Virtual Virgin

through the jammed parking lot until I came to a curb where I could stop and figure this out.

Giggle operated like a fey clone of Groggle, so I swiped around and got up its map program . . . Terra Infirma. I made a face at the name, no doubt a jab at unmagic-bearing mortals. Those fey, on the mischievous side when they weren’t being wicked deadly. I texted in the location.

“This neighborhood is just what it looks like,” I murmured as much to myself as Lilith. “It’s a light industrial area. Small manufacturing companies.”

Even as I spoke, I recalled what Hector had called the Immortality Mob when I first arrived in Vegas. Could this be a secret outpost . . . or headquarters . . . for that mysterious operation? A Vegas version of George Lucas’s Industrial Light & Magic company that offered special effects on a supernatural scale?

After remembering her presence I reported to Lilith. “The other buildings are deserted at night. The rock palace probably doesn’t have any neighbors to complain. Doesn’t seem a likely place to find long-lost moms.”

“Then, let’s head back to Rave Machine for some surefire fun. You can dance if you ditch the statement spike heels.”

I wasn’t ready to give up on the ghost in the machine.

I used the phone’s camera to pan the area. It showed a few other boxy buildings, most one-story, dark, and surrounded by vacant parking lots. I walked along the curb until a sodium iodide light’s peachy glow lit up the signpost.

“Delilah Street,” Lilith breathed behind me. “So this is Corona, California. Home of raves and . . . us?”

“No home here.” I studied the cell screen’s list of businesses along this section of the street. Small manufacturing companies, mostly.

“What a snoozer street.” Lilith was jigging from foot to foot, hands down her jean pockets, stuck in rebellious teen mode. “I’m heading back to the rave for some fun. If Mom’s around here and worth finding, she’ll show up there.”

“Lilith.” I sighed. “That’s an unrented building, I’d bet. The current occupants are there illegally.”

“Illegal is part of the thrill, but what would you know about that? The first man you ever got it on with is the Law.”

“Ex-law enforcement. Ric’s a private consultant now.”

“Still has the soul of a federale, if he still has a soul.”

“You have any other setting but ‘taunt’?”

“Now’s when you tell me I’m a very unhappy girl acting out.” She pouted and turned her profile to flash the tiny blue topaz nose stud I used to also call mine before I discovered her.

What an odd feeling to want to slap yourself in the face.

“Why bother?” I told Lilith. “You dragged me here and now all you want is music, music, music. I’m going to check out the scene farther down the street. I’ll pick you up at the rave on the way back, if my route happens to go that way.”

In this deserted area, my every high-heeled step sounded as loud as a single clap of hands. After a couple yards, I could hear her emo-girl boot-drags fading in the opposite direction.

Without Lilith to worry about, my elation at this trip in time and space came bubbling out. Loretta Cicereau wasn’t the only one who’d walked fey paths. I’d put myself and Lilith in California, three hundred miles from Vegas, in the blink of a smartphone screen.

A faint tinny sound was all that remained of the rave. I passed lit signs that hawked manufacturers of rubber products and energy food and drink lines. Did my . . . our mother toil at one of these places in daylight hours? Was she an assembly worker? A receptionist? Or a sales rep, maybe?

No. Not a sales rep. I wanted to find her in humble circumstances, a former unwed teen whose life had been a string of impulsive mistakes, like me and Lilith. I wanted her to be someone I could pity and feel superior to, glad I’d never known her. I was getting over what the social services in Wichita had done to me, but Mama was the First Cause. The Root of All Evil. I stopped. Looked at the phone I was clutching as if to crush it.

Unsettled anger issues, maybe? came Irma’s chirpy tone. My advice: lose the rage and stow the smarty phone in your pocket.

“You’re back.”

You got rid of the doppelganger. Three’s a crowd.

“Lilith was getting tiresome,” I agreed, “but you are too.”

Me? I’m your best scout. See that two-story building with the corrugated steel sides?

I looked, and nodded. “There are cars parked around it.”

Cars? That meant . . . occupants. Now. At night.

I pushed my almost seventy-year-old shoes into a trot. I sounded like a hansom cab horse in a Sherlock Holmes movie, but in less than a minute I’d passed the sixty or so parked small sports convertibles, feeling a deep pang for the absence of Dolly’s immense and protective Cadillac bulk.

The familiar chimed faintly on my wrist, like an old clock. I was so lost in my vintage dreams that what I actually saw when I made it around the building’s corner hit me like a tidal wave.

The entire front facade was a dazzling plaid of colored neon you couldn’t see from the back parking lot. I heard music on Delilah Street again, but this beat made my hips and skirt sway to the rhythms of salsa, cha-cha, merengue, sexy samba.

If only Ric was here. We could party.

That brought me back to “Terra Infirma.” Hard.

“No,” I said aloud to Irma. “The last thing I want is him messing around in mirror-world.”

Or with your Mamma Mia.

Irma’s words made me squint to see the front entrance, mirrored glass doors with a cursive neon sign above them: LA VIDA LOCA.

I straightened and swung my self-advertising shoes ahead of me one pavement-banging step at a time. This was the place that had paid for my costly sanctuary from the group homes, the nun-run private girls’ high school where I’d been a charity student until I graduated, hit state college, and made it to a BA in journalism on my own.

Mama was . . . Latina? Then, where had my Black Irish coloring come from? Oh, my. I hoped to God I didn’t have a supernatural father . . . uh, besides Him.

Meeting myself in the mirror before I swung the door open, I saw my flushed cheeks emphasized my black hair and blue eyes and made my glossed lips pale by comparison. My vintage forties ensemble was really . . . ugh, perky. What I do to keep Hector Nightwine from stomping all over my druthers.

I yanked the door open and entered.

Chapter Nineteen

A BORED GIRL at the reception desk yawned and slammed a clipboard toward the high counter and me.

She was wearing an orange tank top, enough butterfly tattoos to sponsor a Costa Rican tour, and her hair was striped magenta and blue.

I’d had too many doctor’s office clipboards slammed at me during my recent traumatic sentimental journey back to Wichita, so I slapped it back down on her desk.

“Just visiting,” I said. “I don’t read any permission pleas. I don’t sign any papers or pay any admission fees.”

Her Slinky-supple spine straightened right up. “Uh, sure. Here’s a visitor’s pass, but it’s only good until morning. You’re late.”

“Is that a personal message?”

“Uh, no. Only, the open house is almost over. You’ve got less than an hour to try us out.”

“And what has La Vida Loca got I might want to try out?”

“Look behind you. Wall-to-wall classes. An awesome lap pool, and a totally kew-ool