Night and Day (Book 3): Bandit's Moon (26 page)

“No,” Johnny said, matching the
grin. “Only thing in my pants is Mr. Johnson.”

I stifled a laugh. They didn’t call
him Johnny Three-Legs for nothing.

“Really,” Zach said. “Hey Gus, why
don’t you slide your hands down the front of his pants and make sure he’s
tellin’ the truth.”

“Oh, fuck you,” Gus said. “You’re
worried about it, you do it.”

Zach laughed. “Nah, we’ll take
Johnny’s word for it. Let ‘em check him back at base if they have a mind
to.” He waved his hand at the open door. “Well, get on in and let’s get
this show on the road.”

I climbed up into the van and found
a seat on what looked like a rolled-up gym mat against one side. Johnny
dropped down beside me as the door closed.

There were eight other people in
the back of the van, sitting on the rolled-up gym mats on either side. Six
men, two women. They looked at us as we sat down, but didn’t say anything.
Ten people total. Not a big haul for bar duty, but not bad.

Gus climbed into the driver’s seat,
Zach in the passenger seat. The van rolled away from the curb.

The ride took about five minutes
and there wasn’t much talk. At one point, Zach pointed to one side and
said, “Check out that fine nigger bitch. Bet you’d like to tag
that.”

“That ain’t funny, Zach,” Gus said.
“You know the commander don’t like talk like that.”

“Yeah, well, the commander ain’t
here, is she,” Zach replied. “Pull the damn stick outta your ass, Gus. I
was just kiddin’ around.”

Gus didn’t answer.

A couple of minutes later, the van
stopped. Zach climbed out and pulled open the side door. “Okay,” he said.
“This is your stop.”

I went out through the open door
behind Johnny and looked around. We were on 59
^th
, around the
corner from the Floresta.

When everyone was out of the van,
Zach said, “Okay, we’re gonna take a little walk and then you’re gonna meet
the boss lady.”

He slammed the side door of the van
while Gus came around the back. “Follow me, folks,” Gus said as he started
down the sidewalk.

The ten of us from the van formed a
ragged line behind Gus. Zach fell in behind. As we rounded the corner onto
Tuxedo, I could see the two sentries outside the Floresta in the distance.
They were watching us.

There were probably other eyes on
us as well. Angelo would want to be sure that Schleu’s recruiters had taken
the bait. He’d have people watching, from a distance and maybe up close. It
wasn’t out of the question that he’d even have somebody in the apartment
across the street.

Not that it mattered. They might be
watching, but they couldn’t do anything if we got in trouble. Me and Johnny
were on our own.

As we turned onto the walkway up to
the Floresta, the front door swung open and I got my first direct look at
Katarina Schleu.

She was tall for a woman, probably
not quite six feet tall, but close. She wore black jeans and a faded
olive-drab fatigue jacket, just like Zach’s. There was a black knit cap on
her head, pulled down over her ears.

Schleu studied us as we approached,
her pale blue eyes coming to rest for a moment on each of us, then moving
on. I stared back as she looked at me. It might have been my imagination,
but I thought I caught the barest hint of a smile.

Then Gus stopped at the foot of the
steps and turned to face us. “Gather ‘round,” he said.

The ten of us moved into a small
semi-circle, Johnny at my right. Everyone was looking up at
Schleu.

“Hello,” she said. Her voice was
low and not very loud. It was an old trick I’d been taught years earlier,
sitting in on my first interrogations at 83
^rd
Street station.
Always talk a little quieter than usual, make the person you’re speaking to
strain, just a bit, to hear you. It helped focus the attention, and made
each word a tiny bit more important.

“I’m Commander Katarina Schleu,”
she continued. “I would thank you for coming today, but you should be
thanking yourselves for taking this first step to victory. For too long,
the people of this city have been frozen by their fear of the
vampires.”

She paused and smiled. There was no
humor in the smile. It was just part of the act. Speak. Pause. Smile. Speak
again. “And though it’s pretty damn cold right now, every one of you has a
fire burning in your heart. A fire that says no more. A fire that says this
is our city, our country, our world! Not theirs!”

Schleu was already getting to some
of the people in the group. A few were nodding, and one of the guys said,
“Yeah!”

She smiled again. “Well, you’ve
come to the right place, my friends. There is no fear here. There is no
getting along, no collaborating with those inhuman monsters here. We do not
wear their ownership tags. We do not cower in the night, afraid to walk the
streets of our own city. We are human beings and we will not be
food!”

More nods. A couple of claps.
Johnny grinned and said, “Tell it, sister!” I nodded too. Just another
believer.

Another smile. “Yes, I am your
sister,” she said, her eyes on Johnny. “We are all brothers and sisters,
human brothers and sisters, and our human family will have its day once
again. Soon.”

The smile faded. “I would be lying
to you if I said this will be easy. And I will never lie to you.” Pause.
“It will be difficult. The work will be hard, and you will be asked to do
things you would have never imagined possible before the skeeters came.”
Pause. “Cleansing is never easy. But I say to you that if you will join
with us, you will be there on the day of freedom, the day that we wash the
vampire filth from this city and make it our own once more. This city, and
then another, and another, and another!”

She was good. I had to give her
that. She was saying a lot without really saying anything. Vees are bad,
humans are good, we’re going to get rid of them. That was the message. But
she had her delivery down pat, and it was effective. At least to people who
already hated Vees and wanted to believe that they could somehow be a part
of defeating them.

“Now I know that some of you may be
asking what it’s going to take,” Schleu said. “Will it be dangerous?”
Pause. “Yes. Will it take total commitment?” Pause. “Yes. Will you be
separated from family and loved ones until the fight is done?” Pause. “Yes.
I won’t lie to you. We are declaring total war on the vampires, and some
will not survive to the day of final victory.”

