Kitty and the Midnight Hour Part 15

I ignored that, glancing back at where the monochrome Stella had gone to hara.s.s someone else. "You must be in pretty tight with Arturo, to toss around his name like that."

"Don't tell anyone, but I'm nearly as old as he is. Nearly as powerful. The only difference is I don't want to be Master of a Family. I don't want that kind ofa responsibility. He knows this, knows I'm not a rival. We have an understanding about other things."

"Ah. Why are you even here at all? Why even follow him?" This was touching on what I wanted to talk to him about. He'd been around for a long timea"he'd just admitted as much. He had answers I didn't.

He sat back, smiling like he knew what I was really asking and why I was asking. "Being part of a Family has its advantages. Finding sustenance is easier. There's protection. A guarded place to sleep out the days. These things are harder to find alone."

Dejected, I propped an elbow on the bar. Those were all the things I needed Carl for. What was I supposed to do if I couldn't stand him anymore?

Rick continued. "I spent about fifty years on my own, around the end of the nineteenth century. Ia angered a few dangerous elements, so I set up a place in one of the Nevada boomtowns during the Comstock Lode silver rush. You wouldn't believe how well the mining operations in a place like Virginia City kept away a certain kind of riffraff."

I grinned, drawn into the story in spite of myself. "You p.i.s.sed off a pack of werewolves."

"You didn't come to hear stories. You mentioned advice. Though this seems a strange place to find it."

"I'm running out of friends."

"Nonsense. You have half a million listeners who adore you."

I shot him a glare. "Someone asked me recently who I went to when I needed advice. And I couldn't answer. I didn't know."

"You still haven't told me what you need advice about."

I asked him because he was old and presumably experienced. And, ironically, he'd never given me a reason to be afraid of him.

"I don't understand what's happening. I don't know why Carl and Meg are acting the way they are. I don't know why I can't make them understand why I feel the way I do. I wisha"I wish they'd leave me alone, but then I'm not sure I want them to. Especially Carl." There, I thought I'd gotten it all out.

"You're not looking for advice. You're looking for affirmation."

And I wasn't getting it from the people I most wanted it from. G.o.d, he made it sound so obvious. If someone had called in with this problem, I'd have been able to rattle off that answer.

I rubbed my face. I felt like I was five years old again. See, Daddy, look at the pretty picture I made, and what is that kid supposed to do when Daddy tears it to shreds? I didn't want to think about Carl as a father figure. More likea the tyrant in his harem. Or something.

Rick turned a wry smile. "It's growing pains. I've seen it before. It happens in a werewolf pack any time a formerly submissive member starts to a.s.sert herself. You're coming into your own, and Carl doesn't know what to do with you anymore."

"How do I make everything okay again?"

He leaned back. "If life were that easy, you'd be out of a job."

Right. Time to change the subject. I wanted to hear about the silver rush and Virginia City during the frontier days. I couldn't picture Rick in a cowboy hat.

"So, you want to be a guest on the show and tell some stories about the Old West?"

He smirked. "Arturo would kill me."

The trouble with this crowd was, you didn't know when that was a joke.

About a week later I came home from work and found Cormac leaning against the outside wall of my apartment building. It was well after dark. He had his arms crossed and stood at the edge of the glow cast by the light over the door. I stared for a good minute before I could say anything.

"You know where I live."

"Wasn't hard to find out," he said.

"Am I going to have to move now?"

He shrugged. "The place is kind of a dump. I thought you'd be making better money than this."

He didn't have to know about Carl's payoff. "Maybe I like it here. What do you want?"

My neck was tingling. I needed to get the h.e.l.l out of here. But he wasn't armed tonight. At least not that I could see. Without all the guns he looked less like a hit man and more like a good-guy biker.

"You remember that cop? Hardin? She got in touch with me about those murders."

Just like that, the anxiety went away. The big picture took over. Being p.i.s.sed off that someone was going behind my back took over. "Really? She told me she didn't trust you enough to talk to you about it."

"She seems to have the idea that you're too loyal to your 'kind' to be any help."

"Just because I wouldn't name names."

"Do you have a name?"

"No. Geez, it's like thinking that because someone'sa"I don't know, an auto mechanica"that they know every other auto mechanic in town."

"Werewolves are a little less common than mechanics."

I changed the subject "Why are you helping her? Last time I talked to her, she wanted to prosecute you for stalking and attempted murder."

"She offered to keep off my back if I helped catch this guy."

Hardin knew how to be everyone's friend. "Convenient."

"I thought so." He paced a couple of steps toward me. "Listen. You have information about this killer that I can't geta"the scent. Is there something you're not telling the cops?"

I huffed. "I didn't recognize the scent It's not one of ours. At least I don't think it is."

"Okay. I'm not the cops. I'm not territorial about information. We can get closer to catching this guy if we pool what we know."

"What do you know?"

"How to kill werewolves."

"Is that supposed to make me feel better?"

"No."

Defeated, I let out a sigh. "What do you want me to do?"

"If you see this guy, give me a call. You go places I don't, meet people I can't. You have contacts."

