in bathrobe and slippers, his hair combed and his razor thin mustache unblurred by stubble. If he and Ruthie had been in the sack, they’d been damned tidy about it. “Who the hell are you?”

  I didn’t feel like talking except for more profanity, which I determinedly stifled. What an interesting bit of useless information about myself: I wasn’t in the habit of swearing in front of women, even when they shot me.

  Ruthie broke the silence. “He’s one of Gordy’s. Hangs around the club like he owns it. Dates their headliner, Bobbi. She talks about him like he’s the Second Coming or something.”

  Burton glared down. “Did Gordy put you up to this?”

  I assumed he meant my dumping Alby on the premises. I didn’t feel like answering that one either and continued to hold my leg, plowing inch by inch through the fiery pain. It slowly—far too slowly—receded.

  “What do we do with him?’ she asked.

  “Lemme think.” Burton frowned mightily.

  I looked at the woman. “Why’d you want to bump poor Alby?”

  Her sweet-looking bee-stung lips curled into a sour sneer. “We both did. The dumb lug didn’t dive when he was supposed to and cost us plenty in the—”

  “Can it,” said Burton sharply. “He don’t need to know anything.”

  “Does it matter? You’re not letting him go, are you?’

  “Of course not. What’s your story, ace? Bring Alby here, then ring the cops?”

  “A favor for a favor,” I said as cheerfully as I could manage, given the state of my leg. “They should be here pretty soon, too.”

  “Dammit.” But Burton didn’t seem that upset. He must have finished thinking. “Okay, doll, cover this punk while I carry Alby.”

  “Carry him where?”

  “The roof. You—” he snarled at me. “On your feet and walk.”

  My blood was everywhere; Ruthie’s bullet had clipped me good; I’d lost plenty before putting pressure on with my fingers. Had I been a normal human I wouldn’t have been up to moving. Instead, I peeled myself off the floor, taking my time because I was dizzy. Another stop at the Stockyards later tonight would be necessary—if these two allowed me to leave. I didn’t think they would.

  Now that I was calmer I speculated about hypnotizing them same as the cops, but there was a booze smell from them which would hamper any effort I made in that direction. Two at once with booze was always tricky. One or t
he other might pick up that something was off and object.

  I limped out under Ruthie’s eagle eye. She kept far enough back so I couldn’t lunge for her. Not that I’d try; she looked more than ready to pop my other leg. My condition made me fast enough, but I was curious as to how they planned to get out of their mess. A body and a guy dripping red all over their floors would need a hell of an explanation.

  Burton was powerfully built, but grunted under Alby’s weight. He took small fast steps to the service hall and hit the elevator button. It was a long wait for the cage since Gordy had taken it to the ground floor. The doors finally parted, and we crowded in.

  They hadn’t noticed that my bleeding had stopped. I was healed up now, skin, bone, and muscle like new. Too bad I couldn’t say the same for my ruined pants.

  The doors parted to hot, humid air blowing strongly from the lake. It was no cooler up here than on the street far below. Ruthie urged me out, and I went, continuing with the limping gag. Burton dropped Alby, then got behind me and snaked his arm around my neck, pulling hard. I was taller, but he had the balance and dragged me backward toward the low wall that marked the edge of the roof. I let him get away with it for the moment. If my curiosity hadn’t been up I’d have turned and folded him in two the wrong way.

  “Don’t do anything stupid and I won’t snap your neck,” he told me.

  “Grrhg,” I said agreeably.

  We were the highest building for several surrounding blocks. Whatever he had planned would be untroubled by witnesses.

  “Ruthie, get the bullets out of the gun.”

  “What?”

  “Just do it.”

  She grumbled but did it. “Now what?”

  “Put the gun in his hand. I want his prints all over it.”

  She grinned, liking the idea. I reluctantly cooperated but made a mess of it, smearing my bloodied fingers on the gun’s surface. Even the FBI wouldn’t pick up anything useful from it, but I planned not to let things go that far.

  Ruthie, holding the gun by the satin sash of her bathrobe, was busy putting rounds back in their chambers. She clicked the barrel into place on the frame, and turned it so the two empty shells were in the right position for having just been fired. Smart, smart girl, but she’d forgotten about her own prints on the bullets. Interesting that Burton didn’t remind her about them.

  “What’s this about?” I asked, when the pressure eased slightly on my windpipe.

  “That’s for the cops to figure.”

  “You want them to think I scragged Alby? Why would I do that?”

  “As a favor to your boss, Gordy.”

  “The DA won’t buy that as a motive,” I said, hoping to hear more. “I’ll walk free of this one.”

  Amusement was in his voice as he spoke into my ear. “I don’t think so.”

  I wouldn’t like whatever would come next. I’d sensed the tension in his body. He was braced for resistance. He had no idea just how much.

  “Hey, big boy!” Ruthie called out, her voice a biting command to look her way.

  I was just dumb enough to fall for it.

  She’d opened the satin bathrobe wide, treating me to a full view of a luscious and beautifully naked body. Alive or undead, a man’s going to pause in surprise and be off guard for an instant.

  Which was all Burton needed.

  With terrible speed and strength he wrenched my head around with his big, competent hands. A nasty, loud snap seemingly inside my ears surprised me, then all feeling died below my neck. My head lolled as my weight shifted, and the world spun, sickening, insane.

  If I’d been breathing I’d have gagged and begun suffocating.

