Love Charms

by Multiple

  “Hello, darling!” It was Dita’s voice, bright and full of laughter. “You didn’t get stung, did you?”

  Annie rolled her eyes at the phone. Damn Caller I.D. “No. Listen, I have your honey, but I want—”

  “I’m on my way out, dear.” Dita’s voice changed. She immediately sounded colder, more distant. Disappointed? Annie frowned at the phone as the woman spoke. “But if you want to talk, meet me at The Styx tonight at ten. Bring my honey!”

  “The… Styx?” Annie’s lips felt numb, like she could barely get the words out. “Listen, lady, I can’t keep—”

  “It’s an after-hours club, very posh.” Dita went on as if Annie hadn’t spoken at all. “Fourth and Rochester, right on the corner. You can’t miss it. See you tonight!”

  Annie blinked as the phone went dead in her hand. Is this worth it? she wondered, flipping the lid closed and tossing the phone onto the seat beside her. Closing her eyes, she rested her forehead against the steering wheel, remembering Eric’s smile in the darkness. The recollection flooded her with warmth, and she sighed. I’ll find you, Eric. I promise. No matter what it takes.

  Chapter Five

  The night was cool for May, and Annie stood shivering in the long line. She wished she’d worn more than just the sheer black blouse with a lacy black bra underneath and a black miniskirt. It had been ages since she’d gone clubbing, and she had no idea what they wore anymore. Can’t go wrong with black—that was what she’d thought when she pulled on the same soft, knee-high boots she’d worn the night she met Eric. Now that her teeth were chattering and the crowd stretched around the corner of the building, she wasn’t so sure. She remembered his hands and mouth on her thighs—how they’d shivered for other reasons that night. Not tonight, babe. It’s so damned cold out here, if you licked my thigh, your tongue would stick! She wished she had at least worn a pair of tights!

  “Would you like my coat?” The smooth voice behind Annie startled her and she glanced back to see a tall man with a goatee shrugging off the long leather duster he was wearing.

  “Oh, no, that’s—” Annie’s protest was met with a wink as he slipped his coat over her shoulders. It was a nice length and covered her to the tops of her boots.

  “I insist.” He pulled the collar together under her chin. “You’re shivering like a church mouse, and I don’t really get cold until temperatures drop into single digits.”

  The coat cut the chill of the wind instantly and Annie hugged it gratefully around her shoulders. “Thank you. I wasn’t prepared for such a long line.”

  He nodded, rolling his eyes. “I think Styx wants to be the Club 54 for the new millennium.”

  “Styx…” She looked up at the purple neon sign displayed prominently on the side of the building. “If I remember right, I think my high school graduating class chose ‘Come Sail Away’ as our class song.”

  He laughed. “No, no…not that Styx…”

  “Oh.” Annie flushed. “So much for Kilroy.”

  “I think the band named themselves after the original, though.” He chuckled. “You know…the mythical Greek river of death?”

  “How festive.” Annie wrinkled her nose and glanced up at the stark letters again.

  He winked at her. “Oh, but so very chic and goth and all that stuff.”

  “Of course.” She smiled back at him.

  “I’m Herman, by the way.” He held out a warm, strong hand at the end of a very well-developed arm Annie couldn’t help but admire as she shook hands with him. He was wearing just a black t-shirt, but didn’t appear cold at all. She met his eyes, which were bright even in the dim light of the streetlamps.

  “Herman? As in Munster?” she teased, introducing herself. “I’m Annie.”

  “As in Melville, actually. My mother was an English major. At least she didn’t name me Moby…or Dick.” He grinned and she couldn’t help laughing. “Annie, like the curly redheaded waif?”

  She snorted. “My mother would have died before she named me after either a comic strip or a musical. Anne is a family name. All our names are snobbish that way. Chloe and Rebecca, my sisters—those are family names, too.”

  “It’s better than Herman.” He nudged her a little as the lined moved up. Annie shifted nervously, glancing toward the door. “So is this your first time to Styx?”

  “Yes.” She admitted it with a shrug. “I really don’t do the club scene. I’m meeting someone here.”

