Black On Black (Quentin Black Mystery #3)

by JC Andrijeski

Even as I asked it, I knew.

  I knew some of it at least.

  His thoughts grew cagier. I can only feel pieces of it, doc...

  I tugged on the chain around my neck. Stop dancing, Black. Tell me. Changing how? I focused back on the ceiling, my face warming. You mean the sex stuff? I grunted. Like the fact I practically raped you while you were here?

  I told you why I said no, he sent. I explained that, Miri.

  I know you did. That wasn’t a dig. Not at you anyway.

  He had explained it. Finally.

  In part, at least.

  We talked about that during the same period when we first started talking again over Christmas. I still couldn’t quite believe his reasons. I don’t mean I think he was lying, but what he’d told me blew my mind a little.

  A ninety-year-old virgin, I mused. How is that possible?

  I’ve fucked humans, he reminded me. A lot of them, Miri.

  I grimaced. I know. I was joking... and gee, thanks for that. I really needed that visual to go with my nightly dose of paranoia... so, thanks, Quentin.

  His pain worsened when I said his given name.

  I felt embarrassment on him too.

  I am embarrassed, he admitted after a pause. That’s why I said it. I apologize.

  Relaxing, I shook my head where it rested on the pillow. His honesty still disarmed me. Especially when it came to personal things.

  Sighing, I sent, Why would you be embarrassed with me of all people? My jaw tightened. I got raped, Black. A psychotic seer raped me. That hardly counts as ‘experience.’

  It’s more experience than I have.

  Feeling my mind spark at that, he sighed, backpedaling again.

  ... You know what I mean. Anyway, neither of us knowing what the hell we’re doing isn’t exactly comforting, Miri.

  I rolled my eyes a little. Even so, I felt him dodging still and it frustrated me, partly because I couldn’t feel what was behind it. I knew he didn’t want to talk about this––about any of it, really––but I had no idea why. When I first met him, he’d been so blunt about sex it constantly caught me off guard. I would have said I was a difficult person to shock before him, but he’d done it pretty much every time we had a conversation.

  Whatever I felt on him now, it wasn’t shyness.

  I smiled wryly. You think I’m going to give you a bad grade on your seer sexual performance, Black?

  There was another silence.

  Miri, he sent, his mind stiff. It’s not a big deal. You’re only half-seer, but your needs are changing. You’re going to need... different things now.

  Different things? I was genuinely thrown. Like what?

  Taking a breath, he hesitated.

  For a second I saw him again, leaning against a stone pillar, aiming the rifle down on a mosaic floor, at least eighty feet below him. He was focused on me, but I felt that split in his mind too, maybe in more than two segments.

  I could almost feel him choosing words before he spoke.

  You’re changing a little more than I thought you would, he admitted after that pause. I just wish I was more... you know. Experienced. With such things.

  I laughed. Jesus, Black. What are we, in high school?

  Miri... stop making this a joke. Please. His thoughts grew serious, open enough to disarm me a second time, and to cut off my laughter. Not when I’m so far away. I’m sorry I said the thing about Solonik. Where I’m from there’s not this weird shame thing you have about rape. I wasn’t implying anything at all about consent... I was being literal and saying you’d actually had physical intercourse with a seer. I haven’t done that with a female seer... even forced. I have zero experience of the anatomy of how that works. I don’t know the angles of it... He trailed, as if searching for words. ... any of it.

  Biting my lip, I nodded, thinking.

  It wasn’t just what he’d said.

  I could feel him trying.

  He’d been trying a lot with me, I realized.

  Pretty much every conversation we had, I felt him trying to communicate with me, to clarify things between us. Ever since Christmas, after those weeks where I’d refused to talk to him, where I got drunk and kissed Nick and Black flipped out, eventually admitting he’d never been with a seer and that he didn’t want me to have sex with anyone else. Ever since then, he seemed to take all of our conversations a hell of a lot more seriously.

  Realizing I wanted to do that too, I exhaled again.

  Okay, I sent. Thanks for explaining that. And I’ll stop teasing you about sex. Just stop talking about what a man-whore you are, okay? I got the memo. I don’t need to hear the details... seriously.

  I felt him agree, even as more relief came off him.

  Understood. I don’t want to hear about your past lovers, either.

  I nodded, smiling a little. Sometimes his language bordered on old-fashioned.

  That warmth coiled deeper between us, making me sink into the mattress. It also made the emotional thing worse.

  Gods. He exhaled and that pain on him sharpened. You contacted me on a job for this? To make me afraid you were breaking up with me? I feel like I should go read seer sex manuals. I’m so turned on and relieved and fucked up right now I might need to jerk off...

  I laughed, unable to help it.

  Then he seemed to remember what we were talking about before.

  You don’t really know where I am, Miri? he sent. You’re not really coming here?

  But I did know. I did know where he was.

  Miri, you can’t come here. You can’t.

  Why not? Are you going to tell me the reason?

  That silence returned. I could feel more there. Things he was unwilling to say. Those things pulled at me, tugging on me in the space between us, fighting for me to understand them. He wanted me to understand them. He wanted it so badly. He wanted me to get some message there, but whatever it was, he couldn’t tell me outright.

