by E. A. Copen
Josiah’s answer was a scowl. “So long as you can fix us up with some appropriate clothing, I suppose that’s all right. I’ve got a suit I can wear, I suppose, but Niko’s clothing is all ruined.”
“So that’s why he’s lounging around half-naked.” I smirked. “At least he’s worth looking at.”
“Is he? I hadn’t noticed.” He grunted and dragged his bag out from beside the bed to dig through it.
“Oh, please. How could you not? He’s got abs you could do your laundry on.”
Josiah drew out a slightly wrinkled blue suit wrapped in plastic and tried to smooth it out on the bed. How he kept so much in that little bag, I’d never understand. I’d seen him pull all sorts of things out of there. I wouldn’t have been surprised to see him tug a whole house out one day. That suit, however, wasn’t going to work.
I walked across the bedroom and snatched it away from him, frowning as I held it up. “You’re going to a fetish club, Josiah, not a children’s cancer charity fundraiser. Besides, this is wrinkled.”
He sighed, exasperated. “Well then, what do you suggest?”
I put the suit down and got out my phone to do a quick search. “Let’s see. No, not that. Definitely not that. Hm. How do you feel about latex or rubber?”
The look he gave me told me he didn’t approve of either.
“You’re right,” I said, going back to my phone. “I’ve got just the thing.”
If this whole hunting demons and saving the world gig didn’t work out, I could always find a job in the fashion industry. Anyone who could take the meager scraps of clothing Josiah had and turn it into something that looked decent deserved an award. At least I had the opportunity to make it amusing and to get back at him for being an ass earlier.
I put him in a pair of leather pants, which he complained were too tight, and a black mesh shirt with an intricate spider web weave that he said made him itch. If he hadn’t complained so much, I would’ve just left the outfit as-is, but I was a vindictive bitch who liked torturing assholes. I added a stiff black collar to the ensemble with a tiny white square in the front and put a rosary on him.
“I really hate you,” he grumbled, tugging at the collar.
I smiled and blew him a kiss. “Send in the pretty one for a makeover. I can turn him into an altar boy and you can match.”
“You do that, and I’ll put a curse on you that makes you irresistible to every spider in New York.”
“Fine,” I growled. “You’re no fun.”
Stefan was much easier to work with. Not just because he didn’t mind being a blank canvas, but because he wasn’t quite as skinny and had more defined muscles. He tried to make small talk with me and cracked a few jokes, enough that by the end of the process, I found myself almost liking him.
Once I’d finished, I stepped back to examine my handiwork. I’d dressed him up to play the part of a gladiator with a sexy flair, adding a nice black harness to his upper body that complemented the leather gladiator belt.
“Turn around,” I said. “I need to make sure the back is right.”
Josiah folded his arms. “How come he gets to dress up like a gladiator and I’ve got to wear all this?”
“Because that’s what I felt like making you wear. That’s what you get for pissing off the only person who can make you venue-appropriate attire. I’d worry less about what you look like and more about what we’re about to do.”
“She’s right,” Niko offered while I adjusted his belt, spinning it slightly so the back was open. He was still wearing a pair of leather briefs underneath, but they were tight enough not to leave much to the imagination. “Iosef won’t just let you kill him.”
Josiah scanned Niko head to toe. “Maybe you shouldn’t go. Alexi’s men could be there, watching the place. The minute you show your face, you’ll be in danger.”
“You won’t be able to find Iosef without me. Neither of you knows what he looks like. Besides, I might be able to get us closer to him than you’d be able to get by yourselves. I may have been missing for three weeks, but I’m still in good standing as far as I know. Alexi won’t move against me in a public place like that.”
I slid my fingers underneath the bottom of the harness, tugging it down slightly. “If he does, just remember this isn’t real armor.”
Niko smiled. “Don’t worry about me. I’m a survivor.”
I met his eyes and saw my own reflection in them. “I bet you are.”
