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  Her nails awakened my shadow quickly. I grabbed her wrist tightly, making a breath of air escape her. I placed her hand back on the steering wheel.

  “Don’t you worry,” I replied, “You’ll get more than a little bit tonight.”

  She grinned.

  We pulled up to the club valet and exited the vehicle. Caro tossed her keys at the valet attendant and strode to the door as if she was making a red carpet appearance. A line wrapped around the wall of the club, strangers standing outside waiting for their chance to get into the warm air and enjoy their night. This was a relatively high-end club for such an undeserving crowd to be so eager to attempt to get in. The majority of them would never see the inside of these doors. The owner was selective about his clients and knew they required their privacy. However, word spreads about a selective, high-end establishment, and everyone wants to take their chances that they might get chosen. They’d like to pretend to partake in the glamorous life, or what they thought was the glamorous life.

  As we walked up, the front men parted like the Red Sea. They knew not to question Caro by now, not to mention the owner of this establishment happened to be Franklin, and they knew we were likely on business.

  “Carolina,” one said with a slight bow. Caro walked by without acknowledgment.

  This particular club was an unusual combination of class and sleaze. It was elegant inside, fancy bars, top shelf liquor only, velvet, and crystal chandeliers, like one might be attending a ball of some sort, but the clientele were rich douche bags, wanting to act out their sins in a safe place. Needless to say, we fit in well. There was no loud music, or DJ playing the latest mix of whatever hip hop song was popular. There was simply a jazz band entertaining with a low hum of relaxing yet upbeat music. Smoke clouds lifted over various tables as people smoked cigarettes, cigars, or joints. Caro grabbed my hand and guided me to the bar. She placed her purse on the counter, raised her hand slightly above the counter, and a bartender quickly came over.

  “Yes, ma’am,” said the bartender with a douchey grin, “What can I get for you?”

  He was a tall, muscular, Hispanic guy with a fade, his facial hair trimmed into a perfect line. His teeth shone with bad intentions in a flawless row of pearly whites. I hung back as Caro got our order.

  “I’ll have a Mexican Martini, and she’ll have,” she glanced back at me, “a Whiskey and Coke.”

  “You got it, sexy,” he said.

  “Excuse me?” Caro said with a halt, “What did you just say to me?”

  “I said whatever you want, sexy,” he said with another smile.

  Caro looked over her right shoulder, then her left. “Oh, sweetheart, I know you’re not talking to me,” Caro replied with a seductive smile.

  “Oh, yes, ma’am, I am,” said the bartender, attempting to reach for Caro’s hand.

  “Do you know who I am?” she said, retaining the same sweet composure, while simultaneously retracting her hand from his reach.

  “No, but I’d like to,” he said, seemingly under the impression that he was making headway with Caro. I snickered to myself on the sidelines.

  “Yeah?” Caro said with a beckoning finger.

  “Hell yeah,” he responded, leaning in.

  “Mother fucker, I’m that one you don’t ask about, the one you don’t know, the one you never saw,” she whispered to him, then suddenly shouted across the bar, “Can someone else get me a fuckin’ drink?”

  I laughed as three more bartenders strode over quickly, realizing the situation, expressing their apologies, and relieving the other bartender of his duties. He had a look of bewilderment as they sent him away from the scene. Caro took up her drink and turned to me as I cast a look of amusement in her direction.

  “What?” she asked, “He’s gonna learn some goddamn manners today.”

  “Caro, you never cease to entertain me,” I said with a smile.

  “Fucking men,” she replied, taking a swig of her drink. She handed me my drink and outstretched her hand in expectance of mine, “I’ll show you entertainment.”

  I took the drink and her hand, as she led me to the nearly vacant dance floor. She positioned us in the middle and put her arms up around my shoulder while her drink remained in hand. She said nothing as she leaned against my shoulder. I swayed back and forth gently, and reached my free hand up to her bare shoulder, running my hand across her skin from her neck just below her ear to her shoulder blade, enjoying how soft her flesh was under my touch. She reached with both hands and grabbed my face, the condensation from her drink dripping down my cheek. She surveyed me with her eyes. She found no awkwardness in communicating with me without words. I allowed her to search me deeply; I knew she would never find what she was looking for in me.

