You Know Who I Am (The Drusilla Thorne Mysteries Book 2) (2 page)

He held a layer of gauze to my wrist. “Hold that.”

Kristin reached forward, but I put my hand on the edge first.

He glanced at her. “Get out there and start setting up.”

She vanished.

“You could have killed me, you son of a bitch,” I told him.

He shrugged but he couldn’t look me in the eye. “Dru, listen—”

“You listen. Our deal for four more weeks? Is off.”

He wrapped the tape around the gauze, packing it tightly. “Drusilla, I need you.”

He did, didn’t he? Too fucking bad. That ship had sailed. “Why in the hell would I ever go out there again with you?”

“Because we’re good together.”

“Colin. You kept throwing the knives. That changes a girl’s attitude.”

He slammed the roll of tape on the counter. “You’re leaving me. Changes a man’s attitude.”

“When a man shows up, do let me know.” I waited for him to begin to snarl and I cut him off. “You’re unpredictable and you’re unprofessional. It’s like waiting for Vesuvius to blow. I don’t love you, remember? We’ll figure out the INS thing. I will pay you your money back. And I’m sure you can talk someone else into marrying you. You’re good at talking.” I held up my left wrist. “You’d better do this one, too.”

He shook his head.

“Matching wristbands?” I said. “Don’t want your handiwork to be too obvious.”

He wound tape around my other wrist too. “You’re going to finish the show?”

“Nothing in the rest of the show can literally kill me, so yes.”

Then he kissed me lightly on the lips. “Thank you. We’ll talk after the show, okay? It won’t happen again.”

“You’re damned right it won’t.”

He looked at me again, all regrets and apologies and contrition. “I’m so sorry, Dru.” He kissed my cheek.

Son of a bitch. How did I find all of these charming, handsome bastards?

“The music’s starting. Get going.”

It wasn’t until he was on-stage again that I realized he must have slipped my bracelet in his pocket. Not having that bracelet made me nervous. Even more nervous than an irate husband throwing sharp knives at me.

The bracelet wasn’t valuable. Well, it was made of platinum, so it was worth something. No, the valuable part was the engraving on the inside. The words had been worn down until they were almost unreadable. The engraving said IN CASE OF EMERGENCY CALL and a phone number. A phone number I knew by heart. A phone number I would never ever call again. The last time I’d called it was eleven years ago, when I was sixteen. I’d had the kind of emergency that the word “emergency” was dreamed up to describe.

I’d killed someone. A man whose death people were going to notice. And that death screwed up my father’s business something dreadful, to the point where I knew I needed protection from his wrath and whoever he sent after me.

I called my mother to plead for her help, and she said no.

The bracelet was the reminder I was truly on my own—well, on my own with Stevie, at any rate. Which is why I kept it close at hand and on my wrist.

I didn’t need anyone else paying too much attention to that bracelet or its owner. I had to get it back from Colin before the evening was over.

#

After the water cabinet trick, in which Kristin had to escape before drowning and the body switching (Colin beheaded Kristin and me and then refastened each head on the other’s body, a minor acrobatic feat involving new costumes and wigs) came my solo turn in the show. I went on-stage as he set up backstage.

I drifted out into the audience and shaded my eyes with my hand. “We have a minute. Would anyone care for a quick psychic reading?”

A woman raised her hand.

Lovely, a volunteer. Without one, I’d have to scan through the tables and find the woman who appeared the most interested. And who sat in the lighted section of the audience, because I couldn’t see a damn person in the dark areas. I always aimed for having a woman as the first volunteer, because starting with a man appeared too much like a come-on.

Of course, everything with men is a come-on. Which is one of their better traits, true, but not in the middle of a magic show.

I sized up my volunteer. I’m not bragging when I say I have exceptional eyesight. It’s a simple statistical fact. My eyesight is off the charts. I see better at twenty feet than a normal person does at maybe five or six. One of the things it allows me to do is examine people in tight close-up, notice little things about them that normal vision would miss. This woman was in her early forties, perhaps: fine crow’s feet developing; her mouth framed by light lines starting to set in; the skin on her hands beginning to dry and wrinkle. Stocky. Nice clothing, nothing Wal-Martish—I could tell by the stitching. Quality shoes, a tad too practical. She needed them for more than holidays in Vegas. She was a trifle embarrassed but laughing, looking to have fun. Not seasoned with speaking in front of a crowd. She and her male companion both wore wedding rings that had the same style and lost their initial luster, so they’d been married a while. He had a redder face than his wife did and had crossed his arms over his chest.

