by Deanna Chase
I leaned over and shoved the ticket in my purse.
“What’s that?” asked Killian.
“Just a donation request to support the brave public servants of Los Angeles during this time of budgetary shortfalls.”
In the Other Side, they knew me well enough to let it slide. Note to self: get snuggly with local law enforcement. Or just the meter maids.
I revved up the car and looked in my rear view window, noticing a navy blue SUV pulling out. I waited for it to go around, but the driver waved me to cut in front of him. Evidently, there were such things as gentlemen in Los Angeles.
A couple miles down the road though, I realized that the SUV was following me turn for turn. I slowly wove around the blocks and side streets until we were back by Xiaoming’s. The SUV stuck two cars behind me the whole way.
“Hey, Killian?”
“Yes?” he said as he flipped through my CD collection. The man had trouble sitting still.
“Look in the rear view. You recognize that blue SUV?”
Killian readjusted my mirror so that he could get a good look without having to turn around, “No.”
The driver was completely non-descript. White guy, brown hair, sunglasses. I’d have trouble picking him out of a lineup.
“Thoughts?” I asked.
“Outrun him?”
I looked at the wall-to-wall car bumpers and their red flashy brake lights in front of us as far as the eye could see.
“Let’s try Plan B.”
I pulled over to an empty space and turned off the engine. I saw the blue SUV scramble and pull up at a red curb. Amateur.
“Stay,” I commanded Killian. And he did. If only commanding human men was usually as easy…
I got out of the car and walked back to the SUV. The guy tried to turn on his engine and pull out, but I decided to stand in his way.
I knocked on his window and he rolled it down.
“Can I help you?” I asked.
“I’m just an ordinary citizen. You should get out of the street before a hazardous situation unfolds,” he stammered.
I folded my arms and leaned on his windowsill, giving him a good ol’ look down my shirt. He gulped uncomfortably.
“Now, don’t be like that,” I smiled. “I caught your tail fair and square. Now, why don’t you tell me what I can do for you?”
“I… uh… I thought… Want to go out on a date?” he offered lamely.
“Listen, I’m asking really nicely,” I said as I reached into the car and grabbed him by both lapels. “You seem like you’re new to all this and stuff. Why don’t you just tell me why you’re following me and I won’t reshape your nose into something with a bit more character.”
He sighed and pulled out a badge, “We received a tip that an international smuggler of rare antiquities resided in that building and that we should monitor it. I saw you go in and come out, but I did not see an exchange take place so… I thought maybe I should follow you.”
I smoothed out the guy’s shirt, “Agent…?”
“Agent Hogs.”
“Wait, really?”
He blushed bright red, “It was a thing at Ellis Island when my family came over…”
I was getting sidetracked, “Listen, Agent Hogs, I am not a member of an international smuggling ring, nor is the man who resides there. Xiaoming is an historian and a scholar. That’s it. Whoever gave you this information was lying.”
Agent Hogs protested, “He has a whole lot of trips to China...”
I pulled out my business card and handed it to him, “He deals in antiquities, Agent Hogs. He doesn’t steal.”
At least I hoped that Xiaoming didn’t steal, but the agent looked utterly defeated, so rock on with my bad self for hitting a plausible truth with a shot in the dark.
“We have reason to believe that Xiaoming’s safety may be at risk,” I continued, trying to assure the rookie. “You staking out his house is probably a great idea. Just let me know if there is any trouble or if any suspicious characters go to visit, okay?”
“Okay.”
“It was a pleasure meeting you, Agent.”
“Likewise.”
I walked back to my car and watched as Agent Hogs pulled out a cell phone before driving down the street. I opened the door and climbed inside, “Well, that’s handled. Let’s find ourselves a diamond lion statue.”
Unfortunately, the search was momentarily delayed as my car and the cars around me were thrown thirty feet.
Chapter 27
Car alarms were going off and sirens could be heard in the distance.
“That fucking boundary…” I swore, holding my hand to my temple. My forehead was bleeding where I had conked myself on the suicide bar. “Why is it that my airbags never deploy?”
Killian was on the alert, looking where the boundary had bulged. It shimmered for just a moment and then went back to normal.
“Another failed portal,” he said.
“Yah, that’s what I was thinking,” I muttered as I looked around at the chaos. Stunned civilians were starting to get out of their cars and exchange insurance information with one another. I got out to see how bad the damage was to my vehicle. I sighed as I eyed the dented-in door, thinking about all the fun new claims I was going to have to explain to my insurance company.
“I’ve never felt such an earthquake!” remarked a pale, redheaded gal in a car one over.
Other than the cosmetic damage, it appeared that my car hadn’t hit anyone, so I was getting ready to hop back inside when I felt a hand grab my elbow.
I turned, ready to nail whoever it was in the face, but pulled my punch when I saw it was Xiaoming.
“Xiaoming? What are you doing here?” I asked.
“I followed SUV following you. Make sure you not big, fat liar. You not liar. You stupid. You come now!”
There was another terrible bulge in the boundary. It sent a VW bug through a live animals market and hundreds of chickens were suddenly flying free. Score one for the chickens.
