Daylighters (9 page)

One of those, Claire knew, was Shane’s. His time-share, as he liked to call it. She recognized the shape under the canvas cover.

Rad was sitting behind his battered desk in the office, feet up, sunglasses on. He was a massive guy, tattooed and bare-armed to show them off, and with the glasses blocking out his eyes he looked the exact opposite of all the friendly faces she’d seen coming here. Old Morganville in the flesh. He gave her a nod, put his boots on the floor, and said, “Hey, Claire. Long time no see around here.”

“Not that long.”

“Seems that way.” He shrugged. “Lot’s changed since you left town, and that’s a fact.”

“Not around your lot so much.”

“I see what you did there, with the wordplay,” he said and crossed his arms. “I never liked the damn vampires, and I’m glad to see ’em gone. I never made any secret of that. The new administration seems like it’s got it going on.” He was, she felt, trying to find out where she stood. She didn’t have the inclination to debate it, or the time.

“I just came to pick up Shane’s car,” she said. “He gave me the keys.”

“He still—”

“He also said to tell you he doesn’t owe you anything, so don’t try it.”

She handed over the note, and he read it; his teeth showed briefly, and they were surprisingly straight and clean. “Yeah, okay, can’t blame a guy for trying to make a buck. Got about a half a tank left, so it’s good to go. I’ll take the cover off for you.”

“Shane’ll be by later,” she said. “He, ah, needs to borrow fire retardant from you. Well, not borrow so much as maybe use it all up. But we’ll pay you back.”

“Oh, that sounds just great. Can’t wait to have that conversation. You know, every time I have anything to do with you guys, I end up in a fight somewhere down the line, and I’m really trying to cut down. Anger management and all that crap. Hey, I got a girlfriend now and she doesn’t like it when I get into trouble.”

“Does she like it when you set yourself on fire?”

He considered that. “Fair point. I guess I could give up the foam. What do you want it for?”

“I’d . . . rather not tell you. I promise, we’re not looking for a fight,” Claire said. “But people may be coming for us, and we have to fight back, don’t we?”

“Sure,” Rad agreed. “No crime in that. Some of my best fights were self-defense.” He flexed his muscles a little bit, but it wasn’t as if he was trying to show off, more like he was just remembering the good times. Claire supposed Rad would have a top ten list of his best fights. She’d actually be surprised if Shane didn’t, too, and if some of them didn’t match up with Rad’s list, only on opposite sides. “Okay, I’ll hold my grudges against Shane, not you. You’re too pretty, anyway. Let’s get you the car.”

He led her out to the back, which was a dry, cracked dirt lot with occasional struggling weeds poking up through the hard ground; the weeds looked as dry as the dirt they were breaking through. Most had burrs, so Claire was careful to avoid them as she helped Rad untie the canvas and fold it back in sharp, dust-raising snaps until it was a neat square that he tucked under his arm.

He stepped back to admire the car. “Love this damn beast,” he said. “Your boyfriend has damn good taste in wheels.”

It was a muscle car of some kind, all matte black, with murdered-out wheels and some shiny chrome here and there, just for emphasis. It did look powerful, and intimidating. Claire slid behind the wheel into the shiny leather seat and had to immediately rack it forward four notches so her feet could meet the pedals.

Pedals, not just plural, but triple. Gas, brake, and clutch. She’d had lessons in driving a stick shift, but that had been . . . a while ago. And she’d had her dad coaching her patiently through the process. Plus, that had been a nice, tame small car, not Shane’s Detroit-built monster.

She took a deep breath and went through the steps, just as she remembered them. She fumbled the shift from reverse to first, and winced at the grinding of gears; she saw Rad shake his head sadly from where he stood leaning against the wall. That stiffened her resolve, and she accelerated out fast, hitting second gear before she’d reached the end of the lot. She shifted hard enough to scratch rubber.

It felt good. So did seeing the surprised look on Rad’s face. She gave him a quick, jaunty little wave out the window, which was risky but worth it, and she was in third before she hit the end of the block, roaring through a green light and heading for Macom Hardware.

