The entire building was glamoured, maybe even the buildings next to it as well. That was an impressive bit of magic and one that couldn’t be pulled off by just anyone. I took Sarah’s hand, holding the card Tony gave me in the other hand. She let out a soft gasp as she was seeing what I had been looking at for the first time.
What had appeared to be a one story warehouse building was actually a three story home. The place was gigantic, and had a beautifully maintained lawn leading up to the property. Lights decorated the trees and wrapped around the front porch and second and third story decks. People were moving in and out of the structure, most of them dressed in suits, a few in tuxedos. Music floated out of the entrance, and a soulful voice followed the gentle thrum of the bass guitar.
As we approached the building a woman came down the front steps heading directly for us. She was blonde, mid-twenties, wearing a tight-fitting red dress and a sultry look on her face.
“I haven’t seen you two here before. Need any help finding what you are looking for?”
I pulled Sarah a little closer and she let out a cute little squeal, I made sure to keep my eyes down. “Actually a little help would be just what we need, we’ve never done anything like this before and aren’t exactly sure where to get started.” The blonde moved towards my other arm and took it in hers. I felt Sarah stiffen next to me momentarily, but then she relaxed.
“My name’s Ruby and I’d be happy to show both of you around. Now I just need to know what you’re looking for tonight.”
I looked at the ground again, and then gave Sarah a quick glance. She gave me a small nod and I proceeded. “I’m a bit embarrassed, like I said we have never done anything like this before.”
“There isn’t anything you need to be embarrassed about here, sugar. We cater to your needs. Anything you desire can be found here for a price.”
I nodded, pretending to not have the courage to ask about it yet.
“What do you say we start with a few drinks to loosen you up. Then you can tell me about what brought you here tonight.” She started to pull forward and I let myself be led into the house.
Ruby led us to a corner on the main floor and seated us on a plush couch. She gave the curtains hanging from the ceiling a small tug, adding a sense of seclusion to our seating. I watched her as she strutted away. She looked back over her shoulder once, and winked when she found me watching. When she turned around Sarah gave me a small jab to the ribs with her elbow. I rubbed gently at the spot trying not to draw her attention to it.
“What are you doing?” she hissed.
“Playing a part.”
“Well try and play the part while keeping your tongue off the floor.”
“I seem to remember that you like my tongue.” And I got the elbow again.
“Just remember we have a job to do.”
“I know, but if we don’t play the role we could put one of these women in danger. I don’t think Cane would look very kindly on someone giving away his secrets.”
“Now that is the first thing you said since we got here that makes sense. We might have to take her with us when we leave.”
“True, but I think we need to leave that choice up to her.”
Ruby slid back into our sanctuary holding a bottle of whiskey. “I hope you don’t mind but you looked like you could afford the bottle.”
“Oh, and how much is a bottle of whiskey?”
“One hundred dollars, but it comes with the pleasure of my company while you drink it.”
“Then it seems like the price should be higher.” Ruby smiled, pouring all of us a hefty measure from the bottle. Sarah gave me a little glare, but was forced to smile when I mimicked picking my tongue up off of the ground.
The conversation about events in the city flowed easily from us as we spoke with Ruby. We kept the tone light and she kept it fun and flirty. We had worked our way through about two thirds of the bottle when she finally asked us, “So did you really just come here to have a drink, or were you looking for something more?”
I gave Sarah a kiss and then looked at her waiting for her to confirm it. She gave me the slightest of nods and I knew the ball was in my court. “We wouldn’t mind discussing the something more, somewhere a little more private.”
Ruby smiled. “I was hoping you would say that. It’s not often I get to spend my time with a couple as attractive as you are. If you would like to pay for the bottle, then I can take us somewhere a little more private.”
I made sure to flash my wad of bills at Ruby to keep her interest high. I pulled a hundred and a twenty from the stack and passed it to her. When she walked away I made sure that this time I kept my eyes locked firmly on Sarah. I gave her another kiss and could taste the whiskey on her tongue.
She looked back at me with that wolfish grin. “Don’t get any ideas. I’m not interested in sharing.”
“Don’t worry, my love, this man only has eyes for you.”
She nipped at my lip and I smiled. Ruby came back and waited for us to finish. This time she held out her arm for Sarah to take and I followed behind them as she led us up a flight of stairs. We passed several other rooms before coming to a stop at her door. When she opened it I was surprised to see the size of her suite. The room was huge for its intended purpose. It included a seating area and a tub big enough for three. Curtains lined the far wall but they were transparent enough that I could still make out the bed behind them.
If this was a hundred years ago I would have been sorely tempted to take advantage of the situation. Now I was standing here with the love of my life beside me and it was time to get down to business. “Ruby, we were wondering if you could help us with something?”
“Well that is why I’m here.” She smiled, dropping her dress to the floor.
Her outfit wasn’t nearly as stunning as Sarah’s was earlier, helping me to keep my wits somewhat about me.
“It’s more expensive for a couple, but you two are so cute I’ll cut you a deal. Two hundred for an hour, a thousand for the entire night.”
