20

The fall was short but painful. I landed with the box under my ribs and heard a loud crunch. Pain shot through my midsection like an electrical charge. I let out a scream that would have shamed Fay Wray. Broken rib for sure, plus I’d aggravated a couple dozen Stockton-inflicted wounds.

The next second I heard Blout hit the ground beside me with a short hard thud. At least his fat ass didn’t land on me.

We both stayed on our backs, moaning. Blout was the first to try to get up.

“Are you okay?” he asked as he stood, dusting himself off.

I stared up at the ceiling of the tunnel. “Just leave me here. I’ll be fine in a day or two.”

Blout thought I was kidding. He grabbed my arm and pulled me until I was sitting up. At that point we realized we were now in a huge tunnel, at least twice the width and height of the city’s drainage pipe. Then we saw the box. When I fell on it, I’d crushed one side. The hinges had snapped and spilled the beating heart onto the floor. Blout shined the penlight beam on the throbbing muscle. It was filthy with dirt, but still beating.

“Oops.”

I gathered it up, wiping it clean with my shirt. Blout watched me tend to the moist hunk of meat with a look of total disgust.

“Maybe after we’re done here, you can name it and keep it as a pet,” he said and turned away.

I picked a few granules of dirt from one of the sealed arteries, then tucked it back into the battered box.

Finally Mo’Lock appeared, landing feet first and seeming damn pleased about it. He had been there before, but I distinctly recalled that the first time he explored the tunnel he’d arrived on his ass, so his smugness rolled right off me.

“Which way did your buddies go?” I asked.

The ghoul looked slowly in both directions, then back again, and once more to be sure. “Whitney Green is east . . . that way,” he said pointing. “They went west.”

“Then west it is.” I started to walk, but stopped when I saw Blout holding his head. “What’s wrong?”

“It’s nothing . . . just NHHHGHGH!”

The big man buckled and fell. Mo’Lock grabbed him by the shoulders, catching him before he hit the dirt. I could see the dark glimmer of blood running from both of the cop’s nostrils.

I fumbled in my pockets for a pill. Blout was grimacing and shuddering. He was gritting his teeth so hard I could see the pressure was producing blood. It was seeping through the tiny seams between teeth and gum, filling the nooks and crannies with crimson red. Getting him to swallow a pill was going to be tough. I grabbed his face at the jaw and pinched hard, trying to get his teeth to part. It worked on the third squeeze and I jammed the pill in.