17. Nick
SEVENTEEN
NICK
Nick wants to know, just what kind of benefits does a subparhero get?
"That was exciting," Nick said cheerfully.
"If you say so," Doug replied as he rubbed his temples.
"I do say so. I just said it. You heard me. I'll say it again if you need me to."
"I'm good, thanks. Frankly, I'd prefer it if, in the future, you leave the hero antics up to me."
"Hmm." Nick tapped his nose. "Maybe. It was kind of fun. I can see how a person might get addicted to the power and fame of it all. But I like that you're thinking about the future."
"I was talking to Tim."
"Hahaha." Nick chuckled and looked down at the tortoise, who'd hidden under the bed during most of the excitement. "Thanks for the assist, Tim. It was good just knowing you were there."
"Thanks, I guess." If tortoises could roll their eyes, he just had.
Among other things that evening, they'd confirmed that Lady Luck had no effect on reptiles or Nick Sedgewick. Unfortunately, the first two times they'd opened their hotel room door, Doug had ignored Nick's instructions and rushed inside the room. He'd immediately fallen to his knees with tears streaming down his face, begging someone called Todd not to die, promising Todd that help was on the way. His pleas were soon followed by a terrible silence that Nick knew was Doug realizing Todd was dead. Twice, Nick had to watch Doug being tortured.
Nick couldn't allow Doug to keep reliving the worst day of his life. Stopping Lady Luck was up to him, Agent Nick Sedgewick. Turning back time was tiring, and he hadn't been sure if he'd be able to keep doing it, but he'd known he had to get past Doug and into the room first.
Hoping the third time would be a charm, Nick had darted around Doug—who once again had moved quickly, unable to squash his instinct to protect Nick. He'd immediately collapsed onto the carpet, just like he had the first two rehearsals, leaving Nick to confront Lady Luck on his own.
For what felt like eons, they'd stared at each other. Sizing one another up. Flexing their muscles.
"I can't feel you," a raspy seven-packs-a-day voice had said.
Nick knew he should've been affected by the words because, like at the club, his skin felt tight and twitchy, but that was all it was. He wasn't writhing on the floor like Doug.
"I'm your worst nightmare," Nick had replied. He'd always wanted to say that.
He hadn't had the first clue what to do. He hadn't wanted to touch the being, but he forced himself to move closer while it shied away, moving backward. Okay , he'd thought, she or it doesn't want to be approached by me . Against his basic survival instinct, he'd continued inching closer and closer, trapping it between the bed and the bathroom.
Nick still didn't know who'd been more surprised, himself or the demon.
The demon had kept up its muttering. After it switched away from English, Nick hadn't understood what it had been saying, or rather, incanting. It had been frozen in place by fear, maybe something even worse that Nick couldn't comprehend—something deeper than fear.
It had kept speaking though, switching almost frantically from one language to the next. Perhaps in an attempt to find something that would stop Nick from getting any nearer? He'd recognized Bulgarian, Spanish, something that sounded like old Scots, then had quit trying to parse them out.
None of it had worked on him. The closer he'd gotten to it, the more Nick's skin had itched, as if he'd fallen into a patch of nettles or poison oak. He'd managed to ignore the sensations, telling himself it was just Lady Luck's creepy magic rolling off him like water off a duck's back.
"What are you?" she'd finally growled in English, her voice low and gravelly.
"Nick Sedgewick," he'd replied with a shrug. "Nobody important."
With that, guided by instinct—or more likely, not having any fucking clue what he was supposed to do—Nick had reached out and placed the flat of his hand against the unmoving demon's skull. Then it had felt like a million ants crawling across his skin, being stuck with pins, and jamming his finger into a light socket all at the same time. After about a billion years, the demon's lips parted and it let out a long, gut-wrenching shriek as it shrunk into itself like an apple in a dehydrator and dropped to the carpet.
That's going to leave a stain , was Nick's first thought. His second thought was, It looks like the dried apple head dolls my grandmother used to make . Shocked his ploy had worked, Nick still hadn't moved when the door burst open. The SPAM cleanup agents had arrived.
