30. Out to Brunch
30
Out to Brunch
In a feat of timing, cooperation, and enough illusion magic to render the six of us unrecognizable even to each other, the members of the Bloody Hex walked into the Butter Me Up Buffet for Saturday brunch. Actually, there were seven of us if you counted the black-bedecked zombie girl scribbling with permanent marker on a laminated menu. Maggie, a name I’d reluctantly committed to memory.
At least she looked like herself. I was having a hard enough time sorting out the rest of the crowd of apparent strangers. We occupied a long table in the secluded back room of the restaurant. An area most often used for sad birthday parties or family reunions.
Compared to my recent encounters with food in Thorngate’s cafeteria, this place smelled divine. Maple syrup provided the overriding aroma, sickly sweet and warm, with undertones of spicy sausage.
By the time everyone had filled a plate from the buffet, I thought I had them figured out. At the head of the table sat Grimm, of course. To his right would be Vinton and Avery on the left. Ripley and Maggie might as well have shared a chair, squeezed in as they were in line with Avery. Donovan occupied the space beside Vinton, leaving the foot of the table for Grimm to keep a steady eye on me as he launched into a predictably grandiose speech.
“What a night we all had,” he began. “Full of surprises.”
A tart smile accompanied his statement, causing me to snort softly into my orange juice. Grimm’s attention pulled away to begin a slow circle around the table.
“I’m pleased to announce that, despite a momentary setback, we were able to induct two dozen new infantrymen and women into our ranks,” he said. “While they won’t be joining us this morning, you can look forward to meeting them all in the coming weeks.”
How had he managed that? Did they go door to door after Donovan and I left? Chase people down on the street and beg them to reconsider Bloody Hex membership? Or did they issue apologies for my purportedly drunken behavior and guarantee big, bad Marionette wouldn’t be allowed to scare the newbies in the future?
“I would like to reiterate a formal welcome to our returning members.” Grimm gestured to Ripley, who nibbled a strip of bacon. “Mister Vaughn is back after over a decade, and Fitch, who will be embodying innocence for the foreseeable future.”
“Pussy.” Avery coughed into his hand.
Vinton chuckled.
I tapped a finger toward the necromancer’s fork, flipping it off his plate and toward his face. It struck his shoulder, instead, scattering fried potatoes in its flight.
Avery barked a laugh, and Grimm’s pounded fist rattled dishes all the way down the table. “Fitch Farrow, if you start trouble again today, I will put you back in prison and leave you there! ”
Quiet ensued except for a low growl from Vinton as he picked potatoes from his lap.
Despite being seated beside me, Donovan made every effort to avoid looking my way. I wanted to believe he looked haggard and that he’d been as restless overnight as I had. But the more I studied his face in profile, he seemed alert and even cheerful.
Clearing his throat, Grimm sat up straighter, then took a sip from his steaming mug of coffee.
“Of course, I can’t forget our Donnie boy,” he said. “Official at last. And with good cause. I’m sure your brother is grateful for your timely intervention.”
Donovan nodded but said nothing as Grimm gave solo applause.
Heaving a breath, I glanced to my right, where Maggie had covered nearly one entire side of the menu in bold, black scribbles. She reminded me of a less coherent version of Clyde. Though, so far, no more talkative.
Another marker lay on the table beside her. I picked it up and found an empty corner of the laminated page to draw a Tic-Tac-Toe board.
The zombie girl stopped in mid-doodle. Her head turned toward me with abrupt jerks like a bird hunting for worms.
“You first.” I pointed to the open field.
Tilting her chin to one side then the other, she settled on a square to place an X.
“Looking ahead,” Grimm continued, “our mission remains the same. Thanks to my recent proximity to Maximus Lyle, I have learned the city gate issue will be back up for a vote in the coming weeks. We need to stall that. Which is where Mister Vaughn comes in.”
I’d been wondering about Ripley’s role in all of this and what else I’d missed during my prison stint .
Grimm droned on. “Determined as Maximus is to push the measure through, we must take the matter out of his hands. The choice to close our city will come from the other side of the wall.”
“The humans?” Donovan asked. “I thought we didn’t want them involved.”
Grimm nodded. In his illusioned disguise, I’d finally realized what he looked like. One of those door-to-door evangelists with pamphlets and pressed white shirts. Even his hair was combed and stuck with shiny gel.
“That’s true,” he said. “We want them to distance themselves. Which they will, or risk contracting a deadly virus.”
Crickets.
Heads swiveled around the table until Ripley muttered through a mouthful of biscuit, “There’s going to be a plague.”
“Hell, yeah!” Avery whooped. “Like old times, eh, Rip?”
Ripley grunted assent as he slathered jelly on his next bite of biscuit.
“He can do that?” I asked, recalling the knockout gas he spread at the prison. Spewing poison and disease, he wasn’t a healer at all. Exactly the opposite.
“It’s his specialty.” Grimm smiled.
