The Reluctant Goddess (The Montgomery Chronicles Book 2) (20 page)

“Have you called his owner?”
 

I shook my head.
 

“Are you going to?”
 

I nodded.
 

“This century?”
 

“Look, I know he’s not my dog, but I’m not all that keen to give him back to a man who named him Stupid.”
 

“Maybe he’s a great guy who just can’t name stuff.”
 

“I can only imagine what his kids are called.”
 

He smiled again and once more I wished he wouldn’t. Dan was too charming and I was too vulnerable. Not a good combination.
 

“I’ll take Charlie to the kennels and meet you out front in ten minutes.”
 

I nodded. All I needed to do was check my lipstick and I was good.
 

Over the river and through the woods to the fortune teller’s house I go. I couldn’t wait until Dan found out about that.
 

I shouldn’t have been surprised at the car, honestly. After all, Dan lived in a castle with a moat and a drawbridge and a parking garage that rivaled any of the high-rises in downtown San Antonio. I should have known, somehow, that he would be driving a Rolls-Royce. Actually, Mike was driving the Rolls and Dan was sitting in the backseat.

I got in beside him, trying to look unimpressed. The truth was I’ve never gotten close to a Rolls before, let alone ridden in one. I’d only been in a limousine a couple of times.

This had a limousine beat, hands down.

I settled back against the leather seat, smelling lavender and a faint touch of lemon. Something else was in the air, an almost electrical scent, like ozone after a thunderstorm. Maybe the Rolls was filled with electronic gadgets behind the burled wood.
 

“Why is your name Travis?” I asked.
 

It had occurred to me after he’d told me about his sister. His father was Arthur Peterson’s son. Why didn’t he have the man’s name?”
 

One eyebrow rose at my question. “My mother remarried. Her husband adopted me. I didn’t even know about my grandfather until I was sixteen. Where do I tell Mike to go?”
 

I gave him the address and off we went, so silently that we might still be parked. I put my hand on the seat and couldn’t feel any vibrations from the road. I felt like Cinderella in a magical carriage. Hey, who knows? Maybe it was a Pinto with a spell on it.
 

“About the appointment,” I began, wondering how to put it. “I don’t want you coming inside.”

His left eyebrow went up marginally. He was being a stone statue again. I wonder if the Rangers taught him how to mask his expression.
Reveal nothing, soldier. You are inscrutable. You are a Sphinx among men.
 

Well, he certainly had that down.
 

“Why not?”
 

“I’d prefer going alone.”
 

“Do you think that’s safe?”
 

I hadn’t thought of safety until he asked the question, but it was something I needed to consider. Mr. Brown had recommended Madame X and look what happened when I’d gone to see him.
 

Still, I’d developed the ability to zap people with a single thought.
 

“I’ll be fine,” I said, managing to sound confident and certain.
 

Attitude is everything.
 

Mike parked the car in front of
Fortunes Told and Past Lives Discovered
, a small shop located in a strip mall off Austin Highway. Across the four lane street was a place selling mobile homes. Next door was a knitting shop and on the other side a used book store.
 

The front of Madame X’s place of business was darkened. Nothing showed other than white lettering promising to discover past associations and solve present troubles. No voodoo signs or skull and crossbones.
 

I pasted on my confident smile and left the Rolls, striding to the door with what I considered my businesslike attitude. We have a problem. Let’s solve the problem to our mutual satisfaction. Let’s do business.
 

I wished I had my briefcase, a beautiful white leather thing with my initials in gold near the handle. I’d rewarded myself with it after my last promotion. After awhile, it had become more than an accessory; it was almost an appendage.
 

People don’t give you guff when you carry a briefcase.
 

I pulled open the door and a small bell on the inside handle tinkled merrily. The room instantly reminded me of every fortune teller scene I’d ever seen on TV or in the movies.
 

Something oriental, reminding me of Cinnabar perfume, scented the air. Maybe it was the dried flower arrangement in the corner. I was grateful that I didn’t feel the prickling in my nose that warned me eucalyptus was nearby.
 

The walls were draped in a dark paisley fabric that also covered the large round table in the middle of the room. Two straight back chairs sat on either side of the table, each seat cushioned with a dark colored pillow. I was guessing at colors, because the atmosphere was, let’s say, murky.
 

The only illumination was furnished by two white pillar candles on a table next to another door. I suspected they were battery operated because I couldn’t smell wax burning. The insurance adjuster in me hoped they were fake because it was dangerous to leave burning candles unattended in a room like this. It screamed: fire coming! Claim to follow!

“Hello?”
 

No one answered.
 

I sat at the table, staring at the large round glass ball in the center of it. Candlelight was reflected deep inside the core of the ball.
 

I pulled out my phone and checked the time. Ten o’clock on the dot.
 

Where was Madame X?
 

I decided that I’d wait five more minutes, then leave. Three minutes in, a voice came from a speaker system I couldn’t see.
 

“Identify yourself.”
 

“Marcie Montgomery,” I said. “Your ten o’clock appointment. Mr. Brown gave me your card.”
 

The door beside the table abruptly opened. A figure swathed in a caftan of indeterminate colors stood silhouetted in the doorway.
 

