The Eye of the Moon (23 page)

‘Hi Fritz, is this Dante?’ asked Cleavage as they reached at the bar.

‘YES, ZIS IS ZE YOUNG MAN VE MET LAST NIGHT. VE ARE TAKING HIM TO OUR LEADER. YOU COMING?’

‘Sure,’ said Cleavage, eyeing Dante as though he was a piece of meat. ‘Hi Dante, I’m Cleavage. People call me that ’cos I have a great cleavage. Or mebbe you didn’t notice?’

Dante hadn’t noticed much else. He was staring right down at her breasts as if they had him in a trance.

‘Great cans,’ he said out loud instead of in his head.

‘Excuse me?’

‘Nice to meet you.’ Dante reached out and shook hands with her, finally making eye contact.

Cleavage smiled back at him. She was used to people talking to her boobs all night, so she was pleasantly surprised to meet someone who even looked up. ‘This is my friend Moose,’ she said, pointing to her hideous companion.

Dante shook hands with Moose, who beamed a ridiculously gummy smile back at him.

‘People call me Moose because I put loads of the stuff in my hair to keep it like this,’ she said, patting her enormous blonde bouffant, which looked as though it was held in place with marine varnish.

‘Ha ha! Yeah, right,’ laughed Dante. A confused look came over Moose’s face, and Dante realized immediately that he shouldn’t have laughed at her. She hadn’t actually been kidding.

‘What’s so funny?’ she asked.

‘Great to meet you. You have great hair.’ Dante offered his most winning smile.

‘Aw, thanks,’ she simpered, beaming back at him. The compliment had the desired effect, erasing the previous gaffe from her memory.

In the course of all the meeting and greeting, Uncle Les, the older of the two bouncers, had made his way over to the group. Tonight, he was wearing blue jeans and a matching sleeveless denim jacket with a white T-shirt underneath. It showed off a rippling set of muscles and a six pack that was moulded by the thin T-shirt. He was in need of a shave, but no one was in a hurry to mention it.

‘If you folks ain’t gonna be buyin’ any drinks in here tonight I’m gonna have to ask you to leave,’ he said sternly.

‘We were just leaving, actually,’ said Obedience. ‘We’re heading for Vanity’s place. If Silence or Déjà-Vu turn up, can you tell ’em where we are?’

‘I might.’

‘Thanks.’ Obedience turned to the others. ‘C’mon. Let’s get outta here, before things turn ugly.’

Uncle Les took a look at Moose. ‘Bit late for that, ain’t it?’ he quipped. Fortunately Moose was incredibly thick-skinned, and was so certain of her attractiveness that his spiteful remark went over her head.

The group made their way out of the Nightjar, Fritz leading them down the quiet street towards the Swamp, a strip club owned by Vanity. Dante hung back with Obedience.

‘Reckon that bouncer’s a Grade-A prick, ain’t he?’ Dante ventured.

‘Yeah, but he’s a real badass. You wouldn’t wanna mess with him, trust me,’ the vampire replied.

‘Yeah?’

‘Oh yeah, he’s a hardass, all right.’

‘He ain’t no Wade Garrett, though, is he?’

‘Who the fuck’s Wade Garrett?’

Dante shook his head in disgust. ‘It don’t matter.’

‘Well, maybe they should employ this Garrett character down here. Lord knows we could do with someone to keep all the fuckin’ werewolves out.’

‘You don’t like werewolves?’

Obedience was clearly surprised that Dante even had to ask.
‘Shit no!
Do you?’

‘No.’

‘Good. Those hairy stinking muthafuckers should stick to their own side of town. Last thing we need is the likes of MC Pedro in the Nightjar trying to rap with The Psychics. Fuckin’ nightmare, that was.’

Dante carried on walking along at the rear with Obedience. It was unnerving that every question he seemed to ask had an answer that he felt any vampire worth his salt was supposed to know. How the hell was he going to find out anything about the Eye of the Moon or Peto, or any crap about the clans, without sounding like a fool? Or, worse, an impostor.

Well, there was probably no way of asking without looking stupid. And since he was never normally one to worry about making an ass of himself, he just asked.

‘So tell me, Obedience. Any idea where the Eye of the Moon is these days?’

‘What?
’

‘The Eye of the Moon. Y’know, that blue …’

‘I heard what you said.’ Obedience stopped dead in his tracks in the street and grabbed Dante by the arm, holding him back until the other three vampires were safely out of earshot. ‘Don’t let Vanity hear you ask any shit like that. In fact, don’t you let anyone else hear that kind of talk, either. Talk like that’ll get you killed quicker than a silver crucifix will. People here don’t talk about that stone. Brings nothing but misery with it. And if you’re asking about it, people are gonna think you have it, or know something about where it is. And that ain’t good.’

‘Shit, man, I’m sorry. I didn’t know.’

‘Don’t worry about it.’ Obedience started walking again. ‘Just don’t ask anyone any questions, man. Ever. I introduced you to the clan. If you show me up I’ll be in deep shit. Just be polite when Vanity asks you anything and keep your answers brief. Don’t ask any questions yourself. Keep it simple and he’ll initiate you into the clan. Okay?’

‘Okay. I can do simple. Simple’s my middle name.’

Obedience stopped again and took off his shades to reveal
deep-set dark brown eyes. ‘Man, you’re nervous tonight, Dante. You were cool last night. Now you’re like a bag of cats, all fucking edgy and shit. What the fuck’s up with you?’

‘Aah, y’know, I just haven’t had a drink yet, and I wanna make a good impression when I meet this guy Vanity. Just a bit of nerves, I guess. Nothing a few shots of tequila won’t cure.’

