Predator and Prey Prowlers 3 (13 page)

Fortunately, that was really the FBI’s job.

He stood up again, studying the inside of the trunk. The body had clearly been dumped there, but anyone could have done that, even a human. Someone might have found the body and put it there. Cantwell, Jack, and Courtney had all been involved in taking Tanzer down. More than likely this was a warning to put them on alert that they were targeted for payback, but that was just a guess.

“All right,” he said, turning to the crime scene analysts who had been working on the site already. “Sorry for the interruption. You’ll all have instructions from Al Pratt on how to handle the remains and the evidence in this case. Do nothing until you hear from him.” Like Lieutenant Boggs, Pratt, who headed up the forensics team, had dealt with Prowler murders before, and could keep a secret. Castillo strode away from the scene and back to the rear entrance to the pub, where Cantwell stood with the Dwyer siblings, observed at a distance by a pair of uniforms.

“All right, Mr. Cantwell. Why don’t we go down to the division and talk about all of this?”

The kid, Jack, stared at him. “Is that really necessary?”

Castillo studied him. Once upon a time he had felt bad for the kid. His best friend had been one of the first people murdered by Tanzer’s pack when they started hunting in Boston. But it turned out Jack Dwyer had some secrets of his own, the biggest one being that he could talk to the dead. He and his friend Molly Hatcher had killed Tanzer themselves, which was a major mark in their favor in Castillo’s book. But Jack talking to ghosts was still about the creepiest thing Castillo had ever run across. Though he had once told the kid to call him Jace, he was glad Jack had gone back to
detective.

Castillo glanced at Courtney and Cantwell, then back at Jack. When he spoke, he made certain to whisper so that his voice would not carry to his fellow officers. “If this guy turns out to be a transient or something, or if it turns out there weren’t any witnesses, it’s not impossible to make all the evidence collected disappear. Trust me, it wouldn’t be the first time.”

“Jesus,” Courtney muttered. When Castillo stared at her, she brushed at the air. “No, no. I mean, of course that’s best. It just amazes me, the size of the conspiracy that requires. That it’s been kept so quiet all this time.”

“It isn’t difficult to hide the truth from people if they don’t want to believe it in the first place,” the detective replied, glancing along the alley at Pepper, who caught him looking and glared. “But this is a human corpse, not some monster we can just incinerate. If there were witnesses, we’re going to have to account for what happened here somehow. That means we have to conduct it like a criminal investigation. Forensics, everything.”

He turned to Bill. “It also means that once the other detectives arrive, I’m going to want you to come back to the division with me to give a more formal statement about all this.”

The burly bartender stiffened, a dangerous look in his eyes. Both Jack and Courtney moved closer to him as though they felt the need to protect him somehow.

“I didn’t do anything,” Cantwell said sharply.

“Probably not,” Castillo allowed. “But it’s my job to investigate, and that’s what I’m going to do. Are you going to give me a problem with that?”

Cantwell bristled, but he shook his head. “No. I’m ready when you are.”

The security system in Bridget’s Irish Rose Pub was like millions of other similar setups in homes and small businesses all across America. Ninety-nine percent of its effectiveness came from its mere existence. The average small-time burglar, second-story man, or crackhead willing to B&E for a fix would see the symbols for the security company on the doors and windows and not give the place a second look. In reality, a handful of stickers would probably deter most would-be thieves without actually even activating the system.

On the other hand, anyone who really wanted to get inside a home or building was going to find a way, depending on the level of their determination. In some cases, they might risk setting off the alarm in hopes they could be in and gone before the cops arrived. Or, if they had the skill and the patience, they might be able to find a way to circumvent the system altogether. There were expensive high-tech devices that could do exactly that.

Dallas didn’t like to spend money on that kind of crap. The tech stuff was too unreliable, too sensitive to being jostled or jarred.

He stood in the alley that ran parallel to Nelson Street, downwind, and watched as a police detective took Bill Cantwell away. It was precisely his plan—more of a hope, really. This way, he knew that Cantwell would be otherwise occupied. One-stop shopping for his real targets, no waiting.

