pouch he kept on his hip. “What do you wanna do with their victim in there?”
“Are they still alive?” Alfonzo asked.
“Very much not.” Bella blanched. Ghouls were messy eaters. The person looked like they had been dismantled by a pack of coyotes.
“Then leave them.” Their de-facto leader sniffed dismissively. “We’re not in the business of hiding corpses.”
Eddie looked over his shoulder at the remains of the woman who had been the prey. At least, Bella assumed the person had been a woman. Only the tattered remains of a dress gave it away. The body was nearly unrecognizable. Her younger friend sighed and shook his head. “Eh. It just seems wrong to leave them like that.”
“Someone’ll find them in the morning. We have work to do. C’mon.” Alfonzo gestured a hand, and the three of them headed down the sidewalk.
They walked for a while in silence before Bella spoke. “What do you think of Miss Parker?”
“I think she might be useful to us,” Alfonzo replied with a shrug. “I think her power is unique. I’ll take any advantage we can get.”
“She seems nice. She seems to care,” Eddie added. “Even if she knows she’s in danger.”
“She just seems so…sad to me.” Bella looked off thoughtfully. “Very alone.”
“What’s the alternative? You saw what she can do.” Alfonzo glanced at her. “She can hear souls. Do you think she wants to be around people all that frequently? It must get exhausting.”
“That’s fair.” Bella tucked her hands into her coat pockets. “I suppose I didn’t think of that. I—”
She didn’t get to finish her thought. A snarl from the shadows nearby and a blur of motion served as her only warning. She had a knife buried into the skull of the ghoul as it hovered inches away from Eddie’s neck.
Eddie shrieked and fell to the ground in shock, looking up at the twitching and dying monster in surprise.
Bella smiled down at him. “You’re welcome.”
Alfonzo shook his head. “Children…”
***.
Right on schedule, the hunters knocked on Maxine’s door. This time she was expecting guests and had made a better lunch for the four of them. It was rare that she ever had the chance to host anything more than a séance or the odd gathering. It was hardly a social call, what with their subject matter being more than a little morbid, but she found herself enjoying laying out food all the same.
The city is liable to be destroyed by an undead tyrant who kissed you, and you are amusing yourself with the crudité.
“Hello, Alfonzo, Bella, Eddie.” She welcomed them inside and up to her dining room where she had set out food and drinks.
“Oh, fuck, yes.” Eddie immediately went for the plate of cured meats.
Alfonzo slapped the boy on the arm. “Manners.”
“I’m starving, and it was a terrible night.” Eddie poured himself a glass of wine and, lifting it, made a comical show of extending his pinky finger. “There. Better?”
“Forgive him,” Alfonzo said to Maxine. “He was raised by cows.”
“No, I raised cows. Not by cows. There’s a difference.”
“Is there?” Alfonzo smiled indulgently. It was the smile of a father, teasing a son.
Maxine chuckled. “I spent many years traveling with the Roma. It’s quite all right. They are hardly the vagabonds and thieves people believe them to be, but high society they are not. Make yourselves at home, please. Language and all.”
Eddie was grinning in victory as he piled a plate with food and slumped contentedly into a chair. He looked tired, bruised, and a little haggard.
He wasn’t the only one. Bella’s arm was wrapped in a bandage that was mostly hidden under the sleeve of her dress.
“What happened to you all last night?” Maxine asked.
“Ghouls.” Alfonzo sat at the table, also availing himself of the luncheon, although in a much more decorous fashion.
“One decided to try to make a snack out of me.” Bella smiled as if it were nothing at all, waving her hand dismissively. “But I killed it first. Thank you so much for all the wonderful food, Maxine. You didn’t need to do this, but we won’t say no. We live rather austere lives, hunting as we do.”
Maxine laughed this time more out of amazement than amusement. “A ghoul?”
“If a vampire feeds from a victim and kills them, they rise as monstrous, putrid beasts.” Alfonzo poured himself a glass of wine and sat back. He grunted as he did, and shifted, as if he had leaned on a bruise.
All three of them looked exhausted. Flashes of blood, of snarling creatures in