Black Rain, page 17
“A little while ago. Are you sure you don’t want to hear some of what I dictated today? It’s really good.”
Jesus Christ. I should’ve stayed in Infernum.
“Okay, fine, Haedemus. I’ll listen to some of it.”
Haedemus stared at me in amazement. “You will?”
“I said so, didn’t I? Now let’s go before I change my mind.”
“I love you, Ethan. Thank you!”
Haedemus bolted on ahead to the barn and had everything set up when I got there. “Prepare yourself,” he announced. “Prepare to be dazzled and blown away by how awesome this is. You ready?”
Nope, not really.
“Yeah, sure.”
“You don’t seem too enthusiastic, Ethan.”
“Jesus, Haedemus, just fucking play the whatever will ya?”
“Okay, okay, here we go…”
My name is Nebuchadnezzar Nightingale III, esteemed demon-slaying detective extraordinaire and acclaimed author of highly anticipated memoirs. My comrade in arms, the meekly capable, Drake, or as I've affectionately dubbed him, 'Little Stumbly,' trailed in my majestic wake. On any given day, he was as graceful as a three-legged ox, which is to say, he consistently provided a reliable source of entertainment.
We found ourselves in the domicile of the recently demised Father O'Malley, a god-fearing man by trade, and now, by all appearances, a demon-fearing man in death. Tragic irony at its finest.
As we began our meticulous investigation, I made it a point to explain every minute detail to Little Stumbly, his confused and bewildered face almost as satisfying as the case itself. The room smelled faintly of brimstone and burned cinnamon—quite indicative of a demon's presence, and an amateur one at that.
"You see, Stumbly," I began, delicately sniffing the air and swirling the wisps of sulfuric residue with my magnificent, obsidian horn. "Our culprit is sloppy, leaving traces like this. It's akin to signing one's name at the scene."
Little Stumbly tried to contribute, reaching out to pick up a charred rosary with his clumsy, sausage-like fingers. "Uh, boss, do you think this—"
"Shush, Stumbly," I cut him off. "The grown-ups are speaking." His crestfallen expression was pitiful, but ultimately heartwarming. It's important to remember one's place, after all.
Pacing grandly around the room, I, Nebuchadnezzar Nightingale III, made a show of analyzing the crime scene, deducing with the finesse of a seasoned professional. I found the observations of my sidekick to be as pertinent as a unicorn's horn in a haystack. Quite the sight, but of little relevance in the grand scheme.
As I continued my tour de force around the room, Little Stumbly once again made an attempt to engage in detective work. Bless his simple, earnest soul. He gestured at a circle of ash on the carpet and a cryptic symbol etched on the wall.
"Boss, isn't this—"
"Stumbly!" I said with a dramatic sigh. "Why must you interrupt my train of thought with such trivialities?"
He looked hurt. "I thought—"
"No, my dear Stumbly," I said, gently steering him away from the offending sights. "Thinking is my domain. You merely tag along and learn from my endless fount of wisdom."
I returned to my analysis, albeit somewhat hindered by Stumbly's constant underfoot presence. I considered the unfortunate Father O'Malley, laying there as though peacefully at rest. The perfect picture of serenity, if not for the incongruous addition of the terrified expression frozen on his face.
I was on the cusp of a major revelation, my intellectual prowess poised to crack the case wide open, when Stumbly once again tried to direct my attention toward the strange markings and the ash. His naive eagerness was endearing, but his relentless interruptions were testing even my saintly patience. It seemed Little Stumbly needed another lesson in respecting the brilliance of Nebuchadnezzar Nightingale III.
"Someday, you will understand, Stumbly," I said, patting his head with a benevolent hoof. "Until then, stick to note-taking. It suits your skill level." He nodded, suitably chastised, and I basked in the glow of my own magnanimity.
What a rewarding experience, nurturing the investigative talents of my understudy. A glorious day in the illustrious career of Nebuchadnezzar Nightingale III, a day that would undoubtedly go down in the annals of detective lore, and would no doubt contribute greatly to my upcoming memoirs.
“So, what did you think?”
