by Beth Dranoff
I grabbed an apron and fastened it while giving Derek the Nod. You know—the one that says sorry I’m late, and I’ve got your back, and now would be a good time for you to go pee. The look he flashed me was pure gratitude as he melted into the shadows, leaving me in charge.
Apparently, whatever tonight’s patrons were on made them frisky, thirsty and hungry. The hands, claws and beaks they could keep to themselves. But the orders kept on coming. Gin Giblets—gin plus giblets marinated in a chili pepper/olive oil/port wine vinegar base—were a big hit. So were Flaming Hands—blood orange liqueur, candied lemon peels, grenadine and a shot of pomegranate syrup set on fire with those special order bloody finger happy birthday candles Sandor managed to get from who knows where. But the old Swan favorites were going strong too: Banana Banderos (banana liqueur, Banderos Demon ear juice, two millipedes and a chunk of fresh banana), Kahlúa Kangas (Kahlúa, sweetened condensed milk, fresh basil, Gnort balls and one glow worm served in a long-stemmed glass capable of conga line dancing with the right motivation) and more.
The food orders kept coming too. Cloven hooves battered in cornmeal and served deep-fried with melted shredded cheddar on top. Pig ear crisps made from a mixture of sawdust, wheat gluten and porcine hairs ground into a fine paste and baked at 375°C for forty-five minutes. I’m thinking the “pig” part of the dish’s name came from those hairs. Nachos—of course—because the norms needed something too. Sandor had even added his version of a thin-crust pizza to the menu recently, with toppings ranging from black olives, mushrooms and onions to Zaldor heel scrapings, Snorflart Muckler dandruff flaked spice mix, and a jellyfish ink sauce option.
I felt a cool breeze on the back of my neck and the touch of fingers on my forearm, so familiar, with lips of chilled heat tasting of rose petals and musk and the faintest remnant of remembered death.
“Bloody Bloody Mary? Or will you be having the Rioja tonight?”
“Rioja,” said Jon. “Whatever you have—as long as it’s a good year.”
I pulled the bottle out from beneath the countertop and peered at the orange texturized label.
“Last year wasn’t bad for me,” I said. “How ’bout you?”
And there it was. Wine from a time before my world had tilted sideways and to the left. Because of him. And the boyfriend he refused to leave behind.
I pulled out two glasses and poured some of the rich red liquid for each of us.
“Thanks,” Jon said, sliding a twenty across the bar for his portion. “Keep the change.”
I nodded. I’d more than earned that tip. Jon took a sip from his wine and waited. Such stillness. The frenzy of energy swirled around us but here, between him and me, there was a peace. Focus. And yet it was temporary because there were words needing to be said.
“Sorry about Claude,” said Jon. “He gets jealous.”
“He’s a charmer all right. I didn’t realize you were still seeing him like that.”
Jon shrugged. “I know he did something he shouldn’t have—”
“You mean scratching me and turning me into a shifter?” My life was more interesting now, and I’d discovered community as a result of that scratch, but it didn’t make me any less pissed at Claude. Or disappointed with Jon for going back to him notwithstanding.
The silence stretched, and for once it was less companionable and more noisy with what it was long past time we said to each other. Finally, Jon did the honors. Even though I would have gotten there—eventually.
“We’re done,” Jon said. Not really a question; watching my face as the words passed his lips.
I nodded, the wine on my tongue turning acrid as it mixed with the taste of my tears.
“We are,” I said. “Because—”
“Claude.” Regret and understanding.
“Yeah,” I said. “And Sam.”
That got Jon’s attention, but the smile stretching across his face—pleased?—surprised me.
“Sam is a good man,” he said. “He accepted your apology this time?”
“Yeah.”
“What did you do with Owain?” Jon was teasing, lightening the moment with the faintest wisp of a smile. He knew damned well what I’d almost done with Owain.
“Nothing,” I said. “Owain and me, I think we’re the way we are.”
