Blood Lite II: Overbite (31 page)

“No, they’re not.”

“You do it.”

I reached inside the aquarium, stopping a few inches away from the arachnid.

“So pick it up,” Dave urged.

“I’m going to.”

“I hope it doesn’t take your hand off.”

“I hope it takes your mouth off.”

“Pick it up.”

“I will.”

“Time’s a-wastin’.”

“Why don’t you go home? You’ve served your purpose.”

“No way. I want to see this.”

“Well, be quiet.”

“Pick it up.”

“I am.”

“No, you’re not. You’re being motionless and cowardly.”

The tarantula moved toward my hand. I let out a shameful cry and yanked my hand out of the aquarium so fast that I bashed it against the corner. Dave found this to be extremely amusing. I did not.

“Grow up,” I told him.

“Oh, God, I wish I’d been taping that! I’d give anything to have been taping that! You looked like such a chickenshit jackass!”

“You suck.”

“Reach in there again. It might growl at you this time.”

I opened one of the drawers and took out a long wooden spoon. I poked the spoon into the aquarium and tried to scoop up the tarantula, but it kept scurrying away. “Dammit!

“It probably doesn’t like that flavor of cake. You should have bought chocolate.”

“I’m just gonna dump it out.” I very, very, very quickly reached into the aquarium and removed the plastic log. Then I picked up the aquarium, turned it over, and shook it over the batter. The tarantula didn’t fall out.

“He’s got some seriously sticky feet,” Dave noted.

“Smack the plastic.”

Dave knocked on the aquarium. The spider still didn’t fall out.

“Shake harder.”

I shook harder.

“Maybe you should just pour the cake mix into the aquarium and cook it that way.”

“C’mon, keep smacking the plastic. It’s just a spider. It can’t hang on forever.”

“You actually have to admire its resilience.”

“I don’t have to admire shit! Keep smacking!”

Dave hit the plastic over and over while I kept shaking the aquarium.

“Do you have a squirt gun? We could squirt it off.”

“No.”

“There was a toy store next to the pet store.”

“Keep smacking!”

Finally the spider dropped out of the aquarium and into the batter.

“Thank God,” I said. “Open the oven.”

Dave opened the oven. I picked up the pan as the tarantula waded through the batter, moving right toward me. I hurriedly slid the pan into the oven and slammed the door shut. We breathed a sigh of relief.

Dave flipped on the oven light. “I want to watch it burn.”

“That’s messed up.”

“How often do you get to watch a tarantula die in an oven? Never. I’m not going to let this opportunity slip by. Oh, crap . . .”

“What?”

“It crawled out of the pan.”

I opened the oven. The batter-covered tarantula was on the bottom. “Give me the spoon! Hurry!”

Dave handed me the spoon. I frantically scraped the tarantula off the bottom of the oven and onto the open door. It scurried across the door and onto my kitchenette floor.

“Stomp it! Stomp it!” Dave cried.

“Don’t stomp it!”

Dave quickly backed away. “Where is it? Where did it go? Is it on me? Get it off me!”

“It’s not on you. It’s crawling on the cabinet door.”

“Did it get cooked?”

“Not too much. It’s still moving. Let’s just kill it. I can’t have a tarantula running around my apartment.”

I swung the wooden spoon but missed the spider. It dropped onto the floor next to my foot. I backed into the oven door, lost my balance, and fell. I threw out my arms to break my fall, and my hands came down on the hot metal door. I cried out in pain as I landed on my butt.

The tarantula crawled onto my leg. I yelped and tried to shake it off.

“It’s eating me!” I shouted. It wasn’t actually eating me, but I can be forgiven for exaggerating my situation in my cloud of panic.

Dave crouched over me. “I don’t see it!”

“Kill it!”

“But I don’t see it!”

“Kill it!”

“There it is!” Dave slammed his foot down, missing the spider but hitting my shin.

“You dick!” I shouted.

“It’s too fast!”

“Get something to murder it with!”

Dave glanced around the kitchenette for an effective weapon, then slid a butcher knife out of the wooden holder. I mentally acknowledged that this was not a wise selection, but then the tarantula scurried up my leg and I batted at it in a frenzy.

“Don’t move!” said Dave, crouching down. “I’ll poke it!”

“Don’t poke it!”

“Don’t move!”

“If you stab me I’ll fuckin’ kill you!”

“I’m not gonna stab you! I’m gonna stab the spider!”

“Put the knife down!”

“Trust me!”

“I don’t trust you! You’re not trustworthy! No knife!”

Dave held the tip of the knife above the tarantula. “I’m gonna poke it! Don’t move!”

I froze.

Dave winced and clutched at his eye with his free hand. “Ow! The eggshell is still there!”

