Neither of them blinked.
I shook my head and sighed. “Well. I’ll try to grow an extra pair by then.”
They both cracked up, and Ash leaned in with her Zippo to hit my smoke. Through the flame, I caught a flash in her gray eyes, but she clicked it off. And that’s when the shell of her lighter caught my attention.
“May I see that?” I asked.
She slipped the Zippo into my hand. It had a brushed, black matte casing with a platinum seal centered on the front. Clearly custom work. The club’s logo was wrapped around some engraving I couldn’t read, because a piece of the seal was broken off. It looked a lot like what I found in the pocket of the red leather binder the night I arrived.
“Wow,” I said. “This is really nice.”
I handed it back to her, and she slid it in the left breast pocket of her vest. “It was a gift,” she said.
What I heard were the million things she didn’t say.
And I could’ve sworn someone was humming.
Rorke reappeared with a tray in her hand. “Who’s got an itch needs scratching?”
We all leaned back from the table. The intensity evaporated, and Rorke passed out drinks. Then she took the seat next to me. Slowly, she looked at each of us.
“You told him. Didn’t you?” She said. “I smell guilt.”
“He needs to know,” Ash said.
“Nonsense,” Chance countered. “You should’ve let the man enjoy his last meal.”
Ash cut him a look.
I narrowed my eyes at Rorke. “ ‘Let’s Go to Bed’? Day after tomorrow?”
“Dude. By the way things were looking on the couch earlier, I think you got a good shot at tonight,” Chance said.
Ash nearly spit her drink through her nose, so he got a point.
I dug my hand in the hair at the back of my neck. I could feel heat creeping over my face. “Fair enough, kid.”
“I aim to please,” he said. “So do you, it would seem.”
Ash snorted.
Rorke leaned over to me. I felt her lips against my ear. “We’ve got a story to finish first, Salem.”
“Speaking of a page in your story…” Ash shot a sideways glance at Chance that I almost didn’t catch. “I got a call this afternoon. She digs your pad, Nick. And your job. Said she’s doing good. She wants to stay longer than she thought. If that’s okay with you.”
“Sure it is,” I said. But something else was going on.
An awkward silence followed, and I knew I was the only one who could break it.
“So,” I said. “Let’s have it. Chick or dick?”
Rorke choked on her drink.
“No, no points for that. Seriously. Paige hooked up with somebody at the Air Square. Didn’t she? It’s either Steve or Stacy.”
Chance shifted in his seat.
Ash shrugged. “Yeah, all right. The girl’s name is Stacy.”
Damn, I’d heard this song too many times.
I looked carefully at Chance. “And you didn’t think Ash should tell me?”
“There’s more to it than that,” Ash said.
“And here I thought we were talking about a fashion show,” I said.
“You were. They weren’t,” Rorke said. She was looking at Chance.
“Fine,” he said. “Paige took off because of me. That’s the real reason she called you up and asked you to trade lives, Nick. Because we split up. Again.” He fiddled with a matchbook between his fingers and looked over at me like he was waiting for a reaction. “I didn’t know if I should say anything, man. I hope you’re not pissed.”
I felt Rorke’s hand on my leg. She slid me a bone and a lighter under the table. I sparked it up and handed it to Chance. “How long have you known her?” I said.
“Year or two.”
I nodded. “This is what she does. She runs when things get good. Seriously. You should take it as a compliment.”
He thought about that for a minute. “So you and I are cool?”
“I quit that fix a long time ago.”
Chance seemed to exhale a month’s worth of worry and settled back into his chair with the joint.
I reached under the table and dug my nails into Rorke’s thigh. She wrapped her hand over mine.
“I’d rather have you at my back than some twitchy bitch any day,” he said.
“Ah, she ain’t so bad. But there might not be anybody waiting around for her by the time she figures that out. She’s insecure. You know that, right?”
He grinned at me and passed the bone to Ash. “Wouldn’t know it by looking at her, would you?”
“There’s a lot you wouldn’t know by looking at her.”
