“Spots.” I sighed. Leo and I had ties . . . unbreakable ones . . . two leopards with the same spots. Too much the same in the past, too much the same for now, but maybe . . . maybe not always. I had the feather to remind me of that.
“Spots,” the one who’d given me that feather agreed, the curve of his lips softer; then he continued with a wicked glint to his black eyes, “Her spots are called pasties, I believe. She’s a dancer.”
“Stripper.” I threw a towel at him.
“Who has goals in the theater.” He caught it and polished the bar with broad strokes.
“She wants to be a porn star.” I looked for something else to throw, but there was nothing that wouldn’t come out of this month’s profit.
“And she does charity work.” He tossed the towel across his shoulder and folded his arms.
“She does you for free?” I smiled with caustic cheer.
He frowned. “I do not pay for sex, little girl.”
“You only get to call me that for four more years.” And five foot five was not that short. Maybe in comparison to the six-foot-plus American Indian body he’d chosen, I was somewhat smaller, but I was not little, most especially not when it came to temper, where it counted most. “So did you offer her free drinks here for the duration of your sexcapades or fix her refrigerator?”
That got the towel thrown back at me. “No, thanks.” I folded it and put it aside. “I don’t have to stuff my bra. Unlike some, I don’t feel the need to be a double D or wax myself as bare as a honeydew melon. Barbie dolls are for little girls to play with, not grown, perverted men. Now, about our demon trouble.”
That distracted him. “What demon trouble?”
I told him. He grasped the implications as quickly as I had. “There aren’t many out there who could do that,” he said thoughtfully, before adding, “one less now that I’m grounded.”
“Godzilla to the hundredth power is running around and you have to get your ego in the picture,” I said fondly. “Just remember, your biggest and baddest power now is dropping bird shit on people’s cars.” He kept reminding me how vulnerable I was now. I didn’t want him to forget he was as well.
He ignored the insult—to his manhood and bird-hood. “And Eligos is back.” He turned and served a beer to one of our regulars—a walking handlebar mustache roosting on a skinny guy it was using for life support. The man was a person; he had a name. I knew it . . . first, middle, last, and nickname. I knew where he’d been born. I knew where he lived, who he lived with, how much money he made in Social Security checks. I made it my business to know these things about all my regulars, but one look at him and the mustache never failed to jump into the foreground—an entity all its own. It was like seeing someone with a giant if not friendly spider on his face. . . . It was difficult to ignore.
“We knew he wasn’t leaving Vegas,” I said as the mustache shuffled off to its customary table in the corner. “I’m surprised he didn’t single-handedly found the place. This city is tailor-made for him.”
“And I imagine he thinks the same about you. You caught his interest, and right now, being mortal, that is not a good thing,” he said disapprovingly, as if somehow it was my fault that I might be more entertaining to kill than whatever it was that Eli usually came across.
“Don’t think it’s all about me. You’re as intriguing or at least he will think you still are.” I pinched his cheek. “He might even think you’re more ‘purty’ than I am, you never know. A hot babe like you who has to part lusting strippers like the Red Sea just to walk among the common people. He might want to take you out instead of killing you. Of course he’s not a blonde with breasts the same size and shape as the Hindenburg, but he won’t drop a pastie in your soup at dinner either.”
“I think I’ll bring Morocco by the bar,” he contemplated. “Let you meet her. I think you two will bond.”
“Playing hardball. Cranky, cranky. I would think you’d be in a better mood having your manly needs fulfilled and all.” I took my apron off and stuffed it under the bar. “Morocco. That’s beautiful,” I said solemnly. “Is that where her people are from? Lots of blue-eyed blondes there.”
“I think she saw it on the Travel Channel,” he replied with equal gravity, “and thought it sounded exotic.”
I thought about spearing his hand with a tiny paper drink umbrella, then gave it up as a lost cause and advised, “Hide all your singles when she’s around. I’ll be back in a few hours.”