1 Straight to Hell (19 page)

“I have nothing to apologize for,” he said, “and you’re not back home; you’re here.”  He took the sweater and stepped back, eyeing me critically.  “Not bad, but – “  He loosened another button on my dress, his fingers lightly brushing the skin above my breasts.

I jerked away.  “Do you mind?”  I was still angry but, at the same time, I would have given anything for him to unbutton my dress even further.  Lord, how this man made my head spin!  “What are you doing here anyway?”

He gave me a steady look.  “This is an important job.  Simple, but crucial.”

“And you want to make sure that I don’t screw it up.”  I glared at him.  The last thing I needed was a babysitter.  “I can do fine on my own, thank you very much.”

“Maybe.  But I wanted to make sure there weren’t any mishaps.”

I gave him a look of silent scorn, the one I’d seen on Ariel’s face often enough.

“Your target is in the bar.  You won’t need to approach the hostess’s stand.”

“I’ve been in restaurants before,” I told him.  “I think I can handle it.”  But truthfully, I wasn’t sure.  Not that the fine dining intimidated me.  No, it was the job I was supposed to do.  Having William here made the stakes seem higher now, and I felt like I was taking a test of some kind.  My palms grew moist and my heartbeat quickened.

“What are you waiting for?  Get moving,” Mr. Darcy said.

Resisting the urge to give him the finger, I went into the restaurant without a word.

The lights were dim, all the better for the patrons to see the stunning view of the city.  The room was slowly revolving, quietly turning past the fiery sunset that painted the far horizon.  Where
was
I?  I tried to remember any city that might have a revolving restaurant in it, but came up empty.  I’ve traveled widely, but right then, I was too nervous to think.  I hadn’t been in a place like this for quite a while, and I wasn’t sure that I fit in any more.

Behind me, William stage-whispered, “To the left!”, so I headed in that direction, looking for my victim.  I spotted him right away, slouched over his drink like it was his last friend.  He was far older than I’d imagined, and far uglier, too.  His bulging eyes and wide-lipped mouth made him appear froglike.  He looked like he’d slept in his clothes.  For the past two weeks.

When I walked up to my victim, a younger, better dressed, man whistled at me.  “Hey, Beautiful.  Have a seat.”  He patted the empty one next to him.  He didn’t slur his words, but his eyes were glassy.  He moved aside as if he fully intended for me to join him.

I ignored him and continued on toward the man in the suit.  Sitting down, I ordered a gin and tonic, my signature drink.  I was consulting with my demon about our opening move, but when the bartender gave me my glass, the old guy spoke up.  “I’ve got that, Miss.”  He pulled a crumpled bill from his pocket and set it on the bar.

“Why, thank you,” I said and smiled at him.  I could see my reflection in the mirror over the bar, and, to my relief, I really did look like I belonged in this place.  It wasn’t only the clothes, although they helped.  It was the way I sat with my back straight and the aloof expression on my face.  I looked like I had in the old days before the divorce and the fire and the thousand other things that had happened to me.  I crossed my legs, letting the dress ride up a little on my leg, drawing the old man’s gaze.

Let him do the talking
, the demon suggested.

“You’re quite lovely,” he said.  “You remind me of someone I used to know.”

What a line.  I moved a little closer to him.  “Who’s that?”

His eyes grew distant.  “The wife of a client.”

The wife of a client.  Great.  Someone he was probably cheating with.  As I remembered the ‘actress’ I found in my bathtub, I suddenly hated this man.  Even so, I smiled coyly.  “She must have been a very lucky woman,” I said.

He laughed, surprised.  “Not really.”  He downed his drink and called for another.  Noticing that I’d hardly touched mine, he said, “Drink up.  Life’s short.”  He ordered a second drink for me as well.

The younger man who had asked me to join him walked up, pressing against my back so tightly that I could feel the rising lump under his slacks.  “What’s this guy have that I don’t,” he asked.

I turned around and let my demon snarl at him.  “Get lost.”

He held up his hands and backed away.  “Okay, okay.”  Then, as he swaggered off, he said, “Bitch.”

My older companion looked anxious, but I calmed him with an indolent smile.  “So, please, continue.  The woman I remind you of?”

He regarded his drink.  “I used to wish that I was married to that woman, but she was too good for me.”  He gazed into his drink.  “She had a kind heart.  And I sometimes wonder if she ever thinks about me or the things I’ve done.”  He wobbled a bit on his stool, and I realized how drunk he was.  Alarmed that he might fall, I caught his elbow to steady him.  “You are really beautiful,” he said.  “I mean extraordinarily lovely.”

Okay, now things were even better than the old days.  I’d been attractive, yes.  But not breathtakingly beautiful.  Even the bartender was giving me appreciative, albeit covert, looks.  I felt sexy and desired.  Giddy with the power my demon was lending me.

So when the old man in the shabby suit asked if I would come back to his room with him, it was nothing for me to toss my head and call him a ‘little toad’.  When I threw my drink in his face, he cringed, ashamed, but I didn’t care.  In fact, I laughed.

 I caught the bartender giving me a look of incredulity, but steeled myself against it.  “You disgust me,” I told the old man, and stood up to leave.

The old man’s hands were trembling and there were tears on his cheek.  But even so, he remained courtly, standing up when I did because a gentleman always rises when a lady does.  Even if she’s a stone-cold bitch.

