Eve of Darkness

by S. J. Day

  “It’s not unusual. Some jobs are just more difficult than others.”

  “True. And some locations are just plagued with tengu.”

  “I thought you didn’t believe me.”

  He looked at her. “Do you want to prove me wrong or not?”

  “You’re humoring me.”

  “Do you care?”

  She sighed. “Who’s going to be the lookout?”

  Rounding the desk, she bumped him out of the way with her hip and settled into the dusty, duct-taped chair. She shook the computer mouse to wake up the system, then began to dig around the files.

  “We don’t have the time to waste,” he said grimly. “We both need to be working. Just listen carefully. We’ll hear them coming.”

  “Uh . . .” She frowned at the screen, her brain focused on finding what they needed as quickly as possible. “Listen?”

  “Yeah.” Alec moved to the filing cabinet. A moment later he asked in an amused voice, “Angel? Are you listening?”

  “Huh?”

  “That’s what I thought. You don’t multitask well.”

  “What?” She glanced at him. “Hush. I can’t concentrate when you’re talking.”

  He laughed.

  Eve worked silently, assisted by her newly efficient body. Before being marked she would have been sweating, her heart racing, her fingers shaking. Now the only effect of their illegal activities was a powerful sense of excitement.

  “I have the manufacturer’s name here,” she said, glancing aside at Alec. “Gehenna Masonry.”

  He pushed the drawer shut. “Then let’s go.”

  There was something in his voice that disturbed her.

  “What’s wrong?” She closed the windows she’d opened on the computer and put it back to sleep, then she pushed back from the desk.

  “That masonry. Ever heard of them?”

  “Sure.” Eve searched for the property management’s business cards in one of three holders on the desk. They weren’t there. Opening a drawer she found the box the cards came in, but it was empty aside from a “time to order more” reminder. “They’re out of the biz cards.”

  “We got what we need.” He opened the door. “I don’t think the name of the masonry is a coincidence.”

  “Oh?” She stepped outside and breathed a sigh of relief when no one seemed to pay them any mind.

  “In the Bible, Gehenna was a location near Jerusalem where forbidden religious activities were practiced. It was condemned, and became a place of punishment for sinners.”

  “Oh.” Pausing at the end of the ramp, she looked up at the two gargoyles barely visible from her vantage point. She concentrated hard, willing her enhanced sight to kick in. Like an adjusting magnifying glass, the stone creatures came into view. They crouched, frozen, their faces carved with broad grins. And they were identical to the one that peed on her.

  She sniffed the air.

  Alec caught her arm and laughingly pulled her toward the gate. “You look silly.”

  “I’m trying to use my superpowers.”

  “We’re done here.”

  They reached the gate and Eve explained to the guard that they were out of business cards. Then she and Alec started walking back toward the church.

  “Be careful what you wish for,” she said softly.

  He looked at her. “What?”

  “I’d been thinking about some kind of change in my life. Maybe a new employer, a shorter haircut, or a redesign of my condo.”

  “You’re an adventurous woman.” He shoved his hands in his pockets. “The way we got together proves that.”

  “I’ve never really thought of myself that way.”

  “Do you want a family?”

  There was something in his tone, a kind of tense anticipation.

  Her lips pursed. “This is the twenty-first century, Alec. A woman can have a successful career and a family.”

  “Don’t get defensive, I’m just asking.”

  “I have to go into the office tomorrow,” she said instead, “and hope Mr. Weisenberg hasn’t fired me.”

  They paused at a streetlight and waited to cross.

  “You want to go back to work?” Alec’s brows rose above his shades. “Knowing all that you know, you’re just going to go about your business? What if your boss is a Nix? Or your coworker is a succubus? You’re just going to ignore that?”

  “That’s not funny.”

  “It’s not meant to be.” He leaned his shoulder into the lamppost and watched her. “They can smell you. They’ll know what you are.”

  “What am I supposed to do? I have to work. I have bills to pay.” Eve shoved her hands into her pockets. “Until I get called to class, I can’t do anything else, right? There’s no one I can talk to about getting out of this mark thing until then?”

