Rae Falling, Episode 1 of The Devilhouse Books: Rae Read online

  The front door in the study room slammed, rattling the thin walls and fluttering the posters. Rae’s roommate and cousin Hester walked into the dorm bedroom, home from Bible study. Hester glanced at Rae suffering on the bed, sniffed, and flounced into the bathroom. Her calf-length, eyelet-lace skirt flounced really well.

  Rae groaned. “When you guys leave, she’s going to rag on me about this. That’s another reason I went to Delta Chi, to get out of this dorm room. Yesterday afternoon, she got all ‘The wages of sin are death,’ on me when I was trying to study for my abnormal psych test.”

  “Actually,” Lizzy leaned down, and her fuzzy blonde hair touched Rae’s cheek. Lizzy whispered very softly, very near Rae’s ear, “the wages of sin are about two hundred bucks an hour.”

  Such cash was impossible. “Yeah. Right.”

  Over Rae’s chest, Georgie asked Lizzy, “Are you sure about this?”

  “It wouldn’t hurt to see if things might work out for her.”

  “Okay, then.” Georgie leaned down, pulled her long, brown braid behind her, and whispered in Rae’s other ear, “My parents don’t help me out with money, either. I work ten hours a week, and I pay my own way. Everything. Tuition. Dorm. Meal plan. Books. Plus extra money left over.”

  Even statistics-challenged Rae could estimate that. Two hundred bucks an hour times ten hours added up fast. “That’s, like, two thousand dollars a week.”

  Rae wasn’t sure what you had to do for two thousand dollars a week. She was not going to sell drugs. College was not worth that.

  Lizzy whispered, “And the perks are fantastic. You should see some of the parties we go to. We only went to the frat with you last night because you seemed all nuts.”

  “I was nuts.” Rae was still nuts.

  Georgie’s soft voice was as seductive as whiskey, “Come with us to a party tonight. We want you to meet someone.”

  Rae groaned. “I am in no condition to meet anyone.”

  “You’ll be fine by tonight. Drink the green stuff.”

  Rae winced at their stabbing voices and despaired of drinking any more of that vile green potion. The imaginary smoke steaming off the top of it smelled like fish sticks.

  As the girls cut through the shared bathroom back to their own bedroom, shimmying past Hester, Lizzy asked Georgie, “Does she have anything to wear? She’s a lot taller than we are.”

  “We can get her something from the costume racks. I’ll check her closet for her size.” Georgie called back to Rae, “Be ready at seven with your make-up and hair done like you’re going to a high society wedding.”

  Sure. A high-society wedding.

  Or a funeral.

  Rae’s own funeral.

  Her own funeral would be a relief.

  The girls left Rae alone with a head full of whispering and pain.

  Hester emerged from the bathroom and chanted in her shrill, high voice, “‘Wine is a mocker, strong drink is raging: and whosoever is deceived thereby is not wise.’ Proverbs, Chapter Twenty, Verse One.”

