by Amber Garr
A few hours later, when the drinking slowed down and everyone had thoroughly stuffed themselves, some of the guests left, while others tried to move the party elsewhere.
“Come on everyone. Let’s go to Vogue,” pleaded Detective Remington. Vogue, a bar and nightclub, was a popular spot on Thursday nights. Considering most of the guests were on duty tomorrow morning, I wasn’t surprised to hear a lot of declines.
“I need to get this old man home and into bed,” Mimi said, hoisting her husband up and around her shoulders in support. “Happy birthday, Garrick.”
Garrick held up his drink in a salute. “Thanks, Mimi. And you take care of him, okay?” She nodded and the two slowly made it out of the restaurant. Sara shook my arm and whispered into my ear. “What do you think? Let’s hang out a little longer.”
I made a face. “I don’t know.”
“Oh, come on. Live a little. We can stay for another hour or so.” She climbed into my lap like a child. “Please, Leila? It will be fun. I promise.”
I turned to look at Garrick who seemed to admire this display as much as the rest of the guys still at the table. He laughed and shrugged his shoulders, then downed the rest of his drink. “Okay, let’s go.”
I guess that meant us too. The six of us who decided to continue partying walked the short distance to Vogue. The club was quite large and once we got through a short stuffy hallway, it opened up into a two story warehouse-like structure with multiple bars and one massive dance floor in the center. Although early, the place was crowded with an eclectic group of college students, young professionals, and middle-aged divorcees.
The DJ mixed songs that ranged from the early eighties to the current hits, and the dance floor shimmered with gyrating bodies. We made our way to the bar where someone in our party ordered a round of shots. I knew I would regret this in the morning, but chose to push that thought to the back of my mind. I did, however, decide this was my last drink for the night.
Garrick and I gravitated toward each other the entire evening. Occasionally he would place his hand on my lower back, or I would lean against him when we laughed about something. I’d had enough to drink that my visions weren’t jumping to the forefront with every little contact. For the first time in a long time, I let myself fully enjoy the company. Sara was the center of attention, like always, but her carefree and flirtatious way kept the mood light and the conversations interesting.
Although I’d been genuinely enjoying myself, I hadn’t forgotten that I needed to tell Garrick about the rest of my vision. I just got up the courage to talk to him, when Sara grabbed me and pulled me onto the dance floor. The DJ now played full-blown club music and I couldn’t stop myself from moving. It had been so long since I’d been out dancing with Sara. More than a year ago, I thought.
We moved like the world around us didn’t exist even though I could feel the stares and noticed the men who tried to approach us. But we stayed in our own little world as we rocked our hips and swiveled to the beat. I took off my sweater and tied it around my waist. Thankfully, I’d worn a decent tank top underneath. My hair stuck to my neck, but I didn’t care as I continued to dance the rest of my anxiety away.
A few songs later, the men in our party interrupted us. Or two of them anyway. Garrick and Detective Remington joined our makeshift circle and began dancing. Well, I’m not sure I would call their awkward bouncy movements dancing per se, but at least they were in tune with the beat.
At one point, I’d been holding my hair up off my neck and back, fanning myself in an attempt to cool off, when Garrick snuck his arms around my waist and pulled me a little closer to him. Not so close we rubbed against each other, but closer than I would have initiated on my own. Although shocked at first, I forced my body to settle down and enjoy the moment. We swayed to a reggae techno song and I closed my eyes to imagine dancing on a beach somewhere warm and tropical. Garrick and I continued to move together, even pulling off some steps that prompted me to ask him if he ever took swing dancing lessons before. He pleaded the fifth.
When we all needed a break, we joined the rest of our party at the largest bar. I ordered water and Garrick did the same. Mustering up my courage, I decided to take care of business before getting distracted again. I leaned close enough to speak into his ear.
“Garrick, I need to talk to you about something.”
His smile faltered and I saw disappointment consuming his face. “Is something wrong? Did I push it too much with the dancing?”
