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What was happening at the front gate? Were her friends there? Had they breached it?
Ellinghaus groaned.
I was next to him just that quick. He looked bad, his
reddened eyes dazed and face showing pain. His fangs were out, but it was a good sign. The wooden slug had to have missed his heart. The others were still in him, preventing him from vanishing so he could heal, but he wasn’t lost yet. I got him to drink more blood. It’s the universal first aid for vamps.
“Radio?” he mumbled.
I clicked it on and tried to raise someone, anyone, but nothing. Next, I got his phone and punched the Company version of 911, but again, nothing. The battery was charged, what the—
“Jamming,” he said. “They’re organized.”
“Who?”
“Newbies, old Dracs with short memories, who knows. That dame is no rookie … oh, this hurts.”
It had to be perdition made solid to drag that out of him.
“Gotta hold on, Ell. I have a blocking up. I’m going to stop her.”
He squinted at me, alarm in his eyes when he noticed the Thompson dragging on my shoulder. “Mars, you gotta be kidding.”
Now was not the moment to notice his lapse into using my nickname for the first time. “Okay, I’m kidding, you get better right now and take over.”
He winced and looked past me, even more alarmed.
Kellie Ann strode from the building toward us, a pistol in each hand and blood spray on her oversized top. I dragged Ellinghaus from his seat, hoping the vehicle’s motor would shield him from fire. He couldn’t move much yet. I peered over the dash in time to see her smash right into my half-assed wall about ten feet out.
That pissed her off. When she recovered, she tried a single shot that put a star in the windshield. I ducked and crawled toward the back. Just had to cower for a bit until she circled around and into my trap, then shoot first.
Only she didn’t do that.
A running jump, a second of invisibility making her weightless, then she thudded down on the top of the bus. I’d been in too big a hurry to think of capping my wall with a roof.
I fell back and sent two wild shots straight up. Good thing I was already on the floor; the gun’s kick wasn’t as bad as I’d thought but would have still knocked me there. So that’s why you had to hold this monster on all three contact points and brace.
I sorted myself out and fired three more rounds through the aluminum skin, taking out the overhead light. Glass dropped, and the empty brass flew.
“Marsha!” Her voice … not above, she’d slipped away to the right side, perhaps feeling out the barrier for an opening as I’d hoped. “Marsha, listen to me. You have to listen to me.”
I’d seen the training vids. That was the favorite phrase of vamps the world over, the one that led into the hypnotic process. If they’d put you under once, you were more vulnerable to their voice. I fired through the wall, the crack and kick of the gun distracting me and cutting her off. Couldn’t keep this up all night, I’d run out of bullets. Why didn’t the bitch come around to the back?
Oh, hell, there she is.
I fired. The bullet passed harmlessly through her mostly transparent form. She smiled, a beautiful, winning, friendly smile, her eyes sparkling.
I made myself look away and shot again. Another wasted bullet.
She kept coming forward. Damn it, what a stupid, stupid trap. She’d hold herself in that state, get close, go solid, and put me under and—
Custom sound system cranked to max, the Peter Gunn Theme boomed through the air like a physical thing.
It hurt my ears, but Kellie Ann, with a vampire’s sensitive hearing, went straight into agony mode. She recoiled and vanished altogether.
Ellinghaus was still on the floor, sitting up just enough to reach the buttons on the dash. He had his iPod buds in his ears; they would mitigate the sound somewhat. He gave me a thumbs-up, settled his shades back into place, and swigged more blood.
The racket wouldn’t stop her forever, but it would keep her voice out of my head for the moment. I needed a Plan B.
