Dang cat.
***
I smelled like pizza with an undertang of wet dog and a hint of dead skunk when we pulled into the street at the back entrance of HQ, but I didn’t really care how I smelled. I was tired and confused and worn and wanted to go back to bed, so the stink was more a background annoyance, even in my half-form. The vamps didn’t have to breathe and the humans could avoid me. Or open a window. I was carrying some of my magical stuff with me, in pockets and wrapped in hankies, including the Glob, the key, and the gold Jesus. I’d left the crown at home, under the protectivehedgein my closet.
Thehedge of thornsaround HQ was down, but a simpler warning ward was up and I felt it tingle across my pelt as we drove into the back entrance and over the closed tire-shredder mechanism. As we pulled to a stop under the porte cochere, Eli said, “The Everharts are refining the finished, beefed-uphedgewards at the null prison. Sarah Spieth and Wrassler sent a vamp security team to the prison grounds to protect them.” His emotionless tone said the vamps better not miss anything and let his sweetie pie get hurt. His non-expression said he wanted to be there with Liz, but knew she had witch business to take care of and that he’d be in the way. Eli wasn’t used to being the least important person on a security team. Or unnecessary to his significant other. I thought about patting his hand and saying, “There, there,” butI figured that might push him over the edge and he’d sock me.
There was no food in the security room and there was also nothing interesting happening anywhere on camera. However, I hadn’t been in the security room more than five minutes when Deon pranced in. He was wearing black patent-faux-leather pants with feet, like Angie Baby’s onesie but it stopped at the waist. He was also wearing a hot pink corset over a shimmery black top with spaghetti straps, a blond wig, and a huge pink feather boa flung around his neck.
My chef was pushing a food cart overloaded with chafing dishes full of grilled meat, shrimp, and veggies on skewers. The odor was fabulous and I may have drooled a little as Deon bent over the table putting the dishes in front of me. The position placed his butt at eye level. On it in silver glitter were the words “Cat Girl,” with glittery whiskers out over each cheek.
Cat Girl?
Even for Deon it was a little over the top, so I asked, “What’s all this?” and flashed my fingers up and down, indicating his wardrobe of the evening.
“This,” he said, lifting a skewer of hot pepper shrimp and shoving it at my mouth. I opened it to avoid getting staked with the pointy end and he slid the shrimp off the skewer and into my mouth with his other fingers. “Is delicious. And this”—he did the finger flick up and down his body—“is because I needed a break from being babysitter and a reminder that I am finer than fine and my booty is just as delicious as my”—he did a quick hip snap—“skewers. Tonight’s apparel is an homage to Lilly Christine, aka the Cat Girl, arguably the most famous and beloved burlesque exotic dancer of the nineteen forties and fifties. Tomorrow night I may be Blaze Starr, who became famous for her affair with Governor Earl Long. Such a disgusting man. But as long as I have to pull babysitter duty—though I do love the little ankle-biters—I will remind these heathen bloodsuckers”—he twirled his fingers at the vamps—“what real living is as soon as they have another babysitter in place.”
He air-kissed both sides of my face and pranced out of the room, Cat Girl sparkling.
Tex had this dreamy look on his face, as if he had drunk deeply of his first drunk human and had a buzz on. “Lilly Christine, aka the Cat Girl, was the most beautiful woman I ever saw. She invited me up to her rooms after her last show on January 7, 1965. If you ever want to see her perform, let me know. I can arrange it.”
“She died in 1965 at age forty-one, in Broward County, Florida, of peritonitis,” Alex said, studying his screen, where he had pulled up her info.
Tex smiled. It was pure vamp, and not an expression I had ever seen on his face. “Or so they say.”
Which was vamp for: Tex had turned her and she was undead and he was still smitten.
“I’ll keep it in mind.”Not.To Alex, I said, “Debrief. Now.” But all I could think about was undead strippers and Tex in love. Both were scary.
“We went over the security tapes for HQ and found nothing. We went over the security tapes at the freebie house and then all the clan homes throughout the city—nada. Since the airport strike and Mainet trying to bomb HQ, no attacks have been directed at us. That doesn’t mean our enemies died in their sleep and left us in the clear. It’s much more likely they’ve been too busy planning something else.” He didn’t have to say it would be something nasty and deadly on a massive scale.
That was terror-inducing for all of my people, and a danger to the entire city, and was something I could not control or stop—yet. I couldn’t go after the enemy because I had no idea where they were. I couldn’t fight anything or kill anything. My pelt was itchy at the lack of action and I wasn’t the only one upset. In the back of the room, I thought I saw Koun twitch trying to stay calm.
The security types started talking defensive strategy. Blah blah yada yada. I could listen to them or I could go for a walk. To keep from worrying like a wolf gnawing a leg bone, I inquired about EJ’s, Cassy’s, and Angie Baby’s whereabouts, since Deon wasn’t in charge of them. Informed of their location, I left the main security roomand I wandered to the gym to see what my older godkids were up to.
I almost—not quite, but nearly—was able to ignore Quint’s presence behind me in the hallways, and the presence of a vamp honor guard shadowing me ahead and far behind. Leaving the door open to the hallway at my back, I slipped into the gym, and into the shadows to watch.
The kids were in the care of Wrassler and Gee; the Mercy Blade was teaching them swordplay with small, appropriately sized, wooden sword sticks called staves, one short, one long. It was adorable, so freaking cute I thought I might up and die on the spot. From the expression on Koun’s face, he agreed. But his face fell as we watched. Angie was clearly scary-quick to pick up the forms and mechanics of vamp blood-sport dueling, and that was not something the Dark Queen’s Enforcer and Executioner had expected.
Dang. She was good. EJ was behind Angie in terms of speed and precision but that was the difference in ages. If his first lesson was an indication, EJ was going to be just as fast and powerful.
I tucked my hands into my pockets and wrapped my knobby fingers around the key amulet and the Jesus focal. Watching.
Angie lunged, lunged, lunged, and in between each lunge, she stabbed, stabbed, stabbed and cut, cut, cut. Ducked. Jumped over Gee’s longsword. Darted in, beneath his short sword. On her knees, she stabbed Gee. Hard. Right in the groin.
Every male in the room flinched and gasped.
Gee grunted.
“Oops,” I murmured, quietly stunned. That had to hurt, even for a glamoured bird. I had managed to strike Gee once or twice in sparring, but couldn’t remember if I’d ever managed a kill strike. And I had tried.
Gee crumpled over and lay on the wood floor, stunned.
Angie saw me. She dropped her practice staves and raced over, shouting, “Ant Jane!” EJ copied her actions and raced over too, his high-pitched squeal echoing in the big gym.
I dropped to a knee and caught them, which nearly knocked me to my butt, but I found my balance and accepted dual hugs. When I was done being strangled, and my happy goofy expression had settled into something more queenly, I eased them back. But before I could say anything, I heard a whir from the door behind me.
Through the open door, the flying lizard flashed into the room, tail whipping, wings a blur. I had never seen it fly and it zipped across the high ceiling in acrobatic whirls.Holy mackerelit was fast.
