Night Huntress - Halfway to the Grave Part 29

"Police. Detective Mansfield and Detective Black. Catherine Crawfield?"

Police? "Yes?" Still, I didn't open the door.

There was an uncomfortable pause. "Will you open the door, please, miss? We'd like to ask you a few questions."

The tone of voice didn't sound like he appreciated speaking through a wall. Frantically I kicked my stakes, always nearby just in case, under the couch.

"Just a second! I'm not dressed."

I put the remainder of my weapons into a suitcase and shoved them under the bed. I threw a robe over myself to complete the picture of hastily clothed, and opened the door.

The one who looked around fifty introduced himself as Detective Mansfield, and the younger one, perhaps in his mid-thirties, was Detective Black. Detective Mansfield handed me a card with his name and number printed on it. I took it, shook their hands, and glanced briefly at the badges they flashed at me.

"Those could be from Kmart and I wouldn't know the difference, so you'll excuse me if we just chat at the door."

My voice was cool but polite as I mentally sized them up. They didn't appear threatening, but looks were deceiving, and we knew Hennessey had goons in uniform on his side.

Detective Mansfield looked me over as well, and his eyes were probing. I hoped I looked like the poster child of the innocent college student.

"Miss Crawfield, if it would make you more comfortable, you can call the department and verify our badge numbers. We'd be willing to wait. Then we could come inside and not have to stand." Nice try, but no cigar, fellas. "Oh, that's all right. What is this about? Was my truck broken into or something? There's been a lot of that going on at the campus."

"No, miss, we aren't here about your truck, but I bet you've got a good idea why we would want to talk to you, don't you?"

"No, I don't, and I don't appreciate the mystery, Detective."

Now my tone hardened a bit to let them know I wasn't a quivering ma.s.s of jelly. Like my intestines had become.

"Well, Catherine Crawfield, we don't like mysteries, either. Especially ones that involve murdered mothers and dug-up corpses.

Do you know Felicity Summers?"

The name rang a distant bell, but d.a.m.ned if I was going to say that. "No, who is she? And what are you talking about? Is this a joke?"

My eyes widened a little, as would someone's who had never planted over a dozen bodies in the ground. When he said "dug-up corpses" I thought my knees would give out. Thankfully, though, I was ramrod-straight.

"She was a twenty-five-year-old mother who disappeared six years ago while visiting a friend. Her decomposed body was found eight weeks ago in Indiana by hunters. Yet her car, a navy 1998 Pa.s.sat, was found at the bottom of Silver Lake in our area two weeks ago. Does any of this sound familiar to you?"

I knew who she was now, seeing the registration papers again in my mind the night I killed my first vampire. The same one who had taken me to Silver Lake in a lovely blue Pa.s.sat. Motherf.u.c.ker, they had found the car I dumped.

But I blinked at him in naive confusion and shook my head. "Why would any of that sound familiar to me? I've never even been to Indiana. How would I know that poor woman?"

That poor woman indeed. I knew better than these two smug p.r.i.c.ks how she must have suffered.

"Why won't you let us come in, Miss Crawfield? Is there something you're hiding?"

Back to that again. They must not have a warrant, or they wouldn't be pus.h.i.+ng so hard for the invite.

"I'll tell you why I won't let you in. Because you came to my door asking me about a dead woman like I should know something and I don't appreciate that." There. Arms folded across my chest for indignant effect.

Mansfield leaned in closer. "Okay, we'll play it your way. Do you know any reason why a headless corpse was buried a hundred yards from the sh.o.r.e where Mrs. Summers's car was found? Or why that corpse had been dead for nearly twenty years? I mean, why would someone dig up a corpse, chop its head off, put contemporary clothes on it, and then bury it next to the place where they dumped the victim's car, a state away from her body? Do you have any idea why someone would do that?"

Well, score one for Bones. He had been right that the first vampires I'd killed were young ones.

"I don't know why someone would do that. I don't know why people do many of the strange things they do in this world." That was certainly the truth. "But what I really don't know is why you're telling me all of this."

Mansfield let a mean little smile cross his face.