I could only stare back at Haedemus as he waited excitedly on my considered opinion of his ‘novel.’ It was awful, needless to say. “It was… very good, Haedemus.”
“Oh my god, you really think so?”
“Yeah, very… entertaining.”
“This is great!” Haedemus spun around for a second like an excited dog. “I’m so glad you liked it, Ethan. I mean, I knew you would, obviously, but I’m just glad to hear you say it. And don’t worry, I won’t be using your name in the final version.”
“That’s good to hear.” I turned to leave, half shaking my head on the way out.
“Ethan?”
What now?
“Yes, Haedemus?”
“That girl seemed kind of strange when she got here.”
“Strange?”
“Yes, stranger than she was even last night. She seemed… shaken.”
“In what way?”
He shook his head. “I don’t know, it’s hard to explain. Go see for yourself.”
“All right. Thanks, buddy.”
Exiting the barn, I got curious over Luna's apparently strange behavior. In my trailer, I poured a generous quantity of whiskey into a glass. Cradling the liquor in my grip, I navigated my way to Kendra's trailer, the rhythm of my strides matching the swirling liquid in my hand. Upon reaching the trailer's door, I rapped my knuckles against the cool metal.
Kendra greeted me at the entrance, her features etched with a certain severity, suggestive of a profound discussion with her sister. "Drake, hey," she voiced, an undertone of seriousness clinging to her words. "Come in."
As I stepped into the trailer, Luna's imposing figure came into view, sprawled on the worn-out leather couch. Yet, there was nothing lax about her posture. Her spine was straight, every muscle coiled like a spring under the thin layer of her skin-tight suit. Her gaze, sharp as an eagle's, roved the room with practiced ease, absorbing every minute detail. It seemed like a sigh or a twitch from anyone could set her off in an instant.
Her hands seemed restless, fingers drumming a silent rhythm on the armrest, hinting at the underlying tension. Luna's whole being thrummed with an energy that was hard to ignore. It was like watching a sleek panther in the wild, ready to pounce at the slightest sign of danger.
In her presence, the air in the trailer seemed to tighten, to grow thicker with a sense of imminent action. Her unwavering alertness was contagious, and despite myself, I felt a ripple of unease. But then, I doubted Luna had ever been one for making people comfortable. After all, she was Giordano's most trusted assassin, honed to perfection for one purpose alone—to eliminate any threat with brutal efficiency.
“Luna,” I said, acknowledging her presence with a nod.
“Drake,” she returned, her eyes boring into me, unreadable except for the glint of hardened steel that lurked within their icy depths. The weight of her gaze was nearly palpable, a tangible reminder of the danger she posed. Her lips, often pressed into a stoic line, curved slightly in a semblance of a smile. This wasn't a gesture of warmth or friendliness, rather a silent acknowledgement of the shared peril we were about to venture into.
I turned my attention to Kendra. “What’s going on?”
“It’s Giordano,” Kendra said, cutting to the chase as I drank from my whiskey glass. “He suspects something’s up.”
“What do you mean? How?”
“He knows I lied to him about last night,” Luna cut in, her voice sharp and frosty, bearing the precision of a winter's night. “Giordano didn’t get to where he is by being stupid. When so many of his men disappear, he wants to know why. And when his most trusted assassin fails to take down the two responsible, he wants to know why that was.”
“What did you tell him?” I asked her.
“That you both escaped.”
“He knows who I am?”
Luna nodded. “He knows you.”
“Tell him what happened,” Kendra said.
“Do I have to?” Luna stared at her older sister. “I fail to see how it’s relevant to anything.”
“Let me be the judge of that,” I said, drawing a look of mild contempt from Luna. For whatever reason, she didn’t appear to like me very much. Perhaps because of what I did at the motel, or maybe because of the tattoo serpent that bit her. Either way, she appeared to hold little regard for me.
“Fine,” Luna said, turning her head away for a moment. “Vito used his powers on me. He knows me too well. I’ve never been in the habit of lying to him, so I guess you could say I’m not very good at it. He knew something was up.”
She paused, as if she didn’t want to talk about had happened, but Kendra gave her a look that spurred her on.
