Around the fiftieth time I checked my watch, Nick pointed toward the entrance flap, pulled the mask over his face, and crouched behind a stack of bins. He drew his weapon, but I left my Bear-loaned gun in its holster at the small of my back. Our plan hinged on Rosario’s desire to kidnap me. He’d likely cut and run if he saw me armed, and even though Bear would be right there to stop him, we didn’t need the risk of a tussle.
My pulse quickened as my enhanced hearing picked up approaching footsteps.
Rosario pushed the tent flap aside and stepped in, eyes narrowing at the sight of me. I faked a startle and stumbled back a few steps, while I silently urged him to continue forward. I had faith that Bear would hear if things went to shit and come back us up, but none of us wanted it to come to that.
“What the hell are you doing here?” I demanded, trying to sound just the right amount of panicked. A few more feet and Nick would have the drop on him.
Rosario swept a quick look around the tent then, apparently satisfied we were alone, pulled the Taser from his jacket and advanced on me. “Looks like I’m taking you in—”
“Drop the weapon now,” Nick ordered as he stepped from behind the bins. Rosario pivoted, but went still at the sight of the gun in Nick’s hands. Nick wasn’t a big guy, but Rosario obviously had enough experience to see beyond size and note the calm expertise and the rock-steady aim.
Jaw tight, Rosario placed the Taser on the ground. I drew my gun and held it on him as Nick retrieved the Taser and did a quick patdown, then pulled a set of handcuffs from his jacket and secured Rosario’s hands behind him.
“He’s clear,” Nick said tersely then retreated to cover Rosario from a safe distance.
“Don’t bother trying to run,” I said. “You wouldn’t make it two steps. But I’ll be nice as long as you cooperate.”
“I don’t intend to run,” Rosario said, drawing himself up. “All I care about is the safety of everyone at this festival.” He spoke with calm authority. “Angel, you need to unlock the cuffs and come with me for your own good.”
I made a show of cleaning my ear out with a pinky. “Say what?”
“You’re destabilizing. Kristi—” He caught himself. “Dr. Charish has evidence that you’re suffering long-term effects from Saberton experiments.” He lifted his chin toward me. “The grey. The rot. It’s obviously progressing. If you destabilize completely you could kill dozens before you’re stopped.”
Nick darted his gaze my way, but his gun didn’t waver.
“Holy shit,” I breathed. “You actually believe that manipulative psychopath?”
“She’s not a psychopath,” Rosario replied with heat, then visibly controlled himself. “She only wants to help you.”
I let out a bark of laughter. “She only wants to cut me into little pieces!”
“What? No!” He shook his head. “She would never do that.”
“Only because I won’t let her get close enough.” I cocked my head. It sure as hell looked as if the dude was in love with her. I had no doubt whatsoever that Kristi had played him like a cheap fiddle and was still doing so. “After you helped her escape the Dallas lab, she gave you those videos—the ones you then passed on to Grayson Seeger. But what I can’t figure out is why.”
He stiffened. “Dr. Charish and I intend to shine a spotlight on Saberton’s cruelty to zombies. The videos were meant to increase public sympathy for zombies—for you—before it hits the news.”
“Generate sympathy with that awful Zombie Are Among Us!! mockumentary?” I asked, incredulous.
“It wasn’t supposed to be like that!” Rosario insisted. “It was supposed to be an exposé, disguised as entertainment, of cruelty to zombies. An icebreaker to get people thinking about zombies in a different light—before we unmask Saberton. Grayson Seeger and I had a deal. I gave that son of a bitch the footage and paid him to make a short film that showed zombies as victims.” Impotent fury washed over his face. “But the studio decided to go bigger, hit harder, and changed it to that hate-promoting garbage. Seeger didn’t see fit to inform me.”
“And Seeger was a paranoid mess the night of the premiere because he thought you’d take it out of his hide.”
