Incubus Dreams   ::   Гамильтон Лорел

“You know the line that if all you have is a hammer, all your problems begin to look like nails?”

He frowned at me, not sure where I was going. “Yeah, I like Mr.

Ayoob’s writings.”

“Yeah, so do I, but my point is this. If all you’re looking at is the monsters, then that’s all you’re going to see.”

He frowned harder. “I don’t follow.”

Why was I even trying? “You’re so busy hating me and everyone with me, that you’ve done almost no real police work, or don’t you care about this one? Is that it, sheriff? Is this just some little fag stripper that got himself killed, so it’s not as important as the white women earlier?”

Something flinched through his eyes, if I hadn’t been staring right at him, I’d have missed it. “You must really hate this club.”

His eyes were cool and unreadable when he said, “My experience has been that what goes around, comes around, Marshal. You engage in high-risk behavior, and it catches up with you, and payback’s a bitch.”

I shook my head. “No one so blind as those that will not see.”

“What?” he said.

“Nothing, Sheriff, just wasting my breath.”

The radios on the black and whites crackled to life, and what we heard was enough to stop the squabbling. “Officer down, officer down.”

Location was just down the road at the first strip bar that the vampires hit. Ambitious bastards. I yelled to Micah and Nathaniel, “Take Ronnie’s car and go home.” I was already opening the Jeep’s driver’s side door.

“Anita…” Micah started.

“I love you,” I said, and I slid behind the wheel. I backed up and had to wait for one of the other police cars to get out of my way.

Nathaniel was still leaning against the car where the deputy had questioned him. I hit the button for my driver’s side window. I blew him a kiss. He smiled and blew one back. Then I was in line between two of the black and whites, and we were gone. Officer down, was it the vampires? Or had some drunk gotten lucky? No way to know until we got there. The only bright spot was that I wouldn’t be alone with just the sheriff and his men for long. Police would come from all over for this one. Officers that wouldn’t normally have any business or jurisdiction here would be driving up within minutes.

The ambulance was behind us, with its lights and sirens going.

They could have been simply following the police’s lead, but I took it for a good sign. EMTs only do the full cherry, when they know there’s someone hurt but still alive. I said a quick prayer and concentrated on driving. The sheriff was a bigoted asshole, but he knew the roads, and I didn’t.