Which was why they sprung him from Thorngate. To contaminate the city with some antiquated disease that would force the humans to quarantine us within our own walls. Left to die or sort things out and survive, I imagined it would make little difference to those on the outside.
“When is that happening?” Donovan asked.
“It already has.”
Grimm’s pointed stare past us to the buffet line prompted everyone to turn and look. Food steamed in chafing bowls, exposed beneath the sneeze guard to airborne contaminants. Regular illness spread that way; germs clung to ladles touched by too many hands or were consumed in undercooked fish and poultry. I could think of no reason why magical sickness wouldn’t follow the same rules.
As for the recipients of Ripley’s manufactured plague, the restaurant was brimming with people. Weekend mornings were a popular time for dining out, and every table in the place was seated with patrons greedily stuffing their faces. Most were families with children. My stomach churned.
I looked at my plate, mourning the loss of the best meal I’d had in days before scooting my chair back to put distance between myself and the poisoned food. Others reacted similarly, enough that Grimm chuckled.
“Don’t fret, gentlemen,” he said. “We have the cure. Mister Vaughn will ensure everyone here remains in peak health.”
The same Mister Vaughn who had put in earbuds and was currently thumbing through his phone’s music library? I used the tip of my finger to push my plate farther away. Not taking any chances.
Maggie tapped her marker impatiently on the menu and gave a little whine. My turn. I leaned in and scribbled a lopsided O on the menu before withdrawing once more.
At the other end of the table, Vinton engaged Grimm in muffled conversation. Avery resumed eating while Donovan joined me in abstaining. In the relative quiet, I stretched to nudge his shoe with mine.
He looked over, visibly unsettled about having cleared half his plate. I wouldn’t have blamed him if his next thought was to run for the bathroom to stick his finger down his throat. The details of the disease hadn’t been discussed, but it hardly mattered. The word “plague” came with enough negative connotations to instill fear.
My brother’s gaze met mine, and I floundered for words. “Listen, Donnie, about last night,” I began. “I’m not ungrateful—”
“Not now, Fitch.”
“Then when?” My voice escaped more loudly than I intended. Frustration and fear mingled, calling the attention of everyone else at the table.
“Fitch?” Grimm’s voice drew my eyes away from my brother, and I found myself at the end of an alley of odd looks.
“You have a busy day ahead,” Grimm continued. “Shall we take a moment to recap? Privately?”
I took up the marker to fill in my final O on the Tic-Tac-Toe board. It was a planned loss to the zombie girl, who giggled with delight.
“I think I’ve got it,” I said.
My plans included getting my car out of the impound and joyriding backroads to eventually end up at the Bitters’ End. There, Nash would ply me with libations until I told him everything that had happened in the past ten days. He would make me feel better about it all, maybe good enough that I could stomach my brother’s successful initiation and the fact that the Bloody Hex just poisoned the city with breakfast.
Grimm rose from his chair. He smiled, showing all the practiced charisma of a conman. “I’ll only borrow a moment of your time,” he said.
The others continued staring, including Ripley, despite Maggie tugging on his sleeve to show off her victory.
I pushed my chair back and stood. Did Grimm call the other men out like this? I never saw it. Just me, the problem child, singled out for reprimand every time I turned around.
This one I had seen coming, at least. It was written in stone the moment I climbed onto the table at the Bitters’ End and made a target of myself for everyone in the room.
Grimm and I walked outside, where customers continued to arrive. Families spilled from minivans and SUVs like marbles scattering. Mothers scolded while fathers led the charge across the parking lot and through the doors of Butter Me Up.
As Grimm and I made our way down the long side of the building, I wondered aloud, “You said it’s a deadly plague. How deadly?”
Grimm stopped walking and turned to face me, wearing his illusioned disguise and a practiced, pleasant look. “Any disease is deadly, given the proper conditions,” he said. “But that’s not really your concern, is it? We all have our roles to fill. A machine functions best when everyone does their own part.”
Sighing, I patted my pockets in search of cigarettes, only to be reminded of the soupy paper mess left on the motel bathroom floor.
“You said I had a busy day?” It was more a statement than a question.
Grimm nodded. “Holland Lyle. You should waste no time in speaking with her. Strike while the iron is hot, as they say, or before she changes her mind.”
I thought back to the brief conversation I’d had with Holland while waiting out the post-sentencing chaos in the Capitol courtroom. She’d given me her contact information, and I’d immediately given her cause to regret it. It might have been better to let that situation simmer rather than risk it boiling over.
“The trial was yesterday.” I crossed my arms. “I was in prison until yesterday. I’ve barely slept or eaten… I need a minute. Holland can wait. She’s not going anywhere.”
“Hmm, yes.” Grimm stroked his chin, musing. “I can see how you might be taxed after such strenuous activities last night.”
I bit my lip to keep from laughing. It wasn’t funny, just predictable and unfortunately familiar.
