Sin City Goddess (6 page)

I trusted no one. Everyone knew that, but I held my tongue.

Athena escorted us to the corner, where the tall, glass cylindrical portal stood. “Once you enter the portal, you’ll experience a flash of white light, perhaps a dizzying sensation, and then, after a few moments, you’ll be transported to Las Vegas, directly in front of the city sign. You’ll need to lock hands.”

Archer and I stepped inside the chamber and he grabbed my hands. I grunted.

He said, “I’m sorry I couldn’t help your sister.”

I said, “Just stay out of my way.”

Athena slapped a large, silver button. Then a bright light nearly blinded me, accompanied by a piercing, scraping noise, before everything went black.

It was hotter than Hades’s closet in Las Vegas, and brighter than a Zeus-fueled lightning bolt.

After what seemed like days of walking, I couldn’t take it anymore. My leather pants were melting into my skin, and my skin felt like it was on fire. I liked warmth, but this was ridiculous.

“Where in the blazes is this place we’re to stay?” I said. “How much longer until we get there?”

Archer cocked an eyebrow at me, and the tiny lines etched around his eyes danced. “We’ve been walking for ten minutes. We’ve got quite a ways to go, so I suggest you suck it up.”

“And I suggest you watch how you speak to me, before I blacken your other eye.”

A nerve in Archer’s neck twitched. “That’s not funny. Athena said I can’t take any chances. I can’t bleed.”

“I won’t make you bleed. I’ll only make you wish you were dead.”

“Don’t you mean ‘wish I weren’t dead so I wouldn’t have to put up with your crap’?”

I ignored that last comment. The sun was beating so hard on my face, I could have sworn I was frying. I had never felt such immense heat. I gathered my long hair and wrapped it in a knot, waving a hand at the back of my neck. “You know this town. Is there a river or lake nearby? I have to get some water. I feel as if I’m burning.”

He laughed. “You’re in the desert, sweetheart. No water anywhere. You can wait until we get to the hotel. You’re tough. Besides, I thought you’d be used to this heat.”

“It never gets this hot in Olympus, except in Tartarus. And I avoid that like I would a snake pit, because, well, it is.”

My tone must have signaled I didn’t want to talk about the belly of the Underworld, because Archer didn’t ask about it and kept quiet for a while. Several loud, annoying cars blasted their horns at us while we trudged along the walkway. We passed the W
ELCOME TO
L
AS
V
EGAS
sign, patches of dead grass, and a few tall lights that Archer explained directed traffic.

Then I met the first mortal I wanted to kill.

I was following Archer Mays across a paved road when I heard the motor of a noxious car engage. The vehicle made a braking sound, but before I could turn to see what was taking place behind me, I felt an intense pain on my backside. The impact was so harsh, I was certain my pants were permanently implanted in my ass.

At first I thought perhaps I had violated some pedestrian law and had been hit by the vehicle. Then I saw a middle-aged man with a potbelly and a hairy arm hanging out of a convertible, waving his hand. The driver next to him said, “Yeah! Smack that ass! Hey, baby, what’s shaking?”

I was hot and I was thirsty, and the blinding power of the sun had incapacitated all sense of logic. He was too far away to grab, so I used the power of my voice to punish him. I narrowed my eyes, zeroed in on my target, opened my mouth, and screeched.

Immediately, both men covered their ears, and the car came to a jarring halt. The glass fixtures on their automobile
burst, followed by their mirrors. Then the drinks in their hands imploded, showering them with foamy amber liquid.

Somehow, they knew I had caused it all to happen.

Archer was several steps ahead of me. He wouldn’t have heard the screech—only my targets could. He turned around just in time to see the men circle back, shouting profanities at me.

He was confused, but he quickly realized what had happened when the older, fat man said, “You fucking bitch!”

Then the driver, a young man with spiky blond hair, said, “If you don’t want your ass slapped, don’t dress like a whore. You better have some money to pay for this shit, lady.”

“Gentlemen, is there a problem here?” Archer asked calmly behind me.

The driver, who I realized was a great deal younger than his companion, said, “Mind your own business, fucko.”

Archer smiled widely, reached into his back pocket, his bicep flexing just for emphasis, and pulled out something shiny. “See, fellas, Officer Hot Pants is my business. Now, if you don’t mind, she’s working undercover today. So if you don’t want to go to jail tonight, I suggest you keep your heads down and your mouths shut.”

The two men looked dumbstruck.

The younger man spit on the street, inches from Archer’s foot. “Dude, she trashed my ride. I’m not going to let that go.”

Archer craned his neck, making a show of examining the car. “Really, and how did she do that?”

The older man swallowed hard and looked at his friend.

The driver was either too stupid or too stubborn to back down. “I don’t know, man—she screamed or used a whistle or something.”

Archer pretended to consider this. He rubbed his chin, then turned to me. “You must have quite a set of lungs on you to cause that kind of damage.”

I knew the ploy. My sisters and I had played Good Fury, Bad Fury many a time.

“Sure do,” I said. “After all, this is Vegas. Couldn’t have been a machine making all that racket.”

Archer said, “Or missile testing in the desert.” He looked pointedly at the older man, who licked his lips nervously. “Or other kinds of activity that may take place in a desert. That may involve, oh, I don’t know… flying objects?”

I had a feeling I knew where Archer was going with this. The stories of little green men were as ancient as civilization itself.

