The Laughing Corpse

by Laurell K. Hamilton

  "He's a coworker."

  "A zombie raiser?" Willie asked.

  Charles said, "Yes." His dark face was impassive. His look was quietly menacing.

  Willie seemed impressed. He nodded. "Sure, ya got zombie work after you see Jean-Claude?"

  "Yeah," I said. I stood and spoke softly to Charles, though chances were that Willie would hear it. Even the newly dead hear better than most dogs.

  "I'll be as quick as I can."

  "Alright," he said, "but I need to get home soon."

  I understood. He was on a short leash. His own fault, but it seemed to bother me more than it bothered Charles. Maybe it was one of the reasons I'm not married. I'm not big on compromise.

  21

  WILLIE LED ME through a door and a short hallway. As soon as the door closed behind us, the noise was muted, distant as a dream. The lights were bright after the dimness of the club. I blinked against it. Willie looked rosy-cheeked in the bright light, not quite alive, but healthy for a deadman. He'd fed tonight on something, or someone. Maybe a willing human, maybe animal. Maybe.

  The first door on the left said "Manager's Office." Willie's office? Naw.

  Willie opened the door and ushered me in. He didn't come in the office. His eyes flicked towards the desk, then he backed out, shutting the door behind him.

  The carpeting was pale beige; the walls eggshell-white. A large black-lacquered desk sat against the far wall. A shiny black lamp seemed to grow out of the desk. There was a blotter perfectly placed in the center of the desk. There were no papers, no paper clips, just Jean-Claude sitting behind the desk.

  His long pale hands were folded on the blotter. Soft curling black hair, midnight-blue eyes, white shirt with its strange button-down cuffs. He was perfect sitting there, perfectly still like a painting. Beautiful as a wet dream, but not real. He only looked perfect. I knew better.

  There were two brown metal filing cabinets against the left wall. A black leather couch took up the rest of the wall. There was a large oil painting above the couch. It was a scene of St. Louis in the 1700s. Settlers coming downriver in flatboats. The sunlight was autumn thick. Children ran and played. It didn't match anything in the room.

  "The picture yours?" I asked.

  He gave a slight nod.

  "Did you know the painter?"

  He smiled then, no hint of fangs, just the beautiful spread of lips. If there had been a vampire GQ, Jean-Claude would have been their cover boy.

  "The desk and couch don't match the rest of the decor," I said.

  "I am in the midst of remodeling," he said.

  He just sat there looking at me. "You asked for this meeting, Jean-Claude. Let's get on with it."

  "Are you in a hurry?" His voice had dropped lower, the brush of fur on naked skin.

  "Yes, I am. So cut to the chase. What do you want?"

  The smile widened, slightly. He actually lowered his eyes for a moment. It was almost coy. "You are my human servant, Anita."

  He used my name. Bad sign that. "No," I said, "I'm not."

  "You bear two marks, only two more remain." His face still looked pleasant, lovely. The expression didn't match what he was saying.

  "So what?"

  He sighed. "Anita . . ." He stopped in midsentence and stood. He came around the desk. "Do you know what it means to be Master of the City?" He leaned on the desk, half sitting. His shirt gaped open showing an expanse of pale chest. One nipple showed small and pale and hard. The cross-shaped scar was an insult to such pale perfection.

  I had been staring at his bare chest. How embarrassing. I met his gaze and managed not to blush. Bully for me.

  "There are other benefits to being my human servant, ma petite." His eyes were all pupil, black and drowning deep.

  I shook my head. "No."

  "No lies, ma petite, I can feel your desire." His tongue flicked across his lips. "I can taste it."

  Great, just great. How do you argue with someone who can feel what you're feeling? Answer: don't argue, agree. "Alright, I lust after you. Does that make you happy?"

  He smiled. "Yes." One word, but it flowed through my mind, whispering things that he had not said. Whispers in the dark.

  "I lust after a lot of men, but that doesn't mean I have to sleep with them."

  His face was almost slack, eyes like drowning pools. "Casual lust is easily defeated," he said. He stood in one smooth motion. "What we have is not casual, ma petite. Not lust, but desire." He moved towards me, one pale hand outstretched.

