“So it’s true,” Lauren Carmichael said, gliding over to greet us in a Christian Dior gown the color of a winter storm. “You’re bringing me Gilles de Rais and Daniel Faust.”
“Mademoiselle,” I said, offering a deep bow with a flourish. Turning my face away, if only for a moment, let me hide the glare in my eyes as Meadow Brand loomed into sight at Lauren’s shoulder.
“We need to get him a new body to live in,” Meadow growled, the jagged scar along her face twisting. “I want to kill the one he’s wearing.”
“All in good time,” Lauren said and leaned in as Sullivan took her hand like a gentleman.
“This will be a momentous night for both of us,” Sullivan said.
“It certainly will,” Lauren said, looking around the room. “But where’s the priest? I wanted to meet him.”
“Alas, he’s taken a bit ill. Didn’t think it wise to spread germs around. Since you were so interested in his work, though…”
One of the cambion stepped up and offered Lauren a slender folio with red leather covers, its spine clasped in brass leaf.
“I did bring the book itself,” Sullivan said. “It would be my pleasure to walk you through what we’ve translated thus far, and show you the scope of our ambitions. After dinner, perhaps.”
“Yeah,” Meadow Brand said, her unwavering glare burning a hole in my neck. “Soup’s on.”
Forty
We all sat at one end of the table. Lauren at the head, Sullivan to her left, and Meadow to her right. I sat beside Sullivan, a little close for my liking. The Choirboys filled out the rest of the table, conversing in hushed voices as Lauren’s fake servants flitted in and out of the room in patterns too precise to be random.
The first course was a Cajun-style gumbo, rich and savory and hot from the kitchen. Mama had made it a little less spicy than usual, but if I concentrated I could taste the more special, exotic ingredients she’d added to the mix.
Sullivan didn’t take a bite until he saw me dig in first. He knew I’d put ringers on the catering staff. Probably thought my plan was to poison everyone. What I had in mind was a little more interesting.
The next course offered heaping mounds of pasta Florentine. I’d made the right choice bringing Ben along to help with the charade. His Italian cooking was good enough to pass for professional. At least if I died here, I wouldn’t go hungry.
“I’m curious,” Sullivan said. “You know of my crusade, but what of yours? Why would you need…a man like this to help you?”
Lauren’s gaze drifted toward me. “I’m perfecting a machine that the Lord Marshal had a hand in prototyping. Something to make the world a better place.”
“Something to make the world a better place, from the hands of a child-killer?”
“You are impugning my reputation,” I told Sullivan. He slapped a sheaf of papers on the table. De Rais’s contract.
“As long as I own you,” he snapped, “you will speak only when spoken to!”
It was a clever move. He needed this trade to go off without a hitch. Shutting me up meant one less thing that could go wrong. He was making it that much easier for me, too. I shrugged and ate my pasta.
“Shining things can bloom in dark places,” Lauren said. “Look at you, after all.”
He waved a hand, drenched in fake modesty. “I’m just walking the path of the pilgrim. Helping the wayward souls who come to me for guidance, that’s the joy of my life.”
“Bullshit,” Meadow muttered, making it the one time I’d ever agreed with her.
“Ms. Brand!” Lauren said, but Sullivan shook his head.
“If the lady objects,” Sullivan said, “I’d like to hear why.”
Meadow stared him down across the table. “You can’t change a fish into a bicycle,” she said. “You can’t change a demon into a saint, and you can’t change a cambion into a human. Things are what they are. People are what they are. Fighting that’s a fucking waste of time.”
Sullivan’s lips tightened, and I could see his hand clench under the table. He took a deep breath and forced a smile.
“The journey of a thousand miles,” he said, “begins with a single step. A human sage said that, and I’ve always found it admirable advice. Can anyone change their nature? Can anyone be redeemed, and put their past behind them? I’m still on that journey, young lady, so I can’t say where it will end. I can only have faith.”
One of the cambion clapped his hands, beaming at Sullivan like he was the Second Coming. The others joined in, and soon the table was a chorus of starry-eyed applause. Even Lauren joined in with a polite golf clap. Meadow and I kept our hands under the table.
