The Dark Communion (The Midnight Defenders) (7 page)

Two women were with him – dancers from their flawless figures – both completely naked. The first stood near his face next to one of the utility carts. The other, Noelle, straddled his back, her hands resting against his shoulders and something that looked like the beak of a hummingbird protruded from her mouth into the area between his shoulder blades.

They saw me almost immediately, turned with fierce, dangerous eyes. The thing in Noelle’s mouth retracted past her teeth as she hissed like a feral cat.

Before I could move, Lorelei appeared behind me, motioned to the girls who seemed to instantly forget about me. She ushered me out into the hallway. As the door clicked shut behind me, the man’s screams tore through the silence like a chainsaw.

Lorelei pressed her finger to my mouth as her eyes fixed on mine. I felt numb, so I just listened, and her words broke over me like the tide.

“I make no apologies for what we are, Jono – my sisters and I. Sirens. But I am sorry that you had to learn of it this way.”

“What the fuck was that in there?” I said. “What were they doing to him?”

“Feeding.”

“On what…exactly?”

“Spinal fluid.”

“Right. And you…you have one of those…” My hands moved in front of my mouth like a flutist. “A…a beak?”

She nodded.

I don’t remember what she said next. I felt sick, repulsed by what I’d seen, by what – not long ago – she and I had done together. Sure, I had known she wasn’t human. I’d known there was at least a possibility she was capable of dark, terrible things, but what I’d seen….

And still, a part of me was awed by the fact that after all this time, there was still something I hadn’t seen, a creature I hadn’t come across. I was at a loss. But at the same time I was horrified and furious, and as the man in the room behind us screamed once again, I let her have it. “You fucking bitch!! What gives you the right…?”

She smacked me, spun my face to the side. “How dare you come into my house and judge me? We act according to our nature, Swyftt. We are what we were created to be.”

I laughed, started to walk away, but she put a firm hand on my shoulder. Her voice was softer now, pleading, but still carried that hard edge of anger. “I opened this club to bring foolish and willing humans to us, so we aren’t out there preying on the innocent. And at the same time, we draw in a crowd of Korrigan, which in turn keeps them off the streets and protects children and families.”

“And you’ve never killed a family man who’s wandered in here?”

“If they come willingly through those doors, it is not I that kills them, but their sin. They should be with those that love them. I consider their stories no more than you read the memoirs of the cows you slaughter.”

“This is wrong.”

“You and I are not so different, Jono. I help people, but only if it profits me.” She closed her eyes for a minute and took a deep breath. “If you do not wish to see me again, I will understand. But if you do anything rash, know this: If you bring an army against us, we will be forced to go to war, and there are more of us than you can imagine.”

Silence a minute. I stared at her. Those long eyelashes parted and she looked at me earnestly. She was stunning, not like a monster. I sighed and said, “So you’re not vampires, right? I couldn’t deal with vampires.” She smiled. “Because I have this thing about vampires and how it’s just bullshit.”

I left feeling angry, dirty and used. More than anything, I was confused.

She gave up the sailors the next day, two of which went back to work on the ship, the third, however, had been fed upon and was confined to a wheelchair for the rest of his life.

From there, we developed a semi-regular thing. As per our agreement, I never witnessed another feeding, never heard anymore screams, never went back into that room again. There was something completely unsettling about it.

Imagine my horror then when I opened my eyes after being slam-danced and cracked like a nut against a stripper pole and saw the white walls, felt the cold steel underneath. I sat up suddenly, felt horrible pain shoot through my back, down my leg, and across my shoulders. My head ached, my nose throbbed, and I felt dried, caked blood around my mouth.

“Easy,” came a voice from behind me. “You have had quite a time out there.”

With a good deal of struggling and pain, I managed to turn enough to see the fiery red hair and soft lips of Lorelei. She wore a long, flowing, black dress, and apart from the red around the edges of her big eyes, she looked well put together and quite the vision.

“How long have I been out?” I said in a faint, hoarse whisper.

“Several hours. Midnight passed some time ago. I am sorry you were attacked as you were. They would not have done that had I known you were here.” She sounded hurt.

“Right, sorry ‘bout that, love. Guess it’d just been too long. I didn’t want things to get weird.”

“You have not changed much. Still so good at making people scream and flail around helplessly, I see.”

I managed a smile and then regretted it. My face hurt. “You’re talking about Seven?”

