by Sharon Joss
“Damn, I never thought Taffy was much of a cook.”
Mike glanced at the guy standing next to him at the bar. “He’s not. I’ve just been eating a lot of fish lately, that all.” The guy was idly walking an old silver coin back and forth across his knuckles. Pretty good at it too. Very smooth.
“You must be here on vacation.” A second coin appeared from nowhere and followed the first across the tops of his knuckles. Just as smooth, but with more speed now. “Let me guess. I’d guess upstate somewhere. The Bronx?”
The guy wore a pinky ring with a diamond too big to be real. The coins raced back and forth across the guy’s fingers at lightning speed. His hands showed no trace of calluses; his bare forearms held no blemishes, freckles or scars. “How long did it take you to learn that?” Mike asked.
The coins disappeared. “Honestly, I don’t remember.”
Mike frowned. The guy didn’t belong here. He wasn’t a werewolf, and he was no aging alcoholic. His impossibly black hair was an obvious dye job, right down to the mutton-chop sideburns and spray-on tan. Black eyeliner wreathed his eyes. It was hard to tell in this light, but it looked like he was wearing contacts, too. He was dressed casually in yellow cowboy boots and skinny black jeans that made his legs look like toothpicks. He wore gold chains, too heavy to be real, draped in layers around his neck; his shirt was unbuttoned to his belt. This guy was a total phony.
“You some kind of magician?”
When the guy smiled, the hairs on the back of Mike’s arms stood up. His canine teeth were pointed.
“You a cop?”
Mike shook his head. This was not a line of questioning he wanted to pursue, but he was curious. Surreptitiously, he sniffed the air, but all he got, above the surrounding smells of beer, urine, and sweaty beasts, was hairspray, cologne, and the chemical smell of hair coloring.
“Ah, the mysterious stranger wants to play twenty questions. Let’s see. Here we are in Beasties, yet you are clearly not of the brethren clans. I seriously doubt that Taffy would bestir himself to cook for anyone but a very old friend indeed, so I must conclude you are a friend of the family?” He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply. “One of the Fae, certainly. Are you perhaps fair Sheila’s brother?”
“Not bad.”
“Oh fer yikessakes,” Taffy interrupted. “This is my nephew Mike Bane. He’s the son of that black Tor Hound sleeping over there in the corner.” He turned to Mike. “Rafe is Ambrose Van Cleve’s business partner. He runs the amusement park over at the Mythica estate.”
Mike froze as he met Rafe’s gaze and the knowledge dawned on him. Oh crap. “You’re a vampire.” From the dark depths of his soul, Mike felt Tehuantl stir. Frantically, he forced the curious shaman back into the depths.
Rafe nodded to him. “You’re the shape-shifter. Welcome back.”
Mike glared at his uncle. Why the hell would Taffy be friends with a vampire? The beef stew rolled uncomfortably in his stomach. He could feel Tehuantl’s curiosity about the vampire pushing at him. “Taffy, you bucket mouth. What else have you told him?”
Taffy ignored him and headed off to the kitchen, leaving him alone with Rafe.
The vampire grinned at him. “Taffy and I have been acquainted for decades. We have no secrets.”
But before he could consider that thought, a gorgeous, dark-haired were-woman stepped between them and murmured something into Rafe’s ear.
Every were-man in the place stopped what they were doing to watch her. Tension thickened the atmosphere to a stifling level.
The smell of her perfume wafted over the close, gamey air with the heady scent of gardenia. Something about her triggered a memory that Mike couldn’t quite place. He stared as Rafe and the were-woman shared an intimate moment that left a trace of pink lipstick on the vampire’s cheek.
Mike rubbed his mouth, unable to look away, but embarrassed somehow. He’d seen only a few were-women in his life. Tough, independent, and more than a little scary; a lot of them were muscle-bound and aggressive. They might have been a different species. None of them looked this good. She carried her wolf like some exotic warrior queen.
Rafe excused himself. “I apologize for leaving this conversation so abruptly. Lovely Yolanda here tells me my presence is required elsewhere. Please tell Taffy I’m afraid our business will have to wait until tomorrow evening. Nice meeting you, Mike. I always wondered about that dog.” He wrapped Yolanda’s tanned arm in his own, and they left.
