CHAPTER
8
D ee was busy trying to think of ways she
could ditch Ric. Not that she didn’t appreciate his trying to help,
but she didn’t need a babysitter and she wasn’t in the mood to
share a cab to Rory’s hotel so that Ric could complain about her
needing a place of her own. She had one, she just never went there.
She always meant to but then something came up and by the time she
got around to heading home, it was just easier to head to the hotel
or Bobby Ray’s place.
Thinking she had a good excuse, Dee
began to lie but stopped when she saw it. It sat in its own little
spot, all by itself, freshly washed and detailed by the staff kept
down here, Dee was betting. But worth it, she had to admit. So
worth it. Because if there was one thing Dee didn’t believe in
scrimping on, it was an automobile. And good Lord, but Ulrich Van
Holtz had the best automobiles.
Now, it was true, she leaned toward
American muscle. Cars from the sixties and seventies that, with the
right engine, could hit speeds that would have troopers on her ass
for days. But unlike her cousins, Dee had no problem with small
foreign cars that just reeked of speed and sex. And that was the
one thing she really liked about Van Holtz. The man knew how to
pick his cars. Most of the time, they weren’t even on the market
yet in the States. Instead, he had them shipped over from Italy,
Germany, and Asia.
Today he’d gone for a Mercedes-Benz so
new that it wasn’t even on the market in Europe yet. She knew
because she’d read the article about its upcoming European release
in one of Sissy Mae’s magazines.
While Ric tried to force his hockey
bag into that tiny trunk, Dee dragged her fingers over the rear
fender and moved around the vehicle to the passenger
door.
How Ric managed to get the American
version of a German car not yet available in Germany, Dee didn’t
know. She didn’t ask. To be honest, she didn’t care. Because the
mystery made it even sexier.
“You like?” he asked. “Just picked it
up.”
“Nice.”
He grinned and unlocked the doors by
remote. Dee slid into the leather seat and her entire body tingled
from the contact. Now this was luxury. These Manhattan females with
their obsession for shoes and bags and designer clothes that were
out of style a nanosecond after they were sold could keep all their
fancy crap. Instead, Dee would take this, thank you very much.
Dee buckled her seatbelt and, without
thinking, gave Ric the address of the apartment she never went to.
In fact, she was so busy touching and admiring the man’s car that
she didn’t even know they were moving until they stopped in front
of her building.
“This is where you live?”
Busy opening and closing the glove
box, Dee snapped her head up, quickly taking in her surroundings
and the scum that were eyeing Ric’s car—and probably Ric—from the
various alleys and dark corners of the neighborhood.
What had she been thinking? Why didn’t
she tell him to take her to the hotel? Especially since her
apartment had no damn furniture in it! And to be honest, the whole
street was nothing but a gangland horror show, filled with junkies,
pimps, and murderers. A place where Dee-Ann could get information
when she needed it without worrying about asking nicely or that the
cops would show up should things get ugly. Although one could hear
sirens going off all night long, cops and emergency personnel
rarely came to this part
of town until the sun came up and any bodies lying on the ground
could be clearly seen.
Scrambling to get Ric out of here, Dee
said, “Well, thanks and—”
“I’ll walk up with you.”
“No!” Dee cleared her throat. “What I
mean to say is . . . not necessary. Besides, you can’t leave your
car here anyway.”
“I can’t leave my car here, but I’m
supposed to leave you
here? And that makes sense because . . .”
Stubborn. As stubborn as a mule. Even
worse, Ric’s technique was to keep questioning her until he either
wore her down or the entire street descended on them in a mass
attack.
No, what Dee needed to do was get this
over with quickly.
“Come on then,” she snapped and got
out of the car.
She stood on the street and glared
down one end of the block to the other. She saw bodies step back
into the darkness, not wanting to be seen by her. No one wanted to
be seen by Dee. She didn’t know why specifically, but she didn’t
mind. Not around here.
Together they quickly walked up the
stairs of the building, Dee finding herself more and more
embarrassed as they stepped over trash and filth and a couple of
piles that were breathing and smelled like ninety-proof liquor.
Trying to be rich or look like she was rich was not something
Dee-Ann ever thought about. Normally, what people thought of her or
how they saw her, didn’t matter much. But, for the first time that
she could remember, Dee was embarrassed. Terribly embarrassed that
Ulrich Van Holtz of the mighty Van Holtz Pack was seeing a
Smith—any Smith—living like this.
Lord, she hoped her momma never found
out about this. That She-wolf would have a fit! Where Dee-Ann and
her daddy usually couldn’t care less what people thought, they did
care an awful lot what Darla Lewis thought.
Finally at her door, Dee quickly
unlocked it. “Thanks,” she said and stepped inside. She turned to
close the door behind her but Van Holtz had already walked in.
Normally as polite as any Southerner Dee had grown up with, Van
Holtz would never do such a thing. But when it came to Dee-Ann, he
seemed to be less about polite and more about getting his own damn
way.
“Oh, Dee-Ann.”
She could hear the horror in his voice
and she forced herself not to cringe. “Look, I ain’t got time to
put in fancy furniture and clean up. It’s not like I’ve had much
time these last few months.”
“Dee-Ann, a couple of crates does not
true furniture make.” He hit the switch for the lights—lights that
didn’t come on. “Is the Group not paying you enough?”
Dee cringed. This was getting worse by
the second. “Of course, they are. You are. I just haven’t been back
here for a while and I haven’t had time to set up the apartment
bills to be automatically paid online. It’s not a big deal. I’ll
take care of it tomorrow.”
“It’s roasting in here. The middle of
summer. No electricity, no AC. You’ll overheat.”
