The Glassbreaker Goes Home (The King Henry Tapes), page 6
JoJo didn’t really have any choice; since she needed her arms free to hug Susan. Some emotions can trump instinct, no matter how deep. They had chatted a few times over the phone, but it was nothing compared to real life. To feeling your long lost sister’s arms around you. To hearing her laugh into your ear. To seeing the tears tumble down her cheeks and onto your forehead. Set JoJo off right quick, turning her into a bubbling mess. “Sissy, Sissy, I’m so sorry about all the things I said before you left—”
“Oh, Jo, it wasn’t you—”
“You look so much like Momma!”
“Shhh, Jo, shhh.”
Reason why the Vega handshake surprised him.
Blam!
Right in the palm of King Henry’s hand while he was all distracted. One eye on his sisters, one eye on Val as she baby-talked Nick with Marge. No eyes for Horatio Vega as he slid out of the rushes and pounced like the scavenger he was. “My friend! My brother-in-law! So good to see you well and whole, King Henry!”
“Yeah, uh . . . you too, Vega,” he somehow muttered back.
King Henry hadn’t seen the man since Eureka. Or talked to him directly either. Neither of them had been much pleased with the other that night. Might be all done up and shined bright now, but losing fifty-something Coyotes to Isabel and the Three Queens had cracked that veneer. For just that one night Vega let some of his core show through. Anger. Frustration. Even rage. Wanted a body and I didn’t give it to him. Suppose we’ll have some more words on that tonight.
No anger, no frustration, especially no rage at the moment, but they were in there. Somewhere buried. Buried with the bodies. Fifty-something years of bodies and treachery to go with them fifty-something dead Coyotes. Neither released each other’s hand; they just kept on holding, King Henry grinning out some canine and Vega the epitome of a perfectly civilized human being.
“Your trip from the Institution went well?” Vega inquired.
He asks what I think about the weather and I’m gonna kick him in the balls, King Henry thought but somehow forced a bland answer, “As far as trips go, was one of the least exciting variety. Still . . . no deer shitting in the middle of the road, no pileups, no one tailgating, and especially no helicopters following us, so I suppose I can’t complain overly much.”
Vega shrugged some good nature, even if his expression was of the troublemaking caste. “What would be the point for such theatrics? Your employers can track the car and your competition owns the house across the street.”
.
.
.
What?
Competition owned the house across the street.
Competition. Not the Guild, not Vega, which only left . . .
Vampires?
Vampires bought up the house across the street from his father? Vampires moved in across from Shithole Price?
“Oh, do they?” King Henry’s dirt eyes promised earthquakes and bridge collapses for everyone involved in this sacrilege.
“For almost a year now,” Vega casually confirmed as if it was only a trifle, “Since your visit to their offices, I believe. Though it sat vacant for most of that time and has only been newly rented out. In light of recent developments in your . . . unique relationship.”
Oh fucking really?
And why you telling me now? King Henry couldn’t help but be cynical about the bearer of said news. Just being friendly? A free tip? Didn’t believe that for a second, not with the King of the Coyotes. Always a price, especially for the Price. To put me off my guard? To distract me? For sure on those counts too. “Whole family or just a bachelor?”
“A young Gentlewoman, I believe.”
Some Divine has a vampire living across from my father, King Henry thought through a red haze. It was only said father clearing a big, gruff throat that reminded King Henry of his social obligations. He pulled his hand away from Vega and motioned to Old Man Price with it, trying to hide the fact that the other was clenched into a fist. “My father, Joseph Price.”
The reunion on the other side of the den quieted a bit at that pronouncement, even if the baby made a popping noise made your skull want to crack open. Marge cooed and awed over him, but it didn’t come close to plugging the hole. Someone stick a tit in it already!
“Dad, this is JoJo’s husband, Horatio Vega. He’s in . . .” Everything. “He’s in brokerage and commodities.”
