Two, maybe three, people followed me outside, happy to keep their distance. Inside, those less courageous peered from the glassed entry. Those who were shorter either elbowed their way past the taller shoppers gathered at the doors or leaped into the air in order to see over them, reminding me some of the whack-a-mole game I played with Nick as a child.
An occasional breeze intensified the metallic odor and wafted the scent over the parking lot. Well-defined images of the brutality taking place less than a couple of miles away came with it. What a burden Bianca’s psychic ability must have seemed to her all those years!
With plans to take to the air, I glanced over my shoulder. The shoppers inside and the ones who had come out hadn’t dispersed, and I realized a clandestine departure was out of the question. I tore off the Jimmy Choos and bolted toward the car. The Glock rubbed against the soft flesh on the inside of my thigh as I ran, slowing me down. Reaching between my legs, I yanked it from the holster and tucked it in my waistband.
The tires spun against the asphalt and created a black smoke barrier as I steered the Dodge out of the lot. Time mattered, but thinking about the carnage that awaited, and remembering my near failure at Gettysburg, a part of me was in no hurry to get there.
I heard the rat-a-tat-tat of bullets fired in rapid succession as I swung into Funky Moves’ crowded parking lot, the weapon undeniably an AK-47. Running the Dodge onto the curb nearest the main entrance, I began the exhausting execution of the Hidden Cloak. Sweat swamped my brow, seeping into and stinging my eyes. My clenched jaw ached, and I realized I had chipped another damn tooth. I spat out the fragments and heard them ping against the window, but I couldn’t see them. Nor could I see my forearms. I wanted to keep trying, encouraged by my progress so far, but more shots spilled into the parking lot. Time was running out. I had to come up with an alternate plan!
Elizabeth appeared in the passenger seat and studied me. Past a dramatic sigh, she said, “I assumed the plan was to disarm the criminal, not oneself.”
Under different circumstances, I might have found the double entendre amusing. “I’m really in no mood for lame jokes.”
“Just what exactly was it you were trying to accomplish?”
“I thought it might be best if I were invisible.”
“Well, aside from the majority of your upper appendages, I regret to advise that you have failed miserably.”
I exhaled through flared nostrils. “I’m well aware of that. Look, are you going to help me or not? Because I need to get in there.”
“Then I suppose there is no time for protracted explanation,” she said, fishing around inside my head, after which an electrical surge coursed through every vein, every muscle, and every cell, the sensation like electrocution, and I could no longer see my feet, my hands, or my torso.
“When you wish to reverse the incantation, simply imagine yourself visible once again and it shall be. Godspeed, my child,” she said, tipping her head toward the building, burgeoning fangs swallowing up her lower lip as she sniffed the air like a four-legged predator. “Restraint will undoubtedly prove arduous.”
I wished Nick were there to keep me in check. “Can’t you stay? I’m not sure I understand how to reverse it.” Or if I can resist sinking my fangs into some unsuspecting innocent.
“How many times must we say it, Celestine? The Powers of the Ancients now reside within you. All that is required is your belief.”
“Wait! What am I supposed to do if something goes wrong?” I asked, but she was already gone, evaporating within a pungent sulfuric fog. Panic set in, but I couldn’t think about the worst possible scenario now. I had to get inside the nightclub. Besides, if I failed to restore visibility, hadn’t the Elders promised they would always assist me whenever I needed them?
I bolted from the car, looking over my shoulder and hoping to find Elizabeth near, then charged the main entrance and collided with a woman rushing the door. She lost her balance, and I grabbed her arm to break her fall. Wearing a quizzical expression, she patted down the air in front of her, like a mime trolling for handouts on a busy street corner. Making a wide arc, I managed to squeeze past her and nearly tripped over the dead bouncer, blood seeping from vertical bullet holes dotting his T-shirt.
Bullet holes pockmarked the stark cement walls in a random pattern. Men and women stampeded the entrance, most of the men leaving chivalry on the dance floor or a barstool. Some screamed. Others appeared dazed, wide-eyed and pale despite the strobing rosy hues thrown off the spinning disco ball. A rotund man in his forties bulldozed his way ahead of the others, knocking down one woman and nearly trampling another. I sent him a telepathic command, surprised when he complied with my suggestion, and he assisted the first woman to her feet, then carried the other to safety.
