Werewolf Smackdown Read online

  “As did the clan and pack alphas.”

  “But as far as cooperating with you,” I said, “I’m not interested in Calhoun. I’m only interested in finding Wendy and making sure she’s okay. After that, finding out who’s after me and why.”

  “You may discover Calhoun is interested in you.”

  “I’ll take my chances. Too bad I didn’t bring a gun.”

  Bourbon slid his chair to the side and opened a desk drawer. “I can help you there. If you’re not picky.”

  His sudden generosity startled me.

  He laid an unusual-looking pistol on the desktop. The weapon had a matte-green finish and soft curves, unlike the hard machined lines of a typical firearm, and looked like it had been regurgitated from a Frankenstein Venus flytrap.

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  “A Vektor nine-millimeter. South African.”

  Very cool. I reached for the pistol. “Thanks.”

  Bourbon pulled the Vektor out of reach. “That is mine. Here is yours.” He lifted a revolver from the drawer and pushed it across the desktop to me. The gun was a .38 Special with a stubby barrel and a minuscule grip. It looked like a Smith & Wesson snub-nose. Once upon a time, this type of pistol was the favorite of plainclothes cops.

  I picked up the gun. It wasn’t a real S&W but a cheap copy, a vintage Saturday night special.

  Old school.

  Rust had formed where the bluing had worn off along the barrel, frame, and cylinder. The plastic grips were cracked and loose. I opened the five-shot cylinder and it fell into my hand.

  Make that real old school.

  “Might need a little TLC,” he said.

  “Might need to get chucked off a bridge,” I replied. “This is a piece of junk. Don’t you have something that’s a little more intimidating? A BB gun? Slingshot and marbles?”

  “I said you couldn’t be picky.”

  “Yeah, there’s nothing to worry about. I pull this out to defend myself and my enemies will die laughing.” I put the revolver back together and clicked the cylinder into place. “I need to shop for a pistol that’s worth carrying.”

  Bourbon cocked a thumb out his window, to the north. “Try America Street on the other side of the Neck.”

  “The Neck?”

  “The peninsula north of Spring Street. Separates Charleston proper from the rest of the dirty world.”

  “What kind of a place is America Street?”

  “In the daytime, it’s like the bad part of Metropolis. After dark, it’s Gotham City. In other words, ghetto.”

  I couldn’t walk downtown Charleston without someone trying to kill me. What would happen if I went to America Street?

  Bourbon dropped a Ziploc bag that rattled on the desktop. “Here’s your ammunition.”

  I took the bag and counted about two dozen rounds. Some had nickel cartridge shells, the rest were brass. Most of the shells were tarnished and mangy with verdigris. A few bullets were factory hollow points, others had lopsided lead-slug home loads.

  He handed a paper bag with the logo of a sandwich shop. “I wouldn’t advise carrying in plain sight.”

  I dropped the snub-nose and Ziploc into the bag.

  Bourbon folded his hands on the desk. “You got a gun. You got bullets. Now what?”

  “Like I told you, find out who’s after me and why.”

  “How are you going to do that?”

  “I’m a detective, remember? I have methods.”

  “What methods?” he asked.

  “Harsh methods. I’ve already killed twice today, and it’s barely past noon.”

  His eyes shifted from me, not much, but enough to signal that my answer had jostled his thinking like a speed bump.

  “I better get started.” I cupped the paper bag with the revolver inside and stood.

  Bourbon withdrew his hands from the desk. “The sooner the better.” His eyes gave a red lupine shine, and they betrayed the doubts I’d put into his head.

  I looked into the receptionist’s foyer. She was busy at her desk. Sean Moultier was gone.

  As I turned to leave, a spray can went fsst behind me. I looked to see what Bourbon was doing.

  He aimed the room deodorizer at the chair I’d just vacated. “Don’t take this wrong”—he wrinkled his nose—“but you vampires stink.”

  CHAPTER 7

  I left Bourbon’s office, passed his bodyguards, and got into the elevator. I was holding the sandwich bag that contained the revolver and Ziploc of ammo he’d given me. No sense in carrying an unloaded gun, especially as I’d already been the target of one assassination attempt today.

