11 Baz
11
Baz
Vane yelps in terror, and Sibyl and I gasp. Lloyd curses quietly from somewhere behind me.
The man takes aim at Dorian’s chest, and Sibyl cups her fingers over her mouth.
“Yeah, you ruined her.” The man sniffs, his voice cracking. “She was the kindest, sweetest person, and you wrecked her. Last time I saw her, she said she was going to a party at ‘Prince Charming’s’ house. She died of an overdose at that party. Your fault.”
“You have my condolences,” says Dorian. “But I’m afraid I don’t know the woman you’re talking about.”
“You dare deny it? You dare?” The man’s voice shrills, thin with anguish. “I’ll kill you. I’ll kill you, and I’ll knock off one of your fucking friends, too.” Watching Dorian’s face, he swerves the gun, pointing it first at Vane, who’s half-hidden behind Dorian, then at Sibyl, then at Lloyd, standing farther back, off to the right. Finally he aims at me, still keeping his eyes on Dorian. “Ah! There it is. This is the one you don’t want to lose. I’m gonna shoot this bitch as payback for my sister. Then I’ll kill you, too, Prince Charming.”
My skin erupts in white-hot goose bumps, adrenaline streaking through my veins. Fight or flight—but I can’t do either. I simply stare down the barrel of the gun, perfectly still and silent.
Sibyl releases a tiny sob, but she doesn’t move. Vane is crying, muttering, “Oh my god, oh my god,” over and over. I don’t dare turn my head to see Lloyd’s expression.
“How long ago did your sister pass?” Dorian says calmly.
The man wipes at his reddened eyes with shaking fingers, then clamps that hand to his other wrist, bracing the gun, still pointing it at me. “I–I don’t know. Twenty years, maybe?”
“I’m going to step forward, into better light,” Dorian says. “Look at my face. Tell me how old you think I am.”
“Don’t do anything stupid,” rasps the man.
“I won’t,” Dorian promises. He takes a slow step forward and tips his face up. “Look at me. How old do you think I was twenty years ago?”
“I… God, I–I don’t understand.” The man lowers the gun a little, a tear trailing down his cheek. “You’re, like, twenty-three? Twenty-five? Fuck, you would have been a kid back then.”
“You’ve only seen a photo of this person who hurt your sister. Probably a blurry photo, right?” Dorian’s voice is a smooth river, flowing over the man’s panic. My own anxiety is easing as I listen to him. “And the lighting in the club is shit. This person you’re looking for couldn’t have been me. You have the wrong man. I’m so sorry for your loss.”
The man hammers his forehead with the wrist of his gun hand. “Fuck… Look, I’m sorry. I think I had too much to drink, and I thought… Shit, I almost shot you.”
“Nothing happened,” Dorian says soothingly. “Do you want me to call you a car?”
“Naw, man. I’m gonna go.” With a gulping sob, the man tucks his gun away again and heads past us, hurrying out of the parking garage into the dark street.
I stay perfectly still, breathing shallowly, as if a sudden movement might make him turn around, might bring him back, might end in a bullet searing through my chest… God, I think I’m going to be sick…
Dorian steps in front of me, towers over me, his chest filling the place where the gun was. He clasps my bare shoulders, and his fingers are cold, with a frenzied strength that belies his calm.
“Baz.” His low voice penetrates my fear, and I suck in a shuddering breath.
“Thank you,” I whisper.
His fingers tighten, tugging me slightly toward him as if he’s going to pull me into a hug. But he doesn’t. “Wait here. I’ll go end this. He won’t ever threaten you again.”
He releases me and stalks away, picking up his pace into a jog, following the gunman.
But Lloyd is moving, too, racing after him. He darts in front of Dorian, blocking his path. “Let him go.”
“Out of my way, Lloyd.”
“He’s already gone. It’s over. You handled it.”
Dorian’s ringed hand flashes, a hard shove to Lloyd’s chest. “He almost killed her. I’m killing him.”
“Dorian, come on,” Sibyl begs.
