Weird Detectives (63 page)

“What were you before you started doing this PI bullshit?”

“A cop.”

He grunted. “You sound like a thug. An asshole leg-breaker from South Philly.”

“Thin line sometimes.”

He steepled his fingers. It was one of those moves that looked good when Doctor Doom did it in a comic book. Maybe in a boardroom. Looked silly right now, but he had enough intensity in his eyes to almost pull it off. He gave me ten seconds of
the stare
.

I stood my ground.

His cell phone rang and he flipped it open, listened.

“I’m in a meeting,” he said, and closed the phone.

His smile returned.

I heard the footsteps on the stairs even though they were quiet.

I sighed and turned. There were four of them. All as pale as Skye, but much bigger. “Really? You want to play that card?”

“It’s one of the classics. Though, to be fair, it’ll be more than a typical beating. I . . . hm, am I wrong in presuming you
have
had your ass kicked?”

“That cherry was popped a long time ago.”

The four men entered the room and fanned out behind me.

“So, our challenge, then,” Skye said, “is to put a new spin on this. Something surprising and fresh so that you’ll be entertained.”

“Mind if I take my jacket off first?”

“Go right ahead.”

I heard a hammer-cock behind me.

Skye said, “You can put your jacket on my desk here, and take off your shoulder holster and put that—and your piece—on top of it.”

“Sure, whatever,” I said. I shrugged out of the jacket. I bought it the year the Vikings took their eighteenth division title. I’ll buy a new one if they ever win the Super Bowl. Or when pigs sprout wings and learn to fly, whichever comes first. I folded it and set it down, unclipped my shoulder rig, set that down. If I was going to ruin my clothes, then at least nothing I was currently wearing had sentimental value.

I leaned on the desk. “Let’s agree on a couple of things first, okay?”

“Sure,” he said with a grin.

“When I’m done handing these clowns their asses, then you and I dance a round or two.”

“That would be fun,” he said, “but I doubt I’ll have the pleasure.”

“Second, if I walk out of here on my own steam, then it’s with the understanding that you will leave the lady alone.”

“If you walk out of here? Sure. But, tell me something,” he said, and he looked genuinely interested, “Why do you care? What is she to you?”

“Maybe I’m the possessive type, too. Maybe now that she’s asked for my help, it’s like she’s part of the family. So to speak.”

“Part of the family? You fucking kidding me here?”

“Nope.”

“You Italian? This some kind of dago thing?”

“I said it’s
like
she’s part of the family. My family,” I said, “and I protect what’s mine.”

“That’s it? It’s just a macho thing with you?”

“No, it’s more than that,” I admitted. I gestured to the torture-and-pain motif in which his office was decorated. “But, seriously, I doubt you would understand.”

“Mmm, probably not. I’m not into sentimentality and that bullshit. Not anymore.”

“What happened? What changed you?”

His smiled faded to a remote coldness. “I learned that there was something better. Better than family, better than blood ties. Better than any of this ordinary shit.”

“You found religion?” I said.

“It’s a ‘higher order’ sort of thing that I really don’t want to explain and I doubt
you’d
understand.”

“I might surprise you.”

“I don’t think that’s possible. But
we
might surprise you. In fact I can pretty fucking well guarantee it.”

“Rock and roll,” I said.

I straightened and turned toward the four goons. They took up positions like compass points. The office was big, but not big enough to give me room to maneuver. They were going to fall on me like a wall, and they knew it. The guy with the gun even snugged it back into his shoulder rig. They were
that
confident, and they were smiling like kids at a carnival.

“You shouldn’t have bothered Mr. Skye,” said the guy in front of me. He was the gun who’d holstered his gun. He stood on the East point of the compass. “You should have—”

I kicked him in the nuts. I really didn’t need to hear the speech.

I’m not that big, but I can kick like a Rockette. I
felt
bones break and he screamed like a nine-year-old girl. Dumbass should have kept his gun out.

I stepped backward off of him and put an elbow into West’s face. It had all of my mass in motion behind it. That time I heard bones break, and he went down so fast that I wondered if I’d snapped his neck.

