Under the Gun (11 page)

I shrugged. “Great location. Best dim sum in town.”

“Because that’s what everyone wants right after they meet up with their local werewolf
hunters.”

Alex went to grab the handle of the door, but I put my hand on his, stopping him.
“I think I should go in alone.”

“I don’t think so. It doesn’t look safe.”

I’m not exactly sure how he could surmise whether or not the place was safe as every
single inch of the floor-to-ceiling windows was pasted over with sun-faded Chinese
calendars from the years before I was born and curl-edged posters of pretty Asian
girls hocking everything from videos to glazed crockery with cute, fuzzy kittens poking
out of them.

“I know what I’m doing, Alex. And besides, I have a weapon.”

Surprise registered on Alex’s face. “You do? Are you carrying your gun? Weren’t you
the one who told me that of all the weapons one of us breathers could have, a gun
would be right up there with a teaspoon in terms of effectiveness?”

“I believe I said a gun would be about as effective as a ladle, but yes. And that’s
why I have this.” I dug into my shoulder bag and whipped out my brand-spanking-new
Big 5 knife.

I’d expected Alex’s eyes to go wide or at the very least, go slightly hooded and bedroomy
(what was sexier than a chick with a knife?). I hadn’t expected him to clap a hand
over his mouth and break down into near-snort-worthy guffaws.

“What’s so damn funny?”

Alex, shoulders shaking as he tried to control his torrent of laughter, said nothing.
He just pointed at my knife.

“You’re really going to sit there laughing like an idiot while a woman brandishes
a weapon at you?” I unsheathed the blade, hoping to scare the piss—or at least the
giggles—out of him.

He just laughed harder, tears slipping down his cheeks.

“What the hell is so funny? Don’t think I won’t use this on you!”

Alex’s eyes shot down the length of the blade. “To do what? Gut me?”

I narrowed my eyes. “Maybe.”

“You know what this is for, don’t you?”

I looked down at the blade in my hand. It did suddenly seem slightly less menacing,
but it was a blade nonetheless, and blades were made for gutting people.

“It’s for scaling fish,” he said.

Or for scaling fish.

“What?” I looked at the damn thing in my hand again, squinting at the tiny bass imprinted
on the side. “It’s a bass knife.”

“For fish.”

So I thought it was a bass-style knife. As in, “Bass! The serial killer fish of the
lakes!”

Alex took the knife out of my hand, his finger going over the portion of the blade
that carved upward.

“You hook the fish right here. Then you pull it down and fillet it with this part.”
He flopped the knife over. “This is how you descale it.”

I snatched it out of his hand. “Well, that might be what it’s for in your world. But
in the Underworld, things aren’t always what they seem.”

Alex looked unconvinced. “So you’re telling me Big 5 sells magic bass knives?”

“How’d you know this was a Big 5 knife?”

“Do me a favor,” Alex said, effectively ignoring me and going for the door again.
“Leave the weaponry to me. Unless, of course, we run into a giant bass monster in
the next twenty minutes.”

I shoved my knife back into my purse and glowered at him.
Note to self,
I thought,
once this whole werewolf incident is over, prove to Alex that a fish-scaler can double
as a fallen angel gutter . . . .

“I’m going in alone.”

“No. You’re not.”

“I know what I’m doing, Alex. And besides, I have a—”

“Fish scaler.”

I put my hands on my hips. “I was going to say a plan, jackass. I have a plan.”

“And that is?”

I blew out a sigh. “Well, if you must know, I was going to march in there, paste on
my friendliest and most innocent smile, and ask to speak to Feng.”

“Isn’t that kind of what you did the last time? You know, the time you nearly got
choked to death?”

“That wasn’t my friendly smile.”

“Well, get used to having company because I’m coming in with you.”

I shrugged. “Fine. But I talk to Feng on my own.”

Alex nodded, considering. “We’ll see.”

“But be prepared for total animation domination.”

