Dark Dancer (Rosie O'Grady's Paranormal Bar and Grill Book 3)

by BR Kingsolver

  Lizzy inspected the binoculars, held them up to her eyes, played with them a bit, then handed them back with a shrug.

  “Interesting. You guys need those? I can see better without them.”

  Cindy stared at her until I leaned over and said, “You do know that’s her natural hair color, don’t you?”

  She turned to look at me, then back at Lizzy. “Oh.”

  Lizzy grinned, showing her teeth, a rather unsettling sight—seeing predator teeth in the face of a fairy-tale doll. “I’m only half human, or witch, or whatever.”

  Once we passed the main harbor, we slowed, and the captain crept closer to the shore. The land rose steeply north of the harbor, and I was able to see how the rugged basalt cliffs might provide caves, or at least pockets, of shelter.

  “What are we looking for?” I asked.

  “I’m assuming that if they are sheltering in the same place every night, they’ll wear out a trail in the vegetation,” Cindy said. “Look along the top of the cliffs for anything that looks like a path. Also, if you see any caves, try and see if there’s any kind of trail or trash or anything to indicate the presence of people.”

  We drifted along at a slow speed with everyone except the captain scanning the cliffs. Most of us should have just sat down out of the wind and drank the hot coffee that Cindy brought along. Lizzy was the one who found the clues.

  “Over there,” she said, pointing. “There’s a path that comes out of the trees and then goes down the cliff face at an angle, ending in that depression over there.”

  One of the cops set his binoculars aside and picked up a camera with a huge telephoto lens. After he shot a couple of dozen pictures, we proceeded on, but after another hour of not finding anything else, Cindy gave the captain a signal, and he took us back to land.

  Cindy called me the following day just as I was leaving home to go to work.

  “We got them,” she said, “or at least a lot of them. Twenty-two vampires, including three girls who look like they’re about fourteen. SWAT rappelled down the cliff and into the cave and took them all while they were sleeping. Slickest operation I’ve ever seen.”

  “What about the Hunter?” I asked.

  “You mean the one you saw going into Harland Hall? We have the building under twenty-four-hour surveillance, but the whole campus is on a lockdown curfew after dark. The university administration is having kittens. Frankie and her dad have their hands full keeping them away from the media.”

  “Her dad?”

  “Yeah. Franklin is on the university’s board of trustees. Diversity, you know. There aren’t that many prominent black people in Oregon, so he gets asked to sit on every board, commission, and charity. I would go crazy, but he seems to enjoy it.”

  After she hung up, I thought about what the university curfew might mean. If the Hunters were trying to increase Westport’s chaos factor, they would probably shift their activities, their targets, somewhere else. I hoped the Columbia Club members were taking precautions.

  But sometimes, being right is kind of a drag. A couple of days after the massacre at Willard’s Green, someone set a house on fire where a group of high-school-age werewolves were having a party and killed seventeen kids. The survivors said that some mysterious, possibly magical, force prevented anyone from escaping through the doors.

  Frankie let me know that Blair’s doctors had cleared him to receive visitors, so Jolene and I stopped by and took him some flowers and chocolates. He seemed in pretty good spirits for someone who looked like a disaster.

  “Doctors tell me the arm will be fine in a few weeks,” he told us. “The leg is going to take longer. The bullet broke the femur, and until the wound heals, they can’t cast the leg. So, until then, I’m stuck here with the leg in traction.”

  “Lucky thing you were wearing a vest,” I said.

  “No luck about it. Frankie’s rules. All members of our unit must wear bullet-proof vests while on duty.”

  “You might add ballistic-cloth uniforms to that,” I said.

  “Too expensive.”

  Jolene made a rude noise. “More expensive than surgery, weeks in a hospital, and rehabilitation? I don’t think so.”

  I grinned at him. “Since you’re laid up here and can’t use them, what are you going to do with your season opera tickets?”

  His eyes narrowed. “I’m not giving them to you for free. You’ll have to come visit me regularly and bring chocolate.”

