Chapter 63

I WAITED FOR that flame to sink into me, to take me over, but nothing happened. The hands were still holding me down, I could still feel the press of power, of that brown flame, but that was it. I opened my eyes a slit, and the brown-gold of the flame was dazzling, but it wasn't coming closer.

A gunshot sounded so close that I was deaf for a second. Then the flame was gone, and Vittorio's face was above mine. I thought he meant to kiss me, but realized from the way he held himself that he was ducking. Another shot sounded, and then the people who'd been pinning me let me up and moved to form a human shield by the kneeling vampire.

"Another night," he said, and he was suddenly standing and running in a movement that I couldn't follow with my eyes. I sat up, watching him go, my heart in my throat. I'd seen only one other vampire that could move like that without mind tricks: Truth.

Men were yelling, "Fuck, where'd he go! There! Did you see that!"

Edward was suddenly standing above me, his hand held out. I took it, and he lifted me to my feet. I swayed a little, and he steadied me.

"You all right?" he asked.

I nodded.

He gave me a look.

"He tried to mark me, but he couldn't get past my shields in the time you gave him."

Olaf loomed over us. "Is she hurt?"

"I'm fine," I said, and forced myself to let go of Edward's hand, when what I really wanted to do was collapse into his arms and hold on.

Green uniformed SWAT guys were there now, moving the crowd around as the people began to wander around, asking what happened.

Hooper was there, his face the only pale thing in the outfit. "What the hell happened, Blake?"

"The hostages, the club, it was a trap."

"A trap for what?" Hooper asked.

"Me."

Georgie came up beside his sergeant. "Nothing personal, Blake, but then why didn't he kill you?"

"He doesn't want me dead."

"What does he want?" Hooper asked.

"Me, as his human servant."

"You already belong to the master in St. Louis, right?" It was Cannibal, coming up from the other side of the dispersing crowd.

What was I supposed to say? "Something like that."

"Then he's too late," Cannibal said.

"He thinks he's powerful enough to take me away."

Hooper was standing there, not moving but watching my face. "Is he?"

"Not tonight, he wasn't."

Hooper's mouth made a small movement; maybe it was a smile, maybe not. "Let's not give him another night."

"Amen to that," I said.

I turned to Cannibal, alias Sergeant Rocco. "Some heap-big psychic you are. Didn't you sense Vittorio working the crowd?"

"Sorry, Anita, but I only do memories."

"Shit, can't any of you sense this kind of thing? Where's Sanchez?" I asked.

"Why?" Olaf asked.

"I thought he might have sensed the metaphysics."

"He's with the second team. They're going to scout Bering's house," Edward said. "Grimes wanted his practitioners to see if they could sense the demon."

"Why aren't you with Sanchez?" I asked Rocco.

"My ability is touch and memories. I'm not touching a demon on purpose, and I don't want those memories."

Edward said, "They're trying to see if they can sense the demon, so we can make entry closer to the targets or farther away from them, depending on what they find."

"Give me a gun, and let's get out there."

Edward was beside me; he handed me my own backup gun from a pocket in his tac pants.

Rocco said, "You have vampires right here; why chase demons?"

"This is a hostage situation. I'm not a negotiator."

Bernardo came up. He had blood running down his face from a cut on his forehead; apparently someone had hit back.

The people from the crowd who had tried to beat the hell out of police officers were being given blankets and hot drinks by Red Cross workers. The team doctor was checking them out, with his med tech by his side. I heard a man say, "I knew what we were doing was wrong, but I couldn't stop. I had to do what the voice in my head told me to do. I wanted to stop, but I couldn't."

I stepped in front of Rocco, and he stopped, looking at me. "If Sanchez and the other practitioners can sense the demon, it can sense them. If it's what killed the other operators, it could come out and trail them by their own magic."

"Most demons aren't that bright," Edward said.

"We're aware that some preternatural beings can sense psychic ability, Marshal. We've got them warded so their"-he made a waffling motion with his hand-"signature is garbled."

I was impressed and said so.