I yanked open the door and smiled when Alex’s jaw dropped.

“What the hell?”

Though the sign on the outside of the building advertised C
HINESE
/A
MERICAN FOOD, FREE
W
I
-F
I
and
BATHROOMS FOR CUSTOMERS ONLY,
the inside was bright and cheery and looked like a scene out of an episode of
Sailor Moon
. Brightly colored Formica tables covered every bit of the available floor space and
crammed at each table was a selection of glossy-haired people in various states of
cheery Anime dress. There were schoolgirls in knee socks and over-the-shoulder nunchucks,
sailor girls with wide eyes, argyle socks, and plastic swords, and the occasional
guy staring out under extra-long bangs and guyliner.

Alex leaned close to me, his lips tickling my earlobe. “These are the terrifying werewolf
hunters who nearly choked the life out of you?”

“Shh,” I hissed.

One of the animaniacs stood up with a sweet grin on her face. She was dressed in a
crisp navy and white sailor suit with a kicky red tie. Her red and white striped knee
socks were tucked into the hooker version of little-girl Mary Jane shoes and her glossy
waist-length hair was pulled into two adorable ponytails that framed her deep set,
almond-shaped eyes.

Eyes that immediately clouded over when she recognized me.

“I remember you,” she said, her voice preschool-kid sweet while her eyes shot daggers.
“You were here before.” She circled an index finger a half-inch from my chest and
then her eyes—and her pointing finger—went to Alex. “You were not.”

“It’s Xian, right? I’m Sophie. I’m not sure we actually were introduced the first
time.” I paused, my mouth still hanging dumbly open as I followed the lines of heat
that went from Xian to Alex. Her cherry-red lips were pursed, her finger still hovering
just in front of Alex’s chest. I watched in horrifying slow motion as Xian’s lips
parted ever so slightly. The tip of her tongue darted out and slid across her lips,
leaving a glossy sheen around her cupid’s bow.

“So anyway,” I went on, somehow thinking that if I spoke louder, the sex spell would
be broken, “this is my friend.” I wrapped my hands around his upper arm. “My dear
friend, Alex.”

Alex was stiff, either locked in Xian’s steamy gaze or completely terrified of being
pummeled by the sexy sailor. I gave him a rather hard—yet friendly—shake. “I’d like
to see Feng.” I spun on my heel, my fingers digging into Alex’s flesh. “Is her office
still back here?”

I felt Xian’s tiny hand on my shoulder; she dragged me back with the strength of a
linebacker. “Why do you need Feng?”

I stumbled backward, nearly falling against Alex. He steadied me and I quickly learned
the daggers that Xian was shooting at me earlier were her kind, fluffy daggers. Her
entire countenance changed and I was pretty sure that I was about to be gutted by
a life-sized cartoon character and her band of merry ani-men. I straightened and looked
Xian in the eye.

“What do you two want with Feng?”

“Actually, Xian, it’s just me.” I put my hand on my chest and smiled slyly, rubbing
my tongue over my bottom lip and dropping my voice. “I want to talk to Feng. If you
don’t mind, Alex would like to stay out here with you. He’s a huge fan of anime.”

Xian brightened, and I was suddenly off her radar. She grabbed Alex by the hand. “Come
with me.”

I saw the terrified look on Alex’s face as I zipped down the back hall.

I quickly navigated the narrow hall, picked my way through the grease-and-soot-covered
kitchen, and stopped just before pushing open the ancient screen door. I expected
Feng to be in her workshop shaving some kind of metal or killing baby bunnies or something,
but she was in the alleyway, slouched against the brick wall, head thrown back. Her
eyes were closed and a single shard of sunlight made its way through the surrounding
buildings and washed over Feng’s throat.

I laid my hand on the screen door’s latch. The sound was miniscule, the latch scratching
under the weight of my palm, but Feng’s eyes flew open, her whole body going into
a rigid fighting stance. She narrowed her eyes, practically snarling when she saw
me through the matted screen.