Maybe she could tell how much effort it took to twist that way to see her, because she walked closer. I couldn’t help but smile warmly at her, remembering some of the times we shared. “I meant me. Though it has been a while, it is always a pleasure.” She stood so close I could taste her scent: Honeysuckle and sea air and the sweet nectar of a woman’s blossom. She ran a finger down my chest, traced some invisible pattern only she could see.

With some difficulty, I swung my legs to the side and dangled them off the edge of the table. I watched her finger drawing sigils on my chest. Her nails, candy-apple red, sobered me. In so many ways, I was so weak, and any other night, I would have taken her in animalistic passion and heat, but now, all I could see in my mind, was a small severed hand and those hot pink tips. I held her wrist and looked into her eyes, turquoise and gold shimmering in an ethereal light. “Actually, tonight, it’s business.”

She took her hand out of mine and began stroking the side of my face, moved even closer. Her hard nipples pressed against me. “By the Mother, I have missed you. You sure know how to keep a girl waiting.”

“Been busy, Love. Missing children and all that.”

“So I hear. Nasty business.”

“Why do I get the feeling you know more than you’re telling me?”

“Because I entertain a lot of important people, Love. A lot is said between the sheets. You have a minute, maybe you can find some of the answers you are looking for, but then again…maybe not.”

I turned my head to the side, realized the pain was almost gone. My nose felt better, too. “Did you do something? Give me something?”

“I work in the nervous system, Jono. I know a trick or two for pain. You are lucky I got to you, honestly.” Her smile was weak.

We sat in silence a minute. Then I tried to stand, dropped a little, caught myself. “Easy,” she said and put one of my arms across her shoulders to help me stand. Her skin was so smooth. “Where are you trying to go?”

I shrugged. “Don’t know.” I found the strength in my feet and was able to stand on my own, but I kept my arm around her, and she didn’t move away. She found my eyes with hers, held my gaze for a minute. We kissed, soft and gentle at first, then faster, hard and wet, and she parted my lips with her tongue. She tasted even better than she smelled.

For a moment, I lost myself, but her roaming hands moved lower, tugged at my belt. My body longed for her, but my mind surged with clarity. Gently, I pushed her back. She let out a harried sigh, adjusted herself, teased her hair back. “You have no idea how much it annoys…and intrigues…me that my charms don’t work on you, do you?”

I flashed her a cold smile. “I know exactly.”

“Are you feeling better?”

“Well enough,” I said. “I need to get going. I have to talk to Ape. He was expecting me a while ago.”

She led me into the hallway. “How long had you been here before you picked a fight with my guards?”

“Not long. Fifteen minutes or so.”

“And you never sent word to me? Were you going to leave without saying anything?”

I shrugged. “I told ya, love. It’s business tonight.”

“You wound me, Jono.”

“As much as I love the small talk, I did come here for a reason.”

She said nothing, looked at me.

“I’ve been hired to find a boy that’s been missing for almost two weeks. The client understands he might be dead but they’re paying for closure.”

She rolled her eyes. “Humans and their need to know…. So you stir the supernatural waters and see what rises to the surface?”

“See, you’re not just a pretty face.” I put a hand on her bare shoulder and steeled myself before looking in her eyes. “I need to know if you’ve heard anything, Lori.”

“You know I take few clients these days. The information I have pertains not to children. I can ask my girls if they know anything…. But I do it only for you. And I do it only this once.” Her playful smile was back. “Unless, of course, you want to reciprocate.”

I ignored her. “I appreciate you asking around.”

We stood at the end of the lonely corridor, a heavy metal door set into the wall and one of those glowing, redlight exit signs perched overhead. Lorelei put a hand on the push-bar and applied enough pressure to crack the door, a little of the cool night air brushing past me. I took it as my cue to leave.

“You have my number then?” One of her eyebrows went up. “In case you find anything.”

She nodded. “Humans are sick, too, Swyftt. What makes you think this is anything but?”

“I have a hunch what I’m dealing with is Korrigan. It’s not much to go on…”

“More than just Korrigan feed on human flesh.”

“Sure, but nine times out of ten, it’s one of those bastards.”

“I will ask and contact you if I learn anything.”

I nodded and thanked her.