  I was just joking, but if he really wanted to give me the tickets, I wasn’t going to turn them down. “You drive a hard bargain, Lieutenant Blair. Anything else? Books to read? Music? Dancing girls?”

  He returned my grin. “If you want to dance, I won’t stop you.”

  Cindy Mackle showed up at Rosie’s that night and handed me an envelope. I opened it to find a half-dozen opera tickets.

  “Jordan said you wanted these.”

  “I thought he was just joking,” I said. “These things are worth a fortune.”

  She shrugged. “To somebody, maybe. I’d just as soon listen to cats being tortured. Besides, he said to tell you that he expects the payment you agreed on.”

  All of the tickets were for Wednesday evening performances, the first one in a week, so I would be able to attend. Then I tried finding someone to use the other ticket. I knew Michaela liked opera, so I called her.

  “Normally, I’d jump at it,” she told me, “but I’m going to be out of town. I have a meeting with some legislators in Salem.”

  “I don’t know anyone else who likes opera,” I whined.

  “Sure you do. Shawna Kincaid. She loves it. She even sings opera. I think she was classically trained before she was turned.”

  “You don’t happen to know her phone number, do you?”

  “Nope, sure don’t.”

  So, on my next night off, I headed out to Necropolis to find Shawna. I usually wore my old Hunter’s clothing when I went there—all black from head to foot—but with all the nervousness in the city about Hunters, I decided that might not be the best idea. I opted for a red top to go with my Hunter’s skin-tight ballistic-cloth black pants and boots, figuring that was gothic enough. I hung my short sword in its scabbard inside my coat and caught a bus across the river.

  Even on a Monday there was a line outside waiting to get in. It always boggled me how many humans frequented the place and that human society turned a blind eye to what went on there, preferring to ignore what was blatantly obvious—that vampires really did exist.

  Jill had told me that many college girls new the score.

  “They consider it a safe good time,” Jill had said. “They like the euphoria, they like the sex, and they know a vamp can’t impregnate them or give them an STD. And, of course, they deny to the rafters that they believe in vampires.”

  I assumed the same was true of the college boys who went there. I also wondered how long it would be before the Otherworld finally came out of the proverbial closet.

  After a fifteen-minute wait in line, the bouncers let me in, and I got a ginger ale from the bartender. It was early, and Eileen wasn’t at her usual table on the mezzanine. I wandered around, looking for Shawna.

  I spotted her waiting tables on the public side of the mezzanine, away from Eileen’s table and the special VIP tables for her vampire friends. As I made my way in that direction, a vampire bouncer moved in front of me when I started to put my foot on the first step.

  “VIPs only,” he said. “Red wristband.”

  I glanced at my blue wristband, then reached up, and putting my hand on the back of his neck, pulled his face down until his nose was almost touching my face.

  “Smell that?” I purred. “I’m as VIP as they come, and if you don’t want me to kick your ass, you’ll get out of my way.”

  He jerked his head free and stared at me, his nostrils expanding with my scent. I smiled at him, and he took a step back.

  “Thank you,” I said, and proceeded to climb the stairs.

&nb
sp; A guy was sitting at a table for two by himself. Thirtyish, slicked-back black hair, pale skin, dressed all in black. He wasn’t a vampire, of course.

  “Is this seat taken?” I asked.

  “I was saving it for you,” he said.

  I didn’t waste my breath calling him a liar, just took the chair.

  “If you see the waitress, call her over,” I said.

  We made a small talk for a bit, with him trying to turn on the charm. Compared with the real vamps, he was at a significant disadvantage. He’d obviously memorized the moves, but without their power of persuasion, a lot of his lines fell flat.

  With the same silence as she snuck up on me at Willard’s Green, suddenly Shawna was standing by our table.

  “Can I get you something?” she asked. Her eyes widened when I turned my face toward her and she recognized me.

  “Yeah, I need a date. I have two tickets to see Porgy and Bess at the opera Wednesday night. Want to go?”

