The Nightlife: San Antonio

  He sped east down I-410, eighty-ninety-a-hundred miles an hour. Amazing how fast you can get somewhere at one in the morning when there’s no traffic on the highways. He found Rittiman, no problem. There it was, next to an HEB office, a white warehouse with several street bikes parked out front. Whad’ya know. He wasn’t lying. No black van anywhere in sight.

  “Son of a bitch!” Adrian slapped the steering wheel as his truck slowly rolled to a stop in the parking lot. No movement. No one out front. No one to be seen. He noticed the truck loading doors at the far end of the building. If they drove the van inside, that’s where she’d be.

  He grabbed the tire iron, slid it into his belt, shoved his knife and sheath into his back pocket. Just about any weapon was welcome right now, even a cast iron skillet. Anything to conserve on his limited ammo. He took off at a slow jog for the loading doors.

  As he approached, the office light turned on, spilling a yellow beam out onto the ground. Bingo. His heartbeat kicked up a couple notches. This was one of those moments he lived for, the intensity of a live combat situation. All the military training fell into place, like riding a bicycle.

  He checked the safeties were off on both his pistols. A gun in each hand, he crept up to the window. Crenshaw and two others were there, all standing around the office.

  Adrian recalled there were four of men at the Alamo, and who knew how many more might be inside. As he contemplated how to gain entry and still maintain the element of surprise, a car squealed down the access road, and swerved into the parking lot, tires squealing with the sharp turn.

  “Fuck!”

  Adrian raced to the end of the building and ducked around the corner. Hopefully no one had seen him. He peeked around the building as they pulled to a stop right in front of the double doors. Four Hispanics bailed out of the car and headed straight for the smaller door to the office. They had to be La Eme. Fuck.

  At least four inside, and another four in the car – eight on one. Not good. Not good at all. His chances of walking away from this alive dropped to about nil.

  Bang, Bang, Bang. They knocked on the door and stood waiting, silently.

  The door opened and Crenshaw greeted them. “Good to see you boys. Got your package ready.”

  “Que bueno. I hope you got her under wraps. That bitch is loca.”

  Crenshaw grunted. “We got what you want. You bring the money?”

  “Right here.” The man standing in front slapped the side of a nylon bag that was slung over his shoulder. “But we need to see her first.”

  He must be the boss.

  Crenshaw nodded. They all filed into the warehouse and the door shut behind them. Adrian dreaded what this might mean, what he’d have to do, but he pulled out his phone and dialed the number from the business card he had kept, just in case he needed it.

  The call rang five times before a sleepy sounding Detective Coronado answered. “Hello?”

  “This Coronado?’

  “Yeah…”

  “This is Adrian Faulkner. You need to get out of bed and move, now. The woman you’re looking for, La Reina, she’s at a white warehouse on Rittiman, the one directly to the right of the HEB offices. Look for the Harley bikes out front, you can’t miss it.”

  “Wait a minute. You’re telling me she’s there right now, right this minute?”

  “Yes, and if you don’t get there soon, she’ll be dead. The Aryan Brotherhood and Mexican Mafia are trading money for her life right this minute. Bring the fucking cavalry.”

  “Oh shit. Adrian, are you there? If you are, get the hell out! Now! Let us deal with this. Do you hear me?”

  Adrian disconnected the call and turned his cell to silent. Couldn’t have that thing going off in the middle of all this. Coronado had better bring the whole San Antonio police force down on this place.

  In his heart he knew it was too little too late. The mafia could shove Samantha in their car any minute now, and there’d be nothing to stop them.

  “Fuck it. Nobody lives forever.”

  He slipped past the window, peeking in to see who was in the office. No one. They had gone deeper into the building for their transaction.

  He slipped up on the door, pistol in hand, and tried the knob. Locked. Dammit!

  He shoved his pistol in his jacket and slipped his credit card from his wallet. Once in a while, if people forgot to use the deadbolt, a plastic card could slide in between the door and jam, and pop the lock. Credit card was maxed to the limit anyways, might as well get something useful from it. He jigged and shoved, cursing under his breath until that little click sounded. He tugged and the door opened.

