by Jamie Quaid
“No will here,” Frank declared. Since he was our Finder, we were inclined to accept his word over that of Max’s suits.
“That’s because it’s at Acme, I told you,” Andre said. “Does Paddy need a court order to search?”
“As things stand, the MacNeills have the controlling share. If they object to a search, a court order could take weeks, even if we get Dane’s agreement,” I warned, not trusting Andre’s weird predictions, even if they were right.
Paddy met my gaze. He had no intention of leaving Acme in enemy hands for weeks. Neither did I, not if it meant leaving Bill and Leibowitz and the other patients trapped as guinea pigs.
Shit. I knew what that meant.
23
Once we returned to our part of town, I didn’t want to be left alone. The guys dropped me off to change out of my bat-smeared clothes, but, figuring I’d have nightmares of rat faces frying in hell, I agreed to meet them at Chesty’s for a meal and maybe a powwow. I changed into a pair of battered leather pants and a billowy black silk blouse that hid my arms and not much else. The genie effect made me feel almost normal.
I sought the comfort of friends to cure my jitters. I walked down the main drag, avoiding the mobile Dumpsters lurking near the polluted harbor. Maybe they only danced under a full moon, but in my current state of trepidation I wasn’t taking chances. As it was, the ground rumbled beneath my feet, and I started seeing bats swooping around the burned-out chimneys of the old plant. In his bag, Milo stiffened in alarm, not reassuring me.
Earthquakes seriously dampened any furious need to raid the dungeon again, except now I worried about Bill being buried in rubble. If Paddy didn’t think he could find a will in time to rescue the patients . . . Like a rat in a maze, my brain frantically sought a way out.
The gargoyle on the florist’s shop eyed me balefully. A whiff of sulfur rose from the sewer, but all else seemed as normal as the Zone gets. I’d worked at Chesty’s enough to be more at home with murals of nudes dancing—literally—than in Snodgrass’s stuffy office or the Vanderventer mansion.
Barely dressed waitresses waved greetings as I entered and headed back to the others commandeering my favorite booth in the back. Sarah didn’t work here at this hour. She was too afraid of people. Or men. Or of being startled into a chimp. But I was glad she was back from zombiedom. She didn’t deserve whatever green gas had done to her.
Okay, maybe Sarah did deserve it. Her moral center was pretty warped, but that’s what happens when you’re raised by a serial killer. Still, I couldn’t condemn her for killing her abusive husband—another gray area that haunted my conscience. I hoped the Zone would make her better, as it had people like Bill and Andre, who’d been heading the wrong way down one-way streets until they saw the light. Or the chemical flood. Whatever. People deserved second chances.
Apparently I thought bats didn’t deserve any chance at all.
As I slid into the booth next to Paddy, I doubted that we would come to any agreement tonight. In our current edgy moods, we would all be hacking at the Acme problem from different perspectives, and moving forward would not be the result.
Leo was probably waiting for me to unleash the law for a nice legal search of the plant—even though he had to know that whoever was running things at Acme couldn’t let us into the level where they hid the zombies. They’d fight a court order tooth and nail, and use the time to move the zombies where we couldn’t find them. This wasn’t about a will. It was a power struggle.
Andre would be plotting attack by AK-47. And Paddy . . . Hell only knew what was happening in Paddy’s head. Frank . . . Frank was just waiting for orders.
Me, I wanted food and a good night’s sleep before committing myself to the insanity of entering Acme’s death trap again.
Except I knew I wouldn’t be getting any sleep. I really, really didn’t want to know if I’d be rewarded for sending demonic bats to hell or punished for using my powers without justice. Justice had once been a black and white word to me. No more. I had no evidence those bats were dangerous. I’d killed because I was afraid of them. That’s what bigots did.
We all ordered plates of pasta. Leo squeezed in next to me and Paddy. Andre and Frank sat across from us, where they could admire my cleavage and the food in Paddy’s beard. Cora slinked over to join us. She’d had to hold down the detective agency while Frank was out playing, but the office had closed hours ago.
