Viper Moon Page 5

  I climbed out and he waited in the parking lot until I went inside.

  Nefertiti, Nirah, and Horus waited for me. Nefertiti stretched across the back of the couch and Horus crouched on a cushion with Nirah draped around his neck like a red and black necklace. I sat on the couch and Nefertiti slid down and over my shoulders. She lifted her head to look me in the eye. I rubbed her under her lower jaw with my thumb.

  “Okay, guys. I’m sorry. I let you down last night. Dangerous strangers invaded our home. Abby warned me. No alcohol for at least another month until I’m finished with the meds.”

  I didn’t ask why they didn’t warn me. They couldn’t communicate on that level. Maybe they instinctively understood that I had been truly unconscious and lacked the ability to respond.

  Horus jumped on my lap and I knew that meant he forgave me. I guess the girls did, too, because they wanted to cuddle. While we did, I let myself examine my life and why I lived in such a haphazard manner.

  I grew up on a farm in north Arkansas with the best parents in the world. We lived with the seasons, worked hard, and enjoyed life in general. We weren’t religious, but we weren’t atheists. We believed in God, considered the land a sacred trust, and tried to be good stewards. Neither Mom nor Dad ever mentioned the Earth Mother, but I suspect they wouldn’t be surprised to know she existed.

  My world changed on my eighteenth birthday.

  Mom had smiled hopefully when she gave me the details of Grandpa’s trust fund for his only granddaughter. She reminded me that my good grades almost guaranteed me a scholarship, too. Go to vet school since I had such a strong affinity for animals. Horse whisperer? Cow whisperer? Pig, dog, cat—I understood them all, not in words but in feelings, and they listened to me when I spoke. When that facet of my personality appeared, my wonderful parents became vegetarians for my sake. No animal died around us except of natural causes.

  I don’t know if it was auspicious to turn eighteen on the full moon, or if something predetermined my life before my birth. I went to bed late that night, fell right to sleep, and woke up lying in the middle of the farm’s pear orchard. Silver light misted the world around me to soft gray and black sculptures and the moon herself floated high against the black ceiling of the sky. I stood, not frightened, thinking I’d been sleepwalking, when a woman’s voice spoke softly behind me.

  “Will you accept the call, Huntress?”

  I turned and faced a shadowy figure cloaked in white. Instinct, intuition told me the figure was female. She hid her face in the folds of her cowl.

  “Who are you?” I asked. Dreaming, I had to be dreaming.

  “I am the guardian of this earth. This is no dream, daughter; you are the Huntress. The little ones, the lost, call you. Will you find them?”

  That’s when I became afraid. I became a lost child, terrified, alone.

  “Danger waits, Huntress. But I will give you strength and you will stand for me.” The woman’s voice grew inside my head—and the child’s terror grew in my heart. “You were born on this night. I heard your first cries, saw your strength and courage. You were raised by good parents, taught right from wrong and respect for my lands. Now you must choose how you spend your life. I offer you pain, fear, and danger, but in turn you will be compensated.”

  I suddenly knew the joy of a child found, and the relief of a parent prepared for the worst. I swore I’d do what she wanted. In hindsight, it’s always struck me as a little unfair to give a naive eighteen-year-old girl such a choice—a decision between an ordinary life and the opportunity to be an extraordinary heroine. Guess what she’s going to choose.

  When I woke in my bed the next morning, an address came immediately to my mind. Missouri, two hundred miles north and another state away. Abby’s address. On my nightstand, underneath the lamp, was a significant bronze knife. The knife I carry today. To my mother’s dismay, I emptied my savings account and left the next day.

  Abby taught me about the Earth Mother, the Darkness, and the Barrows. I met Nefertiti in the Barrows one night when she generously bit a monster that had me pinned down. She followed me home. Not long after that, Horus arrived with Nirah. I knew, of course, they weren’t animals or reptiles in the truest sense. I consider them precious gifts. I guess the Mother sent them, though she never said. All three have a limited ability to reason and override animal instinct. That was ten years ago.

