DISPATCHER: Are you in any immediate danger?

MALE CALLER: No.

DISPATCHER: What is the name of the injured person?

MALE CALLER: She’s not injured — Christ, aren’t you listening? She’s torn apart and —

Call ends.

Serita Sanchez, emergency operator for the NYPD, looked at the screen. The software package used by emergency services displayed the street address and name of whoever pays the bill from any phone that calls in. The display read:

Kaitellyn Montgomery

The street address was a third floor walk-up in the West Village.

She contacted the dispatcher, who assigned the job to a patrol unit. It was rush hour on a New York Friday. It took thirty-six minutes for the cruiser to arrive. By then the unknown caller was gone.

There were bloody shoeprints on the landing, leading from the closed door to the stairs. The door was unlocked and ajar. The officers drew their guns, announced themselves, received no reply, and entered the apartment.

Detectives were called at once, along with the Crime Scene Unit.

"ROADKILL" PT.1

Nancy Holder

— 1 —

Buzzards have no borders. East of San Diego, west of Yuma, north of Mexico — as long as there was death, the scavengers had places to go, skulls to strip. With no shadows to signal day’s end, they spiraled down in silence, about to land on suppertime.

The roar of seven motorcycles split the heavens like an atomic blast and the vultures shot back up into the sky. The president of the Ocotillo Militia, Bobby Morrisey, rode point; then his sergeant-at-arms, Fugly, and Johnny Rocket, his V.P. Little Sister and Manuel Mendoza made nine riders, but they occupied the bitch seats behind Monster and Bobby’s younger brother, Walker. The O.M.s were on their way back from the post office two dusty towns over, where Bobby picked up something from their drop box — the mysterious nature of same being the red flag that had initiated covert governmental scrutiny. The club was headed back to Sonrisa, their town, and a misnamed hellhole if ever there was one — sonrisa meant “smile” in Spanish. No one was smiling in Sonrisa anymore.

Little Sister had on brand new black leather chaps — new to her, anyway. It was doubtful she knew Bobby had gotten them off a dead man. Manuel was a blip behind Monster; the eight-year-old’s oversized helmet made him look like a comical action figure.

Bobby raised a gloved hand as he drew abreast of a blasted-out white panel van. It would have been easy to miss, stark as it was against the endless desert.

His brown beard was sun-streaked, and he wore a navy blue do-rag with a faded American flag silkscreened on the front. His face was leathery, with deep fissures between his heavy eyebrows and premature crow’s feet tattooing his dark gray eyes. He had shiny white teeth, which he took very good care of, and he had that beefy, almost-fat appearance some bikers had — working out, maybe some steroids. Like Little Sister and half the men, he wore chaps over his jeans, and heavy boots. His wallet was attached to his belt with a large silver chain.

The other riders followed suit, climbing off, knocking their kickstands in place. Bobby pulled out his .38 short-barrel revolver. Fugly loosened his shotgun and Johnny Rocket unstrapped an Uzi, which was why he was called Johnny Rocket. Before the vampires, rifles and Uzi’s were impractical carries on motorcycles. Above, the buzzards watched philosophically, as if confident there’d be more dead soon.

Second to the last in the line was Mark Thompson, about to move from six-month hang-around to recruit, a speedy time frame unheard of before the world went FUBAR. Bald and scarred, Poison was in the rear; he had been a hang-around for two years before he got his colors.

Thompson was red-headed, freckled, in a ripped-up denim jacket with lots of space for the full Ocotillo Militia patch if he made the grade. Six months before, he’d been mouthing off in the Shaft about wetbacks and bloodsuckers. Bodie, the bartender, nearly booted his ass for throwing an empty tequila bottle at the flat screen when Yuki Nitobe came on to report about the United Nations call for calm. He accidentally-on-purpose hit the mirror on the wall behind the bar, cracking it. Thompson lit into Bodie and told him no red-blooded American would blame him if he burned the Shaft to the ground for broadcasting that bullshit propaganda. Bobby intervened, explaining that the Shaft was owned by the Ocotillo Militia, and they did not appreciate vandalism nor harassment of their employees. Thompson apologized to Bodie after he sobered up and offered to buy the bar a new mirror, but Bobby took fifty dollars instead. Then Thompson and Bobby had a nice long talk about how the fucking illegals crossing the border now included fucking illegal vampires. Bobby invited him along. He could work in the bar for money. The O.M.s also cooked up a little meth in the back. Diversified sources of income.

The guys called Thompson Carrot Top, Gingersnatch, Lucille Balls. He kept up, did his patrols, acted like a square shooter. But he was a liar. He was not what he had told them, a one per-center who’d run a bike shop in Phoenix and shut it down to hit the road. He was not what they thought he was, a patriot like them, committed to the cause.

