The Beast (7 page)

He reached for the door handle.

"No!" My voice had gone high with panic.

He turned toward me and something in his eyes calmed me. "Don't worry, Jade. I can't let them hurt you."

"They can hurt you too, you know!"

He smirked, perfect white teeth gleaming. There was something vicious in that smirk. "No, they can't."

"What are they?" I asked desperately. I wanted them to be something different, vampires or monsters or chupacabra, anything but human. Simon’s world was full of monsters. I couldn’t deal with the human kind, too.

"They're stupid, that’s what they are," Simon said, and pulled the handle.

As soon as the door was open, the first man reached in to pull Simon out. Simon went, but when the man tried to swing the tire iron around to hit Simon he found himself flat on the pavement. Two more rushed forward to take his place.

I was pulled out of the car and shoved from one man to another, then another and another until I was dizzy. Shouts and taunts in English and Spanish rose and fell as I was pushed around. I didn't fight. I could only see flashes of Simon and the others fighting.

A punch to my ribs knocked the wind out of me. I crumpled to the asphalt. They must have gotten bored with my quiet spinning.

When I recovered, I realized that wasn't the case. There were six of them. Three were sprawled on the ground and I thought that one of them might be dead. The three that had been pushing me around were attacking Simon. They jumped on and off of the car, swinging bats and a piece of rebar. Simon, who hovered over them, swung round, wielding a baseball bat of his own.

I saw one of the fallen men reaching for the tire iron and I felt hot white rage flow through my veins. I kicked his hand and picked it up. Before his hand flopped back to the ground I swung and the heavy metal caught him across the top of his head. He went limp. I felt sick, but I looked to Simon.

He was still snarling and whirling, fighting off three men at once. They danced back and forth, not even noticing me. It made me think of bull baiting. They were the curs and Simon the bull.

I ran up behind one of them and brought the tire iron down across his face. The heavy end caught him across the jaw and he fell like a sack of flour. The other two weren't much of a challenge for Simon and he had them both subdued within a few seconds.

The whole encounter couldn't have lasted more than a minute.

Before I had the time to process the scene around us I heard the soft scrape of metal against the ground.

A gun.

I leapt forward and brought the tire iron straight down across the head of the one who had pulled the gun out. I brought it down again and again until I heard Simon shout my name. I don’t know how many times he said it before I finally heard him.

I killed him
, I thought. My whole body went cold.

The man grunted and tried to move and I raised the thing again.

Simon caught it before I killed the man for real.

"Stop," Simon said. "It’s over."

He gathered me in his arms and I nodded, blinking back tears. I couldn't cry again. I couldn't just keep crying about everything. I had to keep it together. His warm arms enveloped me, holding my head to his chest. With one ear to his chest and the other pressed by his arm, I could only hear his heartbeat. I listened to the blood moving through him. When his racing heartbeat slowed, and mine with it, I pushed myself away from his chest. I looked around at the moaning and silent men littered around the empty parking lot, who were so loud only minutes earlier. I wiped my face with my bare wrist.

"We should find some rope," I said.

chapter 7

"Have you seen this yet?" Bob asked. He looked left and right before opening a browser window on his computer.

Shannon didn’t even look up. "Yes."

When the page loaded, I saw a very clear picture of the sidewalk outside of City Hall. Closest to the camera. There was a somewhat blurry, angry looking man tied to a lamp post. Beyond him in crisp detail, a second man glared at the camera, his torso bound to a wooden telephone pole. Beyond him, blurred and smaller, was another man tied to a metal sign post. In the background were three more, tiny and blurred, all in a neat line. They each had a cardboard sign around their necks, suspended with string.

"I tried to steal the wrong car."

I smiled.

"Did you watch the video?" Shannon asked.

I stopped smiling. Video? Bob closed the window suddenly. Shaun walked by, doing his morning patrol.

"Look it up on your phone later," Shannon said, before her earbuds went in. "The chick looks like you with your new hair."

I wasn't sure I wanted to see it, but at lunch I took my new phone out of my pocket. I didn’t have to worry about what to search for.

A text message from Sandra with a glowing blue link was already open on the screen.

"Holy shit, lady you're famous!" it said.

I tapped the link to see a surveillance video from the courthouse across the street. It caught the men creeping toward the car and most of the fighting. A trio of leaves in one corner obscured the car and occasionally rustled but never revealed more than a glimpse of white. Most of the video was of the men dancing toward and away from Simon while he turned around, watching them warily. Then one rushed in and Simon caught him with one hand, lifting him up and slamming him on the ground. The other tried to hit him when he was distracted and Simon jumped out of the way of the blow, grabbed the bat and elbowed the man in the face. A single punch sent the man sprawling. Then the three men rushed at him and it seemed to start all over. I was shocked when I saw myself come out of nowhere with the tire iron glinting for the camera. I watched myself knock one man out and beat another almost to death. Then Simon grabbed my wrist and I realized how small I looked next to him. The embrace that had felt so long lasted only a few seconds before we took the legs of one man and the video stopped.

