Best New Werewolf Tales (Vol. 1) Read online

  I kicked him in the nuts. I really didn’t need to hear the speech.

  I’m not that big but I can kick like a Rockette. I felt bones break and he screamed like a nine year old girl. Dumbass should have kept his gun out.

  I stepped backward off of him and put an elbow into West’s face. It had all of my mass in motion behind it. That time I heard bones break and he went down so fast that I wondered if I’d snapped his neck.

  That left South and North. South spent a half second too long looking shocked, so I jumped at him with a leaping knee—the only Muay Thai kick I know—and drove him all the way to the wall. By the time North closed in I’d grabbed South by the ears and slammed him skull-first into a replica of a torture rack. Blood splattered in a Jackson Pollack pattern.

  I pivoted and rushed to intercept North who was barreling at me with a lot of furious speed; so I veered left and clothes-lined him with my stiff right forearm. He did a pretty impressive back flip and landed face down on the black-painted hardwood floor.

  If this was an action movie everything would switch to slow motion as the four thugs toppled to the ground and I turned slowly looking badass, to face the now startled and unprotected villain.

  The real world is a lot less accommodating.

  I caught movement behind me, figuring it for Skye going after my gun, so I whirled and made ready to launch into a diving tackle.

  Only it wasn’t Skye.

  It was East and West getting to their feet. West’s face was smeared with blood from his broken nose, but he was smiling. As I watched he took his nose between thumb and forefinger and snapped it into place, then spit a hocker of blood and snot onto the floor.

  North was chuckling as he rose; and behind me I could hear South shifting to stand behind me again. I turned in a slow circle. They were all smiling. They shouldn’t have been able to. They should have been sprawled on the floor and I should have been giving some kind of smart-ass speech as I closed in to lay a beating on Skye. That was the script I’d written in my head.

  What the hell was this shit?

  “Surprise!” said Skye dryly.

  “What the hell are these fuckers taking?”

  “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you?”

  “Try me.”

  “Blood,” he said.

  “What the—”

  And I looked more closely at the smiles. Lots of white teeth. Lots of long, pointy white teeth.

  “Oh, balls,” I said.

  “Yeah, kind of cool, huh?”

  “Vampires?” I said.

  “Yeah.”

  “Actual vampires?”

  Skye laughed. The four—well, let’s call a spade a spade—vampires laughed with him.

  Even I laughed.

  “Geez. When shit goes wrong it goes all the way wrong, doesn’t it,” I said.

  “On the up side,” said Skye, “you did win the first round. Nice moves.”

  “Thanks.”

  The four of them circled me. My pulse jumped from ‘uh-oh’ to ‘oh shit’. It was cold in his office but I was starting to sweat pretty heavily.

  “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised,” I said. “You’re one, too? Am I right?”

  “A recent convert,” he admitted.

  “So—that whole weight lose, going all weird on the missus that was—?”

  “A transition process. It’s not like they show in the movies, you know. Takes weeks. The whole metabolism changes.”

  “No kidding.”

  One of the vampires faked a lunge to psyche me out and I jumped a foot in the air. I’m pretty sure I didn’t yelp like a Chihuahua, but I wouldn’t swear to that in court. They all laughed at that, too. I didn’t.

  “Which explains why you lost all that weight.”

  “Who needs steroids and free-weights,” he agreed and spread his hands. “This package comes with honest to God super strength. I’m like Spider-man and Wolverine rolled into one. Super strong and I heal from damn near anything.”

  “Could you be more specific on that last point?”

  “Cute.”

  “Worth a try.” I looked at them, at their grinning, evil faces. My nuts were trying to crawl up inside of my chest cavity. I mean—fucking vampires?

  “Weird thing was,” I said, “I was starting to build a case in my head about your wife. You losing weight and getting pale, blaming her for it all, saying you know what she is… is she a vampire, too? Is she the one who bit you?”

  Skye laughed. “Christ no. And she’s not a succubus either. She’s just a nagging, soul-draining, passive-aggressive codependent bitch.”

