Yeah – about twenty years too late. Maybe more.

Christine gave him one of those What can you do? expressions, then turned to me and said, “I guess I’ll see you at breakfast, Daddy – if not before.”

She stepped closer and kissed my cheek. “Be careful – there’s likely to be a lot of broken glass out there.”

“I will.”

I wondered if Karl was going to get a kiss, too – but apparently they weren’t willing to do that in front of me yet. He got a friendly nod and “’Bye, Karl,” and then she was gone.

I dropped the hospital gown, then opened the suitcase and began to pull clothes out of it. Getting dressed doesn’t usually pose a challenge for me, but this time was a little different. The first time I bent over, I was afraid my head was going to explode. Then I started hoping it would explode and put me out of my misery.

With a little help from Karl, I managed to make myself presentable. I filled the empty suitcase with the dirty clothing I’d been wearing when they brought me in, closed it, and said, “OK, let’s go.”

“You want a wheelchair, get you as far as the front door?”

I looked at him. “You figure they’re going to have any wheelchairs at the fucking crime scene?”

He shrugged. “I could borrow one from here.”

“Yeah, and I can just hear the other guys from the squad when I show up looking like you just sprung me from the Shady Rest Old Folks Home. I might hear the end of it in ten, maybe fifteen years. Fuck that shit – no wheelchair.”

“Then at least let me carry the damn suitcase.”

“Fine – take it.”

As we passed the nurses’ station, one of the ladies in scrubs glanced up at us from her clipboard, then did a double take. “Mister Markowski! What are you doing out of bed? I need you to–”

With his free hand, Karl held his ID folder out and growled, “Police business.” Then he flashed her a little fang. I’m not sure which impressed the nurse more, but after a second, she picked up the clipboard again and began studying it like she was trying to memorize every damn word.

When we came through the sliding doors of the front entrance, Karl said, “Wait here – I’ll bring the car around.”

“I can walk to the fucking car, dammit! Stop treating me like some kind of invalid.”

Karl turned and faced me. “Stan – I’m a member of the bloodsucking undead, right?”

“Yeah – so?”

“So, I can’t see myself in a mirror. But I’d still bet fifty bucks that right about now you make me look good. Just stay put while I get the fucking car, OK?”

Before I could come up with a suitable retort, Karl turned and started walking away. Then a few seconds later the vampire afterburners kicked in and he disappeared into the night.

Fucking undead showoff.

We hadn’t gone very far from Mercy’s parking area when I started to wonder why Karl was driving like a little old lady on her way home from a Sunday social. Then I got it: he was trying to avoid the many bumps and potholes, to cut down on any bouncing around that would make my head hurt worse than it already did.

“Karl.”

“What?”

“I know what you’re doing, and I appreciate it. I really do. But nobody ever died from a goddamn headache, and I want to get to the crime scene ASAP – so will you fucking move?”

He glanced at me. “Yes sir.”

Karl pressed down on the accelerator while reaching under the dash with one hand. He flicked a switch, and the red LED lights behind the grille started flashing their get-the-hell-out-of- the way message. Then he found the toggle that controls the siren.

The high-pitched wailing noise that began an instant later cut into the back of my head like the business end of a Black & Decker Model 12V. And like the Energizer Bat, it just kept going, and going, and going.

Be careful what you wish for, Markowski.

I did my best to keep the pain off my face, but that’s the thing about having a vampire partner – he can sense changes in your heart rate, and sudden agony will definitely kick things up a notch or two.

Karl gave me another sideways look. “Pretty bad, huh?”

“I’m alright – just drive.”

Eight long minutes later, we arrived at the scene of the restaurant bombing – or as close as we were able to get. What looked like dozens of official cars and vans were blocking Moosic Street, all with their own lights going – red, blue, or yellow, depending on the department responding. The effect that light show had on my pounding head made me want to squeeze my eyes shut and keep them that way – for a week, maybe. But Karl and I had a three-block hike in front of us, and I wasn’t going to do it like some kind of blind man. So, squinting like the second lead in a spaghetti western, I got out of the car.

The walk was slow going, what with the police and emergency vehicles parked at crazy angles and the immense crowd of gawkers standing around, probably hoping to see a dead body being carried away – or, better yet, a headless corpse.

Finally, we came to the barrier of yellow crime-scene tape that extended from one side of the street to the other, uniformed cops standing behind it every fifty feet or so. The one we approached, a red-haired patrolman named McHale, knew us by sight and lifted the tape so Karl and I could duck under it. Bending over like that achieved something I wouldn’t have thought possible – it made the pounding in my head even worse. When we’d straightened up, I said to Karl, “Let’s wait here a minute or two, see what’s going on.” Truth was, I just wanted to stand still and see whether the pain would back off a bit – just receding from “Intolerable” to merely “Pretty Fucking Awful” would’ve been OK with me.

Karl looked at me, but all he said was, “Sure, Stan.”

If McGuire had been there, I was prepared to listen to a bunch of “I told you not to act like some TV hero” crap, but I guessed he’d stayed back at the station house. Maybe my night was improving – a little.

Christine had been right, back at the hospital. There was nothing I could do here that all the other professionals on scene couldn’t do, and probably better. But there were things I wanted to know. Besides, I couldn’t stay in a hospital bed while every other cop in the city was on the streets working this case. I just couldn’t.

After a while, the pain did let up a little – enough for me to focus on the scene before us. And quite a scene it was.

This section of Moosic Street was brightly lit, but all of the illumination came either from the headlights of emergency vehicles or the dozen or so HMI lights that had been rigged by the police and fire departments. None of the usual light sources were worth shit at the moment.

Up and down the street, tall wooden lampposts were either bent in half, their lights smashed on the ground, or just knocked flat by the explosion. Most of the power poles had gone down, too, taking the electrical wires along with them. Several loose wires lay on the asphalt, still live, sparking and hissing like wounded dragons.

What I could see of the street – the part that wasn’t covered with debris or puddles left by the fire hoses – had depressions in the asphalt, as if a T-Rex had stomped through, on his way to eat Dixon City. Broken glass was everywhere, and the air was thick with the odor of gasoline, burned rubber, scorched metal, and several other smells that I couldn’t identify.

“Blood,” said Karl, the mind reader. “There’s a lot of blood in the air.”

“You gonna be alright?”

“Yeah, I’m fine,” he said quickly. Maybe a little too quickly.

“Look – Scanlon’s here,” I said, as much to change the subject as anything else.

“I’m not surprised. Lot of work for him and his boys tonight.”

Hugh Scanlon made his careful way toward us, stepping over or around the worst of the debris, avoiding the puddles made by the fire hoses. He kept his hands in the pockets of the light topcoat that he seemed to be wearing every time I saw him.