Crane, R [ Southern Watch 03] Corrupted (11 page)

The buzzing reached a crescendo, and she heard it move a little closer to her, like it was coming up the slope. She was only a few feet off the path at best. It was close, so close. Something buzzed by only inches away from her, less than a foot. She heard a ticking noise and felt a blast of wind in its wake that caused the sleeve of her uniform to flap in the breeze. She jerked it back out of instinct, like she was afraid a car was going to take it off if she left it hanging out there.

This was no car, though. It sounded so eerie, like a swarm of creatures from hell was passing right by, and she couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe, the stink of sulfur stuck in her throat and nose.

The buzzing started to lower in volume, and Erin knelt there on one knee, paralyzed, her gun hand shaking as the sound started to subside. No more gusts of wind passed her, no more strange, scary chattering. The buzzing faded, like the demonic bees had moved down the trail. The angry noises, the ticking, the feeling that something was moving over the ground like a plague of locusts beneath her, all of it was gone.

She finally took a breath and lunged toward the flashlight, still pointing upslope. She grasped it in a dirty hand and pointed it back toward the path, beam lighting the black asphalt below to reveal—

Nothing.

She had just about caught her breath when something touched her shoulder from behind and she screamed, spinning and pointing the gun into the midsection of a figure behind her. The flashlight’s beam caught his face just before she pulled the trigger, and she stopped a hair’s breadth from riddling him with bullets. “Jesus!” she cried.

“Not exactly,” Lerner said, looking a little pained. Duncan appeared in his wake, a little more solicitous. “What the hell just happened here?”

“Well, this is awkward.” Hendricks spoke the words out loud, not even bothering to filter them because they were exactly what he was thinking, and they damned sure fit the situation. He and Alison were standing in the little room upstairs that was just down the hall from the one still cordoned off with police tape. Not that he’d eyeballed it as he went past.

Lucia was shutting the door, and she was doing it slowly. While she did, he had a marvelous view of her back, and her ass was a thing of beauty, he had to concede. The curves of it were just visible at the top of the gown’s skirt. Erin’s was nice as well, but Lucia had some muscular firmness going on that Erin’s didn’t. Not that he was complaining.

“Let me make you more comfortable,” Lucia said as she turned from the door. He could tell it was a persona she was putting on, but the persona was nothing like the hollow, robotic feeling he got from Starling. Lucia was a little clumsy with it, but it was still seductive in its way. He wasn’t feeling it, but that likely had more to do with the third wheel in the room with him than any failings on her part.

“I don’t know that you can,” Hendricks said, standing stiff—in more ways than one he realized with surprise and folded his coat closed. He caught Alison eyeing him and suspected she knew. There was also a waver in Lucia’s voice; that was the main thing that gave her away. He felt his interest subside and a little shame came to him for thinking of her this way. She was paid to be interested; she wasn’t
actually
interested, and with that realization, he felt his own interest dissolve.

“Let me try,” Lucia said and swept close to him. She had a nice fragrance, but it wasn’t doing anything for Hendricks now that he’d been reminded what she was. He’d had a little trouble remembering what he was here to do for a moment, and that embarrassed him even more.

“It’s okay,” Hendricks said, and took a step back as she placed a hand on his chest. “I don’t … um …”

“What’s the matter, baby?” Lucia murmured and shot a look toward Alison. “You want to watch us first?”

“Not gonna happen,” Alison said.

A flicker of uncertainty crossed Lucia’s pale face as she turned her attention back to Hendricks, and he realized it was because he was the one she was more comfortable trying to sweet-talk. “You’re still pretty new at this, aren’t you?” His brain didn’t feel much of a filter in the stark clarity of that moment, and he just let it tumble right out. “The whole seduction thing? A little inexperienced?”

He caught a hint of embarrassment in the eyes, like she was stung he’d figured that out, and she went scarlet in the cheeks. “Let me show you what I’m not inexperienced at.”

“Where’s Starling?” Alison said, cutting through all the crap and turning both Hendricks and Lucia’s head toward her in a hot second. “We’re here to see Starling, not have an orgy.”

