Real Vampires Don't Sparkle (53 page)

Ten minutes later, a Volvo sedan pulled into the garage. Matheus pretended to be looking for something in the glove box. The engine of the Volvo shut off, and Matheus straightened up. He turned off the headlights, then climbed out of the car. He stood by the door, twisting his hand as though locking it.

The driver of the Volvo walked over to the elevator. The keycard reader beeped as she scanned her card.

The elevator doors opened.

Matheus hurried across the garage.

“Hold the lift!” he called, waving an arm.

The woman stopped the doors, holding them back with her foot. She smiled as Matheus mimed sliding his card through the reader.

“Thanks,” he said, as he thought,
No beep. Jesus, what if she notices there wasn’t a beep? Fuck, oh, fuck, I can’t do this.

“No problem,” said the woman. “Are you new?”

“Just transferred from London,” Matheus said.

“Welcome to Nightmare Central.”

Matheus forced a chuckle. The elevator was institutional green, the paint chipped and stained. The woman looked at him, and Matheus realized he hadn’t picked a floor.

“Oh,” he said, jerking toward the buttons and picking one at random. “I’m all out of sorts tonight.”

“I think we all are.” The woman smiled at him again. The elevator stopped, then slowly rose the last foot. “This is me. Nice to have met you.”

“Yeah, you as well.”

The doors closed behind the woman. Matheus exhaled, slumping against the elevator wall. His hands shook. The buzzing receded slightly, but the feeling of wasps under his skin remained. The bond pulled him upward. Matheus wished the bond pointed him to the correct floor, but apparently, that asked too much. Heavens forbid the supernatural version of GHB offer any convenient tips. The first floor seemed to be an office. Matheus had trouble picturing Quin tied up amidst the cubicles and photocopiers. He decided to start on the second.

The second floor consisted of a nondescript hallway, grey carpets, and white walls. The lights stung Matheus’ eyes. He kept his head down, occasionally wiping away a tear before it slid down his cheek. He stumbled as a pair of guards turned the corner. Forcing himself to keep walking, Matheus gave them a curt nod. They ignored him. Matheus took that as a good sign.

The hallway split into a T-intersection. Matheus went left. He adjusted the tire iron, sticking the end into the pocket of his pants, the bend at the top tucked into his armpit. The hallway ended at a locked door. A placard read
Containment Unit One
in thick, no-nonsense letters. Just below shoulder height was a keypad, its display illuminated with the word
locked
.

“Shit,” said Matheus. He glanced down the hall, then back at the lock. With a shrug, he pulled out the tire iron. Sometimes, he had to accept that no clever solution presented itself, and the only logical thing to do was to whack the crap out of something.

The keypad made a distressed whining sound as Matheus beat it with the tire iron. After a couple of good hits, the plastic case cracked, revealing a tangle of wire underneath. Matheus pried the case off, cursing as the jagged edge tore at his fingernails. He yanked out the wires. The keypad gave one last dying beep, then went silent and dark. The door remained closed.

“Right,” said Matheus. “Of course.”

He sighed, and wedged the end of the tire iron between the door and the jamb. He gave the tire iron a couple of kicks, then gripped the metal bar and shoved. The door groaned. Matheus pushed harder, stumbling forward as the tire iron snapped free.

“Fuck!” Matheus swung the tire iron at the door. “Open.” Swing. “You.” Swing. “Piece.” Swing. “Of—oh.”

He managed to warp the door enough to work the deadbolt loose. With the tips of his fingers, he pulled the door open, peering into the dark room beyond.

He stepped inside, closing the door after him. Twenty to one he triggered a silent alarm somewhere. Matheus hoped the guards were too busy wanking over the latest issue of
Guns and Ammo
to notice.

He blinked, waiting for his eyes to adjust. When he pulled the keypad wires, he must have taken the lights out. The sharp sting in his eyes faded as shapes aligned into being. The cracks around the door let in enough light for him to see the glass panes on both walls of a short hallway. Three cells on either side, small boxes set in the wall beside each. Dim figures populated each of the cells, rising as Matheus’ footsteps echoed over the tile. Matheus approached the first one, setting the tire iron against his shoulder.

A curvy brunette in a hospital shift sat on a bench in the cell. She looked at Matheus with no expression. Only her eyes tracked his movements.

