by Katya Moore
My head was spinning. Nothing was making sense, but at the same time, it made all the sense in the world. It explained so much. I wanted to know more. I needed to know what had happened to me.
But then, the cynic in my brain kicked back in.
“Who are you people?” I set my jaw and narrowed my eyes at Luxe. “You’re sure as hell not a wardrobe manager. And you,” I turned my glare on Kit. “You’re no IT guy.” I ended with Amarok. “And I don’t even know who the hell you are. Who are you, and what were you doing in that mansion?”
All eyes went to Amarok. He bowed his head slightly, a wry grin flicking across his lips.
“We’re in… acquisitions.”
“Acquisitions.” I took a good look around the room for the first time. The table Amarok leaned against was piled with security monitors. It looked uncannily like the security desk at the mansion. Complete with cameras pointed at familiar locations in Mother Glory’s mansion. The table I’d been lying on was surrounded by folding chairs. On the wall, there was a large whiteboard with a remarkably well-drawn diagram of Mother Glory’s mansion, with arrows in four different colors, like something out of a heist film.
A heist film. Motherfucker.
“You’re thieves.”
Amarok didn’t flinch. His smile remained steady. “That’s another way to put it.”
I felt my jaw slacken. I looked around the room at the other four men. Cory was snickering into his hand. Feral leaned against the wall and crossed his arms, eyes dark, face unreadable. Kit looked mildly offended. Only Luxe looked at all repentant, and I had a feeling that it was more that he’d gotten caught.
Amarok was the first to speak. “We were trying to stop Glory from using that scroll. We were there to retrieve it. That scroll was the key to…”
I raised my hands and got to my feet. “I don’t want to hear it. I…” Something yellow caught my eye. There was a door two feet to my left, with a tiny yellow feather sticking out from under it. I whirled and snatched at the doorknob.
“I can totally explain this,” Luxe began as I opened the door.
There was no mistaking it. Thousands of canary feathers. Swarovski for days. It looked like Big Bird’s club wear, all fluffy yellow clouds and sparkling gems. Size extra-small. Price tag astronomical.
“Glory’s Picmont gown.” It was half-statement, half-accusation, all fuck-you-very-much.
Amarok sighed. “Alexandria…”
I turned to face him. “Here’s the deal. You let me out of here, I don’t go to the police. I go back to my normal, HUMAN life, and forget this night ever happened. You…go do what you do. Fence the gown. I don’t care. Just stop making up shit about my life. And whatever you slipped me to make me see what you made me see… fuck you all to hell. I’m going to the emergency room to get it flushed.”
Amarok’s eyes softened slightly. It was a look that only pissed me off more.
Pity.
“Do you really think you can go back to your old life? Mother Glory tried to kill you. You were meant to translate that scroll, then crumple to dust, the same as the scroll did. Do you think you’re just going to go in to work tomorrow and translate her emails for her?” He shook his head. “When she finds out you’re alive, do you think she’ll let you stay that way?”
Don’t let him into your head.
“Let me worry about that. You worry about letting me out of here. Now.”
Luxe stepped forward. “Listen, if you need anything, anything at all…” He held out a business card. “You call me. Okay?” His gaze was unwavering, his tone sincere.
I slapped the card aside. “You kidnap me, tell me crazy stories, make me hallucinate, and now you want to give me your number? Get. Fucked.”
He looked wounded, but let his hand drop.
“We need you, Alexandria.” Amarok said. “The key is inside you. We just…”
I pointed to the door behind him. “I’m going out that now. You aren’t stopping me. If you really want to help me, if your motives are really as pure as you say, you’re letting me go. Now.”
Amarok sketched a bow and gestured to the door. “Be my guest,” he said.
“But boss…” Cory protested. “The client…”
Amarok shot him a dark look. He shut up.
Shakily, I crossed the room, acutely aware of the five sets of eyes on me. Painfully aware of the fact that any one of them could have easily overpowered me, even that obnoxious stick boy Cory. I had a single self-defense class in college, but I held no illusions that it would do a damned bit of good against five professional criminals.
My hand rested on the doorknob.
