The King

  When she was finished, she waited for some relief or strength or ... whatever you were supposed to get from this age-old ritual.

  Nope. "Damn it."

  Words--it was all just words.

  Frustration made her kick her head back, slamming it into the compartment--in just the wrong place. "Fuck!"

  Time to get real, she told herself as she tried to reach around and rub the sore spot.

  Bottom line? No one was coming to save her. As usual, she had only herself to fall back on, and if that wasn't enough to get her out of this? Then she was going to die in a truly horrible way--and her grandmother was going to suffer. Again.

  Talk about your prayers? Sola would have given anything just to go back and rewind the evening, hitting pause at that moment when she had come home and missed the strange sedan parked across the street. In her perfect, redo world, she would have gotten her gun out and put a silencer on it before setting a foot past the front door. She would have killed them both, and then gone upstairs and told her grandmother she was going to move the furniture around just as her vovo had asked the week before.

  Under the cover of night, she would have then taken the pair of men out into the garage, backed the car up, and put them in her trunk. Or ... more like one in the backseat and the other in the trunk.

  Out to the boonies. Bye-bye.

  After which, she would have packed up her grandmother and they would have left within the hour--even though it would have been the middle of the night.

  Her grandmother wouldn't have asked questions. She understood where things were at. Hard life, practical mind.

  Off into the sunrise, so to speak, never to be seen again.

  See? Much better movie all around--and maybe that could become reality again, provided Sola took care of business when Benloise's bodyguards put on the brakes and finally let her out.

  Grasping her flare, she started to prepare herself. What angle she was going to take. How to come at them.

  Just mental masturbation, though, wasn't it--everything was going to depend on split-second timing that was ultimately unpredictable.

  As her mind floated into the zone, her breathing slowed and her senses sharpened. Waiting was not a problem anymore; time ceased to have any measure. Thoughts were not an issue. Exhaustion didn't exist.

  It was as she settled into that netherworld between now and later that something truly transformative happened.

  She saw clear as day a photograph of her grandmother. It had been taken back in Brazil when she was nineteen. Her face was unlined and full in the best sense, youth gleaming out of her eyes, her hair down and flowing, not bound.

  If she had known then what awaited her in adulthood, she would never have smiled.

  Her son dead. Her daughter dead. Her husband dead. And her granddaughter, the only one who was left?

  No, Sola thought. This had to end well. It was the only option.

  Sola didn't say anything out loud this time--there were no rote phrases or clasped palms. And she wasn't sure she believed her own prayer any more than the other ones that had been taught to her. But for some reason, she found herself bending God's ear in earnest.

  I promise, Lord, that if you get me out of this, I will leave the life. I will take vovo and get out of Caldwell. I will never, ever endanger myself or steal from another or commit an evil act. This is my solemn vow to You, on my vovo's beating heart.

  "Amen," she whispered aloud.

  THE IRON MASK, CALDWELL, NEW YORK

  "Oh-God-oh-God-oh-God..."

  As Trez held the blond college student up off the floor, he had a good grip on the backs of her legs--but he was sorely tempted to drop her like a Hot Pocket. The sex was adequate--along the lines of the cold-pizza standard: Even if it's cold, it's still pizza.

  But it ain't no Bella Napoli on 7th Ave in Manhattan.

  And this about-to-see-God stuff? Total buzz kill, and not because he was religious in the human way or jel that she was having a great time while he was thinking of pizza. Her grating, squeaky YouPorn performance with the head throws that kept landing her extensions in his face was getting on his nerves.

  Closing his eyes, he tried to concentrate on the feel of his cock going in and out of her. The woman had big fake tits that were as hard as basketballs, and a stomach that had some jiggle, and he couldn't decide what was worst: the fact that he wasn't attracted to her in the slightest; the reality that he was fucking this skank in the front bathroom of his own club--so his staff was going to catch him walk-of-shaming it; or the chance, however slim, that his brother might hear about this from somebody.

  Shit, iAm. The male had a stare that could make a football player in full tackle gear feel like his bare ass was in a stiff breeze.

