Blood Cursed (Rogue Angel) (18 page)

An hour didn’t give her much time. And she had to be prepared for the worst.

Reaching the burned-out dig site and her rental car, she inspected the ashes, but found no sign of bone shards. It had been worth a look. Not even the skeletons in the wall of dirt had survived.

Before driving away she called Luke. “Pack your things, and be ready to vacate in half an hour,” she said to him.

“What’s wrong, Annja?”

“Santos may be involved, and he’s developed an urgent need to make sure I leave the city, dead or alive. And I suspect his hatred for me will extend to you and Doug.”

“Gotcha.”

“I’m putting Doug on a plane back to the States.”

“And you and me?”

“Haven’t figured that one out yet. But be waiting outside the hotel for me, will you?”

“Absolutely.”

She hung up, then took a moment to lament the damaged dig site and the destroyed bones. Thankfully they had the skull, which could tell them a lot about the person it had once been part of. The entire skeleton would have told a much richer story. It was a significant loss to the archaeology community.

If indeed the skeletons had been older than a couple decades, which was now in question.

For some reason, superstition was driving a dark force in this area and perhaps even feeding its power.

A business opportunist would have a field day with a situation like this.

What was it Bracks wanted from the Roma people?

Chapter 15

“I got a translation for the words I found on the paper in the brick,” Luke said as he loaded his supplies into the back of Annja’s rental Jeep. Doug had been granted the honor of holding the carefully packed and wrapped skull, and he had already seated himself in the back. “It’s a blessing!”

Annja wedged her backpack among the men’s things, and swung around to climb behind the wheel. “Hop in. We’ve got to move. It’s been over an hour, and I’m not so sure Santos can tell time.”

“So we’re running with our tails between our legs?” Doug asked from the back.

“Last time I checked I didn’t have a tail,” Annja said. “I don’t know about your physical problems, Doug, but maybe you should keep them to yourself.”

He laughed.

“Sometimes it’s better to retreat,” she added. “There’s already been a fire. And the funeral is taking place as we speak. I won’t be going far. Just to Liberec.” She glanced at Luke. “A blessing, eh? You sure about that?” She pulled out of the hotel parking lot, navigating the quiet streets out of town and through a barren stretch of land sandwiched between hills and flood-eroded silt mounds. The rearview mirror showed a clear road behind them.

“Chester Rumshaven is the foremost expert of Romani dialects, so yes, I’m sure. And it was probably placed in the brick by whoever buried the guy,” Luke said. “I’m calling him a him until we learn more. He—the skull, not the person who buried it—had big mandibles, so it’s a guess. Anyway, the one who buried the body must have thought a few kind words might keep him down. As opposed to a curse.”

“Apparently it worked, until a natural disaster unearthed the bones,” Annja said.

“Yes, either that, or as Doug posited, the blessing was meant to lure the deceased into the daylight where presumably it would be burned because of the undead’s fear of the sun. However that works.”

“Too bad we can’t convince the Romas of the efficacy of the blessing,” Annja said. “They might start looking for other reasons why their children are being kidnapped. Another boy was taken early this morning.”

“No, really? That’s definitely not the work of a mythical creature. What did you learn?”

“A woman who lives in the house behind Santos’s home reported her son Marcus was gone. She’s pregnant, too. Very sad. I suspect Santos is in on this. He’s acting suspicious.”

“Is that the same suspicion that left a cut on your neck?” Doug asked from the backseat.

“Yes. And reason enough to want to leave town to give me a chance to think this through.”

Annja hadn’t noticed she’d been injured. She glanced in the rearview mirror and touched her neck where she’d sustained a nasty scrape during her scuffle with Santos—and spied the billowing cloud of dust fast approaching behind them on the road.

“Hang on, boys, company has arrived.”

She pressed her foot down on the accelerator. Their pursuers probably couldn’t win a race out here on this rutted, gravel road in an old Jeep. The vehicle behind them looked like one of the wrecks from Santos’s yard.

Somehow, though, the Jeep was gaining on them fast. When the first bullet hit their rear taillight, Annja took evasive action, swerving back and forth.

“Get down, Doug!”

“I’m down!”

“Luke!”

“You think it’s Santos?”

“I know it is.” Annja couldn’t handle this situation from behind the wheel. “You’re going to have to drive, Luke. I have a gun in the glove compartment. Slide over here.”

