“She was pregnant?” I whispered, horrified. “Vandekamp ended it?”
“His wife. She won’t let the ‘monsters’ breed.”
The only thing I could imagine worse than being forced to end the pregnancy was how Magnolia might have gotten pregnant in the first place.
* * *
The handlers called my name a couple of hours after lunch, and along with two of the long-term captives, they also called Zyanya and Lenore. That choice was not random. Vandekamp had selected women he knew I would want to protect.
The shifter and the siren were living threats, intended to keep me in line.
The five of us were marched down a series of hallways into a bright, cold room equipped with six salon-style chairs, several racks of skimpy clothing, an entire arsenal of makeup and three women in khaki pants, collared shirts and pink aprons bearing the Savage Spectacle’s silver logo.
The ambient scents were a confusion of perfume, hair spray, lotion and various cosmetic pastes, glosses and powders. And glue.
We were each seated in one of the chairs, but were neither handcuffed nor shackled. Instead, our collars were programmed to paralyze us for the duration of the makeup session. Which took hours.
The “artists” moved us into whatever position their work required, posing us like dolls as they drew on our faces. As they curled, pinned and sprayed our hair. There were no mirrors in the room, because it didn’t matter what we thought of their efforts, so while I could see some of what was being done to my fellow captives, I couldn’t really tell what was being done to me. Except for the heavy false eyelashes. Those were impossible to miss.
The artists chatted as they worked, asking for opinions and offering suggestions as they discussed their families and social lives. It took most of my concentration to keep tears at bay as I listened to them discuss the very things I’d lost, while I sat there locked out of my own body, one step away from being rented out by the hour.
When my makeup was finished, the artist fitted me with a black lace masquerade mask, which fastened beneath the mass of dark curls she’d created. The mask was small enough to display the ridiculous lashes and whatever else she’d done to my face. I felt as if I were wearing several pounds of primer, foundation, glitter and whatever art had been drawn onto my temples and cheeks.
The other two artists finished with their living palettes early and moved on to the two remaining captives while my extensive makeover was completed. When they were finished, the makeup artists headed out for a coffee break, leaving us immobilized in our chairs, staring at a blank wall.
For a long time, we sat there like corpses, imprisoned in our own minds, and I wouldn’t have known the handlers were still stationed against the wall behind us if I hadn’t heard them breathing.
I couldn’t ask the other captives if the wait was normal. I couldn’t even turn to look at them. I could do nothing more than swallow the saliva gathering at the back of my throat, and try not to let the itch inside my left ear drive me out of my mind.
Finally, the hair and makeup ladies returned, smelling of coffee, and they solved the mystery of how we were supposed to get dressed without messing up their work.
We weren’t.
The handlers pulled us to our feet, and we could only stand there, immobilized, while the makeup artists stripped us down to bare skin, then stood back to assess the as yet unpainted portions of their canvases.
My face flamed. The indignity was a familiar one, but no less infuriating than it had ever been, and the knowledge that an audience of handlers stood behind me made my flesh crawl.
After they’d taken stock, the artists rubbed thick, glittering lotions and oils into our skin, then dressed us in skimpy costumes that didn’t have to go over our heads or slide over our sparkling limbs.
Zyanya’s costume was a cheetah-print bikini top with a micro skirt, slit up both sides, all the way to the waistband. Lenore got a skimpy, asymmetrical gold dress that wrapped over one shoulder and draped—barely—over her breasts before falling to midthigh. Her artist tied a matching sash at her waist, then helped her into a pair of gold gladiator sandals that laced up to the top of her calves.
The others were both in variations of generically sexy scraps of cloth draped over strategic parts of their flesh, and everyone but me was decked out in bright colors and extravagant fabrics.
But just like in the menagerie, I wore all black. I was also the only one in a masquerade mask, presumably to help disguise the fact that I had no telltale cryptid features to highlight.
Like Zyanya, I was given no shoes.
Once we were dressed and touched up, our handlers readjusted the settings on our collars and marched us through the topiary zoo into a large kitchen at the back of the main building, where a chef and his staff were putting the finishing touches on hundreds of bite-size appetizers.
The scent of food I would probably never taste made my mouth water.
Bottles of champagne stood chilling in a wall-sized glass refrigerator, along with bottles of white wine. Bottles of red were lined up on a countertop behind several rows of champagne flutes and stemmed wineglasses waiting to be filled.
A man in a formal server’s uniform, complete with a silver vest and bow tie, took us aside for an “engagement briefing.” The tag pinned to his vest read Event Coordinator.
“This bachelor party is as simple as it gets.” The coordinator avoided eye contact as he spoke. “The groom is Michael Hayes, who has some curiosities he’d like satisfied, but the client is James Lansing. His is the credit card on file, so he’s your boss for the night.”
The coordinator glanced at his clipboard. “Lenore...” His gaze finally landed on the siren, whom he clearly recognized. She’d already been “engaged” for two events since we’d been sold to the Spectacle, and rumor among the captives said that putting her onstage added several thousand dollars to the bill. “Lenore, you’re the entertainment.” He pulled a familiar remote from his pocket and pressed a button which pulled up a series of options on a screen I only got a glance at. “I’ve set your collar to allowminorinfluence in your voice. Make them feel good. Lower their inhibitions and help them enjoy themselves. Encourage them to spend. But if you try anything malicious, you’ll spend the night in the infirmary.”