“What are you doing here?”

Fear, like a lead weight, sunk low in my belly. It pressed against my bladder, made
my knees feel weak and made every other limb feel loose. Feng was a trained assassin.
I was an idiot with a bass knife. What was I thinking?

I held both of my hands up surrender-style. “It’s me, Sophie Lawson. We met before.
I was here with my friend Will, and then we—I saw you—at Sutro Point?”

Feng’s hard face registered no emotion, no indication that she remembered me or had
even heard me speak. Finally, she said, “I know who you are. What do you want?”

I gently pushed open the screen door and stepped into the alley. The heat here was
moist and oppressive, the stench of rotted vegetables, leftover food, and deep fat
fryers making it feel heavy and slick.

I knew that Feng and Xian were twins and though their faces—the almond-shaped eyes,
the high sleek jawbones, and hard mouths—were identical physically, that was where
the similarities ended. Where Xian’s eyes were rounded out with coal eyeliner and
big, waggly lashes, Feng’s were tight, narrow slits, always on the verge of shifting,
glaring. Her mouth was set hard, her lips pressed blade thin. She was as tall and
willowy as her sister, but Feng kept her shoulders rounded. Her belly was concave
and her hips were straight and angular, two inches of smooth olive skin visible in
the spot where her baggy camouflage pants came up to meet her fraying black baby tee.

“I need to talk to you.”

“About what?”

I looked over my shoulder, my eyes sweeping the dank kitchen behind me. Assured no
one was lurking or listening, I dug the silver bullet out of my pocket and held it
up to her. “Business.”

Feng’s eyes zeroed in on the bullet. No one else in the city—in the world, likely—made
silver bullets like these, but I spun it around anyway so Feng could inspect the tiny
Chinese symbol carved on the shaft. The Du family was known not only for their werewolf
hunting prowess but for their “artistry.” Each bullet was carved with a symbol that
indicated the season in which it was forged. A nice sentiment for an instrument of
death, I guessed, but disconcerting nonetheless.

“It’s one of yours,” I assured.

“Fine.”

Feng shrugged and I followed her into her “office.” It was a big, empty room that
looked as though it were carved out of concrete, with a uniformly bland gray paint
job. Bare bulbs screwed into dented aluminum sockets hung from the ceiling, the yellow
light casting weird shadows in corners and against walls. There were no windows, no
phone lines, no computers. Floors blended into walls blended into ceiling, giving
the whole place the unpleasant feeling of a solid steel block, while flimsy tables
that looked like they were discarded from the restaurant hinted at more of an inescapable
sweatshop. The Du family emblem was painted on the wall behind Feng—the surname
Du
intertwined with the American spelling, a stylized painting of a wounded werewolf
dying behind the heavy black print. Nausea roiled in my stomach.

I hugged my arms around me, then slyly dipped one hand into my purse, letting my fingertips
rest on the sheathed blade of my bass knife. Feng may not be a fish, but I was ready
to gut her just the same if it came to it.

At least I hoped I would.

I looked around, trying to quell the nervous heat that prickled around my hairline.
If Feng was going to kill me,
I whispered in my head,
she would have done it by now.

Feng settled herself behind an enormous hunk of mahogany wood—part desk, part work
station—and pushed aside a mammoth toolbox that I knew housed bullet samples, spent
shells, and tools.

My palms went damp when Feng stared up at me, her eyes like flat stones, but her lips
quirked up at one end in a kind of wry, challenging smile.

“So what kind of business do you want to talk about?” Feng wanted to know.

I licked my lips and perched on the end of the folding metal chair set up across from
Feng. My throat was closing, but I did my best to control angst in my voice, forcing
my words to come out smooth and natural. “Can I ask you a question first?”

Feng pursed her lips, but gave an almost imperceptible shrug.