  “Wow. You’re really a chauvinistic prick, aren’t you?”

  “Better than being pussy whipped.”

  I dropped it. I had bigger fish to fry than trying to bring this macho jackass into the Twenty-first century. Namely the fact that I was in a roomful of vampires.

  I know I keep harping on that, but really—it’s not the sort of shit that happens all the time to me. Or, like—ever.

  “Say, man,” I said to Skye, “any chance we can roll back this tape to the point where we were still friends? I just walk out of here and we all call it a day?”

  Skye made a face as if pretending to consider it. “Mmm—no, I don’t see that happening.”

  “You want to make a deal of some kind?”

  “Nah,” he said. “You got nothing I want. Except the O-positive.”

  “AB neg,” I corrected.

  “Never tried that.”

  “You wouldn’t like it. Goes right to your hips.”

  The wattage on his smile was dimmer. Jaunty banter can buy only so many seconds and then it’s back to business.

  I tried to keep my face neutral, but my pulse was like a jazz drum solo.

  “I’m going to throw something out here,” I said. I could hear a tremor in my voice. Fuck it.

  “Oh, please.” He gestured to the four killers and they started forward.

  “Wait! Just hear me out. What have you got to lose?”

  The thugs looked at Skye. West gave a ‘why not?’ kind of shrug.

  Skye sighed. “Okay, what is it? Last words? A little begging?” he suggested.

  “Mm, more like last threat.”

  “This I got to hear.”

  The five of them looked genuinely interested.

  “Okay, so here you are, five vampires. That’s some really scary shit, am I right? I mean creatures of the night and all that.”

  He nodded, nothing to disagree with.

  “To most people that’s enough to make them go apeshit crazy. I mean… vampires. Not your everyday thing. It opens up all kinds of metaphysical questions. If vampires exist, what else does. If there are supernatural monsters, does that mean God and the Devil are real. You follow me?”

  “Sure. We get that a lot.”

  “And I’m outnumbered here. Five to one. Tough odds without you fellows being the undead. So—why ain’t I scared?”

  His eyes narrowed.

  “I mean, yeah, my pulse is racing and I’m sweating. But do I look as scared as I should be? I don’t do I? Now—why is that?”

  “So you put up a good front. It’ll be a good anecdote later,” he said. “For us.”

  “Maybe he’s got a hammer and stake,” suggested West.

  That got a laugh.

  “Nope.”

  My heart rate had to be close to two hundred. It was machine-gun fire in my chest.

  “Coupla garlic bulbs in your pocket?” asked East.

  “Nah. I don’t even like it on my pizza.”

  “You don’t have any backup,” said North. “And you don’t got your gun.”

  My blood pressure could have scalded paint off a battleship. I wiped sweat off my brow with my thumb.

  “Okay, jokes over,” snapped Skye. “What’s the punch line here? Why aren’t you as scared as you should be?”

  I smiled.

  “I’ll show you.”

  The first tim
e it happened, way back when I was thirteen, it took almost half an hour. I screamed and cried and rolled around on the floor. First time’s always the hardest. Each time since it was easier. My grandmother and her sister could do it in the time it took you to snap your fingers. My best time was during a foot chase back when I was with Minneapolis PD. I was running down the guy who’d beaten his wife with the extension cord. He saw me coming and ducked into his apartment, I kicked the door and he came out of the bedroom with a gun and opened up. I went through the change in the time it took me to leap through the doorway. Like the snap of my fingers. One minute me, next minute different me.

  I tore the shit out of him. I lost my badge and pension and had to make up all sorts of excuses. On the plus side, I didn’t die, which would have happened if I hadn’t managed the change so fast. I’m only mortal when I look like one.

