I STOOD WITH TWENTY other vampires under the night sky, on the shoulder of an asphalt road beside a dusty field near Last Chance, eighty miles east of Denver. Against the dark contours of the terrain, our orange auras looked like gems floating on black velvet.
A cold, dusty breeze stirred the morning air. As dawn approached, the twilight sky faded from inky black to purple and then to blue.
Bob’s naked corpse hung from a sheet of salvaged plywood propped to face the sun. His head rested on a crude shelf above his shoulders. A ragged hole the size of a fist showed where the vampire hunters had pounded a stake through his sternum. Frayed polypropylene boating rope looped under his armpits and across his chest, holding him flat against the plywood.
To us vampires, the first rays of the morning were the most savage to our flesh. For protection, five of the vampires used the satin robes they usually donned for choir with the Temple Baptist Church. Carmen, as usual, was ensconced in tight black leather, looking like a petite dominatrix making a rural house call. My jacket and trousers rustled in the wind. Everybody wore balaclavas, gloves, and welders goggles.
A corona of yellow light spread over the eastern horizon. A tremor of awe surged through me. Since prehistoric times when the first vampires stalked human prey, this moment of dawn has meant the dreaded finish to us, the undead. Now we watched, standing with impunity in the open, protected by thick tinted glass and layers of polyester, leather, and wrinkle-free cotton.
The sun rose over the edge of the earth. A terrible, incandescent wave bore upon us like the flash of an atom bomb.
Bob’s head and corpse sizzled. His skin turned black and wrinkled. Flesh peeled away from bones and turned into smoke. The tangled mass of his organs spilled from underneath his rib cage. His bones broke apart like brittle twigs. Everything that had been Bob Carcano disintegrated into flakes of ash as centuries of arrested death came back to reclaim their due. The ash swirled and scattered in the eddy of wind twisting before the plywood. After a few minutes, nothing remained of Bob except for a discoloration in the dirt and a last smudge of smoke dissolving into the air.
As a vampire, Bob was lucky to get this modest little ceremony. Solar immolation was our way of destroying the evidence of our presence to humans, nothing more. Bob would be missed, certainly, but as undead creatures who walked in step beside the Grim Reaper, we accepted the inevitability of our final destruction.
The vampires in robes gathered around the plywood sheet and kicked free the two-by-fours holding it upright. The sheet slapped the ground with a whap. The vampires dragged the plywood and lumber down the slope and tossed it into the trash littering the gully.
Carmen and I walked back to her Audi TT roadster, a sleek, flattened lump of metal with narrow windows. We got in, she in the driver’s seat, I next to her. Protected by the Audi’s tinted glass, we pulled off our goggles, hoods, and gloves. Behind us, the other vampires dispersed into three groups and climbed into a copper-colored station wagon, an SUV, and a long-bed pickup with dually wheels.
Carmen unsnapped the collar of her leather jacket and pulled the zipper midway down her cleavage. Neither of us had said much on the way out here last night, consumed as we were with dismay and outrage at Bob’s death.
She plucked a plastic bottle from between her seat and the center console and proceeded to smear her face with coconut-scented SPF 90 sunscreen. Tiny golden Aztec calendars dangled from each earlobe. “With Bob gone, the Denver nidus chose me as its new leader.”
I held my palms up for her to give me some of the sunscreen. “I thought that position went automatically to the most senior vampire in the community. That would be Mel.”
“Under normal circumstances.” Carmen squirted the lotion into my hands. “Because of these vânätori attacks, the nidus wanted someone younger and more ruthless.”
I dabbed the sunscreen on my cheeks. “And that would be…you?”
“Yes. Me.” Carmen unzipped her jacket further and exposed breasts cupped within a black leather bra. She buttered the tops of her tits with sunscreen. “The first question from the nidus to me as the new leader was, what was I going to do about your investigation?”
She flicked her black hair over one shoulder and rubbed sunscreen onto her neck. “Before you answer, be aware that the question came directly from the Araneum.”
My aura spiked defensively. “What’s it to them?”
