by G A Chase
Myles did his best to keep his cool. “Seemed like a better choice than getting into a brawl in front of my patrons.”
Colin set his rum and coke on the table. “I’m not looking for a fight, but I am going to continue coming to your club. Having you glare at me all night from behind the bar is getting tiresome. I won’t insult your intelligence by saying I’m not interested in your girlfriend, but she has made it clear she’s not interested in me. So really, if you trust her, you have nothing to be so cross about.”
Myles really wanted to let his alter ego throw a punch at the guy. “You think I’ve forgotten about you possessing my body or any of your other transgressions?”
“Of course not. What I meant was, I’m not currently a threat to you. I’m not asking to bury the hatchet, just looking to make sure there’s nothing disgusting added to my drink.”
Myles would have been happier if Colin thought there was a side of spit added into the mix. “I can’t answer for how Charlie makes your drinks.”
“So long as I know you’re not influencing his recipe.”
Myles never cared much for small talk, especially not with the devil. “You have my word. If there’s nothing else, I do have a bar full of customers.”
Colin raised his hand. “I do have one other minor request. In the interest of distracting me from pursuing your girlfriend, do you think you could see your way clear to arranging a meeting between me and Sanguine Delarosa?”
Myles wasn’t sure how to answer. Though Sanguine did occupy the same realm as Colin, she had wings, and her eyes looked like faceted crystals. Those changes would be certain to tip him off that he wasn’t back among the living. As the only other physical person in hell, she didn’t have a fake body double for meeting with Colin.
“I’ll talk to her, but no promises. Unlike you, I don’t pass women around like trading cards.”
“Of course you don’t.” Colin’s comment was thick with sarcasm. “As a club owner, I’m sure all your shot girls voluntarily dress so skimpily. If you put in a good word with Sanguine, I’m sure she’ll listen.”
36
Colin checked his pocket watch. The band was well into their second set of the night but still had at least another hour onstage. He squeezed onto the dance floor and worked his way to a ravishing redhead. He’d been eyeing her all night. From the way she undulated with her arms over her head, she clearly wasn’t shy about advertising what her body had to offer.
As Lincoln Laroque, high-powered businessman, he’d never had trouble bedding women. And as Baron Malveaux, he’d had brothels so filled with his conquests he could have partaken of a different woman every night for a year. But as Colin Malveaux, former devil and supposed recent escapee from hell, he’d discovered the meaning of rejection. Unnervingly, each woman he approached started off pleasant enough, but as the conversation moved from benign to seductive, their excuses all started sounding the same. The trick was to move in quickly and act fast with as little conversation as possible. With so many people pressing against each other, his jailor couldn’t transition fast enough to keep up with Colin’s advances. Once his jailor caught on to what he was up to, she invariably moved in to cock block him.
The band was playing “Lady Marmalade.” Colin’s dance companion was the definition of airhead. Every comment he made was greeted with a high-pitched laugh, even when he wasn’t making a joke. Typically, to make sure he’d been heard, he would wait for the band to end a number before making his move, but those breaks were often when a woman would transform from a flirtatious sexual prospect to a repentant conservative opponent.
As Kendell focused on her vocals, Colin took the redhead’s hand. “Let’s get a little fresh air.”
His companion again laughed as her reply—a reaction he took as acceptance. He walked out the door, and she followed him as if she were a balloon animal on a string.
After a half dozen of such encounters, he’d perfected his routine. The dark alley that ran alongside the club lacked the romance of a suite at the Royal Sonesta, but then, he never got a woman more than two blocks from the club before she tendered her rejection.
The sex was quick, unimaginative, and dirty. Her cries of orgasm as he pressed her against the cold, damp brick wall reminded him of an actress’s fake moans in a cheaply made porno. He honestly didn’t care. As soon as he finished, he headed deeper into the dark alley while pulling up his pants. He didn’t bother seeing if she returned safely to the club.