  “Out of all the people in this world, Dani, you’re the only one who never lied to me. Not once. Even before you knew my flaw, you always told me the truth.”

  I looked around the room, absorbing Caro’s words as I tried to stay on task. I saw our objective scale across the sidelines of the dance floor with a young lady in tow.

  “Caro, he’s here,” I said, as I nodded in his direction. Caro threw her head back in an overt fashion to view him.

  “Well, well, let me get my camera,” she said.

  “Here,” I said, pulling mine out of my jacket pocket and sliding it into her hand, “Do you have an angle?”

  She positioned it on my shoulder and I listened to the clicks as she took several pictures. We tried to be discreet because, although Franklin owned the place. If his clientele knew they were being surveyed by Franklin’s people, well, he’d have no clientele. This is where they came to be without the need to hide.

  “He’s going up to VIP,” Caro said, handing me her drink, “That’s where we’ll get the pictures we’re looking for.”

  She walked past me, towards the stairs to the VIP. I stood in the middle of the dance floor, holding two drinks, alone. I quickly made my way back to the bar, downed the rest of her drink, and continued sipping my own. I sat with my back facing the bar, and watched the stairs intently awaiting her return.

  “Excuse me,” came a voice from behind me with a small tap. Not wanting to avert my attention, I reluctantly turned around. It was the bartender from before. I raised my eyebrows to him.

  “Yes?”

  “Hi, yes, ma’am, I just wanted to say that I am so sorry for what I said earlier to Carolina,” he started, abandoning the swagger from before, and attempting to convey ultimate sincerity, “Please tell her that I didn’t mean any disrespect, I didn’t know who she was.”

  I began to say something when I felt a grip reach around my arm and pull me away from the bar.

  “We’re leaving,” came Caro’s voice in my ear. She quickly led me to the door by the arm.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked, knowing there had been a hitch.

  “Nothing, we’re going to have a good night,” she said, waving at the valet, handing her ticket to the assistant.

  “Are you sure everything’s okay?” I asked, knowing something was off.

  “Hey, I got you something,” she said, opening her purse a little to reveal a champagne bottle, cork un-popped. I looked up immediately, as my face grew stone cold serious.

  “Caro—” I began.

  “Oh, look, the car’s here,” she said.

  “What did you do, Caro—” I started once more, then did a double take to the car that had pulled up, a black Ferrari convertible. The valet jumped out of the car and handed the keys to Caro. She dangled them in front of me.

  “You ready?” she asked.

  “Hell. . . Yes,” I replied with my mouth open.

  A commotion erupted behind us as a man came stumbling out of the entrance, still trying to fix his appearance.

  “Get back here, you fucking bitch!” the man shouted in Caro’s direction.

  “Time to go, Dani, now, now, now,” she said as she slid into the passenger side, and locked the door. I ran around the front of the car to the driver’s side and jerked on the door handle. The man began rushing over. The door was locked, of course, Caro laughed at my attempt to open it. I jumped over the driver’s side door and thrust the keys into the ignition. The engine ignited on command and I slammed the gas petal.

  Speeding through the streets, attempting to get to the highway, I looked over at Caro in the passenger seat. She had her arm outstretched towards the sky and sunglasses concealing her face, but the sunglasses could not mask her delight. I entered the on ramp at a cool 85 miles per hour. There was little traffic but still a few scattered cars in various lanes.

  “Faster,” said Caro, lifting her hand above the windshield line.

  95 miles per hour.

  “Faster, Dani,” she said.

  105 Miles per hour.

  “Whoaaaaaaaaa!” she yelled at the wind as it swept by.

  115 Miles per hour, 125, 130, 140. Cars whipped by and removed themselves from our path as quickly as possible.

  Approaching 145 miles per hour, I took the car back down to a relatively reasonable speed and exited. I drove up to the city outlook with its gorgeous display of stars and skyline, then parked the car and unbuckled my seat belt.

