SAMANTHA MOON:
All Four Novels
Moon Dance
Vampire Moon
American Vampire
Moon Child
by
J.R. RAIN
Acclaim for the novels of J.R. Rain:
“Be prepared to lose sleep!”
—James Rollins, international bestselling author of The Doomsday Key
“I love this!”
—Piers Anthony, bestselling author of Xanth
“Dark Horse is the best book I’ve read in a long time!”
—Gemma Halliday, award-winning author of Spying in High Heels
“Moon Dance is absolutely brilliant!”
—Lisa Tenzin-Dolma, author of Understanding the Planetary Myths
“Powerful stuff!”
—Aiden James, author of Plague of Coins
“Moon Dance is a must read. If you like Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum, bounty hunter, be prepared to love J. R. Rain’s Samantha Moon, vampire private investigator.”
—Eve Paludan, author of Letters from David
“Impossible to put down. J.R. Rain’s Moon Dance is a fabulous urban fantasy replete with multifarious and unusual characters, a perfectly synchronized plot, vibrant dialogue and sterling witticism all wrapped in a voice that is as beautiful as it is rich and vividly intense as it is relaxed.”
—April Vine, author of The Midnight Rose
OTHER BOOKS BY J.R. RAIN
The Lost Ark
The Body Departed
VAMPIRE FOR HIRE SERIES
Moon Dance
Vampire Moon
American Vampire
Moon Child
Vampire Dawn
SAMANTHA MOON NOVELLAS
Christmas Moon
SAMANTHA MOON CASE FILES
Vampire Blues: Four Stories
Vampire Games: Four Stories (coming soon)
THE JIM KNIGHTHORSE SERIES
Dark Horse
The Mummy Case
Hail Mary
ELVIS MYSTERY SERIES
Elvis Has Not Left the Building
You Ain’t Nothin’ But a Hound Dog (coming soon)
THE SPINOZA SERIES
The Vampire With the Dragon Tattoo
The Vampire Who Played Dead
The Vampire in the Iron Mask (coming soon)
THE GRAIL QUEST TRILOGY
Arthur
Merlin (coming soon)
WITH SCOTT NICHOLSON
Cursed!
Ghost College
The Vampire Club
WITH PIERS ANTHONY
Aladdin Relighted
Aladdin Sins Bad
WITH SCOTT NICHOLSON AND H.T. NIGHT
Bad Blood
SHORT STORIES
The Bleeder and Other Stories
Teeth and Other Stories
Vampire Nights and Other Stories
Vampires Rain: Four Stories
SCREENPLAYS
Judas Silver
Lost Eden
SHORT STORY ANTHOLOGIES
Vampires, Zombies and Ghosts, Oh My!
NON-FICTION
The Rain Interviews (2008-2011)
Samantha Moon: Four Novels
Published by Smashwords.com
Copyright © 2011 by J.R. Rain
All rights reserved
Smashwords.com Edition, License Notes
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
MOON DANCE
Vampire for Hire #1
Published by J.R. Rain at Smashwords.com
Copyright © 2009 by J.R. Rain
Dedication
This book is dedicated to mothers everywhere:
Our amazing, selfless, unsung heroes.
Love you, ma.
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank Eve Paludan, Liisa Lee and
Sandy Johnston for their generous assistance with this book.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
MOON DANCE
1.
I was folding laundry in the dark and watching Judge Judy rip this guy a new asshole when the doorbell rang.
I flipped down a pair of Oakley wrap-around sunglasses and, still holding a pair of little Anthony’s cotton briefs in one hand, opened the front door.
The light, still painfully bright, poured in from outside. I squinted behind my shades and could just made out the image of a UPS deliveryman.
And, oh, what an image it was.
As my eyes adjusted to the light, a hunky guy with tan legs and beefy arms materialized through the screen door before me. He grinned at me easily, showing off a perfect row of white teeth. Spiky yellow hair protruded from under his brown cap. The guy should have been a model, or at least my new best friend.
“Mrs. Moon?” he asked. His eyes seemed particularly searching and hungry, and I wondered if I had stepped onto the set of a porno movie. Interestingly, a sort of warning bell sounded in my head. Warning bells are tricky to discern, and I automatically assumed this one was telling me to stay away from Mr. Beefy, or risk damaging my already rocky marriage.
“You got her,” I said easily, ignoring the warning bells.
“I’ve got a package here for you.”
“You don’t say.”
“I’ll need for you to sign the delivery log.” He held up an electronic gizmo-thingy that must have been the aforementioned delivery log.
“I’m sure you do,” I said, and opened the screen door and stuck a hand out. He looked at my very pale hand, paused, and then placed the electronic thing-a-majig in it. As I signed it, using a plastic-tipped pen, my signature appeared in the display box as an arthritic mess. The deliveryman watched me intently through the screen door. I don’t like to be watched intently. In fact, I prefer to be ignored and forgotten.
“Do you always wear sunglasses indoors?” he asked casually, but I sensed his hidden question: And what sort of freak are you?
“Only during the day. I find them redundant at night.” I opened the screen door again and exchanged the log doohickey for a small square package. “Thank you,” I said. “Have a good day.”
He nodded and left, and I watched his cute little buns for a moment longer, and then shut the solid oak door completely. Sweet darkness returned to my home. I pulled up the sunglasses and sat down in a particularly worn dining room chair. Someday I was going to get these things re-upholstered.
The package was heavily taped, but a few deft strokes of my painted red nail took care of all that. I opened the lid and peered inside. Shining inside was an ancient golden medallion. An intricate Celtic cross was engraved across the face of it, and embedded within the cross, formed by precisely cut rubies, were three red roses.
