Sin City Goddess (28 page)

But he didn’t say anything. He just lay there shivering, his blue eyes filled with fright.

Blue eyes.

Mortals who had been to Tartarus never had anything but black eyes after they entered. It was their mark. Even if he had somehow changed his appearance, these eyes were filled with light, with hope, and love.

“Please don’t hurt me,” said the man. His voice trembled.

I let go.

Someone pulled me off the man as people stared at me with disgust.

It was Archer. “Hey, I told you there was no practice tonight,” he said to me, a strained smile on his face.

He extended his hand to the tearful man and said, “Sorry, pal. She had you mistaken for me.”

I scanned the crowd. Was Gacy still here? If he was, I couldn’t spot him.

The man accepted Archer’s assistance and scrambled to his feet.

“My deepest apologies. Is there anything I can do?” I said.

The man inched away, straightening out his costume. “I’m fine. Simple mistake.” His voice was still shaky.

I stepped forward. “I feel terrible. May I offer you some currency?”

“No, no, I’ll just be going.” He turned and ran.

After a few frustrating moments of not seeing Gacy anywhere and feeling like a complete jackass, I heard Archer say, “I’m not crazy about clowns either, but maybe it’s best we don’t tackle them just for looking creepy.”

I pulled him off to the side. “You don’t understand. It’s him. It’s been him this whole time.” I kicked a garbage can and it toppled over, spilling out half-eaten food, some foul-smelling clothes, beer bottles, and plastic cups.

Heat was rising off my body in steamy waves.

“Who?” Archer asked.

I said through gritted teeth, “Gacy.”

Archer looked behind him as if the serial killer would be standing right there at the mention of his name. He swung his head back to me. “John Wayne Gacy?” he whispered.

“Yes.”

“Are you sure?”

I flamed my eyes.

Archer raised his hands. “Okay, okay. You need to calm down.”

“Don’t tell me to calm down. I put that heartless snail sludge away years ago. And now he’s back!” I was angry. I wanted to tear something apart.

My wings fluttered then. They were working. Why hadn’t they worked moments ago? The thought of Gacy? Had he somehow paralyzed my flight?

Archer said, “You really need to work on your use of profanity. It may help ease your temper.”

I glared at him and pivoted. I had to find him. I had a trail and I couldn’t lose it. But which way?

There was a clanking sound behind me. Archer had picked up the trash can. I knelt down to assist him.

We tossed bottles and paper bags back into the bin. Archer reached for the clothes, then jumped back, wrinkling his nose. “Oh, that’s nasty-smelling.” He put his arm in front of his nose and mouth.

He was right. The clothes smelled foul. I leaned in to sniff.

“Ick. What are you doing?” He gagged.

I knew that odor. “Lamia. He’s the one working with Lamia. These were his clothes before he changed. He must have found the costume nearby.” I sifted through the trash with a pencil someone had tossed in the can. There was a bag with the name C
OSTUME
C
ENTRAL
printed on it. I stood up, saw the name of the store just two doors down.

“Archer, he purchased the clown suit right there.” I pointed to the small building. The shop windows held three caped costumes, and one black-and-white, giant, furry animal costume. “Should we talk to the clerk? Maybe she’d remember something that could help.”

Archer wasn’t listening to me. He picked something up off the cement. Some small card. “That son of a bitch has my wallet.” He frowned.

“Archer,” I hissed.

“Huh? I’m sorry.”

I tossed the remaining trash in the can. “Well, let’s go talk to the clerk.”

Archer said, “I have a better idea. Let’s go get Helm and Gacy.”

“How?”

“I got his address.” Archer smiled, waving a little piece of paper in front of me.

“Let’s go get the son of a bitch.”

“That’s my goddess.”

Chapter 51

As a partner and an assistant, Lamia proved to be useless. Besides stinking up the joint, she had gotten herself injured and was moving quite slowly. She was asleep now, so at least he didn’t have to listen to that god-awful voice. As if it weren’t bad enough that he had to arrange practically everything himself, from dressing up the girls to their transport, since Lamia had no legs, he also had to put up with her constant bitching about being hungry. Her only redeeming quality was her penchant for potions. He decided he would have to kill her soon.

Once the girls had all been dosed, it was easy to get them dressed in their custom costumes. He bound them together two by two, deciding it best to feed them on the way.

The calm one was still wearing her mask, and he was growing tired of her lack of emotion, lack of tears.

He removed it, and she looked at him with dead eyes for a moment.

Then she blinked, and her eyes sparkled as if they contained a thousand tiny stars. One of those stars shot at him, landing on his cheek. It melted his makeup and singed his skin.

He yelled in anguish, quickly put the blindfold on, and then backhanded her with both hands.

The girl tied to her whimpered.

“Well, well, well, I do believe I am in the presence of a Fury,” he said. He patted his cheek where she had burned him. “Funny, though, you don’t seem as strong as your sister.”

At the mention of the word “sister,” the Fury’s forehead twitched. Just a smidge. Just a hair. In fact, to the untrained eye, it looked like she hadn’t moved a single nerve ending at all. But he was well versed in his Furies. Though he had met only the one. The one whose name he could not speak, for it had been taken from him after his trial. He could never utter her name—no matter how hard he concentrated, how hard he focused, his tongue was simply no longer equipped to form the name. He couldn’t even think it or write it, unless he wrote it backward, which was what he had done on the envelope.