  “Caro, we would have looked really stupid if this car was a stick shift,” I said with a false seriousness.

  “Yeah,” she said, pinching her fingers together, “maybe just a little.”

  She unbuckled her seat belt and grabbed the champagne bottle out of her purse. She popped the cork through the open roof, and carbonation dripped onto the upholstery.

  “Whoa!” she cheered. She took a drink, then passed the bottle to me, and I followed suit. I passed the bottle back to her and she began to exit the veh
icle.

  I followed. She leaned back against the hood of the car.

  “Franklin’s going to be pissed,” I said, walking towards the front of the car.

  As I was rounding it, a sensation started to run through me. It was as if my limbs had begun to take on weight. I dropped to my knees as my ears began to ring with a distant clamor of voices. I felt the pulse of blood throughout my body. Everything slowly began to fade into blackness, then quickly returned to clarity. I regained my stability, shook my head, and slowly rose to my feet.

  “That felt weird,” I said, reaching Caro.

  “Are you okay?” she asked.

  “Yeah, I’m fine,” I said, grabbing my chest, “I just I feel weird.”

  “Weird like how?” she inquired more intently.

  “Like. . . vulnerable,” I said with a precise word.

  “Wow, the impervious feeling vulnerable. This truly is an epic night. You really need to understand your flaw more, Dani. You let it have too much control.”

  “I don’t think I do.”

  “That’s a joke right? It completely runs your life, Dani. All you do is put Band-Aids on it to try to maintain it. You should see when you sleep, it’s terrifying. It’s like three different people live in you.”

  “Is that why you never stay the night?” I ask with a grin.

  “Maybe,” she retorted with a seductive smile. She grabbed me and pushed me against the hood of the car, “Can we play that game?”

  I nodded my head, and Caro retreated to her purse. She came back brandishing a black tactical knife with a black four-inch blade.

  “New knife?” I asked.

  She nodded and shoved me further back on the hood of the car. I moved up the hood until only my feet dangled off the front end. Caro crawled up onto the hood and straddled me. She licked her lips with excitement. Her correlation between sexual desire and the need to inflict pain was uncanny. She enjoyed this game. She told me once that it made her feel like she had the power taken from her a long time ago. Sometimes she was tamer than others, sometimes it was a blood bath.

  “Here,” she said, grabbing the champagne bottle again and pouring it directly into my mouth. It began to foam and run down the sides of my chin. She ran her hand across my mouth, wiping away the excess as she took another swig before placing the bottle on the hood.

  She unbuttoned my shirt, revealing my stomach and chest, then ran her nails across it lightly to build anticipation, making small traces with the knife on my torso. She moved the knife up to my neck, watching everything she was doing but avoiding eye contact with me. I knew the things she expressed had nothing to do with me personally.

  She traced a line across my neck with minimal pressure, a possessed smile on her face. She gripped my right shoulder with her left hand and drew the knife down just below where my left ribcage ended. She made a slit, not too deep but not shallow. My body tensed at this action. She duplicated her action on the right side, deeper this time. I could tell she was going to advance to the finale quickly. She gripped my shirt and shoulder, and pulled me up close to her. She placed the knife at my throat again.

  “You are nothing,” she whispered in a low voice to herself. Her arm tensed as she prepared to make her move. I winced in anticipation, but there was a delay.

  “Dani . . .” she said, beginning to crawl off of me.

  “What?”

  “Dani, you’re not healing,” she said in a panicked tone. She began running her hand across the wound, blood quickly began to run down my sides toward the back of my shirt, “What’s going on, what did I do wrong?”

  “Nothing,” I replied calmly. I slid off the front of the car and moved my shirt to the sides. Blood continued to run in little streams down them. Although the cuts were not too deep, blood flowed continuously. I supposed a few stiches might have sufficed.

  “Do you need to see a doctor?” she asked. I could tell guilt was setting in.

