Eyes of Ice

by J. C. Andrijeski

  “Cop,” he said finally.

  Tom relaxed slightly, nodding. “You were a cop?”

  “Yes,” Nick said.

  “Is that all?” Farlucci interjected, his lips pursing.

  “Military before that,” Nick admitted, a little more reluctantly. “I did some private-sec work for a friend who had his own company, too, while I was on a break from the force. I went back to working homicide after that.”

  “Where?”

  Nick glanced at Tom, who’d asked that question. “San Francisco. Mostly.”

  “No,” Tom said. “Where did you serve?”

  “Afghanistan. Iraq.” Nick shrugged. “I did some work in South America.”

  “Which branch?” Tom said.

  Nick looked at him. “Army.”

  “Regular forces?”

  Nick stared at him. Then he frowned. “No.”

  Farlucci and Tom again exchanged looks.

  They clearly thought he was still holding out on them.

  Probably, Nick thought wryly, because he was. But he didn’t remember signing any kind of contract that told him he had to give these fuckers his life story.

  “What did you do for the White Death?” Farlucci said, his voice even more guarded.

  Nick shook his head. “It’s not like that. We didn’t have roles like that––”

  “But you’d have things they asked you to do more regularly,” Farlucci said, not to be daunted. “They would know what your skill-sets were. They would likely utilize those skill sets, in the ways it made sense to do so––”

  “Yeah.” Nick frowned. “That pretty much falls into the ‘none of your fucking business’ category.” He glanced around at all of them. “…No offense.”

  Rather than being put off, Farlucci smiled.

  “None taken.” He bowed slightly, that smile still touching his lips. “Apologies if our questions were rude. You are, of course, under no obligation to satisfy our curiosity about you. I will say I have no desire to anger your employers in any way… so my interest in your relationship to Whitewing stems primarily from a wish to not inadvertently step on any toes.”

  Nick frowned, staring around at all of them again.

  And okay… he got it.

  It was pretty unusual for someone to leave the White Death.

  They had to be wondering why and how Nick managed to pull it off, as well as what lingering ties might exist. But that didn’t fully explain why they were staring at him like he was a ticking time bomb, either.

  “I don’t run with them anymore,” he said. “I told you that.”

  Farlucci’s expression didn’t move.

  “Of course,” he murmured diplomatically. “Of course. But you must understand my need to be cautious. Particularly given that I’m strongly considering offering you a regular contract with our organization.”

  Nick stared at him.

  He looked at Tom, then back at Farlucci.

  After a long-feeling pause, he let out a laugh.

  “You can’t be serious,” he said.

  “Oh, I assure you,” Farlucci said, refolding his arms. “I’m very serious.”

  Nick stared at him a few seconds more, gauging the human’s expression.

  Then he shook his head.

  “No,” he said.

  Rather than annoyance, Farlucci’s smile returned. “No? You haven’t heard the offer yet.”

  “I’m a Midnight,” Nick said, blunt.

  What the hell. If they didn’t know already, they were going to find out as soon as they scanned his barcode to transfer the credits.

  “…I already have a job,” he added.

  Farlucci and Tom exchanged looks.

  That time, Nick found himself understanding the look there a bit better.

  They’d definitely already scanned his barcode. They might have done it before the fight, but if they hadn’t done it then, they’d definitely done it while he was out. They’d known he was a Midnight. They’d been wondering if he was going to tell them.

  Moreover, they were probably wondering if he was there to investigate them.

  Especially if they were guilty of something, or knew about the dead vampires.

  Farlucci looked back at him.

  That time, some of the guardedness had dropped from his eyes.

  “You could do both,” he said, holding out his hands in a kind of prayer gesture. “We have people at the I.S.F. We’ve worked with them before, with registered vamps.”

  Nick looked between them.

  Then he grunted a laugh.

  “You don’t know much about police work, do you?” he said. “I work with homicide. That means my cases happen when people die. People don’t always die at convenient times. Definitely not from an event promoter’s perspective. What if I had to skip a fight because of a case? That might leave you with a lot of empty slots to fill with amateurs from the audience.”

  If the human caught the crack, it didn’t show on his angular face.

  “You’re not the only Midnight in the NYPD,” Farlucci observed.

  Leaning back slightly, he rested his rear end on a high chrome-colored table and folded his arms. “We might be able to work something out with I.S.F. And with the NYPD.”

  Nick frowned, looking between the four of them again.

  “Why?” he said. “That’s got to be a huge hassle for you. Why not just find a vampire who’s less complicated? Someone you don’t need to do all that for?”

  Again, Farlucci and Tom exchanged looks, and smiles.

  “Think about it,” Farlucci said next, his voice firm. “I’ll have an offer sent over to your headset by the end of tomorrow. After I speak to a few people about the feasibility, of course… from the perspective of your current employment. Just think about whether you might be interested.”

  “Don’t call my employers,” Nick said, blunt. “Don’t do that.”

  When they exchanged looks again, Nick gritted his teeth, then clarified,

  “Technically, I’m playing hooky tonight,” he said.

