Vampire Miami (26 page)

Cloud ignored Joey. “We might be able to work
something out. Selah, since you left, I’ve been thinking hard, and
I got in touch with that latest recruit of ours. Told him about
you. About the strange reaction your blood causes the vampires. He
wants to talk, and if anybody can help, he can.”

“Which ‘recruit’ is this?” asked Mama B. She was
not going to give Cloud an inch.

He, however, remained relaxed, unruffled.
“General Adams.”

“General Adams?” said Selah. “
The
General
Adams?”

Cloud watched Mama B’s face for a reaction, but
when she didn’t explode, he looked over to Selah and nodded. “Yeah.
The same guy who signed the Treaty with the vamps. He wants to talk
to you. So you ready? He’s waiting.”

Rather than be upset as Selah had expected, Mama
B was quietly thoughtful. With no other option immediately
apparent, everybody filed out, and a few minutes later, they were
in the jeep following Cloud and his friends on their bikes. Selah
sat forward. “What do you think, Mama?”

Mama B shook her head. “I don’t know, but this
could work out. If it’s really him, that is. General Adams
disappeared right after the Treaty was signed. So let’s hold off
and see if it’s really him before we get our hopes up.”

“And if it is? If it’s him?”

“Well, girl, if it’s him? Then he might still
have some serious connections with the military. I don’t know.
Let’s take this one a step at a time.”

The general lived in North Miami, close to where
the Wall hit the coastline. A small neighborhood, overgrown and
abandoned. No lights, no movement. Nothing to call attention to the
fact that such a controversial figure might be living there.

They pulled up before a small house, and Cloud
parked his bike in the street, raising his hand to prevent anybody
from driving onto the driveway. Everybody got out, and Cloud
pressed a buzzer hidden under some plants by the mailbox. “He’s got
real-live claymore mines buried around his garden. It’s death to
walk up to his front door without his turning off his security
system first.”

Selah shifted her weight from one foot to the
other. They were all here because of her. She studied the front of
the modest little house. Saw a vague reflection off glass hidden in
the palm tree above them, and stared up into a security camera.
Well, at the least this guy was smart or resourceful enough to have
electricity.

The front door opened, and warm light streamed
out over the garden. “Cloud,” rasped the man in the doorway, “come
on up. Don’t step off the path.”

Cloud took the lead, and they filed down the
path and in through the front door into a small living room. The
house was clean, neat, and sparsely furnished. The front windows
were carefully blocked with heavy drapes so that casual passersby
would not notice the electric illumination within, though the
general had his lights on dimmers so that everything was lit in a
soft, honeyed glow. The walls were bare of pictures or paintings,
no knickknacks or curios on the shelving, no rugs or other homely
touches to be seen. The general was clearly a man of minimalist,
even austere taste.

Their host was a white man in his sixties, trim
and lean with iron-gray hair cut close to his scalp, a long, hard
face, and eyes that glittered like ice struck by the sun. He
scanned the street carefully after they’d all entered, and then
closed the door and shot home a series of deadbolts. Turning, he
walked past them into the living room and turned to survey the
group, hands on his hips.

Cloud was clearly the one most at ease with the
situation, and sat on the arm of the couch. “General, this here is
Selah and her grandmother, this is her friend Maria Elena, and I
didn’t catch your name.”

“Cholly.”

“Cholly. Things got rough tonight and Selah’s in
need of a plan B.”

The general studied her. Selah shot a glance
over to Mama B, who gave her a quick nod. It really was him.
General Adams.

“Good to meet you, Miss Brown. And the rest of
you. Please, have a seat.” He sat in a rosewood rocking chair, and
everybody settled themselves on couches or armchairs. Except
Cholly. He remained standing by the front door. “Cloud tells me
that your blood has a unique effect on the vampires who drink it,”
said the general without preamble. “Can you explain further?”

“Actually,” said Mama B, “we have very little
time. We need to know if you can help the three of us get out of
Miami by tomorrow night. That’s what we need to be speaking
of.”