In the living room, Judge Judy was calmly explaining to the defendant what an idiot he was. Although I agreed, I turned the TV off, deciding that this medallion needed my full concentration.
After all, it was the same medallion worn by my attacker six years earlier.
2.
There was no return address and no note. Other than the medallion, the box was empty. I left the gleaming artifact in the box and shut the lid. Seeing it again brought back some horrible memories. Memories I have been doing my best to forget.
I put the box in a cabinet beneath the china hutch, and then went back to Judge Judy and putting away the laundry. At 3:30 p.m., I lathered my skin with heaping amounts of sun block, donned a wide gardening hat and carefully stepped outside.
The pain, as always, was intense and searing. Hell, I could have been cooking over an open fire pit. Truly, I had no business being out in the sun, but I had my kids to pick up, dammit.
So I hurried from the front steps and crossed the driveway and into the open garage. My dream was to have a home with an attached garage. But, for now, I had to make the daily sprint.
Once in the garage and out of the direct glare of the spring sun, I could breathe again. I could also smell my burning flesh.
Blech!
Luckily, the Ford Windstar minivan was heavily tinted, and so when I backed up and put the thing into drive, I was doing okay again. Granted, not great, but okay.
I picked up my son and daughter from school, got some cheeseburgers from Burger King and headed home. Yes, I know, bad mom, but after doing chores all day, I definitely was not going to cook.
Once at home, the kids went straight to their room and I went straight to the bathroom where I removed my hat and sunglasses, and used a washcloth to remove the extra sunscreen. Hell, I ought to buy stock in Coppertone. Soon the kids were hard at work saving our world from Haloes and had lapsed into a rare and unsettling silence. Perhaps it was the quiet before the storm.
My only appointment for the day was right on time, and since I work from home, I showed him to my office in the back. His name was Kingsley Fulcrum and he sat across from me in a client chair, filling it to capacity. He was tall and broad shouldered and wore his tailored suit well. His thick black hair, speckled with gray, was jauntily disheveled and worn long over his collar. Kingsley was a striking man and would have been the poster boy for dashing rogues if not for the two scars on his face. Then again, maybe poster boys for rogue did have scars on their faces. Anyway, one was on his left cheek and the other was on his forehead, just above his left eye. Both were round and puffy. And both were recent.
He caught me staring at the scars. I looked away, embarrassed. “How can I help you, Mr. Fulcrum?”
“How long have you been a private investigator, Mrs. Moon?” he asked.
“Six years,” I said.
“What did you do before that?”
“I was a federal agent.”
He didn’t say anything, and I could feel his eyes on me. God, I hate when I can feel eyes on me. The silence hung for longer than I was comfortable with and I answered his unspoken question. “I had an accident and was forced to work at home.”
“May I ask what kind of accident?”
“No.”
He raised his eyebrows and nodded. He might have turned a pale shade of red. “Do you have a list of references?”
“Of course.”
I turned to my computer, brought up the reference file and printed him out the list. He took it and scanned the names briefly. “Mayor Hartley?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said.
“He hired you?”
“He did. I believe that’s the direct line to his personal assistant.”
“Can I ask what sort of help you gave the mayor?”
“No.”
“I understand. Of course you can’t divulge that kind of information.”
“How exactly can I help you, Mr. Fulcrum?” I asked again.
“I need you to find someone.”
“Who?”
“The man who shot me,” he said. “Five times.”
3.
The furious sounds of my kids erupting into an argument suddenly came through my closed office door. In particular, Anthony’s high-pitched shriek. Sigh. The storm broke.
I gave Kingsley an embarrassed smile. “Could you please hold on?”
“Duty calls,” he said, smiling. Nice smile.
I marched through my single story home and into the small bedroom my children shared. Anthony was on top of Tammy. Tammy was holding the remote control away from her body with one hand and fending off her little brother with the other. I came in just in time to witness him sinking his teeth into her hand. She yelped and bopped him over the ear with the remote control. He had just gathered himself to make a full-scale leap onto her back, when I stepped into the room and grabbed each by their collar and separated them. I felt as if I had separated two ravenous wolverines. Anthony’s fingers clawed for his sister’s throat. I wondered if they realized they were both hovering a few inches off the floor. When they had both calmed down, I set them down on their feet. Their collars were ruined.
“Anthony, we do not bite in this household. Tammy, give me the remote control.”
“But Mom,” said Anthony, in that shriekingly high-pitched voice that he used to irritate me. “I was watching ‘Pokemon’ and she turned the channel.”
“We each get one half hour after school,” Tammy said smugly. “And you were well into my half hour.”
“But you were on the phone talking to Richaaard.”
“Tammy, give your brother the remote control. He gets to finish his TV show. You lost your dibs by talking to Richaaard.” They both laughed. “I have a client in my office. If I hear any more loud voices, you will both be auctioned off on eBay. I could use the extra money.”
I left them and headed back to the office. Kingsley was perusing my bookshelves. He looked at me before I had a chance to say anything and raised his eyebrows.
“You have an interest in the occult,” he said, fingering a hardback book. “In particular, vampirism.”
“Yeah, well, we all need a hobby,” I said.
“An interesting hobby, that,” he said.
I sat behind my desk. It was time to change the subject. “So you want me to find the man who shot you five times. Anything else?”
He moved away from my book shelves and sat across from me again. He raised a fairly bushy eyebrow. On him, the bushy eyebrow somehow worked.
“Anything else?” he asked, grinning. “No, I think that will be quite enough.”
And then it hit me. I thought I recognized the name and face. “You were on the news a few months back,” I said suddenly.
He nodded once. “Aye, that was me. Shot five times in the head for all the world to see. Not my proudest moment.”
