The crowds were thinning, and thinning fast.

I closed my eyes and concentrated on building up a shout-not a vocal one, but a psychic one-in an attempt to draw Rose"s attention. I gathered it up and sent it out, projecting it toward the drag queen and smacking her with it: Over here! Over here!

She blinked and recoiled, and spied me at my pillar. She gave me a scowl that implied very strongly that she believed I"d brought the suited men here, when of course I had not not, but I"d be hard-pressed to prove it in a shouting match across a still-considerably-loud club floor covered in people.

So I sent it again-Over here, G.o.ddammit! Now!

For some reason, it took. She jolted into action, not pushing her way through to an exit, but grabbing the ironwork circular stairwell behind her and using it to climb the nearest banister. From that banister she skipped onto the rail, up above the people and with a far clearer path than anyone down on the floor could"ve managed. She moved so smoothly and with such strength, that within moments she was down to the other end of the floor and was forced to drop down in front of me. Her high heels crashed loud enough to be heard above the lingering exit music. She grabbed me by the shoulder and yanked me forward.

"What the f.u.c.k is going on?" she demanded in her man-voice.

"I have no idea! But we need out of here, now now-" which was an understatement, because the floor was clear enough that, with a bit of shoving, the suited men were able to run toward us.

Still holding me by the shoulder, Rose shoved me forward and I let her. Nothing could be gained by fighting between ourselves, after all, and she she knew where we were going. I didn"t. I asked, "Is there another way out of here?" knew where we were going. I didn"t. I asked, "Is there another way out of here?"

"This way," she said, propelling me face-first into a very large woman (or man?) who didn"t like getting hit, but who was too drunk to do anything about it. I ricocheted off her (him?) and almost into another support pillar under the balcony, but I steadied myself and wiggled out from Rose"s grasp. I was going to need more mobility than her vise-like handhold would permit.

"Which way?" I asked, and this time she shoved me back, around a corner, down into a very dark place that, after one more turn, was all but pitch-black.

She stumbled and I heard a shuffling sound that indicated she"d decided to jettison the shoes, which-let"s be fair-was a totally great call. I didn"t know how she could walk in the things, and I say that as someone who was running in four-inch heels. "Where are we?" I wanted to know.

She said, "Storage. Move it." And she gestured with the shoes, which dangled from their straps in her hand.

"I can hear them behind us."

"Thanks. Like I need the motivation." She whipped back and took my hand, but they were getting close-very close. Close enough to be scrambling for a light switch somewhere behind us, only a few yards back.

So I said, "No, let go."

"I"m not backing us into a corner-it opens back here, to an alley." And then she smashed against something hard, and it didn"t move. I piled up behind her; I just couldn"t stop in time, and I smacked my face into the back of her shoulder, earning me a mouthful of sequins and a moment of panic.

"It"s locked!" I blurted.

"It shouldn"t be," she complained. "From the outside, maybe?"

"They tend to be pretty well prepared," I said feebly. Then I added, "Work on it."

She sputtered, "What?"

"Work on it. Bash it down if you have to. I"ll take care of these guys."

"What if there are guys outside?" she asked, which was a perfectly valid question.

I said, "We"ll cross that bridge...oh, just work on the door." As I ran back into the corridor without any lights, I added over my shoulder, "We might not need it anyway."

The first suit never knew what hit him. The darkness meant nothing to me, or next to nothing, and I cut through it quickly. I jumped at the last second, grabbed him by the throat, and twisted his head until his skeleton snapped and everything inside the suit ground to a halt. The man went limp and I picked him up, held him low, right around knee level, and flung him down the darkness like I was bowling for feds.

But by then the other three guys suspected something was amiss. I heard whispers going back and forth between microphones and earpieces, but my ears were badly bludgeoned by six hours of too-loud music, and I didn"t catch anything but a collection of ferocious hisses. They were spreading out, and crouching down-I could tell that much.

I took the opposite approach and reached up for a set of pipes that ran above my head. I could see them in the blackness, slick as eels along the ceiling, worming through the building like veins. I propped one foot up onto the nearest crate and it jingled faintly, revealing that it was filled with small decorative bells, d.a.m.n it all to h.e.l.l. Might as well have been packed with exploding whoopee cushions for all the noise it made. But with a shove and a jump I"d reached the overhead pipes and hauled myself flat up against them-just in time to dodge the blast of gunfire aimed at my great jangling f.u.c.kup.

