Samantha Moon Phantasm, page 25
part #9 of Vampire for Hire Series
The closer I got to the metal door, the more I could smell it: death.
Putrid death, too.
Something that been dead for many, many days. Perhaps even a week.
I looked back and saw Franklin staring out at me from the shadows of the stairway. I was beginning to understand why they had tried so hard to keep me away...
The entity within me perked up at the smell, but I had been doing a pretty damned good job of keeping her locked up, so I wrapped a few more mental iron bars around the cage I imagined her in.
A few years ago, I would have gagged at the smell of death. Now, not so much. Now, I was intrigued by it. What had died? How had it died? Perhaps I could never truly go back to who I had been. Perhaps I’d done too many things, seen too many things.
Still, I tried to find a neutral feeling about the smell. In fact, I tried to not have any feeling about the smell at all. My new goal these days was to not give the entity within me any hope. Or any escape.
With each step I took, the pounding on the other side of the wall seemed to keep pace with me, but as I reached the door, the sound stopped altogether, and a deathly silence followed.
More nervous than I thought I would be, I stood just to the side of the door. There was a small, square opening in the door, no bigger than a small fist. Certainly not big enough for Kingsley to reach through. Most importantly, I could see that the door itself was at least six inches thick.
Jesus.
Now, from the other side of the door, I heard the breathing. Deep and ragged. Something was just off to the side of the door, listening to me. That something was, of course, Kingsley.
At least, I hoped it was.
I held my breath; after all, the putrid stench was pouring through the opening in the door. Muted light came through, too. The light was high up, casting a squarish light on the floor before me.
“Kingsley,” I said hesitantly. “It’s Sam—”
A face suddenly appeared in the small opening. A very hairy and sweating face...wild and contorted and in obvious pain. I squeaked and took a step back.
“Sam!” Kingsley gasped, pressing his face into the square opening. “What...what are you doing here?”
Now that I saw him like this—desperate, wild, angry, shocked, and in mid-transformation—I wanted to unsee it. I also wanted to unsmell what I was smelling. Maybe this was a bad idea.
But it wasn’t. I needed him. I needed help.
“I...I have to speak to you—”
“Leave, Sam!” he growled, and turned away from the square, I could see him pacing through the opening, passing back and forth behind it. God, he looked massive, the few glimpses I saw.
“I’m sorry, Kingsley, but I can’t.”
“I’m warning you, Sam...”
He wasn’t himself. I could see that. Or, rather, he was tapping into a very, very angry and primal and hate-filled part of him.
The demon, I thought. It’s the demon coming through.
I powered on, “How do I stop a werewolf?”
I knew all the stories. I’d heard all the rumors. The truth was, I really didn’t know. It wasn’t a question I’d ever needed to ask Kingsley. I suspected Fang would know the answer. But I didn’t feed into rumors or legends. I needed to know facts, and I needed to stop Gunther tonight.
“Why, Sam?” he growled, pacing behind the small opening, each footfall shaking the ground beneath me. If I had to guess, I would guess that he was easily a foot taller, and maybe another hundred pounds heavier.
And he would only get bigger.
And stronger.
“Gunther has another hiker. A woman this time. A woman I know, well, kind of, long story—”
“Enough!” he roared, and I shrank back. And it took a godawful lot to get me to shrink back. But never, never had I heard such force and powerful volume from a human.
Because he isn’t human, I thought. At least, not now.
I knew Kingsley could transform into a wolf—as in an actual wolf—at will. Few werewolves had this ability to shapeshift. But on the night of the full moon, he didn’t turn into a wolf. No, he turned into a hulking, hybrid monster. A true wolfman.
We were still hours from dusk and already he’d changed so much. I knew his transformation was a slow, painful process for him. Unlike the wolf that he could conjure quickly—which, I suspected, was closer to what I did with the winged Talos—his monthly transformation into a hulking beast was nearly unbearable for him. After all, this was when the entity within made a full appearance and, while doing so, apparently delighted in torturing Kingsley along the way.
