The face was fish white. Part of a puckered bullet wound was evident beneath the edge of the cap and the nose was mashed flat and the smile showed a mouthful of teeth, some broken at the gum, others impossibly long. “I don’t drink . . . beer,” Dutch wheezed. Then he grabbed the boy by the hair and jerked him up onto the counter and slammed a hammy fist into the side of the cashier’s head once, twice until he slumped there, moaning, barely able to move. Dutch hit him a few more times just for spite.

The hunger welled up immediately. Larson’s head swam and he wanted to take the boy on the countertop right there and then—that neck was so long, so soft, and he could almost see the blood coursing even through the skin, and the sound of it thundered in his ears—but he fought it, if only for a few moments more. He had the presence of mind to remove himself from the view of the world and those damn big windows. He went behind the counter out of sight and crouched down there, then dragged the boy off into his lap. No one would see them now, he thought. He brushed the hair from that ripe throat . . .

A car door slammed. It sounded very close, just outside even. Larson flinched, his fangs bared territorially, but then it occurred to him. Customers—his meals were coming to him now. He smacked his lips with glee and waited for the bell above the door to ring.

It didn’t. He waited a little longer. Still nothing. They must have been using the phone, yeah, that was it. And if he moved quickly enough, he could catch them, too. He laid the cashier aside and raised up from behind the counter.

The front door was just swinging shut, though the bell still had yet to sound. And parked just outside the store, in plain view, was a new model van he hadn’t seen before. But a van nonetheless.

No . . . it couldn’t be . . .

There was a sound to his right. A conspicuous clearing of the throat. He turned as if in slow motion, catching a silvery flash as the overhead lights reflected off moving steel. Then he saw the soldier’s face, the lips pursed but still half-smirking, and Dutch tried to curse the son of a bitch but found his vocal chords suddenly no longer connected. Neither was his larynx or esophagus or even his spinal column for that matter. The sword blade had passed cleanly through, separating all. His head kept on turning and slid forward off its base as if never truly attached, bounced once, and rolled into the open. The body joined it a moment later.