The tarantula crawled out from beneath the knife and went underneath my shirt. I flinched so violently that my upper leg slammed up onto the knife tip. I reacted poorly.

“It wasn’t my fault!” Dave insisted, still clutching his eye. “I didn’t do anything!”

I slapped my palm against my shirt, squishing Eight-Legged Vengeance onto my belly button. Dave pulled the knife out of my leg and stood up.

“Did you get it?” he asked.

I pressed harder until I was positive that my navel was covered with tarantula guts. I yanked my shirt up and wiped the goo off.

“Sorry about the knife,” Dave said.

I kicked him in the shin.

He dropped the knife.

It hit my other leg, burying itself about an inch into my flesh. It hurt like hell and I kicked the son of a bitch again, as hard as I could.

He stumbled backward, slipped, spun around in a failed attempt to regain his balance, and struck the corner of the counter with his face. His eyeball burst upon impact. I wasn’t immediately sure if it was the one with the eggshell or not.

Dave silently dropped to the floor, blood and slime oozing from his ruined orb.

“Oh, jeez, I’m so sorry!” I said. “I didn’t mean to!”

“That . . . that was . . . that was . . .
ow
. . .”

I yanked the knife out of my leg. “You’ll be fine,” I promised. “We’ll get you to the hospital.”

Dave let out what I’m pretty sure was supposed to be a battle cry and dove at me. I instinctively held the knife out in front of me to protect myself (although, in retrospect, my hands would have worked just as well) and an instant later my buddy was skewered through the throat.

He said something. The gargling made it difficult to determine exactly what it was, but the tone was not complimentary.

I pulled the knife out. The huge gout of blood that came out of his neck made it clear that an ambulance would probably not do him a whole lot of good.

So I didn’t call one. I held him, crying softly, until he was done bleeding and living.

The apartment manager called and asked if I would please turn my damn television down because it was disturbing my neighbors. I said that I would.

In the middle of the night, I dragged Dave out to my car, drove eighty miles out of town, and buried him in a shallow grave. I drank a bottle of beer to honor his memory. I drove back home, climbed into bed, remembered that I’d left my fingerprints on the beer bottle, drove the eighty miles back to the grave, retrieved the bottle, and drove back home.

Since Dave had given his life for revenge on Erica, I vowed to complete my plan so that his passing would not be in vain. The next day, I bought a rubber spider from a toy store, baked it into a cake, and decorated it nicely with a “Happy Labor Day” message, even though Labor Day was two weeks away.

That night the news reported that she had choked to death on a rubber spider leg.

Dave would’ve thought that was kind of funny. So I laughed.

I laughed and laughed and laughed and even kept laughing when the very polite men loaded me into the white van.

Hell, I’m laughing as I type this.

Hee hee hee.

Revenge is fun.

Lucifer’s Daughter

KELLEY ARMSTRONG

Nothing gets my blood pumping like a museum. Millennia of murder and mayhem gathered under one roof. A delicious banquet of guilt-free chaos custom-made for an Expisco half-demon.

I leapt from the car as Karl handed the keys to the valet. Then I saw it.

“No,” I whispered. “I’m having a vision, right? A horrible vision.”

Karl slid an arm around me. “Actually, I think she’s quite beautiful.”

We were staring up at a banner announcing tonight’s event—the opening of a new exhibition sponsored by my grandmother. She’d said it was a display of World War II memorabilia, in memory of my grandfather. It wasn’t.

Smiling down from the banner was a face that horrified me as no vision of death and destruction ever could—my byline and photo under the
True News
masthead.

“The Hope Adams Exhibit of the Inexplicable,” Karl read. “Sounds . . . intriguing.”

“I can’t believe Gran would do this.”

“No? Isn’t this the same woman who used to take you to churches with brown-skinned icons to prove that God loves you, even if you aren’t white? Of course, that was easier than finding horned icons, to prove God loves you even if you are the devil’s spawn.”

I glared at him. Of course my grandmother—like everyone in my family—had no idea I was a half-demon. But I suspect if she did learn the truth, she’d find a way to convince me
that
was okay, too.

I loved my grandmother. Sure, she could be a bigoted old battle-axe, but it couldn’t have been easy when her son—one of Philadelphian high society’s most eligible bachelors—announced he planned to marry an exchange student from India. Gran accepted his choice, though, and accepted all of her grandchildren, including the one born after the marriage broke down. She was determined to prove her love, even if it meant sponsoring an exhibition to say, “My granddaughter investigates Bigfoot stories for a supermarket tabloid and, damn it, I’m so proud of her.”

Karl’s attention had wandered to another sign. This one announced a traveling exhibit featuring the Amulet of Marduk. I wasn’t the only one who liked museums.

“Uh-uh,” I said. “You know the rule. No stealing at any event where we are invited guests.”