Such a strange restriction. He had wondered over the years—over those many years he had been locked up, chained to rocks, forced to attend redemption seminars—what that meant. Was there some sort of power in her name? Would that have allowed him to control her? Or was it simply because she was the only one who had served in Tartarus to guard the blackest of souls?

The other two, he knew, had never been assigned such a daunting task. Was that because they were weaker? Or because they lacked the guts to kill as she had?

“So, who do I have before me?”

Silence, though she was no longer gagged.

“Alecto? Megaera? Come on, fess up.”

She didn’t flinch.

“I suppose it doesn’t matter. I now have two Furies for the price of one.”

Her brow twitched.

“Oh, didn’t you hear? Your sister has come for you, but I’m afraid she’s been captured as well.” He whispered in her ear, “There’s no one to save you.”

She head-butted him, sending his wig flying. He thought about slicing her throat right there, but that would ruin everything. Now that he had the sister, he had bait, leverage.

Which meant even more pain and suffering for her.

He wondered if perhaps that other—the blonde—was worth anything to
her
.

Only one way to find out.

He smiled as he slipped out of the apartment and locked the door.

Chapter 52

Archer explained in the taxi that Tommy had indeed known Jason Helm; they had lived in the same complex, gotten drunk together, done drugs together, before Tommy had tried to get sober. When he had, he had noticed that Jason seemed to be unstable. Tommy had pulled away from the friendship even before he lost his apartment. Helm, Tommy had told Archer, was becoming increasingly unhinged.

“He was obsessed with black magic, Satan, and serial killers,” Archer said.

That explained Gacy and, in turn, Lamia’s draw to him. He had probably called to the monsters many times. Perhaps at first they had arrived as voices. Then maybe visions. Ouija boards were known to be a conduit to all kinds of souls, even the darkest ones. I suspected that when the gate cracked open, the monsters Tommy was worshipping had become stronger, which allowed them to escape in full form.

Most likely with Charon’s assistance.

We arrived at the apartment complex within minutes. Archer tipped the driver.

“He said we can access it through a back door. The place is in the basement.”

I took a deep breath.
Let this be it. Let no one else be harmed.

We crept around the back of the building. It was dark, no streetlights anywhere to be found, and the moon was still hidden.

There was a ramp on the far side of a rusty green Dumpster.

Archer pointed, as if to say,
This way
.

I followed him, wishing I had brought my sword. Archer had his weapon, but if Lamia was here, only a blade would do the trick. At least, that was what I suspected after she had seemingly taken several bullets to the abdomen and slithered away.

Then a terrifying thought occurred to me. How could I kill Gacy? Did it work the same as with Archer? If his body were injured—his reanimated body—would it rot and fall off piece by piece? Or was he now immortal? I hated all of these unknowns.

Down the ramp was a small steel door with a metal lock. Archer pulled out some sort of tool and used it to crack the lock open. It worked. The door creaked open, scraping the cement ramp.

Archer motioned for me to follow him, and I did.

We hugged a wall, ducking down because the ceilings were low. He took out a small flashlight and shone it into the hallway.

Behind me, something screeched.

We both spun around, Archer with his gun pointed at the noise, and me lighting my fury. Archer shone the flashlight down the hall on two beady eyes.

A rat.

I shook my head, and Archer blew out a sigh. We continued down the dark hallway and turned right at the end of it.

There were two doors. One on the right, one on the left. Archer pointed to the one on the right. I nodded.

The door wasn’t steel like the outer door. It had a simple lock.

Oddly trusting for a criminal.

Archer put his ear to the door. He looked down at the ground, looking for a light, a sign of life, anything.

There was a soft glow coming from beneath the door.

Archer held up his fingers. He mouthed,
One, two, three
.

He turned and kicked the door open, gun drawn, and I flipped on the light and engaged my fury. I was strong now, prepared for battle with my bare hands if need be.

A rotten, putrid smell engulfed us, and we both gagged.

The room held five rickety bed frames with five soiled mattresses. Five sets of handcuffs were bolted to the ceiling. There was a tiny closet to the left and a dinky kitchen to the right. Next to one of the mattresses, on the far wall, was a window. Beneath it lay a pulpy, bloody, crusted body.

The skin had been removed.

“What the hell?” Archer walked over to the body. He leaned over it. “What did this? Lamia?” He couldn’t stop staring at the corpse.

“No. Gacy. He must be wearing Jason Helm’s skin. I’ve seen this before.”

Archer leaned in for a closer look. He shuddered. Then he kicked the corpse.

“Archer.”

He looked at me. “What? This dirtbag killed me.”

“That’s not what I meant. Look.”

I trained my eyes to the space just above the window.

Two words.

You’re late
.

They were written in blood.

I realized then that I hadn’t yet read the note Gacy had dropped off.

I tore into the envelope.

So you like to play poker, eh? And I thought I knew everything about you. That should liven up the festivities tomorrow. So here’s how it’s gonna be. Meet me in the desert, five thirty sharp. The coordinates are below. Every minute you’re late, I’ll chop a finger off one of the girls, starting with your sister.

PS: I see you brought a friend. Is it true that blondes have more fun?