  Somebody, somewhere must be looking out for him. “Thank you, God.”

  A pistol in each hand, he slunk through the door low in a crouch and moved down the hallway past the empty office. He crept into the warehouse, straining for the slightest noise to indicate where it was all going down.

  * * * *

  Samantha had waited an agonizing half hour while the bastards stood around the van, making plans to spend all the money they would get for her. The idiots had left her tied in the back of the van, with nothing more than rope. Five seconds after they had stepped out of the vehicle, her razor claws sliced right through her bindings. She had crept around the windows, impatient, peeking out into the dark warehouse. They eventually walked away and left only one man standing in the bay ‘guarding’ the van.

  She looked down at the sandals on her feet, a gift from her fool bloodslave who didn’t understand that a single night without her would be his equivalent of a living hell.

  Adrian, I can’t believe you did this to us both. She wanted to cry, but that wouldn’t solve anything. The only way out was to cut straight through the problem, guts and all.

  She hardened her resolve to do what was necessary and abandoned the sandals. They would be useless for the job ahead. She needed to be able to move, fast.

  The assholes locked the door, as if that would keep her inside. The lone remaining man stood on the driver side of the van, so she opened the passenger side door and counted three seconds.

  “Hey, what the hell are you…” He came around the backside of the van, his gun pointed up in the air, but she wasn’t up. Down on all fours, she dove at him, coming in underneath his gun hand as she hit him hard enough to lift him off his feet.

  His frail wrist in her left hand tried to muscle the gun in her direction as she slammed him on the concrete floor. Cutting into his forearm with her strong grip, she twisted hard and was rewarded with the crunch of broken bone. He would have screamed if not for the fact she had sunk her razor claws into his trachea and squeezed a tight fist, feeling the flesh give way inside her hand.

  She had always enjoyed tearing out throats, made for a nice, quiet kill, and a juicy meal. She gorged herself, drinking her fill. Finally, a real meal. Those little nips off Adrian were never quite enough to satisfy.

  One of the first lessons her master had taught her was that it takes several donors a night to feed properly, or only one donor who wouldn’t survive the ordeal. Her master never really cared which way it went, as long as he filled his belly. His bloodslave collection always needed to be restocked.

  Slurping up the last of her meal, she heard footsteps coming her way. Just in time for the party.

  “Holy hell! What’d you do to Reinhart? Hey guys get over here, now! Reinhart’s down!”

  She stood up from her meal and eyed the man who couldn’t even hold his gun steady. In a flash she zig-zagged left, then right, and was on him. She snatched the gun from his hand like taking candy from a baby. “Fools.”

  She latched onto his neck and chomped through bone, flesh and gristle. She spit out the chunk of flesh and watched him make gurgling noises as he fell to the floor. She hated to waste all that good blood, but his cries had already brought several men running. No more time for food.

  Flash-bang, she flitted off into the warehouse, flying over boxes, diving between pallet stacks, past the H
yster, and ever deeper into the thirty foot high shelves loaded with pallets of boxes. Those fat, greasy bastards had no chance of catching up to her. One of them sent a shot flying, but they couldn’t even see her.

  She could see them perfectly. La Reina was on the hunt.

  * * * *

  Adrian heard shouts, men running. Something was happening, and he hoped to hell she had sunk her teeth into at least one of those assholes. He kept moving forward, tracking the sounds. He slipped up to the edge of a stack of boxes, watching the men milling about. Their hair-trigger anxiety floated thick across the room. Something had gone very wrong here.

  Adrian counted only two white guys, and four Hispanics. Thank god for that woman and her teeth, she’d downed a couple of them already.

  Crenshaw stood up from one of the bodies on the floor. “Who is this crazy bitch? She tore out their throats!”