  That night in Skye’s office wasn’t my best time. Maybe third or fourth best. Say, two, three seconds. It felt like an explosion. It hurts. Feels like my heart is bursting, like cherry bombs are detonating inside my muscles. It starts in the chest, then ripples out from there as muscle mass changes and is reassigned in new ways. Bones warp, crack and re-form. Nails tear through the flesh of my fingers and toes, my jaw shifts and the longer teeth spiked through the gums. It’s bloody and it’s ugly and it hurts like a motherfucker.

  But the end result is a stunner. A real kick-ass dramatic moment that wows the audience.

  I think all four of the thugs screamed. They jerked back from me, looks of shock and horror on their faces. If I wasn’t so deeply into the moment I would have smiled at the irony. Monsters being scared by a monster.

  I crouched in the center of the room, hands flexing, claws streaked with blood, hot saliva dripping from my mouth onto my chest.

  It would have been cool and dramatic to have said, “Surprise!” to them the way Skye had said it to me, but my mouth was no longer constructed for human speech. All I could do was roar.

  I did.

  And then I launched at them.

  Vampires are strong. Four or five times stronger than an ordinary human.

  Werewolves?

  Hell, we’re a whole different class.

  I slammed into West with both sets of front claws. He flew apart like he was made of paper and watery red glue. North and East tried to take me high and low, but they’d have done better to try and run. I brought my knee up into East’s jaw as he went for the low tackle and his head burst like a casaba melon. I caught North by the throat and squeezed. Red geysered up from the stump of his neck as his head fell away. South backed away, putting himself between me and Skye, arms spread, making a more heroic stand than I’d have thought. I tore the heart from his chest. Turns out, vampires need their hearts.

  Skye had my gun in his hands. He racked the slide and buried the barrel against me as I leaped over the desk. He got off four shots. They hurt.

  Like wasp stings.

  Maybe a little less.

  I don’t load my piece with silver bullets. I’m not an idiot.

  He looked into my eyes and I would like to think that he saw the error of his ways. Don’t fuck with the innocent. Don’t fuck with my clients. My clients are mine, like members of my pack. Mess with them and the pack leader has to put you down. Has to.

  So I did.

  * * *

  She saw me coming from across the street, her face concerned and confused. I was wearing a different pair of pants and different shoes. My own had been torn to rags during the change. Stuff I was wearing used to belong to the bartender. He didn’t them anymore. He’d been on the same team as Skye and the four goons.

  I opened the door and climbed in behind the wheel.

  “Are you all right, Ro?” she asked, studying my face. “Are you hurt? Is that blood?”

  I dabbed at a dot on my cheek. Missed a spot. I pulled a tissue out of my jacket pocket and wiped my cheek.

  “Just ketchup,” I said.

  “You stopped for food?” she demanded, eyes wide.

  “It was on the house. I was hungry. No biggie.”

  She stared at me and then looked at the club across the street. The snow was getting heavier, the ground was white and it was starting to coat the street.

  “What happened in there?”

  I put the key into the ignition.

  “I had a long talk with your ex. I told him that you were feeling threatened and uncomfortable with his actions, and asked him to back off.”

  “What did he say?”

  “He won’t be bothering you anymore.”

  “Just like that? He agreed to leave me alone just like that?” She snapped her fingers.

  “More or less. I told him that I had some friends on the force and in L and I, and made it clear that I could make his life more uncomfortable than he was waking yours. He didn’t like it,” I said, “but—” I let the rest hang.

  “And he agreed?”

  “Take my word for it. He’s out of your life.”

  She continued to study me for several long seconds. I waited her out and I saw the moment when she shifted from doubt and fear to belief and acceptance. She closed her eyes, sagged back against the seat, put her face in her hands and began to cry.

  I gripped the wheel and looked out at the falling snow, hiding the smile that kept trying to creep onto my mouth. I was digging the P.I. business. Fewer rules than when I was on the cops. It allowed me to be closer to the street, to go hunting deeper into the forest.

  Even so—and despite what I’d said to Skye—I was pretty rattled that he’d been a vampire. I mean, being who and what I am I always suspected other things were out there in the dark, but until now I’d never met them. Now I knew. How many vampires were there? Where were they? Would they be coming for me?