Did he just say aye? I had a strange sense that I had suddenly gone back in time. How far back, I didn’t know, but further enough back where men said aye.
“You were ambushed and shot. I can’t imagine it would have been anyone’s proudest moment. But you survived, and that’s all that matters, right?”
“For now,” he said. “Next on the list would be to find the man who shot me.” He sat forward. “Everything you need is at your disposal. Nothing of mine is off limits. Speak to anyone you need to, although I ask you to be discreet.”
“Discretion is sometimes not possible.”
“Then I trust you to use your best judgment.”
Good answer. He took out a business card and wrote something on the back. “That’s my cell number. Please call me if you need anything.” He wrote something under his number. “And that’s the name and number of the acting homicide detective working my case. His name is Sherbet, and although I found him to be forthcoming and professional, I didn’t like his conclusions.”
“Which were?”
“He tends to think my attack was nothing but a random shooting.”
“And you disagree?”
“Wholeheartedly.”
We discussed my retainer and he wrote me a check. The check was bigger than we discussed.
“I don’t mean to be rude,” said Kingsley as he stood and tucked his expensive fountain pen inside his expensive jacket, “but are you ill?”
I’ve heard the question a thousand times.
“No, why?” I asked brightly.
“You seem pale.”
“Oh, that’s my Irish complexion, lad,” I said, and winked.
He stared at me a moment longer, and then returned my wink and left.
4.
When Kingsley was gone I punched his name into my web browser.
Dozens of online newspaper articles came up, and from these I garnered that Kingsley was a rather successful defense attorney, known for doing whatever it took to get his clients off the hook, often on seemingly inane technicalities. He was apparently worth his weight in gold.
I thought of his beefy shoulders.
A lot of weight. Muscular weight.
Down girl.
I continued scanning the headlines until I found the one I wanted. It was on a web page for a local LA TV station. I clicked on a video link. Thank God for high speed internet. A small media window appeared on my screen, and shortly thereafter I watched a clip that had first appeared on local TV news. The clip had gone national, due to its sensationally horrific visuals.
A reporter appeared first in the screen, a young Hispanic woman looking quite grave. Over her shoulder was a picture of the Fullerton Municipal Courthouse. The next shot was a grainy image from the courthouse security camera itself. In the frame were two men and two women, all dressed impeccably, all looking important. They were crossing in front of the courthouse itself. In football terms, they formed a sort of moving huddle, although I rarely think of things in football terms and understand little of the stupid sport.
I immediately recognized the tall one with the wavy black hair as Kingsley Fulcrum, looking rugged and dashing.
Down girl.
As the group approaches the courthouse steps, a smallish man steps out from behind the trunk of a white birch. Three of the four great defenders pay the man little mind. The one who does, a blond-haired woman with glasses and big hips, looks up and frowns. She probably frowns because the little man is reaching rather menacingly inside his coat pocket. His thick mane of black hair is disheveled, and somehow even his thick mustache looks disheveled, too. The woman, still frowning, turns back to the group.
And what happens next still sends shivers down my spine.
From inside his tweed jacket, the little man removes a short pistol. We now know it’s a .22. At the time, no one sees him remove the pistol. The short man, perhaps ten feet away from the group of four, takes careful aim, and fires.
Kingsley’s head snaps back. The bullet enters over his left eye.
I lean forward, staring at my computer screen, rapt, suddenly wishing I had a bowl of popcorn, or at least a bag of peanut M&Ms. That is, until I remembered that I can no longer eat either.
Anyway, Kingsley’s cohorts immediately scatter like chickens before a hawk. The shorter man even ducks and rolls dramatically as if he’s recently seen duty in the Middle East and his military instincts are kicking in.
Kingsley is shot again. This time in the neck, where a small red dot appears above his collar. Blood quickly flows down his shirt. Instead of collapsing, instead of dying after being shot point blank in the head and neck, Kingsley actually turns and looks at the man.
As if the man had simply called his name.
As if the man had not shot him twice.
What transpires next would be comical if it wasn’t so heinous. Kingsley proceeds to duck behind a nearby tree. The shooter, intent on killing Kingsley, bypasses going around a park bench and instead jumps over it. Smoothly. Landing squarely on his feet while squeezing off a few more rounds that appear to hit Kingsley in the neck and face. Meanwhile, the big attorney ducks and weaves behind the tree. This goes on for seemingly an eternity, but in reality just a few seconds. A sick game of tag, except Kingsley’s getting tagged with real bullets.
And still the attorney does not go down.
Doesn’t even collapse.
The shooter seemingly realizes he’s wasting his time and dashes away from the tree, disappearing from the screen. No one has come to Kingsley’s rescue. The other attorneys are long gone. Kingsley is left to fend for himself, his only protection the tree, which has been torn and shredded by the impacting stray bullets.
Witnesses would later report that the shooter left in a Ford pickup. No one tried to stop him, and I really didn’t blame them.
I paused the picture on Kingsley. Blood is frozen on his cheeks and forehead, even on his open, outstretched palms. His face is a picture of confusion and horror and shock. In just twenty-three seconds, his life had been utterly turned upside down. Of course, in those very same twenty-three seconds most people would have died.
But not Kingsley. I wondered why.
5.
I was at the Fullerton police station, sitting across from a homicide detective named Sherbet. It was the late evening, and most of the staff had left for the day.
“You’re keeping me from my kid,” he said. Sherbet was wearing a long-sleeved shirt folded up at the elbows, revealing heavily muscled forearms covered in dark hair. The dark hair was mixed with a smattering of gray. I thought it looked sexy as hell. His tie was loosened, and he looked irritable, to say the least.
