As she considered the basement and the potential explosion to come, a jet of fire hurtled toward her, burning her cheek. She scrambled, hand over hand, failing to find a good grip at first but then managing to pull herself up to the window’s edge. The fire at her back continued to burn hot and bright, melting the fabric of her jacket, her top, and her flesh alike.
Her feet found purchase on the concrete wall, and she emerged through the window and to the cold, wet earth outside, rolling on her back to quench the burn. As she lay on her side she saw Vicky had woken up, stirred by her child’s crying, and the family had already started to run toward the chain-link gate the werewolves had torn open on their way in.
Pixi didn’t follow them. Instead she fought to get to her feet, dashed toward the chain-link, and bounded over it again, disappearing into the darkest alley she could find and becoming one with the shadows. Though this had been Wraith’s doing, she couldn’t stop the disappointment swelling in her gut; a feeling amplified by the immense pain she was in.
She had let Murdock down.
Chapter Nine
Pixi peeled her leather jacket off, groaning from the effort as her burned skin pulled and stretched in painful ways. The midnight train rumbled above, causing the tattoo parlor to shake. She let the jacket fall to a heap on the floor and sat on the reclining tattoo chair to rest. She couldn’t see her back, the area where she had been burned was warm and still seemed to sizzle. Blood. That was what she needed. Healthy, vital, human blood to heal her injuries and maybe a long, hot bath.
Pixi touched her cheek and flinched. The mirror in the corner of the room begged her to go and look, and she got up and inched toward it. But someone beat down on the metal shutters just as she came into the mirror’s frame. She turned around and marched through the parlor, her boots crunching on the few bits of broken glass she hadn’t been able to sweep out of the way. Pixi hesitated before opening the shutters. What if it was Wraith? She didn’t think he would knock; also, she was dead as far as he was aware.
Grunting with the effort of stretching, Pixi grabbed the base of the shutters and pulled them up. Lionel took one look at the devastated windows, then at her face, and said, “Jesus. What the hell happened?”
Pixi stared at Lionel, her eyes narrow and sharp. “Take a wild guess.”
“They did this?”
“You’d better come inside.”
Lionel walked into the shop and Pixi set the shutters down. She led him into the back and pulled up a stool, but not before seeing herself in the mirror for the first time. Pixi had caught a glimpse of herself on car windows as she walked, but the reflections had never been crisp and sharp like this one.
Her face was a tragic landscape of battered country. Black cracks spread in jagged lines across her cheek, up to her brow, around her ear, and down to her neck. Beneath the cracks and the lifted skin, she could almost see bone. The worst part was the smell; it was a dry, putrid smell that seemed to fill the room, like a pile of garbage left to rot for a day or two.
At least the flames hadn’t touched her eyes—she may have gone blind, for all she knew. At least until she had fed and healed the damage.
“I’m sorry,” Lionel said.
Pixi whipped her head around to look at him. “Sorry,” she said. “That’s the first time I’ve heard you apologize about anything.”
“I mean it. What the hell did they do to you, Pixi?”
“They set me up. Sent me on a wild goose chase and left me for dead in a burning building.”
“How?” Lionel asked, genuine concern crossing in front of his face like a dark cloud. “How did they manage to trick you?”
“It was my fault. I was stupid to think they would give me a fair trial.”
“Trial? What trial?”
“I wanted them to take me seriously.”
Lionel stood. “Pixi,” he said, but she ignored him.
“I went to Murdock and I asked him to give me something to do. Something to let me prove myself. He told me to go to a building on the other side of the Heights, a meth lab. He wanted to use it, said he had interests in the docks.”
“Pixi, why?” Again, she didn’t listen.
“So, I went. I was going to scare the owner out of the place and let the wolves move in. But that fucking asshole Wraith shows up, locks me inside, and sets the building on fire. They double crossed me, the building burned down, and now Murdock will never see me as one of them.”
“You aren’t one of them.”
“I’m not one of you either, with your suits and your clubs and your whores. If I’m not one of you and I’m not one of them, then who am I? I’m nothing.”
Lionel approached, and Pixi swiped at him, but he ducked under her hand and pushed into her, pinning her shoulder against the wall. “Listen to me,” he said, and she held his gaze. “This isn’t you. You aren’t nothing. Vampires who are nothing aren’t given feeding grounds.”
“Nobody gave me anything. I was born in the heights.”
“Yes, fine, but you know that’s not how the game is played, and you had to start playing our game the moment you became one of us. The fact is that you’re still here because you proved your worth to our kind and they thought you had it in you to keep the peace between us and the wolves. They don’t give border districts to just anyone.”
“Let me go,” Pixi said.
“No,” Lionel said, choosing to remain close. “The fact is, I could have chosen to bid for any other district. I could have gone into Warwick and bought the owner of one of the clubs up there. I could be raking the money in, but I chose to come out here with you. And do you know why?”
She said nothing in reply.
Lionel sighed deeply. “Because I thought I could learn something from you.”
Pixi scowled. “Did you?”
“Yeah. I learned it’s better to rule in heaven than serve in hell. I learned how to adapt, how to be tough.”