A flicker of “yes” snakes through my heart—vindictive approval of Dorian’s threat. Delight that he’d kill a man for scaring me.
But that would be wrong.
It’s wrong to want a man dead, just like it was wrong to glory in Vane’s jealousy.
I can’t necessarily help what I feel, but I do have choices.
Slowly I pace forward and lay my fingers on Dorian’s back. He turns away from Lloyd, toward me.
“I need to end that gun-toting bastard,” he says softly. “He can’t hurt me, and I won’t feel a trace of guilt. It’s the perfect system.”
He’s done this before. I can hear it in the cruel nonchalance of his tone.
And I see it, too—the travesty of him, written in his eyes. Soulless beauty. Merciless youth.
“Dorian,” I say. “Let it go.”
He’s breathing hard, his jaw clenched. Then he tilts back his head, and his eyes start to close. The realization of what he’s doing darts through me like a sizzling bolt of lightning. He’s pushing his negative feelings along the tether, into the portrait, wherever it is.
“No!” I hiss, seizing his wrist. “Don’t do that.”
His eyes flare open, startled.
“Feel it,” I whisper.
He shakes his head. “I don’t want to.”
“Don’t push it away. You have to start feeling things again, uncomfortable things.” I keep my voice low so Sibyl and Vane can’t hear. “Dorian, if you hope to convince me to do what you want, I have to know you’ll try to be good. You can’t be this person.”
“And you can’t have it both ways,” he hisses. “I can feel it and go kill him—or I can push it away and let him live.”
“No.” I catch both his hands. “You’re stronger than that. You can be furious and choose not to act on it.”
His white teeth are bared at me, his eyes blue flame. I stare into them, feeling bolder and stronger than I ever have in my life.
He doesn’t pull away. His fingers close convulsively around mine, as if he’s drawing some of my strength into himself.
Slowly he nods.
“This is really cute, guys.” Sibyl’s voice is fragile at the edges. “But I’d like to go. And Vane’s a mess.”
Vane is leaning over, gripping his knees like he might puke, sobbing huge gasps of terror and relief. He’s shaking visibly, probably from whatever he took tonight as well as from the trauma.
“She’s right. We should go,” Lloyd says, and I’m suddenly conscious that he was watching us the whole time. Quietly observing, like he did when the gunman threatened us. Like he did in Scoundrel.
Dorian seems calmer, so I release his hands, and we all continue into the parking garage, heading for the car. I don’t suggest calling the police, because obviously that would start a whole series of questions Dorian can’t answer.
“His sister wasn’t my fault,” Dorian says in a tight undertone to Lloyd-Henry as we walk. “I told her not to take as much as I did. I warned her she couldn’t handle it.”
“I know.” Lloyd squeezes Dorian’s shoulder.
The drive home is silent. Sibyl pats and strokes Vane’s blue hair while he slumps against her shoulder. Judging by his occasional glares in my direction, he’s disappointed I wasn’t shot or mad that Dorian would have killed for me. Or both.
Lloyd is in the driver’s seat, and I sit behind him, staring out the window at the sky, bruised along the horizon by the light pollution from the city. Now and then, I glance at Dorian in the front passenger seat. The intermittent flash of passing streetlamps and headlights throws the edges of his face into stark relief.
“I have to go out of town for a while,” Lloyd says quietly to Dorian as we turn onto Barre Street. “You remember Jay Gatsby, my friend from a few years ago? He’s in North Carolina now, and he has made some interesting acquaintances I’d like to meet.”
“Gatsby,” Dorian murmurs. “The one you set up with that business opportunity you won’t tell me about?”
“I’d like to claim ownership of his idea, but no, he came up with the business plan himself. I may have given him a little nudge, though.”
“You’re always nudging people, Lloyd.” Dorian pinches the bridge of his nose. “Do I need to find another place while you’re gone?”
“Not at all. You can stay in the penthouse until I return. I hate to leave you at this”—he lowers his voice, but I still catch the last two words—“crucial time. I’ll be back before the two weeks are up.”