  I could not move. It was like those last moments before I conked out for the day on my home earth. A heavy involuntary paralysis takes over, and until I learned not to fight it, the feeling was horribly unpleasant.

  But the timing was wrong. Dawn was hours and hours away.

  He broke my neck. The son of a bitch broke my neck!

  I was released and dropped bonelessly to the rough surface of the roof. It should have hurt, but I couldn’t feel anything.

  Ruthie giggled, a bubbling, full-throated sound of absolute glee. Two dead men in front of her was funny.

  “Hey. . .big boy. . .” She threw herself into Burton’s arms. He caught her hard, and they indulged in some heavy breathing for a moment until he pushed her away.

  “He said the cops were coming, doll.”

  “We can do it before they get here. Come on.”

  “Soon as I’m done.”

  “I’ll die if I don’t, come on!”

  I heard a slap, followed by a surprised gasp—then she giggled again, ready for a second round.

  “You won’t die,” he said. “Get to the kitchen. Clean up the blood. Cut up this belt thing and flush the pieces. Cut ’em small. I’ll be down to help in a minute. Do the back hall, too. Got it?”

  She grumbled, but went away, taking the service elevator.

  Burton must have suspected I’d smeared the prints on the gun. As soon as Ruthie was gone, he dropped to one knee and wrapped my fingers around the grip and trigger, then aimed and fired anther bullet into Alby’s body. I couldn’t stop him. I was unresisting dead meat.

  This was how he marched out of court. He paid attention to details. The cops were to think Alby and I had a beef going, I got shot, took the gun away and shot Alby in turn. But how to account for my broken neck? I didn’t want to find out.

  Why can’t I vanish?

  I tried, frantic, not caring if he saw, but nothing happened. The nerves that transmitted my will to my body weren’t working. I had no sense of up or down, no feeling for the position I lay in, no pain, no numbness; beyond the casing of my skull the world went on without my influence.

  Burton grunted with effort as he moved me. My fixed gaze took in a scenery change I couldn’t immediately understand—sheer, gibbering panic prevented it. A street, buildings. . .at the wrong angles, my arms flopping and swinging above my head. . .

  Down, I’m looking down.

  I understood too late. He let go, and my inert form tumbled over the low wall.

  It takes only a few seconds for a man to drop a hundred feet.

  Flashes of things impressed on my shrieking mind: rush of air, windows tearing past, sidewalk coming up. The appalling, helpless agony of falling.

  I would hit headfirst.

  * * *

  Shreds of a consciousness flowed toward a centrality until enough pooled together to be marginally cognizant.

  Outside of time, it dreamed, but without comprehension for the harsh emotions that churned and rolled over the remains of memory. The creatures engendering such terrors were alien things imprisoned in solid flesh, enslaved by the needs of that form. They hungered and lusted to feed and propagate, creating more of their kind.

  Efficient predators, they killed threats to their kind.

  I was a threat.

  They’d killed me.

  But awareness of a self began to reluctantly return.

  After some struggle, it recalled that it had a name:

  I had been Jack Fleming, once a reporter; I hung out in a gangster’s club and did odd jobs for him and another friend. I had a girl who was too good for me, and survived a hell of a lot of nonsense since my murder last August. I used to enjoy beer; then I drank blood. It kept the machine running. It kept the machine running and able to do wholly impossible things. . .like. . .like. . .

  * * *

  I forgot, waking up fully.

  Screaming.

  Not much to it without air in my lungs, and when I got a breath I clamped my jaw tight. For all I knew something worse might happen. I needed to hear it coming.

  There is the impossible, and then there is the unthinkable. I flinched from the latter, which is what I’d just been through.

  At some point—which my mind had thankfully blotted out—my ability to vanish had taken over and saved me. Whether that had happened be
fore or after my body impacted did not matter. It was sufficient to know it had worked, and I was sobbing inside with gratitude.

  Some while later I tried to move. In this disjointed and shocky aftermath I got the impression my amorphous self was spread like a pancake over a large portion of flat surface, a portion larger than I had any right to cover. That was new.

  I pushed off the worrisome thought that I might not be able to recover.

  It took no small measure of concentration to persuade my invisible self to pull back into its normal shape—whatever that might be. I could not see in this form, only knew what felt right and what felt wrong.

  When instinct told me I was ready for it, I cautiously resumed solidity.

  I stood upright, unsteady, but on whole legs. No bullet holes, no shattered bones, everything in place. I didn’t have so much as a bruise for a souvenir, no damage at all unless you counted the stark terror still shrieking through my rattled brain like a tornado.

  Trembling uncontrollably, I sat down, leaning my back against a building to let the excess adrenaline run its course. There was no point rushing things. It would wear off, given time. A few decades should do it.

  After a while, I bothered to get my bearings: the service alley, no one in sight at this hour, no sign of Gordy. He was probably waiting down the block wondering what was keeping me. I was glad to help a friend in need, but goddammit, there is a limit.

  The shakes gradually passed.

  I found my feet in time to step into a shadow, avoiding notice from a cruising prowl car. It was closely followed by another vehicle with a similar radio antenna. I thought I knew the driver. If he was who I thought he was, then Gordy did indeed have clout in the city, and Soldier Burton had been a fool to make a challenge.

  Things would not run his planned course, though. Alby Cornish was out of sight on the roof. With my body gone from the alley there was no reason for people to look up to see where I’d fallen from. Alby could be there for weeks before anyone found him…unless Burton went back and dumped him in some other spot inconvenient to Gordy and started the mess all over again.