“And what will my clients do in the meantime?”Abe asked.
“They may have reign to wander the grounds,” Judge Volkheim said.
“I object!”Brynholf said.“These individuals are dangerous and cannot be trusted.”
Judge Volkheim rolled his eyes.
“Fine.Lock them up together.Who wants waffles?Nobody?”
“I’ll take some,” Maxwell said.
“Anyone else?”
“I’m a little peckish,” I said.
Judge Volkheim pursed his lips and shook his head at me as he walked out of the door.Shortly afterward, Brynholf used a jabby tazer wand, escorting Nagisa and me back to another vaulted chamber far down below.I suppose escorting was a nice enough word for it.
“If you’re guilty.Which I strongly suspect you are.Then I’ll make the two of you pay for your crimes,” Brynholf said and slammed the door behind us.I could hear keys and chains rattling as we were locked in.
“I guess this is it,” I said.
Nagisa burst into wet, soppy tears.
“It’s just not fair!”he cried.“How did we get here?”
“We did our best to save a bad situation,” I said.
“They could destroy the entire community we’ve built,” Nagisa said.“Do you understand how much work has gone into Chicago’s Underground?Everything I’ve worked for over the past hundred years… wiped out!”
“It’s going to be okay,” I said, wrapping my arms around him.“We got the Deadies taken care of.Now we just have to wrap this up.Just this one last piece of the whole puzzle.”
“Stacey,” he said.He turned and looked at me.“To you, this is simple.But you don’t understand at all.”
“Look, you don’t understand,” I said.“I’ve had to sit and schmooze my way through countless paper-worked hegemonic piles of bullshit red tape.How do you think I got through college?It wasn’t homework and being smart.It was talking my way—or writing my way—out of trouble.”
“Stacey,” he said.“I’m scared.What if this doesn’t go the way we want it to?”
“It may not.And you can be scared,” I said.“It would probably be really stupid not to be.But we’ve got people on our side.We’re going to get through this.Even if it’s going to be a little tricky.After all… we already did most of the hard stuff, right?”
“Punching things and fighting monsters is easy,” Nagisa said.“But all this… this questioning, this red tape.They’re going to ask us what happened, Stacey, and I can hardly wrap my head around it as it is.It’s daunting.”
“We’ll get through it together,” I said.“Just this one last trial.”
We stared into each other’s eyes.I thought of Eddie, Vic, of Brother Al, all watching me from the other side of the court room, cheering me on with their love from a distance.And now here Nagisa—so tall, so wiry, so lean.Like a regal scarecrow.
He moved forward and kissed me.I kissed him back.His nails were more like talons against my back, but his fingers were long and strong and stroked my skin in just the right way.He pressed me back, back, back against a musty cot, and laid me down.I spread myself open to him, and he moved against me, sliding inside.It was like we were animals—ferocious, wounded, touch-starved animals bursting with hormones.He slid inside me, gentle at first, speeding up as he went, caressing my face, and kissing me.He increased his tempo… I could feel a wave of heat from his girth filling me and withdrawing, over and over, a rollercoaster of feeling that ebbed and flowed and rose, slowly aching higher and higher and higher…
I howled when it hit, throbbing and ripping its way over me, and was surprised at the look on his face.He looked… sad?I wasn’t sure.Disheartened?As if he’d made a terrible mistake as if he couldn’t believe himself.And then with a shuddering gasp, he slid from inside me, and laid his head against my shoulder, clutching at me like I was a stuffed doll.
“I’m so worried,” he said.“Thank you, though.”
“This was a lot better than I imagined the tentacle thing would be,” I said.
“I was trying really hard not to let them come out,” he said.“It’s.I know it’s weird.But it happens sometimes when I least expect it.”
“Are you some kind of monster or something?”
“I am a vampire,” Nagisa said.
