"Joanne Baldwin," I said, and presented ID. "I'll be taking the room that Botox Diva just cleared."
He looked at me wearily. "Ma'am? Why that room in particular?"
"Because she probably left Godiva chocolates and chilled Dom Perignon, not to mention random stacks of cash in the couch cushions," I said, straight-faced. "I'll guard it with my life."
That broke the ice a bit. He even managed to produce an anxious second cousin to a smile.
"You're one of them, right?" Them presumably being the Wardens. I nodded. "I hear you guys have some kind of, uh, magic. Would you mind... ?"
"What, working some on these idiots? Not sure you really want me to do that. It tends to not be so great at crowd control, unless you're trying to kill people or put them in comas.
Better let me try the persuasion route first."
"Be my guest. I hope you brought horse tranquilizers." He gave me a bow and handed me the room. Cherise and I exchanged glances and stepped inside.
We stepped in it, all right. The place was complete chaos, which was odd, because it really was a room with all kinds of calm built right in. The designers had envisioned the space as a Victorian-style reading room, complete with expensively bound leather volumes and comfy couches and chairs. Nobody was enjoying the decor now, though. Middle-aged society matrons rubbed shoulders, however unwillingly, with young, vapid starlets (I might have recognized one or two of those, but truthfully, they'd all been sculpted and styled into the same person, so it didn't much matter). A thick cluster of black-clad people who I assumed were New York literary types clumped together like a dour flock of crows toward the outer edge. West Coast bling glittered in a group on the opposite side of the room. It was like a map of the wealth of America, from coast to coast - all arguing at the same time.
Another steward, looking not-so-crisp, was trying his best to calm people. They were ignoring him and all yammering away at each other, waving tickets, papers, cell phones, and BlackBerries. The din was all focused on one thing: I'm going to sue. I'm not leaving without my (fill in the blank).
I beckoned the steward over. He came, looking grateful that someone - even a potential troublemaker - was paying attention to him instead of shouting at full volume. I could understand why; this room full of people, at least fifty strong, had enough clout to bury the cruise line in legal red tape for years, if not generations. "We need to move these idiots out," I said. "It's time to go."
I saw him swallow whatever he was tempted to shoot back at me, and try again. "Yes, miss, I'm trying," he said, in that smoothly patient tone that only the very stressed develop after years of therapy. "I explained that if they didn't disembark, we couldn't wait for them to do so, but - "
"They called your bluff."
"Exactly." He swallowed and tugged a little at the white collar of his formal jacket. "I've tried to get the captain, but he's busy with preparations to cast off." A woman of indeterminate age - indeterminate because plastic surgery, heavy makeup, and a forty-hour-a-week workout schedule had effectively rendered her a wax figure of herself - grabbed the steward by the arm with expertly manicured, clawlike fingers. "What are you going to do about this?" she demanded. "I demand to speak to the captain! Immediately!"
"Ma'am, I'm sorry, but the captain is occupied," the steward said, and patiently removed her grip from his uniform sleeve. "You must depart the ship immediately, for your own safety."
"Don't be ridiculous.This ship was advertised as being able to sail through a hurricane without a wineglass tipping. It's the safest place to be! I refuse to be turned out like some penniless hobo into a storm. My people say there are no hotels, and no flights out. There's nowhere to go. I'm staying."
"That's not an option," I said. "If you get your people and head toward the exit, you might still make it off the ship. Go. Right now."
She fixed me with an icy stare. "And who are you?" Her glance traveled over me, dismissing every item of clothing on me with ruthless clarity, and then summing me up and dismissing me as a whole, all over again. "Are you with the cruise line? Because if you are, I will have a word with the captain about the dress code for - "
"Shut up," I said. She did, mainly because I don't think anybody had told her that in her whole life. "Pretend there's a bomb on board. Now. What should you do?" She blinked. "Is there?"
I stared at her, unblinking.
