Shadow

by Jan Stryvant

  Tomas shook his head and looked back at the others smiling. “Of course he has nothing to fear. We’re the good guys remember? He trusts us.”

  “I still think this job would be more enjoyable if we just locked him up for the weekend,” Fiona complained.

  “Yes, probably. But the DA promised he wouldn’t, so we have to abide by that.”

  They all nodded, most of them looking rather dejected about it too.

  When they finally pulled up in front of the place Shadow woke up and stretched yawning widely. Several members of the team blinked surprised at the show of teeth and claws as he did so. Not to mention all the muscle under the fur.

  “Okay boys and girls,” Shadow said and gave a smaller yawn. “Time for me to go to work.”

  They followed him in as he unlocked the back door of the shop and went inside and started to turn things on.

  Shadow for his part noted he was a bit early. They’d left the courthouse about twenty minutes ago, so it was noon. The place should have been opened over an hour ago; usually they opened at ten-thirty for the lunch crowd. He went and checked the answering machine, sure enough, Kurt had called in sick. The others should start showing any minute, so he shooed Tomas and his gang over to a table and started up the ovens and began pulling out the dough in the fridge to warm.

  “You all just stay put for a few minutes,” he told Tomas, “My opener called in sick as you heard, so I got a bunch of things to get in order for the lunch rush.”

  Five minutes later the morning cook showed up.

  “Kurt’s sick,” Shadow told him, “So it’s just you and me until Vinny gets here.”

  “What about Tony?”

  “He took off today to see his Mom, remember?”

  “Oh, right.”

  Shadow sighed and got busy, some days he really did have to work and this was going to be one of them. As the lunch rush started to pick up he remembered Tomas and his crew were still parked at that corner table, drawing looks. Everyone knew who they were after all. They were on TV enough.

  “Okay listen,” Shadow said walking over to them and wiping his hands on a towel. None of the customers looked twice at him; he wasn’t an uncommon sight here at all. “Here are your choices, I got limited table space so you either order lunch, wait outside, or,” and he grinned at them all, “Sign autographs for the customers and I’ll feed you lunch and dinner for free!”

  They all glared at him, “What?!”

  “Hey, I know how you superhero’s eat. You guys will probably run up a thousand dollar food bill on me. Anyway those are your options, pick one and let me know, I gotta get back to work.”

  “I say we take the free food and sign autographs,” Chen said making them all look at him curiously as Shadow walked away.

  “We are stuck here regardless of what we decide, so he still gets the promotional value of our presence. And none of us would refuse a request for an autograph anyway, now would we? So either we spend our own money to sit inside and eat. Or we spend his. I vote for spending his.”

  “Good point,” Thadieus agreed.

  Ten minutes later Shadow had them seated in a line against a wall behind a table, one which gave them an excellent view of the whole place so they could keep an eye on him, and they were talking with customers and signing autographs. His self-congratulations however were short lived because he was just too busy to enjoy it. Word quickly got around, as it always did, and business boomed even beyond its usual Thursday volume as people came by to meet the city’s super team, and then ordered some food as long as they were there. Both he and the cook were run ragged trying to keep up, and when Vinne showed, early thank goodness, Shadow had to go full bore on making dough and prepping all the other things for the usual night rush.

  The night’s receipts however were huge and when they finally locked the door he was rather happy. Looking around he noticed however that there was no sign of Tomas or his team.

  “What happened to our friends?” he asked the manager.

  “They left about two hours ago. Headed out in a hurry while you were in the back prepping tomorrow’s dough. They left you a note.”

  Shadow took it and looked at it.

  'Sorry to have to run out early, but apparently something came up – Tomas.'

  Shadow smiled to himself, party time at Nance’s he suspected.

  “Kind of surprised you have them as friend’s boss,” One of his cooks said as he got ready to leave. “I thought you didn’t exactly see eye to eye with that group.”