"Nice work," Doug had said, rising to his feet and brushing off his suit pants.
"It actually wasn't at all but hey, it got the job done." Nick had allowed himself to preen a little when he said that. It wasn't every day that his idea was the right one. "What was her deal anyway?"
"Lady Luck manipulated and collected emotions and probably appropriated powers she wanted as well," the cleanup agent said before heading out the door with what was left of the demon. "We found the first two agents, the ones that disappeared before Schoenhut. She fed from her victims is the best way to put it, and if they had powers, she fed until they didn't even resemble humans. But she won't be any longer, seeing as how you disabled her until we could get here. I've never heard of Luck being a hunter before, more opportunistic, but I guess even demons change. Nice work, Agent Sedgewick."
Nick hoped this was the last he'd see of her. It. Whatever. He was exhausted.
Now that the crew was gone, a thought struck Nick. "I'm sorry that we still don't know where Agent Carroll is or if she's still alive."
"As truly harrowing as it was, having my final mission as Long Shot play out in my head in Technicolor detail has given me an idea," Doug replied, rolling his neck and shoulders. "Adding that to what the cleanup guy said about her not being a hunter, I'm sure I'm on the right track."
Frowning at the memory of Doug's obvious distress, Nick moved closer to him, wanting to wrap his arms around him and tell him everything would be okay. "That's what was happening? I could tell it was bad."
Expelling a lungful of oxygen, Doug ran his hand across the top of his head almost as if the motion could somehow erase his memories. "It was bad. Everything that could go wrong did. At the end of the day, my partner, someone I called a friend, died because of it. An innocent bystander died as well. We got the bad guy, but at what cost? I quit the department and not too many months afterward, Rich—now my ex—started seeing someone else."
"So, you think this is your ex's doing?" Nick asked.
"No. Rich is far too lazy to plan a revenge plot. Besides, we were done long before that happened, before Todd died. He must have been an easy target for Melvin though. Melvin must have assumed I cared more than I did about the relationship and would try and get Rich back or some nonsense."
"Melvin as in…?"
"As in Melvin Garon, the one and only Velvet Elvis."
"Holy shit." Surprised, Nick took a step back. "Seriously? Elvis? Did you recognize him the other day?"
"Not when we were at Nitti's. He's done some little things to alter his appearance. I do remember having a vague niggle of recognition when we saw him at the club the next night, but I suspect that the presence of Lady Luck made me dismiss it. But it's him."
"What now?"
"Now we take a trip to Nitti's and confront Melvin. I'm certain he is involved in this. It was his boyfriend we were after that day. The day I took a shot at someone and for the first time in my life wished I could've missed. But how do Pork Pie and Melvin fit in?" Doug was obviously thinking out loud for Nick's benefit.
"Luck is opportunistic, never does anything that doesn't directly benefit themselves. My guess is that Melvin used Pork Pie's odd ambition for powers to direct him toward SPAM and exact revenge against me specifically. They had no idea Luck was working the club," Doug sighed. "I can't believe it took me this long to put everything together. Agents Schoenhut and Carroll were used to lure me to Vegas. How did Melvin know which agents I've worked with? I don't know. But it could mean that SPAM has a bigger problem than missing agents."
As tired as Nick was, he was also beyond ready to get this assignment over with.
"Fine," he said with a heavy sigh. "But I demand—no, I request—Nick Saved the Day Sex later. Save The Day Sex is a thing, right?" He frowned and glanced over at Doug. "If it's not, it should be."
Nick watched as the now familiar goofy smile spread across Doug's face and that irresistible dimple made an appearance, and he almost melted into the carpet himself.
Stepping around the weird stain that absolutely wasn't shaped like a religious icon's head, Doug reached his hand out and tugged Nick's chin upward. Leaning close, he pressed his lips firmly against Nick's.
The kiss was over too quickly. Nick absolutely did not whimper.
"There's more where that came from, but now we have a creep to catch."