Mandy M. Roth - Magic Under Fire (Over a Dozen Tales of Urban Fantasy)

by Unknown

  From across the room came a tinkling sound as someone tapped a spoon against a wine glass. She sighed and picked up her own wine, then moved to the right. The next prospect took his place across from her, and she tried not to groan.

  Speed dating. Whoever had dreamed up this particular social activity could probably trace a direct line back to the originators of the Spanish Inquisition.

  “Hi,” said the stranger across from her, who had middle-management written all over him, from the medium-blue dress shirt to the carefully inoffensive tie. “I’m Trent.”

  “Felicia,” she offered.

  His eyes widened a bit behind wire-rimmed glasses. “That’s unusual.”

  “It was my grandmother’s name.”

  “Ah,” he said.

  An uncomfortable silence followed. Felicia guessed he wasn’t terribly taken by her own appearance; she hadn’t bothered with dressing to impress and had ignored all of Lauren’s advice as to skinny jeans, slinky tops, and high heels. She’d made sure her clothes didn’t have any paint daubs on them, and that had been about the extent of her preparations. No point in selling a false bill of goods — the last time she’d had on high heels had been at a friend’s wedding two years ago, and the memory was painful enough that tonight she’d slid into her usual black flats without a moment’s hesitation.

  “So what do you do?” Felicia asked. She knew this wasn’t going anywhere, but she thought she might as well try to limp the conversation along for their allotted three minutes.

  “I’m an IT specialist at an investment firm here downtown.”

  Of course he was. What else could he be, with that tie?

  “And you?” he inquired.

  “I’m an artist. Portraits mainly.”

  “Really?” Although his tone sounded surprised, his expression was not. She could almost hear him thinking, Well, that explains the outfit….

  She quelled the urge to leap to her own defense. In this town, “artist” was usually code for “waiter” or “barrista.” But she couldn’t think of a way to tell this baby-faced computer guru that she’d had her first gallery show at twenty-four, or that her latest commission, for a well-known studio exec, would net her upwards of fifty grand once she finished it. She hadn’t waited a table since she graduated from college.

  “Yes,” she said. “I never was much of a nine-to-five type.”

  She really hadn’t meant it as a dig, but his smile suddenly looked a little strained. He lifted his bottle of Pacifico and took a swig. “Must be nice to not have to worry about responsibility or any of that other annoying crap.”

  Her eyes widened, and she forced herself to bite back a retort. Just because she painted full time didn’t mean she didn’t know all about personal responsibility. She’d never missed a deadline. She got up and painted every day, whether she felt like it or not. Some people might have the luxury of only having to worry about themselves, but she had her mother to take care of, and Carrie still with two years of college ahead of her --

  Luckily, the now-familiar clink of the host’s spoon against its companion wine glass kept her thoughts from heading into places she really didn’t want to go. She mumbled an insincere, “Nice meeting you,” and grabbed her purse and cabernet, then hurried off to the next station.

  She’d just taken a sip of wine when the next victim slid into the seat opposite hers. As she looked up to see what she was being inflicted with next, she stopped, wine glass lowered a few inches from her mouth.

  Holy crap.

  This new somebody was the polar opposite of the IT guy: tall, with a head of wavy overlong black hair. Black leather jacket, but not biker style — it was sleek and seemed to mold itself to his broad shoulders, and he wore a dark collared shirt underneath. A small red stone glinted from his left ear. Normally Felicia wasn’t much for earrings on men, but somehow this one seemed to suit him, gave him an almost gypsy-ish air that went along with the inky hair and swarthy skin.

  “F-Felicia McGovern,” she blurted.

  He smiled. “I’m Sam.”

  Such a prosaic name for an exotic specimen of a man. “Sam what?”

  “Let’s just go with Sam for now.”

  Fine. She knew the event organizers had everyone’s pertinent information, so if she wanted to let them know she was definitely interested in this Sam-whatever, she didn’t think they’d have too hard a time figuring out which Sam she meant. There weren’t many six-two black-haired Italian underwear models in this lot.

