Faith Hunter - Skinwalker

The Joe was a looker. A little taller than my six feet even, he had olive skin, black hair, black brows. Black jacket and jeans. Black boots. Bit of overkill with all the black, but he made it work, with muscular legs wrapped around the red bike.

No silver in sight. No shotgun, but a suspicious bulge beneath his right arm. Made him a leftie. Something glinted in the back of his collar. A knife hilt, secured in a spine sheath. Maybe more than one blade. There were scuffs on his boots (Western, like mine, not Harley butt-stompers) but his were Fryes and mine were ostrich-skin Luccheses. I pulled in scents, my nostrils widening. His boots smelled of horse manure, fresh. Local boy, then, or one who had been in town long enough to find a mount. I smelled horse sweat and hay, a clean blend of scents. And cigar. It was the cigar that made me like him. The taint of steel, gun oil, and silver made me fall in love. Well, sorta. My Beast thought he was kinda cute, and maybe tough enough to be worthy of us. Yet there was a faint scent on the man, hidden beneath the surface smells, that made me wary.

The silence had lasted longer than expected. Since he had been the one to pull up, I just stared, and clearly our silence bothered the Joe, but it didn’t bother me. I let a half grin curl my lip. He smiled back and eased off his bike. Behind me, inside Katie’s, I heard footsteps. I maneuvered so that the Joe and the doorway were both visible. No way could I do it and be unobtrusive, but I raised a shoulder to show I had no hard feelings. Just playing it smart. Even for a pretty boy.

Troll opened the door and jerked his head to the side. I took it as the invitation it was and stepped inside. “You got interesting taste in friends,” Troll said, as the door closed on the Joe.

“Never met him. Where you want the weapons?” Always better to offer than to have them removed. Power plays work all kinds of ways.

Troll opened an armoire. I unbuckled the shotgun holster and set it inside, pulling silver crosses from my belt and thighs and from beneath the coat until there was a nice pile. Thirteen crosses—excessive, but they distracted people from my backup weapons. Next came the wooden stakes and silver stakes. Thirteen of each. And the silver vial of holy water. One vial. If I carried thirteen, I’d slosh.

I hung the leather jacket on the hanger in the armoire and tucked the glasses in the inside pocket with the cell phone. I closed the armoire door and assumed the position so Troll could search me. He grunted as if surprised, but pleased, and did a thorough job. To give him credit, he didn’t seem to enjoy it overmuch—used only the backs of his hands, no fingers, didn’t linger or stroke where he shouldn’t. Breathing didn’t speed up, heart rate stayed regular; things I can sense if it’s quiet enough. After a thorough feel inside the tops of my boots, he said, “This way.”

I followed him down a narrow hallway that made two crooked turns toward the back of the house. We walked over old Persian carpets, past oils and watercolors done by famous and not-so-famous artists. The hallway was lit with stained-glass Lalique sconces, which looked real, not like reproductions, but maybe you can fake old; I didn’t know. The walls were painted a soft butter color that worked with the sconces to illuminate the paintings. Classy joint for a whorehouse. The Christian children’s home schoolgirl in me was both appalled and intrigued.

When Troll paused outside the red door at the end of the hallway, I stumbled, catching my foot on a rug. He caught me with one hand and I pushed off him with little body contact. I managed to look embarrassed; he shook his head. He knocked. I braced myself and palmed the cross he had missed. And the tiny two-shot derringer. Both hidden against my skull on the crown of my head, and covered by my braids, which men never, ever searched, as opposed to my boots, which men always had to stick their fingers in. He opened the door and stood aside. I stepped in.

The room was spartan but expensive, and each piece of furniture looked Spanish. Old Spanish. Like Queen-Isabella- and-Christopher-Columbus old. The woman, wearing a teal dress and soft slippers, standing beside the desk, could have passed for twenty until you looked in her eyes. Then she might have passed for said queen’s older sister. Old, old, old eyes. Peaceful as she stepped toward me. Until she caught my scent.

In a single instant her eyes bled red, pupils went wide and black, and her fangs snapped down. She leaped. I dodged under her jump as I pulled the cross and derringer, quickly moving to the far wall, where I held out the weapons. The cross was for the vamp, the gun for the Troll. She hissed at me, fangs fully extended. Her claws were bone white and two inches long. Troll had pulled a gun. A big gun. Men and their pissing contests. Crap . Why couldn’t they ever just let me be the only one with a gun?

“Predator,” she hissed. “In my territory.” Vamp anger pheromones filled the air, bitter as wormwood.

“I’m not human,” I said, my voice steady. “That’s what you smell.” I couldn’t do anything about the tripping heart rate, which I knew would drive her further over the edge; I’m an animal. Biological factors always kick in. So much for trying not to be nervous. The cross in my hand glowed with a cold white light, and Katie, if that was her original name, tucked her head, shielding her eyes. Not attacking, which meant that she was thinking. Good.

“Katie?” Troll asked.

“I’m not human,” I repeated. “I’ll really hate shooting your Troll here, to bleed all over your rugs, but I will.”

“Troll?” Katie asked. Her body froze with that inhuman stillness vamps possess when thinking, resting, or whatever else it is they do when they aren’t hunting, eating, or killing. Her shoulders dropped and her fangs clicked back into the roof of her mouth with a sudden spurt of humor. Vampires can’t laugh and go vampy at the same time. They’re two distinct parts of them, one part still human, one part rabid hunter. Well, that’s likely insulting, but then this was the first so-called civilized vamp I’d ever met. All the others I’d had personal contact with were sick, twisted killers. And then dead. Really dead.

Troll’s eyes narrowed behind the .45 aimed my way. I figured he didn’t like being compared to the bad guy in a children’s fairy tale. I was better at fighting, but negotiation seemed wise. “Tell him to back off. Let me talk.” I nudged it a bit. “Or I’ll take you down and he’ll never get a shot off.” Unless he noticed that I had set the safety on his gun when I tripped. Then I’d have to shoot him. I wasn’t betting on my .22 stopping him unless I got an eye shot. Chest hits wouldn’t even slow him down. In fact they’d likely just make him mad.

When neither attacked, I said, “I’m not here to stake you. I’m Jane Yellowrock, here to interview for a job, to take out a rogue vamp that your own council declared an outlaw. But I don’t smell human, so I take precautions. One cross, one stake, one two-shot derringer.” The word “stake” didn’t elude her. Or him. He’d missed three weapons. No Christmas bonus for Troll.

“What are you?” she asked.

“You tell me where you sleep during the day and I’ll tell you what I am. Otherwise, we can agree to do business. Or I can leave.”

Telling the location of a lair—where a vamp sleeps—is information for lovers, dearest friends, or family. Katie chuckled. It was one of the silky laughs that her kind can give, low and erotic, like vocal sex. My Beast purred. She liked the sound.

“Are you offering to be my toy for a while, intriguing nonhuman female?” When I didn’t answer, she slid closer, despite the glowing cross, and said, “You are interesting. Tall, slender, young.” She leaned in and breathed in my scent. “Or not so young. What are you?” she pressed, her voice heavy with fascination. Her eyes had gone back to their natural color, a sort of grayish hazel, but blood blush still marred her cheeks so I knew she was still primed for violence. That violence being my death.