THE DILEMMA SQUEEZED MY head as if I were caught in a vise. Either stay and solve the conspiracy, while Wendy died a horrible death. Or, rescue her and lose the chance of finding out what remained hidden in the white trailer.
I was close to unraveling the conspiracy. The trailer waited a hundred meters away. A memo on Merriweather’s desk stated that they would leave as soon as tonight’s storm passed, which was forecast for three A.M. All I had to do was find out what was inside the trailer and this assignment was as good as over. Thankfully.
Except now the vampire hunters had Wendy. Why had they taken her? Because I had escaped from their trap twice and rather than chase me again, they offered her as the bait I couldn’t refuse.
Time ticked past, as tangible as the air I breathed. Closing my eyes, I centered myself to stave off panic.
I massaged Merriweather’s hands. His sluggish pulse quickened slightly.
“Merriweather, what’s in the trailer?”
His eyelids fluttered as his mind struggled to rise through the subconscious state my hypnosis had put him in. “Redlight.”
“Goddamn it, I know that.” I fought the urge to shake him in frustration.
A vehicle rumbled to a halt outside on the parking lot. Two doors opened and slammed closed, followed by the crunching of heavy steps on the gravel around the building.
It was certainly more security guards. I held my breath and listened as two men entered the building and called out for Merriweather’s sentries. They yelled frantically, clearly having found the guards I’d left asleep in another room.
I had run out of time to interrogate Merriweather. Dropping his hands, I clenched my fists in frustration. My hope was to escape before the guards charged in here. The safest way to flee was out the window next to the glass display case.
I stepped quietly to the window and unlocked the latch.
A guard tried the door and discovered it was locked.
I jerked the window open and pushed out the screen.
The guard kicked the door and called out, “Merriweather-are you okay?” The guard yelled to his partner. “Call Central Security. We have an Amber Tango situation.”
I sprang through the window and landed on the freshly fallen snow.
Behind me, the guard broke the door open and yelled, “I see him. He’s going out to the side.”
I sprinted along the wall and turned the corner. I lunged for my car’s door and expected to feel a bullet claw into my back. Once inside I gunned the engine, spun the Dodge around, and headed for the plant exit. A guard ran out of the building and fired as the curtain of falling snow enveloped me.
I raced toward the plant exit, my head throbbing with anxiety. Everything about this case was one big snarl of trouble that grew more confused and desperate by the minute. Maybe I could get to Wendy and maybe I could get into the trailer, but first I had to lose these pesky guards.
Up ahead, a striped pole dropped across the exit lane along the right side of the guard shack. Red lights flashed on the pole. A guard came out of the shack and readied a submachine gun. He waved for me to stop.
Flooring the accelerator, I aimed for the pole. The guard brought the gun up to his shoulder. Just as I approached the guard shack, I veered to the left and shot out through the entrance lane on the other side of the shack. In the rearview mirror I could see the guard chasing after me, but by the time he had a clear shot I was out of range and lost in the snow. Nevertheless, I felt obliged to flip him off as I turned on the highway and headed to Evergreen.
My squeaking wipers arced through the flakes crusting my windshield. I called information for the address to the wrecking yard. Like any good private investigator, I kept local street maps under my car seat. I fished them out and alternated my attention between the icy road and searching for the address and directions to the wrecking yard.
Could I rescue Wendy and still solve this case? It was a little after five in the afternoon now. Wendy’s captor had given me two hours, which meant they expected me around seven. I had ten hours at the most to drive to Evergreen through this blizzard, get Wendy, and return before the convoy left. The task seemed impossible.
The vampire hunters were waiting to ambush me, obviously. In turn, I knew where they were. And now so would all the vampires in Denver. I called Carmen.
She answered on the second ring. Her breath was labored but relaxed. “Felix, it’s you. I’ve just finished teaching my Butt and Gut class. Good thing you called. I found something else about the Roswell UFO.”
“That can wait,” I replied. “The vânätori have captured Wendy Teagarden.”
Carmen remained silent. She then spoke sharply. “When did this happen?” Anger slashed through her voice. “Where is she? How did you find out?”
“They called on her cell phone. They’ve got her at the Soda Creek Wrecking Yard in Evergreen.”
“How could they have captured her?”
“I don’t know.”
“Where are you now?”
“Leaving Rocky Flats.”
“Which means you’re going after her alone?”
“Yes. Alone.”
“Figures. You and that hero complex,” Carmen said. “In this snow it’ll be a while before the other vampires and I can meet you. We might be supernaturals but traffic makes us the equal of humans.”
“I can’t wait for you,” I snapped.
“We’ll get there as soon as we can. And, Felix, you were looking for a connection between nymphomania outbreaks and vampire-hunter attacks in New Mexico and Ohio?”
“And?”