  Not that he really looked like an underwear model. He wasn’t pretty enough. His features were on the rough side of handsome, and when he smiled, lines showed in the skin around his eyes. She liked his looks no less for that. In fact, she liked them better. The planes of his face made her fingers just itch to pick up a paintbrush.

  She decided it was probably better not to dwell on what those shoulders and broad, capable hands did to other parts of her anatomy…

  “You ever been to one of these before?” she asked.

  “No.” He shot a quick glance around the crowded room, at the well-dressed men and women and the faint air of desperation that seemed to cling to each one of them. “I’m guessing you haven’t, either.”

  “Am I that obvious?”

  “Let’s say you don’t really fit in.” His own drink was a shot of tequila or vodka; he lifted it and consumed its contents with a neat, practiced flip that told her he’d done that sort of thing a time or two before. “But that’s all right. I don’t, either.”

  That was for certain. He stood out like a Chinese crested rooster in a clutch of white hens. “So why did you come?”

  Those dark eyes caught hers. He had amazing lashes, sooty and thick as his hair. “I was looking for something different.”

  Her agent Lauren probably could have come up with a witty reply to that. Felicia forced herself to hold his gaze and said, “So have you found it?”

  He didn’t blink. “I think so. Tell me, is your hair color natural?”

  It wasn’t the first time she’d been asked that question, but for some reason she could feel the heat rise in her cheeks. Damn that whole redhead-skin thing anyway. “I suppose you want to know my age and weight, too.”

  “I didn’t mean to offend you. It’s just that it’s quite…unusual.”

  So are you, she almost said, but she managed to keep the words from slipping out. No point in getting quite so personal just two minutes after meeting the guy. She shrugged and replied, “Irish on both sides of the family. Mom and Dad were both redheads. I just got it double barrels. So what about you?”

  “Neither of my parents is a redhead.”

  She lifted an eyebrow.

  Another one of those white-toothed smiles. She noticed that his canines were slightly sharper than normal. “Actually, I’m part Irish, too. Black Irish, though.”

  She wondered if he were teasing her. It was probably best to ignore the teeth; it would be just her luck to have the hottest guy in the room turn out to be a vampire or something. Keeping her tone dry, she said, “I would never have guessed.”

  Of course the event’s host chose that moment to tap his spoon against the glass. It figured. The conversations with the guys she didn’t care about dragged on forever, and this one felt as if it was over before it even got started.

  Sam didn’t seem inclined to move, however. He gazed at her thoughtfully, then said, “Why don’t you and I get out of here?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I know I don’t need to meet anyone else. How about you?”

  From the corner of her eye Felicia saw the pair who were supposed to occupy the table next standing off to one side. Neither one of them looked exactly thrilled to find her and her companion still occupying their spot.

  “Well, it doesn’t really work that way — and I think we’re supposed to move — ”

  He stood then, unfolding all six-foot-plus inches of his imposing frame from his chair. A shake of his head, followed by, “Tell me, Felic
ia — do you always follow the rules?”

  Of course she didn’t. Well, she wanted to think that she didn’t, but she couldn’t seem to come up with a single example supporting that conclusion. Hastily she gathered up her purse and half-empty glass of wine. It was one thing to talk big about breaking rules and quite another to be deliberately rude; if she and Sam didn’t move on, then this new couple wouldn't have anyplace to sit.

  She shouldered her purse, then turned back to him.

  Rather, the spot where he had stood. He was gone, apparently disappearing into the crowd so quickly she hadn’t even seen him leave.

  Guess he’s not into good girls, she thought, even as she fought back a wave of disappointment so acute she actually felt it as an ache in the pit of her stomach. Since there didn’t seem to be anything else for her to do, she made her way to the next station, where yet another wholly uninteresting candidate waited for her. Great.

  She took her seat and mumbled a pleasantry, but she couldn’t help looking past the table where she had just been sitting. Some poor woman was going to be upset when she realized she didn’t have a partner for this particular segment.

