“I heard that too. Why not?” Katy asked me, genuinely curious.
She had me there. I appealed to Lacey for help, but she shrugged as if to say it never made any sense to her either, but what could you do.
“Who cares?” I said. “What matters is that we shouldn’t be here. We need to get going.”
I was growing exasperated. So far it didn’t look like they realized Katy was a vampire, but if that changed, all bets were off. I suspected the two groups of supernatural creatures kept to themselves, for the most part. I wasn’t sure what happened when a member of the opposite faction showed up unannounced, but I was pretty certain it would result in some kind of drama that I didn’t need.
“Why? I paid for the table for two hours and I’ve barely been here fifteen minutes. Well, I didn’t pay for it; that guy did.” She motioned to the door where the jock made his exit moments before. “But still, it’s paid for, so I’m staying. Now, if you’re not going to buy me a drink, then grab a cue. I’ll rack.” She set her glass down on the bar that ran along the wall and picked up the triangle. She set it on the felt, then took the balls out of the slot in the side of the table and organized them in the triangle’s interior.
“Are you nuts? I see only one of you and at least a dozen of them. If they figure out what you are, things could go south in a big way.”
“That’s why you’re here to protect me, my big strong man.” She finished with the balls, then walked over and placed a hand on my chest. Looking up at me, she batted her eyes in an over-dramatic fashion.
“Wow, she is nuts,” said Lacey. “I mean, aside from the obvious reasons, anyone counting on you keeping them out of trouble is certifiable.” She turned to Katy. “You do realize he’s like a beacon for it? This guy has got the worst luck I have ever seen. It’s not natural.”
Katy stepped back and turned her attention to Lacey, finally taking the time to size her up.
“So who are you exactly? I know you’re not his girlfriend ‘cause she’s on her way to meet Christian.”
Megan was on her way to meet Christian? I sputtered, “Wait, isn’t she still with my mom and Kevin? Why are they going to meet Christian? I have to get to them before Christian can do anything.”
Katy stared. “What are you talking about? How could Toni be with her? She was in California when Christian called her yesterday.”
“Toni?” asked Lacey, her gaze drifting slowly from Katy to me.
“So let me get this straight,” I said, trying to figure out what was going on. “Toni is on her way to meet Christian?” I asked.
“Isn’t that what I just said? Twice?”
“Why on earth would she do that?” I asked.
Katy laughed. “Oh my God, it was classic. You should have heard it! So, like, I might have let it slip to Christian that you had a new girlfriend back in California, and that I had your cell phone with her number on it. So of course Christian had to go and call her up.” She rolled her eyes. “I’m not sure if he wanted to threaten her, or find out where she lived so he could go and snatch her up to complete the set. You know, the ‘everyone Chance cares about’ collection he’s got going? This was before you rescued your mom and then lost her again. That was a smooth move, by the way.”
“Yeah, yeah. What about Toni?”
Katy knew she’d gotten to me and started talking even more slowly, just to rub it in.
“So anyway, like I was saying, Christian calls her up, says he’s a friend of yours, and then asks her if she knew where you were. She wasn’t buying it. So he tries a different angle. He tells Toni that you’re in trouble and he needs to know where you are. When she still refuses and demands to know who he is, he tells her his name and asks to meet with her in person so he can convince her that he’s on the level and has your best interests at heart.”
She paused in her story to walk over to where her glass was, tilted it up, and sucked down the newly melted liquid.
“Well, apparently she already knew all about who Christian was, because she told him he could stuff it and that he had better not have touched you or he was dead. It made sense to me, you know, that you would have warned your girlfriend about Christian. The vampire trying to kill you? But apparently Christian hadn’t expected it, and it pissed him off. So of course he threatened her. He does that when he doesn’t get his way. Said in one of his not-too-subtle innuendoes that he would be ‘coming for her after he finished with you.’
