SNAP: The World Unfolds

CHAPTER FORTY

It was after 10 when I woke.  The sun was burning through drifting morning fog and later would drag people to the beach like a magnet.

For now, though, I could get some exercise.  I wasn’t dedicated.  When I could, usually two or three times a week, I’d do a walk/run for a few miles; just enough to work up a gentle sweat.  The last time I exercised was my walk to the stream in Hungary, and that didn’t work up much of anything.

I pulled on a pair of shorts, t-shirt, socks and running shoes, finger-combed my hair into a loose ponytail and started out.  Smack into Carlos’ chest.

Rats, I’d forgotten my attendant.

“It has to be OK if I go to the beach for some exercise,” I started.  “After all, the sun’s out.”

“It’s fine, as long as either Paco or I are with you.”  I loved the demon sense of humor.

“Well, which one of you wants to go?” I snapped, heading for the elevator.

Carlos and I trotted outside into wispy fog, crossed the block and walked out onto the sand.  I gave myself half an hour and set out on a slow jog along the tide line, where the sand was firmer.  It seemed out of place to have a big man dressed in a black suit keeping an eye on me through binoculars, but, oh well.

Being out doors felt good.  One of the things I missed hanging around with the vampires was fresh air and sunshine.  I could indulge, just not with Jean-Louis.  This morning it was a high tide, so my path was parallel, close to the street and south of the pier.  In fact, there was enough mist that its shape was shadowy; I could only glimpse it occasionally though I could hear the surf washing against the pilings.

I’d gone about half a mile and was turning around when a dog chased a ball in front of me.  I slowed and glanced through a patch of fog to spot his owner.  Something hit me from behind and I smacked face-first into the packed sand, knocking the wind out of me.  I pulled my arm in to push myself up but hands grabbed both arms, wrenched them behind my back and whipped a plastic cuff around them.

“What the hell...” I started as a hand jerked my pony tail and pulled my head back.  I was trying to spit out a mouthful of sand when something dropped over me and the sunlight disappeared.   The cloth smelled dirty and musty as though it’d been stored at the bottom of a gym locker; it was beginning to make me nauseous.  I was kicking out, trying to find a body part I could hurt, when I was suddenly hoisted up and thrown over a shoulder.  My ribs were going to crack from the force of landing on bone and my lungs were fighting to get air.

“Just cool it,” a spidery voice said.  “I’m not going to hurt you, just deliver you.”

My kidnapper hadn’t taken more than two steps before I landed back on the sand again, thrown down with Spidery Voice on top of me.  A second later, his weight was off and there were distinct sounds of hurt coming from him.

The cloth over my head was jerked off.  A distraught Carlos leaned over me.  “Are you alright? I’m so sorry.  Jean-Louis and the Baron will punish me for this.”

The moist, salty air smelled like a rose garden after the gym socks or whatever had covered me.  I sucked it in and sucked it in and finally got enough in so that my heart stopped hammering.  “What happened?” I gasped and tried to stand up, damned difficult with my hands cuffed behind me.

“Let me get that plastic off.  Should we take you to a hospital?”

“No, no, I think I’m OK.  Let me just breathe for a minute, I had the wind knocked out of me.  Who did this?  Was it a Huszar?  But it couldn’t have been!  It’s bright daylight.”