Page 8 of Clay White
“You’re still a kid. I know you don’t feel like it, and you figure your glory days are behind you. But there’s plenty of work you can still do—good work, important work—if you get your head together.”
“If you’re trying to tempt me with a job offer, that’s not why I’m here.”
Townsend’s bark of laughter shook his entire body. “No, I didn’t think so. Anyway, your days with the Bureau are permanently over. But there are many other doors waiting to open. I’ll even be a reference. I have positive things to say about you.”
“Gonna tell them about the little kids I killed?”
“I’m going to tell them you’re a good man who sometimes acts with his heart and guts instead of his brain. The same could be said of most heroes.”
“I’m no hero,” I muttered, looking away. Then I firmed my jaw and turned back to face him. “I didn’t come here for job counseling either.”
“Of course not. I threw that in for free.” He drained his glass a second time and didn’t pour more. “What can I do for you?”
“You can send some agents up north to catch whatever’s been murdering young men.”
Townsend showed no surprise at my statement. He took a cigarette package out of a desk drawer and flicked a silver lighter to life. When he exhaled, he blew a perfect smoke ring. We both watched it drift to the ceiling.
“This isn’t any business of yours,” he finally said.
“Just because I’m not on the Bureau payroll doesn’t mean it’s not my business.”
“And why do you think it is?”
I had to think about that for a moment. “They’re people who don’t deserve to die. If I can do something to stop that—”
“It won’t bring back those children.”
I winced, not so much at the reminder of what I’d done as at the echo of what Marek had said about penance. I hated feeling I was so transparent that anyone could see my feelings and motives. “I know.”
After a deep sigh, Townsend took several long drags from the cigarette and then stubbed it out. “So, what can you tell me about the situation?”
“Not much. A bunch of dead young men—more than the cops are aware of. Kids who liked to hang out in clubs. Every one of them drained.”
“Anything else?”
“It’s not a vampire. At least I don’t think so.”
“What makes you say that?” he asked, chin lifted.
“Condition of the bodies. Not just bloodless, actually desiccated.”
“You don’t think a vamp can do that?”
“No.”
“What makes you so sure?”
I looked down at my hands, sitting uselessly on my lap, then up at him. “I spoke with a vampire.”
I gave him a cleaned-up version of my encounter with Marek. Townsend listened expressionlessly, but his eyes told me he wasn’t surprised to learn about Marek—and he knew perfectly well we’d done more than chat. When my brief narrative was finished, Townsend refilled his glass but didn’t yet drink it. “So you believe in an ethical vampire?” he asked.
“Maybe. If he was the perp, why would he have let me live? Why send me here with a warning?”
“Dunno. Because he hopes to deflect attention from himself?”
I’d considered that possibility, but it didn’t feel right. Of course my instincts had been wrong before, with lethal results.
Townsend heaved his bulk out of the chair and took a few steps toward a wall, where he inspected a yellowed newspaper clipping. The headline was about a congressman from Modesto who’d been caught in a Bureau sting operation a few years back. The bastard had tried to sell his soul to the devil in return for being elected governor. I hadn’t worked on that particular case, but I remembered it well.
