The night air felt awesome against her damp body as she reveled in the freedom of standing in the open air - alone. Her crew needed to chill. After the big argument, going out for a bite to eat with Jose had been good, but she'd brought him home to try to get everyone else to understand. They all needed to go out and do what they loved. She'd tried to convince Shabazz to go check out some jazz. Tried to get Rider to go get his Jack Daniels on with a good card game - him and JL and Jose were some gambling fools. She'd even tried to coax Big Mike to find a barbecue joint and to turn Dan on to some real soul food. Marlene's crazy ass wouldn't even budge to go check out a flick, her favorite pastime. Their loss. She'd tried. And she was out again!
Perspiration damped her skin, her T-shirt clung to her, and her leather pants were now vacuum-sealed to her thighs and butt. Clubbing was da bomb. Dancing put the music back into her veins, her heart was thumping. Yeah, it was all good.
Damali looked down the street. North Hollywood was alive at night. Neon lights flashed, horns blared, people dressed as outrageously as they could, waiting and hoping to be granted access into whatever happening spot. Pullease. All the freaks were out tonight and people were looking for get-high or a drag race. Yeah, the night was alive. So was she.
Danger was all around, certain eyes flickered gold beneath brown irises but didn't approach her. They betta act like they know. Betta recognize. She laughed as third- and fourth-generation vamps steered clear of her like she was their predator. She walked to her Hummer without a care in the world. Yeah, they were gonna get back in the game, start touring, shake the fear and frustration - would kick some more vampire ass. That was all she needed to focus on.
But then she stopped and listened. The night air stirred behind her.
Something familiar caught her nose... a deep, male, sensually musty scent - then was gone. She was tripping. Probably an average, run-of-the-mill vamp trying to push up on her. Demons always left a sulfur trail. Despite the warm night, the sensation had made gooseflesh come out on her arms. The erotic pull this one left was ridiculous, almost made her wet her panties. What was that all about? Adrenaline had shot through her, not fear. Damali put her palm on the handle of Madame Isis, slowly closing her fist around it. A deep ache almost swallowed her as her hand relaxed and the sensation eased. God, she missed Carlos.
He just needed to go to the graveyard before going back in. The club was nearly a disaster. What had been on his mind? Human bodies, vamps present, and Damali glistening with sweat, just seeing her had messed him up, bad.
Yeah, he'd eaten, but not what or how he'd wanted to. But this visit was destined to bring him down, make him think, help put things into perspective. It would have the same effect as Valium, no doubt. That was important before going back to the safe house just before dawn.
He drifted like vapor over the markers, watching disembodied spirits float by, dazed. Poor bastards were locked topside and didn't have a clue, couldn't feel, were just a waste of ectoplasm.
As he neared his brother's headstone, he materialized and walked toward it, stopping to touch the name. "You were too young, hombre," he whispered. A dull ache in the center of his chest wiped away all the hungers that had been competing for his attention. He glanced over at the others that had been buried side-by-side by request.
Shit, as young men they had all told their people, "If I go down, put me on my boy's flank." And so the families had honored those requests. All of them. His entire territory stretched out in a long, military-like row of men under twenty-five. The only marker that was missing was his. His body had not been found, didn't make it to a morgue to be tagged. Even though his brothers got up and walked, they were known by humans to be dead, so a memorial service had been conducted.
He studied each headstone. They were all so young ... It hit him now, finally, after going down to council again and having a seat. The throne had centuries of wisdom emanating from it. Twenty-something years on the planet was nothing. If he'd only known. And Father Pat had been right about one thing. He and his boys, as bad as they were, he seen shit that gave them pause.
Carlos closed his eyes, fully seeing how Alejandro was turned. He should have ripped Raven's heart out himself. No man deserved to go out like that. He could also remember his dead posse sitting around just kicking it. They'd watch the news together sometimes while laughing and drinking, or would read something in the paper, and despite their own proclivities to violent solutions, they'd been taken aback by some things they'd seen.
Yeah, every man had a limit. Bombs that went off and took out innocent bystanders were off limits. Molesting children was waaay off limits. Shooting up women and kids in a sloppy drive-by was off limits in his territory while alive. People's moms and elderly family had always been off limits. He and his boys would debate the craziness and become outraged that some things just weren't done. Even for them. Deep.
Shit... until he'd turned, he didn't think God gave a rat's ass about a little spec of blue planet in his universe. Before he'd seen what he had, he'd assumed that the Almighty didn't care and was too busy to be worried about things like that. But, if what everybody from both sides kept telling him was true, as above, so below, then territory was territory. If anybody moved on even the smallest bit of his, he knew he'd have that foolish individual seen... so why not the Almighty? He wouldn't brook the disrespect, neither.