She lifted one heavily ringed hand to cover her pouty lips. "Is it terrorists?" Terrorists, the new monster under the bed. Well, whatever worked.
"I can't confirm that," I said, in my best poker-faced government-agent style. Hey, I learned it from television. "You should go immediately. But don't tell the others. We don't want to cause a panic."
That was an added kicker, because by being told to keep it secret, she felt privileged, and of course that convinced her. She gulped, grabbed her personal assistant in red talons, and whispered something urgent. Then they hustled off, presumably heading for the docks.
"One down," Cherise said. "Terrorists, huh?"
"The FBI can Guantanamo me later," I said. "It does the job. You take that side of the room, I'll take the other."
And so it went. About three repetitions later of the terrorists-but-keep-it-quiet story, I ran into someone who demanded to know if I had any idea who he was. I tried to control my instinctive awe and assured him I did - how could I not? He seemed to like that, and especially the whole I'm only saving your ass because you're so special undertone. When he strode off, trailing employees like a comet, I turned to see the steward watching me with a look that was half appalled, half amused. "What? Who is he?" I asked.
"I believe he's in the film industry," he said. "You're scary."
"You should see her when she's really bothered," Cherise said as she passed us, heading for her next victim. "But I hope you won't."
I felt the change in the ship before I saw the expression shift in the steward's face from nervous to outright alarmed. There was a deep, throbbing sensation coming up through the decks, transmitting itself all the way through my body.
"We're moving," I said. "Holy crap. Lewis wasn't kidding around."
"Guess not," Cherise said. We'd cleared half the room, but there were at least thirty of the first-class passengers still staging a sit-in, and we were out of time. "Maybe we can load them into lifeboats or something."
"Cher, do these guys look like they'd let us put them into lifeboats?"
"I didn't say they'd agree. We could, you know, knock them out or something."
"So we've moving up from threats to assault."
"Oh, come on . Not like you haven't assaulted anybody recently." And Cher punched me in the shoulder for emphasis.
"It wouldn't do any good," the steward broke in. "In these conditions, we don't dare launch any lifeboats, not even the new speedboat type that this ship carries. We have to have relatively calm seas or there's a significant risk of the lifeboats being compromised." Compromisedwas, I assumed, ship-speak for sunk. Which was kind of where we were, from the standpoint of achieving our goal.
I looked around the room again. Thirty-odd people, of which approximately a third were the rich sons of bitches who'd refused to leave, aggressively arrogant and sure that the universe cared too much about them to put them in real danger.
The others were their hapless hangers-on, employees, and family members.
I hated having innocents in the line of fire, but they'd made their choice, and now I had to make mine.
"Let them go back to their cabins," I said to the steward. "Confine them to quarters for now. If they want anything, deliver it. Don't let them go roaming around. Let them whine all they want, but do not let them intimidate you."
"Yes, miss." He was glad to have a clearly defined order, and he signaled to a couple of discreetly suited security men standing in the wings. They were both impressive specimens - large, muscular, with the kind of no-bullshit expressions that only men who do violence for a living could afford to wear. I figured the bulges in their coats had more to do with weaponry than with overindulging at the all-you-can-eat buffet.
The steward stationed outside was waiting for us when we emerged, and he handed me a key card and a fancy colored map with something circled on it. "Your cabin, miss," he said, straight-faced. "It's the least we can do in exchange for your help." I remembered my earlier snarky request. "It's not - "
"Oh, yes, it is. A special thank-you from the captain. And if you can't locate any stray Godiva chocolates or Dom Perignon, please let me know. I'll bring some to you straightaway."
I shook his hand, held up the map, and waggled both in front of Cherise. Her mouth dropped open.
"You didn't. "
"Botox Diva's cabin." I checked the details. "Two bedrooms. Want one?"
"Maybe. And maybe I want my own swanky digs - you ever think of that?" The steward cleared his throat very respectfully. "The captain's ordered us to close off all non-essential decks. We only have enough first-class cabins for about half of your party.