I’d once thought Leo and Cora would make a pretty couple. He certainly noticed her curves in her skintight leopard-skin almost-dress. But other than teasing each other with flirty looks, they treated each other like furniture. Matchmaking wasn’t my forte. I wasn’t even certain Leo recognized Cora’s snake aptitude. Like me, she probably kept her talents on the down-low in front of golden boy. The Zone hadn’t warped Leo yet. Maybe.
“You do realize that Dane had to set up his fortune in a blind trust when he took the senate seat, and any part of his share of Acme will go into it?” I thought I’d lay out the law just to move the meeting along. “Apparently he’s trying to prove he’s presidential material by removing himself from control of any private entities. That means his trustees will take over his votes.” And I had no idea who they were, but I’d bet Gloria had been top dog. Blind trusts are never really blind.
“If MacNeill is a trust executor, he gets the controlling vote,” Paddy concluded gloomily.
“Since chances of your mother leaving anything to you are slim,” I said, “I suggest that if you believe there really is a will and there’s any chance that MacNeill can find it, you start making amends with Dane. Maybe you can be included as executor of his trust in Gloria’s place.”
I could almost see the not happening thought bubble forming. I wanted to smack Paddy’s head against the wall. If it had been me, I’d have put on my power suit and waltzed into Acme’s office and sat down at the head honcho’s desk and forced everyone to prove I didn’t belong there.
Paddy wasn’t me.
Although I supposed that kind of arrogance would be bad mojo for a scientist who is supposed to be objective.
“Can we get into the plant and reconnoiter?” I asked.
Andre and Cora continued their private conversation. Leo slurped up spaghetti. We were getting nowhere. As a team, we sucked.
I’d been hoping for any other way around it, but we desperately needed to get into Acme—to find the will, to free Bill, to stop the scary rumbling. But no one was talking about what I wanted to talk about. They just didn’t grasp the potential for disaster if Acme slipped out of Dane’s or Paddy’s hands. It was all legal mumbo jumbo to them.
I preferred action to reaction, but I wasn’t getting either tonight.
In frustration, I studied the other customers. Not too long ago, they’d included spies and media all out to get me. I wasn’t at all certain they weren’t doing the same now, although, according to Julius, Andre was higher on their hit list these days. He’d been charged with murder, after all, a rather juicy one. Nervousness about taking on a case for which I wasn’t prepared made me antsy.
Ha. I spotted a familiar face. I didn’t know his name, or that of his fellow reporters, but they’d all had cameras and microphones waving under my nose a few months back. It wasn’t as if I’d forget their faces. I wondered if other Saturn’s daughters were plagued with media nuisances while they battled demons and monsters, or if I was just special.
Andre must have noticed my expression. He slapped his hand over mine in warning. The touch tingled. I gave him my best evil-vamp smile, licking my lips and watching him hungrily. Leo had me blocked in and Cora had Andre trapped. He couldn’t do anything except hold my hand and tap my rubber shoe with his leather one. Not at all satisfactory.
“Do you dance, Leo?” I purred, still watching Andre.
“Not on poles,” Leo said, drinking his beer. But then his gaze caught the way Andre was holding down my hand, and he got the message. “We’re not solving anything here. Maybe it’s time I too
k you home.”
Since we lived in the same building, that almost made sense. Except I’d never needed anyone to escort me anywhere, and I wasn’t ready to call it quits for the night. I wiggled my fingers under Andre’s. He didn’t release me.
“Clancy is asking for trouble, Schwartz,” Andre said, filling in the conversational gap I’d left open. “Either carry her out of here or dispatch the reporters.”
He knew me too damned well. “Not my boss anymore, Legrande,” I pointed out. “If I want to talk to reporters, it’s my business.”
“I’m your only client and I’m paying your office rent, so yeah, I get to be your boss. I don’t want my lawyer irritating the press. They’ve been behaving so far. They’ll go away when they don’t see me murdering old ladies.”
With my free hand, I pinched the hard, bronzed one holding me down. Andre didn’t even flinch. Chinese water torture probably wouldn’t loosen his grip. I didn’t like being boxed in, physically or otherwise.
