by Devin Hanson
The urge would be there, but it wouldn’t be the same for her without Mahlat stoking the fires of lust. Hopefully she figured that out before some thug caught onto her weakness and turned her into a prostitute or worse. All I could do was hope for a best-case scenario, where she abstained until the cravings left her.
Yeah, right.
I sighed and shifted in my seat, crossing my legs the other way. Seeing Jessica bound up and waiting to have sex, then all the talk of submissiveness and the implications was making me horny. Try as I might, I couldn’t shake the image of it being me handcuffed to the bench. Maybe if we turned around, Ethan would…
I squeezed my eyes shut. I was Alexandra Ascher. I might be the daughter of a succubus, but by God, I was still half human. I was the one in charge of my libido. I was not a helpless creature, driven by the whim of her desires.
“You okay?”
I gritted my teeth and gave Ethan a tight smile. “Fine.” The worst part of it was that I knew Ethan would love to have sex with me. All I had to do was shift my shoulders toward him, give him a little smile, maybe bite on a fingernail. We’d be having sex within fifteen minutes. I wanted to. Badly.
Instead, I turned to look out the window again. Ethan deserved better than a quick fuck. Besides the strain it would put on our relationship, there was the very real possibility Ethan would end up like Jessica had been. The image of Ethan slack-jawed and drooling with mindless need sent a chill down my spine. My aching horniness vanished like someone had dumped a bucket of ice water over my head.
Why couldn’t I just be satisfied with having one-night stands? It would be easy to pick up a guy at a club or a bar. I could get my itch scratched without ruining my friendship with Ethan or breaking his mind. Except that wasn’t what I wanted. I had no interest in taking some random guy to my bed. I needed something more than good looks or a fancy car. Without a strong personality in my partner, I might as well get my rocks off manually.
“Jessica really bummed you out, huh? You should be proud of yourself. You had the right instincts; she would have died down there if you hadn’t gone looking for her.”
I didn’t say anything, just looked at Ethan sideways through the fall of my hair. Correcting him on the source of my mood wouldn’t help anything.
“I’m a little surprised she didn’t free herself, though. You broke those chains pretty easily.”
“Must have been a leverage thing,” I muttered. “Probably cheap handcuffs purchased from a sex shop.” That wasn’t true. They had been police-grade, hardened-steel cuffs, but Ethan didn’t know how strong I actually was, and I had no intention of cluing him in.
“Must have been,” Ethan nodded absently. “What’s your next move with your investigation?”
“I don’t know. I’ll have to contact my client and tell them what we’ve discovered.”
“You’re trying to find out why he went insane?”
I made a non-committal noise in my throat. “I mean, how stable could he be if he’s tying up girls in his basement?”
Ethan chuckled. “Fair enough.”
The conversation drifted after that, and we arrived back at Ethan’s house a few minutes later. We climbed out of Ethan’s car and he stretched and yawned.
“Hanging out with you is always exciting, Alex. I don’t know how you deal with the stress.”
I shrugged. It never really got cold in Los Angeles, but we were in the foothills in December and the temperature was starting to creep toward freezing. It was cold enough that I didn’t want to hang out on Ethan’s driveway shooting the breeze any longer than I had to. “Hey, I spent the last two months bored. Maybe it’s hanging out with you that makes my life exciting. Ever think of that?”
I started walking up the driveway and Ethan followed. I was almost to the door when my phone rang, startling me. I glanced at the number and groaned.
“What?”
“Work.” I waved Ethan ahead and picked up. “You know it’s almost midnight, right?”
“No rest for the wicked,” Sam said. “I hope you’re not in bed.”
“No such luck.”
“Good, because we need you. Get this,” I could hear the excitement pick up in his voice. “We got it on video this time.”
“You want to elaborate? What’d you get?”
“The dead body. Lying on a slab, dead as door nails, then it just sits up and walks out of the morgue.”
I felt the hairs on the back of my neck lift up. “Um.”
