Pulse

Chapter 14

I wanted to go home, but I had an order of business to pursue.

I went to the bar first, shoving through people unapologetically to reach the bartender, a wiry guy with glasses who couldn't have been much older than me. He, too, had glitter on him, highlighting his cheekbones and temples. I tapped my knuckles against the bar, which was glass, as a lot of things in this place were.

Glasses glimpsed up at me as he mixed a cocktail, overhead light creating a glare against his spectacles. He yelled over the music, "Can I help you?"

I leaned over the bar to make sure he heard me. "Where's Caprice? Your boss. I need to talk to her."

He stopped mixing, his eyes slimming. Handing off his cocktail mixer to another worker, he eyed me again and then motioned for me to follow him. I did so; he snaked around the bar and into a well-hidden corridor. The lights were dim above our heads, but did their jobs better than the lights in the almost complete darkness of the rest of Caprice's club. The door to the hallway thudded behind us, drowning out the music, thankfully, but not the smell.

In this light, the bartender looked almost ferret-like, beady eyes over a long nose. He also appeared very distrusting. I flipped my hood back to look more genuine. "What do you need with Caprice?" he asked me.

I couldn't help grinning at him. "What are you, her little guard dog?" I chuckled, but Glasses's expression told me this was in no way humorous to him. I coughed to stifle my laugh and reached into my back pocket, producing a business card. It was Caprice's, the one she'd given me the night we met. It was a stroke of luck I'd found it in my desk drawer.

I handed it off to the bartender. "Caprice knows me. She wouldn't have given me her card if she didn't want me to visit, now would she?"

His beady eyes flicked over the card perfunctorily. He dropped it to the ground. "Who the hell are you?"

That was note number one: He could curse. Not an angel, which I'd been expecting. "Just get me Caprice," I ordered again, folding my arms. I was getting kind of tired of this; I hadn't planned to be here all night. "Do you not trust me, or something?"

Glasses scoffed. "Of course not—"

"Nick, go back to work," came a voice that I was pleased and also dismayed to hear.

I looked over the bartender's shoulder, and met Caprice's assertive gaze. I at first didn't recognize her, since she'd cut off her long and luscious black hair, and now had a neat, close-cropped style with a few curls in her dark eyes. Other than that, she looked no different: same elegant gait, same blood red lipstick, same tattooed Bible verse on her right collarbone: The day of death better than the day of birth.

"Mr. Horne," she said in her honeyed voice, striding a few steps forward. Her fitted red dress not only splashed against her bronze skin, but simultaneously showcased her bodacious curves. "How nice to see you again, little one."

I rolled my eyes. "Let's skip the greetings," I said, as Nick realized this had nothing to do with him and scuttled out. Caprice and I now faced each other alone; she was on one side of the hallway, and I on the other. "I just need to ask you something."

She laughed. "I'm your mentor now, is that it?" she taunted, and then her wings sprouted from her shoulders, as alluring and elegant as she. The feathers were matte and dark in the flickering lights above us, rising and then sloping down towards the ground. Caprice cackled again, then surged forward, her wings carrying her quicker than feet ever could.

I was too slow, which angered me. She slammed me to the ground. Kneeling over me, Caprice gripped my neck and grinned into my face. Her smile was not one of kindness. "I'm no one's mentor," she said, squeezing my windpipe tighter to make sure I sputtered, "especially not a mortal's."