“There it is,” I said. “That’s what you really wanted to talk about, right? I’ll get to Holland Lyle when I’m damn good and ready, but this can’t wait another minute. I bet you slept shitty, too. Up all night writing me a fucking speech. So, let’s hear it.”
His illusioned disguise wavered, allowing a brief flash of reality to cross his visage. A beard sprouted from his rosy, church boy cheeks, and the slicked back style of his hair tumbled into long, loose waves. It corrected just as quickly and, when his brows drew down, they were slim as though tweezed, and the expression of scorn created the only wrinkles on his much younger face.
“I don’t know what’s gotten into you, young man,” he hissed, “but I don’t like it one bit.”
I shrugged. “It’s not a bad start, but I’m here for the part where you remind me what a disappointment I am. Maybe we could revisit the idea of me losing your trust or my own ambition. Or what was it?” My eyes rolled skyward as I searched for the words. “Not a disappointment. An embarrassment.”
Grimm caught me by the chin and tilted my head roughly backward. I braced on one leg, barely avoiding a stumble into the holly bushes lining the sidewalk.
Standing with his back to arriving traffic, Grimm didn’t see the attention we were attracting. A pigtailed girl raced by, holding her mother’s hand while staring. I gave her a wave and a strained smile while Grimm pressed into me.
“You lack the barest sense of responsibility,” he said in a gruff whisper. “You have not an inkling of the expectation that comes with your reputation. With your social standing.” His other hand stabbed a finger into my chest. “You represent a proud tradition—”
“Of coercion and murder?” I jerked my head free of his grasp. “We’re thugs. We victimize people. I think I represent that pretty damn well.”
My step forward drove Grimm back. When he tried to set his feet, I pushed with magic until he teetered on the curb, bent over the hood of a parked pickup truck.
“And you’re done putting hands on me,” I said. “I’m not a kid you get to knock around for fun anymore. Hit me again, and I’ll hit you back. And I think we both know who has the better left hook.”
I pinned him there until it seemed he’d relented. But no sooner had I given a few inches of breathing room than did he rage at me again.
“Need I remind you what you were when I found you?” he asked. “A frightened, useless child. A bug I could have crushed under my heel.”
The illusion faltered again, struggling to track his emotions as they took a darker turn. “I made Marionette. He belongs to me. You belong to me, and you will behave accordingly or suffer the consequences.”
Behave. I hated that word.
I cracked my neck.
“Try me,” I told him.
Grimm shook his head. “Not you, Fitch. I prefer to deal with more reasonable men. Like your brother.”
Icy fingers dragged down my spine. Old fears lurked too near the surface, reminders of how long I’d spent afraid of this man. How willing and able he’d been to steal every good thing from my life. Any sense of security or safety was yanked away. He’d seemed all-powerful then. Somehow, now, he still did.
“You’re right,” Grimm continued. “I was awake much of last night. After I reimbursed Nicholas for the damage you caused to his bar, Donovan and I had a lengthy chat about his future. He shared with me his aspirations, his hopes and dreams, and we made plans. While you’re busy at the Capitol, there will finally be room for your brother to flourish. It seems he’s been a bit… trapped in your shadow all these years.”
Safe in my shadow. Sheltered and protected while I took the brunt of the abuse. Donovan didn’t make it to twenty with clean hands and a clear conscience by accident. I fought for that. Part of me died for it. I did for him what I wished someone had done for me.
Grimm closed in again, but not with violence this time, with an impassioned appeal. “I’m prepared to give Donnie what he wants,” he said. “Or what you want for him. Anonymity and safety, am I right?”
He paused for my response, but I gave none.
“That wouldn’t suit him much at all,” Grimm said, “but he is reasonable. Surely, you can be, too.”
The window behind us allowed a view into the back room of the restaurant. Peeking between the blinds, I saw the men and Maggie at the table, casually chatting as though they hadn’t just been informed of a mass-scale murder plot. Even Donovan had overcome his nerves and was finishing his meal, plague and all.
Was I the odd man out?
Of course, I was. I knew that already. Not enough of a team player to fall neatly in line, but not rebellious enough to risk the consequences of turning my back on the band of killers who raised me.
“So, let me get this straight,” I said. “You want me to go make nice with the investigator and trust you with Donnie? Believe you’ll keep him safe as long as I—”
“As long as you continue to be reasonable.” Grimm smiled. “It’s not such a difficult request.”
I worked my jaw.
Leaving Donovan alone with the gang during my prison sentence had been bad enough. I wasn’t convinced his time with them hadn’t spurred him into committing last night’s gruesome murder. And he’d showed up at the prison break with a conjured gun, trigger happy enough that he almost committed murder via friendly fire.
But the alternative was refusing the Capitol job, and then? Then I would lose everything.
I stood in limbo long enough for Grimm to chime in, “So, do I need to put you in contact with Miss Lyle, or—?”
“I’ll call her.”