Chapter 18
Iraise my hand to knock on Tristan’s front door, bracing myself for the onslaught of everyone’s euphoric emotions.
Which, of course, they’re perfectly entitled to feel—I mean, they did stop a supernatural entity from coming through a magic portal into our world and thus prevented a potential apocalypse.
Sometimes I wonder if I should’ve just stayed in Devon.
I don’t really feel like I should be a part of this celebration; my role was peripheral at best. Everything is piling on top of me and I’m tired and confused.
The fact that I still haven’t spoken to my mother keeps playing on my mind. I’ve been in London for months now. I should’ve just sucked it up and gone to see her, but I just can’t. Now I’m stuck in a holding pattern.
Then there are the dreams, which are coming thick and fast now.
I’m able to remember all the details down to the tiniest thing, but they’re also leaving me with blinding headaches and a vague sense of nausea.
I don’t know exactly what my mother was trying to protect me from when she gave me up, but it’s become very clear that the Crawshanks family we’re descended from was caught up in some really dark magic.
Then there’s the stranger in the alley and his insistence that Sam is or will be someone important to me.
I hate being told what to do, especially by someone who didn’t even have the decency to give me his name. It’s just fucking rude.
I stare at the door with my fist suspended above its surface.
Just do it, I tell myself. You can stay an hour, just enough to show your face so they don’t think you’re completely rude and introverted.
Which I totally am, by the way.
I have no doubt Dusty will follow through on her threat to serenade me into the wee small hours of the morning with her apparently extensive repertoire of show tunes if I don’t make an appearance; after all, she’s already sprung a surprise visit on me before.
I’m having enough trouble sleeping without a never-ending loop of All That Jazz.
Closing my eyes and taking a deep breath, I shore up my mental defences, determined not to let any stray emotions squeeze through. I’ve got my hands full trying to figure out where my head’s at without borrowing anyone else’s wild mood swings.
Opening my eyes, I knock loudly before I can talk myself out of it, and a few seconds later, my eyes widen.
In the open doorway stands a six-and-a-half foot—possibly seven in the platform heels she’s wearing—drag queen dressed in a skintight leather mini dress held together by safety pins and hopeful wishes and a sparkly leopard-print fur jacket.
Her hair—which I can see is a high-quality wig—is a black bob that slashes along her jawline with a blunt, heavy fringe covering her brows, settling just above her thick, feathery eyelashes.
Her blood-red lips are pursed as she blows a cloud of pina colada-scented smoke at me.
I cough lightly.
Tucked underneath her arm like a rugby ball is Tristan’s chunky cat, who seems to be staring up at the queen with something akin to absolute feline adoration.
Me, I’m a little scared of her. She looks like she’d chew me up for breakfast and spit me out.
Still, never show fear, right? I draw myself up to my full height of maybe five-nine and give her my haughtiest look.
“Another drag queen? I’m beginning to think Tristan collects you like rather sparkly Pokémon.”
Her dark, heavily made-up eyes scan me from scalp to toe and back again. “You must be Prickles,” she says, her tone even drier than mine. “Chan told us about you.”
“Told you what exactly?” My eyes narrow a fraction.
“That the hot PI has a massive crush on you.”
I sputter and feel my cheeks heat. “That’s not–we’re not–”
“Oh, so it’s mutual, is it?” Her mouth twitches as she watches me verbally flounder. “She also said you’re as prickly as a puffer fish.”
“Charming.”
“Come on.” She opens the door wider and indicates with a tilt of her head that I should step inside whether I want to or not.
She has a very commanding presence.
I hang my coat on the crowded hook by the door, and she leads me into the packed living room.
“Do you want a drink? There’s beer, wine, and cocktails, although you might want to avoid them. If Chan’s been mixing them, you’ll probably be paralytic in two sips. She’s not known for sticking to standardised measurements when it comes to her booze.”
“Um, no thank you,” I say politely. Trying to block everyone’s emotions is going to take a lot of effort, and while I do enjoy a glass of wine, alcohol will only make it harder.
“There are bottles of water in the fridge in the kitchen too. Tristan said everyone can help themselves.”
“Maybe later,” I murmur, and glance nervously at the sheer amount of people I don’t know in the room. I must have a flashing neon sign saying socially awkward across my forehead because the tall drag queen next to me seems to note my discomfort and takes pity on me.
