Dark Road Rising Page 2

of the union. I'd been tied up too tight in my own problems to notice anything odd about him or even remotely suspect. It had been one pip of a surprise when the boom came.

  I was still getting used to it, the topper of a very busy evening.

  It began with one hell of a fistfight between me and Escott, which was what had landed him in the casualty ward. I'd done something really stupid and his attempt to knock some sense into me set me off. I hadn't meant to hurt him, but I woke out of my rage a little too late. Before I could follow his ambulance to the hospital, I'd been sidetracked by a phone call from my girlfriend, Bobbi. In so many words she let me know there was a man in her flat holding a gun to her head.

  That confrontation had ended badly.

  Bobbi was fine, thank God, but there'd been quite an ugly fracas before the dust settled. Kroun had been present, caught a stray bullet, and died.

  Apparently.

  The shooter was also dead, and I was left with a nasty mess: two corpses, a shot-up flat, and me desperately trying not to go over the cliff into the screaming hell of full-blown shell shock.

  By the grace of God, Escott's right fist, and Bobbi holding on to me like there was no tomorrow, I did not fall in. It had been a near thing, though. I was still standing closer than was comfortable to the edge of that dark internal pit, but no longer wobbling. Given time I might even back away to safer ground.

  As I'd sluggishly tried to work out the details of what to do next, Kroun picked that moment to stop playing possum. One minute he was flat on the floor with a thumb-sized hole in his chest, the next. . .

  Well. . . it had been interesting.

  It took hours to clear the chaos at Bobbi's. I saw to it she was driven to a safe place to stay, then arranged to disappear the dead gunman. For this, I got some reliable if wholly illegal help involving the kind of mugs who are really good at guaranteeing that inconvenient bodies are never found.

  Before the cleaning crew arrived, Kroun made himself missing. Temporarily. He hid out in the back of the Nash until the fuss was over.

  That I was no longer the only vampire (that I knew about) in Chicago hadn't really sunk in yet.

  Since we each had secrets to keep, we'd formed an uneasy alliance out of mutual necessity, and there was no telling how long it might last. I had fish of my own to fry and didn't particularly want to be looking after him-but he needed a favor, and, God help me, I turned sucker yet again.

  I didn't want to think just how badly this could end.

  Kroun seemed to doze. He'd not asked about our destination. I took it for granted that he wanted a ride away from the trouble and a chance to get his second wind, figuratively speaking. He had some serious healing to do; it might as well be in the company of someone who understood what he was going through.

  He took notice when I made a last turn and pulled into the alley behind the house. Escott and I hung our hats in an elderly three-story brick in a quiet, respectable neighborhood. Not the sort of place you'd expect a vampire to lurk, but I'm allergic to cemeteries.

  "What's this?" asked Kroun, blinking as I eased the car into the garage.

  "Home. I'm all in. You'll have to stay the day. " Maybe he had plans, but I wanted ask a few hundred questions, but later, when my brain was more clear. Right now it felt like street sludge.

  "There's no need. I found a bolt-hole for myself," he said. "I got time to get there if you call a cab. "

  "At this hour?" I set the brake, cut the motor, and yanked the key. The ring felt too light.

  "Cabs run all the time now, Fleming. It's a big burg, all grown-up. "

  "That's just a rumor. . . ah. . . damn it. " I searched my pockets.

  "Something wrong?"

  "The house key's back at my nightclub. Left so fast I grabbed the wrong bunch. " The wrong coat, too. Along with the Nash-which was Escott's car-I'd borrowed his overcoat. He wouldn't thank me for the bloodstains.

  I cracked the door, careful not to bang it against the wall of the narrow garage, and got out. Kroun did the same, moving more slowly. Something must have twinged inside, for he paused to catch his breath, which was an event to note. Like me, he wasn't one for regular breathing. His reaction had to do with pain.

