Unearthed (25 page)

“Now that’s a gourmand,” Duncan said.

“When this shit goes sideways, I want to kill him first,” Hendricks said.

“I don’t think I’ve ever been to a party like this,” Lauren said, taking her turn looking through the binoculars. “Actually … I can’t remember the last time I went to any party.” She lowered the binoculars and tried to remember the last time she’d been invited anywhere other than a fourth of July barbecue. She couldn’t.

“We’re not really dressed for this occasion, anyway,” Belzer said, taking up the binoculars. “Look at these people. Dressed to the elevens, because the nines are just too last season.”

“Are they people?” Lauren asked. “Are there people in there? Or is it just demons?”

“Hmmm,” Belzer said. “I’m not exactly an expert, but … maybe? The valets look normal enough. Not that that’s a sure measure.”

“If there are all these bad demons,” Lauren said, “causing havoc and killing people in horrible ways … there have to be good ones, too, right?”

“I’m not sure if it’s like the Force,” Belzer said and looked her way to catch her confusion. “Balance and all that, I mean. All I hear about is the bad, anyway.”

“‘If it bleeds, it leads’?”

“Just as true in internet journalism as the other kind,” Belzer said, pressing the binoculars to his eyes again. “Wait, what’s this?”

The entrance of royalty was pretty well-nigh impossible to miss, Hendricks thought as he watched it unfold. A guy who was dressed a cut above came into the room heralded by and flanked by a half dozen others, announced as Viscount Trinculo Barstotte, a name that rang out over a silenced room.

“Should I be impressed?” Hendricks asked.

“Should I bow?” Alison added.

“Why? You wanna blow him?” Hendricks shot at her with a grin.

“Don’t be a fucking gross prick,” Alison said. “It’s a formal occasion; you should have gone with ‘proffer him a salutatory beej.’” If Hendricks had had a drink, he would have taken a sip just to spit it.

“This guy’s big,” Duncan said, under his breath. “Not as big as a duchess, but big. If he’s in town … something’s afoot.”

“Which reminds me of a joke that seems appropriate for the occasion,” Hendricks said.

“I kinda doubt it,” Alison said.

“Why does a foot fetishist care so much about first impressions? Because they want to get off on the right foot. And the left one.”

“You’re not working very hard to swim against that ‘gross fucking prick’ assessment, are you?” Alison asked.

“My next one will be a lot more toney, with mentions of salutatory beejes being proffered.”

“Damn right,” Alison said. “Really class up the joint.”

“Children,” Duncan said, “I’m working with children.” The OOCs eyes were fixed on the viscount as he made his way through the crowd, his little swarm of bodyguards clearing the path toward a hallway toward the back, where Hendricks saw Katlin Elizabeth’s butler waiting expectantly, the fucker.

“Viscount Trinculo Barstotte,” Rousseau announced, and Kitty remained seated. She didn’t drape herself this time, though. She knew the rules, knew the formalities, and the time to break them was not when someone of Barstotte’s station was coming to visit at your request. This was the time to observe the little niceties. And then, if things didn’t go the way she wanted them to, she’d rip his fucking scrotum off and stuff it in his mouth while it was hanging open in shock. That was a fun game, too, and she’d long ago found out that demon men were just as attached to their dicks as human ones. It was really fun to do it to a greater, because they didn’t just poof when you cut them open. You could play with them for days longer than a human.

Trinculo Barstotte was a rude prick, though, and his entourage didn’t leave immediately. She watched them with a wary eye as Rousseau stepped inside and closed the door behind him. That left nine of them in a room that was a little more intimate for that size than Kitty would have preferred. That Barstotte was creating this situation was not lost on her—and it taxed her patience.

“Trinculo,” she said, going straight for the informal address out of sheer irritation, “it’s so good to see you again.” She was lying and they both knew it.

“And you as well, Katlin,” Trinculo said, wandering around the room as though it were his own. She felt her fingers twitch as her essence writhed within her shell. Trinculo was a spoiled sort of brat, and she wouldn’t indulge him by letting him see how under her shell he was getting. He put a hand through his curly locks, and for some reason that annoyed her further.

