Curiosity had gotten the better of him. When he opened his door late one Saturday morning, he could smell unfamiliar cigarette smoke settled in the condo, the scent lingering on the furniture. Immediately he knew that someone had been in his place and it set him on edge. Cautiously he explored the condo for any lingering sign of a presence. Finding none in the major part of the apartment, he made his way back towards the kitchen to think and survey. Nothing had been disturbed, nothing taken, nothing even moved. IT unsettled him further. And then he saw what he was supposed to find.
There, tented on the granite countertop was a white business card he had never seen before. Judas stirred groggily inside him, triggered by the red pulsing feeling Nikolai had in his chest. He picked up the card to examine it.
The card was simple - too simple to be there by accident. It had nothing more than the name of some hotel he had never heard of - no address, no number to call. On the underside was a handwritten date - tomorrow - and a time - 10 PM. There was nothing else.
Nikolai stared at the card, flipping it around in his hands for long minutes, debating. It wasn't the first time he had ever received such an ominous note. To the contrary, in his line of work secrecy was key and the less he communicated, the better. It kept him alive. Nonetheless, this kind of situation always required a bit of hesitance on his end. No one could ever be sure what exactly was going to be waiting for him at some hotel with no information, at a time and date not of his choosing.
This was just another part of the business, after all.
He parked his car a block away from the hotel in a shitty part of town he usually loved and thrived in. But this was an unfamiliar city without the safety of a large populous of supernaturals. In fact he knew little to nothing about the city at all; looking the town up online could only tell him what it looked like, but not how the city breathed, how it's people treated her.
It was darker night than usual here with a warm mist coloring the air between street lamps as he approached the building. He took the steps slowly, trying to absorb as much information about where he was and what building he was in as possible before entering. The news media that he had found about this particular place was extraordinarily vague, listing it only as a refurbished private hotel that had been shut down years ago due to safety violations.
Something in his body felt strange, as if he had been in the building before, even though he had never set foot in this city. It pulled at his chest, beckoning him closer to the hotel despite that red alarm that had begun to sound in his head. Judas kept one eye open on Nikolai and watched. Nikolai tried to force the feeling away, but found himself incapable. Apprehension and panic threatened to bloom in his chest as he entered the building, nearly against his own accord, only to be shoved deep down into a place where they wouldn't resurface for the night; there was no need for such weaknesses like that in business.
"Nikolai Armani?" A pretty girl - one that he doubted was even eighteen - greeted him with a pathetic excuse for a smile. There was bruising on her face, a split lip freshly opened, as if she had just been beaten. She smelled of soap and cum, as if she had been freshly fucked before showering and sent up to greet him here. Nikolai said nothing to her, eyeing her suspiciously. "Follow me, please." The girl turned to leave down the small hallway to the elevator. She walked with a slight limp and nikolai could feel the fear and pain emanating from her.
"Where?" he called after her, remaining in the doorway of the lobby, that annoying feeling of familiarity pulling him with the girl.
"He'd like to see you upstairs." She turned nervously towards him.
"And who would that be?"
The girl hesitated, her body language showing him uncertainty and fear. "I'm sorry, I'm not allowed to say more. Please come with me." She started off again towards the elevator and waited inside for him. Reluctantly, he followed her into the elevator and up they went in silence. They stopped finally on the fourth floor and the doors opened.
