Blood Moon

Chapter 2

Chapter 2

“So, this is Charming? Couldn’t be further from the truth. There’s nothing charming about this place. It’s little more than a ghost town.”

Angie didn’t say anything, because what could she say? Erica was right. There wasn’t much to Charming, Arizona. But that wasn’t such a bad thing. If there had been something, anything at all, really – she wouldn’t be here. She wouldn’t have a job here.

So, yeah. There’s nothing here. But it won’t be that way forever. This is a good thing.

“But I guess that’s just what you want?” Erica said, echoing her thoughts. Erica rolled down the passenger side window, letting in a flow of warm night air. They’d just rolled into town at nearly 5:00 in the morning, yet they’d already passed a few rough looking trucks on their way to who knows where. “Must be getting an early start on their crops. Or farms. Or cows. Or whatever it is people around here actually do.”

“Erica,” Angie warned. They’d been driving for the past eight hours, most of which were filled with Erica complaining.

“Sorry,” Erica said. “It’s just that –”

“You’re not used to this,” Angie finished. Erica opened her mouth to defend herself, to say something more, but Angie continued, “It’s just that we usually work in big cities. New York. LA. Chicago. Even Houston, once.” Erica slammed her mouth shut, defeated. Angie kept talking, saying, “We’ve never taken a job like this. It’s one thing, Angie, to gentrify a business district or even the occasional neighborhood. But it’s an altogether different thing to take on a whole town. Does that sound about how you’re feeling?”

Erica nodded, glancing out the window. Angie could watch as Erica counted the amount of closed businesses they were passing on what amounted for the main drag in Charming, but mercifully, Erica continued to keep her mouth shut.

Angie hadn’t meant to snap at Erica, but she’d heard it all before. She’d heard it the second she’d told Erica about her plans. She’d heard it the entire trip to the airport. She’d heard it the entire flight. She’d heard it when they landed in Tucson, heard it while they got the rental car, and she’d heard it almost the entire eight hour trip to Charming. She’d heard it too many times. Though I’m sure to hear it again.

“It’s just that –”

“What does it matter to you anyway, Erica?” Angie cut her off. “This is my job. I decided to take it. I knew it wouldn’t be easy. But you’re my assistant. And I offered you the opportunity to stay home, and you declined. I’m here to bring Charming to the future, and you’re here to help me. If you don’t want to be here, you’re still more than welcome to leave.”

“I want to be here, Angie,” Erica said. “You know me. I just complain.”

“All of the time,” Angie responded.

“All of the damn time,” Erica said, and she grinned a little. Angie grinned just a bit, too. She liked Erica – for the most part. Truthfully, she did. And while Angie was great at what she did, Erica kept her in check. “Plus, what would you do without me? You couldn’t do this without me.”

“You’re probably right,” she conceded. Angie had all of the ideas. She’d built her business from the ground up. She’d started small: helping failing businesses get back on their feet. She’d moved up to entire chains, restaurants and then hotels. She’d grown from there, taking on entire neighborhoods. Turning bad parts of towns into the good part of town. Along the way, she’d hired Erica as her assistant to help smooth everything over.

But she’d never tried to revitalize a town before. She never would have bothered if it hadn’t been for the outrageous amount of money she’d been offered by the Mayor of Charming. She had no idea how one man could have that kind of money, especially in a town like this, but she wasn’t going to question it – not right then, anyway. She was content to do her job, and get rich while doing it.

“Is that our hotel?” Erica exclaimed. “Oh, God. It’s not even a hotel. It’s a motel. I knew we should have stayed out of town.”

“And drive nearly an hour every morning? I don’t think so,” Angie said as she pulled into the parking lot of the Great Southern Motel. At this time in the morning, it looked absolutely dead, and she reasoned that at any time, it would be absolutely dead. There was only one car in the dirt parking lot and Angie assumed it belonged to whoever was working.

She put the car in park, rolled up Erica’s window – almost catching her arm in the process – and turned the car off. Then she popped the trunk and got out, grabbing her single suitcase. Erica, meanwhile, had to wrestle two suitcases, a duffle bag, and her purse out.

“Need any help?”

“I got it, thanks,” Erica said, leaning the duffle bag on the trunk and slamming it shut. “Let’s get checked in so I can get some beauty sleep. We don’t have anything planned tomorrow, do we?”

“We have a meeting with the mayor.”

“I don’t have to go, do I?”

“You’re my assistant, Erica,” Angie warned again. “I need you there.”

