I sighed. It’s always nice to know where you fall in a list of priorities. Image, guests, and then probably property damage well above my well-being—just like my archaeology days.
The lackey’s eyes glazed over with the apathy people get when they’re about to kill another human being, and he aimed the gun at me. I gripped the arms of the chair. I wasn’t going to keel over and die just yet. I’d have to time it right, but if I could just keep him talking . . .
“You’re making a big mistake. This vampire chick isn’t going to let you walk away from starting a turf war with a dragon. She’s using you as a scapegoat. You’ll be her rogue human who killed the girl after she explicitly told you not to, and then she’ll present your severed head. This stuff happens all the time. You’re just another pawn to be thrown under the bus—”
“Enough,” he said with the fervor only a rabid vampire lackey could show. “Sabine would never do that to me.”
Sabine. I had a name. I had no idea who this Sabine vampire was, but I had a name, and a name can do wonders in the digital age.
Now all I had to do was keep myself alive. The lawn chair had some weight to it and acted as an anchor as I leaned back and inched my Chanel boot towards him. If I timed it just right, I’d catch his foot with my heel and reap his knee before he got a shot off. I doubt he’d see that coming. I planned to throw myself to the side and take a bullet to my shoulder, just in case.
“You know what I hate most about vampire lackeys?” I asked, hoping I could distract him so he wouldn’t catch the last precious inch I’d slid my boot towards him.
“What?” he growled.
“You guys never think ahead of your next fix,” I said as I caught his shoe with my right heel and kicked out my left leg at his knee.
I didn’t connect. A tattooed arm reached around my torso and lifted me clear over the back of my chair as I yelped. Mr. Kurosawa’s boys apparently weren’t as indifferent to vampire lackeys running around their hotel as I’d summarized.
Vampire Boy was nowhere near as lucky as me. He never knew what hit him. Oricho had him by the throat and lifted him up until his feet were dangling off the ground. Vampire Boy’s eyes went wide, and he started grasping at Oricho’s hands. Oricho didn’t squeeze, or threaten, or sprout fangs, or anything else I’d expect from a supernatural working for a dragon. He pulled the quivering lackey in close, and all I could make out were his lips moving quickly as he whispered in my would-be assassin’s ear.
At first nothing happened. Vampire Boy looked more confused than anything else. But a half breath later the expression turned from confusion to terror as he began to twitch. The twitching escalated into full-blown convulsions, and white foam began to spew out of his mouth.
Oricho let him fall to the concrete as if he’d been dropping a sack of trash off at the corner. The vampire lackey twitched and choked for a good long minute, until he lay still in a pool of his own vomit.
I took a step back and whistled. “You guys don’t mess around,” I said. Off the top of my head, I didn’t know of any other creatures who could kill that subtly.
Oricho regarded the body and shook his head. “Drug overdose. So sad in one so young.”
Yeah. Real sad. And a perfectly plausible junkie’s death with no witnesses to say otherwise. As professional a cover-up as the International Archaeology Association ever orchestrated.
I made a mental note to err on the side of caution when dealing with these guys in the future.
“Umm, not that I don’t appreciate you guys stepping in and all, but if you weren’t planning on letting him shoot me, why not step in sooner?”
Oricho turned his attention to me, and I tried to keep from fidgeting. He’d been wearing sunglasses before, and this was the first time I got a glimpse of his unnatural green eyes.
After a moment of regarding me he said, “Starting a war on a conversation and an argument is not wise. It was more profitable to let him act. Besides, this assassin talked too much,” he added, almost cracking a half smile.
I nodded. Yup, that rang true, which reminded me: “He wasn’t with Alexander and the Paris boys. Apparently they’re respecting Mr. Kurosawa’s truce. Have you ever heard of a vampire called Sabine?” I nodded to Vampire Boy’s corpse. “ ‘Cause that’s who threw him under the bus.”
“Perhaps. I will consult with Mr. Kurosawa. If there is anything of note, Lady Siyu shall contact you. In the meantime, do not leave the Circus’s grounds.”