  Shadow chuckled, “Maybe not, but you saw how the customer’s loved it. I hope someone got some pictures. Advertisement like this you really can’t buy.”

  Shadow went home and checked up on Karen, then got himself cleaned up and went back out for a while. He wanted to talk to Nance, but with the heat on him, the last thing he wanted was to draw any attention her way. He decided to avoid Liz and Circe for the same reasons. So he headed down to Bell’s, one of his favorite haunts and headed for his booth in the rear. Kicking back he ordered a drink and a joint, you could get anything at Bell’s, legalities were pretty much ignored, and just relaxed for a while. Eventually he called up one of his girlfriends and went over and spent the night screwing her. Come Friday morning, when he let himself out of her apartment after she had left for work, he was feeling much more relaxed.

  He decided to go make sure the restaurant got opened on time for the lack of any real plans this morning. There was always other business he could tend to, but the whole grand jury thing had him concerned. Maybe it was time to set up that corporation his lawyers had mentioned, so he could keep his legitimate holdings secret from the police, he didn’t want them harassing his staff and hurting his business. He didn’t like the idea of having to go up against Tomas, but for some reason the DA sure had a bug up his butt about Shadow suddenly.

  The shop was open, so he had the driver continue driving down the road without pulling in. A couple bocks down he saw a familiar box van, and had the driver turn down the next street and let him off. Walking back he shifted into his human form for a change, the one form that no one would recognize, and walked down past the Van. It was Tomas’s team’s van alright, and there was a rather official looking, in the law enforcement vein, man behind the wheel.

  Shadow found a discrete location and called his lawyers, neither was aware of any warrants being issued for his arrest, but of course that meant nothing really.

  “Well just be aware that I may be under arrest in the next few minutes,” he told them. “I’m going to go see what this is all about.”

  With that he hung up and after making sure he still had nothing illegal on him, took his defensive form and walked back to the van on the street. The agent started as soon as he saw Shadow. By the time Shadow came even with the window the agent had his gun out and was on the radio.

  “Are you guys looking for me?” He asked politely.

  “Just stay where you are, Sir,” The agent warned him.

  “May I sit in the van please? I’d really prefer not to make a big scene,” Shadow asked politely.

  “Just stay right there, Sir.”

  Shadow sighed, “Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you.” And he just stood there waiting.

  It took them about two minutes to show up, and they did looking rather out of breath and more than a little agitated. Centurion, Thadieus and Tomas flew in of course. Chen and Fiona showed up moments later on foot.

  “Tomas, so nice to see you again,” Shadow said. “To what do I owe the honor?”

  “The District Attorney wants to talk to you about what happened yesterday,” Tomas said in a very no nonsense manner. Even to Shadow he looked upset.

  “So he should have called my lawyers. I’m sorry if I got you in trouble by showing you all off at the restaurant last night,” Shadow grinned and shrugged, “It was just too good of an opportunity to pass up.”

  “That’s not what I’m talking about Shadow.”

  Shadow gave To
mas his best blank look, “Umm, you lost me.”

  “We’re bringing you in for questioning.” Centurion said. “In regards to a murder last night.”

  Shadow bristled a little hardly noticing that they all took a step back from him when he did, “Oh great, who am I supposed to have killed this time? The chief of police? Maybe the local councilman?” He looked up at all of them, “My lawyers are most definitely going to be hearing about this. Now let’s go, might as well get this over with. I hope you didn’t upset the staff back at the restaurant.” And he turned back to the van, “Well you gonna unlock the door?”

  “Umm, Shadow,” Tomas said and Shadow turned slowly back around and looked at him.

  “What?”

  “We’re supposed to arrest you.”

  “Does the DA always arrest people he has brought in for questioning?”

  “Sometimes, especially if he feels they’re dangerous.”