“I don’t care about the hiker, Sam...” His voice rattled, rumbled, like an idling Harley.
“You do, Kingsley,” I said. I almost said ‘Wolfie,’ which was my term of endearment for him, although he didn’t much like it...unless, of course, we were in his bedroom.
He yanked his head away from the square opening and stretched his neck to and fro, and I saw what was happening. His neck was getting bigger. Muscle mass was appearing before my eyes. Muscle mass and fur. He grunted and might have whimpered.
“Leave, Sam. Leave, goddammit.”
This wasn’t the Kingsley I knew. The man I knew was attentive and playful, even if a little stubborn. This creature, stalking behind the door, was only a semblance of the man I now loved. The immortal I loved.
“Kingsley, please—”
He growled as he paced behind the door. I could only see flashes of him behind the small window. The flashes that I saw were horrific at best. With each passing minute, I would lose more and more of him. I doggedly asked my question.
“How do I stop a werewolf, Kingsley?”
I saw him shaking his head as he paced. “Too strong,” he was saying, mumbling. “Too strong, even for you.”
I wasn’t so sure about that, but I wasn’t going to argue the point.
Kingsley went on: “Kill and destroy and feed, and will fight to the death once engaged.”
“Then tell me how to defeat him, Kingsley.”
“Don’t do it, Sam. Wait...for me.”
“He has to be stopped. Tonight.”
He didn’t like my answer and pulled away angrily. His heavy footfalls seemed heavier than just a few minutes earlier. His great head and beefy shoulders appeared and disappeared through the square opening.
Now, I pressed my face into the square opening. “Tell me, Kingsley. Tell me what you know.”
I sensed his hesitation. After all, once I knew how to defeat a werewolf, I would know how to defeat him, too. A small, protective side of him was keeping that information from me. Or not. But that was my guess.
Suddenly, Kingsley’s thick, sweating, panting face appeared just inches from mine. I saw the fangs pushing through his gums, which bled profusely. It was only noon and he was suffering so much. I had no idea he went through such a prolonged, hellish transformation. And he still had many hours to go. How many hours, exactly, I didn’t know. When did a werewolf turn into a full-blown werewolf? At sunset? At dusk? At midnight? At the first sign of the full moon? I didn’t know exactly. But looking at Kingsley now, it looked like the transformation wasn’t very far away.
And I still had to find Gunther.
Shit...
“We are not so different, Sam,” he said, gasping. Blood bubbled between his lips. “The same silver that kills you, kills me.”
“A silver dagger—”
“No, Sam. You’ll never get close enough with a dagger. He’ll be too fast, too powerful. You’ve never seen anything like this, Sam.”
“Then what?”
“A silver bullet.”
“But where...”
“Franklin...” he gasped. “Franklin has them. Just in case...”
He held my gaze, although his bloodshot eyes wavered. I got his meaning: just in case he ever got out and needed to be put down. Of course, he had gotten out a few years ago. Where was Franklin then? A question for another time.
“Go, Sam! Leave me be!”
With that, he slammed his huge hands against the door, and kept slamming them until I gulped and skittered off down the hallway, back to where Franklin was still waiting in the shadows. The thick, metal wall vibrated. More dust and dirt sifted down.
***
Upstairs in the oversized kitchen, as Franklin locked the door that led down into the cellar, I said, “That smell...”
“A deer carcass,” said Franklin, turning to look down at me as he pocketed the key. “I hunted it last week.”
I nodded, sickened and relieved...relieved that it wasn’t a human corpse. Sickened that I kiss that mouth of his. “And it’s been rotting down here ever since, I presume.”
“You presume correctly. Master Kingsley prefers them...putrid. The more putrid, the better.”
I felt my stomach turn, which in itself was a good sign for me. It meant that I was keeping the bitch at bay. The crazy, crazy bitch. Far below, the earth shook violently, as did the kitchen walls around us.