I noticed the only people who seemed to be left in the vicinity were the outback Aussie boys, except now they were carrying cleanup equipment.
I arched an eyebrow back at Oricho. He just raised one right back at me. I know when to pick my battles. “Yeah, about that, I need to be on a flight to Japan tonight.”
For the first time, Oricho’s face betrayed a trace of surprise.
“You’ve located it already—?”
I shook my head and picked up my laptop. I was done with the pool. Besides, up in my room Captain would smell any vampires before they reached the door. “I’ve got a lead and it leads to Japan, so I’m on a flight to Tokyo tonight—or at least I’m booked on one.”
He frowned and shook his head. “It would be better for you to wait until I have identified and spoken to this Sabine,” he said, rolling around the name as if it was something distasteful. “The Paris Vampire Contingency was satisfied with Mr. Kurosawa’s arrangement and removed their agents and selves from Las Vegas last night.”
He nodded at the vampire lackey as two of the Aussie boys lifted the body into a giant metal garbage can. “We noticed him around the casino this morning, but there has been no trace of a female vampire anywhere in Vegas. I promise you I will find her,” he added as I opened my mouth to argue.
“Oh, I have no doubt you’ll find out who she is, it’s the me being alive part I’m worried about,” I said.
Oricho smiled at that. “I promise you were never in any danger.”
The Aussie boys rolled the garbage can away. They were way too cheerful about it. I’d have to look into what they might be before I spent any more time ogling them poolside. “Yeah, well, danger or not, if you plan on me finding your boss’s scroll, I need to be in Japan.”
Oricho frowned and tried to stare me down, but I held my ground. I wasn’t messing around with this job. Finally, he took his cell out, and after a brief discussion in Japanese that was well over my head, he turned to me and said, “Go to Japan. There will be no problems.”
“What—How?” I said.
Oricho raised an eyebrow. That expression was starting to grate on my nerves.
“A minute ago you were insisting I hang around,” I added.
“You said it was necessary to go to Japan and I cannot watch you in Japan, so I called in a favor. Do not worry, they will not interfere with your investigation,” he added, as if reading my thoughts.
Without another word Oricho and the rest of Mr. Kurosawa’s men headed back inside the casino. One of the Aussie boys, the blond wearing a cowboy hat who’d helped dispose of the body, smiled and waved before making a beeline for me.
Smile fixed, he stopped less than a foot away and handed me a worn black leather wallet. I took it—I mean, what was I supposed to do?—and checked the ID. It was Vampire Boy’s: Sebastian Collard’s, to be exact. Collard . . . the face wasn’t ringing any bells, but the name . . . I flipped through and wrote down the Social Security and credit card numbers before handing the wallet back to the Aussie—or whatever he was.
“I’d give that to Oricho, but thanks for letting me look at it,” I said.
He tipped his hat and headed back towards the pool bar without ever saying a single word to me. Creepy.
I grabbed my laptop and headed back upstairs to order room service and pack. If I was really lucky, Lady Siyu might even have some info on Sabine. Lady Siyu—that gave me an idea. I opened the door to my room and endured Captain’s inspection before he let me in. Like I said, he can smell
vampire. I cracked open a Corona and punched Lady Siyu’s number into the phone.
“Yes?” came the bored reply.
“Yeah, hi—” I had to balance the Corona as Captain lugged himself onto my lap and launched into a motor run of purrs. “Listen, there was an incident downstairs—”
“I am aware it was taken care of.” Her voice turned up at the end, insinuating the unspoken question of why the hell I was bothering her.
“Yeah, that’s not why I’m calling. I was hoping if I sent you some details on the assassin, you could find out some information I don’t have readily accessible.”
There was a pause on the other end. “Send the details and I will see what I can do.”
“Thanks, I appreciate it—”
“And Owl?”
“Yeah?”
“Please get to the point in future correspondence.” And the line went dead.