“Ruby, that isn’t why we are here. We are looking for our friend Mathew.” I pulled out his picture and showed it her. “Have you seen him?”
She tried to run to the door but Sarah stopped her and brought her back to where I was standing. She motioned for her to put on her dress again. I gave Sarah a look and blew her a kiss. She laughed back at me. I was just thankful Ruby had her dress back on. She was stunning and it would be much easier to think without her bra and panties distracting me.
“I can’t tell you anything about him, I won’t.”
“Listen, Ruby, he is a friend of ours. We just want to know that he is ok. Maybe we could still pay you for the night, if you can tell us about him.”
I could see her weighing it up. Was it worth it to risk Cane’s and possibly Mathew’s wrath for the extra money? “If you are worried about staying here we can take you with us when we leave.”
“Are you kidding? I get to keep seventy percent of what I make here. I’m going to leave in two years and start teaching with enough money to buy a house and a car, and not have to worry about anything for the rest of my life.”
“We still need to know about our friend.”
“Listen, Mathew is a great guy, and I don’t want to get him in any kind of trouble.”
Sarah smiled at her, taking a seat on the couch and patting the open cushion next to her. Ruby moved towards her and sat down. I moved to the other cushion and made myself comfortable. When Sarah spoke she put enough concern into her voice that even I believed that she cared. “Mathew worked with us until about five months ago and then he disappeared. We just want to make sure that he is ok, and since we haven’t been able to get in touch with him this was our best bet.”
“Mathew stayed here for a while, maybe until a month ago. He got some kind of promotion with Cane and he left with Tessa. From what I heard Cane gave him a house of his own, and before you ask I don’t know where it is.”
I pulled o
ut ten hundreds and laid them on the table. “Just one last thing we need answered. Where can we find him?”
“I told you I don’t know where his house is.”
“What about where he works?”
She looked around the room as if hoping someone else was going to walk in and save her from having to answer that question. “If I tell you will you go?”
“We will and you will never hear from or see us again.”
“He works at some underground marketplace. Apparently it’s really hard to find, and I don’t know where it is.” She stood up and picked up the money from the table, tucking it away before I could see where it ended up. “But I know someone that is here tonight that goes there regularly, and I can point him out to you.”
“Perfect.”
“You really won’t come back here?”
Sarah placed a hand on her arm as she stood up. “You have our word.”
“Good, let’s get this over with.”
Ruby led us back downstairs and out to where the band was playing. She motioned for Sarah to sit and she pulled me out to the dance floor. The band started playing a slow song and the vocals were deep and rhythmic. We swayed across the floor and I was starting to wonder what this was all about when she finally spoke.
“Spin me around so you can see behind me.”
I did as she requested. “Tell me, what am I looking for?”
“See the man in the red suit coat?”
“I do.”
“That’s him. Apparently he is some kind of bigshot that Cane does a lot of business with. Are we good?”
“You have been delightful.”
“I wish I could say the same.” She stopped dancing and led me back to Sarah. Sarah watched her with the cool detached look of a predator. She only smiled when Ruby left us and headed back to the front of the house.
I looked at Sarah and smiled. “Would you like to join me at the bar for another drink?”
“John, we have work to do.”
“Not until our man in the red coat leaves.”
“Can’t we wait outside for him? I can’t stand this place.”
“I’d feel better if we kept eyes on him until he leaves.”
“Ok but this is going to require dancing, at least two songs.”
“That can be arranged.”
We spent the next hour dancing and keeping an eye on our target. Finally he started to shake hands with the men around him. We broke away from the dance floor and headed to the bar. I placed two twenties on the counter to cover our drinks and we headed towards the front. We got there just after the man in red passed through the door. We walked arm in arm behind him making sure to keep our distance.
When he got into a car, I smiled at Sarah. “Looks like you’re up.”
“Just make sure nothing happens to my dress.”
“I’ll make sure it’s safe.”
“You better.” She darted into an alleyway and stripped out of her clothes. She handed them to me and then shifted. The speed of her shift always astonished me. It took most of the Lycans well over a minute to shift. Sarah always managed the transformation in seconds. Now there was a giant beast next to me standing just over eight feet tall and weighing nearly six hundred pounds. She smiled, her long teeth forming a mischievous grin. “Meet you there.”
I had the ability to track Sarah pretty much anywhere in the city. I watched as she loped off after the man in red’s car and I made my way towards our own vehicle. I laid the dress down in the back and pulled out a pair of pants and shirt for Sarah’s return. I pulled the car out into traffic and called on my gift to track her.
Thirty minutes later I was parked outside of a giant row house. Sarah took a moment to shimmy into the pants and shirt before sitting down next to me. “What do you say, want to call it a night?”
“We should stay and keep an eye out for him,” Sarah said.
“He won’t be going anywhere for a while. He drank a lot of whiskey and if he is as big of a player in the market as we were led to believe, he won’t need to be into work early. I say we head back to the hotel, grab a few hours of sleep, and come back.”
