by Lionel Law
She had clipped the story out and stuck it on her fridge, half in shock at the time. Now the image came back to her mind, and she shook her head. “I don’t feel famous. In fact, fame isn’t paying the rent.”
“I know, and I don’t feel like one of the state’s most eligible bachelors either. What I’m saying Renee, is that I don’t care what others think. I enjoy spending time with you, and would love to have you with me for this event. While some of the people there are rich douchebags I will warn you, the cause is good, and I think that is worth my support.”
Renee thought about it for a moment, then nodded slowly. “Okay. You’re staying with me though?”
“Well, we won’t be joined at the hip,” he said. He leaned over and whispered in her ear. “That part comes later.”
Renee took her hand off the steering wheel of the Jeep and ran it over Grady’s thigh. He was wearing shorts, and she slid it under the hemline to feel the strong muscles of his thigh. They kissed, their tongues caressing each other, breaking only when the constricting harness digging into her collarbone became too painful. “Well, I guess so,” she said. “But you do know I don’t have anything appropriate to wear.”
“I’m sure we can get you something,” Grady said, leaning back into his seat as well. “On that note, I saw your latest Litezout outfit. What’s with the new design?”
“The Horseman,” Renee said, shifting back into gear and continuing down the road. “He’s become such a local celebrity, it just felt fitting. You know he took down a meth lab not two blocks from my apartment two weeks ago? I’ll be honest, whoever he is, he’s doing a lot of good. I’ve even heard some rumors that he’s been doing some stuff down in Tijuana too, cleaning up down there. So I mixed a little bit of his pale motif into my gear too. You know how hard it was to get a nonreflective white fabric that doesn’t fluoresce under black lights?”
“Hadn’t ever occurred to me,” Grady said. “So is that why you mixed Disturbed and Also Sprach Zarathrustra? All you’re missing is a big WHOOOOOOO to start the mix.”
Renee grinned. “Growing up, those Four Horseman were the ones my Dad loved the most. So it was kind of an homage to him too. Think it’s too much?”
“Well, I am kind of jealous. I mean, if I didn’t know better, I’d swear you have a bit of a crush on San Diego’s costumed vigilante.”
Renee looked over and smiled, shaking her head. “You don’t have to worry about that. I think The Horseman is only the second sexiest man in San Diego.”
*****
The Del Mar Hilton was huge, in a Spanish neo-colonial style that made Renee feel, for the first time, like she was out of place with Grady. Smoothing her hands over the rich blue of her cocktail dress, she felt like fidgeting. “You sure I look okay?”
“You’re the most beautiful woman here,” Grady said, tugging at the cuff of his tuxedo. “How’s the coat hang?”
“Perfect, as you’d expect,” Renee replied. “You know, you’re the first guy I’ve ever known who has his own custom tailored tuxedo. I do have to give you credit though, you shine your own shoes still.”
“I love the smell of Kiwi, what can I say? But seriously, you look amazing in those heels. I’m glad you decided to go with the five inchers instead of the shorter ones.”
“That’s just because now we can dance and kiss at the same time without either of us having a major kink in the neck,” Renee joked, taking his arm and squeezing it. “And by the way, I appreciate the way you checked out my legs helping me out of the Lotus.”
“They’re more than worth checking out. Now shhh, we have to put on our airs and be on our best behavior,” Grady said, escorting her into the hotel. The grand ballroom had been set aside for the charity event, which apparently included an auction of donated goods and even some services from the various parties in attendance. “I actually donated two things,” Grady whispered as they came in. “Voelker Consolidated is giving away a Ming vase, and I’m also donating a one hour mix session from San Diego’s hottest young DJ to any local event they want, within scheduling limits of course.”
“Oh? Didn’t know you knew Jim,” Renee deadpanned, referring to Jim “BeatzTown” Garland, one of the other popular acts in San Diego. He and Renee had once been friends before professional jealousy had caused him to get snippy with her. “He’ll appreciate the publicity.”
