Dead and Kicking (5 page)

“Ahh, Detective Nash, my friend. Come, come. We were just about to meet this lovely, young
lady.” He made a come forward gesture
with his hand. Nash strode into the room
and glared angrily at me before looking at the Magister.

“Salvador, Tomas.” Nash nodded at the two men on the sofa. “Sorry to barge in like this.” He stepped closer and grabbed me by the
elbow. “You’ll have to excuse us but we
have some police business to discuss.”

The vehemence in his voice took me by
surprise and I yanked my arm from his grasp, taking a step away from him.

“Nonsense,” the Magister purred. “I do believe the young lady, what did you
say your name was again my dear?”

“Harry, Harry Russo,” I stammered it
out.

“Harry?” A little smile crossed his face. “How intriguing.” He turned back to Nash. “I’m afraid your
business will just have to wait, my friend.
The lovely Miss Harry Russo needs a moment of my time and she was here
first.” He smiled again but it was the
smile of the cat that caught the canary - and was about to eat it.

He gestured to the seat beside
him. “Come! Sit!
Have a drink.” He snapped his
fingers and a man dressed as a waiter appeared from the shadows. “Fetch Detective Nash a glass of the 1608 he
enjoys so much.”

“This isn’t a social call,” Nash
replied as he glared at me again.

“Oh, but I insist.” The words slid from his mouth like butter,
the compelling force behind them palpable, but still Salvador smiled like we
were all friends.

Knowing he was backed into a corner,
Nash gave me one last glare before letting himself
drop down on the end of the sofa opposite of Tomas. The waiter appeared with Nash’s drink and he
tossed the expensive blended Irish whiskey back in one swallow.

Salvador smiled at me. “Now Miss Russo, do join us.” He patted the seat beside him. I looked from him to Nash and then back
again. There was no way I was sitting
down between those two.

“I’d prefer to stand if you don’t
mind.”

Salvador shrugged. “Lady’s choice.” He sat back, he eyes travelling over my
body. I may have been dressed for the
rabble downstairs, but up here, I felt seriously out of place. Nash seemed to take a good look at me for the
first time as well, his eyes widening in surprise.

I tried to ignore the growing
sensation of unease, but when the small hairs on my arms began to stand on end
and my skin began to tingle, I slammed my personal shields on to full
force. While low-level vampires are much
like the ones found in stories, sucking blood using retractable fangs, a few,
very powerful vampires achieve the ability to absorb life energy directly from
a living being. These powerful vampires,
called Vlads, still have fangs and can enjoy a blood
meal, but they can also sustain themselves with simple skin-to-skin
contact. The truly powerful, like I
suspected the Magister was, didn’t even need that and could simply sip the
energy from a nearby source. I had no
intention of being anyone’s snack food.
Luckily, another thing that had been instilled in me from a young age by
Gran, was personal shields. Not only did they help ground me when doing
what little magic I could, they also protected me from energy sucking ghosts
and Vlads.

“So, do tell me Miss Harry Russo, how
does a lovely, young lady such as yourself come to be
called
Harry
?” Salvador looked at me with reappraising
eyes. “Surely it must be short for
something? Harriet
perhaps? Although in truth, I
don’t think that is much better. No, something else then.
Hermoine?”

“It’s Angharad, but please, everyone
calls me Harry. I –”

“Angharad! How delightful. You never hear the old names anymore.” He turned to look at Nash. “Why Cian, we have another Celt in our
midst.” He laughed heartily like it was some great joke then raised his
glass. “
Slainte
!
Salud
!” He emptied his
glass and then returned it to the low table in front of him with a bang. “So what can I do for you my lovely Miss
Russo?”

I quickly stole a glance at
Nash. He glared back at me. There would be hell to pay with him when this
was all over. “I…I’m here on behalf of
Bryce Chow, or that is to say his sister, Bianca.”

Nash grumbled something and I shifted
uncomfortably, trying to avoid making eye contact.

“Ah yes, the recently departed Mr.
Chow.” Salvador shook his head in exaggerated
sadness. “Taken so young and before he
paid off his sister’s debt.” His eyes
took on a calculating look. “And you are
here to perhaps renegotiate?”

“No, well, I mean yes.” I pulled the memory stick from my pocket and
held it up. “Do you know what is on
this?”

Salvador leaned forward, his interest
piqued. “Do you?”

