A Beast For The Eyes: A Steamy Shifter Romance (A Ravenswood Romance Book 2) (27 page)

The bus rolled away from the 2
^nd
District and climbed the ramp onto the interstate. Veronica tried to think back to the last time she traveled this way. It had been many years ago, before the quarantine. Either way, it was at the far edges of her memory.

The bus meandered its way through the modest but clean 5
^th
district, depositing still more passengers before returning to the interstate. As it passed through the 7
^th
District, Veronica began to see abandoned houses with boarded up doors and windows. As it traveled through the 9
^th
district, two underdressed children on bicycles stopped to stare at her through the bus window.

When the bus finally reached the 12
^th
District, Veronica was one of only three passengers. She exited alone and surveyed the unfamiliar streets.

The main road of the 12
^th
District was short. She could see a couple dive bars, abandoned storefronts, and a tiny grocery store with barred windows advertising the lottery. People were milling about on the sidewalks. This place was totally unfamiliar to her, but given the District’s reputation, she didn’t want to appear lost. She began walking down the street towards where she saw the most people.

“Hey, sweet thang!” called a group of young men as she passed. “Oh, come on baby! Where you going?”

She scanned the people she passed. She wasn’t sure exactly what she was looking for. Getting to the 12
^th
district and asking around had been the extent of her plan.

She saw women, scantily clad for weather approaching men in front of an apartment building. Men sat on stoops smoking casually from glass pipes. It seemed like everyone turned to stare at her. She marched ahead, thinking about Lucas and clutching the gun in her pocket.

“Uptown girl!” called a man on a street corner. She took it as another cat call and began to walk past. “Whatchu need, baby? Looking for that head change?”

Suddenly, a light went off in her head. This could be her chance.

She turned back around to the man. He was a short black man, with a puffy jacket and an eye frosted over with cataracts. If he was a narcotics officer playing a drug dealer, he was doing an Oscar-worthy performance.

“Yes, I am looking for something. It’s for a friend of mine. He needs it for the moon.”

“Aw, hell no!” he said shaking his head and putting his empty hands up. “Lady, I ain’t nobody got nothing for your friend. You take him right down to quarantine.”

“I heard about something that can help him. Moonshade. Have you heard of it?”

The white-eyed man sucked in his bottom lip and looked silently far down the road for a few seconds.

“I don’t know nothing ‘bout it.”

“Do you know who might?”

“Don’t believe in it myself,” he continued.

“I have money.”

The white-eyed man sighed.

“How much?”

“Fifty dollars.”

“Now look,” he said. “I ain’t promising nothing. I know a guy who might know ‘bout something like that. Just maybe.”

“Would you take me to him?”

She pulled out three bills. He swiftly counted them and put them in his pocket.

“Aight, follow me.”

The white-eyed man led her down the street that led away from the main road. He limped slightly as they walked uphill through less trafficked streets. In a short while, they arrived at an apartment building on the corner of a block.

“Wait here,” he said.

He pressed a button on the panel by the door. There was a click and he soon disappeared inside.

Veronica stood in the cold, looking up and down the streets. She felt immediately foolish for giving a stranger her money and letting him walk away.

She became aware of the uncomfortable feeling of being watched. She looked up at all the windows of the five story buildings that surrounded her. Some had their blinds drawn, others partially open. She couldn’t see any eyes looking back at her. She thought about Lucas’ quest for Moonshade and wondered if it had brought him to this same intersection.

She caught another glimpse of something out of the corner of her eye: a black figure moving in the alley across the street. When she looked, it was gone. She sighed. The whole adventure was putting her on edge.

Ten minutes passed. Veronica was considering leaving when she heard a noise behind her. The white-eyed man stood in the open door and motioned her to come in. She took a deep sigh and followed.

Chapter 5

The apartment building was very old, built sometime around the turn of the century. The electricity and plumbing, which had been added later, were on the outside of the walls. Stained wainscoting ran waist high around the walls under a dirty, faded floral wallpaper. They climbed past an old man who smelled strongly of liquor as they mounted the creaking staircase.