‘Right. Fuck it,’ said Obedience. ‘Let’s stop in at the Painted Lady and have a few drinks there first. You can ask me all the stupid questions you like, get them out of your system. I’ll prep you on what not to say when you meet Vanity, and we can get tanked up while we’re there. How’s that sound?’

‘Yeah! Sounds great, man. The Painted Lady, I ain’t never heard of that place.’

‘It’s an underground joint. They got all sorts there. Alcohol, drugs, gambling, strippers and tattoos.’

‘Tattoos?’

‘Yeah, it’s a tattoo parlour by day, which is why it’s called the Painted Lady. How about getting a cool tattoo on your arm? I know Vanity’s got one of our jackets waiting for you at the Swamp. It’d be kinda rude not to have some ink on your arm to show off when you’re wearing it.’

‘Cool. I’ve always wanted a tattoo.’ Dante had visions of surprising Kacy by getting her name tattooed on his arm. She’d love that. Might even cheer her up a bit.

What actually happened when they got to the Painted Lady wouldn’t have pleased Kacy at all. Dante and Obedience stayed a little too long. They drank too much. They dabbled in some drugs and they watched the strip shows.

And when they were done with all that, Dante, in his drunken state, made a horrific error of judgement.

The report compiled by Stephanie Rogers contained all the information that De La Cruz, Benson and Hunter required on the whereabouts of the Bourbon Kid. She had dug deep, and where so many others had failed, she had come up with an answer. For almost eighteen years a man with no name had been resident at the local mental hospital. He was living there not as a patient, but as a lodger, having checked in there shortly after Halloween eighteen years earlier.

Although the three detectives were scared of no one, they saw no need to go and collect the Bourbon Kid themselves when they could pay someone else to carry out the task for them. Muscle for hire. Specifically, the two most reliable contract musclemen in Santa Mondega: Igor the Fang and MC Pedro. They weren’t just strong, they were super strong. And supernatural. Werewolves, sent to do a vampire’s job with the promise of a few sips of blood from the Holy Cup in exchange for their services. De La Cruz had briefed them, but, lowlife that he was, he hadn’t mentioned to them that the man they were to break out of the mental hospital was in fact – if their information was correct – the son of Ishmael Taos. A man also known as the Bourbon Kid.

Igor parked their camper van in the far corner of the main parking lot outside Dr Moland’s Hospital. The top half of the van had been sprayed blue, but the lower half was a pea-green colour, due to a botched respraying job a few weeks earlier, when they had run out of paint halfway through. It was nearly midnight, but even in the dark the two-tone effect was clearly visible.

The parking lot wasn’t well lit, and with a bone-chilling wind coming in from the ocean it was unlikely that too many people would be loitering around outside a hospital that happened to be situated in the middle of an area of deserted wasteland. The lot had just over forty spaces, but there were only three other vehicles in it and they were all parked out front in the special ‘reserved for staff’ slots. Now was as good a time as any to break a patient out.

Both men pulled balaclavas over their faces, then tiptoed their way up to the glass doors of the hospital’s front entrance. Igor led the way, his huge, six-foot-five-inch frame hardly the best qualification for a discreet approach. MC Pedro, shorter by nine inches, followed, stooped over and trying to keep his face out of sight of any hidden cameras by covering it with his thin hairy hands. He was the smart one of the two, although only in terms of self-advancement and self-preservation. Igor was fearless because of his size, so being seen and identified bothered him less. Pedro was sneakier, and happily allowed his partner to take the lead, letting him be the first to deal with any problems they might encounter.

Pedro’s sneakiness had allowed him to climb the ladder of power among werewolves. He stuck to the simple-minded Igor like glue, using the giant as a kind of unofficial personal bodyguard. It wasn’t that Pedro couldn’t handle himself, it was just that he liked to work his way up the ladder unnoticed, picking off his enemies by first gaining their trust. Whereas if Igor ever chose to try to better himself, all he had to do was use his fists. As things currently stood in the undead world, he was unwittingly using his fists to help Pedro advance himself.

The light from the moon shimmered down on them as they crept along. Luckily it was not yet a full moon, so there was no chance of them turning hairy halfway through the operation.

The main hospital building was three storeys high, the outside painted from top to bottom in a calming light blue colour, although they could not see that in the fitful moonlight. The huge glass double doors at the front entrance were closed,
which was normal not just for this time of night, but at any time. The winds in this region were biting and the place was exposed to the elements, so the doors were almost always kept closed. Igor sized them up as he approached. It was going to take a superhuman effort to knock them down. But then, he
was
superhuman, so there shouldn’t be any problem.

In order to help them sneak in unseen, the pair of them had dressed in black jeans and black sweaters that matched their balaclavas. The effort they had put into dressing themselves as shadows was entirely wasted, however, when one of the massive doors was suddenly shattered by a single kick of the big black boot on Igor’s right foot. Before the glass had even hit the floor, he was striding menacingly through the frame and up to the reception desk. Pedro, spotting the word ‘Pull’ on the undamaged door, was pleasantly surprised to find that it opened easily. He stepped over a few shards of glass on the tiled floor and proceeded to follow his partner into the building.

The desk was manned by a forty-something, bored-out-of-his-mind former doctor named Devon Hart. He had worked as receptionist there for over six years and had seen all kinds of crazy shit go on at night, so this intrusion didn’t particularly faze him. He was reading a book called
The Mighty Blues
by Sam McLeod, and was enjoying it too much to care about the shattered glass and the two thugs who had approached his desk.

‘We’re closed, you know,’ he sighed, without looking up. ‘And if you don’t leave immediately I’ll call security.’

‘Thatta fact? Well, I got news for ya, homeboy, we
are
security,’ snarled MC Pedro.