“Tough,” Pixi scoffed. “You ain’t tough.”
Lionel shoved her harder against the wall, pressing himself against her breasts. He let his fangs show. She didn’t want to admit it, but the suddenness of his movements had startled her, and caused her excitement to flare up.
“You’re hurt,” Lionel said, “You’re mad, you’ve been set up and left to dry. You’re pissed. But you told me Murdock had wanted to use the place, right? The place Wraith blew up?”
Pixi nodded slowly.
“Don’t you think Murdock’s gonna be pretty pissed Wraith took a dump all over his plans?”
She hadn’t considered that. The idea that Wraith would work against Murdock just to get Pixi didn’t seem to make a lot of sense. What had she ever done to annoy him so much that he’d risk angering Murdock just to kill her? Until yesterday, neither of them had known each other. So, why burn the lab down with Pixi in it?
Why do it unless Murdock was in on it?
“You don’t know their kind,” Pixi said.
“Maybe not,” he said, “But I know predators just as well as you do, and I know assholes, and criminals, and people who would do whatever it takes to get what they want. Wraith isn’t after you for no reason.”
“I can’t just go back to the bar and show them what Wraith did to me.”
“No, that’s not the smart play.”
“Then tell me what is. But first, get the fuck off me.”
Lionel loosened his grip and stepped away from her. He tugged on his suit jacket, straightening it, and ran a hand through his hair, smoothing it down. When Pixi caught her face in the mirror, she noticed the lines of blackness had receded and had been replaced by clean, young skin again. The skin would heal, but she would be hungry again soon.
“So,” she said, staring at her reflection in the mirror. “What’s the play?”
“Wraith is the problem,” Lionel said, coming into view in the mirror’s reflection. “If I were him, I wouldn’t say a thing to Murdock. Let him find out on his own that the building he wanted ha
d been burned down. Murdock will blame you. You need Wraith to confess to what he did.”
“Confess? You’re fucking crazy.”
“Do you have a better idea?”
“How about I just straight up murder him?”
“If you want to start a bigger conflict, sure. But you told me you care about what happens to this district. Think of the people who would die if the wolves decided to use this place as a battleground.”
Pixi turned the blackened side of her face away from the mirror and gave Lionel a sidelong glance. “Where was this version of you before?” she asked. “Back at the club, I told you these people were bad news. You didn’t care.”
“Honestly?”
“You better not lie to me.”
Lionel’s jaw clenched tightly. “I didn’t think you’d almost get killed for this place.”
“You thought I was joking before?”
“No. I just thought your instinct for self-preservation was stronger than your resolve. I thought you shared the same curse we all did; the coldness, the distance.”
“I do share it. Difference between us is, I haven’t shut up the side of myself that gives a shit.”
“Yeah… I guess you’re right. But I want to help now.”
Pixi cocked her head, and the simple act of doing so caused the skin on her neck to stretch and crack. She flinched, and Lionel came up to her, concern written across his face. “You need to feed,” he said.
“I’ll be fine.”
“You need blood. Come with me to the club and I’ll help you.”
“I can hunt for myself.”
“You don’t have to hunt. I’m offering you my help.”
Pixi remained quiet and turned away to face the mirror again. When he noticed her back, the burned fabric of her shirt, he approached. He touched her, and Pixi jerked like a startled cat. “What do you think you’re doing?” she asked.
“It’s not just your face, is it?” he asked.
“What does it matter to you?”
Lionel reached for her waist again. “Let me take it off you.”
“I’m warning you.”
“It’s fused to your skin. You need help here.”
“I’ll rip it off.”
He touched her again, but she didn’t come through with her warnings and let him. He slipped his hands into her shirt, caressing her smooth abdomen with his fingertips. He then slowly dragged his hands up along her ribs, his fingers grazing the sides of her bare breasts. She drew her arms up and he pulled the shirt up and over her head, but before he could take it off her entirely, he had to pick the many strands of fabric that had melted into her back.
The scarring there was much worse than the scarring on her face. Her once brown skin was as black as night now, the tattoos she once wore warped and disfigured beyond recognition. Lionel picked delicately at her back while she held the shirt up and over her head. She didn’t care that, one glance at the mirror, and he would have been able to see Pixi’s chest in all its naked glory.
Part of her, the werewolf inside of her, wanted him to. It caused her blood to stir within her cold, dead veins. Caused a delicious warmth to build in the pit of her stomach.
When Lionel was done, he tugged at the shirt and lifted it clean off her head, tossing it to the floor with her jacket. Pixi covered her breasts with her arms when her modesty returned. She turned around to face him, staring into his eyes to try and figure out just what he was about. There had to be a reason why he was acting like this; she didn’t believe he was being altruistic.
Not for a second.
But his eyes gave away… nothing. They glimmered, cold and grey, but devoid of any clues as to his motives. Vampires didn’t have body language unless they chose to have it, didn’t have bodily odors or give cues which could help identify their emotional states like humans did. Vampires were clean slates; perfect liars. At least, unless blood was involved.
