Vampire Zero (Laura Caxton, #3)(17)

“I’m sorry, Trooper, I didn’t mean to—”

She held up one hand and looked at her shoes until her heart had stopped thudding in her chest. “It’s alright. They told me you were coming in. I should have been ready to greet you.” Slowly she uncoiled her arms. They had been wrapped tightly around her stomach. She held out one hand and the Fed shook it. “It’s just—it’s just been a very long night.”

“I appreciate your taking the time to talk to me,” he said, smiling patiently for her. “I’m sure you’re busy.”

She shrugged. She’d been busy an hour before, coordinating the police response, securing the motel, and leading a team of troopers who dragged the field looking for any sign of Jameson. When nothing turned up she’d eventually decided she could go home, that there was nothing more for her to do at the scene. Then Fetlock had called and asked for access to the crime scene. The timing was lousy—it was six in the morning; she hadn’t slept all night and she just wanted to get home. She’d thought about making him wait until she’d had some rest, but he assured her it was important, that he really needed to see the crime scene while it was fresh. Caxton had been a cop long enough to know how the hierarchy worked. Nothing good could ever come from saying no to a Fed. So she had been stuck at the motel while she waited for him to arrive. She had no idea what he wanted. He’d come to her briefing of the SSU but then left without saying anything, and now he was muscling in on her investigation. None of it made sense. “It’s not that I’m not glad to see you,” she said, “but maybe you could explain your imperative interest in this scene. Especially at this time in the morning.”

He smiled broadly. “I guess I’m just a morning person. As for my interest, it’s purely informal, I assure you. If you’d prefer not to meet with me now, I’ll be happy to get out of your way.”

She shook her head. She’d worked with Feds before and she knew that was likely all the explanation she would get—at least until he wanted something from her.

“No, no,” she said. “I’m just not sure how I can help you.”

“Why don’t you tell me what happened here?”

“It started with a routine interview. I’d made an appointment with Angus Arkeley, who was Jameson’s brother, and we were chatting. Then the situation deteriorated.” She filled him in briefly on the night’s events, omitting only her mental state—the doubts she’d felt, the moments of panicked fear, the blank spots when Jameson had hypnotized her.

When he’d heard her narrative—he declined to comment on any of it—she started showing him what remained behind.

When Jameson had left her, when she’d recovered enough to stand, she had made her way back to the front of the motel. The ambulance she’d called for arrived first, but the paramedics hadn’t known where to start, and she had to explain that the corpse in the parking lot wasn’t their patient. It should have been clear, she thought. The remains of the half-?dead stank like they’d been moldering in the ground for months and there was so little left of its musculature and internal organs that she could have easily picked it up in one hand. The paramedics had eventually put up caution tape around the body and then just thrown a blanket over him. Now, as yellow light crept across the parking lot, she twitched the blanket back so Fetlock could see what he looked like.

The Fed winced visibly. Maybe at the smell, maybe at what the half-?dead looked like. “It’s going to be hard to make a positive ID on that,” he said.

“You’re not kidding. The skin’s too degraded to get prints and his teeth are all broken up, so matching dental records is out. There’s no wallet or any kind of identification on him or in the car. I already checked.” That had not been a lot of fun.

“So Angus kicked him to death?” Fetlock asked. “That wouldn’t explain the decomposition.”

Caxton shook her head. “Angus was pretty hard on him, but I think he would look like this anyway. No, he died of old age.” Fetlock frowned at that, but she just shrugged and went on. “Jameson must have raised him from the dead more than a week ago and he’s been rotting away ever since. This guy wasn’t a threat to anyone. He couldn’t even stand up, much less hold a weapon. I think that was intentional.”

“What do you mean?” Fetlock asked.

“Jameson must have known how little life his servant had left in him. He could have sent a fresher corpse to bring his message, but if he had, if the half-?dead had lived just a few hours more, I could have interrogated him and learned where Jameson’s lair is. This guy won’t be telling me anything.”

She pulled the blanket back over the half-?dead’s face. Supposedly a hair and fiber unit was coming from Harrisburg to take a look at him, but she doubted they would find anything. The body was still decaying at an accelerated rate, and by the time they arrived he would probably be nothing more than stinking goo and splintered bones.

“That might explain why Jameson came here so early. The half-?dead was supposed to arrive at midnight to get Angus’ answer, but it was closer to six P.M. when they arrived. I think Jameson didn’t expect his servant to last until twelve.”

“You mentioned that before. That Jameson had approached his brother with some kind of offer and that Angus refused it. You didn’t say what the offer was.”