Lucia’s jaw dropped a little, then she managed to scoop it back up and close it. “Who … is Starling?” She just wasn’t convincing enough. The naivety did her in, and Hendricks exchanged a look with Alison that told him she read it the same as him.

“You’ve at least heard the name before,” Hendricks said, moving his head to look her in the eye. Her focus was split between him and Alison, watching them both like they were gonna bum rush her any minute. “That much is obvious.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Her voice wavered.

“I don’t quite believe you,” Hendricks said.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Lucia said, but the cadence changed midway through her words and her eyes shifted constantly. “I think we should either get to the business at hand or you should leave—”

“Okay,” Alison said.

“Yeah, we’ll go,” Hendricks said. “We don’t want any trouble.”

“I meant you should sleep with her,” Alison said.

Hendricks sent her the most raised eyebrow look of
What the fuck?
he could manage. She shrugged in response. “I am not … no.” He shook his head.

“Then we should leave,” Alison said. “Kind of a shame, though; I thought maybe she’d feel a little more truthful after you tickled her for a bit.”

“How did you even marry Arch?” Hendricks asked in horror as he made for the door. He left Lucia standing in the middle of the room. “You know—reserved guy, quiet, really religious, probably not into suggesting sex with hookers—”

“It’s not like I would have hung around and watched,” Alison said, sounding vaguely offended. “I just thought maybe if you talked to her privately—”

“Yeah, really privately,” Hendricks said as he reached for the door handle, glaring back at her the entire time. “Like, in flagrante delicto, with my privates talking directly to hers, apparently—” There was a flash of something and the faint mood lighting in the room went darker by about ten shades. “What the—?”

“Lafayette Hendricks,” the cool voice reached him. He looked back at Lucia, standing in the middle of the room. It only took a couple seconds for him to realize that Lucia was gone, really gone. It was the eyes, of course. They were a whole different shade now, something different than they’d been before. And the innocence was gone, whatever of it there had been. “I heard you were looking for me.”

He stood there with the door slightly cracked and shut it back gently. Alison was standing there, watching too, just a step from the door herself. “Well, what do you know,” she said.

Hendricks had to agree with that assessment. “Hello, Starling.”

“What the hell are you doing here?” Erin asked, still trying to catch her breath after Lerner scared the shit out of her.

“I asked you first,” Lerner said, annoying the fuck out of her. “What the hell was that?”

“I don’t know,” Erin said, shaking her head. “It broke all the lights as it came down the path. Sounding like … I don’t even know, like a swarm of demonic bees or a giant devil worm.”

Lerner raised an eyebrow at her. “Demonic bees, huh? Well, I can assure you that’s not a thing.”

Duncan spoke. “Blurr’ashaa.”

Lerner rolled his eyes. “Okay, other than blurr’ashaa, which this probably is not, since they tend to stay in Asia and Africa, there are no demonic bees.” He gave Duncan the stink eye. “Besides, blurr’ashaa don’t break lights as they pass.”

“True,” Duncan said. He looked at Erin, and he seemed concerned. “You all right?”

“Other than shitting my pants in fear and nearly shooting Dicky Lerner here, yeah,” Erin said, holstering her gun, “I’m fine.”

“I
should
change my name to Dicky,” Lerner mused aloud. “It fits. Richard Lerner, Esquire.”

“You’re not a lawyer,” Erin said, eyeing him with a level of irritability that was falling slowly, replaced by a weak sense of gratitude.

“That you know of,” Lerner said with a wide grin. “Admit it, it would explain a lot if I was.”

“Uh oh,” Duncan said, and Erin noticed a glazed look in his eyes.

“Relax, I’m not changing my name to Dicky,” Lerner said. “It was just a joke.”

“No, there’s—” Duncan started to speak, but a scream—faint but bloodcurdling—cut him off from down the path.

In the direction the swarm—the thing—had gone.

“Shit!” Erin said out loud, and she took off without really thinking about it. She drew her pistol as she ran, and saw Lerner and Duncan blast past her at a pace that made them look like superheroes or something as they tore down the path. They disappeared into the darkness without a whisper, without a sound, save for their dress shoes hitting the asphalt ahead. Erin was tempted to tell them to wait up, but it wouldn’t really do to have to shout for the demons to come back and protect her. She was a deputy sheriff of Calhoun County, for fuck’s sake.