Though the physical release helped clear his head, what he’d really wanted to see was if she’d change personas. She didn’t.
His conversation with Myles had started off rather stiffly, but once he was out in the courtyard, the irritating buffoon returned. What mattered most was that at no point did any of his acquaintances of the night exhibit the snarky feminine mystique he frequently encountered. So you’ve taken the night off. I suppose you deserve it, but your exhaustion doesn’t bode well for you.
He slapped at a mosquito that had the nerve to suck his blood. He missed. “That’s right—fly back to your mistress, and tell her of my whereabouts.”
Just for fun and curiosity, he focused the same kind of attention on the retreating bug as he had on his bats in hell. To his amazement, the small creature turned around and flew at attention before his eyes. He squished the bloodsucker with a loud clap of his hands. “You really are tired, aren’t you, my jailor? Interesting.”
He held the thick dark-red splat up to a security light. At least I’m real. Like a vampire testing out a sample of blood to make sure it wasn’t tainted, he put the tip of his tongue to his palm. The blood was still warm. It tasted like a demi-glace that had dripped off a steak cooked rare.
He pulled out his cell phone and punched in the number of his office. “Send a town car. I don’t feel like walking tonight.”
* * *
Sanguine rubbed her forehead as she listened to Kendell recount the night’s adventure. “Tell me again what he said to Myles.”
“He wanted to meet with you, but Myles told him it would be your decision. Clearly, we’ll have to tell him no.”
She knew it had been a mistake to take the night off. “He suspects I’m up to something. While we were in hell, he saw me with my wings. He must think meeting with me will prove whether or not he’s left hell.”
“Isn’t that what we want? Once he knows he’s in hell, we can move forward with directing him toward the seven gates. According to Baron Samedi—since Colin, in the form of Baron Malveaux, already died—the final gate will dump him back in Guinee, and then the loas of the dead will usher him into the deep waters. Having him figure out his situation wasn’t unexpected.”
Even after a night’s sleep, Sanguine’s mind wasn’t as sharp as she’d have liked. Spending so much time in hell dulled her like a knife run against a rock. She closed her eyes and focused her attention on hitting each of the main points. “The seventh gate you watch over is between this hell and life, not Guinee. I don’t trust anything those voodoo loas say. Even if he did end up among the dead, Baron Malveaux took over that purgatory once before. There’s no reason to believe he’ll just quietly accept the loas’ judgment now. And if he does work through our gates, that doesn’t mean he’s been rehabilitated. He’s already proven his ability to trick us. Having the devil walking among the living would be even worse than having him confined to hell. The ideal situation would be for him to accept this world we’ve built as his new reality—either because he thinks he’s back among the living or because he sees this version as preferable to life. The longer he’s here, the better our chances. Whatever happens, we need to know the instant he realizes what we’ve done. If he already knows—and we’re again playing a game he’s devised—we may be too late.”
“What do you want to do?”
Sanguine knew it was pointless to say she wanted to kill Colin. The ongoing fight might give her a burst of adrenaline, but she needed support, not anger. “I need a better look into his
life. Are you playing again tonight?”
“Yep, it’s Saturday. You looking for another night off, or do you intend on breaking into his loft?”
Are you crazy? Sanguine resisted telling Kendell what she thought of that idea. “Neither one. I’ll be at the club. You guys just put on a kick-ass show, okay? I could use the entertainment.”
Once Kendell signed off from the seventh gate, Sanguine wondered if she’d have the nerve to go through with her idea. She’d jumped into so many women to reject Colin’s advances that having to accept one made her feathers quiver. Sex is nothing more than a physical encounter, and it won’t even be my body he’s fucking. Basically, I’ll be doing nothing more than watching porn. For me to know if he thinks he’s still in hell, I need to see how he’s interacting with this reality.
The justification for her upcoming liaison, however, didn’t ease the icky feeling that coated her skin like the residual slick after a swim in an oil spill.
