The Keepers Story 01 - The Gatekeeper

what am I going to learn here that we don’t already know? Joe Moore was hanged. Eleven died of gunshot wounds, and the others were stabbed or trampled. I was here earlier for the autopsy of the man who was...cannibalized—and that mattered.”
    Bower gritted his teeth, looking up at the sky as if asking the heavens how this could have happened now. “The mayor is down our throats, Saxon. The police chief—”
    “The mayor wants to be reelected. This town runs on tourism, so naturally he wants an explanation for everything that happened, and he wants it fast and all wrapped up in ribbons. It’s not like we can blame it all on some crazy with a gun permit. Every man out there—assuming we find every man—who shot his piece will claim self-defense. I don’t need to hang around the morgue, Captain. I need to find whoever killed Greenwood and dumped his body on Fremont so something could chew his face off.”
    Captain Bower nodded. His jowls weighed his face down heavily. Bower had been in charge of units that had solved some of the most vicious murders in the city, but right now he looked as if he were a cast member in Zombieville himself. He was a big man, but it suddenly looked as if his skin was hanging off his bones.
    “Yes—find who murdered the man. Or who found his gnawed body and threw it into the street. Get to the core of this and—Lord help us all, Saxon—do it fast. I’d say you could start with—”
    “I know where to start, Captain. I have connections on the street. I know what I’m doing,” Saxon told him quietly.
    Bower nodded. “Then do it.”
    Saxon turned and continued to his car.
    But he wasn’t really heading out to see a snitch.
    At the Wolf and Crown, one of the newest and most elegant casinos to grace the Strip, he pulled up to the valet stand and tossed his keys to one of teh attendants, Billy Shield, a kid he knew pretty well.
    Billy grinned as he caught them. “I’ll have it ready the second you want it,” he called. Billy knew that even though Saxon was a cop, he tipped.
    Saxon headed past the flashing slot machines. He was barely aware of the din that filled the casino as he strode across the elegant marble floor toward the elevators, and he ignored one of the executive guard dogs who saw him, frowned worriedly and hurried in his wake.
    The elevator door closed after him just as the suit rushed up.
    Saxon knew the code to reach the level devoted to the private office of Monty Reilly, owner and CEO of the Wolf and Crown.
    The elevator opened on Monty’s floor.
    And there was Monty.
    He was still in his bathrobe. A silver coffee service sat on his desk. There was an urn of coffee on it with a large bottle of bourbon next to it. To his credit, Monty wasn’t sitting there petting one of his scores of buxom fortune-hunting beauties. He was pacing. He’d dragged his fingers through his dark hair a dozen times and looked like hell.
    “Saxon! I knew you’d be coming, but you got to believe me, this wasn’t done by one of mine. I’m telling you—”
    “Sit down, Monty.”
    Monty, who had the smooth look of James Bond—at least when his hair was combed—sat immediately and stared at Saxon. “It wasn’t one of mine,” he repeated.
    Saxon walked over to the desk and leaned on it, staring back at Monty. “It all started with the discovery of a corpse, Monty. A corpse that had been eaten. Gnawed. Devoured.”
    He’d seen that body, and he knew a werewolf’s marks when he saw them.
    Monty swallowed hard. “Come on, Saxon. You know that a body doesn’t last long in the desert without something eating it. A coyote, a—”
    “A werewolf, Monty. And you’re the Keeper of the Vegas werewolves. Your charges have been getting out of control for a long time. And I know you have a pretty good idea which one of them did this. I’ll bet you cash money that a werewolf was responsible for the disappearance of that craps dealer two months ago, and for that pretty blonde singer who left work and never returned. And I know damn well that a wolf was responsible for those bones we found out in the desert last month. What the hell is going on, Monty?”
    Monty looked away.
    “Who is it, Monty?” Saxon sat on the corner of the desk, crossing his arms over his chest. “That new hotshot from Toronto who gave me grief when I kicked him out of the Wolf’s Den? What’s his name? Jimmy Taylor? Or how about the billionaire pulling your strings—old Carl Bailey? He’s been talking