"Oh, you're good. Just a nice country girl from a small town, huh? You see, I happen to know better. I know, for example, that on the night of November twelfth, 2001, a man matching the description of Felicity Summers's kidnapper was seen leaving Club Galaxy with a tall, pretty young redhead. Driving in Felicity's 1998 navy Pa.s.sat. We had an APB out on the Pa.s.sat, and it was stopped in Columbus that night. For some reason, the officer got confused and let the suspect go, but not before calling in his plates. When Detective Black researched further, he also found out that on that same night, your grandfather called the police because you'd gone out and hadn't come home. Now is any of this coming back to you?" It was like something on Court TV, only sickeningly real. "No, for the fifth time, none of this sounds familiar to me. So I snuck out late the same night a redhead left with someone who may have killed this woman? Does that mean because my hair is red I must be her?"

Mansfield folded his arms in a way that told me he had more to say. "If a hair color was all we had to go on, you'd be absolutely correct. Can't single you out just because your hair is red, right? But my new partner here"-a nod indicated Detective Black- "has been working overtime, and you know what he was able to piece together from a bogus a.s.sault report? You, Catherine. You were identified as the redhead leaving that night with Felicity Summers's kidnapper."

Motherf.u.c.ker. How had they tied me to this? How?

"I don't know who your source is, but for someone to try and link me with this woman after six years is ridiculous. I was still in high school back then. Don't you find it a little weird that all of a sudden, now someone is coming forward to say I left with this person?"

Mansfield allowed himself a nasty sneer. "You know what I find weird? How a nice girl like you got mixed up in this. What are they, Satan wors.h.i.+ppers? Is that why they dug up a corpse and then dressed it in contemporary clothes? Some kind of effigy?

These strange bodies are turning up in more places than one, too. Another one was found not too far from here about ten days ago. That one was a woman, and she'd been dead almost a hundred years! Come on, Catherine. You know who's doing this.

Tell us, and we can give you protection. But if you don't, you'll go down with them for accessory to murder, conspiracy, grave robbery, and kidnapping. Want to spend the rest of your life in jail? It's not worth it."

Wow, did they have some theories. Guess it made sense if they were looking at it from a purely human angle. Why else would someone dig up and then rebury a long-dead body? Because the person wasn't really dead, of course.

"I'll tell you what I know." Anger and anxiety sharpened my voice. "I know I'm done listening to your crazy ideas about dead women and old bodies. You're grasping at straws and I won't be one of them."

With that, I turned on my heel and slammed the door. They made no move to stop me, but Mansfield called through the door.

"I suppose you don't know Danny Milton, then, either? How do you think we got your name? He's the one who saw you leave with Felicity's kidnapper at Club Galaxy six years ago. He remembers because he said the two of you got in a fight that night, and he didn't tell the police about it back then because he was concerned about disclosing his relations.h.i.+p with an underage girl. He told Detective Black all about it on the phone this morning, however, after Detective Black stumbled across Danny's police report stating your new boyfriend had crushed his hand by shaking it. Now, we don't know how Danny's hand got crippled. We know it couldn't have been from a mere handshake. Did you take him somewhere and demolish his hand? Maybe to prevent him from talking? We'll find out everything from him, believe me. And then we'll be back."

I waited until their footsteps faded before I sank to the ground by the door.

Having watched enough TV, at least I knew not to immediately pick up the phone and call Bones. The line could be tapped. They knew enough but still not enough. Their little scare tactic this morning had been staged to send me sobbing out a confession. Well, that wasn't going to happen. For starters, it would be a great way to get an extended vacation in a padded room. One where I could tell all the lovely doctors who were pumping me full of lithium about monsters.

Instead, I dressed in black spandex pants and a long-sleeved tight top of matching material, completed with sneakers and a ponytail. Let them think I was going for a run in the woods. The mouth of the cave was difficult to find unless you knew where to look, which they didn't. Besides, they couldn't keep up with me at a run through that uneven ground if they tried. Mansfield would probably have a heart attack on the spot. He smelled like a chain-smoker.

First, I had to look like I wasn't das.h.i.+ng right out to the scene of a crime. I went to the mall and shopped for an hour, my stomach churning inside. Then I left and started toward the cave.When I parked the truck, I did it even farther away than its normal quarter-mile stop. Instead it was over four miles of wooded territory from the cave. In case I had an audience, I made a show of stretching and warming up as a normal jogger would. Then I sprinted away, going in large circles to confuse someone trying to pinpoint my direction.

