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He didn’t respond, just came closer.
Once again, I noticed that his scent was wrong. It was like nobody I’d ever encountered, and I finally recognized the metallic tang I’d noticed a hint of before. It was blood.
He stopped just out of my reach, met my eyes, and said, “I want to know why you’re here.”
“You tell me! You’re the one who locked me up in a damned cage.”
He seemed taken aback. He went down on one knee, so we were eye to eye. “Why are you here?”
“Hello? Because you put me here!”
Now he was clearly nonplussed. “Tell me who you are.”
“I’m Queen Joyce, remember?” Since I could see my purse on a workbench, I added, “You’ve got my stuff—go check my driver’s license.”
“Damnation!” he said as he stood. “What are you? Witch? Demon spawn? God, not the fae! Please don’t be one of the fae.”
“Excuse me?”
“Don’t bother to deny it—I should have known from the way you snagged that doubloon. You’re not human!”
“Well, neither are you,” I said, suddenly convinced that nobody with that scent could be.
“True enough.” He smiled, but it wasn’t a happy smile. It was, however, toothy. Overly so, with two prominent fangs.
“You’re a vampire?” I’d been told about vampires during Werewolf Orientation, but I hadn’t really believed it. At that point, it had been hard enough for me to believe in werewolves, let alone all the other horror movie denizens. If the issue of immunity to vampiric influence had been mentioned, I hadn’t been paying attention.
He eyed me again. “You move too fast to be a zombie. Not foul enough for a ghoul. Too tall for a leprechaun. Werewolf?”
“We prefer to call ourselves Lupine Americans.”
“I knew my troubles had to be supernatural in origin—no human could cause so much chaos. But I hadn’t suspected werewolves. What are you after? The park? Or were you hired by some other power?”
“Because the whole supernatural world is dying to own a rundown amusement park. Let me explain this to you slowly. I. Am. On. Vacation.”
“I may not be able to glamour you, wolfling, but there are other ways of getting information, ways I don’t think you’ll enjoy,” he said, circling the cage slowly. Then he picked up a power drill from one of the workbenches. “I understand you heal quickly, but I wager that this would still hurt.”
“It would if you had an extension cord,” I pointed out. “Besides which, if you get close enough to try anything, I’m going to give myself a lesson in vampire anatomy. From the inside.”
He put down the drill. “I don’t have to get close. All I have to do is wait for you to get hungry. Hungry as a wolf, you might say.”
“What makes you think I’m going to stay in this cage?” I deliberately started to undress. Well, not completely—the pack members I’d met were comfortable with public nudity, but I wasn’t. I did take off my sandals and shorts and pulled my bra off under my shirt. The panties and shirt would withstand the Change.
“No wolf could tear through those bars,” Pirate Dave said smugly.
I concentrated, and the mist of the Change surrounded me, blocking both my view of the vampire and his view of me. One of the first things I’d had to unlearn was the idea that a werewolf had to become a wolf. After all, a wolf is genetically the same as a dog, and there were lots of breeds of dogs. When the mist cleared, I charged through the bars of the cage and leaped at him. Pirate Dave screamed like a little girl as I bit down on his ankle. Admittedly, a chihuahua wasn’t the most fearsome of canines, but my teeth were plenty sharp and I definitely had the element of surprise on my side.
He tried to kick me away, but I wasn’t nearly so interested in inflicting damage as I was in getting away. The door was still open, and I went for it. Unfortunately the vampire did, too, and I discovered that vampires move awfully fast. He slammed the door before I was even halfway there. I skittered to a stop, then turned to run as he reached for me.
The ensuing chase would have been ludicrous if it hadn’t been—Hell, it was just ludicrous. I couldn’t stop long enough to Change into something more useful in a fight, and he couldn’t catch me unless I slowed down. Finally I dove back into the cage, right back where I’d started from.
“Stalemate,” he said, as I scooted back into my shirt and Changed back to human. Of course, I ended up with one arm sticking out of the shirt collar, but eventually I got myself covered, though there was no way I could wriggle back into my bra.
“This is ridiculous,” I said. “What’s your problem with werewolves anyway?”
“I’ve got no interest in werewolves as long as you stop trying to ruin my park. I’d always heard your kind were ill-educated thugs, but I never expected a pack to make a move on me.”
“For one, I’m neither a thug nor ill-educated. I’m a marketing exec, and I graduated from Harvard. Cum laude. For another, I’m not in a pack.”
“A lone wolf?” he said, raising one eyebrow. “How trite.”
“And lastly, I don’t give a shit about your park. The place is falling apart anyway.”
“Because of you!” he snapped. “I caught you red-handed behind the Kraken, which you were undoubtedly about to sabotage.”
“I was there because I saw somebody sneaking around.”
“Oh, that’s original.”
“And since I’ve only been in town a week, I couldn’t have caused any of the problems you must have been having all summer, given the lovely condition of this place. I’m surprised the board of health hasn’t shut you down.” I saw something almost guilty in his expression. “You used that look-deeply-into-my-eyes thing on the inspector, didn’t you?”
“I’d do a lot more than that to keep my park open. If you don’t start telling me what I want to know, I’ll show you just how much.”
“Your park? I thought you were just the figurehead.” A thought occurred to me. “Oh my God! How long have you been Pirate Dave?”
He actually managed to bow sarcastically. “I am the original Pirate Dave.”
“Have you been feeding off Sea Queens all these years?”
He shrugged. “None of them suffered from it. In fact, they quite enjoyed it.”
“Ew.”
“And how many humans have you murdered as a ravening beast?”
“The only human I’ve ever bitten was you. Scratch that, since you’re not human. Which reminds me. Could I have a glass of water to wash the taste away? Old meat is just rank.”
His face reddened, and I thought I might have gone too far, but suddenly a jaunty sea chanty echoed through the room. Pirate Dave reached into his pocket and pulled out a cell phone.
“What is it? . . . How? I was just there! . . . Was anybody injured? . . . I’ll be right there!”
He hung up as angrily as it was possible to hang up a cell phone and shoved the phone back into his pocket.
I said, “Whatever it was that just happened, obviously I couldn’t have had anything to do with it.”
“All part of your plan, no doubt,” he said. “You kept me occupied while your littermates committed further acts of vandalism.”
“Right, I tricked you into knocking me unconscious. Just admit that I’m not involved, and let me out of here.”
“I don’t think so, wolfling. I’ll be back to deal with you later. Feel free to take any form you like to leave your cage—you still won’t be able to get out of this room.” In a breathtaking burst of speed, he was gone and through the door, and a second later, I heard the lock turn.
“What an idiot!” I said to the empty room. I waited five minutes to make sure he was really gone before Changing to a teacup poodle to get out of the cage. Next I went human so I could reach through the bars of the cage to get my clothes. Once I was dressed, I rummaged around in the tools on the workbench, found a power screwdriver—and an extension cord—and took the hinges off the door. Then I picked up my purse and left.
I saw plenty of park employees on my way through the building, which was apparently the park’s administrative headquarters, but not one said a word. I wondered how many other Sea Queens they’d seen making discreet exits after private visits with Pirate Dave. I’d been prepared to Change and make a dash for freedom if need be, but as it was, I just strolled back to the park’s public areas and out to the parking lot. The fireworks started as I got into my car, and I hoped Pirate Dave was going to go to bed hungry.