  Not what Trez was looking for.

  "...God, oh, God, oh, God..."

  FFS, if she could only spice it up with a couple JCs or something.

  "OHGODOHGOD--"

  Reaching between them, he decided to put himself out of his misery. Tickling her clit, he pitched her over that edge just in time for his erection to completely deflate and all but fall out of her.

  Setting her back down on her feet, he immediately had to catch her, because her knees buckled.

  "Oh ... God ... you're amazing ... you're..."

  Uh-huh, thanks, honey. The only thing he cared about was how long it would take to get her clothes back on. "You, too, baby."

  Trez leaned to the side and picked up her--was it that bra thing she thought was a shirt? Or her thong? Or--

  "Oh, I don't need my leggings yet ... do I?"

  These were for her legs? he thought as he held the black strip up. Hard to imagine it covering more than a hand or maybe one of those serving-bowl-size breasts.

  Who had taken the pseudo-stockings off? Not him, he didn't think, but he couldn't remember, and not because he was drunk. This whole session, just like the last however many years of his love life, was not just utterly, but rather, purposely, forgettable.

  Then why did he insist on pulling this shit again and again--

  Right, no reason to channel iAm. His brother was more than capable of running through that rhetorical Every. Single. Fucking. Time. they were together.

  "Daddy, I love you," the girl said as she gripped his biceps and hung off him like he was a stripper pole. "I love this."

  "Me, too."

  "You love me, right?"

  "Always." He eyed the door and wished he'd scheduled a preemptive knock. "Lemme have your number, 'kay? 'Cause I gotta go back to work."

  Cue the pouting--and didn't that make him want to bare his fangs and chew his way out of the bathroom wall.

  "We could do it again," she drawled, getting up on her tiptoes to try to nuzzle against his neck.

  Girlie, I could hardly get through it once, he thought. A repeat is not anatomically possible.

  "Pleeeeeeeeeeeease, daddy..." More nuzzling. Then she eased back. "Please?"

  Trez opened his mouth, frustration sharpening his temper and his tongue--

  Except as he met her eyes, he saw an honest emotion in them and nearly recoiled. Talk about mirrors ... he felt like he was looking at himself: sad. Hollow. Rootless.

  She was half a woman.

  He was half a male.

  On that basis alone, they were Match.com time, two broken SOBs thrashing around the sex pool, trying to connect in ways that guaranteed their isolation would only continue.

  "Please ...?" she begged, like she was getting ready for another loss in a string of them.

  Staring down at her, he realized he'd common-denominatored her to her externals, but as with all strangers, there was a story behind how she'd ended up in a bathroom throwing around the L-word with a man who wasn't a man at all.

  Hell, he wasn't even a normal vampire.

  Trez brushed her cheek with his knuckles, and when she turned her head into his hand, he whispered, "Close your eyes--"

  The knock was a one-and-doner, and considering how loud a
nd to the point it was? Not like there needed to be a second.

  "Boss? We got issues," came through the panels.

  Big Rob's voice. So it was a security problem--and given that the guy hadn't gone to Xhex with it? She was either out for some reason ... or, more likely, had sent for Trez herself.

  The blonde's fake eyelashes lifted, but he didn't want that. "Gimme a minute, B.R."

  "Roger that, boss."

  "Close your eyes," he said again. As the blonde complied, he quieted himself, the muffled thunder of the club's bass beat drifting off, the smell of her too-heavy perfume abating, the pain in the center of his chest ... well, that stayed right where it was, but the rest of everything went on the dimmer switch.

  Reaching into her mind, he did what his brother had called him out on: As opposed to so many of these women, he took the time to erase the blonde's memories of them being together, from the inane conversation that she'd started up by the bar, to his taking her back here, to the religious experience she'd just had.

  iAm was right. If Trez had been tidying up after himself like this all along? He wouldn't have gotten into the trouble he had with that other chick. And he and his brother wouldn't have ended up having to move into the Brotherhood's mansion. And that female Selena wouldn't have entranced him even more ...

