Six, p.32
Six, page 32
“Paige?” a weak little voice squeaked out.
“Cal?” she asked as she saw her giant of an ex stumbling into the living room. He carried a brown paper bag in his trembling arms, and his normally olive skin tone was bleached to ghoulish white.
“Paige, just stay calm,” he gasped. “Please, stay calm and don’t move.”
“Cal? What is—?”
“Follow the advice, and no one gets hurt,” a very calm, almost mechanical-sounding voice said. The source of the voice took one step to the left, so that Paige could clearly see the automatic pistol in his gloved hands.
“You’re—you’re—” Paige stammered as she saw slicked-back black hair, black shades, and a black suit.
“I’m perfectly capable of pulling this trigger. Memphis, Tennessee, is tenth in the entire country for deaths by murder, so it wouldn’t be too out of place to find two more victims, would it?” he said in a voice so even that it made Paige’s blood run cold. “You, big guy, put down your food and sit in that chair. You don’t look like you’re moving much, little lady, so let’s keep it that way.”
Cal set the bags on the table, but in his fear he ended up knocking one over and bright orange sauce spilled onto the carpet. The stranger with the gun made a clucking noise with his tongue. “Tikka Masala is bitch to get out of carpet,” he sighed. “Between the turmeric and the acid of the tomatoes, it’s going to take me a while.”
Cal and Paige exchanged looks as he stumbled into his chair. Although Cal looked like he had a few inches and a hundred pounds on their intruder, something about the way the stranger moved made them both kowtow.
“I’ve seen you before,” Paige choked out. “You’re—”
“I was afraid that something like this would happen,” the stranger sighed. “I told my master that he’d gotten sloppy recently, but like all of his kind, he doesn’t listen to a lowly, little servant. Now here is exactly what is going to happen. You are both going to sit here, be nice and quiet, and watch some TV. Now I already have Mr. Wilkerson’s cellular phone in my possession. Where is yours, Miss Carmichael?”
Paige nodded toward the table.
“Very good. I hope you don’t mind if I hold on to it for just a little while,” he said as he slowly slid one hand over to grab it while the gun remained trained on Cal’s forehead. “So, I am about to do a bit of cleaning, and I would very much appreciate it if you gave me a hand, Miss Carmichael. Tell me exactly what your father told you, show me anything that he brought you, and then let me erase anything that might cause a bit of trouble from now on.”
“You’re Dr. Yoshida,” she stammered out as she got a good long look of his sculpted profile. “You work for them?”
“Dr. Yoshida? Of all my identities, that’s the one you were told about?” the stranger said with a snort of laughter.
“You work with my great-grandfather—” Paige gasped.
“Paige, what the hell are you talking about?” Cal asked as sweat poured from his bald head.
“It seems that dear Miss Carmichael’s father knows just enough to be dangerous to good people like you. I’m betting he’s gotten a whole bunch of half-information and spun it into some great conspiracy where evil creatures want to rule the world. Am I right? That look in your eyes, Miss Carmichael, tells me that I’m right.”
As he moved the gun, his sleeve slid back just enough to show off a tattoo of circuitry on one arm. The stranger smiled. “My girlfriend always called me a robot,” he said. “It reminds me of her. It’s so important to remember one’s humanity during times like this.”
“Oh god, he’s insane,” Cal whimpered as he trembled in his seat.
“Mr. Wilkerson, if you piss yourself and I have to clean it up, I will be extremely inclined to shoot you,” the stranger said. “Really, Miss Carmichael, you could do much better than him.”
“Are you going to talk all night, or get this over with?” Paige said, staring right at him.
The stranger smiled and pressed his ear. “Yes, I’m taking care of everything. It’s safe for you to come in,” he muttered.
Cal whimpered and shook in his seat, while Paige tried her best to move her broken body. No claws came to her rescue, and her aching bones refused to mend. The apartment door opened once more, and a ghost from Paige’s past walked right inside like he owned the place.
“Great-Grandpa Steve?” Paige choked out right before she woke up.