"Psychic ability is just another part of the job for us," he said. His radio crackled to life, and he turned to listen. He started to do a slow jog, and the rest of us just fell into step with him. All right, the men slow-jogged; I had to fast-jog. My legs were shorter. "The vampires have given up. They've freed the hostages, and they surrendered."

"What's the catch?" I asked. If anyone heard me, they didn't answer, but I knew there was a catch; with vampires there was always a catch.

Chapter 64

SOMEONE HAD HIT the lights in the club so that it was bathed in bright lights. Lower-rent strip clubs are not meant to see bright lights; they reveal all the cracks and bad paint patch-up jobs. They show the illusion for what it is: a lie. A lie about sex, and the promise of having it, if you just pay a little bit more money. Nathaniel, my live-in sweetie, had explained to me that dancers make their living on the customer's hope that real sex is possible. It's all about advertising but never really selling. Under the harsh overhead lights, the scarlet women looked like even if they were selling, you wouldn't want to buy.

The dancer who had lost an ear was being rushed to the hospital, with the idea that they might be able to sew the ear back on; the wound was fresh enough. The other dancers were in the back rooms being interviewed, because we had the vampires in the front area between all the little stages. The vampires were chained in shackles with the new special metal that some of the bigger, more well-funded police forces had for preternatural criminals. It was some uber-space-age metal. I hadn't seen it put to the test yet, so I'd wait before putting my faith in it too completely.

The vampires sat in a sad-looking row, their hands held awkwardly in front of them because the chain went to their waist and their ankles. I had to admit that even if they broke the metal, they probably wouldn't be able to break enough chain to attack before we could get a shot off. Maybe just shackles were a good idea, though you had to get up close and personal to shackle a prisoner, and to my knowledge, the only person in this room who was immune to vampire gaze was me.

Olaf was circling the chained vampires. He was staying out of reach, but he paced them, like a cattleman looking over a herd that he was thinking of buying. Or maybe that was just me projecting. Maybe.

Edward and Bernardo were interviewing the dancers. Why was I with Olaf? Because the dancers knew a predator when they saw one, and even after an evening of being held prisoner by vampires, some of them spotted him for what he was, and it wasn't helping to settle their nerves. For a good interview, Olaf needed to be elsewhere. Why didn't I interview the women? Because I could get as up close to the vampires as possible and not risk being bespelled. My specialty led me squarely to the other room. But Edward had said something to Sergeant Rocco, aka Cannibal, because either he or one of his men were at my side at all times. They were careful not to give the vamps direct eye contact, but they stayed close. Frankly, Rocco made me a little nervous after our encounter at SWAT HQ, but the first time he moved his body between me and Olaf-subtly, but just enough to make the bigger man have to walk wide around me-I just enjoyed that someone had my back.

"Okay, guys, this is the drill. We're going to escort you one at a time into another room and ask you what happened. Don't talk amongst yourselves while we're gone. Marshal Jeffries and some of the nice SWAT operators will still be in the room, so mind your manners."

They all promised like eager kindergarteners. There wasn't a vampire in the room that I would have been afraid of, one on one. But there were ten of them, and ten was a lot. Ten of any kind of vampire would have been scary. Hell, ten human beings all rush you at once and you won't get them all.

Officers helped the first vampire up to shuffle into a small room behind the bar. It was where the liquor was kept, and they put him in a chair that they'd found just for this. I knelt by the first vampire and found myself gazing into the face of a slightly plump man with pale brown eyes and hair to match. He smiled at me, careful not to show fang. He was trying to be all harmless, friendly, helpful, but I knew that of all of them, he was the oldest. I could feel him in my head, like an echo of time. He was three hundred if he was a day. He was dressed neatly, too neatly for the heat, for the town, for what he was pretending to be. He had pale slacks and a slightly darker tan shirt tucked in and buttoned up. The belt was good leather and matched the shoes. His nondescript brown hair had been cut recently and well. The watch on his wrist was gold and expensive, though once it doesn't say Rolex, I can't tell you what it is, but thanks to Jean-Claude I know quality when I see it.