I glanced over the comments and opened a "remix" video dubbed over with techno. I laughed out loud when the techno beat gave way to the Mexican Hat Dance with a sped up video of the men jumping forward and back toward Simon. When the video Jade rushed forward, the techno stopped again and some heavy metal growler screamed. A heavy drum beat and fast guitar accompanied my pulverizing the man who had the gun. I texted Sandra back.

"She stole my hairstyle!"

After a short text conversation, Sandra said that she was making dinner and that I had to be there. I agreed.

When I checked my phone after work I had a new text message from a phone number that was not in my address book.

"We're on the news."

I stared at it for a long time before calling the number.

"Hello, Jade," Simon's warm voice greeted me.

"Hello, Simon." I smiled. Shannon nodded a farewell as she passed me and climbed into her mom's car.

"Have you seen the video?" he asked.

"Of course," I said. "Have you seen the remix?"

He laughed. It was a deep warm sound, even through the phone. "Which one?"

I smiled. "That's pretty crazy. I wonder who those people were that did it."

"So do the cops," Simon said. "The couple is wanted for questioning."

My smile faded. "The couple? What for?"

"Who knows," he said dismissively. "Doesn't concern us."

I smiled again. If we were going to be caught it would have happened already.

Right?

"You're right, it doesn't. Hey, what are you doing tonight?"

"It’s a full moon tonight."

"Oh."

"I'm not doing anything." I heard the smile in his voice and could practically see his dimples.

I invited him to join us for dinner, hoping that Sandra wouldn't mind when I told her. He'd saved my life twice so far, it was the least I could do.

Sandra was already a flurry of activity when I walked in the door.

"You can have your little friend over if you go pick up wine. Now!" She shoved money at me and gave me vague instructions to pick up two bottles of the white one with the fish on it from the health food store. She cursed the name for being so hard to remember and told me to get "real drinks" as well. When I tried to ask what that meant, she threw her hands up at me and shouted something about yellow bean casserole.

I found the wine at the health store with a picture of a fish on the label. I hoped that it was the right brand, because it wasn't hard to remember at all. It said "FISH" in huge letters across the front. I grabbed two bottles and went to the liquor aisle. Sandra normally drank wine and margaritas, so she was almost guaranteed to have tequila. I bought a bottle of vodka, some cranberry juice, and some soda. I paid for half, since I didn't know what she actually wanted.

The house smelled amazing. The table was set for six, the pale pine covered in a dark red table cloth. On the table were a pair of covered casserole dishes, a large covered bowl and several smaller covered bowls. A bread basket sat in the middle next to a large salad bowl.

"What's the occasion?" I asked, setting the paper bags on the couch.

"It's my end of summer feast," she declared. "It's a full moon, the end of summer and the beginning of a lot of great new things. It's time to eat, drink, and get laid!"

"Wow."

Her golden hair trailed behind her as she rushed to open the bags. "You're a saint!"

I smiled and looked around while she popped the wine bottles open. Big stickers of leaves and flowers mixed in with bird silhouettes and acorns decorated the walls. "You did all this while I was at the store?"

She grunted while she pulled the last cork from a wine bottle. "No, I did all that last night. You were out late and I was bored so I just kind of started putting the decals up and preparing food."

"Anything else I can do to help?" I asked.

"Table's set, wine's breathing, foods prepared, house is clean," she muttered, looking around. "Oh yeah, you can hold both of my hands and jump up and down and squeal with me excitedly."

"What happened?"

Her entire body flailed as she punched at the air in excitement. "I got a job! Not just any job, I got a job working with the curator of the museum!"

We held hands and bounced around in a circle, cheering and laughing.

"That's amazing," I said breathlessly. "Well, not really, you worked your ass off for it. But that's great! When do you start?"

"Monday," she said, face pink with pure joy. "I already got to see some of the artifacts they're prepping for display. I'll be touching these things soon. Thousand year old stuff and my grubby little hands will be all over it!"

"Wow," I felt the glow of happiness wash over me. "I guess hard work does pay off, huh?"

She grinned and danced around, then flicked me with a hand towel. "Sure does! Now go get dressed! Oh, I hope your guest is your date, by the way. Jack's brother is bringing a date."

"You finally gave up trying to hook us up?" I asked.

