Shades of Gray: A Jude Magdalyn Novel

by L. M. Pruitt

  “It’s vintage and it has pink. You keep telling me to wear something other than black when I’m not working, and you like pink.” I gestured at her pink shirt and my black, as if she didn’t have any idea what we were both wearing. She frowned at me, which made her look like an unhappy Barbie.

  “Buying a black trench coat with pink embroidery was not what I was suggesting and you well know it.”

  I turned my head to say something smart but my brain seized. Absolutely froze. Possibly the most gorgeous man ever was leaning against the wall next to the Cat’s Meow. Over the roar of the crowd, I could vaguely make out someone doing a horrible rendition of Britney Spears’ “Baby One More Time,” in the distance.

  I couldn’t say what made this man so gorgeous but, God, he was. I knew I was staring but I couldn’t help myself. Since he was staring back at me just as intensely, I didn’t feel bad.

  He was slanted against the wall, but even so, I could tell that he was at least four or five inches taller than me. At my height it’s always a good thing and a pleasant surprise. His hair was almost as dark as mine, long enough to graze his chin and fall in front of his eyes until he shook it out of the way. It reminded me of the hair you see in shampoo commercials, all shiny and rich looking.

  We were less than ten feet from each other, close enough to see the color of his eyes. They were brown, but saying they were brown is like saying the sky is blue. There was such a depth of color it was dizzying, forcing me to drop my gaze and end up looking at his lips. The change of scenery put an entirely new meaning on the phrase kissable. Just looking at them made me lick mine.

  We stared at each other for a minute or two, when Izzy grabbed my arm and shook it. Concern clouded her eyes when she said, “Hey. If you really want to buy it, you can buy it. I’m just joking with you.”

  It took me a moment to put meaning to her words and I replayed the conversation we’d had in order to do it. I laughed and shook my head to clear it. “No, the guy over….” I trailed off when I shifted my eyes and realized sometime in the moment Izzy had caught my attention the man had vanished. “Well, he was there. And he was gorgeous. As in, you would have wanted me to share.”

  Since Izzy and I don’t have remotely the same taste in men, this caught her interest. “I missed him? Damn. Alright, no more arguing with you in public about clothes, it makes me blind apparently.”

  I laughed, and we crossed the street arm in arm, to go up the left side of Bourbon. “Apparently. The funniest thing, though. He seemed really familiar even though I’ve never seen him before.”

  “Come on, if we miss Cayenne’s debut performance we’ll hear about it for a week.”

  Groaning, I walked up the three steps to flash my I.D. at the bouncer. With the plastic cup in my hand, it should have been unnecessary. I eyed the poster on the right of a half-naked woman and poked Izzy in the side with one finger.

  “I swear, the first guy who asks us if we’re lesbians because we’re in a strip club, I’m punching him in the jaw.”

  Chapter Two

  Okay, I have to admit. I’m fascinated by strip clubs. Fascinated in a bird watching a snake way. Or a train wreck way. Either way, it’s one of those so wrong fascinations, you’re almost forgiven for having it.

  It’s not the women, because I’ve never played on that side of the street. I think it’s the overt, almost aggressive sexual nature of the whole thing. When you grow up in a Catholic orphanage, strip clubs are the ultimate flip off to the Mother Superior. I had the brief thought once of having my picture taken with a stripper and sending it to the nuns, but decided against it. It wasn’t their fault they believed I was full of sin and I believed they were full of crap.

  And, let’s face it, it’s a kick. No matter if they’re upscale or absolute bottom of the barrel, strip clubs are always dark and smoky and somewhat seedy. You feel as though you should look over your shoulder just to make sure no one you know saw you go in, even if you’re hundreds of miles away from home. I think if the clubs set up a photo booth, you know the “I went crazy at… ” kind, it’d be a serious competition whether the girls or the booth pulled in more money.

