The 13th by John Everson Page B

I’m working,” he answered and slid their vodkas across.
    David took a deep breath. Was it worth this? Then he slipped off his stool and repositioned himself next to Jill.
    “Hi,” he said.
    “Mmmm, fresh meat.” Jill grinned, taking a sip of her drink, but not taking her eyes off of him. With one finger, she stretched the front neckline of her V-neck T-shirt a little lower, making sure that he could catch a glimpse of the ample cleavage there.
    “Look,” David said, “I was here the other night with a girl I think you might know. Brenda Bean?”
    “Yeah, yeah, I know her,” Jill said, holding up a hand to stop David from going any further. “And I already told the police I don’t know where she went that night. They talked to just about everyone they could find who was at the Shack the night Brenda disappeared.”
    “Did you at least see who she might have been talking to?”
    “Look sweetheart, keeping my eyes on the young sluts isn’t what I’m about when I’m here, okay? I don’t play that team, and usually, we’re working different fields anyway. I know she was here that night, and now that I see you, I seem to remember seeing her with you a couple times. But that’s all I know.”
    David backed off, thanking them, and drained the rest of his Guinness before putting it back on the bar.
    “Getcha another?” Joe asked, instantly materializing to take the empty.
    “Naw,” David said. “I got what I came for.”

C HAPTER E IGHTEEN
    It was nighttime at Castle House, but the asylum was not sleeping peacefully. On the first floor, Amelia was running barefoot down the thick-carpeted art-wing hallway. The moans had started an hour before, and she’d ignored them at first, but they’d redoubled in the past few minutes.
    She’d finally gone upstairs to check on Angela Kirtch, and realized with one look at the woman’s pain-etched face and arched back, that the time was NOW. She took the stairs two at a time, turned the corner and reached the door with the red X, panting. She threw open the door and called down the stairs. “It’s time,” she cried out into the darkness. “Barry, do you hear me? Our first baby is coming. Right now. We have to hurry.”
    In seconds, Rockford’s face emerged from the shadow, and he vaulted up the stairs. “I was just getting the crèche ready,” he said. “Do you have the instruments laid out?”
    Amelia nodded. “Everything is ready.”
    “Then let’s begin.”
    Together they hurried up the stairs to room one. When they reached the room, Amelia flipped the lights on as Barry went straight to the bedside. He put a wide palm on Angela’s distended belly, slowly moving it around and gently pressing, as he stroked her forehead. Then he lifted the thin cotton robe, and eased her legs outward in a V so that he could examine her. The bed was already slick with blood, and he shook his head.
    “She’s already crowning,” he said. “Let’s get her downstairs, now!”
    Amelia ran about the room, disconnecting heart monitors and propping open the door. Then she took the wheel locks off the bed with her foot and helped Barry shove the bed through the door and into the hallway. There was an elevator just around the corner. On the bed, Angela’s entire body tightened, her fingers clawing into the mattress. Even though she was still deeply tranquilized, her breathing quickened, and as the contraction peaked, she screamed. Her eyelids fluttered open, but Amelia could only see the whites of her eyeballs.
    Barry opened the elevator as Angela screamed again, and when the doors slid open, he stepped inside and pulled the bed after him. Then he pulled a key out of his pocket, slipped it into the lock on the elevator controls and turned it, before pressing the button marked simply, B.
    Angela moaned. “Oh God, it hurts,” she slurred.
    “And so it begins,” Barry answered.
    Brenda woke to the distant sound of screaming. She didn’t know that’s what it was at first.