The Truth About Night

by Amanda Arista

  “You don’t think that police tape really keeps the public away from a crime scene.” Rutherford looked down at us.

  “How do we kill it?” Levi growled. “I don’t think we can save Cartwright, but I want it dead.”

  “Get in line,” I snapped.

  “Spell’s not going to last forever,” Rutherford said. His knees weakened and Emily caught him around the waist. Someone pulled up a broken stool for him to sit on.

  I wiped my hands down my shirt, the burn still sizzling around my wrist. That was going to scar. “Well, let’s ask him.”

  I walked to the edge of the protection spell. The Demon glared at me. In the fight, he’d lost more of chunks of his face and the other eye. Just watching him made my eyes water and I wondered if my Charm could even work on a Demon. Seemed to work on all other manner of beastie, but this thing didn’t even really have eyes to look into.

  I let the chill of power wash over me. Let the lightning storm cover me. This was demon against demon, now.

  I found what I thought was the grounding spot in what was left of his eyes and pushed toward it. “What are you?”

  The Demon just laughed at me, the human vocal cords still intact enough to make the eerie noise echo off the now quiet room. But it didn’t look away.

  I stretched my neck and tried again, pushing harder this time. “How do we kill you?”

  The Demon fought his words and was able to swallow them back down.

  Rafe’s shields opened up around him and I was met with the hesitant feeling of his wolf against me. He was trying to enhance me, like he had done before.

  I ask again. “What is your name, Demon?”

  “Cartwright.”

  I pushed even harder. “What is your real name?”

  The word clawed out of his mouth. “Kalimore.”

  I smiled. It was going to take more than just two of us to get out the real information, but a name was a good start. I had done more with less.

  “It isn’t going to work, my love,” the Demon’s voice rasped out. “You are nothing. You are a hint of what you could have been with me. You will never—”

  Emily’s hand clamped down in my shoulder and it felt like someone thrust a furry book against my chest, but Emily’s power flowed easily with mine, mixing with Rafe’s. The chill between my shoulders grew to my entire back.

  I was just about to ask another question when Emily backhanded Levi’s shoulder. With a glare, he put his hand on Emily’s shoulder.

  Then as one, the entire pack opened their power to me. The heavy book on my chest turned into an anvil and the anvil turned into a cement truck and the cement truck nearly threatened to suffocate me with the weight of their animal essences. Then there was a pop, and my entire body went cold, my power pulsing through every ounce of me like never before.

  Locking my eyes on the burning voids of the Demon’s, I asked again. “How do we kill you?”

  The Demon fought fruitlessly. He couldn’t turn away. He couldn’t move. He was frozen in the stare of forty Shifters and one very pissed-off Lilin.

  “How do we kill you?” My eyes began to water and a trickle of blood ran down to my lip as I pushed the truth into him, twisted the harpoon of my gaze straight into the void.

  “Fire,” he finally cried out.

  The entire group took a collective breath and pulled away from me. All the air rushed out of the room as their power retreated back into them. My knees went weak and Rafe was there to catch me, or more accurately, we weakly leaned against each other.

  The Demon threw himself against the protection spell and it threw him back against the concrete wall.

  “You can’t stop me. My thirst will live on.”

  It didn’t take long for the Shifters to pile up a makeshift pyre around the Demon’s circle. Anything that would burn. Wood. Clothing, a small pile of newspapers.

  He pressed his hand against the spell and it sizzled and burned away the rest of the human flesh on his palms, exposing the smooth obsidian of his claws. “You are nothing more than a parlor trick, Lanard.”

  I did my best to ignore him. To not let the truth of his words get to me.

  I turned toward Rafe and shoved both hands into the pockets of my coat, much to his surprise. I winked at him and pulled out an old book of matches from McTaggert’s. It was the first time I’d thought about alcohol in days.

  I ripped off two matches and folded the cover back. With a deep breath to make sure I didn’t blow out the flame, I ripped the matches against the striking strip and watched them catch fire. I lit the rest of the matchbook on fire and tossed it on the pyre.

  The flame was instant and I jumped back and into Rafe. The flames caught quickly around the protection circle.

  The Demon stood still and glared at me. “This is not the end.”

  “It’s the end for you, Kalimore. You will never hurt my city again.”

  A spark from the crackling fire jumped up onto his leg and it was like he had been doused with lighter fluid. His entire body ignited in one flaming pyre and he screamed in pain.

  I covered my ears and pulled away from the heat. I watched as the Demon fell to his knees before collapsing into a rotten, ashy corpse.

  It was over so fast. I stood over the ashes, absorbing the destruction I had caused. I had taken a life, a demonic-going-to-kill-lots-of-innocent-people life, but a life nonetheless. The truth of that sank into my core as the pack started their withdrawal, climbing over rubble, making their way out of the basement.

