Feral Ch. 04

The rain had let up, leaving the roads slick and glistening beneath the headlights of Travis Mills' truck. After driving the SUV for so long, returning to the old Dodge was a strange comfort. Likewise, donning jeans and the well-used leather jacket which had lain dormant in his closet for months made the Ranger feel as if he was coming home to a town that had been transplanted through time. Comforting, yes, but also alien.

He pulled into the lot of the diner just off the highway and stepped out, taking a moment to stretch and allow some blood back to limbs in need of rejuvenation. He adjusted his hat, the one item in his wardrobe that would never change, then strode toward the doors.

An admirably cheerful woman met him at the front and guided him back to the smoking section, which was closed off from the rest of the diner by thick glass walls. Once he was seated, she handed him the menu with a wink and friendly pat on the shoulder. Travis set the menu down without opening, having already decided what he would have.

"Used to be," drawled the elderly man across the table, tapping a cigarette over a plastic ashtray. "You could smoke anywhere you wanted. Now, we're second-class citizens. Forget Rosa Parks being sent to the back of the bus. I couldn't even get on one now with a lit square."

Travis wrinkled his nose and fished out his own pack, taking up the dull silver Zippo belonging to the man across from him. "Folks're afraid of cancer, Ralph," he commented, then lit up.

"But not you."

Travis exhaled smoke and leaned back, licking his lips as he regarded the older man. "No. Not me."

"'Cause you can only be killed by what you fear."

"Something like that."

The elderly man frowned beneath a wrinkled brow. What little hair he had was ghostly white, in contrast to the man's naturally ruddy complexion. A once solid body had become frail with age, yet he still held to a certain bearing, one gained through a lifetime of facing and triumphing over danger. Travis wondered how much longer it would be before he started looking like that.

"Starting to show your age, Travis," Ralph said, as if reading the younger man's mind.

Travis chuckled ruefully. "Bound to happen sooner or later."

Ralph breathed in, then coughed a few times, body wracking before he thudded a fist against his chest to quell the spasms. He cleared his throat noisily before taking a drag and speaking. "So what's the occasion? I ain't seen you in months."

Travis exhaled a weary sigh, shaking his head. He pulled on his smoke, blew a grey-white plume into the air. He regarded the occupants of the other tables peripherally. "Why's it got to be a special occasion? Maybe I just want to have a cup of coffee with my favorite uncle."

Ralph's eyes gleamed briefly above a thin smile. "You're only uncle," he said meaningfully. "Hell, the only family you got left, not counting the ex."

Travis nodded somberly. "Don't think it ain't been on my mind."

Ralph frowned with worry. "Something you want to tell me?"

The Ranger paused as a stocky, middle-aged woman appeared to take his order. He barely looked at her as he ordered coffee and toast, and only spoke again once she was out of earshot.

"Been on the horn all afternoon," he said, scratching at the tablecloth with a rough-nailed finger.

"Doing what?"

"Making the head office mad at me. Screw'em."

Ralph nodded slowly in understanding. "So you really are retiring. Figured, when I saw you in skivvies."

Travis grumbled under his breath. "Been a long time coming."

"I'll say."

A sharp laugh left Travis' lips as he looked up to his uncle. "Knew you would."

The elder Mills shrugged his shoulders. "You always did have too much heart."

The Ranger frowned, borderline insulted. "What the hell's that mean?"

Ralph shifted uncomfortably in his seat. "When you joined the Army, I was surprised. I figured, seeing as how your old man bought it in 'Nam, you'd stay as far away from the military as possible. And then, not only did you join, but you went all the way: fast attack light infantry. Couldn't help but think them spots weren't right for you."

"I did good," Travis said defensively.

Ralph bobbed his head in agreement. "Ain't arguing that," he said. "Just always thought it strange, is all. Then you come back after ten years of active service and stepped right into a Texas Ranger's boots. Really made me think, you know. I wondered if I had you figured wrong."

"Did you?" Travis asked cagily.

Ralph didn't answer as the waitress returned, setting down a coffee cup before his nephew. Both men were patient as the mug was filled. Ralph spoke once the woman was away.

"Not as much as I thought," Ralph finally said with a self-satisfied smile. He tapped his cigarette, then drew from it, dry aged lips puckering around the filter. "You know, the problem I always had was that I always figured you'd do the college thing. First in the family and all that horse shit. Like I said, too much heart."

"I like to think that's always been a good thing."