  Rae pretended to be asleep and wished for death so that the pain in her head and Hester’s Bible verses would all go away.

  ~~~~~

  Squeezing into Cinderella’s Dress

  One of Hester’s miracles must have occurred because by six o’clock, the pain killers and green sports drink had subdued Rae’s hangover, so she scalded off the hangover slime in the shower and dabbed on make-up. With her long, coppery hair curled, she felt better, even if her legs still wobbled.

  Luckily, Hester had gone to a friend’s for the evening so she could neither preach at Rae nor report back to their mutual family on Rae’s whereabouts or deficiencies. Rae had to take her blessings where she could.

  In the adjoining bathroom, Rae found a silver-spangled dress that Lizzy and George must have dropped off for her, because it was the right length for Rae but would have been six inches too long for Georgie, and a full foot of the glittering material would have dragged on the floor behind blond, little Lizzy.

  A note pinned to the strap told her to be in the northeast corner of the dorm’s parking lot at seven-fifteen. No signature.

  The dress must be from Georgie and Lizzy, right?

  Rae had never worn anything like that dress. She couldn’t even figure out how to put it on until she found a tiny zipper tucked into the seam under one armpit.

  She stuffed herself into the dress, sucked in her ribs, held her breath, zipped it up, and waited for the sound of ripping fabric, but the dress held.

  Another miracle.

  The material stretched, and she could breathe even though whalebones cinched her waist. The dress fitted tightly from her pushed-up breasts to her knees and then flared just enough that she could walk with mincing steps. Rae decided that there wasn’t enough room inside that dress for panty hose.

  The dress was cut like a mermaid, and Rae remembered something about mermaids from last night but couldn’t place it.

  Rae turned and looked at her bare back in the mirror. The silver dress dipped behind her and exposed all that naked, ivory skin back there.

  She didn’t look like a small-town high school hick who had gone off to college any more. The dress made her feel womanly.

  Her mother would have declared it generally impractical, and her father would have asked her how she planned to fight off a too-forward date and then outrun him in such an awkward contraption.

  She didn’t need to fight off or outrun a masher. Lizzy and her Taser would be there, and Lizzy and Georgie had Rae’s back. From what they had told her, they had indeed protected her back-side last night.

  She found some strappy black pumps in the back of her closet, and the teetering heels made her all the more unsteady. The last few wisps of her hangover were going to push her off these shoes and split open that miraculous dress like a trout being gutted, pink flesh spilling out of its tight, silver skin.

  That type of gruesome scene was far more likely in her life than a Cinderella dress dropped into her lap and then being whisked off to the ball. Splitting open the dress and her boobs falling out in front of The Handsome Prince was more like Rae’s luck.

  Rae dared God and the universe to hand her such an obvious ill omen that she should indeed return to Pirtleville, get a shop job, and marry the first taker. She just dared them.

  She flipped a long coat over the glittering dress—which now that she was thinking about fish, she did look like a gigantic fishing lure come to life,—and tottered out of the dorm room, down the sidewalk, and stood in the corner of the parking lot where the note had specified.

  Rae waited for something to happen to her.

  ~~~~~

  Limousines and Sunsets

  Rae stood alone in the deserted parking lot at dusk.

  A black town car, its windows darkened, drove into the parking lot and rolled to stop beside her. Dust settled behind the rear tires, and the exhaust irritated Rae’s throat.

  Georgie and Lizzy had not shown up.

  The gravel lot stretched all around her, empty, because all the students who went home on weekends had already left and those who stayed would walk to the bars that were only a block away, but not for an hour or so.

  The car’s windows were tinted so dark that she had barely seen the driver—a white man in a suit and tie—through the front windshield as the car had pulled into the dusty, darkening lot.

  No one would see her get in the car. No one would see it drive away with her inside. No one would write down the license plate or give the police a description of the black car.

  Jeez, she was a danged case study for a stupid-girl-gets-murdered class.

  The rear car door opened toward Rae and she stepped back, disgusted with herself for getting caught in such a stupid trap. She peeked in the car to see what awaited her.

  Georgie and Lizzy sat in the back seat of the car. Lizzy scooted to the middle to make room.

  “Come on,” Lizzy said. “Time to go.”

  Oh. It was just
the girls.

  Rae should really get over that paranoia at some point. You’d think that paranoia might have prevented her from getting rufied, but evidently Rae had the useless kind of paranoia.

  She stepped into the car and snuggled up tight to Lizzy, who was wearing a creamy gold mini-dress that was a few shades darker than her hair. Across the car, Georgie wore crimson. Her long, brown hair was coiled into a sophisticated chignon on the back of her head.

  Rae had curled her hair but hadn’t thought about an updo. Maybe she should have done more. Even in the silver-spangled magic gown, she felt underdressed.

  The girls’ tropical flower perfumes mixed with the smell of the leather upholstery, reminding Rae of a flower garland draped over a horse saddle.

  The car pulled away from the curb.

  Georgie asked Rae, “Feeling better?”

  Rae smiled ruefully. The hangover had been her own fault, first for drinking so much vodka and then for being stupid enough to get rufied. “Yeah, I’m better.”