“Do you have a specific question?” I asked her.

She shrugged and shook her head. “Didn’t think you were going to pick me.” Then she giggled again.

Southern accent. Sounded…Texan. East Texas, possibly Houston.

Here’s what I did: I picked the topic. Then, a few possible angles, all of them light-hearted. Never anything heavy, like divorce. Every time I got a hit off the person, some sign that what I’d said registered, I got a new direction to go in. It was sort of like one of those “pick the adventure you want!” stories my sister Stevie loved so much when she started reading. Granted, she was eighteen months old at the time, and she was over them by the time she was three, when she’d moved on to reading Dumas. In French.

Colin and I had added mind-reading to the act five months ago. We did twelve shows a week, two mind-readings per show for twenty weeks, and in all that time I’d had one person say that I was wrong. All the rest were amazed, confounded, excited by what I said. More than a few people, women and men both, had made their way to the dressing room afterwards, asking for a longer reading. Yes, periodically I did it, because it was an easy way to pick up some extra cash, and a nicer way than half of the showgirls in town earned extra money in their dressing rooms.

I took the woman’s hand and asked her name. Rebecca.

“You’re a Becky, aren’t you?” I said.

She giggled again and nodded.

I took her hand, damp and cold from her drink and trembling with stage fright, and closed my eyes. What would a woman in her early forties who had a comfortable marriage ask questions about? It was either her job or her kids. Job it was. I stay away from doing readings about kids. Too much chance to hit a deep nerve.

“You don’t want to know about your job, do you?” Starting out with a question like this was a win-win—if the person said yes, then I get points for bringing up the topic, and if she said no, then I get points for having dismissed the idea.

Becky’s hand clutched mine a little and she nodded.

“You work in—” Good comfortable shoes, an amiable demeanor, easy with people. Health care or teaching? “—the medical field.”

Becky gasped.

“You’re a nurse?”

She nodded.

“You’ve been overworked lately, haven’t you?” The least psychic thing I could have said: nurses everywhere were overworked. “You’re wondering if you should change positions?” A tiny flex in the hand. “You heard about a new position opening up and you’re wondering if you should move to it.”

Becky shrieked as she pulled her hand away from me and clenched her fists. She was smiling though, which was a good sign.

“Becky, I think you know exactly what you need to do. You need to trust yourself more that you can do what’s right for you and your family.” After a second’s pause, I grinned at her. “Would you mind telling the audience how well I did?”

I tilted the microphone toward her and Becky said, “That was amazing! That’s what’s been on my mind! We’ve been talking about it every minute we’ve been here!” She grabbed me and hugged me, which caused a minor bit of feedback over the sound system.

When she let go, I asked for the second and final volunteer, and a lot more hands went up.

I glanced over at the side of the stage. Colin was leaning against the pole, his arms folded across his chest. He was smiling. Stupid bastard. I picked a second volunteer.

#

After I finished, the music for the final illusion started. The house lights dimmed and I went backstage to get into position. Colin came up behind me and put his hands around my waist and his cheek against my head. “They love you.” He kissed my hair. “Don’t leave.” He interlaced our fingers.

Fabulous. Now he was lovey-dovey Colin. Up mood, down mood. I was tired of babysitting him, just as I was tired of babysitting my sister Stevie, but she came much higher on the priority list than he did. Colin didn’t know that, because he’d never even heard the name Stevie, let alone met my younger sister. Six months into our stage partnership and sham marriage was not the time to mention her existence. Or the fact she lived in a small one-room apartment in a run-down building a few miles off the Strip. He had never asked where I went when I wasn’t with him, and I never volunteered that information. “Colin, don’t do this.”

“At least tell me where you’re headed.”

“I have to get on-stage.”

When Colin’s mood was up, he was fun, he was exciting, he was supportive. Those times I actually looked forward to doing the show—well, if not the actual show, then the rehearsals and the kidding around and going out together afterwards. Bad Colin made things unpleasant.

I remembered what Bad Colin had just done, and I reached into his pocket. No bracelet.