“You don’t have to go it alone,” said a deep voice. The one they called Feral, all golden eyes and muscle. He didn’t budge from his spot on the wall. He made no sudden movements. But his voice froze me in my tracks.
My fingers tightened on the doorknob. “It’s what I do,” I replied.
The door closed behind me, and I leaned on it, gasping for breath.
Now what?
Chapter Seven
I ran blindly for two blocks before I thought to start looking at street signs. I just needed to get away. I felt like an animal that had chewed off its foot to escape, free but horribly maimed and desperate to find someplace safe. My head throbbed. My chest hurt. My stomach churned.
Home? Too obvious. If Glory really was out to get me, that would be the first place she looked.
My pocket buzzed. I pulled my phone out and looked at it.
Su3bus: Did you do it?
Trixie’s screen name was comforting, even if the message wasn’t. I ducked into the doorway of a closed store and hid in the shadow it provided.
AlexMartin092: Do what?
Su3bus: Don’t. You were there. I know you were.
AlexMartin092: Do WHAT?!? Trix, don’t fuck with me. I’m having a shitty night.
My heart raced faster. What the hell is going on?
Su3bus: It’s all over the news. They’re saying you stole Glory’s gown. That you robbed the mansion.
My heart stopped.
AlexMartin092: What the actual fuck?
Su3bus: That’s what I said too. Lex, be straight with me. Did you have anything to do with this?
Su3bus: No judgment. I just need to know.
AlexMartin092: Don’t be dumb. Of course not.
There was a long pause. I chewed at my lip and tried very hard not to vomit all over the shady-looking pawn shop’s doorstep.
Su3bus: Where are you?
I looked around myself.
AlexMartin092: I don’t know. Things got weird at the mansion. I woke up across town somewhere.
AlexMartin092: I think across town. Trix, I don’t know where I am.
I felt a sob building. I bit it back harshly. Crying is not going to help you right now. Get it together.
Su3bus: Meet me at the place. The place with the good noodles.
Su3bus: Get a LiftRunner. They have GPS tracking. They’ll find you.
I felt myself nodding at the phone, the desperation clutching my chest subsiding a tiny bit.
AlexMartin092: Thank you.
Another long pause.
Su3bus: Don’t thank me yet. I’ve got no clue what to do either.
A bitter laugh snuck out of my throat. I slapped my free hand over my mouth and looked around frantically. They hadn’t followed me. At least, I didn’t think they had. What if one of them can turn into a mouse or some shit? I winced at my own stupidity. They gave you acid, dumbshit. They can’t do that.
LiftRunner came through for me. It took an eternity, but a blue sedan with a very wary-looking young man pulled up. He took one look at my tattoos and haggard face, rolled up the window, and drove off.
“Motherfucker.” I leaned against the doorframe and thunked the back of my head against the brickwork a few times, trying with all my might not to dissolve into a sobbing heap of wuss. It was getting harder by the second.
I summoned a se
cond LiftRunner. This time, I got an SUV driven by someone who looked like he had some stones. He had more tattoos than me, forearms like tree trunks, and a cheerful grin.
“You look like you could use a lift to someplace nicer,” he said cheerily.
I sobbed out a laugh. “Yeah. That would be appreciated.”
Tree Trunks was just what I needed. He cranked up the country music on his radio and started singing along, about a mile off-key. Then he started rambling about Los Angeles, the city of dreams, and his dreams of selling a screenplay someday. The story had action, adventure, romance, and giant robot battles. It was going to be a blockbuster hit someday. It was a needed dose of normal. Well, for LA values of normal, at least. By the time we pulled up to the all-night noodle joint, my evening’s adventures seemed like a distant, drug-fueled memory.
Too bad I didn’t take drugs.
I could see her purple pigtails through the glass front of the restaurant. She sat in a booth in the corner, by herself. A moment of self-preservation-induced paranoia hit me. She wouldn’t sell me out, would she? I looked around the rest of the restaurant. It was empty, save for a bored-looking waitress sitting on one of the barstools at the counter and a strapping young chef laboring over a giant heap of bok choi.