There were other vehicles there, of course—police, a tow truck, a crime scene team, and someone from the Medical Examiner’s office. But Dallas was patient. When the last police car was out of sight, Dallas let the minutes tick by. Ten, fifteen, twenty. Enough for the rest of the people in the apartment above the pub to slip back into bed, maybe even fall asleep. If it were earlier, he would have worried more about them staying up to talk about what had happened to Cantwell. But at this hour, he banked on their going back to bed.

A warm breeze blew back his long, straight hair, but he liked that. It made him feel as though, even in the midst of all the steel and concrete around him, the wild was ever present. No matter how much humanity had scarred the face of the earth, nature, the wilderness, was still there beneath and above it all.

A single light burned in a window on the apartment level of the building. The restaurant took up two stories, he knew. The third story was where they all lived. When the light blinked out, he padded silently across the alley. When he had put the corpse in Cantwell’s trunk, he had spotted a broken table up against the Dumpster. The table was still there, two shattered legs and a long crack down the middle. Fortune had smiled on him; the garbage collectors had not been around to pick it up yet.

Still wearing the masque of humanity, Dallas sniffed at the air and peered around the alley. When he was certain he was not observed, he lifted the table and propped its two unbroken legs against the base of the wall, so that it sat at an angle next to the building. Just beneath the fire escape. It took strength to do such a thing silently, but a Prowler had the physical power for that and more.

Carefully, he scaled the smooth face of the table and balanced his feet precariously on the edge that jutted upward. Dallas splayed his hands against the brick wall and stood up straight. The ladder that ought to have protruded from the bottom of the fire escape was missing, as though it had been removed to help deter the possibility of just such an intrusion. But standing upon the table, it was a simple thing for Dallas to thrust himself upward and wrap his right hand around the iron grating of the fire escape.

His left hand came up, fingers slipping into the grating as well. He had seen the humans within, the Dwyer siblings and the Hatcher girl, moving about for a time, while he waited, but then lights had been turned off and it seemed all of them had at last returned to their beds. Still, he could not be sure they were sleeping. Intent upon stealth, he moved slower than he could have, pulled himself soundlessly up into the fire escape and then climbed the ladder to the top. The window there was barred.

Even a determined thief would likely have been turned away by those bars.

But Dallas was not a thief.

Outside the window he caught the scents of those within and a bloodlust rose in him. His heart began to thunder in his chest and his human skin began to feel tight, constrictive around him. His body yearned for the change, the freedom of revealing his true self. With a quick shudder, he let his tongue slip out, slide over his teeth, and he tasted the night, and the flavor of his prey in the air.

The beast within surged forth, but Dallas forced it back down. It was no simple feat, but he had practiced controlling himself and focusing his bloodlust for decades. He was not some foolish animal, controlled only by instinct and savagery. Not like the others of his kind. Dallas was an assassin, a calculating killer, a cunning taker of lives. And it was that calm killer, not the savage beast, who refused to be deterred. He had taken on this job, and even without the help in finding his daughter that Jasmine had promised, even without the money involved, he would have followed through.

With a low rumble in his chest that only he could hear, Dallas stepped onto the window ledge, then up to the railing at the top of the fire escape, then onto the tiny lip on top of the window. His arms shot up and he gripped the edge of the roof with his fingers, then hauled himself up with only the hush of his clothes against the brick to give him away.

On top of the roof he walked only on the edge to avoid any sound below. The window at the top of the fire escape had been barred, but the others were not. Once, twice, three times he stopped to dangle himself headfirst over the edge of the roof. He saw Jack Dwyer shifting fitfully in bed, uncovered, sweating with the heat of the night, when even the breeze through his window must be unpleasant. His sister had an air conditioner in her window, and Dallas could see that the door was open, but the cool air did not seem to help much in the rest of the apartment. He could not tell if Courtney Dwyer was awake, but he suspected she would be the most likely to have trouble falling back to sleep. Cantwell was her lover, after all, or so Dallas had been told.

