by Beverly Rae
“What are you doing, Jenn? No! Don’t do it! I’ll lose important information. Yanking my power source could cause serious problems. Jenn, I’m warning you. Leave my bat—”
I held up the batteries I’d ejected from Partner and checked out his screen. The image of the cowboy wavered for a moment and disappeared. But not before he’d given me a not-so-cowboy-like gesture with his middle finger.
Taking Partner with me, I returned to the living room and held him high for all to see. “Partner’s out of commission for awhile.”
“Who or what the hell is Partner?”
I blinked at Blake. “I meant to tell you about him earlier”—not!—“but I sort of ran out of time.” I handed Partner to Blake. “He’s my partner called Partner and he’s helped me out a lot.” I sighed and searched for the words to describe what the mechanical-device-turned-friend meant to me. “But I’d still rather talk about this later. Okay?”
Myra and George rose together, their fingers intertwined like teenage lovers. “What do you think, Jenn? Is Partner right? Will our babies turn out…you know, not normal?”
Normal? Normal with a Sasquatch? Was she serious? I wanted to tell her everything would work out fine in the end, but I didn’t want to lie, either. How did I know, anyway? “Gee, I don’t know. I mean, on the one hand George is a Sasquatch.” I studied the man standing in front of me, staring at me with imploring eyes. “But then, on the other hand, he’s also human. I think it would take a geneticist to figure this one out. Not a Protector.”
Blake took one final look at Partner and tossed him on the coffee table. “If we’re finished sorting out their future progeny, we might want to get going on a more pressing matter.”
I knew what Blake meant and had to agree. “He’s right. We need to find Michael and the Bracelet before Demogorgon gets his hands on it.”
“Ohmigod. Are you saying my bracelet is the Bracelet? And all the things I could do and my good luck was a result of my wearing it?” Myra fingered the remaining jewelry on her arms. “Figures. I’d hoped the good luck and powers had lingered inside me all these years and had finally broken out. But I’m still plain old Myra.”
After what had happened to her, after she’d stayed a true and valued friend through good and bad, I couldn’t let her get away with slamming herself. Besides, I loved telling the truth when it made someone else feel better about themselves. “Girl, you were never plain or old. You’ve always been and always will be fantastically special.”
We hugged and I could almost hear the testosterone in the room groaning. Blake, for instance, couldn’t stand the girl love-fest for a second longer. “If you two are through sharing a moment, we need to put our heads together and get our asses moving. Time’s a-wasting.”
Time’s a-wasting? Breaking apart from Myra, I pivoted to Blake. Since when had he started talking like Partner’s cowboy? I laughed and punched a button on Partner. “I used him once before to find Michael. Hopefully, Partner’s locator will give us the lowdown we need again.”
Frowning at the unresponsive machine, I let my impatience work my mouth faster than my brain could stop it. “What’s wrong with this damn thing?”
Blake grabbed my hand and opened it up to reveal the batteries. “You killed him, remember?”
“Oh. Yeah. My bad.” Feeling more stupid than angry—but not by much—I reinserted the batteries in Partner and hit the On button. Partner slowly came back to life.
“I see. Not even fifteen minutes later and you already need me. Let me guess. You need me to cowboy up and help you. Am I right?”
I should’ve known he’d have an attitude once he woke up. I swallowed the biting remark I wanted to make. “Yes, Partner, you’re right. We need to find Michael. Can you pick him up on your locator?”
A petulant cowboy glared at me from the screen. “I don’t know. Maybe. What’s in it for me?”
I had to have imagined his words. Was a machine bargaining with me? “What’s in it for you?” I nearly choked trying to keep my retort inside my mouth. Yet a few of them slipped out anyway. “Hmm, let’s see. Maybe the possibility of staying turned on? Or how about saving yourself from winding up in the town dump? Are those incentives good enough?”
Partner’s screen went black. I shook him, wondering if something terrible had gone wrong. “Partner? Are you all right?”
The monitor wavered for a moment, running static across the screen, before the cowboy image reappeared. “Whoa! What the hell happened?”
