F Wilson - Midnight Mass

Stan tapped Al on the shoulder and pointed to the roof of the nearer concession stand. Al nodded. He knew what he wanted: the second-story man had to do his thing again.

Al got to the top of the chain link fence behind the concession stands and from there it was easy to haul himself up to the roof. His sneakers made barely a sound as he crept across the tar of the canted roof to the far side.

The girl must have heard him coming, because she was already looking up when he peeked over the edge. She had one of them cross tattoos on her forehead.

That ain't gonna help you against me, honey.

Al felt a surge of satisfaction when he saw her blond ponytail and long thick bangs. Nice.

He felt something else when he saw the tears streaming down her cheeks from her pleading eyes, and her hands raised, palms together, as if praying to him. She wanted him to see nothin—she was begging Al to see nothing.

For an instant he was tempted. The fear in those frightened blue eyes reached deep inside and touched something there, disturbed a part of him so long unused he'd forgotten it belonged to him.

And then he saw she had a little boy with her, maybe seven years old, dark haired but with eyes as blue as hers, with a tattoo on his forehead. She was pleading for the kid as much as herself. Maybe more than herself. And with good reason. The vampires loved little kids. Al didn't get it. Kids were smaller, had less blood than adults. Maybe their blood was purer, sweeter. Someday, when he was undead himself, he'd know.

But even with the kid there, Al might have done something stupid, might have called down to Stan that there was nothing here but some old torn cat who'd probably taken a swat at that ball and rolled it out. But when he saw that she was knocked up—very knocked up, as in start-boiling-the-water knocked up—he knew he had to turn her in.

As much as the bloodsuckers loved kids, they went crazy for babies. Infants were like the primo delicacy among the vampires. Al once had seen a couple of them fighting over a newborn.

That had been a sight.

He sighed and said, "Too bad, honey, but you're packin too many points." He turned and called down toward the boardwalk. "Bingo, Stan. We struck it rich."

She screamed and the little boy began to cry.

Al shook his head as he watched her cower and hold the kid tight against her. Sorry babe. It ain't always a pleasant job, but a cowboy's gotta do what a cowboy's gotta do.

And besides, all these brownie points were gonna bring him that much closer to some stud time at the nearest cattle farm.

LACEY . . .

Lacey Flannery heard them coming before she saw them. Coming her way. They weren't talking, which was a bad sign. Could mean they were on the hunt. She had a faint hope that maybe they were wanderers like her, but she wasn't about to lay any money on it.

She'd motorboated down from the Sandy Hook area last night. The water tended to be pretty safe, even at night. The suckers stayed off it. She'd abandoned the boat at first light on the inlet jetty and sacked out here under the boardwalk. She'd been awake for about half an hour now. She'd packed up her stuff and had been ready to move out when she heard footsteps on the boards above. A bunch of feet—could have been four, six, maybe eight people. So she'd stayed put, figuring they'd move on.

But instead they were coming to her.

Lacy squatted with her back against a double piling and wondered what to do. Her sleeping bag and duffel were stacked before her on the sand. Better play it safe. She dipped into her bag of tricks, briefly considered her .38, but decided against it. She didn't have many bullets and didn't know what kind of trouble the noise of a shot would bring down on her. She chose her nunchucks instead. Two twelve-inch steel rods connected by a three-inch chain.

Yeah. That'll do.

She slipped out of her black leather jacket and her bare arms goose-bumped in the breeze off the water. The tight black tank top she wore beneath wasn't much for warmth but at least it wouldn't get in her way. She looked down and noticed her nipples poking at the thin fabric. She hadn't worn a bra in three years and didn't miss it now. She rubbed her nipples to make them stick out even more. Hey, girl—use all your weapons. Then she stuck the nunchucks inside the waistband of her jeans at the small of her back. The chain was cold between her cheeks. Thong panties didn't cover much.

Her mouth felt a little dry, her palms a little moist. Let's hope they're friendly, she thought. If not, then let's hope there's no more than two of them.

She rose and peeked around the piling.

Shit. One was a woman. She was going to be harder to distract. And worse, they were wearing cowboy earrings. The good news was there were only two of them.

Lacey stepped out and faced them. "How's it going?"

The stopped dead, staring.

"Ooooh, Jackie," said the dumb-looking guy with the bad skin and the red Mohican as his eyes fixed on Lacey's chest. "This ain't Al's blonde, but she'll do. Oh, baby, will she do."

"Shut up, Kenny."

The skinny, pierced-up, white-trash blonde gave her an up and down; she seemed more interested in checking to see if Lacey's hands were empty. She looked thirty-five but was probably thirty. Not at all Lacey's type.

She fixed Lacey with her squinty brown eyes. "What're you doin down here?"

"Catching some Z's," Lacey said. "How about you two?"

"Lookin for loooove," Kenny said, grinning. "In all the wrong places." He stepped closer. "Hey, ain't you somethin. Look at those muscles, Jackie. And she got tats too."

Lacey looked down at her upper arms and the black Celtic knots that encircled each just between the sleek, well-cut bulges of her biceps and deltoids. She'd spent a lot of time on those muscles.

"Want to see them wiggle like snakes?"

She began contracting and relaxing the muscles, making them dance under the Celtic knots which in turn undulated like, well, snakes.

"Tits and tats and ripped to boot," he said, easing another step closer. "I think I'm in love. Think we can have her join the posse, Jacks?"

"No way. Besides, that ain't for us to decide."

"They look so hard," he said. "You mind if I give one a little squeeze?"

Lacey smiled. "You're talking about my muscles but you're staring at my nips."

He laughed. "Oh, I do like this one, Jackie." He looked at her. "We gotta—"

That was when Lacey kicked him. She knew how to kick, had taken classes in it, and she lashed out her foot as hard as she could, putting a lot of her lower body behind it. She landed a good one, right square in his balls. He made a breathy noise, something like "Hommf!" as he went knock-kneed and dropped to the sand. Jackie stared at him stupidly, as if trying to figure out what had just happened, while Lacey grabbed for her nunchucks. She had a grip on one end and was snapping the other in a sidearm arc when Jackie looked back at her. Her mouth was opening, starting to shout, when the steel bar caught her across the left side of her head. She tumbled to her right and hit the sand, still conscious but just barely, holding her head and groaning. Blood seeped between her fingers.

Lacey turned back to Kenny. He was down on his knees with his hands jammed between his thighs, clutching his jewels, his face gray, his mouth working.

"You fucking bitch!" he managed. "You're gonna wish—"

Lacey kicked him again, in the stomach this time, high, a bull's eye into his solar plexus. He doubled over. Kenny wouldn't be threatening Lacey or anybody else for a while.

Five seconds later she was back in her jacket and booking south with her duffel and her sleeping bag. Behind and above her she thought she heard a woman's voice cry out. The blond the two creeps had mentioned? Lacey stopped and listened. She heard another cry and looked up at a seagull coasting overhead on the breeze. It squawked again. Had that been what she'd heard?