“What? Oh, no. It’s not that. I’ve been having a good time.” I took another sip of my water. “I know this may not be the best place, but I remembered something about my vision. With Angela. There was something else I didn’t tell you because I didn’t notice it the other day.” Hopefully he would believe that.
His eyes widened in understanding and he put his arm over my shoulders to lead us away from the music and toward the front doors. I caught Sara’s eyes and mouthed that I’d be right back. She smiled and tipped her glass to me before turning her attention back to the three policemen at the bar.
Garrick led us past the security guy, who put an invisible stamp on our hands, and ushered me out the front door. The cold air shocked my senses and I quickly put my sweater back on. We found an empty bench not far from the club, private enough that no one should overhear. Garrick switched into detective mode instantly.
“What else did you see?”
I took a deep breath. “I’m pretty sure I saw Jake Montgomery in Angela’s room, and he was the one who knocked her out.” I still didn’t think that it was a good idea to say he knocked her out with magic.
Garrick’s response was silence. I could almost see him trying to link the brother’s odd behavior to what I told him now. “Do you think he could have been involved in his sister’s murder?”
“I didn’t see him in my visions that time. But there does seem to be something …off about him. I can’t explain it, but he exudes darkness, or evil, or just something wrong.”
He sat back against the bench and looked thoughtfully out over the darkened harbor. I hoped I made the right choice, telling him about this. I didn’t know exactly what Jake was doing, but I didn’t want Garrick to get dragged into it. He was a good cop, with a reliable partner, but I still worried about his safety. Especially when I knew they were dealing with supernaturals.
He reached into his back pocket and pulled out a tiny notepad with an even smaller pencil. “Okay, let’s go through this step by step again. Tell me everything you noticed in your visions.”
I did and we sat there for at least thirty minutes reanalyzing everything once more. I found out they had no leads on Angela’s whereabouts and that the mayor was only making a difficult situation worse with his media rants. Now, more than ever, I was ready to help break into the witch’s house tomorrow night so that we could stop this. The toll it had taken on the police, let alone the torture each family had to be going through, had to end.
We finally made it back into the club and by midnight, Sara and I drove home. She fell asleep, but I was secretively appreciative I didn’t need to rehash the entire evening with her. Besides, my lightheartedness faded, and I found myself only able to focus on the task tomorrow night, hoping I would be able to pull off my part.
Fourteen
I planned to be ready at eight. Conner would pick me up while King and Gallus scoped out the house. Apparently Leanna and Atticus had some prep work of their own and they would join us before we needed to get inside.
What does one wear when they commit the first felony of their life? I probably spent two hours going through my closest trying to find something criminal. It had to be black. Yes, definitely black. I finally settled on a turtleneck, spandex workout pants, and the only pair of black sneakers I’d ever owned. They were left over from my waitressing days and I was pleasantly surprised to see they were still in good shape, even if they did smell a little like grease.
I just finished pulling my hair back into a low
bun, like spy girls do in the movies, when the doorbell rang. Conner was here, making my heart flutter. Last night had been a lot of fun and I really enjoyed my evening with Garrick, but this was the first time any man had been to my house who wasn’t a family member or part of the police force since Russ was killed. This was also the first time I’d ever had a half demon in the house, at least as far as I knew. After another quick glance in the mirror, I bounced over to the door.
And as soon as I opened it I realized how much of a dork I must have looked like.
There was Conner, in a regular pair of jeans and a college sweatshirt doing all that he could not to laugh at me. I glared up at him.
“What? No one told me what to wear so I had to improvise.” He started laughing but then choked it back down when I tried to close the door on him. His foot shot out and blocked my attempt.
“I’m sorry. You look good. Really.” He smiled fully at me and bowed his head as he put his hands together in a prayer-like position. “May I have permission to enter my ninja warrior princess?”
