Pomegranates full and fine (11 page)

The voice was very familiar. Tango concentrated. She didn’t know any woman with a voice that sounded like that. It was a strange voice, the speech patterns too old for the very young-sounding tone. What was it that was familiar?

The tone came to her first. Cheryl. The little girl on the plane.

And then the speech patterns, slow to come because they were so unexpected. “
Riley1"
she gasped.

The voice on the machine continued without stopping. “Don’t worry about me. No time to tell you what happened. I’m in Toronto. But there was supposed to be a friend on the plane with me. Her name is Tango. I don’t know what happ—”

There was an enormous splintering of wood in the background. “The yellow file!” Riley hissed into the receiver desperately. People were shouting. The phone clicked, the sound of someone trying desperately to hang up, and then beeped rapidly as new numbers were pressed before the previous connection had cleared. She knew what Riley was trying to do: dial a new telephone number before someone else could press redial and find out where he had called. Someone screamed. Tango didn’t think that it was Riley, but she couldn’t be sure. Finally Riley managed to hang up. The message ended in a second, forlorn beep. The machine clicked and began to rewind the tape with a quiet hum.

Tango’s finger hovered anxiously over the playback button, waiting for the rewinding to finish. It seemed to take forever. The party cabinet, the one Epp had complained about when she’d handed over the keys. Her eyes darted around the room. But there was no cabinet! No. Wait.

She had been expecting a filing cabinet. There wasn’t one. But there was a squat, battered sideboard against one wall. A cabinet, of sorts. And it would have shelves where a filing cabinet wouldn’t. The answering machine clicked and she stabbed the button a second time, then dashed to the cabinet as the Lost and Found office delivered its message. Hands shaking, she dug out the little cabinet key and put it into the lock. She dropped it once, losing a second scrambling for it. The answering machine beeped and Riley’s oddly transformed voice whispered, “Epp.”

The key spun loose in the lock. The cabinet door swung open easily. Something was wrong. The lock was broken.

“... under the bottom shelf...”

The cabinet had papers and books stuffed into it. Tango pulled out the ones covering the bottom shelf and pushed them away from her. She ran her fingers over the dark wood. In the shadows at the back of the shelf, she found a thin gap, barely big enough for her to work her finger into. A panel of wood shifted slightly. She yanked up just as wood splintered on the answering machine. “The yellow file!” hissed Riley. Tango threw the panel aside and felt in the darkness of the hidden compartment. Her heart froze.

Empty.

People shouted and screamed. The telephone clicked and beeped. The message ended.

In the kitchen, Tango found a flashlight. She examined the compartment in the cabinet closely. There was nothing there. Either Riley had been lying about the mysterious yellow file — and she couldn’t believe that — or her first instincts had been right. The apartment had been ransacked.

Maybe not ransacked, but at least searched thoroughly. And so professionally that, amid the clutter of Riley’s life, only he might have noticed if a paper were out of place. Except that the searcher or searchers had broken the lock on the cabinet door. Tango went back over to the couch and sat down heavily. Riley had been kidnapped. Sometime after he had checked his bags in San Francisco, and by someone with the skills to erase him completely from the airline’s records. And she might have been sitting next to him for the entire flight to Toronto — if the strange juxtaposition of Riley’s voice and Cheryl’s meant what she thought it did.

The ransacking had to have happened some time before today, before Riley had returned to Toronto, or else the answering machine would surely have been erased. Probably the ransacking had happened while Riley was in San Francisco. The searchers must have taken their time, and that meant they would have known that Riley wasn’t about to return any time soon.

What was Riley involved with?

At least being trapped in Toronto by Epp’s
geasa
didn’t seem like such a liability anymore. Tango leaned her head back against the cushions of the couch and listened to the message one more time. If the searchers had found the yellow file, there didn’t seem to be any point in her searching the rest of the apartment for clues as to what was going on. The searchers would likely have already found anything that there was to find.

Except maybe for Riley’s bags at the airport, checked before he vanished and still unclaimed. No one would have searched the bags, then returned them to the baggage claim. Six to midnight hours, the Lost and Found office’s message had said. Tango glanced at her watch. She would have to retrieve her car and drive out to the airport, but Lost and Found would still be open. It wouldn’t be hard to convince them to hand over the bags. Tango ran for the door.