One shot, and it could"ve been a nine-millimeter or a cannon in that dark, narrow storage room. But I was well out of its range, up there with the pipes clasped to my chest and my ankles interlocking to hold my full weight up above the floor.

Sister Rose barked, "Raylene!" but I couldn"t answer without revealing myself, so I didn"t. And when one of the feds began a grim charge down the narrow thoroughfare, I swooped down and picked him up Batman-style: one hand over his mouth, one arm around his neck. I held him up off the ground and let him struggle while the third fed came scooting onto the scene. But hey, since I was holding this big heavy lug of a b.a.s.t.a.r.d (and if I were to be honest, gradually losing my feet"s grip on the pipe), I swung him around like a pendulum-breaking his neck with an almost-accidental snap-and I clocked the incoming suit with his buddy"s corpse.

Then I dropped down; I had to, my ankles were giving way and my shoes were on the verge of slipping off. I clattered down to the narrow walkway, landing heavily on the freshest fed. He squirmed and shoved me away, drawing up his gun and getting ready to fire it in my general direction, or maybe Rose"s.

I didn"t let him. I wrenched it out of his hand before he could squeeze the trigger and I used it to bludgeon him into stillness. Something broke and his skin began to leak, but the tang of blood was only a faint distraction. I willed myself to ignore it, because I couldn"t be hungry and be aware of my other pursuer at the same time. This last guy was smarter than the first wave; he was hanging back and patrolling the perimeter as best he could-lurking out by the lights in the hall, where the doorway was open, letting the glare of the cheap bulbs cut sharp shafts of light against the darkness.

I could hear him whispering back and forth into the tiny microphones that were tucked into his shirt collar, and I could even pick out most of the words. He was calling for backup and debating the best approach, which was good. It meant that whoever was after us didn"t know where I was, or what I was.

I hoped hoped they didn"t know what I was. they didn"t know what I was.

Behind me, I heard Rose"s shoulder slam against the back door and then there was a pop as the thing flapped open, sucking a little of the dark out of the storage room. "Raylene!" she cried out, and I still didn"t answer but I was beside her in a flash, behind her and urging her outside, into the alleyway.

"Son of a b.i.t.c.h b.i.t.c.h, you"re fast," she observed. "I thought maybe they"d hit you."

"Me? h.e.l.l no," I a.s.sured her. "But they"ll be on us in a minute, so come on."

"Where?"

Around us the alley was dark and nasty, cluttered with decomposing trash and pocked with puddles that were filled with something that was more eau de b.u.m p.i.s.s eau de b.u.m p.i.s.s than rainwater. Overhead, the moon was rolling slowly across the night sky, ducking behind a few thin clouds and peeping back out the other side. "This way," I said. than rainwater. Overhead, the moon was rolling slowly across the night sky, ducking behind a few thin clouds and peeping back out the other side. "This way," I said.

She asked, "Why?" but she followed regardless, which I appreciated.

"My car."

"You found a parking place out here?"

I would"ve responded but the back door smacked behind us and the last fed had found a friend, and they were on our trail. I ushered her forward and jammed her around the nearest corner, praying we hadn"t been spotted.

If it"d just been me, it wouldn"t have bothered. I"d have taken to the rooftops and been a mile away before their eyes adjusted to this new level of light. But Adrian deJesus was only human, and we had too many common interests and enemies to part company now.

She was barefoot and I was wearing high heels, which was a strike against the pair of us, but she moved easily and, just like she"d climbed the rail indoors, she grabbed a rain gutter and hoisted herself up. The metal tube creaked and groaned but held, and she swung her body over onto the Poppyc.o.c.k Review"s angled roof.

"Come on!" she breathed, reaching down a hand.

I took the hand because I didn"t want to push our luck by relying on the gutter, and I was impressed by how easily she lifted me. Underneath that skimpy drag garb, Sister Rose was built like a brick s.h.i.thouse, and she moved smoothly to draw me up beside her.

She flashed me a military-style hand gesture that I didn"t really understand, but I nodded and followed along. We were on her turf after all, and this wasn"t my corner of town. For all I knew she hung out on the roof and ziplined around the city easy as you please, just for s.h.i.ts and giggles.

