The Shadows

FORTY-FOUR

“He said I needed a parka.”

The following evening, as darkness settled over the compound and the shutters rose for the night, Selena looked back and forth between the two coats Fritz was holding up to her. One was red, the other black; both were wool and relatively long.

“Oh, I’m sorry, mistress.” He turned back to the closet in the mud room by the garage. “How about either of these?”

This time, he offered her a choice between a puffy waist-length jacket that looked like it was made of dinner rolls, and one that was much longer. Both were black and had little tags that read, PATAGONIA.

“It’s a relatively mild night,” Fritz pointed out. “Perhaps the shorter of the two?”

“Yes, I think you’re right.”

Slipping the thing on, she was amazed at how light it was, and after zipping it up, she tested out the two pockets.

“This is fantastic.”

The butler beamed. “My pleasure. Gloves?”

“I think I’ll just keep my hands in here.”

“As you wish, mistress.”

Heading out into the kitchen, she felt as buoyant as a bubble. Trez had refused to tell her anything about where they were going, and the unknown was like a heady wine, making her head buzz and her body float.

She hesitated at the flap door into the dining room. The sounds and smells of First Meal were obvious and friendly, the voices ones she knew well, the scents making her stomach rumble. And yet she turned around and headed out the other exit of the kitchen, the one that opened up by the flank of the grand stairway.

Everyone had been so kind the night before, all the females lavishing such incredible attention and support on her.

She didn’t want to bother them again and didn’t really want the extra regard.

She was feeling a little tired and wanted to save all her strength for the date.

As she came into the foyer, she saw Trez and Manny standing close together on the far side of the mosaic apple tree in the floor. They were talking intently, each one grave.

Her heart stopped. Was the physician insisting she stay in? Or was he going to make her go down to the clinic first?

She glanced behind her and considered bolting. It wasn’t going to be underground, though—

“You need to take care of her,” Manny warned.

“I will. I swear on my brother’s life.”

Oh . . . shoot—

Manny took something out of his pocket. A key fob of some sort.

Dangling it in front of Trez’s face, he said, “She’s never been driven by anyone else.”

“Then why are you giving her to me?”

“Because you need to go in style. You’re taking your woman out, you don’t need to be in some BMW.”

“You are a car snob.”

Selena frowned. Car? They were talking about—

Trez whipped around as if he had noticed her scent on the air, and the instant he saw her, he started to smile. “Hey, there, you ready, my queen?”

Stepping across the vast space, she smiled in return. She’d left her hair down again, because she knew by the way he stared at it, played with it, stroked it that he preferred it that way. And actually, she was not just getting used the style, but coming to like it best as well.

That formal chignon the Chosen were supposed to wear could give you one heck of a headache after a couple of hours.

Rising up to her tiptoes, she kissed his mouth and then tucked herself in against his side, fitting perfectly under his arm. “I am so ready.”

Manny clapped palms with Trez, and then said under his breath, “We gotchu.”

“Thanks, man.”

Then the doctor gave her a wink and headed to the dining room and all the people in it.

“What does that mean?” Selena asked as Trez opened the door out into the vestibule. “That ‘gotchu’?”

“Nothing.”

Leaning ahead, he pulled the second door free, and the cold of the night rushed in, making her nose tingle and her cheeks flush.

“Too much?” he asked.

“What?”

“Too cold? You shivered.”

“I love it.”

“Good, I want to put the top down.”

Parked right in front of the stone steps was a vicious-looking black car, with black wheels and some kind of tail on the back.

“Dearest Virgin Scribe, what is that?” she said.

“It’s called a Porsche nine-eleven turbo.”

“Oh . . . my.”

Going down to the steps, she approached the machine, taking one hand out of her pocket and running her fingertips down its flank. Smooth, shiny, ice-cold.

“But it has a roof, no?” she said.

“It does tricks.”

Opening the door, he settled her in the passenger seat. “It’s Manny’s new baby. He got it a week ago—it’s the same make and model of his last one, but the interior is different? That’s what he says, at any rate.”

Inside, she smelled leather and the human’s cologne and Payne’s scent.

Trez got in behind the wheel and shut his door. When he turned a key, a great growl started up, a subtle vibration emanating through the interior.

“Check this out.” He hit another button. “Look up.”

Like magic, everything that was overhead unlatched and lifted away, retracting in an orderly series of folds into a rear compartment.

“I figured you’d like to see the stars.” He smiled and got the heater going. “It’s got a screen, so we don’t have to worry about backdraft.”