The gunfire had stopped, making it difficult to pinpoint the shooter’s location. The musicians had abandoned the stage and their instruments. Riddled with bullets, the purple metallic drum, previously bearing the band’s name and logo, now looked more like a colander. Near the back of the club, frightened patrons resembled mummies, motionless and deathly white, and plastered their sweaty palms over their mouths to muffle screams as they hid behind tables, upended to serve as makeshift shields. Blood-spattered bodies littered the dance floor, several couples still intertwined in a final tender embrace.
So. Much. Blood.
Unlike the battle of Gettysburg, the dead and wounded lay in an enclosed environment, with no wind or fresh air to dilute the overpowering, exhilarating scent. My body shook with a mild quiver that progressed into a teeth-chattering tremor. My biceps, triceps, pectoral, hamstring, and calf muscles bulged, vibrating with superhuman strength, daring me to act on my desire. Razor-sharp incisors engulfed my lower lip, and I nearly gave in.
But then I saw him. Huddled behind a column as he reloaded, long slippery hair slung behind narrow Quasimodo-like shoulders, a sinister smile revealing the deranged inner workings of a born killer. He blinked and I was on top of him. The column obscured him from the others, and I wanted him to see me. I concentrated with the kind of intensity that bursts blood vessels, but nothing happened. I tried again, this time envisioning an opaque shroud, then the dismantling of that shroud, one section at a time. My hands appeared, then my arms, and then the remainder of my body, like water washing over mud to reveal everything beneath. I saw my eyes, red-framed golden orbs, reflected in his. I smelled his fear, rancid and feral, not unlike Vykoka’s when Bianca surrounded his pack of werewolves and destroyed him. Inching my face closer, I clacked my teeth, and the little color that remained left his face. His eyebrows nearly met his scalp, and within one eye a blood vessel burst, the subconjunctival hemorrhage so dramatic the white sclera turned completely red. A soundless scream revealed his discolored teeth and a wad of tobacco. I could hear the thumping of his heart, felt it pumping wildly as it fed the bloody river coursing through his veins.
The music resumed—“Ghost” by Justin Bieber—while the disco ball began another revolution, flinging a kaleidoscope of color on the walls, and I drew my Glock and rammed the barrel against the shooter’s head. I stroked the trigger, my eyes wandering over the carnage he had caused. God, how I wanted to end his miserable life. He squirmed beneath me, desperate to escape, and I dug my knees into his groin. A line of blue burst through the door, guns drawn, and swept the club in tactical formation. I disarmed the killer, then whacked his head with the butt of my gun and knocked him unconscious.
“This is Detective Crenshaw, KCPD speaking,” I called out. “Don’t shoot. I’ve got the suspect in custody.” Then I stepped out from behind the column and laid down my weapon and the assault rifle.
“Let’s see some ID,” one of the officers said. “Slow and easy.”
“The suspect is over there, behind the column,” I offered, jerking my head toward a shoulder. “I could use a set of cuffs.”
He nodded to another cop, who sprinted toward the column.
I plucked my shield from my cleavage and yanked off the wig. “I was working undercover, just up the road, when I heard the shots.”
“You said you heard the shots?” he asked while retrieving my weapon and handing it back to me. “From up the road?”
“That’s right. From the Budget Bizarre parking lot,” I replied, hitching a thumb in that direction.
His brows furrowed, and I knew he was busy doing calculations. “That’s a couple of miles away.”
I shrugged. “Not quite. And I’m sure you’re aware how the sound of gunfire carries.”
He eyed me with suspicion. “Yeah, but through a concrete building?”
The medical examiner had already been summoned, and I decided to wait outside for the ME’s van. The vacated patrol cars flashed red and blue lights and served as a convenient beacon. A squadron of ambulances shrilled in the distance, emergency lights illuminating the nearby highway and announcing their impending arrival. Two forensics investigators hopped out of their van as four media wagons rolled up and officers worked to cordon off the area. Directing a brief but firm reminder that the media stay behind the yellow banner, I returned to my car and shrugged into the trench coat. Soon after, the ME arrived, and I met her near the entrance.
