Chapter 8 The Sunset Arms

I fired up the Desoto and tuned in Sports Talk on the radio. A Cherago demon had finally broken Hank Aaron's record. I expect they'd have a hard time fitting 600 pounds of demon on a Wheaties box. Doubt he'd sell much cereal, either. Demons. They're everywhere nowadays.

I figured I'd better point my car toward the Sunset Arms and see just what Anyanka was hinting at earlier.

Anyanka's apartment was a pricey piece of real estate located on the northern edge of the demon enclave: kind of Deco-looking, made of white painted brick and miles of curving windows. She was living in high style. It sure was a long way from what I expected. I guess curses are good business. A uniformed doorman waved me toward a bank of elevators done up in overblown baroque style. I rode up to the third floor and tried not to look at myself in the polished mirrors in the hallway. I looked like I'd been dragged over a barroom table backwards and forwards.

She opened the door wearing nothing but a black kimono and a pair of feathery mules. Embroidered sIlver dragons slithered down the front and wrapped themselves around her lush curves. Her red laquered fingernails stroked my cheek and she motioned me inside with a wave of her long black cigarette holder. I could hear piano music in a minor key playing softly somewhere in her luxurious apartment. She was an opium eater's dream.

I didn't think you were going to show, she said. Anyanka handed me a drink, but I sat it down untouched. I needed a clear head to deal with this tasty treat.

She snuggled back into a nest of silky pillows on the plush couch and looked me over again carelessly. I got tired of it.

What's going on with Giles and his wife?

You're a straight-forward man. I like that. She licked her full red lips and leaned back, relaxing into the cushions.

You're a vengeance demon. Talk fast if you're going to.

She raised her painted eyebrows and took a deep drag from her cigarette. Her eyes twinkled with mischief and a soupcon of something else. She blew the smoke into my face with a smile.

Mr. Harris, you're a very rude man. I don't like that. Maybe you've heard what happens to rude men?

I heard.

She smiled maliciously and I wisely refrained from any more idle chit-chat.

I'm saving my vengeance for someone special, she laughed, Ripper Giles.

She was working for him, but she wanted to destroy him? I was shook, but she kept on talking as though I'd never interrupted her.

She's got a little white house at the end of Revello Drive that belonged to her family. And by the way, her name is Buffy. She hates the name Anne. Also, you need to lose the tail.

I looked behind me in a panic, but she was looking out over the balcony. Giles' boys. Two of them. She coolly flicked her cigarette over the edge, watching the metorite shower of red sparks for a few moments, then turned to me.

Giles is shadowing me?

Down below the window, a ratty gray car skulked just out of the streetlight's sodium glare. A gangly young man leaned against it, fiddling with something small and shiny. Another tough sat inside the car smoking.

He's onto me. He knows I'm double-crossing him. I said.

She looked into my eyes. and shook her head. He's got other things on his mind, but you're right. He is suspicious. The wind picked whipped up strands of her smooth dark hair and swirled them around her expressive face. I remembered that Medusa was said to have been as beautiful as she was deadly.
Her perfume was expensive and reminded me of strange and exotic places. The closer she got, the less I cared about demons, slayers or anything else except her warm body pressed up tight against me and her glistening lips on mine.

Go down the back stairs. I'll take care of this little problem, she breathed to me after a while. Her eyes lit with a disturbing green brilliance in the dim room. I suddenly felt very sorry for Giles' hapless minion.
I crept out the back way easily and found my heap around the corner where I'd left it. I crawled inside and shut the door, but not before I'd heard a high pitched masculine shriek echo around the corner. The poor chumps.

tbc

AN: Aynaka is listening to George Winston's Night Divides the Day