The Downside Ghosts Series Books 1-3: Unholy Ghosts, Unholy Magic, City of Ghosts

“Not Boil,” she said. “Doyle. A guy I work with. He’s … I think he’s one of them. One of the guys who did the ritual at Chester, who made the amulet. And I found out what it’s for, too. It’s … they’ve summoned a Dreamthief. A really powerful ghost—he’s like a ghost made of parts of other ghosts, if you know what I mean. Not a basic entity, a complex one. Very strong. Very unpleasant.”

“He the reason you in my tunnels last night?”

Her mouth fell open. “I …”

“Ain’t no fears, just askin. Big Shog tell me he saw you, trying to get out. So how you get in, if you ain’t know how to find the out?”

Shit. He didn’t look mad, but then how the hell would she know how he looked when he was mad? She couldn’t trust the bland curiosity on his face any more than she could trust anything else about him, which—although his behavior so far had at least eased her fears—wasn’t much. “What happened to my clothes?”

“My sister take them off, put you in bed. What you doing in the tunnels, when you say you ain’t like the underground?” He still looked curious, nothing more than that, but he would have been stupid not to be concerned and Chess knew it. She was working for Bump. As far as Lex knew, she was planning to double-cross him over the airport. She wasn’t stupid enough to try it—he could obviously reach her just about anywhere, although not while people were out and about—but he’d be an idiot if he hadn’t considered the possibility.

That he hadn’t shown any interest at all in the thief didn’t surprise her. That was her problem, not his. The tunnels … those were his problem, and she needed to be careful.

“I got chased,” she admitted finally. “I was at the Church doing research and somebody came after me. Do you know who the Lamaru are?”

“Heard of em, aye. They in this?”

“Yeah. I think they’re behind it all. I mean, I don’t think, I know. They chased me down to the platform—the train to the City—and I escaped through a tunnel there.”

He nodded, his gaze appraising. Did he know those bodies were down there? Did he know she’d walked past them to get into “his” tunnels?

“Mighty resourceful, aye.” His weight barely shifted the mattress. “You know, some of them tunnels ain’t been explored in years. You could have gotten yourself mighty lost. Lost enough to never be found.”

She swallowed. Her throat still felt gummy.

“Fact is, they say some folks have. Got lost, meaning. Saying they go down for some explorations, finally end up killing theyselves rather than starve. Maybe them bodies still down there, what you say?”

“I didn’t see any.” It came out as a creaky whisper. She licked her lips and tried again. “Just rats and mold.”

“Aye? Benefit. Seeing something like dead bodies down there be mighty freaked, I imagine.” He reached out and brushed her hair back from her face with warm fingers. “Whyn’t you shower up, tulip, get feeling better.”

The hot water stung her face and her palm, but it felt great. Too bad it couldn’t do anything to help the turmoil in her head.

Terrible. Oh, shit. She was going to have to face him today, to go see Bump and Old-timer Ed—or was it Old-timer Earl?—with him. For a minute she entertained the glorious notion that he might not want anything more to do with her, but she couldn’t be so lucky. Bump wanted this done, no matter how much of an ass she’d made of herself the night before, and Terrible worked for Bump.

Should she apologize to him? But how? Did she even want to?

Apologizing would mean having to explain to him that it had been the drugs talking when she said she wanted to go home with him, wanted to share his bed. Just a side effect, and that was all. In the cold light of morning the inferno that had raged in her blood the night before seemed … precipitous. She squirmed uncomfortably under the heavy spray.

He was Terrible, for fuck’s sake. Scary and ugly and cold. She couldn’t want him. She couldn’t even think about wanting him, it was crazy.

Maybe it would be better just to let it go. It had happened, it had not gone further. What was the point of going further? He didn’t really want her, either. His reaction to her, the stony expression on his face, told her that.

There was a reason she preferred one-night stands, and this illustrated it perfectly.

But how could she apologize without admitting any of that? No. Best to pretend she didn’t remember it, any of it. Spare them both an embarrassing scene.

