Death & Desire: A Snarky Urban Fantasy Detective Series (The Jezebel Files Book 2)

by Deborah Wilde

  Priya ran her finger around the rim of her Solo cup. “What if she refuses to accept that part of you?”

  “After all we’ve weathered together, I honestly believe that she’ll come around, but even if the worst comes to pass and she doesn’t? I was denied my magic for fifteen years. I don’t want to live in the shadows just because it furthers other people’s agendas or they won’t approve. I value truth and that’s how I want to live my life.” I tossed my Solo cup in the trash. “If I’d stayed Mundane, and the only female P.I. in Vancouver on top of it all, how many more years of bottom feeder cases like spying on kids because their parents thought they were on drugs would I have faced? The difference in jobs in the couple of weeks since the ward was broken and my magic was restored is night and day.”

  “You’re a puzzle junkie.”

  “I’ve been called worse.” I smiled sadly.

  Priya hugged me. “It’ll all be okay.”

  I accepted the comfort. And the lie.

  Then I went home for a necessary wardrobe change because I was two braids and a bonnet away from marrying a hard-working man called Pa. Damn it! I hated when Levi was right.

  Chapter 8

  Le Rève was a large–and packed–space in Yaletown, the original Western Terminus for the Canadian Pacific Railway and a warehouse district until its transformation to a trendy neighborhood after Vancouver hosted Expo ’86.

  Talia had come through; our names were on the guest list.

  Priya and I checked our coats and headed for the bar to take stock of our surroundings. My bestie wore a pale pink slip dress that made her skin glow and her green eyes luminous. Her bare legs looked a mile long in her strappy silver heels and her normally sleek flapper bob was a riot of crazy moussed-up curls.

  She was gorgeous and getting her fair share of attention, but she wouldn’t notice. She rarely did anymore, preferring to commit to one boring guy after another.

  A DJ spun jazz remixes in one corner, a couple of tattooed chefs worked feverishly in the open concept kitchen, and the bartender mixed up an impressive array of martinis. The French-Asian fusion of the menu was reflected in the blue and coral vintage wallpaper with its delicate blossoms and paper lanterns mixed with rustic wood tables.

  All of Vancouver’s glittering socialites rubbed elbows, while camera crews caught up with local celebs.

  And hello, Levi.

  His Lordship stood in the center of the room, in the brightest spotlight, with his arm around Chef Miriam, saying something to make her laugh and shake her head. He pushed a lock of midnight black hair out of his eyes.

  I’d made those eyes go wide and dreamy blue with the drugged out fog of lust. Did he catch himself smiling at odd moments, remembering our time together? Or was I just one of many lovers, as easily chosen as the fedora sitting at a jaunty angle on his head, and as easily discarded?

  Priya pressed a highball glass into my hands. “Here. Drink this because you’re licking your lips and staring and it’s embarrassing.”

  “Am not,” I muttered, flushing, and sipped the Jack Daniels she’d procured. Two fingers worth of Gentleman Jack with three ice cubes and a splash of water, just the way I liked it.

  I peeked over the rim to where the interview was wrapping up.

  Levi’s lithe torso was emphasized by the fitted trousers and shirt with a cool Rat Pack vibe to its blocky design. He one-arm hugged Miriam, who swatted at him with her chef’s apron and then hurried back to the kitchen.

  Why couldn’t there be some irrefutable body language of the guilty? Levi was an illusionist, he knew how to conceal his secrets.

  “There’s Miles,” Priya said, pointing in the opposite direction.

  “Let’s do this.” We kind of sidled up sideways to Miles’ general vicinity, but I stopped short of approaching him, stopping in front of a server with a tray of tiny daikon radish boxes that were stuffed with shrimp salad.

  We each helped ourselves to one.

  “Wait for him to come over,” I said, regretting that I hadn’t taken a second daikon box. Fresh, crunchy, and creamy with a tang of lemon, these puppies were delish.

  “How do you know he’ll–”

  “Are you stalking Levi?” Miles’ deep baritone had a distinctly annoyed edge. At six-foot-four, he was a mountain of a man, with serious brown eyes and buzz cut blond hair. He wore a monochrome navy suit, exquisitely tailored to fit him. “How did you even get on the guest list?”