“Why don’t we sit and have a conversation?” Kitty suggested. By now Barstotte was behind her chair, looking at the books on her shelves. They weren’t even hers; they came with the rental. As though she’d ever be caught reading
Gone with the Wind
.

“During the social event of the season?” Trinculo asked. “Crass, Kitty, very crass. I came for the cocaine, honestly, and you haven’t even put a bowl in front of me yet.”

“After we talk,” Kitty said with a smile. Six bodyguards and Trinculo alone in a room with her while Rousseau fetched a mountain of white for the fucker? She didn’t think the viscount had a reputation that should make her worry about that, but she didn’t trust him, either.

“I have a hard time talking without a clear head,” Barstotte said, turning to look at her. He was wearing glasses with rounded frames, and his voice was a little high-pitched in the sense that New York was kind of a city. He waved his fingers in front of his face. “A little clarity … might smooth things along.”

“Have you become an addict of that wicked human powder?” Kitty asked, patronizing and snotty all in one.

“Guilty,” Barstotte said with a grin that wasn’t the least bit shy. “It aids the thinking, and it’s not as though I have nasal passages or internal organs to burn up with it.” He thumped his chest. “No heart, no brain, no—”

“Courage?” Kitty asked with a grin.

“Only the powdered and liquid kind,” Trinculo said. “Be a hostess and get us a little, will you? Let’s talk.”

“Whatever about?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Trinculo said. “Cricket finals. Or the Rog’tausch. You pick.”

“Never been much for cricket,” Kitty said, and she gave Rousseau a nod. “Get this fine fellow a bowl of our finest.” He hesitated, and she gave him a look. “What?”

“The … other guests you were expecting have arrived as well,” Rousseau said.

Kitty felt a rough sense of satisfaction at that. “Excellent. Get this demon a fuckton of coke.” And Rousseau left to follow her command, closing the doors behind him.

Hendricks watched the butler emerge from the hallway. He was dressed sort of like everyone else at the party, but his manner still looked like a butler’s. He was efficient, walked stiff and upright, like that stick up his ass had thorns. He made his way over to a table at the far end of the room and Hendricks watched him scoop up a bowl. “What’s that?” he asked as he watched Duncan nibble on something that looked covered in cheese. Probably human liver pate.

“Cocaine,” Duncan said.

Hendricks’s head swiveled. “Can you bust them for that?”

Duncan snorted. “No.”

“Oh,” Hendricks said, looking at the butler’s retreating back. Someone stopped him, someone making expressive hand gestures. “Are there any things you could arrest them for possession of?”

“Human parts,” Duncan said. “That’s generally frowned upon. Not that it doesn’t happen, but you’re not supposed to get caught. Eating people is the drug war of the demon world. Not everyone does it, but it’s a contentious thing that happens.”

“I think I’m gonna be a little sick,” Alison said.

“It’s pretty fucked up,” Hendricks said.

“No,” Alison said and spit something back onto her plate. Hendricks blanched; he didn’t know whether to make a face or try to hold her hair back. “I don’t think this is crab meat.”

Duncan frowned, then took a sniff. “That’s … that’s …” His eyes focused as he took another sniff. “It’s imitation crab.”

“What a disgrace,” Hendricks said, watching the butler, still caught up talking to some douche on the other side of the room. “Burn this place to the fucking ground.”

“You see anything?” Arch asked, looking through the scope of Alison’s rifle. It wasn’t really hers, it was her father’s, but he’d taken to thinking of it as hers.

“I see a party,” Bill’s voice sounded in his earpiece. “I see dancing people having a marvelous time. I see facial features go staticky every now and again so I know that it’s not really people. And I see Alison just looked like she was gonna heave something up.”

Arch just stared through the scope. It was a really poor way to try and watch anything. So narrow. How did they do it in the movies? Oh, right, they had a set of binoculars.

He swept his scope around and focused on a window toward the back of the house. The curtains were open, and he homed in. He could see the back of someone’s head, a woman’s—she looked like Katlin Elizabeth. Then a man appeared with big glasses and a fancy tux. He smiled and shut the curtains, leaving Arch staring at a crack of light that still made its way through the closed draperies. “You see that?” he asked Bill.

“See what?” Bill replied.