I fired off an email with the info I had copied from Sebastian’s wallet, along with a list of what I was looking for. Financials, employers, home address, work history, had he checked into the hotel with anyone . . . stuff that would take me a week I didn’t have and a lot of bribes. I figured Lady Siyu and Mr. Kurosawa had a lot more pull and resources.
I settled in and logged into World Quest an hour early, heading straight for a dungeon to start making up for lost time. Did you know you can sell World Quest treasure online? For real money?
An hour later Lady Siyu still hadn’t returned my email, but the coordinates for my next quest rendezvous, courtesy of Carpe, blinked across my chat window.
“Time to be social, Captain,” I said, and ported the Byzantine Thief into Dead Orc Soup, a World Quest pub with a sense of humor and a reputation for buying as many orcs and goblins as we could kill.
I’d worry about Sabine when she popped up again. With my luck she’d rear her head sooner rather than later.
3
TOKYO ROSE
6:00 p.m., Tokyo time, and 10,000 feet over the Pacific Ocean
Tokyo is possibly my favorite city in the world. It never shuts down, and Captain and I can sleep in a locked cubbyhole with only one entrance if need be. More importantly, the vampires in Tokyo have nothing to do with vampires in the rest of the world.
“Miss Owl?”
I looked up from my file as the flight attendant offered me a tray with a mixed array of orange and bubbling flutes.
“Would you like a champagne or orange juice for takeoff?” she said.
And this is why I fly first class. Well, that and the legroom . . . and I can actually get out of my seat to go to the washroom. The waiting lounges are nicer too.
“Thanks,” I said with what I hoped passed for a charming smile as I took one of each.
She didn’t seem to mind, but she did politely glance down at Captain’s carrier. The other reason I fly first class: they let us bring our pets on the plane.
“Oh, he’s fine in there. Won’t make a noise. Promise,” I said, and offered her my best charming smile. Personally I think it sucks—and Nadya seems to agree—but the designer clothes and the fact that I still look like I’m in my early twenties buy me a lot of leeway.
The flight attendant moved on to the next passenger, and I downed my orange juice and opened up the file on Sebastian Collard that Lady Siyu had delivered before I’d caught my cab. The cab ride from anywhere on the Vegas strip to the airport is short, so I’d only had a chance to flip through the first few pages. What I’d seen had worried me enough that I’d been flipping through it ever since.
I can’t sleep on planes. Never could. So I usually block time for naps before and after and use the flight itself for research and planning.
On the first page alone there was enough to make me very happy I was taking Captain to Japan with me.
Up until six months ago, Sebastian Collard had been a run-of-the-mill antiques dealer in Florida, specializing in colonial and precolonial pieces from the Caribbean. Once that registered, I knew where I’d seen the name. Someone from his shop had contacted me about a year ago and offered me money to fetch a piece from Cuba. It had been right around my run-in with the Paris boys, and I’d needed cash, badly. ATMs and banks in general had stopped being my friend by that point.
Anyway, I’d backed out of the job last minute and had stopped returning emails when local authorities had started investigating Sebastian’s company on forgeries. Talk about small world.
However, the man in the mug shot was a far cry from the vampire junkie mess who’d pointed a gun at me. He’d been a respectable . . . well, looking at least . . . businessman. No family, no real friends. After the forgery charges, the shop had closed and he’d vanished from the real world.
Yeah, hanging out with vampires will do that to you.
The more I looked through his earlier business records, a sinking suspicion started to needle me.
People who collect antiques love second-opinion appraisals. Unless Sebastian had been some kind of superpowered master forger, there’s no way he could have stayed in business for almost ten years with the steady volume of high-end pieces he’d been moving. It just doesn’t happen. Someone would have stumbled onto the forgeries years ago and he’d have been demoted to selling 1960s kitsch. It was starting to look more like an expensive frame job than a forgery bust.
What did I say about vampires hitting you where it hurts?