“I dig you, Salem,” he said. He was smiling, but his eyes cut to Rorke. Don’t hurt my girl, is what he didn’t say.
Honestly, how could I?
I’d never turn my back on a woman who ordered me a rare prime rib with fried corn on the cob and onion rings so spicy they had horns. I mean, come on now. Heaven never had it so good.
Chapter 29
Several drinks and much lighter conversation later, the four of us stepped back out into the sunset. Ash stretched her arms over her head, toothpick dangling from her lip. Then she stripped off her leather vest and pushed the key to her bike into Rorke’s hand.
“Take her,” she said. “I wanna walk home with my boy.”
Rorke nudged me in the ribs. “Come on, Salem. Before she changes her mind.”
She gave me Ash’s helmet and grabbed another off the back of the bike. Then she straddled the thing and fired it up like she’d been riding since diapers. I climbed on behind her. As I slid my hands down over her hips she gunned it in the opposite direction of the bar. I could hear Ash laughing in my head as we rumbled down the road.
I can’t think of a better way to work off steak.
Well, maybe I can think of one.
Rorke took me on a tour around the lake, through the winding hill country. We rode over bridges that qualified as architectural masterpieces and zoomed by houses that could only be classified as castles. By the time we rolled up in front of the bar, my brain was fluff dried. And the night had kicked in. I was on sensory overload. Lucky for me, it was time to sling some drinks.
If my thighs would just stop tingling.
Rorke climbed off the bike, grabbed me by the collar of my shirt and pulled me within an inch of her lips. “I’d hit you one right now, Salem, but I like the torture.”
I closed my eyes, shook my head and followed her inside.
The doors were already open. Ash was up in the booth, flipping through her books, and Chance was at the front bar stocking the cooler. There were a few girls sitting at Rorke’s, but they’d gotten their own beers and were watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer with the sound turned off. It was still early. Rorke said her hellos, made sure her crew was taken care of, and then turned her attention back to me. I could feel she had something to say, and she was dragging her boots.
“Come on,” I said, wiping down a bottle of Jack. “You need a little of this, or will you fess up without it?”
“I always need a little of that.”
“Fair enough.” I poured two shots.
She picked hers up and clinked it against mine. “Here’s to your heart.”
I cocked my head. I didn’t understand.
And then Zakk Wylde kicked on. “Sold My Soul” was playing louder than the song before it, which meant one of two things. Either Ash was taking advantage of the empty bar and playing whatever the hell she felt like, or she was trying to spin more than just the music. I bet the latter.
Rorke went on. “I mean it. Thank you. It wasn’t my place to tell you about Paige and Chance. I didn’t think I’d care, anyway. But then you showed up and… Shit. I’m sorry, Nick.” She took a deep breath and shoved her hands in her back pockets. “He wanted to meet you first. You know? You can’t blame him. Then Ash said we’d fuck everything up if we let it go on too long.”
I touch
ed her arm to get her to look at me. “And what else?” I said. “He’s still in love with Paige?”
She nodded. Then she rolled her eyes. “What is it with that girl?”
I thought, You hooked up with her. Can’t you answer that?
Her eyes cut back to me. “You know she and I didn’t—”
“No,” I said. “I don’t know.”
“I never called her, Nick. I didn’t even keep her number. I threw it away.”
She was looking at the ground, kicking her boot against the bar mat, when realization clawed its way through me.
Rorke thought I was still in love with Paige.
I moved without thinking and dug my hands into that incredible mess of hair. Then I pulled her to me and sank my teeth into those amazing lips. She snaked her arms around me and bit right back. She tasted like a carnivore, but she melted like butter, and flames jumped straight through my gut.
Her crew started cheering like maniacs. When she pulled back, her eyes were wild. “You scared yet?” she breathed.
Chapter 30
I don’t know how we made it to last call after that kiss.
Oh, wait. Yes, I do. We got our asses kicked.