“What if we miss him?”
“Then we come back the next day, and the next. We have no idea when he is going to the market, this might take few tries. It will be easier to track him now that you have his scent, right?”
“It will be. I still think we should stay.”
“Ok then, we stay.”
“That was easy.”
“After how weird tonight was I think I owe you one.”
“Maybe more than one.”
“Agreed.”
I woke up to an elbow in the side. Seriously if there was one thing I could change about her it was how she woke me up. Something a little less painful would do the trick. I followed her arm as she pointed to something in front of us. So it had been the right call to stay here. Mr. Red Coat was up and going earlier than I would have expected. Even with my magic burning away some of the alcohol I consumed, I was feeling a bit groggy. He must have been slightly hammered still.
I waited until he was at least a block ahead of us and then pulled out and started to follow him. Fifteen minutes later he pulled his car in front of a derelict building. He parked the car and headed inside. Sarah started to open her door and I stopped her. A man walked down the street, hopped into the vacant car, and drove it away.
“Let’s head back to the Palace, grab our gear, and check out. We can drop the car off and catch a cab back in this direction. Then we go after him.”
“Ok but let’s make it quick. His scent won’t last forever.”
12
Edward
April 1924
Lying restless and awake while someone sleeps blissfully next to you can be a paralyzing feeling. What happens when you move, will they wake up, will they be worried or angry at the disturbance? Just when had we crossed the line from a few very fun trysts to Maria spending the entire night with me? It was one of those things that just seemed to follow a natural escalation of events. One day you wake up and life has changed in ways you would have never predicted. That would be if I slept, most nights I tossed around for a few hours until the pain in my shoulder became unbearable, after that there was no point in trying.
Now I felt the additional burden of trying not to ruin someone else’s sleep. Oh the things we do for love. I could already tell that tonight was going to be one of the bad nights, and there was nothing I could do about it. The pain medications had stopped working, and I would only dip into the stash of opium as a last resort. I had been able to make a few sleeping potions but even those were starting to lose their effectiveness. As much as I hated to admit it I needed help to figure this out, and since Corson refused to offer me any further help or to remove his essence from me, I was left with one person to turn to, Demetri.
The only good news I had was that it was early enough in the night here that he might still be awake in London. Slipping silently out of bed I made my way to the office. Demetri had proven himself to be a loyal follower but now I wondered just who he was being loyal to? If he had aligned himself more with the Demons then he would refuse to help me as well. There was only one way to find out.
Picking up the phone I dialed his private line. He answered on the third ring. “Demetri, this is Edward, how are you old friend.”
“Happy to find out that the rumors of your demise seem to have been greatly exaggerated.”
“It’s true, I’m alive. There is something that I need from you.”
“You have only to name it.”
I knew that wasn’t true, something was going on here. Demetri wouldn’t offer to help me for free. Either he was being coached or he had his own agenda in place.
“Thank you, my friend.”
I spent the next fifteen minutes telling him about the wound on my shoulder and all of the remedies I had already used to try and heal it. He seemed to be following along and working through the problem. Together
we determined it had to be something in the blade fighting against the Demon’s essence inside of me. What we needed to do was somehow temporarily remove the Demon essence, heal the shoulder and then restore the essence. Demetri filled me in on an ancient potion that could do just that. It would suspend the demon essence just long enough for me to heal my shoulder. I hoped.
“Thank you for the help, you were my last call before I had to take more drastic action.”
“Your last call, you wound me, Edward.”
“If this works I owe you one.”
“I guess that will be enough, but do not heap too much praise on me yet, the ingredients you seek will be expensive and hard to find.”
And there it was, his hook.
“If you need help locating them, or purchasing anything, let me know. I am sure I will be able to round them up for you at a cost.”
“I appreciate your offer of assistance, but I believe I will be able to secure everything here on my own.”
“Are you sure there is nothing I can help you find?”
I could hear the longing in his voice; it wasn’t that he was desperate to help me, but he hated to lose the chance to line his own pockets. It gave me a perverse sense of pleasure to end the call. “Thank you again, old friend, I’ll be in touch.”
Without the chance of further profit the line went dead. I laughed out loud. I had it, I finally had it. The chance to make the near-constant throbbing pain in my shoulder disappear forever was finally here. It had been my constant companion for so long that I could scarcely think of a time when my shoulder hadn’t hurt. There wasn’t a morning in recent memory that I didn’t wake up with blood leaking from the wound. It would be nice not to have to spend the first part of everyday cleaning and re-stitching my shoulder.
Now all I had to do was secure some additional financing and find that bastard Cane so he could take me to this famous market of his. If it was half the place he boasted of then they would have everything I needed. He might even be able to bring my assets over from Europe. I am sure he would charge a price, but with most of the funds pouring back into his place of business it left me in a decent spot for negotiations. I wondered how much longer I should let Maria sleep before calling her master. As if my thoughts had summoned her, she walked into the office wearing nothing but a pouty smile.
Ascendancy Origins Trilogy Page 38
