Underworld Queen (8 page)

“I’m not allowed to say.”

“Don’t go messing with that lot, Jonas. They’s up to no good.”

“They?”

“Well, before his demise, the former Director had been turning souls left and right. It got to be like some kind of frat house upstairs. After your Audray took charge, I figured it was safe so kicked ‘em all out two days ago.”

“Where’d he go?”

“I have
no
idea.”

“How did he learn to turn so quickly?”

“To be honest with you, I always liked the way Josh did it. He really trained them, gave them guidance on the ins and outs of claiming souls. These lot are real butchers, almost grabbing people off the street. They’ve been lied to, told all sorts of things. Then they would hang around here moping, crying in their X, pick up a girl and get lost for a few days. When they was ready, they’d come back and then they’d start bringing more new ones in.” He wiped down the counter with a pink-stained rag. “Never saw so many new recruits in my life, almost like they was building a freakin’ army.”

“What about Peter’s involvement?”

“Well, they was totally pissed the day he got whacked.”

“But Peter must have taught them how to turn, before he was killed?”

“Yeah, they spent a lot of time in his office. And he came here, too.”

Jonas looked out at the mob of people. One of the girls had gotten her leg caught in the grip of a huge dark angel. He had her body pulled against the cage, her flesh being pressed by the metal rods. Jonas could see the angel had a mind to rip her leg off for sport, an injury she wouldn’t likely survive.

Not today.

Crossing the room in one long leap, Jonas quickly grabbed the man’s shaved head and twisted it with a loud crack. The hulking body slumped to the floor.

He looked at the girl, who was climbing down from the cage, limping. Blood was soaking the towel she held to her groin area. She hurried off without stopping to issue a thank you. Jonas hoped she would heal.

Though the music blared on, the crowd stood still and glared at the man who’d just eliminated one of their favorites. Jonas was also the man their new Director had chosen to share her bed. As he looked from each hungry face to another, there wasn’t a friend among them.

Until he saw a Cheshire smile coming towards him, wearing all black, sporting a silver medallion around his neck. His skin was light pink, but his hair was dark, like Peter’s. He looked to be almost Peter’s twin, but Jonas saw he was bigger built than the former Director. A large scar traversed his cheek and ran down to his jaw line. A deep groove encircled his neck as if the fellow had been hanged.

This bastard is hard to kill. And he’s seen serious battle.

The dark man looked around him, playing to the crowd, as he walked casually toward Jonas. Conversations resumed and the dance floor began to writhe again. The man stopped a short distance in front of Jonas and stuck out his arm.

“Jonas Fucking Starling.”

“That’s me. Am I supposed to know you?”

The man smiled. “As charming as I thought you would be.”

“There a point to all this bullshit, or do you just like to see which way your piss flies in the wind?”

“Now there, you see?” He spoke to his smaller companions. “He’s got two good quips in on me, and I haven’t been able to land a single one.” His buddies stared back at Jonas, eyes wide.

Jonas adjusted his stance so he could reach for the long blade he stored in his boot.

“You’re a hard man to find.” The stranger matched Jonas’ open stance with one of his own. “We’ve been looking nearly three centuries for you. You are a living legend. Took us awhile, but we finally found out how to get here.”

“I didn’t catch your name.”

“Rupert Blade, but then I think you already know that.”

He’d have gone for his weapon, without thought for his own safety, since he had the approval of his Queen, but as much as he coveted this man’s death, he needed information more.

Rupert must have seen the tenseness in Jonas’ upper body.

“This isn’t a place or time to fight, my friend, if I can call you that.”

“I’m not your friend.”

“Acknowledged.” Rupert motioned Jonas to join him in one of the quiet anterooms, away from the crush of the dance floor and the awful cages. “You want something to drink? Some wheatgrass perhaps?” Jonas might have been surprised, but the look of Rupert’s smirk told him he was playing with him again.

“John, go get us some Sexual Apricot.” Rupert’s dark eyes sparkled in the dimly lit room with the six-foot stone fireplace. He sat down on a dark leather couch, and motioned for Jonas to do the same across from him. Rupert watched him, then leaned over a black marble table, elbows on his knees. “I imagine you dally a bit when she’s gone?”

“How do you know she’s gone?”

“Because I happen to know she’s in Bakersfield as we speak.”

This is not good.
Jonas wished he’d just killed the man who knew fully where his soft spot was: Audray.

“Okay, so you’ve got my attention. Why don’t you just spill it and we’ll both be on our way.” Jonas forced himself to relax, but his training kept him alert, heart beating fast, ready for anything. He left his knees wide and open, his back straight up.

John arrived with a tray laden with a dozen shot glasses of pinkish-amber liquid. Two glasses were placed in front of Jonas, and two in front of Rupert. John and his companion each helped themselves to one, and took a seat near the fireplace, within earshot. The balance of the tray was left between Jonas and Rupert.

Rupert tossed back his first shot. Jonas didn’t move a muscle.

“I happen to know you love Sexual Apricot, or have your tastes changed in that direction as well?”

“Like I said, why don’t you tell me what you came here to say? I know you enjoy the witty dialog, but it’s a little annoying, no offense.”

“None taken.” Rupert leaned back on the couch, extending his arms to the sides and crossed his legs. “I’ll be honest with you, Jonas. I came here to find you but I’d rather kill you, and if you turn on me, I will.”

Jonas jumped to his feet. Rupert didn’t flinch, looked back at him with a casual smile, signaling his two readied companions to seat themselves again. Jonas noted he was fully primed and ready for a death fight, something Jonas wanted to avoid.

“Look, asshole, I’m tired of your games.” Jonas started to leave.