  She threw back her head and laughed. “Sure, why the hell not? Who told you I like opera?”

  “Michaela. I don’t have a car, so pick me up? We’ll go Dutch on dinner?”

  “Sounds good to me. Anything else?”

  “Yeah, can you get this guy some new lines? He’s going to die a virgin if he doesn’t pick up his game.”

  We laughed, and then I got up and walked with her down to the bar. I gave her my phone number and address, then got out. The mixture of blood, alcohol, and pheromones was enough to gag me.

  A little while after I got home, my phone rang. It was Shawna.

  “You said something about going to dinner? Were you serious?” she asked.

  “Yeah. I know that The Dorchester burned down, but isn’t there someplace that accommodates cross-species tastes?” The Dorchester had belonged to George Flynn, one of the losers in the vampire succession wars.

  “Sure, there’s a couple of places. A Manger du Sang is downtown near the opera house. Do you want me to make reservations?”

  “If you please.”

  “You know, you’re full of surprises. I never had a mage ask me on a date before.”

  “Play your cards right and keep your hands to yourself, and it could happen again,” I said. She laughed and hung up the phone.

  I ran down to the hospital in the morning, stopping at a candy store on the way to buy some chocolates.

  “Hey, Lieutenant, how are you feeling?” I asked as I walked into Blair’s room and set the box of chocolates down on his bedside table. “Thanks for the tickets.”

  “Did you find someone to go with you?”

  “Yeah, a cute young vampire I met at a massacre the night you were shot. She loves opera. I’ll have to introduce you when you’re up and around again. If you enjoy a walk on the wild side occasionally, I think you two would get along.”

  I had been anticipating delivering that line all the way to the hospital, and the aghast expression on Blair’s face was worth the wait.

  As I was getting ready for my ‘date’ with Shawna, I realized we hadn’t discussed attire. I had always gone formal for events such as the opera or ballet, but I knew some people showed up in blue jeans. I decided to hell with it and I’d do what made me happy. I had bought some pretty dresses, and I rarely had an opportunity to wear them.

  It was the first chance I had to wear the sleeveless sapphire-blue ankle-length satin evening gown, but I loved the way it felt and how I looked in it. I curled my hair, knowing the waves wouldn’t last an hour, and used a couple of blue butterfly clips to pull the sides into a half updo. With blue eye shadow and blue lipstick, I heartily approved of the girl in the mirror and wished I was going out with someone I wanted to bring home.

  If I thought my love life was barren before, going on a date with a female vampire confirmed that I had hit rock bottom. Not for the first time, I wondered if it would be so bad to just pick up a guy and use him for a night the way Jolene and Lizzy did. Most paranormals didn’t stay with the same partner their whole lives, or at least not monogamously. It was different with humans, who might marry someone for thirty or forty years and grow old with them. For us, a lot could change during a lifespan of two or three hundred years.

  When I got into Shawna’s car right after sunset, I saw that I needn’t have worried. Her blood-red dress with long lace sleeves was as elegant as one could get. She also wore eye shadow and lipstick that matched her dress. We looked at each other and laughed.

  As we drove out of my parking lot, she asked, “Are you sure you aren’t at least a little bit bi? I promise I won’t bite.”

  “Sorry. Been there, done that, not a fan.”

  She sighed dramatically. “Oh, well. I guess we’ll just have to settle on conquering the other half of the world.”

  The restaurant served what vampires called ‘prepared dishes’—in other words, the blood had already been extracted from the victims rather than have them present at the table. I perused the menu and saw that raw blood was available from sheep, pigs, cows, and humans, the last being significantly more expensive.

  Some of the dishes were served warm—blood puddings of various types and flavors, blood sausage, blood pies, and a host of other things that the vamps could eat like regular people. There was also a selection of steaks. I ordered a filet medium rare—the most done the kitchen would prepare—and a salad of raw vegetables. Shawna ordered a petit filet, raw, with a warm blood pudding, and sheep’s blood to drink. I had a vodka Collins.