“I thought you could tell me.” Did I trust him? Was this a ruse to think I’d damaged him? Was this box of electronic mish-mash guilt-tripping me?
“I’m not sure.” The cowboy gazed around him to check his internal workings. “I think maybe taking my power source—”
“Batteries. You mean your batteries. Right?” Blake leaned over my shoulder to see the screen.
“No, that’s not what I mean. They may look like batteries, but they’re actually a very sophisticated power source.” Cowboy fisted his hands on his hips and rolled his eyes, acting like the first gay ranch hand I’d ever seen. “Should I continue? Hmm?”
I elbowed Blake in warning. We didn’t need to antagonize the Wireless Wonder. “Yes, go on. Can you tell us where Michael is?”
“I don’t believe I can.”
Was this part of his bargaining ploy? “Why not?”
“You must’ve damaged some of my sensors when you did what you did. I can’t get a reading on anything, anywhere. Shoot, I can’t even get a reading on you and you’re standing right there.”
I studied the image and knew with a churning of my gut he was spouting the truth. Damn. “Great. In other words, you’re of no use to us.”
“Hey, little lady, don’t go blaming me. I can’t work under hostile conditions. Have someone rip out your power source and see how well you handle it.”
The thing did have a point. “Well, what do we do now?” I glanced around at my friends and lover. “Does anyone have any ideas where Michael could’ve gone?”
A silence fell over our group.
“George does.”
Okay, I admit it. Out of the four—five, if you count Partner—individuals in the room, I wouldn’t have expected an answer from George. Still, I couldn’t pass up any suggestions no matter who—or what—made them. “You do? Great. Let’s hear it.”
George looked at the floor and shuffled his feet. I’m guessing he didn’t have many opportunities where he was the one with the answers.
“Go on, Georgie. We’re all waiting.” Myra hugged his arm to her.
“Georgie sometimes sleeps in places where dead humans sleep.”
“Huh?” Can you say eewww? Do I want to know what he means? Judging from the expressions around me, no one else understood what he meant, either. I swallowed and decided to go where no man, woman or creature wanted to go—inside George’s brain. “What do you mean…sleeping where dead humans sleep?”
“I know people think they’re spooky, but they’re quiet. When George can’t make it home to the mountains, George sometimes sleeps in a graveyard.”
Maybe I shouldn’t have supported his relationship with Myra, feeling the way I felt. I mean, the guy sleeps in graveyards, for creep’s sake. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Eeewww. Right now, however, I needed to get him to stick with the problem at hand. We’d discuss his gruesome sleeping arrangements later—if we had to. “And this has to do with Michael’s whereabouts because why?”
George gazed at me with his puppy-dog eyes and proceeded to floor me. “Michael’s a ghoul.”
I tried to remember not all people got to the punch line as fast as I did, but my tolerance level lowered another degree. “Yes, George, we’ve established that Michael’s a ghoul.” I threw out my hands in a now what? gesture.
George, however, was a Sasquatch who marched to the beat of his own slower-than-a-worm-snug-in-warm-mud drum. “Sure-sure. Everyone knows Michael is a ghoul.”
M
yra sensed my impatience and pushed him before I could open my mouth to yell at him. “And? We’re dying here, George. Tell us, please.”
George beamed at her. “Because George sees ghouls in the graveyards lots of times. Ghouls like graveyards. Which means…”
“Michael would like graveyards.” Why hadn’t I thought of this? George, the Big Foot, er, Sasquatch, might appear dumber-than-dirt, but he had some hardworking gray matter encased in that monster-sized head of his.
Blake grabbed my arm, turning me toward him. “I can’t believe I’m about to say this, but I think your job in the real estate business can help us. You know this town better than the rest of us.”
I checked the expectant faces around me. My mind zipped through locating the cemeteries in our area of town and came up with the one closest to our house. “Michael wouldn’t want to waste any time in using the Bracelet. Plus, I think he’d want to get to the nearest cemetery where he could use it in the relative safety of his own kind. Or where he could turn it over to Demogorgon.”
“But what would Michael use the Bracelet for?” Myra patted George’s arm in a loving manner.