Rosario’s expression darkened. “He was a cokehead who thought everyone was out to get him. Though if I’d seen the film Friday, his paranoia might have been justified for once.” He exhaled. “Enough. Angel, we’re running out of time. Unlock the handcuffs. You need to come with me.”
I lifted my hand in a hold on gesture. The roar of ATVs had been a steady background noise for the last few minutes, but my extra-sharp hearing picked up what sounded like a half-dozen four-wheelers as they peeled away from the parade route and headed through the maze of booths and tents in our direction. I held my breath as the throaty engine noise grew closer and loud enough to rattle the tent wall. The roar abruptly died, only to be replaced by laughter and boisterous conversation. Wonderful. A bunch of rednecks decided to park not fifty feet from the tent entrance. C’mon, Bear. Run these assholes off.
Rosario was listening as well. I twitched my gun up. “Don’t do it,” I warned him, voice low. “If we get discovered, your dirt—industrial espionage, attempted kidnapping of yours truly, and let’s not forget the murder of Judd Siler—sees the light of day right along with mine.”
His jaw worked, but he gave a tight nod. He knew I was right. To my relief, the voices moved off a few seconds later. That’s a good Bear. Looked like we still had a bit of a wait before us. Then again, it gave me time to poke a few holes in Rosario’s dream-girl vision of Kristi Charish.
I tapped my finger against my chin as I regarded Rosario. “If your dearest love Kristi is so pristine and kind, why didn’t she give you the rest of those videos?”
“What are you talking about?” He gave a derisive snort, as if I was grasping at straws. “She selected clips. So what.”
I lowered my gun. He wasn’t going anywhere. “Why not let you help choose what to pass to Seeger? Did you even stop to wonder why she included clips that portrayed us as monsters when your goal was supposedly the opposite?”
“It was to show the cruelty,” he said, but the first hint of doubt shimmered over his face. “It’s what was available. She was in a rush. She—”
“But not so much of a rush that she couldn’t edit the clips.” I lowered my head. “Kristi left out some great stuff, like in the video where I’m mauling the big blond guy. You missed the bit right before it where McKinney shot him twice in the chest then gave me a choice: let him die or try to turn him into a zombie.” In my periphery I saw Nick waver. “Or how about the video where I smashed McKinney’s head and ate his brain. A minute or so before that, he shot me four times.” I held back a smile as tension hummed through Rosario. “You really should watch that one again. Not only can you see the bullet holes in my shirt, but if you look real close you can see Kristi Charish behind that glass right before she runs the hell away.”
“You’re lying,” he gritted out.
“You’re in denial,” I shot back. “She’s brilliant, so why would Saberton have her locked down unless they wanted to keep her psychopathic ass under control?”
Rosario summoned a haughty sneer. “She wouldn’t willingly participate in their vicious agenda.”
“Yet somehow she did all the cruel and nasty shit they wanted. Even came up with new ones of her own. Isn’t that weird?”
“They brainwashed her,” he said, but his voice wasn’t as steady. “That’s why I . . . she needed to get away from that place. To recover—”
“How long did it take for her to recover?” I pressed. “A week? Two?”
“It’s not like that. She’s still recovering! That’s why we haven’t begun to move forward on the plans to expose Saberton.”
“Uh huh, yet she’s okay enough to go through videos of tortured zombies and pick out juicy clips fo
r you.”
His eyes darted around as if seeking the words to convince me. As if. I advanced on him and went in for the kill.
“She told you I was about to go nuclear as a result of Saberton testing and that I had to be kidnapped. For my own good. Funny thing, though. It’s been over a year since I was a subject in a Saberton lab. Yet suddenly now I’m about to go mega-monster?” I graced him with my best expression of withering scorn. “And let’s not forget that she was brainwashed all this time and is still amazingly functional. A lesser mortal would be drooling in a padded corner.”
“No, you don’t understand.”