  I was still fighting to understand, growing more and more frustrated with every passing second, when he exhaled. I winced, feeling a wave of what could only be depression steal over him. I felt more pain in that too.

  Miri, he sent. I miss you. I miss you so much. But you can’t come here. You can’t.

  I didn’t answer.

  I was still listening, straining to hear.

  The contract is time-limited, he continued. It’s more than half over. I’m coming back, Miri. I promise you I am... as soon as it’s done.

  I nodded, pressing my lips together as I stared at his ceiling.

  But I couldn’t get it. Whatever he wanted me to hear, I couldn’t hear it.

  My thoughts turned bitter.

  You know they’re playing you... don’t you, Black?

  There was a silence, then he exhaled again.

  Yes. But the truth is, from their perspective, I’m a risk to them. I’m a wild card in their eyes... unaffiliated. So they see me as a potential threat. Their primary concern is to make sure that regular humans don’t know too much about people like me. He paused, and I saw him lean back against the stone pillar. They’re worried it might cause a panic. Or persecution. Remember how I said my people were persecuted where I’m from?

  I frowned. He’d said a lot more than that.

  But I’d already picked up that Black thought we were being overheard.

  Whoever was listening, he clearly wanted them to think I was clueless.

  Well. More clueless.

  But why would you ever expose them? I made my thoughts skeptical. Wouldn’t you just be putting yourself at risk, too?

  He sighed. For the barest flicker, I felt gratitude in that sigh.

  He was relieved I was playing along.

  I still didn’t know why though, what he wanted to tell me.

  They don’t know me, doc. To them, I’m an x-factor. The main reason they want me here is to assess my ideology. I think they want to make sure they don’t have to worry about me doing something crazy. That I’m still conscious of t
he dangers around exposure.

  I felt truth in that and nodded, thinking.

  So they were worried about Black being unaffiliated. Check.

  But what else was he trying to tell me?

  Even as I thought it, he sighed again. I felt a faint warning on him that time.

  I shouldn’t even be fucking telling you this, he added. But a lot of what they’re doing while I’m here is testing me. They’re dragging me to these religious things. Having me do hits for them. They ask me to consent to each job first, but it’s like a morality test... like they’re assessing my personal code of ethics. They’re trying to determine how I feel about human beings. They want to know how much I mind killing them. They want to know where I draw the line.

  Pausing, he added, Killing doesn’t come naturally to seers any more than it does to humans, Miri. We have to be trained to kill, just like you do. It might be even harder for us, since we tend to feel more than your race does.

  I nodded. I still couldn’t quite wade through what he was telling me, though.

  I heard him hitting on the “you’re a human” thing pretty hard. Meaning, he wanted whoever was listening on the other end to think of me that way, too. Since it was different from what he’d said to me before, I couldn’t help but be puzzled.

  Clearly, he didn’t want these people thinking of me as seer.

  Again, a warning pulsed off him, rippling over me like an electrical current.

  Black, I sent, pushing the rest out of my mind. What does any of this have to do with me? Why can’t I go there? They must know you and I are dating, right?

  Before I could take a breath, Black surrounded me like a dense cloud. He blocked me off from everything, pressed so far into and against me it stopped my heart. Realizing he was shielding me, that he was shielding both of us, I held my breath.

  You and I are bonding, he murmured in my mind, so soft I barely heard it. He doesn’t like it. That’s why I’m here, doc. He doesn’t like it at all...

  The shield around me abruptly vanished.

  I realized only then that some part of his mind had continued talking while we were in that other place.

  ... the contract’s more than half over. Just wait it out, okay? I’m doing this for Lucky, then I’m out. Just be patient, doc, please. They’re not going to want you here because of the testing thing. And some of the religious stuff is private...

  He hesitated, and I felt a flicker of his nerves.

  ... You’re okay, right? After everything in Bangkok?

  I knew he asked in part to cover up any lingering emotional tension. It scared me sometimes, how calculating he could be.

  To be perfectly honest, it kind of turned me on too.

  I kept those thoughts carefully shielded in the back of my mind.

  As good as can be expected, I sent back drily.

  I made my forward thoughts defeatist, and a little depressed. Like he’d convinced me not to go where he was and I felt let down and a little annoyed with him. Letting that flavor color my light, I sent more of that separation pain towards him too.

  Feeling him react sharply, his own pain spiking violently, I realized my mistake and immediately dialed it back.

  When that desire on him worsened, I covered it up with a sigh, like I hadn’t noticed.

  Black, are you ever going to tell me anything? About the seer thing? About what I am? Half of what I am, anyway? I paused, waiting. When he didn’t answer, I sighed again. You promised you would. Months ago. Getting information out of you is like getting blood out of a stone. All I really know is that you can read minds, like me. Can’t you tell me anything?

  The silence deepened.

  I knew he heard my real question in that.

  I also knew I’d genuinely hurt him, sending him that pain.

  He fought to control his reactions even now, restraining some part of himself that still coiled and seethed in the distance. For the first time, it hit me how much he’d been downplaying that pain between us. He’d joked about sex, but he’d been casual about it, too. There were nights where we spent a fair bit of time messing around in this space, but those had grown less frequent lately as well. I’d thought maybe he was trying to keep things lighter between us while he was gone, since they’d felt a lot less light while he was here.

