It was an impressive display, but I wasn’t as worried as I might have been. I’d seen this particular trick before, and she’d remained in full control. As far as I could tell, a partial transformation simply gave her more strength without compromising her grip on her other half.
Of course, I could be wrong, I thought, tensing again as something that wasn’t a voice slithered out of Claire’s mouth. It was low and haunting, with a slight echo, despite not currently having anything to echo from. It was something like the sounds the demon made in The Exorcist, only worse, because it vibrated right through skin and flesh both. You didn’t hear it so much as feel it, like someone scratching the insides of your bones.
So, uh, yeah.
And then the sound turned into guttural words. “My car now.”
Blondie swallowed, and looked like he might pass out.
For her part, Purple Hair had gone very, very still. She didn’t move; she didn’t blink. Neither did I, because I didn’t want a repeat of the backyard incident, and I didn’t know what small gesture might set Claire off.
And then a small cadre of fey banged the front door open and came out. They were armed, because they were always armed, but they didn’t look particularly bothered. Maybe because they were skiving off work. A couple leaned against the house, another propped up the doorframe, and one sat on the stairs, working something loose from a molar with a toothpick. But their arrival broke the tension—slightly.
“What is this?” Blondie demanded, suddenly reanimating. “What the hell is—”
“Shut up,” Purple Hair told him harshly.
“But she can’t—she isn’t—and my car—”
He broke off with a gurgle, probably because the mailed fist had just tightened. Purple Hair closed her eyes briefly, the universal sign for “Why me, God?” For my part, I was listening, but didn’t hear any crunching noises. And he didn’t actually have to breathe, so . . .
I just stood there some more.
After a moment, Purple Hair looked at me. “The car we wrecked. It was hers?”
I nodded.
“Ah.” She looked at Claire. “Your car now.”
Claire released Blondie, then turned and went back into the house without another word. He fell to the ground like a sack of potatoes, and stayed there, gasping. Not because he needed the air, but because that’s what you do when someone almost decapitates you one-handed.
I walked over, reached in, and took his spare set of keys out of the ignition.
“Fair’s fair,” I told them. “I knew what I was taking on when I agreed to this job, so you have your week. But that’s out there.” I nodded at the city. “My home is off-limits, understand?”
“Beginning to.” Purple Hair kicked her companion, who was still sprawled theatrically in the grass. “Get up.”
“But my car!”
“You wanna take it from her? Be my guest.” She looked at me. “Just don’t try hiding out here until Saturday. Fair’s fair.”
She dragged Blondie off and threw him in the back of a red convertible. They left, and I turned back to see that the fey had come over and were checking out the car. “Does it go very fast?” one of them asked me.
“Yeah.”
“As fast as a running horse?”
“Faster.”
He frowned, and stuck his head in the window, checking it out.
“Do you think you could teach me how to drive one of these?” Soini asked, looking excited.
I looked back at the house. “Ask Claire. It’s her car now.”
I went back inside.
Chapter Twenty-two
I went looking for my roommate, to make sure she was okay, but she wasn’t in the kitchen. Or the laundry room or the pantry or her bedroom. I’d come back downstairs, intending to try the backyard next, when a fey tapped me on the shoulder. “You have a guest.”
I frowned. I wasn’t expecting anybody, and despite the myths, Louis-Cesare didn’t need an invitation to come in. He had a master power, called the Veil, that allowed him to phase out of this plane of existence for a moment, and bypass whatever pesky ward was in his way. Of course, maybe he was trying to be polite.
“Who is it?”
The fey shrugged. “Says he’s your son.”
I raised an eyebrow. Then I walked over and raised the door latch and stuck my head out. And found a lump on the steps.
It was an odd-looking thing, wrapped in enough layers to leave it a generic mountain of clothes. In addition to what had to be six or more coats, there were scarves, a hat, dark glasses, what looked like several pairs of gloves, and an umbrella. All this despite the fact that it had to be in the mid-eighties and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky.
I leaned against the doorframe. “My darling boy.”
“Shut up and let me in.”
Apparently, it was an angry lump. “You know, I don’t recall having a son.”
“I didn’t say ‘son’; I said ‘child’—”
“Which I also don’t have, unless you count Stinky.”
“—I can’t help it if those weirdos you live with don’t lis—what? The fuck you don’t!”
I clicked my tongue. “Now I know I didn’t raise you. Such a potty mouth.”
“Yeah. ’Cause if I’d been brought up in your crazy-ass family, I’d be so refined. Now let me in!”
“And them?”
I nodded behind him, to where a crew of assorted additional lumps were huddled together under some umbrellas, similarly attired.
And looking miserable, what I could see of them.
“I hadda bring ’em. It’s a long story, and thanks to the damned sun, I can’t even think straight. Now get out of the way!”
I considered it. He was talking through a scarf, which muffled his voice enough that I’d have had no idea who was speaking if the fey hadn’t said something. And even still, I wasn’t taking chances.
“Ahhh! The fuck?” the lump screamed, when I tried to pull down the scarves to take a look. Gloved hands batted at me, and angry eyes glared, barely visible behind black shades. “Are you crazy?”
“I need to verify. So you’re going to have to come up with something—”
A string of profanity, impressive in its scope and extent, greeted that comment. “How you expect me to verify when I’m on fire?”
“I don’t see any smoke.”
“Well, you’re gonna in half a minute, so I hope you got more of that salve. You can rub it on my whole body this time, ’stead of just my ass—”
I sighed and swung open the door. “Come in, Ray.”
Ray came in.
And was followed by a stampede of lumps—and their umbrellas—following him to the dining room and all but knocking me down. I was starting to get déjà vu. They slammed the door in my face, and then screamed at me when I opened it to slip inside.
“All right, anybody on fire?” Ray’s voice rose above the din, while I fumbled around for the light switch. Because the dining room had been built before people worried about things like natural light.
The overhead fixture flickered on to show me a bunch of guys huddled in a corner, one sprawled under the table, sobbing pitifully, and a couple more on their knees, trying to stuff some sweaters under the door. I guess to cut off the weak haze of light filtering through the cracks. And then collapsing back a second later, panting for breath they didn’t need, while Ray divested himself of several tons of outerwear.
“How’s the neighborhood?” a pissy voice demanded, from inside the cloth mountain. “I got a bunch of stuff in the car—”
“Ray—”
“—I think I locked it, but I was in a hurry, and you know this city; can’t trust nobody no more—”
“Ray!”
“—and if somebody rips me off, I swear to God—”
“Ray!”
He peered at me out of the neckhole of a sweater. “What?”
“What are you doing here?”
Pale blue eyes narrowed. “Well, you’d know if you kept your damned phone on. I only left, like, a hundred messages. I been trying to reach you all day! But you never take a call, and Claire’s weird about me, you know?”
“She’s weird about all vamps.”
“Don’t lie. It’s the head, isn’t it?”
“It’s not the head.”
“Don’t give me that. She keeps doing that thing—”
“What thing?”
“That tilt-to-the-side thing, like she’s trying to see where they sewed it back on.”
“You’re imagining things.”
“Check it out sometime. I ain’t imagining shit. She’s giving me cancer.”