  “Charmed to see you as well,” I said. “Miles, this is Priya. Priya, Miles. You’ve met before I believe.”

  “Nice to see you again.” She beamed up at him and Miles blinked.

  Unlike my absentee father, whose charm was magically induced, Priya made everyone around her fall under her spell completely naturally. She was this ray of light and you couldn’t help but be entranced.

  I crossed my fingers and waited. Three… two… one…

  “Hack my House again,” Miles said, “and I’ll nail your ass to the wall.”

  Priya bristled up at him. “If, theoretically, I had hacked it, you would never know.”

  There it was. Sparks. My smirk wasn’t super huge, but just the same, I got very interested in the mini Korean BBQ sliders on buttery brioche passing by. I nabbed three.

  “Exactly. I got very curious when this one”–Miles jerked a thumb at me–“admitted her involvement with the Scott girl. But when I checked the database, there was no sign of Ash verifying whether that family was Nefesh or not. She absolutely would have checked, and if there wasn’t a record of that then someone erased it and didn’t leave a trace.” He crossed his arms, sending a ripple along his biceps.

  “Whoops,” I said, not at all chagrined.

  Priya glared, since I’d asked her to delete all traces of my search, then jutted out her chin at Miles. “Maybe your database is deleting itself in humiliation for the sloppy coding and cheap patch jobs. Where’d you find your programmers? Craigslist?”

  As the two broke out in a squabble, I strode away, satisfied with a job well done.

  A hand clamped down on my shoulder. “Causing trouble?”

  I spun to face Levi. “There you go. Thinking the worst of me again.”

  “You make it so easy.”

  “Well, I model myself after you.” Motioning to Priya that I was leaving, I retrieved my leather jacket from the coat check.

  Levi eyed my outfit of black leather pants and scoop neck crop top. “Your wardrobe points to a severe personality disorder.”

  “While yours would suggest that ninety-nine percent of the time you’re repressed beyond all hope.” This one percent exception was charged with a potent sexuality. The suits were safer. For me. “Let’s go. You’ve made me wait long enough.”

  I followed Levi in silence down the block.

  “Speak, Ash. You scare me when you get quiet and you’re walking behind me.”

  “Don’t worry,” I said. “When you push me to a non-negotiable act of homicide, I promise you’ll see my face.”

  “That I don’t doubt. But seriously. Share the contents of your ever-whirring brain.”

  Ever since that night the two of us had attended the auction in Tofino, I’d shared thoughts with Levi that I hadn’t even voiced to Priya. I wanted to tell him about my problems with Talia, but I didn’t dare expose any vulnerable part of myself until I could safely vouch for him again. And since my weird feelings about him were definitely not a topic of conversation, that left only one way to answer him.

  “I’m wondering how much Evil Wanker knows about Jezebels. It’s like I’m on a teeter-totter and I’ve momentarily achieved this precarious balance, because I’m keeping my magic destruction usage to a minimum. What happens if my Jezebel responsibilities include taking magic on the regular? Will my cravings exponentially worsen? Will I have any control over them? What will that do to my moral compass? I’m bracing myself for one side or the other of this seesaw to come crashing down.”

  “Aren’t you all abo
ut getting answers?”

  “I am. Doesn’t mean they’re easy to hear.”

  “Fair enough.” He beeped a car fob.

  My mouth fell open and I scrambled around the side to get into the passenger seat. “A Tesla?”

  He patted his steering wheel. “Did you think I’d have some gas guzzling muscle car to prove how big my dick is?”

  “No.” I snapped the seat belt in. “I figured you’d recline on a palanquin, carried aloft by your half-dozen minions.”

  “That’s my weekend ride.” He pulled onto Cordova Street–no, launched us into traffic, laughing at my streak of curses. Then he put his hands behind his head and got comfortable as the car merged into the lane.

  I screamed and tried to grab the wheel, but he swatted me away.

  “Autopilot, baby.” He clucked his tongue. “Look at all those suckers with their clunky monstrosities.”

