I wasn’t wearing a shirt. Or a bra. I’m sure I’d just given him quite a show.
“Bastard.”
“Worth it,” he said. “Need any help with your shirt, or would you like to prove it’s better if I stay out of your way with that too?”
“Get out.”
He stood, the sheet dropping completely away, then stretched before finding his boxers.
Okay, I really didn’t want him to leave.
I pulled my gaze away from his fine body and worked on getting into my bra. I got both straps over my shoulders, but couldn’t twist my arm backward to fasten the hooks.
Zayvion silently made his way up behind me.
“Hands off, flyboy,” I said.
“Promise I’ll be good,” he said. “Just use a couple fingers and a thumb.” He did just that, only one knuckle brushing my spine as he hooked my bra. Then he stepped back. “How’s that?”
“Nice.” I turned and wrapped my arms around his waist, resting my head against his shoulder. So much for the tough-girl act.
He held me, waiting to see where I would take this. I had all sorts of ideas of where I wanted it to go, but my stomach rumbled. If I was going to be using magic today at Maeve’s class, I’d need food.
I let go of Zay, gave him a small smile. We both wordlessly went back to getting dressed. I managed the tank on my own, but by the time I found my sweater, I was tired and my shoulder was sore.
“How bad is my shoulder?”
Zay pulled his shirt down. “It’s healing. You have a couple punctures.”
I held out my sweater for him. He took it, and without a smirk, without a single smile, he helped position it over my head, and held the sleeves so I could push my arms into them.
“Anyone call a doctor?” I asked.
“As I understand it, Nola called her physician back home and asked him if he thought you needed medical care. He didn’t seem to think so. Do you want me to take you to the hospital?”
“Right now, I just want some of that breakfast I smell.”
Zayvion and I explored the kitchen together and discovered sausage, eggs, and pecan-maple French toast. We moved well together, comfortable in each other’s space. I liked that. It had been a long time since I had someone around me, this close to me, who made me feel good.
We also discovered a note from Davy that said, Hound meeting 7:30, same place.
A phone started ringing, and I got up from the table to answer it. Except it wasn’t my phone.
Zayvion pulled a cell phone out of his pocket. I didn’t think he had a cell. This thing looked more like a Victorian card case, with metal swirls and gears and beveled glass and tinted mirrors. It took me a second, because I guess I was just slow today, but I finally recognized a Shield glyph etched into the case.
Heavily Warded didn’t begin to describe that thing.
“Yes?” he said.
Whoever was talking on the other line was quiet enough I couldn’t hear them, not even with my acute hearing. Either that or the phone had some sort of Privacy or Mute spell worked into it too.
All I know is the man before me went from a happy lover to a blank wall of Zen.
“Yes.” It was one, stilted word. The answer of a man having to fulfill an unwanted duty. I wondered who it was on the other line and what they had asked him to do.
He hung up and pocketed the phone.
“Nice gizmo, Batman,” I said.
He frowned, and it was strange to see him try to figure out what I was saying. That call must have shaken him up more than I thought.
“The phone,” I said. “It’s neat. All magical and stuff.”
He nodded. “I need to get you one like that. You said your cell keeps dying, didn’t you?”
“Yes.”
“That’s because of how much magic you use. Hold in you. The Wards on it help with that.”
“Great,” I said, feeling like he and I were talking around whatever was really going on. “Is everything all right?”
He rubbed at the back of his neck. “It is.” At my look, he said,“It’s just a job. I need to take care of something. I thought I had the rest of the day before . . . before I had to go.”
He went silent and somber. I tried to lighten things up. “No rest for assassins.” I caught myself on the last word, and Zayvion gave me a sharp look.
“You aren’t going to kill someone, are you?” See how understanding and supportive I could be?
“No,” he said. “Not today. Not this job.” He gave me a hard smile, and I had no doubt that he had killed in the past. And would kill again.
Hells. Now, that was a way to blow all of the fun out of the room.
Still, that’s what Zayvion was—an assassin, a magic user, a Closer. He was also a lover, my lover, and someone who had done his best to help me, and other people in the past. I wondered whether one thing balanced the other.
“Is there anything I can do?” I asked.
“No. It’s fine. I know . . . it’s fine.” He took a breath and let it out again, pulling his Zen back over the top of the killer.
“Do you want me to pick you up here?” he asked.
“Why?”
“To take you to Maeve’s today.”
That’s right. I’d forgotten about class again. Ten o’clock or she’d get demon diaper rash or something.
“Sure,” I said. “Around nine thirty.” I gathered up our plates and coffee cups and took them to the kitchen sink. I walked back to the living room.
Zayvion stood at my window, curtains back just enough so he could see the street below. It was six o’clock, and false dawn was beginning to polish the edges of night.
“Huh,” he said.
“What?”
“Nothing.” He let the curtain drop, picked up his coat, and put it on.
“Good luck,” I said, not knowing what else to say. “Be safe.”
“I will.” He touched my arm. “Be careful.”
With that, he walked out my door.
I stood there, not doing much more than staring at the walls and thinking about too many things. A lot had happened in a day.
