* * * * *
I far preferred racing bikes for money to waitressing. Unfortunately, I didn't have the connections to make a go of it without a little supplemental income. I struck a deal with West: he hooked me up with a race and I cut him a finder's fee, extra if I won.
West was on the sidelines now, watching the race with the small crowd that gathered on the sides of the street. I fixed my gaze on the length of road ahead of me. The "track" was clearcut, up to the old churchyard on Lincoln Avenue and back. A line was spray-painted onto the street at our feet, first across it took home the cash. Two hundred bucks times four riders wasn't a bad haul for a few minutes work.
I laid on the throttle and smiled at an answering purr from the engine. After the abysmal night at Leno's, I couldn't go home without this money.
The two guys on my right were South-side gearheads with shiny, chrome monsters that they probably got straight off a dealer's lot. I could take them easy. The last rider had a cherry-red rice rocket, a Ninja maybe. It was hard to tell in the dark.
A girl in a miniskirt walked in front of us, waving a yellow bandanna like a flag. Her arm came down and we were off in a squeal of tires and a burst of engine smoke.
The Ninja took an early advantage. I expected as much. He was all muscle and power with no finesse. Motorcycles were like children—they needed a feminine touch. I gained on him slowly.
We approached the churchyard at breakneck speed. Tires screeched against the pavement as we made the hairpin turn in front of the churchyard. The Ninja maintained the lead as we straightened and headed back towards the finish line.
As I leaned forward, the bike inched closer. The gap closed between us until we were side by side.
Less than a dozen yards from the finish, I took the lead.
Without warning, I lost control and the bike veered off the street. I managed to lose some speed hopping the curb in front of a row of condemned brownstones but I laid it down hard. I hit the ground and the bike slid a few more feet, scraping its new paint job all to hell. It finally skidded to stop next to a wrought-iron fence, wheels still turning slowly.
"Damn it." My body groaned in protest as I pushed to my feet. No broken bones, but I'd still feel this in the morning.
The race was over. The Ninja was being congratulated by his friends while the Southies wheeled their bikes around, a close second and third. None of them seemed at all concerned that something was awry. A human wouldn't have felt anything—it was a special treat just for me.
I wasn't even worried about the two hundred bucks I just lost. I couldn't care less that any minute a Southie would saunter over to remind me that girls shouldn't be racing anyway. I pulled off the helmet with a gasp and let it roll to the ground. My breathing came forced and rapid as I painfully forced my chest to expand and contract.
A stench had overwhelmed my senses, strong and acrid, so hot that it seared the hair from my nostrils.
The smell of burning sulfur and ancient spice.
The scent of magic.
As quickly as the smell had overwhelmed me, it was gone. To be replaced with the crisp scent of dead leaves and city smog. I shivered and cast my gaze in a full circle. West jogged towards me, still a few hundred yards away. Even at a distance, I could see the sudden pallor of his skin and the whites of his rounded eyes. He'd felt it too.
I knew magic. The smell and taste of it was as familiar as my own reflection in a mirror. I would never mistake it. Perhaps it had been a slow-moving night creature, too dull to conceal the evidence of its passage. It may have been as simple as an unfortunate coincidence. I wanted to believe in chance and good luck, but I knew better.
The Ninja wandered up with a girl under each arm. I always the only one racing but there were always other girls around. Most of them were interchangeable and impossible to tell apart.
It didn't help my sour mood when he lifted his visor to reveal a perfect smile and bronze skin. Losing to the cute guys was always that much worse than eating dust from the ugly ones. The miniskirt from before clung to the front of his jacket like a cat. She insinuated herself into the curves of his body as they walked and I tamped down on a mutinous burst of jealousy. I just wasn't that kind of girl and proud of it, most of the time.
I dug in the pocket of my jeans for a thin roll of bills. I peeled off the first two and handed over the rest. The Ninja waved his girls away and took the money with a nod of thanks. Even here, there were rules. You never made another rider ask for what you owed.
He counted the bills with a practiced hand. Satisfied, he tucked them away in his back pocket. "Up for a rematch?"
"Nah-"
West appeared beside me. "Double or nothing."
I elbowed him aside. Even with the stink of fear dripping off his body like sour piss, West could never turn down that chance of a profit.
"I got to jet."
"Come back anytime." The Ninja winked before sauntering off, two girls coiling themselves around him like snakes.
I limped to my bike. Once set up, I gave it a once-over. Relief relaxed the tense set of my shoulders as I took a calming breath. Most of the damage was superficial, nothing I couldn't fix with a set of tools and some spare time. I'd be out here winning my money back from the Ninja before he even had the chance to figure out how to spend it.
"Some race, huh?" West murmured from behind me.
"I don't want to talk about it."
"You almost had him."
"Can't take home almost."
"Whatever it was, it's gone."
I shivered. We both knew what it was. A mystery. Something powerful enough to taint the city air with its stink and send my senses reeling. Fast enough that it was here and gone in the space of a single moment.
West watched the Ninja roar away, a girl hugged up on the back of his bike. "Bad luck."
"That's the only kind I have," I said with a sigh.
"Nothing to worry about."
I was worried. Questions swirled through my mind, searching for answers that never came. "I'm going home."
"Already." He gestured wide. "The night's still young."
"I'm cutting out before my luck turns worse."
West stuck his hands in the pockets of his coveralls and rocked back and forth on his heels. West worked at a rundown car garage in Ashburn and I never saw him out of the same dirty uniform, smelling like gasoline and grease, with someone else's name stitched on the breast.
The crowd had already dispersed, everyone off to their separate parts of the city. Races didn't go down on any sort of schedule. They got it together quick and it was over even quicker.
West stood in between me and my bike.
"You're in my way." I pulled on the helmet, fitting it low on my head.
He slid back. I threw my leg over the bike and slid comfortable into the seat. My fingers roamed over the controls. Riding was like breathing. The bike felt like an extension of my own body. I sighed at the feel of it.
I turned my key in the ignition. With a low rumble, the bike thundered to life. A sudden blaze of brightness illuminated a small patch of darkness. A trail into oblivion.
Over the roar of the engine, I almost didn't hear him speak. His voice carried to me on the wind, several moments after he spoke. A hushed whisper shared only by us.
"I can find out what it was."
I cut off the engine. Silence and darkness descended, thick and heavy like a weight pressed against my skin. I could see his eyes flash in the darkness. "You said it didn't matter."
"Information always matters." I heard the scratch of a match before his face was illuminated in the orange glow of a cigarette. "Something big is here, it'd be good to know why."
"You want to put yourself in front of a wrecking ball?' My tone was mocking but we could both hear the fear that shook my voice.
"It isn't here for us." His gaze as it met mine was direct. "What's the harm?"
Secrets were a cancer, growing with mindless intent until they consumed you
. I could maybe trust West with my life, but never with the truth.
I had to know before I gave up everything again. "Okay."
His grin flashed. "Meet me at Rage."
West turned away, fading too quickly into the darkness. Revitalized by the earth and sky, he used a more old-fashioned method of transportation.
He'd always preferred his other form. When he ran, nothing between his body and the rest of the world.
I started the engine. The bike rumbled underneath me as I stared in the shadows. My senses were attuned, searching the night for the barest hint of something familiar. My feet came up on the rests as the bike moved smoothly forward, heading towards the riverfront.
The race had been a warning. Now, I stood on the edge of a precipice. I would catch myself or fall.
Even West didn't know my secret. It was my burden to bear alone.
I would trust him with my life, but never with my soul.