Every Which Way But Dead. Ким Харрисон

believe me.”

      I smiled, settling myself farther into the seat, my fluster vanishing at Jenks’s star fawning. Takata tugged a picture of him and his band standing before the Great Wall of China from a dog-eared folder. “Who do I make it out to?” he said, and Jenks froze.

      “Uh …” he stammered, his hovering wings going still. I shot my hand out to catch him, and his featherlight weight hit my palm. “Um …” he stuttered, panicking.

      “Make it out to Jenks,” I said, and Jenks made a tiny sound of relief.

      “Yeah, Jenks,” the pixy said, finding the presence of mind to flit over to stand on the photo as Takata signed it with an illegible signature. “My name is Jenks.”

      Takata handed me the picture to carry home for him. “Pleasure to meet you, Jenks.”

      “Yeah,” Jenks squeaked. “Nice to meet you, too.” Making another impossibly high noise to get my eyelids aching, he darted from me to Takata like an insane firefly.

      “Park it, Jenks,” I breathed, knowing the pixy could hear me even if Takata couldn’t.

      “My name is Jenks,” he said as he lit atop my shoulder, quivering when I carefully put the photo in my bag. His wings couldn’t stay still, and the come-and-go draft felt good in the stifling air of the limo.

      I returned my gaze to Takata, taken aback at the empty look on his face. “What?” I asked, thinking something was wrong.

      Immediately he straightened. “Nothing,” he said. “I heard you quit the I.S. to go out on your own.” He blew his air out in a long exhalation. “That took guts.”

      “It was stupid,” I admitted, thinking of the death threat my past employer had set on me in retaliation. “Though I wouldn’t change a thing.”

      He smiled, looking satisfied. “You like being on your own?”

      “It’s hard without a corporation backing you,” I said, “but I’ve got people to catch me if I fall. I trust them over the I.S. any day.”

      Takata’s head bobbed to make his long hair shift. “I’m with you on that.” His feet were spread wide against the car’s motion, and I was starting to wonder why I was sitting in Takata’s limo. Not that I was complaining. We were on the expressway, looping about the city, my convertible trailing three car lengths behind.

      “As long as you’re here,” he said suddenly, “I want your opinion on something.”

      “Sure,” I said, thinking his mind jumped from topic to topic worse than Nick’s. I loosened the tie on my coat. It was starting to get warm in there.

      “Capital,” he said, flipping open the guitar case beside him and pulling a beautiful instrument from the crushed green velvet. My eyes widened. “I’m going to release a new track at the solstice concert.” He hesitated. “You did know I was playing at the Coliseum?”

      “I’ve got tickets,” I said, my flash of excitement growing. Nick had bought them. I had been worried he was going to cancel on me and I’d end up going to Fountain Square for the solstice as I usually did, putting my name in the lottery to close the ceremonial circle there. The large, inlaid circle had a “permit only” use status except for the solstices and Halloween. But now I had a feeling we would be spending our solstice together.

      “Great!” Takata said. “I was hoping you would. Well, I have this piece about a vampire pining after someone he can’t have, and I don’t know which chorus works the best. Ripley likes the darker one, but Arron says the other fits better.”

      He sighed, showing an unusual bother. Ripley was his Were drummer, the only band member to have been with Takata for most of his career. It was said she was the reason everyone else only lasted a year or two before striking out on their own.

      “I had planned on singing it live the first time on the solstice,” Takata said. “But I want to release it to WVMP tonight to give Cincinnati a chance to hear it first.” He grinned, to look years younger. “It’s more of a high when they sing along.”

      He glanced at the guitar in his lap and strummed a chord. The vibration filled the car. My shoulders slumped, and Jenks made a choking gurgle. Takata looked up, his eyes wide in question. “You’ll tell me which one you like better?” he asked, and I nodded. My own personal concert? Yeah, I could go for that. Jenks made that choking gurgle again.

      “Okay. It’s called ‘Red Ribbons.’” Taking a breath, Takata slumped. Eyes vacant, he modified the chord he had been playing. His thin fingers shifted elegantly, and with his head bent over his music, he sang.

      “Hear you sing through the curtain, see you smile through the glass. Wipe your tears in my thoughts, no amends for the past. Didn’t know it would consume me, no one said the hurt would last.” His voice dropped and took on the tortured sound that had made him famous. “No one told me. No one told me,” he finished, almost whispering.

      “Ooooh, nice,” I said, wondering if he really thought I was capable of making a judgment.

      He flashed me a smile, throwing off his stage presence that quickly. “Okay,” he said, hunching over his guitar again. “This is the other one.” He played a darker chord, sounding almost wrong. A shudder rippled its way up my spine, and I stifled it. Takata’s posture shifted, becoming fraught with pain. The vibrating strings seemed to echo through me, and I sank back into the leather seats, the humming of the engine carrying the music right to my core.

      “You’re mine,” he almost breathed, “in some small fashion. You’re mine, though you know it not. You’re mine, bond born of passion. You’re mine, yet wholly you. By way of your will, by way of your will, by way of your will.”

      His eyes were closed, and I didn’t think he remembered I was sitting across from him. “Um …” I stammered, and his blue eyes flashed open, looking almost panicked. “I think the first one?” I offered as he regained his composure. The man was more flighty than a drawer full of geckos. “I like the second better, but the first fits with the vampire watching what she can’t have.” I blinked. “What he can’t have,” I amended, flushing.

      God help me, I must look like a fool. He probably knew I roomed with a vampire. That she and I weren’t sharing blood probably hadn’t made it into his report. The scar on my neck wasn’t from her but from Big Al, and I tugged my scarf up to hide it.

      He looked almost shaky as he put his guitar aside. “The first?” he questioned, seeming to want to say something else, and I nodded. “Okay,” he said, forcing a smile. “The first it is.”

      There was another choked gurgle from Jenks. I wondered if he would recover enough to make more than that ugly sound.

      Takata snapped the latches on his instrument case, and I knew the chitchat was over. “Ms. Morgan,” he said, the rich confines of the limo seeming sterile now that it was empty of his music. “I wish I could say I looked you up for your opinion on which chorus I should release, but I find myself in a tight spot, and you were recommended to me by a trusted associate. Mr. Felps said he has worked with you before and that you had the utmost discretion.”

      “Call me Rachel,” I said. The man was twice my age. Making him call me Ms. Morgan was ridiculous.

      “Rachel,” he said as Jenks choked again. Takata gave me an uncertain smile, and I returned it, not sure what was going on. It sounded like he had a run for me. Something that required the anonymity that the I.S. or the FIB couldn’t provide.

      As Jenks gurgled and pinched the rim of my ear, I straightened, crossed my knees, and pulled my little date-book out of my bag to try to look professional. Ivy had bought it for me two months ago in one of her attempts to bring order to my chaotic life. I only carried it to appease her, but setting up a run for a nationally renowned pop star might be the time to start using it. “A Mr. Felps recommended me to you?” I said, searching my memory and coming up blank.

      Takata’s