“When will Kingsley fully turn?”
“At sundown, of course,” said Franklin. “Like all true creatures of the night.”
I almost asked what kind of creature he was...except I thought I just might know. Not so much a creature as a creation.
I had six hours, at most. Five, if I wanted to play it safe.
“I need those silver bullets, Franklin.”
He looked at me long and hard, then nodded. “This way, Ms. Moon.”
Chapter Thirty-two
I was sitting in my minivan, along Kingsley’s crushed-shell driveway, weeping.
To think that my boyfriend would be feasting on something dead and rotting...in just a few hours...was a little upsetting.
I shouldn’t have seen him. Perhaps Franklin would have told me how to stop a werewolf. Or perhaps not. His loyalty to Kingsley ran deep...and for reasons I didn’t quite understand. Yes, I had suspected it would be silver. The same silver that removed the entity from me would remove it from him, too.
Except, I would have gone into the fight with a silver dagger, and I might not have returned. Yes, I had known a werewolf would be powerful...but I hadn’t quite grasped just how powerful. The silver bullet was the key, of course.
And not getting too close.
I looked at the Smith & Wesson .357 Magnum sitting on the seat next to me, chambered with the six silver bullets.
It would take a helluva shot. Especially at a charging werewolf.
I was risking my life, I knew. I was risking everything that I held dear. I was risking, most of all, being a mother to my children. No, I didn’t think a werewolf needed to use silver to kill me. Ripping me from limb to limb, and then devouring me, would probably do the job, too.
I looked at Kingsley’s sprawling estate before me. I was certain I could hear his roars from here, and feel a slight rumbling beneath me. He was angry. He was turning. What happened to him each month wasn’t very fair either.
I wiped my eyes and considered my next move. I had to find Gunther, of course. He was up there, in the woods, changing throughout the day, much like Kingsley was. And nearby was a woman. A live woman. Waiting to be consumed by him, no doubt watching his transformation in complete and utter horror.
Some preferred them dead and rotted, others preferred them fresh and alive. I was happy to see that I remained repulsed by both notions.
I drummed my fingernails on the steering wheel, knowing my time was slipping through, well, these very fingers.
On a whim, I pulled out my cell phone and typed in “cars and mustaches.”
What came up next was very intriguing.
Very, very intriguing.
Chapter Thirty-three
I was back in the city of Orange, parked this time in Gunther’s driveway.
He wouldn’t be using it anytime soon. After all, I had no doubt he was in the midst of a full-blown transformation. And in the company of one woman—the wife of my new friend, Sheriff Stanley—who was, no doubt, witnessing all of it. Then again, if this script played out, she would be doing far more than witnessing. She would be an unwilling participant.
So I did what any normal investigator would do under the circumstances: I downloaded an app to my iPhone, the Lyft app to be precise. An app that was, in fact, pure genius.
According to the website, with a simple touch of a button, the Lyft driver closest in proximity to me (thanks to my phone’s GPS) would get pinged that I needed a ride. The app also connected our Facebook pages, apparently for safety reasons. My Facebook page sported an outdated picture of me from nine years ago, back when I was camera-friendly. Luckily, I didn’t look much different now.
Which wasn’t a good thing, I suspected. Soon, I would be getting to the point where my friends and colleagues were clearly looking older than me...by nearly a decade.
Worry about that later, I thought, when the app had finished downloading.
I was almost giddy with excitement.
When the app opened, I pressed the “pick me up” button and waited. While I waited, I sweated. The day was sweltering. I might be immortal but I got hot—and sweated—with the best of them. Which is why I had the A/C running in the minivan while I waited.
A moment later, my phone chirped.
A driver had locked onto me and was en route. Okay, now I was definitely giddy. In fact, there he was on Facebook. A youngish-looking Latino with a round face and wide-set eyes. I scanned Paulo’s profile because I had nothing better to do. Married. A writer on the side. I checked out the links to his books, too. A vampire series, of all things. A witch series, too. And something about gods in Los Angeles.
