by Andrea Speed
“Not all gay-friendly around here, huh?”
He snorted in such a derisive way, Roan figured if he wasn’t gay, he was queer in some respect. Bi maybe, or just had too many gay friends to automatically side with the straight. “Man, I don’t know how Hardwicke got through medical school with such a tiny, narrow brain, but I didn’t tell you that.”
“If I get him, I’ll make sure to hit on him relentlessly.”
Velez laughed, a big, hearty, caught-off-guard sort of laugh, and slapped the clipboard on his leg. “Hot damn. If you do that, I gotta come watch.”
Yeah, that was probably more entertainment than you got watching soaps in the staff lounge.
Roan took some comfort in that fact that his knee-jerk asshole response was still functioning—how bad off could he be if the idea of tormenting an asshat was still his first impulse?
But he remembered his dream of the lion wanting in, and he wondered if letting it in would save his life, or end it faster.
THERE was no other word for it: Grant was hysterical.
Dylan supposed he couldn’t really blame him. If he’d killed and eaten a few people, he might be a bit freaked out himself.
Grant was sitting on the couch, and Dylan kept trying to get him to talk to him, but he kept sobbing, and when he did try and talk, it was broken up by sobs. Dylan could hardly make out a word.
So he went into the downstairs bathroom, found Roan’s secret Percodan stash, and cut a pill in half before pulverizing it into powder. He hoped Grant wasn’t allergic to it, but he really needed him to calm down, and Roan didn’t have any antidepressants. (Oh, he had a bottle marked Prozac, but it was just full of codeine.) Dylan mixed the pulverized pill in a cup of chamomile tea, which he all but forced Grant to drink. He told him it would calm him, and that Roan swore by it. (Roan only swore by it if the box fell out of the cupboard and hit his foot. He didn’t like chamomile tea. But again, this wasn’t anything Grant needed to know.)
The drug seemed to start working on him fast, either that or he was taking Dylan’s instructions to heart. He’d been telling Grant to breathe, to blank his mind and focus on his breathing, meditation techniques. Grant seemed to be sobbing through them, though, so he didn’t think they’d work.
When he calmed down a bit—or at least stopped sobbing so much—Dylan was able to coax some of his story out of him. He didn’t know how or when he’d got infected. Grant had been thinking about it, but was only able to think of his “lost weekend.” A couple of weeks ago, he went to a party with a couple of friends he only referred to as Luce and Weed, and they were doing some GHB, passing a water bottle dosed with the stuff back and forth. They went club-hopping, and Grant lost most of the night after the first club. He woke up in a cheap motel with a sore ass and a mouth as dry as a biscotti (his words) the next afternoon. But he wasn’t worried about it because he found a couple of used condoms. (A couple?) Curtis thought maybe he should get checked out, he thought he had been raped, but Grant didn’t think so, mainly because he went out specifically to get laid. The only problem was, he got so wasted he couldn’t remember it. He assumed he’d had fun. Luce vaguely recalled him leaving with a couple of guys, maybe three, and maybe a girl was there too—her memory was equally checkered.
Dylan wished he hadn’t seen this type of shit before, but he had. More than once he’d overstepped the bounds of his job description and stopped a guy from leaving Panic with a guy so fucking wasted he could hardly stand on his own. Sometimes the wasted guy protested more vehemently than the more sober guy, but Dylan didn’t like the scenario at all. Maybe he took the drugs on his own, maybe he was dosed. Dylan didn’t know and he really didn’t care, he just didn’t want to end up as someone who stood by and did nothing when someone was in trouble. People had complained to the manager about him, but all he got was a slap on the wrist. If the customers didn’t come back, good riddance. Nobody wanted Panic to be known as date-rape central.