Carlos slid his hands across the cool marble and spoke to his brother softly. "Damn, man, if I had known. Didn't think He put his eye on the projects, or anything going on in the barrios. Moms told us, right, though. I had no idea of how much one soul was worth to both sides - serious product, hombre, worth a lotta weight. Hope you understand why I had to dust you... was just trying put it back in the right territory."
Had he known that it wasn't all superstition, he might not have ever picked up a gun or sold product to finance himself out of Hell on earth. They'd all been deceived. Was messed up that he had to die to find out how much truth there was to the rumor about this thing called Heaven and Hell. And here he was, a lost soul trying to get his shit back together, and they wanted him to talk to Damali about hope... in a mind lock? With cold blood in his belly because the microwave would make the shit clot, they had expected him to just go in and chat with her.
Didn't they understand? He glanced down the row of graves. They shared too much. Both had sustained heavy losses. It was beyond the physical with her. This shit between him and Damali went way back, before he'd turned and she'd ripened into mature Neteru. It was volatile. Her music was like the language of ancient Babylon, it bent wills, morphed as she gained new experiences. It was the light's secret weapon. Her voice touched millions. Was as strong as anything he could bring. Yeah, they were too much alike, just on opposite sides of the fence, and ironically, she was all that he had left from his old life, topside.
Sudden tears blurred his vision as he drew back his hand from a headstone and looked up at the sky. Dawn would chase him home soon, and he needed to go check on his mother and grandmother... Juanita, too, just to make sure his markers had held. But as he concentrated on them, he couldn't even detect them. Only a searing heat entered his brain and made him back away from the thought.
He let his breath out slowly, the tears now coming down his face. He wiped them away quickly, and blinked new ones back. All right. They were safe. At least the light had done their part to make sure his people had a solid prayer ring around them that even he couldn't cross, if he got tempted to feed from home. If that failed, he'd marked them as off limits within his zones. It was cool, he told himself. It was all good. He wasn't gonna cry like no punk just 'cause he couldn't see his moms and grandma no more. Fuck it. The DEA had taken his club, liquidated the rest of his shit, moved them to safekeeping under the Witness Protection Program. Human drug lords he'd bested probably wouldn't find them. Vamps wouldn't violate them; the Covenant had surrounded them with light. It was all good, he repeated to himself as he wiped his face hard and swallowed down a sob. He'd watch their backs at night if they ever took a vacation outside his territory - but that cop bastard Berkfield had better have given his mother a maid!
Damn straight. Carlos began walking and then turned back to look at his row of homeboys. "I dusted your asses so you could go to the right place, motherfuckers. You best be looking in on my peeps as guardian angels. You owe me." His voice became gentler as he vaporized to nothingness. "Just do that much for me."
"I don't like it! The Covenant can't just call us and ask us to deal with a nuclear time-bomb like that!" Rider yelled. "Carlos is back - that part is cool, but the other half of the deal the Covenant is trying to work is some seriously risky shit."
"Damn, though, Mar," Big Mike said slowly, giving Rider a nod. "If brotherman can't go down with a stake - "
"You're saying the only one that can plant a sword in his chest is our Damali?" Shabazz, who was normally cool, was on his feet now, pacing with Rider. "If boss comes into this compound again, and loses control like he did on her before... you feel me?"
"Yeah," JL said nodding. "Remember what happened last time? He waltzed right in here on her invitation, which I don't think she's ever rescinded, and faked out our alarms, blew our generators, cut the power, held back the sprinklers - and that was after he'd just turned. Dude has been one of them for a while, at this point. He might have given that old Templar the wrong vision, might have compromised his judgment, ya know?"
"And if he presses up on our little sister like he did before," Big Mike said, growing more tense, "if we gotta put him down, the situation could get real ugly real fast. I agree with Rider. Too risky, Mar. For real, for real."
"But, guys, Carlos saved my ass when he was already a vamp, remember?" Dan stood and kicked a metal stool. "He kept me from getting eaten alive in a parking lot by Raven."
All eyes went to Marlene at the mention of her turned daughter's name. None of the team wanted to ever mention the incident that had broken Marlene's heart when Damali had to do Raven, but the facts were the facts.
"I know," Marlene said quietly. "But the last remaining members of the Covenant are strong, and they've been accurate so far. Plus, the choice is hers."
All eyes went to Jose who had been quiet. It was as though they were straining to hear the opinion of the one person in the group who knew what it was like to experience the loss of a lover. The team didn't move as they waited for him to speak.