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Looking for Stephan&039;s hideout was like looking for the proverbial needle in a haystack, Mark thought Hecomplex almost anywhere Or an old warehouse Or abandoned industrial park

Soet a better sense of where his ne his home base

His next self-imposed task didn&039;t seem to be any easier

Mark wasn&039;t at all sure hoas going to gain access to the ue, and it wouldn&039;t help hiht out Polaroids of the deceased or digital iood at , like innkeeper Lilly Martin, he could alue, there were clerks, assistants, attendants, gurney pushersall kinds of people to get past

Luckily, he started out with a young woman in her mid-twenties, a picture of her husband and baby on her desk

The entire business world knew that confident, direct eye contact brought about the best results And she was easy to engage Without telling too many lies, he convinced her that he had an official reason to be there and got her to agree to let him in to see the body that had been pulled from the Mississippi

As it happened, the remains were in one of the autopsy rooet into the back, and put on scrubs and a mask With a clipboard in hand, he

To his surprise, there was a roadblock A human roadblock

Most of the time that would have meant little, but this roadblock was different It was the cop Sean Canady

Canady looked up, saw hinized him instantly

Hell Now, there was a chance he would be arrested Not good

But Canady only strode down the hallway to greet hiames "Hello, Lieutenant"

"Musician and writer, huh?"

"I swear You should hearinto his eyes

To Mark&039;s aed "You feel you need to see the body? Let&039;s go"

One of the assistant&039;s brought Canady soloves He thanked the assistant, then asked, "Who&039;s on?"

"Doc Mordock"

"Great"

The autopsy room was like every other one of its kind Sterile Tile and paint in soft powder blue Same s to keep the stainless steel tables as clean and germ-free as possible, and to enable the doctors and technicians to work on human bodies, with all their urneys in the room held a for behind it

"Sean, hey," he said

"Doc Mordock, hi," Sean replied

Mordock looked at Mark, a question in his eyes "Mark Davidson," Sean said in introduction "He&039;s seen victims found in a similar situation Heat a killer who has struck elsewhere," he went on to explain briefly

"Hey, he&039;s with you That&039;s good enough for me," Mordock said as he pulled back the sheet

There was always so sad and eerie about a naked corpse on a stainless steel gurney When the head was , the effect was intensified

Mark knew there were things that Mordock could detere inflicted by the water, and the fish and crustaceans that made the Mississippi their home He should be able to determine a time and date of death, what she had eaten for her last meal, and h he did listen to the conversation between Mordock and Sean Canady

"You got an ID yet?" Mordock asked

Canady nodded "Eloise Dryer A few petty thefts, soliciting She&039;s known in a few of the local clubs, but her address is listed as a Houston hole-in-the-wall"

"So she was a prostitute?" Mark said

"Most of the ti the corpse&039;s neck

"Decapitated with an ax," Mordock told hi to bet iven a lot to be killed with such a clean stroke"

"But she was deceased first?" Mark said

Mordock swept indicated the cut "Bloodless," he said

There, Mark noted A puncture mark Not such a perfect way to hide the evidence after all "Bloodless," he repeated, and looked at Canady

The cop was silent His face gave away nothing

"She ht have been killed as part of soh kooks out there" He stared at Mark "And I don&039;t mean just in New Orleans Hell, I was called out to work a case in the back woods of the Midwest, the heart of America, and what those felloere up to made hardened cops puke But, yeah, I&039;ve seen the htered hog"

"That won&039;t be in the press releases," Canady said and looked warningly at Mark

Mark shrugged "I don&039;t write press releases"

"But you do write"

"I won&039;t be writing about this"

Apparently that satisfied Canady "Thanks, Mordock Put anything else you can think of in your report and give it to me as soon as you can You still don&039;t knohere she went into the river?"