“I will call you, Jono,” she added, said each word slow and deliberate, made sure even I understood. “You caused quite the scene in there tonight, and that dirty Kory will expect compensation. As much as I miss you, you must not return for awhile.” Kory, that killed me. I wasn’t sure exactly what it meant, but to call a Korrigan that was about as offensive as you could get. I made the mistake once of using it on a Shade, and well, now I had a scar where my left nipple used to be.

Sirens weren’t Korrigan. They were the children of Echidna, a giant serpent the Greeks believed to be the mother of all monsters, whom they worshipped as a goddess, calling her the Great Mother. They had a religion, of sorts, based on this.

I shrugged. “It wasn’t as bad as all that.”

“You pulled an iron knife on him.”

I thought about it for a second. “Yeah, okay. Dick move. Give him a couple of dances. Bill me for ‘em.”

“If he is still here.”

“He’ll be back.”

“Are you okay to drive?”

I nodded. I didn’t hurt that bad anymore, she was as good as any magic I’d seen.

Lorelei looked almost sad as I pushed the door open a little more and stepped outside. It was dark, but we were at the back edge of the parking lot, and there was a street light not too far away, so I could see enough to walk. I didn’t yet, just stood there looking at her. She looked so warm in the cold night she was practically steaming.

“Next time you come back,” she said, “come back to see me.” She smiled, looked almost as shy as a virgin school girl. That might’ve been the first time I understood her feelings.

She controlled every man she touched, except for me. What I did with her, I did freely. What she and I had, as twisted as it was, was the only real thing in her existence, possibly ever. That was too heavy to think about. “I have missed you. Pity you cannot stay a little longer.”

“I enjoyed seeing you,” I said. With me, it was more complicated. I’d had real, and what Lorelei invited out of me was not love, not even close. It was just adulterated fun, and on some level, it was even needed. I hadn’t had a real relationship since Lara died, and I was so fucking lonely all the time. It was nice to get my cock sucked. And maybe because of that, Lori was the closest thing I had in my life to a relationship. Bollocks. It was complicated, but however I meant it, she took it openly. It meant something to her.

I turned, thrust my gloved hands into my pockets, saw my breath come in puffs of white steam. I’d only taken a few steps. She called to me. I turned, and she just smiled, said, “A storm approaches, Jono.” I nodded, turned away, and kept walking.

Maybe it was a metaphor, her way of saying, “take care of yourself.” Maybe she was just commenting on the weather. Either way, I didn’t see any fucking way I was going to come out of this staying dry.

.

8

The first drops began to fall as I got back into the El Camino. I pulled the car out onto the highway and headed back into town just as the bottom began to fall out. Perfect, I thought and clicked on the wipers.

I couldn’t help thinking that I’d missed something. There was a clue I let slip somewhere, but what was it? And what was with Seven’s behavior? He wasn’t what you would call willing to help, but the fucker was terrified of me. He’d seen what I could do to someone like him and always squealed. But this was different. He was terrified in that club, and I had an ominous feeling it wasn’t me he was scared of.

I wanted a phone, and it was only in these rare moments I regretted not having a cell. I wanted to call Nadia. She worked on cases with me before, she knew Seven, maybe she could offer some insight. Or maybe it was just that she was a woman, and it really didn’t matter if it was my mum or a nun, just the idea of female companionship really plucked something in me.

I thought about Lorelei, the way she looked as she watched me walk away and that tone in her voice that almost seemed to say, “Don’t go.” I thought about that dress, the black, silky fabric, and how much it must have cost only to be used as a rug so often. She deserved better than the life she’d chosen for herself, to be used that way. Sure, part of her must have liked it; it was in her nature; she wasn’t human.

I found myself thinking about how it used to be, the sleepovers, the way she moved on top of me, her nearly unquenchable appetite. I thought about that for a while.

Then I thought about other shit. The kind of shit I didn’t need to be thinking about. For some reason, I felt homesick, but not really even for a home, just a vague, abstract ideal of what I thought at one time home could be. It was a dangerous path to venture down, and the ground that lead me there was muddy. But fuck it, I was in a mood already.

I thought about London, Portsmouth, being a cop. Being married. All that fucking talk about relationships and Lorelei made me vulnerable, fucking soft. As those white dividing lines on the road blurred by me, the rain turned to crystal in the headlights, and nothing but blackness swelled around me as the speedometer clocked me going close to ninety.

And all I felt was fucking lonely.

