Blood Trade

“Turnabout and all that,” he said. I joined him on a bench and sat, my mostly bare feet cold. “Jane? You like George. I can tell. There’s this . . . energy when you’re together.” Not knowing where he was going, I didn’t answer, just turned to him and drew on Beast’s night vision to see his face. He needed a shave, and he looked tired, though he had showered and dressed in fresh clothes. “But your cat, she likes Rick.”



“Crap. What did she do?”



“She rubbed herself all over him.”



I dropped my head. That was why I was thinking of scent-marking. Beast had scent-marked Rick. And now, whether consciously or not, Rick was scent-marking back. Deep inside, Beast rolled over. Mine, she murmured to me. Both mine. “That’s not good,” I said to her, and partly to Eli. “My Beast feels she can have them both, over time. Big-cats don’t mate for life.”



Eli blew out a breath of derision. “Yeah. Tell that to Rick and George. Two alpha males want the same woman? That’s trouble, Janie.”



I shrugged. “I know. We’re not human. Not any of us. And we’re extremely long lived. In the wild, cats each have their own territories. The land overlaps with the territories of other cats, and when a female goes into heat, either she’ll go to the male of her choice or they’ll come to her. Sometimes the males fight. If the female wants the winner, they mate. If she doesn’t like him, then she might run away or she might fight him. But she doesn’t keep him forever. Her next heat might take her to another male. But between times, cats are solitary.” Which sounded terribly lonely, all of a sudden.



“Your men are acting like cats.” He said it as if he were having a revelation. “Circling and waiting.”



“Yeah. I guess. I don’t want them fighting over me, but when they act like cats, it brings my Beast closer to the surface. It’s all so mixed up.” My voice was curiously dull, unemotional. And I could feel the familiar depression creeping along the edges of my mind. It was a weird feeling, more a lack of interest than unhappiness. How did people live with it? I shook away the thought and shrugged away the lurking depression, but it didn’t go far. It crouched in the corner of my mind like . . . like the shadow of Leo that was binding Beast. Was that significant? I couldn’t see how, but maybe so. Maybe bindings, when left unattended and unfed, became negativity and eventually depression. I hadn’t fed off Leo since the binding of Beast. Maybe—



“Jane?”



I looked up, realizing I’d been silent too long. “Yeah. Sorry. Are we hunting anymore tonight?”



“Rick said you needed to eat and then rest.”



“Food, yes. I’m starving. But Rick isn’t my mother. Let’s work.”



“I was hoping you would say that. We need to go to the morgue to make sure Syl took all the vamp heads. And the Kid has one more address we could check out. This one isn’t in Under the Hill. It’s a house just off High Street.”



I smiled at his calling Alex the Kid. The name was catching even for his brother. “High Street is part of the historical district. How far from the last place?”



“Mile or so. Jameson is cleaning your leathers. The sleeve is a goner, though.”



“I had the company reserve some leather from that dye batch. I can get it fixed. Let me get dressed again.” And out of this sweater.



We pulled in to the hospital entrance, my leathers smelling slightly of mink oil. Jameson had tried to care for the leathers with just water, to avoid any chemical stink, but my dried blood was caught in the rough part of the tears. “I’m sorry, Miss Jane,” he had said, while I’d stuffed my face with oatmeal and a rare steak. “But I thought the smell of your blood might be worse than the mink oil. For attracting predators.” He had a point. But I kinda had that new-car smell now.



Eli spun the wheel and pulled into a space marked for physician parking.



“A forensic autopsy unit in Natchez Regional Medical Center,” I said. “Who’da thought?” I hadn’t expected to come back to the medical center for any reason, but especially not for this. And if I’d thought about forensic autopsies, I would have thought they would be done in Jackson, Mississippi’s state capital.



“Let’s chat about taking down revenants,” Eli said. “You suggested earlier that the vamps we’ve been seeing were revenants.”



“Assuming that’s right, until now I’ve never seen one,” I said. “Never talked to anyone who has. There’s no vid on the Net. Only a description by another vamp hunter. He was typing with the three fingers the revenant left him on his right hand. It ate the left hand.”



Eli shut off the motor, pulled his phone, and started texting. Ten bucks said it was to Sylvia.



“They can’t feel pain,” I said. “You know all the zombie movies? Pretty much like that, except they’re deadly fast and they’ll eat anything, not just brains. You have to take their heads completely, and even then they take a while to die.”



