Chapter 15 #2
Officially, they claimed we were better equipped to police ourselves. Unofficially, they wanted their city back and were likely hoping for an eventual case of mutually assured destruction.
“Mind if I have a look?” Mercer asked Beck.
Beck’s eyes narrowed. “You know much about severed power lines?”
Mercer hesitated, and his broad shoulders squared. “No, but—”
“Look all you want, but don’t touch,” Beck cut him off. “If it’s live, you won’t be.”
Mercer gave a stiff nod.
Beck glanced at the club entrance behind us then sighed. “Coll?”
The hellhound whipped around with her head cocked to the summons.
“I’m sure we have complaints to address,” Beck told her.
She smirked. “I’m sure you do.”
Beck didn’t budge, just leveled her with a look that said she was coming whether she liked it or not.
She huffed and tugged her jacket open. “Shall I growl at them? Wave this around?” She drew her revolver in a swift, practiced motion then brandished it in the dim light.
Beck strode forward to cup his palm over the barrel and press it down slowly. “Don’t do that. We’ve inspired enough mass hysteria tonight.”
Colette muttered something under her breath but holstered the weapon obediently.
Beck started toward the front, tossing words over his shoulder. “The power box is around the back, Mister James. Darby can show you.”
They were gone in a moment, leaving Mercer and me standing on the empty club floor. Other than my tail idly waving, neither of us moved.
Mercer’s gaze slid toward me, and his brows pinched almost apologetically. “You don’t have to.”
“I said I wanted to help.”
The furrows in his brow deepened. “Do you know anything about severed power lines?”
I shrugged, lips twitching despite the unease. “I’d say we’re on equal footing there.”
He nodded again before his eyes dipped lower, skimming over my body. I imagined what he saw. Brown skin dark in the low light, nipple rings glinting, cock tucked inside a skimpy black thong.
His throat bobbed then he asked, “Do you wanna throw something on first?”
I did, a little. Being rather violently expelled from Brad’s lap had left me out of sorts and too self-aware. But admitting as much made me itch. I wasn’t shy, and I wasn’t ashamed.
“It’s just skin, Mercy.” I angled my chin up, daring him to push it.
He looked like he wanted to, but he swallowed instead and extended his arm toward the back of the building. “Lead the way.”
With the champagne still fogging my brain, I cut a meandering line out the rear exit and into the desert night.
Despite the darkness, the heat of the day still clung, heavy and stifling.
The pavement warmed the soles of my feet as I crept through the shadows pooling around the building.
I didn’t know exactly where the box was, but thankfully, it wasn’t hard to find.
A padlock lay twisted and useless on the ground beneath the open metal casing. Inside, severed lines curled like blackened veins.
It did no good to look at it, but we stared anyway, wearing twin frowns and matching hands-on-hips poses until Mercer spoke at last.
“So, this Maslow guy…”
I grunted, not looking at him. My eyes stayed on the box and the neat, deliberate cut, wondering how the wraith had managed it without frying himself. Pity. It would’ve been a gift to stumble on his carcass smoking in the dirt. A merciful end compared to what he deserved.
“What does he have against you?” Mercer asked.
I wrapped my arms around my middle, remembering the feel of Maslow’s siphoning touch—how he left me weak and useless. It was bad enough being sucked dry like a damn juice box week after week, but watching him do the same to my boys was a torture all its own.
“He used to own us,” I muttered. “Probably thinks he still does.”
Mercer’s head turned sharply. “Own you?”
“He’s a con man,” I bit out while heat rose in my chest. “Got some demon dealer to help him buy us out of Hell. It was great until it wasn’t, and it wasn’t great for long.”
Mercer was quiet for a second. “Do you think he would hurt you?”
“No.”
“No?” He sounded unconvinced.
“He wants us alive.” I scowled, trying to find the words for things I didn’t want to name. “We’re made of something he likes. He needs it. Or at least he used to.”
We considered the power box again. Another threat.
An escalation. First, the liquor shipment with bottles cracked open and leaking booze like blood across the parking lot, and now this.
Maslow’s message was clear: he could cripple us, shut the Dollhouse down for one night or for good.
He could make Beck’s business venture a failed enterprise, and then what?
Where would we go?
What would we do?
I pictured the dolls scattering like spooked birds searching for a place to land.
Some of them would manage. Colt had enough grit to hustle his way through anything, and Callum would be right behind him, two parts of a package deal.
Zephyr had secured a life as his Daddy’s cherished plaything, so he would never lack for luxury.
But most of us needed the Dollhouse. We needed the stage, the lights, and the family we’d cobbled together.
I rubbed up my biceps, feeling hot and clammy all at once. “You’d think he’d find another supply, but I guess it’s not easy to find another bunch of suckers as gullible as we were.”
Mercer turned his gaze on me, and I wondered what he saw.
A demon in his underwear, liquor-slicked and shaken, or maybe stirred.
Was my hair still a mess?
Would he fix it again?
Did I want him to?
“I wouldn’t describe you as gullible,” he said.
A laugh caught in my throat. “Oh, I have been. More than once.” My mouth twisted. “But I learned better. Painfully. Once, fatally.” I flicked a look at him, unsure how I would explain if he asked for more.
When he held his peace, I summarized by declaring, “It won’t happen again.”
The statement settled between us. Mercer’s gaze darted sideways, chasing a double-decker bus as it barreled down the boulevard. It was long out of sight by the time he found his voice again.
“Do you like Bingo?” he asked.
The question startled a laugh out of me. “Come again?”
Mercer raked a hand through his hair as he looked me over, tracing the dip of my waist and the curve of my bare ass.
“This may not be the best time to ask, but I got invited to a Bingo night, and I wondered if you’d wanna come too.”
My tail gave me away, looping delightedly through the air before I could rein it in. “I’ve never played.”
“Oh.” Relief came as a smile that softened his whole face. “Well, it’s pretty simple. You get cards, and they call numbers. The prizes aren’t great, but—”
“I’d love to,” I cut in.
Blush stained his cheeks, color interspersed with his stubble. “It’s at the VFW Post. Real casual. But it could be fun?”
He’d said more than a few words I didn’t fully understand, and I wasn’t sure if I was more agreeable to the idea of Bingo or how bashful he looked in the city’s evening glow. Either way, I rushed to reassure him.
“If I’m involved, it’s bound to be.”
His smile spread. “I believe that.”
I felt a little steadier. Tipsy still but increasingly grounded as the seconds dragged by.
“I won’t let him hurt you,” Mercer said in the sudden quiet.
The statement left me confused. I peered up and found his face set.
“Any of you,” he said. “I promise.”
“I believe that,” I echoed.
We stood for a while longer, looking at the shorn wires, the Strip, anything but each other. I wasn’t sure what we were waiting for. When he offered once more to walk me to the dressing room, I agreed, though a large part of me wanted to linger.
He dropped me off at the door, then left for the night while I pondered and craved something I couldn’t yet name.