Virtual Virgin

I used the phone’s camera to pan the area. It showed a few other boxy buildings, most one-story, dark, and surrounded by vacant parking lots. I walked along the curb until a sodium iodide light’s peachy glow lit up the signpost.



“Delilah Street,” Lilith breathed behind me. “So this is Corona, California. Home of raves and . . . us?”



“No home here.” I studied the cell screen’s list of businesses along this section of the street. Small manufacturing companies, mostly.



“What a snoozer street.” Lilith was jigging from foot to foot, hands down her jean pockets, stuck in rebellious teen mode. “I’m heading back to the rave for some fun. If Mom’s around here and worth finding, she’ll show up there.”



“Lilith.” I sighed. “That’s an unrented building, I’d bet. The current occupants are there illegally.”



“Illegal is part of the thrill, but what would you know about that? The first man you ever got it on with is the Law.”



“Ex-law enforcement. Ric’s a private consultant now.”



“Still has the soul of a federale, if he still has a soul.”



“You have any other setting but ‘taunt’?”



“Now’s when you tell me I’m a very unhappy girl acting out.” She pouted and turned her profile to flash the tiny blue topaz nose stud I used to also call mine before I discovered her.



What an odd feeling to want to slap yourself in the face.



“Why bother?” I told Lilith. “You dragged me here and now all you want is music, music, music. I’m going to check out the scene farther down the street. I’ll pick you up at the rave on the way back, if my route happens to go that way.”



In this deserted area, my every high-heeled step sounded as loud as a single clap of hands. After a couple yards, I could hear her emo-girl boot-drags fading in the opposite direction.



Without Lilith to worry about, my elation at this trip in time and space came bubbling out. Loretta Cicereau wasn’t the only one who’d walked fey paths. I’d put myself and Lilith in California, three hundred miles from Vegas, in the blink of a smartphone screen.



A faint tinny sound was all that remained of the rave. I passed lit signs that hawked manufacturers of rubber products and energy food and drink lines. Did my . . . our mother toil at one of these places in daylight hours? Was she an assembly worker? A receptionist? Or a sales rep, maybe?



No. Not a sales rep. I wanted to find her in humble circumstances, a former unwed teen whose life had been a string of impulsive mistakes, like me and Lilith. I wanted her to be someone I could pity and feel superior to, glad I’d never known her. I was getting over what the social services in Wichita had done to me, but Mama was the First Cause. The Root of All Evil. I stopped. Looked at the phone I was clutching as if to crush it.



Unsettled anger issues, maybe? came Irma’s chirpy tone. My advice: lose the rage and stow the smarty phone in your pocket.



“You’re back.”



You got rid of the doppelganger. Three’s a crowd.



“Lilith was getting tiresome,” I agreed, “but you are too.”



Me? I’m your best scout. See that two-story building with the corrugated steel sides?



I looked, and nodded. “There are cars parked around it.”



Cars? That meant . . . occupants. Now. At night.



I pushed my almost seventy-year-old shoes into a trot. I sounded like a hansom cab horse in a Sherlock Holmes movie, but in less than a minute I’d passed the sixty or so parked small sports convertibles, feeling a deep pang for the absence of Dolly’s immense and protective Cadillac bulk.



The familiar chimed faintly on my wrist, like an old clock. I was so lost in my vintage dreams that what I actually saw when I made it around the building’s corner hit me like a tidal wave.



The entire front facade was a dazzling plaid of colored neon you couldn’t see from the back parking lot. I heard music on Delilah Street again, but this beat made my hips and skirt sway to the rhythms of salsa, cha-cha, merengue, sexy samba.



If only Ric was here. We could party.



That brought me back to “Terra Infirma.” Hard.



“No,” I said aloud to Irma. “The last thing I want is him messing around in mirror-world.”



Or with your Mamma Mia.



Irma’s words made me squint to see the front entrance, mirrored glass doors with a cursive neon sign above them: LA VIDA LOCA.



I straightened and swung my self-advertising shoes ahead of me one pavement-banging step at a time. This was the place that had paid for my costly sanctuary from the group homes, the nun-run private girls’ high school where I’d been a charity student until I graduated, hit state college, and made it to a BA in journalism on my own.



