“Oh, the regular one’s being cleaned.”The pixie nodded sagely, pointing down a short hall ending in a pair of swinging doors.“It’s this way; I’ll show you.”
“Thanks.”If Liv could get up before the waitress left, Neal would be forced to sit here and wait, since he had arrogated the right and duty of ordering.Social judo wasn’t just for the predators in the room.“Excuse me, Neal.I just need to check my lipstick.Won’t take but a moment.”
“Okay.”Neal reached for his wineglass, settling back in his chair with an indulgent gesture.It clearly never crossed his mind to wonder why his date hadn’t brought a coat, just the pashmina—and why she was still wearing said shawl inside.
“I’ll show you,” the waitress repeated.Her nametag readFiona, and she looked every inch of it.Her hips moved with an aggressive switch that was part youthful exuberance and all business; Liv hid a smile.
Past the swinging door with its round portholes was a short hall, clearly not meant for customers since the floor was bare, polished concrete.Fiona beckoned her through, and as soon as it swung closed her smile turned conspiratorial.“Go all the way down and to the left; there’s the stairwell.If you turn right just outside the door, the alley will take you to Sixteenth.You want me to call you a cab?”
“Nah, I’ve got it, thanks,” Liv muttered.Bostwick’s was only a block or two north of here, and she could hide in the smoking section if Jada or Lou were on duty.Either of them would find this hilarious and pour her a shot to take the edge off; college buddies laboring under the same student loan debt and depressed hiring market were a fantastic resource.“You must see a lot of these.”
“At least he didn’t put anything in your drink,” Fiona said cheerfully.“We had another one ofthoselast week.I hope she presses charges.”
I guess this guy just didn’t have time.“Me too.Thank you.”Liv dug for the cash she’d intended as a rideshare tip and pressed it into the woman’s hand.“Put that order in before he realizes I’m gone.”
“You know it.”A laugh, a wink, and Fiona was gone, the swinging door giving a tired wheeze on its hinges.
The stairwell exit did indeed give onto an alley, which even appeared fairly clean—at least, she hoped it was.Early winter dusk had crawled over the city, and it just might have been too cold to smell anything rotting.It was, however, dark as sin, and she set off for the gleam of passing headlights and shimmering streetlamps to her right.A hum of traffic whispered down the alley’s throat, and she shivered as she wrapped her pashmina and yanked pins free of her chignon.Her hair would keep her neck warm.
Halfway through, she heard a clatter.She glanced uneasily to her left—the alley grew another leg there, and voices floated past the bend.Probably another kitchen; the Hobson wasn’t the only restaurant in the Wellington Building or the Haze Mutual skyscraper next door.
Liv turned hard right; once she was out of the circle of incandescent light from the fixture over the Hobson’s stairwell door she had to blink hard, her eyes adjusting with reticence.She’d read somewhere it took about twenty minutes to really get your night vision on.
Pretty soon she’d be home with a pint of ice cream and her phone, bringing everyone up to date on the latest fiasco.It would make great self-deprecating fodder to trot out the next time anyone started makinglet’s set Livvie upnoises.Especially Mika, who had made it her personal quest to bring Liv to a more perfect union, so to speak.
I just want to see you happy,Mika would chirp.Well, that was a noble cause, but Liv was beginning to think spinsterhood was the golden path to that hallowed state of being.
For one thing, it meant you didn’t have to share a bedorclean up anything other than your own bathroom mess.
“And to think,” Liv murmured as she picked her way cautiously down the alley, “they have a whole separate exit for girls to escape before drinks.”It was a good story, one she could deploy over mimosas at Sunday brunch, and she grinned with satisfaction.The minor business of blocking Neal’s number—and ritualistically swearing off dating apps yet again—could wait until she was home in her pajamas.
The only fly in the ointment was her heels, definitely not meant for this type of urban rambling.She kept to what seemed the driest portion of pavement, and wished she was home already.This was a killer outfit, and she wasn’t even that cold since the striped tights were insulated, but she should have worn boots.
No, she wasn’t shivering, but shewasunsettled.And who wouldn’t be, sashaying down a downtown alley after dark?
It was a verylongalley, too.Thankfully, her footsteps didn’t echo against the brick walls; still, she wondered how long it would take for Neal to come looking for her.
Assuming he could be torn away from his goddamn white wine.Who drank that stuff, especially with bourbon around?Liv shivered, snuggling her chin into the pashmina.A thin thread of anxiety wormed through her chest, banishing any amusement at the prospect of telling her crew about this failed date.
Later, she would wonder if somehow, some dormant part of her had known.
As it was, when the light of Sixteenth Street dimmed ahead, Liv’s chin came up and she froze, caught between one step and the next.There was a sound like a rubber tire ripping from its rim and a sudden wave of nauseating stench so bad she almost reeled.It hit the back of her throat like a Jagerbomb and she gagged, catching her balance and standing, stock-still, trembling in her pretty grey suede heels.
What the hell?Gooseflesh poured down her back.
“Civilian!”someone yelled; something hit her from the side.One of her shoes went flying, and so did she—right into the Wellington Building’s ample, brick-buttressed ass.
A brief, starry jolt of pain, like hitting a rock and soaring over the handlebars of her beloved Huffy Pink Princess when she was eleven.She hadn’t broken anything or even chipped a tooth, both common side effects of bike wrecks she was later glad to have avoided, but shehadcome back to consciousness facedown and stunned on a grassy verge, her bike’s wheels spinning lazily as it lay on its side, a beached sea creature.
Liv surfaced only briefly, hearing a deep, throbbing growl and another shout, a clattering and that awful smell swallowing her once more.
It was undoubtedly a mercy, for the shadowbeast would have eaten her whole.
Born That Way
“Dumbass.”Jake stamped on the shadowbeast’s skull again, was rewarded with a splattering crunch.His blond hair glowed in a random reflection of streetlight; the rest of the alley was beginning to fill up with reflected lumens now that the beast wasn’t exhaling foulness, masking as it hunted.“Erik?How we doing?”
How do you think?It was useless to reply with sarcasm; such things bounced right off his Younger.Erik hissed an exhale, probing his shredded shoulder with careful fingertips.The thing had attempted to shake him like a ragdoll, not caring that a Son’s blood would be poisonous to it.They usually weren’t so willing to stay and fight.
