Blood Blade

Chapter 19

Cole staggered back and bounced off a wall. The back of his head cracked against brick, which made everything around him blur. When he blinked and struggled to regain his balance, he was no longer seeing through Misonyk’s eyes or on Lancroft’s floor. He was outside in the cold night air as the familiar thump of bass echoed behind him.

“What did you do to him?” Paige shouted as she moved to catch Cole before he bounced off anything else.

Misonyk stepped back and was immediately flanked by the two larger Nymar with him. “Nothing yet,” he said.

As Cole steadied himself, Paige stepped in front of him. “And if you try to get your hooks into him again, I’ll kill all of you right here and now.”

Although the men flanking Misonyk were waiting for their orders, Misonyk looked as if he was merely deciding which part of Paige he should rip off first. “You should know better than this, Skinner,” he said. “Defy me any longer and if Henry doesn’t kill you, my sect will complete the task.”

“I’m betting these four assholes and that freak are all the sect you’ve managed to scrape up. If you think that’s enough to keep the cops busy, then just keep making noise until they get here.”

Eyeing Cole furiously, Misonyk wheeled around and headed for the parking lot. While the two bigger Nymar followed him, the one in the bulky overcoat stayed behind. As the pounding rhythm inside Shimmy’s faded from one rap song into another, the remaining Nymar reached beneath his coat and brought out a weapon that looked like a cross between a shotgun and an automatic rifle. The wide black barrel was easy to recognize, but the drum beneath the barrel gave the shotgun more of an edge. Cole might not have known exactly what the shotgun was called, but he made a note to find out and use it in the next game that called for big holes to be punched through things in a loud fashion.

Paige crouched a bit and reached toward the side of her boot where her club was hidden within its pouch and beneath her jeans. “Just leave,” she said. “That is, unless you want this to get real messy real quick.”

Although the gun-toting Nymar didn’t seem impressed by her threat, he backed up a step anyway. Once a car rolled up behind him, he got inside and didn’t shut his door until the car was moving too fast for him to keep his gun aimed at Paige.

“Stay right here, Cole,” she said. “I’ll make sure they’re gone and then I’ve got to have another look around. As soon as I know it’s safe, I’ll bring the car to you.”

Cole allowed himself to slide down against the wall until his butt hit the cold ground. Pressing his hands against his forehead alleviated some of the throbbing in his skull. After rubbing his face and eyelids, the only moisture he felt was from the perspiration that had begun to work through his skin. Apparently, Misonyk had been too surprised by his mental maneuver to spit any more venom at him. A few minutes later Paige stomped from the front of the building to close in on the garbage bins.

“I swear to everything that’s holy,” she growled, “if one more man stares at my chest tonight, I am going to plant my boot in his ass! Would you believe some assholes in the parking lot were too busy watching me to notice which way Misonyk went?” Putting her hands on her hips and looking around as if searching for someone to hit, Paige took a few more breaths and asked, “You all right, Cole?”

“Yeah. I was just—”

“Good,” she said. “Now let’s get out of here.”

“What about Misonyk? Is he…gone?”

Paige hooked a thumb toward the main parking lot and said, “They left, but something else was sniffing around here. It may have been another Mongrel or it may have been something worse. Whatever it is, it’s gone too.”

“And I thought you’d be anxious to follow them.”

“Don’t need to. Prophet’s agreed to help us and should be tailing Misonyk right now. He also gave us some real good leads that point us to a spot west of here, so that’s where we’re going. Now why don’t you tell me what was happening with you. When I heard you got bounced, I came outside and saw you and Misonyk having some sort of special moment.”

Cole followed her back to the parking lot, but couldn’t shake the feeling that someone else was going to jump him at any second. He started telling her about what he’d seen when Misonyk attempted to enter his mind again, but gave up once they reached the car. “Wait a second. What was sniffing around here?”

“It was a shapeshifter. It was too far away for me to tell what kind, but it was a real big one with black fur. It could have been just trying to draw me out far enough to take a run at me, but there’s no time to worry about that. We need to get moving.”

