Chapter Sixteen

The Agent

When we got back on the road, the sun was setting directly ahead. I had to squint and pull my hat lower over my eyes to try and offer some kind of shade against its radiant glow.

Eris sat in the passenger seat, quietly sipping on her cola. The condensation dripped down the bottle and trickled over her fingers, dropping onto her apron in dark water spots.

Over the sound of the tires on asphalt and the wind outside, I kept hearing her voice in my head ask, Do I?

Her words stung more than they should’ve. Given the way I’d conned her, it was natural that she’d be wondering whether anything I’d said at the Dragon was the truth or not.

I wanted to take it all back—make her trust me again. Not just because I wanted to help her survive and get her freedom, but because I wanted to get to know her.

The only problem was that I didn’t know how to make her warm up to me again. Unlike before, I couldn’t turn on the charm. That worked once, but it wouldn’t work a second time. Besides, I didn’t want to. I wanted to return the open honesty she’d always shown me. But how would I even start?

“How far west have you gone? Have you been to California?”

My pulse jumped at her voice, and I resisted the urge to glance over. I flexed my fingers on the wheel. These seemingly simple questions felt significant somehow. Like an olive branch. Or maybe I was interpreting it wrong. Maybe I was being too hopeful.

“Just once. There aren’t many monsters to hunt in California. Smaller cities. Fewer places for crime bosses to really seize control. It’s a beautiful state, though, and the California Redwoods are a sight to behold.”

“What are those?”

“Huge sequoia trees. It’s like the tops of them can touch the sky. I’ve never seen trees that tall or that wide. And there are whole forests of them up and down the hills along the northern coasts.”

I’d ridden, unable to take my eyes off them, through one of the forests with McCarney on horseback, following the trail of a mass killer. The man was a POW from the Spanish–American War who’d escaped the military prison of Alcatraz off the coast of San Francisco. But Eris didn’t need to know all that.

“They sound incredible. It would be just darb to go see them,” Eris said, her voice full of longing and wonder.

“Maybe you can go one day, after all this is over.”

Eris yawned and settled back into her seat. The springs shifted and the leather squeaked, as she said sleepily, “I sure hope so.”

We’d barely gone another mile before the rhythm of her breathing changed into something deep and slow. We hadn’t gone five before her head rolled onto my shoulder.

My heart roared like the engine of a hayburner in the middle of the Brooklyn Bridge, echoing over the waters of the East River.

We drove through the night until I noticed the gas gauge droop to worrisome levels. So I found a gas station and parked to wait for it to open. There was no point in driving further if we were going to run out of gas.

When I cut the engine I would’ve thought that the squealing brakes or the lack of the monotonous sound would’ve awoken Eris, but she slept on. Without driving to concentrate on, I was forced to acknowledge the warmth of her against my side and the smell of her. Back at The Blind Dragon, so much of her scent had been the alcohol and the cigs, and even though she didn’t partake in any of them it still painted her skin like fresh varnish.

But now her unique fragrance filled the car until it was all I could breathe. She was unlike anything I’d smelled before. Better than the sweetest treat from my favorite bakery in DC.

Mentally, I groaned. Troublesome thoughts swirled in my head like thick gasper smoke. The desire to wind my arms around her slim shoulders and pull her to my chest—to protect her—was more than just an impulse. It was a need.

But I didn’t. I kept still and watched the stars, unmoving, in the black night sky.

At some point, I wasn’t sure how much later, she shivered against me. With the utmost care, I leaned to the side, allowing her head and upper torso to fall gently against my chest. From there, I guided her head to rest on my right thigh and slipped my arms out of my jacket. Then I draped the jacket over her sleeping form like a blanket.

Then, like it was the most natural thing in the world, I brushed a piece of hair away from her cheek. I sucked in a breath. Damn. What am I doing?

Stretching my arms across the back of the seat, I returned my attention to the stars. They twinkled back at me mockingly, as if to sing, “You’re such a fool.”

Eris finally woke up when I turned the car engine on after the gas station worker flipped over the Open sign. She pulled up so hard and fast that it was a miracle she missed hitting the steering wheel.

“Where are we?” she said blearily, rubbing her eyes.

“A little outside Cleveland,” I answered, parking next to the first pump.

“Where’s that?”

I got out of the car. “Ohio. About seven hours or so from Chicago.”

She followed me out. “Did you sleep at all?” From her tone I could’ve sworn she was worried about me.

“A few hours. I’m fine.”

“We could rest a little more if you needed—”

“No, we shouldn’t take any chances. Let’s keep moving.”

She nodded, then glanced down, holding out my jacket while her cheeks turned a shade of poppy red. “Thank you for your jacket. It was really…swell of you.”

I moved my hand down my mouth and across my jaw to get rid of any sort of goofy smile. “Keep it. You’ll freeze your mitts off without a real coat.”

With gas in the tank and breakfast in our stomachs, we got on the road once more to head for the Windy City.

Mark Twain once said, “It is hopeless for the occasional visitor to try to keep up with Chicago—she outgrows his prophecies faster than he can make them. She is always a novelty; for she is never the Chicago you saw when you passed through the last time.”