Josiah cleared his throat. “You know where this club is?”
Niko nodded. “I’ll give you directions.”
Niko’s directions brought us to a reclaimed warehouse not far from where Petra had shown us the first body. They’d slapped a neon sign on the side of the place and put a bouncer out front, but other than that no real modifications had been made to the outside of the building itself.
“Classy,” Josiah noted as we parked.
“It’s not meant to be classy. She gets it.” Niko crushed out the cigarette he’d been smoking in the door handle and gestured to me.
I glanced toward the building, shut off the engine, and flipped down the mirror to put on a little more lipstick. Unlike them, I already owned the right clothing to get through the door. The leather zippered catsuit I wore for covert missions was not only an effective piece of operations gear, but I looked damn good in it too. “There’s something to be said for industrial architecture. The cold, rough, rawness of it has its own appeal.”
Niko leaned up between the seats. “How do you want to handle this? There’s a lot of ground to cover.”
“We split up,” Josiah said and crushed out his cigarette. “Khaleda, you take the main rooms. See what your predator instincts tell you. Count the guards and see if anyone stands out. I’ll walk the place and see about magical defenses. Niko, you’re with me.”
“What about her?” He gestured with a thumb to me. “What if she needs backup?”
I smiled the sort of smile that usually made weak men step back. “Sweetie, I’m your backup. I work best alone. We meet back in the parking lot in an hour. Don’t make me come back in there after you two. Remember, this is just recon.”
Josiah threw open the door and stepped out before I’d even finished speaking.
“What an asshole,” I grumbled.
“Don’t worry about us.” Niko winked. “Go do your thing. I’ll keep an eye on him.”
Chapter Fifteen
JOSIAH
I adjusted the too-tight collar around my throat, pulling it repeatedly in the hopes that it eventually loosened. Whatever Khaleda had made it out of, it didn’t seem to want to cooperate.
The last time I’d been into any club, I’d run into a couple of vampires who thought to make a meal out of me. Just another reason the club scene wasn’t for me. All kinds of creatures of the night found it homey. They hid behind the flashing lights, preyed upon the intoxicated.
The humans that frequented such clubs came in two basic varieties: Those who crawled out of their meager dens in search of something, anything to feed their metaphorical demons, unaware of the real ones stalking them from the shadows. They were loud, angry, violent until something louder, angrier, and more violent found them, and it always did. In the end, death always won. At least they’d enjoy it on their way out.
Then there were the poor curious bastards who’d spent their lives on the outside looking in, wondering, imagining, fantasizing about what it must be like to be in the presence of such a power. By day, they were normal men with normal jobs. Bored, living in monotony and monogamy because they knew no better. Still, somewhere in the back of their minds, they nursed a little voice screaming there had to be something other than the nine-to-five grind. Something more exciting, more dangerous, something more.
Then, one day, fingertips calloused from years of typing might brush against an uninflated balloon for the first time and the mind would wander. What if? How would it feel? If they were brave enough, they might try it. And then it’d become
an all-consuming obsession, a drug of the mind.
There were folks between those two extremes, those weekend fetish artists who sent the kids to Grandma’s to break out the silk ropes and latex suits, though such couples seemed few and far between. Judging by the scandalous reactions to recent books and film, most Americans seemed content to co-exist beside the fetish subcultures, acknowledging their existence with curious whispers at book clubs and the occasional purchase of fuzzy handcuffs. For them, there was no need to delve deeper. Just a passing curiosity.
Such people didn’t go to places like Eìdolo.
Niko waved to the doorman and then gestured to me. “He’s with me.”
The doorman nodded and stayed where he was.
While the outer shell of the warehouse hadn’t been adjusted much, the inside had been completely remodeled. Through the door, we found ourselves in a small alcove where Niko waited for me to surrender my coat. I almost didn’t, but it was warm enough inside that I’d already begun to sweat. A lady in a white dress traded me my coat for a slip of paper I tucked into my pocket while Niko settled the door charge.
