Greywalker (15 page)

I stepped closer. "Are you all right?"

"No!" he spat, throwing back his tangled hair. His blood red glower sent a bolt of sickening ice straight through my chest. "I'm not all right! I'm a goddamned vampire with a goddamned hole in his already broken arm. I am not fucking all right, all right!"

Wary, I knelt beside him and looked at the arm he cradled. As I stared, the torn flesh of the bullet wound eased closer together, knit-ting up like a sweater sleeve. Only a couple of millimeters, but enough to convince me that Cameron Shadley was not operating within original design specifications. I looked at him and he glared back. I had to swallow hard a couple of times to work up enough spit to speak and keep my dinner down at the same time.

"I have to get you and your car out of here right away."

"I'll be fine."

"Not once the tow truck gets here."

"Tow truck?"

"Yes." I stood back. "I heard about your car because it's on the impound list. It'll be towed in the next couple of minutes if we don't move it."

He groaned like a soap-opera diva and hung his head back. "Great! Just great! How'm I supposed to drive with one hand? It's a manual."

"I'll drive."

"What about your car? You've got a car, right?"

"My car isn't going to be towed yet. Come on. Let's go. Give me the keys."

Grunting, Cameron reached into the left front pocket of his jeans and flipped me the keys. Miserable, he oozed into the passenger seat as I tied the Camaro's trunk shut around the broken lock, then got into the driver's seat. In five minutes, we were at the payment kiosk.

"Ticket?"

I looked at Cam. He looked back and shrugged. "Lost it."

"Lost ticket pays the maximum—twenty dollars."

I handed over a twenty and asked for a receipt. We passed the tow truck a block away. I parked the car under the Viaduct and turned to Cameron.

"You stay put here while I go back for my truck. I don't want to have to hunt you down again."

"I'll stay right here," he sighed. "Promise."

I got out, taking the keys, and walked back to the garage. The man in the payment kiosk gave me an odd look when I pulled up again.

"Weren't you just here?"

"Yeah. Had to drive my kid brother's car out. He's so smashed he can barely walk."

He grunted and jerked his head, taking my money. "You want a receipt this time, too?"

"Yes. I'm going to make him pay me every cent."

He chuckled and handed me the receipt. I drove away and parked next to Cameron's Camaro. It was right where I'd left it. Cameron didn't seem to be in the front seat, though.

"Cameron?" I yelled, looking around. I didn't see him anywhere around the car. I stared at the passenger seat, furious and grinding my teeth. Something flickered. I breathed deeply and looked harder along the wavering edge of the Grey. I reached out and jerked the door open.

Cameron rolled onto the ground.

"Hey!" he yelled, jumping up. "You're not supposed to be able to see me. That's my best trick!"

"I didn't have to see you, just your Grey shadow."

"I don't cast a shadow anymore."

"You do if you know where to look."

"Huh?"

"Never mind. I can see you. What I want to know is why can I see you in the paranormal?"

"I told you—I'm a vampire," he snapped. There was that glare again. This time I was better prepared, but it still felt like an arctic wind had blown through my rib cage.

I studied him a little harder this time. His skin had a pallor that went beyond merely ill, all the way to waxy, and his eyes seemed to have an opaque glaze over the irises, deadening the vibrant violet I had expected to a pastel lilac. His grin was a dead giveaway: his canine teeth were prominent points and the gums had drawn back. I caught a whiff of something and gagged.

"Jeez, Cam, don't you brush?" I asked.

"Kinda hard to see myself in the mirror, you know."

"Not your hair, your teeth."

Embarrassed, he rolled his lips over his teeth and looked abashed.

"OK, now tell me if I'm wrong. You've been sleeping in your car and cruising the Square at night for over a month now."

"Mostly. I had another place for a while, at the beginning, but I got thrown out."

"The beginning of what, Cameron?"

"Are you thick? Since the beginning of this vampire thing. I wasn't born this way, you know."

"Yeah, I figured. Your mother and sister seem pretty normal. So what happened?"

"I got into some trouble with a guy down here."

"Getting turned into one of the living dead is the current rage in payback?"

"No," he drawled at me as if I were not too bright. He stood there looking grim, then glanced around. "Could we get out of here? I feel kind of conspicuous."

As he mentioned it, I remembered how often I'd felt observed lately myself. "We can go over to my office. It's not far and we can park your car nearby."

He gave a reluctant nod and we both got back into the Camaro. I drove to my building, concentrating very hard on looking calm and thinking fast. We parked and I led him up to my office, ignoring the alarm.

"Listen," I started, sitting behind my desk. "I'm going to deal with your most immediate problems first and get the long story afterward, but you are going to tell me the story, one way or another."

Cameron threw himself into the client chair. "Fine."

"I take it you don't feel safe, or you'd have gone back to your apartment, right?"

"Right. I was afraid I'd hurt RC, if I did. I get really hungry and kind of irrational right after I get up."

I narrowed my eyes. "Hungry. How are you doing right now?" In the back of my head I was gibbering, but had no time to listen to that voice now.

"Not so good. Those two guys woke me up."

"Tough. I'm not opening a vein for you. What else can we do? What do you normally do?"

"Well," he mumbled, looking around the floor, "I catch rats, some-times."

"What?"

"Rats," he repeated, looking anywhere but at me. "I eat rats a lot."

"That's kind of disgusting."

"Yeah, it's pretty gross, but I figure it's better than attacking someone on a street corner. When the bar crowd gets pretty well lubed, I start cruising the drunks. Usually I can find someone who'll help me out."

