Trick of the Light

by Rob Thurman

  Zeke, copper hair hanging loose to his shoulders, shrugged and reached for the bowl of pretzels. “No. I’d have just shot him. I wouldn’t have thought of anything that fun.” He looked up at the TV again, hoping for another repeat. “Anyone tape it?”

  “Fun?” Griffin responded with disapproval, ignoring the tape remark. “Don’t you mean ironic? Poetic justice? His just deserts? Hoisted on his own petard?”

  Shaking his head, his partner scooped up a handful of pretzels. “Nope, fun.”

  Griffin gave in and took some pretzels himself. I could tell he wanted to ask how Zeke had gotten here . . . what with the entire no-driving thing occasionally slipping Zeke’s mind. If he needed to be somewhere, he could be five miles down the road before he remembered he didn’t have a license. Griffin definitely had his reasons for wanting to know. Bus accidents aside, purposely cutting Zeke off in traffic was grounds for punishment. And our boy? He did not do little punishments.

  But Griffin didn’t ask how Zeke had arrived; he wouldn’t do that in front of Leo and me. As tight as the four of us were, Griffin and Zeke were two halves of a whole. Tight didn’t begin to describe their partnership.

  But Zeke knew Griffin every bit as well as Griffin knew him. “Jackie dropped me off. We have a job up in Red Rock today. Demon. Maybe.” This meant demon or someone had turned loose their pet iguana.

  Jackie meant Jackson “Stick up his Ass” Goodman, as Zeke labeled him. As much as I disapproved of labeling, it was a good one. Very accurate. The FDA would completely approve. Goodman was second in command of Eden House in Las Vegas. There was an Eden House in Los Angeles, Chicago, Miami, Dallas, Washington DC . . . fat lot of good it did us there . . . and a few other places I’d forgotten offhand. And that was just in the continental United States. Eden House was worldwide and had been around since, hell, nobody really knew, but long enough to have seen the pyramids built, Griffin had once said.

  “Goodman brought you?”

  Zeke snorted at Griffin’s surprise. Jackson Goodman as second at Eden House was far too important, in his own opinion, for ferrying around people. “Everyone else is out on a job. I offered to take a taxi, but . . .” He shrugged again.

  I could see Goodman’s point of view, considering that the last time Zeke had taken a taxi, the driver had tried to overcharge Zeke, and Zeke had quite righteously, from his point of view, put him through the windshield, resulting in shattered safety glass, screaming people, a mildly confused Zeke who explained reasonably to the yelling, howling cab driver that stealing was a crime. In Zeke’s mind, assault with a windshield was apparently not, and only deserved retribution. As for the Jackie thing . . . Zeke, who mostly did as he was told as long as he was told in the line of duty or outside the line by someone he trusted, refused to call Jackson anything but Jackie. I was sure Jackie had made it clear a thousand times that it was Mr. Goodman or Goodman, not Jackson, not Jack, and definitely not Jackie. Zeke’s green eyes would blink and out would come Jackie, smooth as hundred-year-old scotch.

  So, on the rare occasion when I saw the anal-retentive stiff waltz in here looking for the guys, which wasn’t often, I called him Jackie to give Zeke moral support. Not that he needed the latter, and the former were so out of the ordinary, extraordinary in fact, that most people wouldn’t understand them. Griffin would glare at my encouraged disrespect of management, Lenore would caw, “Nevermore, Jackie. Nevermore,” and a good time was had by all.

  “Going hiking?” I tilted my head at Griffin to take in his expensive casual wear. “That’s not an activity that matches your look today.”

  On demon-hunting occasions Griffin did dress down for the hunt. Not for burning-down-club occasions, but scheduled hunts. He did black on black like Zeke, cheap and disposable. Demon blood? It takes more than a little detergent to take that out. Zeke kicked a duffel bag at his feet. “I brought you some hiking clothes, but I didn’t know you were already wearing jeans.”

  “These jeans? Hell, no,” Griffin refused instantly. “These aren’t hiking jeans. These cost two hundred damn dollars.”

  “That’s sexy, Griff,” I said with mock sincerity. “A demon chaser in two-hundred-dollar jeans. Manly. Very manly.”

  He glared a smoldering response, but since I was in the right with the jeans, he went with the other. “Demon catcher, not demon chaser.”

