Blood Rock (20 page)

“
Not
often, and not with modern ink,” I said, folding my arms. “And as you may have guessed from the Prius, I’m a tree-hugger. Everything I use is hypo-allergenic, and I subscribe to two different dermatology journals. As soon as a pigment proves bad—”

“But how,” Isaacson said, “can you really
know
it isn’t bad?”

“Fucking jerk,” Cinnamon said, sneezing. Then she seemed to notice us all staring at her and set her chin, sullen. “Mom’s the biggest—
fuck!
—the biggest square of them all, and you acts like she’s doin’ somethin’ wrong making people look beautiful! I means, fuck—”

“Cinnamon!” I said. “We talked about your language, and the insults.”

“Reaping what you’ve sown,” Dad said. “You set a bad example. I’ve
told
you—”

“Richard,” Isaacson said, staring at Cinnamon intently, “that’s not helping.”

“You tells it. Fuck, I just met her,” Cinnamon said, “and I always talked like this!”

“She didn’t,” Dad said sharply, “and she’s
my daughter.
”

“Dad,” I warned, pointing a finger at him.

“
She’s my Mom!
” Cinnamon said, face twisting in anger. “Fuck, leave her alone—”

“Cinnamon!” I said, pointing at her—then stopped; my hands were crossed in front of myself pointing at each of them. I put my hands on the table and sighed.

“All right, both of you, settle down,” I said. “Cinnamon, you watch your language. My Dad is from the old school, but he’s a good man.”

“Well,” Dad spluttered, “well, thank you Kotie—”

“And Dad, grow up,” I said. “I have no excuse for my mouth. You gave me every advantage. Cinnamon, on the other hand, has every excuse; she was on the streets two months ago. She had no advantages, and we’re all going to have to cut her a little slack.”

“Well said,” Doctor Isaacson said, still staring at Cinnamon intently, leaning his head on his closed fist like he was miming ‘The Thinker.’ “You know, Jesus once said—”

“Please, Doctor, don’t start,” I said wearily. “Now, everyone, please be nice to each other. I am going to the bathroom, and I don’t want anyone to be dead when I get back.”

But before I’d gotten halfway to the door, Isaacson had hopped up from the table and intercepted me, his weathered, wiry hand falling on my own with firmness. “Miss Frost,” he said, “I hate to butt in on your raising of your daughter, but there’s something you need to know … ”

“Look, you,” I said, then softened. “Doc, thanks for taking Cinnamon’s side, but I really didn’t need the first meeting I’ve had with my Dad in three years spoilt by a sermon.”

“I should never have let Richard talk me into this. I’m sorry,” Isaacson said, and looking in his eyes, I saw he was sincere. “But I need to talk to you about your daughter’s problem.”

He had that soft, sad pitying look, and I got my dander back up, ready to hear him give a whole lecture about how I needed to get her into a Christian school.

“You may have noticed Cinnamon going through a lot of changes now that she’s in her teens,” Isaacson began. “I’ve seen this before. It can be
so hard
on kids with her problem.”

“There’s nothing wrong with being a werekin—”

“That’s not the ‘problem’ I mean,” he said gently. “And I admit this is a snap judgment, so you should definitely get a second opinion, but … please, please, take this seriously. I
have
dealt with this problem before, and I’d never suggest that someone had it as a joke.”

“What is it?” I said. “Just what do you think is Cinnamon’s problem?”

—

“I’m
so
sorry, Miss Frost,” Isaacson said. “I think your daughter has Tourette’s.”

Late that night, we pulled into the parking lot of Manuel’s Tavern, the cavernous restaurant where we met with our Edgeworld friends every week. I was a bit nervous after Saffron blew her top, but I was more worried about Cinnamon.

I had tried to take her clothes shopping, hoping a tour of the outlet malls would wash away the taste of our disastrous meeting with Dad and make her forget about Doctor Isaacson’s little bombshell. But my little thrift store queen had turned sullen. Clearly, with werekin hearing, she’d overheard everything he’d said, but wasn’t ready to broach the subject.