  I didn’t have any of those answers. Not yet.

  I also wondered what else was out there? I could feel the excitement racing through me. I wanted to find out. Good or bad, I wanted to find out.

  I reached out a hand and patted Mrs. Skye’s trembling shoulder. It felt good to know that one of the pack was safe now. It felt right. It made me feel powerful and satisfied on a lot of different levels. I knew that I was going to want to feel this way again. And again.

  The snow swirled inside the thickening shadows.

  Inside my head the wolf howled.

  BABY

  JAMES ROY DALEY

  “Wait!” Jennifer said, somewhat urgently. She was standing in the doorway with a white coffee mug in her hand, looking excited and worried and absolutely beautiful. The cute little hearts on her silk pajamas were shiny and red, complementing the cherry polish on her fingers and toes. Her dark hair was cut boldly short. If her face wasn’t so stunningly gorgeous the cut may have looked terrible because she had a boy’s haircut, really. It was brave and it worked, but somehow it seemed best suited for a nine-year-old brat with ice-cream stains on his t-shirt and the knees knocked out of his blue jeans.

  Richard, standing on the driveway next to his car, turned towards his wife. Complementing his bright green eyes and his slender nose was a smile that seemed more dimple than lip. With a smirk, he said, “What is it?”

  “Just come here for a minute.”

  “But––” Richard had a travel bag in his left hand and his car keys in his right. He lifted them up and flaunted them, as if doing so was a statement onto itself.

  “I know, honey,” Jennifer said, using her ‘baby-needs-some-loving’ voice. “I know, but I have to tell you something. It’s important.”

  Richard unloaded a hearty laugh. “Now? You need to tell me something important, now? The clock is ticking and I’ve got to go! Steve is probably wondering where I am already.”

  “Please, hon. I thought it could wait but now I don’t think it can.” She tilted her head to one side, scrunched up her expression and stood on her tippy-toes. Coffee splashed inside the mug.

  Richard placed his luggage on the driveway and dragged his feet towards his
wife. With his shoulders slumped, his eyes sad, and his face long, he looked like he was visiting his mother on death row. Should have been a stage actor. “What is it?”

  Jennifer wrapped her arms around his waist and kissed him on the lips. Once the kiss was planted she nuzzled into him, and said, “I love you.”

  Richard laughed. “Well that’s fantastic. I love you, too.”

  “No, I want you to really hear me. I love you, Richard Beach. I love you with all my heart. You’re the best thing that ever happened to me, and I’m unconditionally yours.”

  “Aww…” Richard felt his belly flip as an unexpected batch of tears threatened to break free from their hiding place. She had said that very thing on their wedding day; it was part of her vows. Hearing it again was wonderful, and––my Lord, he treasured this woman. She was everything he wanted and more. She was artistic and beautiful; she knew how to make him feel like the luckiest man alive. Every hour they spent together seemed better than the one before it. And sure, his friends might argue that they were still in that honeymoon stage; they might even point out that things were bound to change, but still––if Jennifer wasn’t the perfect woman he wasn’t sure such a thing existed. With his eyebrows raised and his arms around her, he granted her a soft and loving squeeze. “You’re so sweet.”

  “Tell me that you love me.”

  A smile blossomed. “I love you.”

  “No… really tell me. Make me understand.”

  Richard kissed his wife with as much passion as he could muster. He ran one hand along the center of her back while caressing her neck with the other. He whispered, “I love you Jennifer Samantha Beach. I love you more than you’ll ever know. I’d die for you in a heartbeat, because you are the very best part of me. You are my everything; my center; my one. I’m so lucky to have you in my life, Jenn. I know it and I’ll never forget it. I love you, baby-doll. I love you; I love you; I love you.” He kissed her again.

  Exploiting his emotions felt liberating and fabulous. He wanted the moment to last forever. It didn’t. Jennifer pulled away while their lips were connected. She took him by the hand and looked him in the eye.