Chapter 42
CHAPTER
FORTY-TWO
The plan was terrible. A frantic last grasp at hope.
“There’s no way we’re getting to Enzo without Ronnie,” said Carla, shaking her head. “I can’t lure one back to the house without the other.”
Jack wanted to throw up. The yellow-eyed man only nodded, as if in a meeting with a particularly longwinded a client.
Hours later, Jack found himself hiding in a guest room on Castle Drive beside a terrified Boris, listening for the roar of an engine.
The house was too quiet. Despite their confused protests, the servants were dismissed for the day.
Carla waited alone downstairs, wearing a black dress, shiny heels, and light makeup.
A golden bangle jingled alongside the watch on her wrist. Strapped to one thigh was a Glock.
To the other, a hunting knife with a blade as wickedly sharp as her smile.
“I gotta look normal,” she’d told Jack only a few minutes ago. “But seductive. Trust me, if I’m too dolled up, he’ll know there’s something wrong.”
Jack contemplated her definition of ‘dolled up’. To his admittedly untrained eye, she looked like she was on her way to exact bloody revenge on an ex-lover at an exclusive restaurant. If he weren’t so intimidated by the current situation, he’d probably be into it.
Now, she paced downstairs, phone in hand.
Her voice carried across the empty foyer, up the stairs and through the door.
“Yeah, baby. You and Enzo? That’s fine, that’s fine…
Yeah, I just need you to come by the house…
Nah, I don’t want you to send Bobby…. Why?
‘Cause I wanna see you, baby. Is that so bad?” A long pause.
“Alright, fine. Send Enzo then, if you’re really so busy…
Yeah, baby, I love you too. I’ll see you later. Alright. Buh-bye.”
“Shit,” said Boris. He stood flattened against the door, ear pressed to the wood. Jack hovered at the jamb beside him, straining to listen. “Did I hear that right? Just Enzo?”
Jack frowned, drew away. “I think so. That sounds too good to be true."
“I’ll take any win I can,” muttered Boris. Sunlight caught in his curls, illuminated them like a halo. With his blue eyes and handsome face, he was practically angelic.
Deceptively angelic, thought Jack to himself, turning so that Boris couldn’t see his smirk.
It was almost surreal, seeing him outside of the hotel, wearing jeans and a grey t-shirt under a tattered flannel. He wouldn’t have looked out of place on a record sleeve, grungy and gorgeous and just sloppy enough to project an air of nonchalance.
In contrast, Jack wore his suit and clutched his satchel to his chest like it had the power to stop bullets.
“You remember how to load a gun, right?” asked Boris just as Carla thundered up the stairs.
The door flung open. Breathless, Carla entered. “Just Enzo,” she squealed. “He’s just sending Enzo!”
“What did you tell him?” asked Jack, bewildered.
“That I needed some help with a wine delivery.” She shrugged, cocked her hip.
“Oh.” Jack frowned, abruptly realizing that the truck he saw outside every single day probably belonged to the deliveryman. He’d never even thought to ask.
“He could spare a guy for that?” Boris scratched his nose.
“Ronnie takes his wine seriously.”
“Sheesh, I guess so.”
“Trust me, you don’t want to know.”
Behind her, the yellow-eyed man emerged. He’d declined to share his name when Boris asked. Deep down, Jack thought it was better they didn’t know. That somehow, speaking it would conjure the otherworldly and dangerous, akin to opening a portal.
Jack couldn’t have a name like that dancing on the tip of his tongue for the rest of his life.
“You two,” he said, pointing first to Jack, then Boris with a long, gnarled finger. “Are backup only. Let me work, and we won’t have any problems.”
Boris bristled. Jack gritted his teeth and nodded with a little too much enthusiasm—a muscle in his jaw popped.
“Doubt that,” Boris muttered, voice so low that Jack barely heard him.
But the yellow-eyed man glared. “Cooperate, and we all have nothing to worry about.”
Jack kicked Boris in the ankle and smiled awkwardly. “Don’t worry, we’re just backup.”
“I’m not worried about you,” the yellow-eyed man said. In a single fluid motion, he turned on his heel and stalked out the door.
When his footsteps had all but faded, Carla muttered, “Damn, he’s creepy.” She caught Jack’s hand in hers, squeezed, then trailed reluctantly out the door, careful to shut it behind her.
“Backup,” Boris grumbled. “Relegated to back up.” He paced to the window, separated the blinds with his fingers, and peered between them.
Jack couldn’t imagine being disappointed by this. “Maybe it’s for the better. I’ve never shot a gun before in my life,” he admitted. The palms of his hands grew sweaty. He wiped them on his pants.
“Remember to take the safety off like I showed you, don’t point at anything you don’t wanna kill, and you should be fine.”
“I’m pretty sure there are more rules than that.”
“Yeah, but those are arbitrary.”
“I don’t think you know what that means.”
Boris rolled his eyes. “Means it’s up to me to decide.”
“But it’s not arbitrary if there are actual guidelines—”
“Yeah, it is, because my whole life is arbitrary, OK? I decide what matters to me.”
“Yeah?” said Jack, crossing his arms. “Like what?”
A flash of indignation. “I dunno. Lots of things. Why? What are you getting at? I live my life the way I want to, alright?”
Jack stared down at the carpet and tried not to flinch. He hadn’t the faintest idea how to live his life the way he wanted to. Wasn’t even sure what that would look like. “Sorry, that’s not—Sorry.”
“You don’t need to be sorry,” said Boris, sidling up to him, eyes downcast. “I’m just scared we’re gonna fucking die.
I don’t like any of this.” When Jack didn’t say anything, he continued.
“I thought I was gonna watch you die the other night. I don’t want to go through that again.