“Yes.” I risked a quick look at Nash. He was pissed. “I believe that Bryce, uh, Mr. Chow, had
already spoken to you in regards to a renegotiation of his sister’s debt before
he was murdered. You agreed to cancel
the debt in exchange for the video on this memory stick.”

“I see.” Salvador sat back, his hands steepled together, deep in thought. “And you wish to uphold that deal?”

“Yes, but with two additional
stipulations.” I took a deep breath to
try and calm myself. “First, you will
ban Bianca for life from all of your gambling establishments to ensure that a
new debt is not incurred and you will promise to take no additional reprisals
against her or any of Bryce’s extended family; and second, you will pay for a
funeral for Bryce. And not just some
bargain service. It should be handled
by…” I stopped and thought for a
moment. I’ve delivered flowers at one
time or another to every funeral home in the city. “Brinkmans. Their silver service should do nicely I
think.”

Salvador made a show of thinking over
the terms. “These demands are
acceptable, even admirable, but you want nothing for yourself?”

“No.
I’m not here for me. Besides,
what was recorded on this video is totally abhorrent and should be
stopped. You’re the Magister. It should be your concern.”

“You have seen what is in the video?”

“Yes.”

“And you understand what you saw?”

“Yes,
unfortunately.”
I couldn’t stop the shiver that travelled down my spine.

“Very well. Give us the video. Once it has been verified, the debt shall be
considered paid.”

“I would prefer to have the
promissory note signed off now.”

“You doubt the word of the
Magister?”

I had almost forgotten about Tomas,
he had been sitting there so quietly.
Not so now. He jumped up from his
seat and took a menacing step towards me.
From the corner of my eye I saw Nash tense as if ready to jump to my
defense.

“Why should we deal with you when we
can simply take what we want?” Tomas
sneered at me.

The memory stick disappeared from my
hand, leaving me gasping in surprise.
Tomas held the stick up triumphantly. Either he was really fast, or had
some sort of telekinetic gift.

“It seems you no longer have anything
we need,” he mocked.

I shrugged to convey how unconcerned
I felt at his threat. “Perhaps,
provided you know how to decrypt a 128-bit password. Or, you could cancel the debt and pay for
Bryce’s funeral and I could give you the key to the encryption. Your call.”

Tomas frowned and then grabbed a
nearby laptop. He inserted the key. A few moments later he looked at Salvador and
shook his head. Salvador clapped his
hands and laughed heartily. “Ah, Miss Russo, well played.
Well played indeed.”

I managed to get the hell out of
there several minutes later. We settled
on a handshake and a promise that I would courier the encryption token first
thing the next morning. I figured it was
better to just take Salvador’s word rather than press the issue. He was after all the Magister and a vampire,
and vampires could get pretty uppity about someone breaking their word. Besides, the atrocity that had been captured
on the video had to be stopped before anyone else died. Even if Salvador hadn’t agreed to my terms, I
would have ended up giving it to him.

Tess rushed to my side the moment I
exited the stairs. “Omigod! What
took you so long? I was totally freaking
out, especially when I saw Nash go up behind you.”

I grabbed Tess’s arm intent on making
a quick getaway, until what she’d said registered. “Wait a minute. How do you know who Nash is?”
I looked at her and her eyes darted away. There definitely was something she wasn’t
telling me about a certain surly cop, but at this point I really didn’t care to
hang around and find out what it was.
“Come on. Let’s get out of here.”

Outside the club, the line had gotten
considerably longer and the night felt a lot colder on my bare skin. We were hurrying along the sidewalk towards
Tess’s car, when a hulking shape stepped out of the shadows.

“You and I need to talk.”

“Shit!” I stopped with my hand already reaching for
my katana, until I realized it was Nash.
“Damn it, Detective! Are you
trying to give us a heart attack?”

Nash continued to stand and scowl,
arms folded across his chest, blocking our path. “I mean it, you and I need to have a
conversation,” he practically growled the words at me. “And you,” he pointed at Tess, “what were you
thinking?”

Tess practically cowered at his
words. What had happened to my
feisty Chihuahua and who did this guy think he was yelling at my friend? “Look, it’s been a long day and I’m tired and
just want to go home. You can bawl me
out tomorrow.” I grabbed Tess’s arm
again and started to go around him.

“Bawl you out? I should…”
He stopped and looked around then lowered his voice, “I should arrest
you for withholding evidence.”