The general turned and looked at Mama B, who
raised her eyebrows at his scrutiny and stared right back. Selah
had never seen anybody match up to the intensity of a full-on Mama
B stare, but the general weathered it like a rock might the
pounding of the ocean. He held her gaze with his own quiet
intensity, and for a long moment the air between them nearly
crackled with tension. Selah leaned back, half expecting something
to explode, but at last the general smiled, or grimaced, which
might have been the best he could do.

“We are talking about your chances of escaping,
Mrs. Brown. It all depends on Selah’s blood, and perhaps, your own.
Have you ever been bitten by a vampire?”

Mama B stiffened. “Of course not.”

“Interesting. And a pity. To your knowledge, has
anybody else in your family?”

Selah looked to her grandmother, who shook her
head. “No, I don’t think so. At least, not that I know of.”

“The reason I ask is because if Selah’s blood
does indeed have a unique ability to … whatever you want to call
it—exchange qualities with the vampire that drinks of it—then we
may have an incredible weapon on our hands.”

“Weapon?” asked Selah.

“Yes. Do you know why I signed the Treaty?”

Selah suddenly felt like she was back in school
again. Except the general’s stare put Mr. Condarcuri’s best glare
to shame. “Um, because we were losing?”

“Close enough. We weren’t losing, but we weren’t
winning, either. We thought in the beginning that it would be
simply a case of hunting the vampires down wherever we found them
and killing them. It wasn’t. They went on the offensive. You will
recall how soon into the War President Andrews was embraced. Two
months later, they got to Vice President Connor, and then right
after that they took out Speaker of the House Jiminez. That’s not
to mention members of the Cabinet, state governors, military
leaders, celebrities, anybody and everybody who was a public
leader, a source of strength. I was a two-star general at the start
of the War. I was made a five-star general mostly because everybody
above me had been turned into a vampire.”

Selah nodded. That sounded familiar. General
Adams leaned back in his chair. “That’s why I signed the Treaty.
Anarchy was spreading through the country. Recall the riots in LA,
Detroit, and DC? Further, we were losing all the strong and
spirited men and women who actually had the backbone to risk their
lives in fighting the vampires. The last batch who stepped into
office were terrified, were willing to sign a peace settlement at
any cost so that they wouldn’t be the next victims. Which was the
vampires’ plan all along.

“So how did the vampires win? By embracing our
leadership. By removing any effective leader any time they
manifested themselves. We couldn’t protect them, and after three
years of attrition, there was nobody left willing to fight on.
That’s when they asked me to draft and promote the Treaty. To stick
my neck out and take all the blame, for the sake of the government,
to save our country from complete chaos.”

Silence followed his words. Selah looked at
Cloud. He watched the general, face grim. He looked purposeful,
determined, handsome. She thought of Theo, his dark skin soaked by
ocean water, his voice, his anguish. Stirred in her seat,
uneasy.

“So. We lost because we could not protect our
leaders. Could not prevent their being embraced. And yet. If we
were able to create an antidote, or even a vaccine—if we were able
to inoculate our leaders, hell, our citizenry from the
vampires—well. We could then tear up the Treaty and destroy them,
one by one, with impunity.”

Selah blinked. “You think we can do that? Use my
blood to create a vaccine?”

The general grinned, revealing yellowed teeth,
the expression devoid of humor. “It is worth a shot, wouldn’t you
say?”

Everybody began to speak at once, but the
general held her gaze. She had no trouble meeting it, not after the
number of vampires whose gaze she had met recently. But there was
real hope burning in his glacial blue eyes.

“Why,” she asked, and the others fell silent,
“why are you here? In Miami?”

He leaned back. Interlaced his fingers and
looked down at his hands. “I was willing to do as commanded, and
give the vampires Miami and LA if that bought us peace. But I would
be damned if I’d stay free after condemning millions to slavery.”
He looked up, face grim. “Reckon I didn’t have much of a
choice.”

“Oh,” said Selah, and saw that Mama B was
nodding. “So what now?”

“We need to get a sample of your blood to the
lab in the embassy. They’ll take you no matter what once they see
how unique your blood is. Take your grandmother and friend as well
if you insist, I don’t doubt.”

“So we just have to get to the embassy?” asked
Maria Elena.

