Crave

Chapter Twenty-three

 

  Matthias drove the last leg of the trip himself. He'd been flown into this town from his little detour over in Boston because although he could pilot a number of different aircrafts, he'd been stripped of his wings since his injuries.

  But at least he was still able to drive, goddamn it.

  The flight from Beantown to Caldwell had been short and sweet, and the Caldwell International Airport was a breeze--although when you had his level of clearance, the TSA types never got anywhere near you or your bags.

  Not that he'd brought any luggage with him--other than that which he carried around in his brain.

  His car was yet another black-on-black unmarked with armor plating and glass thick enough to give any bullet a concussion. It was just like the one he'd had when he'd paid Grier Childe a visit . . . and just like the one he'd have in any city he went to, at home or abroad.

  He'd told nobody but his number two where he was going--and even his most trusted didn't know the why behind it. There were no problems with the secrecy, however: The good thing with being the darkest shadow among a legion of them was that when you up and disappeared, it was part of your fucking job and no one asked any questions.

  And the truth was, this trip was beneath him, the kind of thing he'd ordinarily have assigned to his right-hand man--and yet he had to do this himself.

  It felt like a pilgrimage.

  Although if that was what he was on, things had better get inspiring pretty frickin' quick. The road he was currently following was just a generic stretch of boutique shops and Walgreens and gas stations that could have been any city, anywhere. Traffic was light and of the pass-through variety; everything was shut up for the night, so you were here only if you were going somewhere else.

  For most of the people, that was. Unlike the rest of them, his destination was . . . right here as a matter of fact.

  Easing off on the accelerator, he pulled over to the side and parked parallel to the curb. Across a shallow lawn, the McCready Funeral Home was dark inside, but there were exterior lights on all over the place.

  Not a problem.

  Matthias placed a call and was routed around from person to person, skipping like a stone through the phones of others until he found the decision maker who could get him what he wanted.

  And then he sat and waited.

  He hated the silence and the darkness in the car--but not because he was worried that there was someone in his backseat or that somebody was about to go click-click, bang-bang from the shadows outside. He liked to keep moving. As long as he was in motion, he could outrun the twitchies that inevitably T-boned his adrenal glands when he was at rest.

  Stillness was a killer.

  And it turned the Crown Victoria into a coffin--

  His phone rang and he knew who it was before he checked. And no, it wasn't going to be the people he'd just spoken with. He'd finished his business with them.

  Matthias answered on the third ring, just before voice mail kicked in. "Alistair Childe. What a surprise. "

  The shocked silence was so satisfying. "How did you know it was me?"

  "You don't honestly think I would let just anyone get through to this phone. " As Matthias stared through the windshield at the funeral home, he found it ironic that the pair of them were talking in front of the thing--given that he'd put the man's son in one. "Everything's on my terms. Everything. "

  "So you know why I've spent all day trying to find you. "

  Yes, he did. And he'd deliberately made himself hard to reach for the guy: He firmly believed that people were like pieces of meat; the longer they stewed, the softer they became.

  The tastier, too.

  "Oh, Albie, of course I'm aware of your situation. " A soft rain started to fall, the drops dappling the glass. "You're worried about the man who stayed with your daughter last evening. " Another shot of quiet. "You didn't know that he'd been there at your house all night? Well, children don't always tell their parents everything, do they. "

  "She's not involved. I promise you, she knows nothing--"

  "She didn't tell you she had a guest during the dark hours. How can you really trust her?"

  "You can't have her. " The man's voice cracked. "You took my son. . . . You cannot have her. "

  "I can have anyone. And I can take anyone. You know that now, don't you. "

  Abruptly, Matthias became aware of a strange sensation in his left arm. Glancing down, he saw his fist had cranked on the steering wheel so hard his biceps were doing the shimmy.

  He willed the grip to release . . . but it didn't.

  Bored with his body's little spasms and tics, he ignored this newest one. "Here's what you have to do if you want to be certain about your daughter. Give me Isaac Rothe and I go away. It's just that simple. Get me what I want, and I leave your girl alone. "

  At that moment, the entire block went dark--courtesy of his little phone call.

  "You know I mean every word," Matthias said, going for his cane. "Don't make me kill another Childe. "

  He hung up and put the phone back in his coat.

  Swinging his door wide, he groaned as he got out, and chose to stick to the concrete sidewalk as opposed to the lawn, even though it was a less direct route to the back. His body ambulating over grass? Not a good thing.

  After picking the dead bolt on the rear door--which proved that even though he was the boss, he hadn't lost his nuts-and-bolts training--he sipped inside the funeral home and set about finding the body of the soldier who had saved him.