  “Caro, I’m fine. I’ll just clean it up—” I began, but was interrupted by ensuing sirens and red and blue flashing lights.

  “Ah, shit!” Caro exclaimed, “Well, that was fast.”

  I quickly grabbed the knife out of Caro’s hand and tossed it over the edge of the outlook. I then grabbed the champagne bottle and dropped it to the ground making it shatter against the pavement.

  “Dani, I told you that was new!”

  “We’ve got bigger problems right now.”

  “We could totally outrun them.”

  “Outrun them? Are you crazy? Just sit on the hood and have your hands visible,” I said over the noise of the sirens. Caro begrudgingly did as I said, “I’ll talk.”

  Four cops walked up on us, two on each side of the car.

  “Lantis Police, let me see your hands!” One commanded.

  Both of us casually lifted our hands up and out.

  They rounded to the front of the car so they were facing us. One, who had his gun drawn, foolishly holstered it.

  “Evening, ladies,” the first officer said. He was a man in his late forties, with a brown goatee just starting to gray. He had an age to his face that made me think he must be a heavy drinker, smoker, or both, or perhaps it was the job.

  “Evening,” we replied quietly.

  “Holy shit!” the man exclaimed, and one of the other officers once again removed his gun from his holster, “What the hell happened to you?”

  “I just cut myself a little on the glass,” I said, moving a piece of the bottle with my foot. Another officer shined his flashlight at the ground where the glass was shattered.

  “Is that right? Cause that doesn’t look like you cut yourself a little,” he said, as he glanced over at Caro, “Maybe you had an altercation of some sort?”

  “Nope,” I said.

  “I’m not so sure I believe that,” he replied.

  “She just fuckin told you –” Caro started.

  “Hey, I’m not talking to you,” the officer replied, sticking his hand towards Caro’s face to silence her.

  She smacked his hand out of her face. Dammit, Caro. An officer immediately grabbed Caro and threw her into the hood of the car.

  “What the fuck! You fucking pig!” Caro shouted. The officer held her against the hood and attempted to put cuffs on her to detain her, “Get your mother fucking hands off me!”

  “Ma’am, you cannot hit an officer,” he said, as the other officer continued to detain her. She resisted.

  “Dani, do something!” Caro yelled.

  “I suggest you disregard her for a moment,” the officer said to me.

  I tried, but listening to Caro struggle in discomfort captivated my mind. I knew the position she was in triggered her. I attempted to awaken my shadow, which oddly laid dormant at a favorable opportunity. I called out to it in my mind, I played reels of angering memories to awaken it, but it was nowhere to be seen.

  An officer stepped forward and whispered, “They work for Franklin.”

  The words were barely audible, but I knew what this officer was implying.

  “And?” said the officer that was doing the questioning, “They may, but I sure as hell don’t. Not like every other asshole in this department,” he said and turned to face me, “Now, let’s go over this again.”

  I heard the officer lift Caro off the hood and slam her back down into it. I lunged toward him and shoved him hard.

  “Hey, chill the fuck out!” I shouted. He lost his footing and stumbled to the ground. Immediately I was placed in the same position as Caro with four cops restraining us.

  Needless to say, we were read our rights and arrested. They attempted to question us once more after we were detained. Neither one of us had anything to say at that point. On the way to the station, Caro was practically silent. She said only one thing to me.

  “Why wasn’t your shadow able to stop them, Dani?”

  As I thought on the question, the answer began to crawl up from my past and manifest in my mind:

  Mortal Nights.

  Chapter Four

  Lawless

  We spent a mere six hours in the clink before we received notice that bail had been posted on our behalf. We trudged out of the holding cell, not anticipating a warm welcome from Franklin. He would, undoubtedly, be furious that one, we got arrested; two, our target could ID us; and three, it happened in his establishment. We collected our belongings and headed through the doors to freedom. Franklin was nowhere to be found, to our relief. Punishment delayed. However, when we exited the building and headed down a small flight of stairs towards the road, a man stood at the end of them.