Mom’s hypnotic red eyes are doing an arc across the bar from me to the door. They linger on the entrance with each pass, as though she is expecting someone. When six vampires—four male and two female—walk in all white skin and black clothing, Mom’s gaze passes right over them and to the cages where a round of fights has come to a finish and payment is being exchanged.
Two words—half-breed—tag my inner thoughts like a repeating catch in a sound bite. I watch a segmented reflection of CeCe in a mirror behind bottles of intoxicating fluids on the other side of the bar. CeCe’s image calmly signals for another green steam, and I count the seconds before I can continue without the fear of looking anxious.
“Did you say Gaire is a half-breed?” I ask, eyes still on púca, like I could care less. But my darkside is quivering, uneasy, fearful enough to raise prickles along CeCe’s arms. I gaze at the fine brown hairs lifting in their follicles.
Mom puts up two sooty fingers and lets our bartender know she’ll take another shot as well. “Yes, a half-breed. I felt it. So what is he?”
CeCe’s eyes blink several times before I can reign in the human side. My mother snags the tell and runs with it. “You didn’t catch it, did you? Well, it’s nothing to be ashamed about. It’s hard to read half-breeds,” she says as we both pretend to watch the púca fly toward us, an eagle now, and two drinks clutched in the bird’s talons. Not a drop of green steam hits the floor. “Anyway, what happened over the diner?”
The fanged-immortals secure a table on the side of the room farthest from the cages. Another púca, with the dark-skinned face, arms, and bare torso of a human, but the lower body and legs of a horse, trots over to the immortals with a laminated menu. I catch images of young men and women as the waiter lays the menu on the center of the table.
Three of the vamps—two females and one male—shake heads in a no thank you gesture, and with a show of fangs, order type-O processed. The waiter nods and while the other three immortals study pictures on the menu of non-processed beverages, the centaur púca prances to the bar with the drink order.
“We didn’t do much,” I tell Mother, and smile at the eagle. It hovers with massive wings fanning, coaster’s flying about, and places our drinks in front of us. “He cooked me breakfast, we talked, and I left.”
“What? None of that well-educated art of seduction?” Mother looks amused.
I push a laugh over CeCe’s lips—weak attempt since Mother saw me spin gravel all the way out of the parking lot in CeCe’s car.
“Actually, that’s all it was. I’m baiting this one,” I lie. “He’s reluctant. I think it’s the age thing.” I laugh again. “Humans have way too many hang-ups. Anyway, it’s more fun to see how long it takes. And I have a few weeks before I have to give up this body.” I lift my shot glass in a toast, and she clinks the base of her glass against mine. “Why not have a bit of fun with it?”
We both chug the shot before she answers. “Well, I do hope you will be discarding this outfit soon. I’m quite bored with it. And be careful, alert. Half-breeds can be tricky.”
“Doesn’t matter,” I flippantly say, although it does. “Nothing can kill us but our own breed, and a doppelganger isn’t a shifter. So I’m in for the thrill, right?”
For the first time, ever, my guardian says nothing. She faces forward. Her smoky form absorbs the stool beside me as she settles. I glance up. Her bright red orbs are piercing, and even though I’m watching her through a reflection in the mirror behind the bar, they penetrate mine. I can tell her body has stiffened. Mother averts her gaze and still she says nothing.
I don’t say anything, either, but my mind is roiling with thoughts of what Gaire is and what he could possibly do to me.
Chapter 6
Gaire
I followed CeCe tonight, directly to the sewers and Purgatory, Down Under. I’ve been hiding by a metal ladder leading up to a storm-drain exit. I have a good view of the entrance to the bar. Nothing exciting has happened since she went in. The time seems to move like a slug on dry pavement.
It’s blessedly dark down here, only a dim ray of light pours from Purgatory’s small window above the door. A gloomy, luminous stream melts into the area around and below the entrance. It adds a surreal atmosphere to the dank and murky scurrility of the sewer where creatures slice darkness, a flickering stream burbles by, and street noises from above add reality.
The fetid air is deeply spiced with all things moldy and decomposing; the smell of death. I feel at home, but not safe. Most of the underworld knows what I am, what my kind is capable of, the threat we bring Down Under. But even worse, some of the older creatures may know my clan, my intimate family—they may know of me because of the reward.