The Last of the Monsters

by Lila Dubois

  “I didn’t want that. Don’t want to scare you.”

  “But you’re right, everything you say is right—we’re doomed.”

  “Then let’s not think about tomorrow. Let’s focus on tonight, on right now.”

  His lips met hers in a desperate kiss. She clung to him as the water sluiced around them.

  She didn’t want foreplay, didn’t want to talk. All she wanted was Henry inside her, fucking her until she couldn’t think anymore.

  “Now, Henry, now.”

  “Are you ready?”

  “Yes.”

  She wrapped one leg around his hips and he cupped her ass, pressing her back against the glass tiles. Akta braced her hands on the wall and tilted her hips. The next moment Henry’s cock was there, sliding between the lips of her sex, rubbing over her clit before finding the entrance to her body.

  He thrust in and Akta gasped. He was big, stretching her—it had been just long enough that her body had forgotten his size, and she felt the invasion as if it were the first time.

  “Akta.” He said her name like a prayer as he rested his head in the crook of her shoulder. Holding her lower body up, he started to thrust.

  It was hard and fast, Akta finding completion first, Henry right behind her.

  They stayed in the shower, washing each other slowly. When they were out, Henry sat behind her on the bed and combed out her hair, which felt as intimate as sex.

  As dawn broke the eastern horizon they lay together on her bed, not saying anything.

  “Finally.”

  “I know. They were getting to be ridiculous.”

  “Uh, maybe we should leave them alone.”

  Someone laughed and Akta frowned in her sleep. She was having a very strange dream. She could hear Lena, Margo and Luke’s voices. Snuggling closer to Henry, she tried to ignore the dream voices.

  “Up and at ’em, princess.”

  Someone smacked her ass and Akta sat bolt upright. There was a growl and in the next second Henry was up, arm shooting out to grab the person who’d slapped her. Luke got there first, holding his arm up to block Henry from touching Lena.

  The five of them stared at each other. Akta was sleepy but waking up rapidly. A few things struck her. One: Margo, Lena and Luke were all in her bedroom. Two: She and Henry were naked, in bed together.

  “Get. Out,” Henry growled. Ignoring the fact that he was naked, he climbed over Akta and stood, protecting her.

  “How about…no.” Margo crossed her arms. “We’ve been looking for the two of you.”

  Henry’s words were still fresh in Akta’s mind, so she said, “This isn’t what it seems.”

  Everyone looked at her. She pulled her hair over her shoulder to hide herself.

  “Seriously?” Lena asked. “That’s what you’re going with? ‘This isn’t what it seems’?”

  Luke snorted out a laugh.

  Henry strode to Akta’s vanity and picked up her robe, bringing it back to her.

  “You know that we’ve all seen both of you naked a bunch of times.” Margo had pulled her phone out of her pocket and was checking her email.

  “Okay, okay, I’m sorry I didn’t tell you,” Akta put on the robe Henry handed her and slid off the bed. She laced her fingers with his. “Henry and I…”

  “Save it.” Cali marched into the room, a half-eaten banana in one hand. “I knew the instant you started fucking. I’m just glad you two finally got around to it.”

  “How did you…” Henry shook his head in disgust.

  “You two were painfully obvious. It was getting to the point I was thinking of roofying both of you and locking you in a trailer together.”

  Akta crossed her arms. “How did you know?”

  “You two stopped acting like lovesick teenagers. If we had more time, I might actually go back and reshoot some scenes—your acting is much better now. Luckily, I think Oren can edit around you.”

  It was one thing to accuse her of being lovesick, it was quite another to insult her work. “Excuse me?”

  “They all knew…the whole time?” Henry sat on the side of the bed and put his head in his hands. “Fuck.”

  “It’s okay, tough guy.” Margo reached over and patted him on the shoulder. “It was mostly Akta. You were pretty good about hiding it.”

  He just groaned.

  Akta flapped her hands in the air. “Why are you all here?”