Claudia “Juice” Romano ducked under the yellow police tape as effortlessly as an overweight woman nearing the age of fifty could. She served me a curt nod and hesitated just outside the door. Between gloved fingers, she gripped a straw protruding from a juice box and slurped the last few drops before fishing a surgical mask from a pocket.
“Nice to see you, Detective. How bad is it?”
“Bad enough.”
“Is the shooter alive?”
“Unfortunately.”
Stern eyes cut my direction, but I sensed a smile lingered beneath her surgical mask. “Give Gloria Hall a call, will you? My assistant is out with COVID-like symptoms, and I’m assuming by bad enough, I’m going to need all the help I can get.” She pushed a latex covered palm toward me. “As far as COVID goes, I’m certain I wasn’t exposed, and I’m fully vaccinated.”
A lethal mortal virus is the least of my concerns.
I hadn’t talked to Gloria Hall in some time. She’d given up her full-time ME position two years ago, preferring an on-call status, which allowed her more free time to enjoy her favorite pastimes: cooking, soap operas, and making her husband miserable. I punched in her number, finding it necessary to reprimand a particularly assertive reporter from the Kansas City Star as I waited for her to pick up.
“Hell-O.” Gloria answered on the second ring. I distanced the phone from my ear when she began to yell. “Stanley! Turn down the GD TV! I’m on the phone.”
I gave her a play-by-play, and she assured me she’d show within a half hour. I was about to go inside to inform Claudia and to assist with the witness statements when I heard Larson Lindley, a detective from a neighboring precinct, call my name. I turned as he breached the crime scene tape. Behind him, the convoy of ambulances swung into the lot.
“I thought that was you,” he said, his eyes snaking over the parted trench coat and coming to rest on my cleavage. He hitched a thumb toward the building. “Business or pleasure?”
I thought about the goose egg and the blue balls I’d given the shooter and smiled. “Both.”
A valley formed between his brows as he considered another question. Instead of asking one, he tipped his head to several cops and four detectives I recognized from his precinct, who were busy detaining and questioning the people who’d managed to escape the building.
“I was just headed in to interview some of the witnesses,” I said as several EMTs threaded a path with their gurneys.
He plucked a pristine notebook from an inner jacket pocket. “I’ll give you a hand. Nice outfit, by the way.”
Gloria’s stature complemented her big personality, so when a large form blocked the entryway, I knew she’d arrived.
“Hidey ho,” she boomed, and I noticed Claudia cringe. She stepped out of the way, allowing the arresting officers room to escort the shooter outside. “That little pipsqueak is responsible for all of this?” she asked of no one in particular.
Claudia sighed. “They come in all shapes and sizes. Thanks for coming, Gloria.”
“Where’s Detective Crenshaw?” I heard Police Chief Patterson ask.
I hadn’t seen him arrive and assumed he’d entered through the rear exit in order to avoid the press. I didn’t have any more questions for the witness I was interviewing, other than a second contact number, and granted her permission to leave.
“There you are,” he said as I made my way across the dance floor, a slow flush warming my body as I endured his long, sweeping gaze.
“I was working a sex trafficking case,” I offered as explanation.
He nodded past a scowl. “I hear you were first on the scene?”
“Yes,” I said and left it at that.
“What was the perp’s state of mind when you arrived?”
“Uh . . . homicidal.” Patterson had always rubbed me the wrong way. He was sexist, rude, and impatient, and I was in no mood to placate him.
“Try to keep up, Detective,” he said snarling. “We’ve identified the shooter as Andrew Thompson. Did Thompson appear to be hallucinating? Was he cognitively impaired?”
I felt my eyes narrow. “He had the presence of mind to load a 75-round magazine, Chief, so I think it’s fair to say he wasn’t cognitively impaired. I also think, by his actions, his mental instability is obvious.”