  I wish I could say the Mother gave me superpowers like a movie character. The old X-ray vision and a nifty fang-and-claw-proof suit would be nice. She did, however, give me physical strength, endurance, and rapid reaction times. Not fantastic, but I’d put myself up against an exceptionally strong weight lifter or distance runner any day. She has never given me anything of a material nature; hence my poverty. Unless you count her occasional nagging, she rarely interferes with my life.

  I don’t regret the decision to become the Huntress; the search fits my nature and feels right. But I sure wish I had read the small print in the contract before I signed on. At nine o’clock, I showered and dressed in jeans and a sky blue T-shirt. Back when I had money, I’d purchased a bottle of expensive concealing makeup. Since I now had a little funding courtesy of Carlos Dacardi, I applied the cream liberally to my face. It covered most of the bruising. Then I cleaned my gun and sharpened my knives.

  The gun, the source of Abby and the Mother’s irritation, was black and heavy in my hands. Would my patroness and guide be more comfortable if I carried a broadsword and shield? Maybe. My ammo dealer makes my bronze bullets by hand. He calls it his magic formula and charges twenty times the cost of regular ammo. I pay his price and ask no questions. I don’t know why the Mother hates the gun so much, unless it symbolizes what men have done to her lands and she longs for the old days.

  I slid the gun into a shoulder holster under my arm near my waist. The belt that held the holster in place also carried extra clips of ammo. One bronze knife went in a sheath on my left forearm and a smaller one slipped into a pouch on the side of my lace-up boots. Once I twisted, adjusted and readjusted, and everything fit right, I covered my arsenal with a light sand-colored jacket and headed out.

  A pervert with a video camera and kiddie porn aspirations had kidnapped Maxie Fountain. The pervert gave me the details as I convinced him of the error of his ways and adjusted his attitude.

  I’d also found kids snatched by a noncustodial parent who thought the Barrows made the perfect hiding place. But these were isolated incidences. The majority of children were taken for a far darker purpose. They became what Abby called acolytes, little soldiers of shadow, taken and trained to grow into service of the Darkness. She made it sound like some great conspiracy, some evil underground movement.

  I found serious crime in the Barrows, but no major criminal organization—or any special evil underground movement—yet. Potential was there, though, and only lacked a leader. With the sudden infusion of a massive amount of arms and explosives, anything could happen. Someone may already be making plans.

  Kids Selene and Richard’s age were usually runaways, but it didn’t take long for them to fall in with the others. The common thread of the notes and the Goblin Den, and the warning about the dark moon, didn’t change the odds they were runaways. Many of my lost sheep were not lost at all. They were where they wanted to be. They were drawn by the thought that no one would find them among the derelicts along River Street. If they lived on the coasts, they would be drawn to New York or LA. Not much I could do except try to talk them into going home.

  Usually I hunted those in the cheap diners and cafés where kids hang out trying to bum a meal, and in the three street missions that ministered to the dregs. Tonight, I’d start my search at the top.

  My POS was running well for a change, and the day’s steaming heat had partially drained away. I stopped at a drugstore with a photocopier and made copies of the two pictures. I’d probably need to hand them out. Cooler air slid over the rolled-down windows as I crossed Copper Creek and drove down River Street
and into the Barrows.

  The inhabited Barrows spread on both sides of River Street, the main road that led to the prosperous docks along the deep channel. A thin line of businesses, no more than two blocks deep, lined the roadway. Beyond that, it fell into a twilight zone of partially abandoned ruins that the Bastinados used as home base for their operations. Their turf boundaries changed often as they continuously battled one another for supremacy over the square miles of urban ruins.

  After that, you entered—if you dared—the Barrows’ relentless, evil heart: the completely deserted Zombie Zone.

  The Zombie Zone. Thirty square blocks of empty, crumbling buildings steeped in the rancid odor of dead industry. Deep in the center of the ruins, old articles in the Chronicle hinted that a total infrastructure collapse created the Zombie in 1929 and again in 1948, but it’s hard to determine exactly when bad things happened there. I’ve found so little history. It’s as if someone went in and erased the place. No one, not even the Bastinados, spend much time in the ruins, especially not at night.