The parking lot was full, which was a very odd sight; she couldn’t remember ever seeing a business with that many customers in town, and yet there they were, whole families out in the daytime, pushing carts into the store, chatting on their cells, living a . . . normal life. She found a spot and shut off the low, growling engine, but she couldn’t quite bring herself to get out of the car just yet. She felt displaced, and sad. If she, Shane, and Eve succeeded in freeing the vampires, these same smiling, happy people would go back to being exactly what they were before—scared and anxious, afraid to leave their homes for anything but necessity, afraid to let their kids run and play. Afraid for a good reason.

How could she really want to bring that
back
?

But what other choice did she have?

It took her a good minute to get herself together, grab her wallet, and walk into the store. She got a shopping cart from the small remaining selection—of course it was the one with the wobbly left wheel—and headed for the back corner of the store, where she remembered seeing fire extinguishers. It wasn’t easy; Macom’s wasn’t built for heavy customer flow, and it was a little like playing one of those traffic games, where one block had to move for another to pass. Fifteen minutes and several apologies later, Claire finally spotted the red cylinders in the corner, and parked her cart as much out of the way as possible while she loaded them into it. There were six on display, and she took all of them. Next to them was a box of strange-looking oval things, but it had the words
FIRE SUPPRESSION GRENADES
on it, and that was something she thought Shane would love.

It wasn’t much of a line of defense, but it was pretty much all she could see, given the limited selection available, though on an impulse she grabbed boxes of preloaded rock salt rounds for their shotgun. Not that she
wouldn’t
shoot someone trying to burn their house down, but she’d rather not shoot them into the hospital, or the graveyard. These might be people she knew, people she cared about, and she couldn’t be their enemy.

Even if she was, at least for now, their villain.

Twenty minutes more to maneuver to the register and check out, and then another five to load everything in the car. Five more minutes of powering the Beast (that was what she decided to call Shane’s car) down the surprisingly busy streets toward the Glass House.

When she got there, Shane was sitting on the front porch in the sun-faded rocking chair that Eve had put out there, half as a joke because none of them were porch-sitting people—and he had a shotgun.

Two uniformed police officers were standing on the steps. The tall blond woman had her hand on her gun, but she hadn’t drawn it; her male partner, also tall, but skeletally thin, hadn’t bothered with his sidearm. He was leaning on the railing and trying to look casual.

In that, Claire supposed he was trying to match Shane, who had broken open the barrel of the shotgun, taken out the rounds, and was cleaning it. She smelled the gun oil as she parked the Beast in the driveway, and instead of unloading the car, she grabbed the box of rock salt shells and walked up the path. The female officer immediately pivoted to watch her with cool, analytical eyes and a blank expression, but she moved aside to let Claire come up the steps.

“Thanks for letting me borrow the car,” she said, and leaned over to kiss Shane on the cheek as if the cops weren’t there. “I brought you a present.”

“Varmint rounds. Cool. Plenty of varmints around these days.” He opened the box, took some out, and began slotting them into the breech of the shotgun. Then he flipped it shut and racked a round, while staring at the cops. Well. That escalated fast.

“I’m sorry, I guess I didn’t get the memo—are we having problems here?” Claire smiled as winningly as she could at the male policeman. His name was Charlie, she remembered—Charlie Kentworth. “Officer Kentworth, how are you? Is there something wrong?”

“We just wanted to come in for a minute, but Mr. Collins here didn’t seem too keen on the idea,” Charlie said. “I thought we could have a nice civilized chat, but seems like I interrupted his weekly shotgun cleaning.”

“Well, you know, a man’s got to have routines,” Shane said. “Cheer up, Charlie, at least it’s only rock salt. It’ll only damage your dignity. Might not even break the skin.” The smiles they exchanged were pure challenge, and Claire resisted the urge to roll her eyes. It definitely wasn’t the time.

“Sorry, why did you want to come in? Not that we don’t love visitors, Officer Kentworth. Just that I only got back in town yesterday, and I’m still getting settled in.” She switched gears and looked at the woman with him. “I don’t think we’ve met before.” She offered her hand, but the police officer didn’t move to take it.

“Officer Halling,” the woman said.

“That’s your first name?” Shane asked. “Officer?”