That handshake was a bit less invasive than the one King Henry received. More respectful, even reserved. No connection, no I-feel-your-pain, just mutual respect, one patriarch to another. “Mr. Price, a pleasure to meet you. I thank you for your invitation with the heartfelt sympathies of my family, as this day was long overdue.”
Old Man Price didn’t punch Vega either, but there was just a tad of something aggressive in his eyes. More restrained than King Henry. A fury that only came out with alcoholic lubrication and those days were in his past as far as Old Man Price was concerned, so fury slept deep. “This house has always been open to you, sir. Same for Jordan. Always will be in the future too.”
Vega’s blue eyes flashed with amusement. “My Josephine was so concerned we might come to blows that she—perhaps—has put this day off for too long. It was a silly fear, but then . . . most fears are silly, aren’t they? Worst of all is fear conditioned by troubling memories; those go deep and cannot be easily excised. Josephine sadly has a fair few of those . . .”
He was generally a shit parent, but pushing a man’s nose in the puddle of piss like he’s some dog? In his own living room?
Of course, as quickly as he slapped you, Vega just as quickly played magnanimous. “But, finally we step past memory! We conquer it together as one! As I have told your son on any number of occasions, I view my Josephine’s family as my own and—though we might sporadically disagree—I will ultimately protect them as strenuously as I do her. So this is a wonderful day of celebration, not one of blows, never one of blows, but of family unified at last!”
All three men took a moment to glance at JoJo, standing there in her finery and radiance.
“Quarrels,” Old Man Price grunted, “but no brawling. Can’t even disagree about your claim that you did right by my daughter, can I? She’s as cared for and loved as any father could hope. So I thank you for that.”
Vega acted like it was nothing at all, easily in his power to make all desires reality. Why, he was likely even the source of this evening somehow! “She is my queen,” he declared, “and now the mother of my beautiful little boy! I could do nothing but undertake every enduring task she places at my feet. Her wishes are my wishes. Her problems are my joy to solve. Indeed, I would give her the whole world, but, alas, the world is such a scandalous cheat!”
Valentine slid her way back over to King Henry, away from El Grande Puke Spewer. When she arrived, she even wrapped an arm behind his back. Trying to soothe whatever’s got me raging with just a touch, huh? Even you ain’t that good, Val. “And I believe you’ve met my girlfriend, Valentine Ward.”
Got herself a handshake too. Vega even brought it up for one of them near-kisses on the back of her hand. “A woman that no man could ever let slip from his mind,” Vega kept pouring it on, “even if I only watched her work from afar and the both of you disappeared without a proper introduction.”
“Your silver tongue proceeds you, King Vega,” Val gave the Coyote some of his own medicine.
A finger flew to Vega’s lips. “No royalty tonight, dear,” he nonetheless made it sound a command. “Best if titles are left at the door and not just for my own humility, yes?”
Queen of Fire was left unsaid, but it hung exactly where Vega wanted it to: over Val’s neck. Valentine might not have done a dumbass thing like declaring herself in front of the entire Guild, but wasn’t a person at Eureka didn’t know the score.
Val took his point, but still had the daring to tease the man. “You have humility, Mr. Vega?”
The Coyote King laughed with exaggerated grace. “A failing, but I do always try to contain myself at the least!”
Like saying I contained my temper by putting a fist through the wall . . .
“What is it you exactly . . . brokerage, was it?” Old Man Price sniffed around. “Not a job set I’m familiar with at all.”
“Commodities, information, safety . . . much of what we have discussed already, in fact. Whatever can have a value placed upon it, I place that value, and it has served me well,” Vega didn’t miss a beat. “But, lately—as my Josephine will likely complain to you all tonight!— my main employment has been assisting with a Las Vegas property of immense ambition. So immense that even my tackling of it has proved troubling on occasion and as such it has kept me away from her more than I wish.”
Having collected her spawn from Marge, it was JoJo’s turn to slide up to Vega. “You haven’t left my side since my water broke. If anything, I’d like it if you spent a day at the casino.”