  Refocusing on the blonde, he decided not to just stop at the Wite-Out routine. Instead of leaving the twenty or so minutes as a blank zone, he gave her the fantasy she was after--that she'd met a guy who was googly-eyed over her and they'd had the sex of their lives five times in this bathroom before she'd decided she was too good for him.

  Which in her new mind-set was going to be something she did frequently.

  Finally, he inserted a thought that she should dress herself and check her makeup. And as a last-minute chaser, he tacked on that she was going to have the best year--no, decade--of her life.

  Trez stepped out a moment later, fly up, shirt retucked, mask of all-good back in place. Big Rob was hovering in the shadows, discreet as any guy the size of a mountain could be.

  Joining the guy, Trez crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against the cloth-covered wall. He didn't usually talk business out in the club proper, but the music was loud enough, the crowd self-absorbed in the way of the drunk and the desperate, and, last but not least, he felt compelled to keep an eye on the blonde. Make sure no one tried to get in there before she came out.

  Plus he guessed he wanted some confirmation that he'd left her in a better state than he'd found her in.

  At least one half of them could be improved.

  "So what's up?" Trez scanned the dark, moody club, his monitoring both second nature and a matter of training: Shadows tended to be watchers, but after working with Rehv and now being the head of this den of iniquity, the shit was his primary interface.

  Big Rob cracked his knuckles. "Alex broke up an argument about an hour ago between two non-regulars. Both men were kicked out, but the aggressor came back and is circling the sidewalk outside."

  The blonde emerged from the bathroom, clothes where they needed to be, makeup retouched, hair pulled back instead of all over everywhere--but more to the point, her chin was level, her eyes calm and focused--and that secret smile on her lips took her essentially average looks into enticing territory.

  As she walked into the crowd, Big Rob's eyes followed her and so did a lot of men's. But she didn't seem to care, her confidence all she needed as an escort.

  Trez rubbed the center of his chest and wished he could whammy his own self and turn things on a dime like that. Then again, all the self-improvement in the world wasn't going to change the fact that the s'Hisbe wanted him back as a breeding stud for the rest of his natural life.

  "Boss?"

  "Sorry, what?"

  "You want us to disappear the guy?"

  Trez rubbed his face. "I'll go deal with him. What's he look like?"

  "White boy, black clothes, Keith Richards hair."

  "That narrows it down," Trez muttered.

  "You'll see him out front. He's not in line."

  Trez nodded and cut around the thick of the crowd, heading for the door. On his way, he looked over all the people, unconsciously searching for signs of conflict that could escalate from posturing bullshit to bowling-alley knockdown.

  Even Goths could be frat boys if you pumped enough alchie into them.

  Halfway to the exit, he caught a flash of something metallic off to the right, but as he stopped and reached out with senses other than his eyes, he couldn't find anything. Resuming his stride, he pushed his way out of his club, nodded to Ivan and the new guy, who were manning the entrance, and took a wander down the wait line, which was full of the usual suspects.

  Although not the Kevin Spacey kind, of course. And more's the pity--he loved the guy in that movie.

  No one out on the sidewalk fit B.R.'s description.

  Guess whoever it was went for a wander.

  As Trez pivoted to head back for the door, he got hit in the face with the beams of a trolling car, and the sting made him pull a vampire and shy away from the light. Blinking to clear his vision, he somehow made it to the front of the line and--

  "What the fuck--he doesn't belong here! Why're you letting him in!"

  As Trez realized he was the subject up for discussion, he stopped and looked over his shoulder. The mouthpiece with the attitude was about five-ten, one hundred and fifteen pounds--and not a girl. Clearly, motherfucker suffered from terrier syndrome, his beady little eyes all fired up as he glared at Trez, his Stampy McStampy drill making him breathe heavy.

  Probably played a lot of World of Warcraft or whatever it was--and that made him forget that if you were going to be a bigoted big-mouth, you'd better be able to back shit up.