My heart slammed itself against my rib cage and my mouth suddenly felt impossibly
dry. I rubbed my palms on my jeans and when my voice came out it was low, breathy.
“What’s it like?”

A single cocked eyebrow. “What is what like?”

I looked around the shadowed room, taking in the sparse furnishing, the cold existence.
“Your job. I mean—I work in an office. I stamp papers and give people”—I almost choked
on the word—“info sessions to get them acquainted with their new insurance policies
and positions.”

It wasn’t a complete lie. There were papers and stamps and even insurance policies.
But my “people” were generally dead and their new position was generally an afterlife
one. And most of my life insurance policies were collectable once the holder died
and then came back to life.

But I wasn’t going to tell Feng that. Or that the whole of my employable existence
consisted of trying not to be killed by my clients.

Currently, I run the Fallen Angel Division of the Underworld Detection Agency. Fallen
angels are everywhere, but my clients are few and far in between, I suppose the consensus
on that one being, “If I’m bad enough to get ejected from Heaven, I’m bad enough to
avoid some UDA paperwork.” Not a lot of them come in to register. So, I do a lot of
Internet searches, determining if certain weird news “events” could have been caused
by one of the fallen rather than just your garden-variety sociopath. Sometimes I hit.
Sometimes I get hit. More often I miss.

But that’s beside the point.

“I mean, my job is pretty boring, pretty run of the mill.” It is, if your office fridge
is stocked with blood bags and your bathroom has three normal stalls and one tiny
one with very high walls for pixies.

Pixies are notoriously, dangerously private.

Feng shifted her weight, resting her elbows on her desk. She looked like she was considering
my question, thinking of what she wanted to tell me—and what she didn’t.

There was a moment of stiff, uncomfortable silence and I briefly wondered if Feng
had triggered some sort of silent alarm, if maybe the Anime Army wasn’t strapping
on bubbly pink shields and climbing astride unicorns to come kill me. I only hoped
that Alex would be able to sweet-talk Xian enough to at least get her to leave the
nunchucks behind.

Feng’s eyes sliced back to me, part scrutinizing, part studying. My heartbeat sped
up and I readied myself for the soliloquy where she told me that she was born into
the family legacy of a werewolf hunting and she did it so as not to disappoint her
overbearing father, but she really wanted to be a ballerina or an accountant.

“It’s incredible,” Feng said instead. I watched her lick her lips as if just the very
idea of hunting was delicious. Her eyes were fixed but dreamy, and her shoulders tensed
under her faded black baby tee. She pushed a lock of her glossy black hair over one
shoulder and leaned into me, chin resting on her hands.

“It’s best at night, when the moon is full. There’s this silvery glow over everything
and you just—you just know when they’re near. There’s this deathly quiet first. It
feels like there’s no one alive in the world—it’s just you and it.”

“It?”

“The beast. The dog.” She bit her words off hard and I felt a stripe of terror run
down my spine.

“Go on.”

“You close in on it.” Feng stiffened now, her whole body reacting to her words. “You
step closer and you can hear your own breath. Your heart is—it’s like, thundering
in your ears. You can hear your own blood rushing. And then”—her eyes flashed—“You
hear it.”

I swallowed hard, horrified but rapt.

“Its breathing is hard. Once the dog knows he’s cornered, his fear is everywhere.
You can smell it. It layers your skin; it’s practically—”

“Palpable,” I said with a shaking voice.

Feng nodded her head rapidly, her dark hair bouncing over her shoulders. “You can
almost taste it. Once you get it in your sight—” She slowly cocked her head to the
right, her ear near her shoulder. She closed her left eye, and pantomimed holding
a gun, her right arm pulling back, her left steadying the barrel.

I felt myself leaning closer to Feng, my heart pounding, my eye closing, trying to
get her sight.

“Then boom!” Her voice was so loud and booming I squelched a startled yelp.