Almost immediately, all the pressure and tension in the room dissipated. After a momentary lull, the volume and activity levels returned to normal. Several of the patrons changed seats to keep an eye on the door. Mike understood the sentiment. Even from the rear, lovely Yolanda looked good enough to eat.
CHAPTER 5 : THE SMELL OF BLOOD
The dream always started the same way: machete in hand, hacking and sweating his way through the rainforest; soaked to the skin, he was alone, but part of an invisible unit, creeping up on the compound belonging to one of the big money men. They thought they’d hit the jackpot; a magnificent residence surrounded by several outbuildings. The guy even had a private zoo. But they’d arrived too late, and the place was deserted. Abandoned. The animals were all dead or starving. They opened the cages of the still living and let them go. The black jaguar was nothing more than a ratty pile of skin and bones huddled in the far corner of a huge cage. The guys in his unit wanted to kill it; put it out of its misery, but he wouldn’t hear of it. After they finished searching the grounds, he sent everyone on ahead for safety, and opened the door.
The poor thing hadn’t twitched a muscle in all the time they’d been there. Maybe the guys were right; the cat was too far gone. To this day, he didn’t know why he didn’t just leave the cage door open like the others. An overwhelming compulsion came to him; to see if it was alive. He never figured it had enough strength to turn on him. Never imagined it could move so fast. He never had a chance. If one of his buddies hadn’t come back to check on him and shot the creature as it was ripping him apart he would have died at twenty.
Three weeks later, while on medical leave in Vera Cruz, he’d awoken in the jungle with no memory of how he’d gotten there. He’d been covered in blood, the broken corpse of a man lay beneath him. The young man’s skull had been crushed and his heart ripped brutally from his chest. As Mike vomited up the bloody pulp in his stomach, Tehuantl made himself known for the first time.
A week later, the local newspapers quoted several members of a doomed hunting party. Each man claimed they’d been following the track of a big black El Tigre. Their pack of mongrel dogs had cornered it against a cliff face. As the men closed in for the kill, the big cat transformed into the spirit of a Nagual; one of the ancient jaguar-men of Olmec legends. The hunters fled in fear as the creature grabbed their leader; the only one among them with a gun. His body was never found.
A week later, the remains of Fabienne Martinez, one of the local cantina girls, was found dead in her room above the bar. Her heart and internal organs were missing. The headlines were lurid, the locals terrified. As one of the patrons of the bar where she’d worked, he’d been questioned, but the authorities found no reason to hold him. Two days later he was on a flight back to the states. As far as he knew, they’d never identified her killer.
It became a pattern for him. Since he had no memory of Tehuantl’s actions, he’d had to go by what was written in the press. Every time the papers reported a murder victim with similar wounds, he assumed it was Tehuantl and moved on. He told himself that the deaths had nothing to do with Tehuantl, but deep inside, he didn’t really believe it. He moved a lot in those early days. It wasn’t until he figured out how to keep the cat happy that he’d finally figured out how to control the shaman.
Mike opened his eyes as cat’s lithe form retreated smoothly back to wherever it went when it left him. Scent was a powerful trigger. That was why he’d had that dream again. Yolanda’s perfume brought back sweet memories of Fabienne.
* * *
Tom teased him about the new shirt at dinner, but he’d shrugged it off. By eight o’clock, he was back on a barstool at Beasties. The rowdies from the previous evening were seated at one of the tables, watching the NBA playoffs.
Mike pestered Taffy for answers, but the barkeep wasn’t talking. Yes, Yolanda came in occasionally, but usually just to get Rafe. No, he didn’t know why a she-were might be dating a vampire. In fact, he wasn’t very forthcoming about vampires in general.
“I’ve known him more years than I care to count, but we don’t talk about that. Vamps tend to keep their personal lives private.”
