save me; I would save myself, but it made me feel better that he was out there. I knew he’d move heaven and earth to find me, because I’d have done the same for him.
“We will need you to drop your shields for the Mother of Us All to possess your body.” His voice was completely human, no growl for him, and he sounded very reasonable, if you didn’t listen to what he was saying.
“Then I don’t think I want to drop my shields,” I said, and I sounded reasonable, too.
“We thought you might say that.” He turned with a swirl of black cloak, so that it blocked my view of the doorway for a moment. They all had to practice with the cloaks for those effects. When he stepped out of the doorway, letting his cloak fall to one side, three more Harlequin were standing there, carrying a man between them. Two of them held his arms, where they were chained behind his back; the third held his chained legs. Long black hair fell forward in a thick mass to obscure his face. My first thought was, Bernardo, but the energy hit me like a hot wave dancing over my skin: shapeshifter.
My heart was in my throat this time, because nothing good was about to happen. Fuck.
“If you change form we will shoot you,” the tall, reasonably voiced Harlequin said.
Lisandro, because that was who it had to be, made a muffled sound, and I knew before he raised his head and glared at me through the loose mass of his hair that he was gagged. His eyes had already gone from dark brown to black, the beginning of his shifting form.
The reasonable one drew a gun from behind his back.
“Don’t!” I said.
“He was warned,” the Harlequin said, and put the gun barrel inches above Lisandro’s left knee.
Lisandro glared at me, all that anger, all that energy in his eyes. There was no fear in them.
The Harlequin pulled the trigger and the shot was thunderous in the stone room. The echoes of it hit the walls and bounced everywhere, drowning out most of the sounds that Lisandro made. He didn’t scream, but he couldn’t be silent while the bullet ripped his knee apart. He also couldn’t not struggle while the pain rode him, but the three Harlequin that held him acted as if his writhing were nothing, like they could have held him all night like that. When he quieted, and blood began to drip steadily from his leg onto the floor, the three holding him stared straight ahead like soldiers on parade. Their lack of reaction was almost as unnerving as the shooting.
The talkative Harlequin’s voice was tinny, distant with the reverberations of the shot, “That was a lead bullet; you’ll heal almost instantly.” He drew a second gun from behind his back. It made me wonder what kind of holster he was wearing. “This one has silver bullets in it; I’ll cripple you with it, and then I’ll kill you with it. We have other hostages, Lisandro. It is such a pretty name for so handsome a man.” The Harlequin looked at me. “Don’t you think he’s handsome, Anita?”
“You know our names, what’s yours?” I asked.
“We are the Harlequin, that is sufficient.”
“So I call you all Harlequin, like calling all dogs Rover? Come on, you’ve got to have names.”
“We are the Harlequin,” he repeated.
“Fine, Harley, what do you want?”
“You know Harley is not my name.”
“Tell me your name and I’ll use it.”
“The Mother of Us All told us to give you no names.”
“Can’t fuck me, can’t give me your name, what else has she forbidden you to do with me?”
“I asked if you thought Lisandro was handsome; you ignored the question.”
“Yeah, he’s cute. His wife thinks so, too.”
“Does that mean he’s not one of your lovers? How disappointing.”
I swallowed hard, and when I looked at Lisandro his brown, human eyes met mine. I think he was thinking the same thing I was: Which answer would help us most? Would they hurt him more if they knew he was a lover, or less? If he wasn’t a lover, would they just kill him? They had other hostages; who? Who, for the love of God?
Harley, for lack of a better name, stepped between us so we couldn’t make eye contact. “It is a simple question, Anita. Is he one of your lovers?”
“Honestly, I’m trying to decide what answer will make you the happiest.”
“The truth will make me happiest, Anita.”
I didn’t like the way he kept using our first names, as if he knew us. I had never heard the voice, I’d have bet money on it. “Would you believe yes, and no?”
He moved so I could see Lisandro again, and he put the barrel of one of his guns against his head. “Perhaps I will simply kill him. I think you would be more cooperative after one of them dies.”
“Don’t do it,” I said.
Lisandro told me with his eyes,
Harley spoke each word slowly, carefully. “Is-he-one-of-yourlovers?” There was anger in each word now, the reasonable tone vanishing in the heat. “If I smell a lie on you I will kill him, Anita.”
“We had sex once, but out of respect for his wife’s wishes we’ve behaved since then. See, yes, and no, I wasn’t lying.” I tried to quiet my pulse, but couldn’t quite do it. I was telling the truth, but Harley seemed to want to hurt Lisandro, or maybe he just liked hurting people.
“His wife’s wishes, what does that mean?” He still had the gun barrel pressed to the back of Lisandro’s head. I did not want to have to watch his brains get blown out. I did not want to tell his wife and kids that I’d watched him die.
“It means that she told him that if he ever cheated on her again she’d leave him, and take the kids, or kill him, and me.”
He rubbed Lisandro’s hair with the tip of the gun, almost like he was petting him with it. “Do you think she meant that?”
“That she’d leave him and take their two kids? Yes.”
“No, Anita, the part about killing him and you. Did she mean that?”
I shrugged as far as I could with my hands bound behind my back. “I don’t know.”
He slid the barrel along the side of Lisandro’s face. “Oh, come, you must have an opinion of the woman.”
“I haven’t met her,” I said.
“Interesting,” he said, and slid the gun barrel underneath Lisandro’s chin. Lisandro jerked away, but Harley put the barrel more firmly under his chin, and forced his face up, until they could meet each other’s gaze. “Would your wife truly kill you both?”
Lisandro just glared at him.
“Oh, the gag, how silly of me, just nod. If you had sex with Anita again, would your wife kill you both?”
Lisandro just looked at him.
“Answer me, Lisandro.”
“Maybe he doesn’t know either,” I said.
Harley looked at me. “Don’t help him.”
“I’m just saying that most married couples I know say things in anger they don’t exactly mean, but I know she’ll take his kids. He coaches their soccer teams. He wouldn’t risk losing his kids.”
Harley used the gun barrel to force Lisandro’s head back farther so that the angle of his neck was painful. “Is that true, Lisandro? Do you value your family?”
This time Lisandro gave a tiny nod, as much as the angle of his neck would allow.
Harley moved the gun and let him put his head down. “And do you value your bodyguard, Anita?”
Lisandro flashed me his dark, angry eyes again. Again, we were both wondering which answer would help us, and which one would hurt the most.
“He’s my bodyguard; he’s good at his job. I value anyone who’s good at their job.” My words were calm, reasonable; the pulse in my neck didn’t agree, but I was afraid of what was going to happen next. I couldn’t find my calm on this one.
“Your words are those of an employer, but your fear is that for a friend. He is your lover, and your friend; yes?”
“I make friends easily,” I said.