At the top landing was a single door. The white-eyed man tapped a short, deliberate pattern on the door and it swung open. A tall, beefy man stood in the door. He gave Veronica a blank stare, before stepping aside to allow them both in. Veronica’s heart raced as the door shut behind them.

The room was illuminated by the daylight filtering in through the window blinds. The room was sparsely furnished with a bare hardwood floor. In the center of the room was an impressively large desk, chipped and scarred from years of service. Behind the desk sat a thin man with sunglasses and corn rows in a cheap, but well-tailored suit. His held a smoldering cigar in his ring covered fingers. Veronica suspected from his manner of dress that this man was a pimp.

For a moment the room was silent. The pimp took a drag from his cigar and exhaled leisurely. Veronica felt that it must be her turn to speak first.

“Um, hello. I’m Veronica,” she began.

“Quincy tells me you come to my corner looking for Moonshade,” the pimp said motioning to the white-eyed man.

“Well, yes. It’s for someone very close to me. Do you know where I could- I mean, do you have any here?”

“Ain’t deal in no Moonshade,” the pimp said.

Veronica’s heart sank.

“That’s okay. Um, do you know who does?”

“Reason I don’t deal in it is, for one thing, ain’t no way to test it. Not unless you associate with folks who got The Sickness.” He leaned forward and looked at her over the rim of his shades. “I don’t associate with folks who got The Sickness. Second reason is it attracts a breed of clientele I do not wish to attract. And third thing is, cops don’t like that Moonshade. And, for the most part, I don’t get too many problems from cops.”

“Then it’s real? I mean, it exists.”

The pimp leaned back in his chair and took another drag.

“Yes. Yes, it exists. Now finding it, though. That’s another thing entirely,” he said. “You don’t know who I am do you?”

“No,” Veronica said.

“Ain’t never been down to 12
^th
before?”

“No.”

“Hmm,” he said thoughtfully. “You just come around here, sweet piece of tail like you, flashing cash at strangers hoping to score some Moonshade. That there’s how folks get theyselves robbed or killed. I’m being very honest with you now. Hell, if I wasn’t I could sell you this bottle of water. You wouldn’t even know the difference.” He smiled at himself before getting suddenly serious again. “Best help I can give you is to tell you ‘go home.’”

“Do you know anybody who could help me?”

The pimp chuckled to himself.

“Go try the Red Fang Bar, four blocks past the way you came. Lot of Wolfmen hang ‘round there.”

He motioned to the doorman who opened the door for her to leave.

“Thank you,” she said, turning to leave.

“Hey,” said the pimp. “If you’re ever looking to make some money, beautiful, you just come find me.”

Chapter 6

Red Fang Bar looked like a promising place. Beer lights shone through the barred windows. A group of four or five bearded men stood in a circle by the door smoking cigarettes. They looked up at her as she approached, making toothy grins and whistling.

Inside, the air was a stifling cloud of cigarette smoke making halos around the dim lights. Everyone turned to look at Veronica as she entered. She took a seat at the bar.

“Whatya have?” asked the bartender, an older woman with a busty chest in a revealing shirt.

“Flame Thrower,” she called out over the jukebox playing the blues.

Veronica took and lit a cigarette from her pocket as the bartender came back with the drink. Veronica sipped at the cocktail as she stared off into the space in front of her trying to organize her thoughts and plan her next move. Would she start up a conversation with a stranger? How would she decide who to ask? The guys outside might know where to find Moonshade. She’d certainly need a couple more drinks before she’d ask them. And what if she didn’t find it? What’s the worst that could happen? Did she really care that Lucas would still be a Wolfman?

No. Despite what the papers said, being a Wolfman wasn’t all that bad. There was a great deal of power that came with it. Some could use it for good, others would undoubtedly use it for evil.

She thought back to last night. Lucas had transformed into an animal, but he was still himself. He was just more powerful and wild. Lucas was always a passionate lover, but as she thought back to that night, she recalled the unbridled passion it seemed to bring out of him.

“Good drink for a cold day,” came a deep, warm voice from beside her.