“Could it have been Henry?”

Page shook her head. “I doubt it. No shapeshifters can change their markings that much.”

“He’s a lot more than just some shapeshifter.”

Now that she’d settled in behind the wheel, Paige looked over at him with an intense glare. “What did you find out?” she asked. “Did Misonyk do anything else to you?”

Shaking his head enough to rattle his aching brain, Cole dropped into the passenger seat. “He didn’t get any more of that shit on me, but I still got that asshole rattling around in my head. Or…maybe I was rattling inside of his.”

“All right,” Paige grunted as she threw the car into gear and sped toward the interstate. “Start talking.”

Cole told her what he’d seen from start to finish. When he was done, he added, “I shouldn’t have even left the table back there. This is my fault, Paige. I’m sorry.”

She sighed again, but looked over at him reassuringly. “Don’t be sorry, Cole. There was nothing you could have done. Nymphs have been tempting stronger men than you for a real long time.”

“And what about Misonyk being able to track us?”

“If Misonyk went through the trouble of bringing you to him, his hold on you must have been weakening. But that’s only the start of it,” she added. “There’s rumblings at the top of the food chain that is way over our heads.”

“How far over?” Cole asked.

“You don’t want to know.”

The rest of the ride passed in relative silence.

Misonyk’s presence in his mind was gone.

The shapeshifter with the black fur was nowhere to be found.

Apparently, those at the top of the chain didn’t need to explain themselves to the lower links.

The hotel they stopped at was just off the highway in a place called Big Bend. For some reason, Cole had expected to spend the night in a rat trap with bugs on the walls and rusty water in the pipes. Instead, Paige had pulled up to a place that might even have earned a star or two more than the Afton Inn. And yes, it served free breakfast.

As soon as she unlocked the door to their room, she stepped inside, dropped her bags, and headed for the bathroom. “Walter should be here before long,” she said through the door. “I need to get the stink of all that cigarette smoke off of me.”

Cole pulled his collar up so he could take a whiff of himself. Although the odor of stale smoke permeated his clothes, there was still more than enough of Tristan’s scent to overpower it. He savored the sweet smell and the memories that came with it until the other odors crept back into his nose. “I thought you said Walter wasn’t a Skinner.”

“He’s not,” Paige replied through the bathroom door. “He’s only along this time as a favor.” After that, the bathroom filled with sounds of water running through the shower, mixed with a few contented sighs.

Cole sat on the edge of the bed, turned on the television and flipped through some reruns. He dug the phone from his pocket and thought about giving Jason a call just to let him know he was still alive. There was still the matter of fixing those bugs for Hammer Strike, but the phone’s battery died before he could scroll through his stored numbers.

“Cole?” Paige said, while sticking her head out from the bathroom. “Could you bring me my bag?”

“It’s right there,” he groused as he shook his phone in the misguided belief that he could somehow frighten the battery into charging up again.

“I know, but…oh never mind.” Stomping out of the bathroom, she clutched a towel to her chest and walked over to the bags that had been piled beneath a colorful sketch of oversized leaves. Her hair was wet and pulled behind her head, showing off her high cheekbones and the crooked line of her nose. Even though her expression was on the perturbed side, it somehow worked when combined with the quickness of her movements and the water that had beaded upon her skin.

Cole watched her discreetly while playing with his phone, but realized his subtlety wasn’t quite up to par when he saw the annoyed roll of her eyes. Shaking her head, she clutched her bag so it held her towel against her stomach as she turned on the balls of her feet and stomped back toward the bathroom. The damp towel spun with her and kept her front covered pretty well. Fortunately for him, the towel wasn’t wrapped all the way around and he was given a quick, glorious peek at her back. Paige’s wet hair hung down to a spot just below her shoulder blades. The smooth curve of her spine was surrounded on both sides by taut muscle that led his eyes to the perfectly rounded curves of her buttocks.

