Blightmare (The Marnie Baranuik Files Book 5)

by A. J. Aalto

  I also had to fix my eyebrows and my scary, pink, grizzly bear toenails and figure out what was splitting my shadow into two mismatched pieces. I took out my Moleskine and pencil, and jotted everything on a list I titled Shit I Hate That I Have To Do, adding Google Dr. Charles Delacovias and call Finnegan Folkenflik. The sooner I figured out this lycanthropy do-I-or-don’t-I, the sooner I could put that to rest, and hopefully Harry would stop making cheeky fox-girl jokes at my expense. He'd already covered up my favorite bedroom poster of Jean-Luc Picard with the Disney cartoon version of Robin Hood. Twice.

  There was also Batten’s letter, which I transferred back into my pocket from the glove box. I had skimmed it at Claire’s, but I hadn’t given it the benefit of a word-for-word read, and I knew I should, even if the thought of it made me want to throw up. Luckily, I was running Marnie 3.0 now, and I faced every crisis with my chin up and my fists ready for action. Too bad I couldn’t punch my feelings.

  I put my car into reverse and returned to the road, taking the long way home, going through a few extra loops to lose anyone who might be following me, thinking I could face everything on my To Do list the way I faced Hood in the sparring room, the way I’d faced Mitch Dunlop in Batten’s yard: obstinately, with possibly dire (and definitely annoying) consequences.

  Chapter 11

  The home phone rang in the office and I let it go to the old-timey answering machine that Harry had insisted on buying at a flea market because it was “quaint.” I heard a scratchy version of my own voice from the office voice mail message.

  “You’ve reached Marnie Baranuik. Marnie is ruined, call back later.” The caller didn’t leave a message. When my cell phone rang a moment later, I ignored that, too. Harry had informed me that both Mr. Folkenflik and Dr. Delacovias had called just before I’d returned home, and he’d promised I’d return their calls; I was dreading both conversations in equal measure, choosing a rap session with a much less demanding bottle of wine instead.

  Harry was whistling jauntily in the front hall as he dressed for an evening out on his motorcycle, and I recognized the tune after some concentration as one of Rameau’s. I was lying on the couch with a half-empty bottle of white wine between my knees, planning on reading Batten’s letter as soon as Harry left. I think he knew it, and was hovering as long as he could, while still maintaining the illusion of not caring that I wouldn’t let him read “the silly twaddle scribbled by a suicidal nincompoop.”

  I couldn’t resist singing along with him; I don’t speak French, but I’d heard the words frequently enough that I could rattle off some misheard lyrics, and tipsy enough that my poor accent did not deter me.

  I sat up and warbled in my opera voice, “Forehead amoebas! Forehead amoebas!

  Jam bread! A van down here in trouble sees no curb!”

  Only Harry’s head appeared, sliding into view at an angle. “Must you?”

  His disembodied head, lips puckered with displeasure, cracked me up. I fell back on the couch clutching the wine bottle and taking a hearty swig.

  Harry’s lips twitched upward devilishly, though he scolded me with a tsk. “I was about to invite you to come for a ride, but I see you’ve been suckling from the teats of both Bacchus and poor judgment this evening and mustn’t be trusted with the operation of heavy machinery.”

  “Righty-O.” I put my chin to my chest and let out a wine-scented belch, because I am drop-dead sexy like that.

  Tugging on his leather motorcycle gloves, he came into full view, perhaps so that I might fully appreciate his outfit, as he did enjoy his pet’s admiration. He’d recently won an auction for a motorcycle jacket worn by Marlon Brando in some old movie about street toughs, or at least that’s how Harry described it. It was probably less expensive than his Belstaff riding jacket, which had cost nearly as much as my car. His lean legs and graceful hips swathed in black denim seemed a parody of my new wardrobe; on me, it looked vaguely criminal, but Harry made it look at once elegant and sinister. That might have had something to do with the source of the clothing. His was largely couture or bespoke, hand-tailored for him on Savile Row or Jermyn Street in London. Mine was secondhand shop with comfort spots considerately worn in for me by the previous owners. He looked ready to mingle with movie stars for a day-after-Cannes luncheon. I looked like I belonged in the shadows, waiting to mug them. Your canapes or your life, bucko.

