Sinners & Sorcerers: Four Urban Fantasy Thrillers (37 page)

+ + +

It wasn’t a traditional job interview. Hollywood had done those, hiring crew, even been involved in casting decisions, table reads, shit like that. This wasn’t like any of those. This was sitting around a trailer that smelled of weed and loserhood, not in equal measure. There was way more loserhood than weed in the air, and that was saying something.

The boys lined up in front of him on the couch looked like they were feral, wild demons of a type he didn’t even really know, not off the top of his head. Little things, really, common as fucking dirt on earth. It would have been too much to ask for a greater to be mixed in with this handful of meth-heads. Greaters didn’t drift around waiting to be henchmen for other greaters. They didn’t lack purpose like these disposable louts, who worked in petty human jobs until something came around for them. Greaters did shit with their lives. Seized moments. Cut a path to success through the brambly bushes of adversity.

Hollywood sniffed the air. Also, almost all of the greaters showered regularly. Which clearly hadn’t happened here.

They mostly wore t-shirts and shorts, and really, they all kind of looked the same to Hollywood. Which probably meant all was right in the world. If one of them wanted to distinguish himself (or herself, he noted with some surprise, because there was a female in there with them, though it was hard to tell given the hairy legs) they’d clean up, start wearing something more presentable. He doubted any of them would do that, though.

“So,” Hollywood said, letting it ooze out and trying to create the right impression from the start. He was seated in a battered old chair that stank like someone had let a dog lay in it every night. There were no dogs in the trailer. None. “I trust …” he struggled to remember Sleeveless’s name, the one he’d given, and gave up after only a moment’s effort, instead gesturing toward the man in the flannel with the cut-off sleeves, “our mutual … friend …” he struggled with that word, “has informed you that I’m looking for some muscle to help me finish the job I’ve got going in this town?” He waited for the nods, which came, some slower than others. He’d hoped the woman would nod first, but she was somewhere in the middle. He looked over the sea of white faces, and then turned to Sleeveless. “Do we not have any … diversity candidates?”

Sleeveless just stared back at him blankly. “They’re all demons …?”

Hollywood smiled faintly, realizing once again he was talking to an idiot. “I mean … do we not have any that might be more representative of other racial backgrounds?” He gave a patronizing smile. “I realize we have a female in our midst, and that’s good, but I just meant some more ethnic diversity. More breadth.”

Sleeveless gave him a cockeyed look. “You know their skin ain’t really real, right? It’s just a shell—”

“I fucking know that, you idiot,” Hollywood said sharply. “I’m just asking if we can add in some muscle that maybe has a little different shade on their shell, so we don’t look so fucking monochromatic. Do you not know any African-Americans or Hispanic-Americans—hell, or Asian-Americans we could add to the pool?”

Sleeveless was rendered speechless by this, sputtering. “You asked for demons, I brought you to the only demons I know …”

Hollywood sighed, feeling a throbbing in his head caused by his essence bulging in his shell. He could feel things through the skin, of course, probably just like a human could, and right now he felt his true self wanting to escape, burst out and rip the head off Sleeveless for being a dumb fuck. He’d given it some thought, wondering how humans felt, back when he was considering being an actor, and after a long time he’d concluded that humans couldn’t possibly feel things the way his kind could. Demon essences reached beyond the shell, could taste, touch, smell and feel things that brushed up against them. Not just the physical, but the metaphysical as well. Which was just another reason humans were a low form of life, just above ferrets.

“Okay, all right, yeah,” Hollywood said at last. It really wasn’t all right, of course. “We’ll just have to make do with a lily-white cast for now and keep our eyes open for other candidates to balance things out as we go.” It probably didn’t matter that much longer anyway, but it burned him; he was in charge of this—production, for lack of a better word, and the way things were just looked … unseemly, to his way of thinking. He divided the couch in half. “You three, go meet up with Krauther,” (what a dumb name) “at the cowboy’s motel.” He thought about it for a second. “Wait, you know what you’re supposed to be doing, right?” He shook his head. “Never mind, that’s too much to ask. You know Krauther?” He waited, and the nods came again. “Go find him at that fleabag motel by the interstate, and he’ll tell you what to do.”