“Meadow,” Lauren said quickly, before she could ruin the moment, “we should resolve our business, don’t you think? Run upstairs and get the ring out of the safe.”
My shoulders tensed. The awkward dinner conversation had just become the countdown to a massacre. I noticed more of the serving staff loitering on the edges of the room, blank-eyed and watching the feast. Waiting for their cue.
“Indeed,” Sullivan said, tapping the contract but keeping it close to his hand. “Tonight, everyone gets what they deserve.”
“My thoughts exactly.” Lauren lifted her flute of champagne.
Meadow returned with a small wooden box and passed it to Lauren before taking her seat. Lauren opened the box and showed it to Sullivan. Inside, the Ring of Solomon sat nestled on a bed of black crushed velvet.
“It’s more beautiful than I imagined,” he murmured.
Lauren set the box on the table, close to Meadow’s hand. There they were, all laid out in a rough triangle amid the half-finished plates: Gilles’s contract, Solomon’s ring, and Father Alvarez’s manuscript.
“There’s only one thing I need to know,” Lauren said.
Sullivan nodded. “Ask anything. I’m an open book.”
I slipped my hand into my pocket and around my phone. Before they picked me up at the hotel, I’d pre-keyed a text message. Two words: “GET READY.” I pressed send.
“Not you,” Lauren said and looked at me. “Him.”
Then she asked me a question in French.
I didn’t understand a word of it, but then she chuckled, spread her hands and said “Non?”
Maybe I could fake this a little bit longer. I mirrored her smile and shook my head.
“Non, non,” I said, as if I was in on the joke.
Her smile vanished. “What I said was, ‘If this is an elaborate scam and you don’t even speak French, say ‘non.’”
“Ooh,” I said. “Gotta admit, that was good.”
One of the cambion, farther down the table, rubbed his eyes like he’d gotten sand blown in his face. Another stared around the room, googly-eyed and confused. The gumbo was kicking in.
“I don’t—” Sullivan said, flustered. “I don’t know anything about this, Lauren—”
“Holy shit!” one of the cambion shouted, jumping up so fast his chair fell back and clattered on the hardwood floor. Another fan of the appetizer. I’d eaten it too. I could feel the enchanted ingredients coursing through my system, and I could see what he saw. Brand’s illusions were good, but not good enough to stand up against a heavy dose of Mama’s magic gumbo. It wasn’t just good for your heart; it was good for your eyes too. The effects would only last a few minutes, but that was all I needed to get this party started.
The servants had been creeping closer, clustering around the table, but now they weren’t servants anymore. A baker’s dozen of Meadow’s human-sized marionettes—faceless wooden armature dolls with rusted metal shivs and razors for hands—stood in a motionless ring around the dining table. A couple of Sullivan’s men yanked small guns from pockets and ankle holsters, clutching their steel close and waiting for orders.
“You were going to betray me!” Sullivan roared, slamming his fist on the table.
Lauren bared her teeth. “You were going to betray me!”
I jumped up onto my chair and climbed ont
o the dinner table, standing in the heart of the powder keg.
“Ladies! Gentlemen! You’re both right! You were all about to betray each other. Congratulations and welcome to Las Vegas. If I could have the floor for a moment?”
All eyes were on me.
“The fact is, it just wasn’t meant to be. Crazy rich lady who wants to blow up the world, crazy demon asshole who wants to invade hell…I know, you had high hopes, but this relationship just wasn’t going to work out.”
“I am going,” Sullivan seethed, “to kill you.”
“Not if I get to him first,” Meadow said.
In my pocket, my phone vibrated against my leg. It rang three times and then stopped. The signal I’d been waiting for. I dipped my fingers into my other pocket and took out the poker chip from the Sands.
“For my final performance,” I said, “a golden oldie. Aleister Crowley called it the Harlot’s Curtains—”
“Kill him!” Lauren commanded. The mannequins didn’t move. They only answered to Meadow.