“Damn it,” Paige growled as she found herself back in the present stuffed onto a caravan bed with a snoring werewolf on either side. Billy and Sammy had taken it upon themselves to be the bread in a berserker sandwich, forcing Paige to squirm and untangle her tail just to escape.
She hopped over the passed-out pretty one, who rolled right over to take her old place, barely interrupting his machine-gun snuffling. The Winnebago drifted side to side, prompting her to hurry to the driver seat. She found Morgan up front, stifling a yawn as he captained the ship.
“How long have you been at this?” she asked.
He rubbed his eyes before pointedly steadying the wheel. “I don’t know; since Billy decided he was too stressed and smoked a blunt. Sammy needed the sleep, and you were sawing logs—”
“I don’t snore,” Paige protested.
“You’re right. You don’t snore; you make sounds that can wake the dead.”
“If you weren’t driving, I’d smack you,” Paige grumbled as she took the passenger seat. “Wow, Colorado is prettier than Nebraska. Did I miss Denver?”
“You missed the highway cutting through Denver, yes, and the turn if you wanted to get to Aspen,” Morgan said. “In fact, if you had slept much longer, you’d have missed the state entirely.”
As if on cue, they passed a “Welcome to Utah, Life Elevated,” sign on the right. As Paige settled back in her seat, she winced. She pulled down her collar to reveal an angry bruise welling up right where phantom Nadia had planted her knees into her chest.
“You all right?” Morgan asked.
“Sometimes I have dreams that are really vivid and really violent,” she said, trying to lose her gaze in the early morning light. “I think I finally remembered something though. Something about what happened right after I was attacked—”
“Oh?”
“Morgan, you’ve followed my great-grandfather, right? You’re the one who sent the information to my dad,” Paige said. She rubbed her temple. “He came after me when I was just back after the hospital.”
“Vampires clean up after themselves. You’re lucky that you’re related to one and he did some sort of voodoo on you rather than just killing you.”
“I still feel like I’m missing something. My vampire was convinced that someone was after him and that I was a weapon of some sort.”
“From what I’ve heard about vampires, they believe that everything is about them,” Morgan muttered. “Maybe it really was just your great-grandfather cleaning up the mess. I never should have encouraged your father—”
“But when do coincidences become unbelievable?” Paige said. “I mean, of all the vampires out there, why would you follow Great-Grandpa Steve? Why did you choose my dad? Why did all this happen coincidentally at the same time that Lorcan was in town to help open a restaurant?”
“I followed your great-grandfather because I got a tip from an informant, the same informant who sold me out to that creepy blond Asian dude and Ping Pong, the cupcake killer—”
“Exactly! We were both tipped off to meet Ivan the evil, who was selling us out to another vampire who wanted—”
“Werewolves,” Morgan finished. “That explains us being lured there, but—wait; Ivan was who my informant warned me about, and then he just shows up—”
“It’s like the pieces are there, but they’re scattered. The more I think about it and the more I learn, the less it makes sense. Ugh, I hate this feeling like I’m being toyed with, like we’re both—”
“Pawns,” Morgan offered. “How do you think I feel? I’ve spent five years chasing my own tail. I had money traced to dozens of shell companies. I had receipts, names, even photos—”
“The photos Dad sent me did come from you then. A lot of those photos were of the same psycho who showed up in my house. He called my great-grandfather master—”
“So we have more connections. I knew if I told your dad just enough—”
“He was babbling about missing scientists and a missing nurse from Boston. One of the supposed missing scientists was the same crazy guy who’s shown up in California, in New York—”
“All vampire hot spots. You’re right; it’s weird.”
“And for some reason both my mom and I are missing memories from the week that my dad was in town.”
“Vampires can manipulate people. All they have to do is feed you their blood,” Morgan said. He made a rude gesture to a sedan that got impatient and zipped around the Winnebago.
“But he didn’t give me his blood!”
“How do you know that your memories are gone?”
“I remembered Lorcan giving me his blood.”