I thought about my wife, Alara, and the Lit class we shared at Highbury College. I sat behind her and imagined I could smell her shampoo every time she tossed her hair. She was smarter than I was, always read the stories, always had the answers.

I cheated with her. Not on her – never on her. She was the only girl in my world. But to talk to her, I cut a few corners, used my ability to see things about her, learned who she was long before she knew my name. That’s how I fell in love with her.

When the semester ended I still hadn’t talked to her. It wasn’t until a party a few months later that I saw her again and struck up a conversation using the Lit class and the things I’d learned in secret. I already knew she was deep, insightful, and intelligent. I didn’t know she was so spontaneous, funny. Over time, she fell for me, too.

She was the first person I ever told about my ability.

Not long after, Alara was pregnant. She dropped out of school and moved back with her parents, who hated me. I couldn’t stand being away from her, and dropped out, too, got a job, and took her as my wife. I took care of her. It was what I wanted.

She was always daddy’s girl, and he had high hopes for her. She was going to be a doctor or member of Parliament, maybe Prime Minister. That all fell apart when she married me. Her family never forgave me, never forgave her. They didn’t even invite us to Christmas dinner. We had each other, and that was enough. Until Anna was born.

I watched the rain as I drove. Felt my heart beating in time with the wipers.

I thought of a rainy afternoon where we stared out at the sea and the dock and the Channel, all encased like stilllife fruit just beyond the window, and except for our heartbeats, the drumming static of the rain, the whole world was still. Then a boat would start its crawl to the sea or the lighthouse would twirl its glow into the fog, and life would resume. But we kept staring, and her heartbeat danced with the rain. She took a deep breath and said, “John, do you ever wonder what the rain forest is like?”

“Not really.”

“You don’t? Sometimes I just like to listen to the rain on the roof and think what it must be like in the rainforest, where all the animals must go when it rains like this.”

“I think the trees are so thick most of the animals stay dry below.” I didn’t listen to the words so much as the way they were said.

“John, let’s go there.”

“To the rainforest?”

“Yeah. One day, why not? I don’t want to stay in Portsmouth my whole life.”

That’s where we met. Where we grew up. Where our love began. It was a quaint port town, known for its fishing. I was the son of a fisherman. God, we were young – the innocent side of seventeen. We had dreams of bigger things then, the way kids do, back when life was full of promise, back before I saw the darkness and my heart grew harder…heavy.

When we lived in London, she was pregnant with Anna. We sat there one night, after she had a nightmare, woke in cold sweat and shook me ‘til I woke too. She laid her head on my chest. I played with her hair as she cradled her belly with an arm.

Outside the window of our little flat we saw the lights of the city, the glow on the river in the moonlight, the slowly passing freighters. In the distance, you could just make out the tower of Big Ben. She watched it all and said, “Remember Peter Pan?”

“I do remember it. I love that story.”

“Will you read it to our daughter?”

“How do you know it’s a girl?”

“I just do, John. Will you read her that story?”

“Of course.”

“You have to promise.”

“I do. I promise. Why? I didn’t think you liked the story that much.”

“I’m gonna be a mom. I’m not gonna be a kid anymore. Sometimes I think about that and get scared. I like to think that there’s a way we never have to grow up.”

“Is that what the nightmares are about? Growing up?”

“Well…that and the baby. That she’s born wrong or ugly or something happens to her.”

“Nothing’s going to happen to her. She’s going to be beautiful and lovely and perfect. Just like her mom.”

“Do you promise?”

“I do. I promise. Nothing will ever happen to her.”

Moments passed between us in silence, but I always knew what she was thinking, always about the baby, always about how she wanted to believe me but there was so much uncertainty. She turned to me, an excited smile in her eyes, and said, “I thought of a name for our daughter. Anna.”

“Anna.” I didn’t have to look down at her to see the anticipation in her eyes. “I love it,” I told her. “It’s beautiful. It’s perfect.” And she hugged me tighter and began to hum something that made her feel farther away.

“You read Anna that story, John. So she knows about Neverland. So she knows that she doesn’t have to make the same mistakes we did. So she knows she doesn’t have to grow up.”

“Maybe we can go there one day. To Neverland.”

She giggled a little. “Yes. Let’s. Let’s really go there.”

