“Ya bought the pool hall and paid everyone else t’ leave so you could talk t’ Alex?” Wade blinked. “Don’t you think that might seem just a little creepy?”
“Oh, I was hoping to talk to all four of you. It’s about Alex and his girl, sure, but I figured maybe you could help me show Alex some logic once you’d heard things out. See, I know a guy can get kind of blinded by a pretty ass when he’s the one riding it. But you three might see things a bit clearer and help Alex realize what kind of trouble he’s in.”
The music died. The last waiter in the place walked up with a bottle of scotch and five shot glasses. He put it all down at the table without looking up at anyone, then walked out the door.
“Mister,” Wade said darkly, “are y’all threatenin’ our friend?”
“No, no,” Rob said dismissively. “I’m not. That girl is, though. Lemme ask, what’s the name she gave you, hm? Don’t wanna say? How about Lorelei, is that close? She’s going by Lorelei? Huh.”
“You need to start explaining yourself,” Alex said. His throat was dry.
“So last night I ran into little Lorelei there out at the mall. Had a talk with her about…mmm, things you probably wouldn’t understand. It wasn’t pleasant. She can get kind of bossy, you know? Controlling. Arrogant.” Rob poured five shots, taking one for himself. Nobody else accepted the drinks. “And then I find out that there’s this whole incident in the parking lot. Bad guys with guns. Some nice, poor kid gets shot. I start putting two and two together.”
“How’d you find us here?” Alex asked.
“That, my friend, is a combination of pliable members of the Seattle Police Department and the almighty dollar,” Rob smiled proudly. “After that, it’s just legwork and more money. I know everything about you, kid. Your school. Your job. Your home. That mom of yours is a damn hot-”
“None of this makes me want to sit here and talk to you,” Alex broke in.
“No, but you’ll stay and listen, ‘cause you know what’s good for you, kid.” Rob took up another of the shot glasses left on the table and downed its contents. Behind him, the waiter left the pool hall and locked the door behind him.
“Or at least, you probably mostly know. But anyone can be tempted. You’ve been fuckin’ her, right? Sure you have. Gotta be fuckin’ her. Anyone would, and I’m sure she’s been throwing it out there at you. It’s what she does.
“Kid, listen. Pussy comes and pussy goes. Unless you let it control you. Now I know she’s some hot snatch, but take a real good look at where that’s landed you. You’ve already been shot once. You know there’ll be more trouble. I’ve seen the kind of trouble her kind makes. Believe me, you don’t want any of that.”
The others just listened. “You’re making an awful lot of assumptions,” Alex said.
“Nah, educated guesses,” Rob shrugged. “The only thing I haven’t figured out yet is how she came to be with a nice young man like yourself. Bitches like her are usually drawn to bad boys. Real bad boys. You’ve met a couple already, right?” Rob said, miming a gun in one hand. He downed another of the shots.
“So I’ve seen how she looks all out of sorts right now. Like something rough happened to her. Oh, you can’t see it, but I can. And she was askin’ about certain things last night, which makes me figure you might be the kind of thing she was askin’ about.”
“What the hell’s he babbling over?” Drew frowned.
“Hell if I know,” Jason shrugged.
Alex just listened, trying to conceal his deepening alarm.
“Listen to me, Alex. All of you. She’s just one girl. Just one piece of ass in a world full of it. All you need is the right tools and you can get whatever pussy you want, and you don’t have to compromise for it. I can make that happen for you. All the hot, willing pussy you could want, and anything else, too.” His voice shook, just a bit, as if becoming overexcited and having a hard time controlling it.
Rob’s shaking hand reached into his pocket. He pulled forth a fistful of small diamonds and let them fall on the table. “I’m here to offer you a tidy sum for this…troubled asset you’ve got here,” Rob smirked greedily. His hand continued to shake. He drew from another pocket a stack of hundred dollar bills wrapped in a paper ribbon. “We can do cash. Just wanted to show variety. These stacks don’t look as impressive as they used to, what with everything going electronic and all. Anyway, I can make it untraceable. All we need to do is come to an amount for you and your friends here. So, can I take this troubled asset off your hands, pal?”
“This ‘asset’ is my friend,” Alex said after a long pause.
“That’s sweet,” Rob said with a hint of a chuckle playing at his voice, “but let’s be real, eh? Everybody’s got a price. Don’t think of it as giving something up. Think of it as trading up. I’m offering a lot more than just pussy here. And no pussy is better than the pussy you’ve bought, and you can buy more than you would imagine with what I’m offering.”
Drew’s eyes narrowed suspiciously. “Did you just come in here and offer to buy another person off my friend?”
“Yeah. Yeah, I did, kid. Way of the world, believe it or not. Don’t go making it into a racial thing. But it’s either sell now or cry later, ‘cause if you won’t sell there’ll be trouble for sure.”
“Those are my options?” Alex asked. Rob nodded. “Sell to you, or you make my life a living hell?” Again, Rob nodded, somewhat cockily. “That’s all I’ve got to choose from? You’re sure?”
Rob opened his mouth to answer, but Alex didn’t wait. He grabbed the bottle of scotch and smashed it over Rob’s head.
* * *
“You sent me home with Alex despite our obvious antipathy,” Lorelei said. “Why?”
“What else should I have done?” Rachel frowned. They walked together with an uncomfortable space between them. “I had to report back. You aren’t a threat to him, regardless of how I might feel about you.”
“And how do you feel about me?” Lorelei’s voice was calm, measured and cool.
“You’re a succubus. Do I even need to say?”
“Rachel…is there any reason for you and I to be hostile, other than that? I am a succubus. You are an angel. Yet neither of us works toward cross purposes any longer.”
“I still serve the divine. I will always serve the divine.”
“Yet I do not serve Hell,” Lorelei said. Rachel stopped to look her in the eye. Lorelei met her gaze without concern. “I serve Alex. I cannot begin to tell you what an improvement that is upon my existence.”
Rachel snorted. “I know how you serve him.”
“Do you? There is sex, yes, for mutual pleasure. There is also affection, companionship, trust, support and protection. I like him. I adore him. The words are alien, and I hesitate to misrepresent my feelings to myself, let alone to Alex. But whatever there is between us, I would not willingly relinquish it for anything. Not for the highest crown in Hell and my freedom along with it.”
“You say that,” Rachel frowned, “but only one of us in this conversation is capable of lying.”
“Yes. But you know I am telling the truth.” Lorelei’s tone softened. “He has opened up paths I dared not explore before now. I resented this condition at first. Now I continue to change, and I embrace it. I mean you no harm. I am no longer your enemy. I may never be ‘good’ by Heaven’s definition, but if I no longer take the sort of actions you combat, why should we be hostile?”
Rachel’s innocently beautiful face was thoughtful as she watched Lorelei. “What’s your idea of less than hostile?”
“In the time that we have had this conversation, how many ways have you imagined destroying me?”
“One hundred sixty-four.”
“We might start there.”
“…sixty-five,” Rachel corrected.
* * *