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  She did. Something jumped out at her right away. “The body was exsanguinated? What is this, some newborn who doesn’t know the rules?”

  “If this is a vampire, they’re not hunting alone.”

  She raised an eyebrow in question. He reached for the papers, flipping through them to find copies of autopsy photos, showing her one in particular.

  “Oh God,” she said in a hushed voice. The body in the photo was little more than shredded chunks of meat. “Werewolf.” There was no doubt in her voice, only a cold matter-of-factness.

  “Yes,” Trent replied softly. “That’s the current theory.”

  She looked through the rest of the stack of papers, the coffee forgotten. “Homeless, runaways, prostitutes, all the usual meals for rogue predators. But it looks like vampires and werewolves. Sometimes the same body has evidence of both.” She looked at Trent. “What the freaking hell is going on?”

  “We think it’s exactly what it looks like, the joining of forces of at least one vampire and one werewolf, possibly more of one or the other or both.” His voice was flat. Obviously he’d had time to accept the idea.

  She, however, had not. “Vampires and werewolves do not join forces. The two courts have fought wars against each other. Even now, we don’t have a peace accord with the werewolves. It’s more like, I don’t know...an extended pause in the conflict.”

  He nodded. “I know that, as does our king. Nonetheless, looking at the evidence...” He gestured at the papers, but didn’t seem to want to look at the photos again.

  “What does he want me to do?”

  Trent took a long drink of coffee. “This is a very delicate matter. You and I know what a precarious hold the king has on his throne. Subjects like you and I are loyal to him, and to his philosophy of the Justice Killing. We choose not to hunt among the innocent and instead take our prey from the predators of the mortal population. Not all vampires agree, you know that. And certainly werewolves have no such moral compunctions. If he lost his grip on the Vampire Throne and his position in the Court of Monsters...”

  She finished for him. “The number of innocent victims would skyrocket.”

  “Which would in turn bring notice to our kind.”

  “It’s hard to imagine mortals accepting we’re real, in this day and age.”

  “Even so, it’s always a possibility, and if it happened, it would lead to war, war within the Vampire Court, war between vampires and werewolves, and other creatures in the Court of Monsters. And war between mortals and those of us who are...not.”

  They sat quietly for a long moment. Trent drank his coffee as she went through the file. “I take it I’m going to Concord.”

  He nodded. “Find out who’s doing this, and stop them, before too much attention is drawn, be it mortal or otherwise.”

  She rolled her eyes. “You make it sound so simple.”

  “I know it’s not, and so does the king,” he said. “There aren’t many he would trust enough to send to your aid, Jessamine, should you need it, but should things get complicated, you know I’ll do everything I can.”

  The sound of her name, the name the king had given her years ago, startled her a bit. She’d known Trent a long time. He meant it when he said he preferred the company of his books. He was a man, a creature, of solitude. So was she, for that matter. Events in the past had brought them to an understanding of each other, and a mutual trust. No doubt this was why their king sent Trent to her, to ask her to risk her life in this matter. She gazed at Trent calmly as he drank his coffee, letting him read her thoughts in the set of her face, the resolve in her eyes. She would find these creatures that had formed such an unheard-of alliance, and she would stop them. There was no question it would mean killing them.

  * * * *

  Long after Trent left, taking one of the yellow-and-orange roses with him, she stayed up to read through the file with care and make notes. The Concord police went from not caring about the crimes because of the status of the victims, to theorizing they were drug or gang-related. A local journalist thought it might be a serial killer, though she noticed the theory didn’t seem popular with police. She made some notes of her own, conducted some research online. Exhaustion began to pull at her, dragging her thoughts down into a jumbled pool.

  She shut down the computer, washed the coffee cups and turned off the lights. The bed was cold but she didn’t notice. She heard faint sounds of traffic outside the apartment building, the mortal world going about its daytime business. Her car, with its windows tinted darker than legal, was parked in the building’s underground garage. She didn’t drive it much, in fact didn’t care much for driving at all, but she was glad she owned it. She’d be able to leave for Concord before deep twilight fell, giving her time to take a good look around.

