Jailbait Zombie fg-4 Read online

  “I don’t like what I’m seeing,” Mel said. “Looks like the zombie drove himself here.”

  “I agree,” I replied. “I can’t imagine that he carpooled with anyone.”

  “That, and he brought something to munch on. So we got a zombie that’s not only commuting but has got the foresight to pack a lunch. Not typical zombie behavior at all.” Mel wiped his hands on his denim overalls. “This is not good.”

  “What do we do about the car?”

  Mel stepped away from the Chrysler. “A couple of vampires in the Aurora PD will take of it.”

  “What do we do now?”

  Mel scratched his sideburns and looked around. “Wait for word from the Araneum.”

  I could already feel myself being pulled into this. Zombies. Yuck. I’d better stock up on bleach and soap.

  I sighed. “This damn zombie has already cost me.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Dagger died owing me money and favors.”

  “You, too?” Mel’s big eyebrows inched up his forehead. “Free-loading bastard didn’t leave much except for a motorcycle and an antique strongbox.”

  “A motorcycle? What kind?”

  “Kawasaki 800 Drifter. A real beauty.”

  I said, “Dibs.”

  “Fine by me.” Mel gave a wily smile. “You should’ve asked for the strongbox. Dagger wasn’t just a mooch but a crook. The strongbox is full of silver and gold coins.”

  “You didn’t tell me that.”

  “You didn’t ask.” Mel put his arm around my shoulders. “As a consolation, I’ll tow the motorcycle to your place, free of charge.”

  “Is that the best you can offer?”

  “Not really,” Mel replied, “but I’ll be too busy counting my money.”

  We left the Chrysler. The reek was a force field that would protect the car until the police vampires came by.

  Mel dropped off the motorcycle. He was right. It was a beauty, a Kawasaki Drifter in blood red with black trim. With its retro fenders and wide seat, the Drifter looked like an authentic Indian, plus it had something else the original American machine didn’t: Japanese reliability.

  I took the Kawasaki on a test cruise, heading west on Highway 72 toward Pinecliff. I didn’t take any votes but I was sure I looked way cooler on this machine than Dagger ever had. Riding fast up the twisting mountain road, I glimpsed a black blur zooming from my left. My reflexes triggered into vampire speed but too late.

  The object slammed into the side of my head and knocked me off the motorcycle. I saw the wreck unfolding in slow motion, but there was nothing I could do except cartwheel through the air and hope I landed someplace soft.

  My motorcycle dropped onto its side, throwing sparks and shedding parts as it skidded along the highway and onto the gravel shoulder. The bike and I flew off the shoulder, exploded through a scrub pine, and bounced down a steep rocky ravine.

  I smashed into a boulder and ricocheted across a pile of rocks. The motorcycle tumbled over me. The bike and I pancaked on gravel and slid down the incline until we slowed to a dusty halt. Dirt and pieces of the Kawasaki showered the area.

  CHAPTER 4

  I lay on my back, blind with pain. Every bone hollered that it was broken. I tried to wiggle my toes and fingers, and all I got was more pain.

  Sledgehammer-to-the-bone pain.

  I lay for long moments, not moving, and the pain lessened from sledgehammer to ball-peen hammer.

  My vision lightened and became a fuzzy blue that coalesced into a sky with clouds. I still hurt all over but felt grateful as the pain slowly dropped from ball-peen hammer pounding to a drumming by a meat tenderizer. I wiped dust from my face. My sunglasses were gone but my contacts remained in place.

  I extended my arms behind me to prop myself up. More pain shot from my right wrist. I lifted that arm and my hand hung at an angle unnatural even for a vampire.

  Blood dripped from the cuff of my leather jacket. The blood clotted and dried instantly, disintegrating into cinnamon-colored flakes.

  I sleeved the cuff back. Shards of pale bones, the ulna and the radius, poked through the mangled skin above my wrist. I tried to convince myself that it only looked more painful than it was. With my left hand, I grasped my right hand across the knuckles and gave a firm pull.

  Another tsunami of pain pounded through me. My kundalini noir thrashed as if it was a snake on a hot skillet.