Thompson was the feds — D.E.A.— and he was undercover.

Behind his sunglasses, Thompson watched the militiamen with the same keen eye as the buzzards. He had seen someone lying in the sand. Bobby’s glance in that direction said that Bobby had, too. Thompson thought about medical attention and water. But all he did was think about it.

Bobby’s quiet brother Walker made sure Little Sister was off the bike before he got up. The slender fifteen-year-old girl stood beside the bike in a boy’s denim jacket and beneath that, a black Oakland Raiders baseball jersey. Her long black hair was braided in a ponytail. Inexpertly applied eyeliner, and lots of cheap silver and gold bling, presents from the bikers. They got that off dead Mexicans, too, and maybe Little Sister didn’t know that, either. Sunshine glinted off gangsta pendants and astrology signs; and her dead mother’s cross and her father’s medallion of the Virgin of Guadalupe. If religious symbols could have kept the vampires at bay, Little Sister would have been all set.

“Keep the kids away,” Bobby called to Walker as he, Fug, and Johnny Rocket peered into the panel van with weapons drawn. Thompson maintained his respectful distance. It was a given that as the lowest rank, he stood guard, watching the highway, ready to sound the alarm if some kind of shit approached. He narrowed his eyes at the unmoving figure twenty yards from the van. He thought about water and medical attention.

Kept those thoughts to himself.

Reaching into the vehicle, Bobby handed a rusty dark green toolbox to Fug. As Fug cracked it open, Bobby rooted around some more, then re-emerged.

“Picked clean,” Fug reported, holding out the tool box. “Clean as bones.”

Bobby shrugged and holstered his .38 in the quick draw pocket of his jacket. He took off his black leather jacket, revealing muscular upper arms, one tattooed with the O.M.s insignia — American flags, twin skulls, and “Ocotillo Militia.” There were two long scars on the other bicep, from vampire fangs, he said. Wallet jangling, he crossed and joined the crowd of militiamen examining the body.

“Hey, there’s someone lying in the sand,” Manuel said in his accented English.

“I know,” Bobby replied.

“Can I go see?” Manuel asked.

“No,” Bobby said, heading for the dead man.

“But he might be dead. I want to see if he’s dead,” Manuel whined.

“Jesus, Manny,” Fug said, throwing Manuel a look of disgust as he caught up with Bobby.

Bobby scowled at Fug. “Watch your language.”

Bobby was thoughtful like that. He always kept the kids away from violence, death, and swearing, ever since he had executed their parents and the O.M.s became their band of uncles.

Walker opened the cooler strapped to his bike and pulled out two Horchata’s he’d bought at the grocery store next to the post office. He had also bought Manuel a new coloring book and crayons. Manuel was eight. Walker handed a Horchata to Manuel and one to Little Sister. Thompson tracked their body language. She practically quivered when Walker’s fingers brushed hers.

Then Walker led them over to the van, gesturing for them to sit in the dirt in a tiny patch of shade as he rolled his shoulders and cricked his neck. He smiled down at the last of the Mendozas. Little Sister’s cheeks went pink and she fixedly studied the Horchata bottle.

“Do you want your new crayons?” Walker asked Manuel.

“Crayons are pussy. I want to see the guy,” Manuel said, pouting.

“Don’t speak like that. Drink your drink,” Walker said. He looked at Little Sister. “You okay?”

She gave him a little nod, her cheeks getting redder. Walker didn’t seem to notice as he sauntered away. He looked at Thompson and nodded. The word was given. The highway seemed safe enough.

Walker and Mark Thompson left the kids and joined the group around the dead man. The corpse looked like a contracted mummy, arms and knees drawn up, as if he’d been hiding in the van, died and stiffened, and got tossed out after the fact. The Bog Man of Mexico. The right side of his face was a varnished skull, bones deeply tanned, jagged teeth and a Jolly-Roger eye socket. The left half still had meat on it, leathery and desiccated. Streaks of blood mottled two deep cuts in the jerky with the deep, red-brown hue of manzanita.

The body smelled like rotten dog food. If it still had a smell, he hadn’t died that long ago.

“Vampire?” Fug asked, looking at Bobby. Bobby, after all, had tangled with the vamps.

Thompson gazed from the scars on Bobby’s shoulder to the fissures on the dead man’s face. Did the vultures devour vampire flesh, too? Was it extra spicy? Did it have a special tang?

Bobby kicked at the body with the dusty toe of his boot. “Naw.” Then, “Don’t think so.”

“He got left behind,” Fug observed. “Where’s everybody else?”

“Why’d he get left behind?” Johnny Rocket said.

“Because he died,” Bobby said. He turned from the dead man and scanned the ground. “Maybe the van broke down so they dumped that, too. See any other tire marks?”