  The police do patrol River Street leading to the docks, but none venture deeper unless they are exceptionally well armed or exceptionally crazy. They fear the Bastinados, though, not the true danger that lies there. Some Barrows businesses with their own security force are safe enough and popular—like the Archangel. It’s in a bad section of town, but the Archangel has first-rate guards, unobtrusive but well trained and well armed. A tacky, out-of-place neon sign on the building’s facade spells out the name, along with a flashing representation of an angel, wings flapping with an erratic electric rhythm. Interesting name since it’s an exercise studio and health food restaurant. Mercedes, BMWs, Jags, and other high-end cars fill the parking lot, watched over by vigilant guards.

  The uptown young professional crowd keeps their bodies in shape at places like the Archangel, because most of them sit on their asses all day and make money. They have to have lots of money to join the exclusive club of the Archangel.

  I cruised the parking lot until I spotted someone pulling out. Of course, others were doing the same thing, and I had to face off with a Mercedes. I gunned the engine on my POS, which sounded particularly powerful thanks to a hole in the muffler. The Mercedes backed down. I guess he figured from the looks of my car I didn’t give a shit and would happily ram him and scratch his shiny paint job. Then I’d hire a lawyer and sue him. I smiled and waved as I climbed out of the car.

  At times, people come to the Archangel in such throngs that they have to keep nightclub-style bouncers, discreetly referred to as attendants, to manage the line at the door. Tonight was one of those times. I ignored the glares of those in line as I entered. The attendants always let me in because Mr. Michael has given them strict orders.

  Handsome, rich Michael owns the Archangel, and he has a thing for me. I’ve never figured that one out. He’s the star, the golden boy, the one the ritzy crowd comes to see—and worship. While I like him a lot, I have some standards. I’m one of the Earth Mother’s children. Michael is different. He belongs to the Barrows, and I’m not quite sure he’s entirely human.

  chapter 5

  The Archangel occupied a renovated brick warehouse, filled with all those machines, wires, pulleys, and weights that I’m sure belonged in a torture chamber in another life. Yoga and aerobics classes had their own special floor cut out and a health food restaurant stretched across the back wall. The modern decor featured light oak wood and brown carpet, with splashes of bright green plants in pretty pots. Lively music and laughter filled the air, covering the incessant whir and clank of machines. It was all a little too neat, clean, and contemporary for me, but my opinion doesn’t count for much because I’m a slob.

  The Archangel’s small restaurant sat on a low balcony overlooking the area where people were twisting their bodies in rather peculiar positions. Michael tells me yoga is great. He regularly offers me private lessons, which I regularly decline. The restaurant has good tea, but the food menu consists of various mixes of grassy stuff and grains we let the cows eat back at the farm. The place even smelled like a pasture.

  In a few minutes, as usual, one of the Archangel’s staff approached me. I recognized him as an employee by his lean, muscular physique, handsome face, and the little angel embroidered on his T-shirt.

  “Mr. Michael would like you to join him upstairs,” he said. His fake smile reminded me of a doll with a painted face. I followed the staff member’s tight, shorts-clad butt up the stairs and into the elegant office with large one-way glass windows looking over the exercise area.

  The office was a copy of the rooms below, clean modern lines broken only by a few potted plants and trees. The desk had a glass top and a cordless phone—period. No paper, no pens; only a spare mesh office chair, perfectly positioned, defined a possible work space. The room did contain a small bar with stools and a saffron leather couch stretched along one wall.

  I went inside and the attendant closed the door behind me—reluctantly. He kept his adoring gaze on Michael as long as he could.

  Beautiful, perfect Michael.

  White blond hair flowed like liquid pearl across his shoulders and framed his flawless, symmetrical face. A tall man, built like a classical Greek statue, he wore a silk shirt that clung to his golden-skinned body. A body that made me clench my fists to resist the urge to run my hands over it. A godlike body.