  “Boyfriend?” He raised an eyebrow at her.

  “No.” She shook her head.

  “Girlfriend?” Now it was both eyebrows.

  She smiled. “No. I’m meeting my boyfriend’s mother. Well, sort of. It’s complicated.”

  “Ah, going to dish about him behind his back and all that catty girl stuff, huh?”

  Annie snorted. “Not exactly. Although I am trying to get information, I suppose. Dita doesn’t make it easy.”

  “Dita?” The look on Herman’s face showed genuine surprise.

  “Do you know her?”

  He shrugged one shoulder. “I think everyone knows her.”

  “I’m beginning to believe that.” Annie rolled her eyes. “How do you know her?” It was a long shot, but maybe if he knew Dita, he would know Eric, too.

  “I would say we’re just casual acquaintances. So Dita invited you to the Styx…” Herman leaned back against the wall, crossing his arms, and she could see the faint edge of a black tattoo under the sleeve of his shirt. He tilted his head at her and smiled. “Styx is a little more exclusive than other clubs, you know.”

  She frowned. “How do you mean?”

  “Well, for starters, not everyone gets in.”

  His words made her heart drop and she swallowed. “Really?”

  They edged forward and Annie saw several people being turned away at the front of the line as Herman went on telling her about the club. “It used to be by invitation only. Now it’s by list. Of course, you can get in if you’re well-known, or with someone well-known.”

  Now she had to be on some list to get in? Great. Annie hoped Dita had put her name down on it. “If it’s so popular, why have I never heard of it?”

  “Ah, but it’s not popular.” He corrected her with a wag of his finger. “It’s exclusive. There’s a big difference. Even this location’s history is a bit of a secret, you know.”

  Annie tilted her head curiously at him. “How so?”

  “Well, I could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you…” He grinned, his bright eyes glittering with humor. She shook her head but laughed anyway. “Just kidding. Believe it or not, this place used to be a monastery.”

  “From monastery to nightclub?” She wrinkled her nose at the long, warehouse-like side of the brick building. “That’s a stretch.”

  “Well, not so far as you’d think,” he countered. “The monks who worked here made beer and wine and other various alcoholic beverages.”

  Annie raised her eyebrows. “Isn’t that sort of a conflict of interests for monks?”

  “Nah.” Herman waved her question away. “Alcohol has rarely been off-limits in religion. Sex? Yes. Getting drunk? Not so much. Most religions throughout history have used alcohol, actually, in their rituals. You know, the whole bread and wine routine? The Greeks had Dionysus—one whole god devoted entirely to alcohol! Besides, haven’t you ever met an Irish Catholic priest?”

  “Okay. I guess you have a point,” she admitted with a smile. “So these monks made booze and got ritually sloshed? Not a bad setup, when you think about it. What happened to them?”

  “This place was a monastery and a distillery back before the Revolutionary War,” he explained. “But I think the Order of Gabriel went underground some time in the eighteen-hundreds.”

  “The Order of Gabriel.” She repeated the words as they moved up together in line. Standing next to him was actually more effective in keeping her warm than his coat was. And she was grateful for his presence. “I’ve never heard of it. Wasn’t Gabriel the Angel
of Death?”

  “Yes.” Herman nodded, smiling as she edged a little closer to him in the chilly night air. “In some Christian doctrine, he was so called. He was also known as the Spirit of Truth.”

  “Interesting…what happened to them? The monks, I mean?” Annie was curious, although she was a little incredulous at the turn their conversation had taken.

  Herman shrugged. “The monastery closed down. During prohibition, the distillery became a factory. Styx bought it ten years ago and turned it into an after-hours club. As for the Order of Gabriel, they never disbanded. Rumor has it that they continue to protect the secret of life and death to this day, although no one knows where the sect is located anymore.”

  “The secret of life and death?” Annie blinked up at him. “They protected the secret of life and death?”

  He nodded, smiling at the stunned look on her face. “What else would the Order of Gabriel protect?”