“The bitch went ballistic. I mean, she actually told Christian not to bother coming for her, because she was coming for him. Can you believe it? The look on Christian’s face was priceless! The man was stunned. He finally got enough of his moxie back to manage something cliché like,” Katy lowered her voice, and in a decent imitation of Christian said, “‘You don’t know who you’re speaking to and what I’m capable of.’ Oh boy, that was a mistake. The words that came out of that girl’s mouth made even me blush, and I’m dead.
“So your darling came all the way out here to meet Christian. She seems a little more fiery than you’re used to, Chance.” Katy nodded at Lacey. “So, is this her replacement? ‘Cause, despite the tough words your current girlfriend used, I think you’re going to need a new one soon.”
This was going from bad to worse. I tried to think of a good way to ask Katy about Megan, one that wouldn’t tip my hand, when I was interrupted by a goatee-wearing bald man with large earlobe stretchers and full body tattoos.
The guy was definitely a werewolf, and despite the sense of impending disaster that came with his visit, I couldn’t help wondering what his ears would look like when he changed, and whether the tattoos would show or be covered by fur.
He ignored Lacey and me, walking straight up to Katy.
“Hey, babe, how about you and I play a game? If you want, we can go doubles against your friends here. I can give you some pointers about how to hold a stick.”
“Thanks, but it doesn’t look like you have much to hold on to.” Katy glanced down at his crotch with a pitying look. Lacey had the bad sense to snicker, which didn’t help things.
“There’s plenty enough for both of you.” He split his leer between the two girls.
Katy wasn’t buying it. “Nah, my man Chance here is more than enough for the two of us. But if you’re nice, I’m sure he’ll let you watch. I mean, who knows—maybe even an old dog like you can pick up a trick or two.” I was pretty sure Katy was intentionally getting me into a fight that I wanted nothing to do with.
The guy’s face contorted into a frown as he processed Katy’s remark. His conclusion had him stepping closer to Katy, sniffing the air as he did so.
Katy pulled her head back as he encroached on her personal space. She raised her brows as she did, and shot him an expression that said, in no uncertain terms, “Ew.”
The guy’s frown deepened, genuine anger starting to crack his features, but at least he stopped sniffing. Unfortunately, that didn’t last long. After stepping back to take the three of us in, he turned his sniffer on me.
I tried to ignore the snuffling sounds as I watched his expression shift from anger to confusion. I finally backed up a step when his head started veering down toward my belt line. No way was that dude sniffing anything having to do with my lower half.
He didn’t advance any more, however. He tilted his head to one side as he tried to figure something out about me that made no sense to him whatsoever.
Giving up on whatever it was that stumped him, he moved on to Lacey. The whole exposition was more than a little awkward, especially after Lacey waved her hand in front of her face when he got close and said, “Deodorant. Find it. Know it. Love it.”
I knew where this was going. And, sure enough, his expression turned cocky as he ignored Lacey’s comment and focused in on Katy.
“A vampire? And you came in here? Lady, you are either really stupid, or really....” He struggled to come up with an alternative.
Crap. This was what I’d been afraid of. I scanned the
walls for a way out. Our table was toward the back of the bar. The closest way out was a hallway a few tables over that led to the restrooms. I assumed it let out behind the pool hall. It was closer than the front door, and with only a couple of tables and a handful of patrons between us and it, we might make it. That is, as long as this guy didn’t draw any more attention to us, and as long as none of the patrons in our way were werewolves.
While he was focused on Katy, I started slowly making my move toward the rear exit. I noticed Lacey following my lead, and the two of us did our best to slip out unnoticed.
“Aw, your vocabulary doesn’t reach much beyond sit, heel, and beg, huh?” Katy said, giving the guy a pity pout.
The man actually growled before raising his voice, calling out to the general population of the hall. “Hey, guys, guess what we got ourselves here? A chick that’s so frigid, she’s stone cold dead.”
“Chance, are you going to let him talk to me that way? Chance? Hey, what are you doing over there?”
