Mob Rules (17 page)

I couldn't see much through the enormous dust cloud that had enveloped the area, but I heard a snarl and a choked
scream when the werewolf appeared on the roof. One of the thugs managed to crawl over the edge, drop to the ground and scramble away while Moonie was tearing the other one's throat out.

When I got to the edge of the clearing, the dust cleared well enough for me to see through the haze to the other side. Another dozen or so thugs had left cover and moved into position on either side of the clearing. I noticed they got well clear of the junk piles, but I didn't think I could handle enough juice to spin the spell again anyway.

The door of the low building opened and Terrence Cole stepped out. He raised his left hand and spread the fingers wide, like a starfish on the move. His other hand was gripping an M-16 with a grenade launcher slung under the barrel.

“Enough,” he said, and his voice was deep and smooth. “Let's cool this shit out before any more brothers get themselves killed.”

I saw Moon Dog creeping to the edge of the building above him, but I gave my head a little shake and he backed off.

“I thought we already cooled this shit out, Terrence. In case I wasn't specific enough, that means you and your fucking gangbangers don't go shock and awe on me.”

“I know what you came here to do. I'm just here to tell you it's not going to happen. Not here, not today.”

“You're protecting that cocksucker?”

Terrence shrugged. “It is what it is, Domino. It comes down from Papa Danwe, and I do what I'm supposed to do. This here's a line I can't cross, even if I wanted to.”

“Fuck your line, Terrence. I came to talk and you tried to dust me.”

Terrence shook his head. “That was righteous, Domino,
if a bit excessive. This is my ground. You come up in here heavy. I got a right to do it that way.”

“Yeah, maybe, and now you have a dozen gangbangers you have to dig out. Some of them might even be alive.”

Terrence shrugged. “You know I didn't see it going that way. It was a nice trick with that repulsion spell. You must have had to flow a lot of juice, though, must have been hard to pull it on my turf. You can't be feeling too good right now.”

Terrence was right—my vampire-hunting expedition was over. I'd flowed too much juice and I was just about done, not to mention I'd almost had an arm cooked. I probably had enough left if it was just the thugs, but there was no way I could handle Terrence at the same time. I didn't really know what he could do, but he had the same job description as me so I could make a close enough guess. I also liked him for the napalm spell that almost cooked me.

The clincher, though, was that Terrence was also right about the political situation. The ambush had been excessive, but warranted, even considering our little agreement. I'd come onto another outfit's territory with the idea of killing somebody under their protection. It didn't really matter that I had a legitimate beef with the vampire.

As it stood, I was probably okay, too. They'd attacked me without warning and I'd defended myself. I probably hadn't gone too far to restore the fucking peace with Terrence—what there was of it. But now that I'd been given the opportunity to walk away, I'd have to take it.

“I'm going to have to stake him, Terrence.”

“I understand that. It just can't happen here.”

I let him think I was mulling it over and then nodded. “I guess I can see that.”

“We can still hold it together, Domino. Like I told you before, some of this shit's already in motion, ain't nothing I can do about it. But it doesn't have to go any further than that. Doesn't have to be any war.”

“Let's keep it that way. You take care of your business and I'll take care of mine.”

“Always, Domino,” he said, and he smiled a wide smile.

I turned around and walked away. When I reached the edge of the clearing I stopped and turned back halfway. I gestured at the wreckage.

“Sorry about your boys, Terrence. I hope everyone's okay.” I tried to make my smile as wide as his.

 

On the way back to Santa Monica, my juice buzz warred with the adrenaline crash. My vision was almost painfully sharp and the wind whipping through the open car roared in my ears like storm surge. My skin felt tight and itched, and I could feel my hair growing. At the same time, the burn I'd felt when I cast the repulsion spell had softened to a warm, euphoric afterglow that was making me wet. In short, I was fucked up.

Most of the time, flowing juice doesn't have that kind of effect. I might get a pleasant tingle, just enough to look forward to the next time, but I'd flowed too much at the junkyard. When Rashan had brought me into the outfit, he'd warned me that juice can be addictive. I'd seen enough crack-heads and junkies in the neighborhood to take him seriously, and I always tried to pull my juice in small doses. Most of the everyday spells I used—like the traffic and parking spells—were just like that. A heroin addict would call them bumps or taps.