I could see his shoulders shake with amusement again and I refused to be embarrassed. With an exaggerated sigh, I walked back into my bedroom, leaving Conner to let himself in. I decided he should wallow in uncomfortable silence for a while, although when I came back into the living room and saw him flipping through some of my illustrations, I knew he was unfazed.
“These are really good. You’re quite talented.” I leaned against the wall for a few seconds trying to judge if he was being serious or not. Just as I started to give him the benefit of the doubt, he arched an eyebrow my way and said, “A much better artist than fashionista.”
I threw my sweatshirt at him and stomped over to the kitchen. His laugh consumed the room and I was surprised to find a smile on my face as I opened the refrigerator.
“Should we take snacks?” I asked. We were going to drive to a spot close to the house and wait until it was clear. I’d been told it might take several hours and I didn’t want the cambion getting hungry while we waited.
“Sure, if you want. Maybe some water would be good,” he snickered. It was obvious that he enjoyed my lack of stake-out abilities.
I grabbed one of my reusable grocery bags and filled it up with water, crackers, and Twizzlers. All of the essentials. I briefly considered grabbing a bottle of wine to control my anxiety, but decided against it in the end.
“So, are we ready to go?” I asked, hoisting the bag on my shoulder and grabbing the sweatshirt back from Conner’s hands. He studied me for a moment then pulled an object from his back pocket.
“Not until you put this on,” he said as he tossed something small and black at me. It was a ski mask, one of those ones that covered everything except for your eyes. I pulled it over my head and batted my lashes.
“Am I ready now?”
He laughed and took the snack bag off my shoulder. “Yes, Leila. I think you’re ready for a life of crime.”
Even though I knew he was joking, it helped to make the situation a little more bearable.
We climbed into Conner’s fun car and headed to our stake-out position. Once again, it was in an area in the suburbs that I wasn’t completely familiar with. When he pulled into a fast food restaurant that advertised being open twenty four hours, I assumed this was our waiting spot. Looking around, I noticed that it was one stop light away from an entrance to a housing development.
“Is that where we’re going?” I asked, pointing in the direction of the entrance. Catching my focus, he nodded.
“Yes. That’s where the witch resides.” He turned off the car and pushed his seat back into a more relaxed position. “We’ll wait here until we hear from Gallus.”
Reclining my seat as well, I made myself more comfortable. “Okay then.”
We sat there for what felt like hours, but must have been ten minutes. I began gnawing on the licorice so I’d have something to do. I counted to sixty as another minute passed. Conner looked like he was trying to take a nap, but I could see the smirk on his face.
“What?” I asked.
He turned his head against the back of the seat and looked at me. “I can tell the silence is killing you.”
“So?” I was very articulate tonight.
He smiled more broadly. “So…go ahead and ask.” He pushed his seat down even further and closed his eyes. “Ask me what you’ve been dying to ask. I’ll be honest with you and we can talk openly until we get the phone call from Gallus.”
So he was giving me a deadline. Ask now or forever hold my peace. I glanced in his direction again only to see another smirk on his face. If he thought I wouldn’t take advantage of the situation, then he was surely mistaken.
I blurted out the first question on my mind. “How old are you?”
He crossed both hands over his heart. “Oh. Straight to the tough ones.” I could tell he was smiling and trying to tease me. Apparently, a little breaking and entering put Conner Hoffman in a cheery mood. “I am quickly approaching one thousand years old.”
I stared at him in disbelief. “How is that possible?” I gasped.
“Well, since I’m the product of an immortal demon and mortal mother, I age at a slightly different pace than most.”
“I’d say so.” One thousand years old. I couldn’t even begin to understand what that meant. “But you look like you’re in your twenties or thirties.”
“Yes, well, that is also part of the secret.” He finally opened his eyes and twisted in his seat to face me. “Up until age seven, I didn’t even appear to be alive. No pulse, no movement. For all intents and purposes I was dead, yet I still aged.” He wiped his hands on his thighs. “Or at least that’s what I’ve been told. I don’t remember much.”