I opened my mouth to ask, "Where are we going?" because she"d started leading me at a leaning pace around the edge. But she smacked me in the mouth-more roughly than strictly necessary-and hissed a "shh!" that could"ve cut tile. She pointed at my shoes and pretended to hold them by the heels. Who was I to argue? I played copycat and joined in the angled game of walking at a sideways lurch, heels dangling from one hand and bare feet sticking grittily to the shingles.

"My car," I whispered softer, at her back. Because I was confident that I could dodge her if she tried to smack my mouth shut again, now that I knew to expect it.

"Where?"

"Peachtree, a block that way." I pointed when she looked over her shoulder to see what nonsense I was going on about.

Down below us we could scarcely hear them, but we could see them.

They were splitting up, circling the building. If they knew we were up above them, they were careful to hide it, but one of them buzzed into his mouthpiece that they needed reinforcements and asked something about a satellite. Call me a pessimist, but I figured that whatever came back through his earpiece wasn"t good for us, which was a b.u.mmer. I"d thought it might be worth my time to hop down, wreak a little havoc, and boom-two feds out of the way, and permanently off our trail. But if more were coming, it might be too much of a time sink to be worth the trouble.

"Do they know?"

"Know what?"

"About your car," she whistled quietly between her teeth.

"Not unless they"re magically tracking me by the pixie dust that spills out of my a.s.s. It"s down there, there," I said, as if I might"ve somehow parked it on the shingles where we stood. Lest that be the last idiotic thought ringing through Sister Rose"s ears, I added, "We have to go down and get it." Because I didn"t plan to carry the bulky queen anywhere. It"d scarcely be any faster than hobbling around in high heels. Behind the wheel, I could get us out and clear at eighty miles per hour, if it came down to it. "Besides, they"re looking for two...woman-shaped people on foot. Let"s go get my wheels and scramble their a.s.sumptions."

"Okay. We"ll split up and do that."

"Are you crazy?" I demanded, a smidge too loud. "Don"t you ever watch any horror movies?"

"They can"t chase us both."

"Yes they can. There"s two of them. two of them."

"Look, they"ve called for backup," she said, indicating the two men below. "They"re going to hang together until backup arrives. They won"t divide to chase us."

She sounded pretty confident of this fact-confident enough to risk her life. So I replied, "Fine. I"ll go get the car." I jacked a thumb to the west. "And I"ll pick you up ...?"

"Down at the diner, as originally planned." I detected an accusatory scowl, and ignored it. "Give me five minutes."

"Five minutes?"

She reconsidered. "Three. And you"d better be there. What kind of car?"

"Dark blue pseudo-cop-car. Crown Vic."

"Fantastic," she said, and I couldn"t tell if she meant it or if she was being b.i.t.c.hy.

"Three minutes," I repeated.

"Three minutes," she said back.

And on the count of three we each dove in a different direction and went leaping, scattering, splashing down off the roof.

I shudder to note that I was the one doing the splashing.

Barefoot and now stinking of something homeless people do in public, I hightailed it around the corner and down the block-without bothering to pretend like I was just an ordinary lady, dressed somewhat s.l.u.ttily, barefoot, and running for her life from a rapist or carjacker or something. No way.

I ran full-tilt, b.u.mping into the late-night (or early-morning) clubgoers hard enough to send them reeling, and then wondering what on earth had just shoved them. I moved fast enough that I probably looked like a blur-a conspicuous blur, to be certain-but I didn"t care. Whoever was on my tail already knew enough about me to cramp my night, and while I"m usually the very soul of discretion, every now and again a girl has to tear loose and run like the devil knows her name.

Because he does. And he has a serial number with which he"d like to replace it.

I reached the car approximately thirty seconds after I"d launched myself off the roof, and then I spent a rather fumbly, humiliating moment searching for my keys. I wasn"t carrying a bag so they had to be in one of my pockets and yes, they were. I dug them out and my hands were shaking. No longer a blur on a sidewalk, I was now a disheveled hussy quaking her way home on a jittery, shoeless walk of shame. Or so I imagined. And so I hoped I projected, because it wouldn"t draw a second glance in that neighborhood.

Finally I got the car open, and got myself inside it. I shoved the key into the ignition and started the thing with a sigh of relief. Then I wondered how much time had pa.s.sed. Three minutes? Maybe? It wasn"t like we"d stopped to synchronize our watches or anything. We"d just nodded at each other and taken off, as if by pure synchronicity we"d meet up 180 seconds later.

