I made the mistake of telling the truth when Nathaniel asked why I was running out with my whole kit over my shoulder. Everyone insisted I take guards as backup, just in case. I didn’t have time to argue, so Nicky and Domino were with me as I hit the stairs. Nicky had called ahead so that bigger guns were waiting for them in the storage room up top. Again, I didn’t argue, because if the worst happened we were running out of time, and we’d need the firepower.

Why not call other police to meet us there? Because maybe I’d just raised a zombie so alive that he could eat a meal and talk about his adventure, and the only thing scary about him was that he was too human. I preferred that to him turning into a ravaging cannibalistic killing machine, but him being that alive scared the hell out of me, too. It was just a different kind of scared.

Nicky asked to carry my vampire-hunting kit. “You’ll be faster on the stairs without it.”

Normally I would have argued and carried my own damn equipment, but since it weighed almost as much as I did, I gave it to Nicky. He threw it over his shoulder. I started running up the stairs, and then the men were up with me, and the three of us fucking ran.

27

I CALLED MANNY from the car, and he was waiting for us outside work. He wasn’t much taller than me, a slender, dark figure with salt-and-pepper hair standing under the streetlight. It highlighted him like a spotlight, ruining his night vision and making him a great target if anyone was aiming for him. He’d been my teacher in the early days of vampire hunting, but he’d never really stopped being a stake-and-hammer man, and that was only good for daytime vamps dead in their coffins, or morgue kills where the vamps were chained down with holy items. Outside those two instances I preferred shotguns or assault rifles, though handguns would do in a pinch.

There were cars having issues with parking, or not parking, in front of us, so we got to wait while we looked at Manny. I didn’t think he’d seen us yet. He was talking on his phone.

“This is the guy who taught you how to hunt vampires?” Domino asked from the backseat.

“Yeah.”

“He taught you how to raise the dead,” Nicky said from beside me. “Edward taught you how to hunt vampires.”

“Actually, the second part was a learn-as-you-go program,” I said. “If I hadn’t been good enough to bother with when Edward met me, he’d have just killed me.”

“Edward is like one of your best friends,” Domino said.

“We weren’t always friends.”

“Why didn’t he kill you then?” Nicky asked.

“I was useful, and he saw some of himself in me, I think.”

The people who couldn’t drive in front of us finally managed to have one car pull out and leave, so the other could park. Manny finally saw us, waving and giving a bright smile.

“He needs glasses,” Nicky said.

“How do you know?”

“He’s squinting a little, and he didn’t see your car sooner, so his night vision is going.”

“You think that’s why he’s standing in the light?” Domino asked.

“Maybe; tell him to get his eyes checked,” Nicky said.

“I didn’t know you cared about Manny,” I said, as I pulled up to the curb.

“I don’t, but you do,” Nicky said, opening the door so Manny could ride shotgun. “If he has a car accident or gets himself killed on the job because he’s too vain to get his eyes checked”—he got out, poking his head back in to finish what he was saying—“it would make you unhappy, and I want you happy.” He held the door for Manny, then moved to the backseat to sit with Domino.

I waited for Manny to buckle up, then introduced him to Domino as I hit the gas. I tried to see the man beside me not as my mentor and teacher, but like Nicky and Domino were seeing him. I’d seen him weekly for years and hadn’t noticed the eye issue, but now that they’d pointed it out I wondered how I’d missed it.

“What’s wrong?” Manny asked; he knew me, too.

I shook my head. “When’s the last time you had your eyes checked?”

“Why?”

“You didn’t see us until we pulled into the light, but we were sitting there for a while waiting for the idiots to finish arguing over the parking space.”

“I was talking to Tomas; he’s got girl trouble and wanted his papa’s advice.” He grinned when he said it, and I knew he didn’t want to talk about his eyes anymore.

“How old is Tomas now?”

“Thirteen.”

“A little young for girl trouble, isn’t he?”

Manny grinned again. “He is precocious.”

I smiled and shook my head. “You mean he’s cutting a swath through the little girls the way you did before you met Rosita.”

He shrugged but looked pleased. I let it go for now, and just hit the lights and sirens; one problem at a time, or you get overwhelmed. I drove fast and had to keep slamming on my brakes, because St. Louis drivers were slow to get out of the way. I’d had out-of-town marshals complain about it, so it wasn’t just me.

“Jesus, people,” I said, as I sat behind a line of cars waiting for them to creep to the side of the road.

“The zombie is still at Denny’s,” Manny said.

“Yeah, but is he just eating dessert or the waitress?”

“How likely is it that he’s really turned flesh eater?” Nicky asked.

“Not likely, but since we aren’t entirely sure what makes a zombie turn flesh eater, forgive me if I worry.”

“I’m not saying don’t worry, or don’t hurry, just trying to get a feel for what I don’t understand.”

I slammed on the brakes as a truck tried to get out of the way of the lights and sirens by pulling out directly in front of me. “Idiot!”

“You drive, I’ll talk,” Manny said, and glanced back at Nicky as he started to tell everything we knew about flesh-eating zombies, which wasn’t actually very much. “The most common cause of a zombie turning flesh eater is a murder victim called from the grave.”

“I know murder vics rise with only one purpose, to kill their murderer; that’s why police can’t just raise the dead and ask who killed them.”

“You’ve been asking questions,” Manny said.

“It’s the only way to figure stuff out if I can’t do it myself, and I can’t raise the dead.”

“I like this one,” Manny said to me. He got a death grip on the oh-shit handle, but his voice never wavered as I careened around yet another car that wasn’t getting out of the way.

“Me, too,” I said, and then went back to concentrating the hell out of driving.

“Thanks,” Nicky said automatically, but I knew his face would match the tone; he said thanks because he was supposed to, not because it mattered to him. “But are you saying that murder victims attack and eat people, or eat their murderer?”

“Most of the time, no,” Manny said. “They just rise willing to hurt or kill anyone who gets between them and their murderer. Until they get their vengeance, they don’t obey the animator who raised them, or any other magic, but if they can’t find their killer right away sometimes they turn to flesh eating.”