  Trez leaned down to the guy and gave him a moment to soak up the size difference--and what do you know, bitch's mouth closed and stayed that way.

  "I own this place," Trez said in a low voice. "So the question is, why the fuck should I let you in." He glanced at Ivan. "He's not welcome here. Ever."

  There was some conversating at that point, but he was done. As a Shadow, he was used to being stared at--regular vampires didn't know what to do with his kind, and frankly, he didn't really care for them, either. In fact, he'd been brought up to believe that the two shouldn't mix--at least until Rehvenge had stepped up to the plate and helped him and his brother in their exile. At first he'd been distrustful of the guy--until he'd recognized that Rehv was as they were: a foreigner in a closed club of folks he didn't respect.

  Oh, and as for the human world? Everyone assumed he was black and attached their own racial associations, good and bad, to that--but there was the irony. He was neither "African" nor "American," so none of that shit applied to him in spite of the fact that his skin happened to be dark.

  That was humans for you, though--self-absorbed to the point where they just had to see themselves in all situations. Meanwhile, there were whole other species walking among them, and they were none the wiser.

  Although ... that being said ... if some misguided dumb-ass tried to pull the racial shit with him at his own front door? Then the idiot could fuck off.

  Back inside the club, the strobe lights and the noise hit him like a brick wall and he had to force himself to break through the resistance. The flashes were just way too bright and the sound was worse, ricocheting around the inside of his skull until whatever was playing became an unintelligible mess.

  What the hell was his staff thinking? Who'd made the call to crank it up so high--

  Oh ... shit.

  Rubbing his eyes, he blinked a couple of times and ... yup, there it was, in the right quadrant: a lineup of jagged lines that shimmered like sunlight through blown glass.

  "Fuck me..."

  Courtesy of the sex sesh in the bathroom, the blonde had gotten herself a new hardwiring job--and he was about to enjoy eight to ten hours of barfing, diarrhea, and searing head pain.

  As all m
igraine sufferers did, he glanced at his watch. He had about twenty minutes before the fun and games started, and he couldn't afford to waste them.

  Walking faster, he pushed his way through the bodies, nodding to the working girls and his security team like everything was fine. Then he went into the staff-only back of the house, hit his office for his leather jacket and his keys, and exited stage left into the parking lot. His BMW was waiting for him, and as he got in, yanked the seat belt across his chest and hit the gas, he wished like hell he still lived at the Commodore--because then he could have had one of his bouncers do the driving.

  Now that he'd taken up res at the Brotherhood mansion? Disinterested, third-party chauffeurs were a no-go.

  Of course, he could call his brother. But iAm would offer his silent-treatment commentary the whole way home, and there was no need to subject himself to that loud noise: iAm was the only person he'd ever met who could make quiet harder on the ears than a jet plane taking flight.

  As his phone went off, he thought, shit, he'd better call in and let everyone at work know he was down for the count.

  Taking the cell out, he looked at the-- "Great."

  But it wasn't like he could send iAm to voice mail. Swiping his thumb across the screen, he put the thing up to his ear even though New York was a hands-free state.

  His brother didn't even give him a chance to "hello" shit. "You're having a migraine."

  "You're not supposed to be psychic."

  "I'm not. I just pulled in as you tore out. I'm right behind you--and there's only one reason you drive off like that at one a.m."

  Trez glanced in the rearview, and was quite proud of himself--if he cocked his head in a certain way, he could actually see the pair of headlights.

  "Pull over."

  "I'm--"

  "Pull the fuck over. I'll come back for the car once I get you home."

  Trez continued driving, heading for the Northway, thinking, nah, he could do this.

  Good plan. At least until a car approached in the opposite lane--as it got closer, he was blinded completely and had no choice but to ease off on the gas. Blinking in the aftermath, he had every intention of nailing the accelerator and continuing on, except reality set in: He was running out of time, and not just in terms of the migraine.

  The s'Hisbe were only going to up their warfare to get him back to the territories, and God only knew what their next move was going to be. So what this situation did not need was iAm watching his brother die right in front of him.