“I’m Brandy, Brandy Butter. There’s also some more of the ladies from The Rainbow Room. Over there in the sequins and the shoulder pads so large she should be playing American football is Ruby Slippers.”
“How does she even get through the doorway in those things?” I frown as I look at the drag queen chugging a cocktail. “They’re huge and so…glittery. It’s like I’ve stepped right into 1983 and an episode of Dynasty.”
“She turns sideways,” Brandy replies, glancing at me. “Aren’t you a little young for that reference?”
“My dads were fans. It’s all about the face slaps and drama.”
Brandy snorts. “Beside her is Ginger Royale.” She eyes my red hair. “No offence.”
“None taken.”
“Over there, that’s Maddie.” She points a lethally pointed purple nail across the room to a short, compact woman with long, curly red hair, who is standing with a beer in one hand and her arm wrapped around the waist of a pretty blonde woman.
“She’s a detective and Danny’s partner at Scotland Yard. The woman with her is her wife Sonia.”
Brandy eyes Maddie briefly for a moment and then looks back to me contemplatively. “I’m beginning to think you gingers are like buses, nothing for ages and then two show up at once. I thought you lot were meant to be a dying breed.”
“Apparently not,” I reply.
“It’s a pretty colour.”
“Thanks.”
“You’re welcome.” She shrugs, and she doesn’t seem the type to compliment people often, so I guess I should be pleased.
“I don’t know him, or him, or her.” She starts randomly pointing people out and not being at all subtle about it.
“I think they’re Tristan and Danny’s new neighbours.
” She takes a long suck on her vape and then releases a thin stream of smoke.
The sickly sweet notes catch at the back of my throat and make me cough again.
“You should get that cough looked at. Summer colds are no joke, especially after all that rain we’ve just had,” she mutters absently, and continues to scan the busy room.
I can barely hear her above the purring of the chunky furball still tucked rather serenely under her arm.
“Ari’s wandering around here somewhere. He’s my partner and the owner of The Rainbow Room. ”
“And that is…a club?”
“A drag club,” she says with an eye roll and a sigh, as if it should be obvious.
“You can’t mistake Ari, not with the gold medallion and copious amounts of chest hair.
Seriously, the man’s like a gorilla. It’s very warm to cuddle up to in the winter though, so it saves on the heating bills, I suppose. ”
Try as I might, I cannot picture Brandy as the type to cuddle.
“To be honest, you’ll probably hear him before you see him.
When I first met him, I honestly thought he had Tourette’s.
Turns out he just really likes the word fuck.
In fact, I’ve never met anyone else who can use the word fuck twenty times in a three-word sentence.
Makes dirty talk very confusing. There was one time in bed that I actually had to gag him with my–”
“Oh, what the fucking fuck’s she fucking doing fucking now,” rings out a brash cockney accent, making several heads turn.
“There he is.” Brandy takes another toke on her vape.
“You’d better not be talking about me, Roberto Caligliari,” she says flatly to a short man in a very shiny, garishly patterned neon pink silk shirt sidling up in front of us.
His black trousers cling to his thick legs and his rather pronounced paunch rests on a large silver belt buckle.
Said bright shirt is open almost to his belly, revealing tufts of what can really only be described as a pelt.
A very thick black and grey pelt. I actually have to blink several times—I’m not sure if I have the beginning of a migraine or if the zigzag pattern on his shirt is messing with my eyes.
“Of course not, my queen.” Ari smiles widely, his bushy eighties pornstache wrinkling at the corners as he blows her a kiss. Then his expression flattens and he hikes a thumb over his shoulder. “I’m talking about the fucking mad old bird with the fucking gin.”
“Why? What’s she done now?” Brandy asks in an almost bored tone.
“She’s only fucking teaching Benny how to play fucking poker.” Ari scowls. “Last fucking week it was fucking blackjack. Kid’s a fucking shark. I lost seventy fucking quid to ’im. I was fucking lucky to escape with the fucking shirt on my fucking back.”
“Small mercies,” I mutter.
“Benny is Ari’s son,” Brandy explains, then points the cat in the direction of the large window. The crowd parts slightly and I see a sweet-faced young man with Down syndrome playing cards with someone just out of my line of sight.
“That’s my fucking boy,” Ari says proudly, his eyes soft and his expression filled with love. Then he turns back to me. “Don’t play cards wiv ’im, ’e’ll rob you fucking blind. It’s that sweet fucking smile of ’is, it gets everyone to go fucking easy on ’im, but ’e ain’t fucking stupid.”