  I reached into the bag and pulled out the revolver. I selected five of the least crappy-looking cartridges from the Ziploc and loaded the snub-nose. Since I was up against werewolves—and vampires as well—I needed silver bullets instead of these lead slugs. And a pistol that inspired more confidence than this knock-off relic.

  I dropped the snub-nose into the right leg pocket of my cargo pants. I stepped from the elevator and went out the front door of the building onto Broad Street.

  What next?

  Find Wendy.

  Make sure she’s okay. Learn how, or if, she’s mixed up in this mess between the werewolf clans and the vampire assassins that I’d killed. Bourbon knew Wendy. That was enough to convince me that she was in danger.

  The second thing I’d do was contact the Araneum. Let them know there’s trouble brewing among the werewolves. A fight between clan alphas could spill over into our side of the supernatural realm. And tell them about Julius Paxton. I was convinced this was the same Paxton I’d gunned for in Los Angeles. Back then he didn’t seem the type to forgive and forget. I doubted that in the meantime he’d answered an altar call and found Jesus.

  If Paxton wanted me, I wasn’t hard to find. He could’ve attacked me in Denver. Then what prevented him? What about Charleston encouraged this attack?

  And Wendy? I wondered how she’d greet me. A big sloppy kiss would be nice. Maybe we could play house while I was in town.

  Her business card didn’t show an address. I would check the Internet when I returned to the mortuary. To orient myself, I pulled out a tourist map of Charleston from my back pocket. Dozens of ads for local attractions crowded the margins of the map, but only one caught my eye: Pirate Coast Tours.

  The tour companies were clustered around the intersection of State and Market streets. I’d start there.

  A black Mercedes limo glided to the curb and halted at the corner in front of me. A man in a dark gray suit climbed out of the front passenger door. He had a bull neck and shoulders wide as an ox yoke. He popped the rear door, held it open, and stared at me.

  His expression brimmed with guarded hostility. I couldn’t decide if that look was meant for me to keep my distance or to say that we had pending business.

  His eyes flicked to my right, a tell that someone was coming up on that side.

  I started to turn. I got the whiff of garlic and stiffened, frozen by the disgusting odor.

  A hand swung from behind me and to my left. The tell had been a diversion. The hand moved at supernatural speed and clamped a cloth over my mouth and nose. The cloth brought the revolting stench of more garlic. My guts seized and I was overcome by the need to retch.

  Another hand clasped the back of my head and kept the cloth tight against my face.

  The poisonous vapor of the garlic twisted through me. Nausea sucked the strength from my body. I slapped at the hand over my face like a sick kitten. The world swirled before me.

  Two large hands clenched my upper arms, their grips strong as iron. In a blur of motion, I was pushed into the limo and fell across a cushioned seat.

  A gruff voice barked, “Don’t make trouble, asshole. Understand?”

  The garlic odor kept me weak and nauseated. Everything around me was a dizzying smear of colors. I could barely sit upright, let alone fight. I nodded.

  The cloth was lifted from my face. Cool, sooth
ing air washed up my nose, into my mouth, and down my throat.

  A hazy apparition of a woman, wearing a brown business suit—short jacket, slacks, white blouse—folded herself in front of me. The door beside us slammed shut. Someone climbed into the front seat—someone heavy enough to make the limo rock in place—and the front door thumped closed. The door locks clicked, sealing me inside.

  My kundalini noir withdrew into an anxious ball. My shoulders, neck, and back stiffened in panic.

  Who were these people? Supernaturals? What did they want? Since they had used garlic to subdue me, they knew I was a vampire. A sickening lump grew in my throat. They could’ve done worse than jam me into this car. Maybe the garlic treatment was only a start.

  The woman extended her arm and offered a white object. With my eyes still blurry and my head wobbling in dizziness, I couldn’t tell what she held. It smelled like lemon.

  I snatched the object. It was a cloth, soaked with lemon juice. I pressed the cloth over my face and breathed deep.