  My heart was thudding in my throat. It wasn't fear. I didn't think it was a mind trick. It felt real. Desire, he called it, maybe it was. "Don't," my voice was hoarse, a whisper.

  He, of course, did not stop. His fingers traced the edge of my cheek, barely touching. The brush of skin on skin. I stepped away from him, forced to draw a deep shaking breath. I could be as uncool as I wanted, he could feel my discomfort. No sense pretending.

  I could feel where he had touched me, a lingering sensation. I looked at the ground while I spoke. "I appreciate the possible fringe benefits, Jean-Claude, really. But I can't. I won't." I met his eyes. His face was a terrible blankness. Nothing. It was the same face of a moment ago, but some spark of humanity, of life, was gone.

  My pulse started thudding again. It had nothing to do with sex. Fear. It had a lot to do with fear.

  "As you like, my little animator. Whether we are lovers or not, it does not change what you are to me. You are my human servant."

  "No," I said.

  "You are mine, Anita. Willing or not, you are mine."

  "See, Jean-Claude, here's where you lose me. First you try seducing me, which has its pleasant side. When that doesn't work, you resort to threats."

  "It is not a threat, ma petite. It is the truth."

  "No, it isn't. And stop calling me ma fucking petite."

  He smiled at that.

  I didn't want him amused by me. Anger replaced fear in a quick warm rush. I liked anger. It made me brave, and stupid. "Fuck you."

  "I have already offered that." His voice made something low jerk in my stomach.

  I felt the rush of heat as I blushed. "Damn you, Jean-Claude, damn you."

  "We need to talk, ma petite. Lovers or not, servant or not, we need to talk."

  "Then talk. I haven't got all night."

  He sighed. "You don't make this easy."

  "If it was easy you wanted, you should have picked on someone else."

  He nodded. "Very true. Please, be seated." He went back to lean on the desk, arms crossed over his chest.

  "I don't have that kind of time," I said.

  He frowned slightly. "I thought we agreed to talk this out, ma petite."

  "We agreed to meet at eleven. You're the one who wasted an hour, not me."

  His smile was almost bitter. "Very well. I will give you a . . . condensed version."

  I nodded. "Fine with me."

  "I am the new Master of the City. But to survive with Nikolaos alive, I had to hide my powers. I did it too well. There are those who think I am not powerful enough to be the Master of all. They are challenging me. One of the things they are using against me is you."

  "How?"

  "Your disobedience. I cannot even control my own human servant. How can I possibly control all the vampires in the city and surrounding areas?"

  "What do you want from me?"

  He smiled then, wide and genuine, flashing fangs. "I want you to be my human servant."

  "Not in this lifetime, Jean-Claude."

  "I can force the third mark on you, Anita." There was no threat as he said it. It was just a fact.

  "I would rather die than be your human servant." Master vampires can smell the truth. He would know I meant it.

  "Why?"

  I opened my mouth to try to explain, but didn't. He would not understand. We stood two feet apart but it might have been miles. Miles across some dark chasm. We could not bridge that gap. He was a walking corpse. Whatever he had been a
s a living man, it was gone. He was the Master of the City, and that was nothing even close to human.

  "If you force this issue, I will kill you," I said.

  "You mean that." There was surprise in his voice. It isn't often a girl gets to surprise a centuries-old vampire.

  "Yes."

  "I do not understand you, ma petite."

  "I know," I said.

  "Could you pretend to be my servant?"

  It was an odd question. "What does pretending mean?"

  "You come to a few meetings. You stand at my side with your guns and your reputation."

  "You want the Executioner at your back." I stared at him for a space of heartbeats. The true horror of what he'd just said floated slowly through my mind. "I thought the two marks were accident. That you panicked. You meant all along to mark me, didn't you?"

  He just smiled.

  "Answer me, you son of a bitch."

  "If the chance arose, I was not averse to it."

  "Not averse to it!" I was almost yelling. "You cold-bloodedly chose me to be your human servant! Why?"

  "You are the Executioner."

  "Damn you, what does that mean?"

  "It is impressive to be the vampire who finally caught you."

  "You haven't caught me."

