Blood Hunt by Lee Killough Page B

Harry’s place. “Sorry.”
    “ What happened?” Serruto asked.
    Talking hurt. Garreth tried to find a short answer. Reaching up to the heavy collar of bandages around his throat, he managed to whisper, “Lane Barber bit me.”
    They stared. “She bit you! That’s an understatement. How did it happen?”
    How could he explain the loss of will that allowed her to stand him passively against a wall and tear his throat out? Damn, that light hurt. He shut his eyes. “Please. Close the curtains. Sun’s too bright.”
    “ There’s no sun,” Harry said in a tone of surprise. “We’ve been socked in with heavy fog since midnight.”
    Garreth opened his eyes again in astonishment. Noises that sounded overly loud and light that hurt his eyes. Bleeding to death produced one hell of a hangover. But to his relief, Harry closed the curtains. It helped a little.
    “ Lane bit Mossman and Adair,” he said with an effort. “Drank their blood.”
    “ Christ!” Harry shuddered. “The barmaid thought Barber might be kinky, but she’s really bent.”
    Barmaid? Garreth did not ask the question, but he raised his brows in query.
    Serruto explained. “We went around to the Barbary Now. Harry thought that you might have been there. The barmaid told us what you two talked about.”
    If that were so, Harry must have made the same connections he had. He looked questioningly at Harry.
    Harry sighed, shaking his head, indicating to Garreth that they had not arrested Lane.
    “ She’s skipped,” Serruto said. “Caught a plane to be at her mother’s bedside, she told the manager.”
    Harry said, “Something spooked her. When she came to work, she told the manager that she might have to leave suddenly. She’d even arranged for another singer to come in. After her walk with you, she sang a second set, then made a phone call — to her family, she told the manager — and said she had to leave.”
    Garreth’s visit that afternoon spooked her. She saw him taking down the license number of the car. “Search her apartment?”
    They nodded. “Nothing,” Serruto said. “No personal papers in the desk or trash. Some had been burned in the fireplace. The lab is seeing what they can recover from them. Refrigerator and cupboards bare. She left a closet full of clothes. The manager has no idea where her mother might live.”
    A nurse came in. “Lieutenant, that’s enough for now.” When Serruto frowned, she slid between him and the bed and herded both the lieutenant and Harry away.
    Harry called back, “Lien sends her love. She’ll visit as soon as it’s allowed.”
    When they were gone, the nurse moved around the bed, tucking in sheets. “For someone so weak, you’re a restless sleeper.”
    For the first time in his life. “Not comfortable. Sleeping pill?”
    “ Absolutely not. We can’t allow anything that depresses body functions.” She leaned across him, pulling up the covers. As she did so, the smell of her filled his nostrils...a pleasant mixture of soap and fabric softener and something with an odd but strangely attractive metallic/salty scent. “How about a back rub. That may help.”
    It did not. The sheets felt hot and sticky every place they touched him, with razor creases. He twisted in vain looking for a cool spot. However futilely he hunted a comfortable position, however, unit of blood reduced his feeling of weakness. The dragging weight of his body lightened and he moved with less effort. A thirst that had persisted all day turned into hunger and he looked forward eagerly to supper. An eagerness evaporating abruptly when he saw the broth, gelatin, and tea they allowed him.
    “ I don’t get real food?” He thought longingly of fried rice and Lien’s sweet-and-sour pork.
    “ We don’t want to strain your circulation by making it work at digestion.”

Maybe we did not, but he wished otherwise. Then again, maybe she was right. After eating, his stomach churned uneasily, as though debating whether to keep the