Pomegranates full and fine

by Unknown Author

  The ransacking had to have happened some time before today, before Riley had returned to Toronto, or else the answering machine would surely have been erased. Probably the ransacking had happened while Riley was in San Francisco. The searchers must have taken their time, and that meant they would have known that Riley wasn’t about to return any time soon.

  What was Riley involved with?

  At least being trapped in Toronto by Epp’s geasa didn’t seem like such a liability anymore. Tango leaned her head back against the cushions of the couch and listened to the message one more time. If the searchers had found the yellow file, there didn’t seem to be any point in her searching the rest of the apartment for clues as to what was going on. The searchers would likely have already found anything that there was to find.

  Except maybe for Riley’s bags at the airport, checked before he vanished and still unclaimed. No one would have searched the bags, then returned them to the baggage claim. Six to midnight hours, the Lost and Found office’s message had said. Tango glanced at her watch. She would have to retrieve her car and drive out to the airport, but Lost and Found would still be open. It wouldn’t be hard to convince them to hand over the bags. Tango ran for the door.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Curious Laura chose to linger Wondering at each merchant man.

  “That one,” urged Tolly. “What about him?”

  Matt turned his head ever so slightly to look around at the men in the bar. His gaze settled on two at a pinball machine. “The one playing?”

  “The one to his right. Redhead.” Tolly’s tongue ran around his mouth like a moray eel lunging out of a coral reef. The mad vampire’s face was sharp and eager tonight. Last night's activities had agreed with him — in more ways than one. His body had been pierced in virtually every imaginable place, bright metal loops, balls, bars and spindles. His entire share of Solomon’s money had gone to pay for the extensive, expensive piercings. Blue had rolled his eyes when he had seen the effect. Matt had laughed out loud. Miranda had walked around Tolly, considering his decorated body from every angle. There was a beautiful, painful intensity to the piercings, a kind of art. Sooner or later, he would tire of the piercings and pull them out, letting the wounds heal over, but for now the effect was a work of inspired genius. She felt sorry for the piercing artist. After Tolly’s visit, he or she would probably never be quite the same again. The vampire’s madness had an eerie way of infecting the mortals he came in contact with. Tolly gestured, metal flashing in the skin between his thumb and forefinger. “There.”

  Matt slapped the other vampire’s hand down, but nodded. “I like him. Good-looking. Big. Strong. Should put up a hell of a fight.” He glanced at Miranda. “How about it?”

  Miranda shook her head. “He’s with a friend.” “Who?”

  “The guy playing pinball.”

  Matt snorted. “The guy playing pinball is not his friend. Redhead is trying to pick him up.”

  “Same principle. He’d remember if Redhead went home w'ith someone else.” Miranda studied the redhaired man a moment longer, then added, “And Redhead’s too big. Things might get out of hand.” “Not much.” Blue leaned forward, his chair creaking under him. “Picky-picky. You’ve been finding excuses all night. There must be someone in here who’s good enough for you.”

  “Yeah,” Matt agreed. “Just choose one, Miri.” Miranda fixed him with a slow, steady glare. “Don’t be hasty. You’ve already annoyed Solomon once.”

  Matt flushed. Miranda turned away.

  Last night, after he had released the other vampires from the magickal paralysis, Solomon had treated Matt like something he had scraped off the bottom of his shoe. Of course, no mention was made of Miranda’s role in toppling Matt so painfully. Solomon had pretended that it was Matt’s own fault, his body overbalancing as the magick captured him. Whenever possible, the mage had stared pointedly at Matt’s broken nose, crooked until the vampire could find a mirror and fix it. All of his conversation and negotiation had been conducted with Miranda. She had also pointedly ignored Matt, bargaining with Solomon as though there really was something to bargain about. There wasn’t, of course. She would do anything for the Bandog — and Solomon. Even so, Solomon’s payment to the vampires had been substantial, more than enough to offset the short-term inconvenience of being unable to feed on their victims.