Veronica was startled. She hadn’t heard the man approach. She looked over and was doubly surprised by the handsome face she found. He was tall and thin, sporting an immaculate beard. His hair was slicked back carefully and a small cross was tattooed upside down under his eye. As he turned to look at her, she imagined she could see a red tinge to his hazel irises. There was something magnetic and disarming about him.

“Well, yes. I’d like to think so,” she said.

He smiled an easy smile that brightened his eyes.

“I’ll have a Flame Thrower, same as this beautiful woman beside me,” he told the bartender. He returned his attention to Veronica.

“No,” he seemed to say rather to himself than to her, “I can’t say I recall a winter this cold in quite a stretch. The wind cuts to the bone, doesn’t it?”

“Yes, it’s awfully cold,” Veronica agreed.

“Pardon me if I sound forward when I say it, but you don’t look like the kind of girl you typically see walking around the 12
^th
District.”

“Why is that?”

“Well, you’re rather pretty, articulate, well dressed...”

He chuckled softly to himself, “Where are my manners? My name’s Deriston. Friends call me D.”

“Veronica,” she said, shaking his hand. “You don’t seem like the kind of man you typically see in the 12
^th
district either.”

Deriston shrugged.

“I moved here about a year ago. It’s not upscale living, but it’s not the hellhole people make it out to be either.”

“Where’d you live before?”

“5
^th
District. Up on Hickory Ave. It was a nice little place. What about you?”

Veronica finished her drink and motioned to the bartender for another. She could feel the warmth of it spreading through her core. She enjoyed finding some conversation in the midst of this frustrating quest. She didn’t want to admit to Deriston that she came from the upscale 2
^nd
District.

“I’ve got a flat in the 4
^th
District with my boyfriend.”

A peculiar little smile came to his face when she said that.

“The 4
^th
District is a nice place,” Deriston nodded in approval. “What do you do up there?”

“I work retail. Nothing terribly exciting, I’m afraid. What about you?”

“Butcher,” he said. And then quickly, he turned to face her with a steely and cold expression, “So tell me Veronica, what is a pretty little saleswoman doing at a dive bar in the middle of 12
^th
District? It’s obviously not to find some work selling clothes to strange men in bars.”

Veronica wrestled silently for a moment with her thoughts, wondering if she should trust this man. She’d come a long way and certainly didn’t want to go home empty handed. There was something in his eyes and the confidence with which he carried himself. No, it wasn’t just that. There was something else, but she couldn’t quite put her finger on it. She decided to take a chance.

“I’m looking for something I hear you can get around here,” she said looking into her empty glass. She looked up into his eyes. “Something to help someone very close to me.”

“What kind of help?”

“They don’t tolerate the moon very well.”

Deriston glanced over his shoulder before leaning in and dropping his voice to a whisper.

“You mean Moonshade?” he said.

Veronica nodded. Deriston fixed his eyes on her in silence for half a minute. He seemed to be calculating something in his mind or perhaps plotting his next words carefully.

“I may be able to help,” he said.

“Really?!” Veronica’s heart skipped a beat as she marveled at her good luck.

Deriston nodded.

“I don’t have it today, but I could have it tomorrow.”

“How much?”

Deriston sat quietly contemplating for a moment.

“Normally, $250 or $300 a dose. But, I think I can get it to you for $100.”

“Deriston, that’s fantastic.”

“We’ll have to meet up somewhere private. My place is only two blocks south of here. Do you have a pen?”

Veronica took a pen from her bag and handed it to him. He scribbled down the address on a napkin and handed it to her.

“Meet me at this address at one o’clock tomorrow. Come alone and tell no one.”

“Thank you,” Veronica said quietly.

“I’m happy to help,” Deriston said with a magnanimous smile. “This next round’s on me.”

Chapter 7

Veronica boarded the bus back to the 2
^nd
District. She was elated at the success of her journey. She pulled the napkin out of her pocket and mouth the address to sear it into her memory in case the napkin was somehow lost or destroyed.

She thought of Lucas and imagined his reaction to the good news. She decided she would keep it a secret until she had the potion in her hand. She would have to get his hopes up when there was even the smallest chance that her plan would fall through. She had no doubt in her mind that it would, though. Though he was a stranger to her, Veronica trusted Deriston. Her intuition told her that he would not let her down.