After she’d disappeared into the bathroom, Cole tossed his phone onto a nearby table and walked over to the plastic bag from the outlet clothing store they’d hit earlier that day. Before he could pull the tags off his new shirts, the bathroom door swung open and Paige stepped out wearing a baggy T-shirt and a clean pair of cutoff sweatpants. “No Walter yet?” she asked.

“Not unless he’s got some of that invisible crap on him. By the way, I’ve got an idea for that.”

“Save it,” Paige snapped as she plopped down on the bed and searched for the TV remote. “I’m too tired.” While she flipped through the channels, someone knocked on the door. “Could you get that?” she asked.

“Is this some sort of initiation thing? The rookie gets to do all the grunt work?”

With a cute grin, Paige replied, “Yep.”

He stepped up to the door and put one eye to the peephole. All he could see through the cracked fish-eye lens was a tall figure in a long dark coat. The man had a large suitcase in each hand and what looked like an overstuffed gym bag under one arm. Without setting any of the bags down, the figure tapped his foot against the door and waited.

“That you, Walter?” Cole asked.

Behind Cole, Paige reached for another one of her own bags and found a .45 pistol.

“Yeah it’s me,” the man outside grunted as he lifted his chin to show his face to the door. “And you’re about to get a real good look at my ass through that peephole if you don’t open the damn door.”

Cole opened the door, but Paige didn’t lower her gun until she could see Walter’s face. At the moment, that face wasn’t happy.

“Sorry about that,” Cole said. “Just being safe. Need any help with those bags?”

“No, I’ve got ’em. Thanks for ruining Shimmy’s for me, by the way. I’m probably banned from there now. Got a place for me to set these down?”

“Anywhere you like, Walter. You want some coffee?”

“Already had plenty. How do you think I scrounged up all that gear Gerald left behind and made it here so quickly?” He kept talking as he set up his cases so they were all evenly spaced on the bed that Paige wasn’t on.

“You did follow Misonyk, right?” she asked.

Walter nodded. “Long as I could. That car was headed west when I lost it, but that means they were headed toward Janesville.”

“So they lost you?” Paige groaned.

“They sure did. Oh, and they also had a running head start and could see damn near anyone pulling away from that parking lot in their rearview mirror. You want to hold that against me too?”

Reluctantly, Paige shook her head. “Sorry. Thanks for trying, Prophet.”

“Wish I could’ve done more, but I should be able to pick up on them later.” Tapping his temple, he added, “I know where they’re going, remember?”

“Oh,” Paige grumbled skeptically. “That’s right.”

Motioning toward the second large case, Walter added, “The Brown rifle is in there. It’s not the .50 cal, but it should do all right.”

“Oooh,” Cole purred as he reached out to touch the rifle. “I’ve been using these since Sniper Ranger 2! Can I have a look?”

“You were a Ranger?” Walter asked.

“Oh, no. Sniper Ranger. It’s a video game. I…uh…” The more he spoke, the more he wanted to go stand in a corner. “I design games. Never mind.”

“If you designed Sniper Ranger 1, you’ve got some answering to do. The specs for most of those weapons were ridiculous.”

“I know!” Cole replied. “I researched them all for Two and tried to make it more realistic.”

“I’ll have to give that one a try,” Walter said. “Go on and see how she feels, since you may just have to use it.”

“I don’t want to brag, but I have fired one of these before and I was pretty good,” Cole bragged.

Looking over to Paige, Walter said, “The rounds are all coated in the antidote, so it really doesn’t matter where they hit. If it’s a Nymar, it’ll feel it.”

“I said I was a good shot,” Cole repeated.

“Then hit them in the heart and you may kill one,” Walter explained. “I won’t guarantee it, though. If you do have to go up against a human, that thing’ll drop ’em just fine. A shapeshifter, though…”

“Speaking of shapeshifters,” Paige said as she handed over one of the bundled towels she’d collected from the last hotel room Cole had rented. “Think you can get this to Daniels?”

Walter carefully unfolded the towels, dipped his fingers into the greasy residue and whistled. By this time, the towel looked as if it had a shimmering void in its center. “Oh, he’ll have some real fun with this. It’ll take me a little while to find out where he went, though.”

