31
I'd been loud enough, and it had taken long enough, that part of me wished there was a back door to my office. But there wasn't, so I couldn't slink off even if I'd been willing to do it. Besides, if Bert ever suspected that I was that bothered by it, he'd use it against me. Try for some kind of leverage in the ongoing game of one-upmanship that Bert and I had played for years. The only cure for it was a bold face. Sigh.
I ran my fingers through my hair, which is all you're supposed to do when your hair is as curly as mine. Brushing just makes it frizz. I checked my makeup in the little mirror that I'd started having to keep in the desk. The problem with dressing more like a girl was that it forced you to have to care. Once you put on the lipstick, you had to look at it periodically to make sure it hadn't smeared like clown makeup. I liked the way lipstick looked on me, but I hated having to think about it.
The eye shadow had survived pretty well, but the lipstick was pretty much smeared all over my mouth. Again, I was grateful that the carpet was dark. Red lipstick on a pale carpet would have looked awkward. On the deep brown, you couldn't see it.
I used some makeup remover that was supposed to be used to take off eye makeup, but I'd found it worked dandy on lipstick. I used a moist wipe to get everything off and then had to reapply the lipstick. See, so much trouble. I was just happy that I almost never wore base makeup. That would have been a bitch to get off the carpet.
When my mouth was as red as when I started, I put everything back into the desk drawer, got up, straightened my skirt, took a deep breath, and went for the door. With everything that had happened to me in the last twenty-four hours, having to face Bert down still took more courage than was pretty. You do not fuck at work. You just don't. It's d¨¦class¨¦ to say the least. Shit.
When I stepped out into the reception area, I got a surprise. No one assumed we'd been having sex. The screams had been violent enough that everyone assumed it had been a bloody battle, a near thing. The fact that both Nathaniel and I came out bloodier than when we started helped. Mary had sat him down in her very own office chair. She was laying out bandages, while Nathaniel cleaned the wounds on his hand. They were deep, bloody nail marks. Once I would have said that it looked like a leopard ripped him up, but I'd seen the damage that real leopards could do, and I knew better now. I was sort of amazed that I'd done that much damage, though.
I went to stand near him. "I'm sorry," I said.
"I'm not mad."
This close I could see that the front of his knuckles on both hands were raw as well. I frowned. "I didn't do your knuckles."
"Carpet burn," he said.
I looked at the bloody scrapes and made a face. "Ow," I said.
"I don't mind," he said.
Mary looked up at me. "That woman and man are in with Bert. They wouldn't leave without their son's things." She looked pissed. "I cannot believe that they abused you like that."
I licked the edge of my lip where Steve Brown had belted me and realized that it was healed. I'd put on lipstick and it hadn't hurt. Shit, and wow. A very positive side effect. It's nice that there were positive ones.
I touched my cheek where Barbara Brown had sliced me, and it still hurt. I hadn't seen it in a mirror, but it had probably looked worse an hour ago.
"I'll help you clean that up, when I'm finished with your friend," Mary said without a trace of sarcasm. Friend, without any double meanings. It wasn't just her typing skills that had kept Mary on as our daytime secretary. She had a real gift for taking things in stride. She had Nathaniel hold a gauze pad over his hand while she taped it. She hadn't put plastic gloves on. I couldn't remember if I'd told her what Nathaniel was, or not.
In human form he wasn't contagious, but she probably had the right to know. Almost as if Nathaniel read my mind, he said, "I tried to get her to let me clean it up myself."
Mary glanced back at me. "He told me"--she seemed to search for a word--"he told me, and I told him, that you can't catch lycanthropy from a human being."
Nathaniel looked up at me with those big eyes. The look said, I tried.
"You're right, Mary, in human form there's no contagion."
She smiled at Nathaniel in a very motherly way. "See?"
"Most people don't want to take the chance," he said, softly.
Mary finished bandaging his hand and patted him on the shoulder. "Most people are just silly."
He smiled at her, but it left his eyes wounded. Most people are just silly. She had no idea. I guess I didn't either, not really. I'd just begun to get the reactions from people who thought I was a lycanthrope. I hadn't lived with it for years the way Nathaniel had.