The other half will get our best accommodations farther toward the stern." Cherise gave out a sigh. "Okay, fine. I'll suffer with your guest room. You'd better not snore."
We were about halfway to the cabin, according to the map, when I felt a flutter at the edges of my awareness, like a psychic breeze. It felt cool as a mint balm to my irritated soul, and I sighed in sudden relief.
David was back.
I turned my head to see him striding down the broad hallway, heading our way. He glimmered like a hot penny, even under artificial light - silky auburn hair, worn long enough to curl at the ends, perfect bronze skin that would make a self-tanning addict weep in envy. Behind round John Lennon glasses, his eyes sparked brilliant orange, like miniature suns. His eyes were the only thing that gave him away right now as being more than human.
He was dressed in well-worn, faded jeans, a white Miami-weight shirt that fluttered in the air-conditioned breeze, and a ball cap advertising a local crab shack. He'd forgone his long vintage military coat, mainly because I'd lectured him enough about the unlikelihood of anyone except terrorists and flashers wearing coats in the Miami heat. Although the idea of David as a flasher - a private-performance-only one, of course - still lingered in my mind.
His gaze was fixed on me, and he crossed the distance fast, although he didn't appear to be in a hurry. Even so, it still seemed to take forever before his hands touched me - a gentle stroke from my shoulders down my bare arms, to my wrists, then back up to cup my face. My whole body hummed and relaxed into the sensation. At close range, David's eyes were both less and more human - less human in color and more human in content. He was worried.
He had good reason to be.
"How are you holding up?" he asked me. His voice was low and intimate, like the warmth of his body near mine. "Any pain?"
"Nope," I said. "Nothing I can't handle."
His gaze held mine, searching. Waiting. I was dimly conscious of Cherise standing a few feet away, doing the awkward dance of exclusion from an intimate moment. With no key card of her own, she'd have to wait.
"I promise, if I feel anything change, you're the first to know," I told him, and put my hands on him, because I couldn't not put my hands on him. I stepped forward and folded myself against his chest, and his arms closed over me, holding me close. I felt his lips brush my hair, a butterfly touch that made my heart skip.
"Let me check the mark," he said. I shook my head. "Jo. Let me see it."
"It's fine."
"Jo."
I sighed and backed up a step, then turned so my back was facing him. His fingers touched my shoulder and moved down and in, pushing back the fabric and moving the strap of my bra aside to look at the thing on my shoulder blade.
It looked like a black torch tattoo. I knew that, because I'd spent enough time staring at it in pocket mirror reflections. It was the parting gift of my old boss, Bad Bob Biringanine - or what was left of him, anyway. He'd once been one of the most powerful Wardens in the world, but he'd gotten it illegally, the way some athletes abuse steroids.
His particular poison was a Demon Mark - he'd volunteered himself as a host for a gestating Demon, and in return it had given him all the power he needed.
Until it was done with him, at least. I wasn't sure that what was currently walking around in his skin had much in common with the original Bad Bob.
Bad Bob had also given me a Demon Mark - unwillingly - and eventually I'd gotten rid of it. I never wanted to feel Bad Bob's sticky, foul fingers pulling my strings again; the very thought of it made my skin crawl and made me long for a shower and a steel scrub brush.
David's gentle touch slid over the black torch mark, and it was as if his fingers disappeared as they passed across the dead space of it. I couldn't feel the pressure at all.
Then his touch was back, real and warm, on the other side of the numbed spot.
"It's still contained," he said. His voice was very quiet, meant only for my ears. "If you start to feel anything - "
I already had felt something - that sickening longing for destruction as I'd watched the storm. I knew it was bleed-over from the black tattoo... but I couldn't make myself tell him, either.
"Yeah, I know, yell for help." I hated being helpless. Hated it. But somehow, Bad Bob had found a way to strip away my defenses, and I couldn't fight this thing. Not on my own.