So she sat and stewed. A lot.

In the end we just went back and rescued stuff from my apartment. She
kept
stewing. By ten we were pooped, so I decided we should drop in on the weekly get-together of our friends—even if one was gone forever, and one was being a royal vampire-queen bitch.

So it was ten-fifteen, rumbling over the speed bumps, when Cinnamon finally nerved up the courage to ask, “What’s it means to ‘have turrets?’ I thought turrets went on castles.”

I stared straight ahead, eyeing a couple leaving the Tavern and, hopefully, heading towards a parking space. “Normally you don’t ask until you already know,” I said. “Couldn’t find it on Google?”

“No,” she said, disgusted. “I didn’t have time. Plus I can’t spell it.”

“You should try it,” I said. The couple went around to the other side, and I booked it forward before someone else horned in. “They can sometimes guess the spelling—”

“Mom!”

“All right,” I said, pulling us to a stop. “It’s a … disease that makes you cuss.”

“Oh, fuck,” Cinnamon said—then, angrily, struck the car door repeatedly with her balled-up fist. “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!”

I stared over at her, trying to put Doctor Isaacson’s words from my mind. She was cussing, sure, but it didn’t sound like an uncontrolled outburst; it just sounded natural. Her life had been pretty shitty and she didn’t need anything else on her. “I’m not sure you’ve got it.”

“But you’re not sure I doesn’t?” Cinnamon said, mouth closing oddly, like she was biting off more than she could chew. “I does, doesn’t I?”

I started to say no, and then her head snapped aside in that weird sneeze—and now I could clearly see it
wasn’t
a sneeze, but a
tic
: a quick snap and a mouth motion, miming the biting gesture she’d just done seconds ago, but grossly exaggerated. What had sounded like a sneeze was a clearing of her throat, followed by a choked-off exhalation.

Oh,
hell
. This was
exactly
what Isaacson had said he’d seen in his special needs ministries.
Not necessarily cussing
, he’d said,
but facial or verbal tics, often manifesting in puberty and worsening progressively through the teens, difficult to willfully control—

The car in front of us beeped, and I slammed my brakes. I’d let us roll forward, and damn near hit them as they started to back out. I waved and backed us up, then pulled forward and took their space once they were gone. As I put the car into park, I looked back over at her.

“You don’t gots to say it,” she said, staring at her hands. “Your face said everything.”

I started to respond, but she unbuckled her belt and got out of the car. Before I could smooth her feathers, a motorcycle rumbled past, nearly running us over. The biker shook his fist at us as he passed, and I started to flip him off, then laughed. It was Calaphase.

He looped around once more, then wedged his bike into a half-space at the end of the lot and came to join us. “Now
that’s
how I remember you,” I said, grinning, as he walked up in a long-tailed leather biker’s jacket over a slightly punky take on a business suit.

“Should have known it was you grabbing the last damn space,” he said, taking off a pair of gloves and stuffing them into his pocket. “Hey, Dakota.”

And without thinking we leaned forward and gave each other a hug. It felt natural, and good; and he was
so strong
. Embarrassed, I leaned back and looked him over, trying to brush off the familiarity of his touch, and said, “I like it. The suit is a nice touch.”

He winced. “Revy’s … service,” he said. “It was today.”

“You should have told us, Cally,” I said. “We wanted to—”

But Calaphase shook his head. “Sorry, persona non grata, Kotie.”

Cinnamon snorted, tugging at her collar. “Kotie and Cally sittin’ in a tree—”

“Hey you,” I said, tousling her hair. “Shall we go in and face the music, Calaphase?”

“Why of course, Lady Frost,” he said, slipping a small laminated card out of his jacket. I took it curiously: it was an Oakdale Clan Affiliate Card, with an older picture of me someone had scarfed from the Rogue Unicorn web site. “Just in case.”

“Thanks,” I said, still staring at it. “You don’t think I’ll need it in
there
?”

“You never know,” he said. “Our little Vampire Queen looked pretty steamed.”