  “You can help me check out Gehenna Masonry.”

  “Why? You don’t need me.”

  Alec straightened. “It’s not about that. It’s about right and wrong, and something is wrong here.”

  He caught her elbow and led her across the street. A group of tourists passed them, heading in the opposite direction. The women in the group stared at Alec, their heads turning to follow him with appreciative eyes.

  “If I’m right about the tengu being in that building, will identifying him bring him up in the queue?” she queried. “Is taking a leak on a Mark worthy of getting your number called?”

  “His number isn’t up.”

  “Reed said there’s a queue. No vigilantism.”

  “That’s true. Now, if the tengu had tried to kill you, all bets would be off. Self-defense trumps the queue.”

  “So what are you doing?” she pressed.

  “I’m investigating.” He shrugged in a sinuous ripple of powerful muscles. “That’s all.”

  Eve kept her eyes forward, but her thoughts were turned inward. There was a part of her that found the thought of hands-on, pounding-the-pavement research very appealing. The thrill of discovery and the sudden flash of understanding was a rush she craved. It was one of the aspects of her job that she most enjoyed—the pursuit of solutions to problems.

  “You’re quiet,” he said, as they rounded the corner and the church came into view.

  “Based on the name,” she said, “what are your thoughts?”

  “It’s possible that when the masonry delivered the gargoyles to the construction site, they had the tengu on the truck. The one that came after you. Maybe he took a potty break while they were unloading. He might’ve caught wind of you, thought he’d play a bit without risk of repercussions, then rode off into the sunset.”

  “That’s why there’s no smell around here?”

  “It makes the most sense. And if my theory is correct, we need to find out its final destination. Buildings with tengu have higher suicide rates than those that don’t. Higher rates of business failures. Extortion. Evictions. Embezzlement. Adultery. Visit any dead mall in this country and you’ll find evidence of tengu infestation. This particular tengu is bolder than most, so it’s going to be more troublesome than most.”

  “Well, your theory also leads to speculation about how widespread this distribution might be,” she added. “If you’re right about the masonry being involved, it might not be a one-time thing.”

  “Exactly.” He smiled with approval.

  Eve hit the remote for her car alarm when they were several feet away, noting that many of the parking spaces were now filled. From the church, faint sounds of voices raised in song could be heard. Sprinklers sprayed the nearby lawn, casting rainbows in the mist.

  One of the corner sprinkler heads was broken, creating a stream of water that snaked across the asphalt. It caught Eve’s attention only because of the smoothness of the pavement, a rarity in California.

  She had traveled extensively over the course of her life—family road trips when she was younger and job site visits when she was older. Nowhere else in the United States had she ever seen such bleached and crack
ed roads as there were in California. Repairs were made with topical applications of tar, creating a haphazard web of black over gray that was often more prominent than the painted safety lines. But not here at St. Mary’s. It was another sign of the health of the church’s congregation.

  More than that, however, the asphalt made Eve think of her life. Over the years it, too, had lost its color. As cracks had appeared, she’d slapped a Band-Aid on them and kept on driving. Her dissatisfaction almost felt like a midlife crisis, and at twenty-eight years old it was far too soon for that.

  “I’ll help you,” Eve blurted, meeting Alec’s gaze over the roof of her car. “But only to the extent that it doesn’t interfere with my work.”

  “Deal.” The curve of his lips drew her eyes to his mouth.

  Shaking her head at her preoccupation with sex, Eve pulled on the handle and stepped out of the way of the swinging car door. Her gaze dropped to the driver’s seat to facilitate sliding into it and the stench of a sewer made her recoil violently. Looking for the pile of shit she must have stepped in, she found herself staring into eyes of malevolent, crystalline blue. A face. In the puddle at her feet. She screeched, kicking instinctively, causing the visage of the Nix to explode in a shower of water droplets.

