Page 62 of Taste of Blood

“Once.”

“And?”

He shrugs. “He’s an acquired taste.”

Yeah, maybe it’s a taste I don’t feel like acquiring. I resolve to keep my eye on him as we climb into the van.

♦ ♦ ♦

The whole stakeout situation becomes tedious in short order, especially when it seems like the place we’re watching is abandoned.

We’ve been sitting on the street for hours and haven’t seen anyone come or go. We spotted the cameras around the perimeter of the building, which limits our movement, but thetwo guys we assigned to the roofs were able to get in position without being detected.

At least we hope they have. No one’s come out to challenge them.

It’s that total lack of activity that sets my teeth on edge. I’m about ready to say fuck it and go pound on the door when we spot headlights coming our way. A box truck turns into the complex and swings around to back up to the loading dock.

“About fucking time,” Zake mutters from the driver’s seat.

The comms crackle to life as one of the men on the roof calls out.

“You seeing this?”

“Everyone hang tight,” Gio replies.

The door on the truck opens and a man gets out and walks up to the back of the warehouse and presses a button on a keypad. From this distance I can’t tell if he’s human or vampire.

Almost immediately the side door opens and another man walks out and accompanies the driver to the rear of the truck. We can see them lift the roll-up door and disappear inside. After a minute they reappear carrying a large crate.

“What the fuck is in that?” I wonder aloud.

Zeke calls out to the guy on the roof. “Eli, can you get a better look at that crate?”

“Negative. It’s just a plain wooden crate. Got a stamp on the side but I can’t read the writing.”

The loading dock door slides up and the men struggle to carry the crate inside, so it must be heavy. We try to get a look into the room beyond but the opening has those plastic strip curtains hanging over it and the door lowers as soon as the men are inside.

“Well at least we know somebody’s there,” I muse.

The driver appears out the side door a few minutes later and gets into the truck and drives away. It’s about that time everyonestarts doing their check-ins. Two guys on the street report that the truck heads east and want to know if they should follow, but Gio tells them to maintain their position.

“What do you think?” I ask Zeke.

“I’d like to get a look at that crate.”

“Yeah. It looked heavy. Could be guns.”

“Doesn’t make sense,” he says. “What would vampires do with guns?”

“Unless they’re looking to make a move on humans.”

“Now that would track. Or maybe they’re selling them to finance this little war they’ve got going on.”

I hadn’t thought about that. Unsanctioned vampires don’t have the capital backing of a Guild, so they would need to get cash from somewhere, and it most likely wouldn’t be anything legitimate. Dealing weapons or drugs would be a quick way to bankroll their operation.

The more I observe about these guys, the more I realize this is way more serious than a couple of rogues bucking the system. This Python character is running a full-scale, organized crime campaign that rivals the Crimson Guild. If I was Dante, I’d find it hard not to take this personally.

Everything goes quiet again for about an hour, then another vehicle approaches, this time a shitty white van. It pulls up to the loading dock and two men get out and make their way around back. They pull three women from the van, all looking terrified and worse for wear, and shove them in the direction of the side door.