InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Purity 9: Subterfuge ❯ Deviant Behavior ( Chapter 75 )

[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]

"Are you finished yet?"

"Hold your horses, woman.  You're making it crawl back up again."

"We're going to get caught if you don't get a move on it."

"You realize, right?  There's an art to this . . ."

"There's no art involved, Roka.  Can't you just . . . I don't know . . . force it out or something?"

"If I force it, there's a good chance that something else will come out—something that neither you nor I will like, though for entirely different reasons."

"You're so gross."  Valerie heaved a sigh and shook her head as she glanced up and down the hallway through the smallest crack in the door that she could manage and still see.

Oh, the day had started out normally enough.  Waking up in a nice, comfortable hotel bed at the Seneca Rotundra, one of the trendiest of the most upscale hotels on the west coast and definitely the nicest one in Portland, Oregon, she'd had a wonderfully quiet breakfast of fresh grapefruit and about a gallon of coffee when she'd gotten a message on her voicemail from Evan that he was down at a local radio station, doing a ten minute interview to promote the new album but that should she miss him desperately—his words, not hers—that he'd left his room key at the front desk and that she should feel free to cuddle naked in his bed and wait for him.

Which, of course, she hadn't done, but she had laughed, so if that was his goal, he'd succeeded in spades.

Still, despite his statement that it was only a ten minute interview, he hadn't come back to the hotel for nearly three hours.  He hadn't mentioned that he had to stop by the television station for an interview and to perform a song for Wake Up, Portland's ten o'clock segment, and, not surprisingly, he was in a pretty bad mood, considering Mike had waited until they were on their way to the station to ask him if he would mind performing 'Piece of You', which, naturally, Evan had minded quite a lot.  In the end, he said that he'd done a really, really antiseptic version of 'V'—he got no brownie points from her for it—and that had, in a roundabout sort of way, led to this . . .

It might not have been so bad if Mike had left it alone at that, but he hadn't.  Valerie was picking at the huge steak dinner that Evan had ordered from room service for her when the man had stalked in, leveled a no-nonsense look at the rock star, and informed him in no uncertain terms that he was absolutely not to even try to leave the hotel.  It seemed that some of the kids who had bought tickets for the cancelled show were camped outside and more than a little bummed about the whole thing, and the local police along with the hotel security staff were worried about those same kids' safety.  Evan had later told her that security was such an issue this go-round because of last year's debacle outside a hotel where another rock band was rumored to have been staying.  Three kids were trampled to death when someone had hollered that the band was coming outside.  It was a fluke, of course.  There had been a number of off duty police officers around at the time to provide some extra authority.  The band, however, was notorious for their anti-police stance, and the crowd had taken their cue from them.

Of course, the other reason—far more important, in Valerie's opinion—was that Evan simply could not afford to get into even the slightest hint of trouble, all things considered.  He had to keep his nose clean, like it or lump it—at least until after court.

But anyway, after spending the next hour or so whining and complaining about being treated like a child—something that Valerie had found extremely amusing since he kind of was acting like one—he'd grabbed her makeup bag and started to root through it.

"What do you think you're doing?" she asked mildly.

"Just looking."

"What for?"

He shrugged and shot her his version of the 'best little boy in the world' smile.  Looking back now, one might have thought that she should have realized that he was up to no good.  She didn't.  "Just looking . . . hey, can I borrow this?"

"You want to borrow my lipstick?" she asked, arching an eyebrow since she wasn't sure why he'd want to borrow such a thing.

"Oh, and these, too?"

"My body spray and nail polish?  Pink Blush isn't really your color, you know."

"Color doesn't matter," he assured her.  "It'll work . . . it'll be awesome."

Little alarm bells were clanging like crazy in her head.  She ignored them.  "Why?  What do you want with that stuff?"

He grinned and dug a lighter out of his pocket.  "Come on, V.  Want to see something hella cool?"

She probably should have said 'no' at that point.  Unfortunately, her curiosity was getting the better of her, and considering he was already on his feet and tugging her by the hand toward the door, she was already in it, she supposed.

And she'd stood outside Bone's door, watching with her arms folded over her chest as Evan painted a five-foot penis on Bone's door with Pink Blush nail polish.  Then she'd blinked and stepped back when Evan lit it on fire with the disposable lighter that he'd picked up to set off the fireworks earlier.

"Oh, my God!" Valerie gasped, unsure whether she should laugh or get the hell out of Dodge.  Evan was cackling, though, thoroughly pleased with his shenanigans, and when Bone threw open his door a few moments later, he had to jump back to keep from being singed in the flames that were engulfing the wet nail polish.  The head of security was bare-ass naked with a hideous, fluorescent orange condom on.  The girl in the bed—Valerie had no idea who she was—screamed when she saw the flames, which only served to make Evan laugh harder as he carted around, grabbed her hand, and took off down the hallway at break-neck speed.