Grant was really worried about Curt and Tiffany. He’d seen the papers, he knew Curt was dead, but he wondered if Tiffany had been found yet, if she was okay. Dylan honestly told him he didn’t know. Roan read newspapers, watched BBC World News, but Dylan avoided it all. His one concession was to watch the Daily Show and the Colbert Report with Roan, but that was it. He just got to a point where he couldn’t take it anymore. Television news was shallow and shock-driven (okay, BBC World News probably not so much, but that just showed you how needlessly clever Ro was), newspapers were depressing, and he’d decided he’d had an overload of negativity in his life as it was, so he eschewed all of it. He knew enough to get by in conversation, to know what was generally happening in the world, but that was it. If anyone needed a deep conversation about some news item, he pointed them to Ro and went elsewhere. He wasn’t stupid, just burnt out on everything he wanted to change but couldn’t.
“Wow, that chamomile tea really works. Can I have some more?” Grant asked, sagging back into the sofa. He was no longer crying, but his face was still streaked with tears. He was filthy. He was wearing clothes that clearly weren’t his—they were ill-fitting, the pants too baggy, the shirt too tight—and he smelled like he hadn’t had a bath in days. The cat scent was particularly rank on him.
That made him reflect on how Roan smelled after a transformation. After dosing himself with enough painkillers to kill an ox, he went and cleaned up, but Dylan thought it was remarkable he didn’t smell that bad. Maybe to himself; he wasn’t even going to try and imagine how nuanced Roan’s sense of smell was, except the fact that he could pick up an infected in a crowd was kind of scary. But Roan’s lion scent was not “cat enclosure at the zoo,” nor was it Grant’s smell now. It was lion, yes, or at least something feline, but it was tempered by a Human smell, something not unpleasant. Although Humans stunk, yeah, often worse than any cat, but still… he couldn’t explain it. Was it because he liked him? Dylan considered that, but no, that had never stopped him from disliking the smell of another man’s sweat before, so he didn’t know what was going on here. The pheromone overload? Ro said he shed a lot of them during transformation time, as was common with all infected. Or maybe it was just that Roan had such a unique smell it was hard to dislike. He didn’t know, but he knew enough not to tell him. Roan would probably see it as another way he wasn’t quite Human.
“Why don’t you clean up?” Dylan suggested. “There’s a shower in the bathroom, and I know we have some spare clothes you could wear.” Actually, he didn’t know that. Grant was kind of short, five five, and extremely scrawny right now, maybe a hundred pounds or at least in that neighborhood, and everything they had would probably be too big and baggy for him. But Roan had to have some skinnier clothes around. During his transformation period, his weight could drop precipitously, to a scary degree. Dylan, vegetarian that he was, would encourage him to eat meat at those times, if only for its protein and fat properties.
Grant looked at him with slightly owlish eyes, tempered by the drugs and the easing of his hysteria. “Then you’re gonna call the cops?”
“I have no idea what I’m gonna do,” he admitted. He didn’t. Yes, Grant had killed people, but Dylan also knew it wasn’t his fault. He should have got his stupid ass tested, but that was a moot point now.
Grant seemed to accept that—what choice did he have?—but as he struggled to his feet, he said, “I loved them, you know. Curt and Tiff. People wouldn’t understand, but we were a team, y’know?”
Why wouldn’t people understand you liked your roommates? That didn’t make any sense. Unless…. “Were you involved with both of them?”
Grant looked down at him as if he had just revealed a developmental disability. “Duh. We were a threesome.”
A threesome. They were all in a relationship together? Why not? He’d heard of stranger setups. But why was Grant out partying then? Was he the third wheel—the guy brought in for fun, but just an adjunct of the Curt-and-Tiffany relationship? It was possible. “Was Tiffany infected? No one seemed t
o know.”
“I don’t think so… but maybe now. If I was infected, she could be, I guess. I hope she’s okay. I never meant to hurt anyone, y’know.”
“I know. You can’t help the change.” But he could have helped before, he could have not—no, that was being morally superior and didn’t help anything. Grant shouldn’t have gotten so wasted, but if he was raped, it wasn’t his fault. No one deserved to get raped just because they were an idiot. That was doubly true about getting infected.
Grant wandered off to the bathroom, and Dylan was wondering if he should go get some Febreeze to get the scent out of the couch, when it suddenly occurred to him that maybe he should call Randi.
What would that accomplish? Yes, she’d know her brother was alive and momentarily safe, but then what? He couldn’t claim to know her as well as Ro did.