“I’m looking for someone,” Matheus said. “Um—”

The woman stood up. In a blur of movement, she reached the glass, then pointed one light brown finger at the box in the wall. Her nail had been ripped out. A trail of blood crusted down to her wrist.

Matheus glanced away. The others had moved to the glass as well, all faces turned to him, set in the same eerie stillness Matheus associated with Quin. Matheus looked at the box instead. He pressed the button on the bottom, leaning toward the speaker.

“I’m looking for someone,” he said. “Tall, olive skin, black hair, face like a bag full of knives.”

“Quin,” said the brunette. “You came to visit Grigori.” A soft West Indies accent rolled out of the intercom.

Matheus remembered the dark-haired woman curled at Grigori’s side, her face turned away.

“Where’s Quin?” he asked.

“Let me out and I’ll tell you.” The brunette pressed her palms against the glass. Sores ringed her wrists.

“Tell me first,” said Matheus. He bounced the tire iron on his shoulder, flashing a quick look at the door.

“Don’t be stupid. The guards know you’re here. They won’t be much longer. Let me go and maybe one of us will get free.”

“One of us,” repeated Matheus.

“Preferably me.” The woman gave him a lightening smile. “Quickly. Before the guards come.”

“Jesus. Fine. Stand back.” Matheus assumed a batter’s stance in front of the glass pane. He’d never played cricket, but Bianca and Stephen had dragged him to enough games that he knew the pose. He squeezed his eyes shut as he swung. A bang reverberated through the room as the impact rippled through the glass.

“Try again,” said the brunette. “Hurry.”

Matheus moved closer to the glass and raised the tire iron.

“I better not lose an eye,” he said to the woman.

He felt the strike on the glass, then the hollow sensation of shattering through solidity into empty air. Matheus staggered, crushing some of the still-popping glass beneath his sneaker. He looked the woman in time to see the surprise flash across her face.

“Where’s Quin?” Matheus asked.

“They took him away an hour ago,” said the woman. “Give me that. I’ll get the others.”

Matheus stepped back, holding the tire iron over his head.

“I know he’s here somewhere,” he said. The bond wrapped around his stomach, bisecting his flesh with barbed wire. As far as directions went, he preferred Google maps. At least they had instructions other than, “Go that way for indeterminate miles. Your destination will be somewhere.”

“We’re staked when they move us. There’s a room….” The woman faltered. She gave a tiny shudder, then threw her shoulders back. “You can see the top of the warehouse next door. Fourth floor, I think.”

“Thank you.” Matheus tossed her the tire iron. He sprinted from the room, slapping open the damaged door and bouncing off the wall opposite. His shoes squeaked on the tile floor.

“Shit, shit,” he muttered. He took the turn toward the elevators, lab coat flapping behind him. He skidded to a halt in front of the elevator doors, just as the bell binged the car’s arrival. A screen of white-hot panic rose in Matheus’ mind.

He choked, wide-eyed and staring at the group of guards standing in front of him.

“Help me!” he screamed, waving a finger behind him. “They’re loose. They’re free. Oh, God!”

One of the guards grabbed the front of Matheus’ shirt and threw him into the elevator.

“Get to the safe zone,” said the guard. Motioning to the rest of the group, they moved down the hallway, half-crouched and fingers on triggers.

Matheus hit the
close
button like he was a telegraph operator on the Titanic. He let out a manic laugh as the elevator started to move upward. He slumped back, rubbing a hand over his face. The elevator slowed. Matheus straightened, letting out a shaky exhale. The bell chimed, and the doors opened onto the fourth floor.

Matheus stopped, blinking at the bright, cold light. From his position, he saw into a half-dozen laboratories, complete with lab-coated scientists. They looked into microscopes, scribbling notes blind, their hands gloved in purple latex. A couple fiddled with flasks and mysterious fluids, using what looked like over-sized syringes to drip the liquid onto small colored disks. Matheus jumped as a glass door to his left slid open with a hiss. Two people walked out, ignoring Matheus as they started down the hallway. Matheus ducked his head and followed them down the hall, through the future set of the next CSI show.
CSI: Undead
.

“—solutely amazing. The oldest specimen we’ve ever found. By nearly a thousand years. Imagine what it’s seen.”

Matheus’ attention snapped to the pair he trailed. He increased his pace, hoping to hear more clearly.

“It’s not here to give a history lesson,” said the other one.