I started to ask, then decided I didn't want to know right now. He saw me shake my head and looked relieved.

"It's a long, nasty story," he said.

"I can imagine. In the meantime, it looks like your trunk is bro-ken. That a problem?"

"Yeah. See, I sleep in there."

"You sleep in the trunk?"

"It's good and dark and I don't get rousted by cops. Besides, my dirt is in there."

"Dirt?"

"Haven't you ever heard about the native earth?"

"No. What about it?"

"A vampire must sleep in his native earth every day. Well, or at least close to it."

"Why?"

"I don't know. That's just what I was told."

"You ever tried to sleep without it?"

"No. I'm afraid to try. What if I shrivel up or something? It's not a great life—or unlife if you like—but it's mine and I'd like to keep unliving it a little longer, if you don't mind."

"Sounds like you need a more secure place to stay."

"What do you suggest? The county morgue?"

"No. Give me your car keys."

"Why?" he asked, reaching for them again.

"Because I'm going to take care of it while you go out for some-thing to eat. Also, this way I know you'll come back."

"You're not very trusting," he said, handing me the keys as he stood up.

"I'm a professional not-truster," I answered. "Now go out and do what you need to do, but don't break any laws I'm going to hear about."

"Yes, ma'am," he replied with a sarcastic salute as he marched out.

I paged Quinton. In less than a minute, he called me back.

"Hi, Harper." I could hear him smiling. "What can I do for you?"

"I've got a weird situation and I need some kind of security system rigged in a car ASAP."

"Can't wait, huh?"

"No. Not really."

"What sort of thing are you looking for?"

"Ignition cutout, lots of noise, armed and disarmed from the trunk, and extra security for the trunk itself."

"The trunk?"

"Don't ask. Oh, we probably need to add some kind of handle inside the trunk lid and fix the lock."

"What kind of car is this?"

"'Sixty-seven Chevy Camaro."

"It'll take me a couple of minutes to collect my stuff and get over there. OK?"

"Great. Thanks."

"For you, no problem."

Quinton showed up before Cameron did. I took him down to the parking lot.

"Very nice car. Who's Cam?"

"The owner. He's in some trouble and he's worried about the car. I think he's been living out of it. He hides in the trunk to dodge the police— that's why we need a handle and an arm/disarm switch in there."

"He wants to get in the trunk and stay there for a while with the alarm on?"

"I think so."

Quinton rolled his eyes and blew a strand of hair off his face. 'That's going to be a bit more complicated. This could take a little longer than I thought."

"Like how long?" asked Cam, looming up behind me. I spun and glared at him. Quinton just blinked.

The silence began to stretch. The males stared at each other.

"Hey, that's enough," I said. "Cameron owns the car. Cam, this is Quinton. He's going to build an alarm for the car so it's safer for you to use. Any problems?"

I glanced between them. They each shrugged. "Good. I have to go move my truck. Cameron, you come with me. Then we'll have a chat in my office. Quinton, if you need anything, come up and knock." I pivoted and stalked away.

So long as I was boiling, the discomfort of Cameron's Grey presence was easier to ignore. It only took a few minutes to move the Rover and get Cameron back up to my office. I kept my temper on simmer.

"OK," I started, sitting again, "the car is taken care of. Now let's deal with the rest of this mess."

Cameron stared down at his hands clasped in his lap. He sighed in disgust. "It really is a mess, isn't it?"

"It could be worse, but it's not good. Why didn't you get in touch with anyone?"

"At first, I thought I was just... sick. I didn't believe all that vampire junk. I thought I might have something really nasty, but I figured I'd either get better soon, or I'd have to go to a doctor. When I found out what was happening to me—I mean when I believed it—I panicked."

"You seem to have adapted. If you'd called your mother, you could have avoided panicking her, too." I wanted to kick myself for sounding like a stereotype.

"What was I supposed to say?’Hi, Mom. Sorry I can't make the birthday party, I'm a vampire and I wouldn't want to upset you by biting the guests'?"

"How about 'I'm sick, but I'm going to be fine and I'll see you soon?"

He sighed again and lowered his head even farther. "I guess I didn't think, but I don't know what I'm doing. I'm not very good at this vampire stuff."

"You mean you don't just wake up one night and know how to be a vampire?"

"No. Usually you have somebody around to take care of you, teach you, until you can take care of yourself."

"So, what happened to your... tutor?"

Cameron shrank. "He threw me out," he whispered.

In a cartoon, the wooden desktop would have slammed into my lower jaw as my mouth popped open. Cameron squirmed and snuck a peek at me out of the corner of his eye. I clenched my eyes shut and smoothed out my face.

"Threw you out?" I repeated, choking on a dry throat. I swallowed and restarted. "Why?"

"He said— He didn't— I didn't want— I—" Frustrated, he plunged his face into his hands. "I can't do this!" he howled. "I suck at this!"

I didn't laugh. I stood up and walked over to put a reassuring hand on his shoulder... and fell straight through to the Grey.

I couldn't breathe. I was cold, frozen, falling, sliding through some-thing writhing, oozing, squeezing into me. Black cold. Cameron raised his head and looked through me with a gaze like a razor. I yanked my hand away from that burning cold/hot, live/dead flesh... and stumbled backward, falling against the desk and sitting down hard on its top, gasping.

"What's wrong?" he asked, jumping up to offer assistance.

I pushed at the air between us. "Don't touch me!"

He recoiled as from a blow, drawing his hands back against his chest.

I gnawed air and fought back to some kind of equilibrium.