Whereas Lady Siyu had been able to find all sorts of information on Sebastian, Sabine remained an enigma. Sebastian had checked into the Paradise hotel—a lower-end resort for gambling habits and families on tight budgets—with a young woman, but the trail ended there. I hadn’t managed to find anything online either in reference to a vampire named Sabine. I’d have to wait for Lady Siyu to call with more information once she contacted the Paris boys to find out if this Sabine was one of theirs. I wasn’t holding my breath. I locked the folder back up in my satchel. No sense obsessing over it until I had something better to go on, and there’d be plenty of time for that once I landed in Tokyo.
Captain gave a mrowl. The blond businesswoman sitting across the aisle shot me a dirty look, then flicked her magazine open.
I have this theory that there’s a black so deep and bottomless only lawyers dare wear it. I call it lawyer black. They must ask for it by name when ordering suits. The blonde was dressed head to toe in it. I stuck my tongue out and mentally patted myself on the back for the look of pure shock on the woman’s face. The things I get away with wearing Chanel.
“Come on,” I said to Captain, and held out his harness. He crawled in with minor complaints, and I walked him up the aisle to the bathroom. Those videos that claim they can toilet train your cat? Totally true.
The two Japanese Harajuku teens sitting near the front ooohed and ahhed over Captain and his red harness. Captain rolled over for them, sopping up the attention. It made up for the cat-hating lawyer.
Once I had Captain back to our seat, I checked the time. Two hours left until landing. I rested my head against the back of the seat. What I really needed now was to plan my steps for when I got off the plane, which meant going over my dig notes and the few lines I’d gleaned from the Japanese thesis on the Bali site. I pulled my laptop out and waved the flight attendant over.
“Do you by any chance have a couple of Coronas back there?” I said.
Captain and I breezed through customs. Best ten grand I ever spent was bribing a doctor to prescribe me an “assistant pet” to deal with my “debilitating anxiety and panic disorder.” I think they have padded rooms and an assortment of colorful pills set aside for people who tell their therapists they need an assistant cat to help them evade vampires. Ten grand it is, thank you very much.
I breezed past the baggage carousel and through the exit, and hightailed it to the nearest washroom. I had everything I needed in my oversized Chanel purse. As a general rule I try to never check luggage. Lucky for me the washroom was empty. I picked the farthest stall from the entrance. No sooner had I closed the
stall door than Captain started to complain he had to go, so I let him out of the carrier while I changed.
I pulled my Chanel jacket off, reluctantly I might add, and replaced it with a hooded Ralph Lauren canvas jacket I’d picked up along with a few other things on my shopping spree. Next were the high-heeled boots, which I replaced with a pair of flat leather riding boots. I zipped the boots up over the Chanel jeans and checked that the bottom of the jacket hung long enough to hide the label. I packed the clothes and purse into a canvas Ralph Lauren backpack I’d rolled up and hidden in the bottom of the oversized purse. Last but not least, I wiped off my eyeliner and red lipstick, replaced them with sporty bronzer, undid the wraparound French braids, and beachified my hair.
Once I was satisfied I looked like your run-of-the-mill, respectably fashionable university student, I pulled up the canvas hood, popped Captain back in his carrier, and headed for the exit. Why all the trouble? People can ask drivers where the girl in the expensive Chanel jacket and designer purse was dropped off, and the driver’ll probably remember and be more than happy to tell said person for very little cash. The boho student with the canvas backpack hopping on the train? Who cares.
I navigated the crowded platform until I located the train that would take me to the Shiyuba district, where Nadya lived. Not until I was sitting on the train and relatively sure no one had followed me did I turn my cell phone back on.
Two messages blinked into existence on my screen; one from Oricho and one from Nadya. I checked my email—yeah, international data plans—and still nothing from Lady Siyu yet (or Dragon Lady, as I referred to her in my phone address book, where she’d never see it). I checked Oricho’s message first. All he said was that it was important, and to call him. Shit. Why bother leaving a message if you don’t leave any details? Why not just text? Nadya’s message was a more efficient use of long distance; she was going to be at the club late, so I was to just meet her there.
I put my Bluetooth earbud in and called Oricho. He answered on the first ring.
Owl and the Japanese Circus Page 4