“Oh, I understand perfectly,” I said with a humorless laugh. “Here, let me lay it all out for you. Kristi Charish is perfectly fine. Better than fine. In fact, she’s at the top of her game, especially when it comes to manipulating people to get what she wants.” I softened my voice. “Dante, she’s playing you for a fool. There’s no way in hell she’d publicly expose Saberton, because that would also trot out all of her own dirty little secrets.”
He licked his lips, eyes pleading with me. “No, you’re wrong. She’s not fine. She’s fragile. That’s why we . . . why she needs me to take care of her.”
“Fragile.” I gave him a long look. I almost—almost felt sorry for the chump. “I guess that word has a different meaning in your neck of the woods. I can’t imagine how a person who’s been made fragile through deliberate brainwashing could mastermind the kind of wheeling and dealing she’s been doing with Saberton and my people for the past few days.”
Rosario stared at me, mouth working as he groped for a reply, a comeback. Anything. My last statement had been the one brushstroke that changed the picture—kind of like adding a Hitler mustache—and now he struggled to understand this new image. I had a suspicion there were little details about Kristi that he’d dismissed or excused since they didn’t fit into his “poor fragile Kristi” picture. With a little dose of reality feedback, he was starting to realize that those same details fit into this new picture like the smile on that Mona Lisa chick.
The tent flap flew open. Finally, I thought with relief. But instead of the bulk of Bear, a petite form burst in.
“Angel!” Justine Chu screeched in delight, a Hurricane drink glass in one hand and a phone in the other. A canary yellow feather boa was draped around her neck along with a dozen pairs of Mardi Gras beads. A tight silver dress barely covered her various naughty bits.
I quickly holstered my gun—without shooting myself in the ass like I had in New York. Nick yanked his gun out of sight while Rosario shifted so that Justine couldn’t see the handcuffs. None of us wanted witnesses to this bullshit.
“Hey, Justine!” I said, doing my darndest to sound really thrilled to see her even though worry churned in my gut. Where the fuck was Bear?
Justine tottered forward in high-heeled purple boots, grinning widely and happily oblivious to anything out of the ordinary. “I’ve been looking all over for you, and here you are!” She flung her arms wide, dousing Nick with rum and fruit juice.
“Why were you looking for me?” I asked. Shit. Did that sound paranoid? Yeah, that totally sounded paranoid.
Fortunately, Justine didn’t notice. “Well. About an hour ago I saw a petite little masked blondie and thought maybe that was you ’cause you’re tiny and have blonde hair, y’know?” She swayed near Rosario and gave him an unfocused once-over. I tensed, ready to surge to her rescue if he tried anything, but she merely gave him a wink and a chuck on the chin and continued my way. “Then the blonde babe turned and went the other way, and I was like, Oh my god, I know that cute little butt! And now I’m here and you’re here, and I have to tell you”—she took a deep breath—“this Mardi Gras shit is awful!”
“Huh?” I’d been trying to split my attention between her and Rosario, which obviously wasn’t working. “Wait. Why?”
She looked at me very seriously, if not soberly. “Because . . . I am really fucking drunk.”
“No. Way.”
Justine let out a peal of laughter. “I know, right?”
“Welcome to Louisiana,” I said with a cheery grin even as I tried to keep tabs on everything else. Nick had one eye on Rosario and the other on his phone as he sent a text. Trying to get hold of Bear, I was certain, and the tension in his stance told me there’d been no reply.
Rosario. My gut dropped. He was watching Justine with a friendly, approachable smile. His stance was calm and comfortable, as if standing with his hands behind his back was natural and certainly not at all because they were handcuffed. He didn’t give off the cold-blooded killer vibe, but I knew he’d done something to Bear. I needed to wring the truth out of him, but first I had to get Justine out of here.
I took her arm to steer her toward the entrance, but she planted her purple-booted feet and swung a fierce look at the two men.
“This woman saved me from Val Kilmer!” she announced. “And because of that she never got a picture with me!”
“Yeah, a picture sounds great,” I said. “Maybe outside—”
“Don’t be silly!” For a drunk chick, she sure moved fast. Before I could react, she flung an arm around my shoulders, yanked me close, and held up her cell phone. “Selfie time!”