  “We’ve been calling you,” Lena said. Luke stayed at her side, staring pointedly at the ceiling. Cali and Margo wandered out of her bedroom. Maybe it was time to change the locks and the alarm code.

  “It’s my day off.”

  “From acting, sure. You don’t get a day off from being an owner in the production company.”

  “Pants,” Henry said. “I need pants.”

  “Is something going on?” Akta asked Lena.

  “Sort of. Come out to the living room and we’ll explain.”

  “All of them are monsters?” Jack Vice pointed at the men.

  Hesitantly, Lena answered, “Yes.”

  Early that morning, Luke and Runako had finally managed to meet with the marketing firm they’d hired for the movie. When they changed from men to monsters, the marketing team had finally understood that saying that the men were monsters wasn’t a gimmick, but the truth.

  They’d brought in the president of the company, who happened to be in LA. Rather than be put off or dropping them as clients, the president had told them that they needed more than a marketing plan for the movie—they needed a full-on PR team. When Lena said the marketing fees were already eating up a huge chunk of the budget, the president agreed to take them on as clients pro bono, calling them “the ultimate PR client”.

  Now they were sitting in a massive conference room that made the Calypso Productions offices look like a hovel. On one side of the table were sharp-eyed, well-dressed PR consultants and marketing managers. On the other sat the owners of Calypso Productions and the monsters, including Tokaki and Maeve.

  “And you?” he asked Maeve.

  The gorgeous woman smiled, and it was a thing of terrible beauty. “I am not human.”

  “We’ll come back to you, we don’t want to complicate the issue. Okay, let’s see it.”

  Henry looked at Akta. She seemed both worried and hopeful. Henry didn’t exactly understand why they needed these PR people, and he was surprised to see Akta and her friends, who seemed scared of nothing and no one, so hesitant.

  “Fine,” Luke said, rising from his chair and taking off his clothes. There was no reaction from the people on the other side of the table as Luke, Runako, Tokaki, Henry and Seling stripped. Lena had thought ahead and brought them each a pair of shorts made to fit them as monsters. They pulled them on as humans, holding up the baggy garments.

  Michael and Maeve got up and moved to the end of the table to give them space.

  “What about you?” Jack Vice, the company president, asked Michael.

  “I’m not like them.”

  “So what are you?”

  He crossed his arms. “Something that will freak out the humans.”

  “I’ll be the judge of that.”

  Michael looked at Jane, then joined the others and stripped. One by one they changed, the sounds of cracking bone and splitting skin loud in the sudden hush. Henry focused on Akta as he changed, and strangely it didn’t seem to hurt as much.

  There was a moment of silence as the humans looked at them. Henry kept his wings folded tightly to his back. Big as the room was, it wasn’t big enough for four monsters and a white tiger as long as a freight car. Michael was still in his human form, watching and waiting to see the PR team’s reactions.

  Jack paced back and forth on the other side, examining each of them closely.

  “This,” he said, motioning to the monsters, “is the holy grail of PR. They’re nightmares, creatures of myth and legend. Can we make them a part of modern society? Can we spin this?”

  “Does he know we’re r
ight here?” Henry asked generally.

  “I don’t think he cares,” Luke said.

  “I could make him care.” Runako took a half step forward.

  The PR people sucked in a breath. Jack held up a hand. “My apologies. Normally we wouldn’t have this kind of meeting with clients in the room.”

  Luke pulled Runako back. “We’re fine. Continue.”

  A woman with a streak of pink in her hair and bright red lipstick narrowed her eyes. “What’s their history with humans?”

  Luke opened his mouth, but before he could say anything Jack cut him off. “Doesn’t matter. That’s going to be part of the mystery—let historians and scholars rewrite history. Let them beg the monsters for chances to interview them. Reality is complicated. We want to tell a simple story.”

  “Protectors. They’ve been the protectors of humans for all of history,” a young man with dark eyes said. “They’re bodyguards, warriors.”

  “Good, keep going.”