“Best of luck with that one,” said Jon, gliding to standing.
“Thanks.” And then, because I couldn’t not ask: “Will I see you again?”
“If you need me, I’ll come,” he said. “We’ll always be friends.”
I nodded, swallowing the lump in my throat. “Good,” I managed.
And then he was gone, melting into the throng.
* * *
No time to dwell on what could have been. Whatever lull Jon had wrapped around us, that single moment of peace, it crashed to an abrupt end as soon as he’d vanished from sight. Could the mayhem have been there all along and I’d somehow missed it?
At least the tips were good.
* * *
Sam showed up about an hour before closing. We were operating on Pride Standard Time—if a bar applied to the City for a special license, they could push last call to four in the morning from the usual get-your-last-drink-orders-in-now time of 2 AM.
Sam didn’t make a production of his arrival, sliding into a seat at the end of the bar and checking out the room while he waited for me to find a spare moment for him. I made sure he had a bottle of the latest Junction microbrew we’d gotten in this week while he waited—a syrupy, dark ale called Zen Ghouled—and a bowl of fresh pretzels. Dating the bartender had to have some advantages, right?
You’d think once the kitchen closed the place would thin out. Most nights, patrons would either be stockpiling drinks before we cut them off, or they’d be chasing down their servers to settle tabs before the subways closed. It was either that or the Vomit Comet home—an all-night north/south bus rite of passage to be avoided if at all possible. Because vomit.
Not tonight. We’d be needing to do a sweep of all the Swan’s nooks and crannies before we left, and cleanup would definitely require rubber gloves and construction-grade garbage bags.
Yuck.
I stared out over the bar, unfocusing my eyes, allowing the murmurs and pulsating techno-beats of dancers weaving through and up and around each other to flow through and around me as well. In my mind I was there with them, my heart pounding to the tempo of the song as sweat poured across my skin. Fabric gummy as it clung to my available surfaces.
Something wasn’t right. A snarl caught in my throat and I clenched the counter, my fingers sprouting claws. Shivering. Even though the AC had been on all night, and the temperature hadn’t changed at all. A quick glance at the thermometer gauge behind the pimento olive and lemon-slice trays confirmed it.
Sam was on his feet and scanning the room at my first growl. He’d sensed nothing other than me, but for him that was enough. Still human, but ready to change if needed.
I couldn’t see anything. But I could feel it. A sensation unsafe to free if I was in feline form, not yet; I hid my paws until I could force them back to two sets of four fingers plus an opposable thumb on each side. Watching. Trying to identify this disjointed certainty that what I was seeing was not everything that was there.
Sandor’s head popped out from the doorway of the Employees Only area. He’d probably been doing a preliminary count on tonight’s take. Or maybe he’d been napping. Something had pulled him from that to bring him here; based on his perplexed nose-scratching, he didn’t know what it was either.
Janey swung by with her tray and another round of drink orders. Her voice like tiny crab-apple fists bounding off a wall of rubber and foam, trying to get my attention; failing.
“Ah shit,” she said, glancing over her shoulder, recognizing that look on my face. “N
ot again.” Janey dropped her tray, clattering hard plastic against the harder Lucite, breaking through my fog and somehow getting Derek’s attention while she did it. He’d left the drink management zone to get a start on the cleanup. I was betting wherever he lived was spotless and without clutter as well.
“OK, folks.” Sandor’s voice boomed over the scene, cutting through the music and the words. “We’re getting ready to close up for the night. Let’s settle those bills and have a great dawn.”
Nothing happened.
Janey eased over to the soundboard and slid the master control audio level down to three from its previous seven or eight. Derek started turning the lights up; not full bright, not yet, but at least a couple of notches above the chocolate smoke of five minutes ago.
The dance floor was covered—vertically, horizontally and everything in between—with bodies, all very much alive and in motion. We stared. I wasn’t exactly blushing with innocence—I don’t think any of us were—but my cheeks actually flamed at the show.