“The Rog’tausch,” Trinculo said, his high voice ringing through the room. She’d watched him close the drapes and knew what was coming. She sighed a little, but only inside. Outside, she kept her face completely neutral, a perfectly poised smile on her lips to keep them from realizing she knew what was about to happen.

“Yes,” Kitty said. “It’s what I’m here for.”

“That’s kind of a problem, then,” Trinculo said. “Because … I’m here for it, too.”

“I know,” she said. “And we can work together. Accommodate each other. Share the credit or the glory, if you like.”

“That sounds like a really good deal,” Trinculo said, in a voice that told her he thought nothing of the sort. “It looks like you’ve got two pieces already.”

“Three,” she said, still smiling. “I just convinced Feegan Bardsley to join my cause.”

“Feegan Bardsley,” Trinculo said in a low voice. “He’d sell out his mother for a dollar.”

“I can work with that; I’ve got dollars to spare.”

“So do I,” Trinculo said, putting a hand through his curly, sandy hair. “But he didn’t offer to work with me.”

“Did you … ask?” Kitty smiled so sweetly at him. “Nicely?”

Trinculo laughed, a harsh, grating sound. “That’s where I went wrong. I should have asked. Usually I just … take, you know?” His face grew serious. “I see what I want, and I just take it.” He looked down at the hand on the ground. “Oh. Look what I see.”

Kitty kept a cool layer of disapproval over the fury she’d felt since this prick’s entry. “That would be an exceptionally bad thing to take.”

He smiled, a predatory one. “For you, maybe.”

She did not even glance back at the six guards. “For you, darling. You’re just too stupid to know it.”

She whipped the knife free of her belt and leapt sideways at the first guard. She hit him just below the breastbone, colliding with him as he burst into flaming darkness. She broke through the cloud he left as he was sucked back to hell and brushed her knife against the next one, nicking his arm just enough. The process began with him, but she was already on to the next, and caught him with a blade just behind the ear. He disappeared with a pop as Kitty stood there, the right side of the room now cleared of the three guards that had been standing there a moment earlier.

She spun, facing the three opposite her, and smiled, still sweetly. These motherfuckers weren’t going to get her down. “Next?”

Duncan stiffened, moving like someone had poked him in the back with something hot or holy. Hendricks gave him a quick look up and down, made sure he hadn’t gotten jabbed. “What?” Hendricks asked.

“Did you hear that?” Duncan asked.

Hendricks turned his head, took in the whole scene. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. The butler was still there, nodding effusively at the guy who had caught him, big bowl of cocaine just sitting there in his arms.

“What’s this?” Arch muttered, staring through the scope at the closed drapes. They were moving a little, like the wind had caught them, or like somebody on the other side was up against them.

Kitty held Trinculo up. He was on his knees, throat in her hand. She couldn’t cut off his air or blood supply like she would with a human, but getting squeezed wasn’t a pleasant experience for a demon, either. She’d blazed through the other three guards like they hadn’t even been standing there. She would have thought that they’d have ditched their overconfidence when they saw what she’d done to their fellows, but true to form, they were idiots all the way to the end.

“I … I … I … I—” Trinculo was on a permanent stutter loop.

She slapped him in the face, knocking aside his glasses. “This is the problem with so many of our royals. Generations of easy living have made us fat and complacent, unwilling to do the hard work of evil ourselves. Oh, sure, we’ll torture a human ritually if they’re trussed up and brought to us, but the legwork? The lure? The seduction, if needed? Threats? Pressure? Bloodletting?” She pushed his head back so he could look right at her. “You’ve all become a bunch of weak-titted pussies. Or flaccid cocks and withdrawn, hide-from-the-cold balls, for equality’s sake.” She leered at him. “But for you— let’s see how weak your tits really are. Then, maybe we’ll test your cock for flaccidity.”

Kitty drove the blade of the knife into his tuxedo shirt, tearing fabric and drawing the first scream out of Trinculo. She slapped a hand over his mouth and wrestled him to the ground with little effort as she exposed his nipple. She scalped it off in one stroke, let it fall like the pinched end of a summer sausage, watched it blacken and vape before it hit the floor. “Look, there’s a little piece of you gone. You should have concentrated on it, kept it here longer. Maybe we could have reattached it.” She grinned at him. “I have a needle and thread. I could have practiced on you.”