“Reality warped around me. I’d seen Vito do the same thing to others before, but never to me. A wave of fear washed over me. It was as though Vito had flipped a switch inside me, unleashing a flood of my deepest, darkest fears. The room we were in was suddenly filled with shadows, manifestations of my own insecurities. Figures of my past failures, distorted and monstrous, leered at me from every corner. I saw Kendra, lying cold and lifeless, her accusing eyes boring into me…” She trailed off, shaking her head. “Then I felt these waves of terror that threatened to shatter my sanity. Every breath was a struggle. I could hear Giordano's cruel laughter. The room spun, the fear was overwhelming, until all I knew was the abyss of dread that Vito had submerged me into. He left me there for hours. It was the worst thing I’ve ever experienced,” she admitted almost reluctantly.
“Tell Drake what Giordano said,” Kendra said, her voice saturated with the weight of the situation. Her hands clenched the fabric of her jeans as she focused on Luna, a strand of hair hanging over her forehead as she leaned forward in anticipation.
“He said he had worked out who Kendra really was,” Luna began, her voice betraying a hint of anxiety. Her fingers twitched on her lap, a subtle sign of her internal turmoil. Her gaze strayed for a moment, lost in thought. “Which contradicted everything he’d told me about what happened to my family. He always said my sister had been killed by the people who killed my parents.”
“By him,” Kendra interjected, her voice sharper, adding a punch to her words. Her features tightened, highlighting the scars of her past battles etched on her face.
“Yes,” Luna agreed, her head bobbing slowly, as if she was physically grappling with the reality of her words. “He didn’t seem surprised at all that Kendra had survived, and now she was back to take her revenge. He seemed glad, in fact, like it was all a game to him. A game he knew he would win. Vito told me I had forty-eight hours to grab Kendra—and you, Drake—and bring you both to him. If I didn’t, he said he would make me suffer in ways I couldn’t imagine… for the rest of my life.” Her eyes, normally as cold and calculating as a sniper's scope, glazed over, her mind clearly a million miles away in a memory. “I believed him.”
Amidst the tension, I found myself reaching for a cigarette, the small action a necessary moment of reprieve. With a flick, the tiny flame illuminated the anxious creases on my face as I leaned back on the couch, giving Luna the space she seemed to need. “This might not be a bad thing,” I offered, hoping to steer the conversation toward something more productive.
“What do you mean?” Kendra asked.
“It might be our way in to Giordano’s sanctum.” My words hung in the air, a proposal dangling between us.
“You’re crazy if you think you’ll just walk in there and kill him,” Luna said, her voice taking on a harsh edge. She leaned forward, her stern gaze meeting mine. “You have no idea how powerful he is. No one does.”
“He must have weaknesses we can exploit,” I argued.
“If he has, I’ve never seen them.” Her tone was flat, hopeless, further fueling the tension in the room. “And he rarely leaves his sanctum.”
“So what are we going to do?” Kendra's voice was tinged with desperation. “We have to do something or Luna will suffer, and I think my sister has suffered enough.” A fragile smile flickered across Kendra's face as she locked eyes with Luna, her hand reaching out to lay gently on Luna's. Luna's response was a faint echo of her sister's smile, her icy exterior cracking ever so slightly, hinting at a vulnerability she rarely allowed to surface.
“I’ll think of something,” I said, putting my cigarette out and finishing the rest of my drink before turning to Luna. “In the meantime, has Giordano ever mentioned someone named Theron?”
“The vampire, you mean?”
Luna's answer made my eyebrows shoot up in surprise. “Yes. What did he say about him?”
“Only that he knows this Theron guy is making plays against the lower-level gangs, and that he expects Theron to come at him too at some point.”
“Is he worried?”
Luna shook her head. “No, he isn’t.”
“I have it on good authority that Theron is moving against Giordano,” I said, a hint of urgency creeping into my voice. “I don’t know when, but soon.”
“I’m not letting some fucking vampire kill Giordano,” Kendra said, her hands balling into fists as she glared defiantly at me. “I want to kill him myself.”