“How could I possibly leave you for even a moment? You so dazzling with the touch of motherhood! My boy so very boisterous in his calls for his papa!” Vega took the baby to hold. At least it had quieted after being returned to JoJo’s arms. Half asleep and content, it kinda sorta looked less like a demon. All the women smiled over Nick again. Even Old Man Price joined in.
King Henry . . . not so much.
See! You seeing this shit? All about that fucking baby! Got a Vamp next door I might have to kick around, but this is the shit I’m stuck with! Next thing they’ll all be trying to decide whose nose or eyes he’s got, even though his face don’t look human at all yet, if you can even see it through all the snot!
“My hair, your daughter’s eyes,” Vega immediately judged Nick’s genetics.
Fucking called it!
“Not likely to be a tall, strapping man,” Vega kept prophesying out his favorite hole, “but handsome! So handsome! Handsome enough to make the ladies blush. To turn their heads when he walks down the street and how soon will you be walking, my Nicholas? Soon, yes? Oh, daddy can’t wait, no he can’t. What a handsome boy!” A glance in King Henry’s direction. “Unless of course he favors his uncle . . .”
King Henry bore the indignity of his less than stellar visage, just like always, and held out another hand towards his eldest sister, who had not gotten a single smack from the ugly stick. “You’ll remember Susan.”
“Of course I remember Susan!” Vega melodramatically exclaimed like he’d been done wrong just by the insinuation he might not remember Susan. Nick was once again deposited back into JoJo’s arms as Vega went for a final legendary handshake. Her he gave the full Bill Clintonesque I-feel-your-pain added touch on the forearm. “How has your transition been, my dear?”
Susan blushed at the regard, especially as another kiss rained down on the back of her hand, Vega going all in with the charm offensive. “It’s preferable to my life before, Mr. Vega. I never did get a chance to—”
“No, no! No thanks necessary, dear. As I said, family, yes?” Vega assured her. “It was a significant cost to me, but . . . you are very worth it.”
Price the shifty fucker still hadn’t called in, but he would, maybe tonight. Maybe tie it up with the vampire nonsense. Not just for King Henry, either. For each and every one of them, all while never mentioning that someone else already picked up the fucking tab.
“And life at the Institution? How are you acclimating?” Vega followed up.
“It’s . . . very different. Less controlled than before, but . . . more therapy. More testing too. Lots and lots of conversations,” Susan explained. “But they do seem to care about me . . . which is more than I can say about before. I have a job too! Once school is in session I’m assisting in the child care department.”
Institution Child Care Department: Natalie Gullick’s impromptu Pre-K class for faculty children.
“Though, living with Little Bro is quite weird,” even Susan got a dig in. “I’m used to being the one to take care of him after all.”
“He could still use the help I imagine,” Vega chuckled. He then politely offered to turn Susan into a hostage just like he had with JoJo, “If you ever need space, there is an absolutely massive amount of it at our ranch. I’m sure that my Josephine would very much enjoy your company as well. Just say the word and I will collect you myself.”
“Or your old bed here is always waiting,” Old Man Price also quickly put in a counterclaim.
Susan glanced at King Henry, suddenly nervous. “Maybe . . . maybe one day.”
“One day,” King Henry promised.
I’m curing you, Suze. You and all the rest. No matter how many Council meetings he had to sit through to make it a reality.
Susan turned to JoJo. “You’re awful quiet.”
“I’m behaving,” the middle sister growled, “and making sure the next generation is behaving too!”
Nick smiled.
The next generation just farted on your dress, so there!
“He’s a fine boy, Jordan,” Old Man Price told her, tongue thick. “A . . . very fine boy.”
JoJo had never done shy well, even worse than King Henry at it, but she seemed completely out of place. Dad complimenting her. It had probably been twenty years. “Want to hold your grandson then?” she whispered, not meeting his eyes.
“Of course I do,” Old Man Price whispered back.
At least it ain’t me, King Henry thought as the gas-spewing burden got shifted over.