  “You’ve been in such restaurants before,” she said after the waiter brought our drinks.

  “I worked in one for a short time, and George Flynn invited me to dine with him and his family at The Dorchester once.”

  “There’s a rumor that you’re an ex-vampire hunter.”

  “You know how those silly rumors get started. I’ve never stopped hunting vampires. I just have more fun doing it now. Instead of cutting off their heads, I drag them to the opera.”

  Shawna laughed. Her voice was very pleasant, her laugh melodious. I wondered if I could talk her into singing for me without crawling in her bed.

  When we got to the opera, I insisted on taking a selfie of us together before the performance started. I sent it to Blair captioned, “Thanks for the tickets!”

  I had never seen Porgy and Bess before. The Illuminati wouldn’t have considered it “real” opera, having been written in America, in English, with black performers, but I loved it. So full of life!

  Chapter 18

  After the show, Shawna took me to a vampire bar I’d never been to before. She was as excited about the opera as I was, and as we walked down the street, she burst into song with Summertime. Her voice was truly extraordinary, and it was the perfect punctuation to the evening.

  She led me down a side street between two tall office buildings and then around a small park. What looked like a maintenance building without windows was set against the back of a skyscraper. A minute after she pushed a button on the wall next to a black door, the door opened, and we entered to find a foyer bathed in red light.

  Once inside, I saw immediately that it catered to a completely different clientele than Necropolis. It was decidedly upscale, the majority of the patrons were vampires, and the only humans in the place were with their vampire dates. Shawna ordered a real Bloody Mary, but I stuck with straight whiskey.

  Shawna introduced me to a few people, and I saw some nostrils flare, but she growled at the one guy who made a pass at me, and after that, everyone left me alone.

  We found a small table, and as I listened to the conversations around us, I learned that Hunters and Willard’s Green were two of the major topics people were discussing.

  “How well known is this place?” I asked.

  She shrugged. “Among humans, probably not at all, and I doubt the younger and less affluent of us have ever heard of it. The owner doesn’t encourage those who are not discreet.” And well heeled. Their idea of rail whisky was a twelve-year-old single malt.

&
nbsp; “Do they allow smoking in here?” I asked.

  She looked at me as though I’d lost my mind. “Of course not. Vampires don’t smoke. You’d never find an open flame in a vampire establishment. Even the grill at Manger is electric.”

  The sound of breaking glass came from the back of the bar, and I smelled something burning. Jumping up, I ran toward the sound and found flames in the hallway leading to the restrooms. Pieces of a broken whiskey bottle lay on the floor, and the window in a door beyond that was broken, too.

  I pulled energy from a ley line and pushed it at the fire, covering it, and smothering it. Behind me, in the bar, I heard pandemonium break out. Vampires always got panicky around fires.

  Turning around, I almost ran over Shawna, who was standing behind me. Over her shoulder, I saw another fire break out near the front door. I pushed her aside, shielded myself, and made my way through the crowd. Once again, I managed to smother the fire before it spread past the foyer.

  “I’ve got our coats,” Shawna said in my ear.

  “Good. Stay behind me.” Someone was trying to torch the place, and I had my suspicions as to who. I stopped in the foyer and calmed myself, then pulled as much ley line magic as I could hold. Taking my coat from Shawna, I retrieved my dagger, the main gauche, and handed the coat back to her.

  I pushed through the front door. A motion to my right caused me to look up and find a Hunter bringing his sword down at my head. With no time to dodge, I pushed all the energy I could into my shield. Instead of his sword bouncing, it stopped. Somehow I had trapped it in my shield. I saw panic in his face as he pulled on the sword, struggling to wrest it free.

  I poured more energy into my shield, afraid to divert any power to another spell. Stepping toward him, I shoved the spell-forged dagger through his shield and into his chest. He let go of his sword and took a step back. I hurled a ley missile at him, and his shield dissolved.