I smiled at him. He smiled back. "Name?"

"Jefferson, Henry Jefferson."

"Well, Mr. Henry Jefferson, tell me what happened."

"Honestly, officer, I was in the casino, playing poker, and he came to stand by the table, just outside the ropes."

Ropes meant he'd been at one of the high-end tables, where a hand could start at five hundred, or ten thousand, or more. "Then what?" I asked.

"Then he made me cash out and told me to come with him." He looked up at me, and there was puzzlement and a hint of fear on his face. "Maximillian is a powerful Master of the City. He protects us, but this guy just came out of nowhere and I couldn't say no."

The next vampire was a lot younger in every way. Maybe only a few years dead, and barely legal when he crossed over to undead land. He had healed needle scars at the bends of his elbows. He'd been clean a long time. I had a hunch.

"Church of Eternal Life, right?" It was the vampire church, and the fastest-growing denomination in the country. Want to know what it's like to die? Ask a church member that's gone on. That's what they call it, going on. Church members wear medical ID bracelets, so if they're in a life-threatening situation, you call the Church and have a vampire come and finish the job.

The man's eyes widened, and his mouth opened enough to flash fang before he remembered. Boy, he was new. He recovered and tried to do what all the older vampires tell you to do when talking to the police: play human. Not pretend to be human, but just don't be vampire.

"Yes," and his voice was whispery, so frightened, "how did you..."

"The needle tracks. The Church got you off drugs, right?"

He nodded.

"What's your name?"

"Steve."

"Okay, Steve, what happened?"

"I was at work. I sell souvenirs just down the street. People like buying from a vampire, ya know."

"I know," I said.

"But he came up to the stand, and he said, Come with me, and just like that, I did." He gazed up at me, his eyes wide and frightened. "Why did I do that?"

"Why does a human being go with you once you bespell them with your gaze?" I asked.

He shook his head. "I don't do that. The Church rules..."

"Say no vampire gaze, but I bet you've tried it, at least once."

He looked embarrassed.

"It's okay, Steve, I don't care if you've played slap-and-tickle with the tourists with your eyes. Did this vampire catch you with his eyes?"

He frowned up at me again. "No, I would swear it wasn't his gaze. It was almost as if he said, Come with me, and I had to do it."

"So, was it his voice?"

Steve didn't know.

None of them knew why they had done it. They'd left their jobs, their dates, their money on craps tables, and just followed him. Sometimes Vittorio had spoken; sometimes he'd simply stood close to them. Either way, they'd followed him and done what he said.

The girl looked about nineteen, but except for Henry Jefferson, she was the oldest of them. Two hundred years and counting was my guess, and it wasn't a guess. Her hair was long and dark and had fallen over her face, so she was trying to blink it out of her eyes.

We'd already been through name, rank, and serial number, when I said, "Sarah, do you want me to get your hair out of your eyes?"

"Please," she said.

I moved the hair carefully out of the wide, blinking gray eyes. She was the first one to ask, "You're looking me in the eyes; most humans don't do that. I mean, I wouldn't roll you or anything, but cops are trained not to look into our eyes."

I smiled. "You aren't old enough to roll me with your eyes, Sarah."

She frowned up at me. "I don't understand." Then her eyes went wide, and what little color she had to her skin drained away. You don't get to see a vampire go pale very often.

"Oh my God," she said, and her voice held terror.

Rocco stepped up. "What's wrong?"

"She's figured out who I am," I said, quietly.

Sarah the vampire had started to scream. "No, please, he made me. It was like I was some human. He just rolled me. Oh, God, I swear to you. I didn't do this. I didn't mean... Oh, God, oh, God, oh, God. You're the Executioner! Oh, my God, oh, my God, you're going to kill us all!"

"You might want to step outside. I'll try to calm her down," Rocco said, having to yell above her screams.