  “Well right now I’d say I’m pretty far from dangerous. However if you want to arrest me and book me and all that other shit, well I’m not going to be so far away from it as you might like.” He looked at Tomas and growled rather ominously, “And if you try to put handcuffs on me, it will get very dangerous indeed. So far all of this has just been annoying, don’t push it Tomas, the Cat has limits.”

  Tomas noticed that Shadow’s demeanor had radically changed in that last sentence, and he remembered the conversations where Shadow had mentioned the ‘Cat’ in the past. Shadow was warning him clearly that he was holding Tomas responsible for this decision, and that he would fight them.

  “Can I trust you to behave if I don’t cuff you?” Tomas asked.

  Shadow nodded, “No cuffs, no BS arrests and bookings and I’ll behave. Remember I came and found you, I’m not looking for trouble.”

  “You sure that’s safe?” Thadieus asked.

  “As much as I’d like to see if we can take him, Shadow’s reputation for following his word is pretty solid. And he did come here looking for a peaceful surrender.”

  “The DA is going to be pretty pissed about the lack of handcuffs,” Centurion pointed out.

  “Well maybe it's time the DA learned that we don’t work for him, isn’t it?” Tomas said turning to the rest of the group. “This is my team and I make the calls. Got it?”

  “Yes, sir!” they all replied.

  Tomas turned to Shadow, “And you damn well better keep your word. Don’t think I won’t kick your ass if you violate my trust.”

  Shadow nodded, he could feel the threat in those words, Tomas was walking his own tightrope here. He’d have to make sure he didn’t violate the trust they’d spent the last several years cultivating either.

  “Now unlock the doors, Sams, and lets go pay the DA a visit.”

  The drive in was rather quiet. Shadow’s feelings were pretty mixed and he was feeling rather conflicted. He’d been ready to fight for his life there, and calming down was taking a little bit of time, if he’d known they were looking for him for a murder rap he would never have approached the van. He’d figured they were just mad at being used in the store last night to drum up business. He knew the others were uncomfortable with him riding with them and not cuffed and sitting on the floor in the back like most of the bad guys they brought in.

  Tomas for his part didn’t know if he was riding with a bomb sitting next to him or not. He knew Shadow was trying real hard to not run afoul of the government, which was tough when one of the members of that government had tried to have him killed. He wanted Shadow to make it through this, preferably with no dead bodies involved. At least by the time they got to the office Shadow had calmed down significantly.

  “The rest of you go back to the office, Centurion you come with us.” Tomas told them and Shadow got out and quietly followed Tomas in the back entrance and down to one of the interrogation rooms. Tomas had Centurion wait outside and make sure no one listened in without Tomas’ knowing about it.

  Neither Tomas or Shadow were at all surprised when the DA flew into the room demanding to know why Shadow was not in handcuffs, and why he was not under arrest.

  “Simple, he came to us. I told him if he came quietly there’d be none of that.”

  “But I gave you an order!”

  “Yes well, good thing you’re not my boss, isn’t it, George?” Tomas sighed, “And don’t go thinking about getting any cops in here, I gave my word. Shadow came here with me and he’s leaving here with me. So ask your questions.”

  The DA looked like he was going to explode for a moment, but then turned towards Shadow. “Where were you last night?”

  “Well up until they left me, you can ask Tomas for all the details. After that, well we closed at nine, and I left about nine thirty. I got cleaned up and went to my favorite watering hole, then met up with a girlfriend and spent the night at her place. Why?”

  “My material witness, who was supposed to turn state’s evidence on a number of cases as well as yours, and enter the witness protection program today, was murdered last night.”

  “What time?” Shadow asked sitting up curious.

  “Forensics isn’t sure yet, but they found the body at a quarter to seven.”

  Shadow looked over at Tomas, “That’s why you had to leave last night I take it?”

  Tomas nodded, “Shortly after we left a fire swept through the offices of the law office that was handling the witness, representing him. One of the senior partners is dead and the entire place was gutted.”

