Kitty and the Midnight Hour Part 17

"Yes. I'm hiding, but the phone cord won't go any farther. I don't want to hang up, Kitty."

I didn't want her to hang up. A nasty little voice in my head whispered ratings. But the only way I was going to find out what happened was if she stayed on the line.

"Estelle, if you have to hang up, hang up, okay? The important thing is to get out of there in one piece."

"Thank you, Kitty," she said, her face wet with tears. "Thank you for listening to me. No one's ever really listened to me before."

I hadn't done anything. I couldn't do anything. I was trapped behind the mike.

After that, I had to piece together events from what I was hearing. It was like listening to a badly directed radio drama. Tires squealed on asphalt. A car door slammed. Distant voices shouted. The phone slammed against something again: Estelle had dropped the handset. Running footsteps.

I paced, my hands itching to turn into claws and my legs itching to run. That happened when I got stressed. I wanted to Change and run. Run far, run fast, like Estelle had tried to do.

I called Cormac back.

"Yeah?"

"It's me. Are you there? What's happening?"

"Give me a break, it's only been a minute. Give me another five." He hung up.

Then on the other line, bells jingled as the door opened and closed. Footsteps moved slowly across a linoleum floor. I heard a scream. Then sobbing.

What was it about Elijah Smith that could make a vampire afraid of him?

"Estelle. Won't you return to me? You can regain what you have lost. I'll even forgive this betrayal." A calm, reasonable voice echoed like it came from a TV in the next room. It sounded like a high-school social studies teacher explaining a lurid rite-of-pa.s.sage ritual as if it were a recipe for mashed potatoes. A smooth voice, comforting, chilling. This voice spoke truth. Even over the phone, it was persuasive.

Elijah Smith, in his first public appearance.

"What are you?" Estelle said, as loud as she'd yet spoken, but the words were still m.u.f.fled, filled with tears. "What are you really?"

"Oh, Estelle. Is it so hard for you to believe? Your struggle is most difficult of all. The ones who hate themselves, their monstersa"their belief comes easy. But you, those like youa"you love the monsters you have become, and that love is what you fear and hate. Your belief comes with great difficulty, because you don't really want to believe."

I sat down so heavily my chair rolled back a foot. The words tingled on my skin. He might have been talking to me, and he might have been right: I didn't believe in a cure. Was it because I didn't want to?

"A cure is supposed to be forever! Why can't I leave you?"

"Because I would hate to lose you. I love all my people. I need you, Estelle."

What was it Arturo had said: She is part of me. If she is destroyed, part of me is destroyed as well. Could Elijah Smith be some sort of vampire feeding on need, on his followers' powers?

If only I could get him to pick up the phone.

Yet again, I called Cormac.

"Yeah?"

"Has it been five minutes? At least keep the line open so I know what's happening."

"Jesus, Norville. Hang on. There's an SUV parked here. Three guys are standing guard in front of the building. I don't see weapons. They might be lycanthropes. They've got that animal pacing thing going, you know? Arturo's limo is parked around the corner. Lights off. Wait, here he comes. He's trying to get in. I gotta go." I heard the safety on a gun click, then rapid footsteps.

I hated this. Everything was happening off my stage. I was blind and ignorant. For the first time, I hated the safety and anonymity of my studio.

Then Cormac said, "Don't move. These are loaded with silver."

"You!" That was Arturo. "Why on eartha""

"It's Norville's idea. Get your girl and get out of here before I change my mind. You, step aside. Let him through."

I had two lines open on a conference call. Two feeds of information culled from static and noise, all of it broadcasting. Outside, nothing. Cormac must have had something big trained on Smith's goons, because I didn't hear a grumble from them.

Then, from insidea"

"Estelle? Time to come home. Walk with me." This voice was edgy, alluring. Arturo.

"Estellea"," Smith said.

"No. No no no!" Estelle's denial became shrill.

"Estelle." Two voices, ice and fire, equally compelling.

"Estelle, pick up the phone! Pick up the phone and talk to me, dammit!" I shouted futilely.

I wished I could talk to her. What would my voice do to the mix? What could I possibly say to her except: Ignore them! Ignore us all! Follow what heart you have left, if any, and leave them.

She gave one more scream, different from the previous shrill scream of fear. This was defiant. Final. There was a crash. Something broke, maybe a set of shelves falling to the floor.

A pause grew, as painful and definitive as a blank page. Then, "This is your fault," said Arturo, his voice rigid with anger. "You will pay."

"You are as much to blame," said Elijah Smith. "She killed herself. Anyone would agree with me. Her own hands are wrapped around that stake."

For a moment, I could feel the blood vessels in my ears, my lips, my cheeks. I felt hot enough to explode.

I could piece together the bits of sound I'd heard and guess what had happened. A piece of split wooden shelf, maybe a broken broom handle. Then it was just a matter of aiming, falling on top of it.

G.o.dd.a.m.n it. My show had never gotten anyone killed before.

Arturo said, "What are you?"

"If you come to me as a supplicant, I will answer all your questions."

"How dare youa""

"Everyone get out before I start shooting." That was Cormac, showing admirable restraint.

Quick, angry footsteps left the room, growing distant. Calm, slow footsteps followed. Then, nothing.

Cormac's voice burst through my silence, in stereo, coming through both lines now.

"Norville? Are you there? Talk to me, Norville."

My hands dug into the edge of the table. The plastic laminate surface cracked; the sound of it startled me. When I looked, my fingers were thickening, claws growing. I hadn't even felt it. My arms were so tense, my hands gripping the table so hard, I hadn't felt the s.h.i.+ft start.