“Do you remember that the recent outbreaks and attacks started after a UFO crashed in Roswell?”
I zoomed around a van. “Maybe we could go over this later.”
“Give me a minute. The remains of the UFO and its crew were moved from Roswell to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, just outside Dayton, Ohio, the second location of the nymphomania.”
I eased off the accelerator. “What year?”
“Nineteen forty-seven. Then in 1952, the year when nymphomania and vampire attacks surfaced in Ohio, that was when the UFO was moved again.”
“Where to?”
“I don’t know,” she answered.
“You just said 1952.”
“So what?”
“That’s the year Rocky Flats became operational,” I said. The image of the white trailer in the Protected Area flooded my mind. The disjointed details and facts about this case swirled about me like a cloud. Dr. Wong and his sudden trips to Area 51. The red mercury. The outbreaks of nymphomania. It all sounded too crazy to be true.
“Where did you get this info? And if you say the Internet, then you’re wasting my time.”
“No, it was from a vampire in Ohio. She worked as a civilian secretary for the air force back in the fifties. She claims that she heard about an extraterrestrial biological entity. An alien.”
Alien? Was that the mysterious cargo in the trailer? A UFO? The infamous Roswell UFO?
“Felix, you there?”
“Yeah, I’m here.” I accelerated again.
“You still going after Wendy?”
“Yes.” My confusion coalesced into murderous determination. The vampire hunters would have to die. Then I would return to Rocky Flats and break into the trailer. I gave Carmen directions to the wrecking yard. “Get there as soon as you can.”
“Be careful, Felix.” She hung up.
By the time I had driven up the mountain on the interstate and taken the Evergreen exit, I had less than nine hours. Up here at altitude, the storm was a cascade of quarter-sized snowflakes. My vampire vision couldn’t penetrate the blizzard much deeper than human eyesight. The vague shapes of buildings flanked the road. Ice caked my windshield-wiper blades. Hot air whooshed out the heater vents and kept my Dodge a warm metal cocoon.
My car crawled along at twenty miles an hour. Whenever I tried to speed up, the Dodge yawed across the road. Better to creep along at this pace than spin into a ravine.
A dim red traffic light hovered above the road. Lines of snow in the gray air outlined the pole holding the traffic light. A green rectangle smudged with snow hung from a cable. The sign said Byrant. I turned right, passing a NO OUTLET sign, and followed the road winding up the hillside.
To the left, behind a snow-encrusted chain-link fence, construction equipment looked like giant prehistoric beasts hunkered down for the winter. Down to the right, oblong cylinders of natural-gas tanks lay nestled together under a blanket of snow. A vacant two-story building loomed on the left. The road curved to the right, past rows of storage sheds.
Up ahead, a plywood sign rested against a telephone pole. Snow trickled down the spray-painted scrawl: Soda Creek Wrecking Yard.
My tires abruptly spun. The transmission whined. My Dodge slowed. I dropped into first and nudged the gas. The rear tires spun again. The car slid to the right and then backwards.
The hill was too steep. This was as far as I would get on wheels. I turned the steering to straighten the Dodge and let it settle with a thump against a pile of rocks marking the edge of the shoulder.
The heavy snowfall turned the glow of the street lamps into orbs of hazy luminescence. In the diffused light, a wire fence materialized in the haze of the snowfall. Scattered behind the fence were derelict cars and a tow truck. At the far perimeter of the yard stood a simple, prefab metal building with a pitched roof.
I searched for auras betraying the presence of humans lurking behind cover. Nothing. This place was lifeless as my refrigerator. And about as cold. I rubbed my hands in the hot air blasting from the vents and tried to absorb as much heat as I could.
My watch said 6:43. Time to move. I turned off the car’s motor and tugged my knit cap low on my forehead. I pulled Merriweather’s SIG-Sauer out of my pocket and checked the magazine. I had plenty left for the four vampire hunters. Those I didn’t shoot and kill outright, I’d finish off with my fangs. My kundalini noir coiled expectantly, relishing the thrill of impending violence. Stepping out of the car, I stashed my keys and the pistol in the pocket of my barn coat. I cinched my gloves. My boots crunched into the snow. The sound sent a shiver up my back to remind me how much we vampires hated these frigid temperatures. A chilly dankness was okay, but this cold was bitter enough to freeze me into a big Popsicle.
The snow fell with a hiss. Halfway to the wrecking yard, I turned around to get my bearings. Snow an inch deep already covered my car’s windshield.
My fingertips tingled. I sensed I was being detected but not watched, as if some force were tapping into the energy of my aura. Perhaps it was Wendy, there was much about her I didn’t know.
How to sneak into the building? I could transform into a wolf. The fur would keep me warmer. But at some point I’d have to transform back into a vampire and then I’d be naked. The cold was barely tolerable in these garments. Without them, I’d frost over in minutes.
