Page 43 of Ashes of Sin and Stardust

“No.” I rolled my eyes. “Not now. Maybe after I get the details.”

“When do we do this?”

“I have plastic tubs in the back of my car right now.”

“I’m glad we could chat, Reuben,” Peter said as he sipped his third cocktail.

Peter Woodrow and I sat side by side in the lower level of my bar, and he was drinking some fruity sweet cocktail designed for college students who didn’t like the taste of alcohol but still wanted to get fucked up. He was already starting to get fuzzy, and we hadn’t gotten anywhere yet.

Meanwhile, I was gritting my teeth and clenching my fists to avoid punching him in the mouth. Now that I’d seen what happened between him and Rachel, everything that came out of his mouth sounded sleazy. But I had no choice. I needed to be out with him tonight so he wouldn’t be able to pin the theft on me.

I had knocked on his door that afternoon and offered my hand, asking to take him out to dinner and drinks to “clear the air.” He fell for it, probably because he didn’t remember me shouting at him and hitting him in the ribs because he’d been too intoxicated. I saw Lindsay’s car drive up to his house in my rear-view mirror as I turned out of his neighborhood.

“Tell me about your slave,” I asked. “The one who ran away.”

“My little ghost,” he said softly, swirling his drink. He downed the rest of it, ordered a fourth, and then attacked the cheese fries in front of him.

“Alice was an anomaly,” he continued after a moment. “She was mentally wacked out, so it was hard to tell if she was serious, or if she was testing you. She topped from the bottom all the time. We had rules in place that she asked for, but she broke them regularly. It was exhausting.

“She reached a point where she was so hard to follow, so chaotic and stressed out from losing her job, her friend disappearing, her old Daddy dying... she shut down on me. I did the only thing I knew to do... I gave her a very heavy impact session. She always seemed settled after that. And she did. She slipped into subspace, didn’t drop hard at all after the session, and coasted her way through the next few weeks totally blissed out...

“And then yourfriendfreaked out and decided to punch me in the face,” he said, spitting the word friend as if it were a curse. “Alice ran off, and I haven’t seen her since... I’ve called the police, put out a missing person’s report on her. I worry she’s gotten herself into trouble. She doesn’t do well on her own and it’s been over six months.

“But even the few times she freaked out on me in the past, she always came back,” he said, nodding with conviction. “I believe she’ll come back to me eventually.”

“What other times did she freak out on you?”

“Just a few random times when her disorder got the worst of her. Usually, it was when she felt we were getting closer, more intimate, more emotionally involved. She would push me away, act out, brat worse than normal to get me to leave her, so she would have control over the situation. It’s all about control for her. She’s not really a sub. A bottom and a masochist, but she doesn’t submit. Not really... she’s fun as hell to fuck, though. She loves pain, and she lives to be dominated.”

We talked until I got a text from Lindsay saying all of Alice’s stuff was out of the house and she had all the paperwork from his desk drawer. I dropped him off on his doorstep and drove away before he could realize he’d been robbed.

Lindsay was already in my house when I got home. “Man, that guy is an asshole,” she said. “I feel like I need to take a bleach bath after being in his house.”

“How’d you get through the security system?”

“Bitch please,” she rolled her eyes. She was sitting on the lid of one of the plastic tubs. “I work for one of the most high-tech private military organizations in the world and am wanted for international cyber terrorism, and you’re wondering how I got past your rinky-dink podunk electric locks? I broke into the pentagon last week.For fun.”

I had a feeling that was an exaggeration on her part, but I let it go.

“Thanks for getting that stuff... you pick up on any memories?”

Lindsay shook her head. “Not related to Alice. This must have been left behind at least a few months ago.”

“About six months from what I understand.”

“Yeah, no dice. Energy dies pretty fast. Sorry, Reuben.” She hesitated, then asked, “You want help with the room?” She nodded her head slightly towards the hallway. The third door on the right was still locked, unopened, untouched, like a time capsule I had yet to disturb.

I wanted to tell her that I’d take care of it myself, but I knew I probably wouldn’t. I’d paced up and down the hallway just two days ago, trying to convince myself to clear it out, knowing there would be a new resident in that room one day. And yet... I just couldn’t stand the idea of even opening the door.

“It won’t be as bad as you think,” Lindsay said. “I can block it out for you, if you want.”

Never be ashamed of your emotions.

“No,” I said. If I was going to counsel a kindergartner on facing their fears, I could clean out a bedroom and deal with what came my way.

Lindsay stood behind me as I opened the door. Inside, it was as if she were alive and real, probably sitting by the tv, or playing outside in the garden. Her shoes sat by the foot of the bed, her stuffed AristoCat and octopus nestled on top of white lacy pillows. A white eyelet comforter with lace around the edges was pulled neatly up to the top of the bed. All around the room, taped to the wall, were drawings of birds, butterflies, puppy dogs, and stick figures. There were many drawings of tall dark stick men beside shorter stick girls. The girls wore pink triangle dresses, colorful tiaras, and a collar around the neck, a long leash attached from the collar to the stick man’s hand.

Lindsay inhaled slowly, her eyes seeming to fade out as she looked around the room. She was scanning for energy that she could sense with her strange abilities.

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