And as for Lex … were his questions about what she’d seen in the tunnels a threat? Or was it genuine concern, or even a way of removing himself from responsibility for the dead men she’d seen. A subtle message that she shouldn’t think he was a murderer, which was rather amusing because of course he was, and she’d have known that even if she hadn’t watched him stab a man through the throat in her kitchen. So was Terrible, so was Bump, so was Lex’s boss Slobag—although come to think of it, she still didn’t know exactly what Lex did for Slobag. Given that Slobag was reputedly at least as bloodthirsty as Bump, if not more, though …

In the entire Downside she’d probably have a hard time finding more than a handful of people who’d never sent another soul to the City before its time. It was certainly a group to which she no longer belonged, not after the break-in and the syringe full of lubricant.

She switched off the water and dried herself. The only clothes she had were her pan ties and the Dead Kennedys shirt she’d been put to bed in, which she assumed belonged to Lex and slipped back over her head now with the feeling that she was acquiescing to something by doing so.

Her face in the mirror almost made her scream. Her nose and left eye looked mottled and swollen, like someone else’s features superimposed on her face. The pain had lessened some with the pills and the shower, but it was still there, a constant reminder of her confrontation with Doyle. As if she needed one.

She brushed her teeth, applied deodorant and moisturizer, and opened the bathroom door. “Hey, Lex, where are my clothes, anyway?”

He was sitting on the end of the bed, leaning back on his hands so his long, wiry torso curved beneath his shirt. “Having them washed. Might be ready soon.”

“So … what, I’m stuck here until they’re ready?”

“Methinks my jeans may be some big on you, aye?”

“How long?”

“Half an hour, hour maybe. How you think we fill that time?” His eyebrows raised, his gaze focused on her bare thighs beneath the hem of his T-shirt. Chess looked back at him, her expression just as frank.

He wasn’t really a nice person, but again, neither was anyone else she knew. He’d kidnapped and taunted her. But he’d also helped, the night he killed that Lamaru in her apartment and, somehow more important, the night he’d driven out to the Morton house to retrieve her Hand for her.

She didn’t care much about him, but she liked him well enough and he was certainly sexy and appealing. He wasn’t—well, he wasn’t anyone she imagined she could ever be serious about, and that was a good thing. If she’d felt anything real for him, any real trust or affection, if she’d had any sense they could have an actual future together, she wouldn’t even be able to consider letting him have what he so obviously wanted. But what connection there was between them was based on nothing more than mutual attraction and mutual semi trust, and she wouldn’t have any regrets if she never saw him again after everything was finished. Which made him pretty close to perfect for the time being.

And in the last couple of days she’d almost been killed too many times to count, and there was a very good chance she would actually die in the days to come. So why not?

“I don’t know,” she said. “Got anything in mind?”

“Aye.” He sat up and leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “Whyn’t you show me that ink?”

Chapter Twenty-five (#ulink_528cd163-3dcc-5ad7-bf2d-10fdbad409c3)

“Once a person has begun to break the laws, they will continue unless punishment is received so their souls may be cleansed. For this reason it is important to watch your neighbors and your friends as well as your family, in order to protect them from damning themselves …”

—Families and Truth, a Church pamphlet by Elder Barrett

Her breath caught in her chest as she stepped forward, her feet cool on the smooth floor. About a foot away she stopped and lifted the edge of the shirt to her waist.

“Aw, I ain’t see it that well. Awful small, aye? Come closer.”

She took another step.

“Closer.”

Now she was close enough that his face was hidden. All she could see were the thick black spikes of his hair.

His fingers slipped under the top edge of her pan ties and pulled them down far enough to reveal the whole tattoo, the black-and-red tulip she’d gotten when she turned eighteen and entered the Debunker training program.

“Mighty pretty, tulip,” he said. His breath caressed her skin. “Why’s it for?”

She shrugged. “Just for fun.”