Darkest Heart (2 page)
Judd's cheeks were red with embarrassment. "Man, I'm so sorry you had to deal with that. But it's not what you think. . Kitty and I lived together for a few months over a year ago, but she was incredibly jealous. It got to the point where I couldn't take any more, so I moved out. She's been dogging my tracks ever since. She scared off the last two women I was interested in."
Sonja shrugged. "I don't scare easy."
* * * *
He bought her several drinks, all of which she downed without effect. But she did feel giddy, almost lightheaded, while in his company. To be mistaken for a human woman was actually quite flattering.
Especially since she'd stop thinking of herself as human some time back.
They ended up dancing, adding their bodies to the surging crowd that filled the mosh pit. At one point, Sonja was amazed to find herself laughing, genuinely laughing, one arm wrapped about Judd's waist. And then Judd leaned in and kissed her.
She barely had time to retract her fangs before his tongue found hers. She slid her other arm around his waist and pulled him close, grinding herself against him. He responded eagerly, his erection rubbing against her hip like a friendly tomcat. And she found herself wondering how his blood would taste.
She pushed him away so hard he staggered backward, nearly falling on his ass. Sonja shook her head as if trying to dislodge something in her ear, a guttural moan rising from her chest.
"Sonja?" There was a confused, hurt look on his face.
She could see his blood beckoning her from just beneath the surface of his skin: the veins traced in blue, the arteries pulsing purple. She turned her back on him and ran from the temptation, her head lowered.
She shouldered her way through a knot of dancers, sending them flying like duckpins. Some of the bar's patrons hurled insults in her direction, a couple even spat at her, but she was deaf to their anger.
She put a couple of blocks between her and the bar before slumping into a darkened doorway, staring at her shaking hands as if they belonged to someone else.
"I liked him. I honestly liked him and I was going to... going to..."
Like. Hate. What's the difference? Blood is the life, wherever it comes from.
"Not like that. I never feed off anyone who doesn't deserve it. Never."
Aren't we special?
"Shut up, bitch."
"Sonja?"
She had him pinned to the wall, one forearm clamped against his windpipe in a chokehold before she recognized his face. Judd clawed at her arm, his eyes bugging from their sockets.
"I'm ...sorry..." he gasped out.
She let him go. "No, I'm the one who should be sorry. More than you realize."
Judd regarded her apprehensively as he massaged his throat, but there was still no fear in his eyes. "Look, I don't know what it is I said or did back there that put you off..."
"The problem isn't with you, Judd. Believe me. Look, I gotta go." She turned and began walking away, but he hurried after her.
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"I know an all-night coffeehouse near here. Maybe we could talk..?"
"Judd, just leave me alone, okay? You'd be a lot better off if you just forgot you ever met me."
"How could I forget someone like you?"
"Easier than you realize."
He was keeping pace alongside her, desperately trying to make eye contact. "C'mon Sonja! Give it a chance! I - damn it, would you just take your shades off and look at me?"
Sonja stopped in mid-step to face him, her expression unreadable behind her mirrored sunglasses. "That's the last thing you want me to do."
Judd sighed and fished a pen and piece of paper out of his pocket. "You're one weird chick, that's for sure!
But I like you, don't ask me why." He scribbled something on the scrap of paper and shoved it into her hand. "Look, here's my phone number. Call me, okay?"
Sonja closed her fist around the paper. "Judd - "
He held his hands out, palms facing up. "No strings attached, I promise. Just call me."
Sonja was surprised to find herself smiling. "Okay. I'll call you. Now will you leave me alone?"
When she revived the next evening, she found Judd's phone number tucked away in one of the pockets of her jacket. She sat cross-legged on the canvas futon that served as her bed and stared at it for a long time.
