Darkest Night - Smoke And Ashes Part 44

As it swung shut, he called.

The door jerked out of Leah's grip. Bra.s.s hinges creaked but held.

The look she shot him through Ryne Cyratane's torso promised a thousand years of torment and an immediate b.u.t.t kicking. Tony let his arm drop back to his side and croaked, "Come on. We're on a tight schedule."

"There's time..."

"No." He sounded definite. Go him. He had no idea of what he'd do if she refused to listen.

Fortunately, he didn't have to find out. Leaving the manager standing confused and unfulfilled in the conference room, Leah stomped down the corridor, right past him and out into the lobby, heading for the exit. Half expecting to see smoking footprints in the carpet, Tony followed.

Disoriented by the unexpected sunshine, he had to dance around a shuttle bus and a pair of taxis vying for the same spot. By the time he was in the clear, she was already at the car. "That manager," he said before she got a chance to speak, "he was married."

"So?"

"So he was married."

Leah settled back against the trunk and crossed her arms. "Are you telling me you never got into a car or went into an alley with a married man? Most hustlers can't afford those kinds of scruples."

He didn't remember telling her in so many words that he used to hustle. Still, took one to know one. "That was different."

"How?"

"This guy, the manager, he didn't make that choice. You didn't give him a choice."

Her eyes widened incredulously. "So you were saving his marriage?"

"Maybe."

"You know nothing about him. He could be putting it to half the cleaning staff." "That has nothing to do with me. This did. If he decides to betray his wife, that's his business, but we don't get to make that choice for him." Suddenly, the pavement was a lot closer than it had been. "Ow." Why was he on his knees?

"Tony?"

He blinked up at her.

"You didn't take the time to focus properly, did you? You used your own internal power for those runes, didn't you?"

"Could have." He honestly didn't remember. "I was in a bit of a hurry," he reminded her as she helped him back onto his feet.

"You don't generally demand a lot of foreplay."

He expected more argument, but she was quiet as she opened the car door and eased him down onto the seat. He couldn't read her expression and he didn't trust the silence, so just before she slid the key into the ignition, he grabbed her arm. "What?"

To his surprise, she leaned over and kissed him gently on the cheek. "You're a good man, Tony Foster. A good man with power.

I'm not sure if I find that terrifyingly hopeful or just terrifying."

As she effortlessly shook free of his grip, Tony sagged back against the seat and frowned. "Yeah, well, that and five ninety-nine will get you a meal deal," he said after a moment, unable to decide if he should be flattered or insulted. "Which reminds me; you'll need to..."

"Hit a drive-through on the way to number twenty-five. Yeah, I figured."

"Tony, wake up!"

There was a certain, this is the last time I'm going to say this tone to Leah's voice that dragged his eyes open. He could see trees silhouetted against a sapphire sky. "It's almost dark."

"I know. You ate and then you fell asleep, and I couldn't wake you."

"Why am I wet?"

"I said I couldn't wake you," she snapped, tossing the empty cup into the back seat and starting the car.

Now he thought about it, it was a pretty stupid question. Although she'd reclined his seat as far as it would go, sleeping in the car had left him stiff. And not in a good way. "Oh, man, I have really got to take a p.i.s.s."

"There's a gas station on the corner."

"Where are we?"

"Just down the road from number twenty-five," she told him, pulling up to the pumps. "It's on a private house. Give me your credit card. For gas!" she added when he stared at her blankly.

"What's wrong with your cards?"

"The gas is going into your car."

"Right. Fine. Whatever." It wasn't until he was getting back into the car having visited both the bathroom and the convenience store, holding a bag of beef jerky and a giant sport drink and feeling much better that he realized what she'd said. "On a private house? Not in?"

"There's a piece of soffit missing. Do you know what that is?"

"Sure. I'm a wizard. We know things."

"It's the piece that fills in the angle between the roof to the house."

"Ah." He chewed a piece of jerky as she pulled out into traffic. "Bungalow?"

"Two stories."

Two stories with a porch and a flagstone walk and some bushes clipped into tight little spheres. Dark curtains were drawn over lace sheers in the front window, but a thin line of light seemed to indicate someone was home.

Standing on the sidewalk and craning his head, he could just barely make out the shimmer. "I can get it from here."

The first rune slammed up against the eaves trough and rained down in a shower of blue sparks. Tony threw the remains of his sport drink on a smoldering spherical bush. Good thing neighbor in the city means minding your own business. "Son of a b.i.t.c.h.

I can't get the right angle on it, the porch is in the way. I'm going to have to lean out that second-story window."

"And how," Leah snorted, peering up at the house, "are you going to get to that second-story window?"

"I guess we're hunting for another location," he said as he headed back to the car.

She caught his wrist as he was opening the trunk. "Tony, people with that kind of repressed shrubbery are not likely to be fans of Darkest Night."