“Take your time, but I’ve got first dibs when he does come up with something,” Paige insisted.

“Of course.” While folding up the towels as if swaddling a baby, Walter nodded toward the gym bag and said, “There’s more antidote in there, but use it sparingly. It’s just what was left behind by those guys heading out to Philadelphia. They mentioned something about Nymar being able to ingest more and more of the stuff. Could be an immunity or possibly some sort of vaccine.”

Rolling onto her side, Paige furrowed her brow and asked, “Any reason you didn’t mention a Nymar vaccine before?”

“I pass on what I hear to MEG. Don’t you check in with those guys?”

“Yeah,” she said with a dismissive wave, “but they’re kind of…creepy.”

“They know their tech, Paige,” Walter scolded. “They also do a damn good job of putting up with the likes of you. You shouldn’t give ’em such a hard time.”

“Wait until you get hit on by every geek that answers the phone over there and see how you like it.”

Walter smirked and said, “Well, maybe if you use your sexy voice, those creepy guys will help you circulate these,” he said as he handed her a piece of paper that had obviously been torn from a small, spiral notepad.

“Are these the new lottery numbers?” she asked.

“Oh, yeah. Real winners too. I can feel it.”

Cole set the rifle down and lovingly patted the stock. “Lottery numbers? Did you get those from another dream?” When he didn’t get a joking response, he snapped his eyes back and forth between Walter and Paige. “Did he? Seriously?”

Walter nodded.

“Don’t get so excited,” Paige said. “He’s only right less than half the time. As long as we spread the numbers to different people around the country, the big hits barely even make the news and we’re all set up for a while.”

Cole’s skeptical grin slowly faded as he thought about all the times over the years when he’d seen reports of a bunch of people hitting the lottery and dividing the jackpot to something much less impressive than the whole amount. “I always wondered how that happened,” he muttered.

“What’s gonna happen,” Paige chided, “is that you got to make a whole lot of calls to a whole lot of people to spread a whole lot of numbers. Consider it another one of those initiation things.”

“I thought MEG was going to do that!” he said.

Paige shook her head and waggled the paper at him. “MEG does a lot for us, but those guys love their websites. If these numbers found their way onto one of those, they’d be worthless even if every single one of them hit. By the way, you won’t be e-mailing them either. Phone calls only. I’ll give you the numbers.”

Once Cole had taken the paper from her, Paige began sifting through one of Walter’s cases. When she reached the bottom, she looked up and asked, “Didn’t Gerald leave an armor kit with you?”

“I only have one pair of hands,” Walter replied patiently. “See why I meet her at the strip bars, Cole? She’s always willing to get in and get out real quick. Meeting in the real world only leads to me mixing up another batch of something or bugging one of my suppliers for something else. Makes me wish for the old days before you folks knew I could get my hands on this stuff.”

“You could always just join up with us,” Paige said as she picked up the TV remote and flipped through a few channels. “I could sure use the help, with the massacre we’re trying to avert. I still need to check up on that Half Breed den and then try to make it to Janesville with time to spare.”

“Fine,” Walter said as he motioned for Cole to follow him out of the room.

Paige nearly shot up from where she’d been resting. “You’re going to help us full-time?” she asked hopefully.

“I’ll cruise into Janesville, find that Nymar who left you in the dust tonight, see what I can see about a massacre, and then point you in the right direction when you’re through cleaning out that den. You’ll owe me, and I still want a cut of that money being offered by those pale kids in Chicago. Now, I’ve got some more cases to haul up from my van and I don’t intend on doing all the lifting myself.” With that, Walter turned and left the room.

“I’ll give him a hand,” Cole said. When he reached the door, he stopped and turned to look at Paige. She was laying on her side, propping up her head with one arm while using her free hand to work the remote. “Walter seems like a big help.”

“He is.”

“So what’s the difference between what he’s doing and what he’d do if he was an actual Skinner?”

Slipping back into her kung fu master voice, Paige replied, “Bringing sword to battleground and wielding it are two very different things, young one.”