So much for that plan. Lacey and I hadn’t made it halfway before Katy’s questions drew every eye in the establishment to me. I froze, not failing to notice that Lacey kept right on moving toward the exit.
“Looks like your blood bag is bailing on you, little girl,” said the guy, smirking, in a voice thick with derision.
Katy pursed her lips. “Makes you wonder about what ever happened to the quality of men.”
“There’s your problem. Any dude that hangs out with a corpse instead of finding himself a hot-blooded woman ain’t no man.”
“Hey!” I said.
“What, you think this little old corpse isn’t hot enough to get your blood boiling?” Katy walked right up to the guy, putting her arms around his neck.
Katy’s move and sudden change in demeanor caught him completely off guard. He stood frozen, looking down at her, unsure how to react.
It was the opening Katy needed to forcefully move her knee up into his groin. The action was quick, and I would remember the sound of the preternaturally strengthened collision of knee on balls for years to come. My legs cross involuntarily every time I do.
“Don’t worry about answering. It was a rhetorical question,” Katy said, as the guy doubled up.
She grabbed the back of his leather jacket’s collar and threw him behind her. He slammed head first into the side of a pool table. The impact of his skull on the laminate siding made a loud crack like a good billiards break.
Katy leisurely picked up her glass and ate an ice cube as she watched the guy slump to the floor. I began to slink toward the back door again.
Katy shattered another ice cube with her canine and said to the stunned onlookers, “So… any of you flea-bitten mongrels actually been with a bitch that wasn’t wearing a collar? No? Too bad—it makes all the difference.”
With that remark, the tattooed guy’s buddies finally moved, and when they did, they were fast. The werewolves went from stock still to up and moving in no time flat.
Unfortunately, Katy’s death wish had rubbed off on me. Despite my best attempts at self-preservation through cowardice, two of the five assailants peeled off and headed in my direction. I sighed as I readied myself, noting that somehow Lacey continued to remain unnoticed as she surreptitiously closed in on the exit.
In retrospect, I should have gone for a pool cue, but something about a barroom brawl made me think: bottle. Of course, in the movies, they usually use the larger ones meant for whiskey.
Let me tell you the reason for that. As it turns out, beer bottles are neither as gratifying nor as prone to breaking in spectacular fashion as the other type. The one I used to clock the first guy upside his head thumped against his dome with extreme ineffectiveness.
To add insult to injury, I hadn’t checked to make sure the makeshift weapon was empty before deciding to brain the guy with it. As I brought the bottle up in an arc above my head, its contents fell prey to the force of gravity. A room-temperature shower of fermented liquid and backwash rained down on me before the ineffective collision.
The guy barked out a short laugh as the bottle rebounded off his “ironic” knit cap.
That did it. My right hand dropped the bottle as I sent a quick left jab up at his grinning face. I felt the gratifying, though painful, impact as my knuckles hit home under his jaw.
I wasn’t able to enjoy it for long. His buddy tackled me from the side. We slid across the worn felt of a nearby pool table, sending balls in every direction. On the painful journey, I got to watch the yellow-and- white-striped nine-ball fall into a corner pocket before we rolled off the opposite edge of the table and dropped a hard three feet onto the stained concrete floor.
The werewolf I was grappling with was stronger and faster than me, but I was better trained, and on the floor is where I do my best work—in more ways than one, at least according to my past girlfriends.
I maneuvered for a leg hook, flipping myself around so I was on top of him as he lay face down on his back. I applied a chokehold, which would have had a regular human in submission in short order. It might even take out this werewolf fairly soon. I had never fought with one before. I knew they had inhuman strength and endurance, but I wasn’t sure exactly what their limits were.
I never found out. The guy in the knit cap had circled around the table, landing a football-style punt kick to my side. It sent me rolling sideways, fresh pain lancing from the earlier gunshot wound. My gun slipped out of my pants and went skittering across the floor.