“But don’t you wonder about it?” Tehuantl’s reaction to the vampire had worried him, but Mike wasn’t certain that his own curiosity was entirely separate from Tehuantl’s. From what he’d surmised and read about the Nagual, the warrior priest’s lust for blood was unnatural. Was it possible that Tehuantl was some kind of vampire? “You’ve never asked him how he was made? I mean, is it like the blood exchange they show in the movies?”
Taffy busied himself, wiping clean glasses, avoiding his eyes. “I don’t know that it’s the kind of thing you can come right out and ask, directly. It’s too personal.”
“Oh sure. It’s fine to blab about my personal life to a vampire, but you won’t give me the same quid pro quo. What kind of business do you have going on with Rafe, anyway?”
Taffy grinned. “Ask him yourself, lad.”
A hand clapped Mike on the back. “Ask me what?”
Mike’s stomach dropped as he turned to see the vampire Rafe and a black were-man.
Embarrassed, he shook his head. “Nothing.” Out of the corner of his eye, he caught the gleam of laughter in Taffy’s eyes as he pulled a fresh pint for the newcomer.
“Silas here is one of our security officers out at Mythica,” Rafe said. “I thought you might appreciate some company while Taffy and I take care of business. I’ll be back in a bit.”
Silas took a seat on the stool next to him and closed his eyes as he took his first sip of Taffy’s foam-topped porter. “That’s nice.” He wiped the white foam off his upper lip with his forefinger.
The guy had a very relaxed, loose demeanor. Against the darkness of the big man’s skin, his yellow eyes positively popped. The were-man turned around on his barstool to face the room, and gave a solemn nod to the toughs.
“Friends of yours?” Mike asked.
“Pack.”
“Don’t you have to go over and sniff their butts or something?”
The were-man did a double take, then grinned. “Nah. They’re still pups in training. I’m the only big dog in here tonight.” He took a long swallow of porter. “You got a problem with that?”
“No.”
The silence between them stretched. It seemed less and less likely that Yolanda would be stopping by. Mike finished his beer and stood to leave, when Silas asked him a question.
“Excuse me?”
“Rafe brought me here to meet Farley’s son. Said you might be looking for a job.”
“Oh right. Yeah.”
“Is the dog really your dad?”
Mike waved him off. “Yeah, but it’s a long story. I don’t like to talk about it.”
“Is he a shape-shifter or a were?”
“Neither. He’s Fae. They turned him into a dog when I was five.”
“But you’re shape-shifter, right?”
“Not according to NYPD.”
Silas took a long slow swallow of beer. “You’re lucky then.”
Mike pressed his lips together. This guy knew nothing about what it had been like for him, or what it was like to be responsible for destroying his father’s entire life. He didn’t have a clue what it was like being faced with his father’s sacrifice every single day, and people telling him he’d ruined a good man. Because Farley Bane had been a very good man.
He let it pass. It wasn’t worth it. “How’s that make me lucky?”
Silas nodded to Farley, dozing at their feet. “Your father loves you.”
Something about the sound of Silas’ voice caught Mike’s attention. “Well, I’m sure your father loves you too,” he answered lightly.
Silas grimaced, his face a mask of pain. “My dad infected me intentionally on my twenty-first birthday. I thought maybe the same thing had happened to you.”
Struck speechless, Mike could only stare. The ALVS virus had been developed as a biological weapon to use against troops stationed in the Middle East. Those who survived beyond the first few months onset of the disease generally learned to control their beasts. With reasonable precautions, accidental infection rarely occurred. His father must have been human when Silas was conceived. Mixed human and lycan marriages were not unheard of, but conception between the two species wasn’t possible. The idea that a father would intentionally infect his own son; he couldn’t even imagine such a thing.
He didn’t know what to say. Silas must have thought they shared a common tragedy. Instead he’d bared what had to be the most painful experience of his life. “Oh man. That sucks.” It sounded so lame, but he couldn’t think of anything else.
Sheila came over and set two fresh pints in front of them.
“Drink to your daddy?” Silas raised his glass.
Still speechless, Mike could only nod and drain his glass.
“So. You High Tor Fae or what?”
Mike choked on his beer. “You always this nosy?”
“The reason I’m asking is that you obviously don’t know much about vampires. If you’re going spend time around guys like Rafe, you need to know that vampires prefer the taste of Fae blood to human. Like whipping cream to skim milk. Get it?”