“I apologize,” I said. “This was the only time I could make it today.”
“I’m glad I can work around your busy schedule, Mrs. Moon. I wouldn’t want to inconvenience you in any way.”
His office was simple and uncluttered. No pictures on the wall. Just a desk, a computer, a filing cabinet and some visitor’s chairs. His desk had a few picture frames, but they were turned toward him. From my angle, I could only see the price tags.
I gave him my most winning smile. “I certainly appreciate your time, detective.” I had on plenty of blush, so that my cheeks appeared human.
The smile worked. He blushed himself. “Yeah, well, let’s make this quick. My kid’s playing a basketball game tonight, and I wouldn’t want to miss him running up and down the court with no clue what the hell is going on around him.”
“Sounds like a natural.”
“A natural dolt. Wife says I should just leave him alone. The trouble is, if I leave him alone, he tends to want to play Barbies with the neighborhood girls.”
“That worries you?” I asked.
“Yeah.”
“You think he could turn out gay?”
He shrugged uncomfortably, and said nothing. It was a touchy subject for him, obviously.
“How old is your son?” I asked.
“Eight.”
“Perhaps he’s a little Casanova. Perhaps he sees the benefits of playing with girls, rather than boys.”
“Perhaps,” said Sherbet. “For now, he plays basketball.”
“Even though he’s clueless.”
“Where there’s a will there’s a way.”
“Even if it’s your will and your way?” I asked.
“For now, it’s the only way.” He paused, then looked a little confused. He shook his head like a man realizing he had been mumbling out loud. “How the hell did we get on the subject of my kid’s sexuality?”
“I forget,” I said, shrugging.
He reached over and straightened the folder in front of him. The folder hadn’t been crooked, now it was less uncrooked. “Yeah, well, let’s get down to business. Here’s the file. I made a copy of it for you. It’s against procedures to give you a copy, but you check out okay. Hell, you worked for the federal government. And why the hell you’ve gone private is your own damn business.”
I reached for the file, but he placed a big hand on it. “This is just between you and me. I don’t normally give police files to private dicks.”
“Luckily I’m not your average private dick.”
“A dick with no dick,” he said.
“Clever, detective,” I said.
“Not really.”
“No, not really,” I admitted. “I just really want the file.”
He nodded and lifted his palm, and I promptly stuffed the file into my handbag. “Is there anything you can tell me that’s perhaps not in the file?”
He shook his head, but it was just a knee-jerk reaction. In the process of shaking his head, he was actually deep in thought. “It should all be in there.” He rubbed the dark stubble at his chin. The dark stubble was also mixed with some gray. “You know I always suspected the guy doing the shooting was a client of his. I dunno, call it a hunch. But this attorney’s been around a while, and he’s pissed off a lot of people. Trouble is: who’s got the time to go through all of his past files?”
“Not a busy homicide detective,” I said, playing along.
“Damn straight,” he said.
“Any chance it was just a random shooting?” I asked.
“Sure. Of course. Those happen all the time.”
“But you don’t think so.”
“No,” he said.
“Why?” I asked.
The detective was used to this kind of exchange. He worked in a business where if you didn’t ask questions, you didn’t find answers. If my questions bothered him, he didn’t show it, other than he seemed to be impatient to get this show on the road.
“Seemed premeditative. And no robbery attempt. Also seemed to be making a statement, as well.”
“By shooting him in the face?”
“And by shooting him outside the courthouse. His place of work. Makes you think it was business related.”
I nodded. Good point. I decided not to tell the detective he had a good point. Men tend to think all of their points were good, and they sure as hell didn’t need me to boost their already inflated egos.
I’m cynical that way.
He stood from his desk and retrieved a sport jacket from a coat rack. He was a fit man with a cop’s build. He also had a cop’s mustache. He would have looked better without the mustache, but it wasn’t was my place to suggest so. Besides, who better to wear a cop mustache than a cop?
“Now it’s time to go watch my son screw up the game of basketball,” he said.
“Maybe basketball’s not his game.”
“And playing with girls is?”
“It’s not a bad alternative,” I said, then added. “You think there’s a chance you’re reading a little too much into all of this with your son?”
“I’m a cop. I read too much into everything.” He paused and locked his office door, which I found oddly amusing and ironic since his office was located in the heart of a police station. “Take you, for instance.”
I didn’t want to take me for instance. I changed the subject. “I’m sure you’re a very good officer. How long have you been on the force?”
He ignored my question. “I wondered why you insisted on meeting me in the evening.” As he spoke, he placed his hand lightly at the small of my back and steered me through the row of cluttered desks. His hand was unwavering and firm. “When I asked you on the phone the reason behind the late meeting you had mentioned something about being busy with other clients. But when I called your office later that day to tell you that I was going to be delayed, you picked up the phone immediately.” He paused and opened a clear glass door. On the door was etched FPD. “Perhaps you were meeting your clients in the office. Or perhaps you were in-between clients. But when I asked if you had a few minutes you sounded unharried and pleasant. Sure, you said, how can I help you?”
“Well, I pride myself on customer service,” I said.
He was behind me, and I didn’t see him smile. But I sensed that he had done so. In fact, I knew he had smiled. Call it a side effect.
He said, “Now that I see you, I see you have a skin disorder of some type.”
“Why, lieutenant, you certainly know how to make a girl feel warm and fuzzy.”
“And that’s the other thing. When I shook your hand, it felt anything but warm and fuzzy,” he said.
“So what are you getting at?” I asked. We had reached the front offices. We were standing behind the main reception desk. The room was quiet for the time being. Outside the smoky gray doors, I could see Commonwealth Avenue, and across that, Amerige City Park, which sported a nice little league field.