She'd been careful to make sure Judd hadn't followed her the night before. Her current nest was a drafty loft apartment in the attic of an old warehouse in the neighborhood just beyond the French Quarter. Save for her sleeping pal let, an antique cedar wardrobe, a Salvation Army-issue chair, a mini-fridge , a cordless telephone, and the scattered packing crates containing the esoteric curios she used as barter, the huge space was otherwise empty. Except for those occasions when the Dead came to visit. Such as tonight.
At first she didn't recognize the ghost, as he had lost his sense of self in the years since his death, which blurred his spectral image somewhat. He swirled up through the floorboards like a gust of blue smoke, gradually taking shape before her eyes. It was only when the phantom produced a smoldering cigarette from his own ectoplasm that she recognized him for who he once had been.
"Hello, Chaz."
The ghost of her former renfield made a noise that sounded like a cat being drowned. The Dead cannot speak clearly - even to Pretenders - except on three days of the year: Fat Tuesday, Halloween, and Candlemas. The ghost-light radiating from him was the only illumination in the room. "Come to see how your murderer is getting on, I take it?"
Chaz made a sound like a church bell played at half-speed.
"Sorry, I don't have a Ouij a board, or we could have a proper conversation. Is there a special occasion for tonight's haunting, or are things just boring over on your side?"
Chaz frowned and pointed at the scrap of paper Sonja held in her hand. "What? You don't want me to call this number?"
Chaz nodded his head, nearly sending it floating from his shoulders. "You tried warning Palmer away from me last Mardi Gras. Didn't work, but I suppose you know that already. He's living in Central America right now. We're very happy."
The ghost's laughter sounded like fingers raking a chalkboard. Sonja grimaced. "Yeah, big laugh, dead head. And I'll tell you one thing, Chaz; Palmer's a damn sight better in bed than you ever were!"
Chaz made an obscene gesture that was rendered pointless since he no longer had a body from the waist down. Sonja laughed and clapped her hands, rocking back and forth on her haunches.
"I knew that'd burn your ass, dead or not! Now piss off! I've got better things to do than play charades with a ghostly hustler!"
Chaz yowled like a baby dropped in a vat of boiling oil and disappeared in a swirl of dust and ectoplasm, leaving Sonja alone with Judd's phone number still clenched in one fist.
Hell, she thought as she reached for the cordless phone beside the futon. If Chaz doesn't want me to call the guy, then it must be the right thing to do....
* * * *
Judd's hair was freshly washed and he smelled of aftershave, but those were the only concessions made to the mating ritual. He still wore his nose- and earrings, as well as a Bongwater T shirt that had been laundered so often the silk-screened image was starting to flake off.
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) Judd poked at the iced coffee with a straw. "If I'm not getting too personal - what was last night all about?"
Sonja studied her hands as she spoke. "Look, Judd. There's a lot about me you don't know - and I'd like to keep it that way. If you insist on asking about my past, I'm afraid I'll have to leave. It's not that I don't like you - I do - but I'm a very private person. And it's for a good reason."
"Is there someone else?"
"Yes. Yes, there is."
"A husband?"
She had to think about that one for a few seconds before answering. "In some ways. But, no; I'm not married."
Judd nodded as if this explained something. It was obvious that what she said was bothering him, but he was trying to play it cool. Sonja wondered what it was like. Living a life where the worst things you had to deal with were jealous lovers and hurt feelings. It seemed almost paradisiacal from where she stood.
After they finished their iced coffees they hit the Quarter. It was after midnight, and the lower section of Decatur Street was starting to wake up. The streets outside the bars were decorated with clots of young people dressed in black leather, sequins, and recycled Seventies rags. The scenesters milled about, flashing their tattoos and bumming cigarettes off one another, as they waited for something to happen.
Someone called Judd's name and he swerved across the street toward at knot of youths lounging outside the Crystal Blue Persuasion Dance Club. Sonja hesitated before following him.
A young man dressed in a black duster, his shoulder-length hair braided into three pig tails and held in place by Tibetan mala beads carved into the shapes of skulls, moved forward to greet Judd.
