Chapter Thirty-Four – Luke

 

“Guy’s going to take me down to the guest house,” I said as I glanced up at Molly’s reflection in the mirror. “What do you do?”

“I’ve told you, Luke. I know what to do.”

“Repeat it back, just for good measure.”

I’d been drilling her on the plan since we’d left Bobby out in the desert with my old change of clothes, still reeking of his own piss and sour fear in our rearview mirror.

“Okay, okay.” Her fingers twisted at the cloth of her skirt, fidgeting from nerves. We only had a few minutes before we reached the gate to the mansion, and I needed her on point. I could practically hear her heart rate increasing with every foot we drove. “I go in, I try to avoid contact with any of the guests until you find me.”

“What do you do if I don’t find you in a reasonable amount of time?”

“I leave. Don’t bother trying to get my phone back, don’t go looking for you. Just go. Get the car and demand to leave.”

I nodded. “Good. What do you do if they don’t let you leave?”

“Scream to high heaven and hope for the best.”

I nodded again.

Unfortunately, the best plan we had was for her to make a huge ruckus, to make the situation uncomfortable for everyone involved. No one would want a girl there who had gotten cold feet—that was just bad form. They wanted pliable, willing women, who had seen the dollar signs and known exactly what they were in for.

“What about you?” she asked. “What if you can’t find me?”

“Oh,” I said, touching the side of my nose, “I’ll be able to find you. Promise. Nothing could happen that would ever make me lose you.”

“You’re pretty confident in that nose of yours.”

I grinned. “Gotten me out of more tight spots than anyone knows.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Now is not the time for bad puns.”

“When is, then?” I asked.

Ahead of us, the Tahoe’s headlights illuminated the gate as we approached. I braked and began to slow. Subconsciously, I reached inside my jacket and touched the unicorn horn stuffed within. Bobby said he’d never been frisked before while waiting for one of the women. Whether they’d make an exception for me, I had no idea, but the prospect wasn’t exactly appealing. Especially not with my pistol stuffed in the back of my suit pants, the extra clips in my pocket, and my Maglite inside my suit jacket.

“And we’re sure this’ll work?” she asked, the nervousness moving from her hands and into her voice.

“It’s as good a plan as any. You ready?”

She leaned over in her seat and found the masquerade ball mask Chuck had sent with her. Carefully, she stretched it over the top of her elegant hair and brought it down till it fit snugly on her face. “Ready as I’ll ever be.”

I rolled down the driver’s side window, leaning out to push the intercom button. A single tone sounded, and I carefully repeated the password Bobby had given us. “Sanda-Lucsandra.”

In back, Molly held her breath.

I just kept staring straight ahead, though. If I faltered, if I looked nervous, if I seemed out of place for even one second, this whole plan could fall apart. This was during their party hours, and security was going to be tight.

Especially after our little escapade early this morning.

After what seemed like minutes, rather than just seconds, the intercom sounded again, and the wrought iron gate began to mechanically open.

Window rolled back up, I returned to facing forward, breathing a sigh of relief.

“Guess we’re in?” Molly asked, reaching up to adjust her mask.

I nodded slowly. “Guess so.”

“Luke, I just know I’m going to screw this up.”

“What? No, you’re gorgeous. You’ll be fine. You’re going to look more beautiful than any of the girls there.”

“No, it’s not that,” she said, shaking her head. “I just don’t know how to act. These women who rub elbows, and God only knows what else, with powerful men, they act a certain way. I’m just some girl from Washington state.”

“Who’s your favorite actress of the forties?”

“You’ve got to be kidding me. We’re going to talk about movies right now?”

“No, seriously. Who is it?”

Exasperated, she sighed. “I don’t know! If I had to choose one, guess I’d say Elizabeth Taylor.”

I nodded. “Good choice. Just act like you’re her going to a fancy party.”

She snorted with laughter, a decidedly very un-Elizabeth-Taylor-like thing to do.

I grinned at her in the mirror. “Seriously, it works. You did it earlier today, didn’t you?”

“That? I was just pretending to be a ditzier version of Heidi.”

“So? Do the same thing, but with Elizabeth Taylor. That’s all. Act.”

“Just act, huh?” She laughed. “I guess I can do that.”

“You’ve got a gift for it,” I said. “This whole time you’ve been putting on a face and pretending to be someone else. That’s all this is.”

“A gift, huh? Maybe I should reconsider my dream of working for a nonprofit, then. Go to Hollywood, instead.”

We both laughed. Laughed in spite of where we were going. Laughed in spite of the world being a horrifying place. Laughed because what else was there to do right then? But, when our laughter halted, we both found we had little to say.

I drove the Tahoe up through the twisting and turning of the road, my eyes occasionally glancing up to catch Molly’s in the mirror. We stayed silent, just letting the feel of this place wash over us.

The feeling of the car seemed to change. Where we’d been laughing moments before, now a certain kind of reverent calm fell over us just as suddenly. The air seemed to thicken till it was the consistency of motor oil, and we were practically swimming. We both retreated from the conversation, letting the words fall by the wayside and die.

Palms sweaty, lost in my own thoughts, I tightened my grip on the steering wheel, shifting them uncomfortably on the faux leather. My mouth was dry, my tongue thick. And every inch we climbed seemed to make things worse.

Up ahead, the mansion came into view, like a yellow moon rising in the sky above us as we continued to climb the twisting road. Every foot forward was another few inches higher, and I could almost feel the place’s pull as we continued to drive towards it. This was madness, what we were doing. And, like madness, it had its own kind of bizarre logic that could never be explained to outsiders. We were hunters, but we were hunting the most dangerous game.