  “Why do you look surprised, ducky?”

  “I’m not,” I said, “this is just how my eyebrows go now. Roll with it.”

  “Hrm, yes. Well, it’s a shame you cannot join me.” He gave the gloves an extra tug for effect. “You could use the practice.”

  Harry had been teaching me to drive the motorcycle, and I was getting more comfortable with it, not that I’d get any recognition for my improvement from my Cold Company tonight, after I’d held Batten’s letter at arm’s length and told him no.

  “If I get off this couch,” I said, “you’re gonna regret it, dead man.”

  His pierced brow arched and his smile broadened. “You have all the ferocity of a newborn weasel and nearly as much charm, my sweet.”

  I aimed my bottle at him. “Did you know that the dominant stoat will often steal a kill from the weaker one? It’s called klepto…” I paused to remember, blinking rapidly through the pleasant blur of booze. The blinking seemed to help. “Kleptoparasitism.”

  “Dearest, do you by chance have a point to make?”

  Vampires do it, too, I thought. And then, Revenants! V-Word, dammit. “I am merely showing off my staggeringly vast knowledge for your delectation and amusement in the hopes that you might be passionately overwhelmed by my nerd power.”

  Harry read something on my face and slid further into the room. “You seek to humble me tonight, my sugarplum. I think you should find this an insurmountable task.” His voice sank as he took a knee beside the couch and drew his face closer to mine. “I am the dominant force in this territory, and I am unconquerable.”

  I snort-laughed. “You’re unconquerable abroad, too. You forget I’ve seen you steal a kill.”

  His eyes flashed chrome, and his pupils were pinpricks. “Is that what I did? And my pet believes that I must need the reminder?” He licked his canines, first one and then the other, behind which his fangs were extending with determined slowness. It was a gesture meant to put the fear of all that is unholy into a mortal heart. Perhaps because of my wine buzz, all it did was make me want to continue to press my point, even while the alarm bells ringing in the back of my head warned me not to.

  “From not one…” I showed him one finger, and then two. “But two masters of noble houses.”

  “I think, in light of recent events and with a care for your blood alcohol level, we should continue this discussion at a later date, my Own, once time has stitched the wounds in your poor heart. Mark my words, this mourning of yours is lacking in stamina and is destined to prove ephemeral.” He placed a cool kiss on my forehead. “It’s a jolly nice night for a ride. Diaphanous clouds over a lovely quarter moon, and not a snow-blossom in sight. Were you not fairly pickled, I’d be quite content to ride behind you.” When this didn’t produce the effect he wanted, he let out a little huff. “Do set aside the hockamore for one evening, my doe?”

  “Hockamore,” I repeated, sloshing the wine around in the bottle. “This hockamore?”

  “Quite.” He took the bottle from my hand. “I’d not like to find you tangle-footed and hugging the rails like a bory-eyed sailor yet again tonight.” Then, more kindly, “Surely, one can read the beef-wit’s letter without liquid courage, love. They are, after all, only words.”

  I shivered and cast an eye at the woodstove, which was glowing with the last remains of a log and needed another. “One has most assuredly heard enough words for one evening,” I said, imitating his posh accent.

  My Cold Company’s ever-patient hand landed atop my head and he petted me gently, smoothing strands of hair out of my face and off my forehead until he was satisfied.
“My sullen sweetheart,” he purred, pouring compassion and a blur of comfort through the Bond, reminding me that he could still do such things. “I will tour about for a wee bit, pop ‘round the office for a little tidy, and circle back to cosset and indulge you. How does that sound?”

  He wasn’t going to take the bait, but he did take the wine away, and he was already crossing the room with it, looking down his patrician nose at the label, clearly heading for the kitchen sink to dump it. This wasn’t the evening I had planned, and I hadn’t made any headway on my daunting To Do list. I sulked, disgusted with myself.

  Harry’s whistling started up again and followed him to the kitchen along with the tread of his motorcycle boots. I swung off the couch and crawled to the woodstove to stoke up the fire and add a heavier log. I was about to haul myself off the floor when a sparkle caught my eye from beneath Harry’s wing chair, and upon further study, I discovered one of Bob the cat’s silver catnip mice. In fishing it out, I had to lower my front half flat to the rug.