He shrugged and smirked at me. “If I had two guesses, I would say that you were either a vampire, or, like I said, you had a skin condition.”
“What does your heart tell you?” I asked.
He studied me closely. Outside, commuters were working their way through downtown Fullerton. Red taillights burned through the smoky glass. Something passed across his gaze. An understanding of some sort. Or perhaps wonder. Something. But then he grinned and his cop mustache rose like a referee signaling a touchdown.
“A skin disease, of course,” he said. “You need to stay out of the sun.”
“Bingo,” I said. “You’re a hell of a detective.”
And with that I left. Outside, I saw that my hands were shaking. The son-of-a-bitch had me rattled. He was one hell of an intuitive cop.
I hate that.
6.
I was boxing at a sparring club in Fullerton called Jacky’s. The club was geared towards women, but there were always a few men hanging around the club. These men often dressed better than the women. I suspected homosexuality. The club gave kick-boxing and traditional boxing lessons. I preferred the traditional boxing lessons, and always figured that if the time came in a fight that I had to kick, there was only one place my foot was going.
Crotch City.
I come here three times a week after picking the kids up from school and taking them to their grandmother’s home in Brea. Boxing is perhaps one of the most exhausting exercises ever invented, especially when you box in three-minute drills, as I was currently doing, which simulated actual boxing rounds.
My trainer was an Irishman named Jacky. Jacky wore a green bandanna over a full head of graying hair. He was a powerfully built man of medium height, a little fat now, but not soft. He must have been sixty, but looked forty. He was an ex-professional boxer in Ireland, where he had been something of a legend, or that’s what he tells me. His crooked nose had been broken countless times, which might or might not have been the result of boxing matches. Maybe he was just clumsy. Amazingly enough, the man rarely sweat, which was something I could not claim. As my personal trainer, his sole responsibility was to hold out his padded palms and to yell at me. He did both well. All with a thick Irish accent.
“C’mon, push yourself. You’re dropping your fists, lass!”
Dropping one’s fists was a big no-no in Jacky’s world, on par with his hatred for anything un-Irish.
So I raised my fists. Again.
During these forty-five minute workouts with Jacky, I hated that little Irish bastard with all my heart.
“You’re dropping your hands!” he screamed again.
“Screw you.”
“In your dreams, lass. Get them hands up!”
It went on like this for some time. Occasionally the kickboxers would glance over at us. Once I slipped on my own sweat, and Jacky thankfully paused and called for one of his towel boys who hustled over and wiped down the mat.
“You sweat like a man,” said Jacky, as we waited. “I like that.”
“Oh?” I said, patting myself down with my own towel. “You like the sweat of men?”
He glared at me. “My wife sweats. It’s exciting.”
“Probably because you don’t. She has to make up for the two of you.”
“I don’t know why I open up to you,” he said.
“You call this opening up?” I asked. “Talking about sweat and boffing your wife?”
“Consider yourself privileged,” he said.
We went back to boxing. We did two more three-minute rounds. Near the end of the last round, I was having a hell of a time keeping my gloved fists up, and Jacky didn’t let me hear the end of it.
When we were done, Jacky leaned his bulk against the taut ropes. He removed the padded gloves from his hands. The gloves were frayed and beaten.
“Second pair of gloves in a month,” he said, looking at them with something close to astonishment.
“I’ll buy you some more,” I said.
“You’re a freak,” he said. He studied his hands. They were red and appeared to be swelling before our very eyes. “You hit harder than any man I’ve ever coached or faced. Your hand speed is off the charts. Good Christ, your form and accuracy is perfect.”
“Except that I drop my hands.”
“Not always,” he said sheepishly. “I’ve got to tell you something so that you think I’m earning my keep.”
I reached over and kissed his smooth forehead. “I know,” I said.
“You’re a freak,” he said again, blushing.
“You have no idea.”
“I pity any poor bastard who crosses your path.”
“So do I.”
He held out his hands. “Now, I need to soak these in ice.”
“Sorry about that.”
“You kidding? It’s an honor working with you. I tell everyone about you. No one believes me. I tell them I’ve got a woman here that could take on their best male contenders. They never believe me.”
Around us the sparring gym was a beehive of activity. Both boxing rings were now being used by kick boxers. Women and men were pounding the hell out of the half dozen punching bags, and the rhythmic rattling of the speed bags sounded from everywhere.
“You know I don’t like you talking about me, Jacky.”
“I know. I know. They don’t believe me anyway. You could box professionally with one hand behind your back.”
“I don’t like attention.”
“I know you don’t. I’ll quit bragging about you.”
“Thank you, Jacky.”
“The last thing I want is you pissed-off at me.”
I box for self-defense. I box for exercise. Sometimes I box because it’s nice to have a man care so vehemently whether or not my fists were up.
I kissed his forehead again and walked out.
7.
I drove north along Harbor Blvd, through downtown Fullerton and made a left onto Berkeley Street. I parked in the visitor parking in front of the Fullerton Municipal Courthouse, turned off my car, and sat there.
While I sat there, I drank water from a bottle. Water is one of the few drinks my body will accept. That and wine, although the alcohol in wine has no effect on me.
Yeah, I know. Bummer.
My hands were still feeling heavy from the boxing workout. I flexed my fingers. I couldn’t help but notice my forearms rippling with taut muscle. I like that. I worked hard for that, and it was something I didn’t take for granted.
I sat in the minivan and watched the entrance to the courthouse. There was little activity at this late hour. I wasn’t sure what I was hoping to find here but I like to get a look and feel for all aspects of a case. Makes me feel involved and informed.
And, hell, you never know what might turn up.