By the time he'd slammed the door to his room, he was out of breath and doubled over, and Valerie wasn't much better.  Then they'd crept down to the next floor where Tay and Frankie were holed up and set their door on fire after a few spritzes of body spray.  Those two cussed Evan out pretty thoroughly as they tried to put out the fire with the nearest thing on hand—Frankie's leather coat.

But when Valerie asked if Evan was going to repeat the process on Mike's door, Evan grinned broadly and shook his head.  Nope, according to him, he had something much, much better—and far, far fouler—in mind for him . . .

So they'd spent the next hour and a half in Valerie's room while he ate a huge pot of beans with a side of steamed cabbage.  Valerie wasn't sure that it was a good idea, all things considered, but it'd be a couple of days before she'd be stuck with him in the confines of the bus again, so she figured that if it was bad, she could always lock him out of her room.  It did occur to her that there was something fundamentally wrong with what he was doing, but again, curiosity bit her hard, and she held her tongue . . .

He refused to explain things to her, though, even after he'd returned from the front desk where he'd schmoozed a copy of Mike's key off the girl at the desk, much to Valerie's annoyance.  She had a fair guess as to what he was plotting—maybe.  Then again, a part of her really wasn't entirely convinced that even Evan could be that . . . that . . . disgusting . . .

The desk girl had given him a few keys, one of which was Mike's, another of which was Bone's.  Evan said that Mike was in a meeting, so that should be safe, but Bone was downstairs, probably listening to Tay and Frankie bitch about Evan's juvenile antics.  Evan had left her in the hallway to distract Bone, should he come back before Evan was finished setting the next trap, but nothing had happened, and he'd hustled her away from Bone's room fast after he reemerged.

Down the hallway and around the corner, he'd unlocked Mike's door and pulled her inside.  The first thing she noticed was the thick metal padlock on Mike's suitcase.

"He's a little paranoid, don't you think?" she asked, waving a hand at the lock.

Evan grinned and chuckled.  "Hell, no.  He learned pretty fast, but he did it the hard way."

"What?  Did you do something to his suitcase before?"

"Not me, and not that one," Evan replied, grabbing the pillow off the bed and groping it as he gave it the once-over.  "Good, good . . ."

"What do you mean?  What did you do?"

"I told you, V, I didn't do anything.  Deet was pissed at him because he'd confiscated his eightball, so he got revenge."

"What's an eightball?" she asked, frowning at him since she wasn't fond of having to admit that she didn't know something.

"Crack cut with heroin," he replied.  "It was back when Deet was using a lot heavier."

She wasn't sure if it was worse that Evan knew what it was or that he'd said it so matter-of-factly.  There was something inherently horrifying in it, wasn't there?  Letting out a deep breath, she crossed her arms over her chest, hating that part of Evan's world and everything it stood for.

As if he could read her thoughts—maybe he'd read her expression—Evan sighed and shook his head.  "He was busted for drug possession later that year.  Prison was hard on him—Miss dumped him when he got arrested because he'd promised her before that happened that he'd stop . . . but when he got out, he was clean, so I guess it was worth it, in a really fucked up way."

"You don't sound like it was worth it," she pointed out quietly.

Evan shrugged and tossed the pillow back onto the bed.  "He was a lot different after he got out of there," he explained.  "Meaner, you know?  Wouldn't talk about it, not even to me . . . Read in the paper that one of the inmates in Deet's cell block was murdered, but I never heard the details.  Guess it doesn't matter, right?  All he wanted to do after that was forget about it . . ." Shaking his head, he had an uncharacteristically thoughtful frown on his face—no, more of a confused one . . . "Anyway, he managed to talk Miss into giving him another chance when he was paroled, but it was hard on him because Daniel didn't really know him.  Miss was pregnant when he got sent to prison, and Daniel was nearly two years old before she'd let Deet see him . . ."

"I didn't know that."

He shrugged again, pasting on a sad facsimile of a smile.  "Yeah, water under the bridge, right?  Anyway, back to business . . ."

She let the subject drop since he seemed more interested in letting it go than chewing it to death, anyway.  Staring at the suitcase again, she bit her lip, questions forming in her mind with an almost perverse resolve.  Narrowing her eyes, almost afraid to hear the answer, Valerie shook her head.  "So how did Dieter get revenge?" she asked slowly, dubiously.

Evan spared a moment to cast her a much more Evan-like grin before he reached for the other pillow on the bed to continue his inspection.  "He shit in Mike's suitcase."

Valerie's mouth dropped open as her eyes bulged slightly, as she snorted indelicately.  "Nuh-uh!"

"Yuh-huh!" Evan protested.  "He did!  He totally did!  Mike was so pissed that he wouldn't speak to either of us for a week unless it was deathly important.  Best week of my life . . ."