“The Araneum insists that we focus all our attention, at the expense of all other obligations, on finding and destroying the vânätori, on taking direct action.”
“You mean killing humans outside of self-defense?”
“Chalé. This is self-defense.” Carmen pursed her lips and applied blood-red lipstick. She flipped down the sunshade and looked at the vanity mirror. Laminated pictures of Frida Kahlo and the Virgin of Guadalupe were pinned next to the mirror. Of course Carmen wouldn’t see anything in the mirror but the interior of the car.
“Do you know what I hate most about being a vampire? Fixing my makeup without a mirror.” Carmen slapped the sunshade against the interior ceiling. “How many more vampires have to die before we do something?” She smoothed her hair.
“And the police?”
She polished the sunglass lenses with a tissue. “Subsisting on chalices and donated blood hasn’t made us that complacent. We can cover our tracks.”
“What does this have to do with my investigation?”
She put on her sunglasses and tugged at the corners to make sure they fit tight. “If things get…uh…sticky, I’ll need you. These vampire hunters use guns. You have experience with firearms.”
“And getting shot, too. Don’t forget that part. Want to see my scars?”
Carmen peered over the tops of her sunglasses and gave me the once over. She zipped her jacket to cover most of her cleavage. “Some other time.”
I put in my contacts. Now that I was unable to see auras, the world looked inert and unfinished.
She started the Audi and honked the horn. The station wagon honked back. Carmen pressed the gas pedal and her car darted off the shoulder of the road. Gravel pinged against the chassis. When the tires bit into the asphalt, the Audi lunged forward and we accelerated toward the highway.
Carmen cocked her thumb to the tiny backseat. “Gimme that portfolio, will you?”
The portfolio sat atop a pile consisting of cross trainers, a yoga mat, and a gym bag.
I placed the portfolio on my lap and stroked the cordovan leather. “Pretty nice. Expensive, no doubt.”
“Sí, un regalo.” Carmen nodded simply. “A gift from one of my chalices.”
“Like your leather outfit?”
“Like my leather outfit.”
I tapped the instrument panel. “And the car?”
“What can I say? My chalices are generous people.” Carmen gestured toward the latch on the portfolio’s flap. “I asked the Araneum to send me what they had concerning vampire-hunter attacks in America.”
I pulled out several manila folders and flipped open the first one, a document in a language I didn’t recognize, followed by what appeared to be an English translation.
“What language is this?”
“Romanian,” Carmen answered, “the native tongue of Transylvania. You’ll need to become familiar with it.”
I read the English translation. “It says that ten vampire deaths have been attributed to these vânätori de vampir. On a path that started in New York and ended in Denver.”
I upended another envelope and a bunch of color photographs clipped together fell into my hand. A sticky note on the top photo read that these were photos of the vânätori pursuing us. On the back of each picture was the name of the man depicted.
The first picture. Mihail Vasile. A thin face, hungry eyes peering from under strands of hair, as if he were a shrew trying to hide in his own skin.
The second picture. Teodor Vlasov. A round, bearded face, less a head than a hairy bowling ball perched upon a thick neck. I remembered him-he was the sniper who had killed Dr. Wong and was one of the two attackers who had dragged Bob out of the Buick.
Next. Petru Codreanu. A slightly lesser version of Vlasov, but with an equally fierce expression. Close-set eyes that seemed to flicker anxiously even in this frozen image.
Finally. Nicolae Dragan. An apt name for their leader. Eyes that burned at me from the paper. As I studied his image, his presence became so powerful that I expected an aura to radiate from the photo. In his beard and close-cropped, steely-gray scalp, he looked like a zealous mob boss, the kind who would incite a lynching and supply the rope. Dragan was the one who had come after me with a crucifix and an ax, and then more recently blasted Bob with a shotgun.
“Look familiar?” Carmen asked.
“Most definitely. All four of these scary bastards.” I slid the photos back in the envelope, relieved at shutting the psychic connection.
I turned to a folder marked “History of Colorado Attacks.” I read the first entry aloud. “Three vampires were allegedly killed by vânätori in 1883, two around Leadville, the third at Central City.”
