He kneels for a closer look. “She’s an old woman. How could she possibly—”
“What you’re looking at are mortal remains. You were right in suspecting a vampire was behind the attacks. She was with a couple when I found her. I let them go.”
“I know.” Max holsters his gun. “I saw them run by.”
“Did they make it?”
“From what I could see.”
“Good.”
Max switches his gaze from the corpse to me. For the first time, he sees the blood soaking my shirt, on my thighs.
“You’re hurt?”
“No.” Not much anyway.
I don’t think I’ll tell him I let myself get shot with my own gun. “It looks worse than it is.”
He nods. Luckily, he knows how it is with vampires.
“What should we do with that?” He points to the thing on the ground.
“Bury it.”
Max swings his flashlight in an arc. “I didn’t bring a shovel. What can we use?”
I spy a flat piece of rock and a long, sturdy branch kiln-dried by the sun. I retrieve them. “It will take work, but we can use these.”
I hand him the branch to begin scraping away sand and follow after, scooping out a hole with the rock. My side screams in protest, but within fifteen minutes we have a hole big enough and deep enough to cover the corpse. I grab her by the arm and throw her in.
“She’s really dead, right?” Max asks.
“You mean is she going to rise up in three days and come after us?” I prod at the body with my foot. “No. She’s gone.”
We set to work, shoveling the sand back in, tamping it down with our feet, setting a layer of rock and debris over the grave. To protect it from scavengers.
A flashback. Another vampire corpse. Another grave dug in the desert. Another pair of hands working beside mine.
Lance. Friend. Lover. Traitor.
Dead now. By my hand.
A shudder racks my body.
Max’s shoulder is so close to mine, he feels my body jerk. He pauses. “Are you sure you’re all right?”
The vampire answers from the darkest place in my soul. “It’s nothing. I just walked on someone’s grave.”
EPILOGUE
Max recognizes one of the guards at the border crossing. They exchange a few words in Spanish and he waves us through. It’s good because I’m not sure I want to try to explain the rust-colored stains covering my clothes.
Max drives me back to my car. He watches me climb gingerly out. “Can you drive?”
I massage my side. The scrape caused by the stake is healed. The path the bullet tore through my side is healed. Now it’s just the skin pulling tight as it regenerates over the wounds that makes me wince when I move.
“Yeah. I’m a little stiff but by the time I get home, I’ll be fine.”
Max watches as I get into my car and crank the engine before he motions for me to roll down the window.
“Thanks, Anna. You did good tonight. I owe you one.”
Okay, here’s my chance to tell him what I planned to tell him. To go fuck himself. To never call me again. To go to one of his vampire whores the next time he needs help.
What am I waiting for?
Max is leaning toward the window, smiling. He looks more like the Max I remembered. Superman, defending truth, justice, and the American way …
Shit.
I smile back.
And drive away.
MONSTER MASH
A DELILAH STREET, PARANORMAL INVESTIGATOR, CASE
Carole Nelson Douglas
Sansouci, the main muscle for the Las Vegas werewolf mob, caught up with me at the neutral territory of the Inferno Hotel bar.
“Muscle” was no cliché when it came to Sansouci. I stand almost six feet in heels, and talking to him made me tilt up my chin, but then, I’m not afraid to lead with it.
“Delilah Street,” he greeted me, or maybe purr-growled.
Everybody assumed Sansouci was a werewolf. Yeah, with the silver forelock in his jet-black hair, the forest green eyes, and a long, lean build, you could picture him chasing the full moon in a thick fur coat, a creature of ferocity and grace.