That left South and North. South spent a half second too long looking shocked, so I jumped at him with a leaping knee—the only Muay Thai kick I know—and drove him all the way to the wall. By the time North closed in I’d grabbed South by the ears and slammed him skull-first into a replica of a torture rack. Blood splattered in a Jackson Pollack pattern.

I pivoted and rushed to intercept North, who was barreling at me with a lot of furious speed; so I veered left and clothes-lined him with my stiff right forearm. He did a pretty impressive back flip and landed face down on the black-painted hardwood floor.

If this was an action movie everything would switch to slow motion as the four thugs toppled to the ground and I turned slowly, looking badass, to face the now startled and unprotected villain.

The real world is a lot less accommodating.

I caught movement behind me, figuring it for Skye going after my gun, so I whirled and made ready to launch into a diving tackle.

Only it wasn’t Skye.

It was East and West getting to their feet. West’s face was smeared with blood from his broken nose, but he was smiling. As I watched he took his nose between thumb and forefinger and
snapped
it into place, then spit a hocker of blood and snot onto the floor.

North was chuckling as he rose; and behind me I could hear South shifting to stand behind me again. I turned in a slow circle. They were all smiling. They shouldn’t have been
able
to. They should have been sprawled on the floor and I should have been giving some kind of smart-ass speech as I closed in to lay a beating on Skye. That was the script I’d written in my head.

What the hell was this shit?

“Surprise!” said Skye dryly.

“What the hell are these fuckers
taking
?”

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you?”

“Try me.”

“Blood,” he said.

“What the—”

And I looked more closely at the smiles. Lots of white teeth. Lots of long, pointy white teeth.

“Oh, balls,” I said.

“Yeah, kind of cool, huh?”

“Vampires?” I said.

“Yeah.”

“Actual vampires.”

Skye laughed. The four—well, let’s call a spade a spade—
vampires
laughed with him.

Even I laughed.

“Geez. When shit goes wrong it goes all the way wrong, doesn’t it,” I said.

“On the up side,” said Skye, “you did win the first round. Nice moves.”

“Thanks.”

The four of them circled me. My pulse jumped from “uh-oh” to “oh shit.” It was cold in his office, but I was starting to sweat pretty heavily.

“I guess I shouldn’t be surprised,” I said. “You’re one, too? Am I right?”

“A recent convert,” he admitted.

“So . . . that whole weight loss, going all weird on the missus, that was—?”

“A transition process. It’s not like they show in the movies, you know. Takes weeks. The whole metabolism changes.”

“No kidding.”

One of the vampires faked a lunge to psyche me out and I jumped a foot in the air. I’m pretty sure I didn’t yelp like a Chihuahua, but I wouldn’t swear to that in court. They all laughed at that, too. I didn’t.

“Which explains why you lost all that weight.”

“Who needs steroids and free-weights,” he agreed and spread his hands. “This package comes with honest-to-God super strength. I’m like Spider-Man and Wolverine rolled into one. Super strong and I heal from damn near anything.”

“Could you be more specific on that last point?”

“Cute.”

“Worth a try.” I looked at them, at their grinning, evil faces. My nuts were trying to crawl up inside of my chest cavity. I mean . . .
fucking vampires?

“Weird thing was,” I said, “I was starting to build a case in my head about your wife. You losing weight and getting pale, blaming her for it all, and you saying you
know
what she is. Is she a vampire, too? Is she the one who bit you?”

Skye laughed. “Christ, no. And she’s not a succubus, either. She’s just a nagging, soul-draining, passive-aggressive, codependent bitch.”

“Wow. You’re really a chauvinistic prick, aren’t you?”

“Better than being pussy whipped.”

I dropped it. I had bigger fish to fry than trying to bring this macho jackass into the twenty-first century. Namely the fact that I was in a roomful of vampires.

I know I keep harping on that, but really . . . it’s not the sort of shit that happens all the time to me. Or, like . . .
ever.

“Say, man,” I said to Skye, “any chance we can roll back this tape to the point where we were still friends? I just walk out of here and we all call it a day?”

Skye made a face as if pretending to consider it. “Mmm . . . no, I don’t see that happening.”

