Blood Crimes: Book One (19 page)

      “Donald, you never cease to amaze me. Have you found where he’s staying yet?”

      “Not yet. But I did find someone who saw
Jim
’s girlfriend. Can I talk frankly?”

      “Of course,” she said, but with that crackling glass quality edging into her voice. The sound of it made Hayes’ heart beat just that much faster, and once again he found himself sweating. He knew he was making a mistake, but he told her his theory on how the girlfriend was used as bait to lure the victim into a dark alley. “I think he uses her with all these killings,” he said.

      
M
ore glass crackling as she asked whether he had shared this speculation of his with anyone else.

      “No, and I’m not going to.”

      “Go on.”

      Hayes wiped his brow, felt his heart skip in his chest. “I think
Jim
is killing people and drinking their blood.”

      No response from Serena. Just dead silence. Hayes wiped a handkerchief along the back of his neck, continued, “These people being killed are all missing a lot of blood. Another thing they have in common is they’re all lowlifes, dregs of society. In Kansas City the word on the street was a vampire did the killing. Police are discounting that as nonsense, but I have a gut feeling someone saw the killing, and saw
Jim
drinking the victim’s blood.”

      “Donald, my advice is spend your energies finding which motel
Jim
is staying at and to quit wasting them on this kind of speculation. It is not anything you would ever be able to prove, and would not be beneficial for you if you could.”

      Hayes’ heart was racing. Her tone had changed to something artificially friendly, but there was an underlying threat to it.

      “Understood,” he said, his voice cracking.

      “Good. And drink some water. Your voice sounds a bit froggy. Call me as soon as you find him.”

      She hung up, and Hayes stood for a long moment feeling shaky inside, especially his heart which was fluttering like a butterfly. Why the fuck did he have to bring that up? What the fuck was the matter with him? He gritted his teeth as if he were in pain, then went back to his car where he cracked open a Cleveland yellow pages that he had picked up earlier and found its motel section. There were a lot of divey low-cost motels listed, especially around the airport. This was going to take a while. He called his office and spoke with
Ann
ie. She had faxed the drawing to all the motel’s that had fax machines and was overnighting copies to the rest. She had already called half of them and out of those fifteen of the desk clerks claimed the girl was staying with them. “That’s what a ten grand reward’s going to get you,” she added. “I was surprised I actually talked to people who were willing to admit they hadn’t seen her.”

      “Restores your faith in humanity, don’t it?”

      “You bet’cha.”

      
Ann
ie gave him the list of leads, and told him she’d keep on it. Using a city map, Hayes located where the motels were and started with the ones closest to the airport. He had crossed six of the motels off his list when he heard the news report over the radio about a man found dead in a movie theatre, his body savagely mutilated. The newscaster didn’t specify how the body was mutilated, but did state that the police were considering it “one of the most vicious and depraved murders in recent Cleveland history”. As far as Hayes was concerned that said something.

      
One of the most vicious and depraved murders in recent Cleveland history.

      All he could think of was
Jim
, and a vivid image of
Jim
’s drawing crystallized in his mind. A large part of the murder didn’t fit—the fact that it took place so soon after the other murder and that it happened in the middle of the day and in public. In the past the bodies would be left hidden so they wouldn’t be discovered for days, and Hayes was sure that there were plenty of corpses that still hadn’t been found. As much as this murder didn’t fit, he couldn’t shake the feeling that this was
Jim
’s work, and more than that, that something very wrong had happened to cause it and that more killings were on the way. He looked up the address for the Cineplex and put down his list of third-rate fleabag motels. 
 

Chapter 8
 

      
Jim
sat grimly waiting for Pearce’s phone to ring. Pearce had already called Raze to tell him most of the money was accounted for. Before
Jim
was willing to set up an exchange he wanted to talk with Carol to make sure she was okay. According to Raze she was still in transit, but he’d be calling back within the hour. That was forty minutes ago.
Jim
shifted his gaze to the biker, who appeared calm and unconcerned.
Jim
doubted he’d be so relaxed if he understood that if the call didn’t come in the next twenty minutes pieces of him were going to be ripped off until he told
Jim
where Raze and the rest of his biker gang could be found.

      Pearce’s cell phone rang.

      
Jim
nodded to him to answer it. Pearce flipped the phone open, listened intently and handed it to
Jim
.

      “Zeke’s all over the news,” Raze said.

      “At least you now know what you’re dealing with.”

      “You fucking asshole.”

      “Again, at least you know what you’re dealing with. Let me talk to Carol.”

      
Jim
heard some talking in the background, then the sound of a woman gasping.

      “Carol! Are you okay?”
Jim
yelled, his body tensing as he prepared to do worse to Pearce than they could possibly be doing to Carol.

      There was some coughing, then Carol telling him she was okay. “They just took a rag out of my mouth,” she said.

      “They haven’t hurt you?”

      “Not too much.”

      “What do you mean not too much?”

      She was pulled away from the phone and Raze was back on.

      “Quit your worrying,” Raze said. “We haven’t done nothin’ to her yet. Just a few bumps and bruises from her traveling. It’s not too comfortable riding in the trunk of a car. Where we doin’ the exchange?”

      “At the airport.”

      “Uh uh,” Raze said. “As I told you, Zeke’s all over the news. The cops could have your description and there could be an all points out on you. It’s going to have to be someplace more private.”

      “Bring her to my motel.”

      “We can do that, Champ.”

      
Jim
gave him the address of the motel and his room number.

      “I want Carol here in fifteen minutes. Otherwise Pearce is dead and I start hunting for you,”
Jim
said. “When your guys get here, you let her go, and once she’s in the room safe with me, I let Pearce go with the money. There’s no other door to the room, so there’s no other place for me to sneak out to. You want to ask Pearce about that?”