He flashed me a grin and gestured through the doorway. “After you.”
The biggest difference between a fetish club and a typical nightclub was the atmosphere. Fetish clubs had that aspect down and catered to their clientele with an efficiency rarely seen anywhere else. Aside from the thick and pounding industrial music, Eìdolo achieved the desired aesthetic by draping iron chains from the ceiling and suspending human-sized birdcages up high. In each cage, a human swayed, gripping the bars and dancing seductively. Lights flashed different colors on the crowd in unpredictable patterns, rainbow lights alternating against the pressure of darkness closing in from the corners. A bar stood off to the left, the bartender behind it wearing a dress made of pink latex and a collar with several charms. There weren’t many people occupying the tables on the main floor, but those that were there were all decked out in black leather, latex, and full-body rubber suits.
To the right was a designated play area, set apart from the rest of the room by being on a stage. There, all sorts of equipment were on display from tables to metal cages and medieval-style wooden stocks, all staffed by lovely ladies in leather and boots. Khaleda would’ve been right at home up there with them. Scratch that. She’d have put every one of them to shame.
Someone bumped into me, laughing. She was dressed like one of those Catholic school girls after school was out: white shirt tied above the midriff, pleated skirt pulled down to expose as much of her as possible, pigtails and shoes with little pink bows on them… The woman flashed me a drunken grin and raised her glass to me before gesturing to three of her friends dressed similarly, except the second one had lost her shirt. “Hey, good-lookin’. You want to party?”
“Sorry, love. Not my thing.” I slid by her and scanned the crowd. Where had Niko gotten to? I’d only looked away for a second, and the bastard seemed to have disappeared.
I pushed through the crowd, working my way away from the bar and further into the room. I scanned unfamiliar faces, heart pounding in my ears. The dance floor was too crowded a place to think. I needed to get away from the bodies pressing in. There, an empty space in an alcove between this room and the next.
It felt like it took forever to get there, and there was no sign of Niko in the meantime, nor Khaleda. She should’ve made it inside by then, but maybe she’d struck up a conversation with someone in the parking lot. Good on her.
I reached the small alcove and stopped there, crossing my arms and leaning one shoulder against the cool steel wall. The next room was made up of mirrors on the ceiling, the wall… everywhere but the floor. The room was empty but for a single chair in the center of it under watery red and blue lights.
The hairs on the back of my neck suddenly pricked up at the sensation of being watched. I turned my head and spotted Niko in the doorway behind me. Somewhere, he’d acquired a pack of menthol cigarettes. He held them in one hand like a precious object. Something about his posture sparked a memory of the dream I’d had about shedding my own skin. It felt like it meant something, but I couldn’t put my finger on what. Was it just a dream? Or something more?
Niko glided down the corridor, clearly more at home in this atmosphere than I was. For a moment, I wondered if he’d been here before, and if so, with whom.
He stopped and leaned on the opposite wall, facing me. “Do you like it?”
A drop of sweat slid down underneath the priest collar, somehow chilling my spine. Wasn’t that the same question he’d asked me in the dream? Coincidence. It had to be. If only I believed in such things. “Like what?”
“This place? The atmosphere. You sped away from all the action pretty fast.” He nodded back toward the main room.
I turned so Niko was beside me and no longer behind me. “Which part of it am I supposed to like exactly? The crowds pushing in so tight I can’t breathe? The second-rate music that’s trying to make up for lack of originality with bass and volume? Or the pretentious little twats who think just because I’m here I’m going to go home with them?”
He smiled a predatory smile. No, not predatory, at least not in the sense of a large predator stalking prey. This was a different sort of hunt, the sort that left my heart pounding with excitement, not panic. There was something in the way Niko moved that made it difficult not to watch him, as if every little movement had a purpose beyond simple action. It was a language all its own, unspoken but powerful. His smile was a power I wanted to take in my hands and mold into something else, something darker.