  “You did good, kid,” Xenom, the bear of a man, said. He curled his fingers into what was left of the mouth and braced his other against the shoulder and wrenched the skull off. For good measure, I supposed. He tossed it in a black sack and followed the rest of the people out of the half-collapsed building.

  “Thanks,” Levi managed before turning away.

  I wanted to yell the loudest I-told-you-so at him, but softened when I saw the delicate way he cradled his wife’s limping frame toward the exit.

  The others moved away, hobbling and carrying the children from the cages as they went up the still intact staircase. Rafe wrapped his arm around me and pulled me away from the sight. Slowly, we made our way across the basement and followed the rest up the stairs.

  “Don’t think about it, Merci. Not tonight,” he said.

  “So you read minds now?”

  “I know the look. It’s going to be okay.”

  And it was the truth. I saw it in those amazing eyes of his. The ones that never lied to me and never looked away. “I know.”

  Rutherford loomed over us. “Cops should be here soon. Think we’ve got half the most dangerous felons in the city in that basement, so you and your friends need to scoot.”

  Rafe nodded and we headed for the front door. Before stepping outside, I stopped and turned toward Rutherford.

  “One question,” I started.

  “We don’t have time, Lanard.”

  “Did you know my father?”

  Rutherford studied the night sky, probably calculating the impending swarm of police, but I wasn’t going to budge on this. I needed to know this above all other questions in this moment. I needed to know if Rutherford was the missing person that could have saved my father.

  “No. I came in after he died, but I knew about him. Why else would I have put up with you all these years?”

  Maybe it was a concussion setting in, or exhaustion, or trauma, but I didn’t fight as that truth settled into my view of the world.

  Rutherford nodded and his tone was completely different when he spoke again, something softer, sympathetic almost. “I’ll answer everything later. But the last thing I need is them seeing you at a crime scene before there is a crime.”

  I could deal with that. Could deal with it much better when Rafe slipped his hand into mine and pulled me toward the warehouse door. “You and I are going to have that talk.”

  “You can buy me coffee. Now go.”

  And for the first tim
e in our relationship, I actually did what Rutherford said; I walked away from a crime scene.

  The cool night air seemed to cleanse my nose of the scent of brimstone as Rafe and I walked back to the car. I tried not to think of the bodies left in that basement. I tried not to think that, because of me, pack mates had been kidnapped, battled a small army of lost humans, and were going home right now to lick their wounds.

  Instead, I dug through my bag to find my keys. I readjusted the messenger across my chest. The weight of the camera inside settled against me, and I felt better, was comfortable.

  We were at my car when my cell phone rang. “Seriously.” I pulled out the glowing thing. “Hello?”

  “Lanard, I’ve got a story for you.”

  I groaned. “Hayne, stop listening to the police scanners and go be with your daughter.”

  “Some explosion. I need you to cover it.”

  “No, Hayne. I need a few days.”

  “But Merci—”

  “It’s about my dad.”

  “Oh.”

  But there was more in that ‘oh’ than the monosyllabic sound. Part sadness, part surprise. Maybe I was reading into the one word too much or maybe it was exhaustion and nostalgia mixing together tonight, but I owed Hayne for all these years of protecting me, of putting up with me, and letting me chase the leads that lead to the closing of my father’s final story.

  “I’ll cover the story, but then I’m taking a week off and that Brian kid can be your lap dog.” I hung up and turned to Rafe who was smiling as he leaned against the car next to me.

  “Working late, honey?” he asked.

  “Seems so, darling.”

  He reached out for me and wrapped his arms around my middle. I rested against him, against his warm, strong frame. He brushed his nose against mine. “I’m going to take shower and go to bed.”

  “The pack doesn’t do some sort of celebration when they win back the city? Howl at the moon or something?”

  Rafe smiled. “Not quite.”

  I watched him. I’d used the ‘l’ word and the ‘b’ word in the same day and I was still standing. It still held the potential to be a decent night. “My bed or your bed?”

  “My shower. My bed.”

  I almost pouted. I liked the idea of finding him in bed when I got home. Whenever that would be. Like the idea of how warm and safe that bed would be because I was going to sleep for a week after tonight.

  He slid his hand up to my face and brushed his thumb over my lips. “We are going to take this slow.”

  I could do that. Maybe.

  “So, I have question for you, Merci Lanard. Would you go out on a date with me?”

  The End

  EXCERPTS FROM TRUTH ABOUT BLOOD: AVAILABLE XXX

  I had my list of questions prepared. Every single question I had come up with in the past month. The who’s and what’s and why’s and how’s.