  My breathing was raspy and I clutched my seat belt in a death grip, bracing myself for impact.

  “Ash? Oh, fuck.” Levi took manual control of the steering and pulled over to the curb, cutting the engine. “I’m sorry. I forgot. I…” His expression tight with anxiety, he went to stroke my shoulder, then pulled back.

  I only dimly registered all this, silently alphabetizing items in his car to calm myself down.

  At some point, the vise constricting my ribcage disappeared and I let go of the seat belt, only to find I’d worn harsh red grooves in my skin.

  “Ashira?” Levi said softly.

  I nodded shakily. “I’m all right. What’s a little PTSD now and then?”

  “I’m so sorry. I didn’t realize autopilot would upset you.”

  “I didn’t either since Moriarty isn’t the Batmobile, but that whole endless void bungy jump back in the grove doesn’t seem scary anymore, so that’s a win. Don’t worry about it.” I patted his thigh, his muscle flexing under my touch.

  “Feeling me up, are you?”

  “Yes, I was going for a worse trauma to override the PTSD.” I settled back against my seat. “Carry on.”

  We drove through East Vancouver, Levi driving the car himself, swinging past older apartment buildings and low slung warehouses.

  “I learned some other interesting facts about Gavriella, if you’d care to know them,” Levi said.

  “Not yet. I want to see her space unhampered by any bias or prior knowledge. By the way,” I said, “we ought to come to an agreement on my fee for the case I’m working on.”

  “The one I didn’t hire you for? Let’s go with pro bono.”

  “Let me rephrase. You’re not paying me for this case. You’re paying me to destroy the fourteen vials with the smudges that I’m getting as payment for this case. A girl cannot live on smudges alone. Plus, it’s a humanitarian act benefiting all Nefesh and as House Head, you can’t say no. Wow, this car is really quiet inside. Super smooth.”

  “You’re working for the Queen?” Levi smacked the wheel. “Ma vaffanculo. Are you insane?”

  “I’m not working for her, she merely recommended me for the job. I then used my stellar negotiation skills for the vials. You’re welcome. Also, officially, as Levi Montefiore, Head of House Pacifica, you don’t know any of this. You only know about it as my–”

  I cut off, suddenly unsure how to finish that sentence. “Archnemesis” sounded a little grand especially now that Chariot was in the picture. “Hate-sex buddy,” while accurate, didn’t fit anymore. Boss? Hard pass. Friend? Something in me rankled. If I was truly friends with someone, I wouldn’t be able to make them a suspect in a case. I’d know them well enough to say whether or not they did it.

  “–Levi.” I finished, limply.

  “Know about any of what?” he growled.

  “Exactly, that’s perfect.”

  Levi beat his head against his seat, a gesture which cheered me up considerably. He drove through the light traffic at tortoise miles per hour, so overtly cautious in his overcompensation for earlier that he made half-blind grannies seem like NASCAR drivers.

  I didn’t have the heart to bug him about it.

  “Anything else you’d like to dump on me?” he finally said.

  “Since you asked so nicely? Yes. Once I’ve finished this job, I want you to push my registration through and get my enhanced strength verified to change the status of my P.I. license and openly take Nefesh cases.”

  My strength part was actually fairly low on the magic scale, maybe a two out of five, not like people with Tough Guy powers. I wasn’t chucking cars around, but I was strong enough to do serious damage with my punches and I could pin a man down. Useful close contact fighting skills in order to then use my blood magic on a person.

  Levi opened his mouth but I held up a hand.

  “Hear me out. Both my birth records and medical records from the time of the crash when I was thirteen have me documented in like thirty different places as Mundane. Every inch of me was examined. It’ll quash any idea that I’ve been Rogue all this time.”

  Unlike everyone else who was born with magic, my best guess was that my powers had been passed down as a recessive gene from my Nefesh father Adam and activated after the trauma of my car crash when I was thirteen. I hadn’t known any of this until very recently, when a blow to my skull had revealed a hidden Star of David tattoo that turned out to be a ward suppressing my magic. It had been scarred when I hit my head, and thus broken, allowing my magic to manifest.