I understood his words deeply. Chicago was always changing—it was a twisting menagerie of art, culture, murder, politics, business, crime, and, above all, monsters. It felt like I was here every other month chasing down a freshly made beast dripping blood on the pavement—not to mention a fancy new skyscraper climbing its way toward the heavens as if to touch God Himself.

If He was even up there.

Driving into Chicago, Eris became much more subdued. The last few hours we’d been talking, which felt…precious. Our conversations hadn’t been about anything too significant, but then, that’s what made them so important. She told me about when her bartender, Stanley, took her to see a Red Sox game. He spent the whole time explaining to her the rules of baseball and while she barely understood them, she recalled it as one of the best times of her life.

She asked me about my favorite cities and what kind of food I’d tried in New York. She asked about Broadway shows like Show Boat and Don Juan and jazz bands. She even wanted to know about our nation’s capital and the Lincoln Memorial, only seven years old but already promising to be one of the most famous.

For a girl who seemed to spend most of her days in a dim speakeasy, she was incredibly knowledgeable. I could almost see her, picking up newspapers left by patrons at closing time, and reading for hours on end about a world just outside that nondescript door.

“Everything is so big,” Eris whispered into the corner of the window, craning her neck to view the latest skyscraper going up.

Indeed it all was. The so-called “giants” of the city made sure of it, enlisting famously brilliant architects and drafting great plans, determined to not only meet their former glory before the Great Fire of 1871 but far surpass it. And they’d done it.

Keeping my gaze on the road, I maneuvered us through the hellish traffic. The jalopies and hayburners, men on horseback and people in carriages, newsies dodging in between bumpers, waving their papers.

“So where is this friend of yours?” Eris asked, her gaze on a passing streetcar with red paint and gilded gold trim.

“A drum in the heart of downtown.”

Eris blew out a breath. “Of course. A speakeasy. Why couldn’t they be a curator in a museum?”

I laughed. “Actually, this specific monster would make a good historian.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You’ll see.” I tried to make it sound teasing because I didn’t want to scare her unnecessarily. She had plenty of reason to be scared already.

Eris folded her arms and wrinkled her nose. “Fine, so what now? The drum won’t be open till dusk.”

It was then that I swerved the car into a space that another had just vacated, angering three other cars behind me that likely wanted the same spot. “We need to get you something else to wear.”

“What’s wrong with what I’m wearing?” she asked, glancing down at her uniform. “It’s rather comfortable.”

“Eris, you can’t wear a maid’s uniform to a speakeasy.”

She huffed and rolled her eyes but followed me out of the car anyway. With the manticore’s briefcase in hand, I fell into step beside her and we headed down Third Avenue.

Queen Vicky’s was a high-end, high-society, high-price, high-everything boutique that had been in Chicago for at least two generations.

I could’ve taken Eris to a new fancy department store—like Sears or Macy’s—to get her a new dress, but I needed to talk to the tailor. He had old familial connections to one of the head gangsters in East Chicago, and I figured that if anyone in this city would know what BKH stood for, it would be him.

As we entered the high-ceiling boutique, Eris inhaled sharply.

It was impressive.

The floors were marble imported from Italy, all white and gray and light blue swirls in a sea of soft cream. Moldings lined the corners in extravagant patterns like that from ancient Greece. A crystal chandelier hung in the middle, lit up with bright yellow electricity. Dresses and suits hung on silver racks while a few strategically placed and posed mannequins stood on elevated daises sporting the latest and greatest fashions.

“Colt Clemmons, as I live and breathe,” a low, smoky voice said from the back of the store. A thin older woman with string upon string of oyster fruit around her neck and bobbed silver hair emerged from beyond the silk curtain hanging in the back of the store. Belva Murdeena once told me she received that curtain from a sheikh in Arabia who claimed to be in love with her. A bunch of phonus balonus, but Belva Murdeena sold extravagance and embellishment, so it naturally flowed from her like spilled glass bottles on milk day.

I carved a smile onto my face and took off my hat, drawing it to my chest with a slight bend at my waist. “Belva, you look a vision as always.”

Belva moved toward us, her dress flowing around her thin frame and the tassels brushing against her calves. “Always,” she agreed with a smile on her red lips. Then she slid her painted eyes over to Eris, looking at her from head to toe.

“And who is this unfortunate creature? Your latest squeeze?” She tsked as she plucked at Eris’s uniform with long fingernails. “If you were going to pick up the help you could’ve at least gotten one from the Ritz Carlton. Plenty of girls there looking to join your wild, adventurous lifestyle.”

I’d only met Belva once when I’d been shadowing Sawyer, but apparently I’d made an impression on her. How would Sawyer handle this? He’d probably schmooze her up. I didn’t like the idea, but I needed her husband’s help.

Sometimes the ends justify the means. Another lesson from McCarney.

Unable to stop myself, I glanced down at Eris once more. She was looking at Belva with curiosity as if the shop owner was indeed an artifact in a museum. “She’s not joining anything, Belva. She’s just a friend in need of your help. Besides, you’re the only dame for me,” I said, flashing her a white smile.