Mama was . . . Latina? Then, where had my Black Irish coloring come from? Oh, my. I hoped to God I didn’t have a supernatural father . . . uh, besides Him.



Meeting myself in the mirror before I swung the door open, I saw my flushed cheeks emphasized my black hair and blue eyes and made my glossed lips pale by comparison. My vintage forties ensemble was really . . . ugh, perky. What I do to keep Hector Nightwine from stomping all over my druthers.



I yanked the door open and entered.



Chapter Nineteen



A BORED GIRL at the reception desk yawned and slammed a clipboard toward the high counter and me.



She was wearing an orange tank top, enough butterfly tattoos to sponsor a Costa Rican tour, and her hair was striped magenta and blue.



I’d had too many doctor’s office clipboards slammed at me during my recent traumatic sentimental journey back to Wichita, so I slapped it back down on her desk.



“Just visiting,” I said. “I don’t read any permission pleas. I don’t sign any papers or pay any admission fees.”



Her Slinky-supple spine straightened right up. “Uh, sure. Here’s a visitor’s pass, but it’s only good until morning. You’re late.”



“Is that a personal message?”



“Uh, no. Only, the open house is almost over. You’ve got less than an hour to try us out.”



“And what has La Vida Loca got I might want to try out?”



“Look behind you. Wall-to-wall classes. An awesome lap pool, and a totally kew-ool juice and wine bar.” She narrowed her tar-pit eyeliner at me. “I see you shop last century. La Vida Loca will have you out of those nineteen-forties fat farm dresses and into sixties anorexic Alice-in-Wonderland white tights and French nape-bows in no time.”



“Is this a chain?”



“Shut your mouth with duct tape!”



Somehow the imagery had turned very creepy.



“This is a one-and-only totally spa-experience health club,” the receptionist said. “We specialize in after-hours workouts for the working girl.”



“Who’s the boss?”



“Our owner and CEO is leading the Zumba Zapata class and should be down in a few minutes. Step up to the bar and have an energy drink on the house.”



Anybody is a fool for a freebie, me not excluded. I plopped myself on a bar-height stool at what looked like an old-fashioned soda fountain with chrome taps and stainless steel mixing machines.



Lilith was missing out on a fun detour down Delilah Street.



“What can I getcha?” The tanned, collegiate-looking blond guy wearing the cop mustache behind the counter looked so California.



I studied the handwritten menu above the work area. Between graphics of smiling and fan-dancing fruits and veggies I perused a funky list of smoothie names, like Bloody Mary Contrary and Vegetarian Voodoo.



“I’ll have a Red Zombie.” Since I’d created a Silver Zombie cocktail I was curious about the nonalcoholic fresh and fruity version.



“Freshly squeezed,” he said with a wink.



“Pomegranate,” I suggested.



The mixer machine was whirring like a speedboat engine, so I didn’t hear his answer.



He turned to put a tall beer glass of scarlet liquid down at my place.



“Cranberry?” I tried next.



He shrugged and returned to polishing the chrome and stainless steel for the next day. I’d just have to use my connoisseur’s nose and tasting tongue.



I had the glass rim at my lips when a hand from behind me snatched it away.



“A glass of sparkling water for the lady,” a low, contralto voice ordered. “She’s the designated driver type.”



I turned indignantly, already pointing at the chorus line of fruits and veggies on the sign above.



“Merely mixers, my dear, not the hard stuff actually on tap. Let’s have a look at you.”



I couldn’t have put it better myself.



I slipped off the stool and turned to stand nose-to-nose with her. My designated fairy godmother was a tall brunette poured into a peacock-blue leotard. White skin, dark hair and eyes, with that coal-black mane pinned off her neck in a forties updo. Not a drop of sweat showed on her or the leotard she rode in with. Not a bit of a hitch in her breathing.



I managed to remain as cool as one of the line-dancing cucumbers above us. “The Vida in La Vida Loca, I assume.”



