CHAPTER EIGHT
Midnight was almost on us, and I hadn’t been able to cope well with the nerves. Leo had been cryptic as hell with his intentions, and that had caused my brain to go into overdrive, working through all of the possible scenarios I was likely to find myself in tonight, none of which I thought I was exactly ready for, even if Leo thought I was.
Of one thing I was certain of—I was ready to sink my teeth into something. I had been ready to do something, anything, useful for days. Since that night at the club when I chased a vampire down across the rooftops of London it had felt like all I had done was sit and wait for things to happen to me, and that was no way to live a life.
I knocked and let myself into Leo’s room at ten minutes to midnight, finding Leo and Aiden both waiting for me. Aiden had on a pair of black jeans, a black t-shirt, and a leather jacket that doubled up as a hoodie. Leo was similarly dressed, only his leather jacket had a faded lion embroidered onto the back of it, a banner with some words I couldn’t pick out, and patch with the initials MC on it.
That I did recognize.
“You didn’t tell me you were in a motorcycle club,” I said to Leo as I walked into the room.
He shrugged. “You didn’t ask.”
Aiden and I exchanged knowing smiles. “So, why are we here?” I asked, turning back to Leo.
“First thing’s first; you’re going to need to shapeshift,” Leo said.
“Shapeshift? Why?”
“It’s just a precaution, but we don’t want anyone recognizing you instantly.”
“Don’t you think the people hunting me have the means to pick me out of a crowd whether I’m shapeshifted or not?”
“Maybe, but I’d rather make them work for it than give your identity away from the start.”
I sighed. “Okay, but shapechanging for a long time really sucks it out of me.”
“I’m sure loverboy over here will be happy to fix that problem when the time comes, now shapechange.”
I shut my eyes, rolled my shoulders, and cracked my neck a little. As I did, pieces of my body began to change. In my mind I imagined an ordinary looking woman with no particularly striking features; plain brown hair, slightly pale skin, dull, brown eyes. Pretty, just plain. Instead of putting the energy into making the image attractive, I put it into making the image stronger, faster, and sharper. Maybe she was the captain of a women’s rugby team, someone whose body was muscly and toned, and stronger than she appeared.
When I was done, Leo grabbed my hand and caused reality itself to collapse around us. My stomach flipped, then flipped again, like a washcloth being rung out over a kitchen sink. I shut my eyes for the duration, but the trip itself didn’t last more than a couple of seconds. Soon, the cold night air was touching my face again, and my feet were standing on solid—slightly wet—ground.
“I’m never going to get used to that,” I said, groaning. Then, looking around, “Where the hell are we?”
Aiden suddenly exploded onto the scene, leaving a whisper and a soft trail of black smoke as he materialized. He shrugged the sensation off much faster than I had, but then he was a demon, and I wasn’t.
“East London,” Leo said, “A place called Hackney.”
“And what exactly are we doing here?”
“I’ve caught wind of an underground party taking place around here. Rumor has it someone’s got a supply of the drug. I want to know if the rumor is true, and also if whoever has the drug, got it from Elroy.”
“And just how are we going to achieve that? We aren’t exactly low profile.”
Aiden and Leo looked at each other. “We can turn into shadows,” Aiden said, “And you don’t look like Lilith anymore…”
“Oh, so you want me to go to this supernatural party and ask all the questions while you two bozos hide in the shadows and watch?”
“That’s the gist of it,” Leo said. “It’s the only way to make this work.”
“Why do I have to do all the hard work?”
“Because if you mess up, we can spring out and fix the situation.”
“Comforting.”
“It better be. Now, the place you want to go to is over there—down the street, make a left. It’s an abandoned pub. It’ll look closed. Just push the door open, go inside, and make like you own the place. Then start asking questions, find the drug, and we can find the dealer.”
I sighed, rolled my eyes, and started walking. “Yeah, yeah, I know how to find drugs at a party. Also—” when I turned around to look at them, Leo and Aiden were both gone. “Guys?” I asked the dark, quiet alleyway around me.
