The wall I leaned against did what it could to cool my skin, though heat radiated from my racing heartbeat. My fingers dug into the space between two bricks, scraping out a piece of cement. I inspected the gray powder underneath my nails and told myself to breathe, trying not to kick myself too hard in the ass for letting him see my anger. I had time enough for that later. Now, I had to keep an eye on Donna.
The jazz music that Tommy always played bounced off the dry ceiling, but it did little to help the buzzing in my ears. Breathe slowly, dammit. I leaned forward to see through the small hole in the wall that separated this room and the main bar. It smelled sweet and rotten, like my grandfather’s attic.
Donna’s dress had caught Nocturne’s attention. Unsurprising. Men were like fruit flies and she’d been dipped in syrup and walking naked through a fresh market. Their words were indistinct this far away, but after a few minutes she was able to accomplish what I hadn’t, linking her pinky finger into his belt and leading him toward the back hallway. The buzzing in my ears had gone, and the delicious adrenaline had kicked in, leaving every inch of him crisp and clear. His eyes were wide and almost unfocused, or perhaps focused yards behind Donna’s curls. I almost felt a tinge of pity for him, but swallowed it, leaning over to pick up the piece of broken table I’d been saving for just an occasion such as this.
The floor boards creaked underneath his shiny shoes, and I could just see his lips part slightly as he followed her into the room. Donna’s skirt was caught up slightly in her underwear, and I could see the tear on her left stocking that she’d tried to fix last week with clear fingernail polish.
I slammed the piece of wood into his back, and he let out a noise like a wounded animal, falling to the floor. His long fingers spread out in front of him, not catching his fall, and he hit an old bookshelf face-first.
“What the f-“ he started to say, but Donna already had pulled a taser out of her dress- god knows where she’d been hiding it, and jammed it into his neck. The sound of jazz rose louder overhead, and he slipped further down to the floor. I took a heeled foot and placed it gently over his trachea, carefully holding onto the wall so I didn’t slip.
“Is he dead?” Donna asked, her voice tight and high, but soft. She knew not to be too loud. Her hands shook, but she didn’t look away.
His eyes opened, and he glared at me, lifting one hand.
“Down, boy,” I growled. He swallowed, then put his arm back down.
“Better,” I said, conscious of how much weight I was putting on every object I was touching. What if some drunk bastard made it past Tommy to use the bathroom and stepped in on us? I didn’t expect to see him here, but that’s not an excuse for poor planning. I could feel the blood turning my cheeks pink. “Do you remember Lacy?”
His facial expression slid into that of something I’d describe as reptilian, but that would be an insult to the animals.
“Let me up, toots,” he said, raising an eyebrow. “Or least move your skirt slightly to the side. Can’t see anything that pretty a’ this angle.”
My lips pursed, about to let an expletive fall from them, but a click near my left shoulder made me freeze.
A curl had fallen from Donna’s hair, and a slick of sweat stuck it to the side of her face. She was holding a gun.
“She’s got bright blue eyes, dishwater blonde hair, and a mole on her left cheek that she’s self-conscious about,” Donna said, her voice soft and sweet. “She tried to convince me to cut it off of her once, you know that? But that piece of shit told her it was beautiful. That she was beautiful. You remember yet?”
Nocturne didn’t move, his eyes glued on the gun.
“Nod, if you remember her.” Donna said.
He tilted his head slowly forward once.
“Don,” I said slowly, “We want to scare him, not kill him.”
“You think he’s going to get scared?” she turned to look at me, eyes wide like bambi’s. “Lord, girl, you’re more naïve than I took you for. Men like him to scare, they get angry.”
Someone on the other side of the wall broke a glass, and I stepped back, the heel of my shoes twisting slightly underneath my feet.
“He burned her,” Donna said, the words slow and solid underneath her teeth. I could almost taste the acid in the air. “He burned my sister.”
The man’s eyes shut momentarily, perhaps in thought, perhaps in prayer.
“And we’ll burn him,” I said, my voice flat. “But I’m not going to jail for this piece of gutter trash.”