Mary turned to me, touching my cheek gently. She was shaking her head. "I wanted to call the police on them. It's enough to file assault charges." She started dabbing at the scratches. There must have been some alcohol in the stuff, because it stung.
I took a deep breath so I wouldn't wince. "I don't want to press charges."
"You feel sorry for them?" she asked.
"Yes."
"You're a better woman than I am, Anita."
I smiled, and the cheek was a little tight for it. "I've been hurt a lot worse than this, Mary."
"Never by a client," she said.
I let that go. There were stories that Mary didn't know, and we all stayed out of jail that way.
She was frowning at me. "If I didn't know better, I'd say you're healing."
"It's clean enough, Mary, thanks." I went around her to the desk and the bandages. I'd need a gauze pad bigger than the one on Nathaniel's hand. Of course, my scratches would probably be healed by dawn, and his hand wouldn't be. Damage that I caused seemed to heal as if another lycanthrope or vamp had cut them up. We'd noticed that just lately.
Mary turned me around with a hand on my shoulder. "You hold the gauze in place, and I'll put the tape on, just like I did for your friend." The look in her eyes said plainly that I was being silly, too.
I let her tape up almost the entire left side of my face just short of the eye. Barbara Brown had done this before, I'd have bet money on it. Women will try to scratch in a fight sometimes, but most of them aren't good at it. Barbara was good at it, like she'd had practice.
Mary looked at my torn nails. "Does that hurt as much as it looks like it does?"
I never know how to answer questions like that. Hell, yes, or how should I know? "It hurts," I said.
She handed me a small bottle of alcohol. "Take this and soak your hands in the bathroom until they stop bleeding."
I looked at her. "Hell, no."
She gave me the parental look. "You've ripped off most of the nails on both hands. Do you want to get infected?"
I thought about telling her that I couldn't get an infection, but we didn't know that for sure. I wasn't truly a lycanthrope, and while I'd gained their ability to heal, I had no way of knowing if I'd gained all their abilities to keep healthy. It would be a bitch to ignore Mary's advice, and then lose a finger to gangrene or something. But damn, it was going to hurt.
The door to Bert's office opened before I could run off to the bathroom. His face was very solemn, though there was something in his eyes, some flicker, that I didn't trust. Not suppressed laughter, but something.
"Anita, do you want to press assault charges on the Browns?" He said it straight-faced, in a serious voice. He spent a great deal of effort making me take all kinds of shit from clients and never before suggested we press charges.
I studied his face, trying to read where this was going. "No, I don't think that will be necessary."
Steve Brown showed at the door first, with his arm around his wife. "We are so sorry, Ms. Blake. Really, I don't know what came over us. It was... inexcusable."
"Thank you for not pressing charges, Ms. Blake," Barbara Brown said. She'd been crying, and the last of her makeup had worn away. She looked older than when she'd entered my office, and it wasn't just the lack of makeup. It was as if what had happened had sucked a little more of her life away.
"We just need our son's things, and then we'll go," he said. He looked horrible, too. Not that they shouldn't have looked horrible, but something else was going on. I didn't know what, but something wasn't right. Something beyond just grief and embarrassment, and fear of the cops.
"Mary will escort you into the other office for your things," Bert said.
Mary couldn't keep her opinion completely off her face, but she led them into my office. When they were out of earshot, I stepped up to Bert and said quietly, "What are you up to?"
He gave me innocent eyes, which meant he was lying.
"What did you do, Bert? You know I'll find out eventually, so just tell me."
He kept giving me that innocent blank face of his, with that false sincerity that was still in place for when the Browns came back out. I had an idea. But the act was so low I didn't think even Bert would have tried it.
"You pretended to call the cops, didn't you?"
He gave me a "who-me" look, which meant I was right.
"You took their check. The house check."
"Anita, even I wouldn't do that."
"Yeah, you would, if you thought you could get away with it."
His eyes thawed to their usually level of insincerity. "They're coming back, just smile and agree with me."
"Bert, either you tell me what you did, or I'll blow it all to hell."