  “We’ll simply fudge the truth a bit and say the recessive gene turned on when I bashed my skull last week. Between the documentation and your natural arrogance, no one will question you.”

  “Grazie.” He paused. “Talia will freak.”

  No lies. No games. “We’ll weather this storm. I can’t live a lie.”

  Levi snorted. “Just a half of one. You want me to hide your Jezebel magic and only put your strength on the books.”

  “D’uh. I’d rather not have a target on my back with every whackjob and criminal trying to use me. It’s better this way. At least until we understand why I have it.”

  “There’s another solution.” He pulled up in front of an older apartment building off Clark Drive with stone sconce flourishes that had gone grimy over time. After turning off the engine, he faced me, his teeth worrying his bottom lip. “Come work for me, off the books. Permanently.”

  Why? To control what I do and don’t learn about you?

  “Never,” I said. “I worked my ass off building up my business. It’s not much–yet–but it’s mine.”

  Levi was quiet as he got out of the car, his strides long and his hands jammed in his pockets.

  I peered up at him, moonlight etched across his features, over his rugged cheekbones and those full lips that were currently tugged downward. “You mad that I don’t want to be part of your fiefdom?”

  Levi stopped and ran a finger along my jaw. The touch sent goosebumps cascading along my skin, and I wrapped my jacket more snugly around me. “There are benefits to having you under me,” he said.

  “Absolutely. It’s that much easier to knife you between the ribs, you cocky bastard.” I waved a hand around my face. “And you’d see my beautiful visage as I did so. As promised.”

  Levi gave me a snarky smile, unlocked the front door, and we entered the lobby.

  Chapter 9

  The faded red carpet was printed with either swirls or body outlines and the stairwell reeked of onions.

  Levi fiddled on his key ring for the one to Gavriella’s apartment while I checked for wards. Sure enough her magic, similar to mine, thrummed under my fingertips.

  “Let’s not test whether it finds us hostile or not.” Since the ward was created with Gavriella’s blood, I was able to hook into it, tease it out of the doorframe that anchored it, and destroy it. I experienced a mild high, a triple espresso shot level which dissipated, bringing me gently back down once I completed the process and finished the magic off. Momentarily satiated, the ever-present hum of longing in my head dialed down t
o a barely noticeable presence.

  I motioned Levi inside. “Age before beauty.”

  “I’m only three months older than you.”

  “The statement stands.”

  Gavriella Behar’s apartment, while small, was surprisingly bright, cheerily decorated with vivid pops of color, and smelled like lavender. I did a cursory walkthrough to see if anything jumped out at me. In the bedroom was a framed print of the Sagrada Familia, the church in Barcelona, and in the hallway was a painting of a flamenco dancer, her red dress spinning as she snapped a fan with maximum attitude. On Gavriella’s kitchen counter sat a wide, shallow stainless steel paella pan, which I only recognized from an old Anthony Bourdain episode in Spain that Priya had watched. Food travel shows were her preferred binge-watch.

  When I’d met Gavriella, she’d been battered and broken, unable to do more than whisper. I hadn’t noticed any accent if she had one.

  I checked her medicine cabinet for any medication or a handy patch that would quell the magic cravings, but the most potent drug was Midol.

  “Gavriella was Jewish.” I returned to Levi in the living room. “Got quite the stash of Manischewitz coconut macaroons in her cupboard. I approve, because those things are delish to even us most secular of Jews, but it’s Passover food. Not something non-Jews are gonna have on hand.”

  Levi snooped through the drawer of the large sideboard in the dining area of the open concept space, his hands in the thin gloves I’d provided us both to prevent fingerprints. I’d assigned him the task of looking for an address book, phone, or laptop. “Perhaps all Jezebels are,” he said.

  “Might all be women, too.” I wandered over to the bookshelf, because books were a fountain of insight into a person. “All female Jezebels fit with the mythology of worshipping the Bride of Yahweh and the Jezebel label. Something to consider.”

  Most of the books were Spanish paperbacks across a variety of genres, but there were English bestsellers mixed in there as well.