They made the switch, him sliding across to the driver’s seat while Annja held herself up by the steering wheel and used the windshield frame to keep a grasp on the moving vehicle. Another bullet tore out the right side mirror. She couldn’t determine if they were a bad aim, or if the shots were intended to warn them.

The wolf had hurt Doug; she’d bet the pursuer was a bad aim.

She choked on dust as she dove to the passenger seat and went for the pistol. “Keep this speed,” she directed Luke, “but swerve. Don’t make us an easy target. Looks like only two in the Jeep behind,” she said, facing backward and gripping the roll bar with her left hand.

Right arm straight out, she aimed for the rusted front grille and pulled the trigger. The truck behind them swerved sharply, brewing up dust clouds. But they were still in pursuit.

“Incoming!” Luke yelled. “A truck ahead.”

“Just don’t crash into them,” Annja warned.

Aiming, she fired again, and the Jeep’s windshield cracked down the center. While she didn’t want to kill anyone, and knew her bouncing aim could never land exactly where she wanted it to, she had to take the chance in order to protect Luke and Doug.

The oncoming vehicle was a tractor pulling a wagon loaded with stacked tractor tires. As Luke navigated around them, and swerved off the road, the tires struggled to grip the loose gravel and the back of the Jeep pulled to the side. Annja could feel the vehicle’s left side tires want to take off from the ground, and only sheer willpower kept all four tires on the road.

Another bullet hit the dashboard above the radio. Luke shouted a curse. He sounded impressive, having abandoned his usual gentle Welsh tone. The wheels spun as he fought to maintain control and get back on track but he gunned the engine and that dug in the back tires in the soft earth that edged the gravel road. This time the right tires did momentarily leave the ground before dropping the vehicle in a dead stop and a billow of dust.

Annja leaped out of the Jeep and waited until Santos’s vehicle had cleared the slow-moving tractor. “Stay in the car, both of you!”

She stood in the center of the road, gun aimed for the tires of the oncoming vehicle. The first shot missed. The second hit the rusted chrome bumper. The car didn’t slow as it ate up the distance between them.

Drawing in a breath, Annja straightened her stance. She wasn’t about to lose this game of chicken.

Firing again, she saw the windshield shatter. Springing up, her foot touched the hood of the moving vehicle and she pushed up and levered herself skyward. In midair, she somersaulted high above the same spot from which she had jumped, momentarily feeling the air hold her there as if flying. Then she landed on the ground in the car’s wake, wobbling into a crouch.

Drawing her sword from the otherwhere, she swung upright and turned to stalk toward the vehicle, which had ground to a stop in a plume of hazy dirt and throat-clogging dust fifty yards beyond where her rental had come to a stop.

Santos curled around and hopped out from the passenger’s side, sword thrust before him. He wore a scarf tied around his head, and it fluttered in the breeze behind him. Determination tightened his jaw and his dark eyes focused on her.

Annja dipped low, sweeping her sword arm across her body, and when she stood upright, she cut the blade across Santos’s weapon. As her body spun through the delivery, she punched Santos in the kidney with a hard left hook. The surprise jab knocked him off balance. He stumbled, grunting out an oath, his sword arm wavering.

Recovering from the momentum of that swing, Annja twisted at the waist and elbowed Santos’s jaw as she swung back around to face him. He managed to swipe the blade before her, low, aiming for her shins. Annja leaped high, pistoning her knees to her chest. The blade cut the air where she had once stood.

She landed on one knee, her left hand touching the gravel for balance. Rising in the next breath, she lunged, shoulder first, and plunged into the man’s chest. Her body twisted against Santos’s. Grabbing his shirt, she lifted him and shoved him away to clear her personal space and prepare for another strike.

“Are you seriously going to do this?” she snarled angrily.

“I said I’d give you an hour,” he said, spitting out dust. “Time’s up, bone hunter.”

He dashed forward, but she met his charge with a defensive thrust of her sword. Blades clashed in a clatter of steel. They fought for purchase on the dug-in tire ruts that wedged the loose gravel into mounds. Yet Annja had never felt stronger. She stood with Joan’s sword gleaming in the sun.

This was the reason the sword had chosen her.

She’d come to Chrastava for a simple archaeological mission and a salacious legend. What she’d uncovered sickened her, and she would get her answers and take them to the authorities.

