In Love by Christmas: A Paranormal Romance (5 page)

“Well, this is cheery. How about a drink?” Doug positioned himself a few steps from the entrance to the hallway where Leroy had disappeared, with the main entrance to his back. “Yoo-hoo! Can I get a drink? Some Scotch. You can bring it to me, sugar,” he said to one of the three or four whores standing around looking scared. He made himself smile and act totally at ease. Doug began to look over the available talent. “Do I get to play, or just my friend?”

The madam and bouncers were silent, looking equally likely to beat the crap out of him as let him buy a woman.

“Hey! You got any more?” Doug shouted. “I want one with
big tits
and a
big ass.
How about back in there?” He headed toward the hallway and its multitude of bedrooms. A big guy with a baseball bat blocked his way.

“Pick one from the living room,” he said.

“Sure, OK. Here I am, wanting a nice friendly screw and I get baseball bats. If you don’t want me to go back there, I’ll fuck her right here. You with the big ass, come over here.” Doug began unzipping his pants. “Let’s do it right here, honey. Bend over, baby. You’re gonna love this.”

Leroy walked out of the hallway and across the living room, carrying a scrap of flesh and rags wrapped in a big coat. “Let’s go, Doug. I got her.”

A couple of guys with bats and guns stumbled out of the hall after Leroy. Their pants were unzipped and hanging off their hips. They struggled to zip them as they ran.

The front door flew open. Hannah Hehrman and her operatives burst in, legs spread, and weapons drawn. “Lie face down on the floor. This is a raid.”

Leroy stopped when he got to Hannah and opened the coat, letting Hannah see what they did to Cass. Leroy displayed all of her, from her jaundiced skull of a face to the reeking shreds at the back of her gown.

“Shut up, you stinking bitch,” Hannah shouted at the madam. “Do you know who was in your closet?” Hannah had the madam shoved against the wall with a baseball bat jammed across her throat. The woman gagged as Hannah screamed, “
She was my baby!

Hannah switched to a whisper, “No one hurts my baby. You will find that out. You and your people are going to tell me everything about yourselves. You are going to open your hearts and minds to me. If you do that, maybe you’ll live. Do you understand?”

The madam spit in Hannah’s face. Hannah laughed. “You think that scares me. Do you think I will not hurt you?” She jabbed the bat into the woman’s throat, hard. The madam choked.

Her soldiers had assembled the bouncers and whores in the living room and secured them on chairs, taping their mouths. They arranged them in a circle so they could watch Hannah. Their eyes rolled, signaling their terror. The music was turned up high enough to muffle any noises the hostages might make, but not enough to bother the neighbors.

“You think you are as tough as me. Eh?” Hannah never wiped her face. “You should fear me, fatso. Because …” Hannah pulled the baseball bat away from the madam’s throat and held it away for a long moment. The heavy woman remained frozen, and then lunged at Hannah.

Hannah pulled the bat back like a major league player and swung it the same way. It hit her target square across the face at the level of the nose. A thud filled the room. The woman dropped, dead, the center of her face caved in.

“You should be afraid of me.” Hannah raised the bloody bat. She circled the room. “I really like using bats. The noise when you connect is so satisfying.”

She casually walked up to one of the bouncers, tied in a chair. With that same lightning swing, Hannah drove the bat into his crotch, where his legs met his torso. He couldn’t scream due to the duct tape over his mouth, but he tried. Several pops from deep in his body accompanied the swing. A wet stain began to spread from the point of impact.

“This type of blow breaks the pubic bone. I also cracked both of his hipbones, and of course, severed his urethra. I can’t crush his genitals in this position. That requires a special type of chair.”

She paced, “That girl you held captive means a great deal do me. When I saw what you did to her, it made me angry. It made me want to show you what pain is. And take my revenge.”

Hannah went ape-shit, as only she could. She never made a sound, but she tore what was left of the bouncer to pieces. When she could do no more with a bat, one of her soldiers handed her a huge knife. The others put the subjects on tarps before she went to work on them. Hannah ran a very neat operation; no mess.

“You see, I have done this before,” she turned to the terrorized hostages. “I love what I do, especially when it is for revenge. I deserve to take my revenge, don’t you think? What you did to that girl was hideous. All of you were involved. No one helped her.

“I have not killed those of you who know something. For instance, you,” she pointed to an innocuous bouncer, the smallest of the bunch, “are the accountant. You operate the computer systems and control the records. We will talk. Mostly, you will talk.

“That fat bitch was nothing. But you are,” she leered into the face of one of the whores. “You know everything, don’t you? You’re the one who runs this place. Who was your contact? Who paid you to keep that girl here? Where did the money come from?”

A yellow puddle appeared and spread under the girl’s chair. “You are smart. You should be afraid. However afraid you are of the one who paid you to keep my child, you should be twice as afraid of me.” She taunted the girl. “Would you like some plastic surgery?” Hannah pulled sharp-nosed pliers from her belt and a small knife. “You want a nose job? Or I can put the basketballs from that piece of shit’s chest in
yours
.”

