Sam Harlan (Book 3): Damned Cold by Kevin Lee Swaim Page A

Sam, perhaps even more dangerous than vampires.”
    “Hah. Nothing is more dangerous than vampires.”
    “They’re playing with the Tarot,” Jameson said. “Oracles like the Tarot and the I Ching aren’t just toys. They can be … deadly.”
    Callie turned to look at Jameson. “I know that you think—”
    “I don’t just think,” Jameson said. “I know . Oracles don’t tell the truth. They present possibilities. Which, by the way, are open to interpretation. Trying to assign meaning to them can cause the very event you’re trying to avoid.”
    “So I’m not the Manipulator?” I asked. “Great. I don’t really want to be the driver of fate.”
    Callie sighed. “Should we go back to the hotel?”
    “What?” I asked. “Why?”
    “Those trees to the south,” she said. “They must have been watching us from there. Maybe they left a clue.”
    “A clue?” My stomach tightened. I took a deep breath and held it until the surge of anger faded. “We’re not the police. We don’t have any training. How are we supposed to find clues? And, if we do find a clue, what are we supposed to do with it?”
    She turned to me and her eyes were shiny and hard. “Do you have any better ideas?”
    She’s got me there. Maybe she’s the smart one and I’m just the dumb sidekick.
    My stomach growled loud enough for everyone to hear. “Fine,” I said. “We’ll go back to the hotel, but I’m going to stop and get something to eat. Didn’t I see a Subway in this town?”
    Mosley nodded. “Right after the railroad tracks.”
    “Great.” I nodded to Callie. “We get an early lunch, and then we go back to the hotel. Fathers, do you want to join us?”
    Mosley started to nod, but Jameson shook his head. “No,” Jameson said. “I think the four of us traipsing around makes too much of a display.”
    I thought about that, and how absurd we’d look parading through town, just a beautiful woman, a rough looking man, and two priests. It sounded more like a bad joke than a serious attempt to find an evil witch, a vampire, and a missing woman. “We’ll be back when we find something,” I said.
    * * *
    I placed my order with the pretty Indian woman at the counter who quickly made my two roast beef foot-longs. I paid for my sandwiches, coffee, and Callie’s chicken salad, and we took seats near the front of the building. It was a newer franchise. The building looked a little rough on the outside, but the inside was clean and inviting and smelled of fresh-baked bread. I opened my sandwich and took a bite. I had the woman load the sandwich with extra roast beef, and it tasted delicious. I started to chew and had a moment where I longed for the beef to be rare, almost bloody, and quickly shook my head.
    “What’s wrong?” Callie asked. Her plastic fork was hovering over her chicken salad, but she was eying me intently.
    I started to speak, but a man in his early sixties opened the door behind her, causing the bell to tinkled. The man had an orange, bottled tan and dyed blond hair. I put him in his early sixties, and he was a shade taller than me, but wore a suit just expensive enough to set him apart from the locals.
    The woman on his arm was a different matter. She was starkly beautiful, with coal-black hair, deeply tanned skin, and a skirt short enough to be considered indecent. I put her in her early thirties, but the man said something and she laughed, and I saw crow’s feet around her eyes and upped that to early forties. The woman glanced my way, smiled, then turned back to her companion.
    I felt a sensation I hadn’t expected. Just a glance from the woman had ignited my libido.
    “ Sam ,” Callie said, just loud enough to bring me back to my senses.
    “Sorry.”
    “Why are you acting so … weird?”
    I gulped down some of the coffee. It was hot, and that’s about the only thing it had going for it. “Edmund said I’d be feeling things, and he’s right. I’m angry.”
    “Everyone gets angry,”