I licked my lips, taking a deep breath as we rounded the final turn. Ahead of us, the Illuminati House loomed, its windows lit, the fire burning in front. Six men in black robes stood in front, masks fashioned to look like bird beaks protruding from where their faces were supposed to have been. They were aligned side by side, their arms, hidden within the sleeves of their voluminous robes, tucked behind their backs.

Every experienced soldier felt fear. Felt nervous. Every mission you ran was a series of events with potentially fatal outcomes for you, and for the soldier by your side.

This, though, was different. I’d never run a mission with a woman I cared so much for. Hell, I’d never met a woman, period, for whom I cared so deeply. And here I was, driving her directly into danger, where she’d be unarmed except for the flash on her cell phone. Into a place where men would be looking at her like a piece of meat, a mansion where this zmeu would be stalking her.

Taking the exact opposite path of what we should have. Like Hansel and Gretel knowing full well that the witch was going to eat them, but going for that candy anyways. Because, witch be damned, they wanted their sweets!

But the worst of it was that we didn’t have any other options.

I drove up and took the circle around the fire pit, bringing the car to a stop in front of the men.

“Ready?” I whispered, going for the door handle.

“Ready.”

I got out of the SUV, fast-walked around the front. I stopped by the rear passenger side door and pulled it open for Molly. “Ma’am.”

I could practically hear the gasp from the guys behind me. Even with as many beautiful women as they’d seen in their lives, they still hadn’t seen the likes of Molly dressed to the nines. One long leg came down from within, followed by the other, and her heels clicked with a certain kind of satisfaction as they met the flagstone circle’s surface.

Or, maybe, it was the flagstone’s satisfaction I’d just heard?

Even I had to remind myself not to stare, and I quickly pulled back and put myself into a close approximation of parade rest, left hand behind my back as I held the car door open with the other.

“Mistress,” one of the robed figures intoned as Molly straightened to her full height, and, with a little wink, nodded to me. The figure turned his body away from us till he was almost sideways and gestured with one outstretched arm towards the door. “The party awaits.”

“I’m surprised Dominic didn’t greet us himself,” she said in a low and sultry voice as she stepped off from the car and walked past the man, her hips swaying like a hypnotist’s pocket watch with each stride of her mile-long legs as she headed right for the mansion doors, and the two figures flanking it. It took a force of will for me to snap myself out of my fugue and close the passenger door.

“Unfortunately, the master of ceremonies is occupied with important duties at the moment,” replied the footman as he glided behind her, his robes so long they brushed over the flagstone walkway. “I’ll pass your disappointment along, though.”

“No,” she said, already halfway to the front door, “don’t trouble yourself. I’m sure he’s a busy man, with such a huge gathering to facilitate.”

I blinked once, twice, three times.

Molly must have really taken my advice to heart. This was not the woman I’d driven up here with, at least not on the surface.

The figures ahead, who wore black suits, ties, and smaller demonic masks, pulled open the sanctuary’s main gateway for her.

She didn’t even spare them a nod as she strutted in, leaving all the men out here with a kind of breathless sigh passing our lips. As soon as the doorway shut behind her, one of the guys whistled low from within his beaked mask as the robed men all broke ranks and shed their sense of decorum.

“God. Damn,” the whistler said, his voice hollow within the long beak.

“You see that fucking ass, dude?” asked another, his hand up to readjust his mask. “Fucking Christ, man.”

“Makes me wish I was a fucking millionaire, or whatever. Buy that kind of pussy all weekend long, if I could.”

“That’s the only thing?” asked one of them, smacking his friend in the shoulder. “You’re dumber than I thought.”

I sat there, stone-faced, listening to them harp on about Molly, my hands clenched so hard at my sides that I was nanometers away from drawing blood. I bit the inside of my cheek, fought down the urge to teach them how to respect a lady, even when she wasn’t around.

After all, the mission came first. If Molly was playing her part so well that the guys left in her wake acted this way, that’s just how it was. It didn’t mean I needed to give up the mission just because my sensibilities were kicking in.

The mission was what mattered.

But, still, it got to me. More than just a little.

“Hey,” I barked. They all kind of turned to me, their big beaked masks all turning my direction at once. I stabbed a thumb back over my shoulder. “Where the fuck do I put this thing? And where the fuck do I plant my ass for the next five hours? And who I gotta fuck to get a drink ’round here?”

The guys all laughed inside their masks, throwing their robed heads back so they all looked like a murder of crows having a good joke about a dying man.

“I got you, dude,” one of them said, coming up to me. “We park ’em down around the corner. End of the night, we’ll show you where.”

I dug into my pocket, pulled out the keys, and tossed them over to him. He snatched them from the air and disappeared around the side of the Tahoe, opened the driver’s side door, and climbed in.

Another guy reached into the side of his robe, fished for a moment, and produced a silver flask. He thrust it out at me as he came walking up. “We’ll take you down to the guest house and get another couple belts in ya, brother. You play poker?”

I took the flask from him and unscrewed the cap. “Been known to. Not very good, though.”

“That’s great!” said one of the other robed men. “New guys are our favorite.”

I tipped back the flask, took a nip. Canadian whiskey. The almost sweet rye flavor washed over my tongue, making me grimace. I screwed the cap back on, pushed it back into the guy’s hand. “Lead the way, man. Drink can’t get in my hand fast enough.”

The rest of the guys laughed, and we headed off down the side of the house, to a side path lit by staggered landscape lanterns. Ahead of me, the black-robed man continued to chat and nod, the beak pushed up over his head.

I didn’t follow the conversation much. Honestly, I didn’t care what he was talking about. All I cared about was whether or not that robe of his would fit.