  “Why do I feel like I’ve just been plopped down into the middle of the Da Vinci Code?” she murmured, shaking her head and glancing toward the ever-nearing door with a little laugh. She spoke mostly to herself. “First bees and now secret monastic sects…I can’t imagine what’s next.”

  “Bees?” He cocked his head at her, his smile bemused.

  “Never mind.” It was Annie’s turn to wave his question away. “It’s a long story. So tell me, Herman…what is the secret of life and death?”

  “Do you really want to know?” His question was casual, but his eyes were very serious and she found herself transfixed by his steady gaze.

  Finally, she nodded. “I think I need to know.”

  Leaning in to her, he warmed her ear with a whisper. “The secret is…death is not the end.”

  Annie let his words sink in, trying to comprehend the fullness of them, and found that she couldn’t. Instead, she turned and asked him, “How do you know all of this?”

  “Let’s just say I’m a bit of a trivia buff.” He winked and crossed his arms and Annie again glimpsed a fuller view of the black tattoo on his upper arm. She lifted the sleeve of his shirt slightly to reveal several strange characters that wrapped around his upper arm: Γαψρηελ.

  Annie raised her eyebrows. “Why don’t I believe you?”

  “I bet you want to know what it says?”

  She nodded, studying the tattoo. “Is it Greek?”

  “It’s all Greek to me.” He winked. Leaning close, he whispered, “It says…Gabriel.”

  “Why am I not surprised?” She smiled up at him. “Just a bit of a history buff, huh?”

  “Hey, would you look at that! A lucky penny!” Herman stooped to pick it up off the ground. “What’s that old saying?”

  Annie murmured it, a rhyme right out of childhood. “See a penny, pick it up, and all the day, you’ll have good luck?”

  “That’s it!” He held the penny up to the light. It gleamed as he turned it from side to side. “Did you know there’s more to that saying?”

  “No.” Annie shook her head and smiled. “But I bet you know it.”

  He beamed. “I do! ‘See a penny, let it lay, and bad luck you’ll have all day.’”

  “Good thing I’m not superstitious.” She pulled his coat around her, shivering and still somehow feeling cold, even though her body was warm enough now. “I don’t believe in black cats or broken mirrors or lucky pennies…or boozehound monks who protect the secret of life and death, for that matter.”

  Herman gave her a lopsided smile. “My mother used to have another saying.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Better safe than sorry.” He winked and pressed the penny into her hand, folding her fingers carefully over it. “I think you’ll be glad we picked this one up.”

  Annie was surprised the coin felt warm. She would have opened her hand to look at it, but they had reached the front of the line and a voice distracted her.

  “Who are you?” The doorman’s eyes swept over her and Annie felt herself shrinking.

  “A—Annie Thanos.” She stumbled over her own name as he glanced down at the clipboard he was holding.

  “You’re not on my list.”

  Damn Dita. Of course, she would end up waiting out here this whole time and not be on the list to get in! After the coffee bean fiasco and the bizarre honey bee pursuit, Annie wouldn’t put anything past the woman.

  “She’s on my list, Doc.” Herman winked as he slipped his coat off her shoulders. The sudden change in temperature made Annie shiver as she glanced over her shoulder at him. “Let her in.”

  “All right.” The doorman gave Herman a nod and stepped aside.

  “Aren’t you coming?” Annie stared back, incredulous, as she started through the door.

  “Nope.” Herman waved her on. “I like it better in line…between Scylla and Charybdis!” She shook her head at the obscure reference to Greek mythology—the origin of the phrase “between a rock and a hard place.” He winked and disappeared back into the line as she made her way into the club, and she didn’t have any more time to wonder at his strange allusion.

  The club was dark and loud and sought to swallow her whole. There were so many people it was hard to move. So much for exclusive. She shaded her eyes against the pulsing colored lights and looked for Dita. How was she ever going to find her? The club was huge, laid out in several levels, very like a warehouse with steel railings and stairways. The place was hazed with a thick blue light that seemed to come from everywhere at once. Annie noted the lights located high above, placed sporadically on the warehouse ceiling.