  Confirming the identity of Jim Heron's "corpse" felt as necessary as drawing his next breath.

  Back in Boston, in that defense attorney's rear garden, Jim braced himself for the fight that was coming, literally, on the wind.

  "It's just like killing a human," Eddie shouted over the gale. "Go for the center of the chest--watch out for the blood, though. "

  "The bitches are sloppy as shit. " Adrian's grin had an edge of madness to it, his eyes sparkling with unholy light. "It's why we wear leather. "

  As the brick house's kitchen door slammed shut, and the lights went out, Jim prayed that Isaac kept himself and that woman in there.

  Because the enemy had arrived.

  From the midst of the shoving gusts, black shadows rippled over the ground and boiled up, forming shapes that became solid. No faces, no hands, no feet--no clothes, duh. But they did have arms and legs and a head, which he guessed ran the program God, the stink. They smelled like rotten garbage, a combination of sulfurous egg and sweaty, spoiled meat, and they growled as wolves did when hunting in a coordinated pack.

  This was evil up and moving, darkness in tangible form, a four-set of nasty, festering infection that made him want to take a bath in bleach.

  Just as he settled into his fighting stance, the back of his neck went off, that ringing alarm he'd felt the night before tweaking its way into the base of his brain. His eyes shot up to the house in a fuck-no . . . except he was certain that wasn't the source.

  Whatever--he needed his game head on big-time.

  As one of the shadows rolled up into his space, Jim didn't wait for the first strike--not his style. He swung wide with his crystal knife and kept going as he ducked under a blow that snapped out farther than he'd expected.

  Got some elastic in 'em evidently.

  Jim did make contact, though, nicking something that caused a spray of liquid to shoot in his direction. In midair, the splash morphed into buckshot pellets that then dissolved when they hit him. The sting was instant and intense.

  "Fuck!" He shook off his hand, momentarily distracted by the smoke rising from his exposed skin.

  The blow landed on the side of his face and made his head ring like a bell--proving that he might be an angel and all that shit, but his nervous system was still decidedly human. He immediately went on the offensive, outing a second knife and double-blading the bast
ard, forcing the thing into the bushes while he ducked those punches.

  As they engaged, the back of his neck continued to holler, but he couldn't afford to be distracted.

  Fight what was in front of you first. Then deal with what came next.

  Jim was the first one to get a kill in. He lunged when his opponent arched forward, his crystal dagger going in at the gut level. As a rainbow explosion of light flared, he twisted away, covering his face with his arm to block the deadly spray, his leather-covered shoulder taking the brunt of the impact. The splattering of shit steamed and stunk like battery acid--burned like it, too, as the blood of the demon ate through the cowhide and headed for his skin.

  He immediately fell back into fighting stance, but the other three oilers were covered: Adrian was handling a pair and Eddie was all over his guy . . . demon . . . whatever the fuck it was.

  With a curse, Jim reached up and rubbed his nape. The sensation had graduated from tingle to roar, and he bowed under the agony now that his adrenaline ebbed a little. God, it just got worse . . . to the point where he couldn't handle it and sank down on his knees.

  Putting his palm on the ground and bracing himself, it dawned on him what was doing. In a case of perfectly bad timing, Matthias had acted on the spell he'd put on his corpse back in Caldwell--

  "Go!" Eddie hissed as he slashed and retracted. "We've got this! You get to Matthias. "

  At that moment, Adrian offed one of his pair, his crystal dagger going deep into the thing's chest before he jumped up onto the stoop to avoid the spray. The sprinkle of buckshot hit the other demon he was fighting--

  Oh, shit. The black oily bastard absorbed the spray--and doubled in size.

  Jim glanced back Eddie, but the angel barked, "Go! I'm telling--" Eddie dodged a strike and threw one of his own with his free fist. "You can't fight like this!"

  Jim didn't want to leave them, but he was quickly becoming worse than useless--his buddies were going to have to defend him if this ringy-ding-ding got any more acute.

  "Go!" Eddie shouted.

  Jim cursed, but stood up, unfurled his wings, and took off in a shimmer . . .

  Caldwell, New York, was more than two hundred miles west--assuming you were a human on foot, bike, horse-back, or in a car. Angel Airlines covered the distance in the blink of an eye.

  As he touched down on the front lawn of McCready's joint, he saw the unmarked parked at the curb . . . and the fact that an entire block was without electricity . . . and knew he was right.

  Matthias had come calling.

  Just the man's style.

  Jim headed across the grass, and felt like he was going back in time . . . to that night in the desert that had changed everything for him and Matthias.

  Yeah, his summoning spell had worked.

  The question was what to do with his prey.