“What’s the password?” he says. His voice is a growl.
Password?
“I . . .” I start. I think fast. “My friends are already in here.” I point toward two girls walking past. They’re a few years older than me, wearing short sheer dresses, high shoes. I’m still in jeans and Delia’s sweater. “I think they forgot to . . .”
The guy shakes his head. “No one gets in without a password. I’m going to have to ask you to leave, then.”
But I can’t leave yet. And the idea of someone trying to get me to go makes me brave. You’re the sweetest little honey pie, Delia said once, until someone tells you that you can’t do something.
I clear my throat. “Be careful what you say, now. Tig’s expecting me, and if you stop me I doubt he’ll . . .”
The guy puts his hands on his hips and sets his jaw. And then, suddenly . . . he bursts out laughing, like this is the funniest joke he’s ever heard in his life. “Ah, I’m only messing with you, dolly.” He looks me right in the eye. His pupils are enormous. “It’s the suit, right? Makes me look like I get to make the rules.” He winks and steps aside. “Have a big ol’ blast!”
I feel a flood of relief, because I’m in. And then right behind that, ice-cold fear, because I’m in. I grit my teeth. It’s time to do this.
I make my way forward. I’m the youngest person here. Everyone looks like they’re in costume – colored fishnets on their arms, top hats, jewel-toned tuxedos, tiny glittering dresses. Delia would have loved this place. Maybe she did.
I look out at the rest of the room. It’s all raw open space. There are three enormous white sculptures off to the side – a ten-foot-tall head, a dancer with no arms, two bodies entwined. At the back of the room is an entire wall of windows, looking out over dark buildings and beyond that a cold white moon that looks carved too.
“For me?” a voice says.
I turn. There are two girls standing next to me: one tall and thin with a huge glittery choker, the other shorter, her eyes lined in green. Choker hands Eyeliner a small white pill. Eyeliner raises her perfectly arched eyebrows.
“Yup,” Choker says. “His very finest.”
They place the pills on the tips of their tongues and swallow them dry.
I stare at them, like I want what they have. “Hey, do you know where I can find Tig?”
Eyeliner gives me a puzzled look, then points toward the back corner of the room. A doorway. “Where else would he be?”
I force myself to inhale slowly, to exhale slowly. I pass a couple swaying against each other. I pass three girls laughing.
This is it.
I look through the doorway now; it leads to another room, much smaller than the first. In the center of the room is an enormous old-fashioned sleigh bed covered in pillows. And in the center of the bed is a guy sitting cross-legged, head shaved smooth.
Tig.
A girl with long bleached-white hair climbs on Tig’s lap and presses her lips to his. I step back. He looks up. He pulls away from the kiss.
“Come on in,” he says. His voice is high and breathy. He points at me and curls his finger. I walk forward.
Tig’s face is thin, lit from below by the small stainedglass lamp on the nightstand. He could be any age at all.
He is on the bed stroking the girl’s hair like she’s a cat. His shirt is half unbuttoned, revealing a hard, pale chest. “And how may I help you, pretty girl?”
“I was hoping you could hook me up,” I say. I press my tongue to the roof of my mouth. Fear rises from my stomach.
Tig tips his head to the side. “What are you looking for?”
“Something . . . fun,” I say.
Tig twists his mouth to the side. “I don’t know you. Who are you here with?”
“No one.”
Tig licks his lips and smiles, but his smile doesn’t reach his eyes. “So what the hell are you doing in my house?”
Another wave of fear washes over me. But I hold his gaze.
“I’m here because . . .” Because I want to know if you killed my friend. “Because I heard there was a party.”
“Like fuck, you did.” He shakes his head. “Tell me or get out.”
A jolt of electricity shoots up my spine. I think of Infinity and my promise, I think of my dead best friend and how no one can hurt her anymore. I think of the fact that someone did. I clench my fists. “Delia sent me.”
Tig raises one eyebrow ever so slightly. “Ah-ha, a message from the underworld, then.” He whispers to the girl on his lap. She pulls herself up off the bed, smooths her small white skirt, and heads for the door. When the girl is gone, his smile fades. “Save your bullshit,” he says. “What do you want?”
Maybe Delia’s ghost really is here, because Delia wouldn’t have been scared of this guy for a second, and suddenly neither am I.
“I want to know what she stole from you,” I say. But really, I just want to get him talking.
“So she told you about that, did she?” He clenches his jaw.
“She told me a lot of things.”
“Well then you know a hell of a lot more than me.” Something in the room shifts.
“What did she take from you? And what did you do to try to get it back?”
“Well, well,” Tig says. “Are you here to avenge your poor dead friend?” He purses his lips into a frowny little pout. “How sweet.”
Something inside me bursts. I open my mouth, and then it’s like I can’t stop. “I know where you live, and I know what you do. And if you did something to Delia . . .”
“Are you really threatening me?” His eyes don’t look right. I realize then that he’s on something – lots of things, probably. “That would be an extremely silly thing to do.”
I want to turn and run. I exhale through my nose. “I’m not making a threat,” I say. “I’m stating some facts.”
“Well, then I’ll state some facts too. You shouldn’t be poking other people’s beehives. But you have balls, and I like that in a girl.” He pauses. “So I’ll do you a favor and tell you a little thing about your friend: She was up to some fucked-up stuff that even I wanted no part of, and that is really saying something. But I didn’t do anything to her, if that’s what you’re here to find out. She told me she needed it for protection – that was her excuse.”
It? “Who did she need protection from?”
Tig shrugs and his lips spread into a slow smile. “Based on what happened, I’d say herself.”
He pulls himself up off the bed then, tall and sinewy. He opens the drawer of the nightstand, takes out a pill bottle. He walks toward me, falling, catching himself, falling again. He grabs my wrist. His hand is strong and too hot. He forces something into mine, then lets me go.
“What’s this?” Sitting on my palm is a small white pill.
“A goodie bag,” he says. “Because it’s time for you to leave my party.”
He stands there, hands on narrow hips. And I realize there is nothing left I can do. He’s not going to tell me anything else.
My body still buzzing, I walk back out into the main room.