  At their blank looks, he added,

  “…It’s why I didn’t want to be ID’d on the feeds. I was the Midnight on the Kellerman case. They have me keeping a low profile right now. For political reasons. You tell them I’m here, and I definitely won’t be entertaining offers. Of any kind.”

  Again, Farlucci and Tom exchanged looks.

  Again, Nick got the impression his confession hadn’t deterred them.

  If anything, it seemed to pique Farlucci’s interest further.

  “I see,” he said. “Thank you for explaining that. And if it helps, I would never contact your employers without your prior permission. I was thinking more along the lines of lawyers. I also planned to consult with several people we’ve worked with before, who are experts in negotiating contracts for I.S.F.-reg’d and employed vampires.”

  Nick felt his jaw harden.

  Lawyers. He should have known.

  Pausing, still gauging Nick’s expression, Farlucci added,

  “Of course, you wouldn’t need to work as a Midnight at all, if you decided to take a contract with me. I’m assuming you know that… but I would think about that too, if I were you, Naoko Tanaka.”

  Nick scowled at the other’s use of his real name.

  He didn’t bother to comment aloud, though.

  When the silence stretched, he hopped off the padded table.

  “You got my clothes?” he said. “I’ve got people waiting for me.”

  Again, Farlucci and the human named Tom exchanged looks.

  Then Tom looked at Nick.

  Smiling faintly, he inclined his head towards the door.

  “Come on, killer,” he said, his voice back to amused. “I’ll take you to the locker room… and the showers.”

  When no one said anything else, Nick gave them all a cursory nod, then followed the blond male, Tom, out of the room.

  Chapter 9

  Invitation

  Before
Nick managed to get out of the pit, Tom handed him another card.

  The blond human wandered into the dressing and towel-off area not long after Nick left the shower cubicles and a blissfully hot shower, and had at least half of his clothes back on his body.

  The card got presented along with Nick’s headset, which Nick was a lot more relieved to see, even if he was nervous about turning it on, given what just happened in the ring.

  “Come to the club tonight, if you want,” the blond man said, smiling. “Bring your friends. Everything’s on the house.”

  Nick grunted, non-committal.

  At that point, he was buttoning up his shirt, staring at the blinking light on his headset.

  He was a lot more worried that his friends were freaking out, wondering where he was.

  “Your choice, of course,” Tom said agreeably, seemingly undaunted by Nick’s non-answer. “But there’ll be other fighters there. People you could talk to, if you wanted to get an idea of what the set-up’s like for the vamps we contract with.”

  Pausing, he added,

  “…There’ll be a hell of a lot of vampire-friendly humans there, too. Very vampire-friendly humans. Humans who like the fights… and who like vamp fighters. Male vamp fighters, in particular.”

  Nick gave him a flatter look.

  At the other’s smile, he grunted a little.

  “No thanks on the vamp groupies,” he said to the other’s laugh, finishing with his shirt and shouldering on his jacket before he reached for his coat and headset. “But I’ll ask my friends about the club. Assuming they aren’t scouring the emergency rooms for me by now… I’ll see if they want to go.”

  Tom laughed a second time, clapping him on the arm.

  “It hasn’t been that long,” Tom assured him. “I’m sure they’re up there.”

  Nick scowled a little, glancing at the monitor playing in the room.

  It was running the current fight in the ring, between two female vampires, each one of them buffed out, and close to six feet tall.

  He glanced back at Tom.

  “No one will know me?” he said, frowning faintly. “When I leave?”

  Tom shook his head. “You can go out the bottom, if you like. It pops up on the other side of the ring. Away from most of the media. We’ll give you an employee badge, if you like. Generally speaking, the reporters don’t look twice at the vamps wearing those.”

  Nodding towards Nick’s coat, he added,

  “You’ve got the contacts still, too. I put them in a case, with solution, in case you wanted to wear them out. You could go out the front with those on. They’ll just assume you’re a human working for us.”

  Nick nodded.

  Thinking about that, he decided to go with the contacts.

  He’d have a better chance of finding Charlie and Kit quicker that way.

  “All right,” he said, sitting down on the padded bench with his boots in one hand, his black socks stuffed in the boots. Not sure what else to say to the human, he gave him a nod. “Appreciate all your help down here. I’m sure I’ll see you around.”

  Tom smiled back, holding out a hand.

  After a bare pause, Nick took it, shaking it cautiously from where he sat.

  “I hope so,” Tom said, his voice sincere. “I genuinely hope so, friend. You were badass in there. Maybe we didn’t say it enough, but you were fucking amazing. I think you could more or less name your price with Farlucci… although for the love of all that’s holy, don’t tell him I said that.”

  Nick nodded, unsure how to react to that.

  “Thanks,” he said finally.

  “I mean it, man. Really hoping to work with you again.” Tom pointed at his own neck, indicating where Nick had been shot with the dart. “And sorry about that. It should wear off totally in an hour or so.”

  Nick wasn’t sure what to say to that, either.

  In the end, he only nodded a second time, releasing the other’s hand.

  Giving Nick a half-salute and a last smile, the human turned away, finding the door with his eyes and aiming his feet towards it.

  Nick watched him go, frowning faintly.