He took hold of my arm, which he never does, and smiled over my head. "Ms. Blake needs a little more persuasion to agree to our deal."
"Oh, please, Ms. Blake, please, don't press charges. I don't want it in the papers that I'm crazy. Our daughters have seen enough bad publicity about us."
I turned and would have said something, but Bert whisked me into his office and closed the door. Unless I was going to put up a fight, I had no choice but to let him manhandle me a little.
He stayed by the door, with his back against it, as if he were afraid I'd bolt. "Anita, this is fair."
"What is fair?" I said, and my voice was already warming up, ready to be pissed.
"We could press charges against them," he said.
"But we're not going to," I said.
"But we could."
"Bert, either tell me the truth, or get away from the door."
"A bonus, Anita, for them beating the hell out of you. What's wrong with that?"
"How much?" I said.
He looked uncomfortable.
"How... much?"
"Ten grand," he said, and then went on hastily, "he owns his own construction firm. He can afford it, and they did go way over the line."
I shook my head. "Bert, you bastard."
"The wife offered me the check for the refinancing of the house when I started to talk about pressing charges. I didn't take it. So I'm not quite as much of a bastard as you think I am."
"You can't take money not to press charges. That's illegal."
"I didn't say outright that that was what the money was for. Hinted at it, maybe, but I know better than to say something specifically. Give me a little credit."
I stared up at him. "You get as much credit from me as you deserve, Bert. If they calm down and tell the cops what you did, what will you say the money is for?"
"A retainer," he said.
"I can't raise their son, Bert, or his girlfriend."
"Can you at least talk to the detective in charge of their case?"
"So you can keep the money?"
"I was thinking more that you might offer your expertise to the police."
"I am not a specialist in murder, Bert, not unless there are monsters involved."
"Does a serial killer count as a monster?" he asked.
"What are you talking about?"
"Their son and his date were the first, but not the last. He killed a couple the year after."
"Are they sure it was the same person?" I asked.
He shrugged. "You'd need to talk to the police on the case, and for that you'll need the permission of the parents, since as you pointed out it's not a crime that you have jurisdiction over." He almost smiled.
"I'll make you a deal, boss man. I'll talk to the cop in charge. If they think they know who it is, but don't have proof, then I can't help, but if they're lost, then I have one idea."
Bert smiled full out. "I knew you would."
"But if my idea tanks, and they get nothing out of it, you will write them a personal check for ten grand."
"Anita, I'll just give back the money."
I shook my head. "No, your personal check for ten grand."
"You can't make me," he said.
"But I can start a vote to kick your ass out of here. You don't know shit about raising the dead, or crime, or vampires. You're the money man. But you're not the only money man in the world, are you?"
"Anita... you really mean it," he said, and he sounded surprised.
"You just cheated these people out of ten thousand dollars, Bert. It makes me wonder what else you've done. Makes me wonder if we need an audit of the books."
He was getting angry, it showed in his eyes and the tight line of his mouth. "That is out of bounds. I have never cheated anyone in this company."
"Maybe, but if a man will cheat in one way, he'll cheat in another."
"I cannot believe you would accuse me of that."
"I can't believe I haven't wondered about it before," I said.
His face was darkening with his effort not to explode. You could watch his blood pressure rise. "Audit and be damned."
"I'll make you a deal, Bert. I'll settle for you giving them back their check, instead of a personal check from you, but you have to stop this shit. We make enough money, Bert, you don't have to cheat people."
"They offered the money. I didn't ask for it."
"No, but I bet you made it so they'd think of it. Nothing said outright, like you said, but you put it out there, somehow, you made them think of it."
He opened his mouth, closed it, then leaned back against the door. "Maybe I did, but, Anita, they made it so easy."
"You just couldn't resist, could you?"
He let out his breath in a long shoulder moving sigh. "I lost my head, a little."
I shook my head and almost laughed. "No more losing your head, Bert, okay?"
"I'll try, but I can't promise. You wouldn't believe me."
I did laugh. "I can't argue that."
"Do you want me to tear up the check now?"
I watched his face for the signs of pain that parting with money usually cost him, but all I saw was a resignedness, as if he'd already given the money up for lost.