Very red lipstick made her teeth look supernaturally white as she smiled, particularly the pointed canines. Or it could be Crest strips. And a genetic tendency to sharp incisors.



“Ihateyourguts,” I got out and closed my eyes. “Just something I wanted to get off my chest once before I die.”



She leaned past me. I peeked to see her claiming my abandoned Red Zombie.



“Welcome to Delilah Street, Delilah. Let’s talk in my office. Take your sparking water.” She eyed the bartender. “I’ll lock up the health bar, Bane.”



While I followed her past the steel-and-birch suspended staircase, a flock of fit young women thronged up it in thong leotards and tights. All were pale, thin, muscular, wearing the same Revlon red lipstick as my hostess, the thick creamy old-fashioned kind that caked and would peel off with a bit of your lips as it got old. Kinda a metaphor for vampires.



They slowed, their eyes fixed on me as they ran into one another and formed a clot on the stairs, predatory pupils dilating, lips parted, and not from exercise.



“Come along,” Vida ordered, emphatic.



I skedaddled after her through a pale birch door. Better one-on-one. The office furniture beyond was more silver-and-blond Nordic modern with accents of scarlet leather and silk. My hostess finished wrapping a sarong around her hips, Dorothy Lamour or Hedy Lamarr come to life from some native girl film of this woman’s prime, the nineteen freaking forties.



I stood with my back to the closed door. “You’re Cesar Cicereau’s Vida.”



She froze like a statue of an Egyptian goddess. Her spine became stone, every disc visible and incised like a hieroglyph, and her voice came out raw and god-awesome. “Don’t ever use a possessive of that name and mine in my presence again, Delilah.”



She turned, smiling and gorgeous. “Now sit. I won’t bite.”



Her dark-chocolate eyes threw me a half-humorous, half-challenging look as sharp as a perfectly aimed dart.



I couldn’t help admiring her style, maybe because we’d both adapted it from glamorous but hard-boiled forties film dames. The only difference was Vida had done it naturally in her time. I’d done it unnaturally decades later, hiding in dark empty group-home rec rooms, watching old midnight movies with a nail-file weapon clutched in my hand.



“You were expecting me?” I slunk to the red leather sling chair in front of the desk.



It might mean I was a nonchalant shady lady. It might mean I was scared out of my vintage-loving mind. Take your pick. Mom was my literal role model? And she could eat me. Gee, a whole bunch of fairy tales rolled into one.



I leaned forward to set my water glass on the white sharkskin desktop. “I’m well over twenty-one now, you know. What’s the foamy red stuff about? Blood beer?”



“Never you mind.” She leaned behind her and selected a crystal decanter from a line of liquor bottles. “Feel free to spike your water, since you’re such a big girl now. Albino Scotch should suit you.”



I shook my head, blinking. Red Zombie, white scotch?



“This is California.” Vida sipped my former drink, my former supposed veggie refresher.



“Why did you leave Las Vegas?” I asked her. “When did you leave?”



“Don’t you mean, ‘Why did I leave you’? And Lilith. Where is she, by the way?”



I jerked my head to the vague air behind me. “Preferred the rave up the . . . street to exploring. I guess I’m glad she’s safe, at least.”



“Lilith is never ‘safe.’ It’s against her nature.” She smiled again, which was more disturbing than if she’d hissed and bared her fangs. “On the other hand, I always knew you’d find me, Delilah. You’re the explorer.”



“Vampires can’t reproduce.”



“No time for niceties, I see. What vampires can and cannot do is a tangle of mixed mythologies, my dear.”



“And our father?”



Vida shrugged and sipped. “It’s not for me to say. There are . . . candidates. Some,” she added as her fangs showed, “forced upon me.”



Oh, Lordy. First I’d worried for years I’d been raped as a child and I just get over that false assumption and now I get to worry I’m a product of rape. Can’t women ever get free of such ugly personal histories?



“I saw a photo of you in the old days on Cicereau’s computer,” I told her so she’d know I was an effective investigator. “It was something of a family shot, if you include that to mean ‘Family’ in the mob fashion.”



“How did you get access to Cesar’s computer?”