  It wasn’t until the human disappeared, and Nick was shoving his foot into his first boot, that the reality of the situation hit him.

  He was going to have to go to this fucking club.

  Nick didn’t put on his headset until he was already most of the way up the stairs leading out of the gated area around the ring.

  He was still blinking too much, trying to re-adjust to the brown contacts over his vampire irises. That feeling of being vaguely blinded, or even just mildly visually impaired, mixed badly with the lingering wooziness and off-balance feeling from getting darted.

  On a more positive note, at least Tom had been right.

  Between the contacts, the street clothes, and the mask he’d worn in the cage, no one appeared to recognize him. No one appeared to be looking at him at all––at least not in any way that was relevant. He didn’t notice any media drones hovering around him, either.

  When he flicked on his headset, it was a whole different story.

  Multiple pings filled his ears, letting him know of recorded messages.

  He got a least four separate addresses lighting up behind his eyes.

  Frowning a little as he nodded to the black-shirted guys who were working the gate, he decided to bypass all the urgent pings and blinking, and just call Kit directly.

  Farlucci’s security guys knew who he was.

  They were opening the doors, smiling at him openly. One even clapped. When Nick was close enough, another thumped him on the back, offering a hand to shake. Nick was shaking the second bouncer’s hand when Kit picked up on the other end.

  “What the FUCK, man?” she half-yelled through the channel. “WHERE ARE YOU, NICK? NO ONE WOULD TELL US!”

  He winced, fighting the urge to match her volume in his reply.

  He switched to sub-vocals instead.

  “I just got out––” he began, but she cut him off.

  “They wouldn’t tell us SHIT! They just said you were okay. But they fucking darted you. They DARTED you! Are you really okay, Nick? They didn’t hurt you?”

  Nick flinched slightly at the intensity of her voice, wondering if she was drunk.

  Nodding at the second human whose hand he just shook, he smiled when the same male human said he hoped he was coming to the club that night. Keeping his face neutral, Nick muttered something noncommittal right before he walked away from the gate, touching his ear where the headset sat and looking up towards the stands.

  He kept walking as he looked for his friends, instinctively putting distance between himself and the gated area around the ring.

  “NICK? ARE YOU STILL THERE?”

  “Jesus… yes,” he growled. “Calm the fuck down, all right? I’m fine. I just got out.”

  He glanced around, partly out of paranoia when he saw a few media drones skim by overhead. Taking in faces, he blinked from the contact lenses, still fighting to get his bearings in the crowd as he looked up towards the stairs leading higher into the stands.

  “Where are you?” he said. “I’ll come to you––”

  “No. Charlie says she just saw you. We’ve been keeping an eye on the gate, looking for you. She says you just walked out…”

  Kit trailed, either pushing her way through the crowd, or talking to the female detective.

  “…Okay. Got you,” she said, her voice marginally calmer. “Just picked you up with facial rec.”

  “Facial rec?” he said, alarmed. “What the fuck, Kit?”

  “My lenses, Nick. My eyes. They’re enhanced… remember? Calm down. Me and Charlie are heading down to you now––”

  “Me, calm down?” he muttered, now watching the stairs. “Sure, kid.”

  He was still looking for them when Kit’s voice rose again.

  “Ms. St. Maarten called me,” she said, huffing as she made her way down the stairs. “She was a little fre
aked, seeing you fight.”

  Nick frowned, blinking as he turned his face away from another media drone that buzzed by overhead. He turned Kit’s words over in disbelief, staring back in the direction of the stairs.

  “How the hell did she even know about this?” he said, walking closer to the stairs, despite what Kit had said, his fingers on the headset.

  “Dunno.” Kit’s voice was still slightly out of breath. “You know how she is. She probably has some kind of flag in the system for every time someone runs your barcode. Did you tell anyone else? Anyone who knows St. Maarten?”

  Nick frowned, trying to process Kit’s words.

  He barely heard the first part.

  He was too busy obsessing on the last thing she’d said.

  Wynter.

  Wynter knew St. Maarten.

  Would Wynter really have called the Archangel executive, though?

  He knew St. Maarten helped Wynter out once upon a time, getting her out of a potentially bad situation with St. Maarten’s pervy ex-husband. Were the two of them actually friends, though? Did they talk regularly?

  “Calm down, Nick,” Kit said, exhaling. “I can feel that big brain of yours on the verge of exploding… and it’s not that big of a deal. Frankly, I was glad to have the backup. If something went wrong, if it turned out Farlucci really was this vampire-murderer, St. Maarten would have been my first call.”

  Nick thought about that, and grunted.

  He couldn’t really fault the kid’s logic.

  St. Maarten wasn’t the worst person in the world to have on their side, if Nick disappeared down the rabbit hole for whatever reason.

  “We’ll talk about it later,” he said. “Speaking of which, don’t make a big scene down here, okay? There are media drones everywhere. We should go somewhere. I have another lead I might have to follow tonight anyway, probably with Charlie––”

  Someone grabbed his arm.

  Nick didn’t realize how tightly wound he was until those fingers gripped his arm.

  He turned sharply, jerking free in one hard move. In the same instant, he fell into a crouch, muscles tense, teeth half-bared.