  "If you would behave yourself, the others would think so. Only you and I need know that it is pretense."

  I shook my head. "I won't play your game, Jean-Claude."

  "You will not help me?"

  "You got it."

  "I offer you immortality. Without the compromise of vampirism. I offer you myself. There have been women over the years who would have done anything I asked just for that."

  "Sex is sex, Jean-Claude. No one's that good."

  He smiled slightly. "Vampires are different, ma petite. If you were not so stubborn, you might find out how different."

  I had to look away from his eyes. The look was too intimate. Too full of possibilities.

  "There's only one thing I want from you," I said.

  "And what is that, ma petite?"

  "All right, two things. First, stop calling me ma petite; second, let me go. Wipe these damn marks away."

  "You may have the first request, Anita."

  "And the second?"

  "I cannot, even if I wanted to."

  "Which you don't," I said.

  "Which I don't."

  "Stay away from me, Jean-Claude. Stay the fuck away from me, or I'll kill you."

  "Many people have tried through the years."

  "How many of them had eighteen kills?"

  His eyes widened just a bit. "None. There was this man in Hungary who swore he killed five."

  "What happened to him?"

  "I tore his throat out."

  "You understand this, Jean-Claude. I would rather have my throat torn out. I would rather die trying to kill you than submit to you." I stared at him, trying to see if he understood any of what I said. "Say something."

  "I have heard your words. I know you mean them." He was suddenly standing in front of me. I hadn't seen him move, hadn't felt him in my head. He was just suddenly inches in front of me. I think I gasped.

  "Could you truly kill me?" His voice was like silk on a wound, gentle with an edge of pain. Like sex. It was like velvet rubbing inside my skull. It felt good, even with fear tearing through my body. Shit. He could still have me. Still take me down. No way.

  I looked up into his so-blue eyes and said, "Yes."

  I meant it. He blinked once, gracefully, and stepped back. "You are the most stubborn woman I have ever met," he said. There was no play in his voice this time. It was a flat statement.

  "That's the nicest compliment you've ever paid me."

  He stood in front of me, hands at his sides. He stood very still. Snakes or birds can stand utterly still but even a snake has a sense of aliveness, of action waiting to resume. Jean-Claude stood there with no sense of anything, as if despite what my eyes told me, he had vanished. He was not there at all. The dead make no noise.

  "What happened to your face?"

  I touched the swollen cheek before I could stop myself. "Nothing," I lied.

  "Who hit you?"

  "Why, so you can go beat him up?"

  "One of the fringe benefits of being my servant is my protection."

  "I don't need your protection, Jean-Claude."

  "He hurt you."

  "And I shoved a gun into his groin and made him tell me everything he knew," I said.

  Jean-Claude smiled. "You did what?"

  "I shoved a gun into his balls, alright?"

  His eyes started to sparkle. Laughter spread across his face and burst out between his lips. He laughed full-throated.

  The laugh was like candy: sweet, and infectious. If you could bottle Jean-Claude's laugh, I know it would be fattening. Or orgasmic.

  "Ma petite, ma petite, you are absolutely marvelous."

  I stared at him, letting that wonderful, touchable laugh roll around me. It was time to go. It is very hard to be dignified when someone is laughing uproariously at you. But I managed.

  My parting shot made him laugh harder. "Stop calling me ma petite."

  22

  I STEPPED BACK out into the noise of the club. Charles was standing beside the table, not sitting. He looked uncomfortable from a distance. What had gone wrong now?

  His big hands were twisted together. Dark face scrunched up into near pain. A kind God had made Charles look big and bad, because inside he was all marshmallow. If I'd had Charles's natural size and strength, I'd have been a guaranteed bad ass. It was sort of sad and unfair.

  "What's wrong?" I asked.

  "I called Caroline," he said.

  "And?"

  "The baby-sitter's sick. And Caroline's been called in to the hospital. Someone has to stay with Sam while she goes to work."

  "Mm-huh," I said.

  He didn't look the least bit tough when he said, "Can going down to the Tenderloin wait until tomorrow?"

  I shook my head.

  "You're not going to go down there alone," Charles said. "Are you?"

  I stared up at the great mountain of a man, and sighed. "I can't wait, Charles."