I pushed away from the chair and shook my hands, then crossed my arms, pressing my fists under my elbows. Human now. Stay human, just a little longer.

"Norville!"

"Yes. I'm here."

"Did you get all that?"

"Yes. I got it all."

I hadn't even said thank you to her. Thanks for the interview. I knew better than anyone how much courage it sometimes took just to open your mouth and talk.

"There's a body here. A girl. It's already going to dust. You know how they do."

"I should have done more for her."

"You did what you could."

A new sound in the background: police sirens.

Without a closing word, Cormac hung up, and I heard silence. Silence inside, silence out.

Silence on the radio meant death.

Matt said, "Kitty? Time's up. You can go thirty over if I cut out the public service announcements."

I gave a painful, silent chuckle. Public service, my a.s.s. I sat here every week pretending I was helping people, but when it came to really helping someonea"

I took a deep breath. I'd never left a show unfinished. All I had to do was open my mouth and talk. "Kitty here, trying to wrap up. Estelle found her last cure. It's not one I recommend.

"Vampires don't talk about their weaknesses as weaknesses. They talk about the price. Their vulnerability to sunlight, wooden stakes, and crossesa"it's the price they pay for their beauty, their immortality. The thing about prices, some people always seem willing to pay, no matter how high. And some people are always trying to get out of paying at all. Thanks to Estelle, you now know what Elijah Smith and his Church offer, and you know the price. At least I could do that much for her. As little as it is. Until next week, this is Kitty Norville, Voice of the Night."

Chapter 9.

The police couldn't go after Smith for anything. There wasn't a body. The only crime they had evidence of was breaking and entering at the convenience store, and the suspect, Estelle, was gone. The Church caravan had pulled up stakes and left town by the next morning. If I hadn't had the recording of the show proving otherwise, I could have believed that none of it had happened. Nothing had changed.

The next day, another mauling death downtown, the fourth this year, made the front page of the newspaper. A sidebar article detailing the police investigation included an interview with Hardin's colleague, Detective Salazar, who happened to mention that one of the detectives on the case had consulted with Kitty Norville, the freaky talk show host. Did that mean the police were seriously considering a supernatural element to these deaths? Were they part of some ritualistic serial killing? Or did they think a werewolf was on the loose downtown? The police made no official comment at this time. That didn't stop the newspaper from speculating. Wildly. The press was calling him "Jack Junior," as in Jack the Ripper.

Sheer, pigheaded determination got me through the day. Putting one foot in front of the other, thinking about things one step at a time, and not considering the big picture. The life-and-death questions. I stopped answering my phone altogether, letting voice mail screen calls. At least the CDC/CIA/FDA government spook didn't leave any messages.

Jessi Hardin left three messages in the s.p.a.ce of an hour. Then she showed up at my office. She crossed her arms and frowned. She looked like she needed a cigarette.

"I need you to take a look at the latest scene."

I sat back in my chair. "Why not get that hit man, what was his namea oh, yeah, Cormac? He knows his stuff."

"We got paw prints from three of the crime scenes. I took them to the university. Their wolf expert said it's the biggest print he's ever seen. It would have to be a 250-pound wolf. He says nature doesn't make them that big. The precinct is actually starting to listen to me."

"Oh, that's right. You said you didn't trust Cormac."

"If you could come to the scene, identify any smells, or whatever it is you do, that would at least tell me that I'm dealing with the same killer."

"Why don't you just hire a professional?"

She unfolded her arms and started pacing. "Okay. Fine. How did you find out that I talked to the bounty hunter?"

"He told me."

"Great," she muttered.

"He wants to pool information. He has a point."

"Look, at this stage I'm talking to everyone I can think of. I'm even consulting with someone from the FBI Behavioral a.n.a.lysis Unit."

I tilted my head. "You're treating this like a serial killer case? Not an out-of-control monster?"

"Serial killers are monsters. This guy may be a werewolf, but he's acting like a human, not a wolf. His victims aren't random. They're well-chosen: young, vulnerable women. I'm betting he picks them, stalks them, and kills them because they're easy prey." Oh, that was a choice phrase. "His MO is a serial killer's MO, not a wolf's. Or even a werewolf's. Yeah, I've been doing some of that reading you gave me. The wolves usually seem smart enough to stay away from people."

"Yeah. Usually. Look, Detective." I fidgeted, forcing myself to look at her only at the last minute. "I don't think I can go through that again. The last time really bothered me."

"What, did it look tasty to you?"

"Can't I be shocked and traumatized like anyone else?"

Arching an eyebrow skeptically, she said with a heavy dose of sarcasm, "Sorry."

I looked away, my jaw tightening. "I suppose I should feel lucky you aren't treating me like a suspect."

"I'm not being nice. It's a matter of statisticsa"serial killers rarely turn out to be women."

Saved by statistics. "I may know what he smells like, but I don't know how to find this guy."

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, like she was counting to ten or organizing an argument. Then she looked at me and said, "You don't have to see the body. Just come to the site, tell me anything you can about it. You have to help me, before more women die."

If this conversation had happened at any time other than the day after the show with Estelle, I could have said no. If she hadn't said that particular phrase in that particular way, I might have been able to refuse.

I stood and grabbed my jacket off the back of my chair.

The site of this killing wasn't far from the other, but the street was retail rather than residential. The victim was a late-night convenience store clerk walking home after her s.h.i.+ft.