“Wasn’t our guys,” Carmen said. “We’re dealing with mortals. Those hunters would have died long ago.”
I continued. “The next attack occurred in 1969.” My thoughts froze on the date. I opened the folder labeled “Attacks in the 20th Century.” “There were several vampire killings from 1910 through the mid-twenties. Then nothing until 1947.”
I could feel my aura sparkle in alarm. Reaching into my pocket, I retrieved the paper Wendy had given me. I compared her list of nymphomania outbreaks with this record of vampire murders. “Roswell, New Mexico, 1947-nymphomania and two vampires killed. Dayton, Ohio, 1952-nymphomania and two vampires killed.” I paused to control my quaking, excited voice. “Denver, 1969-nymphomania and three vampires killed. Now recently, another outbreak of nymphomania in Denver followed by the appearance of vânätori de vampir. In every case, the vampire-hunter attacks followed the discovery of nymphomania by mere weeks, sometimes days.”
We reached Highway 36. Carmen whipped the Audi around the corner. The tires squealed across the asphalt. I grabbed my shoulder harness. We cut in front of a semi. The driver blasted his air horn. Smiling, Carmen straightened the steering wheel and floored the gas pedal. The turbocharger kicked in and the Audi zoomed west toward Denver.
“You keep driving like that,” I said, looking back at the driver as he flipped us the bird, “and we won’t need any vampire hunters to finish us off.”
“Sorry,” Carmen replied dryly. “I like to drive the way I like to have sex. You know, turbo-banging.” She patted my knee. “You okay, grandpa?”
I clasped her wrist. “Don’t test me.”
Carmen grinned and tugged free. She raced the Audi around a minivan. “So the vampire attacks and the nymphomania are related?”
“Have to be. There’s too much coincidence. The question is, what happened in Roswell in 1947?”
“What’s the date?”
“Of the nymphomania?” I perused Wendy’s list. “July seventh, ninth, and sixteen.”
Carmen reacted with a startled “No shit?” She pulled up the hem of her jacket and fumbled with the belt of her leather jeans. “I can tell you exactly what happened on July third of that year. The debris of a flying-saucer was found on the MacBrazel Ranch, near Roswell.”
“How would you know that?” I asked, wondering why she struggled to undress.
As Carmen tilted her muscled abdomen toward me, she brushed her left hip against the bottom rim of the steering wheel. She displayed a Star Trek insignia tattooed below her navel. “As a Trekker, I’m up on all UFO lore.”
I examined the tattoo. “Interesting way of remembering something. I would’ve just tied a string around my finger.”
Carmen buckled her pants again. “Do any of those dates mean something to your investigation?”
I thought for a moment. “Rocky Flats started operations in 1952, the same year there was an outbreak of nymphomania in Ohio. I don’t see a connection. Then in 1969, there was a plutonium fire at Rocky Flats, the so-called Mother’s Day Fire.”
Carmen took Wendy’s list and flattened it across the spokes of the steering wheel. “That outbreak of nymphomania in Denver occurred shortly afterwards-in May, June, and July. When did the vampire-hunter attacks happen?”
I glanced into the folder. “August and September.”
Carmen folded Wendy’s list and handed it back to me. During a long moment of silence, she gradually tightened her fingers around the rim. Her knuckles turned white. She pressed harder on the gas pedal. “What is it about the nymphomania that draws the vampire hunters?”
I shrugged, embarrassed by my ignorance and inability to connect the facts. “I don’t know.”
Carmen passed a Corvette. “Let me check the dates. Maybe I can find something useful.”
“Call when you do. In the meantime, I can do more than wait around Denver with my thumb up my butt.” I tucked the folders back into the portfolio. “Give me twenty-four hours.”
“Twenty-four hours for what?”
“I need twenty-four hours to complete my investigation. At the end of that time I’ll either be available for your direct action or I’ll be dead.”
Carmen eased off the gas. The speedometer needle arced down past a hundred miles an hour. “Dead? Killed by whom? Vampire hunters?”
I shook my head solemnly. “No, worse. The guards at Rocky Flats.”