  And yet Matt had still tried to taunt Solomon, desperate to reassert his wounded pride. “If you knew as much as you claimed about the Sabbat,” he had sneered arrogantly, “you’d know that you can’t negotiate with just one of us. A Sabbat pack has no leader.”

  Solomon had responded in tones so frosty that Miranda waited for ice to form. “If you knew as much about yourself as you believe you do, you’d realize how wrong you are.”

  That had left Matt with his mouth shut tight. The pack had taken Solomon’s money and gone to Hopeful to select their first victim: a gay man, alone, maybe a little bit drunk. It had been simple enough. A combination of Tolly and Blue’s abilities to hide and her own power to manipulate shadows had ensured that the pack would be unnoticed, or at least unremarked-upon. Matt had approached the victim, using his talents of persuasion and hypnotic control to lure him away from the bar.

  They had left the man’s body in a park, laid out under a tree as though in resting state — Tolly’s idea. The mad vampire had also placed pennies over the dead man’s swollen eyelids. The hardest part of the process had been resisting the call of the man’s blood. But they had. Beaten and battered, there was no sign that he had been killed by vampires. Ordinary humans could have killed him.

  Tonight they would take their second victim. Solomon would contact them tomorrow night and tell them where to hunt for a third. Hunting in Hopeful was more difficult this time, though. The gays of Toronto were in mourning over the loss of one of their own. They knew that Hopeful was the last place he had been seen alive, and many had come here for an impromptu wake. For a few, like Redhead, it seemed as though nothing was wrong. Life went on. They were untouched by death. But even the ones like Redhead would be more wary now. A gay man had been murdered. Would it happen again?

  “What about one of the bartenders?” suggested Blue. “They’re getting hit on all the time. Nobody would notice one more.”

  “They may be getting hit on, but: they’re not accepting,” Matt pointed out. “Now that old guy in the corner...”

  “Wait.” Miranda’s eyes narrowed as she thought. “We don’t have to pretend to pick someone up. We could just grab a bartender when he leaves.”

  “But that won’t be for at least a couple more hours!” “We have time.”

  Tolly looked around for the old man Matt had mentioned, his neck twisting inhumanly far. “I like him, too. Besides, the bartenders wouldn’t be leaving alone.” Miranda grimaced. “Tolly, you’ve liked everyone you’ve seen in here. If you were doing the choosing, we would have to slaughter the entire bar.” The mad vampire’s eyes lit up with a hungry delight. “No,” said Miranda firmly. She stood. “We take a bartender.”

  There were two bartenders working tonight, one blond with a rainbow of pride rings on a choker around his neck, one brunette in a leather vest. Miranda chose the blonde. He gave her a friendly, quirky smile as she walked up to the bar. “What can I get you?”

  She smiled back. Solomon had told her once that her entire face changed when she smiled, that it almost came back to life. “What have you got on tap?”

  The bartender named four or five beers, some she remembered from her university days, some she had never gotten around to trying. She never would now. One of the beers had the ironic name of “Old Nick’s Red.” Miranda ordered four pints of it. “It’s busy in here tonight.”

  “Nobody wants to mourn John alone.” He gestured with his head as he poured the beer. A sort of makeshift shrine had been set up at one end of the bar, a photograph of the man the pack had killed, with flowers, a basket for donations, and a petition urging the government to crack d
own on hate crimes. Impulsively, Miranda dropped a ten-dollar bill in the basket and signed the petition. That earned her another smile from the bartender.

  “Thanks.” He set down the first two pints. “Do you want me to bring these to your table?”

  “No, it’s okay. What time do you get off tonight?” The bartender laughed. “If you mean what time does the bar close, we stop serving booze at one o’clock, but I have to stay around until two or three. If you mean what time could you talk me into going out with you,” he looked away from the beer tap just long enough to flash her a glance, “I’m afraid you’re barking up the wrong tree.”

  “I don’t think so.” She caught his gaze and held it. “You look really tired. You should leave early tonight. Go home. Get some rest.”