“It is as far as you’re concerned.” The woman hadn’t taken her hand off the butt of her gun, and as she shifted position, Claire’s eyes were drawn to the flash of gold on her collar: the Daylight Foundation pin. “We’ve had a report that you keep illegal weapons in your home. We’d like your permission to conduct a search of the premises.”

“I thought that they issued warrants for things like that,” Shane said, and ran the oiled cloth he held over the shotgun as if he didn’t have a care in the world—and as if he didn’t, in fact, have things inside the house that would get him arrested. “I mean, they did when the bloodsuckers ran things around here. I’d think we’d have a little more due process with humans in charge, right?”

“Are you saying you won’t let us inside?” Officer Halling said. Her eyes were a peculiarly cold shade of storm blue, and although there was nothing to show it in her body language Claire had a premonition that she was really, really angry. There was no way to guess why. Maybe she was just an angry person, generally.

“That’s what I’m saying,” Shane said. “Michael Glass owns this house, and since he’s been put in your fancy new
enclave
, I guess I have to do what I think he’d want, which is say no. Claire?”

She nodded. “Come back with a warrant,” she said. “That’s not too much to ask, is it?”

“No,” Halling said. “It’s not. We’ll be back soon.”

“Well, you know where to find us,” Shane said, with a wildly sweet smile, as he put the shotgun casually on his shoulder. “Laters.”

“Sorry about the trouble,” Kentworth said, and Claire got the sense he was embarrassed by his partner’s antagonistic edge. “You two . . . I know it sounds like a cliché, but please don’t leave town.”

“Why would we? We’re Morganville residents. We live here,” Claire said.

Halling made a noise in the back of her throat that wasn’t
quite
a growl, and led the way back to the police cruiser. Shane sat in the rocker, looking for all the world as if he might fall asleep, he was so relaxed—at least until the cruiser turned the far corner.

Then he came up out of the rocker like someone had set it on fire. “You got the extinguishers?” he asked, setting the shotgun aside.

“In the car. What was all that about?”

“I have no idea, but I’m getting the strong idea that we’re just not wanted around here anymore, Claire. And I don’t know why, because we’re just so
charming.
”

“Well, you are,” she said, and kissed him lightly. “Come on, help me get it all inside.”

He carried an armload of the extinguishers, while she snagged the last couple and the box. They dumped the lot in the front parlor, raising a faint cloud of dust from the old cushions of the couch, and Claire waved it away, coughing.

“What—” Shane’s attention was riveted on the box she’d put down, and before she could even begin to answer, he was ripping into it, looking as thrilled as if it were magically Christmas. “Do you know what these are? Do you?”

“Some kind of weird grenades,” she said. “Don’t get too excited. I don’t think they explode or anything.”

“These are
excellent.
You arm them and throw them into the fire. If it isn’t too big, it’ll explode into a powder that puts the fire right out.” He grabbed her and kissed her. “You brought me
grenades.
You are officially the best girlfriend ever.”

“I’m the most worried girlfriend ever,” she said. “Because this is getting a little too crazy. The cops? Really? And you decided to clean the shotgun to, what, intimidate them?”

“C’mon, this is rural Texas. Shotguns are as normal as garden gnomes. Besides, that gun oil really stinks up the house.”

“So do your shoes, but I don’t see you leaving them outside.”

“Did Eve text you that joke? Because it sounded like her.”

“She’s been tutoring me,” Claire said, and stood back from him a little, because being so close to him made it harder to be logical. He had that effect on her. “Do we need to put anything in the pantry room?” The pantry room was a hidden room just off the kitchen, behind shelves of ancient canned goods. It was basically just a dirt room, windowless, that had almost certainly been used for visiting vampires from time to time, or for even less savory things, but it was safe enough for storage.

“Now that you mention it, I have a bag full of stuff that might do well in there,” he agreed. “You know, my sparkly unicorn collection. They’d probably jail me on general principles for that.”

“I’m serious!”

“Me, too. I would never joke about sparkly unicorns.” He held up a hand to stop her from getting irritated. “Okay, yes, I will hide all the stuff that needs hiding. Give me fifteen minutes, and then I’ll head out to grab the stuff from Rad. Though, damn,
grenades.
Not sure we need much more than that. They might even make good offensive weapons.”