  At first she mistakenly thought this “request” was another order, but in reality it was not. It was an appeal to her sense of honor and justice and her loyalty to the king himself. A vampire that had, for whatever insane reason, joined forces with a werewolf was killing innocent people. Worse than that, vulnerable innocent people. That went against everything this current King of Vampires believed in, everything his followers believed in. Everything she believed in. Jessie may have been a monster, but she was a monster with a code of ethics.

  Chapter 2

  The highway passed by in a blur. The bland interstate scenery held no interest for her. Jessie kept her eyes on the road, her mind turning over thoughts and theories about the murders in Concord. As dusk fell, she relaxed her grip on the steering wheel. She wore long sleeves and driving gloves. Once, years ago, she’d been burned in the bright light of the sun, and had no desire to ever experience that again. Even with the car’s darkly tinted windows she took extra caution. Now, with the last light disappearing below the tree line, she tossed her sunglasses onto the passenger seat and peeled off the gloves. Reaching into her leather backpack purse, her fingers searched for a pack of cigarettes and her lighter. She smoked for a while, her mind drifting away from Concord toward a nebulous empty calm, lulled by the boring drive.

  The CD player was set to shuffle. Oliver Nelson’s The Blues and the Abstract Truth, Miles Davis’s Kind of Blue, John Coltrane’s Blue Train, Dave Brubeck’s Time Out and Chet Baker’s The Italian Sessions, all just for the drive. More were in a black CD carrying case in the passenger seat floorboard. Locomotion cued up and didn’t suit her mood. She pressed the “next” button until she found something that did, Take Five. She lit another cigarette, rolling down the window a few inches to let the smoke blow out. The night air felt warm and inviting, so she thumbed the button to let the window slide down a few more inches, hit another button to open the sunroof. She turned the stereo up louder to hear Brubeck over the rush of wind, playing Take Five over and over as she drove farther into the night.

  * * * *

  Half a dozen or so people loitered outside the Red Eagle bar, smoking. They were all cops, since the bar was a cop hang-out. They would much rather have been smoking inside, but state law made it illegal now and the police commissioner, not being a smoker himself, had no sympathy for anyone who wanted to break that law, even his own officers, so they smoked outside and complained in colorful terms.

  Brandon Ellis parked in the lot across the street and jogged to the bar’s entrance. One of the cops gave him a nod in greeting, a few of them glared at him and the rest ignored him. As a crime reporter for the Concord Post, he was used to a mixed bag from local police. He returned a nod to the cop who’d greeted him as he opened the door and went inside.

  For the most part, the Red Eagle looked like any other bar, heavy on the cop and military decorative touches. Several American flags covered the walls, with framed pictures of local cops who’d died in the line of duty, posters with law enforcement and military themes, and a large painting behind the bar of a red eagle in flight, wings spread wide.

  Brandon surveyed the room and found who he was looking for at the far end of the bar—Henry Gonzale
z, veteran detective on the Concord PD and Brandon’s favorite inside source. He was not the lead detective on the Waterfront Murders, as the Post—meaning Brandon—dubbed them, but it wasn’t for lack of ability. Gonzalez didn’t care to chase the attention of his superiors in the department anymore. The lead slot went to a much younger, attention-hungry detective named Robbins, who no longer gave so much as the time of day to Brandon, much less information on the case.

  Brandon made his way to the end of the bar, taking the empty stool next to Gonzalez. “Buy you a beer, Henry?” He signaled the bartender.

  “Crap, Ellis!” Gonzalez growled. “Don’t talk to me in public. What are you trying to do to me?”

  Brandon laughed. “I thought you didn’t care what your fellow officers thought of you anymore?”

  Gonzalez raised an index finger. “I said I don’t care what the brass says. There’s a difference. Just because I don’t care if the flashy cases are given to people like Robbins, doesn’t mean I want to have to listen to everybody in the department bust my chops for talking to you.”