For larger spells, I had my little rituals, and I had Mr. Clean
to take some of the juice. The spell talismans were handy, too. Not only did they allow me to trigger an effect more quickly, but I was also able to charge them with a little juice at a time.

At the junkyard, I'd been rushing, hard. I'd flowed enough juice to toss around a couple tons of scrap metal like LEGOs. The gangbangers had been trying to kill me and I did what I had to do. Some of them were dead—probably all of them—but I wasn't planning to stop by their funerals or anything. Bad guys die. Someday I'd be on the wrong end. And
goddamn
that juice had felt good. Even the burn had been a good pain; the kind of pain you get from doing something your body needs but doesn't like.

I threw my head back and let the wind thunder over my face, and laughed. Outside of the bosses, there probably weren't five gangsters in L.A. who could have handled that much juice. Terrence probably couldn't. Fuck him—he was pretty good, but I doubted he could've moved that pile.

“I am a fucking monster!” I yelled, and laughed again.

Moon Dog whined and stared at me with those fucked-up yellow eyes. He'd been lying on the passenger seat with his muzzle tucked between his paws all the way from the salvage yard.

I looked over at him. “What? Look, Moonie, you don't got to worry about those fucking guys. I'll set you up, you can lay low for a few days if you want, but no one's going to fuck with you. Not after that, they ain't gonna fuck with you.” What I meant was they wouldn't fuck with
me.

Moon Dog just whined again and dropped his nose to his paws.

When we got back to the pier, I waited outside the building while Moonie changed back. When he came outside, he
was trying to wipe away the blood matted in his beard with a dirty rag. For whatever reason, I hadn't even noticed the blood on the werewolf's muzzle.

I pulled out my roll and peeled off five bills. “Moonie, thanks for helping me out back there. You didn't have to get involved, and I want you to know I appreciate it.” Moon Dog grimaced and took the money like it was a job application.

“That was fucked up, Domino.”

“Fuck those guys, Moonie. I went out to talk and they tried to put me in the ground.”

Moon Dog didn't seem to want to look at me. He was quiet for a minute. “I did a lot of fucked-up shit in the Nam,” he said finally. “Had to, or thought I did. I didn't have to like it, though. Thing is, some guys did.” He looked at me then—more like squinted at me.

“Jesus, Moonie, I didn't like it,” I said, trying it out. It didn't sit quite right.

Moon Dog nodded. “That's good, babe. Most of those guys never made it home. They just kept going back, one tour after another, until they finally got to stay there. Some of them came back when the government made them, but their minds are still in the bush. Always will be.”

“And you, Moonie?” Without the juice buzz, it probably would have seemed like a rude question.

Moonie chuckled. “I guess I made it out of the bush but never quite made it home. That's all right. I got no complaints.”

“Well, me, either. I guess I won't turn into some psychotic baby-killer just because I decided not to let a few gangbangers shoot me.”

Moon Dog flinched at the term “baby-killer,” but he seemed to have put in enough words for one day. He just nodded, told me to be careful and wheeled himself back into his hole. The
whole experience hadn't been too good for him. His PTSD was probably acting up.

By the time I got home, the buzz was gone and my mood was foul. I slammed the door, slammed myself onto the couch and stared at the peach-colored wall. Then I got up and went to the kitchen, grabbed a beer and slammed the refrigerator door. When I got back to the living room, Honey was hovering there.

“Bad day?” she piped. Her cheerfulness was annoying. I dropped back on the couch and drank my beer.

“What happened?” Honey landed on the coffee table and looked at me, concerned.

“Nothing much,” I said, and glowered.

“It doesn't look like nothing much.”

That pissed me off. “I don't want to talk to you right now, Honey.”

“Yes, you do.”

That really pissed me off. I thought about yelling, but I couldn't work up the energy for it.

“You're hurt, Domino,” Honey said. She lifted into the air and hovered near my shoulder. She started to reach out, and then drew back.