“You don’t like crowds. Don’t like the music. Don’t like leather pants.” He pulled a cigarette from the pack and placed it between his lips. “Is there anything you do like, Josiah Quinn? Because you seem pretty fuckin’ miserable to me.”
I sparked a flame between two fingers and offered it to him. “I like plenty,” I said as he leaned over to touch his cigarette to the edge of my flame.
Once he’d gotten it lit, he puffed out a big cloud of smoke that drifted over to caress my face. “Such as?”
I plucked the cigarette from between his lips and placed it between mine, drawing in a mouthful of that awful menthol smoke to return the favor by blowing it back in his face. “I like to smoke.”
Niko focused on the cigarette in my fingers, his tongue darting out to wet his lips. “Go on.”
I considered him for a moment, wondering if he’d somehow forgotten the reason we’d come into Eìdolo to begin with. Maybe this was the reason. It was early, and Iosef might not even be there yet. We had all night to focus on killing him and stopping this so-called Godfather of Night from summoning Remiel.
Crime and punishment were eternal, two opposite forces always struggling for dominance. So long as there were rules, there were those who’d break them, and where there were rule breakers, there were enterprisers seeking to unite the counterculture into a cohesive whole. Godfathers of pain and suffering. No, they weren’t going anywhere, but maybe we should.
“I was in your apartment earlier.” I took another puff on the cigarette before handing it back. “Before Alexi burned it down. Smoked some of your weed and had myself a nap. Had an interesting dream.”
Niko took the cigarette and smirked. “Do tell.”
“It was just a dream.”
“You know it doesn’t have to be,” Niko said, his voice deepening slightly.
The music changed, and with it, the direction and color of the flashing lights. Magenta and indigo flashed over Niko’s body, making shadows deepen and features sharpen.
I stepped in. My face hovered inches from his, a hand on either side of his head, palms resting against the cool concrete wall. “I don’t like it when people fuck with my head to get what they want.”
“What is it you think I want, Josiah?” He was smirking, the bastard.
He knew what he wanted, but did I? It was all mixed up in my head. I fought the impulse to push him against the wall and wrap
my hands around his throat, squeezing off the air until he admitted what he’d done, fought the need to tell him this was the most I’d felt in ages. It was equal parts inexplicable rage and selfish desire, filling the void pain had left behind. As much as I wanted him, I hated that I did because I couldn’t trust myself not to turn it into something more.
“Stop smiling at me, you bastard,” I said and closed my mouth over his, smothering that enraging smirk.
It wasn’t a gentle kiss. The world didn’t fade into the background, forgotten, no sparks ignited. It wasn’t that kind of kiss. It was a kiss that became part of the world we were in, one that belonged there as much as the rule breakers and the mirrors and the shackles on the wall.
Niko’s hands went to my shoulders and he pushed me hard against the opposite wall, teeth grazing my tongue. My fingers slipped down to his chest, fingertips curling against hard muscle under soft skin. I dug my nails in and melted into the way his body responded, flexing against the pain. His face ground against mine, sandpaper on a match, the friction threatening to spark a fire.
I must’ve kissed dozens of people in the last twenty years or so, but no one quite like that. No one except maybe Danny.
With that realization came memory and a new pain in my chest, the breathless agony that made me desperate to forget those stolen rooftop moments. I tried to push it away, to live in the moment and not in the past, but it all came flooding back with that kiss.
I pushed him away and drew the back of my fist over my mouth as if that would wipe away what’d just happened. That familiar darkness had returned to Niko’s eyes, crawling over me, threatening to set my skin on fire. I turned my back to him so I wouldn’t have to look at him. “Come on. We’ve got a job to do.”
Two big men stepped into the hallway at the far end, blocking our escape. I glanced behind us to see two more had come in from somewhere else.
Niko whispered a curse and stepped closer to me. “Alexi’s bodyguards. They must’ve recognized me. I thought we’d have more time.”