“I’m not sure.” Blake and I exchanged a worried look. Obviously, Michael hadn’t planned on using the Bracelet to regain his and Blake’s mortality. Instead, I feared he would rendezvous with Demogorgon and hand over the Bracelet. “But I intend to find out.”
“My thoughts exactly.” Blake leaned over and searched my face. “And the nearest cemetery is…”
“Twin Oaks Cemetery. Ten miles from here.”
My Gravestone or Yours?
Have I mentioned how I’d love for someone, once in my career, to say “Hey, great idea, Jenn!”? Maybe even give me a little pat on the back with an “’Atta girl” thrown in? But nooooo. Nothing of the kind ever happens and it didn’t happen this time, either. I stood, arms crossed, and unmoving. Blake, Myra and George, however, dashed for the front door.
Proving once again big guys can move quickly when they want to, George reached the front door first and held it open for Myra. He blocked Blake with a tree-trunk-sized arm, and arched a bushy eyebrow at my husband. With a grunt of satisfaction, George followed after Myra.
Blake let his irritation seep into his tone, turned and arched his own, albeit well-groomed eyebrow at me. “Are you coming or what?”
Or what? Had he really given me attitude? Oh, no, he hadn’t. But alas, he had. Still feeling sorry for myself at the lack of congratulations I’d wanted and didn’t get—although George was the one who’d come up with the graveyard idea—I nodded at my snippy hubby and trudged grumbling after him.
“Hey, what about me? You’re going to leave me on, right?”
Crap. I’d forgotten about Partner. “Why? Can you fight? Can you run? Why should I take you along? For comic relief?” I knew I shouldn’t, but I took out my frustration on the person—person?—who was easiest to blame.
Partner let loose with a whirr of angry sounds. “Why should you take me along? Are you seriously asking me why you should take me along?”
I rocked my head to one side, then the next. “I’m seriously asking you. Talk up or shut up.” I cringed at my harsh remarks, but it was too late to retract them.
Partner shot different colored beams of light onto the ceiling, flashing on and off like an insane lighthouse. “Because, Ms. Pissy Protector, I can call for help.”
His answer hit dead-on and blew my snarkiness to hell and back. Even though Blake and Myra had cell phones, Partner’s direct line to the Society would get help faster. And without a bunch of explanations. “Good point.” With Partner in hand, I followed Blake out the door.
The new Mutt and Jeff were already loaded into Myra’s tiny Corolla. I took a moment to wonder how George could fit his massive form into the little car. But such mysteries would have to wait for another time. Another time when the fate of my brother-in-law, much less of the world, wasn’t in jeopardy.
Blake and I slid into my Jag—I know, I know. I can’t help it. I simply like saying the word Jag, so sue me—and I handed Partner over to Blake. I waved to Myra sitting in the driver’s seat with George of the Jungle riding shotgun, urging her to follow. She pulled out of the drive and waited for me to take the lead. I swung my Jag—shut up!—out of the drive and noticed Mrs. Hardgrave sticking her head out her door. I waved at her, too, hoping she’d pay no attention to the animal-like man riding in my friend’s car. With one eye on Mrs. Hardgrave and the other on the street ahead of me, I stomped my foot on the gas, zooming my Jag down the quiet suburban street.
Ten miles had never seemed farther in my entire life. Blake buckled and unbuckled his seatbelt in anticipation of jumping out of the car, hot on the search for Michael. But he was driving me nuts with his antsiness. Normally, I’m an easygoing kind of gal─really, I am!─but this time it was all I could do not to slap him upside the head. At last, I slid the car against the curb outside Twin Oaks Cemetery, bumping both the front and rear tires and jostling Partner off Blake’s lap. He smacked against the glove compartment, fell to the floor and skidded under the seat.
“Hey! Watch it, Jenn! You call that parking?”
Neither Blake nor I took the time to retrieve him. Instead, we launched ourselves out of the car and headed toward the twelve-foot-tall wrought iron entrance gate. “Partner, quit griping. If we’re not back in thirty minutes, call the Society for backup.”