Morgan’s face stiffened slightly. “I bet you did,” he growled. “Anyway, that was after you bit Irvine. Our kind is far more resistant to vampire tricks—”
“I had already bitten Irvine when they broke into my house!” she said. “It was the night I was back from the hospital—”
“Then maybe the infection was still setting in. You were probably feverish and delusional as well as terrified—”
“I was helpless—that’s what I was. I feel that way right now, and I’m sick of it. It’s a shame we’re already past Denver, or I’d go find my dad and give him a piece of my mind for starting all this.”
Morgan shifted uncomfortably in his seat and cleared his throat a little. He had started a nervous round of nods even before his lips were moving.
“What are you not telling me, Morgan?”
“Um, you father isn’t actually in Denver, Paige,” Morgan choked out. “He’s been hiding with Bernard in Nevada. I thought we should take you to him.”
“What did you just say?” Paige said slowly.
“In about eight hours or so, I’m going to take you to your dad.”
28
Exactly eight hours and twelve minutes later, the werewolf Winnebago puttered into the sleepy town of Searchlight, Nevada. The big, brown vehicle skidded slightly onto a dirt parking lot, and the whole gang cheered as Billy declared, “Here we are, campers.”
Paige’s smile faded into a scowl as she peeked out the window to see just where the RV had landed. Morgan hung his head in shame.
“The Bust Stop, really?” she sighed as she saw pink neon legs virtually kicking at the late afternoon sun.
“It’s a perfectly legitimate business establishment, with the finest steak and eggs this side of Las Vegas,” Billy declared. “They also have, on average, two to three strippers under the age of forty. Let’s go!”
“Of course my dad would be at a strip club,” Paige muttered as she kicked at a pile of pebbles. “This is what he was doing while I was running for my life.”
“It’s a nice place, really,” Morgan said as he too shuffled in the dirt. His point was slightly undermined by a blotto biker flying out the door to go vomit in a cactus. A moment later a tall, broad-shouldered man sauntered out the door with a leather bag. He tossed it next to the cactus, careful to avoid the puddle.
“Well, if it isn’t the Haitian sensation,” Billy cried as he ran to give the bouncer a huge hug. “Wesley, our Morganator is all grown up and has a girlfriend!”
The bouncer gave a wave and glittering smile to Paige. His dazzling teeth matched his diamond studs and the shimmery gold fabric of his designer pants.
“Morgan, come over here,” Wesley cried. “I’ve been worried sick with you off in the big city.”
Both Sammy and Morgan joined Billy and Wesley in a hearty group hug. Paige couldn’t help but smile at the scene even as a few more drunk patrons stumbled out of the bar. “Excuse me,” Wesley sighed before helping one wobbly older gentleman into the back of a cab.
“How many drunks can you have at four in the afternoon?” Paige asked.
“These are the regulars who start at noon. They know to get out when I start my shift if they know what’s good for them,” Wesley said. He then punched Morgan’s arm and asked, “Are you going to introduce us, bro?”
“Paige, this is Wesley; Wesley, Paige,” Morgan said.
Wesley walked over and took her hand. As he kissed it, Morgan all but groaned. “Very pleased to meet you, Paige,” Wesley said with the slightest trace of an island accent. “Now, if you wouldn’t mind coming inside, I can get you some real food and some clean clothes. No offense, but you all smell like you’ve been in Billy’s camper for a little too long.”
“Is Bernard here?” Morgan asked as he pointedly wrapped his arm around Paige’s waist. She couldn’t help but smile.
Wesley scanned the horizon with his dark eyes. “Oh, probably, but you know Bernard. He won’t show up until he’s got his tinfoil hat finished.”
“Tinfoil hat?” Paige asked as she slipped into the air-conditioning.
“Let’s just say that Bernard is a huge fan of your father’s work,” Morgan said.
The group shuffled uneasily through the mostly empty tables topped with red satin tablecloths. A few barely sober regulars took the choice seats by the stage, while two girls shimmied and sashayed around poles on either end. The red velvet curtains and old-time corner booths seemed out of place with the coating of glitter stuck to random liquids on the floor.
“I liked it better when it was a magic club,” Morgan sighed as they wandered past unused chafing dishes and the beaten-up marble bar.