“You sure this isn’t zombies? It sure looked like a zombie to me.”
“Seriously?”
“We caught it on camera getting into a car outside the morgue. We pulled the plates and caught it on a bolo five minutes ago. A plainclothes is tailing it right now.”
A cold shiver ran up the back of my neck. “Tell your man to stay clear.”
“Why? We can’t let someone else get murdered.”
“Sam, trust me on this one. You do not want to get into a fight with this thing.”
“Someone has to,” Sam growled.
“Tell me where it is. I’m on my way.”
“No way, Alex. You’re a civilian. You’re not going to engage. We’ll corner this bastard and take him out the right way.”
“You don’t get it. Shooting it will not do anything.”
“Why not?”
“Because its already dead, Sam!” I turned back to Ethan’s house and saw him standing in the doorway, his eyes wide. “Shit.”
“What? What’s going—”
I eyed Ethan. “Hold on a sec.” I lowered the phone and Sam’s voice came from the speaker like an angry cricket chirping in my hand.
“That was Detective Friday on the phone?”
I nodded.
“Are you going to tell me what this is all about?” Ethan asked.
“No.”
Ethan pursed his lips, then shrugged but I could see the hurt on his face. “Okay. Does it have anything to do with your missing bodies?”
“This one isn’t safe, Ethan. I can’t ask you to ride along.”
“If it’s police business, then I doubt they’d appreciate me being with you anyway.” He forced a grin. “I don’t know whether to be offended that you’re trying to protect me, or flattered that you care.”
“Thanks, Ethan.”
“But I don’t like being kept in the dark, either.”
“If I could tell you what is going on, I would.”
“I’m also not a super huge fan of Friday putting you in danger.”
The shouting coming from my phone was starting to run down. I held up a finger to Ethan, putting that conversation on pause, and lifted the phone back to my head. “Sam. You still there?”
“Damn it, Alex, I—”
“Just tell me where the car is.”
“No deal, Alex. You want in, it’s going to be on my terms.”
“I don’t want in,” I snapped, “I want to be running in the opposite direction. But I also don’t want you to get killed.”
“So, you know more about what we’re facing?”
“Some,” I admitted, “but not nearly enough!”
“Then you know more than we do. I’m coming to get you. Are you home?”
“No. I’m at Ethan Bishop’s house.”
There was a pause, then, “Okay. I’ll be there in ten minutes.”
I hung up and scowled at my phone. “Sometimes I hate working for the police.”
“Same.” Ethan walked out and sat on a porch chair next to me. “You don’t have to go with Friday,” he said worriedly. “You’re a civilian, so they can’t force you to go into danger.”
I sighed. “Yeah, but their checks keep my power on and my cat fed.”
“That monster of yours does eat a lot,” Ethan said. “I wouldn’t want to miss a meal with him either.”
“I’m pretty sure if he was hungry he’d go find a neighborhood Doberman to eat or something,” I grinned.
“Alex…”
“I’ll be all right, Ethan. Sam will make sure of that.”
Ethan ran a hand through his hair. “That doesn’t make me feel better,” he sighed. “What is it that you’re helping the police with anyway? Why do they need you?”
I looked helplessly at Ethan. “I can’t tell you that.”
He nodded. “Okay.” There was a long, awkward pause, then he pushed himself to his feet. “You want me to wait out here with you until Friday gets here?”
It was cold and lonely, but I didn’t want to drag out the silence between us more than I had to. “I think I’ll be all right, thanks.”
Ethan nodded again and turned to leave.
“I’ll send you a text when we’re done.”
“Thanks.” He looked back at me and struggled with something, but couldn’t find words for whatever he needed to say. “I’ll see you later, then.”
I hugged myself against the cold as Ethan went back inside and shut the door. A minute later, the light in his bedroom turned on and I saw the shadow of him moving around. Even with my riding jacket, it was too cold to be standing still.