  As her leg came back down, the spray regrouped in a rush, forming a rope of water that wrapped around her ankle. It yanked hard. Eve fell, the ground rushing up to meet her, the Nix’s face leering with such gleeful anticipation it struck terror in her soul.

  CHAPTER 11

  As Eve’s knees buckled, she reached blindly for the car door, crying out as her forearms slammed into the thin metal lip that rimmed the top. She caught the edge with her fingertips, her body nearly dangling as water snaked around her calves and pulled at her.

  Then Alec was there, catching her around the waist and chanting in a language she didn’t recognize. What she did understand, however, was how furious he was. His large frame vibrated with it and his voice hummed with unmistakable menace. She kicked furiously at the puddle, her shins hitting the bottom of the door in her frenzy. The displaced water began to converge, evaporating with unnatural swiftness until it was no longer there.

  “Shh,” Alec murmured with his lips to her ear. “He’s gone. It’s okay. Calm down.”

  “Calm down?”

  “I can’t believe he came after you while I was here,” he bit out. “He knew he didn’t have the time to hurt you with me nearby. He’s just terrorizing you.”

  She hiccuped, which brought to her attention the fact that she was crying. “Just? Damn it that’s enough!”

  “No. It’s too much.” He set her down and urged her toward the passenger side. “I’m driving. You’re shaken up.”

  “I’m pissed.” And she was. She was scared, yes, but she was mad as hell, too. Her forearms and shins hurt, and aggression flowed across the surface of her skin like a hot breeze.

  “We need to add the Nix to our to-do list.”

  “You’re goddamn right we—Ow! Crap!” She hissed as her mark sizzled.

  “Watch it.”

  Alec opened the door for her, then rounded the trunk and slid behind the wheel. He moved the seat back to accommodate his longer legs, then turned the engine over and slid the transmission into reverse. “You okay?”

  “No. I’m not okay.”

  He squeezed her knee, then tossed his arm onto her headrest. He glanced out the rear window as the car backed out of the space.

  The drive to her condo was made in silence. Eve wiped her tears, examined her already healing arms, and inhaled resolve deep into her lungs. When Alec pulled into her assigned spot next to his Harley, he sat for a moment with both hands on the wheel. He stared straight ahead at the cement block wall that framed the parking garage. Eve got out.

  As she passed through the archway that led to the lobby, she paused at the mailboxes and waited for Alec to catch up. He dropped her keys into her outstretched palm and she opened her box. Mail poured out and littered the marble floor. Eve cursed and pried out the rest with effort. Some of the envelopes were torn, junk mail was crushed, and there were three receipts to pick up packages that wouldn’t fit in the box.

  Alec whistled, his brows arching. He handed her the mail he had retrieved from the floor. “Popular gal.”

  “It’s been over a week since I checked my box,” she reminded, stepping over to the nearby trash receptacle and beginning a cursory sift through the mass. She tossed the sales flyers, coupons, and catalogs. There was a letter from her sister and she set it on top, her fingertips lingering on the paper a heartbeat longer than necessary. She saved a Del Taco flyer with a sudden appreciation of her present hunger, then she paused, unblinking.

  “What?” Alec looked over her shoulder. He stilled, too. Reaching around her, he plucked the postcard from her nerveless fingers and flipped it over. “It’s stamped, not bulk mail.”

  “Yeah.” A chill swept through her, like the old saying about a ghost walking over her grave. “The date of the cancel says it was mailed the day before I was marked.”

  Eve took the postcard back and read the text on the reverse. It was an invitation to view the Gothic-style building infested by the tengu. Olivet Place it was called. Only the date preprinted on the card was still a few months away and the collage of photos on the front included blank sections with notes like “insert lobby photo here.” It was a mock-up and should not have been mailed.

  “Someone wanted me to go to that building,” she said, frowning.

  “Looks like.”

  “Why?”

  “That’s the question.” Alec mantled her with his body and rested his chin on her shoulder. “This isn’t good.”

  “Ya think?” She exhaled in a rush, her gaze riveted to the suddenly threatening piece of paper in her hands. “What are the chances that I would be lured to a demonic building at the same time I was marked?”