“I can always go back to Snodgrass, Legrande. I don’t need you or your problems if you’re going to boss me around. Those reporters over there could be our key to Acme. Let me loose or I’ll scream. Let’s see how many white knights come running.”
With disgust, he shoved my hand away. A pity, actually. I kind of liked the human contact. The imperiousness, not so much.
Leo warily let me out, looking as if he’d far rather heave me over his shoulder. Golden Viking had used that maneuver once before, when I’d been in no emotional shape to deal with it. He probably sensed I’d carve his heart out if he tried it now.
I tossed the mane of hair I’d yet to have cut and bit color into my lips as I swung toward the table of reporters, giving them a full view of the goods. Under normal circumstances, brown-wren me and my crooked teeth wouldn’t be overtly noticeable, but black leather works for me, and these guys knew me enough to be leery.
Since I would never be the friendly sort people would welcome with open arms, I was learning to accept that response. I might prefer it otherwise, but these guys didn’t count for much.
“Hello, boys,” I purred, noting there were no women with them. Poor Jane was stuck at home with her two-year-old. I wondered how many men at this table had wives at home dealing with the kids while they drank beer and annoyed people like me. “Looking for some entertainment?”
“Working the poles these days, Clancy?” one of the older ones asked. “What does your boyfriend the senator think about that?”
I gave him the brilliant gap-toothed smile that Max had told me turned him on. “Why, if you believe everything the media says, Danny Boy has a pole in his apartment just for me. A more original story would be a newsman who reported news instead of gossip.”
They slugged back their drinks and glared. I had no sympathy. If they couldn’t sell newspapers with real stories instead of entertainment news, then they needed to get out of the business.
“So, what’s the real news?” a balding one asked. “Give us something worth writing about.”
“I’m just a little ol’ lawyer, not a big bad investigative reporter. And I can’t say anything that would jeopardize my client’s case.” I hesitated just a fraction, giving them time to absorb the fact that I actually had a client. “But the senator and Andre aren’t real news. It’s the actions of Acme Chemical that should be examined. Corporations are where dirty deeds are hidden these days.”
“That’s your boyfriend’s family gold mine,” one of the younger ones said, trying to sound smart-assed. “You had a fight with Dane? That why you’re over there playing footsie with a murderer?”
I sighed and glanced at the balding guy with mock sympathy. “Is this what you have to put up with every day? Does he always believe what he’s told without getting the facts?”
I left them snickering at the younger guy’s expense. He was probably glowering and vowing revenge, but I’d made them all think, for a change. Real news wasn’t lying out in the street, waiting to be picked up. As with gold, you had to dig for it in dirty, sometimes dangerous, holes.
But those lazy bums wouldn’t be digging into the dungeon soon enough for me, dang it.
I sauntered out and headed up the hill. Maybe I could catch up with the Fat Chick and chat, find out how much she knew about this business.
Within minutes, I was aware of being followed. Oversensitive to bats, I saw pink ones darting about under a purple street lamp. A yellow rat scampered across the street. The Zone liked color as well as food.
I stopped at the corner and leaned against a neon blue building to reconnoiter, as they say in the movies. If necessary, I knew how to blend into the shadows. I’m small and dark and I’d been doing it for most of my life. But I fancied these were friendly footsteps.
Leo and Cora walked toward me, acting not exactly like a happy couple but more like pissed-off bodyguards. I sighed and stepped back onto the sidewalk. “You really shouldn’t follow me, you know.”
“Yeah, and you really should keep your mouth shut, but we know that’s not happening, either,” Leo said.
I glanced at him in surprise. Leo seldom said much, and what he did say was usually politically correct. I glanced at Cora for answers, but she was eyeing him with interest, too.
Leo just took my arm and steered me up the hill, refusing to answer questions we weren’t asking.
“Silent Cop Syndrome,” I told Cora, talking around him. “All I did was point the stupid hounds in a better direction.”