A strand of razor wire ran atop the fence. Hooking my gloved fingers into the fence, I swung my legs up. I balanced on top of the fence, then hopped between the spiraled strands of the razor wire and dropped to the ground. I should have floated but my vampire levitation powers were all but gone. Perfect.
My legs flexed to absorb the impact. The SIG-Sauer sagged within my pocket. Now, inside the perimeter of the wire, my ears and fingertips tingled in alarm. This was the right place. The vampire hunters were here.
My fangs extended. My fingers curled in anticipation at clawing flesh and breaking bones. My vision turned red. I wanted more than to spill the blood of my enemies; I wanted to taste it even if I wouldn’t drink it. So what if I had weakened powers-I also had the SIG-Sauer.
I crouched behind a Ford Galaxy resting on cinder blocks and examined the building’s stained, corrugated metal surface. Piled against the back wall were jumbles of acetylene gas bottles, workbenches, a lathe, broken office chairs, and stacks of wheels. The relentless snowfall added to the bleakness of the yard. In the center of the building, a garage bay door faced me. Windows flanked the door. I hoped they had heat inside.
I hunched my shoulders and tightened my scarf. My fingers began to go numb. I hadn’t expected to linger in the snow like this or I would’ve dressed in heavier clothes.
I zigzagged, creeping, through the yard to the bay door. My ears buzzed, warning of danger. Somehow I sensed that my aura was being probed. But how? Humans had no tools to detect the supernatural.
I halted next to the rusted hulk of a Studebaker. I scanned the roofline and telephone poles and tried to discern anything that looked like a video camera. Nothing.
I approached the bay door and pressed my ear to its surface. From inside drifted the soft murmur of a woman’s whimper-Wendy.
I clasped the door handle to jerk it open and then stopped. This door wouldn’t open quickly, if at all, and not without causing a racket. There was the window to my right. I’d break through that and rush in.
I looked through the dirty glass and scanned the interior. Anybody inside was tucked out of sight.
I lifted a car wheel from the snow and swung it toward the window. Grasping the SIG-Sauer, I leapt after the wheel as it smashed through the panes. I held my hands in front of my face to ward off the glass shards.
I skidded off a desk, knocked over a stack of notebook binders, and tumbled to the floor. It reeked of dust and grease. Two burning auras rushed from the gloom in opposite directions.
As I sprang to my hands and knees, a stiff heavy bar whacked my back. Pain blasted through my spine. Falling to my knees, I clawed the air and dropped the pistol. I barely managed to turn my head to the left to view that attacker.
An aura of hate outlined his beefy mass. He swung a length of rebar and hit me again along the small of my back. A lightning bolt of pain shot down my legs. I convulsed and choked.
From my right, a pole with a thick, open hoop on the end like a set of jaws reached toward my neck. My nostrils flared at the metallic smell. Silver. I grasped the pole but the shaft slid through my weakened grip until the hoop closed around my neck. The silver burned the bare skin of my throat. I gagged in pain.
A tall, bearded man twisted the pole so that the silver hoop singed and choked me. His scowling face matched the photograph of Nicolae Dragan, the vânätori leader. The pain and panic kept me from focusing a vampire stare upon him. I fought to stop the agony by jamming my gloved hands under the silver hoop.
Dragan leaned over me and twisted the pole to keep the silver metal hoop pressed against my bare skin.
I writhed on the floor like a fish gaffed in the gills. I groped for the SIG-Sauer.
“Petru,” Dragan yelled instructions to the other vampire hunter, who kicked the pistol from my reach. Petru grasped my right arm and kicked his heavy boot into my armpit. A spasm of excruciating pain shot across my torso and paralyzed me. My arm went limp. Petru looped a steel chain around my wrists and neck, then fastened me to a heavy metal pipe that he laid across my shoulders. He secured the chain to the ends of the pipe with steel padlocks.
Dragan pulled up on the pole, burning the bottom of my jaw, and forced me to get to my knees.
Petru grasped a steel cable and carabiner hanging from the ceiling. He snapped the cable to the pipe at a spot right behind my head.
The silver hoop around my neck opened, and Dragan pulled the pole away. I gasped in relief, light-headed with pain.
Dragan palmed a hand control at the end of an electrical cord dangling from the ceiling. He pressed a button. A winch whined from above and tightened the slack in the cable. The pipe lifted. The chain squeezed around my wrists. My shoulders were wrenched upward. Dragan kept raising the pipe until I danced on tiptoes, crucified. Sickened by waves of pain, I hung my head and retched, tasting bile and blood.
Dragan whisked the knit cap off my head. He grabbed my hair and slapped my face, hard enough to blur my vision. “Show your fangs now, spawn of Satan. Soon I’ll have them in my hand and I’ll be kicking your severed head out into the snow.”