  “Very nice. I like how your voice got deeper there. Muy macho,” I said, then asked Zeke, “How are you going to haul the kind of firepower you need without being spotted by a ranger? A shotgun stands out.”

  Holy water, crosses, none of that worked on demons; it was all myth . . . maybe because the demons once were angels. Maybe they were already inoculated, so to speak, by their time in Heaven; maybe not. Who knew? They were resistant to the paraphernalia of all religions: Hinduism, Islam, Judaism . . . any of them. So leave your crucifix at home and don’t even get me started on The Exorcist. Diapers and a pea soup-free diet and that girl would’ve been fine. For a demon, however, you did need heavy firepower or an angel with a flaming sword, and as angels hadn’t been too enthusiastic about getting their hands dirty for quite some time now, heavy firepower it was.

  Shotguns were the usual weapon of choice for the coup de grace, slugs the ammunition. Even demons needed their brains. Knives, smaller guns—smaller than a shotgun anyway—were good for slowing them down, but for taking them out, a shotgun was the best. Unless you were into axes or swords for whacking off the head. My boys used them all, but the shotgun was their favorite.

  “Hand grenades,” Zeke said complacently. “They fit in the bag with the knives, guns, etcetera.”

  “Hand grenades.” Griffin said it as calmly as he would’ve said, Watch out for that gum on the sidewalk. “The ones we keep locked up in the weapons arsenal and have to have Mr. Trinity’s permission to use. Those grenades?”

  Mr. Trinity was head of Vegas Eden House. He did not have a nickname. He might not even have had a first or middle name. Mr. Trinity could make Jackie boy pee his pants with the rise of one iron gray eyebrow.

  “Yep.” Zeke waved for a beer, the pretzels apparently having made him thirsty, before wiping the salt on his jeans with combat-scarred hands just like Griff’s.

  “Did you get permission?”

  The green eyes slid uncertainly toward Griffin. “No.”

  “Did you break the lock or kick down the door?” Griffin was now pinching the bridge of his nose before slipping on his sunglasses and threading an agitated hand through his hair.

  “Kicked down the door. Maybe that wasn’t the right thing to do?” From Zeke’s tone he’d figured out just now that, no, it wasn’t the right thing to do. It was the expedient thing to do, the black and white thing, but perhaps not the correct thing.

  “Never mind. They needed a metal door anyway.” Griffin dropped his hand and dismissed it as if it were nothing, just that quickly, and slung an arm over Zeke’s shoulder. “Let’s go kill ourselves a demon, assuming it’s not just a pissed-off gecko.” Zeke looked mildly relieved and they sauntered out with their duffel bag.

  Zeke was going to be in big shit and Griffin was going to get him out of it. Bottom line, Eden House couldn’t afford to lose a telepath. They might only be able to sense surface thoughts, but it was enough to spot a demon—or a robber, but that’s something we found out later.

  Regardless, the House knew if they tossed Zeke, Griffin, their empath, was gone too. They couldn’t afford to lose two of their best. They did have a few more telepaths and empaths, but humans with talents were few and far between, at least until evolution picked up a little speed, and Griffin and Zeke were their strongest by far.

  Griffin looked back at me, his expression both desperate and fierce. I put a finger to my lips. Their bosses would hear nothing from me. If he thought he could hide the fact that Zeke had done it, more power to him. I wouldn’t give him away.

  “Those two,” Leo grunted as he refilled the pretzel bowl with a rustle of a bag a few weeks p
ast expiration.

  “They have a long way to go,” I admitted as I watched them pass the window to turn the corner that led to the alley where Griffin parked his car—the same alley where we’d destroyed the demon last night, “but I think they just might get there. As long as they learn Eden House isn’t the be-all and end-all of existence.”

  “So it’s not the shit?” he said solemnly, and shoved the pretzels my way—already knowing the answer.

  “No, not nearly the shit it thinks it is,” I said absently as I crunched some stale bread and salt, but he already knew that. “Has Robin called back yet?” He’d called last night when I was out. He said he’d call back today. Robin Goodfellow was one of the many contacts I’d made throughout my life. If I didn’t know something, which was rare, he was likely to.