  I’d decided that Michael could not be completely human because of the way he manipulates people, the way he draws them. It’s not just the looks. His voice, his gestures, his very presence demand adoration and worship. I realize that some movie and rock stars are adored, but when you meet them in person, it fades. Not so with Michael. He remains angelic and compelling in person.

  Since I spent so much time in the Barrows, it was inevitable that I’d meet Michael. Five years ago, I’d found one of my runaways working in his kitchen. We’d had a small altercation. I beat the shit out of one of his bouncers. When Michael objected, I took him down, too. I surprised him. I wouldn’t be able to do it again. Another reason for doubting Michael’s humanity? He’s superstrong. Stronger than me, even with the enhancement from the Mother.

  Michael had sworn he didn’t know the girl was a runaway, and very effectively persuaded her to go home. He invited me for a drink and I accepted. We talked. I told him I was a private detective—I still had my license then—and I found lost children. He seemed vaguely interested, but when he pushed me about why I was so strong, I left. Since then, I’d drop by occasionally and show him pictures of runaways; some of my biggest clues came from his staff. He has a fearsome reputation on the streets. People get nervous when they talk about him—but they won’t tell me why.

  I’m not exactly sure when he became obsessed with seducing me. Or why. I figured it was a challenge because I was partially immune to his powerful charisma. I don’t know why I was immune, but he grabbed me and kissed me one night. I responded to his kiss for a moment, then shoved him away. Nobody grabs me like that. He immediately apologized. Since then, I’ve kept my distance.

  Michael gazed at me with glacial blue eyes. He smiled and I broke into a sweat.

  “The Huntress stalks her prey,” he said. “She hasn’t come to enjoy my company.” He spoke in a smooth, lyrical tone that made women and some men lean forward, desperate to hear more.

  I edged away from him. “I have an idea where enjoying your company might lead.” My body reacted as it always did in his presence. It was purely physical. My skin tingled as desire rose. My body didn’t care that he might not be human.

  “Would that be so bad?” Michael moved closer. Too close.

  “No. Not bad. That’s the problem. And we’ve been through this before.”

  “Indeed we have.” He brushed a finger over my cheek, a caress soft as a sparrow’s wing. “Who hurt you?”

  His powerful body emanated possession. He would avenge any wrong against me. He has no right to that. I belong to no man. I didn’t answer his question.
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  “Tell me about the Goblin Den, Michael.”

  “The Goblin Den is a dangerous place for you, Huntress.”

  “The Barrows is a dangerous place for me, Michael.”

  He still spoke softly, but I caught an edge of caution. Was I actually beginning to know him that well? Well enough to hear nuances in his voice? I drew the pictures of Selene and Richard out of my jacket pocket and offered them to him. “I have a thread leading to the Den.”

  “You will not find these children at the Den. I will, however, inquire for you. I’ll keep the photos and pass them around.”

  It was as much as I expected. “I don’t have that much time. I have to go. The Den is my only lead.”

  “Then I’ll take you there.”

  I stood silent, surprised, a rare thing for me.

  Michael picked up the phone and ordered someone to bring his car to the front. He suddenly turned to me and, in a single swift motion, snatched me off my feet, removed my gun, and tossed it aside. Then he had me on the floor, on the soft carpet, my body pinned tight.

  I stared into his face. His eyes burned with bright, savage intensity and he drew deep breaths like a man going into a life-or-death struggle. He crushed his mouth to mine and sent shock waves of desire racing through my body. My fingers locked in his silky hair. Great Mother, what would it feel like brushed across my bare skin? He released my mouth, but his hands caressed my breasts and I trembled under his touch. I spread my legs and felt him hard against me. Great Mother. I wanted . . . but I would not. I twisted under Michael. “Let me go!”

  Michael instantly released me.

  He rolled over and lay beside me, with one arm draped across my waist. “Why not?”

  “You’re addictive.” The words came out harder than I’d intended. “You’re like a drug. Smooth as silk. If I get a taste, I’ll only want more . . . and more. I won’t let anything, or anyone, own me like that.”