  “Okay, just to be straight here, all of this took place while I was under observation by Tomas and his team, or close enough after he left that there is no way in the world I could have done it, right?” Shadow asked the DA looking up at him from the chair Shadow was sitting in.

  “Yes,” the DA sighed. “But it’s too convenient. I want to know what you knew about it, and what your involvement was!”

  Shadow shrugged, “I still don’t know who your witness was. I also had no chance at all to talk to anyone about your witness after you sprang it on me in the hearing yesterday. Who was this person anyway?”

  “You don’t need to know that!”

  “Well you just told me they’re dead, so what does it matter?” Shadow asked curiously.

  “It was the guy who brokered the contract on your life for the mayor, Shadow.” Tomas said quietly.

  Shadow growled and put his hands flat on the table letting his claws dig into the surface and stood up, his nose only an inch from the District Attorney’s.

  “Let me get this straight,” he said still growling. “You were going to give sanctuary to someone who set up innocent people to be murdered for the pleasure of a corrupt politician, and at the same time you were going to try and send one of the targets of these crooks to jail? Are you going to prosecute the other ones who were murdered as well, Mister Prosecutor?” Shadow snarled showing his fangs, “I’ve heard people say you’re a pretty straight arrow, but if you keep making deals with killers don’t be surprised if one day the devil calls you his own!”

  Shadow smiled evilly as the blood drained from the DA’s face. “If you have any further questions for me, call my lawyers!” He turned to Tomas, “Get me out of here before I break my word.”

  Tomas opened the door and they left.

  # # # # #

  A month later Shadow was sitting in a park when Tomas walked up to him and sat down.

  “Why a park?”

  “Cause I can hear or see anything within a couple of hundred yards. Why not? Plus I like the leaves in the fall.”

  Tomas looked around, winter was in the air and there were very few leaves left to look at. “The DA I think is still afraid you’re going to come for his soul.” Tomas chuckled. “That little devil speech and the snarl on your face was pretty impressive.”

  “Yeah well, it was all pretty hypocritical if you ask me.”

  Tomas nodded, “Well he’s a good man. Hopefully he’ll learn from this and realize that sometimes it’s better to let thi
ngs go.”

  “So he’s completely given up on the mayor then?”

  “Yes and no. He’s investigating corruption down at city hall under the old administration. Something you said sunk in.”

  “Which was?”

  “The other victims. He hadn’t thought to consider that there may have been others who had died.”

  “There were.”

  “Any idea who?”

  “No, but I heard enough rumors about what was going on through my own little sources.”

  “I know you didn’t kill him. But you knew he was going to get killed, didn’t you?”

  “Who? The mayor?”

  “Oh please, I know you took care of him but in my book that’s self defense. No I mean the other guy. The one who set it all up.”

  Shadow shrugged, “I was pretty sure he was going to get whacked. I just didn’t know when. People in his line of work, well their customers see him spilling his guts on one thing; they figure he’ll spill his guts on others. Then there are the people who work for him. They wonder if they’ll be sold out too.

  “No, as soon as the word got out, his lifespan was in minutes from then on.”

  “And you just made sure the word got out, right?” Tomas asked.

  “From what I gathered, there were a number of people who made sure the word got out. I bet a lot of money changed hands while you were eating pizza that night.”

  “So just what was our deceased mayor mad at you for anyways?”

  “I caught his son raping a young girl. I decided on a little ‘eye for eye’ justice. Turns out he liked being raped by big gay leathermen.” Shadow shrugged, “How was I to know? So the mayor blamed me for turning his son not only queer, but making him a bottom too.”

  Shadow watched surprised as Tomas started laughing, and didn’t stop for several minutes.

  “That’s .... that’s priceless!” Tomas snickered.

  “You know, I thought you’d be upset by that.”

  “Why?”

  “Well, because you’re gay.”

  “Pfft! Hell no. I love seeing big high school jocks get what’s coming to them. Well at least the ones who deserve it. How’d you figure out I was gay?”