Was he serious? This was getting out of hand. I held my hands up to him, fists clenched,
wrists together, daring him to slap the cuffs on. “Fine. Arrest me.
Maybe I’ll get a nice, quiet jail cell to sleep in. You have nothing to
charge me with and you know it.”

Nash grabbed one of my hands and
pulled me closer. “I’m not going to
arrest you, but we
are
going to
talk. You ride with me.” He started to pull me the opposite direction
from where I wanted to go.

“Listen you Neanderthal, I already
have a ride.” I wrenched my hand from
his and gestured to Tess, expecting her to chime in and come to my
defense. Instead, she shook her head and
looked down at her boots.

“I’ll deal with you later,” Nash
growled at Tess. “Go home.”

Tess quickly turned and scurried off
towards her car. “What the hell,
Tess? Thanks a lot,” I called after
her. I couldn’t believe she had just
abandoned me.

Nash reached for my hand again and
twined his fingers with mine. He seemed
to have calmed down a little. “Come
on. I’ll take you home,” he started
walking back towards the club, dragging me along, “and then we’ll talk.”

We walked back past the entrance to
the club in silence, Nash still holding my hand. I don’t know whether it was because he forgot
he was doing it or he was afraid I might bolt, but it felt kind of nice, so I
didn’t complain. We came to a side
street and Nash stopped in front of a motorcycle. It had a split 2-up seat with a tiny little
grab bar over the back fender.

“Oh no, you don’t expect me to ride
on the back of that?” I gestured to the bike.

“What’s the matter….chicken?” Nash grinned.
“You obviously have a death wish.
This should be right up your alley.”
He straddled the bike and fired it up.
“Get on.”

Not seeing much of an alternative -
my ride had deserted me and there was little chance of hailing a cab at this
time of night - I kicked down the foot peg meant for the passenger and climbed
on. To say it was awkward is an
understatement. I mean are all biker
chicks short or something? I felt like I
was all knees and elbows as I tried to find a way to hang on for my life
without actually touching Nash.

Finally, having lost what little
patience he had left, or maybe he just took pity on me, Nash grabbed my arms
and pulled me close, wrapping them around his mid-section. I tensed, but then he growled, “you’d better hang on” so I let myself relax against
him. I barely had a moment to appreciate
the heat coming off him or the flat, washboard abs I could feel beneath my
hands, when the bike roared to life and took off down the lane. I’m not ashamed to admit it, I squealed like
a girl in surprise.

***

Ever heard the expression ‘like a bat
out of hell’? The person that coined the
phrase must have ridden on the back of a motorcycle with Cian Nash. He drove as if speed limits were more like
suggestions and the right of way was his.
Always.
I finally just buried my face against his shoulder and held on for dear
life.

When we arrived at the firehall, I
practically fell off the bike in my haste to get my feet on solid ground. My hair was a windswept mess and my cheeks
were numb with the cold. The parking lot
was empty except for my beat up old Chevy truck. No surprise that we beat Tess home with the
way Nash, the maniac, drove. I shot a
quick “thanks for the ride” over my shoulder and sprinted up the stairs to the
second storey entrance.

My hopes that Nash might just drive
off and leave me alone were dashed when instead of the sound of the door
slamming behind me, I heard the clomping of motorcycle
boots as they followed me inside. I
scowled at Nash and he scowled right back, but seemed to be opting for the
silent treatment. Fine
by me.

Nash followed me further into the
apartment and did the one thing everyone did when they saw it for the first
time. He walked over to check out the
fireman’s pole that had a prominent place between the kitchen and the dining
area. The pole ran up to the third level
through a circular hole in the ceiling.
Actually the pole ran through all three stories, from the third floor
right down to my shop below, but we had sealed up the floor around it on the
second level. The pole was more a
conversation piece than anything, although I admit that both Tess and I used it
on occasion as a quick way to get from the third floor hallway to the kitchen.

I pulled off my leather jacket,
feeling slightly uncomfortable at how much bare skin was revealed, and
unclasped the harness for my katana.
Nash’s eyes widened at the sight of the two foot blade.

“Do you know how to use that thing?”

The condescension in his voice set my
teeth on edge, but I ignored it, turning my back on him to hang the precious
blade on the wall. I grabbed a hooded
sweatshirt from the hook by the door and pulled it on. Walking to the kitchen, I deftly unhooked and
removed the leather contraption underneath the sweatshirt as I went. Only when it and the dog collar were piled on
the kitchen counter and I felt much less restricted, did I reply.