It
, Matheus thought. He pressed his lips together in a tight line, his jaw aching.

“I know, but—”

“Be quiet. If he hears you talking like that, you’re out.”

“Surely, he’d understand—”

“Permanently out.” They walked past a plain door, the only one Matheus had seen not made of glass.

Matheus jolted to a stop.

Quin was behind that door.

The bond pulled tighter, barbs biting into his organs. He bit his cheek until the taste of rotten blood filled his mouth. He glanced around the glittering Advertisement For Science. He expected more black and red, leather and spikes, not the interior of a paranoid research company. The employees-cum-minions paid him no attention, busy with some evil purpose. If Matheus were still human, he might be on board with exterminating the undead. Scientists knocked out smallpox, didn’t they? On paper, getting rid of a plague on humanity seemed like a good idea. In reality, they’d captured Quin and hurt him, and Matheus felt as though his teeth were about to rattle out of his skull. Humanity could swing.

He reached for the handle, freezing as an alarm split the air. He jerked away, looking left and right. People were standing up, rushing around their labs, gathering notebooks. Doors opened up and down the hall; the air filled with questions.

“It’s a drill. It’s got to be drill, right?”

“What’s going on?”

“Didn’t we have one last week?”

“I don’t know. You think it’s a test?”

People moved around Matheus, paying him no attention. The two men he’d followed turned around, joining the crowd to the stairs.

Matheus stood frozen in the empty hall. He giggled in the silence.

The door opened into a tiny office, with two desks on either side only a couple of feet apart. Another door stood between them, padlocked shut.

Matheus snorted. Squeezing behind one of the desks, he searched out some paperclips. He twisted one in half, then began to work.

A few minutes later, the lock clicked open. Ten years ago, Matheus could open a lock like that in under forty seconds. He was out of practice.

The padlock hit the floor with a heavy
thunk
.

He opened the door.

“
Hurensohn
,” he said.

Quin lay in a modified dentist’s chair. Silver cuffs circled his wrists, ankle, and neck. Overkill, considering the wooden dowel driven through his chest. Tubes ran over his body, connecting to an I.V. bag. Tracks of needle-marks covered his arms. One hand had twisted in the cuff, the last two fingers bent completely around.

Matheus had no idea what the rest of the room looked like. He stumbled forward, numbness spreading from his fingertips. He braced one hand on Quin’s shoulder, grabbing the stake with the other. With a grunt, he yanked the dowel free.

Quin screamed, contorting into a rigid arc. His limbs shook, head wrenching side to side. He slammed down. The chair rocked with the impact, the bolts holding it in place groaning, vinyl squeaking against Quin’s skin. His knees and elbows bent and rose as though he wanted to curl into a fetal position. The metal cuffs bit into his bare wrists.

Matheus heard a pop, like someone cracking their knuckles.

Quin shrieked louder, a mountain range of broken bones dividing the back of his hand.

Matheus thrust the stake into Quin’s chest. He staggered back a step before his legs gave out.

“Mother of Christ,” he said, drawing his knees up and wrapping his arms over his legs. For less than a minute, he’d felt a fraction of what Quin felt, and his veins still burned. Faint red marks on Matheus’ skin matched where the cuffs touched Quin.

He barely noticed them, overwhelmed by the acid in his blood, eating into him from the inside out. Matheus dug his fingers into his calves, hard enough to feel the muscle fibers beneath his pants.

After a few minutes, Matheus stood up on jittery legs. He focused on removing the IVs, pinning his attention to each needle sliding from underneath Quin’s skin. His gut curled back against his spine. He shuddered as each needle’s tip broke free of Quin’s flesh.

The IVs out, Matheus shoved the tubes and rolling contraption hanging with bags into the corner. Then, he attacked the cuffs. After a couple of lost nails, and painting the air blue, Matheus realized the controls hung on the back of the chair. He hit the button, and the mechanism whirled, bending Quin into a jackknife. Matheus swore, mashing buttons and giving Quin the abdominal workout of the century.

Finally, the cuffs snapped open.

Matheus let his head drop onto the back of the chair. If they didn’t get out soon, he was going to spend the rest of eternity with a twitch and a stutter. His nerves pushed the red line. Matheus imagined them snapping with tiny pings, one after the other, like the strands of rope holding the star’s love interest over a cliff. Matheus really hoped the producers hadn’t opted for the downer ending.