"Maybe," Ralph conceded. "Passion can make a man fight harder, make him beat the odds. But it can also be more dangerous than any bullet."

Travis smiled awkwardly, stirring creamer into his cup. "And charm can only take a man so far."

The older man's eyes were penetrating. "You would know."

Silence feel between them. The two men smoked and sipped their coffee, ignoring the world.

"What's bothering you, Travis?"

The Ranger sighed through his nose, lips twitching. "Just thinking about a few things," he said dismissively.

Ralph smiled knowingly. "What's her name?"

Travis laughed, an embarrassed, self-admonishing sound. "Guess I'm still like wet newspaper to you," he remarked, eyes twinkling for a moment.

"What's her name?" Ralph repeated.

Travis eased back, tapping his fingers on the table. "Janie," he said. "Little truck stop cutie. Met her about seven months ago; we been seeing each other, casual like."

"Bet there's a story there."

Travis smiled wanly. "Ain't there always?"

"You gonna marry this girl?"

He scoffed. "Doubt it."

"But you love her."

Travis shrugged and took up his coffee mug. "Probably I do."

Ralph cocked his head. "So what's in the way?"

"Just about everything," Travis said tiredly. "She's half my age – exactly – and she's got some habits I can't stomach."

The older man grinned rakishly. "Bet she fucks like a rabbit on a hot spring day."

Travis smirked. "I ain't telling."

Ralph looked his nephew over for a long moment as the Ranger smoked and drank. "There's something else."

"Nothing gets by you, huh?"

"Maybe you forgot I was a Ranger, too, for thirty-three years."

Somberly, Travis shook his head. "Even if I got touched in the head, I'd never forget that."

"So what is it?"

Travis mused silently, running his fingers along the edge of the cup. "Took a call couple days ago," he said. "Group of illegals got slaughtered in a truck crossing the border near El Paso. Nasty sight. Figured at first it was some of them Mexican Mafia types, sending a message or something. But then I learn about a car found abandoned this morning just east of Hondo, also from El Paso. Something that used to be a man stuffed in the trunk. Pretty sure what killed him was what killed them illegals."

"Got a lead on the killer?"

Travis sighed wearily. "Just a name: Coyote."

The older man stiffened slightly. "Coyote," he repeated.

The Ranger's eyes flickered with suspicion. "You know the name."

Ralph pursed his lips. "Assuming you ain't referring to them human traffickers that bring illegals across the border . . . ."

"No. I ain't."

Ralph looked troubled. He took a sip of coffee, coughed a few times. "Ain't heard that name in more'n twenty years. We tracked him all over the state, never found him. Shadow on glass, that one."

"There ain't nothing in the archives about that," Travis proclaimed in suppressed alarm.

The older man shrugged. "Don't surprise me. Most of the bureaucratic staff graduated from A&M."

Travis grumbled in distaste, thinking. "If it's the same one, he'd be an older man by now."

Ralph let out a raspy sigh. "Unfinished business," he said.

Travis stared at the ceiling. "Part of me just wants to let it go, let the next guy take it. I put in my twenty years. I ain't got no more obligation."

The older man's gaze was piercing. "You and I both know you don't believe that."

Travis' face soured as he traced random patterns once more upon the table. "No, reckon I don't."

"So what're you gonna do?"

Travis huffed in exasperation. "This ain't like nothing I ever seen before, Ralph. I'm almost tempted to believe this wasn't no man that carved them people up. And more than that, but I'm pretty sure he's here, right now. And whatever he's up to, it's only gonna get more bloody."

Ralph watched his nephew's face carefully as he spoke. "So again, I'm asking, what are you gonna do?"

Travis met Ralph's gaze determinedly. "Guess I'm gonna do my job," he said. "One last time."

*****

"Exquisite," Luke murmured, smoothing his hands along the insides of the young woman's eagerly-spread thighs. Her milky skin glowed in the stark light shining through the windows from the street below. The plump lips of her smooth-shaved sex glistened, bringing out the youthful color of her coral lips. He lowered his head, passing the flat of his tongue across her labia, tasting the trickling moisture which seeped from within.

She hissed, arching her back, gripping the backs of her knees as she surrendered to his attention. The aroma of her filled Luke's senses, so ripe, so sweet . . . .

"Ah!" she cried out, nearly on the verge of orgasm already as Luke pressed his mouth to her needy genitals. He held her lean thighs firmly in his grip, sucking the tangy flesh into his mouth, nipping lightly with his teeth. The girl writhed, cooing, giggling, then purring with passion that yearned for release.