“I want to make a deal, in exchange for your life and the safety of your woman.”

“I don’t make deals.”

“Oh, but I have it on good authority you do.”

“Your information is wrong.”

“You forget your past, sir. Remember when you were eighteen and the dandy of the ladies at court? Remember when the Queen and her cousin couldn’t get enough of you, even after she was well with child? Your child?”

Jonas saw the peach and golden brocades of the Queen’s boudoir, her “Pleasure Palace” she had called it—a place even Charles himself was not allowed. She’d not gotten around to making it a nursery when the king died and she had to flee the castle. He’d spent half a year of his life screwing any woman who came to him there, on the Queen’s orders, under penalty of death. He’d stopped caring about his own life shortly after he arrived at Court. He did it to preserve the lives of his beloved Anne and both their families.

“Ever wonder what became of the child?”

Jonas assumed the child was stillborn, as the Queen’s other thirteen offspring had been. His hands balled into fists at his sides, as he remained standing.

“I can introduce you to descendents of his. Yes. He
was
a male child. And he became a very rich and powerful man.” Rupert frowned. “Just not a king.”

Despite himself, Jonas was curious, mesmerized by Rupert’s words. But he also felt his past reach up and grab him by the balls.

Rupert got up and extended his hand again. “Welcome back to the family, cuz.”

N
ow it was
time for Burt. She wondered where his remains would wind up some day. Hopefully not in a well kept cemetery. She wished it would be at the bottom of a drainage canal or woods. He wouldn’t have a headstone. There would be no angel looking over him.

The freeway was snarled with afternoon traffic. The hot, dusty and flat surroundings looked like hell itself, except for the lush green rows of crops that splayed out like spines of a fan as she drove by. She watched the automatic sprinklers spread their shimmery goodness over the green rows, spraying as if sugar-coating everything. She smiled and checked her rearview mirror.
The only sweetness in this godforsaken place is long dead and buried.

Traffic crept along until the turnoff to the VA Hospital, which must not have been a popular destination. The brown and cream two-story brick building looked like an old military base, complete with a jet fighter cemented into the dry crabgrass turnaround in front of the building. A few children were climbing up on its wings and trying to pry loose the bars keeping them from the cockpit.

Audray was conscious that her car was attracting attention everywhere she went. In LA she would be one of many. And at her home in Northern California, where she kept the car, a red Maserati wasn’t commonplace. But it wasn’t odd, like down here. Some of the wealthy farmers might be able to afford one, but would never even consider it. She’d always been taught that if you showed your bling in the Central Valley, you were putting your life in danger.

The car chirped as she locked it and made her way up the concrete steps bordering a meandering ramp that zigzagged to the hospital entrance.

The cool lobby was a welcome relief from the hot late afternoon, but it smelled of urine, disinfectant and dust. Audray’s heightened senses brought it in so fast she needed a surgery mask. The waiting room was filled with several patients and family members, some of both in wheelchairs.

She felt instantly tired, not sure if she had the energy to do what she came to do. But she took a deep breath and walked up to speak to the black woman seated behind a window enclosure, dressed in a blue smock. The whites of her eyes were as yellow as her teeth.

“Can I help you?” she gave Audray a rather murderous glare.

“I’m here to visit a family member. His name is Burt Foreman.”

The receptionist looked over a clipboard and shook her head. “I’m sorry, Mr. Foreman is not able to have visitors.” Her smile was wide, as if she enjoyed dishing out the news.

“Yes, well I understand he is in rather poor shape, but it is urgent I see him.”

“I’m sorry. Hospital rules.”

Audray inhaled and blew over the woman while she pled her case again. The woman’s eyes half closed as she leaned back and almost tipped over in her padded rolling office chair.

Audray continued staring down at the woman, breathing hard, adding another dose of her influence, due to the woman’s extra girth. At first she thought the receptionist would pass out. But then she shook her head.

“Boy, is it hot in here?” She fanned her face with a stained file folder and looked back at Audray, who kept her jaw tense and allowed her eyes to rim in red, ready to flame her in an instant if it became necessary. She had no intention of going away until she got the permission to finish her deed. The woman exuded fear and confusion, her lower lip beginning to tremble. A tiny bit of spittle resided in the corner of her mouth.

“Oh, what the hell. He’s gonna die any day now. I doubt you’ll be able to speak with him.” She stood up. The woman was easily six-foot-two and the size of a professional football player. “Five minutes.” She held up a hand that could palm a basketball, fingers spread wide. “You got five minutes, you hear?”

More than enough time.

The woman answered the phone and held up her five-minute sign like a small pizza platter. Audray was careful not to appear unnaturally quick, and entered the room Burt shared with three other male patients. Everyone was sleeping except for a younger man who was a double amputee, heavily medicated. He nodded as Audray passed him to get to Burt, whose bed was next to the window. Both televisions were blaring.

She looked down at the gray face of the man she saw in her dreams as she cried herself to sleep in those early days. He wore death like a blanket all around him, and it wasn’t becoming. He had a tube down his nose secured with a white piece of tape. A yellowish green liquid was being sucked from inside him, ending up in a clear jar with an inch of the frothy buildup at the bottom. He was hooked up to an IV on the back of one hand, but his other flaccid arm had large purple and red bruises on the inside at the crook. One purple trail snaked up from the bruise almost an inch.

That probably hurts.
The thought gave her courage.

Audray picked up the yellow plastic water pitcher and poured a stream over his face and onto his chest. Burt opened his rheumy eyes and mumbled, trying to wipe the water, getting his arm caught in the plastic tubing. His eyes got small as he squinted to see who was next to him.

“Don’t have your glasses? Guess you don’t read much.”

“Who…?”