One of them stood up abruptly, and Hollywood smiled. “Good. Someone’s got initiative.” He waved at the other two. “Go on.” He reached in his pocket and pulled out a wad of bills. “Here.” Threw a Franklin at each of them. “For your day’s labor.” They filed out, and he turned to look at the four who were left. “You guys are gonna get marching orders from Sleeveless.” He smiled. “We have something planned for one of your local cops, something special.”

It was the woman who smiled first. He liked that. Predator’s instinct. “You’re gonna run this team,” he said to her then waved at Sleeveless. “He’ll tell you what to do.” He peeled off four hundred-dollar bills and handed one to each of them, careful not to touch their hands, then found his way out the door, pushing the old screen door on the outside of the trailer out of the way as he stepped down. The flies weren’t as thick here as at the dairy farm, but they were still present. Still annoying. But at least out here he could breathe.

+ + +

Alison was already inside when Arch got home, the sound of soft footsteps coming toward him on the thin carpeting of their apartment. He put his keys in their familiar spot on the table next to the door then relieved himself of his cell phones, both of them. By that time he heard her near the end of the hall, coming out of the bedroom. He caught a glimpse out of the corner of his eye, a little splash of red, and he turned his head to see.

She was leaned against the frame of the bedroom door like a pinup model, arching her back, bare feet on the carpet, showing off her long legs, tan from the long hours she spent out on the balcony of the apartment and beside her momma and daddy’s pool. His eyes followed them all the way up to the red piece of lingerie she was wearing, something that reminded him just a little of a one-piece bathing suit but pared back considerably. All the important pieces were covered, bikini-like. A see-through lace panel, which hung loosely from the bra, delicately covered her trim waistline.

Arch wasn’t quite sure what to make of the whole ensemble nor did he really want to give it too much thought. Any thoughts of demons slipped out of his mind as he looked at her, standing there in the faded afternoon light that seeped into the apartment through the closed curtains. This was hardly the first time she’d done this, dressed up for him in this way. It was one of her favorite things, judging by the bills from Victoria’s Secret, which was one reason why he didn’t complain. She’d done it more since they’d decided to try for a baby, but it was hardly a new occurrence before that. And it wasn’t for nothing, either; there was a very simple reason why she kept doing it.

Because it worked every time.

He crossed toward where she waited, giving him a very forward look, using her index finger to beckon him onward with a slow, sexy, come-hither motion. And a few minutes later, after she had gone first, he did indeed come. Hither and yon.

+ + +

She’d wanted to get a beer, and Hendricks had gone along with it. Who was he to argue with what the lady wanted, after all? They’d debated walking to Fast Freddie’s from the burger joint and ultimately decided against it. Too damned hot, they’d both concluded before hopping into her little subcompact. It wasn’t much cooler in there, Hendricks reflected as they drove the hundred yards or so to the bar’s parking lot before getting out. The car’s air conditioning hadn’t even had a chance to start working before they were done with the drive.

The light dimmed as he walked into the bar. It was a little like a cave, dark and unpleasant. There was still smoke in the air, unlike lots of the bars he went to nowadays in cities. Anti-smoking ordinances had forced the cigarettes outside to the parking lot. Hendricks was mostly indifferent on that score; he didn’t mind being around smoke and sometimes even preferred it when he was drinking. Sometimes he’d buy a pack when he was wasted, just chain-smoke his way through it, barely inhaling. It felt good, having a beer in one hand, cigarette in the other. When he was sober, he couldn’t even stand the smell of them.

Erin walked in front of him, striding up to the bar before slapping her keys down and giving him a sidelong look. “Now, if I’m gonna drink here, I can’t drive home, so I’ll need some place to sleep it off later.” She was straight-faced this time, probing him for a response.

He tried to decide whether to open up and be as blatant as she had been but decided that subtle was probably better from him; women could get away with bold and make it sexy. “I might know a place within stumbling distance.” He smiled a little when he said it and hoped it was just right.

She got impish. “Oh, do you?” She slid the keys toward the barman, who wordlessly picked them up and made them disappear under the bar. “Well, all right then. Set us up, Phil.”