“No, all you did was antagonize Andre until his ears poured steam. And his nose smoked,” she added for emphasis. “No one does that. Andre is a mite . . . peculiar. You can’t just go rubbing him wrong, then walking out.”
Andre was a mite peculiar, all right, but he was a big boy and not my responsibility. “I’m even more peculiar,” I declared, “so people better start tippy-toeing around me, too.” I meant it. Andre and I were going to go head-to-head one of these days, and people needed to back off.
“He didn’t mean it about being your boss,” Cora said. “He was just sounding off, like men do. You just gotta turn on your sexy, and he’ll be buying carpets for your new office.”
The thought of my new office made me feel better. Except it probably had secret tunnels under it, filled with Andre’s computer equipment, where he filmed and copied my every move. “Is there any way of getting bug protection?” I inquired, thinking aloud.
“Like, listening-type bugs, or cockroaches?” Cora asked.
“Listening-type. And hidden cameras.”
Leo finally checked back into the conversation. He’d been the one to discover Acme’s devices in my last apartment. “No monitoring equipment,” he noted, glancing up our empty street for surveillance vans.
I thumped his temple. “Underground, Schwartz. What does Andre have under that building? Demonic bats? More bomb shelters?”
“Union Army tunnels,” Cora said unexpectedly. “Some collapsed when they were building the harbor tunnel. These houses were built after the Civil War, but they used the excavations as foundations. I don’t know that they’re all connected anymore, though.”
“Collapsing tunnels, even better.” I aimed toward the office building, then realized I didn’t have a key. I bit my tongue really hard to keep from cursing Andre.
“Looking for this?”
We all turned to watch Andre coming up the hill. He’d donned dark tailored slacks and a gray silk shirt before meeting at the club, and they emphasized a walk sexier than that of any cowboy I’d ever seen on TV. In his fingers he twirled a brass key.
“One of these days, you’re going to end up like Max,” I warned, reminding him of the ball of flame that had ended Max’s life. “You stand forewarned. I want some respect. I’m not cute, I’m not sweet, and I’m not entirely stable. So keep it cool, Legrande.”
“I totally respect what you’re saying, Justine,” he answered mockingly, sliding the key into the lock. “Not cute, not sweet, and not stable.”
&
nbsp; I swiped the key from his hand the instant the door opened. Once inside my magnificent new office, I mellowed. My office. Milo leaped out to explore. Having my own office meant I could take my cat to work with me. We could guard each other’s backs.
I ran my hand over the enormous wooden desk, not caring if it had been built for men with quills. It was huge and heavy and demanded respect just by its existence. That’s what I wanted. Well, not the huge and heavy part.
“Tunnels, Andre?” I asked, waiting expectantly as he flipped switches. I could see the plate-glass windows would need shades for night.
“What’s with you and caves? Haven’t had enough bats for one day?” he asked, leading the way down a hall I hadn’t had time to explore. “There is no elevator, which is why we can’t rent this place. It’s all stairs. Spiders. Cobwebs.”
“Bad plumbing and old toilets,” I agreed solemnly. “I have a friend who knows a good plumber.” Jane’s father had taught her all she needed to know about the business. Andre wasn’t scaring me.
Cora and Leo tagged along, either out of curiosity or to keep us from killing each other. Although by now it ought to have been obvious that we both just needed to get laid, and we were doing our best to resist. There were ethics rules about going to bed with clients. Besides, it was a bad idea all around.
The floor beneath us began to rumble before we reached the stairs.
“The bomb shelter!” I cried when the sway of old floors didn’t stop but worsened.
I scooped up Milo and we ran for the front door and our helpless patients.
24
As the rumbling motion of the ground continued, Leo shouted into his phone, and below the hill, people fled into Edgewater Street, screaming in alarm and expecting an explosion. The gargoyles growled uncertainly. I checked the chemical plant to the north. It wasn’t completely dark. I could see flickering lights but no signs of fire. I didn’t have time to study the situation. If the street was about to cave, we had to get our people out of the shelter. Rippling pavement couldn’t be safe.