No hoots and hollers now. No
clapping. This was the serious stuff.

“But I promise you, my friends,
that day will come. Sooner than you think. Humanity will rise up in an
angry wave and sweep the land clear. And the names of those who fall will
be remembered long after this city is forgotten. We are the vanguard. We
are the chosen few who will change the course of American history. We are
the ones who will save humanity itself!”

A few nods and a raised fist. It
was all about the rhythm. Up and down.

“I know that this burden is perhaps
too great for some of you,” she said softly. “We ask a lot, we demand a
lot.” Pause. “But we offer a lot! You will stand, side by side, with others
of your kind, and defeat the enemy. You will drive them from uptown,
downtown, midtown, westside, and yes, from eastside as well! And when we
are done, this city will be free!”

Plenty of stomping and hollering
now. This is what they wanted to hear. I clapped and nodded.

Schleu turned and pointed at the
door behind her, then turned back to us. “Will you walk through this door
with me?” she shouted.

A couple of guys said
“Yeah!”

“Will you stand with us against the
vampires and retake our home?”

More agreement. I guess this was
the point where you could say no and go back to whatever bar they’d found
you at. That probably didn’t happen much. If at all.

“Will you join us!” Schleu
shouted.

“Yeah,” I said with a big
smile.

“Hell, yeah,” Johnny
said.

She looked over us again, her gaze
flickering from person to person. She smiled. “Then welcome.”

Schleu spun and opened the front
door of the Floresta. I started up the steps behind her, Johnny at my side.
The rest were right behind.

She marched across the lobby, her
destination a double-door on the far side. The lobby itself was large, but
mostly empty. There were half a dozen people sitting on the big staircase
to the right that led up to the second floor. Watching us.

I glanced in that direction. And
recognized Nancy Haynes, sitting on a step next to a big guy with a KISS
tee-shirt and a John Deere cap on the back of his head.

Her eyes didn’t meet mine, and I’m
not that sure she was even paying much attention. The big guy next to her
had his hand around her shoulder and down the front of her
shirt.

I looked away quickly. Though I’d
only met her face-to-face that one time, we’d talked for about fifteen
minutes while she tried to put the moves on me and I tried to get the
information I needed for my report. Memorable? Not to me. She only stuck in
my mind because of the jokes I heard about her later in the
squadroom.

It had been at least six and a half
years. Maybe closer to seven. And I was just one cop of many. With any
luck, if she saw me, I wouldn’t register.

Still, I was ready. Well, as ready
as I could be, considering the situation.

If she remembered me, if she
started shouting that I was a cop, I was going to make a break for the
front door. The sentries would be surprised. I might get a weapon away from
one of them, shoot them both, run like hell.

Realistically I would never make
the sidewalk, if I even got out of the building. But I wasn’t going into a
hole in the basement. At least not on my feet.

The shouts never came. Either Nancy
hadn’t seen me, or she hadn’t recognized me. It was probably just a stay of
execution, not a reprieve. If she was in the building, and I was in the
building, eventually our paths would cross. If I was lucky, she’d be alone
and I could talk to her. Or kill her.

Schleu went through the far doors
and we followed. As I went inside, I saw the faded lettering on one of the
doors. EXERCISE ROOM.

There were three card tables in a
row ahead of us, a woman in a camouflage uniform sitting behind each.
Beyond them, folding chairs in rows, with an aisle between them, in front
of a low stage.

Schleu was on the other side of the
card tables, talking to a tall guy that could have been Angelo’s twin in
the body department. Big shoulders, tiny waist, big legs. But where Angelo
had dark hair and was swarthy, this guy had blond hair that was almost
white and it didn’t look like the sun had hit his face recently. Especially
under the little white Hitler mustache beneath his nose.

“I’m Captain Konrad,” he said,
looking at us as we bunched up inside the doorway. “Line up in front of one
of the tables and answer the questions. When you are done, sit down in one
of the chairs behind me and remain silent.”

“Captain Konrad will conduct your
preliminary briefing,” Schleu said. “I will meet with each of you
individually a little later.”

Konrad turned to her and saluted.
She returned the salute. All very military. All part of the act. They were
showing us that this was the real deal.

I let a chubby, dark-haired woman
get in front of me in line, to get an idea of what kind of ‘questions’ we
were going to be asked.

She approached the card table.
“Name?” the woman behind the table asked, pen poised above a
clipboard.

“Sue,” the woman said.

“Full name?”

“Susan Ward,” she said.

“Identification?

“What?

“Do you have any identification.
State ID card, driver’s license?”

Sue shook her head.
“Sorry.”

The woman wrote something on the
clipboard. “Address?”

“Sixteen Metcalfe Circle,” Sue
said.

“Employment?”

“I work behind the counter at
Rudy’s Bargain Store on 86
^th
Street,” she said. “You know, a
cashier.” She paused. “I help people find things too.”

The woman wrote on the clipboard,
then looked up. “Thank you, Ms. Ward. Please take a seat.”

“Okay,” Sue said.

I moved up to the table. The woman
was still looking at the clipboard as she wrote.“Name?”

“Charlie Welles,” I said. “Welles
with an e-s.”

“Identification?”

I took out my wallet and removed
the driver’s license. “Here you go,” I said, handing it to her.

She looked at it. Held it at a
couple of different angles, looking for the holographic seal. Maybe they’d
been burned by phoney ID. “Is this address accurate?”

“Yes, ma’am,” I said with a
smile.

She didn’t return the smile.
“Employment?”