That’s what finally broke through to me: his courtesy.  I blinked, taking in his miserable expression.  “I’m sorry,” I told him.  I used several napkins to dry him off.  “I don’t know why I did that!”  But, of course, I did know.  I’d given my demon way too much power.

I ordered it to back off, but it fought back, demanding that I walk out of the bar.  I refused.  It screamed in outrage, filling my head with noise.  I told it to shut the hell up.  Gradually, I won.

I spent the next half an hour attempting to cheer my victim up, but when he finally excused himself and left the bar, he didn’t look any happier.  Dispirited, I left the restaurant, which, by now, was almost empty.

But I couldn’t locate the otherworldly passage I needed to get home.  I walked up and down the lobby, looking for a ripple in space, but I didn’t see a thing.  Behind me was a bank of elevators, but I knew I hadn’t taken them when I arrived.  The door had opened on this level.  I was sure of it.

Stop playing around,
I ordered my demon. 
Show me where to go.

She stubbornly resisted.  I could feel her burrowed deeply inside my conscious like an old, hurtful memory.

I began to panic.  I turned around to go back to the restaurant’s entrance and re-orient myself, but my way was blocked by the man who had accosted me at the bar earlier.

He was taller than I’d realized, and much broader across the shoulders.  He was also much drunker.  “Did you get lost?”

“No.”  When I stepped to get around him, he moved as well, obstructing my way.

He kept going forward, herding me into the farthest corner of the lobby.  As he passed an elevator, he pushed a button.  “You weren’t very nice to me back there.”

I dredged my psyche, trying to unearth my demon and tap into her rage.  But it was hopeless.  She remained hidden deep inside me, refusing to surface.  Instead, I called for help, but the word came out pathetically weak.  I tried again.  “Help!!”

The elevator opened, and to my horror, it was empty.  The man grabbed my elbow hard enough to make me whimper and tried to pull me inside the car after him.  I hit him with my purse, and when that had no effect, I dug my nails into his arm.  “Let me go, you bastard!”  I took aim at his crotch, but he thrust his hip at me, cutting off my attack.

He yanked harder, tearing the sleeve of my dress.  Desperate, I drove my foot into his, hoping to land a stiletto in the middle of his instep, but all I did was throw myself off balance, giving him an opportunity to drag me into the elevator.

The doors began to close.

Then a pair of hands wrenched them open again.  My attacker was hauled outside by the back of his collar, spun around, and thrown up against a wall.  I came out into the lobby to see William land one blow in the other man’s gut and another across his chin.

My attacker was larger, but William was stronger.  And angrier.  The cords on his neck stood out as he once more slammed the man into the wall, this time hard enough to crack the paneling.  I had a brief vision of what I must have looked like when I went crazy on Jasmine that day.  No wonder Tommy was worried that I might hurt my family.

William hit my attacker again, this time in the nose.  Blood sprayed across the framed artwork on the walls.

“Stop,” I begged.  I pulled on William’s sleeve.  “That’s enough.”

William shrugged me off, then threw the man to the floor where he fell in a heap.  When William raised his foot to stomp on his face, I grabbed his arm once more.  “Stop!  You’ll kill him.”

“He deserves it.”

I tried to wedge my way between them.  “I’m fine.  It’s over.  Please, let’s go.”

With great effort, William lowered his foot.  He closed his eyes and took a deep breath then, slowly, relaxed his fists.  In a few minutes, he was calm enough to straighten his jacket.  I, however, was trembling so hard I could barely stand.  William took my elbow and guided me into a doorway that I still couldn’t see.  A minute later, we stood on a moonlit beach.

“Are you all right?”

“Yes.”  I sank down onto the sand, and William sat next to me.  “I think so.” 

He returned the sweater that he had taken earlier, draping it across my shoulders.  “It’s a good thing I stuck around.”

I should have been happy about this as well, but I wasn’t.  I was absurdly angry.  “And tell me, why did you stick around?  What, are we friends now?  Or don’t you want anyone else touching your
toys
?”

I was glad to see him flinch.  “I only stayed to make sure you didn’t fail your assignment, of course.  Which you did.”

He was right.  I had failed.  I tried to piece together the fragments of the evening.  “It started out okay.  But then it all fell apart.”

“It didn’t fall apart.  You purposely ruined it.  That’s why your succubus wouldn’t come when you needed her.  She’s furious with you.”

“I guess I did sabotage things,” I admitted.  I picked up a handful of cool sand and let it slide through my fingers.  “I couldn’t bear the way my target looked after I’d thrown the drink at him.”

“Let me give you some advice,” William said.  “Get in, do the job, and get out as quickly as you can.  Don’t stop to see the damage.”

A full moon hung low on the horizon, and the water reflected it back in a long, rippling pattern.  The beach was postcard perfect, but I was too miserable to enjoy it.  “I know that I have to do this job,” I said, “but I can’t.  I just can’t.”

“As I said before, the more you resist your conscience, the easier it will become.  Pretty soon, it will be second nature.”  But he sounded less than confident.

I could tell without looking at him that his demon was ebbing.  And when he put his arm around me, it wasn’t the demon’s allure I felt, but the companionship of the man who had brought me the box of my mother’s possessions.

“Don’t do that,” I told him and moved away.