Chapter 37 : Poor Bastard

by

      The Colorado air nipped at my cheeks as I walked through the lot of the local bar. The moon was out, hidden behind the trees, leaving the neon signs the only light to guide my way. My own personal compass.

     I needed a drink, desperately.

     The heavy door slammed shut behind me, but no one turned. The music was far too loud and the crowd too rowdy to notice the new arrival, and for that, I was grateful. I was invisible here. Aside from the blond woman behind the bar who had served me last night, no one seemed to care as I lingered in the doorway. 

     My gaze fell to the bulletin board. The last time I had been up this way, it was covered with nothing but business cards and lost animals, but this time - this time, I couldn't pull my eyes away from the handsome deputy whose heart I had buried beneath the bridge in Chicago. His eyes seemed to follow me as I took a step forward, and I froze, my breath catching in my throat as I finally learned his name. 

     David Watson. 

     I wanted to run my fingers across his strong jaw, but looking at it for too long - let alone touching the flier was too dangerous. I may have been invisible, but the man on the wall was not. People were looking for him, and I didn't want to be found in the process. 

     "Whisky?"

     I nodded to the bartender as I sat down on a stool. My eyes followed the countertop, hoping to find someone to occupy my mind for a few minutes, but as my prospects finally fizzled out, I found myself staring at the small television on the other side of the bar - the local reporter standing in front of a log cabin as the county coroner wheeled a body behind her. 

     "What happened," I asked, slinging back the cup. I set it down on the counter, and she only smirked at me - knowing better to fill it than leave the bottle this time. I wasn't sure if she heard me as she poured, so I asked her again. "Can you turn that up a bit?" 

     "I'd love to, hun," she said, scanning the crowd behind me. "But people come here to escape the bad shit, not dwell on it." 

     I nodded, glancing behind me to take in the crowd. The smiles. The laughter. Their hips moving to the music, and their hands roaming over each other. It was like they were in their own little neon-lit world - just playing pool, taking shots, and kissing strangers. Of course, they wouldn't want to hear about another one of their neighbors dying. It probably took everything in them to ignore the missing poster of the deputy on the way in. 

     "Well, between you and me," I said, this time sipping on my drink. "What happened?" 

      The bartender shrugged and glanced back at the television. "I try not to pay attention anymore. So much bad shit going on in the world these days. I can't keep up. And by the looks of it," she said, turning back to the television. "I don't think I want to." 

    "Old man Elkins," a gruff voice sounded from a few stools over. 

    I leaned forward and caught sight of a white-haired man with a braided beard. "Poor bastard. I heard it was an animal attack." 

     "An animal attack?" The woman in front of me gawked. Her thin fingers had clutched her chest as she grabbed the remote and turned it up. Elkins was a staple at this bar. I had learned that a long time ago. He was always sitting in the corner stool near the back exit - his nose in his journal and his gun on his hip at the ready. 

     He was like me. A hunter. And a damn good one at that. I had tried on many occasions to get him to talk to me, to teach me after I  tracked the vampire that killed Jonas to these parts of the woods - but he always refused. He was as stone-cold as they came for such a gentle and admired man, which only raised suspicion. 

     If Daniel Elkin's was dead - it sure as hell was no animal that killed him. 

    "Where are you going?" The woman behind the bar called after me, but my feet kept me moving. Through the parking lot and into the stolen truck I had acquired somewhere south of the border. It took everything in me not to drive straight to his place. I had to do this right. I had to give the cops and press enough time to survey the scene, and I had to get back to my place and figure out exactly what the hell was going on around here. 

     I was just thankful that the one who had all the answers was still tied to the chair.

     "You lied to me," I taunted as I removed the burlap sack from my friend's head. His head fell forward as if he was still unconscious from the dose of dead man's blood I injected him with before I left, but after a few quick slaps and a quick sniff of the blood I slit from my fingers, his fangs bared and his eye drew dark. "There you are."

     "You fucking bitch," he spat at me, earning a quick one across the cheek. 

     "Didn't your mother ever teach you how to talk to a lady?" 

