The Laughing Corpse (Vampire Hunter 2)

I glanced at Ronnie, then at Fatty who was nearly right beside her. I glanced at Mr. Jean Jacket, who was nearly beside me. I glanced back at Ronnie. Her eyes widened just a bit. She licked her lips once, then turned back to stare at Fatty. The guy with the Beretta was mine. Ronnie got the .22. Delegation at its best.

"What do you want?" I said again. I hate repeating myself.

"You to come take a little ride with us, that's all." Fatty smiled as he said it.

I smiled back, then turned to Jean Jacket, and his tame Beretta. "Don't you talk?"

"I talk," he said. He took two steps closer to me, but his gun was very steadily pointed at my chest. "I talk real good." He touched my hair, lightly, with his fingertips. The Beretta was damn near pressed against me. If he pulled the trigger now, it was all over. The dull black barrel of the gun was getting bigger. Illusion, but the longer you stare at a gun, the more important it gets to be. When you're on the wrong end of it.

"None of that, Seymour," Fatty said. "No pu**y and we can't kill her, those are the rules."

"Shit, Pete."

Pete, alias Fatty, said, "You can have the blonde. No one said we couldn't have fun with her."

I did not look at Ronnie. I stared at Seymour. I had to be ready if I got that one second chance. Glancing at my friend to see how she was taking the news of her impending rape was not going to help. Really.

"Phallic power, Ronnie. It always goes to the gonads," I said.

Seymour frowned. "What the hell does that mean?"

"It means, Seymour, that I think you're stupid and what brains you have are in your balls." I smiled pleasantly while I said it.

He hit me with the flat of his hand, hard. I staggered but didn't go down. The gun was still steady, unwavering. Shit. He made a sound deep in his throat and hit me, closed fist. I went down. For a moment I lay on the gritty sidewalk, listening to the blood pound in my ears. The slap had stung. The closed fist hurt.

Someone kicked me in the ribs. "Leave her alone!" Ronnie screamed.

I lay on my stomach and pretended to be hurt. It wasn't hard. I groped for the Velcro pocket. Seymour was waving the Beretta in Ronnie's face. She was screaming at him. Pete had grabbed Ronnie's arms and was trying to hold her. Things were getting out of hand. Goody.

I stared up at Seymour's legs and struggled to my knees. I shoved the derringer into his groin. He froze and stared down at me.

"Don't move, or I'll serve up your balls on a plate," I said.

Ronnie drove her elbow back into Fatty's solar plexus. He bent over a little, hands going to his stomach. She twisted away and kneed him hard in the face. Blood spurted from his nose. He staggered back. She smashed him in the side of the face, getting all her shoulder and upper body into it. He fell down. She had the .22 in her hand.

I fought an urge to yell "Yea Ronnie," but it didn't sound tough enough. We'd do high-fives later. "Tell your friend not to move, Seymour, or I'll pull this trigger."

He swallowed loud enough for me to hear it. "Don't move, Pete, okay?"

Pete just stared at us.

"Ronnie, please get Seymour's gun from him. Thank you."

I was still kneeling in the gravel with the derringer pressed into the man's groin. He let Ronnie take his gun without a fight. Fancy that.

"I've got this one covered, Anita," Ronnie said. I didn't glance at her. She would do her job. I would do mine.

"Seymour, this is a .38 Special, two shots. It can hold a variety of ammunition, .22, .44, or .357 Magnum." This was a lie, the new lightweight version couldn't hold anything higher than .38s, but I was betting Seymour couldn't tell the difference. "Forty-four or .357 and you can kiss the family jewels good-bye. Twenty-two, maybe you'll just be very, very sore. To quote a role model of mine, 'Do you feel lucky today?' "

"What do you want, man, what do you want?" His voice was high and squeaky with fear.

"Who hired you to come after us?"

He shook his head. "No, man, he'll kill us."

"Three-fifty-seven Magnum makes a f**king big hole, Seymour."

"Don't tell her shit," Pete said.

"If he says anything else, Ronnie, shoot his kneecap off," I said.

"My pleasure," Ronnie said. I wondered if she would really do it. I wondered if I'd tell her to do it. Better not to find out.

"Talk to me, Seymour, now, or I pull the trigger." I shoved the gun a little deeper. That must have hurt all on its own. He sort of tried to tippy-toe.

"God, please don't."

"Who hired you?"

"Bruno."

"You ass**le, Seymour," Pete said. "He'll kill us."

"Ronnie, please shoot him," I said.

"You said the kneecap, right?"

"Yeah."

"How about an elbow instead?" she asked.

"Your choice," I said.

"You're crazy," Seymour said.

"Yeah," I said, "you remember that. What exactly did Bruno tell you?"

"He said to take you to a building off Grand, on Washington. He said to bring you both, but we could hurt the blonde to get you to come along."

"Give me the address," I said.

Seymour did. I think he would have told me the secret ingredient in the magic sauce if I had asked.

"If you go down there, Bruno will know we told ya," Pete said.

"Ronnie," I said.

"Shoot me now, chickie, it don't matter. You go down there or send the police down there, we are dead."

I glanced at Pete. He seemed very sincere. They were bad guys but. . . "Okay, we won't bust in on him."

"We aren't going to the police," Ronnie asked.

"No, if we did that, we might as well kill them now. But we don't have to do that, do we, Seymour?"

"No, man, no."

"How much ol' Bruno pay you?"

"Four hundred apiece."

"It wasn't enough," I said.

"You're telling me."

"I'm going to get up now, Seymour, and leave your balls where they are. Don't come near me or Ronnie again, or I'll tell Bruno you sold him out."

"He'd kill us, man. He'd kill us slow."

"That's right, Seymour. We'll just all pretend this never happened, right?" He was nodding vigorously.

"That okay with you, Pete?" I asked.

"I ain't stupid. Bruno'd rip out our hearts and feed them to us. We won't talk." He sounded disgusted.

I got up and stepped carefully away from Seymour. Ronnie covered Pete nice and steady with the Beretta. The .22 was tucked into the waistband of her jogging shorts. "Get out of here," I said.

Seymour's skin was pasty, and a sick sweat beaded his face. "Can I have my gun?" He wasn't very bright.

"Don't get cute," I said.

Pete stood. The blood under his nose had started to dry. "Come on, Seymour. We gotta go now."

They moved on down the street side by side. Seymour looked hunched in upon himself as if he were fighting an urge to clutch his equipment.

Ronnie let out a great whoosh of air and leaned back against the wall. The gun was still clutched in her right hand. "My God," she said.

"Yeah," I said.

She touched my face where Seymour had hit me. It hurt. I winced. "Are you all right?" Ronnie asked.

"Sure," I said. Actually, it felt like the side of my face was one great big ache, but it wouldn't make it hurt any less to say it out loud.

"Are we going down to the building where they were to drop us?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"I know who Bruno is and who gives him orders. I know why they tried to kidnap me. What could I possibly learn that would be worth two lives?"

Ronnie thought about that for a moment. "You're right, I guess. But you aren't going to report the attack to the police?"

"Why should I? I'm okay, you're okay. Seymour and Pete won't be back."

She shrugged. "You didn't really want me to shoot his kneecap off, did you? I mean we were playing good cop, bad cop, right?" She looked at me very steadily as she asked, her solid grey eyes earnest and true.

I looked away. "Let's walk back home. I don't feel much like jogging."

"Me either."

We set off walking down the street. Ronnie untucked her T-shirt and stuck the Beretta in the waistband. The .22 she sort of cupped in her hand. It wasn't very noticeable that way.