A few penetrating dips of his tongue, and she was ready to explode. But Luke wanted to take his time, mixing frustration with the promise of greater pleasure to come. Gliding up over her lithe body, his cock erect and demanding, he slid inside her rippling tunnel with relative ease, feeling the snug, sucking muscles within gripping and pulling him deeper.

"Oh, God, oh, God," she moaned, clutching him tightly, gripping his strong arms, locking her ankles behind his toned waist. Plaintive, doe-like eyes fluttered up at him, framed by dark mascara and shaded makeup. "Fuck me . . . ."

He said nothing, silently acquiescing to the raver girl's demand which matched his own. Over and over, he thrust inside her, feeling the heat of her body seething through the shaft of his cock. She bucked and moaned continuously, wincing and gasping through first one, then two, then a third orgasm before Luke finally felt his own release. Only then did he sigh with pleasure, allowing passion to pour from his stark lips even as it gushed from within him to soak into her womb.

*****

He padded to the living room of his spacious apartment in the darkness, needing no light to guide his way. The small nylon bag lay where he had left it, upon the chair facing the matching sofa across an iron worked coffee table. Taking it up, Luke set the bag beside him on the leather cushions and unzipped it. The stacks of neatly-arranged bills – mostly twenties and fifties – held his attention only briefly before he reached beyond them to the cloth-wrapped bundle beneath.

Since taking the bag from the Greyhound bus terminal that afternoon, Luke had only briefly examined the weapon which Gregor had described as "something that would be helpful." Now, however, he unwrapped the large, broad-bladed knife, feeling the preternatural cold which seeped from it like mist from dry ice.

It was heavier than any knife Luke had wielded before, and somewhat crude in design. The blade held but one edge which, while fairly sharp, would dull rather quickly with use. The hilt was bound tightly in simple leather, and the guard was pragmatic. Despite the weapon's crude appearance, however, Luke understood he held a weapon of particular and powerful importance.

So it's true, he thought. Either that, or Gregor has finally gone off the deep end. Either way . . . he flicked his finger against the blade, resulting in a dull metallic ring. Either way, I'm not taking any chances.

"Luke?"

He lowered the large knife between his naked legs as he looked to the enshrouded doorway of his bedroom. The tired, sated, and borderline worshipful face of his lover looked upon him, large eyes blinking slowly as her mind swam up from the depths of sleep.

"Did I wake you?" he asked.

The girl shrugged, wrapping the blanket she had dragged from the bed more tightly around narrow, porcelain shoulders. "I woke up and you weren't there," she said, taking a few steps closer. But she stopped upon catching sight of the knife.

Luke smiled disarmingly. "Just a gift from someone I know," he explained cryptically.

She remained unmoving for a long moment, eyes darting here and there before finally returning to Luke's face. "I wanna tell you something," she whispered.

He set his jaw. "All right."

She stepped closer, sinking onto the edge of the couch, facing him. Her expression was one of dead seriousness. When she spoke, it was with the air of a practiced speech. "You know, I've always thought that there was more than just this . . . this fragile human world."

Luke arched an eyebrow, waiting.

His lover continued: "I know what you are, Luke," she said, her eyes searching his. "I can only imagine the pain and loneliness you must feel. Living in the shadows, pretending to be something you're not, hiding from the flames and pitchforks."

He frowned. Flames and pitchforks?

"I know what it's like, too," the girl went on, reaching out to touch his bare leg. "I've always been different. For the longest time, I wondered what that meant. Then I started reading about . . . about the truth."

"The . . . truth," he repeated cautiously.

"Yes," she said vehemently. "The truth. It's okay, Luke; I won't tell anyone. To be honest, I don't want to be part of the world of my birth anymore. I want to walk in the shadows with you."

Luke looked away, lowering his head as he laughed softly. "I think you should go home," he said. "Sounds like you had a little too much absinthe."

"No," she said firmly, sliding closer on the couch. "I know what you're doing, and it won't work. I can see through the masquerade. I want to be embraced."

He rolled his eyes. God, not another one, he lamented silently. He pushed up from the couch, slapping the flat of the dull dark knife against his thigh. "Go home," he repeated, with more of a derisive tone in his voice.

"But . . . you chose me," she bemoaned, brow furrowed in confusion.

