OF COURSE THE point in making a dramatic exit is not to be seen again. And to not look back.
That's the whole point of pride, too, and why it's a sin.
I walked into the kitchen. Not one laggard was left. They'd all faced and passed the night's surprise bogeyman with a lot less drama than I had-I, the founding mother of this exclusive club.
In fact, I hadn't passed him at all.
Nor had any of them approached me or slipped a billet-doux into my sweating palm to offer a tip on Lilith. I'd forgotten all about her until I tangled with Snow. And the groupie murder? I'd been too surprised by the hoopla to think about that, either, although I now had all their freshest email addies.
Evening score: Snow, 10; Delilah, 0.
The kitchen smelled of cola and punch rinsed down the stainless steel sink. The rear exit was an industrial-strength door with a push bar and bold sign, warning: EXIT ONLY.
I hadn't brought my messenger bag, just jammed my car keys into my low-rise jeans pocket. They were always a pain to worm out...
I eased the door wide with my back, bracing my feet to hold it open. Once out, I couldn't get back in. The story of my life in Las Vegas, in reverse.
While one hand was jammed alongside my right hip dueling jagged steel key edges, the big door slammed shut, ramming me in the rear. I hopped outside just in time to avoid crushing.
Nobody was outside to have pushed it. Not even the wind.
Attar of Rose's lime juice and older, uglier scents helped me spot a Dumpster tilting against the building's back concrete block wall like a grounded garbage scow.
Only a faint pink-gold glow made it back here from the front parking lot lights, giving the Dumpster the odd illusion it was outlined in mercurochrome neon.
That's Las Vegas, city of illusions and delusions.
I'd have to hike around the whole unappetizing rear area to get to Dolly up front, if I ever got her keys out. That's what I get for buying tight jeans to wear to Los Lobos werewolf disco someday with visions of Ric jamming his hands down my back pockets during the slow dances.
I didn't know which felt tighter, my jeans or my conscience, and I wore the same insecure mules as when the Bela Lugosi CinSim Dracula had hijacked me from the Enchanted Cottage. Then I noticed that one edge of the luridly lit rusted Dumpster was accessorized with a leaning human figure.
Quicksilver's loss came back with a double stab of regret. In Las Vegas these days seeing a "human figure" is no guarantee of anything. I could use a partner with serious nose and fangs right now.
Oooh-eee, Delilah, Irma joined in with gusto. You've managed to maroon yourself in dead-end limbo with who knows what. Maybe you'd have been better off in the front parking lot, down on your knees applying first aid to that Snow character's bare back with your tongue.
That's disgusting! Shut your mouth! I told her.
Irma had been getting on my nerves lately and I didn't need any help in that department.
I dug deeper for the keys, their spiky prongs my only weapon besides my wits, which had been AWOL lately. A shiver along my spine told me the still-hidden silver familiar was expanding its reach to act as either defensive or offensive weapon. I couldn't tell whether it was ashamed of me too, or just being sneaky.
I scuffed forward. Retreat in this city is certain death.
"Can I help you with anything?" I asked.
The likeliest suspect here was a wino hunting dregs in the tossed liquor bottles.
"You can help me with everything," a husky voice answered.
Wrong answer. It was too knowing, too challenging to be a stranger's voice.
"Did you send the message that you'd located someone I'm interesting in finding?" I asked. Was some anonymous groupie going Deep Throat on Lilith?
"Maybe. Depends on the message you got."
Why did I think a simple evening run to a Strip shopping center to meet rock-star groupies didn't require the presence of Ric, or the marines?
I cleared my throat. "I was after information on a murder of a Cocaine groupie at the Inferno. I don't suppose you'd know anything?"
"I know everything," the hoarse voice answered.
I bet. It sounded honed on sandpaper, neither male nor female, human nor unhuman.
The figure was slumped so close to the Dumpster side I couldn't tell if it stood on two legs or three, in shoes or boots, on cloven hooves or big, shaggy paws. The head was a spiky mystery that could be too much drugstore gel or demon spines. Today's street punks often resembled arcane night terrors of hundreds of years ago.
And why was my armed duty belt locked in Dolly's truck? Was it because I didn't want to scare the Snow groupies? Or did I just not want to look "hippy" in a former Weight Watchers venue? Or was I just sexist enough to think that a bunch of women weren't dangerous?
Could I actually be hoping that Snow was still hanging around to taunt me further?
You gotta resolve that bipolar thing you got going, Irma suggested throatily.
"I know," I snapped aloud at Irma.
"You know who I am and why I'm here?" the figure growled back. "I don't think so, Delilah the Dog Slayer."
How did-? Never mind, it was exactly the right thing to make me wince and lower my guard. "Who are you?"
"You'd never guess in a thousand years, and certainly haven't in twenty-four."
"So you know how old I am. So what? It's public record."
"I'm not."
A scrape of leather sole on back-alley grit warned that the figure had stepped away from the Dumpster and toward me.
The stiletto of light that edged the hulking metal caught the stranger in its glare, cutting a foot-wide swath across a death-pale cheek down to the black-leather-booted calf opposite me. I recognized the footwear.
Mine.
Studying the opposite figure, I recognized pieces of my height, hair, build.
"The late, great Lilith, I presume," I managed to spit out past the rapid hip-hop rhythm of my heart. "I'd heard you might be here tonight. Why show in person only now?"
"You were getting too close."
"And the Dumpster? How could you be sure I'd exit through the rear?"
Even as I asked the question, I wished I'd been wearing Lilith's version of my ass-kicking motorcycle boots to use them on my own rear. Snow. He'd been stationed at the front to drive me out the back.
Was I really that predictable? More important, did Snow work for Lilith or vice versa? I waited for Irma to chime in with theories and further critiques, but she kept mum.
"The Dumpster," Lilith answered slowly, like a Big Sister spelling it all out to the middle-grader, "is 'our place.' It's where everyone else thinks I am you and you know I'm not."
"Did Snow grab that security tape showing you in my clothes clobbering his groupie to protect you?"