Out of habit, Sonja scanned his face for Pretender taint, but it came up human. While the two spoke, she casually examined the rest of the group loitering outside the club. Human. Human. Human. Hu -
She froze.
The smell of vargr was strong, like the stink of a wet dog. The only reason she had not noticed it before was the reek of fish and freshly slaughtered poultry from the nearby French Market. The odor was radiating from a young man with a shaved forehead, whose hair at the back of his head was extremely long and held in a loose ponytail, making him look like a punk mandarin. He wore a leather jacket whose sleeves might well have been chewed off at the shoulder, trailing streamers of mangled leather and lining like gristle. He had one arm draped around a little punkette, her face made deathly pale by powder and grease paint.
The vargr met Sonja's gaze and held it, grinning his contempt. Her hand closed instinctively around her switchblade.
"I'd like you to meet a friend of mine - "
Judd's hand was on her elbow, drawing her attention away from the teenaged werewolf. Sonja struggled to conceal the disorientation from having her focus broken.
"Huh?"
"Sonja, I'd like you to meet Arlo, he's an old buddy of mine..."
Arlo frowned at Sonja as if she'd just emerged from under a rock, but offered his hand in deference to his friend. "Pleased to meet you," he mumbled. Sonja shot a sideways glance at the vargr twelve feet away. He was murmuring something into the punkette's ear. She giggled and nodded her head and the two broke away from the rest of the group, sauntering down the street in the direction of the river. The vargr paused to give Sonja one last look Over his shoulder, his grin too wide and his teeth too big, before disappearing into the shadows with his victim.
That's right. Pretend you didn't see it. Pretend you don't know what that grinning hellhound's going to do with that girl. You can't offend lover boy here by running off to do hand-to-hand combat with a werewolf, can you?
"Shut the fuck up, damn you," she muttered under her breath.
"What did you just say?" Arlo snapped, jerking his hand free from her grip.
"I'm sorry," she said hastily. "I was thinking about something else." Arlo grunted and nodded his head, but cast a hard look over his shoulder in Sonja's direction as she and Judd continued on their way. She could feel suspicion and hostility tingeing his thoughts.
Jesus, Judd's got himself another head case.
As they passed one of the seedy bars that catered to the late-night hardcore alcoholic trade, someone's
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) mind called out Sonja's name, and a black man, his hair plaited into dreadlocks, stepped from the doorway of the Monastery. He vote a black turtleneck sweater and immaculate designer jeans, a gold peace sign he size of a hood ornament slung around his neck. "Long time no see, Blue."
"Hello, Mal," Sonja said with a weary sigh.
The demon Malfeis smiled, exposing teeth that belonged in the mouth of a shark. "No hard feelings, I hope? I didn't want to sell you out like that, girlchick, but I was under orders from Below Stairs."
"We'll talk about it later, Mal...."
The demon nodded in the direction of Judd. "Got yourself a new renfield, I see."
"Shut up!" Sonja hissed.
Mal lifted his hands, palms outward. "Whoa! Didn't mean to hit a sore spot there, girly-girl."
"Sonja? Is this guy bothering you?" Judd was hovering at her elbow. He gave Mal a suspicious glare, blind to the demon's true appearance.
"No. Everything's cool." Sonja turned her back on the grinning demon and tried to block the sound of his laughter echoing in her mind.
"Who was that guy?"
"Judd - "
"I know! I promised I wouldn't pry into your past."
Sonja shrugged. "Mal is a - business associate of mine. That's all you need to know about him, except, no matter what, never ask him a question. Ever." They walked on in silence for a few more minutes, and then Judd took her into his arms. His kiss was warm and probing and she felt herself begin to relax. Then he reached for her sunglasses.
She batted his hand away, fighting the urge to snarl. "Don't do that."
"I just want to see your eyes."
"No." She pulled away from him, her body rigid as a board.
"I'm sorry - "