Two security guards patrolled the front of the building. So where had they been at the time of Kingsley’s shooting? Probably patrolling the back of the building.
Behind me was a wooded area; above that were condominiums. A bluejay swooped low over my hood and disappeared into the branches of a pine tree. A squirrel suddenly dashed along the pine tree’s limb. The jay appeared again, and dove down after the squirrel.
Can’t we all just get along?
When the guards disappeared around a corner, I got out of the van and made my way to the court’s main entrance. My legs were still shaky from the workout; my hands heavy and useless, like twin balloons filled with sand.
The courthouses consisted of two massive edifices that faced each other. Between them was a sort of grassy knoll, full of trees and stone benches. The benches were empty. The sun was low in a darkening sky.
I like darkening skies.
Shortly, I found the infamous birch tree. The tree was smallish, barely wide enough to conceal even me, let alone a big man with broad shoulders. As a shield, it was useless, as the additional bullets in Kingsley’s head attested. To have relied on it for one’s sole protection of a gun-wielding madman was horrifying to contemplate. So I did contemplate it. I felt Kingsley’s fear, recalled his desperate attempts to dodge the flying bullets. Comical and horrific. Ghastly and amusing. Like a kid’s game of cowboys and Indians gone horribly wrong.
I circled the tree and found four fairly fresh holes in the trunk. The bullets had, of course, been dug out and added to the evidence. Now the holes were nothing more than dark splotches within the white bark. The tree and Kingsley had one thing in common: both were forever scarred by bullets from the same gun.
The attack had been brazen. The fact that the shooter had gotten away clean was probably a fluke. The shooter himself probably expected to get caught, or gunned down himself. But instead he walked away, and disappeared in a truck that no one seemed to remember the license plate of. The shooter was still out there, his job left unfinished. Probably wondering what more he had to do to kill Kingsley.
A hell of a good question.
According to the doctor’s reports cited in a supplementary draft within the police report, all bullets had missed vital parts of Kingsley’s brain. In fact, the defense attorney’s only side effect was a minor loss in creativity. Of course, for a defense attorney, a lack of creativity could prove disastrous.
Someone wanted Kingsley dead, and someone wanted it done outside the courthouse, a place where many criminals had walked free because of Kingsley’s ability to manipulate the law. This fact was not lost on me.
Detective Sherbet had only made a cursory investigation into the possibility that the shooting was related to one of Kingsley’s current or past cases. Sherbet had not dug very deeply.
It was my job to dig. Which was why I make the big bucks.
I turned and left the way I had come.
8.
“So how often do you, like, feed?” asked Mary Lou.
Mary Lou was my sister. Only recently had she discovered that I was, like, a creature of the night. Although I come from a big family, she was the only one I had confided in, mostly because we were the closest in age and had grown up best friends. We were sitting side-by-side at a brass-topped counter in a bar called Hero’s in downtown Fullerton.
I said, “Often. Especially when I see a particular fine sweep of milky white neck. Like yours for instance.”
“Ha ha,” she said. Mary Lou was drinking a lemon drop martini. I was drinking house Chardonnay. Since I couldn’t taste the Chardonnay, why order the good stuff? And Chardonnay rarely had a reaction on my system, and it made me feel normal, sort of, to drink something in public with my sister.
Mary Lou was wearing a blue sweater and jeans. Today was casual day at the insurance office. This was apparently something that was viewed as good. She often talked about casual day; in fact, often days before the actual casual event.
“Seriously, Sam. How often?” she asked again.
I didn’t say anything. I swallowed some wine. It tasted like water. My tastebuds were dead, my tongue good for only talking and kissing, and lately not even kissing. I looked over at Mary Lou. She was six years older than me, a little heavier, but then again she ate a normal diet of food.
“Once a day,” I said, shrugging. “I get hungry like you. My stomach growls and I get light headed. Typical hunger symptoms.”
“But you can only drink blood.”
“You mind saying that a little louder?” I said. “I don’t think the guy in the booth behind us quite heard.”
“Sorry,” she said sheepishly.
“We’re supposed to keep this quiet, remember?”
“I know.”
“You haven’t told anyone?” I asked her again.
“No. I swear. You know I won’t tell.”
“I know.”
The bartender came by and looked at my nearly finished glass of wine. I nodded, shrugging. What the hell, might as well spend my well-earned money on something useless, like wine.
“Have you tried eating other food?” asked Mary Lou.
“Yes.”
“What happens?” she asked.
“Stomach cramps. Extreme symptoms of food poisoning. I throw it back up within minutes. Not a pretty picture.”
“But you can drink wine,” she said.
“It’s the only thing I’ve found so far that I can drink,” I said. “And sometimes not even that. Needs to be relatively pure.”
“So no red wine.”
“No red wine,” I said.
My sister, with her healthy tan, put her hand on my hand. As she did so, she flinched imperceptively from the cold of my own flesh. She squeezed my fingers. “I’m sorry this happened to you, Sis.”
“I am, too,” I said.
“Can I ask you some more questions?” she asked.
“Were you just warming me up?”
“Yes and no.”
“Fine,” I said. “What else you got for me?”
“Does the blood, you know, have to be human blood?”
“Any mammalian blood will do,” I said.
“Where do you get the blood?”
“I buy it.”
“From where?” she asked.
“I have a contract with a butchery in Norco. I buy it by the month-load. It’s in my freezer in the garage.”
“The one with the padlock?” she asked. I think her own blood drained from her face.
“Yes,” I answered.
“What happens if you don’t drink blood?”
“Probably shrivel up and die.”
“Do you want to change the subject?” she asked gently.
She knew my moods better than anyone, even my husband. “Please.”