  “That... might be a good idea.” The bartender’s eyes became unfocused as her will laid itself over his. “It’s been a long day.”

  Miranda nodded, maintaining eye contact. She had him. “It has. I bet by one-thirty this place will be so quiet, one bartender could look after it all.”

  “Yeah,” the bartender replied distantly. Then he twitched and yelped, his attention going back to the tap as beer spilled over the edge of the full pint glass and foam went dripping down his hand. “Shit.” He grabbed a towel and wiped the sides and bottom of the glass.

  “Sorry,” Miranda murmured, “I was distracting you.” “No,” the bartender said, as if they had been doing nothing more than flirting, “it was my fault.” He put the glass down and started filling a fourth. “That’s eighteen dollars.”

  Miranda dug out a twenty and a couple of crumpled twos. “Keep the change.” A nice tip. He might as well feel good while he had some time left.

  “Thanks.” He looked up at her again, then his glance flickered to the side, to a second woman who had just come up to the bar. A short woman with long, brown hair. “Hey, Tango.”

  “Hi, Todd. Have you heard anything about Riley or his friend?”

  “Sorry.” .

  “Damn.” The woman sounded frustrated and depressed. “Do you have Toby on tap?”

  “Sure do.” ’

  “Give me a pint.”

  The bartender nodded. He finished pouring Miranda’s last pint and passed it to her. “There you go. Do you need a tray?”

  “No, thanks.” Miranda gathered the four glasses carefully between her hands. With a last sideways look at the short woman, she started back to the pack’s table.

  Tango. A strange name, but one she had seen somewhere before. She tried to remember where. It came back to her. A notice on the message board by Hopeful’s door. She turned her head to look for it, but the bright blue paper was gone. Someone had torn it down. There hadn’t been much on it anyway: Tango looking for a man named Riley, Riley’s description, leave a message with Todd at the bar. Not that Tango was likely to have much luck finding her friend. Missing-persons rates were always high in cities held by the Sabbat. Police success rates in solving missing-persons cases were usually very low.

  There was something odd about the woman herself as well. There was an intensity about her, the odor of her body and her blood transcending smell and becoming an almost tangible energy in spite of her obvious exhaustion. An energy that made Miranda think a hand run through Tango’s hair would create the snap and crackle of static electricity. An energy that made her own undead veins hum and vibrate. She set the beers down on the pack’s table. “The bartender is going to leave at one-thirty. We’ll go out a bit earlier, wait, and follow him home.”

  Blue looked at the beer with faint amusement. “What are we supposed to do with these?”

  “Pretend you’re having a good time. It’s called Old

  Nick’s Red.”

  “Cool!” Tolly picked up his beer and chugged it back in one very long swallow, then smacked his lips. “Disappointing.” He belched thunderously.

  Matt shivered with disgust. “Try to make it to the bathroom before that comes back up.” He raised an eyebrow as Miranda took her glass and turned back to the bar. “And where are you going?”

  “I haven’t fed yet tonight.”

  “That little number that just came in?” Matt nodded. “Not my cup of tea, but probably the only person in this place that you’d stand a good chance with.”

  “Thank you, Matt.” She took his beer and shoved it over to Tolly. “Here,” she said sweetly, “I don’t think Matt’s going to want this. Why don’t you have another?”

  She walked away from the table before she could witness the effects of Tolly’s drinking. It wouldn’t be pretty.

  Tango had moved away from the bar and stood at a counter, caught between a bunch of rowdy pretty boys and a pair of big, muscular men who were necking as if they were vampires themselves. The other woman was staring blankly at a television monitor mounted up near the ceiling. There was some kind of soft porn video playing, but Tango didn’t seem to be seeing it at all. Miranda caught the eye of one of the muscle men and dismissed him with a quick flick of her head. He pulled his partner away to another part of the bar. Miranda stepped in and took their spot next to Tango. For a few minutes she just stood there, pretending to sip her beer and watching the monitor silently.

  “You know,” she said finally, “I just don’t understand what they see in this stuff.”