“Oh, you do, do you? I’m trying to get ahead of an insanity plea, Crenshaw. According to that piece of shit, a vampire sat on his nuts, confiscated his weapon, then hit him in the head.”
I forced a chuckle. “That’s pretty bizarre, Chief. He’s either hallucinating or . . .”
“He plans on pleading insanity to spare himself death row. Get onboard, Detective. I want every loophole at his disposal closed and cemented over. And what’s this I hear about a transfer to nights?” Before I could respond, Patterson said, “The DA’s going to want to talk to you first thing in the morning. So, I suggest you go home and catch a couple of hours sleep. You’re going to need it.”
From the experiences I’d had with District Attorney Mitch Sullivan, the chief wasn’t exaggerating. Sullivan was a pretentious little man with his eye on a congressional seat. Apparently, a lack of humility was inherent; those behind the scenes equally detested his brother the mayor, often utilizing similar vulgar terms whether referencing one man or the other.
“It will all be in my report, Chief. I don’t see how a face-to-face is going—”
“Maybe I didn’t make myself clear, Detective,” he interrupted. “Come morning, you will be in the DA’s office, first thing.”
I was more worried about impending daylight than missing a few hours of sleep, but because it seemed there was no way I could avoid it, I said, “If it’s all the same to you, Chief, I’d like to finish up here.”
He grumbled his acceptance, and I returned to the witnesses.
“Glad to see you’re in one piece,” someone spoke behind me an hour later.
“I’ll be with you in just a minute,” I said to the next witness, then turned to give Quaid my utmost attention. “What are you doing here?”
“I was in the neighborhood. I heard it was you who took the son of a bitch down.”
I nodded. “So you were in the neighborhood, huh?”
“I would have been here sooner, but while I was on the way I got a call on a possible abduction. Looks like you were right about the abductors sticking to Wednesdays.”
Shit! If I could have only remained, another victim wouldn’t have been grabbed. I raked tense fingers through tangled honey-colored strands. “Tell me we have a lead this time.”
He sucked his teeth and hitched his off-the-rack pants toward his ribcage. “This one got us some intel. She took off toward the loading docks, and they caught up with her there. . .”
“Where there’s no shortage of security cameras.”
He winked. “That’s right. We’re running the abductor’s image through FRT now. The camera also caught one of the driver. It’s grainy, but we both know they’ve worked with a lot less.”
Facial recognition technology had helped us solve a number of cases over the last five years, so I was, guardedly, hopeful.
“Were either one of them baldheaded?”
“Your guess is as good as mine. They both wore hats.”
“Do we have an ID on the vic?” I thought it pointless this early in the investigation, but I asked anyway. I resisted a volley of toe taps as he leafed through his notes.
“Kayleigh Mateo. She had just clocked out and was leaving the store.”
“So she worked there?”
“When she wasn’t busy doing other things.”
I threw my weight behind one hip and blew out my frustration. “Cut the cryptic crap, Quaid. What other things?”
“Simmer down, Crenshaw. I’ll get to it.”
“Now would be nice.”
“I wondered why she ran toward the loading dock, so I browsed through some pretty mind-numbing footage. Twenty minutes before her shift ended, Ms. Mateo was helping a delivery driver unload something other than inventory.”
“They were having sex?”
He nodded. “That would be my guess. They disappeared behind the truck—out of range, but the camera caught the driver rounding the truck, approximately ten minutes later, zipping his pants. Ms. Mateo appeared, buttoning her blouse, a few seconds after that.”
“So when she ran toward the loading docks, she probably assumed the driver was still there—”
Quaid nodded. “And thought he could help her.”
Thinking aloud, I said, “It’s possible they’d been watching her, knew she worked Wednesdays, and knew what time she’d leave the building.”
“Sounds like a plausible theory. Want me to give you a hand?” Quaid asked and tipped his head toward the remaining twenty-some nightclub witnesses.
“I’d appreciate that.” Even though we had the shooter and his weapon in custody—and I had caught him in the act—protocol dictated a thorough report. Regardless, I found it difficult to mask my resentment; I had a feeling we’d soon see a dramatic increase in abductions, and I was anxious to return to the cases I’d been assigned.