The barman nodded and a couple glasses were filled and on the bar a moment later. She led Hendricks toward a corner of the bar under a Miller sign and when he sat down at a table, she dragged her chair over to sit almost on top of him. That was fine by him, because she smelled just the faintest bit of sweat but mostly of a fragrance that was girly and sweet, something he had caught only in passing before. She was right there next to him, close enough to lean into, close enough to touch, her beer sweating on the table just beside his.

“So,” she said, breathing at him, her perfume mixing with the faint hint of beer on her breath, as she shuffled to untuck her buttoned-up khaki uniform top from her pants. It looked a little sloppy, totally at odds with what he’d come to expect from her, but he was still pretty damned smitten. “What should we talk about?”

He gave it a second’s thought as he took a pull of his beer. “The weather is the normal topic in ice breaker situations like this, I think.”

“It’s fucking hot, without the fucking. At least at the moment.” He didn’t miss the suggestion as she took another drink, putting her glass back down half-empty. “You’ve got some catching up to do.” He took her meaning and drained the rest in one long gulp. She blinked, a little impressed. He set it back on the table and she held up two fingers to Phil, who nodded from his lonely place behind the bar, only one other customer in the entire establishment. “So,” she said again, “what should we talk about?”

He felt the first gentle stirrings of a buzz, just barely. “I don’t really know. I’m not much of a conversationalist anymore, honestly. Out of practice, I suppose.”

“Hm.” She sort of frowned, twisting her lips by puckering them to one side and then the other before looking back up at him. “We could just make out.”

He thought about asking her if that would be out of place in a joint like Fast Freddie’s, but the thought fell by the wayside as she leaned in and put her lips on his with just the right amount of pressure, the smell of the beer on her breath a kind of sweet, heady perfume all its own as his tongue found hers.

+ + +

Arch was lying on his back, breathing heavily, his head leaning against the bed near the headboard. His pillow had gotten knocked off some time during their romp, he wasn’t sure exactly when. It wasn’t a pressing concern, not at the moment. He’d entered the dreamy, sleepy state of post-coitus where very little mattered. Two days of long shifts, short sleep and bizarre events had drained him, and it was showing. A few things were prickling at the back of his mind, things he knew he needed to do, but they was so far back in the haze of tired that he couldn’t quite grasp them.

“I have to go,” Alison muttered into his bicep. He opened his eyes enough to look down at where she lay rested against his side, her pale skin against his dark, blond hair spilling over his arm like a waterfall of yellow. She sat up, bare to him, and somewhere south he felt a stir, like he could maybe go again in a little while. Not yet, though. He was still settled into a nice fog of afterglow.

“Go where?” he murmured, not really thinking it over.

“Back to work.” She rolled to the edge of the bed, letting her legs hang over as she sat up, her bare back facing him. His eyes crawled over it, noting for the millionth time the lack of tan lines. It provided a nice aesthetic continuity. He wanted to reach out and stroke her starting from the shoulder on down to the top of her crack, but he couldn’t quite find the energy for it at the moment. Maybe later.

He let his eyes drift shut again, and though he was dimly aware of the sounds of her moving about the room, fetching clothes from the floor, it only came to him in drifts, followed by what felt like long periods of missing time. He felt her kiss and it stirred him enough to open his eyes again. She was sitting on the bed next to him now, looking down with a sweet smile. “Hey,” he said quietly, still sleepy.

“I love you,” she said, and kissed him, leaning over, the soft cotton of her polo shirt pushed against his chest.

“Love you, too, babe,” he said, and let his eyes drift shut.

“I’ll be back late,” she said, words drifting into his consciousness from somewhere above.

“Mmhmm.” He was drifting off again, dimly aware that her footsteps were receding now. The smell of her perfume—a trendy one from a department store she visited down in Chattanooga—was still hanging in the air, along with the earthier smell of his sweat. His muscles were at peace, worn out, relaxed. He rolled his head sideways and the scent of the laundry detergent from the sheets wafted up at him, something just a little fruity, like apple. They felt soft, and he was perfectly content to lie like this, just like this, maybe for the rest of the night. He heard her in the kitchen, grabbing a bottle of water out of the fridge before leaving, like she always did.