by J. L. Ray
Her description made Cal glad that he knew exactly where the two had ended up after they left Monster-Match. At least he hoped he knew where they had gone. He didn’t think they’d had time to...Serena interrupted his thought.
“He called once, but he was only checking in about work. He said he wouldn’t be in until late tomorrow. Something about an out-of-town trip.”
“Ah,” Cal commented, doing his best to keep any reaction off his face when he just knew that damned demon, no pun intended, was probably dogging Tony’s footsteps all the way to Jersey. “We had a few more questions for him, which I guess we gotta wait to ask tomorrow, when he gets back.” Then he gave himself a theatrical V-8 forehead smack for Serena’s benefit. “Hey, I bet Heraphina could help us with a couple of those questions. Is she working this evening?”
Serena suddenly looked incredibly nervous, which set off both cops’ internal radars. “Uhm. She called me a few hours ago and asked me to take her shift tonight. She should be back in tomorrow--at least she had better be! I have someone else covering my desk this evening. It’s a good thing we don’t have much on the schedule right now. In fact, we plan to close early because of the reno we’re in the middle of doing to the offices downstairs.” She shook her head, and her bouncing blonde curls shook with her. “Shiny, silk bustiers and thigh highs! I will be glad when that’s done.”
Cal nodded. “I bet it really messes up everything for the employees--probably makes it hard to get a decent schedule. Maybe Heraphina’s doing some job on the side?”
“Oh, I don’t think so. That might violate her probation terms. Of course, so does getting out of her required shifts.” Serena’s voice took on a scolding tone, “I am so glad the boss is away! This just is not the way he would want things run.”
Cal slumped over the desk a bit to make himself smaller and more approachable and leaned forward like an old gossip, “Gee, does this sorta thing happen a lot?” Immediately Serena looked uncomfortable, so Cal added, blinking his large brown eyes, undeniably his most attractive feature, at her, “It just seems so unfair to put so much responsibility off on your little bitty shoulders.” He smiled at her in sympathy, his lumpy ogre facade somehow actually managing to pull that one off.
“Oh my peep-toe pumps, no!” Serena breathed out. “In fact, it has only happened in the last two weeks. Heraphina has called in sick a few times, and lately she has asked me to cover for her or to bring in a temp to cover for her. And since I am the office manager, it is my job!” she added clasping her hands together virtuously.
Cal shook his head, “It sounds to me like she’s taking advantage of your good nature, is what it sounds like. And there’s you, just helping her out.” He looked mournful. “She doesn’t sound like a very good employee. Is she new?”
Serena shook her head, “No, no. She’s been here longer than most of the other employees!” She leaned forward toward Cal, and if he’d been interested, he’d have gotten a good long look at the rounded pink mounds attempting to spill out of the frilly pink bustier Serena wore with her frilly pink business suit. No fan of pink, he was too intent on reading her face as she talked, which the Lieutenant quietly noted with approval. “I think she bargained her way out of Lock Up several years ago, at least that’s what I heard. She ended up here to work off her time.”
Cal leaned his head on his hand and gave her a calculated, admiring look, “I’ll bet you know all the tales of the employees and clients here, huh?”
Serena giggled and leaned further in. Her generous C-cup bustier hung on for dear life, but to the Lieutenant, it looked like a near thing. He was beginning to wonder if he needed to give Cal a medal for heroism. Somehow, the detective still seemed to have his eye on the right prize, more information.
“Detective Kelly, you know I signed a confidentiality clause when Mr. Mephisto gave me a job. I wouldn’t break my clause for the world!” she sighed. “But I keep hoping that Mr. M will fire Heraphina.” She frowned, an adorable little pout. “I think she scares away some of the clients out of sheer spite!”
Cal put his free hand up to his mouth in shock, and Azeem held on to a rumble of laughter. “Why in the world would she do that?” he gasped, very girlfriend to girlfriend.
Serena batted her eyes, “Well, you know, she is a witch, after all. I always heard the only reason there are not more witches than there already are is that only the prettiest sister gets a mate. Then she keeps him prisoner until she has enough daughters. Then, she kills him!” She nodded, “And I’ll bet that Heraphina isn’t that sister. Really, think about it. No sex at all? That would put a big, Troll-sized cramp in anyone’s attitude!”