“—but me, I call it Closing Time.”
Lauren bolted up from her chair and shouted, “Kill them all!”
I tossed the chip in the air. It spun end over end, glittering like fairy dust, and exploded.
A pulse of white-hot magic blasted through the room like a flash-bang grenade. Every light died at once, the bulbs in the grand chandelier exploding while the candles on the table sputtered and went black.
That was when the shooting started.
I hit the table, landing in a clutter of dishes as a shot winged over my head. The mannequins moved in, crashing in a wave of wood and rusted steel against the cambion. In the shadows, Sullivan grabbed for the ring while Lauren grabbed for the contract, the two of them almost running into each other. I snatched the book, hauling it back by my fingertips and clutching it to my chest as I rolled to one side, thumping to the floor in a puddle of cracked china and soggy pasta. It wasn’t the most dignified exit, but I was still breathing.
Raw screams ripped through the air. I saw a cambion go down under a mannequin’s weight, the kid gurgling his last breath from a punctured lung as it stabbed him again and again. Another mannequin ate a bullet and collapsed with nothing but splintered wood above the neck. I trench-crawled under the table, following its length toward what I hoped was the kitchen door. As soon as I came out of cover, I crouched and broke into a run, staying as low as I could.
The rest I did from the memory of Pixie’s stolen blueprints. Through the swinging door, hard left, and down a portrait-lined corridor in the dark, then another left. The kitchens were abandoned, lit by moonlight, and the remnants of the next course only half complete. Good. Everybody had bailed on cue.
The door on the far end of the room slammed open, and Meadow Brand barreled in with a gun.
A flickering stream of cards leaped from my pocket and fluttered into my hand as she pulled the trigger. One of my cards took the bullet for me, bursting with light as it tumbled to the floor with a spent .45 slug buried in its heart. I flicked out my fingers and another pair of cards went flying at her. She ducked behind a kitchen island, firing off a wild shot that slammed into the stove.
I dodged left as she jumped up again and opened fire. I tossed card after card into the air, flipping them up like dancing shields. I made it to a small table, kicked it over, and dropped to one knee behind it.
“Much as I’d love to finish this right now,” I said, “you’d better think about your boss.”
“What about her?” Meadow called back, prowling around the edge of the room and looking to flank me.
“You’re sharing the house with a pissed-off demon who’ll probably kill you both.”
“She’s heading for the panic room. She’ll be fine until the cops get here.”
I peeked over the edge of the table. Meadow fired off another round, and a chunk of wood exploded into sawdust.
“Exactly! So if she gets there before you, do you really think she’s going to risk opening the door to let you in? Or is she going to leave you to take your chances with Sullivan and his boys while she stays safe and sound?”
There was no answer for a moment. Then I heard Meadow hiss “Fuck!” and the sound of pounding footsteps as she ran for the panic room.
“No honor among thieves these days,” I muttered and ran out the service door.
I didn’t stop until the far end of Lauren’s driveway, on the edge of a road that snaked into desert darkness in both directions. Headlights strobed three times in the distance, right on cue. I walked toward them.
A white Audi Quattro rolled up and stopped at the side of the road. The tinted window rolled down, and Caitlin looked out at me expectantly.
I stuck out my thumb. “Gimme a lift, lady?”
“Nobody rides for free,” she said with a sly smile. “Did he fall for it?”
“Hook, line, and sinker.”
“Get in,” she said. “Now it’s time for the fun part.”
Forty-One
I dialed my old number. Sullivan picked up on the first ring.
“I’ve got your book,” I said casually. “Just fell into my hand at the banquet, can’t imagine how.”
“So you do. Clever little thief.”
“Out of curiosity, don’t suppose you managed to kill Lauren and Meadow?”
“No such fortune. They hid in their little room of steel. We took our fallen soldiers and left. I’ll be paying them both a visit after I get my book back. What’s your price?”
“I want Alvarez. Get yourself another translator, but that poor guy’s been through enough.”