Mary Lou grinned. She caught the attention of the bartender and pointed to her martini. He nodded. The bartender was cute, a fact not lost on Mary Lou.
“So what case are you currently working on?” she asked, stealing glances at the man’s posterior.
“You done checking out the bartender?”
She reddened. “Yes.”
So I told her about my case. She remembered seeing it on TV.
“Any leads yet?” she asked, breathless. Mary Lou tended to think that what I did for a living was more exciting than it actually was. Her drink came but she ignored it.
“No,” I said. “Just hunches.”
“But your hunches are better than most anyone’s.”
“Yes,” I said. “It’s a side effect.”
“A good side effect.”
I nodded. “Hey, if I have to give up raspberry cheesecakes, I might as well get something out of the deal.”
“Like highly attuned hunches.”
“That’s one of them,” I said.
“What else?” she asked.
“I thought we were changing the subject.”
“C’mon, I’ve never known...someone like you.”
“Don’t you mean something?”
“No,” she said. “That’s not what I mean. You’re a good mother, a good wife, and a good sister. You are much more than a thing. So tell me, what are the other side effects?”
“You saying all that just to butter me up?”
“Yes and no,” she said, grinning. “So tell me. Now.”
I laughed. “Okay, you win. I have enhanced strength and speed.”
She nodded. “What else?”
“I seem to be disease and sickness free.”
“What about shape-changing?”
“Shape-changing?”
“Yes.”
Having my sister ask if I could shape-change struck me as so ridiculous that I burst out laughing. Mary Lou watched me briefly, then caught on because she always catches on. Soon we were both giggling hysterically, and we had the attention of everyone in the bar. I hate having people’s attention, but I needed the laugh. Needed it bad.
“No,” I said finally, wiping the tears from my eyes. “I can’t shape-change. Then again, I’ve never tried.”
“Then maybe you can,” she said finally, after catching her own breath.
“Honestly, I’ve never thought about it. There’s just been too much other crap to deal with, and this...condition of mine doesn’t exactly come with a handbook.”
“So you learn as you go,” said Mary Lou.
“Yes,” I said. “Sort of like The Greatest American Hero.”
“Yeah, like him.”
We drank some more. My stomach was beginning to hurt. I pushed the wine aside.
“You ever going to tell me what happened to you?” Mary Lou’s words were forming slower. The martinis had something to do with that. “How you became, you know, what you are?”
I looked away. “Someday, Mary Lou.”
“But not today.”
“No,” I said. “Not today.”
Mary Lou turned in her stool and faced me. Her big, round eyes were glassy. Her nose was more slender than mine, but we resembled each other in every other way. We were sisters through and through.
“So how do you do it?” she asked.
“Do what?”
“Look so normal. Act so normal. Be so normal. Hell, life’s hard enough as it is without something like this coming out of left field and knocking you upside your ass. How do you do it?”
“I do it because I have to,” I said. “I don’t have a choice.”
“Because you love your kids.”
“Sometimes it’s the only reason,” I said.
“What about Danny?”
I didn’t tell her about Danny. Not yet. I didn’t tell her that my husband seemed revolted by the sight of me, that he turned his lips away lately when we kissed, that he seemed to avoid touching me at all costs. I didn’t tell her that I was sure he was cheating on me and my marriage was all but over.
“Yeah,” I said, looking away. “I do it for Danny, too.”
9.
The shower was as hot as I could stand it, which would have been too hot for most people. Some of my sensitivity had left my skin, and as a result I needed hotter and hotter showers. My husband, long ago, gave up taking showers with me. Apparently he had an aversion to the smell of his own cooking flesh.
My muscles were sore and the water helped. I was thirty-seven years old, but I looked twenty-seven, or perhaps even younger. There wasn’t a wrinkle on my pallid face. My skin was taut. Usually ice cold, but taut. My muscles were hard, but that could have been because I never stopped working out. After all, there is only so much one can lose of one’s self, and so I was determined to maintain some normalcy. Working out reminded me of who I was and what I was trying to be.
My body was still sore from boxing, but the soreness was almost gone. I heal fast nowadays, amazingly fast. Just your average, run-of-the-mill freak show.
I stood with my back to the spray and let my mind go blank. I stood there for God knew how long until an image of Kingsley and his bloody and confused face drifted into my thoughts. It had been such an angry attack. Full of pent-up rage. Kingsley had pissed off someone badly. Very badly. At one point in the shooting, the shooter had actually paused and looked at Kingsley with what had been thunderstruck awe, at least that’s how I interpreted the grainy image. The look seemed to say: How many times do I have to shoot you before you die?
I had already soaped up and washed and conditioned my hair. There was nothing left to do, and now I was only wasting water. Sighing, I turned off the shower. Rare heat rose from my skin, a pleasant change for once. My skin was raw and red, and I was in my own little piece of heaven. The kids were with their sitter, and tonight I was going out with my husband. We tried to do that more and more lately. Or, rather, I tried to do that more and more lately. He reluctantly agreed.
Early on, after my transformation, Danny had been a saint. Someone he loved (me) was hurting and confused, and he had come to my rescue like no other.
Together we had devised schemes to let the world know I was different. It was his idea to tell the world I had developed xeroderma pigmentosum, a rare, and usually fatal, skin condition. With xeroderma pigmentosum, even brief exposure to sunlight can cause irreparable damage that could lead to blindness and fatal skin cancers. People eventually accepted this about me―even my own family. Yes, I hated lying, but the way I saw it, I had little choice.
Danny helped me change careers, and helped me set up my home-based private investigation business. He also explained to the kids that mommy would often be sleeping during the day and to not bother me. Finally, he helped set me up with my feed supply with the local butchery.