“Wise ass,” Grady cracked, before whispering. “Okay, show time.”
Coming into the grand ballroom, the first thing that struck Renee was how purple everything was. Not only the flowers, but the lighting and the tablecloths all were various shades of purple. The walls and ceiling had gold and red highlights, leaving her feeling like she was back in time. “I swear, if Julius Ceasar shows up talking about crossing the Rubicon, I would not be surprised in the least,” she whispered. “I feel like I should be wearing a toga.”
Grady nodded but didn’t answer, instead leading her towards a group. “Marcus, Sophia!” he greeted two of them, extending his hand. He shook hands with a black haired man and traded air kisses with a middle aged, slightly overweight woman, both of them looking like they were in their late thirties or maybe early forties. “How are you doing?”
“The golf game’s going well, but my putter seems to be wonky right now,” the man replied as he shook Grady’s hand. “How about you, Voelker?”
“Well, you know how it is, I never can get my chip game good enough to really have to worry about my putter too much. By the time I’ve hit the green I’m already over par, so it doesn’t really matter. Marcus, I’d like to introduce you to my date for this evening, Miss Renee Williams.”
“Ah, the DJ I read about in the paper,” Sophia said, extending one bejeweled hand. “Sophia Rutledge. It’s a pleasure. This golf obsessed buffoon next to me is my younger brother, Marcus.”
“Thank you, it’s nice being here,” Renee said. “I must admit though, I’m totally lost when it comes to discussion of golf or anything like that. The only golf club I’ve ever held is a putter over at a mini-putt range.”
“I wouldn’t concern yourself with it, dear. It’s a horribly expensive waste of time, in my opinion,” Sophia replied. “The only reason I let Marcus indulge in it is it lets me get on with the real family business.”
“Which is?”
Sophia looked almost insulted that Renee didn’t know who she was, but Grady saved her. “Marcus and Sophia own two hospitals in the city,” he said, taking her arm. “Apologies Sophia, but my girlfriend is one of the healthiest people I’ve ever met. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her even sneeze.”
Leading her away, he smiled sheepishly at her. “Sorry. Marcus is okay, but when Sophia is having one of her moods, she can be a bit difficult to deal with.”
“I can tell. And they are your friends?”
Grady shook his head. “Hardly. Honestly, I can’t call any of these people my friends. They’re business partners, social acquaintances, sometimes rivals, and a few I might even call my enemy, but no, nobody here is my friend.”
Renee thought about it, things falling into place. “It’s kind of like some of the people in City Heights,” she said as they made their way over to the hors d’ourves table. “When I was growing up, there were a lot of hustlers, pimps, drug dealers and gangsters. Watching them, I learned a lot about how those groups operated. Later on, I remember watching National Geographic and seeing a special on how supposedly young people join these groups in order to find friends and acceptance, a family. But what I remember was different. Everyone was distrusting of everyone else. You trusted your own group just enough to know that if another gang came by, they’d draw down on them before they drew down on you. But real friends? No. A lot of homies, bloods, cuzzes and niggaz, but no friends.”
“Sounds like the Heights and Del Mar aren’t all that different,” Grady said. “Just the weapons are a bit different, that’s all.”
The event started with an hour of hobnobbing and schmoozing. Renee quickly felt l
ost, as comments went over her head, perceived slights were ignored, and through it all Grady seemed to deliver as good as he got. More than once she saw the tightening of the eyes or the slight flaring of the nostrils that told her whatever it was Grady had just said, it had angered the other person, while at the same time amused the other people around them, or at least was an unreturnable comment.
She honestly tried to keep up. However, she quickly felt like a toddler stomping around in her mother’s high heels while pretending to be an adult. Every verbal step she took felt awkward and wrong, either too much or not enough. If she didn’t say anything, at least she could pretend that whatever was said didn’t affect her, or she could hide behind a polite smile. It was a flimsy defense, and when they finally sat down for dinner, she was on edge. Their table was shared with four other people, one of whom she recognized, the television reporter Maria Mendoza from Action Five. “Maria, it’s good to see you again,” Grady said, leaning over to whisper in Renee’s ear. “Don’t be jealous, I didn’t arrange this. But I dated Maria for a few weeks back when we were in high school.”