“You take care of yourself,” Tree Trunks shouted after me.
I flashed him a tired smile. “I always do,” I lied.
“Put this on.” Trixie shoved her hoodie across the table at me as I slid into the booth. “Your tattoos are all over the fucking news.”
I yanked the black-and-purple hoodie on and zipped it up. There was a tiny anime figure dangling from the zipper pull, some sort of half-bunny girl with her fingers in a victory-V.
“The hood, too.” She gestured vaguely around her head. “You’ve got the cool hair. People might recognize it.”
I yanked up the hood, obscuring my asymmetrical hair and regretting getting that Celtic knotwork shaved into the side. “Thanks, Trix. Now, what the hell is going on?”
Trixie slid her phone across the table. There was a video cued up.
I looked over at the bored waitress anxiously. She was engrossed in a mobile-app game on her own phone.
I pressed play.
“…at the Forever Young estate, home to pop legend Mother Glory. Police claim that security footage implicates one of Mother Glory’s employees, Alexandria Martin, as an accomplice in the theft of an original Ia Picmont gown, valued at one-point-seven million dollars.” My employee ID photo popped up. I regretted wearing the tank top. You really could see all of my tattoos. “Martin’s computer burst into flames, setting off a fire alarm that allowed the escape of…”
I slammed my finger down on the video. “Those utter and complete bastards,” I hissed beneath my breath.
“What utter and complete bastards?” Trixie asked.
“Trix, I was kidnapped,” I whispered. Her eyes widened, her mouth forming a tiny O. “The guys who stole the Picmont stole me, too.”
“What? Oh my god!” She slapped her hands over her mouth and looked over at the waitress, then dropped her voice to a frantic whisper. “Oh my god! Are you okay? How did you get away? Did they…do anything? To you?” She reached across the table and clutched my hand over the phone.
I shook my head. “No. Maybe. I don’t know. It was…” I thought back to my conversation with them. The shifting. The magic. “They were crazy. And it’s over now. I just have to… I have to find a way to clear my name. I have to find someplace to hide.”
“It was Toby, wasn’t it?” Trixie’s eyes narrowed to tiny slits. “That little weasel. He was playing with your computer. He put some sort of rootkit on it to blow it up. I know it.” She squeezed my hand. “I’ll make sure security looks at that. That should clear your name. Until then, we need to find you a place to lie low.”
“They’re going to be watching anywhere I know to go.” I frowned down at our clasped hands.
“I don’t think they’re watching my place. Not yet, anyway.” Trixie released my hand and slid out of the booth. “Come on. You can crash there tonight, then we can work out a good disguise. Is there anyone who could hide you? Anyone you trust?”
A pang hit my chest. There was only one person in the world I trusted. The words wrenched themselves out of me, visceral and raw, the cry of countless lost souls before me.
“I need my mom.”
Chapter Eight
I stuffed my hands deep in the pockets of my borrowed baggy cargo pants. Chains jingled from the pockets. Thematically, it coordinated with the Alice in Chains hoodie that covered both my figure and my tattoos. I was just another shapeless, disaffected young goth-industrial millennial youth. My eye makeup was exaggerated and reminded me of Cory, so goth it hurt. Black eye shadow sunk my eyes inward. Long streaks of eyeliner traced over my cheekbones, artfully changing the shape of my face just the tiniest bit. My cheeks looked rounder, fuller. So did my lips, coated in a thick layer of black gloss. I couldn’t make myself stop playing with the long hot-pink wig without restraining my hands somehow. It tickled my neck and reminded me why I’d lopped off most of my hair in the first place.
I did not feel inconspicuous. Trixie insisted that I’d be hiding in plain sight. No one would mistake me for me. Also, this was pretty much all she had in her wardrobe, so I was shit out of luck otherwise.
Time to put it to the test.
I rounded the corner and saw it parked across from Little Leaves. A Dodge Charger LX, black, exempt plates, steel rims, no hubcaps. I looked closer and saw the small spotlight on the dash. I’d watched just enough police dramas to know what I was looking at.
Shit.