Which reminded me. I was seriously behind in my journ aling. I pulled my book out of my coat pocket, and the small manila envelope that Violet had given me fell out onto the floor. I was surprised I hadn’t lost that in the fight.
My self-defense list. Might need to make a few calls on that before Violet sent the Beckstrom Enterprises henchmen out to get me.
I took the envelope and journal with me back to the living room and tossed the envelope on the table. That could wait. I found a blank page in my journal and quickly recapped everything that had happened in the last day.
Just reading it made me tired.
I got up and pulled back the curtains, looking outside just like Zayvion had. I didn’t recognize anyone on the street. The city looked normal. I looked across the street and up. There, on the rooftop opposite my building, sat a hunched and familiar form.
I doubted anyone except Zayvion would even look up and see the gargoyle sitting on the roof of the building, his wings pressed against his back. Not because you couldn’t see him in front of the heating vents. But most people did not look up as they went about their daily motions.
Stone’s head was tipped so he looked not out over the building like most gargoyles in architecture, but down at the street. Specifically, down at the street in front of the door to my building.
Well, it looked like I had myself a big ol’ watchdog.
I stared at him for a bit, but he did not move. I didn’t know if that was because dawn was coming on, turning him to inert stone, or if he was pulling the immobile-statue bit for his own reasons.
Either way, I liked the thought of him being out there. Sort of like a big, dumb pet rock guardian angel.
The memory of him tearing into the Necromorph flashed behind my eyes. Correction: big, dumb, deadly pet rock guardian angel.
I let the curtain fall, and strai
ghtened the living room and kitchen—not that either needed much cleaning. Nola visiting had some extra advantages. I tried reading one of the several paperbacks I’d been picking my way through, but didn’t have much luck. After reading the same page three times I gave up and opened the manila envelope.
Violet knew how to do her research. Five brochures fell out, each with a photo of the instructor and staff, and a note card with her list of pros and cons attached.
I scanned them. Put two back in the envelope just because the instructors looked too damn smug, and spent some time comparing the remaining three. Two male instructors, one female. All offered a variety of training, from weekend self-defense classes to lifelong fighting disciplines. Not having much to go on, I decided to just call all three and make appointments to meet them.
But before I could dial, the phone rang.
I picked it up. “Hello?”
“Allie?” The voice was young, a woman. I couldn’t quite place it.
“Yes?”
“This is Tomi.”
Davy’s ex-girlfriend, the cutter Hound. The one who had kicked the shit out of him. The one who was running with a rough crowd. The one who hated me.
“Hey, Tomi,” I said. “Are you okay?”
I think the question surprised her. I could hear her catch her breath, could hear the sound of traffic in the background as she paused.
“Tell Davy to leave me the hell alone or I’ll get a restraining order for him.”
“Have you told him that?”
“Yes. He won’t listen to me. It’s over. It’s so fucking over.”
I rubbed at my forehead. She sounded angry and sad and a little afraid. Hells, I hated breakups.
“He’s worried about you,” I said. “About who you’re with and that maybe you’re hurt. Tomi, if you are hurt, or if you’ve gotten in a bad situation, you know the Hounds are here to help you. I know some doctors, lawyers, who would help straighten things out for you if you needed it. I’d make sure they got paid, so you don’t have to worry about the money.”
She paused again, inhaled, held her breath. I could almost feel her thinking it over Finally: “Tell Davy to back off or they’ll kill him.”
And then she hung up.
I stood there with the dial tone buzzing in my ear while I tried to think this out. I could call Stotts, tell him Tomi was mixed up with someone who wanted to kill Davy. Of course, a lot of new boyfriends want to kill old boyfriends, so it might be an empty threat.
It hadn’t sounded like an empty threat. She sounded afraid.
But Tomi was a Hound, and Hounds did a lot of things to manage pain—drugs being one option. She might be high and hallucinating, for all I knew.
I hung up the phone. Stotts already knew I had scented her at the job yesterday. I assumed he was following up on that, so there was a good chance the MERC’s had their eyes on her.
Which meant what I should do was try to find Davy. I didn’t have his number or address. Note to self: get phone numbers of Hounds. But I could still make the meeting at 7:30 and see him there, or get his number from someone else.
Since my last attempt to walk the street had ended with me sporting a raft of new cuts and bruises, I called a cab, waited for it to drive up before I left my building, and took it down to Ankeny Square.
The driver dropped me off at a corner with a light. It was cold out but not yet raining. I put my head down and walked as quickly as I could, not looking right or left. Not looking at the buildings or the street. Not looking at the people who hustled through here, like winter ghosts waiting for this graveyard to come back to life in the spring, waiting for the courtyard to fill with booths and music, the smell of incense, handmade soap, and food from carts.
My heart was beating a little too quickly. Ankeny Square felt like death. Pike’s death.
I ducked into the building. Compared to the stark gray light outside, the light inside was burnished a warm yellow. Long mazes of halls and shops and doors that went nowhere pocketed light into corners, lost it in the rafters, and poured it against blank walls. The smell of grilled garlic, incense, and soap hit me so hard, I held my breath. The fragrances filling the building followed me all the way down the central stairs and into the barely finished basement.