  Looking up, she spotted a crowd of people on the second level, all grouped together. Then she heard a high, familiar laugh, floating over the pounding of the music coming through the dance floor speakers that were taller than she was. She knew she had found Dita.

  Annie’s boot heels clicked against the metal as she made her way through the couples dancing together on the stairs. Edging her way against the railing, Annie made her way toward the throng of people that surrounded Dita as if she were some modern day Scarlett O’Hara entertaining a crowd of would-be suitors. Dita’s eyes met hers through the crowd and Annie reached into her skirt pocket to pull out the jar of honey she had put there on her way out the door that night. She waved the honey back and forth and heard Dita squeal in delight as she stood and beckoned to Annie.

  “Oh, yes!” The woman’s voice was unmistakable. The crowd parted like the Red Sea as Dita moved toward her. The woman snatched the jar of honey from Annie’s hand and held it up to the light as if she were looking at gold. “Perfect! Lovely! Thank you, dear.”

  Annie pursed her lips and put a hand on each hip. She had to speak loudly to be heard over the music. “Eric doesn’t live with Virgil!”

  Dita raised her eyebrows. “I never said he did. Would you like a drink?”

  “No…thanks.” Annie shook her head, eyeing the older woman. “Why didn’t you just give me Eric’s address?”

  “I didn’t know if he wanted you to have it,” Dita confessed with a smile. “Would you mind running down to the bar to get me a drink? I’m simply parched!”

  Annie rolled her eyes. “I’m sure one of your…followers…would be happy to do it.” She glanced around at the throng of onlookers, who were quietly watching them both. “I just want to know where Eric is. Tell me and I’ll go.”

  “Now dearest…” Dita put her arm around Annie’s shoulders and steered her toward the stairwell. “I’ll tell you everything you want to know. Just be a love and run down to the bar and ask the white-haired gentleman back there for a Black Death.”

  “A…what?” Annie frowned at the older woman. If that was a drink, it was one she had never heard of.

  “A Black Death,” Dita repeated clearly. “And if he tries to make it with vodka, be sure to tell him you want the real thing.”

  Annie shook her head and sighed as she tromped her way back down the stairs. She found herself standing dutifully at the bar, waiting in line for a drink. Just
like a good little girl. Her face burned and she looked down at the glass in the bartender’s hand, her mood darkening as she moved to the front of the line.

  “Can I have a Black Death, please?” Annie asked the white-haired bartender. She had made sure she was in his line, just like Dita had directed. He lifted the hood covering his snowy head and raised his eyebrows at her. All the bartenders were dressed in black robes with hoods, probably to accentuate the whole River Styx theme, she mused, as the old man stood and blinked at her.

  “Sure thing.” A martini glass was up on the bar before Annie could even blink and she saw him take the cap off a dark-colored bottle of vodka.

  “Oh, wait—” She smiled apologetically and placed her hand over the rim of the glass. “Dita told me to tell you, if you started to make it with vodka, that she wanted the real thing. I’m sorry. Does that mean anything to you?”

  “Dita?” His eyebrows rose further and he put the cap back onto the bottle. “Indeed. Does it mean anything to you?”

  Annie shook her head, giving him a puzzled look as he lifted the gate at the end of the bar and stepped out from behind.

  “If you want the real thing, you must pay your passage.”

  “Passage?” Annie sighed. Of course she would end up getting stuck with the bill. “I don’t suppose Dita has a tab running here?”

  The old man smiled, easing his hood back slightly. “Those unlucky souls who come without coin are denied, I’m afraid.”

  Unlucky souls? See a penny, pick it up, and all the day, you’ll have good luck. Annie opened her hand, still closed around the penny Herman had placed there. She had forgotten about it entirely.

  “Ah…yes.” The man plucked the coin from her palm and Annie only saw a brief glimpse, but it didn’t look like a penny to her. No longer a small copper thing, it seemed to glimmer gold in the blue light from above as he held it up to briefly inspect it before putting it into a pocket in his robe. “Follow me,” he directed, waving her toward a door next to the bar that swung on its hinges as they walked through. The corridor was dimly lit, and Annie took a few hesitant steps and then stopped.