With everyone distracted again, Val took the opportunity to whisper into her boyfriend’s ear, “See, no explosions at all. All that brooding in the car and it was for absolutely nothing.”
“Yet,” he corrected her.
Cuz now I want the explosions, oh yes I do, you Vamp fucktards.
Val recognized the signs. “You went from defensive to offensive, why?”
“While you were poking the Wailing Monstrosity—”
“He’s adorable.”
“He’s a time bomb. In a whole bunch of ways . . .”
“Yes, well, he’s too young to test yet. Let him finish with teething and crawling first, okay?”
“How long?”
“Ultras can show as young as five. Most by twelve.”
Want me to wait five to twelve years? Like I’m gonna be alive that long with the way my life’s been lately . . .
“If you’re that concerned, then the first thing you should do is tell your sister,” Val added some reason and sympathy to the situation, along with her ‘I expect only the best from the man I love’ expression.
“We’ll see . . .” King Henry hedged.
“And you still haven’t told me why you look like the ceiling might cave in at any moment,” Val didn’t let go of her earlier premonition.
“While you were fondling the Infection Bucket—”
Val rolled her eyes.
“—Vega let drop that a Vamp moved in across the street.”
Val’s irisless eyes blazed at the news. Instead of reining him in, she only asked, “Do you need my help?”
“I hope not. I got it. Just the distraction I needed. You just . . . enjoy yourself, okay?”
“He’s adorable,” she teased him again.
“Maybe I’ll like . . . look at it later.”
Nicholas Vega.
Here at last.
Can’t even speak yet and already starting fights.
Guess he is half a Price.
Valentine’s Revenge
It was a calm and placid night.
As beautiful as a Visalia night could be. Not quite all the way to darkness just yet, but the red sun hung at the horizon, bathing the backyard in shadows so long they looked beyond their breaking point. Had a warm and lazy feeling to it all. The few sources of artificial light either leaked through from the back slider or haloed LED lanterns strategically placed on the big camping tables Old Man Price had pushed against each other to fit them all.
King Henry wasn’t sure where the tables had come from, but they’d lived out under the sole willow tree for as long as he could remember. Probably already here when the folks bought this place. Big, solid wooden tables. Benches too. All with quite a bit of wear in them now, but that just made it feel authentic—like a tiny sliver of some national park had been transplanted into Shithole Price.
Backyard’s grass looked well-maintained. Freshly cut that morning maybe. Was a bit of that freshly cut grass smell still in the air even. Grass, tree sap from the willow, and five different perfumes or colognes all percolating about. Marge smelled like fifty flowers got together for an orgy, JoJo something foreign and spicy, Susan a type of baby-powderesque scent King Henry associated with his mother, Vega like oiled leather, and Val . . . well, vanilla and sun-tan lotion.
Guess that makes me and Dad the simple cavemen, don’t it?
And what about the most important person in the entire world: Nick Fucking Vega? Smelled like shit wiped off with an aloe pad.
I just want one of my own so bad!
Couldn’t forget the food either.
Plenty of nice smells coming from there.
Might have been the White Trash version of Mexican, but damn was that smell tasty enough to make your mouth water. Once they got it all laid out in the middle of the tables and off went the covers one by one . . . well, forget figuring out what someone’s perfume smelled like. Sorry, Val, this caveman got him some grub to chow down!
Was plenty of space for the seven of them to sit and eat, but not so much they could break up into groups. Vega took one end for himself, Old Man Price the other. JoJo and Marge dutifully plopped down at their sides. Nick was placed in some kind of baby car-seat, torture device between them. Fuck am I so happy I don’t know the name for that thing. Opposite, King Henry got stuck between Susan and Val. Which made him the other baby at the table, he supposed.
At least it was too young to be stealing any of the food. Though he did kinda feel bad it has to suck on JoJo’s nipple as its primary source of nourishment. That nipple had been places. Places you didn’t want to put your mouth. Probably been pierced too. Means when you’re sucking, you got to worry about two extra holes. That was some complicated shit for a baby only a week old.