Pixi let her hands drop, exposing herself to him. Her chest and arms were covered in tattoos; from Chinese dragons, to religious iconography, to wolves. Her body was a canvas for art, but it was also entirely feminine. Lionel drank the sight in, but didn’t advance. Didn’t reach for her. Didn’t touch her. Only this time, she saw something happen in his eyes—caught a glimpse of inner conflict.
She stared at the jacket and the shirt on the floor. The jacket hadn’t melted into her flesh, but it was burned and charred all the same. “I need to change,” she said.
Lionel approached her and her breath caught. She thought he would touch her, and considered the way in which she would react. She was thirsty for blood, and mad as hell. These impulses overwhelmed her senses. But the lines between thirst, anger, and lust were blurry where vampires were concerned. Maybe she would take him on the floor, or—but Lionel didn’t touch her. Instead he removed his suit jacket and handed it to her.
“Let me help you,” Lionel said, helping her slip the jacket on. “I want to help you.”
Pixi clasped two of the jacket’s buttons. “You can help by coming up with a plan on how we’re going to get that son of a bitch Wraith and his crew. If you think I need to get him to confess what he did in front of Murdock, then that’s exactly what I plan on doing; and I can’t do it alone.”
“You’re serious? I meant help with the feeding part, not the ‘going after a bunch of werewolves’ part’.”
“I’m dead fucking serious. You’re lord of this domain just as much as I am. This is your responsibility too. If you aren’t willing to die for the Heights like I am, then you should consider finding somewhere else to hang your hat. Otherwise, you help me figure this out right now. Every minute we wait is another chance Wraith has had to turn Murdock against me—against us. If that happens, it’ll be war.”
Chapter Ten
As much as Pixi enjoyed working on her own, she had to admit Lionel had his uses. For one, he could talk a knot into untying itself. He also had wealth the likes Pixi had never seen—and probably would never see—not that she cared for wealth to begin with. But he also had eyes and ears all around Crow’s Heights, and with a quick call to one of his many contacts could find just about anyone he needed to find.
In this case, he was looking for a car filled with rowdy guys cruising around the area. Not surprisingly, they weren’t hard to track down. Pixi would have preferred hunting the werewolves down by scent, the old-fashioned way, but this was much more efficient and precise. Wraith and his pack were in the Heights, and by the sounds of it they hadn’t left the area they had been in for themselves in some time.
This meant they hadn’t gone to see Murdock yet, or at least Pixi hoped as much. If Murdock had already been told about what happened, and Wraith had pinned the blame on her, she would have expected to hear howls on the night air. As it stood, the night was still and calm. Cold, and crisp. The breeze caused her hair to stir as she walked the streets with Lionel by her side. She had gone home to acquire a hoody and had turned the hood up to hide her face, not that there were many people on the streets to look at her anyway. Some of the vagrants in Crow’s Heights looked worse than even she did.
But she had also grabbed something else from her house. She pulled the cylinder on her Colt M1877 revolver out. The gun had a long barrel, a firm grip, and empty chambers. From her pocket, she produced a bullet and stared at the cap. The bullet itself was made of brass, but the cap was silver, and it shone in the moonlight.
“That’s an interesting looking bullet,” Lionel said.
Pixi loaded it into the revolver, followed by another, and another, until all six chambers were filled. She flicked the cylinder to make it spin, then slapped it into place. “They tried to kill me,” she said.
“So, you’re going to try to kill them?”
“No, but I’m going to scare the shit out of them. You ever gone up against werewolves before?”
“No,” he said.
“Nervous?”
“If I play my cards right, I won’t have to go up against th
em at all.”
“I don’t think you understand how these people work.”
“I know exactly how people work. Werewolves are people, right?”
She gave him a sidelong glance. “You can’t buy your way out of this,” she said, tucking the revolver into the seat of her pants.
“I wasn’t planning to.”
“Then expect a fight.”
Lionel nodded. “I will. Luckily, the fight will happen on our turf. Their mistake has been setting up shop without knowing the place. I thought werewolves were smarter than that.”
“They usually are, but Wraith doesn’t seem like a normal wolf. Seems too weak to be an alpha.”
“Why’d you think his pack takes orders from him, then?”
“I don’t know. Maybe he bought his way to the top.”
Lionel scowled at the slight dig Pixi had just taken. “Very funny.”
The breeze kicked up a stack of papers and sent them scattering around Pixi’s feet. “I don’t know how a man like that becomes alpha,” she said. “But I kicked his ass the first time we met. Knocked him clean out.”
“From what I know about their kind, shouldn’t they have seen you as their alpha after that point?”
“They’re werewolves, not animals.”
“Close enough, though, right?”
“Careful,” Pixi warned. “If I hadn’t been bitten by one of your kind I would have become a werewolf.”
“I didn’t see myself running a club, having blood dolls, or a network of contacts. When I realized I couldn’t become an astronaut because binge drinking and having sex with a different girl every night was way more fun, I decided I wanted to have money. Wealth. Maybe a yacht and a plane. I only found out later, much later, that people had been planted in my life to drive me down the path that would lead me to become just the right guy to join the night.”
“Yeah, you were groomed. That’s fucked up.”
“The point is, I’m good at what I do because I adapted. I played the hand I got dealt.”
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