      “Don’t need to, Champ, your word’s good with me.”

      “Anything other than that happens and it’s going to get ugly.”

      “Don’t worry, Champ. Fifteen minutes. We’ll be there. Just don’t fuck things up on your end.”

      Raze hung up.
Jim
handed the phone back to Pearce, then sat back and watched how relaxed Pearce appeared. He knew what they were planning. Once Carol was in the room with him and they had their money they were going to storm the room and massacre the two of them—or maybe kill
Jim
and take Carol to sell into white slavery. It wouldn’t work out that way—if they tried something like that
Jim
would kill them, but they didn’t know what he was, so they thought it would be a cakewalk. He glanced again at Pearce and saw how the biker could barely contain his smirk.
Jim
had no doubt that was what was going to happen. Fine. It didn’t matter. As long as he had Carol back safely, it didn’t matter how many of these bikers he would have to kill.

      He moved over to the window and pushed the curtains aside enough so he could look out.

      “You don’t like sunlight much, do you?” Pearce asked.

      
Jim
kept his stare out the window.

      “Only thing you should be worrying about is whether your buddies try something stupid, because if they do you’re going to be wishing you were in Zeke’s place.”

      “I’m not worried.”

      
Jim
didn’t bother responding. Five minutes later he heard the roar of Harleys. Not too long after that he saw them. Two bikes pulled up, both riders were big guys, both showing the same tattoos that the other gang members had. Carol was not with them. From out of the corner of his eye
Jim
saw Pearce’s smirk widening.
Jim
broke a hole through the window with the butt end of the .45 he had taken off Zeke.

      “Where’s Carol?” he yelled.

      One of the bikers put a hand to his ear as if he couldn’t hear him. Both of them kept coming closer. The barrel of a sawed-off showed from under one of their leather jackets. They were moving faster now as they took their guns out.
Jim
raised his .45 to take out the closest of the two but Pearce rushed him, stabbing at him with a knife that he must’ve had hidden in one of his boots. The point of the blade hit him in the cheek, and if he were a normal human being it would’ve cut through to the bone. Instead it bounced off the same as if his skin were coated with metal. Pearce’s fist flew backwards, and he ended up hitting himself in the face. The biker fell to the floor as if he’d been sucker-punched by a heavyweight.

      The door was kicked open. The biker with the sawed-off leveled the weapon at
Jim
’s chest and pulled the trigger. The other biker had pulled out a Glock and was firing at him. The force of the bullets knocked
Jim
against the wall. He hit it hard, then tumbled to the floor.

      “Piece of shit asshole,” the biker with the Glock spat out. He fired a couple of more shots at
Jim
’s body. One of the bullets ricocheted and took off the tip of his pinky finger.

      “What the fuck?” he started, but before he could say anything else,
Jim
had gotten to his knees. He dove forward and knocked the biker to the floor, then crawled on top of him. With a small twist of his shoulders he separated the biker’s head from his body. The other biker, the one with the sawed-off, was helping Pearce to his feet. When he saw what happened to his buddy, his jaw dropped open, his eyes quickly turning glassy. Pearce grabbed the shotgun from him and got off another round, again knocking
Jim
off his feet. Then Pearce slapped the other biker who he was calling Ash out of his stupor and the two of them ran from the room.

      
Jim
pulled himself back to his feet and heard both of the Harley’s engines being gunned. He was still holding the dead biker’s head. In a heartbeat he was outside, throwing a fastball at Pearce. The biker ducked at the right moment and the bowling ball-sized head missed him by inches.
Jim
started running. It was almost five, and while the sun wasn’t as intense as earlier, it still hurt like hell, but he ignored it and kept running, moving a lot faster than either biker could’ve expected. A block later he had gained on them, and was now in stride with Ash. The biker pulled a 9 mm from his waistband, but before he could get a shot off
Jim
threw himself at him, hitting him with a solid tackle. They went down hard, the Harley skidding across the street and taking them with it. A Land Rover slammed on its brakes and tried swerving out of the way but still went over Ash’s skull, crushing it like a grape.
Jim
rolled away. He collected himself, saw the biker was dead, and went through his pockets taking out a wallet and a cell phone. The driver of the Land Rover was a woman in her seventies with reddish-orange hair. She wore skintight black leotards and knee-high leather boots which made her look like an eggplant with long straws sticking out of it. Her cosmetically-caked face looked aghast as she explained how there was nothing she could do to avoid the man she ran over.
Jim
ignored her, pushed the Harley back up and went after Pearce.

      Pearce had a block and a half lead on him.
Jim
gunned the Harley’s engine and squeezed in and out between cars, sometimes driving on the other side of the street, at other times pulling the bike onto the sidewalk and sending pedestrians scattering. Pearce tried to do the same, but he had lost his nerve and kept looking over his shoulder which slowed him down. His bike fishtailed taking a turn and by the time he righted himself
Jim
had made up the lost ground and was alongside him. He was about to launch himself at Pearce when the biker saved him the trouble by wiping out. Both Pearce and the Harley skidded along the road leaving a streak of rubber, blood and skin behind. After thirty yards, the bike hit a hydrant and knocked it over.
Jim
got off the Harley and checked on Pearce.
M
ost of the skin from Pearce’s face had been torn off and there wasn’t much left to recognize him from. One eye was missing, the other was fluttering, and the little skin that was left was as white as milk. He was going fast. Water from the busted hydrant soaked
Jim
and washed away a thick stream of blood oozing from the biker.