Hannah and her team did what she did best: data extraction. They left the apartment sparkling and clean with no evidence of anything untoward happening, Hannah and her team knew everything about everyone in the cathouse. Every name, every number, every contact. Hannah had all their accounting information, where they put their money. All the girls’ names and where they came from.

And the name and address of the guy from Spain who kept track of Cass for Enzo Donatore. Hannah would kill him, and then go up the line to Enzo. No one would ever harm Cass again. She was sure that Enzo Donatore saw at least some of her revenge from his see-stone. “Hannah Hehrman declares war on you …” she said into the emptiness.

In her room much later, Hannah held on to the bathroom sink and sobbed. She slumped to the floor, her legs unable to hold her up. Her body convulsed as grief overwhelmed her.

“Oh, my sweet baby. What he did to you.”

5

Passing in the Night

“
L
et’s go, Leroy.”
Doug grabbed his arm and pulled him to the medic’s vehicle, which was pulled up to the underground elevator in the condo’s lot.

The medic approached, trying to put Cass on the gurney in the middle of the rear cabin. “No!” Leroy waved him off.

The van/ambulance started moving the instant Leroy slammed the door. The parking attendant barely looked up as they hurtled into the dark street.

Leroy held Cass across his lap like a baby, his breathing becoming ragged as her condition revealed itself. Her skin seemed glued to her bones; her face was a parchment-covered death’s head. Black circles ringed her eyes. Her arms were bones full of needle marks. She seemed too light to be a grown woman. Her nightgown was filthy.

“They had her in a closet, Doug. With no heat or water. It stank.” She stank. A cry escaped from him. “Oh, Cass. What did they do to you?” Her eyes were pasted shut with amber guck and she was so unconscious that his healing couldn’t touch her.

“Oh, Cass. Wake up! I’m here. I’ve got you.” Tears burst from Leroy’s eyes. “She can’t feel me, Doug, she’s almost gone.”

The van pulled into an alley and then into the opening of an underground parking lot. They stopped, the back opened and Doug led Leroy to an elevator. “This is a small clinic, Leroy. We can’t take her to a public hospital. Enzo Donatore’s spies will know instantly. This is a good place. They can stabilize her until we can take her somewhere where they can rebuild her physically.”

They walked down a hall. Cass wasn’t heavy enough to be a burden. Her bones poked into Leroy’s arms. Her legs hung without control or sensation. She was dying, and he couldn’t help her.

His ribs pumped. He couldn’t stop crying.

Leroy had cured everyone who came to him, except for one person. He couldn’t touch his mother’s cancer and neither could his grandpa. The two of them sat by helplessly, unable to keep the woman they loved most on this earth from dying. He’d failed his mother.

And now he was failing Cass.

“In here, Leroy. Put her on the table.”

It was a tidy intensive care unit. Machines ringed the table. A doctor was there, wearing green scrubs with a green cloth hat tied around his head. He nodded at Doug and went to work. He set up an IV in Cass’s arm. Machines began to beep.

Finally, the doctor stopped and addressed them. “A few more hours and she’d have been dead. It’s going to be touch and go as it is. I’m putting fluids in her. She needs a full-fledged hospital. She’s yellow from kidney failure. She may have hepatitis, HIV, liver and kidney damage. I can’t treat those. Her anorexia could cause her heart to quit at any time. I’ll have her ready to travel in a few hours. Mr. Duane has ordered transportation.”

The doctor turned to Leroy. “Are you her husband?” Leroy shook his head. “But you have a relationship?” Leroy nodded. “Well, she’s in for a rough ride. What Mr. Duane proposes is the correct thing. She needs to be in a guarded medical facility until she gains weight and gets back on her feet. If that’s possible.”

Leroy sat next to her in the hospital, holding her hand. “Baby, it’s me. Leroy. Can you feel me? Oh, baby, I’m here for you. I can heal, Cass. Did you know that? If you let me, I’ll heal you. Sweetie, can you feel me?” He raised his head, despairing. “Baby, I been healin’ since I was four. Almost nothing I can’t heal.”

But there was. He couldn’t heal his own mother. He watched her die of cancer and wondered about how the Great One loved them and gave them abilities, but took them away when it mattered most? He’d failed before.

“Cass, honey, they’re gonna take you to a hospital. It’s a good place. They’ll fix you up. Or, if you can, let me heal you. I can do it, baby. I can.” He was lying to her. Not to himself though. All the time he sat next to her, praying and talking to her, he was there, six years old, talking to his mother as she faded away. Sitting next to his grandfather, the most powerful healer in the world, who couldn’t heal his own daughter, either.