I craned my neck to look at my shoulder. I'd forgotten about it. “Thanks for reminding me. Now it hurts like hell.” I got up and went to the bathroom, grabbing the bottle of aspirin from the cabinet. I returned to the couch, reached for the juice and chased down a handful of the pills.

This time, the spell didn't come together at all. The juice and the tablets both made it halfway down. The juice burned off and faded away, but the tablets stayed there and I damn near choked on them. I finally forced them down with beer, and then slammed the empty bottle on the table, coughing.

“Let me, Domino.” Honey flew over to the French doors and wrestled with the doorknob. She pulled open the door to the balcony and went out to her garden.

“What are you going to do, roll me a joint?”

“Don't be sarcastic, Domino. Take off your shirt.” Honey came in with an armful of green stuff and flew off to the kitchen. I wasn't in the mood to be helped, but I wasn't in the mood to hurt, either. I stripped down to my bra, wincing and cursing.

I heard cabinets opening and closing and pots rattling in the kitchen. Then Honey started singing. It might have been chanting, but it sounded like music. I didn't recognize the language. It was either something humans didn't speak anymore or something humans had never spoken.

After about ten minutes, Honey came back in carrying a saucer that was almost as big as she was. She set it on the couch beside me and I saw there was some kind of yellowish paste on it.

“Looks like honey, Honey.”

“I used honey for the base.” She rubbed her hands in the paste and then held them up, like a surgeon who had just finished scrubbing. Pixie dust drifted down from her hands. “Now relax,” she said. “This isn't going to hurt, but it might feel a little strange.”

I grunted. Honey came to me and started rubbing the salve into my wounds. It didn't hurt, but I still flinched the first time she touched me.

“Jesus, that's cold!”

“Relax, Domino.”

And it did feel weird. It felt like my flesh had gone as liquid as the salve, like Honey was moving it around, smoothing it out with her hands. She went back and forth to the saucer,
working on my shoulder, arm, neck and scalp. I didn't look until she was finished. When I did, my skin was liberally coated with the salve, but it was a healthy, undamaged pink underneath.

“Jesus,” I said. “That's a hell of a lot better than my aspirin spell, even when it works.”

Honey shrugged. “It's glamour. I'm pretty good at it.”

“Glamour,” I said. “You mentioned that before, about the walls. What does that mean, exactly?”

“It means the magic will come undone if sunlight touches it,” Honey said.

“Really?”

“No, I'm just kidding,” she said and laughed. “It's just what we call fairy magic. It's as real as yours, just different.” I relaxed my eyes, unfocused my vision and looked at my shoulder.

“I can't see it,” I said. “I can't see the magic.” I looked at the walls Honey had painted, and I couldn't see any magic in them, either.

“It's not the kind of magic you can see. You can't see it any more than a normal human can see yours.”

The pieces finally clicked together in my mind. “Honey, that's why I couldn't see the magic the spirit used to squeeze my guys! The killer didn't clean it up, I just couldn't see it.”

“Of course you couldn't,” Honey said. “The spirit would be channeling magic from the Beyond, not from Arcadia.”

“Huh,” I said. “Well, I can see what you did with it, and I can feel it, and it rocks. Thanks, Honey.” I tried a smile.

“No problem.”

A thought occurred to me, and I frowned. “Any, uh, charge for that?”

“Yeah, you have to take a shower with me.”

“Honey—”

She laughed. “I'm joking. That was on the house, just because we're friends.”

“Yeah, okay. Well, thanks.” I looked around. “How are you doing, settling in, I mean? You got everything you need?”

“Yeah, it's great! Did you see my place?”

“What place?”

“In the kitchen. You know, my nest.” I hadn't even noticed it when I got my beer. I shook my head.

“Come on, I'll show you!” Honey flitted into the kitchen and I followed.

The nest looked like Barbie's Fantasy Island, if there'd been such a thing. The entire kitchen table was covered with what looked like a miniature forest. There was a sparkling pool in the middle, and a rocky hillside climbed away from it and into the kitchen wall. A shimmering waterfall tumbled down from it and splashed into the pool.