"Only until I scare her off. Unless you really do have a date. Then I guess I'm done until that's over. You two are meant for each other."

I laughed and thought about Cole. I had never paid him too much attention, much to Sandra's dismay. He was good looking, but he was a little… boring. He was into football and beer and sometimes played basketball on the weekends. It’s not that those are bad things, but he was so normal it had made me dismiss him.

Simon was so far from normal that shivers ran up my spine just thinking about him. I thought of our first kiss and our kiss under the streetlamp after our attackers were all tied up in a row. His soft lips on mine, his strong arms wrapped tight around my waist. I touched a finger to my lips. It was like a distant dream.

"Jade!" Sandra yelled, banging on the bedroom door suddenly. I jumped.

"What?"

"They're here, they're here! And holy crap, your man is hot!"

"His name's Simon."

We opened the door together. Everyone arrived at once and each of them brought a gift. Jack carried a bouquet of flowers arranged in a vase. Cole had a Tupperware container under his arm and his date, a young redhead, carried a bottle of champagne. Simon also had a bottle of champagne.

"We already talked about how we brought the same thing," the redhead laughed, an irritating sound. I already didn't like her. "It's almost as bad as showing up in the same dress!"

Jack rolled his eyes and kissed Sandra's cheek, then mine.

"It would have been more interesting if you two were wearing the same dress," I said. I meant it to be friendly, but it didn’t quite come out that way.

Simon grinned.

Sandra snatched one of the bottles of champagne and uncorked it over the sink. Normally she drank everything out of the highball glass that an ex-boyfriend had etched her name and a flowery heart on while everyone else got mugs, but she poured the champagne into actual champagne flutes. Wine glasses for the wine and water glasses for water were already set out on the table.

"Who else is coming?" Jack asked, eyeing the spread.

"No one," Sandra answered. "This is it."

"All that is just for us?" Cole asked.

"I don't think I could eat all that," the redhead bleated.

"Good thing there's six of us, then," I muttered.

Sandra shot me a look that was equal parts amused and irritated as she uncovered the dishes on the table. There was salad and rolls, a yellow and green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, roast beef, baked squash and cooked spinach. In true Sandra fashion, it was more than a feast for six people.

"Save some room for dessert," she said. "I might have gone a little overboard with that too."

I laughed.

"It's your fault, Jade. I just wanted to tell you about the new job but you were out so late." She narrowed her eyes at me. "Where were you?"

Simon and I glanced at each other.

Sandra looked from me to him and back. She covered her mouth with both hands. Her wide eyes meant that she’d figured it out. I could only hope that she thought we were holed up somewhere having sex. Anything but the truth. "No way."

"What?" The other three asked almost in unison.

I gave a nod that I wasn't sure even Sandra would notice. She bolted her glass of champagne and poured another, then laid out the serving utensils like nothing had happened.

I was seated across from the redhead. Simon sat next to me, across the table from Cole. Sandra and Jack occupied the ends like they were king and queen.

Silverware clinked against plates while Sandra boasted about all of the things her new job would require of her. We all smiled and asked questions and drank. Across the table, the pale redhead pushed a few tiny bites into her tiny heart shaped mouth while Simon demolished half of an acorn squash followed by a plate loaded with beef, potatoes and veggies. The redhead’s yellow dress plunged low in front to suggest the cleavage she didn't have, with a daring hem cut high to revealed an expanse of creamy thigh that I was glad I couldn't see over the table. I looked at Cole to see him judging Simon just as harshly.

"So Cole," Sandra said. "How did you meet, um-?"

The redhead opened her perfect mouth, covered it with perfect manicured nails and said. "Oh my god I'm so rude! My name's Jessica!"

Of course it is,
I thought, half expecting her to add "like Jessica Rabbit!"

Sandra nodded. "So how did you two meet?"

"I'm a paralegal," Jessica said.

That explained nothing, except that I probably should have been in a much higher paying job than data entry.

"We used to work at the same place," Cole said. "Then we ran into each other at the gym a few days ago."

I gave a bland smile.

"That's cool," Sandra said. "What about you and Simon, Jade?"

I smiled for a second, debating whether to tell the truth or not. I wasn't in court, I could tell the truth without telling the whole truth. "We met at a gas station."

Sandra eyed me suspiciously. "Really?"

"Yup. I spilled soda all over the place and he offered me a ride."

"Why were you at a gas station without your car?" Jessica asked, sparkling green eyes wide with concern.

"My car was there," I said. "It just wouldn’t start. I got a ticket for leaving it, too."

“A hero complex, huh?” Cole muttered into his spoon. Then, louder, “so he took you home, then? That’s cool.”