  The bartender, more engrossed in the Cubs game on TV than anything else, slowly poured a couple of beers from the tap and set them in front of the two men. Brandon took a drink, making an effort not to wince. He wasn’t much of a beer drinker. He took a small notebook and pen from his inside jacket pocket and turned to face Gonzalez. “What did you mean by, ‘people like Robbins?’”

  “Oh no,” said the cop. “You’re not pulling me down that road.”

  “Hey, hey, what road?” Brandon kept his voice light, amused, but he still pushed. “What do you mean, Henry? I’m just curious what you meant.”

  Gonzalez sat in silence for a long moment, his eyes on the game. When he finally spoke again, it was in a quiet voice guaranteed not to carry to anyone hoping to listen in. “People more interested in drinks with the brass after hours than doing their job, people too arrogant to know when they’re in over their heads.”

  Brandon edged closer, keeping his voice low and his gaze on the TV. “So no calling in the FBI?”

  Gonzalez gave a slight shake of his head.

  “Back to drugs and gangs?”

  This time, a nod.

  “I thought they were past that. I mean, this town knows what drug and gang violence looks like, and this... This is nothing like it. What the hell are they thinking?”

  “They’re thinking the last body to turn up belonged to a girl who was a hooker and a mule for a guy in Johnny Watanabe’s organization. And you know the jones Commissioner Rifkin has for Watanabe.”

  “Rifkin’s wanted Watanabe behind bars since before he was commissioner.”

  “And if Robbins can tie Watanabe to these killings, or someone in Watanabe’s organization who might tell tales on Watanabe...” Gonzalez finished with an indistinct motion of his hand.

  “You and I both know this isn’t gang-related. This is a serial killer. Robbins could put Watanabe and his whole organization behind bars, and it wouldn’t stop these killings.”

  “Look, kid.” Gonzalez sighed, finishing his beer in one long drink. “Everybody’s pretty high-strung right now. You keep poking them with a stick, they’re going to circle the wagons. Rifkin’s already been complaining to your editor.”

  Brandon laughed. “That’s like getting a gold star on my report card.”

  Gonzalez gave him a quick grin. “You know, they got beat cops out all over the waterfront with mug shots of Watanabe’s people, asking every hooker, homeless person and runaway about gang activity, drug activity. Not even asking anyone if they’ve seen anyone else...anything out of place. It’s all Watanabe, all the time.” There was a hint of something in the older cop’s voice, a hint of a suggestion.

  Brandon thought for a moment. “People like that don’t volunteer much information to cops, especially information the cops aren’t even looking for.”

  Gonzalez turned to him and gave him a significant look. In a louder voice, he said, “Next time spring for some buffalo wings too, cheapskate.” He rose from his stool and with a hard clap on Brandon’s back, ambled out of the bar.

  Brandon watched him go with a deliberately sour look on his face.

  The bartender approached and pointed at Brandon’s barely touched beer. “You’re not drinking the rest of that, are you?”

  Brandon shook his head. “Uh, no.” He rose, pulling money out of his pocket to leave a tip.

  The bartender nodded slowly. “Sissy boy. Stick to lattes, why don’t you.”

  Brandon froze, incredulous. I hate this bar.

  * * * *

  Jessie looked at her watch. Eleven o’clock, plenty early. She’d left her car at the hotel and walked across town to the waterfront. She wore jeans, a black t-shirt, boots and a lightweight black canvas jacket. Keys in her pocket, she didn’t need a purse, and no need for any hidden weapons, either. Wearing the jacket was more of a habit than a necessity and, besides, in a place like the waterfront, the less skin she showed, the less attention she attracted. She hoped.

  The warm summer air caressed her face and the back of her neck and riffled her ponytail. Smells came to her on the wind, of food from bars and restaurants, alcohol and the tang of pot smoke, as well as sweat, blood and urine, and general mortal funk. Added to that was the fetid, dirty, polluted water of this bend in the river, industrial stench and decay. Would she be able to find some place to buy some flowers to make up for this overload of stink?