  Thinking back on what he’d pulled me into that shield to tell me, I wondered just how constructed that casualness had been.

  I started thinking maybe he was hurting as much as I was.

  He let out a soft sound in the space, right before he pulled on me again.

  I miss you, he sent softly. Gaos, doc...

  I nodded, feeling the message there, too.

  I needed more though. Especially if I was going to get him out of there.

  Is there anything you can tell me? I sent. Anything at all? Anything apart from, “you’re changing?” And “stay away from me?” And “you’re psychic”?

  I deliberately used the word psychic. Black told me once that seers didn’t use that word. They had other, much more nuanced words. Hundreds of them, from what he’d said.

  I felt him thinking. I had no idea if that was a front too.

  You’re going to have to wait until I get back, he sent finally. Honestly, there isn’t much to say. I’m affecting you a little... you know that already. And Solonik changed things with the sex. But you’re going to be fine. I promise you. It’s nothing to worry about...

  As he spoke, I got the barest glimpse of an image.

  It was there and then gone, like a few frames spliced into a longer film.

  In that millisecond, I saw a jumping orca and three stars.

  Can you wait? he said, softer. Can you wait until I get back, honey?

  I nodded.

  I can wait, I told him.

  I felt his relief. Good. Thank you.

  But I wasn’t going to wait.

  I was pretty sure Black knew that.

  I was also pretty sure he didn’t know the extent of it, however.

  Six

  CONFESSIONS

  THE PAIN IN his light worsened, before he even saw her.

  He knew that had to be coming from the construct here too.

  I didn’t fully understand what he meant by “construct,” but I could tell it had something to do with the building where he stood, the overall flavor of what lived inside it.

  I don’t think you’ve yet have the pleasure of our pet... have you, Mr. Black?

  The man sitting at the head of the table looked like a vampire to me. Like a villain from some kind of fairy tale. It wasn’t Lucky, though.

  I knew that from Black, too.

  Black was wary of this male, however. Very wary.

  The vampire-looking male worked for Lucky. His exact place inside this revolving palace of bullshit was unclear, but Black knew he had to be relatively high up. Middle management, at the very least. Black suspected higher.

  When the man motioned him deeper into the room, Black glanced around, feigning nonchalance.

  The high-ceilinged room recalled its older roots in more ways than one.

  Chandeliers hung from the ceiling, dotted with real candles dripping white wax. Food covered the long wooden table in front of him, even though most of the chairs remained empty. Black knew he’d been called up early, prior to the end of the religious revival, or whatever the fuck was going on downstairs.

  Apparently they pulled him out so he and the vampire could have this little face-to-face.

  Black was just as happy to skip the fanatical crap, but being up here alone with this sociopath didn’t exactly reassure him.

  He sat when the older seer motioned for him to sit.

  He felt naked without his gun, which they’d confiscated at the door. Even apart from the physical insecurity of being in here alone, he could feel them fucking with his light already.

  They were constantly fucking with his light.

  I felt him thinking about me.

  He pushed me out of h
is mind too though, even as that pain worsened, growing briefly bad enough that he clenched his jaw. He knew they were doing that too, at least in part. He knew it even before he saw where the vampire motioned with one pale hand.

  Go on, the man with pale yellow eyes urged, smiling. Offer yourself to her. She feels empty without a cock in her, brother...

  The seer was handsome, if in a goth-y, devoid of color kind of way.

  He looked almost albino with his porcelain skin, those eerie yellow eyes and his long, white hair, perfectly framing high cheekbones and a flawless face with full, red lips.

  He really did look like a vampire.

  Black heard somewhere that this sick fuck got off on cultivating that image deliberately. Probably to scare humans. Either way, apparently he got a kick out of adhering to as much of the mythology as he could. Only going out at night. Drinking blood. Avoiding the sun.

  He was a fucking psycho of the highest order, in other words.

  He called himself “Grigoire.”

  Black doubted that was his real name.

  Go ahead, the male seer urged, motioning towards the naked female on the floor. She’s dying to get her mouth on you, brother... and she’s been trained very well. You won’t regret it, I promise you. And she doesn’t eat until she swallows... He stroked the female’s hair, like she was a dog. Isn’t that right, my darling... ? he cooed at her. You’re hungry, aren’t you, sister?

  Black fought back a grimace. He barely gave the female a glance.

  It wasn’t the first time they’d offered him sex, of course.

  He’d even heard the story with this particular seer. According to some of the “faithful” downstairs, chanting like zombies in the underground church of crazytown, she’d crossed Lucky’s people, trying to free their other captive females.

  She was a seer herself of course, one of only a handful in this world, and they’d basically broken her mind for her “insubordination.”

  From what Black could tell, they’d tagged a number of females here as a kind of resource for Lucky’s crew. The excuse he’d been given was for the continuation of the race, but he knew that’s all it was. An excuse. The idea that they’d basically enslaved their own infuriated him, but he’d learned to keep his mouth shut about a lot of things since he’d gotten here.