After ten miles of sprinting, I darted into the cave. Bones was already walking toward me, a puzzled but pleased expression on his face.

"Kitten, didn't expect you so early-"

He stopped, seeing my face. I threw my arms around him and burst into tears.

"What is it?"

He picked me up, carrying me swiftly through the lower entrance and depositing me on the couch. I got hold of myself enough to explain.

"Danny. Danny Milton! d.a.m.n him, he managed to f.u.c.k me again, and this time he kept his clothes on! I just got a visit from two detectives. Thanks to that schmuck giving them my name and telling them I left a club with a murderer, guess who's their prime suspect in an unsolved crime involving a young woman and a strange mummified corpse? I think you're going to need to drink them and change their minds, or I'll never graduate college. G.o.d, they think I'm protecting an occult killer, you wouldn't believe some of their theories-"

Alarm flashed across his face and he got up from the couch.

"Kitten." There was deadly intensity in his voice. "Get on the phone and ring your mum. Right now. Tell her to get your grandparents and leave. Bring them here, all of them."

"Are you insane?" Now I stood also, eyes wide with incomprehension. "My mother would run shrieking out of this cave to begin with, she's afraid of the dark, and I can just see my grandparents bunkering down here. The police aren't worth-"

"I don't give a rot about the police." His words sliced through the air. "Hennessey's looking for anything he can find on me or, failing that, on someone close to me. You know he's got connections with the police, so if they have your name now as a suspect in a murder where there's a strange shriveled corpse, then he would also. You're not anonymous anymore. You've been linked to a dead vampire, and all he needs to do is take one look at a photo of you to know you're the same girl who almost got him killed, so get on the phone and get your family out of that house."

Sweet Jesus, I hadn't considered that! With trembling hands I took the phone he handed me and dialed. It rang, one time...two...

three...four...five...six...Tears sprang to my eyes. They never let it ring that long. Oh no, no, please...ten...eleven...twelve...

"There's no answer. I spoke to her this morning, before the detectives came. She said someone was at the door...."

We sped off through the trees on his motorcycle. For once I was glad he had the d.a.m.ned unsafe thing. It was the only type of vehicle that could navigate through this territory at such speeds. If anyone tried to pull us over, I would look guilty as all h.e.l.l of anything they accused me of. Over my tight black spandex from before, I now had on crisscrossed boots with stakes inside, silver throwing knives lashed to my upper arms and thighs, and two guns tucked in my belt filled with silver bullets. Not that we would have stopped for anyone. Somebody could just try to catch us.

I kept trying my family on the cell, cursing and praying when there was still no answer. If anything happened to them, it would be all my fault. If only I hadn't drunk that spiked gin and been unable to kill Hennessey...if only I'd never met Danny.... A thousand different ways to scourge myself seared through my mind. Normally it took an hour and a half to get to the house from the cave.

Bones made it there in less than thirty minutes.

We pulled right up to the front and I was the first one off, running up the steps of the porch and through the open door. Once there, my brain refused to translate what my eyes saw. The red liquid smeared on the ground caused me to slide forward and then fall to the floor with the momentum of my panicked strides. Bones stepped inside with more caution but just as swiftly, and he dragged me to my feet.

"Hennessey and his men could still be nearby. You're no use to anyone if you break now!"

His voice was harsh, but it penetrated through the paralyzed part of my mind, which went blank upon the sight of all that blood.

The early shades of dusk darkened the sky. Pale amber beams of remaining light illuminated the sightless eyes of my grandfather sprawled on the kitchen floor. His throat had been torn out. It was his blood I'd slipped in.

Shaking Bones off, I unsheathed my knives and gripped them, ready to fling them at any undead thing that moved. There was a trail of blood leading up the steps, and crimson handprints left grisly signs for us to follow. Bones took a deep whiff of the air and pushed me back against the landing.

"Listen to me. I only smell them faintly, so I think Hennessey and whoever was with him aren't close. But you keep those knives ready, and you unleash them at anything that flinches. Stay here."

"No." I spoke through clenched teeth. "I'm going up there."

"Kitten, don't. Let me go instead. You keep watch."