  But that table was occupied by a couple who seemed to be speaking with some animation. Frowning, Felicia scanned the rest of the circle. Sam was nowhere to be seen. If he’d left in the middle of the session, shouldn’t his absence have caused a gap in the circle of men? Every table was full, however, with no sign that he had ever been there.

  What the hell?

  HE LET himself walk down the street, eschewing the speedier ways his kind used to move around the city. Sometimes he found it beneficial to surround himself with humanity, with their endless variations and petty concerns and cheap vitality. If he didn’t allow himself to think, he could almost pretend that he was one of them. Odd fantasy, and one his fellow demons didn’t appear to share. None of them could see the appeal in being human, apart from the evanescent pleasures this world provided. And since demons could avail themselves of those pleasures without all the pesky inconveniences of being mortal, why would they want to bother with being real humans?

  Why, indeed.

  Perhaps he had taken his leave of Felicia too abruptly, but that mattered little to him. Nothing wrong with tantalizing her, leaving her wanting more.

  He knew he wanted more of her.

  Throughout the ages he had taken human lovers as the mood struck. Not indiscriminately, of course, but with human form came human desires as well. Those desires could be ignored or sublimated as need be, but there had never been any prohibition against fraternizing, as long as a demon’s lover wasn’t someone intended for Hell.

  No worries on that score with Felicia McGovern, of course. If anything, she seemed almost too proper for his tastes. He liked a woman with a bit of the wanton about her. On the other hand, he was willing to put up with quite a bit for a chance at seeing those glorious copper curls of hers spread across a pillow.

  The mental image sent a flood of heat through his loins. But he was no mortal man, ruled only by his flesh. He ignored the wave of desire and moved on. After all, he had gone some time without physical release. He could wait.

  But first, he wanted to make her wait for him.

  AT FIRST FELICIA wasn’t sure she’d heard the host correctly. “Excuse me?”

  He sent her a look that was half-annoyed, half-pitying. “As I said, we have no record of anyone with a first name of Sam participating tonight. Are you sure you heard him correctly?”

  If it had been a difficult or complex name, that might have worked as an excuse. But “Sam” was pretty hard to misunderstand. On the other hand, hadn’t he said, “call me Sam”? That seemed to imply his name wasn’t really Sam. But why would he show such an obvious interest in her, only to give her a false name and then disappear into the night?

  The beginnings of a headache started to throb at the base of her neck. Felicia knew she should just admit to herself that she’d struck out, then take herself home, make some herbal tea, and call it a night.

  Some part of her refused to give up, however. “I might have gotten his name wrong,” she told the host. “But he was pretty recognizable. Tall guy, longish black hair, black leather jacket, and an earring?”

  He gave her a stare that made her want to reach up and feel the top of her head in case she’d suddenly sprouted a pair of horns. “No one like that. Maybe it was someone from the restaurant who came here into the bar by accident or something, but he wasn’t signed up for the event.”

  Her encounter with Sam felt anything but accidental, but she didn’t think she could come up with a way to tell the host that without him handing her another one of those horn-spouting stares. Better to cut her losses and get out of here before she did anything else to make herself look like a complete idiot.

  She said, “Okay, sorry. My mistake.” She wasn’t sorry, and she didn’t think she’d made a mistake, but she did know she’d already wasted enough time here. Sam was obviously long gone. No point in pursuing the matter any further.

  Cool night air surrounded her as she stepped outside. She felt better almost immediately, even though the evening breeze was dry, all moisture stolen by the bluster of Southern California’s Santa Ana winds. At least she couldn’t smell the fires; the smoke had been driven out to sea by the harsh gales. It was beginning to get chilly, despite the day’s heat, and she wished she had thought to bring a jacket.

  Her loft was only a few blocks from the restaurant/bar where the speed-dating event had been held, so she didn’t bother with a taxi. Friends told her she was crazy for roaming around downtown by herself, but she’d never felt unsafe. The local news broadcast far more stories of people going nuts in suburbia than of mayhem in L.A.’s center. A few miles away, down in the sprawl of South Central, things were different, but the people here in the heart of the city tended to leave one another alone.