  They rode out of the university and onto the freeway, like the anonymous black car was speeding them away from their real lives.

  Even after two and a half years, the university had never felt like real life to Rae. Real life was scraping by, and everyone you knew scraped by, and after the mine and smelter had closed and laid off everyone’s fathers, the scraping got harder.

  On the high overpass, the beige desert city spread under the slicing laser rays of the sunset. Riding over that bridge, Rae felt like a flying fish, but at least she was a flying fish with two other shiny fishies, packed close together in the black car.

  Beside Rae, every time Lizzy breathed, her soft shoulder rubbed the skin on Rae’s arm.

  Georgie said, “We want you on your toes tonight. This is going to be a great party. Don’t worry about what to do or anything. Just be,” Georgie looked at the car’s black headliner and pondered for a second, “vivacious. Be yourself—funny and snarky and little wide-eyed innocent at times,—but more of all that.”

  Rae was taken aback. “How in the heck am I ‘wide-eyed innocent?’”

  Lizzy cocked an eyebrow at her. “You’re kidding, right?”

  “No.” Rae had been born and raised down by the Mexican Border. People in her family smuggled drugs across the Border in one direction and ran guns in the other while other family members pretended to try to catch them. She was anything but innocent.

  Lizzy’s other eyebrow rose. “Rae, honey, have you met you?”

  “I’ve lived with me all my life. Have you met my cousin-roommate? Since when am I the innocent one in my family?”

  Georgie dismissed Rae’s defense with a wave. “Oh, we didn’t say in your family. I would say that roommate of yours is practically Amish, but even the Amish aren’t that Amish any more. What cult does she belong to, anyway?”

  “It’s not a cult. She’s Baptist.” Like Rae was raised.

  “Southern Baptist?” Georgie asked.

  “Oh, no. First Baptist.” From somewhere deep inside Rae, the words rose up. “Those Southern Baptists are going straight to Hell, what with all that singing and shouting out in church and whatnot.”

  Georgie and Lizzy laughed at her. Rae laughed, too, but she wanted to cringe at that rote line popping out of her mouth. If she had known how, she would have thrown all that gunk out of her brain.

  Georgie said, “Oh, God. Wait until The Dom hears that crap. He will eat that up.”

  Lizzy flinched just a little, which Rae felt because Lizzy was curled up next to her like a chilly cat. Riding in the back of the car and pressing close to Lizzy’s tiny body felt nice, like they were cousins, maybe, like holding her body and pushed-up breasts close to a girl was okay if you were cousins.

  The driver drove the car down off the freeway, into the black-shadowed skyscraper canyons of downtown.

  Georgie said, “Rae, honey, you just bat your eyelashes when you say stuff like that. The guys will be all over you.”

  “Can’t say anything yet,” Lizzy said.

  “I know. I won’t say anything until The Dom gives us the high sign.”

  Snuggled against Rae’s soft flesh, Lizzy flinched again and stared straight out in front of her, watching the road through the front windshield.

  Lizzy had twitched both times Georgie said Dom’s name. Rae didn’t know that she wanted to meet this guy Dom who made sarcastic, self-assured, Taser-wielding Lizzy flinch.

  Georgie, however, was brisk and professional. “Rae, just remember that we’re on your side, because we like you and don’t want you to have to leave college.”

  “I’m glad,” Rae said, and she was unreasonably happy that they liked her. They looked great tonight, dressed so beautifully and all done up. Rae had never seen anyone so beautiful, and Lizzy’s shoulder delicately nudged Rae’s breast as the car took a corner. “I like you girls, too.”

  Georgie continued, “Here’s what you need to know. When we get to the party, you should mingle, have a drink or two and have some fun, but do not make an embarrassing spectacle of yourself like last night at Delta Chi.”

  “Oh, heck no. I was just upset. And rufied. You guys sound tense.” Maybe their high-paying job was dealing drugs. Maybe they were the coke suppliers at an upper-crust parties. Rae was nobody’s mule. People who dealt drugs died, either by overdose or by a rival drug cartel. Often, their families were killed, too. She wouldn’t risk that.