“Oh my yes,” Cal replied, hoping to get her to go on. “But still, she needs the job to finish her Lock Up term. You’d think she’d do more to hang on to it. Am I right?”
Serena shook her head and frowned. “I would think so. But she worked with Adonis when he first started, so she’s been here over five years. I think she liked him a lot.” She grimaced, “From what she has said, I even got the feeling that he, well, might have, uhm...”
“No way!” Cal breathed at her.
“Seriously!” she answered. “It’s just icky to even think about it. I don’t know which is worse, the boss having sex with a co-worker, especially with his...tastes, or that evil old witch with anybody!” She slapped a hand to her mouth. “I try not to be prejudiced, but she’s so mean! Anyhow, since Adonis left and Mr. M took over, I think she’s had a real bug up her granny panties.”
Cal had gotten enough from the nymph to feel positive that they were finally on the right track to finding the vampire, and more importantly, its creator. He patted Serena’s arm, “Well, sister, just put that right out of your mind and think of good things, like, uh, kittens and rainbows and uh...”
She giggled, “The semi-annual sale at Victoria’s Secret!”
“Yeah,” Cal chimed. Then he handed her his card. “If Heraphina does show up for work, could you give me a little buzz on your f-light?”
“Anything for you detective,” she gave a little wiggle that pushed the bustier’s max capacity to its limit and a smile that suggested she really did mean anything.
“Thanks, doll,” he told her, once again grateful to be happily married to the sexiest ogre he’d ever met.
As he and the Lieutenant left, Azeem purred, “A very good job in there. High marks for keeping to your task and not being sidetracked by the...er...view.”
“Are you kidding me? Berthell’s better looking than Serena any day of the week. Besides, I bet that nymph is high maintenance!” He leaned over and whispered to Azeem, “And apparently she had some kind of rhyming hex that comes with the sex.” He heard his own words and looked horrified. After a few seconds he said, “I think that was just an accident.” He waited another second or two, and then slumped with relief. “Oh wow. I was worried it might have rubbed off even when I wasn’t thinking about sex.” He turned a horrified face to the Lieutenant. “I mean, I kinda was, but not with her!”
“I’ve never heard of a rhyming curse with sex,” the Lieutenant remarked. “Well, at this point it sounds as if Heraphina may have anticipated being caught. We need her address and we need to get there quickly, in case she tries to run.”
While the Lieutenant and Cal worked on investigating Heraphina’s connection to the murders, Tony went up to the roof of the Supernatural Crimes Investigation Bureau to talk to the DragonMaster about a ride to Jersey. Only cities with a million or more inhabitants had multiple dragons on staff at with Supernatural Crimes for faster travel, so because she worked in Washington, Tony had access to three possible rides. All of them were Silverbacks, the largest of the dragon race. They could carry as many as ten people at a time, and while the dragons were happy for any excuse to go up in the air, the DragonMaster, a wily old Natty from the mountains of North Carolina, acted like any dragon requisition might lead to some kind of abuse of his charges. She knew that getting Hoot Polk to agree to let her t
ake a dragon for a one-person trip would be an uphill battle.
She went up into the rooftop hanger area, ready to good-ole-girl him, just one Natty to another, when she stopped short, floored by the site of Hoot and Phil, squatting down by the enormous paw of Nancy, one of the Silverbacks, the two chatting away and pointing at Nancy’s paw every once in a while. The juxtaposition of Hoot in his black overalls and white t-shirt, a chaw of tobacco pushing his lower lip out, and Phil in a business suit, impeccably well-groomed, left Tony standing, dumbfounded, long enough for Phil to notice her arrival. He stood up from a crouched position with effortless grace, his double-button wool in subtle charcoal plaid and his black shirt underneath echoing the black in his hair. Only his honey brown eyes added warmth to a color palette dominated by his dark clothing, the silver and black dragon, and the black overalls that Hoot insisted on wearing to work in the hanger. Apparently, the casual clothes Phil had been wearing before weren’t adequate to whatever he was up to now. She wondered what it was.
