Texas Hold 'Em (31 page)

Katy smiled as soon as she spotted me, then immediately frowned when she saw I had company. She leaned over and put her arm around the neck of the guy she was with, pulled him close, and had a quick conversation. He looked momentarily confused before heading off toward the front door. Without even looking back, he abandoned Katy, his drink, and a couple of wadded-up twenties that he had pulled out and left on the table before leaving.

More than a few guys watched him go, and I could see them jostling amongst themselves to decide who was going to move in on Katy now that she was unaccompanied and considered fair game. I wasn’t in any hurry to join the rush.

“What are you waiting for?” asked Lacey, as the dazed jock brushed past where we stood near the entrance. “Isn’t that her? The trampy-looking blonde?”

“Yeah, but we have a problem.”

“Hey, Chance!” Katy drawled loud enough to draw most of her admirers’ attention from her to me.

I sighed, then resumed my march forward. This was going even worse than I’d expected, which was saying something, as I had expected it to go fully pear-shaped.

“Hi Katy. This is Lacey. Lacey, this is Katy.”

“I’m his dead girlfriend’s sister. Who the hell are you?” Katy asked.

It was strange to see Lacey taken aback. I think it was a first for her.

“I’m a friend,” she managed, after a split-second pause.

“Gee, Chance, your current girlfriend’s not even dead yet and you’re already lining up another one? You
have
changed,” Katy said. Then she held up an empty tumbler. “I’m empty. Either of you want to volunteer to fill me up?” She didn’t say with what.

I ignored her request. “Katy, what are you doing?”

“Trying to get a drink. Unsuccessfully, it would seem.” She jiggled the ice around in her glass for effect.

“No—I mean, in general. Jesus, Katy, you can’t go around like this.”

She looked down at herself, then back at me. “I don’t see anyone else around here complaining.”

“That’s not what I’m talking about!” I glanced around and lowered my voice. “The murders. You killed Fred. Then picked up some guy at a bar and left him lying dead on the street. Then you whacked a cop.”

“Fred wasn’t murder, Chance—you should know that. He was a hunter. We were asked to bring him to Christian, alive if possible.” She tilted her cup to her lips, letting an ice cube into her mouth, which she proceeded to suck on. Then she shrugged and said through the ice, “It’s not my fault he resisted.”

Sure it wasn’t. “And the other two? What about them? The guy you dumped out of Jacob’s car two nights ago, and the cop you killed right after?”

“Are you stalking me? How cute. If I’d known I had an audience, I would have staged a better performance.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

She crunched her ice and said, “I didn’t kill that guy. What do you think I am? I mean, he woke up in the gutter, but let me tell you, that’s exactly where his mind was that night. Serves him right.”

“So the cop—he’s alive as well?” It was possible I’d misjudged Katy after all, and let circumstantial evidence paint a picture of her in the worst possible light.

“Oh, no, him I killed. That asshole pulled me over and I wasn’t even speeding.”

Nope. I had her right the first time. Being turned into a vampire had twisted her. She couldn’t cope in any constructive way, so she just turned it all off. Her humanity was gone. I looked into her eyes and found no sign of remorse for anything she had done.

Not knowing what else to say, I returned to the problem at hand.

“Do you realize this is a werewolf bar?” I felt Lacey stiffen beside me at the revelation of our current location. I wondered whether maybe Katy had a death wish, and was hell-bent on acting crazier and crazier until it finally killed her.

“Technically it’s a pool hall, not a bar,” Katy said.

“Werewolf pool hall, then. Whatever. That’s not the point, Katy. The point is, it’s full of werewolves,” I said as Lacey composed herself, then tried to act casual as she surveyed the bar in a fresh light.

Katy simply shrugged, crossed her arms, and took in our surroundings with none of Lacey’s subtleness.

“Sure. That’s what I heard, anyway. I wanted to check them out for myself. Funny we never ran into one when we were hunting, huh? Other than needing a shave and some tips on personal hygiene, they don’t look like werewolves.”

“Well, no, they don’t. At least not until they change. But that’s not the point, either. The point is that they
are
werewolves.”

“You would know—you always were our little supernatural radar.”