He’d done so much to save her, but he couldn’t do this final thing that would make her well. He couldn’t find a bit of consciousness in her. None existed; she was that close to death.

“Leroy, the ambulance is almost ready. We need to move her.” Doug nudged him. “Donatore may find her. The hospital is a safer place. “

Leroy got up and bent over Cass. She was plumped up a little from the fluids, but still looked awful. He kissed her forehead over and over. “Cass, I love you. I want to marry you. Try and remember that while you’re getting better.”

When he raised himself, Cass’s eyes were open. Their eyes locked for what seemed like hours. He felt her in his soul, his body. He thought she was going to speak, but then her eyes glazed and the pupils rolled back. She began convulsing in long, slow rolls. Her mouth was flecked with foam.

“Get back,” the doctor said. It took a while, but he stabilized her enough for the paramedics to take her.

Leroy’s knees buckled. She had recognized him and gone into seizures. He had never felt so devastated.

The feeling lasted all the time they were in the ambulance, driving through the night through places he didn’t know to a hospital he didn’t know either. It was in the country; they drove through miles of forest. Different forest than the majestic mariposa trees he knew, the kings of the leafy world. These were skinny trees, jammed too close together. The headlights cut a tunnel through the darkness. Too green, even in the darkness. Too jammed together. Mist rose from the forest floor.

Cass was strapped in a gurney. He sat next to her, holding her hand, talking to her. Giving her all the energy he could.

“You’re gonna make it through just fine. You’re gonna get some weight on, get your heart going good. You’re gonna be fine, Cass. When you see me next, you’re going to crack open a big smile. You know who I am, don’t you, baby? I’m Leroy. Your soul mate. When you see me next, we’re gonna have a big wedding at your dad’s house, or at my ranch. Your dad is going to buy you the most beautiful wedding dress …”

He kept it up like that for three hours. Patter about them and how things were going to turn out. Their wedding. “I built a cabin on our ranch, Cass. I didn’t know what I was doing, but it was for us. It’s real big. Got high ceilings, all logs. It’s got a bedroom, but I built it so I can add more easy. For our kids, we’re going to have kids.”

All the time he talked, he could feel the energy between them. Other spirit warriors had told him about the energy that flowed between soul mates. Nothing could have prepared him to experience it. Bliss. Golden bliss billowing through them.

She had to feel it.
Feel it, Cass,
he thought.
You’ll know. We’re meant for each other. You have to live.

Cass lay on the bed in the ambulance, strapped down. Immobile. Eyes closed. They’d washed the sticky stuff that held her eyelids closed off, but the lids didn’t flicker. Still, still as death. Only faint breathing that even he could barely hear said she was alive.

Oh, Grandpa, come and help me. Bring Mama and all the Ancestors. Bring the Great One and the eagles and Kachinas. Bring them, please. Save her,
he prayed.

Nothing. No sustenance. No aid.

The driver spoke into a mic, asking for a gate they couldn’t see to be opened. They pulled into an almost invisible lane and drove down it, leafy branches brushing the sides of the vehicle.

“It’s an old estate,” Doug said. Leroy was so glad Doug was there. He was a spirit warrior too, married to his soul mate. He knew what Leroy was feeling.

“Buddy,” Doug said and laid a hand on Leroy’s arm. “You can’t save her. I don’t even think your grandfather could. She’s got a curse on her, Leroy. She’s got to work her way through it herself. This is where she belongs. We have to leave her and leave her fast before Donatore knows what’s going on. She’s been here before. I brought her here. They got her better. We’ve got to get out of the way and let them do it.”

They were at the emergency door of the hospital: an old mansion, shingled brown and three stories high. He could feel the place; it was a good place, old and well cared for.

They were in a white room. They had had to go through white corridors to get to it, fresh painted white and clean. Cass lay on the gurney, waxen.

“Please, baby, do something. Let me know you’re alive. Let me know you know I’m here.” Tears streamed down Leroy’s cheeks. He didn’t wipe them. Oh, if she didn’t say something, do something … His tears pelted down and he wanted to bend over and sob. He hovered at the edge.

“We’ve got to go. She can’t hear you.” Doug took his arm to lead him out, but he shrugged it away and ran to her.

Leaning over the bed, Leroy grabbed her arms and shoved his face close to hers. “Baby, it’s
me.
Don’t you know
me?”

“Mr. Watches, I’m afraid I have to insist …” A doctor with a stethoscope around his neck and a clipboard entered the room. Two nurses followed. A big guy in a white suit was behind him.

Doug pulled on his shoulder. Leroy was ready to turn, ready to belt him, ready to go with him, when a movement stopped him. Cass was looking at him, eyes shiny in their sunken sockets. She just looked at him. Didn’t say anything. Her soul pulled him into her; he inhabited her, just for a moment. Her eyes closed.

“I love you, Cass. Get well for me.”

She couldn’t die, could she? Not after their souls had touched.