  "But the Tenderloin." He lowered his voice as if just saying the word too loud would bring a cloud of pimps and prostitutes to descend upon us. "You can't go down there alone at night."

  "I've gone worse places, Charles. I'll be all right."

  "No, I won't let you go alone. Caroline can just get a new sitter or tell the hospital no." He smiled when he said it. Always happy to help a friend. Caroline would give him hell for it. Worst of all, now I didn't want to take Charles with me. You had to do more than look tough.

  What if Gaynor got wind of me questioning Wanda? What if he found Charles and thought he was involved? No. It had been selfish to risk Charles. He had a four-year-old son. And a wife.

  Harold Gaynor would eat Charles raw for dinner. I couldn't involve him. He was a big, friendly, eager-to-please bear. A lovable, cuddly bear. I didn't need a teddy bear for backup. I needed someone who would be able to take any heat that Gaynor might send our way.

  I had an idea.

  "Go home, Charles. I won't go alone. I promise."

  He looked uncertain. Like maybe he didn't trust me. Fancy that. "Anita, are you sure? I won't leave you hanging like this."

  "Go on, Charles. I'll take backup."

  "Who can you get at this hour?"

  "No questions. Go home to your son."

  He looked uncertain, but relieved. He hadn't really wanted to go to the Tenderloin. Maybe Caroline's short leash was what Charles wanted, needed. An excuse for all the things he really didn't want to do. What a basis for a marriage.

  But, hey, if it works, don't fix it.

  Charles left with many apologies. But I knew he was glad to go. I would remember that he had been glad to go.

  I knocked on the office door. There was a silence, then, "Come in, Anita."

 
How had he known it was me? I wouldn't ask. I didn't want to know.

  Jean-Claude seemed to be checking figures in a large ledger. It looked antique with yellowed pages and fading ink. The ledger looked like something Bob Crachit should have been scribbling in on a cold Christmas Eve.

  "What have I done to merit two visits in one night?" he said.

  Looking at him now, I felt silly. I spent all this time avoiding him. Now I was going to invite him to accompany me on a bit of sleuthing? But it would kill two bats with one stone. It would please Jean-Claude, and I really didn't want him angry with me, if I could avoid it. And if Gaynor did try to go up against Jean-Claude, I was betting on Jean-Claude.

  It was what Jean-Claude had done to me a few weeks ago. He had chosen me as the vampire's champion. Put me up against a monster that had slain three master vampires. And he had bet that I would come out on top against Nikolaos. I had, but just barely.

  What was sauce for the goose was sauce for the gander. I smiled sweetly at him. Pleased to be able to return the favor so quickly.

  "Would you care to accompany me to the Tenderloin?"

  He blinked, surprise covering his face just like a real person. "To what purpose?"

  "I need to question a prostitute about a case I'm working on. I need backup."

  "Backup?" he asked.

  "I need backup that looks more threatening than I do. You fit the bill."

  He smiled beatifically. "I would be your bodyguard."

  "You've given me enough grief, do something nice for a change."

  The smile vanished. "Why this sudden change of heart, ma petite?"

  "My backup had to go home and baby-sit his kid."

  "And if I do not go?"

  "I'll go alone," I said.

  "Into the Tenderloin?"

  "Yep."

  He was suddenly standing by the desk, walking towards me. I hadn't seen him rise.

  "I wish you'd stop doing that."

  "Doing what?"

  "Clouding my mind so I can't see you move."

  "I do it as often as I can, ma petite, just to prove I still can."

  "What's that supposed to mean?"

  "I gave up much of my power over you when I gave you the marks. I practice what little games are left me." He was standing almost in front of me. "Lest you forget who and what I am."

  I stared up into his blue, blue eyes. "I never forget that you are the walking dead, Jean-Claude."

  An expression I could not read passed over his face. It might have been pain. "No, I see the knowledge in your eyes of what I am." His voice dropped low, almost a whisper, but it wasn't seductive. It was human. "Your eyes are the clearest mirror I have ever seen, ma petite. Whenever I begin to pretend to myself. Whenever I have delusions of life. I have only to look into your face and see the truth."