Not only did we get our asses kicked, but there were reps from all arenas of the fashion show, in and out the back door all night long. They were unloading everything from cases of water to cases of thongs. Art work, photographs, food, jewelry, feminine whatnot, clothes, clothes, and more clothes. It just kept emptying through the door like a car full of clowns. We juggled all this extra chaos on top of the usual Thursday night crowd of several hundred.
I learned from Chance that the catwalk and the event curtain were retractable, and that they both ran on motors controlled from the DJ booth. This was excellent news. It meant I didn’t have to build anything. It meant I didn’t have to get involved with the Three Amigos and a pile of nail guns.
The back bar was supercharged, yet quiet. Rorke’s crew kept watching me like they all had a secret, murmuring to one another over the tops of their beers and smirking. They didn’t ride my ass about anything. In fact, they hardly talked to me at all. I told myself it was because of the kiss, but it was a lie. Something else was going down.
Then at midnight, the lights flickered off, and the chiming started. Ominous clock tower bells, the sound of rain and a backup beat vibrated through the bar. Any respectable Goth would recognize that intro long before it started. It was an extended instrumental cut of “Bloodletting.”
A deep red light flooded the back stage, and the crowd went nuts. Then they started to back away.
I looked over at Rorke. She was grinning like a maniac. She nodded once toward the stage and raised an eyebrow.
“And so it begins,” she said. “Watch this, Salem.”
I turned back to the stage.
Ash lowered the music to a pulse. She was looping the beat, just as a low buzz started to tickle my ears. Then it got louder. And louder. Like a swarm of mad bees descending on the dance floor.
I looked up at the booth.
Ash had on a black-and-white striped miner’s hat, cocked lazily to one side. The hazard light flashed red in time with the music. She had a giant set of gears in her hands, and a cigarette dangled from her lip. A mic was clipped to the side of her hat.
“You guys hear something?” she said.
There was a low grin in her voice. It melted over the room, and the crowd went insane. Then they started to chant something I couldn’t understand.
I leaned over to ask Rorke what the hell everybody was saying, and she wasn’t there. But Chance was. And he’d hit the light at the front bar, so it was in total darkness.
“I thought I’d come watch this with you,” he said. “Trust me. Ain’t nobody ordering drinks right now.”
“What the hell are they chanting?”
“Madder red.”
“Isn’t that a color of dye?”
“Not tonight.”
The catwalk slowly stretched out onto the dance floor. The further it crept, the more I could see of an intricate mural painted in heavy swirls of gold, white and red on a black background. I couldn’t tell what I was looking at yet, but I knew Ash was responsible.
“Are those flowers? Or are they women?”
“Both,” he said. “They’re Lily.”
Then a motor revved, and the curtain started to descend upon the stage. It made a horseshoe from Naenia’s corner to the stairs by Rorke’s bar. It was incredible, thicker than the walls and hand painted to match the catwalk. Along the hem, in iridescent black on black, it said Madder Red over and over again, woven through with jagged red vinery and fierce little white flowers. In the middle was an enormous pair of golden eyes that seemed to hover separate from the curtain itself.
The crowd continued to chant.
The second the fabric touched the stage, Ash kicked the song into gear. The crowd stopped chanting and screamed their fool heads off. Then the curtain flew apart and licks of flame jumped up the sides of the catwalk. There was an incredible blast of sparks by the entrance, and Rorke stalked out on the walk in chainmail lingerie with a whip and a Bengal tiger at her side. I nearly dropped dead.
Chance leaned over. “Cat got your tongue, Salem?”
“Sweet mother of god.”
“Even she can’t help you now.”
“The tiger is?” I asked.
“Madder Red. The show’s…muse.”
“No, I mean, who does it belong to? It’s not on a leash.”
“No leash necessary, dude. Madder belongs to Rorke.”
“What the fuck?” I started laughing out of shock. This beat the steak knife thing, hands down.
One of Rorke’s girls jumped up on the bar and reached over her head for a bell that was hanging from the ceiling. I’d never noticed it before, and it was huge. She gave it a good solid yank, and the tiger took a flying leap to the end of the catwalk. Then it stood up on its back legs and pawed at the air, roaring like mad. “Roaring like Mad…” I mumbled.