“I can hold my own.”

“Hold your own?” The condescension had been replaced once
again with anger. “You are so over your
head.” He ran a hand through his hair in
frustration. “Do you even know what
you’ve done?”

“Done? I’ve brought a dangerous and horrific act to
the attention of the proper authority and I’ve helped out someone who needed
it.”

“No, what you’ve done is brought
yourself
to the attention of the most
dangerous man in the city. Do you
realize the danger you put yourself in tonight?
Not to mention breaking and entering a crime scene earlier today.” Oh, so he had somehow figured out I had been
there at Bryce’s.

“I can take care of myself. I knew what I was doing.” I came to stand in front of him. He had a good eight inches on me, but in my
Doc Martens, I at least didn’t have to strain my neck to look into his
eyes. “Look, I appreciate your concern,
but I had everything under control.”

As I turned away from him, his hand
shot out to grab my arm. “You’re not as
smart as I thought you were, if you think you stand a chance against a
vampire.”

That was it. Enough was enough. Just who did this guy think he was? Drawing on my six plus
years of martial arts training and double that in self-defence techniques, I
grabbed his hand by the thumb and used his own momentum to twist it around. With just my grasp on his thumb, I had him
helpless and kneeling on the floor, his arm twisted painfully behind his back
in two seconds flat. It was the same
move I had used on Neville. “I told you
I can hold my own.”

I released him almost immediately,
turning my back on him, only to find myself swept off my feet and pinned to the
floor, my breath knocked out of me.

“Never turn your back on your
enemy.”

Winded, I looked up into his eyes,
surprised to find not anger but genuine concern. “Are you my enemy?” I asked a bit breathlessly.

The moment was broken by the sound of
steps outside the door. I used the
distraction of Tess’s arrival home to escape.
Pulling my arms to my sides and then pushing up on his chest, I scissored my legs up and knocked him to the floor beside
me. I quickly straddled him and threw an
open-handed palm to his face stopping just before I would have made contact and
broken his nose. I jumped to my feet and
backed away from him.

The three of us stood staring at each
other until Tess dropped her eyes and looked away. Nash continued to stare at her angrily.

“What the hell is your problem?” I turned to glare at Nash. “She lives here. There’s no need to growl…” I paused,
my eyes going wide as the pieces fell into place.
I looked from Tess and back to Nash. “That’s it, isn’t it? You
are
practically growling…growling like a big, angry…”

“Harry…” Tess pleaded.

“… dog. You’re one of them,” I went on ignoring Tess,
knowing the dog comment wasn’t going to do me any favours. I can’t believe I didn’t see it before. If there was ever an alpha male, it was Cian
Nash.

“You told her?” Nash took a step towards Tess, who cowered
even more.

I stepped between them and pushed at
Nash with my hands on his chest. “Of
course I know. We live together, grew up
together. It’s a little hard to hide the
fact that you go all furry with the full moon.”

Nash scowled at my furry
comment. That’s another thing werewolves
don’t like, being reminded that no matter how much control they may have over
their shape change, all bets were off at the full moon.

“I had permission to tell her,” Tess
mumbled, not looking up.

That was news to me, but I’d go with
it. “Yeah, she had permission so stand down. You. Big. Bully.”
I accentuated each word with a push against Nash’s chest, none of which
made him budge an inch. I’d never seen
Tess so cowed. Of course I had never
seen her with another werewolf except her uncle. His gym was mainly used by humans, not werewolves,
and when it was used by the pack, it was closed to the public. On a whole, most werewolves didn’t bother to
work out. I guess getting furry and
running around on all fours chasing rabbits once a month was enough to keep you
fit.

I crossed my arms and glared at Nash,
who in turn glared at Tess. Finally, I
couldn’t take it anymore and I threw up my hands in disgust. I stomped over to the computer and grabbed
the copy of the video I had made.

“Here. I made you a copy. Take it.
Maybe there’s something on there you can use, but good luck explaining
it to the norms you work with.” I
grabbed Nash’s hand and pushed the memory stick into it. “Now, will you please just leave?”

Nash shoved the memory stick into his
pocket. “Fine, I’m going. But this conversation isn’t over.”

“Yeah,
whatever.
Don’t let the door hit you on the ass on the way out.”