I got home in time to call Bolton & Son, the slaughterhouse supplying my local supermarket, before they closed. Much to my surprise, the address was in the southwestern part of the city—I’d definitely thought it would be located somewhere in the countryside, but apparently not.
“Mjello?” I rough voice greeted me, on the second ring.
“Hi, is this Bolton & Son? The slaughterhouse?”
“Affirmative,” the man on the other end said. “What can I do you for, lady?”
“I wanted to talk to someone about the recent changes to the blood you supply. I was making my grandma’s old recipe for blood sausage, and the taste was off. When I talked to my local butcher, he said the change might come from their new supplier—which would be you. To stop vampires, or something like that?” I was pretty impressed with how much I managed to sound like someone who didn’t live off microwave meals and takeout.
There was silence on the other end of the line for a little while. “Well, yes, we have implemented some changes. They were never intended to harm good people like yourself, just looking to make some home-cooked food. Tell you what, why don’t you come by the office? I’d love to have you sit down with some of the people in charge of this change—they might listen to a consumer more than they do us. We have a few of the old school butchers here who ain’t too keen on messing with the food, if you know what I mean. How about noon tomorrow?”
“Er…” I blinked. I hadn’t exactly been planning to make an excursion out of this, but on the other hand… if I did go, I’d get to snoop around more. So long as I could continue faking a keen interest in the proper preparation of blood sausage, it was undoubtedly a one-time chance at getting closer to getting to the core of whatever network had deemed me expendable enough to kidnap this summer.
“How about Friday around noon? I’m off work then,” I suggested cheerfully.
“It’s a date. Just ask for Billy when you arrive,” he said.
“All right, see you then, Billy!” I hung up, feeling mightily proud of my sleuthing skills.
* * *
When Friday rolled around, I drove my beat-up Fiesta to the address given to me by my supermarket butcher. The slaughterhouse was located at the edge of an industrial estate, surrounded by busy roads, and the stench rolling out from its open gates when I pulled up spoke its clear language that I’d gotten to the right place.
I parked up by what looked like the office-part of the building and got out, shielding my nose with one hand. It wasn’t so much the smell of animals—I’d spent some time in the countryside before—but the overwhelming smell of… death. It was the only description I had for the pungent stench that hung over the building.
Before I could start walking to the nearest steel staircase leading up to a door I assumed hosted the office, that same door swung open and a portly man in a vest and with face stubbles squinted out into the dull November light.
“Hi! I’m Olivia Green—here to meet Billy. We spoke on the phone earlier this week,” I said, lowering my hand from my nose to not be rude. The slaughterhouse’s smell immediately overwhelmed my senses once more, and I forced myself not to gag.
The guy cracked a lopsided smile. “Ah, yes, the sausage specialist. Come on up, sugar. We’re all ready for you.”
The way he said it made something at the back of my brain perk up, a small bolt of adrenaline sparking in my blood. I hadn’t been too worried about my amateur spying, because there was no way in hell they’d ever be able to guess my ulterior motives. I’d even made sure to come during daytime hours, to ensure they didn’t mistake me for a vampire. But now, as Billy the butcher waved me up the stairs and into the gaping maw of the slaughterhouse, I suddenly found it hard to make my feet move up the steps.
Why? Why were my fight or flight instincts on high alert, just from one sentence from this guy?
I hesitated, reconsidering if this was such a good idea and if perhaps I should just hightail it out of there, when the middle-aged man let his eyes roam over my winter coat-covered body, his smile turning distinctly lecherous.
Ah. And there was the reason for my reluctance to get any closer.
Sausage specialist, my ass.
I pushed my uncomfortableness aside and ascended the stairs with a forced smile. I wasn’t going to back down from investigating this slaughterhouse and the people behind it just because its entry was guarded by a horny dude with wandering eyes and a creepy vibe.
“Great, can’t wait. So, who am I meeting?” I asked as he stepped just enough aside that I had to brush past him to get in. Yup, he was a full-on creep. No wonder my immediate instincts had been to turn tail and run.
“Just Elliot from, ah, PR,” Billy said as he led me down a short corridor that looked like it could use a renovation. The beige paint was peeling off parts of the walls, and the linoleum floor was worn with brown patches from old spillage that hadn’t been cleaned up in time. And over it all the smell of death still hung like a depressing cloud, even if it was milder than outside.
“You have a PR department?” I asked, not managing to banish the surprise from my voice as he opened a door into what turned out to be a small office in as desperate need of TLC as the hallway. The beige paint on the walls was the same, but the floor had been upgraded to a worn, orangey-brown carpet. A desk overflowing with paperwork took up about a third of the room, and three chairs had been squeezed into the remaining space. In one of them sat a lanky, black-haired man who looked to be about thirty.
“Yeah, ‘course,” Billy said. “After that incident with the lamb, we had to. Nobody was in the mood for mutton for weeks. This is Elliot—our PR guy. Elliot, this is Olivia Green—the girl who called about our blood supply.”
I wasn’t even close to asking about what ‘“amb incident” had made Chicago stop buying lamb chops for two weeks, so instead I put on my best dim homemaker smile and stretched out my hand toward the guy who’d won “slaughterhouse PR dude” in the job lottery. “Pleased to meet ya!”
“I’ll leave you two to it, then,” Billy said, giving me another once-over before he shut the door behind me, leaving me alone in the small office with Elliot.
“Likewise.” Elliot gave me a thin smile and reached for my hand for a brief handshake. His hand fell cool and clammy against mine, with no strength. A bit like I imagined holding a lukewarm dead fish would be like.
I masked my grimace with another smile.
“So, you make blood sausages?” he said as he motioned for me to take the chair next to his.
I obeyed. “Yeah. Grandma’s recipe.”
“And this is the first time you notice any difference?”