Belva threw her head back, exposing her wrinkled, swan-like neck. “Oh, Colt. I would believe that if you could both stop gazing at each other like a couple of lovesick fools.”

Eris stiffened, dropping my arm.

Dammit. Clearing my throat, I stepped away from Eris. “Belva—”

“Not another word of your so-called flirting, you handsome devil, your friend and I have quite a bit of work to do.” She grabbed Eris by the shoulders and drew her toward the side of the shop with flapper dresses covered in sequins and sparkles. As they walked, Belva glanced over her shoulder. “Now, do be a dear and go after what you really came for. Gus is in the back.”

Astute woman.

Eris threw me a shaky smile as she was steered away. After returning her smile, I ducked behind the Arabian sheikh’s curtains and followed the sound of a sewing machine.

Gus Murdeena was the second son of one of Chicago’s oldest crime families. They came from Dublin, wanting to make their American fortune, and found it in tailoring and safe-cracking.

Gus was hunched over a sewing machine when I walked into the back room, moving a strip of fabric steadily under the rapid needle, cheaters on and large nose so close that it was in danger of being sewn into the dress.

At my steps, he looked up. His eyes narrowed. “Colt Clemmons,” he grumbled.

Unlike his wife, Gus was a practical man with…simpler tastes. He didn’t care for my “wild, adventurous lifestyle” and he detested the monster trade. In fact, it was when his brother started using monsters as trigger men that Gus began his role as a BOI informant.

“That fool McCarney still using a boy to run his dirty errands?” Gus shook his head and turned off the machine, leaning back in his chair to rub his eyes.

At nineteen, I was hardly a boy. To be honest, I’d stopped being one the moment I woke up a monster on the BOI’s operating table.

“I’m not working with the BOI on this one, Gus.”

He blinked his watery blue eyes and frowned, running a hand over his thinning hair. “You know I don’t approve of what they did to you, lad. But you need their protection. You’ve still got—”

“There’s someone else who needs protection more than me. Someone is after this girl—she’s a monster. Made one about eight years ago and she doesn’t remember much. Not the name, nor the face of her creator. I figured the only way to keep her safe is to find this creator. At the very least, I need to know who we’re running from.”

Gus stared at me through his thick lenses for a long time before he blew out a harsh breath. “So what do you need from me?”

“I’ve got to get in to see Gin tonight. Do you think you can arrange it?”

Gus folded his arms and scowled. “Short notice, but I can make a few calls. Mind you, I can only get you through the door. You’ll have to do the rest.”

“That’s all I’ll need.”

Gus grunted and returned to his sewing machine, inspecting the stitches he’d just made and their tiny perfect lines. “So why are you still here?” he asked.

I crossed over to his sewing table and set the briefcase next to the half-made dress.

“What’s this?” he asked, pulling the briefcase toward him.

“The gold letters on the side: BKH. Ring any bells?”

Gus squinted at it for a good thirty seconds before he shook his head. “Can’t say that it does. But if it’s from New York, that’s probably why. Where’d you get this?”

“Pulled it off a manticore after us.”

Gus cocked a brow. “A manticore, eh? Nasty piece of work.”

“Not for me,” I said. It was meant to be honest, not arrogant. A manticore’s poison, like so many other magical monster ailments, didn’t affect me. I’d…gone through a lot to ensure that.

“You mark my words, young hunter,” Gus said, leaning over his work and pointing to me. “You’ll be in a ring with a monster that you can’t knock down one day. And it will be too late. Then I’ll be standing over your cold corpse, saying I told you so.”

“Thanks, Gus, I love our little talks.”

He waved me out of his back room. “I’ve got calls to make. Go buy something.”

Four hours later, I was still waiting on Eris. In that time, I’d used Gus’s quarters to bathe and change into a new suit that Gus himself had tailored. Hidden in one of the suit pockets was a slip of paper with the password for the speakeasy I’d need for tonight. Using a government-issued lighter I carried but rarely used, I burned the paper and brushed the ashes off my hands.

The clock on the shop’s wall read half past ten when I heard sounds from the stairs behind the side door that led to the Murdeenas’ apartments.

“Well come on, child.” Belva clicked her tongue, summoning her like she would a pet poodle.

I stood, straightening my suit, about to tell Belva she’d cost us precious time, when Eris emerged from the darkened stairs into the boutique’s light, and all words died on my tongue.

Eris’s auburn hair had been washed and styled into finger waves and bunched and pinned below her ears and around her neck. Tucked into the folds of her curls was a simple yet elegant feather hairpin and her makeup was light, accentuating her blue eyes and painting her lips in a subtle pink hue. Her flapper dress was a soft cream, closer to white than peach, and it sparkled and shimmered at the slightest movement.

As I’d been waiting I couldn’t help but wonder what kind of dress Belva would choose for Eris. I’d imagined the usual fashion—dark, rich colors, like plum or emerald, maybe even a solid slinky black, since that seemed to be popular among young flappers. But I should’ve known better. Belva was legendary for finding the right attire for anyone—and it involved her seeing beyond the limitations of things like past and present fashions.

She’d looked within Eris.

And what she found was an angel.