Blake beat me to the gate and called over his shoulder. “Thirty minutes? Hell, if Michael uses the Bracelet or gives it to Demogorgon, we’ll be vanquished in less than ten minutes.” With a snarl, he shook the heavy link chain and lock securing the gate.
“What if he already has?”
“Let’s hope he hasn’t had time to slow down and figure out how to use it. Maybe there’s more to using the Bracelet than simply wishing with it.”
“Myra didn’t have any problems using it.”
“I know.” He paused a second to wonder, then shrugged the problem away. “Let’s find him first, then worry about what happens next.”
The two doors of the entrance were held together with the sturdiest chain I’d ever seen. No one would get into the cemetery at night. At least, no human would.
Myra’s car squealed to a stop behind mine, barely missing rear-ending my car. I silently gave thanks for the small favor. George and Myra rushed over to us before I had time to greet them, but Blake was focused on the problem of getting the gate opened.
What’s wrong with this picture? I studied the gate, trying to coax an answer to the surface of my tired mind. Although I could sense the answer hovering near the edge of my consciousness, I couldn’t dredge it out of the swirling mass of circuits called my brain.
“Watch out, everyone.” With a growl reminding me once again of his other identity, Blake grabbed the metal and yanked. Links separated, flying into the air. The lock and the rest of the chain fell to the ground and the gate swung apart. “Let’s go.”
Myra and George rushed by me, dead on Blake’s heels as his long legs ate up the ground. I followed, still unable to let go of the elusive idea. At last, the thought broke free of my subconscious and swam to the surface. “Wait a minute!”
All three of my companions whirled to confront me.
“What? Come on, Jenn, we don’t have time. I have to stop my brother from making the biggest mistake of his life.” Blake bounced on the balls of his feet, keeping himself ready to go in any direction. “Both his lives.”
“You mean worse than changing into a ghoul?” Okay, maybe worse for the rest of humanity, but I couldn’t fathom how it would make anything worse for Michael. “You’re talking about your brother, right?” I shook my head at him. “We’ll have to have this debate later. But for right now, you need to stop. We’re letting him get away.”
“Standing here talking is letting him get away.”
George nodded at Myra’s words and reinforced them in his own unique way by picking her up and raising her above our head
s. “Yeah, Listen to Myra.” Did he think we couldn’t hear her unless he held her up?
“Put me down, George.” He placed her gently back on the ground.
The whole conversation would’ve seemed comical if I hadn’t needed to get my point across. “This isn’t the right cemetery.”
“What?” They peered at each other after all three of them had uttered the word in unison.
“Cute, guys, but try it in harmony next time. Listen up. Michael didn’t come here. We’re at the wrong graveyard.”
Now they remained silent—together. For a second, I thought I saw the human—partly human—version of Hear No Evil, Speak No Evil, See No Evil. I gave them one more chance to speak, but they were a mute bunch. “Okay, here’s the thing. If Michael had come to this place, wouldn’t he have broken through the gate like Blake did?”
They peered past me to study the gate. What was their problem? I knew they were smart enough to grasp my argument. Or at least two of them were.
“Oh. I get what you mean.” Myra slowly nodded, yet I still wasn’t sure she understood. But at least she’d given me a reaction.
The big guy’s face drooped, the implication of my words finally sinking in. “George does, too.”
Okay, those weren’t the two I’d assumed would get me.
Blake, my wonderfully intelligent man, still didn’t get it. How could he not? I frowned at him, urging him to accept the truth. I glanced at George and back at Blake. Was it an IQ thing? Naw, couldn’t be. Maybe it was a man thing. Did he simply not want to admit we’d messed up? Instead, he pivoted on his heel and started running toward the middle of the cemetery.
“No. He’s here. I can sense him.”
“Blake!” I took off after him, zipping past Myra and George. However, they didn’t take long to catch up to me. I huffed and puffed to keep up with my hubby and tried reasoning with him. Trust me. Running alongside a demon isn’t an easy thing to do. Especially with a really fast demon. “Slow down. You’re wasting time. This isn’t the right place. Dammit, Blake, stop!” No matter how hard I tried to keep up, I soon fell behind him.