I left him to the hysterical vampire and went back out into the main part of the club. Hooper and Olaf were arguing, quietly but heatedly, in the corner of the room away from the prisoners. There were still plenty of guards on the vampires. I walked by them and found them watching me. The looks were either hostile or scared. Either they'd heard Sarah screaming or someone else had figured it out. Of course, there was one other possibility.

I got close to the two men and caught snatches, "You son of a bitch, you are not allowed to threaten prisoners."

"It was not a threat," Olaf said in his deep voice. "I was merely telling the vampire what awaits them all."

"They're telling us everything we want to know, Jeffries. We don't need to scare them into confessing."

They both looked at me and made enough room so I could join the little circle. "What did you tell the girl?"

"How do you know it was a girl?" Hooper asked.

"I'll do you one better, I'll tell you which girl. The one with long, wavy brown hair, petite."

Hooper narrowed his eyes at me. "How the hell did you know that?"

"Otto has a type," I said.

"He was talking low to her, but he made sure the others could hear. He told her he was going to cut her heart out while she was still alive. He told her he'd make sure and do her after dark, so she'd be awake for it all." Hooper was as angry as I'd ever seen him. There was a fine trembling in his hands, as if he were fighting the urge to make fists.

I sighed and spoke low. "Did you also mention who I am?"

"I told her we were vampire hunters, and we had the Executioner and Death with us."

"I know Blake is the Executioner, but who's Death? You?"

"Ted," I said. I glared up at Olaf. "You wanted them afraid. You wanted to watch the fear on all their faces, didn't you?"

He just looked at me.

Hooper asked, "What's your nickname, Jeffries?"

"I do not have one."

"He doesn't leave survivors," I said.

Hooper looked from one to the other of us. "Wait a minute, are you telling me that these vampires are all going to be executed?"

"They are vampires involved with the serial killer we were sent to destroy. They are covered under the current warrant," Olaf said.

"The human crowd at the barricades attacked police officers, but when they said the vampire took them over, we believed them."

"I believe the vampires, too," I said.

"It doesn't matter," Olaf said. "They took human hostages, threatened human life, and are proven associates of a master vampire that is covered under an active warrant of execution. They have forfeited their rights, all their rights."

Hooper stared at Olaf for a second, then turned to me. "Is he right?"

I just nodded.

"No one died tonight," he said, "and I want to keep it that way."

"You're a cop; you save lives. We're executioners, Hooper; we don't save lives, we take them."

"Are you telling me that you're all right with killing these people?"

"They aren't people," Olaf said.

"In the eyes of the law, they are," Hooper said.

I shook my head. "No, because if they were really people under the law, I'd have another option. The law, as written, doesn't make exceptions. Otto is right; they have forfeited their right to live under the law."

"But they were under the power of a vampire, just like the human crowd."

"Yes, but the law doesn't recognize that as a possibility. It doesn't believe that one vampire can take over another vampire. It only protects humans from the power of vampires."

"Are you telling me that there's no other option for these vampires?"

"They go from here to the morgue. They'll be chained to a gurney with holy objects, or maybe these new chains will do, I don't know. But they will be taken to the morgue and tied down in some way, where they will wait until dawn, and when they go to sleep for the day, we kill them, all of them."

"The law does not say we must wait for dawn," Olaf said.

I couldn't keep the look of disgust off my face. "No one voluntarily does them while they're awake. You only do that when you're out of options."

"If we do them as soon as possible, then we can move on to help Sanchez and the other practitioners."

"They radioed in," Hooper said.

"What happened?" I asked.

"House was empty. The house had been torn up by something, and Bering, or what we assume was Bering, is dead. He'd been dead for a while."

"So, a dead end, no pun intended."

Olaf said, "I thought they were only to scout the house psychically, and wait for the rest of us to enter it."

"They sensed nothing in the house. They radioed in and the lieutenant made the call." Hooper turned back to me. "If we could prove that these vampires were telling the truth, could you delay the executions?"

"We have some discretion on when to put the warrant into force," I said.

"Cannibal can get their memories."

