23 Hours: A Vengeful Vampire Tale(60)

“Well, make it focus or something,” the warden commanded. The view on the screen was no more than a blurred smear of brown and reddish yellow. Nothing at all could be made out of that view.

The half-dead winced again. “The cameras focus automatically. They can’t be adjusted from here. It’s possible that…”

“That what? Don’t keep me waiting, just spit it out.”

The half-dead nodded. “It’s possible she smeared something on the lens. Like Vaseline. Or lipstick. Just about anything viscous would do.”

“Pepper spray,” the warden said. “I’ll bet it was pepper spray. There’s enough of it in this place to paint the curtain wall.” She smacked the monitor again. “I need to know what’s going on in that loading bay. I sent a detail down there to kill Caxton and I would very much like to know if they succeeded or not. I imagine you would like to know that as well, hmm? Because it looks like she’s killing every half-dead she runs across, and if I don’t find out what I need to know, I’m going to send you personally down there to check and see what condition she’s in.”

Clara laughed. “You’re wasting your time.”

The warden turned and glared at her. “You have something to share?”

Clara started to shrug, then thought better of it. The band around her arm might interpret that as a sudden move and hit her with a near-lethal electric shock. “You can’t threaten them with death. They’ve been there once already, and believe me, they aren’t afraid to die again. It would be a mercy. You’re in pain, aren’t you?” she said, addressing Franklin.

The half-dead sneered at her. “None of your business, cunt.”

“They like to talk tough. But look at its face. You think that doesn’t hurt? But it can’t stop itself from scratching. Its whole existence is a scab, a temporary scab over a fatal wound. They only last for about a week before they fall apart, did you know that? All that’s left then is a pile of goo with maybe some eyes and fingers sticking out. And twitching. Still twitching.”

The half-dead’s eyes were bright and huge as it stared at her.

At its sides its hands were clutching at nothing and then relaxing, over and over again.

The warden coughed into her hand. “She’s taunting you,” she said. “Ignore it. I don’t know if she thinks that making you attack her will get her anywhere, or maybe she’s just bored. Either way, ignore everything she says.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Franklin said, and seemed to relax a little.

It had been worth a shot.

Clara had come to an inescapable conclusion. Her value to the warden was very small to begin with, and it was about to evaporate. Malvern had ordered her capture for use as an insurance policy. A way to control Laura. If the half-deads did manage to kill Laura—Please God, no, she thought, but if they did—then Clara would be completely useless to the warden. In fact, she would be a liability. She’d seen far too much. Knew too many secrets. The warden would have a very good reason to kill her.

If the half-deads failed to kill Laura, which Clara thought was more likely, she might gain a few extra hours of life. More time to sit around watching the warden’s plans unfold, more time to fret and worry and wonder just how she was going to die.

She had to do something. The risk was very high that by angering Franklin or the warden she would get herself hurt. But there were no other options. With the band on her arm she was unable to run away and unable to attack them herself. If Franklin attacked her, though, she might be able to get its weapon away from it. Then she could kill it and threaten the warden into removing the band on her arm, and then she could—she could—

The main problem with any of these theoretical plans was that she wasn’t Laura. She wasn’t fast, or tough. She didn’t instinctively know how to fight, or when to duck, or how to escape from a bad situation. She had been a police photographer. She was learning how to do crime lab science. Nothing in her law enforcement career had prepared her for violence. She didn’t even know how to shoot straight.

A half-dead ran into the room then, its mouth hanging open in shock. “They’re out of the loading bay,” it said, cowering as the warden came over to look down into its ravaged face.

“I beg your pardon?” the warden asked.

“I—-just—I saw them on another camera. There’s a truck. It’s driving around the yard. It has to be Caxton and her partner. But they’re being stupid. They’re driving the wrong way. Away from the main gate.”