Leaning back, she saw . . . the velvet heavens with its twinkling lights.

Letting out a shout of joy, she threw her arms around him and pulled him in for a kiss. “This is incredible!”

He laughed. “I can’t believe you’ve never seen a convertible before.”

“I never travel by car. Unless I’m with you.”

“Well, get your belt on. This bitch is going to fly.”

As he hit the gas, the car leaped forward like a horse out of the gate, and she couldn’t help but look up to the night sky and smile so hard her cheeks hurt.

Even with the mhis, he went so fast, firing down the mountain until they got to the road at the bottom. He took a left.

“Where are we going?” she said as he punched the accelerator again, and she was sucked into the contours of her seat as the engine roared.

“You’ll see.” He glanced over. “Warm enough?”

“Perfectly so!”

It was loud and exhilarating, cold air whirling around her head, hot air blasting on her feet, the car growling and leaning into the curves of the road. Before she knew it, her heart was beating fast and her stomach doing flip-flops and she felt octane in her veins.

“I hope it’s a long trip!” she shouted.

“What?”

“Never mind!”

She lost track of the minutes and the miles, but gradually she became aware that the forest landscape had grown dotted with human settlements. Soon, stores, neighborhoods of houses, a park, and stacks of apartment buildings appeared.

“Where are we?” she asked as he slowed to a stop at a red light.

“On the outskirts of Caldie.”

“Are we going downtown again?”

“Nope.” He smiled at her. “But we’re almost at our destination.”

A small car that was low to the ground and the color of a banana pulled up next to them, and she felt the driver glance over. Music was thumping inside of the other vehicle, and its engine revved up.

“Is he having some kind of spasm?” she asked. “Of the foot?”

“No, it’s happening in another location,” Trez muttered.

When the light overhead turned green, the little car exploded forward, its tires squealing, an unpleasant burning smell left in its wake.

“What was that all about?” she wondered.

“Wait for it.”

Sure enough, a car with blue and white lights popped out of a parking lot and fell into pursuit. But not of Trez and herself.

Trez shook his head. “The little shit should know you never drag on this street. Besides, he’s crazy to take this car on.” He reached over and gave her hand a squeeze. “You ready?”

“Oh, yes.” She looked around and saw nothing but a stretch of single-story businesses linked together by a common roof and a parking lot. “Are we here?”

“Almost.”

Actually, they went quite a bit farther on, past another bunch of stores with the word outlet tacked onto every name. And then there was a shallow stretch of woods and a little hill, followed by . . .

Parking lots. Vacant parking lots big as the lawns of the Sanctuary.

Except then she looked out the other side of the car. “What . . . is that?”

“Welcome to Storytown.”

Selena sat forward. On the far end of the biggest of the parking lots was a set of lit entrance signs so high and wide they defied comprehension. But what came after them? Was even more astounding. Vast mechanisms reaching high into the sky were lit up like rainbows, all flashing lights and spinning tops as if they were toys made for giants.

Trez turned Manny’s car onto all the asphalt and roared across the acreage, heading for a gate in the fencing over to the left of what looked like the check-in area. As he stopped before the side entry, they had to wait for but a moment before a human in a navy-blue uniform triggered something and waved them through.

“Hey, Mr. Latimer.”

Trez reached out and offered his hand. “Call me Trez.”

“I’m Ted.” They shook and the man nodded at Selena. “We’re going to take great care of you guys tonight. Head through there.”

“Roger that. Thanks, man.”

“No problem.”

As he hit the gas, Selena was overwhelmed by all of the neon lights. “What is this place. This is . . . magical.”

“And it’s all ours. No one else is here, just you and me.”

“How is that . . . possible?”

“One of my security guys is the brother of the head of security over here. They spoke to the owners and they’re doing me a little favor.”

When they came up to a second guard, Trez stopped the car and cut off the engine. “You liked that crazy ride last night through downtown, right?”

“Oh, yes—yes, so much.”

He leaned in and kissed her. “Wait’ll you go upside down, my queen.”

iAm watched from a security tower high in the center of the amusement park as Trez piloted the Porsche through the gate and came to a stop at the second security point.

“You want binocs?”

He glanced over his shoulder at Big Rob. “Nope. I’m good.”

The bouncer from shAdoWs whistled as he put the handset back up to his peepers. “You have awesome eyes to see that far.”

iAm just shrugged and took another draw from his Thermos mug. The coffee inside was strong and hot enough to pizza your tongue. Just the way he liked it.