  Having said I’m fascinated by strip clubs, I’m not a regular patron. For one, I can’t afford it. Two, if you’re not into girls, you can only watch all but naked women for so long before it gets boring. It’s like porn in a way – once you’ve seen it once, you’ve seen it all. A friend of mine and Izzy’s recently had the dubious honor of being hired to dance and we were obligated to attend her debut performance. It was also our job to tip her if nobody got up, we had to get the ball rolling, so to speak.

  Izzy ordered another Bud, and I asked for Jack and Diet, already resigning myself to the astronomical cost of it. When the cheap stuff is eight dollars a drink, you know you’re getting hosed. Sure enough, the total for the two drinks was over twenty but I gave the woman who brought them to us a sizable tip. Less than five minutes in the door, and I was already out forty bucks. This is how they get you – drinks and tips.

  We’d timed our arrival almost perfectly. I’d barely taken a sip of my overly Diet drink when the D.J. announced Cayenne’s appearance. We clapped, as expected, and deserved. Not many women can boast having a body made for stripping without having some surgical enhancements, but Cayenne could, and she knew how to use it.

  Cayenne strutted, swayed and crawled her way around the stage, garnering a fair amount of attention. She knew how to use what God and Nature had given her and she used it well. I was okay with watching until the bikini top came off and then I shifted my eyes to the ceiling and kept drinking. It’s one thing to see your friends naked when you’re changing, and it’s another to see strangers stripping their clothes off. It’s something completely different to see your friend stripping her clothes off for strangers.

  Izzy must have been thinking the same thing; she leaned over and spoke in a low voice. “If you ever decide you need to do this for money, please, don’t tell me. I won’t be making your opening night performance.”

  I opened my mouth to ditto her comment, when my eyes swept down and across the stage. It might sound melodramatic, but I seriously thought my blood froze in my veins. It’s hard to get cold in New Orleans, but I felt like I was sitting in a block of ice.

  Twenty feet away, separated from me by a stage with a mostly naked woman and at least a dozen momentarily thought challenged men, sat Hart. He was staring directly at me.

  My first reaction was to grab Izzy’s hand and make a run for it. The man was just creepy in a nightmarish way, one you can never fully understand. Add in his severely unhealthy obsession with supernatural contact and I knew his being in the same strip club at this time was a really, really bad thing.

  Izzy’s breath against my ear jolted me unpleasantly enough to break my stare-down with Sir Creeps-a-Lot. “I don’t know what’s going on, but whatever the two of you are doing together in his head, he finds it real fun.”

  Hart’s eyes shifted back to the stage and I let out a breath I hadn’t been aware of holding. Turning enough for Izzy to hear me and still keep him in my line of sight, I replied, “That’s the man from Mrs. Talanger’s.”

  Izzy’s gasp was enough to let me know she thought the situation as strange as I did. “Not to be cliché, but of all the strip clubs in the entire world….”

  “I think the quote is actually about gin joints, but I get the picture. I suppose it’s out of the question to ask security to throw him out because he’s creepy as hell?”

  As we watched, Hart took out a wad of bills held together by an expensive looking bill clip, peeled off five twenties and threw them on the stage. Izzy sighed violently enough to make the hair near my temples dance slightly. “That would be a yes.”

  We sipped our drinks in contemplation, not really paying attention as Cayenne shifted into her second song. By now, the seats around the stage were filling up, and money was starting to appear in more than one hand. Hart was watching Cayenne work the men and
the way he watched her chilled me.

  “I think we’ve done our duty as friends. It’s time to leave.”

  I nodded my head at Izzy’s announcement and stood, hitching my jeans back up around my hips. I stopped the woman who had served us our drinks earlier, Izzy and I each gave her a fifty to give to Cayenne. Not quite the same as buying a friend business cards when she got a job, but it was the thought that counted. Considering how hard I’d had to work for that money, it was a damn sight better than business cards.

  Cayenne blew us a kiss as we passed the stage on the way out the door and I took my eyes off the man long enough to throw her a peace sign in return. The first breath of air as the mirror tinted glass door opened was heavy with the smell of liquor and the press of human bodies. I inhaled it as though it was crisp mountain air. There was something about being in the same room as Hart that made fresh air imperative.

