Another One Bites the Dust (32 page)

I nearly slapped her again. Anything to strike the glee from her shining black eyes. But then people still might die, little people like Lai and E.J., and I couldn’t have that. “What a marvelous plan,” I drawled, “destroying your own people.” I spun my finger next to my temple and rolled my eyes. “Brilliant.”

“No, Grandmother, don’t you see? I have mailed letters to the
Washington Post
and the
New York Times
taking responsibility for the explosion on behalf of the American fanatics who demonstrate outside the gates of this festival. My partner was able to transfer their fat leader’s fingerprints to the envelopes and even to the bomb itself. No one will doubt the story, because it is widely known that the Chinese acrobats are managed by vampires.”

“I do not understand. What American fanatics? Who are you framing?”

“The church people!” Pengfei cried. “Their hatred for the supernatural is well documented. They actually wrote a threatening letter to us when they heard we were bringing the acrobats to Corpus Christi. It was what gave us—well, our partner—the idea.”

“And who is this partner?”

Pengfei’s eyes practically glowed. “His name is Edward Samos. He sponsored a group of reavers to come and help us achieve our goals. What a ruthless beast their leader is!” She must be referring to Yale, who, I assumed, had carried both the security guard and Wu along inside him until Samos had found bodies for them. I wondered if there were any more out there that we should know about. But before I could frame a reaver question that wouldn’t sound too suspicious, I thought of one that was much more important.

“And this Samos. Why should he care about China?”

“He cares about the entire world! Every creature born or made with something extra, something that makes them
other
, falls under his protection as far as he is concerned.”

“And what is he protecting them from?”

She looked at me like my brains might be leaking out of my nose. “Humanity, of course.”

So Samos had found himself a cause, huh? Or was he just masquerading behind a worthy issue as a way to net more allies, soup up the power until even his battery overflowed?

“So when this bomb explodes?” I prodded. “What happens then?”

“Our countrymen will be enraged when so many of our people are killed so horribly on foreign soil. Words will erupt into bullets and those into bombs. And in the midst of the carnage we will emerge with a new army.” She clasped her hands in front of her chest as she imagined it, smiling madly at her vision of the bloody battlefield. “Men armored as dragons will lead the march across this land of self-absorbed, avaricious barbarians, leaving nothing but ash in their wake.”

“And just how did a little girl like you learn how to blow people up?” I demanded, planting my free hand on my hip. I sensed that Vayl had reached his position. I could signal him anytime now.

As I’d hoped, my dig offended her. “Women can do anything they wish these days, Grandmother. Sometimes all they have to do is read the right books or hire the right engineers. It is no longer necessary to marry the right man.”

I nodded as if I appreciated her point of view. “And so?”

“I wired the explosives to one of the campers. After the acrobats finish the show they will all return to their temporary homes to shower and change. And so, in”—she checked the diamond-studded watch on her right wrist—“fifteen minutes, all forty of our acrobats, including twelve children, will be dead!”

“You bitch!” yelled Cole so loud into my earpiece I thought for a second my hearing would be permanently impaired. I have rarely had to work so hard to keep the pain off my face. “Sorry, Jaz,” he said immediately. “Sorry, sorry. Won’t happen again.”

“But what if someone sees the bomb?” I asked.

“Never.” She said it with such utter confidence that my hopes of finding the device in time to disarm it died. “My
cantrantia
”—by that she meant her core power—“is that of concealment. Even if you stood directly on top of it you would never detect it.” Her laugh, a light and pleasant tinkle, caressed the air. “Even I could not find it now.”

It sucks to be right.
If I hadn’t been so worried about the acrobats and their kids, not to mention innocent passersby, I’d have been deeply depressed. But Pengfei obviously wanted some Granny praise for her dirty deeds, so I said, “How exciting! You have certainly done well for yourself, Granddaughter. Please, let me do you the honor.” I bowed, deeply enough that the bolt from Vayl’s crossbow flew six inches over my back and straight into Pengfei’s stomach.