Rolling her eyes, Valerie pressed her lips together, refusing to laugh on principle.  Somehow, Evan's tale didn't surprise her, even if it did gross her out to no end.

"You need to hurry," she hissed, turning her head to glance back at him, only to stop short, eyes flaring wide when she saw him sitting on one of the pillows with his pants pulled down.  At least she couldn't see certain parts of him from her vantage point . . . "What are you doing?  Put your pants back on!"

Evan rolled his eyes and hissed for her to be quiet.  "Now, that'd kind of defeat the purpose, now wouldn't it?"

"What purpose?  What are you doing?" she demanded.

Evan stared at her for a moment then wrinkled his nose.  "I'm going to fart into this pillow—if you'll be quiet and let me concentrate."

"You're going to—Ew-w-w-w-w!  That's so gross!" she blurted.  "And why would you do that in his pillow?"

"Because if you fart into someone's pillow then leave it alone, they'll get a good, healthy whiff of it when they go to bed, and I happen to know that Mikey sleeps face down, so it's the perfect way to get him.  'Course, it only works with a feather pillow, so we got lucky there.  Now be quiet so I can—"

"That's disgusting," she announced as though he didn't already know that much.

"Well, yeah!" he replied as if he figured that the disgusting factor was a given.  "Seriously, though, if you keep talking to me, I'm never going to be able to do it."

Valerie uttered a little 'hrumph' and checked the hallway once more.  It was empty.  "What do you mean, it only works with a feather pillow?  What does that have to do with it?" she demanded.

Evan's face scrunched up in complete concentration, which only made her roll her eyes.  "V!" he whined.  "I'm serious!  Stop distracting me!"

"Answer the question, Roka."

Heaving a sigh—he must've figured that she wasn't going to let him alone until he gave in, he shook his head and rolled his eyes, wiggling his butt on the pillow like he was trying to make himself more comfortable.  "I don't know exactly why, but I imagine that it has something to do with the density of the pillow.  Feathers are denser than foam, and a gust of wind—like a fart—would pass into it a lot easier, but it's also dense enough to keep it in there no matter how long it stays unmoved—just don't fluff the damn thing . . ."

"That sounds like a crock of shit," she informed him, cocking an eyebrow.

"I told you that I don't know the particulars.  I just know that it works."

"And who told you this, great God of Perversion?"

He grinned.  "My cousin, Morio did, and he didn't actually tell me about it—he showed me.  Care to hear how?"

Making a face, Valerie quickly shook her head.  "Ugh, no . . ."

Waving his hand toward the door again, Evan's grin widened, and with a heavy sigh, Valerie glanced out into the hallway once more.

"I can't believe you talked me into this," she muttered under her breath as she resumed lookout duty.

In truth, she wasn't entirely sure how he'd managed to convince her to go along with his antics.  She supposed that it had seemed interesting at the time—bending the rules after a lifetime of walking the straight and narrow, maybe . . . or maybe it had something to do with the mischievous glint in his eyes when he'd unceremoniously decided that she ought to be his partner in crime . . .

And she supposed that she'd have to admit, at least to herself, that she was having fun—in a really demented, twisted sort of way . . .

The most ungodly sound made her cringe.  Muffled by the pillow, sure, but it sounded awful, just awful.  Unable to stop herself, she shot him a horrified glance.  "I think you need to go wipe," she told him.

Unfortunately, her commentary only increased his amusement, and he nearly fell off the bed, he was laughing so hard.  Apparently he still possessed the sense of humor of a five year old, but then, she already knew that, too.  "It's roses, V!  A dozen of them—maybe two!"

Grabbing the second pillow, he was literally howling in laughter.  Valerie was about to tell him just how messed up he really was when the smell hit her hard.  "Oh, my God," she gasped, fumbling with the door, yanking it open, and darting into the hallway.  He was rank—grossly, sickeningly rank—and she covered her nose and mouth with her hand, half scared that the hideous stench had managed to follow her into the hallway.

A couple minutes later, Evan stumbled out of the room, his eyes unnaturally bright since he'd laughed himself to tears.  He didn't stop to say a word as he grabbed her hand and dragged her down the hallway to the fire escape.

Valerie sighed again, but finally laughed as they dashed up the stairs, two at a time . . .


"Do you have any idea how much money it's going to cost to repair the damages you've done?  Of course you don't, and you don't care, either.  You're damn lucky that management isn't kicking us out or having you thrown in jail for destruction of property.  You burned Bone's door!"

Evan carefully schooled his features since he didn't figure that Mike was quite as amused as he was.  "I also burned Frankie's door, too . . . or maybe it was Tay's . . . Not sure . . ."

That earned him a scathing glower.  Valerie shifted in the chair beside him, her hands folded demurely in her lap, feet tucked back under her chair looking like the picture of innocence.

'She should be getting reamed, too,' his youkai pointed out sullenly.

