The Last Smile in Sunder City (The Fetch Phillips Archives #1) - Luke Arnold Page 0,42
it seep into my blood before I put my fingers to my face and felt someone kick in my sinuses. I swore, took them away and had another slug. I drained the bottle. I got up and paced around the room cursing some more. I slapped the top of my head and found new bruises. I sat down again and held my nose, closed my eyes, jerked it to the left.
Not hard enough.
I screamed into my fist and threw the empty bottle at the wall. It was a few minutes before I tried again. During the second attempt, I heard a click bounce around my whole stupid head. It dislodged some blood clots at the back of my throat that fell into my guts. I managed to make it to the sink before the whole bottle of whiskey came back up.
I washed my face, wiped the sink clean of blood and filled it with water to soak my stinking clothes. I dropped in some soap and then I dropped myself on the bed. I slept through the day, and when night came, I just kept on sleeping.
There was someone in my room.
Not enough light to see them, but I knew they were there. They weren’t moving. I wasn’t moving. I was stark naked with toilet paper stuffed into my nose and nothing in arm’s reach but a bloody pillow and my own limp dick.
When the light flicked on, I jumped up on my knees and pulled back my elbow, readying a punch.
The intruder didn’t flinch. He had the body of a boy and the delicate features of a beautiful woman but with a pencil-thin mustache that might have actually been pencil. He was holding out a lamp and was better dressed than anyone I’d seen in Sunder for years. Expensive velvet garments in charcoal and blue with a deep-purple cape that fell over his shoulders. He had painted nails, clean boots and two thin blades strapped to his belt.
“Hello, Mr Phillips.”
I took a long enough pause to see that his weapons weren’t drawn before I collapsed back and covered my privates with the sheet. I’d reopened the scars on my arm and lip, and fresh blood dripped on to the bed.
“It seems you’ve been learning some lessons,” he continued. “I believe your schooling may not be over for th—”
“Is that a cape?”
He stopped, mid-word, with his pretty little mouth hanging open.
“W-what?”
“Are you wearing a cape?”
“Yes. I—”
“Who the hell wears a goddamn cape? What are you?”
“I have been sent by—”
“Eat a dick.”
“Excuse me?”
“Excuse you? I don’t know why I should. You break into my place in the middle of the night and wake me up in my birthday suit. There is a thing called business hours.”
“It’s exactly your business that I have come to talk about.”
“Then business hours it is. Come back after midday and wear something sensible.”
I rolled over and showed him my ass.
“Mr Phillips!” The little shit was getting really agitated now. “You’re going to want to hear what I have to say.”
“Go practice your trapeze act, Flyboy, before I make you eat your outfit.”
The toilet paper fell out of my nose while I talked, so I shoved the crimson plugs back in.
“Mr Phillips. I bring you a message on behalf of The League of Vampires; the mighty protectors of the weak and bringers of justice. It has come to our attention that—”
“Are you a Vampire?” I didn’t even roll over.
“It has come to our attention that—”
“You’re just a messenger, right? That’s what you said?”
“I come on behalf of the League—”
“But you’re not a Vampire?”
“… I am not.”
“Then don’t say ‘our attention’. It has come to their attention.”
He stopped talking for so long I almost fell back to sleep.
“It has come to their attention that you have been investigating the disappearance of a member of the Blood Race. We have been watching y—”
“They have.”
He sighed.
“They have been watching you for some time and have allowed your investigation to continue because… they had faith that your interests and theirs were the same. Now they fear that your lack of care is more of a danger to their cause than a benefit. You will stop your investigation. You will not mention the Blood Race. You will abandon your meager attempt to find Mr Rye or there will be consequences.”
“What about the girl?”
“What girl?”
I rolled over and plucked the paper from my nostrils.
“Ahhh. They didn’t tell you everything, did they, kid? A girl is missing and a ticking in my brain tells