  The refreshing aroma washed away the nausea and loosened the knots in my body. When I lowered the cloth, I caught another strange whiff. A musky aroma filling the interior of the limo.

  Werewolf.

  My shoulders and neck tightened again.

  The woman before me came into sharp focus. She sat on a jump seat unfolded from the back of the partition between our compartment and the front of the limo. She was a stocky, muscular brunette with the unwavering, alert gaze of a watchdog. Her lips parted to show impressive fangs. Coarse hair grew from the back of her hands as she started the process of morphing from human to werewolf.

  She pointed a bizarre pistol. The black metal gun had brass fittings and a sleek tapered barrel. A glass vial jutted from the top of the pistol. A vaccination gun, but loaded with what drug?

  I stared at the vial until I could make out the label: Oil of garlic. Concentrated.

  I was so fucked.

  My kundalini noir recoiled. My guts loosened at the thought of garlic oil dissolving my flesh and turning me into a bag of vampire menudo.

  Two more weres sat up front, the driver and the guy in the gray suit who had distracted me. He draped a thick arm over the partition. He scratched the mat of fur growing from his wrist to his knuckles.

  Go ahead, his fanged snarl taunted, try me.

  Someone to my left stirred. I wasn’t alone on the backseat.

  An older man wearing a finely tailored suit lounged beside me on the leather upholstery.

  “Welcome, Mr. Gomez,” he said in a relaxed Southern drawl. “I’m looking forward to telling my side of this story.”

  In his dark, almost black suit, he seemed to melt into the inky interior of the limo. I blinked a couple of times before I recognized him.

  Randolph Calhoun.

  The werewolf that Bourbon wanted me to kill.

  CHAPTER 8

  I sat in the back of the limo, me against four weres. The two goons up front. Calhoun next to me. And don’t forget the hairy bitch with the garlic-oil vaccination gun.

  Not quite the worst-case scenario but pretty damn close.

  Calhoun waited patiently, as if he expected me to thank him for the ride. His suit rippled over his body like liquid cloth. The cut of his jacket and the design of his shirt and tie were fashionably understated, but even so, they made Bourbon’s expensive clothes seem bargain basement.

  Calhoun’s thick hair looked sculpted rather than combed. His platinum-gray eyes seemed to float in their deep sockets as if sheltered from the cares of the world by money and privilege. He looked heavier than he had in any of the photos Bourbon had showed me. The beginnings of a double chin clung to his jaw. He looked well fed and prosperous.

  Then he raised his left arm.

  The three claws of his prosthesis glimmered surreally. He rested this arm on his lap. The claws protruded from slots in a steel knob that extended from inside the starched cuff of his shirt.

  I wasn’t curious about his prosthesis. It was enough that I knew Calhoun had lost his arm in Iraq. I had war wounds of my own, on the inside. I didn’t want to talk about mine, and I was sure Calhoun didn’t want to talk about his. Besides, all the theatrics with his goons and the garlic weren’t so we could snuggle and reminisce about our time working for Uncle Sugar.

  Calhoun needed information from me. When he got it, then what? I slipped my hand into my cargo pocket and touched the sandwich bag. If there was trouble, I could rip it open and grab the snub-nose. The pistol wasn’t much for range, but within the confines of the limo, it should do enough damage. The female were holding the vaccination gun would get the first .38 slug between her eyes.

  The were up front, the biggest of these supernatural mutts, dropped his gaze to my hand in the cargo pocket. He frowned and curled his right upper lip to show me a long curved fang.

  I withdrew my talons, pulled my hand from the pocket, and showed him my empty palm.

  The were’s fang retracted. He smirked and said, “Same plan, Mr. Calhoun?”

  Calhoun replied yes. The were turned around and tapped the driver on the shoulder. The Mercedes glided from the curb.

  I asked, “Where are we going?”

  Calhoun answered, “Someplace so you can get a broader perspective of our situation here.” His voice was cool as a mint julep.

  “Meaning where exactly?”

  “My office in Mount Pleasant. On the other side of the river. I’d like to talk to you about Mr. Eric Bourbon.”