“Can’t hurt,” I said, slipping it into my back pocket and starting across the alley towards the low brick structure that was Manuel’s Tavern. “More comfy than a steel collar, anyway.”

“For you,” Cinnamon said, again tugging at her own. “Why am I stuck with this and you gets a card? You don’t even changes—and you never actually said why you lost it.”

“She did not lose it,” said a smooth voice, in a lovely but clipped South African accent. “My Lady Saffron took it from her in a rage.”

All three of us froze in the middle of the street. Darkrose stood there, leaning against Manuel’s Tavern, form expertly blended into the black curved shape of a giant Coca-Cola bottle advertisement painted on the yellow wall. A second ago I could have sworn she wasn’t there.

The black vampire stepped forward, dark cloak falling open around her to reveal another full-length leather catsuit, of which she apparently had a full wardrobe. Her tall, always striking form was enhanced by knee-high boots, with heels almost high enough to make her my height, and she stalked forward in them expertly, stepping right before us, barring our path.

“So it
was
the bitch throwin’ a fit,” Cinnamon hissed. “Thought so.”

“You two have created quite the mess,” Darkrose said, staring at me and Calaphase with dark black eyes that seemed to bore into us. Her hair was pulled back in tight cornrows which made her exotic South African features harder, more severe. “She is in a mood.”

“This mess and her mood is her fault,” I said tightly. “
She
chose to interpret her ex having an innocent dinner with a friend as some kind of marital betrayal.”

“True,” Darkrose admitted, glancing at Calaphase. “But I do not think she would appreciate seeing you tonight. Either of you.”

“What?” Calaphase said. “I know she was angry, but this is
ridiculous.
”

“I agree,” I said. “
I
started these meetings. And it’s a public restaurant.”

“But she still blames you, and is too hot under the collar to think clearly.” She stepped aside. “
I
will not bar your path. But I came to warn you—
it is not safe to go inside.
”

“Not
safe?
What the
fuck?
What is she,
two?
” I said. “I mean, God
damnit
—”

“Not safe—really?” Calaphase said. “You heard us coming. Can
she
hear us?”

“If she was paying attention,” Darkrose said, smiling. “She’s very,
very
powerful, but inexperienced. If you entered she would know, but you are safe, for the moment.”

“Well,
screw
her,” I said, a shade short of livid. “Come on, let’s go to the Vortex.”

“However,” Darkrose said carefully, “I’d like to take Cinnamon inside.”

“What?” I asked, putting my hands protectively on her shoulders. “Why?”

“To shame my Lady Saffron into admitting that the protection on Cinnamon still stands,” Darkrose said. “Perhaps I can get her to re-extend it to you … ”

“Now
I’m
a little too hot to go under the collar again,” I said, still feeling the flush in my face. “You know, I didn’t think I cared, but … she had that made for me, and she threw it away. Kind of like she did with our relationship when she became a damn vampire.”

Calaphase twitched and Darkrose put her gloved hand to her mouth.

“I’m so sorry,” I said, now feeling embarrassment. “That just popped out.”

“You sure
you
don’t has Tourette’s?” Cinnamon asked, looking up at me.

“No, your mother is right,” Darkrose said. “It is a … hard thing when your lover becomes a vampire, when the one you love becomes a
thing
that feeds on human life. It is very hard, for you know in your heart the first life they want to feed on is your own.”

My lips parted. This wasn’t a vampire talking anymore; this was a human. And it was not abstract; this was very real, and very personal. It had happened to her.

“I’m so sorry,” I said. She looked sad and very old now. “I didn’t know.”

“It was a century ago,” Darkrose said. “Another life. Another time.” She straightened, smiled. “I do not blame you. Selfishly, I am glad, because I want her.”

She said that simply, openly, staring me straight in the eye. But I couldn’t blame her for staking her claim clearly. Some tiny part of me would always be connected to Savannah and remember what we’d been like together, when I didn’t want to wring her neck. “I’m glad you have her, my Lady Darkrose.”