"He'll be opening himself up psychically to vampires. That's different from playing around in human brains," I said.

"It doesn't matter why they did what they did," Olaf said. "According to the law, they will be executed, regardless of why."

"We're supposed to protect all the people in this city." Hooper pointed back at the waiting vampires. "Last I checked, they qualify as people."

"I don't know what to tell you, Sergeant. No jail will take them, and we can't leave them for days chained to a gurney with holy objects. It's considered cruel and unusual, so they must be executed in a timely manner."

"So it's better to just kill them than to leave them on the gurney?"

"I'm telling you the law, not what I believe," I said, "Frankly, I think putting them in cross-wrapped coffins for a while would keep them safe and out of the way, but that was considered cruel and unusual, too."

"If they were human, it wouldn't be."

"If they were human, we wouldn't be talking about putting them in a little box and shoving them in a hole somewhere. If they were human, we wouldn't be allowed to chain them to a gurney and remove their hearts and their heads. If they were human, we'd be out of a job."

He stared at me, a slow dawning look that was almost disgust. "Wait here, I'm going to talk to the lieutenant."

"The law is the law," Olaf said.

"I'm afraid he's right, Hooper."

He looked at me, ignoring Olaf. "If there were another option, would you sign off on it?"

"It depends on the option, but I'd love to have a legal recourse for moments like this that doesn't include murder."

"It's not murder," Olaf said.

I turned to him. "You don't believe that, because if it wasn't murder, you wouldn't enjoy it as much."

He gave me those cave-dark eyes, and there was a hint of anger down in the depths. I didn't care. I just knew that I didn't want to kill Sarah, or Steve, or Henry Jefferson, or the girl that he'd made cry. But to keep Olaf from being alone with the women, I'd take them myself, but not while it was dark, not while they could see it coming, not while they were afraid.

"You really don't enjoy killing them, do you?" he asked, and he sounded surprised.

"I told you I didn't enjoy it."

"You did, but I didn't believe you."

"Why do you believe me now?"

"I watched your face. You're trying to think of ways to save them or to lessen their suffering."

"You could tell all that from one look?"

"Not just one look, a series of looks, like clouds passing over the sun, one after another."

I didn't know what to say to that; it was almost poetic. "These people are innocent of any wrongdoing. They don't deserve to die for not being strong enough to resist Vittorio."

"Ted would say that no vampire is innocent."

"And what do you say?" I asked, trying to be angry, because it was better than the shaky feeling in my gut. I didn't want to kill these people.

"I say that no one is innocent."

Hooper came back with Grimes beside him. Grimes said, "We have a lawyer who's been wanting to try for a stay of execution in cases like this."

"You mean like that last-minute call from the governor in the movies," I said.

Grimes nodded. His so-sincere brown eyes studied my face. "We need an executioner to write it up and sign that he or she thinks that executing these vampires would be murder and not in the public good."

"Let Cannibal read some minds, make certain we haven't been fooled, and then I'll sign it."

"Anita," Olaf said.

"Don't, just don't, and you stay away from the prisoners."

"You are not in charge of me," he said, and there was the beginning of anger. Great.

"No, but I am," Grimes said. "Stay away from the prisoners until further notice, Marshal Jeffries. I'll tell the other marshals what we're doing."

They walked toward the back room and the ex-hostages and Edward. Olaf said what I was thinking. "Edward won't like what you're doing."

"He doesn't have to like it."

"Most women value their boyfriend's opinion."

"Fuck you," I said, and walked away from him.

He called after me. "I thought you didn't want to."

I kept walking. The vampires on the floor stared at me as if I were Vittorio, or something else equally scary. There was hatred in a few eyes, but underneath it all was their fear. I could taste it on the back of my tongue, like something sweet that held a bitterness to it, like dark chocolate that's a little too dark.

The far door opened and Cannibal was helping Sarah the vampire walk through the door. She caught sight of me and started screaming all over again, "She's going to kill us! She's going to kill us all!"

Usually she'd be right, but maybe, just maybe, we really could save everyone tonight.