Luna turned her gaze to Kendra, her eyes widening slightly as if seeing her sister in a new light. “You have no idea what you’re saying. After everything I’ve told you about him, you still want to go after him?”
“Look at what he did to us, Luna,” Kendra retorted, her voice rising with her anger. She stood up abruptly. “He destroyed our family! Our fucking lives!”
“What do you want to do, Luna?” I asked. My question hung in the air as the room plunged into a heavy silence. Luna's eyes flicked between Kendra and me, and for a moment, I saw a flash of something in her eyes that wasn't there before—confusion, uncertainty, maybe even fear.
“Honestly, I wish I could just kill you both right now and be done with it,” Luna said, her words slicing through the tense silence like a blade.
The shock of her words was palpable. Kendra and I exchanged a glance before turning back to Luna. “You don’t mean that, Luna,” Kendra whispered, her voice choked with emotion.
“Don’t I?” Luna rose to her feet, her voice stone cold and her expression reverting back to the one I first met—a ruthless killer. I could almost see her hand twitch toward the place her gun usually rested. “You may not believe it, but my life was simple before you came along, Kendra. I had a purpose, and I was content. Now, you’ve blown all that to pieces.”
“What are you saying, Luna?” Kendra asked, her voice wavering. “That you want to stay with Giordano? That you want to remain his fucking lapdog? The man who killed our parents?”
The tension in the room skyrocketed, the air growing thick and charged with the energy of their confrontation. Luna was silent, her eyes dark and unreadable as she studied Kendra, then me, and back to Kendra. Her silence said more than her words ever could—she was at war with herself.
She appeared almost fragile in that moment, torn between the loyalty that had defined her existence and the blood ties she had long since believed severed. "My world… my purpose… it's not as black and white as you make it out to be," she said, the cold edge of her voice wavering slightly, revealing another hint of vulnerability.
“Listen,” I said, now standing between her and Kendra. “I have some idea of where you’re coming from. Not too long ago I belonged to an organization that I once believed in. The company gave me purpose, strength. It defined who I was until I realized the company didn’t give a shit about me. I was just a tool to them, and when I questioned my purpose and the company’s nefarious motivations, they turned on me. All I wanted was to live a live of integrity, to make the world a slightly better place, not help an evil, power-mad man become even more powerful.”
“So what did you do?” Luna asked.
“I walked,” I said. “But the man I worked for wouldn’t stand for it, so he had my wife and daughter killed.”
“Jesus, Drake,” Kendra said. “I’m sorry.”
I shook my head, the dull lighting of the trailer casting long shadows over my face as the words fell from my lips. “Not as sorry as I was.” The memory of loss, of pain, was a bitter aftertaste. I drew in a breath, my gaze growing distant as I looked beyond the confines of the trailer, to a past filled with darkness and deceit. “Anyway, the head of that company, a man not too dissimilar to Giordano, kept coming after me. In the end, the only way to stop him was to kill him. He almost ended the world before I finally got to him. I ripped his black heart right out of his fucking chest, and then it was over. I was finally free.”
My declaration hung in the air, the harsh reality of my history settling around us. Luna stared at me, her face a whirlwind of emotions. Her eyes held a depth of understanding, the storms of her own past reflected in the turbulence within them. “So you think I should rip Giordano’s heart out?”
“Not literally,” I said. “The point is, abusers make their victims think they're powerless, that they owe something to their tormentors. But you owe Giordano nothing, Luna. He used you, manipulated you. His power over you is not a sign of his strength, but of his cowardice. You’re not his pawn. You have your own strength, your own mind. Remember that."
Before Luna could respond, Kendra interjected, her voice soft and filled with an earnest plea. “We can still have the life we were supposed to have, Luna,” she said. “It’s not too late.”
There was a hardened edge to Luna’s voice as she responded. “But I’m not that person anymore,” she insisted. “I’m not that little girl from back then. That girl died. So did you, Kendra.”
“That might be true,” Kendra replied, moving closer to her sister. Her steps were gentle, her body language non-threatening as she reached out and clasped both Luna’s hands within her own. “But we can still make different lives for ourselves. It’s what Mum and Dad would’ve wanted.”