  I had done all my research, with the help of state records and Rafe. It was good to have a boyfriend who was handy in the library.

  I’d even managed a new pair of shoes and a messenger bag to handle all of my usual interrogation paraphernalia: wad of cash, breath mints, and the lens from Ethan’s camera, just in case I suspected anything other than what met the eye.

  I was going to nail the truth of all this and I wasn’t going to take no for an answer. I’d been waiting long enough.

  The drive down there was longer than I remembered, or maybe it was because I was dragging the storm clouds of the Charm with me. Not exactly at full tilt, it was enough to make me think twice about taking the plastic bottle of whiskey I had hidden away for a rainy day. The storm clouds were gathering, but I’d been nearly a month without a drink or a nosebleed.

  This wasn’t going to be the thing that broke me.

  I pulled into the visitor’s lane at the entrance of the gated community. I shuffled my driver’s license out of my purse and rolled down my window as a guard twice my size and half my speed leaned as far as his little torso would let him out of the window, not risking actually getting up from his seat.

  “What can I do you for?” he asked with a thick, Southern drawl.

  I’d nearly forgotten that eight hours were enough to get you below the Mason Dixon line, which was far too south for me. I preferred my winters cold and bitter, but this was where the story lead me, so this is where I followed.

  “I’m here to see Margot Weber. She said she would put me on the list.”

  He nodded and pulled his head back into the booth like a turtle, slow and with a few double chins.

  I tapped on my steering wheel and waited for him to check the list. Still not a patient person.

  He eventually stuck his head out again. “Can I see your license?”

  I produced it faster than he probably thought a human could move. He flinched away from the small card.

  Eventually, his sausage fingers removed the card from my own and I watched as his eyes glued to the slick scars around my wrist.

  I pulled my hand back into the car and pulled my sleeve down over them. The Demon had left its mark in more ways than one. Needless to say, this summer was going to be pretty unbearable if I had to keep wearing long sleeves all the time. Piper said she might be able to help a little, but I told her I didn’t need it. If they were going to heal, they would heal, and if they didn’t, they would just add to the story of who I am.

  “We don’t get too many visitors from the great commonwealth of Pennsylvania,” he said.

  “Interesting,” I plastered on a fake smile and waited as he looked at the license, then looked at me, then back at the license, then back at the list, and then at me again.

  “Well, everything seems to be in order,” he said as he returned my license. “Do you need any directions from here?”

  “I’m good,” I said as I plucked my license from his fingers and tossed it back into my purse. “Thank you.”

  The gate had barely reached its halfway point when I drove around it to get on my way. I knew it was just his job, but this couldn’t wait any longer.

  I needed answers and I needed them now and there was only one more person I could get them from.

  As I was driving the twenty miles an hour speed limit through the gated community, a word rested on the tip of my tongue for the manicured lawn and the perfectly placed trees that were still coming into their own and the sheer fact that each person I drove past waved at me. Who does that?

  I turned down Magnolia Way and counted the perfectly crafted cottages, each in a coastal pastel. The fourth on the left was my destination, if memory served me.

  I turned into the driveway and parked in front of the third garage door. Then I did a three-point turn and backed into the same space. You never know when you needed to make a fast exit and this wasn’t the mean streets of Philly where darkness and a stun gun was all I needed. This was the burbs and it had its own rules.

  I triple checked my EDC in my messenger. I ran through the questions in my head and finally mustered the courage to get out of the car.

  I caught a reflection of myself in the window and pulled my hair back into a curly pony tail to keep it out of my eyes, if this encounter resorted to that.

  I took a deep breath, relaxed my energy, and held Ethan’s silver medallion to my chest.

  The truth helps more than it hurts.

  With one last glace to the road as a potential way to walk away from danger, I threw my messenger bag over my shoulder and walked quickly to the porch. The wooden wraparound probably telegraphed my arrival more than the three quick knocks I made to the door.

  When no one answered after three seconds, I thought I could turn around, but a shadow passed across the frosted glass. I jumped away, heart in my throat.

  The knob turned, and slowly, the door opened revealing a woman in her mid-fifties doing everything right because she didn’t look a day over forty. Her pastel pants and white chiffon blouse were a little formal for the occasion, but she had to do something to
make the six-carat rock on her ring finger look like it belonged here on earth and not supporting its own solar system. The flare of it alone nearly blinded me as she brushed her still strawberry blonde hair away from her face.

  My mouth ran a little dry as I locked with her pale cobalt eyes.

  The questions surfaced as I stood there on the porch, began to buzz around like a hive on a live wire, began to swarm and the familiar feeling of it seemed to give me the strength to finally speak.

  “Hello, Mother.”