“That’s right. But more importantly, werewolves and vampires don’t exactly play well together.”

“I heard that too. Why not?” Katy asked me, genuinely curious.

She had me there. I appealed to Lacey for help, but she shrugged as if to say it never made any sense to her either, but what could you do.

“Who cares?” I said. “What matters is that we shouldn’t be here. We need to get going.”

I was growing exasperated. So far it didn’t look like they realized Katy was a vampire, but if that changed, all bets were off. I suspected the two groups of supernatural creatures kept to themselves, for the most part. I wasn’t sure what happened when a member of the opposite faction showed up unannounced, but I was pretty certain it would result in some kind of drama that I didn’t need.

“Why? I paid for the table for two hours and I’ve barely been here fifteen minutes. Well,
I
didn’t pay for it; that guy did.” She motioned to the door where the jock made his exit moments before. “But still, it’s paid for, so I’m staying. Now, if you’re not going to buy me a drink, then grab a cue. I’ll rack.” She set her glass down on the bar that ran along the wall and picked up the triangle. She set it on the felt, then took the balls out of the slot in the side of the table and organized them in the triangle’s interior.

“Are you nuts? I see only one of you and at least a dozen of them. If they figure out what you are, things could go south in a big way.”

“That’s why you’re here to protect me, my big strong man.” She finished with the balls, then walked over and placed a hand on my chest. Looking up at me, she batted her eyes in an over-dramatic fashion.

“Wow, she
is
nuts,” said Lacey. “I mean, aside from the obvious reasons, anyone counting on you keeping them out of trouble is certifiable.” She turned to Katy. “You do realize he’s like a beacon for it? This guy has got the worst luck I have ever seen. It’s not natural.”

Katy stepped back and turned her attention to Lacey, finally taking the time to size her up.

“So who
are
you exactly? I know you’re not his girlfriend ‘cause she’s on her way to meet Christian.”

Megan was on her way to meet Christian? I sputtered, “Wait, isn’t she still with my mom and Kevin? Why are they going to meet Christian? I have to get to them before Christian can do anything.”

Katy stared. “What are you talking about? How could Toni be with her? She was in California when Christian called her yesterday.”

“Toni?” asked Lacey, her gaze drifting slowly from Katy to me.

“So let me get this straight,” I said, trying to figure out what was going on. “Toni is on her way to meet Christian?” I asked.

“Isn’t that what I just said? Twice?”

“Why on earth would she do that?” I asked.

Katy laughed. “Oh my God, it was classic. You should have heard it! So, like, I might have let it slip to Christian that you had a new girlfriend back in California, and that I had your cell phone with her number on it. So of course Christian had to go and call her up.” She rolled her eyes. “I’m not sure if he wanted to threaten her, or find out where she lived so he could go and snatch her up to complete the set. You know, the ‘everyone Chance cares about’ collection he’s got going? This was before you rescued your mom and then lost her again. That was a smooth move, by the way.”

“Yeah, yeah. What about Toni?”

Katy knew she’d gotten to me and started talking even more slowly, just to rub it in.

“So anyway, like I was saying, Christian calls her up, says he’s a friend of yours, and then asks her if she knew where you were. She wasn’t buying it. So he tries a different angle. He tells Toni that you’re in trouble and he needs to know where you are. When she still refuses and demands to know who he is, he tells her his name and asks to meet with her in person so he can convince her that he’s on the level and has your best interests at heart.”

She paused in her story to walk over to where her glass was, tilted it up, and sucked down the newly melted liquid.

“Well, apparently she already knew all about who Christian was, because she told him he could stuff it and that he had better not have touched you or he was dead. It made sense to me, you know, that you would have warned your girlfriend about Christian. The vampire trying to kill you? But apparently Christian hadn’t expected it, and it pissed him off. So of course he threatened her. He does that when he doesn’t get his way. Said in one of his not-too-subtle innuendoes that he would be ‘coming for her after he finished with you.’

“The bitch went ballistic. I mean, she actually told Christian not to bother coming for her, because she was coming for him. Can you believe it? The look on Christian’s face was priceless! The man was stunned. He finally got enough of his moxie back to manage something cliché like,” Katy lowered her voice, and in a decent imitation of Christian said, “‘You don’t know who you’re speaking to and what I’m capable of.’ Oh boy, that was a mistake. The words that came out of that girl’s mouth made even me blush, and I’m dead.