  He'd left a dark patch on the center back of the seat, a transfer from a much larger stain on the back of his coat. It'd been hours; his wounds would have closed by now. The blood he'd leaked should be dried. Must have been the damp. The heavy air smelled of snow, but not the clean kind out of the north. This had a sour, rotting tang, as though the clouds were gathering up stink from the city and would soon dump it back again.

  Going easy on his left leg, Kroun limped across the patches of frozen mud and dingy snow that made up the small yard, then stalled halfway to the porch. He began to cough, a big deep, wet whooping that grew in force and doubled him over. It sounded like his lungs were coming out the hard way. I started toward him, but there's nothing you can do to help when a person's in that state. The fit comes on and passes only when it's good and ready to go. Spatters of blood suddenly bloomed on the untracked drift in front of him.

  I couldn't help but stare at the stuff. The smell had filled the car, but I'd successfully shoved it aside. This was fresh, dark red, almost black against the snow. He wasn't the only one with a problem. Mine was less obvious. I waited, holding my breath, unable to look away.

  Waited. . .

  But-nothing.

  Nothing for a good long minute.

  Couldn't trust that, though.

  Waited. . .

  And finally took in a sip of air tainted with bloodsmell. . .

  Dreading what must happen next. . .

  But no roiling reaction twisted my guts.

  No cold sweats.

  Not even the shakes.

  It was just blood. A necessity for survival, but nothing to get crazy over. No uncontrolled hunger blazed through my gut, not even the false starvation kind that scared me.

  So far, so good.

  I relaxed, just a little.

  Cold, though. . . I was cold to the bone. . . but that was okay. It wasn't the unnerving chill that left me shivering in a warm room, but the ordinary sort that comes with winter. I'd thought I'd lost that feeling.

  Kroun's internal earthquake climaxed, and he gagged and spat out a black clot the size of a half-dollar. He hung over the mess a moment, sucking air, and managed to keep his balance. My instinct was to lend him an arm to lean on while he recovered, but he wouldn't like it. I didn't know him well, but I knew that much.

  He'd made a lot of noise, perhaps enough to wake a neighbor. I glanced at the surrounding houses, but no one peered from any of the upper windows. The show was over, anyway. Kroun gradually straightened, his face mottled red and gray. He kicked snow to hide the gore.

  "You okay?" I asked. I'd have to stop that. It could get irritating.

  "Still peachy," he wheezed. When he reached the back porch, he used the rail to pull himself along the steps. He looked like hell on a bad week. "No house key, huh?"

  "Yeah, but-"

  He fished a small, flat case from the inside pocket of his tattered, filthy overcoat. A couple of nights ago it had been new-looking, but an explosion and fire had turned it into something a skid-row bum would have tossed in the gutter. Kroun might well have been rolling in that gutter. His craggy features were gaunt now, his hair singed-except for a distinct silver-white streak on the side-and when I inhaled he still stank of smoke and burned rubber. He opened the case, revealing a collection of picklocks. "Lemme by. "

  "No need," I said-and vanished. Into thin air. I was good at it. Didn't think twice.

  "Shit!" Kroun hadn't expected that.

  His reaction was muffled to me. My senses in this state were limited, but it did have advantages, like getting me into otherwise inaccessible places. Damn, I felt smug.

  "Fleming? You there?"

  I'm busy. I pressed towar
d the door, sensing the long, thin crack at the threshold, and slipped in. Though I could have passed right through the wood, this path of least resistance was less unsettling. Going solid again on the other side, I unlocked and opened up, gesturing Kroun in.

  He looked like he wanted to say a lot of things, but held back. I thought I understood his expression: an interesting combination of annoyance mixed with raw envy. It only flashed for a second, then he pocketed his case. "Nice trick. "

  "Just a way out of the cold. C'mon. "

  He stepped into the kitchen, and I locked the door again for all the good that would do. Even the dumbest of Chicago's countless thugs knew how to break and enter in the more conventional sense, though none of them had any reason to do so here. Quite the contrary. I'd gotten into the habit of thinking that way, though. Blame it on the scurvy company I kept.

  "Phone?" he asked.

  "The wall by the icebox. " Actually, it was a