He whirled about, facing her. "Let me guess: abused as a child? Step-dad or Uncle Bob couldn't keep his hands to himself?" he asked rudely. "You write death poetry, don't you?"

The girl sunk back slightly, gathering the blanket around her. "I . . . sometimes," she admitted.

Luke gave her a tired look. "Go home," he reiterated. "Go home to your Anne Rice novels and your role-playing games. Play make-believe with your vampire fantasies."

"But you chose me!" she repeated vehemently.

"Yes, I did," he said patronizingly. "I chose you because I wanted to fuck you. I thought I was pretty clear about that in the club, when I said, 'let's go to my place and fuck.'"

She pouted, making her look girlishly younger. "You . . . you are a vampire, right?"

Luke laughed, then sighed in exasperation as he pinched the bridge of his nose. "No, actually, I'm not. And I sure as hell would never want to be."

"Why not?" the girl protested. "To live forever, never fearing death--"

He grunted impatiently, raising his hand in interruption. "Only an idiot never fears death," he said.

"But--"

"Do me a favor," he snapped. "Don't talk anymore. Just pick up your clothes and leave."

She sputtered, insulted. "Wh-what did I do?" she asked plaintively.

He regarded her with jaded eyes. "Nothing," he said wanly. "But I can't give you what you want, anyway. Besides, I have things to do."

*****

Scattered hours of sleep here and there had finally begun to take their toll. Travis felt the insistent pull of fatigue, despite his bull-like stamina. Pulling the truck into the gas station, he was grateful for the lapse in the monotony of the passing of dashed white lines on the road and amber-colored street lamps overhead.

He paid with his debit card and leaned against the bed of the truck while listening to the rhythmic whirring of aged machines housed within the pump. Remembering a time when gasoline cost less than a dollar a gallon, he shook his head in disgust as the monetary amount quickly racked up, to the tune of four times the amount of gas being poured.

"Fucking shame," grumbled a voice from the next pump over, catching Travis' attention. The Ranger turned his head, looking upon a tall, lanky man who appeared to be just a few years his elder, long, greying blond hair tied back in a ponytail. He squeezed the gas nozzle inserted into the tank of a late-model sedan.

"Excuse me?"

The man looked up with a casual smile, his eyes a bright hue of hazel which caught the harsh light of the station. "Gas," he said. "Too fucking expensive."

Travis chuckled. "Still, it beats walking."

The man laughed. "Got me there," he agreed. "What's a couple hundred bucks compared to walking from El Paso, right?"

The Ranger frowned, becoming more awake in an instant. Instincts honed over thirty years instantly put him on edge. He straightened and pushed away from the fuselage of the truck. "You came up from El Paso?"

"Sure did. Hell of a nothing drive, ain't it?"

Travis watched the man from the corner of his eye, suddenly conscious of the weight of the .45 tucked into the jeans at the small of his back. There was something innately threatening about this man, Travis decided. Still, he spoke civilly: "Can be."

"It just gets me," the man continued, looking down at the nozzle stuck into his car. "Twenty years ago, I could'a filled up my car for less than the price of, say, getting a hummer from a truck-stop waitress. Now, filling the tank costs more than emptying your balls. Kind of ironic, ain't it?"

Travis nodded curtly. "Ain't it," he agreed, slowly slipping his hand beneath the edge of his jacket.

"How's the little bitch doing, by the way?"

The man's derogatory words and tone were all the impetus Travis needed to decide his intuition was correct. Silently, yet in full view of the man at the next pump, he slipped the .45 free and let it hang conspicuously against his right thigh. Travis stood with head bowed in profile to the man, trusting his peripheral vision to alert him to any sudden movements.

A dark, patronizing chuckle rolled out from the man. "Planning on doing something with that?"

"If I have to," Travis responded without hesitation.

"What if I told you it wouldn't do any good?"

Slowly, Travis turned his head, his eyes dark and serious beneath the brim of his hat. "You stupid enough to put that to the test?"

The man laughed under his breath. "You assume stupidity when it's just reality."

Heart beats danced between the two men, filling the air as quietly as their own exhaled breaths. Travis' eyes wandered up and down the other man's form, noting the practiced grace and stance of a man used to combat.

"Coyote," the Ranger said at last. "I got a feeling this meeting ain't coincidental."

The older man made a noise like an amused, throaty, guttural growl. "Are they ever?" he quipped with a throaty laugh. "Gotta hand it to you; you're pretty quick. I always figured you 'good ole boy' types didn't get subtlety."