“Okay,” Renee replied, not surprised but also not jealous. It wasn’t like she expected to go her entire time with Grady without meeting at least one ex-girlfriend of his. “It’s nice to meet you, Miss Mendoza. I enjoy watching your work on Action Five.”
“Really? Thanks,” Maria said, giving her the first genuine smile she’d seen all night. “I have to admit, I caught one of your shows last year, it was really good. When I saw that you and Grady were seeing each other, I was surprised, but then again, him and I were an unlikely pair for a while too. Sorry Grady, did I let the cat out of the bag?”
“Hardly Maria,” Grady said with a well worn groan. “I do think though I’m going to get a t-shirt for these events that says Yes, I did date Maria Mendoza for three weeks. It would save a lot of time.”
Maria chuckled and shook her head. She leaned over, closer to Renee, and lowered her voice. “To be honest, I love just getting his goat like that. The unflappable Grady Voelker, taken down by a woman like me. It’s fun.”
“Well, he is cute when he’s turning red,” Renee said back, smiling at Grady. Sitting up, the two women smiled more comfortably than she had all night. “By the way, I’ve really been enjoying your series on The Horseman. How’d you get the story?”
“Honestly? Pissed off my editor,” Maria said. “He wanted to assign me to a muckraking story, but one of the companies involved is my grandfather’s. I couldn’t do that, and I told him to keep his lies to himself. Because of that, he put me on the crank story beat for a month. The Horseman story just dropped into my lap while I was on that desk, and I ran with it. To be honest, that video of him doing his thing really made the story, and took the story from one local interest piece to real news. With it already in my lap, my editor couldn’t pull it from me without a real reason, and he didn’t have it. I’m looking forward to him really eating crow when the SCalies come out in December.”
“SCalies?” Renee asked, puzzled.
Maria nodded, not offended in the least. “Southern California News Media Association Awards. They tried calling them the SCNMAAs, but calling an award something that sounds like a cross between skin and enema just didn’t work. So, SCalies it is. Still a stupid name, but who knows? I may get out of San Diego and into one of the national beats from The Horseman. My agent already got a call from MSNBC.”
“Wow, best of luck,” Renee said. She could see Maria on cable news, she had the looks that the stations wanted. However, she didn’t look the MSNBC type, in her opinion. CNN or FoxNews with their trend towards knockout news anchors was more her guess. “So any guesses as to who The Horseman is?”
“None,” Maria said. “I’ll be honest, I’ve had to edit some of what I’ve put on the air about him as it is. I mean, some of the stories I’ve heard, they say he could fly. If I put that on the air, you know I’d be back covering dog adoptions and other hard hitting news before the show even finished. Until I get video of this guy doing anything other than kicking street gang ass, I’m playing it very conservatively in what I say. But yeah, I’d love to meet him some day. To be able to interview a real life superhero? If he’s half the man some of these stories say he is, he’d make the Olympic decathlon champion look like a first grader playing against the NFL.”
“Perhaps some day you will talk with him,” Grady said, “but I think they want to start the auction.”
The auction turned out to be more fun that Renee had expected. Starting with the lower value items (her session, unfortunately, went third in the auction. On the other hand, she did get five thousand for it), each item was brought up, with the main rules being that nobody could bid on an item they themselves had donated. There was apparently some sort of top donor award up for grabs, and the organizers didn’t want someone to bid themselves into the award.
Grady joined in on some of the bids, never actually winning any but driving up prices on items she knew he had no interest in just to get others to bid more. One time, she leaned over to him as he raised his hand, increasing the bid on a steel and copper sculpture and whispered in his ear. “That is the ugliest damn thing I’ve seen all year. It looks like a dog met a Mack truck while it was hunched over pooping.”
