Zombies Sold Separately

TWENTY-FOUR



Wednesday, December 29


“About time you got your ass in to work,” Olivia said as I dragged said ass in through the door of the PI office at ten the next morning.

“You decided to make it.” I smiled then winced. My head ached thanks to the four beers I’d ended up having last night. I was usually only good for two. “Stay an extra day with the family unit?”

Olivia rolled her eyes and stood from behind her desk so that I could see her shirt.



SILENCE IS GOLDEN

DUCT TAPE IS SILVER


“Took sixteen rolls to shut all of them up,” Olivia said and I laughed.

“Lots of interesting things to tell you.” I plopped my purse onto my desktop, then pulled my hair back from my face and knotted it.

“Get going then.” Olivia leaned back in her chair and put her orange Keds up on her desk and crossed her legs at her ankles. “I’m ready.”

For a moment I hesitated. How was I going to do this without telling her I had not only one, but two of the stones. But the memory of the Magi’s words was clear.

“I suggest you not even show it to your partner unless you have to.”

I paced back and forth in front of our desks as I started with the trip to visit my parents and the discussion about what had happened twenty-two years ago; my visit to Rodán and then to the Magi; my search for the Sorcerer Desmond; the Zombie and Sentient attack last night. I told her that we were supposed to watch out for stones and mentioned the Sentients had at least one, but I managed not to tell her that I had two of them with me.

“You were a little busy while I was gone.” Olivia looked thoughtful as she made the understatement. “Tell me more about the Sorcerer.”

I went around my desk and drew my cell phone out of my purse before setting it on the desktop. “I don’t know anything about the Sorcerer except that he’s an artist who shows his work in a gallery.”

“Desmond, right?” Olivia scooted her feet off her desk. “Does he have a last name?”

“Yes on Desmond, and for all I know that is his last name.” I pulled out my chair and sank into it. “That’s how he signs his work.”

She straightened in her seat and turned to her computer monitor. “Gallery name?”

“Sun Lee,” I said.

The click-clack of Olivia’s keys on her computer keyboard was loud as she typed. “In SoHo,” she said, apparently finding the gallery.

“You’ve got it.” I rubbed my forehead as I wished shifting from Drow to human could get rid of mild hangovers. “Hopefully Ms. Sun Lee will call soon with some good news.”

“If she doesn’t call you soon, maybe you should give her a little reminder,” Olivia said. “But for now, tell me more about the stones.”

I stared at my purse and thought about the Magi’s instructions again.

Why couldn’t I show the stones to Olivia?

The phone rang and I looked away from Olivia to glance at the identification screen. I didn’t recognize the number.

“This is Sun Lee.” The woman’s voice was quick and efficient when I answered. “Desmond will meet you at his studio at two-thirty this afternoon.”

“Can he meet earlier?” I asked. That wouldn’t give me much time to talk with him and then get back home to shift before sunset, which was close to four-thirty this time of year.

“It is the only time he has available, Ms. Carter,” Sun Lee said. “Desmond is a difficult individual to pin down for any kind of meeting.”

I’d just have to have the speediest conversation possible on Zombies, Sentients, Hosts, keystones, and women in stones, and hope he wasn’t late. I sure wasn’t going to be.

“Okay,” I said. “Two-thirty it is.” I grabbed a blank pink sticky note from a dispenser on my desk. “What’s his address?”

“Just one second while I look it up…” Sun Lee’s voice trailed off. “My apologies, Ms. Carter, I neglected to update my files with the address of his new studio,” she said. “I’ll let you know in time for your appointment.”

She hung up before I had a chance to respond. I scowled at the phone then rolled my shoulders.

“Where is he?” Olivia asked.

“Sun Lee is going to call me back with the information.” I looked at the time on the computer. “We have a little while before our meeting. I just hope that it’ll be enough time to get what we want and leave.”

Olivia frowned. My cell phone rang and I glanced at it. I smiled.

“Adam,” I said when I answered the phone. “Did you make it back?”

“Late last night,” he said. “Are we still on for lunch at one P.M.?”

“Can’t wait to see you.” My smile broadened. “Feels like it’s been forever.”

“I’m working up a few leads on a new case for Captain Wysocki,” he said, “so I’ll meet you there.”

“Okay.” Something suddenly felt a little strange. Off. Or maybe it had been there all along and I had just missed it. “Is everything okay, Adam?”

“Yeah,” he said. “See you then.”

An odd feeling made my stomach twist in the strangest way as he disconnected the call.


* * *



In Il Cortile, an Italian restaurant, I sat alone at a table for two, facing a tall alabaster sculpture of a woman with her leg bared, her skirt flaring away from her knee up to her thigh. It was a pretty sculpture, I thought. Sultry.

It was after one. Adam was almost fifteen minutes late, which was unusual for him.

