Bloodshot - Cherie Priest [68]
Then I fired off one more quick email, in case he was still online—and in order to feel like I’d gotten the last word in.
Major,
You sure know how to reassure a girl, don’t you? But I’m hard to scare. So count me in. And hey, D.C.? I’m actually headed that way next weekend. Me and some friends are crashing town for a convention. Maybe if I can prove I know my shit, you’ll invite me to tour the facilities or whatever.
Anyway, I know that neighborhood. I’ll check out your mystery building and report back within twenty-four hours.
~Abigail
The line about the convention might come back to haunt me, but I was willing to bet it wouldn’t. It’s Washington, D.C., and I defy you to find a single weekend wherein not one single convention is being held there. For all he knew, I was scooting into the District for a Star Trek event or a gun enthusiast show. I just hoped he wouldn’t call me on it.
I wanted to dwell on this, to fester over it and try to paste together some psychic defense against it, but it was coming up on nine o’clock at night.
This meant it was still entirely too early to check out the Poppycock Review (a name I loved, by the way) … or so I’d assumed, until I managed to convince myself otherwise. The night may be too young for me to show up as a customer, but the time was damn near perfect if I wanted to get in and out in a sneakier fashion without battling the disco-darlings and their tribe.
Who was I kidding? I was bored, and out of ideas, and only trying to justify getting out of the condo when I was almost too frightened to do so. A little fresh air would help calm me down. Probably.
I skipped the MARTA and drove myself back down toward the deJesus residence, then took a handful of turns that led me deeper into the frat-boy-and-bachlorette-party-plagued blocks where the bitch-techno blared and the locals complained about all the slumming straights. The pure agony of finding a place to park made me almost reconsider my loathing of the public transportation system, but eventually I found a narrow slot in which to leave my vehicle. I had to bash the bumper of an SUV to squeeze into the nook, but I didn’t exactly shed a tear over the event and no, I didn’t leave a note. That’s what they get for parking too close to a fire hydrant, with one wheel on the curb. An asshole who leaves his (or her) vehicle in such a fashion deserves whatever automotive detailing inconvenience comes his (or her) way.
(I do have auto insurance, believe it or not. Over the years I’ve stolen the identities of a few people—none of my victims, that’s too close for comfort, but I’ve got paper trails leading back to tombstones here and there. My insurance is listed under one of those identities, and it all looks legit. But that doesn’t mean I jump at the chance to hand it out.)
The Poppycock Review was a two-story building that somehow managed to look short and squat, regardless of its peaked red-and-white roof. The wall that faced the main street was painted 1983 Prince-Purple, and the side wall where the front door was located was bright yellow, with giant rhinestone sparklies rimming the door frame like salt on a margarita glass. Curtains were artfully draped, covering the window and obscuring the interior view. These curtains were rainbow-themed, with gold and silver threading giving them a touch of added shimmer.
Here’s to truth in advertising.
But all its aggressively bad trappings aside, the Review looked like an aging hooker—tarted up real pretty, but starting to break down beneath the cosmetics. The windowsills had all been painted over recently, but that didn’t hide the fact that they were warped and splitting with age, and the glass in the window was clean but scratched all to hell. I got it. The place had seen better days, and this wasn’t the top-of-the-line destination it might’ve been thirty years ago.
But if the warm-up music inside was any indication, the joint was still ready to hop. I heard a house-style remix of something