“Yes. I’ve already made a couple of exploratory
phone calls. I tried to have them medevac you out of here, but they
refused to so flagrantly break the Treaty on my word alone. They’ll
take you, however, if you get to the embassy in person. Will keep
you long enough to test your blood for its unique properties, and
then—well. They’ll figure it out from there.”

“All right,” said Cloud. “Then we’ve got to get
going. Selah, you can ride with me on my bike. The others can
follow behind in the jeep.”

Everybody began to protest again, Mama B arguing
in favor of waiting for dawn, which was only a couple of hours
away, while Cloud wanted to move immediately before the vampires
could intercept them in any manner. Selah stayed quiet, not knowing
what was best, still struggling with the idea that her blood could
somehow change the course of the War, could end the Treaty, could
be the key to defeating the vampires.

“Go in the morning,” said General Adams, his
voice cutting through the argument. “Trying to get in at the very
end of the night would be suspicious. My home is safe. Wait three
hours, and then drive out with the dawn. You can blend in with the
morning traffic, and have a much higher chance of getting through
unnoticed.”

Cloud subsided, visibly unhappy but unable to
argue his position further. The general stood and pointed at Maria
Elena and Joey. “You two. My kitchen is over there. You should find
plenty of bread and peanut butter with which to make sandwiches for
anybody who is hungry, as well as two gallons of fresh milk.” He
pointed at Cholly and Cassie. “You two can go to that hall closet
and dig out blankets and extra pillows. That couch is a futon. See
if you can’t make enough beds for everybody to get some shut-eye.
Cloud, you know where my security monitors are. Monitor them.
Selah, Mrs. Brown, please come with me.”

He turned and walked out of the room, and for a
second, everybody simply stared at each other, Cassie positively
bristling, but then Joey laughed and stood. “I mean, come on. He
was
a five-star general. How else do you think he’s going to
approach a sleepover?” Cloud snorted and broke the tension.
Everybody began to move, to talk, and Selah and Mama B followed the
general into the back of the house.

The back room was clearly a study. Bookcases
covered the wall, books stacked in tottering piles everywhere.
Selah wanted to ask why he didn’t just read everything
electronically, but let the question lie. The general sat behind a
large walnut desk, and pulled out something shaped like a flute
case. He opened it, revealing two hypodermic needles along with
test tubes and other medical paraphernalia.

“Just what do you think you’re doing?” asked
Mama B.

The general looked up. “Taking a large blood
sample from your granddaughter.”

“And why should she let you do that?”

“In case we don’t make it, Mama,” said Selah.
She sat before the desk. “If my blood’s that important, it makes
sense to get a backup copy. Just in case.”

“We
are
going to make it,” said Mama B
flatly.

“Indeed you are.” The general assembled his
equipment, sterilizing the needle. “Still, no sense in putting all
our eggs in one basket. On the off chance, we can’t risk it.”

Mama B nodded uncertainly, and didn’t avert her
eyes when the general calmly and with a steady hand drew two test
tubes’ worth of Selah’s blood.

They awoke far too soon. Selah rolled onto her
back with a groan and covered her eyes with her forearm as General
Adams turned on the lights and walked amongst them, shaking each by
the shoulder and commanding people to rise to their feet. Maria
Elena rolled into Selah’s back and buried her face between her
shoulder blades and began to curse in Spanish.

With a sigh, Selah dropped her arm and looked at
the ceiling. Her eyes felt stale, her mouth was tacky, and she
ached with a deep fatigue that yearned for another six hours’
sleep. Still. It was time. She took a deep breath, and focused on
the fact that in a couple of hours she might be free. No longer
tired, she sat up, and joined the general muddle of people trying
to get into the only bathroom with running water—no questions about
how the general had pulled that off—and then into the kitchen for
coffee and sandwiches.

An hour later, they were ready. The general had
given up on keeping people on schedule, especially after Maria
Elena took half an hour to get ready in the locked bathroom. The
coffee was bitter, the bread was stale, but nobody complained.
There was an almost holiday atmosphere to the moment as they stood
about the kitchen, laughing nervously at jokes and staring
pensively out the windows.