“This should be interesting,” I said.
According to the app, he was only two minutes away. I looked at the time on my cell: 1:38. According to my weather app, sunset was at 6:19 p.m.
I did some serviceable math. I had five-and-a-half hours before a woman would be consumed alive by a real werewolf.
And, yeah, I cared, dammit. I cared a lot. I had met her husband. I had met her unborn kids. They needed her, dammit. They needed her alive. They had a family to build. Not to mention, I had given Sheriff Stanley some of my best marital advice. I didn’t want to see that advice go down the drain.
Not funny, I know. But try as I might, my new morbid sense of humor didn’t seem to be going anywhere.
“Choose your battles,” I said to myself.
After all, a morbid sense of humor I could live with. Not giving a shit about death—and feasting on my neighbor’s cat because I couldn’t control myself—wasn’t something I could live with.
Quite frankly, I was better than that. I lived to fight the bad guys. I lived to protect the innocent. I was not a bad guy myself. I was one of the good ones, dammit, and I was going to do everything I could think of to ensure just that.
That I stayed as good as possible.
Further down the block, a white Toyota Prius turned onto the street. As it approached, I could see the driver through the windshield, sort of leaning forward, forearms wrapped around the steering wheel, scanning. Yup, it was the same guy in the Facebook page—Paulo, the vampire/witch/demigod writer. Most telling was the furry mustache attached to the front grill of the Prius. My Lyft ride had appeared.
I stepped out of my minivan, waving. He frowned, thick eyebrows bunching up, then pulled into the driveway, next to my minivan. He jumped out, smiling, but also looking confused as hell.
“I’m sorry,” he said, talking fast, eyes scanning somewhat wildly. He either had a serious case of A.D.D., or something else was going on. “But I’m a little confused. You need a ride, right?”
“Maybe. Mostly, I need some information.”
“Okay, now I’m a lot confused.” Paulo gave me an easy laugh, although his eyes never stopped scanning.
A.D.D., I thought. And bad.
“First,” I said, “why are you confused?”
“Because I usually pick up Gunther at this address.”
“Only Gunther?”
“Yes. What’s going on here? Do you need a ride or—”
I stepped forward and reached out to his mind. Holy sweet hell, that was a scrambled, nearly incoherent mind. I reached deeper, through the chaotic miasma of thought streams, and found his core and told him to relax and to answer my questions, and that I was a friend.
He nodded, and for the first time, his eyes settled down, and settled on me. He exhaled. I suspected this was the first break his mind had had in years. Decades, perhaps.
“First question,” I said. “Why do so many Lyft cars come down this street?”
“It’s because Gunther tips so well. Usually $200.”
“But I thought the app summoned drivers, not the other way around.”
He nodded, smiling easily. He was good-looking, in a round-faced, wide-eyed sort of way. “It does work that way, in theory. But some Lyft drivers will game the system. After all, the system pings the closest driver, so we’ll sometimes patrol areas where known big tippers live or work, hoping to get pinged. With Gunther, we know we can make an easy $200, especially when it starts getting close to the full moon.”
I blinked. “What do you know about the full moon?”
The driver shrugged, still looking at me, eyelids dropping a little. Now that his rapidly-running mind had shut off, he was getting sleepy.
“We Lyft drivers sort of figured it out, since he’d been doing this for so long.”
“Doing what for so long?”
“Grabbing a lift up to Big Bear. Turns out, it’s every full moon.”
“Has he told you why he leaves every full moon?”
“He told me he’s an amateur astronomer. That he has a cabin in the woods where he has a telescope.”
My heart thumped once, twice, loudly, excitedly.
“And why does he tip so much?”
Here, the Latino driver paused and fought against my control, but I silently encouraged him to continue and he finally nodded. “He pays us to keep quiet about the location.”
“Have you seen the cabin?”