Training took over; I regained my feet and assumed a ready stance. The bartender picked up the handgun. I thought the situation was going to go from bad to worse, but he ejected the clip, locked the slide back, and tossed the piece back down on a table.
My peripheral vision caught the blur that was Katy. She was landing a kick into the face of a tattooed girl sporting a Black Dog Pool Hall t- shirt. I was relieved to see that Katy hadn’t escalated the encounter into anything more deadly than fisticuffs. I doubted her self-restraint and was glad she had left her axe back home.
Lacey arrived at the exit to the hall, where she took up position to watch the fight. My annoyance with her rose when she reached toward the nearby counter and started helping herself to the basket of pretzels.
I didn’t have time to dwell on her lack of help, because Knit Cap was coming for me again. I went on the offensive, moving into him. I executed a foot sweep. Grabbing the front of his shirt with one hand and his left arm with my other, I twisted him around as my foot brushed the floor, knocking his feet out from under him.
He went airborne. I twisted him during the journey so that he would land on his back, laid out in front of me. I kept hold of his arm and moved to secure an arm lock as he hit the ground. He screamed out in pain from the impact and the force I began to apply to his limb. I internally applauded myself at the textbook takedown.
His buddy wasn’t as appreciative. He’d gotten up and grabbed a pool cue, the one I should have taken at the beginning of the fight, and sent it whistling in an arc toward my face. I was forced to jump back out of the way, releasing the hold on Knit Cap as I did.
I kept my eyes on the attacker as he made another wild swing with the cue that I easily dodged. Had I expanded my field of vision, I would have noticed that his friend on the floor had spun around onto his hands and feet and lunged at my legs.
Knit Cap crashed into my shins, and I fell face down on him. I sent a series of sharp knees at his face. The first connected, and I thought I broke his nose. He jerked his head out of the way, causing the rest to land hard against the top of his shoulder. I heard the satisfying crack of his collarbone as my last strike broke it.
My celebration ended when his buddy broke the pool stick across the back of my head.
Chapter 24
My body had taken more than its fair share of beatings in recent days, and it was not at all happy. As I regained consciousness, it protested loudly and in excruciating fashion. At this point, the only thing keeping me go
ing was whatever residual amount of Marie’s blood still flowed through my system.
Someone must have thrown me out the back exit I had originally been heading for, because I lay sprawled in an alley beside a dumpster that could have made a skunk turn green with envy.
Katy was standing over me. The grime covering one side of her once- white tank top told me she had been thrown out along with me. The standing-over-me part told me she had obviously recovered a bit faster than I had.
Her lip had been split open, so when she smiled, it was a bloody grin.
“That was fun!”
I seriously questioned the girl’s idea of a good time. “I’m surprised they let us live,” I said, rolling into a sitting position. I tried to decide between rubbing the back of my head or my side. Other things hurt too, but they were too far back in line to garner my attention. I settled on rubbing both. It probably wasn’t a good look.
Katy made an exasperated sound and stepped away to kick a discarded soda can. The empty maroon-and-white container ricocheted off the wall with a loud hollow ting.
“Come on, Chance. Why do you have to be so dramatic? Not everything involves killing. Sometimes a situation calls for a good old-fashioned barroom brawl.”
“I thought it was a pool hall,” I said.
Katy grinned wider.
“I told you that expecting Chance to keep you out of trouble was a dumb idea.” Lacey stepped into focus above me. She extended her hand, which I took. With her help, I managed to stand up, only crying out a little as I did.
Standing hurt worse.
“And where were you while all this was going on?” I asked Lacey, knowing exactly where she had been.
“On the sidelines cheering you on! Don’t worry—I would have stepped in if things had started getting ugly. You did okay, considering there were two of them.”
“Thanks.”
“Of course, you lost.”
“Nice of you to notice. And Lacey, I’m glad I can count on you to have my back,” I said.
In a moment that reminded me of old times, Katy said, “Well, Chance, when it comes down to it, you know I’ve got your back.”
Texas Hold 'Em Page 25