There were at least two undercover cops at my mom’s shop.
I took a couple deep breaths, willing my heart to stop pounding. The Telltale Heart references raced through my mind. They’d hear it. They’d see the sweat forming on my brow. They’d smell the guilt on me.
What guilt? I didn’t do anything. Goddamn it, this is fucked up.
I crammed my hands deeper into my pocket, slouched a couple more inches, and sauntered as casually as I could toward the tea shop.
I was not the usual clientele, but neither were they. I could see them sitting in the corner, two men with tight haircuts and inexpensive suits, drinking coffee. In a tea shop.
Subtle, boys.
They glanced at me, did a double take, then settled back down. Thick Neck muttered something to Slightly Shorter. Slightly Shorter snorted into his coffee cup and stared out the window.
I took a shuddery breath, my spine rigid. Am I safe? I can’t be safe. Why wouldn’t they suspect…?
I heard a giggle from the opposite corner and my spine unkinked.
Apparently, it was a goth convention at Little Leaves. Six girls…no wait, four girls and two guys… aw hell, gender’s a construct and they were not in construction. Six goths sat at the biggest table, chatting animatedly. Two wore long flowing gowns, one wore a corset and a top hat, one a fishnet shirt with Xs of electrical tape over their nipples, one was rocking a full Gothic Lolita outfit complete with tiny crinoline and black lace doily in her hair, and the last wore a Ministry t-shirt and black jeans, just to be casual.
“Happy Beltane!” the Goth Lolita chirped my way.
Beltane. May Day. Of course. Mom would be doing readings all day today.
I grunted at Lolita. She giggled and returned to her conversation. I sidled up to the bar at the front of the shop and pulled up a stool.
My mom’s assistant, Becky, set down a teapot and turned to face me. “Welcome to Little Leaves! What can I brew for you today?” Her smile was cheerful but bland. The smile you give a perfect stranger. I’d known Becky for a decade. My spine unkinked a little more.
“Can I speak to Ella?” My guts twisted. “She’s busy. I know she’s busy. But it’s important.”
“May I say who’s asking?” She twirled a strand of mousy brown hair around her fingertip and tipped her dark-rimmed glasses back
up the bridge of her nose.
I glanced over my shoulder. The cops were pretending not to listen.
“She read for me on my sixteenth birthday. Something… something’s coming true, and I…” I leaned in and lowered my voice. “It’s…personal.” I forced a stage whisper. “Sexual.”
Slightly Shorter went back to his coffee-drinking and window-staring. Thick Neck bit back a chuckle and pretended harder.
Becky looked over at them and narrowed her eyes. She patted my hand tenderly. “Don’t you worry. I’ll let her know you’re here.”
“Thanks.”
I started to fidget with the ends of the wig, then folded my hands firmly in front of me on the bar. The goths were discussing the big concert at the Othello Theatre this weekend. Mother Glory’s concert. I glanced back at them, wondering if they were members of the Thousand Young. I spotted the hands-and-crescent logo of the Soul’s Tears necklace tattooed on the back of Ministry T’s hand.
Shit.
If my cover got blown, I had bigger problems than the cops. The Young were fiercely loyal to their favorite singer. She wasn’t just a pop star to them. She was the sun, moon, and stars. Ministry T was a lightweight with his demure hand tattoo. I’d seen photos of fans who’d branded Glory’s logo into their flesh. You could get the steel brands on Craftsy for fifty bucks. I heard they were good sellers.
I thought back to Raul. He had a full chest-piece tattoo of Glory’s face, surrounded by the crescent and soul’s tears. He could rest his own hands at the sides to complete the logo. He’d shown it to me on my first day at the mansion. I’d bitten my tongue and smiled as bright a smile as I could manage in the face of such insanity.
I should have run.
Ministry T caught me staring. I whipped my head back around and studied my own hands.
“You going to the concert?” he called.
I cleared my throat and spoke into my chest. “Can’t. Too broke. Tickets have been sold out for months and I can’t afford a scalper.”
“Damn. That sucks.” Ministry T wore a smug smile. “I sold my car to get mine.”