'Nah . . . I mean, it was all kind of my idea . . .'

'But she went along with it—and it was her girly crap that you used to set said-doors on fire, in the first place.'

'The penis was pretty awesome . . .'

'The orange condom was better.'

'That's true . . . remind me to ask Bone later where he got it, will you?'

'M'kay.'

"Are you listening to me, Roka?"

"Absolutely," he replied without as much as batting an eyelash.

Mike heaved a sigh, draped his hands on his hips, and continued to glower at Evan.  "You're not.  I know you're not.  I can tell you're not, damn it."

"I am; I swear!" Evan lied.  "I mean, it's not like I was trying to hurt anyone . . ."

The scowl on Mike's face shifted into a suspect frown.  "Isn't that the same thing that Dieter and you said when you set the hotel room on fire in Pittsburgh?"

Pressing his lips into a thin line to keep himself from laughing outright, Evan feigned innocence.  "That was an accident," Evan managed to say without grinning.

"What'd you do that time?" Valerie asked, leaning toward Evan and whispering her question without taking her eyes off Mike.

Clearing his throat, Evan leaned toward her to whisper back, "Deet wanted to see if he could do that trick where you light a match and spit booze on it."

Valerie blinked a few times then shot him a quick look.  "Did it work?"

"A little too well," he replied.  "Set the curtains on fire, and they went up like a forest in a drought."

She nodded slowly and sat up straight once more.  Mike rolled his eyes and rubbed his forehead in a weary sort of way.  "The point is," he went on sternly, "you cannot run around causing trouble just because you're bored.  Are you listening to me?"

"Mikey?"

"What?"

Evan shrugged and pressed on his ear a few times.  "The whole fucking hotel is listening to you."

"Yeah, but are you?" Mike countered.

"I hear you; I hear you.  Bad Zel."

Mike didn't look impressed, mostly because Evan still looked anything but contrite.  "I'm not joking, Roka, and I mean it.  Keep it up, and you'll be sleeping on that damned bus all the time because no one in their right mind is going to let you stay in their hotel."

"Aw, come on, Mike," Evan said with a sigh.  "What the hell else is there to do around here?  Nothing, that's what."

"Then find a hobby," Mike growled from between clenched teeth.

Evan made a face and pointed at Valerie.  "I had hobbies!  She banned them all!  If you want to bitch someone out, then you should do it to her!"

"Way to throw me under the bus, Roka," Valerie muttered.

"Any time, baby," he quipped.

"Jerk."

He chuckled.

"Pay attention, will you?" Mike snapped.  Letting out a deep breath, he looked downright exhausted, and for the briefest of moments, Evan almost felt sorry for him—almost.  After all, he didn't actually dislike Mike.  In fact, if he had to admit it, he'd say that he respected him for the most part.  Sure, there were times when Mike would say or do something that would rub Evan the wrong way, but that was part of his job, and Evan knew that, too.  Mike wasn't a bad guy, per se—he just had a sucktastic job, and while Mike might well bust Evan's chops often enough, it could always be worse.

Of course, that didn't mean that Evan was above making the man squirm.  It was his considered opinion that Mike would be bored out of his mind if Evan behaved himself all the time.  "What do you want me to do?  Write a letter of apology to the hotel?"

"I want you to start thinking before you do stupid shit," Mike growled.  "Do me a favor and stay in your room for the rest of the night, will you?  Just stay the hell out of trouble."

"Mike . . ." Valerie said suddenly, her voice lowering an octave in a smooth drawl.

"Yes?"

Smiling sweetly, the attorney got to her feet and very casually patted the manager on the arm.  "I think you need to get laid," she said.  "I hear it's good for de-stressing."

Mike's mouth dropped open, and he stared for a full minute before he turned on his heel and stalked toward the door.  "I give up," he grumbled, slamming out the room with a deafening 'bang'.

Evan burst out laughing.  "I can't believe you told him that!" he gasped between guffaws.  "I really can't believe you told him that!"

"Well, it's true," she retorted defensively.  Slowly turning to eye him, Valerie's eyes brightened by degrees as the tiniest hint of a smirk turned up the corners of her lips.  "He hasn't figured out what you did to his pillows yet, has he?"

Winding down to a wide grin, Evan shrugged.  "I doubt it."

She thought that over and nodded.  "He's going to bawl us out again when he does, isn't he?"

Evan's grin widened.  "Very possibly."

Her lips twitched, and she grabbed his hand to drag him toward the door.  "Come on."

"Hey . . . Where are we going?" he asked but made no move to pull away.

She didn't slow down as she hustled him down the hallway.  "I'm kind of bored," she admitted, "and since you just got me in trouble, the least you can do is buy me a couple drinks."

Evan chuckled and followed her into the stairwell and down the steps.  "Whatever you want, V.  Whatever you want . . ."