The wind carried a whisper, and the whisper was Aiden’s voice. “I’m here,” he said, almost as if he were speaking directly into the back of my mind. Only his voice wasn’t quite normal; it echoed, but the echo wasn’t his voice at all—it was a raspy, almost hissing kind of voice that gave me the chills.
I shuddered. “Okay, let’s not do that too often,” I said, then I turned around and started walking in the direction Leo had told me. There was a pub at the end of the road alright, only it didn’t look like a pub at all. The entire building looked foreclosed, or condemned. There were wooden boards on the windows, and the front door had a faded eviction notice slapped on it. The door, however, did have a handle, and Leo had asked me to just open the door and walk in like I owned the place, so that’s exactly what I did.
The thumping bass of trance music suddenly hit me followed by the heady waft of pot smoke, an aroma I could have easily attached to any number of seedy clubs and bars I had been to back at home. Someone else may have been intimidated by the music, the smoke, the dimness and or the crowd of undesirables, but none of it really bothered me, so I walked on inside, shaking my hair loose and roughing it up a little.
Nobody looked at me like I was out of place, nobody asked me who I was, or why I was here. In fact, nobody so much as glanced at me as I wound my way through the pub’s smoky interior, weaving in and out of clusters of people, wayward stools, and small round tables, all the while keeping my eyes peeled for anyone who might look like a supernatural drug peddler. In this place, however, that could have been one of fifty different people.
I had my work cut out for me, but I wasn’t about to let that discourage me from what I had to do, so I decided to start with the DJ, since this wasn’t exactly a functioning pub, and more like an abandoned building that was being squatted in. Without thinking much of it, I grabbed one of the beers sitting in the cooler next to the DJ, whose set up consisted of a laptop attached to a pair of old speakers, and dropped a couple of coins in the tray next to him.
The DJ, a tall black man with dreadlocks and goggles on his eyes, turned to look at me when I hadn’t immediately left his side.
“What?” he asked, his silver teeth glinting in in the dim light.
“I’m looking for someone.”
“Ask someone else.”
“I’m asking you.”
“And I don’t give a shit.”
I pulled a £20 note from my pocket and handed it to him. The DJ stared at the note, took it, and stuffed it into his pocket. “Who are you looking for?” he asked.
“I don’t know his name.”
“Can’t help you then,” The DJ made as if to exit the conversation, but I snatched the side of his t-shirt and pulled his attention back on me. “You’d better get your hand off me.”
“I don’t know his name,” I said, “But I know he’s dealing.”
“Dealing what? Smack, charlie, pot? Take your pick.”
I shook my head. “I don’t think you understand me.” With a moment of concentration and the blinking of my eyes, I made my pulpits become serpentine, and turned my eyes a glowing shade of amber. Blinking hard again, my eyes returned to normal.
The DJ narrowed his eyes. “You’re looking for Eddie. He’s over there. Tell him I sent you.”
“Why should I do that?”
“Because I’m in for a cut of whatever he sells.”
Glancing across the abandoned, makeshift pub, sending my eyes to the spot where the DJ was pointing, I noticed a booth where four guys were sitting. Each of them looked like they’d served time in prison for a number of different, aggressive crimes, but there was one who looked a little more distinguished than the others—maybe because he was wearing a cheap suit, instead of the classic leather jacket and jeans combo most other people in this place, myself included, had picked to go out in.
I nodded at the DJ, then slid away from his control station, bringing my beer with me. Straight away, one of the larger guys stood and sized me up. He was easily twice my size, maybe larger, but that didn’t faze in the slightest.
“There’s nothing for you here,” he said.
“Yes, there is,” I said, “I’m looking for Eddie.”
The big man stepped aside, and the man wearing the suit tilted his head and narrowed his eyes. He was a wiry man, with sunken cheeks and thin, greasy black hair, but his eyes were sharp. Sharp as a shark’s tooth, I thought.
“Who are you?” he asked, his voice oddly smooth, and calming.
“I’m Alice,” I said, approaching and placing my palms flat on the table, “And I’ve heard you’re dealing.”
Eddie grinned.