He walked over to the sign.

“Karl . . . We had a deal . . .”

“No, I believe the deal is that I may not steal jewels from
guests
at events to which we are invited.”

“Okay, but then taking the amulet would break your deal with Clayton, which says—”

“That I can’t steal artifacts of historical significance. The Amulet of Marduk is an Egyptian reproduction. Bling. Very old . . .” He looked at the sign again, and his blue eyes gleamed, the wolf in him spotting prey he liked far more than rabbits. “Very valuable bling.”

“No.”

“If I’m not breaking the rules . . .”

“Sure you are. Remember the one that says, ‘Thou shalt not steal’?”

A faint eye roll at such a bourgeois notion.

“Fine,” I said. “I’ll go in to the party. You sneak in the back and do your thing, while I hang out with Nelson Graves. Remember Nelson?”

Karl gave a rumbling grunt that sounded suspiciously like a growl.

“Gran says he asked if I was coming tonight and if I was still with you. He said he’d see what he could do about that.” I pursed my lips. “It’s tempting. He’s attractive, under thirty, rich and, best of all, has a job that’s unlikely to land me in a prison visitor’s room anytime soon.”

He put his hands on my hips. “Start that and you won’t get to your party anytime soon.”

“I mention another guy, and you feel the need to assert your property rights? A little medieval, don’t you think?” I stepped away. “But if that puts you in the mood, think how much better it’ll be after a whole evening with Nelson. Provided, of course, that you don’t steal anything.”

He arched a brow. “Threatening to withhold sex if I misbehave? A little medieval, don’t you think?”

Before I could answer, a Town Car pulled up to the curb, my mother in the passenger seat. Karl strode over to open the door. I couldn’t see the driver, and tried to remember whether she was coming with the Democratic congressman or the Republican one. I could never tell them apart, and it was so embarrassing when I got it wrong.

As the congressman talked to the valet, my mother pointed to the banner. “For the record, I had no idea she was doing this.”

“I know.”

“She’s just trying to be supportive.”

“I know. I just wish she’d find a less”—I looked up at the banner and cringed—“public way to show it.”

She hugged me. “I know.”

As we climbed the steps, she asked me how my work was going. She never asked about Karl’s. I think she knew he wasn’t really in the import-export business. She didn’t care. As she’d said even before we were dating, “He’s good for you, Hope,” and to her, that was all that mattered. For Karl’s part, even when she wore her most valuable jewels, that gleam never entered his eyes, which for him was a sign of unparalleled respect.

The congressman—Democrat, Karl mouthed—was waylaid on the steps, and Mom waved for us to go on inside while she joined him.

I stepped through the doors to find myself face-to-face with . . . myself. A giant banner hung from floor to ceiling, just in case anyone had missed the one outside.

“Oh, God,” I said. “I don’t think I can do this.”

“I don’t blame you.” Karl pointed to a service door. “I do believe that will take us into the rear of the museum, near the display for the amulet. And with those banners all over the building, no one will wonder why you’re wandering about.”

“Nice try. If—”

The hall went dark. Voices rose in a chant. I heard a scream. Felt a splatter of warm liquid. Licked my lips and tasted blood.

The chanting grew louder, but the screams drowned them out. I strained to see deeper into the vision, hoping to catch a glimpse of whatever was responsible for the delicious chaos washing over me.

The screams faded and I felt Karl’s hands rubbing my arms. I blinked and looked around. He’d tugged me into a corner.

“Trouble?” he said.

I shook my head. “Just a vision of past ritual torture or human sacrifice. You know museums. Full of dull, dry hist—”

The hair on my neck rose as a voiceless whisper called to me, promising more sweet chaos . . .

“Hope?”

“Museums,” I said, shaking my head, and motioned him into the foyer.

“Ironically appropriate, don’t you think?” Karl whispered.

We stood before a display dedicated to human-demon hybrids in myth and popular culture, including Hell Spawn—
True News’
s answer to
Weekly World News’
s Bat Boy.

The whole exhibit was like that—linking my articles to supernatural legends. Fascinating, actually. And, yes, flattering, once I got past the cringe factor.

Tour guides led partygoers through the displays. We were in the first group, with my mother, the congressman, and Gran.

“I wish your father could have been here,” Gran said. “He’s so proud of you, dear.”

“I’m sure he is,” Karl murmured. “But it’s a long way to travel.”

I glowered at him. My
father
might be Lucifer, but my
dad
was still Will Adams. He was on business in Indonesia and had sent a gift with Gran—a silver armband engraved with mystical symbols. Ugly as hell, but it was his way of showing his support, and a lot more welcome than sponsoring a museum exhibit in my name.