There wasn’t anything left for me to do up at Ethan’s house. I headed back down the driveway and got my gloves out of the storage compartment on my scooter. A glint of polished wood beneath the gloves caught my eye and I drew out one of the two tonfas I kept inside.
The tonfa was twelve inches of polished hardwood with a handle jutting out at a right angle a third of the way down the shaft. Otherwise known as a police baton, the tonfa was one of the weapons used in eskrima. In the right hands, it could break bones or even kill. I wasn’t allowed to use the weapon in practice, lest a moment of poor control result in a cracked skull or a broken finger for my sparring partner.
Going against a ghoul, though, I’d want every advantage I could find. I knew so little about ghouls. I had no idea what they were capable of, but considering what the rest of the djinn were like, I didn’t think it’d be possible to overestimate them.
The grip of the tonfa felt solid in my hand, the weight reassuring. I picked up the second one and tucked them under my armpit long enough to tug my riding gloves on. Down the hill, tires squealed as a car took a corner too fast and I saw headlights sweep over the intersection at the end of the road.
A moment later, a SUV with a white-and-black police paintjob blew through the intersection without slowing for the stop sign and screeched to a halt in front of me. The passenger door popped open and Sam waved at me.
“Alex, good. Hop in.”
I swung up into the seat and hauled the door shut. Sam had swapped his usual sports jacket for a bulletproof vest. A shotgun sat in a holder between the seats.
“We going to a war?” I cracked.
“Buckle up.”
Sam pulled into Ethan’s driveway far enough to make a three-point turn, then accelerated back down the hill driving faster than was safe. As soon as we got out of the quiet residential streets, he flicked a switch and blue and red strobes ignited on the roof. The siren wailed and Sam leaned on the accelerator, blowing past the lingering late-night traffic at more than double the speed limit.
I hadn’t ever ridden in a cop car with the sirens going, and I clung to the grab handle with my teeth clenched tight. Surface streets weren’t designed for going sixty miles an hour and I felt every bump and unevenness in the street’s surface.
“So, this ghoul,” Sam shouted over the siren. “What do you know?”
“Nothing certain,” I replied. “You have to understand, in the States, these things are unheard of.”
We jounced through an intersection, our tires squealing as Sam dragged us around a pickup truck that hadn’t noticed the flashing lights and sirens sweeping up behind it. “Then what do you know?”
I tried to pull my attention off Sam’s crazy driving and remember the details of my research session earlier in the day. “It’s all conflicting. They’re dead, they’re incorporeal, they’re alive.”
I expected a good-natured rejection from Sam, but he just nodded. “Okay. How do we take one down?”
I shrugged, but the motion was lost in the jostling of the car. “We can destroy the body it’s in. But that wouldn’t be permanent.”
“It’s a start. I noticed you’re armed.”
“Is that a problem?”
He spared a glance for me and I saw the tightness in his eyes. Sam was scared. “Do you have a permit to carry them?”
“What do you think?”
His lips tightened. “It’s illegal to carry a baton without a permit in California.”
“Really? You’re going to bust my balls now?”
Sam hesitated, and for a moment I was sure he was going to order me to leave the tonfa in the car, then he shook his head. “No. Not tonight. But you have to promise to get a carry permit for them as soon as possible.”
“I’m in the class to get the permit,” I shrugged, “but I can’t carry it without being a registered security guard somewhere.”
He relaxed. “Oh, I think we can find a way around that, at least while you’re on police business.” Sam glanced over and checked the GPS. “We’re getting close.” He flicked off the sirens and lights and slowed down to the speed limit.
I looked down into the sedan next to us and saw Sam’s partner, Lara, also wearing a bulletproof vest. Abruptly I understood what was happening. “How many cops are tailing the ghoul?” I demanded.
“Lara and us,” he replied absently. “And the plain car tailing him.”
“What are you planning?”
His face hardened. “I’m not going to just let him get away again. Soon as he stops, we’ll hit him together. No way he walks away.”