“Fine,” she replied, leading the way into the front desk of the Great Southern. Angie followed slowly, looking around as she did so. There wasn’t much around the Great Southern. It happened to be on the northern end of town – not that there was enough of town to really have a north or south end, she noticed.

When Angie entered the room that contained the front desk, Erica was already there, clanging on the bell to get some service.

“Hello?” Erica was calling, but there was no answer. She rang the bell a few more times. “What the hell?”

“Maybe she’s not here,” Angie said. “Maybe there’s a number we can call, or something.”

“This is such –”

“Hold yer horses!” a voice yelled from behind them. Angie jumped at the voice and turned around. An old woman, covered in wrinkles and barely up to Angie’s shoulders, waddled into the room. A cigarette was clutched between her teeth and Angie had to fight off a cough as the old woman walked past her and went around the desk.

Erica didn’t have that kind of tact: she tried fanning a hand in front of her to dispel the smoke, which seemed to only deepen the scowl on the older woman’s face. Angie had to suppress a grin; she couldn’t imagine this woman not scowling.

“Whaddaya need?” the older woman asked. Her voice sounded worse than the croak of dying frogs.

“What we need is our rooms,” Erica shot back.

“What my friend means,” Angie said, sliding in front of Erica and into the cloud of cigarette smoke, “Is that we have a couple of rooms booked. The last name is Campbell.”

The old woman grunted and then started flipping through a notebook. She grunted a second time and then said, “Nothing here.”

“I set them up,” Erica said, indignant. “I called ahead. They have to be in there.”

The old woman grunted again and Angie said, “Maybe my friend spoke to someone else?”

“Nope.”

“Nope?”

“I’m the only one who works here.”

“So I talked to you and you messed something up,” Erica hissed, narrowing her eyes.

“I didn’t mess nothin’ up,” the old woman spat back.

“Hold on,” Angie said, reaching into her bag. “Let’s just get a room for the night and we’ll sort this out tomorrow. How much is it for two rooms for the night?”

“Gonna have to book through the week,” the old woman croaked, a nasty grin spreading on her face. So, she can smile. When she’s trying to take advantage of us.

“No –” Erica began.

“Not a problem,” Angie said, pulling out her checkbook.

“Cash only.”

“Okay, that’s not a problem, either,” Angie said, putting her checkbook back into her bag and pulling out her stash of emergency money.

“Fourteen hundred.”

“Excuse me?” Erica said, but Angie stepped in front of her again.

“A hundred a night, girly,” the old woman said. “And then there’s the both of ya.”

“A hundred a night? For this place?”

“Erica?” Angie asked, turning around. “Can you please wait outside?”

“Ange, we’re getting ripped off. This is a racket!”

“Just wait outside!” Angie snapped. She was tired and more than that, she was sick and tired of Erica’s mood.

Erica went outside and waited while Angie paid the money. She didn’t like it any more than Erica did – but she was in no mood to deal with it right then and there.

“If, by some chance, you find the receipt of our transaction, we would get a refund, right?”

The old woman grunted, which Angie took as a reluctant yes, and then handed Angie two room keys. Angie thanked her, left the front desk, and went outside. Erica was outside looking furious.

“She’s ripping us off, Angie!”

“I know. I know, but we’ll figure it out tomorrow. Let’s just get some rest and try not to piss off the locals too much yet.”

“It’s a scam! I’ll pull up our receipts and confirmation numbers tomorrow morning. After I’ve gotten my beauty sleep. We’ll get a refund, I promise you.”

“I know you’ll figure it out,” Angie said, and she meant it. She had a lot of money, so much she almost didn’t care what happened to it. Getting shafted on the motel bill was unfortunate, but Angie knew Erica would get to the bottom of it. And if she didn’t…

Well, it’s just money.

“I bet our rooms are at the very end of the motel,” Erica complained. Angie looked down at the keys, then looked at the room numbers – all of which were vacant – that they were passing. “Tell me I’m right.”

“You’re right, Erica,” Angie said. “Just like you so often are.”

Together, they made their way to the very end of the motel. Erica’s was at the very end, Angie’s right next to it.

“I’m almost afraid to see what this room is going to be like,” Erica said, hesitating. “I bet it’s disgusting.”

“Do you ever say anything positive?”

“No,” Erica said, opening up her room and disappearing inside.

Angie sighed and opened up her room. Inside was dark. She felt around for the light switch, flipping it on, and got a good look at where she would be spending her foreseeable future.

“I hate it when she’s right,” Angie said, sighing and entering the room.