"Tech forensics are working on it, ebb and flow, all that," Mordock told hi With the current and the river life, well, a body goes to hell pretty quickly when it&039;s in the water But here&039;s so-whoever tossed her didn&039;t really care whether or not she was found She wasn&039;t weighted down She was just duain and turned to exit the autopsy room Mark followed hi at Mark "Did you get what you were after?"

"Yes Did you?" Mark, too, stripped off his autopsy-room paraphernalia

Canady studied him "Not just one vampire but lots of them, eh?"

Mark said cleared his throat "She was used for some kind of a blood rite"

When Sean didn&039;t respond, Mark went on

"Every cult has sorand priest, whatever," Mark said, studying Canady "I get the impression you&039;ve dealt with cults before That you knohat I&039; about"

"Come in tomorrow You can have a sketch artist draw up a likeness of this man Stephan for me"

"Thanks," Mark said, then hesitated Canady see him with such apparent respect But he was afraid for the uys really think they are vao down if they&039;re hit with holy water, and they back away fro to make a victim rise from the dead, they cut off the head to keep the population fro out of control I&039;rinned "My cops won&039;t know they need to stake the guy, is that it?"

He didn&039;t know if Canady waslike that," he said

"I&039;ll take care of it Come by the station tomorrow, Mr Davidson"

"Thank you Um, Lieutenant?"

"Yeah?"

"They may not all be men"

"Pardon?"

"Vampires They come in both sexes"

"Gotcha," Canady said "Tomorrow"

Mark hesitated "Like I said before, he&039;s hiding out somewhere He can move about by day, but it&039;s a better time for him to rest"

"I&039;ve warned local law enforcement to be on the lookout," Sean told hi as they understand that they could really be in danger"

"I know ht Well, thanks"

As soon as Mark left the ue, he hurried back to the bed and breakfast As he pulled into the lot, he saw that Deanna and Lauren, wearing bathing suits and carrying bags that he assu into their cottage

Lock it, he thought as the door closed behind them Lock it! And don&039;t let anyone in

He decided they were safe enough for the ti and headed back to his car

Just when the world seemed all nice and nore they found Heidi out of the shower, dressed and on her cell phone She flashed them a smile and mouthed the word, "Barry"

They both nodded; then Deanna headed into the shower, and Lauren plopped down on the sofa, turned on the television and found the news

There was a police officer, a big handso to get theirfor anyone, but especially wo

"But the victim was a known prostitute," one of the reporters called out

"The victim was a woman," the policeman said firht have been anywhere along the Mississippi Folks, this is a great city We&039;ve had our share of trouble, but ays rise back up Right now, let&039;s assu a probleently Go out, have fun Go to dinner-ga this city has to offer Stay in groups Don&039;t go down dark streets on your own Don&039;t assume that you&039;re safe just because the last victim was a wo, either There&039;s nothing new about predators And there&039;s nothing new to guard against the smart is always the best defense"

The reporters all started shouting questions, speaking over top of each other The detective lifted a hand "There&039;s nothing else I can say at the : Don&039;t open your door to strangers"

"Even tall, good-looking ones, Lieutenant?" one of the feers of any kind, Ari about murder and clearly hadn&039;t appreciated her levity

And that was that They kept shouting, but he had turned and alking away, and that was that

The television went off with a soft ping Lauren looked up Heidi had flicked it off with the remote control "We need to listen to that man," she said firmly

"Of course Smart man," Lauren said

Heidi sat down next to her "You&039;re getting that look that oing out"

"Yeah, and we&039;re doing what the officer said"

"What&039;s that?" Heidi asked, frowning

"We&039;re sticking together"

Heidi waved a hand in the air "Of course That will be easy"

Deanna popped out of the bathroom, followed by a cloud of stea in her hand "It&039;s all yours, Lauren"

"Great Thanks" Lauren rose and walked in to take her shower She was grateful to discover that despite Heidi and Deanna having gone before her, she still had hot water