“There she comes now, Mr. Polk. My knight in shining armor!” Phil said this to Hoot, his comment completely bare of any irony. “Detectives Newman and Kelly are working overtime to save me from the effect of the Geas, even though Detective Kelly has just become the proud papa of a lovely new boy.”
Hoot turned his head to spit some tobacco juice out into a spit cup he held shielded from view in his hand. “Yup. Them two are right good at that, ain’t they?” He turned to Tony and asked, far more pleasantly than normal, “And y’uns need yourselves a dragon to go to Lock Up, do you, sis?”
“Why yes, yes I do,” she told him, and decided to throw herself into the role, whole hog, since it looked like they were going to score the fastest route to questioning Adonis. “I would hate to see someone like Mr. Akkadian here, someone who is giving back to the society that I’m sure he has taken from time and time again, someone who probably still owes more than he can every repay to that society, lose his chance at redemption when this time, he really isn’t guilty.” As she spoke, Phil lowered his head and nodded humbly, only the sly grin he shot her from behind Hoot’s back giving away his true reaction.
“Uh huh,” Hoot nodded thoughtfully, shifting his chew around a bit in the front of his mouth. “Well, I’ll leave that to y’uns down in the policing side of things. I jus’ need to see the writ from the Judge givin’ permission for the interview, and then I’ll saddle up old Nick for you two to fly.” He pointed at Nancy, “And thank you Mr. Akkadian for showing me why Nancy’s been so doggone upset and cantankerous these last two days. I’ll get that boil between her digits lanced, and she’ll be just as good as gold then.” He turned to Tony and added, “She purt near took the head off the last fella I checked her out to carry. I thought we might have to retire her, but your consultant here found the problem.” He turned to spit again and then headed to the next holding area to wake the sleeping dragon there.
“Shouldn’t we let sleeping dragons lie?” Tony muttered, watching Hoot as he walked gingerly across the straw to the backside of Old Nick’s head.
“Not if you are intent on getting to New Jersey quickly.”
Tony turned to Phil and gave him a onceover. “And you’re up here because?”
“I am going with you.”
She kept looking.
“I thought you might benefit from having access to magic.”
“But I have got some magic,” Tony said as she patted the Louis Vuitton tote that she still had slung over her left shoulder. She hadn’t had time to get it back to Glinda yet, and besides, she really didn’t want to see the witch again any time soon if she was going to be so bitchy over a demon who Tony wasn’t even interested in. Not really.
“You can’t fully operate most of those here without help,” he reminded her, since Nattys, for the most part, had too little juice to get magical items to work unless the items were enhanced, like f-lights or other standard issue equipment. In Fairie, she could manage it because any magical ability increased there. But not in Mundania.
She continued to look at him for another full minute. He didn’t break, so she finally sighed and said, “I take it the Lieutenant knows that you’re coming with me?”
“I was ready to persuade him that two would be better than one with a Being like Adonis. Happily, he needed no persuasion. He asked me to go with you again. He remembers Adonis from Fairie.” He frowned. “Besides, I do have a vested interest in having this matter settled soon.” Then he turned his most charming smile on her, “I hope that you won’t mind the company? I can sit in front if you like, in case Nick is snappish.”
Both of them glanced over at Hoot, who had woken Nick and then gone about settling a two-person harness on the dragon, just behind the back of his skull and snugged up against the first line of spikes, so that the harness itself used the line of spikes to stay gripped tightly to dragon’s back. The harnesses were copyrighted Dwarf creations, 99.9% likely to work every time, or your money back.
Tony stared at Phil a little longer, shook her head, then pointed to the dragon now waiting for its passengers. “Get your ass on and belted before I change my mind.”
“My ass is at your command. Always.” His eyes flicked up and down her, taking in her tailored navy suit and white lycra top as he added, “For any purpose you might need.”
“Just. Get. On.”
He pulled a hairholder out of the inner pocket of his tailored jacket and smoothed his hair back as Tony stared at him. “Do you need one?” he murmured, as he finished securing his hair.