The sound she made was less of pain and more of shock and denial.

I stood up. “That’s what you get for ignoring your Granny.” Mocking words, but my mind was on the corpse lying in that gazebo. Not just dead. Soul raped.
This one’s for you, victim lady. And when I get hold of that bastard Yale . . .

Both of Pengfei’s hands wrapped around the bolt, trying to pull it out, but Bergman had foreseen this possibility. As soon as it had penetrated her body, two long spikes had emerged from the tip, anchoring the bolt securely in her abdomen long enough for the wax covering the pill to melt. Theoretically, at least. She screamed as she pulled and things inside her body gave that should never have moved.

“Come on,” I murmured. “Come on, come on.” It was like standing in a cavern waiting for the tour guide to turn on his flashlight. But instead of brightening the night with an inner sunburst, Pengfei yanked the bolt free.
“Shit!”

I should’ve known. Dammit, didn’t that welcome mat teach you anything, Jaz? Bergman’s prototypes only work half the time, and then not always how they’re supposed to
. Stupid! Never want something to succeed so bad you totally deny reality waiting for it to work.

My hand itched to pull Grief, but I hadn’t been honest with Bergman when I’d said the gun served as our backup plan. It didn’t. Because Pengfei was Vayl’s kill. And I’d learned early in our partnership that you don’t stand between him and his target unless you want to remind him gently and repeatedly that you’re on his side while his eyes spit red fire and his cane sword waves dangerously close to your throat.

“Hey, what’s that over there?”

“I dunno. Let’s check it out!” Young, piping voices, headed our way.

I looked over my shoulder. Vayl had intercepted two wayward kids, and I saw several more looming right behind them.
Damn, now he’s sidetracked by crowd control. What to do? What to do?

Pengfei dropped what was left of the bolt, which was when I realized the business end had remained in her body. But its reaction continued to delay itself far beyond our scheme. Originally the ignition had been timed for two hours. I’d asked for instant.

“Bergman!” I hissed, covering my mouth so, hopefully, the sound wouldn’t reach the translator. “Where’s the
sizzle, wap
you promised?”

“How long has the pill been active?”

“I don’t know, a few seconds.”

“Give it time,” he pleaded. “I know it’ll work.”

“Do you have any idea what you’re asking?”

“I know it’s dangerous, but this could revolutionize the way we fight vampires. Please, Jaz. I put my heart and soul into this.”

Oh, for crying out loud
.

Pengfei began to back away.

“Where are you going?” I demanded.

“Yacht,” she muttered. “Safe there. Heal better there.” As she spoke, blood spilled from the side of her mouth.

I strode toward her. “I don’t think so,” I said, pulling a classic bully move—ankle behind the calf, hard shove that took her to the ground. Except I hung my arm out there a little too long. It gave her time to grab hold, pull me off balance, and flip me over onto my back. Remembering how lethal her hand-to-hand fighting skills had shown themselves to be during the yacht massacre, I quickly rolled to my feet. The wound had slowed her some. She’d only just made it to vertical herself.

I moved in fast, aiming multiple kicks at that bleeding midsection, hoping to weaken her more. She blocked every one.

Having seen her style, I expected a counterattack of such blinding speed that all thought would be suspended in the simple act of survival. But the wound had taken its toll on her aggression as well. She came at me with one arm down, guarding her stomach. The other snaked out, stabbing at my throat.

I dodged the blow, landing one of my own in the middle of her chest, which staggered her. Closing in, I tried to take her down again, but she backed me up with a series of low kicks, a couple of which landed square enough to leave my shins black-and-blue for days.

I faked a kick to her abdomen and she dropped her arm, leaving her head wide open. So I pulled the kick and powered it upward, landing it just above her right eye.

She dropped to her knees.

Vayl came to my side. “She’s all yours,” I said.

“Actually, I think Bergman has taken care of her,” he replied.

