“You got my drink?” Gail asked.
“Bourbon, double, neat,” I answered.
“Great, shut the door before you let all the steam out.”
I pushed the door shut with my free hand and then leaned against the wall, sipping my drink, and enjoying the view.
As Gail rinsed her tresses, I saw they hung just past her shoulders. I remembered her hair longer. She slid the door back far enough to stick an arm out. “Hit me, Hoss.”
I stepped close enough to put the glass in her hand. Her fingers wrapped around it and immediately drew the glass into the shower with her. I watched her toss back the double. She coughed once and then her hand reappeared with the empty glass. “Thanks, how about a refill?”
I took the glass and grinned. “Sure, I think I can manage that. Ah, do you need your back washed?”
Gail’s face appeared in the opening. She had a wide smile on her face and she chuckled, a deep, pleasant sound that vibrated deep in her throat. “It’s nice to know some people never change. You want to wash my back, Jesse? Is that all you want?”
“That’s all I’m offering, if anything else comes up, well …”
She laughed then, full and heartily. After the night’s shocks, I enjoyed hearing her laugh. “I know something would come up, but I don’t know that I’m ready for that, Jesse. I’ll take a rain check on the backwash.”
“Sure. I imagine you’re tired and sore.”
She leaned against the shower’s front wall and let the stream flow across her head and down her back. “Tired and sore, sure, there’s that, but I’ve never let that hold me back and you know it. I’m just not ready to pick up where we left off. That wasn’t why I called you.”
“I understand.” I retreated to the door and opened it. I turned back to the shower. She was facing me, her body perfect in my memory. “It’s really great to see you again, no matter why you called.”
“Great to see you too, Jesse.”
“I’ll wait for you in the living room,” I said and pulled the door closed behind me.
I refilled Gail’s glass, topped my glass off with another shot and a little more ice, and went to the sofa. I set her glass on the coffee table and then set my own on a coaster. The side of my glass was thick with dew. My tablet was on the end table. I activated it and Googled local businesses. I was pretty sure what materials I’d need, but I wasn’t sure where I could find them in Huntsville.
Gail came out a few minutes later, her damp hair plastered against the collar of her clean blouse, a short sleeve, floral print number that looked like silk. The blouse hung past the waist of clean jeans. Her feet were bare and her belt, with the Colt’s kidney rig, and her overnight bag hung over her left shoulder. The Mossberg and her hiking boots were in her hands. She took a chair directly across the table from me and laid the boots and the Mossberg on the floor. Opening her bag, she removed a cleaning kit, ejected the Colt’s magazine, and cleared the breech. Picking up her glass of whiskey, she took a healthy slug, set it back on the table, and proceeded to fieldstrip the Colt.
I saw she’d replaced the bandage on her arm.
“What are you looking up?” Gail asked.
“Supply places. I figure we’ll need a lot and I better find out where to get everything before we catch a few zees.”
“Want to tell me what kind of supplies? I have a lot in the van.”
I chuckled mischievously. “I don’t think you have these. Let it be a surprise. So, Gail, fill me in on what you’ve been doing all your life because apparently I don’t know what the hell you do.”
She paused running a brush down the Colt’s barrel, took another hit on her whiskey, just a sip this time, and nodded. “All right. If you’re getting involved, you’ll need to know what’s what.
“Like I said, hunting is the family business. We’ve been in the business longer than anyone in the family knows, but after enough time, well it just doesn’t ever seem to end.”
“And you personally,” I said. “What have you hunted since your Dad died?”
“Just the usual, ghouls and werewolves, of course, then there’s the occasional zombie, vampire, banshee, leprechaun—”
“Wait a minute, a leprechaun?” I interrupted.
She pointed the cleaning rod at me. “Just because they’re short little bastards doesn’t mean they take after the Lucky Charms’ guy. They’re famous for their pot of gold, but they get that gold by thievery, chicanery, and murder. They’ll kill you just for your gold crowns.”
“Damn,” I said with a shake of my head and a grin. “I think I’ll go back to Cheerios.”
“Hah-hah, you’re a funny man. Anyway, pretty much every evil bastard that has ever been written about exists in one fashion or another. Most can be killed with enough firepower, but some creatures have to be killed with either a blessed object or something else.”
“Like silver for werewolves,” I said.
“Yes, exactly, taking the head will kill most things, but most of them don’t want to stand still long enough for decapitation. Go figure. Ghost or poltergeist can be slowed with salt and iron; I keep a couple boxes of rock salt and steel rounds for the shotgun. Iron stops the fey—”
“Fey?”
“Fairy-like creatures, they’re pretty rare. Then there are the truly evil—demons and their ilk. You have to banish them, usually with a holy object or an exorcism, but they’re even rarer than the standard unnatural beasties.”
I finished the web search, set the tablet aside, and picked up my Beretta from the end table. I unloaded and