CHAPTER FIVE

Curious Laura chose to linger Wondering at each merchant man.

“That one,” urged Tolly. “What about him?”

Matt turned his head ever so slightly to look around at the men in the bar. His gaze settled on two at a pinball machine. “The one playing?”

“The one to his right. Redhead.” Tolly’s tongue ran around his mouth like a moray eel lunging out of a coral reef. The mad vampire’s face was sharp and eager tonight. Last night's activities had agreed with him — in more ways than one. His body had been pierced in virtually every imaginable place, bright metal loops, balls, bars and spindles. His entire share of Solomon’s money had gone to pay for the extensive, expensive piercings. Blue had rolled his eyes when he had seen the effect. Matt had laughed out loud. Miranda had walked around Tolly, considering his decorated body from every angle. There was a beautiful, painful intensity to the piercings, a kind of art. Sooner or later, he would tire of the piercings and pull them out, letting the wounds heal over, but for now the effect was a work of inspired genius. She felt sorry for the piercing artist. After Tolly’s visit, he or she would probably never be quite the same again. The vampire’s madness had an eerie way of infecting the mortals he came in contact with. Tolly gestured, metal flashing in the skin between his thumb and forefinger. “There.”

Matt slapped the other vampire’s hand down, but nodded. “I like him. Good-looking. Big. Strong. Should put up a hell of a fight.” He glanced at Miranda. “How about it?”

Miranda shook her head. “He’s with a friend.” “Who?”

“The guy playing pinball.”

Matt snorted. “The guy playing pinball is not his friend. Redhead is trying to pick him up.”

“Same principle. He’d remember if Redhead went home w'ith someone else.” Miranda studied the redhaired man a moment longer, then added, “And Redhead’s too big. Things might get out of hand.” “Not much.” Blue leaned forward, his chair creaking under him. “Picky-picky. You’ve been finding excuses all night. There must be someone in here who’s good enough for you.”

“Yeah,” Matt agreed. “Just choose one, Miri.” Miranda fixed him with a slow, steady glare. “Don’t be hasty. You’ve already annoyed Solomon once.”

Matt flushed. Miranda turned away.

Last night, after he had released the other vampires from the magickal paralysis, Solomon had treated Matt like something he had scraped off the bottom of his shoe. Of course, no mention was made of Miranda’s role in toppling Matt so painfully. Solomon had pretended that it was Matt’s own fault, his body overbalancing as the magick captured him. Whenever possible, the mage had stared pointedly at Matt’s broken nose, crooked until the vampire could find a mirror and fix it. All of his conversation and negotiation had been conducted with Miranda. She had also pointedly ignored Matt, bargaining with Solomon as though there really was something to bargain about. There wasn’t, of course. She would do anything for the Bandog — and Solomon. Even so, Solomon’s payment to the vampires had been substantial, more than enough to offset the short-term inconvenience of being unable to feed on their victims.

And yet Matt had still tried to taunt Solomon, desperate to reassert his wounded pride. “If you knew as much as you claimed about the Sabbat,” he had sneered arrogantly, “you’d know that you can’t negotiate with just one of us. A Sabbat pack has no leader.”

Solomon had responded in tones so frosty that Miranda waited for ice to form. “If you knew as much about yourself as you believe you do, you’d realize how wrong you are.”

That had left Matt with his mouth shut tight. The pack had taken Solomon’s money and gone to Hopeful to select their first victim: a gay man, alone, maybe a little bit drunk. It had been simple enough. A combination of Tolly and Blue’s abilities to hide and her own power to manipulate shadows had ensured that the pack would be unnoticed, or at least unremarked-upon. Matt had approached the victim, using his talents of persuasion and hypnotic control to lure him away from the bar.

They had left the man’s body in a park, laid out under a tree as though in resting state — Tolly’s idea. The mad vampire had also placed pennies over the dead man’s swollen eyelids. The hardest part of the process had been resisting the call of the man’s blood. But they had. Beaten and battered, there was no sign that he had been killed by vampires. Ordinary humans could have killed him.