"So we expand our demographic." Shaking free, he pulled out his show jacket and shrugged into it, dropping his jean jacket into the trunk. It was the ubiquitous black satin with a blood red logo across the back, and he didn't wear it often-there were only so many Donnas a guy could face in a day-but it made him look more official and at past seven on a Sat.u.r.day evening, that could only help. "We'll get whoever's in there to take me to that room because we want to use the view out of it on the show."

"They won't care."

"And we'll offer them a great deal of money."

Leah glanced at the shrubs as they walked up the front path. "That might work. Except," she added, "I get the impression CB's not going to sanction that."

"We're not actually going to use the view," he reminded her, heading up the porch stairs.

"Fair enough. But once you're in the room, they're not just going to let you lean out the window."

"No, you're going to distract them. Or him. Or her. Or the Brady Bunch. Without forcing he, she, or them to break any vows."

"Okay, Mr. I've-got-an-answer-for-everything: if it's not a him, how?"

"We'll be on the second floor."

"So?"

Tony sighed and pressed the doorbell. "You're a stunt-woman, right? Fall down the stairs." "I don't understand." Mrs. Chin clutched at the front of her pale blue sweater with one hand and peered anxiously from Tony's card to Tony. "There'll be a television show on our front lawn?"

"No, ma'am. We just want to shoot... film," he corrected when she looked startled. "We want to film the scene out the window just like it is."

"But why?"

"For the television show."

"Yes, you said that, but why?"

"It'll be what one of the characters sees when they look out their window, Mrs. Chin."

"Except they won't ever be in your room," Leah added quickly. "We'll put the pieces of film together back at the studio."

"I see." Either she didn't, or she was confused about something else. "And you'll pay me money for this?"

That was almost a statement and definitely not what she might be confused about.

"Yes, ma'am."

"Because you always hear about how much money there is in television." She glanced at the card again. "How much money?"

"I can't say exactly, ma'am. I need to take a look and see if it's suitable and then..." He pulled his cell phone from his pocket. "...

send a couple of pictures to the boss."

Her eyes narrowed. "You're not taking pictures of the inside of my house."

"No ma'am. Just the view out the window."

"And you want to do this now?"

"The sooner the boss makes a decision, the sooner we can cut you a check."

"But it's dark out," she protested, leaning just enough to see past them and get confirmation.

"That's okay. It's a television show about a vampire. But a good vampire," he qualified as her eyes began to narrow again. "It's about a vampire detective who solves crimes and protects people."

Mrs. Chin nodded, slowly. "That sounds familiar. What's it called again?"

"Darkest Night." He half turned so she could see the logo on his back. "We shoot right here in Burnaby."

"I've never heard of you," she declared, but she stepped back and let them into the house.

"Oh, good heavens! Miss? Are you all right?" Tony hadn't seen the fall, but it had certainly sounded impressive; lots of b.u.mping, lots of crashing, and finally some very believable moaning. As Mrs. Chin ran out of the room, he leaned out of the window-fortunately, one of the old-fashioned kind that lifted up and had no screen-twisted around and, using the frame, pulled himself up to sit on the ledge. He had to lean away from the building, left arm stretched right out to get the runes through the weak spot and although all four slid through, he wasn't entirely positive that it had closed. He leaned a little farther. Squinted...

The world tilted in an interesting way, but there was definitely no shimmer.

No window ledge either.

Porch roof, though.

And then a bush.

A bush that turned out to be just a little st.u.r.dier than he was.

Oh, that's just f.u.c.king great, he thought, rolling out onto the lawn, breathing fast and shallow through his teeth so as not to scream. Four days of fighting demons, and I get taken out by shrubbery.

Lying there and bleeding seemed like his best option, but unless they wanted to deal with more questions than he was prepared to answer, he had to get away from Mrs. Chin before he fell over. More specifically, he had to stand up and then get away from Mrs.

Chin before he could fall over again.

Bright side, nothing was broken.

Nothing important anyway.

Thankful he seemed to be in marginally better shape than the bush, he staggered up the porch steps and peered into the front hall.

Leah was sitting on a wooden chair, head in her hands. Mrs. Chin was nowhere in sight. Opening the door, he waved Leah quiet and moved as quickly as he could to her side as Mrs. Chin came from the back of the house with a gla.s.s of water.

"Oh, there you are," she snapped, her gaze flicking to the stairs as she handed Leah the gla.s.s. She obviously thought he'd just come down them and just as obviously disapproved of his lack of concern for his companion. "This young woman should be taken to the hospital."

Hospital? Was the spell no longer protecting her? "Are you hurt?"

"She fell down the stairs," Mrs. Chin told him grimly. "There could be all sorts of internal damage and I am not responsible. Those stairs are safe. I wasn't near her when she fell. I gave her a gla.s.s of water."

"Of course not."

"If you try to sue me, that's what I'll tell the judge."