"You don't agree with Hardin? You don't think I'll protect him just because he's a werewolf?"

"I think you'll do the right thing. You have my number." He turned to walk away.

"Who owes who a favor now?"

He glanced over his shoulder. "Don't worry, I'm keeping track."

Matt leaned against the doorjamb between the sound booth and studio. "Kitty? There's a live one on line three. Might be a crank, but she sounds like she's really in trouble. You want it?"

I could say no. This was my show, after all. It would be a lot easier and better for everyone if I transferred her to a hotline. Too bad there wasn't a hotline for troubled vampires and werewolves.

I nodded, listening to my current caller's ornate commentary about miscegenation and purity of the species. Standard canned reactionary rhetoric.

"Uh-huh, thank you," I said. "Have you considered a career as a speechwriter for the Klan? Next caller, please."

"Oh, thank you! Thank you!" The woman was sobbing, her words unintelligible around the hysterics.

"Whoa, slow down there. Take a breath. Slow breaths. That's a girl. Estelle? Is this Estelle?"

She stopped hyperventilating somewhat, matching her breathing to my calm words. "Y-yes."

"Good. Estelle, can you tell me what's wrong?"

"They're after me. I'm hurt. They're coming after me. I need help." Her words came faster and faster. My heartbeat sped up along with them. Her voice lisped, like she held her mouth too close to the phone.

"Wait a minute. Explain your situation. Who's after you?"

She swallowed, loud enough to carry over the line. "Have you heard of Elijah Smith? The Church of the Pure Faith?"

I stood and started pacing. More than heard of him, I was almost ready to show up at his door and let him have at me just to learn something new. I so wanted to expose him for a charlatan. Right now, the church caravan was parked some sixty miles away from the studio.

"Yes, I've heard of them."

"I left. I meana"I want to leave. I'm trying to leave."

"Oh. I meana"oh." I, who made my living by my voice, was speechless. No one had ever left the Church of the Pure Faith. None of Smith's followers had ever been willing to talk about him.

I had so many questions: What was she? Had she gone looking for a cure? Did it work? What was Smith like? This was the interview I'd been waiting for.

"Okay, Estelle. Let me make sure I'm clear on this. You area"what, vampire? Lycanthrope?"

"Vampire."

"Right. And you went to the Church of the Pure Faith seeking a cure for vampirism. You met Elijah Smith. Youa"were you cured? Were you really cured?" What would I do if she said yes?

"Ia"I thought so. I mean, I thought I was. But not anymore."

"I'm confused."

"Yeah," she said, laughing weakly. "Me, too."

Estelle sounded exhausted. How long had she been running? The night was half over. Did she have a safe place to spend the day? And why had she called me!

Witnesses. We were live on the air. Thousands of witnesses would hear her story. Smart. Now if only I could live up to her faith in me.

"Are you safe for the moment? Are you in a safe place or do you need to get out of there right now? Where are you?"

"I lost them, for now. I'm in a gas station; it's closed for the night. I'll be all right until dawn."

"Where, Estelle? I want to send you help if I have to."

"I don't think I want to say where. They might be listening. They might follow you here."

This was going to be tough. One step at a time, though. I covered my mouthpiece with a hand and called to Matt. "Check caller ID, find out where she's calling from." Through the booth window I saw him nod. I went back to Estelle. "When you say they're after you, do you mean Smith? Do you mean his people? Do they want to hurt you?"

"Yes. Yes!"

"Huh. Some church. Why don't people leave him?"

"Theya"they can't, Kitty. It's complicated. We're not supposed to talk about it."

Matt pressed a piece of paper against the booth window, pay phonea"unknown, it read.

"Estelle? Walk me through the cure. You saw a poster announcing a church meeting. You showed up at the tent. How long ago was this?"

She was breathing more calmly, but her voice still sounded tight, hushed, like she was afraid of being overheard. "Four months."

"What happened when you got there?"

"I arrived just after dark. There was a group of tents, some RVs, campers and things. They were circled and roped off. There were guards. About eight of us gathered at a gate. There was a screening process. They patted us down for weapons, made sure none of us were reporters. Only the truly faithful ever get to see Smith. Anda"I wanted to believe. I really wanted to believe. One of the people they searched, I think he was a werewolfa"they found a microphone or something on him, and they threw him out."

They threw out a werewolf. That took some doing. "People who've tried to break into the Church have met up with considerable force. Who works on the security detail?"

"His followersa"everyone who lives and works in that caravan is a believer."

"But they've gotta be tough. Whole werewolf packs have gone after hima""

"And they're going up against werewolves. And weretigers, and vampiresa"everything. It's fighting fire with fire, Kitty."

"So they're not really cured."

"Oh, but they are. I never saw them shape-shift, not even during the full moon. The vampiresa"they walked in daylight!"

"But they retained their strength? They were still able to deal with a werewolf on equal terms?" Lose the weaknesses without losing the strengths of those conditions? Some might call that better than a cure.

"I suppose so."

Interesting. "Go on."