  “Slim to none, I’d say.” His voice was grim, his touch possessive.

  “Is there any possibility that the bad guys knew ahead of time? The two events have to be connected, right? Seems like too much of a coincidence.”

  “There is no such thing as coincidence.”

  She didn’t say it, but she was glad Alec was with her. Yes, he’d gotten her into this mess to begin with, but at least he was around to help her deal with the aftermath. “So what do we do?”

  “Ms. Hollis?”

  Eve jumped at the sound of her name. Alec turned fluidly, pushing her behind him as he faced the man who addressed her. The visitor was dressed flawlessly in a three-piece suit of dark gray, his tall and slender frame motionless with his hands clasped behind his back. His hair and eyes were as gray as his garments, and his thin lips were curved in the vaguest glimpse of a smile that did not touch the rest of his face. Behind him waited a black limousine.

  “Yes?” She stepped around Alec despite his protesting murmur.

  “Mr. Gadara would like to meet with you now,” the man said in a voice without inflection.

  “Now?”

  “Yes.”

  “How did you get in here?” The parking garage had a gate that required a remote or a resident code to enter.

  One gray brow arched. “Gadara Enterprises is the trustee of this property for your homeowners’ association.”

  Eve glanced at Alec, whose jaw and frame were tense. “I’ll need a few moments to change,” she said.

  “I am afraid there is no time for that,” the man in gray replied, pivoting to gesture at the open rear door of the limo. “Mr. Gadara has a flight at four.”

  “I’m wearing wet jeans,” she pointed out. She had no makeup on, her hair was in a messy ponytail, and she probably had a shiny forehead and nose. Beyond that, however, Gadara had stood her up for their last interview, so she wasn’t feeling too accommodating. “I also need my portfolio.”

  “Mr. Gadara is familiar with your work.”

  “He can’t expect me like this.”

  Gray Man sai
d nothing, simply waited patiently.

  “Okay, fine,” she conceded.

  “I’m coming with you.” Alec’s gaze never left their guest.

  “That is not advised,” Gray Man interjected.

  Eve’s gaze narrowed. “He comes if I say he comes.”

  “Mr. Gadara will not appreciate the request, Ms. Hollis,” Gray Man drawled.

  “Well, I don’t appreciate the last-minute notice to go see him,” she retorted.

  “As you wish.” Gray Man moved to reenter the limo. “I will advise him of your sentiments.”

  Eve made a split-second decision. She could keep protesting the crap being shoveled her way, or she could do something about it. She looked at Alec. “I have a jacket in my trunk; could you get it for me, please?”

  Alec looked startled, then none too pleased with the request. “You’re not going alone.”

  “That’s fine. I knew you wouldn’t like being left behind.”

  She glanced at Gray Man, who had paused. He didn’t seem to catch her hint, but Alec’s pursed lips told her he hadn’t missed it. “You could toss all the mail in there, too,” she suggested with a wide innocent smile. She secured her mailbox and handed him the keys.

  Alec headed toward her car, glaring over his shoulder. While he was occupied with finding the right button on the remote to open the trunk, Eve slipped into the backseat of the limo. “Let’s go.”

  Without hesitation, Gray Man climbed in and they set off. Alec shouted something after them and Eve winced inwardly. She knew he was pissed at her, but she thought it best to dance to Gadara’s tune for a bit and see what “shook out,” as Alec said. She’d been marked in Gadara’s building, after he stood her up. Since Alec insisted that there were no coincidences, Eve thought it was necessary to go back to the beginning. If the only way to do that was to go alone, so be it. She wasn’t helpless; not with her new super skills. Clueless about being marked, maybe, but not helpless. And Alec would be only a step or two behind her.

  Fear didn’t enter into the equation. Or maybe she was scared to death and her brain was too scrambled by shock to notice. Without the accompanying physical reactions it was impossible to tell. She was grateful for that, since the lack of emotion kept her mind clear.