” His voice was small, guarded. “I’m not cut out for this. "
“I’ll try not to die,” Jack managed. “If you promise, too.”
Boris laughed, dark and throaty. “Yeah, fine, I’ll give it a shot.
” He was close enough to touch. Close enough that Jack could feel the heat radiating from him.
He flashed back to that night in the bed, terrified out of his mind waiting for the vampire to return, grounded only by Boris’s firm embrace and low voice.
Maybe it was wrong, but there was nothing Jack wouldn’t give to be there again, this time without the ever-pressing fear of death and despair. How might that night have gone if they weren’t recovering from an attack, watching for any sign of the vampire’s return?
But Jack was with Carla (at least, for now), and Boris… Boris was an enigma. Jack wasn’t even sure if Boris was as haunted by those quiet moments as he was, or if he’d already forgotten, lost in a haze of bikini babes and fast cars.
“Good,” said Jack. When he finally managed to make eye-contact, something in Boris’s expression made his chest ache. Was it sorrow? Regret? Fear? Longing?
The screech of tires startled them apart and away from the window.
“Holy shit, is he already here?” Jack gasped, hand over his heart.
“Maybe it’s the wine,” suggested Boris, separating the blinds with his fingertips, and peering out. Just visible through the trees was a maroon sedan.
Jack shook his head. “Delivery van’s already here. Anyway, I’ve seen this car before. It’s gotta be him.”
They exchanged frantic glances.
“I’ve never shot a gun before either,” whispered Boris, inching closer to the door.
Jack wanted to scoff at him, ask why he’d been so cocky, but found his voice had dried up in his throat. Enzo was here. Enzo, who was better armed than Jack could imagine. Enzo, who allegedly dabbled in magic that he couldn’t possibly comprehend. Enzo, who perhaps had the power to end all this.
It seemed impossible that one man had caused all this chaos. Jack absolutely dreaded meeting him.
Ears pressed to the door, Jack and Boris waited. The doorbell rang. Carla’s heels tapped across the floor. A lock clicked.
“My hero!” she cried. “I’m so glad you’re here. It’s so much more than Ronnie’s usual shipment. I swear, I don’t know what to do with all this!”
The voice that answered was loud, brash, overconfident.
Jack could’ve sworn he felt it reverberating through the floorboards.
“Well, that’s why I’m here, sweetheart. Don’t worry about it.
” A pause. “But, uh, you gotta tell me: why do you need help now? I thought you handled this kind of thing all the time.”
“I told you,” Carla chirped. “It’s a big shipment.”
“Uh-huh,” said Enzo, like he didn’t believe her. “It just seems a little fishy.”
“What’s so fishy about it? I didn’t feel like dealing with a big shipment, so I called my boyfriend! Is it fishy now when I call Ronnie?”
“Well, it’s only fishy because you’re the only person in this entire town who ever does anything out of character, sweetheart.”
“I’m not your sweetheart. And what do you mean, I’m out of character? The fuck?” The edge to her voice was gone, replaced by a nervous waver. But the anger was still there, simmering beneath the surface.
“Shit,” Boris snarled, reaching for the doorknob.
“Wait,” Jack hissed, grasping him by the wrist.
Boris glared but retracted his hand. Jack’s palm burned where they’d touched.
Enzo’s voice ricocheted through the foyer.
“I just mean that you aren’t normally so high maintenance.
You’re a good woman, Carla. Not too needy, not too dramatic.
I mean, you’re a loudmouth and you’re not exactly my type, but you aren’t a problem, you know?
But lately—lately you’ve been out of your lane.
Busting into the club, car crashes, running away, lots of other stuff I’m sure I don’t know about. ”
Clenching his hands until his nails dug into his skin, Jack glanced at an equally horrified Boris.
“What, like I do the same thing every day?”
“That’s just the thing,” said Enzo slowly. “You did. For a long time. You know what? I think you woke up.”
“The fuck does that mean?” Heels tapped against the floor, growing quieter with every step. Shit. She was leading him from the foyer, deeper into the house.
As badly as Jack didn’t want to leave Carla alone with this creep, he had to admit that it would be easier to sneak up on them away from the grand staircase.
“I think you know more than you’re willing to admit.”
“All I know is that I need a fucking drink,” Carla snapped. Her voice had grown distant, but she spoke loudly and clearly so that it carried through the halls. “What the hell’s wrong with you? Did you open a portal and swap out your brain?”
“You never believed in the portals.”
“If you start acting any weirder, I might start. Come on. I got a lot of boxes to move.”
“Ruse is up, Carla,” said Enzo, too calm. Jack’s heart stammered in his chest. “Tell me what you know.”
“I don’t know a damn thing. Ronnie sent you to help, so help or get out. I don’t have all day.”
“Bossy.”
“Yeah, well, I didn’t get to where I am by worrying about everyone else. Come on, help me out.”
Boris caught Jack’s eye, reached for the doorknob. Heart leaping, he nodded.
The door inched open silently. Jack credited Boris’s steady hand and the militant staff—not a door in this house creaked.
They slipped free, treading carefully onto the (thankfully carpeted) landing.
The grand staircase loomed before them, sweeping elegantly into the foyer, a place Carla studiously avoided whenever Jack came over.
The space was too open and (he feared) too opulent.
There, he would stand out like a zit among freckles.
“Servants’ stairs are over here,” he whispered, pointing down the long hallway. It seemed an impossible distance to traverse. A thousand miles and a hundred doors waited between them and the narrow stairwell.
“You go first, then,” Boris said, gesturing.
Inhaling deeply, Jack stepped into the hallway and peered over the railing to ensure that Carla and Enzo were well out of sight before he tiptoed down the hall.