  “That’s why there are gargoyles on buildings—it’s a remnant of a time when real gargoyles protected humans.”

  “And that one looks a bit like a parade dragon.” An older woman wearing miles of gold necklaces pointed at Tokaki.

  “My Clan were the protectors of the Chinese and Japanese emperors,” Tokaki said.

  “Good to know, but irrelevant,” Jack said

  Henry looked at Tokaki and saw the surprise on the tiger’s face.

  When writing the screenplay, Jane had made a point of not including too many true things, but that had been to protect them. Jo, the production designer, had also been careful to create sets that didn’t closely resemble either the Great Clan’s home in the Rocky Mountains or Tokaki’s Clan’s home in China. But they’d all assumed that once the movie was out and they started talking about their people, the thing that would save them would be truths like the fact that Tokaki was descended from a human princess.

  “Why is it irrelevant?” Luke asked.

  Jack braced a hand on the back of a chair. He was older, polished. He looked like the men on the covers of the magazines they’d used as guides when first arriving in LA.

  “Is this movie a true story?”

  They looked at each other, then Luke answered, “No.”

  “Exactly.” Jack started pacing again. “What you’re doing is creating a first impression. The truth has too many variables—if the story is based on a kernel of truth, all the better. If it’s not—” he shrugged, “—the fallout is managed.

  “I’m not saying the movie is a bad idea—it’s not. We saw some clips, and it looks good. But that’s not going to be enough. The movie will reach the small people, the flyovers, but it won’t sway policymakers, pundits and leaders.”

  “What do you propose?” Lena asked.

  “A marketing campaign for the movie and a simultaneous PR campaign about the reality of monsters. When it all comes out, we’ll be ready with a press release that tells the story we want told.”

  “Superheroes.” The woman with the pink hair had been writing furiously. “They’re superheroes, out of hiding. They want to let the world know they exist.”

  “Why now?” Jack asked his employee.

  One of the men spoke up. “They’ve just defeated something, someone.”

  “That implies there’s something to fear and opens them up to attack.”

  “The world is ready. The world is finally ready to see them, and now that there’s global communication, they can come out to everyone at once.”

  “Good,” Jack said. He looked at Michael. “And what about you?”

  Michael grumbled a little, then shifted. Unlike the others he appeared fairly human in his true form, with huge white wings.

  “An angel?” The woman with the gold chains sat back and whistled. “That’s a lot.”

  Jack examined Michael. “Agreed. You stay under wraps unless we need you.”

  Michael nodded, looking relieved.

  “This is great and all,” Cali said, “but what do you want them to do exactly?”

  Jack narrowed his eyes. “We’re going to start at the top.”

  “The top?” Lena asked.

  “Which one of you is in charge?” he asked the monsters.

  They all looked at Maeve, then each other. Henry shook his head slightly. Maeve was too important to risk. Plus she was a bit nuts.

  “I guess I am,” Luke said.

  “Good, then you’re coming with me to Washington. You’re going to meet the president.”

  Chapter Eleven

  “Jack, how are you doing?”

  “Good, good. How about you?”

  “Not bad.”

  Henry watched as Jack Vice embraced the White House Press Secretary. The men looked eerily similar.

  “Are they…?” he asked Luke.

  “Brothers? Yes. Lena looked up Jack Vice’s bio. His real last name is Tanel—he changed it because his brother was in politics.”

  Luke stood with his arms crossed, but Henry could tell he was nervous. They’d boarded a private jet to Washington this morning. After much debate among themselves, it had been decided that Henry would go with Luke. Runako couldn’t keep his mouth shut, Tokaki was too easygoing and Michael was officially under wraps unless they needed him.

  Henry had really never imagined they’d end up here. Long ago, their people had been the advisors and guards of human rulers—in cultures and dynasties around the world and spanning thousands of years. But it had been centuries since any of their people had met with a human leader.

  “So, what is it?” The press secretary, Adam Tanel, looked curiously at Henry and Luke.

