Free Bad Moon Rising by Jonathan Maberry Page A

free hand up to massage his throat, but restrained it—that would look weak—but he couldn’t control the involuntary swallow. His throat hurt like hell. He jabbed Ruger hard with the pistol barrel. “I don’t give a leaping shit about Lois…but she’s my property, Sport. Mine .”
    Ruger said nothing, but he sneered and slapped the pistol barrel away—which Vic allowed—and turned away to hide a hungry little smile.
    (6)

    Crow watched as Weinstock got up and walked into the bathroom to splash cold water on his face. He reappeared in a minute, dabbing at his eyes with wads of paper towels, leaned his shoulder against the door frame, and threw a quick look at the door to make sure it was firmly closed.
    “I can’t believe we are having this conversation,” he said. “I can’t believe I’m having a conversation with the word ‘vampire’ in it.”
    “Welcome to my world.”
    “It’s my world, too, damn it. I’ve been living this nightmare for weeks now, ever since I did the autopsies on Jimmy Castle and Nels Cowan.”
    “Not that I want to play who’s the bigger dog, Saul, but I sure as hell got you beat there because mine starts back in 1976, during the Black Harvest.”
    Weinstock winced. “Oh man…don’t even try to tell me that the Massacre is tied into all this. I don’t want to hear that. I don’t want to know that.” He came over and sank down in the chair. “Okay, okay…tell me everything.”
    So Crow told him. He started with Ubel Griswold moving into the town, talked about the 1976 blight that destroyed the town’s crops and killed most of the livestock—including all of Griswold’s cattle—and how the Massacre began shortly afterward.
    “What are you saying? That Griswold was a vampire, too?”
    “No…I don’t think that was it.” Crow licked his lips. “I think Griswold was a werewolf.”
    Weinstock sat back and studied him. “Okay. Right. Fine. A werewolf. Peachy. Our conversation now includes vampires and werewolves. Why don’t we throw in ghosts and the Jersey Devil, too, then I can go and blow my brains out and no one will blame me.”
    “You want to hear this or not?”
    Weinstock signed. “Not really,” he said, but he made a twirling motion with his index finger to indicate that Crow should continue.
    “For whatever reason Griswold moved here, if we at least for the sake of argument accept that he was a…werewolf…” Even Crow had a hard time saying the word. It felt clunky in his mouth and its edges caught in his throat. “Then he must have come here to lay low. Raising and killing the cattle kept him off the radar until the blight killed the cattle and all of the other local livestock. When the urge to hunt came on him where else did he have to turn but people? Even then he tried to keep it on the QT by preying on tramps and hobos, but I think the lust for human blood got the better of him and he just started hunting anyone he could find. Val’s uncle was killed, my brother Billy. Terry’s little sister, Mandy…and remember, Griswold almost killed Terry, too. He was in a coma for weeks.”
    “God…”
    “I would have been killed, too, ’cause he came after me, but Oren Morse—the guy we used to call the Bone Man—he saved my life. Griswold hadn’t completely transformed yet and the Bone Man was able to stop him. He tried to tell people about it, but nobody listened to him. Far as the rednecks in the town were concerned—my own father among them—Morse was just a black draft-dodging tramp. This was thirty years ago, Saul, and no one paid any attention. When I told my father he kicked the shit out of me. You got to remember, he was one of those young jackasses who hung out at Griswold’s all the time. Griswold was their hero.”
    “I seem to remember not shedding a tear when your dad died, hope that doesn’t offend.”
    “Nah, Dad was a complete tool. Point is, he either didn’t believe me or didn’t want to believe me, and he put such a fear