Jack Quinn, thin and tough as leather, stood in the middle of the hallway, smoking.
“Morning,” I said.
He nodded. “Evening.” At my look, he added, “Night shift.”
I opened the door to the other unfinished hallway and practiced not freaking out in enclosed places while I strode past the spackled Sheetrock to the room at the end.
The door was open, and the room, which probably had been a Prohibition hidey-hole and gambling parlor in an earlier incarnation, stank of mold and old, wet building. There was one table—a sheet of wood propped on two sawhorses—in the middle of the room, and six folding chairs against the peeling, faded floral wallpaper and bare brick walls.
Hounds, about twenty of them, only six of whom I’d actually met, one of them being Davy, thank all that was holy, stood in the room. A mix of men and women, old and young, insane and even more insane, the Hounds all stood or sat in such a way as to not come into contact with their fellow human beings.
I scanned the faces of everyone gathered, letting the sudden silence at my entrance stretch out. I’d learned years ago that she who controlled the silence in a room, controlled the room.
So far, so good. Every eye was on me.
“Morning,” I said to everyone gathered. No one answered; they just stared.
Neat.
There was a chair at the table, the chair Pike used to sit in. I guess I was expected to go sit in that chair, but my feet would not move. The idea of taking his place, really taking his place, made me want to turn around and leave.
Pike was gone. And I could never replace him.
I stepped in and leaned against the wall on the left side of the doorway so Jack could walk in past me.
“So we need to go over a few things,” I began.
Davy flipped open a pad of paper on a clipboard and clicked his pen. What do you know? He really was going to be my secretary. I gave him an appreciative glance and tucked both my hands in my coat pockets, letting my body language say relaxed.
“Pike had a lot of hope for the Hounds. He was a smart man. He knew potential when he saw it.
“But I’m not Pike. I don’t know what he had planned for the Hounds, for us. So I’m going to tell you what I’m going to do.”
A few feet shuffled. But other than that, the only sound in the room was Davy’s pen moving across the paper.
Tough crowd.
“First, I’m moving our meeting place to somewhere that doesn’t stink.” And doesn’t remind me of Pike’s death, I thought.
“I know the guy who runs Get Mugged. There’s a warehouse right next to him that he’s thinking about buying. I’ll see if he’ll cut me a deal. I’ll set up a permanent meeting place with a couple couches available for Hounds who need to sleep.”
It was like a collective exhale. Body language changed from angry, tense, tight, to . . . well, to less of that.
“Who’s gonna pay for it?” a short, athletic man I’d never met asked.
“Me.”
“An’ what are we gonna owe you for it?”
“The courtesy of not burning the place down, or doing illegal crap while you’re there. If you can’t follow those two rules, the door will be locked next time you come calling.
“I’m also setting up a medical fund. Not just for disasters, but for regular doctor visits, pain-management counseling, legal drugs, rehab. That kind of stuff.”
I can say one thing for Hounds. When they have something to say, they are not shy about speaking up. I leaned back against the wall, letting them bitch and grumble until someone actually asked a question.
“You think you can throw money at us and we’ll follow you like dogs, Beckstrom?”
“Listen,” I said
with more calm than I felt.“I promised Pike I’d try to do good for the Hounds in the city because he cared about you. You don’t want my help, then don’t show up.”
That went over well. There’s nothing like a couple dozen Hounds with stares set on hate.
Yeah, well, they could bite me for all I cared.
Bea, the bubbly Hound who worked the morgues, came bustling in the door, pulling the wide hood of her jacket away from her mop of curly hair.
“What did I miss?”she asked with a grin.
I swear, I had never seen that woman in a bad mood.
Jack, an unlit cigarette in his mouth, leaned toward her conspiratorially. “Beckstrom’s kicking the hive.”
“Really?” Bea looked around, spotted me. “I always knew you’d be trouble.” She sounded excited about it. “So, what’s the buzz?”
I opened my mouth to answer, but Jack cut me off. “She’s aiming for health care, free bunks, that sort of shit.”
Bea’s eyebrows hitched up until they got lost in her bangs. “Really?”
I spoke before Jack could. “Yes. And now I want to know who’s working a job. And I want cell numbers so I can call you to let you know where the next meeting will be held.”
It took maybe an hour to record where and what everyone was working, and to get non-Hounding volunteers to buddy up and keep an eye on the job and be willing to call 911 if something went bad for the Hound.
Davy handed me the notepad he’d been using, and I worked on memorizing Hound names and gigs. Between schools, retailers, hospitals, personal hires, and nonprofits, the Hounds in this room covered all corners of the city, and even some of the other nearby towns.
Strange to think there were that many people who believed magic was being used illegally against them.
Maybe stranger to think that they were probably right.
The meeting broke up a lot like the last one I’d attended. People simply filed out the door when they were done talking. Soon the only people left were Bea, Jack, Davy, and me.
“Anyone have the time?” I asked.
Jack glanced at his watch. “It’s five after nine.”
Which meant Zayvion was probably on the corner of the street outside my apartment, waiting to take me to Maeve’s.