And she was running alone on a path infested by demons of a kind she couldn’t even identify.

She sped up.

Her breath came in short gasps, legs pounding against the trail. Trees covered this part of the path, obscuring the glow of the moon where it turned the clouds a silvery-white. The river made its noise off to her side, and she could not hear the buzzing, not now.

The sulfur smell was still there, though. Lingering, like they’d left a trail of it. Like slugs.

Her flashlight beam bounced as she ran, illuminating the asphalt. She slowed as the flashlight started to show figures ahead in the dark, catching the first hint of something other than a blank path in front of her. One of them moved and the light caught the eyes, lighting them up red like an exposure on those pictures Erin had seen from her childhood. It took only another second for her to realize it was Duncan, looking back at her in the night.

He was kneeling, and after another moment Lerner appeared just down the trail from him. He was standing, arms folded, a look of disgust on his features.

“What is it?” Erin asked with a sense of growing dread. She slowed to a walk, as though she knew it was something bad without waiting for the answer. Her mind was telling her to stay back, to get away.

“See for yourself,” Lerner said. He didn’t look happy about this. Not that he ever looked happy, really.

Erin edged closer, taking the slow walk. The beam bounced with her every step. She caught the shine just under Duncan’s leg where he squatted, the dark liquid betraying a red tinge as it reflected her light.

Blood.

It only took a few more steps to see what Duncan was huddled over. Another figure, mangled and missing limbs. This one looked like it had been dragged along the path, skin missing and flayed to expose part of the skeleton. The blood dribbled out here and there as she stood over it.

“Sweet Jesus,” she said, and thumbed her mike. “Dispatch, this is eighteen. Send a coroner van to Rafton Park.” She paused, and felt a little wave of nausea sweep over her. “And you might want to wake the sheriff, because we’ve got another one.”

Arch awoke to the sound of his ringing phone. He hadn’t thought he was going to be able to sleep, what with Hendricks and Alison having gone to the brothel. He figured he’d lay awake in bed and toss for a spell until he’d finally get up and pace for a while. Apparently that hadn’t happened, though, because he was deep in a state of dreamland when he heard the phone’s jagged tones.

He’d nearly swept everything off the nightstand in his bid to silence it before realizing exactly what it was. When he answered, he knew his voice was full of grog. “Hello?”

It took him a minute to interpret everything the voice on the other end of the line was saying—static and the natural fuzziness of his own train of thought keeping him from understanding right away. It even took him a minute to realize it was Erin, not Hendricks or Alison, who was calling him. And another few seconds for everything she was saying to register.

By the time he was fully awake, he was already moving toward the closet where his uniform waited. He had a feeling it was going to be another one of those days.

Of course, every day had been one of those since the demons had come to town, but that was not a thought that reassured him.

Starling stared at Hendricks. Hendricks stared right back at her. He couldn’t tell if it was the mood lighting in the whorehouse or if it was just something about her eyes, but he couldn’t tell what the hell color they were. He stared at her, ghostly white, in the middle of the room, trying to decide what to say, and then Alison went and solved that problem for him.

“What the hell are you?” Alison asked.

Starling cocked her head at Alison, and Hendricks just watched, wondering if she was going to snap at her, attack, continue to stare or maybe just answer truthfully.

“I am a matter of no concern,” Starling said, a little too quickly.

“You’re concerning us more than a little,” Hendricks said. That was truthful. Nobody liked an unsolved mystery.

She turned right around to stare at him with those eyes, and Hendricks felt a little shudder. “This form is necessary to communicate with you. That is all that matters.”

“So you’re not Lucia,” Hendricks said. Like he hadn’t already known that. “Who and what are you?”

“Irrelevant,” Starling said.

“Then what is relevant?” Alison asked, cutting right through the bullshit.

“I am here to help,” Starling said. Hendricks couldn’t shake the feeling that this was the truth, though he didn’t know why. “To help you save this town from the destruction that is coming.”