“You work for Bracks, don’t you?”

Santos dodged her feint, and returned a thrust that she easily avoided with her quick footwork. His height, about six inches taller than her, put his swings level with her throat, so she was keen to move quickly and keep an eye on the twitch in his elbow that signaled his thrusts.

“I’ve done work for him off and on over the years,” he said on gasping breaths.

“A freelancer, eh?”

“You’ve made it difficult to enact what should have been a simple task. I notified Canov the moment I heard about the skull. Thought he’d be interested. And he turned me on to Bracks.”

Canov. She’d heard that name before...from Garin. “Bracks uses innocent people’s fear and superstition to cover his dirty work?”

“Yes, but we didn’t need someone like you to preach to the Roma how foolish their beliefs were. To make them doubt.”

“I don’t see that I accomplished anything close to that. They’re burying a child today and all the Roma believe Tomas will come back from the dead to avenge himself.”

“Leave them alone. Let them have their beliefs.”

“Wait! Are you afraid of the child’s revenge, Santos?”

He slashed at her, losing all skill in that moment of anger. She’d struck a chord. He did fear revenge for his crimes. Otherwise, why pursue her so relentlessly?

“Is Bracks the one who ordered you to sic your wolf after us?”

The man shoved the scarf off his head, wiping away the sweat in one rough sweep, and tucked it in a pants pocket. He stepped to the side, double-stepping to not lose balance. Annja sensed he was tiring under the hot sun. “You killed my wolf,” he muttered.

“What is Bracks’s game?” she pressed. “Does he take the children, then sell their blood? Their organs? And why a child? If the man is dealing in human flesh and blood why not an adult?”

Though a child would prove easier to abduct and subdue.

“I have no idea—I only find the kids for him.”

“You’re lying.” Annja’s steel cut Santos’s arm and he winced, yet maintained his defense.

“I don’t know what he does with them!”

“You saw the boy who returned with a wound that had been stitched up. They take more than blood,” she surmised. “They’re harvesting organs.” Had to be. “It’s a sick crime, Santos. How can you allow it to happen to your own people?”

“You’ve become a nuisance, Annja Creed. Besides that, you’re deadly. I think my driver took a bullet. He could be dead!”

“You’re next.” Annja thrust low, driving the edge of her blade along the inside of Santos’s leg, cutting the jean material and opening what she hoped was the femoral artery. She wasn’t going to hold good on that threat; it would be wiser to keep him alive so the authorities could question him. “I need some real answers, or I’ll leave you here to bleed out.”

The blood spurting from his leg, Santos fell to his knees, his sword arm falling slack. Slowly, he collapsed onto his side, gripping his thigh and cursing her. He wasn’t going to give her any more information. Good thing she didn’t subscribe to the power of a Gypsy curse, either.

Releasing the sword back to the otherwhere, she could still feel the lingering warmth of the hilt.

Santos was quickly growing weaker. If the man lived, he could talk to the police.

She raced to the Jeep where Doug, still in the backseat and strangely shirtless, leaned over the front seat tending Luke. Frantic, he looked to her, then to Luke, and shook his head.

“What is it? Is he hurt?” she asked as she arrived at the driver’s side. Blood covered Doug’s hands, and he fumbled with the T-shirt he’d removed to press against the side of Luke’s neck.

“He took a bullet to the neck right before we swerved to a stop. He’s bleeding a lot. I don’t think he’s dead. Hell, Annja, this is not happening!”

“He’s not going to die.”

She didn’t know that. She had no idea how bad the wound was. If it had skimmed the carotid, or merely opened flesh and abraded the skin like Doug’s wolf bite.

“Help me get him onto the passenger seat. I remember seeing a hospital in Liberec not far from the train station. I’m going to get Luke some medical care, then see you off to the States.”

“Is that guy back on the road dead?”

Annja climbed behind the wheel and shifted into gear. “Not yet.”

* * *

T
HE
HOT
AFTERNOON
sun boiled in the bubbling wound on Santos’s leg. He was growing dizzy and his mouth was dry, yet sticky. He knew he had to get to a hospital, and fast. The sword cut was deep and the blood flow had slowed. Or maybe it hadn’t.

He blinked. The bright sun flashed in his eyes and made it difficult to see anything.

The driver, a friend for over a decade, must be dead. He hadn’t moved or come to help Santos.