* * *
From the recliner in his condo, Colin had a perfect view of the World Trade Center. He restlessly rocked in the chair while twirling the plastic guitar pick he’d caught from Kendell with his fingers. Whether or not he was in hell wasn’t the issue. Kendell and Sanguine had made a tactical mistake in letting him experience what it might be like to return to the living. Abject boredom wasn’t his goal in life. Being the devil in hell, however, held real possibilities. And being the devil in life—now, that was a worthy pursuit.
I don’t even know what it means to be the devil. I’ve been so busy trying to escape that I never fully embraced my godlike powers. He twirled the small triangular piece of plastic faster. What he really needed was to break back into Luther Noire’s sanctuary. When he’d had control of the World Trade Center, he’d been as foolish with the paranormal objects as some idiot burning paintings in a museum to stay warm. All the practitioners of magic since the beginning of time had their life’s accomplishments housed in that tower of concrete, steel, and glass. As an interdimensional embassy, the tower and its contents existed in whatever reality Colin inhabited. The treasures were there for the taking. He had no one to stop him, save for the one man who knew the true dangers. Start slow. Avoid detection. Luther must be going crazy trying to round up all the vaults I jettisoned. He’ll already be distracted.
Colin threw the pick onto the coffee table to stop his fidgeting. Like an omen of good fortune, the piece of plastic stopped in the middle of the glass surface instead of skidding off to the floor. My luck is changing. All I need to do is avoid whatever malevolent presence keeps foiling my advances. “Show yourself, Sanguine Delarosa.”
He didn’t expect an answer. He couldn’t even be sure she was the one pulling the strings on the people he met, but as the granddaughter of hell’s architect, she was probably in charge. Asking Myles to set up a meeting had been more about calling the team’s bluff than actually wanting a conversation with the woman. If he were to pursue his plan, he’d need a better way of keeping tabs on his jailor than bumping into random women.
“Guess I’ll be making another trip to the club. Hopefully, you got some rest last night.”
To avoid driving himself crazy, he spent the afternoon wandering the Quarter. He couldn’t be sure, but it seemed every woman he passed eyed him with suspicion as if he were some rapist. Though as Baron Malveaux he’d indulged in such perversions, taking a woman against her will no longer carried any satisfaction for him. All such violence proved was a man’s brute force and lack of self-control, not his skill. To seduce a woman, however—especially if such a dalliance wasn’t in her nature—required finesse. He considered professing his innocence to an elderly woman who scampered past him toward a waiting bus. But admitting his suspicion that Sanguine spied on him from every passing stranger would be to needlessly play a card from his hand too soon. The real game will be tonight. It is interesting, however, that she appears aware of the upcoming duel.
* * *
As dusk turned to night, Sanguine learned from her mosquito squadron that Colin was already at the club. She still wasn’t sure she could go through with her plan, but the random encounters she’d allowed with Colin weren’t as insightful as she’d hoped. Like most people, he didn’t reveal to strangers what he truly feared.
Enough of the city lay between Bayou Saint John and the French Quarter that so long as she didn’t aim high into the sky, her nightly flight would be hidden from Colin by the buildings. In addition, City Park lay between her and Colin, stretching from the waterway to the lake. Her flight over the trees and lagoons wasn’t quite the same as being over her beloved swamp, but it was the best the city had to offer.
She flew low enough over the manicured marsh to see her alligators lounging in the reeds. “I envy you, hell gators.”
Her biggest challenge while in flight was resisting the temptation to time travel. A little peek at the forward lens of her mulitoptic vision would move her into the future. Staring too long at the images that drifted off behind her would send her back in time.
