Page 19 of Countdown to Murder
“But if the vampire’s been outside a while, he’ll be the same temperature as the air, and infrared won’t help,” I noted.
“Right, but even a ten-degree difference, if he comes close to us and he’s traveling too fast for us to see in the visible spectrum, I’ll see the infrared blur.”
I pulled up an hourly forecast on my phone. “It’s supposed to be in the forties this evening. We’ll assume he brought his food, so the house he’s been in will have the thermostat set in the sixties or possibly low seventies. If it’s a short flight, we might be in luck.”
“Or if someone drives him close and he flies the rest of the way,” she said.
I engaged my mic. “Control. Once we hit sunset, look for cars parked and not moving within a five-mile radius.”
“Copy that.”
Mira started to say something and seemed to change her mind.
“Say it.”
“I’ve lived with vampires all my life.”
“And?”
“Seven miles. Maybe nine or ten, if he’s an old one.”
I engaged my mic again. “Control. If nothing shows up, double it to ten miles. Focus on areas close as the crow flies but hard to get to via roads.”
“Copy that.”
I’d cleaned the grill while it was still hot. When Mira finished eating, she stood and cleaned everything else while I finished eating. She also poured me more coffee, and had noted the way I like it — lots of cream, no sugar.
So, when I finished, it was only a matter of rinsing my dishes, settling them into the dishwasher, and making a pit stop by our room to use the bathroom before we went to Sloan for a sitrep and short session to decide whether to stick with our strategy or alter it. We all agreed to stick to the plan, and I told him, “Mira and I are going to walk the house and then the grounds, and talk to everyone. When we finish, we’ll hang out in the woods behind and above. I want to watch the sky. Mira will relieve Ember when the two of you go off. I’ll stay in the woods. We’ll let Jones decide who takes your spot.”
Chapter Ten
Mira
Drake’s supply stock was in the back of the media room, so I chose two camo capes while Panda questioned the men manning the control room. I marked what I was taking, rolled them up tight, and slid them into a side pocket of my tactical pants. Panda and I were both dressed in all black, with our guns worn outside our clothes instead of inside, since we didn’t intend to leave the property. We spent an hour talking to Jones and then all seven of his men. By then, the other seven were starting to show up in the kitchen, and we spent twenty minutes talking to them.
Finally, we made a wide lap around the mansion, hiked our way twenty-five yards up the mountain, and I climbed a nice, straight tree with branches dense enough I could go up without having to scale the maintrunk. I went at least twenty yards up, pulled the capes from my pocket, and dropped one down to him.
“You know he’ll see us even with these on.”
“Yeah,” I agreed, “but it’ll take him a little longer, and if he doesn’t think to look for people in the woods, he might miss us.”
We could speak in a conversational voice and hear each other. Both snakes and lions have better-than-human hearing. Snakes also pick up ground vibrations. I couldn’t when standing, but if I was lying prone or supine, I could. I believe my skull is acting as the drum, since resting my head on my arm severely dampens the effect. It’s possible my chest cavity does as well, but doesn’t pick up as much.
This meant if I leaned my head against the tree trunk, I felt the vibrations from it. Panda was sitting, leaned against it, and I felt his heartbeat. It felt so personal, almost as if I had my head on his chest, but I didn’t move away. I could watch the sky and feel his heartbeat at the same time.
“Have you ever fallen from a tree?” Panda asked.
“I’ve been pushed out of one in a fight. Never fallen without help, though.”
“How high?”
“Higher than I am now.”
“Injuries?”
“Broken bones. I immediately shifted, so no biggie. I was thrown off a fourteen-story balcony once. Landed in the parking lot with major head injuries. Unconscious. Mysnake has been conditioned to want to come out when other shapeshifterschangearound us. They put me in the van, and two wolves shifted beside me. The snake shifted, and I was okay.”
“Yeah, that was in my information packet about you. Handy. I assume the vampires somehow conditioned the snake to it?”