Things changed when Anna was born. They changed again when she got sick. So many doctor’s visits. So many hopes dashed against the rocks. So many dreams left by the wayside in favor of some madder pursuit. There was no cure for Anna, that quickly became apparent, and when we lost the house for medical bills, we moved back to Portsmouth, back to my parent’s house on the bay, and waited for Anna to die. Hopes were weak, and all we had were our dreams and each other, but even then, I felt Alara slipping from me. I would take hold of her, hold her close to me, and we would lay there and watch the sea and we would dream. We were so young then, maybe twenty-one, but it felt like we had each lived several lifetimes.

In the moments she would allow herself to be still, Alara would sit on a bench on the dock and stare off at the sea. When I was brave enough to look for her, when I found her there, she would tell me, “In stories they say that Atlantis was an island not too far from here, and it sank beneath the waves because of their own folly. The things they could do with energy, John. With medicine. If we could just find Atlantis…”

“There is no cure for her, Lara.”

“Fuck you, John.”

“Lara…”

“You don’t give up on her like that. There’s gotta be something. There’s just GOT to be…”

I sat on the cold wood beside her, the smell of salt and fish in the air, the gray skies around us foretelling some ominous storm could soon be upon us. Somewhere a fog horn blew. I put an arm around her and she started to cry. She buried her head in my shoulder and I felt her warmth and her hurt and anger. I felt just as powerless. And in a desperate attempt to untie my hands, I whispered to her, “Maybe in Atlantis they could cure her, Lara. Maybe we can find it. Maybe we can make things right again.”

She continued to sob and shake in my arms and through the muffling pain, I felt her words more than I heard them. “Let’s go, John. Let’s really, really go.”

I tried so hard to be strong for both of them. Maybe I grew up, and maybe Alara didn’t, and that’s why we grew apart. But in the end, she was so weak and selfish. Or maybe I was….

I remember when I found her, not even a week after the funeral, alone, in our bedroom. She was sprawled out on the floor, a bottle of pills in one hand. It was empty, some of the bi-colored tablets scattered on the rug. She got so sad in Anna’s last days; she started seeing a doctor and they gave her some pills to make her feel better. She never got happy, though, just numb. But I guess that’s better than sad.

I remember taking her in my arms, cradling her head, the way she hung limp, like heavy rubber tubing, that fucking empty bottle rolling across the hardwood. I couldn’t take it. Not this much; not this soon after. A heart needs time to recover. And I just broke.

The sudden cold rush that swept through my body was overwhelming. I’d been walking on a frozen lake for months, maybe years, but holding her there, the ice gave one final crack and I was completely submerged. Even my hair hurt, my teeth, my fingernails. I struggled to hold her, but shook too badly, and screamed. Then I collapsed.

I’d been strong for too long because I knew I had to be, but I wasn’t being strong for myself and now I was alone. Now, there was no one to be strong for. I couldn’t keep the tears back: there were so many and they’d been building up for so long. I buried my head into her the way she had done to me so many times. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

My mother screamed somewhere behind me and started crying. I felt my father’s hands on my shoulders, trying to pull me back, trying to comfort. And I cried out.

After that, I didn’t need pills to go numb. It took a long time before I felt anything again. For so long I blamed myself, went to her therapist, but none of it helped, and months passed with me in my Grey Country of apathy.

One day I woke and realized that no, I didn’t fail her. She failed me. And after that…I hated her. I hated her for every fucking time I’d been there for her, that the onetime I needed her, she abandoned me forever. The Grey turned to Black and apathy turned to anger. Therapist turned to priest, and finally, after six months of being alone, of shutting everything else out, my parents, my friends, my emotions, I was able to pick myself up again.

It was the late 1980s, and I discovered my only hope, if I had any left, was in something greater than myself. I’d never been a God-person, never had any faith, but goddammit, it couldn’t hurt. I moved back to London and joined the Seminary. I did the fucking exorcism thing for a bit before I quit that shit too and ended up with the Hand where everything else just fell apart. That’s how I came to Seattle.

My fucking city.

And then as though they’d been summoned, I saw the lights on the Space Needle in the distance, saw the silhouette of the skyline materialize like a ghost out of the night air.

I blinked the tears out of my eyes and focused on the road, took a deep breath to stabilize myself but shook involuntarily as I exhaled.

The streets were quiet as I drove them, and I had the thought to stop back by my office and check the messages, but was tired. I stopped just long enough to grab a coffee and then, finally, headed home.