“You blow the fucker’s head off. Nothing but brains and fur on the back wall.” Feng
was grinning and splaying her hands, heinous, psychopathic jazz-hand style. She giggled
and bile clawed at the back of my throat.

I thought of Sampson and her words reverberated in my head—
His fear is everywhere . . . brains and fur on the back wall. . . .

And then she
giggled.

My stomach roiled when she looked at me, the grin going all the way up to her eyes.
“It’s the most amazing feeling in the world, man.”

“The killing?” I could barely get the words past my teeth, knowing the hunted, the
“it” she could be looking for was within seven square miles of Feng’s rage, and someone
who was so close to me.

“No,” Feng shrugged. “That’s just a fringe benefit. The real good feeling comes from
knowing that you’re keeping San Francisco safe from another one of those salivating
tree-pee-ers.”

“Really?”

“No.” Feng wagged her head, her grin not faltering at all. “I really like the killing.”

I tried to mirror Feng’s overjoyed grin, but I’m pretty sure mine came out as wildly
uncomfortable as I felt. I shifted in my chair, trying to take the immense weight
off my suddenly full bladder. “At least you enjoy your work,” I managed.

Feng frowned, looking off in the distance again. “Yeah, but, a lot of it is just busy
work now. At least that’s the way it feels. Don’t get me wrong; I like making the
bullets.”

“They’re like art,” I mumbled absently, repeating what I had heard her say, had heard
Dixon say, had heard Will say.

Feng pumped her head, her lips rolling up into an agreeable half smile. “Yeah, they
are. I like doing it—and not just because I know what their final destination is.”
She mimed shooting a gun once more, and once more my stomach threatened to escape
through my mouth.

“It’s just that there’s not a lot to do lately. Not a lot of active duty. We’re pretty
clear. Except . . .”

I leaned forward, the angst and sickness in my stomach flip-flopping to heart-palpitating
anxiety. “Except?”

Feng leaned back, all the spunk and joy going out of her face as a suspicious expression
masked it. “What did you say you wanted again?”

“Um,” I stuttered, digging in my pocket for the silver bullet. “This. This bullet.
It’s yours.”

“Uh-huh.”

I sucked in a shaky breath. “I found it at a crime scene.”

Feng looked at me blankly, her expression giving nothing away.

“At Sutro Point.”

Finally, she nodded. Whether it was in agreement or understanding I couldn’t be sure.
“You were there.” We locked eyes and I straightened, feeling slightly bolstered. “Why
were you there?”

Feng crossed her arms in front of her chest looking relaxed, but guarded. “Same reason
you were there, I suspect.”

“I came with a police detective. We were processing the crime scene.”

She raked a hand through her hair, looking away. “Same here.”

“It was a homicide. Two humans were murdered by another human being.”

Another cocked eyebrow, another hint of that wry smile. “I disagree. Actually, my
sister Xian disagrees.” She leaned over and plucked the bullet from my hand. “And
I don’t shoot just to shoot.”

“So you saw—you saw the perpetrator?”

Feng didn’t answer, didn’t even look at me. She dropped the bullet on the desk and
spun it with a finger. I watched the glistening silver blur as it spun.

“So, you were at the crime scene . . . because Xian sensed something?” Xian was the
tracker, and Feng was the shooter. That much was pretty clear.

Feng looked at me as if alarmed. “How did you know that?”

I felt my mouth drop open, felt the words sticking in my throat. “Uh . . . uh . .
. I just assumed.”

Her eyes flashed as if she was considering my answer. “A werewolf was responsible
for those deaths.”

I swallowed hard. “You think?”

“I know. Xian sensed a new wolf in town and twenty-four hours later, two people are
torn apart. It’s not rocket science, Pippi Longstocking.”

I bristled.

Feng sighed and crossed her arms. “Why exactly did you come here?”

“I know you’re hunting werewolves. I know you know there is a new wolf in the city.”

Feng’s face remained hard, but I could see her façade crack, just a tiny bit. “And?”