“That is Jade Lion,” said Xiaoming. “Too much power. Only works with world walker. Cannot work in hands of non-magic without Diamond Lion. But if lion rests eyes on you, border will open. You will be a noodle and the border will be like mouth.” He made a slurping motion, indicating what fun I had in store if I happened to face the wrong way. I needed to train this guy in the fine art of conversation. Ew.
“You must follow me.”
We ducked into a smoky mahjong hall. It was kind of like a church bingo place, long folding brown tables and chairs. They obviously hadn’t gotten the notice on the “no indoor smoking” ban. Old guys chewed on black cigarettes and stared at us suspiciously. Xiaoming spat out something in Chinese and hustled us through. I saw a group pick up their table and stand at the ready to place it in front of our exit spot.
We dashed through the concrete plaza of old Chinatown, past the brightly colored buildings and a statue of some random Chinese leader.
Xiaoming led us over to the subway. He shooed us up to the elevated platform, “I will bring your car to Father Killarney. You go to top of train station and wait for me.”
Chapter 28
I wasn’t too sure how great I felt about hanging out on an elevated platform to catch a train instead of staying nice and safe with my feet on the ground. But for whatever reason, Xiaoming thought we needed to take the train. So be it.
After about ten minutes watching clouds of smoke erupt all over Chinatown from whatever amateur was trying to wield the lion, I looked down the track for the train.
And then I saw our transport.
If I wouldn’t have felt so completely ridiculous doing it, I would have rubbed my eyes in disbelief. There was Xiaoming, cigarette hanging out of the corner of his mouth, on a pump cart like you see in the old Wile E. Coyote cartoons. The thing that made this cart different was that the whole thing was made of polished silver.
I stuck my thumb out and Xiaoming pulled up to the platform.
&nb
sp; “Nice ride,” I remarked.
“I pimped it for you,” he replied dryly.
I always get the comedians.
Killian leapt over to the cart and then held out his hand for me. Usually, I would scoff at such niceties, but my head was bleeding fairly profusely in that way that only head wounds can bleed.
“Thanks,” I said. He helped me to sit and then took a place on the opposite handle. Between him and Xiaoming, we accelerated to a pretty respectable speed.
“So,” I said, trying to come up with some polite chit chat, “you just keep this baby locked in your garage?”
Xiaoming grunted, “It is for protection. Silver wheels keep us from bad magic attack. Like your stealth bomber, but on train track.”
Stealth. Right. You know, if you’re not blind to three people perched on a shiny handcart and deaf to rhythmic squeaky pumping.
“So, where are we off to?” I asked, my eyes watching the buildings as they whizzed by.
“I get you out of Chinatown before you destroy it.”
“Excuse me, I did not destroy anything.”
“You bring fist of destruction. You will not make portal in my neighborhood.”
“I am the victim here!” I pointed out, holding up my blood-covered hand.
“Does not matter who started it. I end it. You go home.”
“Killian is the one that got me into this. I wouldn’t even be here if it wasn’t for him. If you want to blame someone, maybe you should bark up that tree.”
Xiaoming gave Killian the old fisheye and then declared, “He working. You sitting. He okay. You lazy.”
There was no winning with this guy. He and Father Killarney were a match made in heaven.
“How they find you so fast?” Xiaoming scowled at me.
“I have no idea,” I replied, “Although you need to be on the lookout. Evidently your place is being…”
I’m an idiot.
That tail had nothing to do with the long arm of the law. There was no antiquities stakeout. I was a chump and had even given the guy my contact nformation.
“Crap,” I said.
“What you do now?” Xiaoming accused.
I looked over at Killian apologetically, “The guy in the SUV who was tailing us. He looked like a fed. I had a little talk with him. Thought I was doing you a favor by straightening him out. The attack came right after he made a positive ID on me.”
“You so stupid.”
“Yah, Xiaoming, I get that,” I snapped. God, he was like a high school gym teacher from hell who kept telling the fat kid all she had to do was run faster. I turned to Killian, “I can’t believe I didn’t pick up on it.”
Xiaoming gave a huff, “You able to open portal. Lion is like a positive magnet and you a negative magnet. It drawn to you. They just have to find where you are and point. You like diamond lion, except not as good.”
“Thanks for the kind words, Xiaoming. Have you ever considered a career in motivational speaking?”
“There are ways to talk between border. You say you have ‘shitty’ family here on Earth, correct?”
“And some very nice family, too, I’ll have you know.”
“Your phone go through border so you can talk to family?”
I thought only my dad was strong enough to set up an inter-dimensional phone line. Evidently I was wrong, “So the fake fed has a phone line to the Other Side, too, and told them where to aim the Jade Lion?”
“If you facing right way, jade lion open up portal like jian sword to enemy belly button. You make sure not to look at border when it is coming at you.”
I finally got what he was trying to tell me. Facing the right way at the wrong time was hazardous for my health. I couldn’t believe we had survived this long, “Killian? Did you know I wasn’t supposed to be looking at the border?”
“Not an inkling.”
Seriously, if fate was going to suck me into an alternate dimension because of an inappropriate glance, I didn’t really think I had much of a fighting chance.