We were discussing the museum renovations when Karl decided it was time to use the restroom. I’d say he felt guilty about those repairs, but Karl never feels guilty. The renovations were his fault. We’d first met here four years ago when I’d tried to stop him from stealing something—surprise, surprise—and nearly got the place burned down running from someone
else
on his tail. Thousand-year-old papyrus scrolls and fire half-demons really don’t mix.

Karl hadn’t commented on the renovations. Nor had he commented on our return to the scene of our first meeting. I’m sure he remembered—kind of hard to forget—but Karl wasn’t the sentimental type. Also, he hadn’t made the best first impression. It’d been two years before I’d go out with him, which I’m sure he considers a failure best forgotten, for the sake of his ego.

Gran was pointing out the new plasterwork when the director arrived. “The guest of honor,” he said, pumping my hand. “Isn’t your exhibit marvelous?”

“It is.”

He lowered his voice. “Some board members were opposed to the exhibit, saying it would be pandering to the basest segment of society.”

“Understandable. It’s—”

“And I said, that’s the
point
. Entice them in with the lurid and the ludicrous and maybe they’ll get lost on the way to the restrooms and actually see something edifying. In tough times, we all need to do what we can. However distasteful.” He nudged me. “You know all about that.”

Gran pushed between us. “Actually, my granddaughter likes her work. And I like it, too. Folklore is an important part of any culture and—”

—a lesson you won’t soon forget
, a voice boomed.

I jumped. Mom put a hand against my back. The lights flickered, but no one else seemed to notice. As Gran continued lecturing the director, a tendril of chaos wrapped around me, tugging me deeper into the museum.

Oh, hell, where was Karl? And what was he getting into?

When I said I had to go, Mom tried to stop me, thinking I was upset by the director’s comments, but I brushed her off and hurried into the back hall.

No sign of Karl. I closed my eyes and concentrated. I could pick up blips of chaos from the party. Anger. Jealousy. Envy. When I tuned that out, I got a jolt of the real stuff, coming from the jewelry exhibit.

Oh, hell.

I jogged along the dark corridor.

Thrall of Lucifer, heed my words!

I spun, nearly tripping. The hall was empty.

You have rained down chaos and destruction for long enough. May you spend eternity suffering the torment you have visited on so many.

Something wrapped around me, tight as a mummy’s bindings. I struggled to get free, shrieked and shouted curses in languages I didn’t recognize—

“Hope!”

I snapped out of the vision to find myself on the floor, lying across Karl’s lap.

I scrambled to my feet. “You took it, didn’t you?”

“What?”

“The Amulet of Marduk. Damn you, Karl, I asked—”

“I didn’t take anything.”

I grabbed his tuxedo lapel and reached inside the jacket for the hidden pocket.

He caught my hands. “If you want to undress me, there are better places to do it. In fact, I saw a suitably dark—”

“What did you steal?” I asked.

“Nothing. Yes, I was in the room with the amulet. Yes, I have every intention of taking it. But not tonight. I wouldn’t do that when—”

Something small and furry scampered past a doorway.

“Rat?” I said.

“No, it smells like—”

Chattering erupted. Then the sound of tiny nails skittering across the floor. The creature darted out of a dark adjoining room and launched itself at me. The smell of the thing hit me—an awful stink of formaldehyde and badly stored fur. It thumped onto me, claws clutching the front of my dress. A tiny spider monkey face turned up to mine.

A tiny
dead
spider monkey.

Its eyes were beads and half its teeth were missing. At every joint, the fur and skin had ripped open. Sawdust spilled out. Through the openings, I could see bone and the wire that had held the monkey in a pose—until it’d been reanimated and no longer cared to be in that pose.

Karl grabbed the monkey by the scruff of the neck and whipped it away from me. It hit the wall and exploded. Sawdust and fur flew everywhere, including in my mouth. I spat and clawed it out, gagging.

Again, the sounds of tiny, scrabbling nails filled the hallway. I looked up. One arm and one leg were still attached to the monkey’s torso as it pulled itself toward me.

Karl strode forward.

“You can’t kill a reanimated corpse,” I said.

“I can try.”

He stomped on it. The arm and leg launched from the torso like rockets.

I winced. “Better hope the SPCA doesn’t catch you doing that.”

He snorted and kicked the bits into a storage room.

I stared at the tufts of fur and curls of sawdust left behind on the polished floor. A top-notch necromancer can reanimate long-dead corpses, but what was the chance that one was practicing his craft during a museum charity event? At the same time that Karl was poking around ancient artifacts?

“Show me where you were,” I said. “And what you did.”

• • •

He’d been in the traveling jewelry exhibit, checking out security so he could return another day and steal the amulet. It was still there, though, and he swore he hadn’t even touched its glass box. What he
had
handled was a display in an identical case. As a test run, he’d opened it and closed it up again.

“And that’s it?” I said.