  The Black Hands exchanged nods and pulled out their pistols, checking the loads. One man spoke, probably the boss. “Que malo! We heard the stories, but, we thought it was just rumors. You know how they tell stories down there in Chihuahua. They say she kills men with her hands and teeth. I seen mafiosos that like to cut off hands and feet, but I never seen this shit.” Looking down on the bodies, he crossed himself and said a prayer in Spanish.

  “I want my money, now.” Crenshaw had a pistol in hand, and he looked like he was ready to use it on anyone. Adrian had never seen him when he wasn’t smiling, jovial, talking shit. The man was scared, and like most men, that translated to aggression.

  The lead soldier pointed towards the darkness of the warehouse. “Go get the bitch, and I got your money.”

  “Fuck you. I brought her here for you, and now I’m burying two of my friends. She’s your problem.”

  They looked back and forth, attitudes flaring and more cursing in Spanish. “You want the money? You gotta help bring her down. Dead or alive, no importa. Just get the bitch.”

  Adrian didn’t care for the sound of this negotiation. He took his chances to slink in closer, trying to get positioned to take out at least three of them initially. As he sighted in on Crenshaw, the whole gang moved as one, guns in hand, heading deeper into the warehouse. Adrian recognized the lone man who ran back to the office, baseball cap with a goatee. The man passed within five feet of Adrian’s crouched hidey spot, never even noticed him. A series of switches kicked on and the overhead lights came up, bathing the warehouse in an eerie, pale light. It wasn’t the brightest lighting system, but it certainly changed the game.

  The man jogged back, his eyes focused on the central corridor where the others went. He didn’t see the tire iron until it connected with his face. He went down, hard, with no more than a grunt. Adrian buried his knife in the man’s throat until the blade scraped concrete. This white-trash bastard was not getting back up, ever.

  Adrian grinned. “Feels good to be back in action.”

  He wiped the blood off on the man’s shirt and sheathed his blade. That one was a freebie. The rest of them wouldn’t be so easy.

  But, he could retake the advantage. He jogged over and turned off all the light switches. Lights only worked in their favor. Men called out as soon as the lights dropped, and Adrian couldn’t help but smile to hear their distress. They had good reason to fear the dark.

  He snagged the baseball cap from the dead white-trash and headed in the direction they had gone, deeper into the darkness of his soul and the warehouse.

  * * * *

  Chapter 20

  She smelled fear in their sweat and the scent lured her closer. They circled around the shelves and back again, trying to keep each other in sight as much as possible. One man seemed unperturbed. He walked ahead alone, bold, stupid.

  She bided her time until he came around the corner of a stack of boxes, momentarily out of sight from the others. She pounced and drove his face to the floor. He got off one shot but it didn’t hit anything. She didn’t have the luxury of playing with this one, so she snapped his neck quickly and retreated.

  “Hey! She’s over here!” One of them came around the corner just as she leapt away. He sent several shots in her direction, hitting only boxes. More of them milled around the site of her kill, but she kept moving. They were slow and weak. She’d been spoiled by Adrian, his sleek, powerful body and his animalistic urges. Compared to her chosen, these men looked like food – nothing more.

  They stuck close together as they advanced, slow, cautious. The tang of their sweaty fear reeked worse than ever. She wouldn’t be able to pick them off so easily anymore.

  Then another joined them, trailing up from behind. She did a double-take and her heart thumped loud in her chest. Him, her man. She’d know him anywhere. She’d been so focused on hunting, she had ignored the sense that he was coming for her. Now, she felt him in her bones, felt every step he made as he walked casually into their midst. He moved differently than these men, a quiet confidence. The baseball cap obscured his face, but she knew it was him.

  Crenshaw called out to her chosen, Adrian, “What the fuck is up with the lights?”

  Adrian kept walking right into the center of five men. He was the most fearless man she’d ever seen, or too stupid to know any better. Either way, she couldn’t just sit there and watch him die.

  Shrieking a ferocious battle-cry, she launched into the air above the men and came down with teeth bared and claws ready.

  * * * *

  Adrian heard his cue. She couldn’t have timed it better if he’d planned it. With her scream he pointed in the air. “She’s over there!”