Madame X, if that’s who had appeared, was a tall, Amazon-like woman. The turban on her head only maximized her height.
 

When she entered the room, closing the door behind her, I was instantly assaulted by a perfume that always made me slightly ill. I always hated getting on an elevator with a woman wearing that perfume. Once, I even had to get off before my floor because I was afraid I was going to get sick. My luck it was so popular.
 

“I am Madame X,” she said, her voice deep and throaty. “You are the one who wants to know about the Dirugu.”
 

“Yes.”
 

“Why?”
 

Madame X sat opposite me. I don’t know if she punched a secret button somewhere, but the glass ball lightened a little as if it were glowing inside.
 

She and I stared at each other for what felt like an eternity, but was probably only a minute.
 

The woman was near my mother’s age. She’d probably never been conventionally pretty, but she was arresting. Her nose sailed before her face like the prow of a ship. A broad and tall forehead was counterbalanced by a long and nearly pointed chin. Her eyes were a curious shade of brown, like light shining through a glass of Coke, making the color almost amber. Her large mouth was expertly lined in a dark red shade of lipstick, the crimson making her teeth appear large and white, not unlike a shark.

 
“Why?” she asked again.
 

I straightened my shoulders, banished my unease, and wrangled with the idea of telling her the truth.
 

“I’m a vampire,” I said.
 

That should be enough. If the woman consulted her watch, she’d know something was off. I was a vampire awake at ten o’clock in the morning.
 

She only stared at me.

“Evidently, my father was a vampire, too. My grandmother is a witch.”
 

There, enough genetic information.
 

She abruptly stood.
 

“Come,” she said. “You do not need your fortune told. You need to learn the past, instead.”

C
HAPTER
T
WENTY

Vampires can’t be choosers

Madame X walked to the other side of the room, opened the door she’d just come through and disappeared from sight.
 

“Miss Montgomery!”
 

That was my clue to follow her, evidently.
 

If the fortune teller room had been dim, this place was the opposite. High overhead windows bathed the space in white light. It took a few seconds for me to register what I was seeing. I might have been transported through a magic door to the New York City Public Library. I’d only visited it once, but I’d been amazed by the sheer number of volumes on display.
 

Here there were no tables for readers or softly glowing lamps. Only a number of books to rival that library, stacked on shelves stretching to the sill of the high windows. I couldn’t see how deep the shelves were, but they seemed to go on forever.
 

Just how big was this strip mall?
 

She followed a long corridor, passing at least six closed doors before leading me into a small office furnished with a desk overflowing with paper, two visitor chairs and a desk chair on which there was a long blue heating pad.

That heating pad made me think Madame X was all human, a thought making me breathe a little easier.
 

She moved behind the desk and whipped off the turban, revealing a cascade of bright red curls falling to her shoulders.
 

“My name is Mary Dougherty,” she said. “I’m the Librarian.”
 

What a curious way to put it. Not
a
librarian as much as
the
librarian.
 

She waved me into one of the visitor chairs and I sat, staring up at her with eyes that were probably as wide as an owl’s. I had a feeling that I’d finally found someone who could give me the information I’d been seeking ever since waking up in the VRC. No, not then, but two weeks later when it was evident I wasn’t like the rest of the fledglings. I craved tacos, not blood. I didn’t have a yen to bite a neck, but a Big Mac. Give me anything fried and I was your slave. Just hold the Type O, please.
 

 
Her brown eyes seemed to catch the light and reflect it back. A quick impression gone in a second. I wondered if I was wrong and she wasn’t a hundred percent human after all. Should I settle in or run like hell?
 

I stuck my hand in my pocket where my phone was, just in case I needed to speed dial Dan in a hurry.
 

"Don't be afraid," she said.
 

I was most emphatically not afraid. I was cautious, however, and that seemed to me to be a good thing. In a world peopled by Brethren, you really couldn’t be too careful.

“You wanted to know about a Dirugu,” she said, grabbing a large manilla envelope on the desk and holding it out to me.
 

It could have had a bomb in it, but I didn’t care at the moment. I took it anyway.
 

“Would you like some coffee?”
 

My life was about to change and she was being hospitable? I found myself nodding anyway and answering a question as to how I took it.
 

Instead of ringing someone, she left me alone in the office with the manilla envelope.
 

I placed it on the chair next to me, folded my hands like a good little girl on my lap, and tried to slam down my sudden terror. Someone actually knew what a Dirugu was. Someone who hadn’t looked at me as if I were a loon. However, that someone had morphed from being a fortune teller to a librarian, too.
 

The envelope was beckoning me.
 

My first days as an insurance adjuster had left me feeling uncertain and stupid. My degree had been in business. I'd struggled through accounting, deciding there and then that I would be better served by concentrating on the more personal aspects of business like human resources. Being an insurance adjuster meant you needed to know a lot about people. Gradually, I’d acquired a certain competency and with it assurance.
 

Where had that confidence gone?

When Mary/Madame X returned, bearing a tray and wonderfully aromatic coffee, I asked her a question that had been bothering me for a while.
 

"Where do vampires come from?"

 
I’d gotten a slanted view of vampires from Orientation, from witches, and another opinion from a master vampire. I had Dan's take on the species and what I knew from popular culture. I wasn’t sure any of it was correct.