  Izzy and I crossed Bourbon to one of the numerous souvenir shops, lit up as bright as noon in a sea of neon. In addition to the beads, postcards and t-shirts—my favorite being “FEMA: Fix Everything, My Ass”—there were bottled, non-alcoholic drinks. Normally the pair of us could drink all night, but the whiskey I’d already had wasn’t sitting well in my stomach. Izzy went for the caffeine she considers a major food group.

  We were both quiet, unusual in and of its self. Something about seeing Hart had creeped out not just me but Izzy. She doesn’t scare easy, one of the reasons we’re friends, so I was comforted by the knowledge it wasn’t all in my mind. The shop attendant was handing Izzy back her change when I felt the hairs on the back of my neck ruffle. I turned my head slightly to the right and noticed a woman watching me. Without looking fully in her direction I couldn’t be one hundred percent certain, but I was willing to bet my favorite trench coat it was Sir Creep-a-Lot’s companion from earlier in the evening.

  I waited until we were on the sidewalk walking back toward home before saying anything. “That strange woman from earlier was just in the shop.”

  Izzy stopped in the middle of St. Peter, causing a group of rowdy tourists to part and flow around us like water. Izzy’s eyes were a little wider than usual and I could see the pulse jumping in her throat when she spoke. “Weird man’s lady of the night? Jude, this is way beyond coincidence. Way, way beyond coincidence.”

  “You think?” I shut my eyes, took a deep breath in and let it out slowly. “Sorry, I know you’re just as freaked out as me. I have no idea how they even know where I am or why they want to know.”

  “Look, we’ll just stop one of the ever present members of the NOPD, and….” Izzy trailed off and I threw my hands in the air, causing water to splash up from my open bottle and land on my face. Swiping it away with my free hand, I shook my head.

  “What can I tell them? ‘Gee, officer, I met these two earlier when I was preparing to swindle them by reading tarot cards, insulted their intelligence and moral character, and now they’re in the Quarter at the same time that I am.’”

  Izzy took a sip of her soda and tapped her left hip with her fingers. “Okay, I can see how explaining this to the police would be more than a little difficult, but—.”

  She let out a little shriek as I pulled her out of the middle of the street and against the wall outside Preservation Hall. I’m sure if it wasn’t for my hand clapped over her mouth she would have cursed me up one side and down the other. As it was, she tried to bite me and stomp my foot until I leaned close and hissed in her ear, “Opposite corner.”

  They couldn’t see us, mostly thanks to the swell of college kids on the sidewalk. Never have I been more thankful for drunken Tulane students than at that moment. God only knows why I was whispering, or trying to get Izzy to be quiet. There was no possible way we could be heard amidst the thunder of Bourbon Street, but there’s something about terrifying situations in general that makes lowered voices and silences seem more appropriate.

  Sir Creep-a-Lot and his female companion had acquired a couple of compatriots, and it was clear they were looking for someone. The way the night and my luck were going, it was a fairly safe bet it was me. It was bad enough when there were just two of them. The new members of the hunting party looked like retired football players, or bodyguards – big and bulky. You can look and tell it’s muscle, not fat, and if it hits you, it’s going to hurt. A lot.

  When Izzy stopped struggling, I let my hand drop. Without another word, I grabbed Izzy’s hand and headed toward the river. We were halfway down the block to Royal Street when I risked a glance over my shoulder. The convenient crowd a moment before split apart and I felt Hart’s eyes lock onto me.

  I broke into a run, Izzy right next to me, taking to the street when the crowds on the sidewalk proved too thick to push through. I knew where I was headed. Common sense would have me turn onto Royal and heading to the police station. Whatever was guiding me had me barreling down St. Peter for Jackson Square and St. Louis Cathedral.

  I’ve seen the Cathedral more times than I could begin to count. I worked in the open area between it and Jackson Square during the day, reading cards for tourists and locals alike. The ghost tours do a little spiel near the gates of the Square before heading down Pere Antoine Alley where it’s said a ghostly funeral procession sometimes passes during intense storms.

  The one night when we desperately needed a group of people, hell, a swarm of them, not a person was near the Cathedral.