“I know,” Grady said soto voce. “But Sophia doesn’t want to lose to me, and the guy who donated it is actually a decent person. So, I’m going to drive the price up to about seventy five thousand, then drop out.”
His instincts were perfect, as she could see Sophia wince as she raised her hand, agreeing to eighty thousand for the ugly chunk of metal. She turned to congratulate Grady on his adept bidding when suddenly the main doors to the banquet hall exploded in a hail of fire and smoke. “Good evening ladies and gentlemen!” a man bellowed over the surprised cries of the group. He was short, maybe five foot seven, and wore a Guy Fawkes mask with his black military style clothing. With him he carried a pump action shotgun, while the three others with him had submachine guns. “I’d love to say I represent some revolutionary group that is here to alleviate the world of the one percent or something, but the reality is me and my boys are just here for the money. So if you all sit down and shut up, nobody gets hurt.”
Renee couldn’t help but notice that somebody already was hurt, a waitress who was holding her arm and crying out weakly. She looked like she may have been caught by the blast of the door, or perhaps a piece of shrapnel, she wasn’t sure which. “What should we do?”
“Exactly what he says,” Maria replied. She reached for her purse, laying it on the table. “I know about these guys. They’ve taken down quite a few jobs in the area over the past six months. And yes, they’ll use those guns.”
Renee nodded, and laid her hands on the table. The gang went around gathering cash and certain jewels, tossing them all into messenger bags. Things were going well until someone, Renee couldn’t tell who, started arguing with one of the gang members about taking his gold ring. He struggled with the gunman, wrestling over his weapon until a short burst of shots rang out, the hall filling with screams. Renee felt something hit her in the chest, and darkness swallowed her up. The last thing she saw was Grady kneeling over her, his face filled with fear and concern.
Chapter 6
The first thing Renee was aware of was a bright light in her eyes. She wondered if she was dying, and it was the fabled ‘light at the end of the tunnel’ so many near death experiences talked about. She didn’t think so, after all she was cognizant of her body. At the same time however, she didn’t think she was in a hospital. It had been years, but she’d been in hospitals before, and the one thing she remembered was the constant electronic and machine noise. Whether it was ventilators hissing, heart monitors beeping or just the constant sound of squeaky shoes on linoleum, she had never known a hospital as quiet as she thought it was right now.
“Renee?” a voice asked, and it took her a moment to place it. It was a familiar voice, one she had come to enj
oy, one she had come to trust. She thought it was one she could say she had even come to love…..“Renee? It’s Grady.”
Grady! Of course! Her eyes snapped open, only to blink shut again at the bright intensity of the overhead fluorescents. “Where am I?” she said, reaching up to shade her eyes. “What happened?”
“You’re in my lab,” Grady replied, standing next to her. She looked down, and could see that she was still in the cocktail dress from before, but Grady had ditched his coat somewhere. “I brought you here after you got shot.”
“Here?” she asked, looking around. The lab was done in eggshell white, and looked like something out of a futuristic computer lab. She thought it kind of looked like the starship Enterprise. “If I got shot, why’d you bring me here, and not to a hospital?”
Grady came around to sit beside her, and she could see the blood that still soaked his shirt. “Is… is that my blood?”
Grady looked at his shirt and nodded. “You were hit in your aortic arch. After the shooting, the gang ran like hell, and I jammed a popped balloon into the wound. I carried you out of there, saying you couldn’t wait for an ambulance, my Lotus was faster. I brought you here because even in the car, you technically died on me. I heard your heart stop, and even though I did everything I could, you were dead for four minutes before I could get you on the table. I was desperate, and did the only thing I could.”
Renee looked down at her chest again, and didn’t see any wound at all. “If I’d been shot, where’s the hole? Where’s my wound?”
Grady stood up and pulled off his shirt, exposing his chest to her. “I told you when we met that I have a PhD in engineering. And while that’s true, it’s not just that. I’m what doctors call a polymath, or someone who pretty much learns everything at first sight. I’m also the descendant of the Nephilim.”