  Harry came back and cleared his throat at my raised ass. “If this is your way of convincing me to stay home, I am afraid I must confess, it is working splendidly.”

  I straightened and chucked the toy at his head. “You sure you don’t want to save the tidying up for when someone else can give you a hand?”

  Harry waved this away, and before he could hide a surge of shame and sadness through the Bond, it ran through my own chest. “It is but a small thing.” He grabbed his motorcycle helmet and turned to the hall, and paused. “MJ, do you think there might come a time that you might be amenable to my reading that note? Of course, it’s private…” He tried to smile, but it came off as a tight twitch of his lips. “Only, it seems that every person in Our Lad’s life got a letter but for me.”

  I frowned. “That can’t be true. Jerkface would have had a lot to say to you.”

  “Not even so much as a,” Harry cleared his throat, and roughened his voice into an entirely-too-good imitation of Batten's, “’Thanks for the Bug. It's yours again now.’” Realization landed on him, and his eyes tightened.

  Wes hadn’t gotten a letter either. The two revenants. The dead guys. Only the living apparently counted as important people in Mark Batten’s life, I thought. It was a final blow from beyond the grave, and it seemed cruel even for Jerkface. Batten couldn’t have known that it was Harry who would hand him his empty sentence if his plan went cockeyed, and he’d written the letters long before returning to the island of Svikheimslending, so he’d purposefully ignored the dead guys for another reason. I would never point out the obvious aloud to Harry, so I stepped closer to him and hugged him fiercely.

  He gathered himself up, wound and all, rubbed my back vigorously as though he could dislodge the unhappiness, and smiled down at me tolerantly. “Right. Well, I’ll leave you to it, shall I?”

  With that, he was out the door, and a moment later, while I was tiredly slopping to the bathroom, I heard his Kawasaki roar to life and he was lost to the night.

  ******

  The letter was only one page, handwritten in Batten's hasty scrawl on hotel stationery from Hammerfest, Norway, dated January third. It began with Hey, Snickerdoodle, and it was at that point in my reading that I stomped directly to the bathroom, dropped the letter on the vanity, and threw up in the toilet. My stomach cramped hard around the brownie and Dr. Pepper and hockamore — whatever that was — and the spicy stuff I’d been forced to eat at the Indian Gourmet and Saloon, and the sight of it coming up just made me heave anew. I crammed my eyes closed and waited it out, using my left hand to gather my long ghost hair back. I flushed and waited, willing my upset stomach to settle, telling myself that I could do it, I could read the letter, I would be okay. Everything would be fine.

  It won’t be fine. It will never be fine, my traitor mind argued. But that was nonsense, and deep down, I knew it. People die. Batten was not the first person I’d ever lost. He wasn’t even the first person I’d lost in my line of work, or in my private life. He hadn't even been the only person I'd lost in January.

  I did some square breathing and tried to recall any of the soothing techniques I’d Googled instead of going to a therapist. Maybe it was time to take Hood’s advice and look for some help. Once my stomach settled, I went to the tub and turned on the water, putting in the plug. I turned to the linen cupboard and took out Harry’s Penhaligon’s Blenheim Bouquet bath gel. He would not mind my borrowing some; in fact, he’d be delighted; it was his favorite scent on me. I put a generous blob under the rushing water and let the fragrance spill into the room and ease my nerves. It was only when I had calmed that I picked up the letter again. Bringing the box of Kleenex closer to me on the bathroom counter, just in case, I made up my mind to read Batten’s last words for me all the way through.

  Hey, Snickerdoodle. If you’re reading this, that means I’m gone. Try not to hate me too much. I’ve always followed my gut. I know you get that. You do the same. As much as I teased you about having bad instincts and fucking up, you always manage to pull things through. Don’t think I didn’t see that. Someone had to give you grief about your lack of foresight. That was my burden.

  There wasn’t any other way this could have ended. If you’re honest with yourself, you can see that. I don’t know what else to say. If it works, I won’t have to explain.

