HERMIE PRODUCED RIC'S Vette at the drive-up. Shezmou tipped him with a real coin of some kind. It didn't impress the parking valet demon. Hermie shrugged and bowed us good-bye.
When Ric took the driver's seat, he tipped the delighted demon a fifty-dollar bill. Quicksilver bounded into the front seat after me, so I was squashed in the middle, sandwiched by my two dearest and now really nearest.
I looked in the rearview mirror. A sedate tourist couple driving an electric-powered Caddy convertible sixty years newer than mine was flagging the Lord of the Slaughter to unload their luggage.
I couldn't help laughing, as we all left the Karnak, grinning from ear to ear at our escape and reunion, Quicksilver most of all.
It was still dark, so I dug the neon-filtering sunglasses out of the glove compartment and we cruised the Strip in shades like Hollywood celebs.
At the Nightwine estate, Ric pulled his car under the Enchanted Cottage's porte cochere. We went inside, using the door card in my bagged jeans. We installed Quicksilver by his ever-full food bowl and ever-fresh water bowl in the kitchen.
He eyed us in turn, refusing to indulge. He suspected what was coming.
So did my hormones.
Ric took my hand and led me upstairs. I figured I'd soon have my movie-poster body ravished with Rudolph Valentino moves. Or vice versa. Goodie.
Instead, Ric paused mid-stairway. His cocked knee blocked the stairs and me. Hmm. Did he have something kinky in mind with me over his knee?
Yeah. Talk, he requested. Imagine a guy wanting to talk first.
I mentioned that.
"That's a talk-killer outfit you're wearing," he agreed, pulling me so close his Gypsy leathers creaked, "but I need some answers first."
I put my arms around his neck and inhaled a heady perfume of leather and bar-smoke and also scented soap traces from both of us. That's my pseudo-Sinkhole undercover guy, pitted-steel rough on top and civilized silk underneath.
"So," I said, "do I resemble that naughty magazine cover that gave you a premature kick-start on puberty?"
"S¨ª, señorita. First, I want to know how you ended up at the Karnak again to get the temple dancer makeover. Last I saw of my Delilah, she was taking down temples, not sending up temperatures."
I nuzzled his five o'clock shadow. It wasn't just makeup. If he skipped shaving twice, Ric was primed to sell men's cologne in Male magazine.
"It's all the real thing," I said, pushing my torso against him so he'd get to the action I needed.
"Why would that old lech Howard Hughes, who I noticed didn't stick around for introductions after Quicksilver and I arrived, give you highly collectible seduction gear? What were you two doing in the Karnak 's condo-tower penthouse?"
"Details, Ric. You don't want to lose the moment with details."
I'd pushed off him so he could fully appreciate my outfit. I felt the silver familiar slipping its form as hip chain, so my torso had started quivering even before Ric touched my skin.
He wet his forefinger (swoon) and slowly dragged it across the filmy skirt's top just beneath my bared navel.
"Details," he mocked me. My insides clenched with excitement while his finger pushed into my outie. "Your costume could use a little ring here."
As his forefinger continued its effective navel engagement, a blue-topaz-studded silver ring snagged the tip.
He frowned. "When did you get that piercing?"
"When you weren't looking close enough, obviously, amor."
Damn silver familiar was now butting into my romantic interludes instead of hiding out as a discreet toe ring.
"I'm looking close now," Ric said. "What's going on? You at the Karnak again. You in Hughes's harem?"
"I had a misstep in a mirror gone bad. Last night I finally tracked Lilith through the Snow groupies. She and I had a brief one-on-one in a dark alley. Didn't go well and the Karnak hyenas had tracked me there. I jumped through a reflecting glass door. Knocked myself out in a travel agent's office, I think, and ended back at the Karnak."
I made a face, remembering awakening to a situation so like my recurring nightmare.
"Hughes had somehow grabbed Shez after the pillars fell, so was keeping an eye out for me too and got me to the safety of his penthouse.