“The priest,” Sullivan said, “has not been harmed. I wouldn’t dream of it.”
“Even so. I want him. Also, I want my fucking phone back.”
“Trite. But very well. You’ll meet me at—”
“No,” I said. “You meet me. Get a pen and paper. I’ve got directions for you.”
• • •
Emma hadn’t been lazy. From a distance, the Silk Ranch was a graveyard for construction equipment. Cranes slept in the dark, their steel heads bowed, while a dump truck the size of a small building kept watch over a wasteland of bundled steel girders and bags of concrete mix. Only the lights inside the front gate burned against the night, the rest of the compound silent and still. Caitlin and I had been driving for hours, and dawn wasn’t far away.
We rolled in and parked by a cluster of empty cars. As we walked toward the main building, hand in hand, Emma and Ben came out to meet us. Ben’s eyes went wide.
“But I thought you two broke up—” he started to say, and I held up my hand.
“All will be explained. Here, hang onto this.”
I tossed him Alvarez’s book, and he clutched it tight.
“Spotters up the road just called in,” Emma said. “They’re about three minutes out, just like you expected.”
“Showtime,” I said. The four of us stood and watched as lights appeared in the distance. They slowly rumbled closer, winding through the shadows. Four SUVs, black on black. The last of the Redemption Choir.
The tails of Caitlin’s white leather trench coat rippled in a cold desert breeze. She only wore that coat when she was going to war.
The SUVs snaked through the gates and fanned out, splashing us in their headlights as they rumbled to a stop. I didn’t blink. Sullivan got out of the middle vehicle and walked toward us. His mahogany stick rapped against the hard-packed dirt with every step. He stopped about ten feet away.
“Caitlin,” he said.
“Sullivan.”
“I’ll admit, I’m surprised to see you here.”
“That was the idea,” she said.
“Such a pleasure, to end all my problems and avenge all the wrongs done me, on a single night.”
He lifted his hand. Behind him, the remnants of the Choir climbed out of the SUVs and joined him. Every one of them was packing heat. A lot of angry faces and a lot of guns.
“For someone with
a reputation as a trickster,” Sullivan told me, “you certainly did fall for my little ruse. I knew what you were trying to do at the banquet. My goal, on the other hand, was to convince you to meet me somewhere remote. Somewhere I could finish you off without fear of interruption. So I prepared a—”
“I know,” I said. “The book’s a fake, and you let me steal it.”
He blinked.
“This was never about the book,” I said. “And it was never about Alvarez. Hell, it was only peripherally about you, but you dropped a golden opportunity in our laps. We wanted to lure you out here. So you dangled a fake book in my face, and I pretended to fall for it.”
“But, but how—”
“That part’s easy,” Caitlin said. “Daniel organized a meeting to discuss the plan of attack. Except it wasn’t the real plan.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Just a little theater, for an audience of one. Ben. Your inside man.”
Ben stumbled back, his eyes wide, shaking his head as he groped for words. Emma turned to watch him. She didn’t look surprised. Just sad. Sad and tired.
“It’s not,” Ben stammered. “It’s not what you think.”
I nodded. “Yeah it is. See, I sussed you out early on. I told you I was going to meet with Alvarez, and not only did the Redemption Choir show up at the church, they knew my name. Someone had tipped them off that I would be there. Only one person in the world knew that. You.”
“I can explain that!” Ben said, taking another halting step back.
“You came late to the planning meeting. Remember those computer problems that kept you at the office?” I said.
Emma wriggled her fingers in a tiny wave. Her voice was soft. “I arranged that.”
“Working with your wife can be a hassle,” I said, “especially when she knows you’re stabbing her in the back. First, we had the real meeting, to give everyone their real instructions. Then we waited for you to show up, and told you exactly what we wanted you to tell Sullivan. That helped ensure he wouldn’t kill me out of hand—dumb move, by the way, Sully—and bringing you along for the operation made it look like I trusted you. Naturally, we expected you’d leave Alvarez at home and bring a fake book to the party.”
Redemption Song (Daniel Faust) Page 25
