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“Been a long time since I had to go out on calls, but I remember the place a little.” He scratched his mustache, something I was coming to recognize as a tick to soothe his nerves.
“Can you, Cedes and Nolan go around back? I’m assuming there’s a back?”
“There is.”
“Keep an eye on the exit. I don’t expect these guys to make a break for it. They seem more like a stand-your-ground lot to me. But who knows?”
“And if they try to run?”
I raised an eyebrow at him. He knew what I was going to say, because I’d already said it once before, and my opinion on the matter hadn’t changed. Instead of telling a cop I wanted him to kill people, I said, “If it comes to it, I want you to look around. Keep a picture of the city in your mind, and remember they are the ones who did this.”
He gave a solemn nod, though I didn’t necessarily believe he would pull the trigger if it came down to it. It didn’t matter too much. The likelihood one of the necros would try to scuttle out the back seemed minimal.
Especially given this new biker-gang revelation.
Honest to God. A necromancer biker gang?
Could this night get any worse?
I shook my head, trying to chase the thought away. It could get worse, and was likely to before it got better. I didn’t need to tempt the fates with more negative thinking, though it was hard to avoid right now.
One mountain to climb at
a time.
“Reggie, Tyler and Desmond, stay out here with Sutherland and Genie. Holden and Clementine are coming with me.” I might have spared Des’s feelings if I took a moment to explain my choices, but I was hoping he understood why I would choose Holden instead of him. The vampires could withstand more injuries, and I was going to try to keep Des from taking another bullet for me if I could.
I opted to bring Clementine because something in her attitude resonated with me. Not to mention the power of her voice, which would come in handy keeping things calm inside. It didn’t hurt having an attractive young blonde with me, either. I hoped she might distract the men inside from lashing out with violence too quickly.
Clementine was a strange mix of deadly seriousness and flippant disregard for her surroundings. I’d seen her in action as the gatekeeper of Havana, and she was a force to be reckoned with. But out in the street she had a joyful, carefree demeanor. I didn’t know what to make of her, but for some reason I trusted her at my side.
Maybe I had a soft spot for blonde vampires.
She wasn’t a substitute for Brigit, though. No one could fill the gap Bri had left behind. Now there were more holes in my heart next to hers. Places devoid of feeling that might never work properly again. I was scared to think what might happen if I lost anyone else tonight.
If Holden or Desmond were to fall, my heart would cease to function. I might as well join the ranks of the walking dead.
It was up to me to ensure that didn’t happen.
We strode towards the entrance, Clementine with an extra bounce in her step and Holden with the steely resolve of someone who knew everything was hanging in the balance.
“Be careful in there,” I warned as we reached the door.
“I’m always careful,” Clementine replied, winking.
She and I had very different ideas of what it meant to be careful.
As we stepped through the entrance I was surprised we were able to walk right in without bypassing any guards or doormen. We walked into the middle of the bar, where a raucous heavy-metal song was playing on a boom box and dozens of men in leather were shouting their conversations to one another. A bare second after we entered, everyone went dead silent, and someone killed the music on the stereo.
Now the inside of the bar sounded more like the street we’d just left.
Mixed in with the men were a few women. Most wore short denim skirts and too much makeup, but towards the back of the room was an older woman, maybe forty, with deep auburn hair and relatively conservative clothing. She was dressed more like the men than the other women. She was the one I focused my attention on. Something about her suggested she was in a position of authority, and I trusted my gut.
“Nice get-together you’re having here,” I observed. “I don’t suppose you guys noticed hell on earth has sprung up outside.”
A few of the men guffawed, and some clinked glasses. The older woman stared me down.
“I don’t think you were invited to this party,” she said, her voice raspy, but not in a bad way. She had the husky tenor of a lounge singer or a mysterious leading lady from the forties.