I pulled out into the street, cutting off some a.s.shole in a low-riding car with a racing stripe. The driver swore and honked and flipped me the bird and I flipped it right back as I gunned the gas and heaved my big-a.s.s car out into the street.

The diner wasn"t far away. One block? Two blocks? A couple of blocks, yes-because I was parked on the other side of the Poppyc.o.c.k Review. But traffic was heavy and the only streetlight I hit between my starting point and my destination surely surely held me up longer than the three promised minutes. I tapped my bare, wet, grimy foot against the brake and muttered, "Come held me up longer than the three promised minutes. I tapped my bare, wet, grimy foot against the brake and muttered, "Come on on," as if my irritation could somehow bend the universe to my whims.

If only.

And just when I was working myself up to a neurotic frenzy wherein Sister Rose had been captured, or had vanished, or was lying dead in one of those foul-smelling puddles, a knock on the pa.s.senger window gave me a shock that would"ve stopped my heart if I"d still been alive.

She was there, slapping her hands against the window and saying, "Come on, on," just like I"d been saying about the stoplight. Only I couldn"t call her "she" anymore. In three minutes (or four, or five, or however long it"d taken me), Sister Rose had morphed into Adrian deJesus, brother of Isabelle and wearer of clothes that looked suspiciously like they might"ve come off a federal agent. It was the fastest ident.i.ty swap I"d ever had the pleasure of witnessing.

I pressed the b.u.t.ton to unlock the car, and with a swift yank of the handle and a sliding leap that landed him in the pa.s.senger"s slot, he was inside. I locked the doors again.

The light turned green.

We rolled through it like the most ordinary of couples, doing the most ordinary drive home ever. I saw two long black cars pulling up to the block where the drag bar had all too recently been the scene of several murders (on my part), and the fleeing of one great drag queen (on Adrian"s part).

I made a point to quit looking in the rearview mirror as I drove.

8.

I took him back to my place because h.e.l.l, where else was I going to take him? We were in the same boat, and I couldn"t honestly see him flipping out and calling the feds to report me. Besides, he"d talked like he knew I was a vampire back at the drag bar, and in the car we were both too d.a.m.n tense and silent to converse, so we didn"t, and I needed to warm him up or lighten him up or...or something. Whatever it took to get him talking, now that I had my p.r.o.nouns sorted out. took him back to my place because h.e.l.l, where else was I going to take him? We were in the same boat, and I couldn"t honestly see him flipping out and calling the feds to report me. Besides, he"d talked like he knew I was a vampire back at the drag bar, and in the car we were both too d.a.m.n tense and silent to converse, so we didn"t, and I needed to warm him up or lighten him up or...or something. Whatever it took to get him talking, now that I had my p.r.o.nouns sorted out.

I"d sorted them thusly: When he was dressed as a man, talking like a man, and looking like a man, as far as I was concerned he was a man. In ladywear, with full lady persona, she was a woman. And if he/she had any issue with my designations, he/she could take it up with me later, when no one was trying to kill or capture us and stuff us into the trunk of a long black car.

So he he stood in my kitchen, leaning over the bar, his neck glistening with sweat-and a dusting of leftover glitter. That stuff really stood in my kitchen, leaning over the bar, his neck glistening with sweat-and a dusting of leftover glitter. That stuff really is is the gift that keeps on giving. the gift that keeps on giving.

We were both sullen and uncertain of how to begin speaking, but he was downing a gla.s.s of scotch he"d found under the sink and I was wrestling with a bottle of nice red wine, on the very verge of smashing it against the counter just to get at the sweet, sweet goodness inside.

The cork sprang free just in time to stop me. I grabbed a goblet and filled it up-d.a.m.n the torpedoes and all that.

When I had a full gla.s.s in hand, and he had a mostly empty one before him on the counter, I said, "So."

And he said, "So," right back.

I gave up and said, "This is ridiculous. You know I"m a vampire, I know you know I"m a vampire, and we both know your little sister was part of a government project. Feel free to stop me when and if I"m wrong."

He didn"t stop me.

"All right, then," I continued. I was not exactly rea.s.sured by the illusion of control but I"d accept it in lieu of actual control, so I bullied the conversation forward. "She died, years ago. The military told you...they told you what? That she"d killed herself? That she"d merely pa.s.sed away as part of some test or experiment?"

"Something like that."