“You want to make a deal of some kind?”

“Nah,” he said. “You got nothing I want. Except the O-positive.”

“AB-neg,” I corrected.

“Never tried that.”

“You wouldn’t like it. Goes right to your hips.”

The wattage on his smile was dimmer. Jaunty banter can buy only so many seconds and then it’s back to business.

I tried to keep my face neutral, but my pulse was like a jazz drum solo.

“I’m going to throw something out here,” I said. I could hear a tremor in my voice. Fuck.

“Oh, please.” He gestured to the four killers and they started forward.

“Wait! Just hear me out. What have you got to lose?”

The thugs looked at Skye. West gave a “why not?” kind of shrug.

Skye sighed. “Okay, what is it? Last words? A little begging?” he suggested.

“Mm, more like last threat.”

“This I got to hear.”

The five of them looked genuinely interested.

“Okay, so here you are, five vampires. That’s some really scary shit, am I right? I mean creatures of the night and all that.”

He nodded, nothing to disagree with.

“To most people that’s enough to make them go apeshit crazy. I mean . . . vampires. Not your everyday thing. It opens up all kinds of metaphysical questions. If vampires exist, what
else
does? If there are supernatural monsters, does that mean God and the Devil are real? You follow me?”

“Sure. We get that a lot.”

“And I’m outnumbered here. Five to one. Tough odds even without you fellows being the undead. So . . . why am I not scared?”

His eyes narrowed.

“I mean, yeah, my pulse is racing and I’m sweating. But do I look as scared as I should be? I don’t, do I? Now . . . why is that?”

“So you put up a good front. It’ll be a good anecdote later,” he said. “For us.”

“Maybe he’s got a hammer and stake,” suggested West.

That got a laugh.

“Nope.”

My heart rate had to be close to two hundred. It was machine-gun fire in my chest.

“Coupla garlic bulbs in your pocket?” asked East.

“Nah. I don’t even like it on my pizza.”

“You don’t have any backup,” said North. “And you don’t got your gun.”

My blood pressure could have scalded paint off a battleship. I wiped sweat off my brow with my thumb.

“Okay, jokes over,” snapped Skye. “What’s the punch line here? Why aren’t you as scared as you should be?”

I smiled.

“I’ll show you.”

The first time it happened, way back when I was thirteen, it took almost half an hour. I screamed and cried and rolled around on the floor. First time’s always the hardest. Each time since, it was easier. My grandmother and her sister could do it in the time it took you to snap your fingers. My best time was during a foot chase back when I was with Minneapolis PD. I was running down the guy who’d beaten his wife with the extension cord. He saw me coming and ducked into his apartment. I kicked the door and he came out of the bedroom with a gun and opened up. I went through the change in the time it took me to leap through the doorway. Like the snap of my fingers. One minute me, next minute
different
me.

I tore the shit out of him. I lost my badge and pension and had to make up all sorts of excuses. On the plus side, I didn’t die, which
would
have happened if I hadn’t managed the change so fast. I’m only mortal when I look like one.

That night in Skye’s office wasn’t my best time. Maybe third or fourth best. Say, two, three seconds. It felt like an explosion. It hurts. Feels like my heart is bursting, like cherry bombs are detonating inside my muscles. It starts in the chest, then ripples out from there as muscle mass changes and is reassigned in new ways. Bones warp, crack and re-form. Nails tear through the flesh of my fingers and toes, my jaw shifts and the longer teeth spike through the gums. It’s bloody and it’s ugly and it hurts like a motherfucker.

But the end result is a stunner. A real kick-ass dramatic moment that wows the audience.

I think all four of the thugs screamed. They jerked back from me, looks of shock and horror on their faces. If I wasn’t so deeply into the moment, I would have smiled at the irony. Monsters being scared by a monster.

I crouched in the center of the room, hands flexing, claws streaked with blood, hot saliva dripping from my mouth onto my chest.

It would have been cool and dramatic to have said “Surprise!” to them, the way Skye had said it to me, but my mouth was no longer constructed for human speech. All I could do was roar.

I did.

And then I launched at them.

Vampires are strong. Four or five times stronger than an ordinary human.