I touched his back, tentatively, rubbing it in small circles. "Your plan to blame her death on the trolls is a bust. Now what?"
"It doesn't matter what we're going to do next, Anita. You will be out of town."
"We told Wilkes we were leaving," I said.
Richard took off the sunglasses and wiped at his eyes with his palms.
"Look at me, please, Richard," Niley said.
Maybe it was the please; for just an instant, Richard looked across the table. For an instant, Niley saw his eyes. "Such pretty brown eyes. You are a lucky woman, Anita."
Richard started to push to his feet. I laid a hand on his arm. His muscles were hard and so tense they thrummed with, I think, a desire to jump across the table and hurt Niley.
"I want to make sure that you are gone. Lately, the spirits have told Howard of a beast that will aid the lady. I think I am looking at the beast."
"How did you find out?" I asked.
Richard slid the glasses back in place and slid his chair back into the table. His shoulders were hunched so hard, the T-shirt was straining at the seams.
"The local vampires don't like you much," Niley said. "I approached them, trying to gather information about the spear. Some of them have been in this area for long enough to have witnessed the event. Sadly, they had not, but they told me interesting things about you and Richard and the Master of the City in Saint Louis. They said you were a menage a trois, though Richard seems reluctant to admit an interest in men."
"Don't believe everything that you're told, Niley, especially from people who don't like us. Your enemies always make up better rumors than your friends."
Niley pouted. "Oh, dear. Then my advances have been very unwanted indeed." He laughed. The smile faded. "I think it is time for the threat."
"Knock yourself out," I said.
"I think a tranquillizer dart from a distance for Richard. When he wakes, he will be bound by silver chains and on his stomach, naked. I will rape him, and I will enjoy it. Then I will let Linus slit his throat, and Linus will enjoy that." He turned cold eyes to me. "You, Anita, I will give to Linus for his master."
Linus turned to me. He looked the same, but the skin on my back tried to detach itself and crawl away and hide. Every hair on my arm stood up in nervous rows. Evil whispered through that bright diner.
Howard gasped, hugging himself.
I stared at Linus and didn't try to hide it. I was scared of him and what lay inside him.
Niley laughed, deep and pleasant. "I think we understand each other at last, Anita."
Richard turned and looked at Linus. The hair on his arms was standing at attention, too. He spoke, looking directly at the sorcerer. "How you are fallen from Heaven, O Day Star, son of Dawn!"
At the first line, that awful power receded, the skin creeping a little less. Linus's face was no longer pleasant.
Richard said, "How you are cut down to the ground, you who laid the nations low! You said in your heart, 'I will ascend to Heaven; Above the stars of God I will set my throne on high.' Isaiah." With the last line, the scent of evil retreated. It lingered like perfume in an empty room, but it was closed down for now.
"Impressive, Richard," Niley said. "So you are a true believer."
Richard rose slowly from his chair. He put a hand flat on the table and leaned across it. I felt the prickling rush of energy like a hot thread pulled across my skin. He lowered his sunglasses just enough for Niley to see his eyes, and I knew what he was doing. I knew that Niley was watching those brown eyes change to wolf amber.
Richard spoke low and carefully. " 'And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.' " He slid his glasses back over his eyes, stood, and stepped away from the table. He held his hand out for me. I took it. I let him lead me out of the restaurant. Shang-Da followed at our backs.
I risked a glance back. I didn't turn to a pillar of salt, but I saw Niley's face. And I knew, knew without doubt, that he would see us dead.
36
I didn't even ask Richard if we were leaving town for real. I knew the answer, and frankly, I was with him. On the off chance that Niley was right and the spear was here, we couldn't let him have it. But it was more than that. Richard had drawn a line in the sand; good versus evil. Good can't tuck tail and run. It's against the rules.
It took about three hours for us to pack and pretend to leave town. We put Jamil in the back of the van with a coffin on either side of him to keep the stretcher from sliding around. Nathaniel had managed to get his lower back sliced up defending my honor. Though he admitted that he hadn't been fighting so much as getting in the way of an eager werewolf. However it happened, he got to ride in the back with the injured, probably stretching on top of a coffin, for all I knew. Cherry rode in back with them -- I think to act as a peace officer. Jamil didn't seem to like Nathaniel much. I drove the van. Richard followed in his four-by-four with Shang-Da, and all the equipment he'd brought for an entire summer of camping and studying large primates. Everybody else rode with me.
Sheriff Wilkes sent Maiden and Thompson to escort us out of town in a black and white, or in this case, a blue and white, but the effect was the same. Thompson waved merrily as we drove past them out of the city limits. It would have been childish to give him the finger, so I didn't do it. Zane did it for me. Jason blew them a kiss.