     "You're not a lady," he snarled. "You're a dead woman." 

     "No deader than your girlfriend?" I said, a small laugh escaping my lips as he fought against the blood-soaked binds that held him in place. "I gave her a proper burial, by the way. Right into the Pocotaligo River. Hopefully, she'll hit a few rocks and knock those fangs loose before someone finds her." 

      He threw himself forward, trying desperately to get at me. "I'm going to -"

     "To what?" I mocked, leaning back against the counter and crossing my arms. "Kill me?" I couldn't help but scoff. "Sweetheart, I have a demon on my shoulder. I can't die. So you have two options." I grabbed a chair from the corner of the room and spun it around, so I was straddling it. I crossed my arms over the top and lazily picked at my cuticles as I talked to him. "I can let you go, and you can run back to your alpha and tell him I'm coming for him, and he can kill you, slow and painfully. Or, you can tell me what I need to know, and I can kill you, quickly."

      "Fuck you!"

      "Bo," I muttered. "Either way, you're going to die." I pulled myself up from the chair and began to pace, hoping the fact that I had been eyeing my tools would get him to talk. Though, even as I picked up a pair of pliers, he was not swayed. "I'm a very patient person, Bo," I told him as I tangled my fingers into his hair and jerked back his head. He hissed at me, and I took it as a quick opportunity to take hold of his jaw, squeezing tightly to keep his mouth from shutting. "It took my twelve years to get this close to the answers I need. So you can either talk, or you can watch me take away everything that makes you what you are." 

      I didn't give him a chance to speak. His bloody fang was in the palm of my hand, and I stepped back, watching as he cursed and spat mouthfuls of blood at me. "Look at that. Vampires do bleed." 

       His head fell back, and he chuckled as he licked the blood from his lips. "You're going to be fun to kill," he threatened. 

      "Touche," I said, lunging forward and grabbing his chin again. He fought for a moment, but I was able to reach over and dip the tip of the pliers in the mason jar of blood. I held it in front of his eyes, and I could tell by the way his sparse lashes began to flutter that it was already beginning to burn. "Tell me what you know about Samuel Elkin, or I'll take your eye next."

     "Go to hell!" 

     "Oh, I plan on it," I snapped as I jerked back his head and yanked out yet another fang. His gums sizzled where the dead man's blood had made contact, and I stepped back, watching him squirm in pain as he shouted obscenities. He was so close to giving me what I wanted, but he was stronger than I had anticipated. Pulling fangs was going to get me nowhere. "Still not talking."

      He spat another mouthful of blood at the ground in front of me, and I sighed as I exchanged the pliers for the whole jar of vampire toxin. "You look a little thirsty there, Bo."

     "You're a fucking psychopath." 

     I smiled as I settled back into the chair in front of him. "You know me so well." I gave him a sweet smirk and stood back up, grabbing his jaw and pulling it open as I hovered the jar over his open mouth. A droplet fell against his cheek, and he tried to jerk away as the flesh burned and sizzled, but he had nowhere to go. "This is your last chance," I told him, inching the jar closer to his face. "Tell me what happened to Daniel Elkin."

        He fought it. Harder than he had probably fought against anything in his life, but in the end, the thought of his body burning from the inside out was too much. "We killed him! Okay? We took the son of the bitch out! But he deserved it. He's been hunting our kind for decades! And if it hadn't been for Luther, we would have taken you out next."

     I stood back, letting go of his jaw. "Luther?" 

     The name struck a chord. 

     "I take it you know him..."

      I wanted to scream, but I did my best to keep the anger simmering below the surface. "This isn't about Luther or his bitch of a girlfriend. This is about Elkins. Now tell me - did you come across a gun?"

     "Really? Lady!" He shouted at me. "He was a hunter! He had hundreds of guns."

      I crouched down in front of him. "Yes, but this one is special. Very old. Very powerful." 

     His darker eyes narrowed as he searched for something within me. Something he seemed to have found as he began to laugh. It was sadistic and uncontrolled - but it gave me everything I needed to know. 

      "I'll take that as a yes."