“Okay. Well. You just promise you’ll spin me like we’re playing Pin the Tail on the Wood Sprite the next time they try to punch a hole through.”
We entered a tunnel and the red tip of Xiaoming’s cigarette was the only light in the place. Thank god the guy could chain smoke like a mutha otherwise we would have been plunged into complete darkness. Still, as he lit up his fourth, hacking up a nasty wad of phlegm, I commented, “You don’t worry much about your health, do you?”
“I read air quality report,” he said, removing the cigarette from his mouth to point it at me, “At least I have filter.”
As we emerged from the tunnel, a familiar brownie was standing at the switch. Pipistrelle threw the lever and we rolled off onto a side track.
“Pipistrelle! You found us!” I said with a smile. I know he had been pretty much useless up until this point, but I was sort of warming up to him like you do a friend’s puppy.
The little guy gave a smart salute.
“My master sent me with word of your uncle,” he informed us cheerily.
“What?” I asked as Killian and I hopped off the cart.
“Ulrich is coming to kill you,” said the brownie.
I looked up at Xiaoming. He gave me a “so it goes” sort of shrug, flipped a couple gears on the handcar, and took off the way he came, leaving us standing out there in that field.
Good to know he cared.
“Pipistrelle, do you know when or how?” I asked as I patted myself down to make sure my stake was still within easy reach.
The brownie nodded so hard he almost fell over, “I learned that he has brought a clan of vampires over by way of a sulfur circle. They will come tonight. You would do well to find shelter before the sun gives way to the darkness.”
He was so excited to be able to give us something useful, he made the imminent attack by a clan of vampires sound like it was a surprise party.
I looked over at the hill. The sun had already touched its ridge, “Killian, we gotta get moving. We’ve got a half hour, maybe forty five minutes.”
“Pipistrelle,” Killian said patiently, crouching down so that he was almost eye level, “are they tracking us?”
“They do not know where you are currently. I heard him say that you had visited Chinatown. They will most likely smell you there and come find you here.”
Killian looked up at me worried.
I calmed him, “The handcar’s silver wheels will have protected our path.”
Killian pointed at my head wound, “Except that you are bleeding.”
Fucking elf. He was right. I had probably dribbled enough blood along the way for a pack of regular old hound dogs to sniff us out, much less a gaggle of blood suckers who track bodily fluids for a living.
“Let’s just worry about them tracking us from this point forward. It’ll be pure luck if they find us all the way out here.”
Killian became very still, “Do you think they know about your sister?”
Shit.
Her house was a fortress, but other than that, my sister was utterly defenseless. Her husband was a great guy, but he knew more about battling it out with the vampires of Wall Street than the more garden-variety blood sucking ones. It appears I may have inadvertently brought an (un)living nightmare to her doorstep and I was all the way across town.
“We can’t go there tonight,” I said. “Not while they are tracking me. They shouldn’t know about Mindy, but we can’t go back there again until this is done.”
I turned to the little brownie, “Pipistrelle, as soon as we are safe for the night, I need you to go take care of my sister. Get your boss to put a glamour around her and her husband. He owes us one more mark and I’m calling it in. He has to protect them from anyone who would do them harm.”
Pipistrelle nodded seriously, “I hear and I will obey. My master will protect Maggie’s sister and Maggie’s sister’s husband. I will make sure!”
I ruffled that little guy’s hai
r and he looked like he was about to pop from the show of affection.
I turned back to Killian, “If we find a payphone, I’ll call her and give her the rundown.”
Killian pointed to my cell phone, “Do you want to try to call her now?”
I thought about that damned business card I had just handed over to the faux government goon, “They’ll trace any number I dial, or at least that’s what I’d do.”
Killian nodded in understanding, “Well, then, it appears we are on our own tonight. Pipistrelle? Do you have any recommendations for shelter?”
The little guy nodded, “There is an inn close by.”
Killian turned to me, “Do we risk harming innocent people by staying there?”
It was probably a deep philosophical question, but I was still bleeding, “As long as we get ourselves over a threshold and nobody around us invites any of the bastards in, everyone should be okay. They can only hold us under siege until morning.”
“Unless they have your uncle’s talisman.”
“Right.”
Next time I saw my uncle, I was going to let him know he was a real jerk.
Killian held out his arm in a sweeping bow to the brownie, “To the inn, Pipistrelle!”
Twilight began to fall and every squirrel in the brush sounded like an attack. Fortunately, you can’t go too far in LA without running into civilization somewhere. The desert-like scrub gave way to urban blight and old homes. There were streets and buckled sidewalks which made moving much easier. The thing about Los Angeles, though, is that no one walks. You can go for miles and miles and see plenty of cars, but not a single soul. To say it is creepy is an understatement, especially when you’re waiting for a clan of vampires to jump out at you at any moment.
As the darkness closed in, we started hugging the buildings and checking around the corners before we moved. My heart rate was definitely up and my senses on high alert.
The last light of day faded to nothing and Killian picked up his pace to a brisk jog. Besides elves being absolutely gorgeous, they’re pretty much crazy athletes and have never heard of “fatigue” or “dropping dead from exhaustion”.