  Mister? These Southern werewolves were polite, even as they schemed to kill one another.

  The limo turned left and headed north up East Bay Street. We passed a horse-drawn carriage loaded with tourists. I thought of Wendy working as a tour guide, and my eyes panned the carriage in the hope of seeing her.

  Calhoun asked, “What did Bourbon tell you?”

  I brought my attention back to him. “That’s between him and me.”

  Calhoun’s eyes gave a malicious red sparkle, like the trace of light on the edge of a crimson blade. “Let me be a little more direct. What did Bourbon propose to you?”

  I’ve done dumb things in my career, but I wasn’t stupid. If I told the truth—that Bourbon wanted me to kill Calhoun—I’d bet that female werewolf would pump me with garlic oil.

  “Privileged info. I can’t tell you.”

  “What if I made a counteroffer?”

  “Keep your money. Buy what’s-her-name”—I pointed to the were-bitch—“a personality.”

  She gave me the finger.

  Calhoun moved uncomfortably and spewed a vibe of frustration.

  I felt the vibe. If he ordered an attack, getting the revolver would take too long. I’d go after the female were’s throat with my talons and then decapitate Calhoun.

  He must have sensed my tension. He signaled her by raising his good arm and wagging his fingers. She flicked a button on the vaccination gun and dropped it into a purse by her feet.

  Her muscles slimmed, becoming more feminine. The hair on her hands turned into wisps and disappeared, leaving behind tanned naked skin. Almost human. I could handle human.

  “If it makes you feel any better,” I said, “I’ll throw you a bone. Whatever Bourbon offered, I turned him down.”

  The throw-you-a-bone comment made Calhoun tighten his brow in offense. “Are you leaving Charleston?”

  “I was,” I answered. “But I’ve changed my mind now that someone’s tried to kill me. I need to find out who and why.” I recited the details about the crab, the vampires, and the business card belonging to Bourbon. I wanted to prime Calhoun before I asked about Wendy and Paxton.

  Calhoun’s gaze flitted about my face as he read every twitch and nuance for extra meaning.

  When I paused, he said, “I don’t understand. You’re here because Bourbon wanted to hire you. Now you tell me he had something to do with the attack on you.”

  “Let’s not jump ahead of ourselves. I asked him and he denied it.”

  “Y
ou believe him?”

  “Let me get the facts. Then I’ll tell you what I believe.”

  “If Bourbon wanted to attack you, why use vampires?”

  “Maybe there’s no werewolf up to the task.”

  Calhoun suppressed a laugh. He glanced at the female were. She grinned and shook her head.

  He said, “Too bad you had to kill the vampires.”

  “Yeah, I’m real torn up about those morons.” I waited a beat before mentioning, “I found another business card.”

  He perked his eyebrows.

  “Wendy Teagarden.”

  CHAPTER 9

  Calhoun let his eyebrows settle and his expression became flat and opaque. He was hiding something about Wendy.

  Our limo passed a restaurant with people sitting under umbrellas on a patio.

  “You know her?” I asked.

  “We’re friends.” His eyes turned curious. “How do you know her?”

  “We’re friends.”

  Calhoun gave an amused nod. “You’re surprised she’s here?”

  “I am. Haven’t seen her in years.”

  “She’s doing well,” Calhoun said without my prompting. “By her standards.”

  “What’s that mean?”

  He chuckled. “It means Wendy is being Wendy. She does things her way.”

  I understood. However Wendy earned her keep, she was always a free spirit.

  “But we’re here to talk about Bourbon,” Calhoun said, “not Wendy.” He raised his prosthesis to display his claws. “He and I are equivalent alphas within our respective clans.”

  “And you’re both here in Charleston?”

  “This city is the symbolic center of werewolves in North America. Neither one of us will cede ownership to the other. Given the snug confines of Charleston, it was inevitable that he and I would clash when our clans maneuvered for dominance.”

  “When you say ‘clash,’ do you mean killing one another’s werewolves?”

  Calhoun restrained a smile. “Such as one with a missing head?”

  “Actually it was missing the body.”