“So your darling came all the way out here to meet Christian. She seems a little more fiery than you’re used to, Chance.” Katy nodded at Lacey. “So, is this her replacement? ‘Cause, despite the tough words your current girlfriend used, I think you’re going to need a new one soon.”

This was going from bad to worse. I tried to think of a good way to ask Katy about Megan, one that wouldn’t tip my hand, when I was interrupted by a goatee-wearing bald man with large earlobe stretchers and full body tattoos.

The guy was definitely a werewolf, and despite the sense of impending disaster that came with his visit, I couldn’t help wondering what his ears would look like when he changed, and whether the tattoos would show or be covered by fur.

He ignored Lacey and me, walking straight up to Katy.

“Hey, babe, how about you and I play a game? If you want, we can go doubles against your friends here. I can give you some pointers about how to hold a stick.”

“Thanks, but it doesn’t look like you have much to hold on to.” Katy glanced down at his crotch with a pitying look. Lacey had the bad sense to snicker, which didn’t help things.

“There’s plenty enough for both of you.” He split his leer between the two girls.

Katy wasn’t buying it. “Nah, my man Chance here is more than enough for the two of us. But if you’re nice, I’m sure he’ll let you watch. I mean, who knows—maybe even an old dog like you can pick up a trick or two.” I was pretty sure Katy was intentionally getting me into a fight that I wanted nothing to do with.

The guy’s face contorted into a frown as he processed Katy’s remark. His conclusion had him stepping closer to Katy, sniffing the air as he did so.

Katy pulled her head back as he encroached on her personal space. She raised her brows as she did, and shot him an expression that said, in no uncertain terms, “Ew.”

The guy’s frown deepened, genuine anger starting to crack his features, but at least he stopped sniffing. Unfortunately, that didn’t last long. After stepping back to take the three of us in, he turned his sniffer on me.

I tried to ignore the snuffling sounds as I watched his expression shift from anger to confusion. I finally backed up a step when his head started veering down toward my belt line. No way was that dude sniffing anything having to do with my lower half.

He didn’t advance any more, however. He tilted his head to one side as he tried to figure something out about me that made no sense to him whatsoever.

Giving up on whatever it was that stumped him, he moved on to Lacey. The whole exposition was more than a little awkward, especially after Lacey waved her hand in front of her face when he got close and said, “Deodorant. Find it. Know it. Love it.”

I knew where this was going. And, sure enough, his expression turned cocky as he ignored Lacey’s comment and focused in on Katy.

“A vampire? And you came in here? Lady, you are either really stupid, or really....” He struggled to come up with an alternative.

Crap. This was what I’d been afraid of. I scanned the walls for a way out. Our table was toward the back of the bar. The closest way out was a hallway a few tables over that led to the restrooms. I assumed it let out behind the pool hall. It was closer than the front door, and with only a couple of tables and a handful of patrons between us and it, we might make it. That is, as long as this guy didn’t draw any more attention to us, and as long as none of the patrons in our way were werewolves.

While he was focused on Katy, I started slowly making my move toward the rear exit. I noticed Lacey following my lead, and the two of us did our best to slip out unnoticed.

“Aw, your vocabulary doesn’t reach much beyond sit, heel, and beg, huh?” Katy said, giving the guy a pity pout.

The man actually growled before raising his voice, calling out to the general population of the hall. “Hey, guys, guess what we got ourselves here? A chick that’s so frigid, she’s stone cold dead.”

“Chance, are you going to let him talk to me that way? Chance? Hey, what are you doing over there?”

So much for that plan. Lacey and I hadn’t made it halfway before Katy’s questions drew every eye in the establishment to me. I froze, not failing to notice that Lacey kept right on moving toward the exit.

“Looks like your blood bag is bailing on you, little girl,” said the guy, smirking, in a voice thick with derision.

Katy pursed her lips. “Makes you wonder about what ever happened to the quality of men.”

“There’s your problem. Any dude that hangs out with a corpse instead of finding himself a hot-blooded woman ain’t no man.”