Pity creased his face, but I ignored it. My grief I forced into a tiny hard lump inside me that I would unravel later. Much later, when every vampire or person with them who had done this was dead.

"Get out of my way."

My tone had never been more menacing and he stepped back but followed closely behind me. The door to my bedroom was kicked in. It hung by only a hinge. My grandmother was face down on the floor, her hands frozen into claws as if in death she still tried to escape what had chased her. There were two wounds on her neck, one shallow, one gaping. It looked as though she'd dragged herself while dying, up the steps to get to my room. Bones knelt beside her and did a strange thing. He inhaled near the gouges around her neck, and then picked up a b.l.o.o.d.y pillow from my bed and held it to his face.

"What are you doing?" G.o.d, he wasn't hungry, was he? The thought sent a vile tremor through me.

"I can smell them. There were four of them, including Hennessey. I smell your mum on this pillow. They took her. And there's not enough of her blood here for her to be dead."

Relief and fear caused me to nearly sag on my feet. She was still alive, at least possibly. Bones nosed around the room like a deadly blond canine, following the scent back down the stairs. I heard him back in the kitchen and knew he was giving Grandpa Joe a similar sniffing. It was too awful to contemplate. Gently I turned my grandmother over and her open eyes seemed to stare accusingly at me. This is all your fault! they silently railed. Choking back a sob, I closed them, and sent a prayer upward that she was at peace, because I never would be.

"Get down here, Kitten. Someone's coming."

Abruptly I darted back down the stairs, avoiding the slick blood that lined them. Bones had something crumpled in his hand and he propelled me out the front door as he shoved it inside his belt. A car screeched down the road about a mile away and I grabbed two extra knives until each hand held four.

"Is it them?" I hoped it was. There was nothing more I wanted than to tear into the animals who had done this.

Bones stood next to me with legs apart and narrowed his eyes.

"No, they're human. I can hear their heartbeats. Let's go." "Wait!" I looked around despairingly, my clothes and hands streaked with my family's blood. "How will we find out where they've taken my mother? We're not leaving until we do find out, I don't care who's coming!"

He jumped onto the bike and spun it around, waving me over with a jerk of his head.

"They left a note. It was in your grandfather's s.h.i.+rt, I have it. Come on, Kitten, they're here."

Indeed they were. The car slammed on its breaks about a hundred feet away and out came Detective Mansfield and Detective Black with their guns drawn.

"Hold it right there! Don't you f.u.c.king move!"

Bones leapt off the motorcycle and stood in front of me before I could blink. He was s.h.i.+elding me from the bullets that could only injure him for a short time but would do far worse damage to me.

"Get on the bike, Kitten," he murmured too low for them to hear. "I'll get on behind you. We have to go. They would have called for backup."

"Hands in the air! Drop your weapons!" Mansfield approached with slow steps. Obligingly Bones stretched out his hands in compliance. He was buying time.

Something cold settled in me and spread, overriding the grief and the pain. Bones expected just to take two full clips in the back while we rode off. Or let them try to handcuff him and then slam them. Well, I had other ideas.

Both detectives advanced on him, seeing Bones as the primary threat. They foolishly ignored the old adage to never underestimate the power of a woman.

I stepped out from behind Bones with my hands in the air, palms facing me. When Mansfield took another step forward I flung the first knife. It skewered him straight through the wrist and his gun fell to the ground. Before Black could react I let loose the other knife, and he, too, collapsed screaming to the dirt, clutching his bleeding forearm. It made the next two knives easier to find their marks, and in a blink both of their hands were paralyzed with silver blades protruding from each wrist.

Bones arched a brow at me but said nothing, and climbed behind me on the bike as we sped off.

Their shouts behind us faded with the distance.

TWENTY-TWO.

W E DROVE OVER UNPAVED ROADS AND through the trees to avoid being seen. In the distance, I occasionally heard sirens. Even though I was in front, Bones controlled the bike. He maneuvered it around trees at speeds that normally would have made me throw up from fright. Now I wanted him to go faster.

When we approached the highway, he stopped. It was dark now, shadows swallowing up the light. Bones laid the bike down on its side and covered it with a few branches he yanked off a nearby tree. The freeway was about a hundred yards away.

"Stay here. Won't be a moment," he promised cryptically.