“I’ll pant.”
“You’ll be like a dog locked in some
idiot’s car.” He took several steps farther in. “And you’re still
living out of your bags?” He faced her, his eyes naturally
reflecting the light coming from a streetlamp outside her apartment
window, which had no curtains or blinds. “How long have you had
this place?”
Months, but she wasn’t about to admit
that. “It’ll be fine.”
She walked past him to her window. Her
eyes narrowed and she opened the window, leaned out, and gave one
of her vicious snarling-barks at the males circling around Van
Holtz’s car. They took off running and Dee turned around to find
Ric . . . cleaning her floor?
“What in hell are you
doin’?”
“You’re not staying here. I am not
letting you stay here.”
He wasn’t cleaning her floor, he was
shoving the few clothes she had here back into her duffle bag. Dee
rolled her eyes in an attempt to hide her mortification at this
current situation.
“That’s real sweet of you, Ric,”
although she had to work hard not to sound bitter, “but I don’t
need you to . . . what are you looking at?”
Still crouched on the floor next to
her bag, he was staring off in a dark corner near her barely used
closet. Standing, he walked over, spun around, and came right back,
picking up her duffle bag.
“We’re out of here.”
“What is it?”
“Vermin. You have vermin.” He looked
at her duffle bag, flung it to the floor. “I’ll buy you new
clothes.”
“Darlin’, this is New York City.
There’s vermin everywhere. They were just circling your
car.”
“I’m not talking human vermin,
Dee-Ann. I can handle human vermin. This kind of vermin . . . I can’t
handle.”
Surprised a wolf would openly act so
freaked out about a goddamn rat, Dee-Ann walked over to her closet
to show Van Holtz how a Smith handled a little ol’ vermin
problem.
Ric stood by the door, foot tapping
impatiently, his entire body coiled and ready to make a crazed
sprint out the window and to the safety of the unsafe street below.
But, as much as he might want to, he would never leave Dee-Ann
alone to face that . . . that thing she had living in her
closet.
It was a known fact around the world
that there were two things the Van Holtzes hated universally,
whether it was the American Van Holtzes, the German, the
Italian—whatever. And those universally hated things? Roaches and
rats, the bane of any
restaurant’s existence.
For the Van Holtz Pack the hatred went
far deeper than that. It wasn’t unexpected that one of their
restaurants would be shut down for weeks if there was
any sign of vermin. Even
the health department’s more scummy inspectors, willing to take a
payoff to overlook things, didn’t bother to try to elicit bribes
from any Van Holtz. What was the point when the whole group reacted
to any sign of mold, fungus, or vermin with an intense violence
rivaled only by actual house cats? In fact, a few Van Holtzes,
including Ric, were known to hire feline line cooks
just so they could deal
with any rodent problems. But there could be no playing with the vermin, as some felines
liked to do—especially those mountain lions and leopards—they were
there to kill, kill, kill. One of Ric’s favorite grill men was an
Ecuadorian cheetah who went after vermin with an almost psychotic
glee. When he finally left the restaurant to run his own
kitchen—Ric cried a little.
Sighing dramatically, Dee ambled
across the room to see the horror that lay in wait. He knew what
she was going to do. Or what she’d try to do—show Ric what a big
wuss he was being. Well, let her
try, he thought, seconds before she fled back to his
side, panting, eyes wide in fear.
“It hissed at me,” she said, her voice
a tad higher than he’d ever heard it before.
“Let’s get out of here.”
“Are rats supposed to
hiss?”
“It’s not a farm rat, Dee. It’s a
Manhattan rat.”
“It’s the size of my cousin’s
dog!”
“And has a nest it’s protecting, so I
suggest we just get the hell—”
It came skidding out into the middle
of the room, all long and ripped like it had been on steroids for
years. It hissed at the pair again, beady eyes red and pulsating
with rage. And, going on instinct alone rather than rational
thought, the two wolves made a crazed run for it, right out the
door and into the hall, Ric slamming the door shut behind them.
They stood with their backs against it, their shoulders pressed
together, both of them panting, even shaking a little.
On the other side, that thing slammed
its entire body against the wood, small claws viciously digging.
The pair jumped and Dee, the She-wolf who had faced the meanest
predators in this country and others, grabbed Ric’s hand and yanked
him away and down the stairs, jumping over trash and drunks until
they reached his car, which he was glad to see was still
there.
He unlocked the doors with his remote
and yanked the driver’s side door open. That’s when Ric looked up,
sensing they were being watched. He’d give anything to see some
terrifying human standing there, maybe with a high-powered rifle,
ready to shoot them both dead. But it wasn’t some terrifying
human.
“Dee . . .”
Slowly, Dee looked over her shoulder
and up. The rat—a female with babes to protect—stood on the sill of
that open window, glaring down at them with those beady rat eyes.
Then it hissed again, showing a mouthful of fangs.
They both scrambled into the
car.
“Go!” Dee yelled. “Go, go,
go!”
He did, starting the car, and tearing
out of that spot, grateful that the German car gods had created his
car so that it went from zero to sixty in six seconds
flat.
Ric didn’t stop driving until he was
forced to by traffic and a red light several blocks
away.
Still panting, he gripped the wheel.
“You’re never going back there,” he told her, unconcerned that he
was ordering her around about her personal life, a line he rarely
ever crossed with anyone. Yet he simply didn’t care. “That rat and her family
own that apartment now.
We’ll find you something else. Something nicer.”
Dropping back against the seat, Dee
nodded and said, “Okay.” And left it at that.
The light changed and Ric headed back
to his place, where there was furniture, electricity, and
absolutely, unequivocally, no
vermin.