My hand moved to his right pocket but he smacked it away. “Yes, I’m irresistible. Save it for later.” He grinned and pulled the curtain aside. “Your cue.”

I headed out.

The finale was an over-the-top spectacular of blood, gore, and exceptional deftness with capes. Or, in some cases, dropcloths stained pink from all the stage blood that had been dropped on them during previous shows.

At the end, Colin merrily lopped parts off Kristin while I ran around reattaching them. It was all very Sweeney Todd and the audience enjoyed it, finally getting into the blood and gore of the Grand Guignol. Then Colin eluded both of his assistants, vowed to return, and then disappeared.

In sync, Kristin and I both looked up at the large sheet-covered mass hanging from the stage ceiling. It had hung up there the entire finale, of course, but no one would have looked at it with all the antics on-stage. And a bloody stain began to spread from where the cable disappeared into the sheet.

“You don’t think—”

Kristin said, “Isn’t he afraid of heights?”

“Isn’t he afraid of hooks?” I always got a laugh with that one.

I shimmied out of my heels and lifted my foot. After waiting a moment, I wiggled my toes. “Oh!” Kristin said, late on the mark as usual. Then she wove her fingers together to form a platform for me. I stepped on her hand, she boosted me up, and I jumped to snatch the sheet off Colin.

I landed on the ground, bloody sheet in hand. And nothing happened. The audience was supposed to gasp at the sight of Colin, impaled on a meathook, before he raised his golden head and winked at them. But as I stood there with the sheet, the audience sat there, silent. Waiting.

Kristin stared up at Colin. Then she looked at me, widening her eyes a little to signal me that something was wrong.

I looked up. The round, smiling plastic mannequin’s face of the practice dummy beamed down at me. The blood pack leaked dark red corn syrup. And the dummy wore a square piece of paper pinned to his chest.

Right on cue, as though the show was continuing as usual, the meathook began to lower. At the point where Kristin and I would help Colin off, to fervent applause, we unhooked the dummy to silence broken only by ice in glasses and a few murmurs here and there.

Kristin took the note off the dummy’s chest. “Sorry, have to go,” she read. She looked at me. “What does that mean?”

The audience seemed to get the idea that something had gone terribly wrong, because the murmurs graduated to talking at full volume.

I put my hand on Kristin’s shoulder. “Stay here,” I whispered. I ran backstage, to where Sam and Q waited by the curtains. “Where is he?”

Q shrugged at me. Sam said, “He went around to stage left. Said he had a new end tonight.”

Sam, darling Sam. So good with the mechanical things, and so much slower with others. I ran behind the fire curtain to the other side of the stage: no Colin.

I dashed to the back door of the stage, which emptied out into the employee parking area. When we arrived at the casino for our little talk, Colin had taken the space right by the fire door, and I parked next to him. I pushed open the fire door into a cool Las Vegas night. The Strip lit up the heavens two miles away. The halogen light near the fire door showed me the parking space was empty.

Colin Abbott had abandoned his own show.

I stood in the entrance of the fire door for a millennia or two, trying to understand this. I could sooner believe Colin would literally saw me in two—or three, or more—than I could wrap my mind around him leaving his magic show.

I thought of the note.
Sorry, have to go
.

He’d left before I could.

“Filth-swilling whoremonger of Babylon,” I muttered before slamming the door shut. Q slouched nearby. “Give me your phone.” He handed over his mobile without so much as a peep. Smart boy. I called Colin’s cell.

It rang. And rang.

He was gone. And he’d taken my bracelet with him. My stupid goddamned bracelet.

“Where is he?” The voice was oily and loathsome, and that was the best part of the man.

When I turned around, I found Barry Coffey glaring at me. Barry Coffey was short, round, balding, and the producer of our show for the casino. He had thick, stubby fingers and his suit—I think he had only the one—stunk of cigars. He’d hated me since I arrived, because I’d told him, rather forcefully and a mite shy of breaking a digit, that I was not open for business. He’d tried again when Colin had proposed the Grand Guignol theme. Colin explained that it would be messy, but a great selling point. Coffey’s response? She gives me a blowjob, you can have your show. Without missing a beat, Colin mentioned that not one but two other casinos had contacted us, and we’d tank every show from here on out if we needed to. Coffey caved, but he never forgave us. Didn’t send us a wedding gift either. Told us to be at the theater at the regular time that night.