  They all looked up, guns held high, except for Adrian. He had both pistols out firing in two directions. He dropped two of them before anyone knew what he was doing.

  Crenshaw recognized the danger and dived for the floor, scrambling to get out of the line of fire. He didn’t get far. A hundred pounds of shimmering cocktail-dressed fury landed on him and tore through his throat in ravenous abandon.

  Adrian couldn’t afford to focus on what she was doing, and, truthfully, he’d rather not see it. He kept firing at the downed men and sighting on the running Mexicans, shooting at anything that moved. One guy got behind some boxes and then popped back up with an automatic weapon in hand. Bullets peppered the air around Adrian.

  Adrian dived and rolled, not the easiest thing to do in a jacket and bulletproof vest. A second later she was shrieking again, a god-awful noise that had never come from the throat of a human being. He followed the sound of her fury as she leapt high in the air, right over the boxes, and landed on the man with the automatic rifle. His shots ended abruptly, replaced with meaty-crunchy noises and the short but poignant scream of a man dying in agony.

  He had no more time to consider La Reina. The last Mexican was running off into the warehouse. Adrian couldn’t risk the man getting on his cell phone and calling his buddies. This man could not escape, not if Adrian and Samantha wanted to get out of the country alive. Adrian gave chase, wishing he had night-vision goggles like his military days. Hunting people was so much more fun with expensive military toys.

  He skated around boxes, jumped over loose pallets, and then stopped to listen. Ahead were sounds of scuffles and cursing in Spanish. He headed for the noise, trying to be quiet and stay low. The area the man had been in evidenced nothing. Several paths led off between the boxes in three directions.

  Adrian strained to hear or see something, anything, the slightest movement. He was out in the open, vulnerable, but he didn’t know which way to go. A noise high up on the top shelf drew his attention, but then a click sounded behind him. A gun being cocked.

  “Adrian, down!” She screamed as she descended from on high.

  A gunshot hammered into his back and slammed him face-first to the floor as another shot blew past the hairs on his neck, a slight stinging burn across the skin. Barely missed him.

  Adrian fought through the throbbing pain, tears in his eyes as he rolled over. He tried to focus in the darkness to aim his pistol, but all
he could see was a ferocious blur of shimmery black cocktail dress. She landed on the man with a thud and wrestled with his gun hand. Adrian couldn’t see enough to shoot without hitting her, so he lay there on his back, gun sighted, waiting for an open shot.

  She was strong, so much stronger than a woman should be. She tossed the gang-banger around like a rag doll, slamming him back and forth between two pallets of boxes. The man lost his pistol in the frenzy, but Adrian held his gun on them, watching in horrified awe as the man was lucky enough to get in one solid punch to her nose.

  That’s gonna piss her off real good.

  Her head rocked back, and from the gristly sound, Adrian suspected her nose was probably broken. A growl of rage escaped her as she snapped back at the man with a handful of claw and came away with half the skin of his face.

  That’s so gross. But he couldn’t look away as she sunk her teeth into his throat and finished the gory job. The creature enjoyed her work, maybe a little too much.

  She turned on him, face covered in other men’s blood, and some of her own. She reached for him anxiously. “Were you hit?” Her monstrous toothy visage was the picture of concern, if you overlooked all the blood.

  What the hell had he gotten himself into with this wicked woman?

  “I … I’m good. The vest stopped one round. I’ll probably have a killer bruise, but it’s okay.” He slowly dropped the pistol away from her as she took his hand and pulled him up off the floor.

  Her hands fluttered around him, checking to see that he was indeed unharmed. He could do nothing but stare at her. She was so fucking strange, fascinating and attractive, even covered in bloody gore.

  “What?” She began to look irritated, realized he was staring at all the blood on her face, and lifted up the hem of her sparkly dress to wipe it away. He caught a flash of the silky black thong panties he’d bought her as she tried to clean herself, but only succeeded in smearing blood around her face in swirl patterns.