This was unbelievable. I vaguely recalled seeing something about that on the paranormal website. So I added, “Yes, I think I read about that.”
He laughed louder this time. “You read about me?”
“Not you exactly, but yeah, I did a little research about all of you…supernaturals.” He seemed amused and somewhat pleased with that. Without coaxing him, he continued with his story.
“Once I reached puberty, about sixteen or so, my aging slowed down dramatically. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not like that dead bloodsucker, I still age, but the best I can tell is that it’s at a pace of about one year for every hundred human years.”
“Oh! Like a dog then?” I questioned before realizing that I’d just compared him to man’s best friend. “No, that’s not what I meant. What I meant was that we’d have to compare you to how we age dogs.” I stuttered on. “No…I mean you age at a different rate, like a dog.”
He thoroughly enjoyed my unease, and didn’t make any move to bail me out. Instead he placed a hand on the leg that I had curled underneath me.
“Relax Leila, I know what you mean.”
A great sense of electricity flowed through my body from that one touch. It reminded me that we’d touched before and I thought about the visions at the football game. I guess now was the time to ask…
“So what was I seeing when I read your hand at the stadium?”
“I don’t know what you saw. If you can tell me, I might be able to explain it.”
Okay. Shaking my head, I tried to organize my thoughts and choose the most pressing question. After all, I didn’t know how much more time I had before Gallus would call. “I saw you standing in front of a mirror.” Apparently that wasn’t enough information because he looked at me with a blank face asking me to continue. “You looked upset.” I tried to think about how to word the next part and couldn’t come up with a diplomatic solution. “You had red eyes and really pointy teeth in your mouth,” I blurted out, obviously failing to be tactful.
With that declaration, he sighed and laid his head back against the seat in apparent exhaustion. “Yes, I was afraid of that.”
Silence filled the car much to my dismay. But considering the topic, I decided not to push him. Finally, he spoke again.
“I’m going to tell you a story, Leila. One that very few humans know.” He used the tiny lever to pull his seat back into a driving position, placed both hands on the steering wheel, and gazed out the front window. I suddenly felt very uncomfortable.
“You don’t have to tell me. It’s okay, I can live without that knowledge.” Even though I really wanted to know, I certainly didn’t want to be one of the only humans privy to whatever it was he would tell me. It felt like that might be too risky.
Sensing my unease, he laughed a little. “Breathe. I can tell you’re afraid. It’s not like it’s a huge secret for people like us. It’s just that there are only a handful of cambions in the world today, so most people don’t know much about the intricacies of our existence. I promise I can tell you without having to kill you afterwards.”
Oh, so funny, that one. My heart beat a hundred miles an hour and he was making death jokes. And how could he tell that I was afraid? He continued without acknowledging my inner monologue.
“As a half demon, I’m not totally immune from the obligations of that world. Ever since my aging slowed and I obtained some of their skills, I’ve had to do certain…tasks for my demon sire.” Not seeing the reaction written all over my face, he continued. “I’ve inherited abilities that make me a very lethal being. Demons are known for collecting souls and I am obligated to assist them.” He said the last statement with such nonchalance, I almost thought he was testing my sanity.
“Collecting souls?” I dared to ask.
With a sigh he turned his attention to me. “It’s complicated. I don’t actually suck the life out of them, but…I do take their life. I’m pretty much the most perfect assassin ever created.” Before I could form some type of response, he hurriedly said, “But that part of my life is over now. I have fulfilled my responsibilities, and I’m free to live as a full human.” He looked back out the window.
I still couldn’t move. I was sitting next to a killer who’s been perfecting his techniques for nearly a millennia. Panic overwhelmed me and I didn’t know if I should try to run or try not to make any sudden moves. I guess when you find out someone is a half demon, you have to expect that there may be some evil involved. But to actually hear about it first-hand…that was a bit much. Conner inhaled deeply and closed his eyes.