"Not yet."
He looked up, hope showing momentarily in his pale eyes.
"Don't get excited. It's a slender little hope, but if it helps lead to something that can help the police then we'll have earned some money. If it doesn't, then we can return the money."
"Do I want to know what your plan is?" What he was asking was, was it illegal, and did he not want to know so he'd be able to deny it later. Bert knew that I stepped over lines that wouldn't just get jail time, but an execution notice. I knew that he was just this side of a con-man, a swindler, but he knew, or suspected, that I was just this side of a cold-blooded killer. There were bosses that couldn't have handled that doubt, or that almost knowledge. We stood and met each other's eyes, and we had an understanding, Bert and I.
"I'm going to see if the cops will bring down some of the boy's clothes for Evans to look at."
"The touch clairvoyant that tried to cut his own hands off?" He made a face when he said it.
"He's out of the hospital," I said.
He frowned. "But didn't the paper say that he tried to cut off his hands so he wouldn't see murders and violence every time he touched something?"
I nodded.
"Anita, I never thought I'd say this, but leave the poor guy alone. I'll give back the money."
I narrowed my eyes at him. Was he being nice to fool me? Did he mean it? Out loud, I said, "Evans is feeling better than he has in years. He's taking active clients again."
Bert looked at me, and it wasn't an entirely friendly look. "This man has tried to kill himself to keep from seeing these things, and you want to take items from a serial killer case where he cut up a nice teenage couple. That's cold, Anita, that's truly cold."
"Evans put himself back on the market, Bert, I didn't. He's married now, and he's a lot more relaxed than he ever was before."
"Love may be grand, Anita, but it doesn't cure everything."
"Nope," I said, "it doesn't." What I didn't try to explain to Bert was that Evans's new wife was a projective psychic null. She negated most psychic abilities within yards of her. Evans was a lot calmer around her. She truly had saved him.
His small pale eyes narrowed at me. "That man out there, the boy, he's your boyfriend."
I nodded.
"Just your boyfriend?" he made it a question.
"What else could he be, Bert?" And it was my turn to have the innocent face.
He shook his head. "I don't know, but the noises from your office were a hell of a show, and that was without any visuals."
I didn't blush, because I was working too hard at keeping control of my face and eyes. "Do you really want to know, Bert, or do you want deniability later?"
He stood there for a moment, thinking, then shook his head. "I don't need to know."
"No," I said, "you don't."
"But you'd tell me the truth, if I wanted to know?" he asked.
I nodded.
"Why, why would you tell me?"
"To watch your face," I said, and my voice was soft, and not altogether pleasant.
He swallowed hard and looked just a little paler than his untanned face had a moment before. "It would be something bad, wouldn't it?"
I shrugged. "Ask and find out."
He shook his head again. "No," he said, "no."
"Then don't ask questions you don't want the answers to," I said.
"Don't ask, don't tell," he said.
I nodded, again. "Exactly."
He gave that roguish, I-know-something-you-don't smile. "But we get to keep the ten grand."
"For now. If Evans agrees to see the evidence, we'll need a bankroll."
"Is he that expensive?"
"He risks his sanity and his life every time he touches another clue. I'd make people pay for that, wouldn't you?"
A light came into Bert's eyes. "Does he have a business agent?"
"Bert," I said.
"Just asking, just asking."
I had to shake my head and give up. Bert had a real genius for making money from psychic gifts that other people thought of as curses. Would it be so bad if he could help Evans make more money? No. But I wondered if Bert understood that Evans was one of the most powerful touch clairvoyants in the world. That to brush against another person with his fingertip told him more about that person than most people would ever know. Bert would probably offer to shake hands, and the deal would be off. I only suspected what Bert was. One touch, and Evans would know for sure. In a way, if Evans didn't run screaming it would be reassuring for me. I would never offer to shake hands with Evans. One, you never offer your hand to a touch clairvoyant, just bad form. Two, Evans had brushed up against me before, by accident, and he hadn't liked what he saw. Who was I to throw stones at Bert, when he might pass Evans's radar unscathed, and I knew that I would go down in bloody flames?