And yet I couldn’t look away.
There was a tentacle wrapped around a human man’s leg, naked, and the strawberry-blond hairs covering him twinkled in the reflected glints of the disco ball above. A second and third tentacle worked their way up, suctioning on then off and then on again; the man’s head was thrown back and his mouth parted in a silent screaming O! His hand gripped at a creature with five breasts, all of them purple—and not from the cold. She was facing him, licking her lips, but pushing her tail and ass back into the waiting face of I wasn’t sure what but it involved claws and whiskers and both breasts—only two—plus a penis.
And so it went, with variations. No single group was like the other in any way—aside from the part where they were giving each other pleasure. There were the two women, one leaning against the wall while the other was on her knees in front of her, face buried between thighs that gripped back. A few feet over, another woman, another wall—this time the person in front of her was what I assumed was a human male until I saw the wingspan shift between his shoulder blades to flutter, teasing, across the woman’s body. My breath caught.
“Whoa,” said Sam. He’d glided up beside me without noticing. Can’t imagine why I’d be distracted.
“Yeah,” I managed. My heart was racing; the heat from Sam, even at two feet away, licked at my skin. Needed a taste. I angled towards him, reaching up and around the back of his neck to pull his lips to mine. Sam resisted at first. Unexpected. His eyes looking around, knowing himself now that something was not as it was meant to be; and yet, even so, he couldn’t say no.
The kiss went places his lips were not touching, and I shivered against him. Sam’s fingers in my hair, stroking, going lower. Fur under flesh, strands reaching out to touch, pushing at the surface, tickling in places we couldn’t reach. The part where we weren’t alone, surrounded by others who were feeling some version of that same energy, only made the moment hotter.
Need.
I didn’t care that this was where I worked, that people I knew would be watching. Derek’s eyes burning through my shirt, the clothes I still wore, wanting to see what was underneath. Janey stared too, but her lust for Derek and her jealousy of his attention on me in this moment was coarse salt on my tongue. With that small part of my brain still thinking beyond the haze, I was surprised by the force of her green-eyed passion. I had enough on my testosterone-laden plate without adding another player, especially one I had to see almost every day.
Sam didn’t count. But I pulled away to look at him anyway.
And realized what was going on all around us.
Chapter Thirty-One
“Sam,” I said, touching his forearm as he leaned in for another taste. I could stop anytime. Right? His lips on mine again, all other thoughts lost as his need pressed up against me. I slid my palm down against it, and he strained to reach me through the layers between us. Too many.
But. There were reasons to...not? Not what? Couldn’t think beyond the now, heat sweating my skin, all things hard and soft and peaked and fuck I wanted him now, here, and who cares who sees us.
My breathing jagged, claws digging into his shoulders as I pushed Sam back to the bar. Claws? His hands on my hips as he lifted me up, setting me down on that same counter where I’d been cutting lemons minutes earlier. My ankles crossed behind his waist, pulling him in closer. His tongue sandpaper rough as he stroked along my neck; then, changing directions, as he slid up my shirt from below. My back to the larger room—some privacy at least. All I could do was follow the path of his tongue, wet friction, soaking through the thin veneer of my bra to what still lay hidden.
Sam’s teeth fastened around the edge of lace and eased the scratchy material down, the bristle on his cheek flicking my nipple as it passed. Oh. His fingers doing the same, liberating my other breast to greet the blast of cold from the AC unit over his shoulder.
Grateful that I was facing away from anyone but Sam. Until I opened my eyes, fluttering, and realized I was facing the mirror behind and above the rows of bottles. Shielded from wider view by the muscle-tautened broadness of Sam—but not for much longer, as his kisses trailed down. Derek’s stare fixated on my now-bare breasts and I thought about having him join us. Groaned and closed my eyes again as Sam found that spot, there, his hands refusing to be kept out by something as inconsequential as my underwear or anything I was wearing on top of it. My legs over his shoulders now.