Danny had been a dream. But that had been then; this was now.
So tonight we were going to dinner. I would order my steak raw and do my best to participate with him. He would avert his eyes, as usual. Not a typical relationship by any means. But a relationship, nonetheless.
I found myself looking forward to tonight. I had recently read a book about how to be a better wife, how to understand your man, how to show your love in the little ways. It’s amazing how we all forget what’s necessary to keep a loving relationship intact. Well, I was determined to show him my appreciation.
Of course, most marriages didn’t deal with the issues I have, but we would make it through, somehow.
I was still dripping and toweling off when the phone rang. I dashed out of the connecting bathroom and into the bedroom and picked up the phone on the bedside table.
“Hello,” I said.
“Hi, doll.”
“Danny!”
There was a pause, and I knew instinctively that I was going to get bad news. Call it my enhanced intuition, or call it whatever you want.
“I can’t make it tonight,” he said.
“But Danny....”
“We’re backed-up at the office. I have a court case later this week, and we’re not ready. I hope you understand.”
“Yes,” I said. “Of course.”
“I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
“I’ve got to get going. Don’t wait up.”
That was our little joke now. Of course, being a creature of the night, all I could do lately was wait up.
He hung up the phone.
10.
It was evening.
I was pacing inside the foyer of my house. The muscles along my neck were tense and stiff. Outside, through the partly open curtain, I could see the upper curve of the setting sun.
I continued to pace. Breathing was always difficult at this time of day. I was making a conscious effort to inhale and exhale, to fill my lungs as completely as I could.
In and out.
Slowly.
Keep calm, Samantha Moon. You’ll be all right.
Nevertheless, a sense of panic threatened to overcome me. The source of the panic was the sun. Or, rather, the presence of the sun. Because I did not, and could not, feel fully alive until that son-of-a-bitch disappeared behind the horizon.
I checked the curtain again. The sun was still burning away in all its glory.
Crap! Had the earth stopped in mid-orbit? Was I doomed to feel half-alive for the rest of my life?
Panic. Pure unabated panic.
I breathed.
Deeply.
Consciously.
I leaned against the door frame and closed my eyes, willing myself to relax. I reached up and rubbed my neck muscles. I continued to breathe, continued to fight the panic.
And then, after seemingly an eternity, it happened. A sense of peace and joy began in my solar plexus and spread slowly in a wave of warmth to all my extremities. My mind buzzed with happiness, pure unabated happiness, and with it the unbridled potential of the coming night. It was a natural high. Or perhaps an unnatural high. I opened my eyes and looked out the window. The sun was gone.
As I knew it would be.
* * *
The kids were with Mary Lou and her family at Chuck E. Cheese’s. I owed Mary Lou big. Danny was working late, preparing for his big court date. So what else was new?
I had not yet realized just how much my life was unraveling. It occurred to me then, as I was driving south along the 57 Freeway, that I might have to give up detecting if Danny was going to continue working so late. In the past, he would be home with the kids. Now, he rarely got home in time to see them off to bed.
The thought of not working horrified me. Like they say, idle hands are the devil’s tools. By keeping myself busy, I was able to forget some of what I had become, and to keep the nightmare of my reality at bay.
But something had to give here, and it wasn’t going to be Danny. He had made it clear long ago that this was my problem.
My windows were down. The spring evening was warm and dry. I couldn’t remember the last time we had rain. I liked the rain. Perhaps I liked the rain because I lived in Southern California. Rain here was like the elusive lover who keeps you begging for more. Perhaps if I lived up north I would not like the rain so much. I didn’t know. I’d never lived anywhere else.
I took the 22 East and headed toward the city of Orange. At Main Street I exited and drove past the big mall, and turned left onto Parker Avenue and into the parking lot of the biggest building in the area.
I took the elevator to the seventh floor. In the lobby, I was greeted by a pretty brunette receptionist. Greeted might have been too generous. Frankly, she didn’t look very much like a happy camper. She was a young girl of about twenty-five, with straight brown hair that seemed to shine like silk. My hair once shone like silk; now it hung limply. Her pink sweater knit dress was snug and form-fitting, highlighting unnaturally large breasts. Did nothing for me, but then again, I am not a man. I sensed much animosity coming from her. Waves of it. I think I knew why. She was working late, and I was part of the reason she was working late.
I gave her my most winning smile. Easy on the teeth. The nameplate on her desk read: Sara Benson.
“Hi, Sara. I’m Samantha Moon, here to see Mr. Fulcrum.”
“Mr. Fulcrum is waiting for you, Mrs. Moon. I’ll show you to his office.”
As she did so, I said, “I understand you’re going to help me tonight?”
“You understand correctly.”
“I would just like to express my gratitude. I’m sure you would rather be anywhere else but here.”
“You have no idea,” she said, and stopped before a door. “He’s in here.”
11.
Kingsley occupied a spacious corner suite, filled with lots of dark wood shelving and legal reference books. Had the blinds not been shut he would have had a grand panoramic view of Santa Ana and Orange. Thick stacks of rubberbanded folders were piled everywhere, and in one corner was a discreet wet bar. A bottle of Jack Daniel’s was sitting not-so-discreetly on the counter.
“Generally, the Jack Daniel’s stays behind the bar during office hours,” said Kingsley, moving around from behind his desk and shaking my hand, which he might have held a bit longer than protocol required. Then added, “You keep strange hours, Mrs. Moon.”
I removed my hand from his grip. “And you heal surprisingly well.”
The scar above his eye was almost gone. Indeed, it even appeared to have moved a little―to the left, perhaps―but then again Mom always told me I had an overactive imagination. He saw me looking at it and promptly turned his head.