Crucial time. He’s talking about me and my decision on whether to paint Dorian’s new portrait.
As fun as this day has been and as interesting as my conversation with Dorian was, the incident with the gunman has woken me up. Whatever Dorian may say or do, no matter how sweetly he smiles or how much he confides in me, he is after one thing—my gift. He gave up his one great love to keep that portrait, and he isn’t going to take kindly to a refusal at the end of all this.
Is it right to string him along, to give him hope that I’ll say yes?
Obviously it’s wrong. I know it is.
But I want what he’s offering. The food, the fun, the shopping, the introduction to clients, the tour of the best and brightest parts of Charleston society. The chance to build a brighter future for myself. I want all of it.
My desires are more important to me than Dorian’s feelings.
Which is a horrible thing to admit to myself.
Maybe I should stay isolated, living the quiet life of an artist. Because since I’ve made new acquaintances and moved toward having some kind of social life, I’ve started seeing all the morally gray parts of myself again—the parts that are okay with hurting other people. And I don’t like it.
We’re passing the corner where the abandoned Coast Guard building lies like an overgrown tomb in the dark. There’s a single streetlamp on the corner, and—
And in the white glare of that lamp, I see three figures. A quick snapshot emblazoned on my brain.
The central figure, tall and red-bearded, with bronze muscles, wearing black shorts.
It’s the character I drew the other night. The one Screwtape erased from my tablet.
He looks vaguely watery, almost see-through. Flanking him are two tall, hunched, crooked creatures, like wolves made of sticks, vines, and moss.
The image is gone as fast as it registers in my brain.
I twist frantically in my seat, trying to look back. “Lloyd, stop the car.”
“What? We’re almost to the gate. Just let me—”
“No, no, stop it here!” I cry. “Please!”
“Shit, okay, fine.” Lloyd pulls over, and I leap out, ignoring Dorian’s “What the fuck, Baz?”
I leave the car door open and run across the street, distantly aware of Sibyl saying, “Did you give her something, Lloyd? Something that messed with her head?”
I jog to the sidewalk and stare down it, toward the circle of light cast by the streetlamp.
They were right there—the man I drew on my tablet and the two monsters.
But the sidewalk is empty.
Footsteps scuff the pavement, and Dorian’s fingers close on my arm. His voice is stiff with concern. “Get in the car, Baz.”
“I saw something,” I tell him. “Two of those stick-wolf things, skriken or whatever.”
He scans the area. “If you did, they’re gone now. Did you take something? A pill, a powder—”
“No! I didn’t imagine it. This was real, Dorian. Fucking real. There are more of those monsters, and—and something else—” But I can’t make myself tell him that I saw my fictional drawing in real life. Because that’s absolutely nuts. It’s not possible.
I probably just saw a random guy walking a couple of big dogs.
That’s got to be it, because the alternative is way too weird and scary, even for my life.
“I’m sorry,” I gasp.
“It’s okay.” Dorian maintains his hold on my arm until we’re safely across the street. We climb back into the car, and Lloyd pulls into the gated courtyard of the Chandler Apartments.
“I don’t think I feel like swimming,” I say. “I should get home. Another night, maybe.”
“No problem,” Vane says almost gleefully. He hops out and goes around to the trunk to get his shopping bags.
Sibyl squeezes my arm. “Rest up, hon. See you soon.”
“I’ll take her home, Dorian,” Lloyd says.
“I’m fine to drive,” Dorian insists. “It’s a few blocks away. You go pack for your trip.”
Lloyd yields the driver’s seat, and I move to the front passenger side. As we pull out of the complex onto the street again, I chew on my thumbnail. It tastes gross and weird because there’s still a little paint under that nail from my frenzied art session last night.
“Sorry to wreck the fun—again,” I say.
Dorian casts me a sidelong look. “How about we try a different kind of fun tomorrow?”
“Like what?”
“I’ll surprise you.”
I wince. “Surprises aren’t my thing.”
“I think this one will be.”