He’d been not just asleep, but practically in a coma, when his brother had woken him up with this bright idea around ten this morning. The plan was nuts, of course. Who the hell rented out an entire park for three hours?

Especially when the damn thing had closed for the season the week before?

Trez did. That was who.

And iAm helped the guy get it done.

Making this all happen for Selena had taken an unbelievable amount of money, and some candid phone calls that had been hard to get through. But thanks to Big Rob back there, and his brother, Jim, a.k.a. Jimbo, and the wife of the owner who had just lost her father to cancer the summer before, they’d gotten it all set up: Staff had been called back from post-season retirement, and machines that were in the process of being winterized had been called into service again. They even had the concession stands working—thanks to the waiters at Sal’s.

The joy on Selena’s face, and the pride on his brother’s puss—obvious even from up here in the tower—had made it all worth it.

And you know, it was impossible to have disdain for humans tonight.

For chrissakes, the owners weren’t even keeping the money left over after the staff were paid. They were giving it to the American Cancer Society.

Sometimes people rallied, he thought. They really did.

“So who is she?” Big Rob asked. “I mean, I heard he had a girlfriend, but I didn’t know she was . . . you know, sick. They been together long?”

“Long enough.”

There was a thick silence. “He’s not coming back to work, is he.”

“Not for a while.”

“Are you guys going to sell us?”

“I don’t know. We haven’t gotten that far.”

And wasn’t that true on a variety of levels.

iAm checked his watch again. Eight thirty. Perfectly on time with a departure set for eleven thirty. Manny’s fancy-ass mobile surgery center was stuck downtown, the area still too hot from the party the night before to move the thing, but they had a good contingency plan for Selena. Manny had his old refurbed regular ambulance still and the thing was on standby, the amusement park’s management more than happy to accommodate the medical wait-and-see and the good doctor on their property.

“I can understand why he didn’t say anything,” Big Rob murmured as he dropped the binocs. “And not for nothing, but wow, she’s out of this world looking.”

“She’s also really good people.”

“Does she know what he does . . . you know. Classy woman like that, I mean . . .”

“To be honest, I think that shit’s the last thing on their minds.”

“Yeah. Sure. I mean, yeah.”

iAm glanced over at the guy. “Don’t worry, I got ’em. You can head over to the club.”

The human nodded. “I should go.”

As the man hesitated, iAm put out his palm. “And as for future plans with the businesses, we’ll take care of everybody, I promise. No matter what happens.”

Big Rob shook. “Thanks, man. But I gotta say, we really like working for you. Besides, I don’t know if Silent Tom has another interview process in him. Nearly killed him five years ago when we applied with Trez.”

“Yeah, I think he’s said all of twelve words the entire time I’ve known him. Drive safe out there.”

“Thanks. Call me if you need anything.”

Big Rob put the binocs down on the desk and paused for one last moment, looking out to where Trez and Selena were strolling between the bumper cars and a children’s teacup ride. Shaking his head, he went to the exit, and closed the door behind him as he left.

iAm checked his watch again.

Three hours.

And then what. What the hell was he going to do about maichen?

What if Trez and Selena needed him . . . and he was out meeting with that female?

Jesus, after a lifetime of celibacy, it was a shocker to find that he’d made an arrangement to be alone with a member of the opposite sex. And it was not to talk.

No, he was not in a talking kind of mood.

Rubbing his eyes, he pictured the female draped in all those pale blue robes and the urge to get under all that masking took on an obsessional edge. Hell, if it hadn’t been for a molecular exhaustion, he probably would have spent the entire day staring at the ceiling over his bed thinking about what he was going to do to her. As it was, he’d crashed with a hard-on and woken up with one, too.

He’d done nothing about either erection.

If he jerked off, it somehow felt too real.

And for the same reason, he’d told his brother nothing about the trip into the s’Hisbe or the female he’d met or the “date” he’d made.

Compared to what Trez was facing, all that was such small potatoes. And there was also a dreamscape to it all, which he was surprised to discover he wanted to keep in place.

Maybe because it made things less intimidating?

But come on, he didn’t think he was going to go. How could he leave . . . ?

No, he wasn’t going. For the first time in his life, he didn’t think he could trust himself not to go straight-up animal on some poor female. And hell, she was probably having second thoughts, too. Meeting an unknown male in the middle of nowhere? She’d be insane to do something like that.

Especially because she had to know what was on his mind.

No, he told himself. Neither of them was going to show up at that cabin at midnight. And that was better for everybody.

Really.

It was.