  “No, but he’s not exactly punctual. The orgies tend to slow him down,” Leo said dryly. True. Robin did like his extracurricular activities. I finished up with the ice, ran a cold, tousling hand through my unruly mass of hair, and had just started working on the glasses when the phone call came. Robin’s impatient, snarky voice was on the other end. It was his usual smooth tone, a tone that always seemed to carry the message Let me fly down to Vegas and show you, or you and Leo, or you, Leo, and anyone else you might have in mind, a good time. “The Light of Life, that’s what you said you were interested in, right?” he asked. “Instead of my naked and amazingly sculpted body? Your loss. Your horrifically catastrophic loss.”

  I ignored the usual bragging . . . truthfully, it wasn’t all bragging . . . and focused on the Light. I was “interested” in it and had been for years. I’d spent the past few of them waiting for news of it to surface, a whisper of a dying demon two months ago to finally echo the rumors, and then set to tracking Robin down via the network of people like me. People in the business of knowing things.

  The demon hadn’t known the location of the Light and very probably didn’t genuinely know anything at all—demons like the little sin of gossip as much as humans do, but Robin . . . Robin definitely knew his shit, which made finding him worth my while. He didn’t stick in one place too often, but if there was anything worth knowing that I didn’t, then he would.

  “Yes, the Light of Life. I’m looking for it just like I said the last time I called and the time before that and the time before that. Have you found anything?” I demanded. I’d noticed Eden House had been looking for it as well and looking hard. Whether they’d known about it as long as I had was a different story. Griffin and Zeke couldn’t tell me. They weren’t high enough to be in the real loop. They were strictly demon chasers, nowhere near management level. They didn’t know what their bosses did. And in some cases, such as this one, they didn’t know what I did either.

  “I’ve heard something, but I’m in New York and I’m in no position to leave. I have friends in trouble. I’m in trouble. It’s like the bad old days when we chased the demons and Eden House out of the city all in one night. I never was able to get the scales and feathers out of my best cashmere coat. I billed the Vatican and the Church of Satan, but did I get my money? No, not a damn penny. Of course, the party afterward almost made up for it. You’ve never seen so many drunk vampires and werewolves in your life. Even Wahan ket showed up, and you know what it takes to pry his dusty, mummified ass out of the museum basement. I remember . . .”

  It was honestly awe-inspiring, who and what you could see if you traveled every corner of the world and kept your eyes open. What you could hear as well, but I didn’t have time for Robin’s trip down memory lane, as entertaining as it usually was. I cut him off impatiently, only verbally, although if he’d been talking to me in person . . . It’s so difficult to be good sometimes. “Robin, I thought you were in a hurry. I know I am.”

  “Fine. Fine. Deny me a little stress relief. The best I can do is give you a name.” He did sound a little stressed under his customary tale spinning and Robin never sounded stressed. He’d fallen in with a bad crowd apparently. That made him more like me. Good for him. I didn’t want to be the only one. Although vampires and werewolves, tsk, were nothing but fanged and furry trash. I’d stick to demons.

  “Who, then? What’s the name?”

  “Wilder Hun.”

  “You’re kidding,” I said incredulously.

  “That’s what he calls himself. Born Eugene Gleck, so who can blame him.” He rattled off an address. “He’s also a molester of sorts, out of jail a year now.” He would’ve told me to watch myself, but he knew better.

  “A woman.” I rapped a fisted hand against the bar. Of sorts? What did he mean by of sorts?

  “No.”

  “A man?” Less usual, but it happened. More and more, it happened.

  “No. Think alcohol, a great deal of it, and a redneck’s most faithful companion.”

  Ah, it was simply Robin being Robin. I didn’t roll my eyes—that would be juvenile—but it took effort. “All right. Your random pervert. So no one can say if it might have been consensual?”

  “I don’t think they had the Pickup Truck Whisperer around to ask, but it wasn’t his and I hear the muffler was never quite the same.” I heard noises behind his voice. “I’ve got to go. Wire the money to my account.” In the background I heard him say, “I said, get away from her. Salome doesn’t like you. You do not want to end up down the incinerator like that Great Dane.”

  He hung up before I could get the news on Salome and what she had against Great Danes; so sue me—I was curious. Born curious and lived every day the same way. Ah well, maybe the next time I talked to Robin I’d get the story on the cranky Salome. I had Wilder Hun, the moronic-named truck molester,. to deal with now.