  As Jessie reached an intersection, she checked out the street signs, pulling the small notebook from her jacket pocket where she’d made notes on the murders, another block to the site where the latest body had been found. She waited for the light to change then crossed the street.

  It turned out to be a long block, not to mention a fine example of urban blight. The few streetlights that were intact were intermittent. Trash littered the street. Curiously, though, no one slept on the dilapidated benches or in the boarded-up doorways. In a place like this she would have expected to see that, but then she realized all the street people were probably congregating somewhere brighter, somewhere safer.

  Yellow police tape flapped like streamers in the breeze, leading to an alley between two abandoned buildings. She approached slowly, senses alert, finding no one, mortal or otherwise, nearby. Jessie entered the alley, taking note of the dried blood still staining the concrete ground and splashed on the nearby dumpster. In this part of town, she figured nobody was too concerned about cleaning up. White chalk outlined where the pieces were found, spreading to halfway up the alley. The stench of death still covered the area like a heavy blanket. She walked around to take a closer look, careful where she stepped. She didn’t want to bring too much of this smell with her.

  Jessie remembered details from the police report and newspaper coverage of this one: a young female, known to have worked as a prostitute and a drug mule. The newspaper article seemed to suggest she’d been a runaway. The police had a street name for the girl, but no other ID yet, some silly thing like Lynx or Minx. Nobody on the street admitted to knowing her real name. She was just another shadow in the night, insubstantial, evanescent, like a wisp of smoke curling in the air and melting away.

  She shook her head, trying to snap out of her reverie, kneeling to get a better look at the chalk outlines and the blood spatter. Somebody had thrown themselves a real party here. Her stomach clenched. The alley desperately needed a good rain to wash away the reminders.

  Eager to leave the scene behind, she rose and headed back to the sidewalk. Jessie had a roll of bills in one pocket. Spreading them around would be the easiest way to get information. Would the king see the humor in her sending him an itemized expense report? She left the area in search of some of those brighter, safer places, to find people to talk to.

  * * * *

  “Did you guys know her real well?” Brandon asked.

  The boy shrugged, cramming his cheeseburger into his mouth as hard as he could.

  The girl took a drink
of soda and answered, “Not real well. You know how it is.”

  They were seated at a table in the back of a fast food restaurant. Brandon had finally found two kids willing to talk about Minx, the latest victim in the Waterfront Murders case, but only if he fed them. It was money well spent, in more ways than one. These two kids, neither one of whom wanted to give him their name, lived on the streets. Both had the too-lean, slightly feral look of having been on the streets too long already, even though both were clearly underage. Brandon knew they could get at least one fairly decent meal a day down at the Joshua Mission, but one good meal a day was not enough, especially for kids.

  The boy polished off the cheeseburger and started in on his mega-sized order of French fries. Keeping up a continual sweep of their surroundings, he rarely looked at Brandon directly. He said softly around a mouthful of fries, “You know who she worked for, right?”

  Brandon’s muscles tensed and he tried to keep his face bland. “Uh, yeah. One of Johnny Watanabe’s guys.”

  The girl leaned across the table, the dark roots of her self-dyed red hair marking a large swath over the middle of her head. “She worked for Nico. You know who that is?”

  Brandon nodded, and she continued.

  “I heard Nico was real torn up. He’s not mean like some of Johnny’s crew. He’s okay, you know?”

  “So you don’t think he had anything to do with this?”

  She shook her head. “He put the word out, he wants whoever did Minx, and he’ll pay for information.”

  “When did he do that?”

  She shrugged. “I heard it today at the mission.”

  “Did you guys have anything to tell him?” He kept his voice neutral. He didn’t want them to think he’d be mad if they admitted to scamming him for a meal.

  The kids stayed silent, neither of them looking at him. He’d pegged it right. He looked from one to the other, at their ragged, ill-fitting clothes, the fear below their surface of toughness. This is no way to grow up, he thought. “I gotta get going,” he said. He handed a bill to the girl. “Why don’t you guys get a couple of shakes or something?”