“Nyx.” Adam touched the back of my shoulder as he came up from behind me. The warmth of his hand burned through my blouse to my skin. I tilted my head and smiled at him, and he gave me a light kiss on my lips. “Sorry I’m late. Accident on Canal Street.”

My eyes, head, heart, and soul were so hungry for him that I wanted him to wrap his arms around me and hold on tight.

Everything about Adam drew me to him. His smile, his touch, every intimate conversation we’d ever had. The way he cared for me. Accepted me. I didn’t realize how much I’d missed Adam until he took his seat across from me and I met his gaze.

I didn’t realize how much I needed him until then. Something I hadn’t recognized or acknowledged before. A need to be with someone I loved, and to be needed.

Then an odd sensation tightened my belly at the look in his eyes. The feeling I was getting from him wasn’t the excited thrill I usually felt when I was with him.

Like I had when we were talking on the phone, it felt off. Wrong. I wanted to ask him if something was bothering him, but it didn’t feel right to do so.

When the waiter took our order, I went with the capellini like I’d planned, even though I’d lost my appetite. Adam ordered bruschetta as our antipasti as well as gnocchi for his meal. I let him choose the wine and he went with a Barbera.

Adam asked me how my holiday was with my family, and I found myself avoiding anything that made it different. Like saying “Otherworld” or “Drow Realm” or anything magical. I talked about my trip as if they lived in another part of New York.

In turn I asked Adam about his visit to his family and I felt distanced from him when he talked about all of his relatives—his cousins, aunts, uncles, sister, her husband, and his brother.

It’s so different with Elves in Otherworld. It’s more like a large extended family, not broken down into smaller groups as humans do.

When we finished eating we both declined dessert and I didn’t order the limoncello I would normally have gone with.

The plates were cleared away and the silence between us wasn’t a comfortable one. I knew he had something to say, and my senses told me I wasn’t going to like it.

“Nyx.” He looked uncomfortable as he cleared his throat. “I’ve been thinking a lot about us.”

My face washed hot. I knew what was coming and I didn’t want to believe it.

“Last week, at the reception, it put a lot of things into perspective for me. It was a dose of reality.” Adam clasped his hands on the table and focused on me as he spoke. “We are literally from two different worlds.”

For the first time ever I was glad I couldn’t cry. At least not tears. The need to cry was strong, the pressure backing up behind my eyes. But the Drow part of me had no tears to shed.

It felt like it was coming from a long distance when my phone rang inside my purse. I just ignored it as I stared at Adam.

No words would come to me. I just listened to him, feeling an almost out of body sensation, as if he was talking with someone else.

“We would constantly be making up stories, living a lie when around my family and friends.” He looked down at his fingers and then back at me. “We could never go out together anywhere close to sundown. That means no night out on the town with friends. No dinners with family.” He paused. “I can’t even take you out to dinner and a Broadway show if we wanted to go to one.”

My back felt stiff and straight, my body frozen. This was happening and I barely comprehended it. Adam was breaking up with me.

“My parents could never meet yours.” Adam sighed. “You couldn’t join my family for anything that involves an overnight stay. Like going to the family’s Adirondack cabin with my parents and other family members, or whatever else involved the sunset or sunrise.”

Everything I’d thought before, everything I’d felt, started to crack then shatter.

“You would be a secret I couldn’t share,” he continued. “That’s not fair to either one of us.”

The desire to scream at Adam rose up within me so swift and strong that I could barely hold it back. How could he do this? From the beginning he knew what I am. He knew. But he continued seeing me and now he was breaking my heart.

“It’s not your fault,” he said. “It’s mine. I led you to believe it could work because I thought it could work.”

His words nearly made me split in half.

The air around us crackled. Water whirled inside our glasses like mini whirlpools. Our table shook, silverware rattling on the table. Wine sloshed over the lip of my wineglass and splashed onto the white tablecloth, staining it deep red. The whole room was shaking.

Adam looked around us then back at me with a stunned expression. He seemed to recognize that I was causing everything that was happening.

Embarrassed that I’d lost control like I had, I dragged my elemental magic back to me. When everything was calm again, I picked up my purse and stood.

“Thank you for lunch,” I said, managing to keep my voice from shaking like the room had been.

“Nyx, wait,” he said as he stood, too. “I don’t want it to end like this.”

“Maybe you should have thought about that when you first found out what I am,” I said and held up my hand before he could say anything else. “There’s nothing more to talk about.”

I turned and walked out of the restaurant, my heart breaking with every step I took.

“Nyx!” Adam called after me but he hadn’t gotten the bill yet from the waiter and was trying to pay it while calling after me.

A taxi was coming up the street and I ran to the curb and flagged it down. The cabby pulled into traffic just as Adam made it out of the restaurant.