She shook her head, then turned and walked over to Hoot and Nick. Not just a demon--a high maintenance demon. Glinda could have him.
“Introduce yourself, sis,” Hoot pulled her back to the task at hand, reminding her of the etiquette for approaching a working dragon.
She walked over to Nick’s head and put out a hand. The dragons communicated by touch, for the most part, so she put her hand up to his cheek and laid a palm flat against it. Out loud she spoke what she was thinking, “I am Detective Newman. I need to go to Lock Up in New Jersey. Is this agreeable to you, Dragon Nick?”
The dragon lowered its large head in a kind of nod, and then Phil came over and placed his hand near Tony’s, a little too near in her opinion. Out loud he said, “I am Mephistopheles. Know you me?” The dragon nodded. “I wish to go to Lock Up with this woman.” The dragon nodded, then, in a move neither of them expected, it blew out a puff of smoke, like a laugh.
Hoot, who’d been watching, grinned. “Dragons read folks better’n any critter I’ve ever worked with. Reckon he’s found something in this that tickles his funny bone.” He gave them a look before he walked away. “I wonder what that is?”
Tony looked at Phil and then climbed up into the front seat in the harness, “Remind me, why are you going with me?”
He had climbed up behind her, and though he didn’t need to do so, he had his hands placed on her waist.
“You will need me there when you confront Adonis. Trust me on this.” Phil leaned in closely enough for his breath to move the hair she had refused to put up in one of his holders. “Are you sure you do not want something with which to tie up your hair?”
“No, I don’t. And quit messing with my hair!” she added when she felt him gathering the weight of it in his hands, its length several inches longer than his. She jerked the ponytail he’d made out of his hands.
He was quiet for just a moment, then added mournfully, “It will hit me in the face and sting when we get up to speed. I shall probably ingest large amounts of it by accident.”
After a minute, she dropped her head in defeat and then sat up straight. “Okay, okay already.” She waited, left hand out, expecting him to hand her the holder, but then she felt him gathering up her hair again, smoothing its length from scalp to end with both hands. It was all she could do not to start purring. It felt like he was giving her scalp massage, and, hello, she really didn’t need him doing something so totally inappropriate. “What
are you doing?”
“Taking care of your hair for you.” He leaned in closer to her face and breathed, “Such lovely touches of red throughout the length of it when the light hits it.” Her head pulled a couple of times as he secured it.
She had meant to pull away and do it herself, but by then, she felt him let go of the ponytail, which hung down behind her now. It annoyed her less up than it did down, as long she didn’t think about having Phil back there messing with it. She really, really needed a time out if it took this little to distract her from a case. Maybe she just needed more sleep. Or less demon.
When Hoot indicated that his passengers were settled, Nick brought his wings up and took the short run on the rooftop flight deck, jumping at the end to grab air which his wings. They headed north, to the Lock Up facility, which existed in an area between Martinton and the Wharton State Park in southern New Jersey. The facility itself moved through magical means and had moved frequently since it first materialized in 1989. In fact, it could have simply continued to travel across country, never staying anywhere for long, had that been necessary. However, that would have meant that the Mundanes working there would have had to uproot their families for each move, which limited the length of employment for most potential guards. So when the town of Martinton, New Jersey offered the facility a permanent spot in 1992, it had stopped moving, the Supernatural Warden, Medusa herself in gorgeous flowing robes and headscarves, thanking the council live on FaeV in front of a gaggle of news crews. Fae-Vision had played that scene repeatedly in the months after Lock Up settled near the state forest, and the local station in Martinton used it as part of their Mageline web site.
The ride itself would take comparatively little time, just over an hour, and in the harness, though moving very fast and very high, the magical wards cut the white noise down to almost nothing and allowed those riding to carry on a conversation. Most dragon crashes occurred in the first ten minutes of a flight since take-off was the most dangerous part of dragonback rides. Nick had thousands of hours of air time, but no one risked distracting a dragon taking flight. However, as soon as they reached altitude and leveled out, Phil started talking. For the first time, Tony found the convenience of magical interference with Natural laws annoying.