I peered down at her. The skin had begun to peel off her hands, neck, and face in thin, curling strips. Heat built inside her quickly after that, so fast I could feel it blasting from her, as if I was standing too close to a bonfire.

We backed off as steam rose from her body. It soon became a torrent of smoke that bubbled and blackened along with her skin. Her hair and clothes finally caught fire, and I heard a couple of kids say, “Hey, check that out!”

Vayl caught them before they’d stepped more than a foot off the path. “Go home,” he said grimly. They turned tail and went.

CHAPTERTHIRTY-FIVE

As we hurried away from Pengfei’s smoking remains I said, “Cole?”

His voice boomed in my ear, loud, low, and excited. “Just got off the phone with Jericho. The evacuation has started. He said the bomb squad may be able to contain the blast some, but it’ll still be big.”

“Okay. Tell them we’re going to put a great big mark on the camper that’s wired. They won’t be able to find the bomb. Tell them not to waste time trying; it’s magically concealed. But at least they’ll know its location.” Who knew, maybe they’d be able to blanket the place with some sort of retardant. As I recalled, it wasn’t that big. At least if it was the one we’d inspected earlier. And I knew it was. What a crock of crap. We’d looked all over the thing without once realizing we were staring straight at the bomb. A thought occurred to me. “Uh, would you move the RV again? If that sucker gets damaged Pete will be twitching well into the next decade.”

“Sure.”

Vayl touched my arm. Even now, with everything behind us and all we were about to go through, that light stroke of fingers on skin fired my attention. “Yes?” I said, working to keep my voice level.

“Our time is limited. I will go mark the camper. You find Lung.”

Without even a “See ya later, alligator” he was gone. As I strode toward the main path I thought,
This is going to be harder now. Lung’s in the crowd that’s being herded toward the building exits. He knows they’ve been compromised. What am I supposed to tell him? What would he believe?

I’d reached the Acrobats’ Arena. Wide-eyed people came pouring out of the main entrance, clutching each other and their children, talking in high voices, many of them crying. But nobody was screaming. Nobody had broken into a run. Credit the off-duty SWAT guys who flanked the exit and the path and who I could hear inside the building, speaking in calm, authoritative voices.

I tried to sense Lung among that mass of humanity. He shouldn’t be that hard to pick out. I recalled the scene in our tent, just before it burned. What was his scent like again? Wait, I was still wearing the medallion. Then I realized it didn’t matter.

“This is bad,” I muttered.

Vayl, hearing me through his earpiece, asked, “Is the crowd out of control?”

“They’re okay. I’m not. It’s Lung. Vayl, I never scented him. Not once. It was always Pengfei or the other vamps around him, but never him. The armor covers it up. I haven’t seen him yet, and if I can’t pick him out of this crowd, I have no way to find him. Wait a second. Something’s happening around back.”

I ran behind the building, led by the sound of a woman shouting and crying. I rushed forward when I recognized Xia Ge struggling in her husband’s arms. “Ge!” I said. “What’s wrong?”

She took one wide-eyed look at me, screamed, and passed out. That was when I remembered I still looked like Pengfei.

I leaned in close to Shao. “Dude, it’s me, Lucille Robinson. What happened?”

Poor Shao looked half dead himself, but he managed to say, “Chien-Lung is kidnap Lai.”

“How?”

“Lai strap in stroller. Ge sitting in front row, watching show. When evacuation begin she going out acrobats’ exit. That where Chien-Lung strike her down and take Lai away.”

“Where’d he go?”

Shao pointed back toward the marina.

I squeezed Shao’s arm. “I’m going after him, Shao.” I wished I could promise to bring his baby back. But both of us knew we didn’t live in that kind of world.

I took off after Lung. “Cole, I want you out looking too,” I said. “Not confronting, just looking.”

“I’m on it!” he replied.

Vayl said, “I am inside the camper trying to find something to mark it with, but I will be with you shortly.”