Great. “Got it.”
“But the High Tor Fae have a blood treaty with Ambrose Van Cleve that goes back more than three centuries. No fighting, no biting. The Van Cleves can’t touch the blood of High Tor Fae. They are restricted to volunteer donors or their own little spit-heads.”
“Spit-heads?”
“Blood stewards are addicted to the unique saliva of the vampire who feeds off them. So what’ll it be?” He grinned. “You High Tor Fae or buffet?”
He’d pronounced the word like buff-Fae. Fun-nee.
“Now that you mention it, my father was mostly High Tor Fae; my mother, only half. I guess that makes me mostly High Tor Fae too.”
“There. See how easy that was?”
“Okay, thanks for the tip.” The door to the bar swung open, and Mike glanced up expectantly, but it wasn’t Yolanda.
“You expecting someone?”
Silas didn’t miss much. “Not really. There was this were-woman who came in here last night looking for Rafe--”
Silas laughed; a booming, joyful sound. “Oh get in line, pal. Everybody’s fond a’ Yolanda.” Silas glanced over his shoulder at the toughs watching the playoffs. “Guys like you and me don’t have a chance. She’s alpha bitch material; the only thing she’s interested in is finding the right pack and the right wolf. Right now, that big guy over there is running neck and neck with our pack Alpha, Vince.”
Mike glanced over at the group of were-men across the room. The largest of them returned his stare with hostile interest. Mike looked away. “The galoot?”
“Yeah, he’s Alpha material. Or so he thinks. We’ve lost several senior pack members over the last couple months. Him and all the rest of those guys over there are all new recruits. Trick wants to be Beta, but Rafe won’t have him.”
“What happened to the old guys?”
Silas made a face. “Silver bullet, probably. Self-inflicted, no doubt. Or that’s what the sheriff thinks. Local law enforcement doesn’t spend much time looking for lost dogs; even you should know that.”
Yeah. Without human DNA, lycans were out of luck where justice was concerned. “Why would what Rafe thinks have anything to do with a wolf pack? Isn’t that the Alpha’s job?”
“Hey Vince is a good Alpha. Things are run a little differently at Myt
hica. Everybody likes Rafe, so we make sure he likes the wolves who work closest to him, that’s all.”
“So why was that fine-looking were-woman kissing on him last night? Rafe is no wolf.”
“Yeah well, that’s just Rafe. The guy’s a frickin’ babe magnet. He’s like catnip to women.”
“He’s a complete phony.” It made no sense at all that a beautiful woman like that would be throwing herself at a dead guy. Although he had to admit, Rafe seemed like a decent enough guy. For a vampire. It wasn’t right. “He dyes his hair.”
“Yeah,” Silas nodded. “She smells good, too.”
“Tell me about it.”
CHAPTER 6 : THE EARLY BIRD
Mike drove into the parking lot of Fat Frank’s Bait and Tackle in the pre-dawn darkness, but the only vacant space available had a water-filled pothole deep enough to fish in. He paused, as the dim words of his father echoed in his ears.
“Potholes are portals to the land of the Fae, son. Ordinary people don’t have to worry; they can just drive right over them. But people like us; people with more than a little Fae blood running through our veins have got to be careful, or we’ll get sucked right in.”
So while other kids had grown up with stupid superstitions like breaking their mother’s backs, he’d grown up worried about potholes and the High Tor Fae.
Farley whined on the seat beside him as he maneuvered the Chevy to straddle the depression. To the right of them, a shiny-new black Silverado was parked with a BassCat outboard trailered behind. The boat had a custom paint job of a yellow and green striped bass rising to take a fly. The New York State license plate read WERE117. Damn nice rig for a werewolf.
The smell of fresh-brewed coffee greeted them as he opened the glass door to the tackle shop, and Farley trotted inside like he owned the place. The deerhound seemed unbothered by the morning crowd of men loading up coolers of beer and bean dip for the big Finger Lakes fishing tournament on Canandaigua Lake. The place was packed. Tournaments were always good for business.