What would Ro do? He was asking himself that very question when the phone rang. Dylan picked it up almost offhandedly and didn’t even say hello before Holden said, “I know who the killer is.”
18
Lucifer
MRI machines sucked. They really, honestly sucked.
You lay motionless inside a cramped metal tube that made you feel like a torpedo waiting for launch, and weird noises went off around you as you fought off claustrophobia you’d never had before for an hour that seemed to last approximately one thousand years. Roan asked to bring a book into the tube, but oh no, they wouldn’t allow that. He couldn’t bring in his MP3 player either. (Not that he had it, but it was the principle of the thing.) And the worst indignity of all, he had to continue to wear the stupid paper hospital gown. If they wanted to have a look at his ass, they just could have asked.
So Roan spent his time in the tube composing complaint letters in his head. He wrote one to the inventor of the MRI machine, to the technicians staffing it, to the head administrator of the hospital, to the local paper for not telling readers the real truth about the Illuminati conspiracy to cause brain damage using supersonic frequencies during American Idol (okay, this was when he started losing his mind). Worse yet, he swore the sounds were giving him a headache. At least he didn’t have the catheter stuck up his dick anymore.
Finally Roan was released from the captivity of the MRI machine, and the doctor in charge was right there, saying, “That wasn’t so bad, was it?” He was a needlessly enthusiastic Japanese man who looked exactly like that guy on Heroes if you aged him ten years and gave him a receding hairline. His name seemed to be Stuart Senzaki, which sounded like a Witness Protection name if he’d ever heard one.
Roan glared at him. “Yes, it was. And now you’ve given me a headache, so thanks a lot.”
“Really? When did it start? Where does it hurt?”
“Like I have any concept of time in a tube. And it hurts all over.”
Senzaki pulled out a penlight and shined it in his eyes, making him wince. “Jesus, are you trying to kill me?”
“Sorry, I’m just trying to—”
And this was when things got weird.
It was like time jumped, like a poor editor had suddenly been assigned to the film that was his life. Because next thing Roan knew, he was on his back, looking up at Senzaki, Velez, and a woman he didn’t recognize. His head pain wasn’t so bad anymore, but it felt like he had a cloud of something vaguely toxic still fogging up his neurons. “What the hell am I doing down here?”
All three exchanged a troubled glance as Velez looked down at him and said, “I think you had a bit of a seizure, dude.”
“No I didn’t,” Roan snapped, and tried sitting up. But Velez put a hand in the center of his chest and pushed him back down, and the woman, who had brown-blonde hair so short it could only be called a buzz cut, produced a rather long-looking needle and said, “Please hold still.”
“You drugging me?”
Velez shook his head. “Trying to make you feel better. Your head still hurt?”
“Not really.”
“That’s not a no,” Velez replied, as the woman shot Roan in the hip. He didn’t really feel the needle, and he didn’t know if that was a good thing or a bad thing.
“What the fuck’s wrong with me?”
“That’s what we’re trying to find out,” Doctor Enthusiasm told him, with—guess what?—a little too much enthusiasm.
Roan wondered if he was ever getting out of this bloody fucking hospital.
DYLAN rubbed his eyes and felt inexplicably tired. Oh, right, he hadn’t slept well last night. Still, that was no excuse; he was a night-shift worker, he was supposed to be used to odd hours. “How do you know, Holden?”
“’Cause I’ve been watching the DVD I got from Colt’s apartment on Ahmed’s laptop, and you won’t believe who the third part of the Newberry sandwich is.”
Dylan sighed and tried to sort all of it out in his mind. There was the dull “beep” of the call-messaging system telling him someone else was calling, but he decided to just let it go to message. Probably wasn’t important anyways. “Colt just gave you the DVD?”
“Um, no, he was… indisposed.”
“So you stole it?”
“Um, basically, yeah, but he’s not going to miss it.”
Oh crap. Did Holden want to get arrested? “Do you know what Roan’s gonna say?”
He clicked his tongue dismissively. “He’s used to me by now. Anyways, third person—wanna hear it or not?”
“Do I have a choice?”