I fired up the flames in my eyes, just for a moment, and both men looked at each other, jumped in their broken car, and sped off. I thought I heard the younger guy say, “Man, I told you aliens exist!”

Archer looked at me after the car was out of sight. “Well, hell’s bells, is that a smile I see on your face?”

I had rather enjoyed toying with a human who misbehaved, but I wasn’t about to let Archer Mays know that. I set my mouth into a grim line.

Archer said several minutes later, when I was certain my skin had cooked right into my flesh, “Admit it: we make a good team.”

I stole a sideways glance at his stubbly chin and sturdy shoulders. “Don’t push it.”

“You want to tell me what you did back there? It’s probably not a good idea to attract too much attention to ourselves, you know.”

“He needed to be punished. I used my wail.”

“Your wail?”

“My voice.”

“How?”

I clenched my fists, growing irritated with all the questions. Just because we were a team didn’t make us friends.

“Can we not talk? I’d like to keep all the saliva in my mouth until we get near a watering hole,” I said.

“Suit yourself,” he said stiffly.

I knew we needed to share information eventually, and that I was being spiteful, but I didn’t care. I needed to reserve all my strength. The force of my screech had drained me. I could feel my energy slipping with each step. What was it about this city that so instantly infuriated and exhausted me? Why did I feel as if my power was fading?

Is this what had happened to Alex? Had my sister been so immersed in having fun that she hadn’t realized this town was stealing her force? Was that why she had been taken? Because she simply hadn’t had the strength to fight?

Or was it something else entirely that was siphoning my power? Something darker and more deadly?

Because, after all, the gods are immortal only in Olympus. Here, we are vulnerable. Just like humans.

Chapter 8

He was aching to kill again. It had been so long since he had felt the soft flesh of life being snuffed out beneath his fingers. The ones who were so surprised, they couldn’t even scream. Those were his favorite. Sometimes, after he cut them, he would dip a finger into their open wounds and taste the blood. It was like sweet wine to him. And the thrill! Once, when he had been drunk, he had told a friend there was no greater pleasure in life than death. Of course, he’d had to cover up, had to pretend as if he was only joking, but he had meant it. The satisfaction of watching an innocent human being die at his hand aroused him. It was the only way he could achieve that kind of pleasure anymore. And a man had needs. It wasn’t his fault he was wired this way.

He felt as if he had been under a trance, a spell of some kind, for far too long. Going through the motions of acting normal. But who among us was truly “normal”? Show him a man without sin, and he’d show you a man with a secret. All the great ones—Jack the Ripper, Ted Bundy, Jeffrey Dahmer—all led perfectly socially acceptable lives until they got caught. Then the judgments came. The punishments. Now, he would dole out his own punishments.

He looked around the darkened room, feeling alive again. His playmates were all fast asleep. None of them had seen his face. None of them knew what he was planning. Their cries,
their pleas, their tears wouldn’t save them. Women were more emotional than men, sure, but what he hadn’t expected was the way they smelled when they were afraid. Like feral cats emitting an odor of protection. They smelled metallic, earthy, sweet, and tart all at once.

He wanted so badly to take one of those fragile necks in his hands and squeeze until her eyeballs popped. They didn’t actually pop all the way out, in his experience. At least, they hadn’t with the others. He’d like to see that, though. Maybe he could try something new. An experiment.

But no, he had to wait. He had to have patience.

It wouldn’t be long now.

Chapter 9

We navigated the city like rats in a maze. We had to cross over streets, go up and down moving staircases, and still it seemed we were no closer to our destination. I couldn’t understand how everything seemed within reach when it was actually miles away.

Occasionally, I would point to something and Archer would identify it. He explained that a pawnshop was where people exchanged valuables for currency. I couldn’t help but feel a bit sad thinking of all those lost treasures. Humans used to value ancient artifacts. It seemed now that everything was disposable.

We passed open markets, eateries, and a few of those characters in animal costumes that Hades had shown me back in the war room. As the lord of the Underworld had said, people were posing for pictures with them, libations in hand. I saw a few women walking around in elaborate headdresses, with little covering anything else. I couldn’t blame them in this heat, but those things on their heads—and the sparkling, painfully high heels dressing their feet—looked unbearably uncomfortable.

And then I spotted her. An angel with wings. I tugged Archer’s shirt and said, “Look, she must be a goddess. Perhaps it would be all right to use my wings. We can fly to our inn in no time!”

There was a shiny pyramid to the right of her.

“That’s the Luxor. It’s a casino and hotel, and she’s likely in costume, handing out two-for-one passes to a show.”

“You mean the wings aren’t real?” I asked.

He said, “Nothing in Vegas is real.”

I couldn’t hide my disappointment.

“We’re not too far. Hang tight,” Archer said.

We passed another casino—which I learned was the term mortals used for gaming houses—that looked like the New York skyline, and Archer explained there was another farther along the path that resembled the Eiffel Tower of Paris. All of them were lit up more brightly than the sun. Why did they need all these lights in the daytime?

By now, the sweat was pouring off me, and Archer didn’t look much better. His cheeks were flushed, his hair damp, and he adjusted his jeans now and then, as if he wished he could take them off. I briefly wondered what his legs looked like. Were they strong and athletic-looking, like his upper body?

I pushed the thought out of my mind. The sun was making me delirious.