  Tango blinked. “Sorry?”

  “I don’t understand what they see in this stuff.” Miranda gestured toward the monitor. “It’s just mindless and repetitive. It’s the same thing, over and over again.” “So’s baseball.” Tango took a swallow of her beer, a black, tarry liquid with a thick head. “And you could see that,” she added, as the scene on the monitor changed to show a well-built man rubbing his crotch, “at a baseball game, too.”

  Miranda laughed, half a put-on, half real appreciation of Tango’s joke. She held out her hand. “I’m Miranda.”

  “Tango.”

  “I know. I heard...” she fumbled for the bartender’s name, “Todd talking to you. And I saw your message when I came in tonight.”

  Tango looked at her sharply for the first time. “Do you come here often? I’m looking for a friend: red hair, glasses, geeky....”

  “Named Riley. No, sorry. I saw the notice, but that’s it. I hope you find him.”

  “Too bad somebody pulled the notice down.” Tango frowned as she took another drink.

  The short woman almost sounded paranoid. “Maybe they know him,” suggested Miranda.

  “But they didn’t go to Todd.” Tango sighed. Miranda took the opportunity to move a little closer to Tango, enjoying the thrill of the hunt. “You’re not from Toronto, are you?”

  “No.” Tango put her glass down. Miranda waited for her to say something else, then prompted her gently.

  “Where are you from?”

  “Alberta originally. Red Deer. Most recently, though, San Francisco.”

  “Nice city.” Miranda tried to dredge up long-ago memories of a trip there with her old high school band. “I love the trolley cars.”

  “Cable cars,” Tango corrected. “It is a nice place. Very different from Toronto.”

  Miranda put her glass to her mouth, letting a little beer wash past her lips then back out. The taste was nauseating. “So what brings you here?”

  “Oh, holidays. And looking for Riley, now.” She laughed quietly and bitterly.. “I just can’t seem to get away from this city.”

  “Toronto has that effect on some people.”

  That made Tango snort with sour amusement. She picked up her glass again and raised it in a toast. “Then here’s to Toronto the Good!” She tossed back the last few mouthfuls of beer.

  Miranda smiled. Tango was going to be easy prey. The smell of the small woman tickled Miranda’s nostrils. Tango’s skin was quite pale, and she could imagine the rich blood that flowed just beneath it. She forced herself to stop thinking about that before the lust for blood overcame her in the middle of the bar. “Let me buy you another,” she offered.

&nbs
p; “I don’t think so.”

  “Come on. You look like you need it.”

  Tango sighed. “Give it up.” She looked straight ahead, staring at the monitor again. “Believe me, I wouldn’t agree with you.”

  “What do you mean?” Miranda fought to keep suspicion off her face.

  Still staring ahead, Tango brought two fingers up to her mouth, crooked them, and wiggled them in front of her canines. Fangs. Miranda’s own mouth closed sharply. Tango nodded. “You wouldn’t like me. My blood does all kinds of nasty things to vampires. Hallucinations, especially.”

  Miranda hissed. The other woman was no more human than she was! The odd energy that clung to her should have told the vampire that. She took a step back, wondering how long it would take for the rest of the pack to reach her if she needed them. “What are you?”

  “Stop that.” Tango didn’t even turn. “I’m not going to put a stake through your heart, if that’s what you’re afraid of. I’m a Kithain.” Miranda tried to place the term, but couldn’t. Tango snorted, a little bit contemptuously. “A changeling. Are you Camarilla or Sabbat?”

  Miranda bit back a snarl. “Sabbat. How did you know?”

  “I’ve been around. Vampires aren’t that hard to spot close up if you know what to look for. For starters, you’re not actually breathing, and you’re not really drinking your beer. And the two guys who were here disappeared awfully conveniently for you to move in.” She paused, then said, “If you promise not to try and hypnotize me, or whatever it is you do, I’ll turn around.”

  “Why should I?” Miranda growled.

  “Mostly because I’d like to talk to you. And it’s not easy to do that when I can’t look at you.”