  Wilder lived an hour or so from Vegas in Moapa. That’s the thing about Vegas that’s so different from other cities. There’s no main drag, then suburbs, more suburbs, scattered houses, rural area stretching on and on . . . no. There’s Vegas and then there’s nothing. Nothing but dirt, sand, tumbleweeds, and the occasional mass of horny tarantulas swarming across the road during mating season. You really have to settle in and drive to find the next signs of life. It ain’t cheaper outside town, baby, because there is no outside town. You have to haul ass to the next town and watch the gorgeous, brown, flat, dead scenery in between.

  When I finally arrived at the Hun Mansion, a shack with a distinct lean, I checked my Smith & Wesson 500 and slid it into the back waistband of my jeans and covered it with my shirt, a Chinese silk and brocade top in reds, golds, and peacock blue. It’d warmed up too much for the sweater. That was Nevada winter weather for you. The shotgun I left covered with a blanket in the backseat of the car. A round or two from my Smith wouldn’t do much but annoy a demon, but Hun was most likely no demon, just your run-of-the-mill pervert. And I trusted my judgment enough to play it that way. I also trusted myself to take down any pervert, run-of-the-mill or otherwise.

  They say the gun is the great equalizer. Not so. A gun blowing off a guy’s balls, that’s the great equalizer.

  I sat on the hood of my car, the metal hot but bearable, and called out to the guy with a hammer banging on the side of his “house.” “Hun. I’m looking for a Wilder Hun. Is that you?”

  There is ugly, then there’s ugly, and then there’s your mama hooked up with King Kong. He was tall, six foot seven at best guess, hairy . . . long, scraggly brown hair and beard, tufts of hair sticking out of the collar of his T-shirt. His arms were like prehistoric caterpillars, bristling with spiny fur, even his ankles from under his jeans . . . never mind. Big Foot in a torn T-shirt and dirty jeans, and with eyes the color of algae on pond water.

  Take your picture of the desert yeti and move on to something more touristy and a little less nauseating.

  He spit on the ground. “That’s me. Whatcha want, little girl?”

  I get called that a lot. I was five-five, flat-footed, but I was rarely flat-footed. I liked heels, the higher, the better, and it wasn’t because of my height. What you can do with a knife you can do just a
s easily with the three-inch heel of a boot—it only takes more pressure.

  You don’t need height. Guns, boots, and attitude, that’s all you really need.

  He started toward me before I could respond to his “little girl” remark, and I held up a hand, then patted the warm metal beside me. “Whoa, Sasquatch. This is my car. It’s a very nice car, and I love it. Don’t you have some sort of fifty-foot restriction against approaching possible victims?”

  The teeth he bared in a snarl weren’t in the expected Sasquatch-Big Foot range. They were quite nice. Sparkly, pearly white, and so incredibly perfect, they had to be dentures. I had a feeling jail was only one of the punishments Hun had gotten for his crime. In a parking lot somewhere, cavity-ridden teeth had probably once littered the asphalt. Someone had loved their truck as much as I loved my car and had used either a crowbar or a tire iron to prove it.

  I started to comment on his bright, orthodontically perfect nonsmile, but remembered I did want some information from this man, and insulting his postcoital dental repair probably wasn’t the way to go. “Just kidding. Just kidding.” I smiled brightly myself and patted the hood beside me again. “Have a seat.” Grumbling, he sat and the car groaned under his weight. My nose stung under the smell, but I kept talking. “I’ve come all the way from Vegas to chat with you and I brought some friends.” I pulled a small wad of cash out of my pocket, spread the bills out, and waved them like a fan. I gave him geisha-girl eyes over the top edges. Men, even those with excessive monkey genes, never fail to fall for that . . . well, that and the four-inch chrome barrel I shoved in his ribs.

  The stick and the carrot.

  It was a pretty sad commentary that human society never much got past that stage.

  “A friend of mine says you know something about the Light of Life.” Griffin had mentioned in passing two years ago that Eden House was looking for it, had been looking for it, although he didn’t know for how long—but it was important. It was important all right. What they didn’t tell him was that it was the most important thing that existed in the world. I was surprised he was able to hear what little he had. He had no idea what it truly was or what it could do. It was hard to say who did know in the House—either Trinity and Goodman or only Trinity. High-level info for high-level jerks.