Billy, on the other hand, was clutching a flier to his chest and extolling, “Oh, there is a god; we’re here for the topless brunch on Sunday—”
Paige tried her best to keep her eyes fixed on the floor, but the mix of smells and stains made her have to swallow rapidly to fight the gag reflex. “Morgan, can I use your sanitizer for my eyeballs?” she asked as she saw a particularly suspicious pile of tissues.
“Only if I can use it first,” Morgan muttered.
They ended up being deposited in the dressing room marked “Visitors,” just past the girls’ locker room and some terrifying place labeled the Bubble Palace. Wesley gave a sheepish smile as he tossed leather pants to Sammy, Billy, and Morgan. “I’ve got plenty of leftovers from the last Ladies’ Night,” he said.
“Don’t you have any jeans?” Billy asked.
“Only the crotchless tear-away kind, I’m afraid. These are from the BDSM Boys from Reno, and I’m sure we have some that fit all of you,” Wesley said.
“I think I can hold out for a Wal-Mart run,” Morgan said as he tossed the studded black leather skinny pants over to Billy.
“No offense, but you smell bad even for you,” Wesley said as he waved his hand in front of his face. “Now I think that you should do your lady friend a favor and hit the showers, then show off the assets in these babies.”
Paige wandered over and picked up another pair. “Ooh, assless chaps—what more could a girl want?” she said with a little giggle. “Sammy, are you going to be changing into these, because I’d love to see that—”
The ever-taciturn Sammy gave a wink and trundled off with the pants. Morgan rolled his eyes but got to his feet. “Just show me where the showers are, and Billy, I know you and Sam have some extra clothes buried somewhere,” he hissed.
Wesley turned his attentions to Paige. “You can get some clothes from Bunny. She’s one of the managers. Now, I’m on the clock, so you’ll have to excuse me while I go back out front. There’s a shower in the girls’ room if you want to sneak down the hall.”
“Bunny?” Paige asked.
“Yeah; next door.”
Paige dutifully snuck across the hall. She eyed the racks of sequined and see-through numbers and cringed. Her eyes widened even further as she found one special rack of chains and black leather, crowned at the end with a pair of shorts with an enormous black and white tail pouring out the back.
“It’s for the Pony Club,” a no-nonsense voice said from behind Paige. She jumped as a much taller woman came barreling by with an arm full of boas. “Are you a new girl?”
“New girl? No, I’m just looking for Bunny. Wesley said I could get some clothes—”
“Oh, Wesley sent you?” she said, eyeing Paige. “I’m surprised since you have no tits to speak of, but what do I know? Yeah, I’m Bunny, and I’m sure I can find you something. Any friend of Wesley’s is a friend of mine.”
“Um, those shorts with the tail—” Paige said.
“Oh, the tail is separate,” Bunny said as she tugged the tail free to show off a rather suspicious plug of rubber. “But we have bridles and manes too if that’s what you’re into. The dungeon downstairs is our biggest draw on Thursdays through Saturdays.”
“But they make clothes with holes for a tail,” Paige said, eyeing the shorts again. Bunny raised a brow. “I mean, if I wanted to do something kinky for my boyfriend, you know.”
“Just how kinky is your boyfriend?”
“He’s a real animal,” Paige said with a smile.
Bunny patted Paige’s shoulder and gave her a wink. “Well, we like that here. Go get yourself a shower, and I’ll hook you up.”
Paige was pleasantly surprised by Bunny shoving her a bag of toiletries and towels so that Paige could have her first proper girlie shower in the better part of a week. She squealed with delight at the razors and shaving cream, as well as actual body wash. Her delight devolved into maniacal giggles as she read the label on the shampoo and conditioner she was given. “Mane and Tail, of course, Paige, of course,” she choked out as she saw the rearing horse on the bottle.
She indulged in the luxury of a hair dryer and moisturizer and found the few ladies who worked at the Bust Stop to be genuinely friendly and accommodating, offering her everything from deodorant to mousse.
By the time she was done, she barely recognized the reflection in the mirror. Bunny gave her a huge thumbs-up before ordering someone named Miffy out on the dance floor.