  I worked the fractured bones into place. My vision went black again. All I sensed were my screams echoing from the mountains above. Light gradually came back into my eyes. My screams faded to silence.

  I waited a moment to center myself, then surveyed the area. The motorcycle frame and engine lay in a twisted mess like the smashed carcass of a giant insect. I had thought that inheriting this bike from Dagger had been a good deal, but clearly his jinx had followed me. I had nothing to show for what he owed me except bruises, shattered bone, and a long walk home.

  I needed something for a splint. I reached for the battered shell of the front fender, sat up, and held the fender upright between my knees. I extended a talon and sawed a length of the fender. I wrapped the strip of metal around my broken wrist and pulled the slack out. Gritting my teeth, I clamped the metal tight. Blood seeped along the edge of the splint. Wasn’t pretty, but this time tomorrow I should be okay.

  Sunlight heated patches on my face. The crash had smeared the makeup and sunblock I had slathered on to protect my undead skin.

  I rubbed a sore spot on my skull. What the hell had hit me?

  A dirty black shape the size of a grapefruit stirred beside my boots. The shape sprouted a pair of claws and a pointed beak. It rolled to one side and staggered to its feet. Torn feathers drifted from its ruffled flanks.

  A crow. Had to be a messenger from the Araneum. This bird was the blur that had collided against me.

  The crow swung its little round head and wobbled as if drunk.

  I grabbed what was left of my motorcycle’s front fender and tossed it at the crow. “I want to talk to your boss, you little shit.”

  The fender clattered around the bird. It acted unimpressed by my wrath and poked at the ground. The crow jammed its beak into a scramble of weeds and wrestled loose a silver object the size of my little finger.

  But the object wasn’t silver, it was white gold and platinum; a message capsule the crow wore on its leg. The crash must have knocked the capsule loose.

  The crow grasped the capsule in its beak and limped toward me.

  I took the capsule and wiped away the dust. I unzipped my leather jacket and leaned forward to create a pocket of shadow. With my left hand I unscrewed the ruby-rimmed cap, keeping the capsule in shadow to protect its contents from direct sunlight. The Araneum sent notes on vampire skin. A touch of sunlight would make the undead parchment burst into flames.

  The Araneum must flay the smelliest vampires because when I removed the cap, what shot out was a putrid odor worse than rotting meat wrapped in moldy swim trunks.

  I used the point of a talon to snag the parchment rolled inside the capsule. The parchment resembled yellowed onionskin. Keeping the note tucked close to my belly, I fumbled with the note to unfold it with my good hand. The parchment opened to a rectangle the size of a poker card. The message appeared as if it had been written on an old manual typewriter.