  She’d purchased the loft a few years back before gentrification had really taken hold. At the time she’d had to drive miles to get to a supermarket, but now a gleaming new Ralph’s was within walking distance. Her newer neighbors were just as likely to be lawyers or Internet entrepreneurs as artists and musicians, but that was all right. She liked the variety, and the fact that, while everyone in her building tended to keep an eye on everyone else, people mostly stayed out of her business.

  Not that Felicia had much business to stay out of. Between making sure her mother was doing all right in the managed-care facility where she now lived and keeping an eye on her younger sister Carrie, now a junior at UCLA, men had been pretty low on Felicia’s priority list for some time. Her agent Lauren had poked and prodded until Felicia finally agreed to the speed-dating event, mostly to get her off her back.

  And see how well that turned out, she thought, as she turned her key in the lock and let herself into the loft. She dropped her purse on the kitchen counter and went to put the kettle on the stove. What she really needed was some peppermint tea to bring much-needed moisture back to her throat, followed by a good night’s sleep. She knew better than to paint when she felt like this; the deadline for her latest commission was coming up quickly, but she knew she’d make it. What she couldn’t afford was any mistakes brought on by exhaustion…

  …or preoccupation with a certain black-haired stranger. Despite her best efforts to put the brief encounter behind her, his face kept swimming up in her mind. Those eyes like pools of ink, the clean, sculpted lines of his jaw. She’d always been a sucker for a good chin.

  Or maybe just a sucker, period. She needed to stop making the mistake of dating creative types; they invariably left her high and dry when things got the least bit difficult. On the other hand, she couldn’t think what she’d have in common with someone in a supposedly stable career, like an accountant or a banker or a high school principal. Carrie kept hinting darkly about trying to fix her up with a certain eligible anthropology professor, but that was more of a running joke between them than anything serious.

  T
he loft was well over two thousand square feet. Normally, Felicia enjoyed the feeling of space it gave and the warm, natural light that poured through its high windows, but tonight it felt oddly hollow, cavernous. The whistle from the kettle echoed off wood floors and exposed brick.

  A shadow moved outside one window, and she started. Then she realized it was only her next-door neighbor’s cat Dempsey, making his usual nightly rounds. Shaking her head at herself, she went to the kitchen and turned down the burner, then dropped a tea bag into a mug and poured hot water over it. The reassuring smell of peppermint drifted up to her nose.

  Really, was one encounter with an interesting stranger enough to make her this jumpy? Better to chalk it up to the Santa Anas and their well-publicized effects, including short tempers and all-around jitteriness. Hadn’t someone once tried to use the hot, dry winds as part of an insanity defense?

  Her windows looked east, toward Boyle Heights and the hills of Mount Washington and the Arroyo Seco. A gibbous moon had just begun to rise beyond their dark shapes, its face tinged yellow-orange from the dust and smoke in the air. Felicia wrapped her fingers around her mug and stared out into the night sky. She wondered if Sam was looking at the moon as well.

  HE FOUND Abigor in one of his favorite haunts, at the base of the first “O” in the Hollywood sign. From this vantage point one could see the entire city spread out below. Tonight the air was almost achingly clear, save for the smudge of smoke that hung off the coast. Despite his form, Samael’s eyes weren’t quite human; no mortal could have differentiated between the haze from the fires and the equally black blur of the Pacific Ocean.

  “Slow night?” he asked.

  A beer bottle glinted as Abigor raised it to his mouth. He swallowed, then said, “Slower than the 405 at rush hour.”

  “I had no idea L.A. was such a hotbed of virtue.”

  “It’s not. I guess all the baddies just decided they didn’t want to check out on a Friday night.” He extracted a bottle from the six-pack next to him and offered it to Samael.

  Since it was something drinkable this time — a Belgian ale — Samael took the offering and neatly popped off the cap. His nails looked human, but they were stronger. Far stronger.