They both laughed, and the laughs were so similar that it was kind of unnerving. "I know you have the right to make him a deputy, but I know what Mr. Schulyer here is, and where his primary residence is." Zerbrowski leaned in close enough to us that no one else would hear. "Dolph would kill me if I let him into the crime scene."
"You catch me if I pass out, and he can stay out here."
"Pass out," Zerbrowski said, "you're joking, right?"
"I wish I was." I had both hands on Jason's arm now, fighting the urge to totter on my high heels.
"Dolph said that you'd said you were sick. Did he know how sick?"
"He didn't seem to care, just wanted me to get my ass out here."
Zerbrowski frowned. "If he'd known you were this shaky, he wouldn't have insisted."
"Pretty to think so," I said. I could feel the blood draining from my face. I needed to sit down, soon, just for a few minutes.
"I would ask if it's the flu, but I see the bandage on your neck. What did it?"
"Vampire," I said.
"You want to report a crime?"
"It's been taken care of."
"You kill his ass?"
I looked at him through the dark lenses of the glasses. "I really need to sit down for a few minutes, Zerbrowski, and you know I wouldn't ask if I didn't need it."
He offered me his arm. "I'll escort you through, but Schulyer there can't come." He looked at Jason. "Sorry, man."
Jason shrugged. "It's okay, I'm really good at entertaining myself."
"Behave yourself," I said.
He grinned. "Don't I always?"
I would have stayed there and made sure he promised me how good he would be, but I had only about enough energy to walk into the house and sit down before my legs gave. I'd leave the police officers and emergency crews to Jason's mercy. He wouldn't do anything bad, just irritating.
I stumbled on the steps leading up to the small front porch. If Zerbrowski hadn't caught me, I'd have fallen.
"Jesus, Anita, you should be in bed."
"That's what I told Dolph."
He eased me through the door and found me a small straight-backed chair in the hallway. "I'll tell Dolph how sick you are and let the kid take you home."
"No," I said, though I did lay my forehead on my knees while the world steadied around me.
"Jesus, Anita, you're as stubborn as he is. Dolph won't take no for an answer, so you drag your ass out of a sickbed to come down here. I give you an out, where I'll take the heat from Dolph, but nooo, you're going to show Dolph that you're just as stubborn and bullheaded as he is. You planning to faint in his arms? That'll really show him."
"Shut up, Zerbrowski."
"Fine, you sit there for a few minutes. I'll come back and check on you, and I'll escort you through the crime scene. But you're being stupid."
I spoke with my face still in my lap. "If Dolph were sick, he'd still be here."
"That doesn't prove you're right, Anita, that just proves you're both stupid." With that he walked away, farther into the house. It was good that he left, because for the life of me, I couldn't have argued with him.
18
When Zerbrowski first led me into the room, I thought, there's a man levitating against that wall. He did look like he was floating. I knew that wasn't true, but for just a moment my eyes, my mind, tried to make that what I saw. Then I saw the dark lines where blood had dried on the body. It looked as if he'd been shot, a lot, and bled, but bullets wouldn't have kept him pinned to the wall.
Strangely, I wasn't faint, or nauseous, or anything. I felt light and distant, and more solid than I'd felt in hours. I kept walking towards the man on the wall. Zerbrowski's hand slipped away from mine, and I was steady on my high heels in the soft carpet.
I had to be almost underneath the body before my eyes could make sense of it, and even then, I was going to have to ask someone who was more tool-oriented if I was right.
It looked like someone had taken a nail gun, one of those industrial size nail guns, and nailed the man to the wall. His shoulders were about eight feet off the ground, so either they'd used a ladder, or they'd been close to seven feet tall.
The dark spots on the body were at both palms, both wrists, forearms just above the elbows, shoulders, collarbones, lower legs just below the knees, just above the ankles, then through each foot. The legs were apart, not pierced together. They hadn't tried to imitate the Crucifixion. If you went to this much trouble, it was almost odd to not echo that long-ago drama. The very fact that they hadn't tried seemed strange to me.
The man's head slumped forward. His neck showed pale and whole. There was a dark patch of blood on his nearly white hair just behind one ear. If the nails were as big as I thought they were, if that blood had been caused by a nail, the tip should have protruded from the face, but it didn't. I stood on tiptoe. I wanted to see the face.