Dust Devils by Janz Jonathan

Author:Janz, Jonathan [Janz, Jonathan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
Published: 2014-02-04T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Seventeen

Bittner had reached the corner of the bar before he noticed Cody bearing down on him. The sheriff raised his Colt, but he did it gradually, almost like a man in a dream. Cody kicked the gun from his hand, reared back and let loose with a punch to the man’s stubbly jaw that made Cody happy to be alive. Bittner half spun, collided drunkenly with the brass rail and stumbled sideways into the pooled darkness behind the bar.

Cody followed him, the sheriff now clambering away, Bittner’s ratty eyes large and shiny in the murk. Cody had a moment of acute paranoia that Dragomir or one of the others would fall on him while his back was turned, but then he remembered Dmitri Seneslav the night before, the man’s eyes widening in sudden distress. No, they’d not bother him over here, he realized. Not a single one of the devils had ventured near the bar during the entire melee. And they wouldn’t either. Not only because they were engaged in a battle with a gun-toting mob, but because they were afraid of something. If Cody was right…

Bittner lay on his back, his hands outstretched beseechingly. The man’s lips trembled as if he were freezing to death, but no words escaped them. At least, nothing coherent.

“Don’t move,” Cody commanded. Moving low, he hurried over to the door leading to the kitchen, but it was just as he’d figured, locked tight. He could use the .38 to blow holes through the lock, and that’d get him through the door, but the moment he fired, the devils would be swarming over here—or at the very least, they’d be aware of his position.

No, Cody thought, rushing back to where Bittner still lay, his round body encased in a debilitating fog of terror. He had to see if his hunch was correct.

Cody’s eyes flicked to the cobalt vase poised between two bottles of gin. He kept the Smith & Wesson trained on the sheriff while with his free hand he reached out and clutched the bouquet of bluebell flowers. When he knelt before Bittner, the gun in one hand and the bouquet in the other, the sheriff stared at him uncomprehendingly.

“Don’t worry,” Cody said, “I ain’t gonna ask you to marry me.”

Bittner’s stupid eyes blinked, then shot wide when the shrieks began.

Cody didn’t even need to rise and turn around to see what was happening. The vampires had attacked the shooters. An ugly, jeering doubt grabbed hold of him then, told him he’d missed his chance to thwart the vampires, that he could’ve made a difference in the battle.

But that was bullshit, and Cody knew it. Had he joined the fray, he’d be dying as surely and as violently as the rest of them were dying.

Trying to block out the wails and the gunfire, Cody said, “Sit up.”

But Bittner wasn’t listening, was staring at the ceiling beyond Cody, perhaps imagining the scene of indescribable horror unfolding just forty feet away.

Cody raised the butt of the .

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