The third window that he hung down and peered through led into the kitchen. It was empty and quiet save for the tick of the moon-and-stars clock that the Prowler’s eyes could make out on the wall, even in the dark. The window was wide open to let in the breeze, but there was a screen. How simple it would have been to tear the screen out with his hand. But that would be too loud. Though he had no doubt he could kill them all even if they knew he was coming, Jasmine had warned him that these humans were formidable and seemingly fearless. They had killed Tanzer, after all.

So, caution.

Dallas retreated back to the roof and removed a small pair of wire cutters from his pocket. He had expected screens. Hanging once again from the edge of the roof, he cut away the bottom corners of the screen slowly, methodically. Finished, he slipped the wire cutters back onto the roof then reached into the two holes he had made in the screen and undid the latches that held the frame in place. Carefully, he popped the screen inward and set it gently aside.

Swiftly, flesh tingling with anticipation, he turned around and lowered his feet down onto the windowsill, then slipped through.

He was inside.

For a seemingly endless span of moon-and-stars ticks, Dallas simply stood in the kitchen, inhaling the scents of life, of this odd family, their cooking and their dirty laundry and the sweat of their emotions. Silence reigned. Nothing moved. He could hear the hum of the air conditioner in the next room.

Quickly now he went into the hall. Outside the door to Courtney’s room he paused, then glanced around the edge, ready to pounce if she noticed him. Ready to change, to tear out of his human skin and then to savage her. A tiny grin slipped across his features.

That was one of the few things he liked about the human form. It felt good to smile, especially when it was a smile of pleasure rather than amusement.

Courtney lay on her side, turned away from the door. The sheet barely covered her, and he admired her still form a moment, thought what a shame it would be to have to kill her. But he had a reputation to uphold and had long ago dismissed any real regret for his victims. Or, at least, any regret that might hold him back.

Soft and precious in a cotton pajama top, Courtney’s chest rose and fell with a gentle rhythm. She might have been awake, staring into the darkness, or trying to will herself to forget the events of the night long enough to drift off. But he thought she was already there, already sleeping.

Dallas would come back to her.

He slipped along the hall, wary of the open door at the far end where Jack had his room. Halfway along the corridor, on the side opposite Courtney’s room, he caught the scent of the other female, Molly Hatcher. Dallas moved through the darkened apartment and slipped into the girl’s room. Though the air conditioner in Courtney’s room was turned up high, still it was too warm. Molly was sprawled in a tangle of sheets, her red hair in a wild spray around her head. Her eyes were closed and her lips parted in a strangely seductive display of innocence.

Asleep.

The T-shirt she had worn to bed was rucked up to expose her gently sloping belly, a stretch of pale, smooth, perfect flesh that made Dallas growl low in his chest, despite the risk. He felt fur begin to sprout through his false human visage and his teeth grew longer, sharper. The lure of that perfect, creamy white skin would have presented him a great challenge if he had still needed to control himself.

But the time for control had passed.

Her life would pass into him as he tore her flesh apart, as her blood spattered his fur.

Dallas slipped farther into Molly’s room and the change came over him. He could feel the skin tear as his fur pushed up from beneath, as his limbs restructured themselves in a shifting of bone unlike any other possible in creation. The false human skin flaked off and sifted down to the floor in a fine dust. Part of the transformation, particularly the elongation of his jaws and the thrusting up of fangs, was painful, but it was a glorious pain, as though with every fiber of his being he were reaching back to the primal heart of his ancestors.

His nostrils flared, his pointed ears twitched. He breathed in this human girl, this prey. Slightly crouched, he moved to the edge of the bed, tilted his head at an angle, and watched for a moment the way she slept, the simplicity of it. There was human prey that tasted awful, like some wretched refuse.

But just looking at this girl, he knew she would be succulent.

Dallas crouched low over her, the growl rising in his chest, becoming just a little louder. He brushed the hair from her face and waited for her to open her eyes, to look up at him.