  Our esteemed Felix Gomez, Find the creator of the zombies. Destroy him and all the zombies. Immediately. We expect your usual thoroughness. Report when completed. Araneum The crooked letters were typed in the brown color of dried blood. In what aisle of Office Depot would you find such a typewriter ribbon? I’ve learned to decipher these messages because the Araneum must pay a thousand dollars for each word, they’re so stingy with information. First clue, creator of the zombies. Meaning the Araneum knows someone is reanimating the dead. Second clue, zombies. Plural. I’ve only seen one. The Araneum knows there are more. Third clue. Him. Gender, male. Although these notes were annoyingly brief, they were
precise. Fourth clue. Immediately. Meaning the threat is big. Nothing about who and where. Typical. The reverse of the note was blank. I reread the front to make sure I didn’t miss anything. I balled up the note and flicked it away. The note arced into the sunlight, flashed and crackled and turned into a puff of smoke. I had my orders. My Kawasaki lay in sad, broken pieces around me. I had much work to do, beginning with finding a way back to Denver. I pointed the capsule at the crow. “You’re not getting any points for a dramatic entrance. Why couldn’t you have come to my office?” The crow preened and picked at its wings. The dirt was gone and its feathers gleamed shiny and fresh. The crow marched close to my side and extended one leg. The clip on the capsule was bent so I worked it to cinch tight around the shank. The crow stamped its foot to test the security of the capsule. A breeze started up the ravine, murmuring through pines and aspens, and stirred the dust. The crow faced the breeze and spread both wings to cup the wind. The crow levitated straight up, claws and the capsule dangling. The crow continued up, up, not moving its wings, riding the wind with an expert grace. The claws retracted and the crow receded into a black speck in the blue sky. Show-off. I could levitate, though not high or far. Plus it took a lot of work. You don’t get anything for free in this world. I struggled to my feet and dismissed the wreckage of my Kawasaki with a sigh and a shrug. I climbed up the ravine along the trail of scattered motorcycle parts. Every step jarred me like a swat across my back with a burning two-by-four. Once on the shoulder of the narrow highway I dug into my jacket pocket for my cell phone, which fell apart in pieces. A white minivan came down the mountain and I flagged it. An enormous dog in the van barked and lunged at the rear windows. The driver’s window lowered. A woman wearing a ball cap and sunglasses studied me and the pieces of metal and glass decorating the skid marks leading off the road. “You okay?” she asked, amazed no doubt that I was upright. “I’m better than I look,” I lied. “Blowout and I hit this.” I raked my boot through the gravel on the asphalt. “Any way you could give a ride into town?” “Where exactly?” I had to get home. “Near Sloan’s Lake.” “No problem,” she answered. The cargo door on the opposite side popped open. I hobbled around the front of the van. The dog’s barking grew more fierce. A girl of about ten sat in the passenger’s front seat; she eyed me like I was a specimen from Ripley’s Believe It or Not. Remembering the little Iraqi girl reappearing in my dreams, I got a flutter of the heebie-jeebies from this girl’s stare. But she was a tiny blonde with a Hannah Montana T-shirt and weighed all of sixty pounds. My paranoia turned into embarrassment. The day I couldn’t handle this waif was the day I’d drive a stake through my own sternum. I slid open the cargo door, and the raucous barking thundered out. A boy-considering the resemblance, the girl’s younger brother-moved guardedly across the middle seat to make room for me. The dog in the back-the mongrel offspring of a St. Bernard and a cave bear-flashed yellow teeth and bashed against a wire grid barrier behind the middle seats. The van rocked as the hairy beast lunged from side to side. The boy put his hand on a latch at the front of the grid. He kept his wary little eyes on me. His arm seemed spring-loaded to throw the latch open. No wonder this woman wasn’t afraid of picking up hitchhikers. Make a wrong move and you’re meat scraps. “Buttercup, easy now,” the woman cooed. “Don’t be a bad girl.” Buttercup? That prehistoric monster? I buckled in, keeping as far right as I could to stay out of the line of vision from the interior mirror. Buttercup poked her snarling muzzle through the wire grid and sprayed doggie drool against the back of my neck. Buttercup had good reason to snarl. I picked up the aroma of young human flesh layered in the strong smell of Buttercup’s canine musk. In the ancient bloodsucker days, these kids would’ve been a banquet for us vampires. But now, it’s hands off. We drove down the winding mountain road into the suburbs of Denver, turning through Golden and reaching Wheat Ridge. The Sloan’s Lake area was another five miles away. I caught the girl staring at me through the right outside mirror. This ride was about to get dramatic. Her big blue eyes moved in a searching pattern. She unclasped her safety belt and whirled about to stare at me over the side of her seat. The driver eased up on the gas. “What are you doing?” The girl’s eyebrows pinched together and her eyes became loaded with suspicion. “Mom, why can’t I see him in the mirror?”

  CHAPTER 5

  Time to cover my tracks and find another way home. I bent forward-pain zippered from vertebrae to vertebrae. I flicked the contacts from my eyes and sat up.

  Tendrils of alarm lashed from the red auras of the girl, her mom, and the boy. Buttercup picked up on their blossoming panic and the van quaked as the dog jumped and clawed at the wire grid.

  I made eye contact with the girl first. Her aura lit up like I’d hooked her little toes to an electrical socket. She sat still, open-mouthed, eyes big as quarters. I eased the girl back into her seat.

  The boy trembled as his blood turned ice cold. Terror kept him from doing anything but hold still while I hypnotized him.

  When Mom turned to look, I snatched the sunglasses off her face and zapped her. I reached over her shoulder for the steering wheel while telling her how to work the pedals.