She closed her eyes and focused on the beating of her wings. The cool fall air felt good on her skin and feathers. The exercise helped calm her fears. Colin might be physically stronger than any woman Sanguine might inhabit, but that was the extent of his dominance. She’d seen him sneak into enough back alleys with various sex-bots to know how empty his life had become. If falling for Kendell had driven him to long for life, maybe becoming infatuated with Sanguine would redirect his desires to hell. What he feels for me doesn’t matter. He’s loathsome. I just need to find out if he’s faking it. Guys are useless at subterfuge while they’re having sex with a real woman.
She spread her wings to their fullest and banked back toward the park. If she didn’t check in on him soon, he might choose another sex doll for his evening’s entertainment. She landed on the large limb of an oak tree overlooking the New Orleans Museum of Art. Mentally, I may have to be jostled in the club, but at least my body will have this refuge.
With her eyes closed, she focused her attention on the women in the club. Like a chess player contemplating her next move, she mentally touched each female voodoo doll to judge Colin’s interest. He sat at the back of the club, wearing tinted glasses to hide his eyes.
She took the body of a petite blonde that could have passed as Kendell’s younger sister. Dancing had never been Sanguine’s strong suit, but showing off the woman’s body didn’t take much skill. If Colin noticed her, he didn’t make it known.
Next, Sanguine tried a redhead with pale skin and too many freckles. Again Colin didn’t seem to notice. A long-legged blonde at the bar was talking to Myles while Charlie looked on enviously. Perfect.
Sanguine took possession of the woman’s body and stared into Myles’s eyes. “Do I have your attention?”
A flash of recognition lit up his eyes. “Do you need me?”
“Just checking in. Don’t freak out if I leave with Colin. And don’t tell Kendell.”
He went back to mixing a margarita without responding.
When Sanguine turned her back to the bar, she noticed that Colin had removed his glasses. She maintained eye contact while taking a long suck on the thin straw of her hurricane. He was out of his chair before she set the tall glass back on the bar.
He walked up and took her hand as if she were a teenager caught out past curfew. “Let’s get out of here.”
Though her normal response to such impudence would have been a slap to the face that would leave a nice red mark, she meekly followed him. “Where are we going?”
He acted as if he hadn’t heard her. Once out on the street and away from the club noise, he guided her toward the alley. “I’ve got a nice secluded spot for us.”
She dug her high heels into the pavement. “So that’s it? You’re just going to haul me out back and screw me? Not very romantic, are you?”
He let go of her hand and turned toward her. “Did you really think we were coming out here to talk?”
“I th
ought maybe you’d buy me something to eat first. Or are you on some kind of fucking schedule? Only so many hours in the night to fill your quota?”
He glanced at the neighboring businesses as if he’d never noticed them before. “Feel like some pizza?”
Though Sanguine was the only actual woman in hell, and Colin had been left to his own devices with the women the team had created, she wondered if he could possibly be that rusty when it came to seduction. “You’re quite the one for foreplay, aren’t you?”
“You know the problem with all you women? Too many questions. I swear, every conversation I get into, all I hear are mindless questions. If I truly thought you could carry on an in-depth discussion for more than five minutes, I’d take you to Commander’s Palace.”
“Challenge accepted. I hope you like vegetarian pizza.” She had long considered what a man would put up with in terms of a first meal with a woman a good indication of his interest in her. Only assholes contradicted a woman’s tastes. If he thought she was wrong about the food, she probably needed to find a different guy.
“Haven’t had it in years,” he said, “but I’m game.”
The small restaurant was nearly empty as all the jazz clubs were in full swing. The quiet atmosphere was a welcome change.
“What shall we talk about?” Sanguine asked.
“Since we’re not just going to go right at it, what’s your name?”
Sanguine quickly accessed the woman’s specifics. Every fake person in hell was a projection of a real human. “I’m Annie.”
“And I’m Colin. It’s nice to meet you.” His response sounded way too patronizing.
“What do you do for a living, Colin?” She hated small talk, but it came easily while she was hiding behind the mask.
“I’m between gigs, but I don’t expect that to last long. I’m currently following a strong lead.”