The camera clicked. Rosario tossed the handcuffs to the ground and bolted for the door.
“Fuck!” He’d taken advantage of the Justine distraction to either pick the locks or use a hidden handcuff key. “Justine, I need to fetch my phone from my car so I can get my own picture! Be right back!” I tore out of Justine’s grasp and charged after Rosario, hoping to hell it would take her a minute to realize she could simply text me the selfie pic. Or better yet, forget the whole incident in her current inebriated state.
Outside, Rosario pelted along the side of the tent to the parked ATVs and began a frantic search for any with keys left in them. I tried to pour on the speed, but I was operating at pathetic and normal Angel-levels.
Rosario let out a cry of triumph and climbed onto an ATV decorated with reaching zombie arms made of chicken wire, duct tape, and painted papier-macˆhé.
“You know I won’t stop ’til I catch you!” I shouted as he started the engine.
“If you chase after me, you won’t find Bear in time,” he called over his shoulder then roared off, metallic purple streamers flapping behind him.
I stumbled to a gasping stop then turned as Nick ran up, mask off and his face contorted in worry.
“What did he mean?” Nick demanded. “In time for what? Where’s my dad?”
I reached toward him out of instinctive desire to give comfort, then stopped when he recoiled with instinctive need to stay away from the monster.
Swallowing my dismay, I pulled my hand back. “Bear’s not dead,” I told him. “Rosario’s not that cold-blooded.” But he was desperate—deep in a pit of lies and trying to climb out before the walls collapsed on him. Desperate enough to put Bear in a life-threatening situation. “Your dad is around here somewhere. Start looking.”
“What are you going to do?”
I bared my teeth. “I’m going to chase Rosario down and find out where your dad is even if I have to rip it out of him.”
For the first time since discovering the truth about me, Nick met my eyes without recoiling. “Do what you have to.”
I wanted so badly to take a precious second and hug him, but I didn’t. Instead I took off running. Not after Rosario, but around to the back of the tent and my car. Breathing hard, I threw myself into the driver’s seat and downed three packets of brains. But brain-boosted abilities alone wouldn’t be enough for this pursuit. I needed the mega-boost of a combat mod.
Warnings clamored through my head as I grabbed the syringe and vial of V12. Dosing myself on top of the grey-rot was downright stupid. But if I held back and Bear died, I’d never be able to live with myself. Not to mention, Rosario woul
d have time to act on his misguided whistle-blowing plans before the Tribe could stop him. I’d done a whole lot of stupid in my life. For once, maybe stupid was the right thing to do.
I drew a dose into the syringe, then drew up more. And more. A full syringe—three doses. I injected myself and drew another cc then hesitated. I’d taken four doses last night and gained zombie overdrive abilities.
But Rosario had a huge head start. Right now I needed to be a motherfucking superhero.
My hands shook as I drew yet another cc into the syringe. Five doses total. I’d worry about the consequences later.
I’m it. I’m the one who can do what needs to be done.
I shoved the needle in and slammed the plunger home, and was out of the car and moving as the first drops hit my system.
Chapter 33
MegaSuperZombiePowers. Holy fucking shit. Fatigue vanished, and every sense flared into ultrafocus. I knew Bear’s scent, but there were too many other people-scents around and not enough time to seek his out. Right now it was Rosario’s scent that I followed as it floated in twisted, teasing ribbons along the festival paths. The monster within urged me to run the prey down on foot, but I ignored it. Unlike the times when brain-hunger clawed and howled, I was still in full control of my mental faculties, and I had a better idea.
Parked behind a churro booth was an ATV parade float. Colored lights flashed within a basketball-sized plastic brain secured in front of the handlebars, while a man with salt-and-pepper hair strapped a bloody mannequin to the rack behind the seat with bright pink duct tape.
“I need to borrow your four wheeler,” I shouted as I ran up. “It’s an emergency!”