“Oh no. Sam, we can’t get into a shootout with this thing! Are you even listening to me?” I shouted. “He’s already dead! You can’t put him down that way!”
Sam slammed a hand against the steering wheel. “You keep saying that,” he growled, “but it doesn’t give me a solution!”
“I don’t have one yet,” I admitted.
“Then we do it my way.”
Before I could argue, the radio chirruped. “Target is slowing. Looks like it’s heading into a parking lot.”
I looked out the window, trying to figure out where we were. Sam’s chaotic driving had brought us to Glendale, somewhere in the vicinity of the Galleria, but I didn’t recognize any of the office buildings we were going by.
“Have him follow the car,” I said quickly. “The ghoul is going to drop the corpse before we have a chance to question it, but whoever is driving that car will know something.”
“Good thinking.” Sam relayed my suggestion and after a moment, Lara came on the radio, affirming the order.
Lara was driving in front of us, and she suddenly swerved to the side of the road. I caught a glimpse of a man, naked but for a hospital gown flapping behind him, as he disappeared into an office building. Sam slammed on the brakes and we skidded to a halt. He flicked on the spinning lights and threw open his door without bothering to get out of the middle of the street.
“You coming?” he called, before snatching the shotgun and jumping out of the SUV.
Adrenaline spiked, sending my heart rate surging upward. My head felt stuffed full of cotton as I kicked open my door and jumped to the ground with tonfas in hand. The hardwood felt solid through my gloves, their weight reassuring.
Lara joined us as we ran for the office door. “Backup is on the way, but we can’t wait.”
The office building was a three-story structure built on top of a parking garage, faced with brick. We reached the door and Lara stiff-armed me in the chest, shoving me back.
“You stay behind us,” she snapped. Then, without waiting for a response from me, she hauled open the door. Sam raised his shotgun to his shoulder and slipped through. I watched him clear the lobby then jerk his head toward the stairwell. Only then did Lara step out of the doorway into the lobby and let me in.
I tried to tell myself
that Lara wasn’t being insulting. Being forced to stand back while Sam cleared the lobby reminded me how casually the ghoul had killed the clerk in that store. My enthusiasm for running ahead fizzled out and I started thinking very seriously about going back and hiding in the SUV. What the hell was I doing? A few months learning how to throw someone to the mat in a gym did not make me qualified to fight a ghoul.
“Hurry up!” Lara hissed at me, snapping me out of my introspection.
With a quick shake of my head, I ran across the lobby. The office building had an atrium with a rather impressive tree growing in the middle. In the stairwell, I heard bare feet slapping somewhere above, then the crash of a door slamming open.
Without a word, the three of us sprinted up the stairs with Sam in the lead. By the time we hit the second floor, Lara’s breath was coming hard, but she pushed herself to keep up with her younger partner. Sam slowed as he reached the landing before the third floor, and leaned out with the shotgun raised and ready.
Lara panted as she tried to catch her breath and glanced back at me. I was hanging a few stairs back as she had instructed. Thanks to the energy I had received a few hours prior, the hard sprint up three flights of stairs hadn’t felt any more difficult than getting up from the sofa to get a fresh drink from the kitchen. After giving me a puzzled look, Lara turned back around and reached up to give Sam’s shoulder a quick squeeze, letting him know she was ready to move.
Sam eased up the last flight of stairs and nudged the door open with his foot before stepping through and checking the blind spots. I was close on Lara’s heels as she moved out onto the balcony running around the atrium, her handgun raised and ready.
The crown of the tree was at roughly eye level on the third floor, and didn’t obscure the far side of the balcony. I saw the man in his hospital gown running for an office door on the far side. He moved with an oddly stiff gait, like the muscles in his legs and back were still in rigor mortis.
“Freeze!” Sam shouted, “This is the police!”
The man looked back at us, and I saw his eyes were bloodshot. His jaw fell open and he screamed at us. It was like nothing I had ever seen or heard of. The man’s voice ripped and caught from the force of it, and his scream was bestial, primal in its ferocity.