In my head, Derek was leaning across the bar to play with my breasts, arms snaking around from behind. Rubbing my nipples between thumbs and forefingers, pressing together before releasing them again into Sam’s waiting mouth. Teeth.
The neckline of Sam’s t-shirt bunched in my hands as I used it to guide him upwards, his lips brushing across mine. My ankles hooked behind his neck; nowhere for him to get but closer. Sam chuckled. He didn’t seem to mind, his eyes going dark and then golden as my hands found the tight slopes of his ass and dipped in further.
How far were we going to take this? With all these bodies around us not our own?
Wait. Thought. There was something I was trying to do, stop.
At the edge of what I could see, Janey had Derek against the shadows. On her knees, both of his hands buried in her hair, holding her in place.
Something not right.
I tried to follow that thought. I did. But then Sam remembered how to unbuckle his belt, and that my shorts were stretchy and easy to peel off, and there were condoms, and then it was too late. Sam was in, and I didn’t care that Derek was watching or that the counter was wet or that whatever was going on didn’t make sense. I arched my back and gave in, gave up, gave out as we reached that crest together.
* * *
And yet, and still, it wasn’t enough.
That sense of something out of synch kept buzzing in my ears. I was still riding that wave, legs too rubbery to attempt walking or even standing yet, so instead I looked. And looked.
No longer could I make out individual shapes on the floors and tables and chairs that made up the central area of the Swan. Where before had been sex, now there was smoke and liquid and shadows twisting and turning into each other.
“Sam,” I said, careful not to touch him this time. I raised my hips to pull my pants back up—they hadn’t gone far anyway—maneuvering the cups of my bra back into place before pulling down my tank. “Look.”
I motioned to the rest of the room, the players who weren’t us. Sam nodded as he fixed his shirt, zipping up his pants while leaving his belt undone. Not focused. Glancing over but not registering what he was seeing.
I snapped my fingers in front of his nose; held up my index finger and moved it first to the right and then back to the left. Sam’s eyes tracked me. Good. Now I had to get him to pay attention to something that wasn’t me.
His own finger made contact, tracing a line
along the softer skin of my inner arm. Down to my wrist before sliding his hand into mine. Our fingers lacing together, palm against palm; I couldn’t think past the taste-touch of his lips. Wanting more.
No.
I pulled away, twisting my body to one side so I was cross-legged. Not enough—I could still feel his heat. Blinked, and suddenly saw the energy in the room for what it was: gnarled threads of tonal vibrancy winding around and through an ever-expanding ball by something or someone at the other end of the room. Was it just me? I glanced around, checking for recognition in anyone else’s eyes, but mine were the only pair not glazed over with need.
I concentrated, taking all of that craving reignited, rolling it between my palms into a sphere; visualizing purples and blues and oranges, kneading the air into a gooey mass until I could see turquoise blues and buttercup yellows and pastel pinks. Plucking at those threads to weave a cat’s cradle string game of colored wax crayon air of unique strands. Tweezing them out, one and then another, before releasing the thread into nothingness. Hanging in the air before dissipating into the ether.
I looked up again and Sam’s eyes were clear.
“What the...?”
“Look around,” I said. “Something’s not right.”
“No,” he replied, scanning the room. “It’s not.”
I glanced over at Janey and Derek. They’d changed positions; now Janey had her palms flat against the wall, skirt hiked over her hips and held there by Derek’s hands as he plunged into her. The look she’d given me earlier cleared any doubts I had about whether this was something she really wanted. Even though I couldn’t be sure that the haze hanging over all of us wasn’t some kind of Rohipnol effect. Damn. Janey should get her moment with Derek, if that was what she wanted. The problem was that I couldn’t be certain—and without her explicit, clear-minded consent, this entire scene took on an ick factor it was my responsibility to remedy. Whoever sees a problem has a responsibility to try and fix it, right?
So I came up behind Derek and tapped him on the shoulder. He ignored me.
