Midnight Mass

Her chest tightened at the thought. She couldn't, wouldn't lose him.

"I'm going up there," she blurted.

"No way!" Lacey said. "Our job is to stay here."

Carole began pushing the desk away from the door. "No. I can help. I can use the cross to keep them back."

Lacey grabbed her arm. "Carole—"

Carole wrenched free. "Please don't fight me on this. I've got to go. I've just got to."

"Shit!" Lacey said. "Then I'll go with you."

"No." She cracked the door and peeked out into the hall. Empty. "One of us has to stay here. That's you."

Without looking back, she stepped into the hall and started for the elevators.

She heard Considine's voice behind her. "Tell her she's got to go down to one and catch an express to eighty."

"Carole—" Lacey began.

"I heard," Carole said over her shoulder.

"Keep your gun ready," Lacey called. "You see anything moving, shoot first and ask questions later."

"I will."

And she would. Joseph needed her and no one was going to bar her from reaching him.

BARRETT . . .

Barrett staggered through the Empire State lobby in a daze. His men lay strewn about like jackstraws. Blue-gray faces everywhere. Those who weren't dead were well on their way.

Obviously they'd been poisoned, but how? The water supply? The breakfast eggs? The coffee? Didn't much matter now. He just had to remember not to eat or drink anything within blocks of this building.

But all of his men? Surely there had to be a couple who'd missed breakfast. But he didn't know who and he had no way of contacting them. They were scattered throughout the building. He'd have to go floor to floor and door to door.

The other question was who. Who did this? What did they want? Were they after the cowboys, to send a message to anyone who collaborated with the enemy? Or were they after the undead too? If so, they'd be upstairs, on eight-five—where the vamps would be sitting ducks and the shit would really be hitting the fan.

Barrett turned and looked back at the front doors. His first impulse was to cut and run. As top cowboy the responsibility for all this would be laid on him. But on the other hand, he'd been looking for a chance to put himself in the spotlight. Maybe this was opportunity knocking.

He had to reach the Security Center. He could get the lay of the land there and decide what, if anything, he could do. He headed for the elevators. As he passed the security kiosk in the main lobby he remembered it was equipped with a couple of monitors.

He stepped up to the console and dialed through the various feeds but stopped when he came to the Observation Deck. He gaped at the scene playing out on the little black-and-white screen. Some guy with a scarred-up face had Franco. The head vampire hung in his grip like a rag doll. A couple of get-guards were crawling through the stairway door. Where were their guns? Why didn't they shoot?

They needed someone to take charge up there and take this fucker out.

James Barrett gri

He searched the drawers of the kiosk looking for something to give him an advantage, no matter how small, beyond his big gun. He found some pepper spray and a couple of pairs of handcuffs. He took the spray, then pulled his Magnum and headed for the elevators.

As he approached the Observation Deck express bank, he heard a set of doors slide open. He started to step back, then reversed field. The car couldn't hold that many; he might be outnumbered but he had surprise on his side. So he made a snap decision and charged with both arms held straight out before him, pepper spray in his left, pistol in the right. He'd reached full speed when a woman stepped out of the car. He collided with her head on. As they fell to the floor he began firing into the car. He got off two booming shots before he realized it was empty.

Barrett turned his attention to the woman who was struggling beneath him. He slammed the heavy barrel of his Magnum against her head, stu

He stood and looked down at her. A slim brunette. Not bad looking, but not his type. One thing he knew about her was that she didn't belong here. That meant she was with the ugly guy on the Observation Deck. And that meant he had a hostage. Perfecto.

JOE . . .

Half a dozen get-guards were through the door now, their machetes scraping against the marble as they dragged themselves across the floor.

These should be enough to make the point, he thought as he edged himself and Franco away from them and closer to the patch of sunlight. They appeared to be in the camera's field of view.

Now .. . the moment of truth.

Questions surged unbidden into his mind. Did he really want to do this? It would end everything. No more Carole, no more Lacey. Wasn't this existence, hideous as it was, better than no existence at all?

No. Unequivocally no. He would not spend the centuries this half-breed existence might give him as a creature of the darkness and twilight. Yes, he'd have more time with Carole and Lacey, but he'd also have to watch them age and die.

Better to make a clean break, better to end his personal horror by removing another horror from the earth.

He lifted Franco and tensed his muscles to hurl him into the light.

"Get ready to burn, Franco," he whispered.

"No! Please—!"

Just then an elevator chimed to his left. The doors slid open and his heart sank when he saw Carole. He didn't want her to have to watch his death throes. But panic and rage exploded within him when he saw the gri

Barrett.

The head Vichy propelled Carole ahead of him into the atrium. The doors whispered closed behind them.

"Well, well," he said, still gri

"Carole, are you all right?"

She shook her head. A thin stream of blood trickled down her temple from her scalp. Her eyes filled with tears.

"Joseph, I'm so sorry."

"It's all right."

He made a silent promise: I'll get you out of this, no matter what it takes.

He noticed that her arms were pulled behind her, which meant her hands were bound. In a way, that was a relief. Barrett had no idea how lucky he was. If Carole were able to get her hands into her pockets, she might have blown them both to pieces by now.

"Let her go, Barrett," Joe said.

His eyebrows lifted. "You know my name? You have the advantage over me, sir. And I'm sure I'd not forget a face like yours."

There wasn't time to get into that.

"Just let her go."

"And why would I want to do that?"

"It's the right thing to do."

"For you maybe, but not for me. I'm willing to make a trade, though. Her for him." He pointed to Franco. "Hear that, Bossman? I'm saving your ass. And I expect something in return—big time. After I straighten this out, I want to be turned. Immediately. We waive the ten-year clause. Agreed?"

"Yes," Franco rasped. "Of course."

"And I don't want to be turned by some low-level drone, either. By you or, better yet, by the guy who turned you, if he's still around. I want wings."

Franco nodded. "Yes. Anything. Anything you want."

"You want to be like them?" Joe pointed to the undead guards who were continuing their inching crawl toward him. They'd be within striking distance in a minute. "Look at them. Slithering along the floor. They're vermin!"