  All three sat quiet as mannequins, their auras fading to red shimmers. I’d given each an extra powerful dose to keep them under long enough for me to escape. When they came to, they would remember giving me a lift and then me disappearing sometime during the drive down the mountain.

  Buttercup howled, rabid with rage, eager to rip me to pieces. Shame that vampire hypnosis didn’t work on dogs, especially this volcanic bitch.

  I guided the minivan into an alley behind a liquor store, tucked a pair of twenties into the mom’s hand, and got out.

  How to get home? I didn’t want to risk stealing a car. Taxi? A cabbie could recall me. Not too many fares look like they’ve rolled down a mountain.

  I limped two blocks and waited for the bus. Compared with the other people at the bus stop in their eclectic urban attire-chrome army helmet; a cape made of feathers; plastic shopping bags for shoes; the middle-aged man in a denim miniskirt-I appeared normal and easily forgotten.

  I took a seat at the rear of the bus and isolated myself behind a moat of pain. My arm hurt too much for me to care about anything but self-medicating and not missing the transfer.

  After I got to my apartment, I cleaned up and smothered the pain with aspirin and a whisky sour. I checked voice mail from my landline.

  There was a message from Olivia, a favorite chalice: a human who willingly donated her blood. Part of the attraction for chalices was belonging to our supernatural subculture. But once part of our extended family, chalices kept coming-so to speak-for the orgasmic rapture experienced from the fanging. For us vampires, chalices provided convenient nourishment without the stalking of innocents and the risk that brought.

  There’s a catch. A chalice was bound to silence about the existence of the supernatural world. Any transgression warranted an immediate and agonizing death. Failure to punish any such chalice meant the vampire master also deserved the final blow from undead to permanent dead.

  Olivia’s cheery voice sang from the phone. “How’s it hanging, Felix? Long and thick, I hope. If you’re hungry, call me, baby.”

  Damn right I was hungry. Plump, horny, and succulent Olivia. Comfort food for a vampire.

  I flexed the fingers of my injured hand. My wrist ached. My back ached. Everything ached. Olivia would help me feel much better.

  I set the phone aside.

  Then, like a curtain falling before me, everything blanked out. An instant later the little girl appeared.

  The voice returned, repeating my name.

  Just as abruptly, the hallucination disappeared. The voice faded, the echo so faint it was like I had never heard it at all.

  I put my hand on the desk to stop the dizziness.

  One second I was in my normal world, then flash came the little girl, and flash again, back to normal.

  My kundalini noir shrank around a cold
ball of fear. My hands trembled from the chill.

  I pulled up a chair and sat.

  The war was years behind me.

  Was I going insane?

  CHAPTER 6

  I bought a new cell phone. My first call was to Mel and I told him about the visit from the crow.

  “What about the bike?” he asked.

  “What about me?” I replied. “The damn bird nearly killed me.”

  “But it didn’t. Meanwhile the bike is still fucked up.”

  “More than that. It’s a wreck.”

  “Man, I don’t want to hear that,” Mel said. “Where’s the bike?”

  “Up Coal Creek Canyon. Right where I crashed it.”

  “I got a friend who owns a wrecking yard. He’ll retrieve the bike and part it out. Give you a hundred for it.”

  “Deal.” Sucker, I would’ve given him the title for free.

  “What have you learned about the zombie?” Mel asked.

  “Nothing yet. Gimme a break, will you? I’m still limping from the wreck.”

  “That’s your problem,” Mel said. “Tell you what, I’ll send what I got on zombies. Modus operandi. Past history.”

  “As opposed to future history?”

  “Fuck you. You want my help or not?”

  “Sure,” I said. “Anything would be appreciated.”

  “It’s in the mail.” He hung up.

  I had better do my homework on Barrett Chambers, aka the now permanently deceased zombie. I keep a hacker on retainer. Every month I mail a few hundred bucks to a P.O. box in Kalamazoo, Michigan. In return I get snapshots into almost every database wired to the Internet. I sent an e-mail to my hacker with info I had on Chambers and a list of my questions.

  My next phone call was to Olivia. My wrist hurt more than it should’ve. I needed her fresh blood to help me heal.