“No. The guy looked kinda familiar but I couldn’t place him, so I started going through some recent pictures, and I found him: Jessie Newberry.”
Dylan thought perhaps he’d misheard something. “Who, exactly?”
“Jessie Newberry, John Newberry’s oldest son. It’s a digital file of Colt fucking not just Kyle but Jessie. Fucking cousins—how scandalous would that be? Not only gay, but incestuous. No wonder John wanted to kill every person who might know about it.”
That was pretty icky. But Dylan wasn’t sure he made the connection. “Why would John kill his own brother over that, though?”
“’Cause he probably blamed him. He had the detective follow him and figured out he was gay, right? Well, bi, but John sees no distinction because he’s a fucking philistine. I knew when I had John he was a fucking liar, but goddamn it, I had no idea of the scope. I had that fucking murderer and I let him get away! Not again.”
“I don’t know, Holden. I mean, I can see why someone might kill to keep that quiet, but I don’t see why he’d kill his own brother over it.”
“This is one fucked-up family.”
“I’m sure, but….” Dylan just shook his head. “I don’t know where I’m going with this. Just don’t do anything rash, okay? Wait.”
“Well, I’m still in Oregon, so it’s gonna hafta wait a bit, but I’m right about this bastard, Dyl. I’ll show you.”
“Okay,” he sighed and hung up. He wasn’t a detective, he wouldn’t claim to get this, but he wasn’t sure Holden’s supposition was the correct one. It felt off somehow. He really wanted to talk it over with Roan—he’d know what the flaw was, he’d figure it out.
There was something on call messaging, so he called in to their machine to hear it and just about hit himself when he heard the first syllable escape from the stranger’s voice. It was the hospital—Roan was awake.
His first impulse was to slam down the phone and race over there, but he could hear the hiss of the water in the shower, and he remembered he still had Grant to deal with. He could hardly leave him on his own here, could he?
Roan would probably tell him to stay here, to keep an eye on him, but there was no way in hell he was going to do that. Did he have a choice?
He hung up the phone and then quickly punched up a familiar number. “Randi? Tell me you’re not busy. Because there’s someone here you’re gonna want to see.”
DYLAN barely waited for Randi to come over before he took off. Randi still seemed stunned, but he just pointed back toward the house and got in the car. The urge to se
e Roan now was almost overwhelming. It probably didn’t help that the mysterious “something” was forefront in his mind. But Roan was stronger than him, right? Stronger than anyone. He would survive it, no matter what it was. He had to believe that, because up to this point, it had been true.
It was a crowded mess in the hospital lobby, so he was able to avoid everyone and duck up the fire stairs, taking them to Roan’s floor. He was aware this was a form of cheating, but he honestly didn’t give a shit.
Once he came out on the floor, Dylan only took a few steps before he heard, “Hey, the boyfriend.” Dylan turned and saw a nurse coming toward him, black with nice braids and a Puerto Rican accent.
“I do have a name.”
“I know. Sorry, man, forgot it. It’s not Bob, is it?”
“No, it’s Dylan.”
“Ah, so that’s why I was thinking of Bob Dylan.” He grinned, showing off impressive teeth. “It’s kinda against the rules, but I’m gonna go let you see Roan now. Just don’t be alarmed that he’s a little groggy.”
“Why’s he groggy?”
“We had to medicate him after an incident with the MRI. But my god, what a stubborn smart-ass, he’s fighting the meds.”
“He will fight anything, up to and including an angry, torch-wielding mob. What incident? He didn’t punch someone, did he?”
“No, but I’m sure he would have if given the chance.” The nurse paused briefly. “He had a small seizure.”
“What?” That was like saying a “small brain hemorrhage,” wasn’t it?
The nurse, whose security badge read Velez, made a “calm down” gesture with his hands, like a mime shoving an invisible creature into an invisible box. “It really isn’t that big of a deal. Getting an MRI can be very stressful, and he was in a weakened condition to begin with. We’ve had lots of seizures, panic attacks, even a tearful breakdown or two. It probably shouldn’t have been done this soon, but the doctor felt it was imperative.”