  My shirt was stuck to my back and my breath heaved in my lungs when I stumbled to a stop in front of the Cathedral. My heart sank with recollection. I should have remembered, the gates were locked at night. Short of jumping the fence, there was no way to get on church grounds. I had no idea why it was so paramount for us to be on church grounds, but it was.

  Before I could figure out the next step in my lack-of-a-plan plan, the Creepies came around the corner of St. Peter. Suddenly, jumping the fence seemed like the best idea all night.

  Izzy was bent over, her head between her knees, trying to catch her breath. She isn’t active at her best moments, and running a block and a half full out had left her more winded than me. If it came down to a fight, Izzy was at more of a disadvantage.

  I hauled her up, not giving her time to complain. With my eyes on the approaching quartet, I knelt down and made a basket out of my hands. “Up and over, Izzy. No arguments. And back away from the fence.”

  For one of the few times in our friendship she did exactly as I told her, without any comments or complaints. She’d just turned around and started backing towards the steps when one of the new, larger players jerked me up by my left shoulder, fast enough to have me stumbling into him. Without missing a beat, he whirled me around, locking both of my arms behind my back.

  There’s a reason cops cuff you from behind. It immobilizes your upper body and more than one person has discovered you can’t kick with both legs. The muscle behind me knew all this and used his knowledge accordingly. If there’s a scarier sensation than looking into a face that could haunt your nightmares and not being able to get away from it, I don’t want to know what it is.

  Hart reached his right hand out and stroked it gently down my left cheek. His touch was icy and even though he’d had to have run just as fast as Izzy and I, he wasn’t winded in the least. None of them were, including the woman, and she was wearing three-inch stilettos. The woman had some serious skills.

  His voice was just as cultured as earlier this evening but there was something else in it now, it took me a moment to pinpoint exactly what - eagerness.

  “You sacrifice yourself for your friend. How noble. I do believe I’ll enjoy bending your will to mine.”

  He leaned toward me, close enough I should have been able to feel his breath on my face. His mouth was less than an inch from mine and I couldn’t feel even the minutest stirring of breath. As close as he was, the pulse in his neck should have been visible – it wasn’t. He smiled and the flash of light on his teeth buckled my knees.

  He had fangs. Honest to God, true as
you live, fangs.

  Oh, this is bad.

  The muscle behind me grunted loudly and for a moment I thought my sagging had put too much weight on him. The thug could probably bench press me. There was no way a little thing like my knees buckling would make him grunt. I heard a whiz above my head, followed by a second, louder grunt, and I put two and two together.

  Somebody was shooting him – with arrows.

  This night could not possibly get any more fucked up.

  My captor dropped my arms, probably in an attempt to pull the arrow out of his chest, and I fell to my knees. I heard the air above me hiss again and then twice more. When I turned my head to look behind me, I saw the thug on the ground, arrows in his heart and head. I would have screamed, except Izzy was doing enough for the both of us.

  I was suddenly jerked back to my feet.

  Hart held me in front of his body like a shield and I got my first look at the new dancers joining the fight. If the evening hadn’t already taken more turns than a drunken man’s road, seeing the gorgeous man from outside the Cat’s Meow aiming a loaded crossbow at me would have been the cap on possibly the worst night of my life. It didn’t help when I noticed more archers on either side of him, and to the far left – a woman old enough to be my grandmother – with a ball of fire in her hand.

  Apparently, I’d been wrong. The night could get more messed up.

  “Release the girl, and I’ll allow you to walk away tonight, Hart.”

  Hart laughed and it was the sort to make small children cry and flowers die. Well, maybe not, but it wasn’t pleasant.

  “What makes you think such an outcome is possible, Williams? Would you shoot the girl if I refused to release her?” he shouted at the archer.

  I was getting irritated at being jerked around and being called “girl”, but figured in this moment discretion was the better part of valor. Williams, as my would-be rescuer answered to, smiled coldly. “You’ve forgotten to guard your back, Hart. One would think you would have learned such a lesson over two hundred years ago.”