“Exactly,” Chance said.
The crowd was infatuated. Rorke whistled for the tiger, and it turned and sat on its haunches. Then she cracked her whip and thrust a hoop over her head. Just as it burst into flame, the tiger charged, leapt through the hoop, and circled back to Rorke’s side. She grinned, tossed the hoop aside, and sauntered off the stage with her tiger as the song faded out.
“What the hell was that?” I said.
“The opening ceremony. Welcome to the family, Salem.”
Chapter 31
Chance stayed with me until Ash put the lights back on over the dance floor. When people started milling up to the darkened front bar for drinks, he took off.
I still couldn’t blink.
The girl who rang the bell jumped the bar again and started lining up shots for the regulars. She handed me two.
“You’re lucky we dig you, Salem,” she said. “Every year, about this time, it’s open season on the bartender. As you can well imagine.”
“How is she single?”
She ignored me. “At midnight, two nights before the show, Ash and Rorke always pull out the walk, drop the curtain, and bring in Madder. The way they do it changes every year, but the ritual itself is the same. Not only is it hot as hell, but with the stage out and the curtain down, they get two days of free advertising. Not that they need it, but it gets the regulars pumped. If either one of them told you this is just a fashion show for charity, they lied.” Her eyes darted back to the rest of the crew like she was making sure nobody was listening. “It’s a memoriam, too.”
I nodded. It made complete sense, since Mofet started the event. “So the date is relevant?”
“Yes. It’s the day she died.” She clinked the shot glass in my hand and said, “Here’s to Helluva.”
The hair on my arms stood up.
I raised my shot to her and tossed it back. Then I took our glasses and put them in the sink.
“What’s your name? I’m s
orry, I’m better with drinks.”
“Elise,” she said and ducked back under the bar before I got the nerve to ask her how Mofet could’ve started the event knowing the day she would die.
Last call snuck up on me. I didn’t even realize it was two. Probably because Rorke never came back. I served up the final rounds and started breaking down the bar. Half an hour later, Ash wandered down from the DJ booth with a stack of requests and an empty glass. The hardhat was gone, and she was wearing a black and gold kimono open over a leather bra. Around her neck was a choker made from several large teeth.
“Madder’s baby teeth,” she grinned.
I just shook my head. “My god, woman.”
“I told you this place is a lot bigger than you think.”
“In more ways than one.”
“Amen.”
“Can I fill that for you?” I nodded at her empty glass.
“There’s a black pitcher in the bottom of the cooler. The one marked ‘Cleaning Agent.’”
I blinked at her.
“We can’t let the regulars ride the pony,” she said, shaking her head while she flipped through her lists.
I got down two glasses instead of one.
“Do you study those?” I asked, eyeing her stack of lists.
“I do,” she said. “Every night. I have to find the songs I don’t have or they’ll start burning me CDs, which can get sticky. Plus, it’s easier to work in new stuff if I can reference what they’re into. The request logs are like a journal. Look. It’s fascinating.”
I leaned over the bar, and she turned the stack so I could read. I saw immediately that these were not just request logs. Ash had page after page of graffiti, notes and drawings. Most of it proclaimed she ruled the world, and every few lines somebody would request a song.
I looked up, and she made a gesture at stabbing herself in the heart. “Ouch, right? Look at this, Nick. I’ll show you what I mean. See this jagged shorthand. On three pages she requested ‘I Fall with Your Knife’ tonight. She only asks for that song when her ex is in town. Which leads us to this girl here. The ex. See this loopy red writing? She’s an editor. Wears pens in her hair. She’s hot on the dance floor, but only to ‘Red Right Hand.’ She requests it whenever she hooks up with somebody. Somebody other than girl number one. Enter, girl number three. She’s been hot on girl two since she was with girl one. So when I saw number three request this Cure song, here.” Ash tapped a third distinct handwriting. “I knew Nick Cave had hooked up with Robert Smith, and Peter Murphy got kicked to the curb.” She grinned. “Pretty crazy, huh?”
Helluva Luxe Page 15
