“C’mon, Ivan, you feeble little fuck! We kicked your butt back in the other house, and we’ll kick it here!”
Without taking his eyes off George, Ivan suddenly reached out his arm, grabbing Lou by the throat.
Shit...
George was about to rush him, but Ivan held up a hand, palm-out. Don’t move. George decided not to move.
Ivan’s head transformed back into its human form. Though it should have looked ridiculous to have a big strong wolfman with a human head, George found nothing even remotely comical about his appearance. The bloody bullet holes in his face helped with the lack of amusement value.
“Hey, George, remember when I had my claws on your throat?”
Just had to talk, didn’t you? Couldn’t resist a little mockery.
“I remember.”
“I let you live. Lou’s fucked.”
Lou slammed the cross into Ivan’s arm, burying it about an inch deep. Ivan screamed and released his grip on Lou’s neck. His face began to switch between human and wolf features the way it had after George kicked him in the nuts.
Now!
George moved forward. No other chairs were immediately available, so he’d just use his goddamn fists.
Ivan ripped the cross out of his arm, which sizzled at the wound. He flung the cross at the bearded guy, who had almost made it to the open doorway. It struck the back of his head with skull-shattering velocity, and the bearded guy slumped forward, clutching at the immense gash.
The woman kicked the window. This time, her foot broke through.
George threw a punch, aiming for Ivan’s kidneys. Let him find out how it felt. The punch connected and Ivan howled.
Ivan spun around and grabbed George. Using both hands, he threw George into Lou, and the two of them stumbled across the bar and hit the floor for the umpteenth time that evening.
The woman kicked at the glass twice more, opening up a hole big enough to escape through. She ducked through the new exit, then lost her balance as Ivan grabbed her by the ankle, digging his claws in deep. She fell onto the glass, breaking through it most of the way to the floor. Ivan dragged her back inside over the jagged remains. Her screaming and flailing around made things much worse for her.
George cringed. Where the hell were the cops?
The cross wound had stopped sizzling and bleeding. Ivan stepped on the woman’s legs, grabbed a handful of her long black hair, and jerked her head back, snapping her neck.
The one-armed man lay on the floor and groaned.
The bearded guy wasn’t moving. He was either unconscious or dead. Probably dead. Six for Ivan, if you didn’t count the trampled woman or the person who’d been shot upstairs.
That only left the couple underneath the table, George, and Lou.
Ivan held up five clawed fingers on one hand and his index finger on the other hand. Then he pointed to the man and woman under the table and held up two more.
They screamed as the werewolf strode over to them. Ivan picked up the table, exposing them completely, then threw it at the bearded guy. Direct hit. Even if he wasn’t dead now, he’d never walk, speak, or eat solid food again.
The man and woman cowered against the wall, hands in front of their faces as if that would stave off Ivan’s attack.
Ivan transformed his head back again, then beckoned to the man. “Come here.”
“No!”
“Here’s my offer,” Ivan said, speaking calmly although he was breathing heavily. “You get up, walk over here, and let me gouge your eyes out, and I’ll let your woman live. Otherwise I’m going to jump over there and rip you both to shreds.”
George picked up another chair.
Ivan looked back at him. “Are you fucking kidding me? Enough with the chairs, George! I’m tired of punching you around.”
“Really? I’m sure not tired of hitting you with chairs.”
“Hilarious. You’re a funny guy, George. But I’m not talking to you right now.” Ivan looked back at the couple. “It’s a straightforward deal, sir. Walk over here, let me poke out your eyes, and she goes free. I swear. How about it?”
The man stood up. Without hesitation and ignoring the woman’s horrified wail, he walked right up to Ivan, fists clenched and head held high.
“Holy shit! You actually did it!” Ivan looked around the bar as if to confirm that everybody had seen the same thing. “I can’t believe it! I am absolutely flabbergasted! You must love the absolute shit out of her, huh?”
The man nodded. “Yes, I do.”
“Well, I--I honestly don’t know how to react to this. I kind of figured that I’d just be ripping you two apart.” Ivan gestured to the woman. “Go. Get out through the broken window.”
“Please don’t hurt him,” she said, getting to her feet. Sobbing, she ducked underneath the broken pane of glass and left the bar.
“I’m stunned,” said Ivan. “Just stunned. Wow. I don’t know if you’re brave or a complete idiot. You know what? I don’t even feel like gouging your eyes out after that. You deserve to keep them. Go follow your woman and get some mega-pussy tonight.”
The man turned and hurried out through the broken window. Ivan let him go.
“Can you believe that?” Ivan asked George. “He was going to let me do it. Would you do that for your girlfriend?”
“I don’t have one.”
“And it’s probably because you wouldn’t give up your eyes for her. So what’s my count? Six...” Ivan walked over to the nice guy with one arm, and slammed his foot down on his head, several times. “Seven. I could cheat and count the poor bitch who got crunched at the door, but I like to play fair.”
“So you’re one short,” George said.
“Yeah. What a disappointment. Do you think anybody else will be dumb enough to come inside?”
“The cops.”
“Cops count. I could definitely make it to eight if the cops show up. But that would involve more waiting around, and I can’t help but feel that there’s another way to achieve my goal. Hmmmm. Let me think...”
George looked at Lou. They exchanged a knowing glance, and then both rushed Ivan at the same time. The “bash him with a chair” tactic hadn’t been entirely successful thus far, but if they both got in good hits simultaneously...
Ivan leapt at George, jumping into the air like a wolf going for the kill. George didn’t even get to swing the chair before Ivan landed on him, knocking him to the floor yet another time. He had an instant to think that counting the number of times he hit the floor would make a good drinking game, and then his head struck the floor and nothing mattered anymore.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
A Bad Time To Be Lou
Considering the circumstances, Lou thought he’d done a pretty good job of keeping himself together. He wanted to yell and cry and run around in circles and let the dark specter of madness completely engulf his ass. He could use a little bit of insanity right now to keep him from focusing so much on the current reality.
Unfortunately, either he was locked away in a padded cell having hallucinations about a bloody werewolf massacre at the Cotton Mouse Tavern, or he was entirely sane. If this was a hallucination, he could just sit back, relax, and enjoy his tranquilizers and lobotomy, but for now he had to assume that this was all real, and so he had to act.
Lou was not a man who liked to lose. If he wasted fifty bucks at the slots, he’d be pissed about it for hours. The big difference between himself and George was that Lou would ultimately decide that losing fifty dollars was punishment enough and walk away, whereas George would keep pumping coins into the machine hoping to win enough to make up his losses. And, usually, George would leave with enough cash to pay for the hotel, meals, and a topless show, whereas Lou would be out his fifty bucks and fuming.
But there was no “win” this time. Maybe they’d recapture Ivan, and maybe they’d kill him, but there was no happy ending in store for anybody here.