Be s on a plane and getting the hell away from here

Heidi and Deanna would never do it

But Deanna was acting even stranger than she was herself, she thought Just as going on? Deanna wasn&039;t given to flights of fancy or weirdness There were just tooaround lately Mark Davidson, ally attractive but scary as hell Jonas, Deanna&039;s guy

And then

It wasn&039;t human, Deanna had said

Back up, she told herself There were oftenwatched Creepy little moments There were times when she had been home in LA and felt her heart accelerate when she looked out at the darkness and the bushes rustling near her door Fear was a natural human emotion, or, if not flat out fear, at least unease

They would go out tonight They would check out the bars, and they would ether

But the newscast kept replaying in her ers

He hadn&039;t been out on the road in eons He hadn&039;t driven this way since he&039;d returned to New Orleans, and he wasn&039;t even sure right nohy the te

He kneas in the right place, though

But the house was long gone, and nothing had been built in its stead There was only a tangle of growth covering the property

He wondered idly ned it now Easy enough to find out, he iined

He stared at the property for a while, then walked along the sweeping drive Sonolias remained, as did the foundation If he closed his eyes, he could alhter

It had been a great house, long ago

He turned and headed back to his car The past couldn&039;t be changed, but the future looe it

"A hurricane, please," Deanna told their server He was tall, ebony, and had a seously flirtatious, and they were being flirtatious in return

"Hurricane," hethat was now incorrect "People still order hurricanes, right?" she asked weakly

The waiter offered theain "Yes Hey, it&039;s just a drink, you know? We had one bar that never closed during the whole storm When they ran out of beer, the owners went over and picked some up at the A&P, and left an IOU Anyway, it wasn&039;t really the hurricane that did us in, it was the flood waters You go right ahead and order whatever you want"

"Thanks," Deanna said "What a face," she et their drinks

"Not bad buns, either," Heidi said, laughing

They could actually hear each other speak, Lauren noticed Maybe a lot of people had stayed inside after all But not them They&039;d overeaten at K-Paul&039;s, then chosen a place offering snized one of thea saxophone, while she could have sworn that earlier in the day he had been playing a troed," Deanna reminded her

"I know that I&039;m still on the look-out for the two of you"

"Heidi, please," Lauren groaned

"That&039;s right She&039;s already eare six," Heidi teased

Lauren refused to rise to the bait and instead listened to the sain The big nized her, as well

She lifted her beer to hiain

The bar was busy, but fairly large, and the acoustics were good "Irene&039;s-great place for dinner," she heard, as someone next to her recoht

For a orgeous," Heidi said, startling Lauren frohts She looked back to her two co the waiter "You have tofor Jonas," Lauren heard herself say, then wondered why

Deanna flushed, obvious even in the diht her breath

Her friend aiting for Jonas

Heidi sighed drao ahead and flirt with him, then," Deanna said

"Heidi, you have to let us choose ant to flirt with," Lauren insisted

"I just want everyone to be as happy as I aine? No mistrust, no war, because everyone would always be really happy, even the people running all the countries"

Lauren stared across the table, and Deanna tilted her beer bottle and grinned "I think she&039;s had a few"

"Think about it," Heidi said stubbornly "Laugh if you want gto But let&039;s face it, we have some world leaders out there ould definitely benefit froo with the flow after three beers

"Here, here," Deanna said dryly as the waiter swooped in with her hurricane Sheat hiaze was riveted on the bar

Lauren quickly turned, trying to see what had captured Deanna&039;s attention, and she saw hier

She tensed immediately

He was attractive Tall, six-one or so, and lean Just under or about thirty, with thick, dark, slightly wavy hair, one strand falling and for a drink, thanking the bartender Then he turned and saw Deanna

He smiled Nice smile

Deanna stood Hurricane in hand, she started toward the bar

"What?" Heidi demanded

Lauren, too, was on her feet "It&039;s him," she explained

"Him, who?"

"Deanna&039;scrush," Lauren supplied "Jonas"