“Yeah. Sounds like our critters.” Eli grunted, and it sounded like cursing. “Silver?”



“Won’t kill them. They—” I stopped and sat up in the seat. “The whole Naturaleza thing has always resulted in stronger, faster, harder-to-kill vamps. Maybe the spidey vamps are Naturaleza revenants, are a way to make vamps immune to everything. Silver, stakes in the heart, even partial beheading. Traditionally, less than three percent of staked vamps rise as revenants. Maybe the Naturaleza leader is experimenting on scions, making them into revenants, trying new magics forced from the missing witches to see what works. Some have seemed like rogues, newly risen and unintelligent; others have been in control of their faculties. Maybe the spidey vamps are a stepping stone to vamp perfection, or a mistake along the way.”



“I don’t really care where they come from or who their mommies are,” Eli said. “I just want to kill the suckers.”



“Yeah. Okay,” I said, thinking. “Me too.” But even I could hear the lack of real interest. For once questions about vamps were more interesting than just killing them.



“This might help.” He handed me a brown paper bag. It was heavier than I expected, and I nearly dropped it. I looked from the bag to him and back, and reached in. I pulled out a shotgun-shell holder, already loaded with rounds.



I felt my heart lighten. “Swuuueeet.” I unsnapped the strap and drew the Benelli from its spine holster. Eli opened his tool kit, flipped on a tiny tight-beamed light, and quickly mounted the device on the left side of the receiver while I watched. I now had quick access to an additional six shells. “I like. How much do I owe you?”



“Not a dime. Consider it a belated birthday present.”



I felt odd and didn’t know what to say, like maybe . . . shy. Or something. So I drew on my Christian children’s-home manners and said, “Thank you. It’s really, really nice.” Eli snorted, and I ducked my head, realizing that nice was probably not a good description for a weapon accessory, but it was all I had. I turned the holder over, admiring it from every angle, figuring out how the holder would affect the way the gun rested on my body from the strap, and how I’d handle it in the holster, and how the slight change in weight might affect firing. The draw would be different, and I worked through the mechanics of it. “Really nice,” I said happily.



I turned as a shadow caught my attention and watched Sylvia Turpin approach the car. “She’s pretty,” I said.



“She’s a knockout. And she likes guns almost as much as you do.”



I gave a half smile. I wish my love life was so uncomplicated. And then I thought about the two together as a couple. Instead of a white picket fence, these two would have a gun range and a fallout shelter with enough food to hide out for a whole year. Right. There was uncomplicated and then there was Eli and Sylvia. Not uncomplicated; just a different kind of complication.



Eli rolled down his window. Sylvia bent down and rested both arms on the window ledge. She was wearing makeup again, and her hair was pulled back in a ponytail. “Hiya,” she said. “The doc’s getting ready to start another autopsy. Come on in.”



“Coffee anywhere?” Eli asked, opening his door and stepping to the pavement.



“The cafeteria has a coffee bar this month. Something new they’re trying to beat back the competition. It’s not real coffee—you know. the burnt sludge from the bottom of the pot after it’s been sitting all day—but it isn’t bad. It’s horribly fresh, with all sorts of icky flavorings. And the espresso is made while you wait.”



“I’ll buy you some of this horrible coffee,” Eli said.



Sylvia laughed, and I figured all was okay now with their weird relationship. “The doc’s all excited about the vamps’ external characteristics. He can’t wait to get them open.”



“Get them—” Eli grabbed her arm. “You did take their heads already.” At her wide eyes he added, “Hell. You didn’t get my text. Did you?” Sylvia shook her head. “There’s a good chance the new-style vamps will rise as revenants unless you take their heads.”



I heard a beepbeepbeep. The sheriff went from dead stop to a sprint in a half second, pulling her police radio. She shouted back to us, “That’s man down! We got trouble in the morgue!” She shouted into the radio as we dashed down the sidewalk, “Take their heads! It’s the only way to kill them!” Over the radio, we heard gunshots and screaming.



No one stopped us as we entered a side door that had been propped open with a pencil. Sylvia kicked the pencil out of the way and we raced down a hallway as the door closed behind us, took a right down another hall, and flew down a short flight of stairs. We heard muffled screams and more gunshots. Sylvia rammed open the door at the bottom while drawing her service weapon. I reached up and pulled the M4, adjusted the vamp-killer on my left hip, and let out some of Beast as we ran. Her strength and speed flowed into me like a drug, and I laughed shortly, showing my teeth.