  “Let’s go someplace private.”

  They were led to an inner room in the hotel where they were meeting.

  “These two gentlemen are part of a secret race. In the past, they were human protectors, but a few hundred years ago they went into hiding. Now they want to make their presence known.”

  Adam narrowed his eyes, looking first at Henry and Luke, then at Jack. “Secret race? Not more vampires?”

  “No, the vampires are taken care of. Twilight did what they needed it to do, so they’re okay.”

  Henry and Luke looked at each other. The humans knew about vampires? The Clan wasn’t even sure they existed.

  “So what are they?”

  “Monsters.”

  “That feels like a derogatory term.”

  “How about gargoyles?”

  Adam looked at them. “They look human enough.”

  “Right now.”

  The press secretary sighed. “Jack, don’t give me the spin.”

  “How about they show you?”

  At that, Henry and Luke rose and carefully took off their suits. Under them they were wearing loose shorts made out of the stretchiest material the wardrobe department could find.

  When Jack nodded, they changed.

  Adam whistled. “Damn.”

  “As you can see, this is something the president needs to know about.”

  “They’re human-friendly?”

  “They want to be. They went to Hollywood looking for help.”

  “Hollywood?” Adam shook his head.

  “Because Washington is so welcoming?” Jack raised a brow.

  “Fair enough.” He took his phone from his pocket. “The president has a light schedule today—hopefully we can catch him. You’ll fill me in on the rest as we go.”

  “Change back, guys.”

  Henry and Luke melted back into their human forms and quickly redressed before following the humans out to a car.

  Henry looked at Luke. “Is this really going to work?”

  Luke raised his eyebrows. “You never thought it would, did you?”

  “I hoped, but humans are not known for being accepting.”

  “We don’t need all of them to accept us. Just enough of them to keep our Clan safe.”

  Henry nodded and joined Luke in the black car that was taking them to the White H
ouse.

  “We have a problem,” Jo said.

  “Oh thank God, the Secret Service didn’t kill you.” Akta dropped down onto the floor.

  “What? The Secret Service killed who?”

  “Jo?” Akta stared at her phone. She’d been so anxious to answer it she hadn’t even looked at the screen.

  “Uh, yeah, remember me?”

  “Yeah, sorry, I thought you were Henry.”

  “Didn’t he go to Washington with Luke?”

  “Yes, their plane landed a few hours ago.”

  “And you think that they’ve already been killed by the Secret Service?”

  “Okay, probably not, but I haven’t heard from them.”

  “Have you talked to Lena? She’d know if Luke was in trouble.” Mates could tell when the other was in danger or hurt. Tokaki hadn’t known Jo was his mate until she’d been seriously hurt and he’d been able to feel her pain.

  “I did. She says they’re fine and that I should stop calling her every five minutes.”

  Jo sighed. “Now that we’ve got that out of the way, can we talk about our problem?”

  “We have another one?”

  “Yeah. We do. I—”

  There was a clatter on the other end of the line.

  “Hello? Hello!” The voice was female and sounded young, no more than seventeen or eighteen.

  “Uh, hello?”

  “ARE YOU THE MOVIE STAR?”

  Akta held the phone away from her ear. Who the hell was she talking to?

  “I’VE SEEN ALL YOUR MOVIES!”

  “Can I talk to Joanna, please?”

  “She’s my, uh…” The line went quiet for a moment, and Akta heard muttering in what might have been Chinese or Japanese. “She’s my sister-in-law!”

  “Jo is your sister-in-law?” Akta had a vague memory of Jo saying something about Tokaki’s sister, who’d helped take care of Jo when she was injured.

  “Yes, I’m Madoka, and I’m going to be a movie star!”

  “Oh shit,” Akta whispered.

  There was more clacking and the sound of voices arguing before Jo came back on the line.

  “Akta.”

  “I get the problem.”

  “Madoka is a little Hollywood mad.”

  “Why is she here?”