  I enjoyed us. I know you’ll doubt that. But I did enjoy us and that’s the truth. We had something. I couldn’t label it. I’ll let you do that. Be kind to whatever memory you might have of me. Be very careful. I learned there are few people you can trust in our profession. Trust Chapel. He’ll never lead you astray. And trust Harry. Can’t believe I’m writing that. If you need to confide in someone, confide in Harry and Chapel. With everyone else, mind your mouth. I need you to take that seriously.

  There were wear marks there on the paper where he’d erased something a few times, and on top of that feathery spot, he’d written, Be safe. And don’t fuck everything up, Snickerdoodle. XO.

  Ps. I’m so sorry.

  My eyes blurred and I stormed to my room for a piece of paper and a No. 2 pencil. I went back to the bathroom and turned off the tub faucet then turned to the letter, laid the paper over the letter, and used the pencil to gently shade over the place where he’d written “Be safe.” It didn’t work the way I’d hoped it might, because the depressions he’d made in the paper weren’t deep enough. I held the letter up to the misty room and filtered the vanity lights through it, squinting past “Be safe.” There, under the words, mostly erased, I could make out the words I love you.

  For a moment, I thought I was going to throw up again. Shock, happiness, and bitter sadness slugged it out in my guts and in my chest until I didn’t know what to think. He’d erased it, though. He’d thought better of saying such a thing. Did that mean he hadn’t meant it? Or that it wasn’t fair to say it? Did it even matter, now that he was gone? Yes, it matters. It matters. It’d gotten an “XO” that might have seemed cheerful if not for the depressing “I’m so sorry” that followed it.

  I stared at the bath water, no longer sure I wanted a soak. I considered it, but the idea of taking off my clothes struck me suddenly as too vulnerable an idea. I wasn’t in the mood to be exposed, now. I wanted to hide. I needed darkness and oblivion. There was a bottle of butterscotch schnapps in my night table with my sleeping pills. I slogged into my bedroom, took it out, and shook a couple pills into my hand. It isn’t easy to drink under a bed, but this wouldn’t be my first Underbed Rodeo, and I’d manage it. Pausing before attempting to crawl beneath it, I considered the pills and thought maybe I could deal with life without sleeping through it. We’re choosing to move forward, remember? Like Chapel. We’re choosing to be okay.

  Mind your mouth. Had Batten really directed me to shut the fuck up? That’s how he wanted to talk to me in his last letter ever? You pompous asshole. And Be kind to whatever memory you might have of me. Double-damn asshole on you, too!

  That was easier, but a
t the same time, a lot harder; in accessing the nice memories, I had to pass the cesspool of my regret. Missing him. Wanting him. I’d done all of it before, after Buffalo. The pain felt familiar, if sharper and deeper. I stood in the middle of my bedroom and drank from the bottle, looking down at the tiny blue pills in my palm. Batten wouldn’t like how you’re handling this. I drank again, angrily. Well, I told myself, I don’t like how he handled this, either, so we’re even.

  Just as I popped the pills in my mouth, I heard the softest scrape of a boot outside, under my bedroom window. I immediately cheeked the pills before the mouthful of schnapps could wash them down my throat, and turned my back on the window. Pursing my lips, I quietly pushed the pills out of my mouth with my tongue; they plopped silently onto the rag rug beside my rumpled bed, one of them landing on a crumpled sock. I mimed taking another swig of the booze while summoning psi and sending it in a cold wash behind me, seeking answers, probing for the identity of the watcher. Had Mr. Kujawski decided he liked my ass and wanted to try and peep me in my frog-print underpants? Had Beau tracked me home? Rob Footer coming by for a tattoo consultation, Elvis in tow? Was my trainer planning a sneak attack to test my preparedness? I already knew none of them were near me. Mr. Kujawski smelled of sausages and chewing tobacco, and my sensitive DaySitter’s nose wasn’t picking that up. Hood smelled of menthol candies, faint cigarette smoke, and Irish Spring body wash. The person outside had recently developed a fear of me where none had existed before, a fear that seeped through his veins on sweat, probably because I’d killed birds in order to successfully stab him in the butt with flying scissors. And he was back for more. Ballsy, Buddy. Real ballsy.

  “Oh, bitch,” I whispered. “It’s going down for real, now.”