  “Nope, we’re fine. These parties are fun, but this isn’t the job. This is just advertising. At some point, after an hour or so, if everything is going all right, we’re going to introduce you to the The Dom.”

  “This guy’s name is Dominic?”

  “No. He’ll ask you whether you like the party, and this is crucial, you tell him the truth about exactly what you like and don’t like about the party, about the people there, about what you see.”

  Rae’s nerves ratcheted up past Lizzy’s little twitches. “What kind of a party is this?”

  “Just a cocktail party, like the Delta Chi house but with better booze and no rufies. All you have to do is have a few drinks—they’re really good, you should try a few, and I mean a few,—and talk to some interesting people, meet our friends, and eventually talk to The Dom, probably. He may not even have time to talk to you tonight, but he’ll be watching.”

  Beside Rae, Lizzy flinched again, and she looked down at her hands in her lap. Lizzy had gotten a pink manicure.

  Rae should have painted her nails. At least her nails were clean. Her nails had never been clean before she had moved to go to the university. At home, everyone had gray nails. “And then what?”

  Georgie shrugged. “After the party, a limo will take us back to the dorm and drop us off. You can get buzzed. You won’t need to drive. Geez, Lizzy. You’re trembling.”

  Lizzy looked over Georgie’s shoulder and out the darkened window. “It’s just the first time that I’ve seen him since last week.”

  “Seriously, stop freaking out.” Georgie settled back in the seat, nudging Lizzy closer to Rae.

  Rae was finding it hard to breathe because every time she took a breath, Lizzy’s arm rubbed her breasts, and Lizzy didn’t seem to notice or to want to move her arm.

  Georgie said to Lizzy, “After that Dom-Date I had with him a couple months ago, he was great. After five minutes, maybe even three, it won’t be weird any more. You’ll be fine.”

  Rae’s curiosity got the better of her. “You dated this Dom guy?”

  “Just the once,” Lizzy said. She looked shy, which looked weird on her.

  Rae asked Lizzy, “So, you don’t think he’s going to call you or something?”

  “It’s not like that. It’s understood that it’s just the one date. I don’t even know how much money he must have spent on it. At least a couple thousand dollars, maybe more, depending on how much those concert tickets were. We met the band during the sound check and sat in the second row. Then we went out for dinner. That bottle of wine he ordered
was ridiculous, and tasty.”

  Rae was used to Georgie and Lizzy being brazen women, as they would have been called back in Pirtleville. She admired them, but now vulnerable, little Lizzy needed protection. Maybe Rae should be the one with the Taser tonight. Rae asked, “Are you afraid of him?”

  “Oh, hell, no.” Lizzy caught her breath. Her lips plumped. Her light blue eyes went glassy, and her cheeks pinkened. “I’m not afraid of him at all.”

  Rae had had enough physiology classes to see that Lizzy was either in love with Dom or seriously turned on.

  Lizzy crossed her legs, rubbing against Rae’s silver dress and thigh, and Lizzy’s breath caught in her throat. Lizzy closed her eyes, but Rae saw Lizzy’s blue eyes roll upward just as her lids closed.

  Pulses travelled through Lizzy’s skin, and she shivered against Rae’s arm.

  Good Lord, Lizzy had just had an orgasm, one of those small throbbing ones, just thinking about the guy.

  Georgie leaned over, pushing Lizzy more tightly against Rae’s side, and asked her, “What did he do to you?” Her voice suggested that she knew very well the things that Dom did to people and that they were naughty.

  “I don’t want to talk about it.” Lizzy’s cheeks turned wilder pink.

  With even more knowing coyness in her voice, Georgie asked, “For how long?”

  Lizzy touched her own smooth shoulder and stared out the front windshield with a vague smile on her face. The sunset glowed on her skin. “Three hours.”

  Georgie laughed at her.

  Lizzy asked, “It’s not going to be weird, right?”

  “No. If his pattern holds, he’ll pay a little more attention to you tonight than usual, and he won’t have a date with him, in deference to your feelings. Next week, though, it’s back to business as usual.”

  Lizzy nodded. “I can handle that.”