Tonight they would take their second victim. Solomon would contact them tomorrow night and tell them where to hunt for a third. Hunting in Hopeful was more difficult this time, though. The gays of Toronto were in mourning over the loss of one of their own. They knew that Hopeful was the last place he had been seen alive, and many had come here for an impromptu wake. For a few, like Redhead, it seemed as though nothing was wrong. Life went on. They were untouched by death. But even the ones like Redhead would be more wary now. A gay man had been murdered. Would it happen again?

“What about one of the bartenders?” suggested Blue. “They’re getting hit on all the time. Nobody would notice one more.”

“They may be getting hit on, but: they’re not accepting,” Matt pointed out. “Now that old guy in the corner...”

“Wait.” Miranda’s eyes narrowed as she thought. “We don’t have to pretend to pick someone up. We could just grab a bartender when he leaves.”

“But that won’t be for at least a couple more hours!” “We have time.”

Tolly looked around for the old man Matt had mentioned, his neck twisting inhumanly far. “I like him, too. Besides, the bartenders wouldn’t be leaving alone.” Miranda grimaced. “Tolly, you’ve liked everyone you’ve seen in here. If you were doing the choosing, we would have to slaughter the entire bar.” The mad vampire’s eyes lit up with a hungry delight. “No,” said Miranda firmly. She stood. “We take a bartender.”

There were two bartenders working tonight, one blond with a rainbow of pride rings on a choker around his neck, one brunette in a leather vest. Miranda chose the blonde. He gave her a friendly, quirky smile as she walked up to the bar. “What can I get you?”

She smiled back. Solomon had told her once that her entire face changed when she smiled, that it almost came back to life. “What have you got on tap?”

The bartender named four or five beers, some she remembered from her university days, some she had never gotten around to trying. She never would now. One of the beers had the ironic name of “Old Nick’s Red.” Miranda ordered four pints of it. “It’s busy in here tonight.”

“Nobody wants to mourn John alone.” He gestured with his head as he poured the beer. A sort of makeshift shrine had been set up at one end of the bar, a photograph of the man the pack had killed, with flowers, a basket for donations, and a petition urging the government to crack down on hate crimes. Impulsively, Miranda dropped a ten-dollar bill in the basket and signed the petition. That earned her another smile from the bartender.

“Thanks.” He set down the first two pints. “Do you want me to bring these to your table?”

“No, it’s okay. What time do you get off tonight?” The bartender laughed. “If you mean what time does the bar close, we stop serving booze at one o’clock, but I have to stay around until two or three. If you mean what time could you talk me into going out with you,” he looked away from the beer tap just long enough to flash her a glance, “I’m afraid you’re barking up the wrong tree.”

“I don’t think so.” She caught his gaze and held it. “You look really tired. You should leave early tonight. Go home. Get some rest.”

“That... might be a good idea.” The bartender’s eyes became unfocused as her will laid itself over his. “It’s been a long day.”

Miranda nodded, maintaining eye contact. She had him. “It has. I bet by one-thirty this place will be so quiet, one bartender could look after it all.”

“Yeah,” the bartender replied distantly. Then he twitched and yelped, his attention going back to the tap as beer spilled over the edge of the full pint glass and foam went dripping down his hand. “Shit.” He grabbed a towel and wiped the sides and bottom of the glass.

“Sorry,” Miranda murmured, “I was distracting you.” “No,” the bartender said, as if they had been doing nothing more than flirting, “it was my fault.” He put the glass down and started filling a fourth. “That’s eighteen dollars.”

Miranda dug out a twenty and a couple of crumpled twos. “Keep the change.” A nice tip. He might as well feel good while he had some time left.

“Thanks.” He looked up at her again, then his glance flickered to the side, to a second woman who had just come up to the bar. A short woman with long, brown hair. “Hey, Tango.”

“Hi, Todd. Have you heard anything about Riley or his friend?”

“Sorry.” .

“Damn.” The woman sounded frustrated and depressed. “Do you have Toby on tap?”

“Sure do.” ’

“Give me a pint.”

The bartender nodded. He finished pouring Miranda’s last pint and passed it to her. “There you go. Do you need a tray?”

“No, thanks.” Miranda gathered the four glasses carefully between her hands. With a last sideways look at the short woman, she started back to the pack’s table.