by Jax Garren
Emma’s voice was soft, but her jaw was tight and her blue eyes bored into his with fierce emotion. “That’s right, sweetie pie, you don’t buy hookers. You buy time with one, just like any other service. She’s on the clock and can’t get in the car without us paying for her time. It don’t matter what we do with it.”
Rosalie tapped her foot. “Look, miss, I got something I was thinking of telling you, but I ain’t sure it’s a good idea. But I don’t need to get in the car or nothing.”
At her seriousness, his embarrassment left. “Tell us. What we decide to do with it isn’t your fault.”
Her face scrunched up as her fingers tapped her waist, like she wanted to talk but was afraid of the consequences, then she blurted, “You know about the voodoo lady?”
He turned to Emma. Growing up, there was always somebody supposedly casting hoodoo at somebody else. It was usually just powder and fear, but now he knew that magic—some of it anyway—was real.
“I ain’t awares, no,” Emma said neutrally, as if she, too, wasn’t sure what to believe.
Rosalie ducked her head into the car with more teenage gusto than sexuality, face eager. “You should. Madame Nephtalie’s the real deal, a genuine voodoo witch. And I was thinking, zombies are voodoo. It’s those mayates out in Manor who’re doing this.”
Javier shot his hand up. “Ay, girl. Language.”
She swayed a little, settling farther into his window with a sardonic eyebrow raised. “You don’t like me saying Manor?”
He bit back a response. Solving black-brown race relations wasn’t on his agenda tonight. “How do we find Nephtalie?”
She shook her head, waving a finger. “You don’t want to. Madame Nephtalie? She don’t like white people.”
“I’m not white.”
She snorted. “You all gentrified.”
“Javi, money,” Emma ordered. “Rosalie, you let me and my friend here take care of ourselves. Give us an address, and we’ll make sure you ain’t gotta work no more tonight.”
The jaded light in Rosalie’s eyes faded just enough for the happy kid she should have been to shine through. She’d take that deal.
If he handed her money, he was paying into a system he opposed… but he was going to do it anyway so she could keep that shine for just a few hours, despite the fact that she’d be back out tomorrow. “How much?” he grumbled.
“Hundred,” Rosalie said with finality. That was it? One hundred dollars for a night of servitude. He tried not to shudder at the thought.
“The hell, girl?” Emma chastised.
She rolled her eyes. “Fine. Fifty. ’Sides, I only need ten to make quota. You pay in cash, and it’s mine.”
Somewhat mollified that at least she’d keep most of the money, Javier dug through his wallet and pulled out four twenties. Emma put a hand on his before he could fork it over. “You really don’t know what you’re doing. Pay after. Paying a professional first is asking for a renegotiation.”
Rosalie giggled, her young laughter making his chest ache. Push it aside. You can’t fix the world, so focus on what you can do. “Where is Madame Nephtalie?” he asked.
She clucked her tongue. “Madame Nephtalie’s gonna curse your ass. I’m paid to fuck people, not to screw ’em.”
“Rosie,” Emma said, tone full of warning.
“Fine. Try not to die, miss. You neither, doc. You two are all right.”
They got an address, and as Rosalie turned to go, Javier remembered something. “Hey, Rosalie, how’s your arm? The bite, is it healing okay?”
“Oh…” She shuffled away from the car, expression nervous. “It’s fine.”
She was lying. “Can I see?”
But she was already walking away. “Bye, doc, Miss Emma. Don’t get cursed!”
“Come see me if you get black lines!” he yelled after her, but her feet only moved faster as she ran.
* * *
Old cars—not antiques, just old—lined the county road. Flickering light illuminated a field out past a barn. Javier turned off the car, and the tribal rhythm of dozens of drums filled the night. “We’ll be trespassing.”
Emma stared out her window. “I’m more worried about the point-oh-oh-oh-oh-one chance these folks know what they’re doing. You know much about voodoo?”
“They do it in New Orleans?” They probably should know more than that. He did a quick search on his phone. Rhiannon knew a lot about it, he was sure, but he didn’t have time for the doctoral thesis she’d no doubt present. When it came to talking to Rhi about magic, patience was not a virtue but a necessity. “According to the internet, purveyor of all truth, it’s from Haiti. A ceremony held at Boi Caïman in the mountains instigated the Haitian Revolution, the only slave rebellion ever to result in the founding of a state free of slavery and run by people of color.” He skimmed more text, trying to get the basic idea. “At the ceremony, a woman was mounted by a loa…” Loa, from what he could tell, were spirits—like gods or demons—that made voodoo spells work. “It looks like ‘mounting’ is another word for possession. She was mounted by Ezili Dantor. They slit the throat of a pig and distributed the blood out to everyone, who swore to kill every white on the island. They were successful in carrying out the loa’s order, and Haiti became a free country.” He kept skimming. “Can’t say I blame them.”
“Remind me to not get possessed.” She lifted her brow. “Think what we’re calling zombies are folks possessed by these loa things?”
“Maybe? I’d say unlikely, but possession’s out of my purview. If that’s the case, though, we shouldn’t have to worry about transmission.” He opened the door and pocketed his phone. “Maybe we can see what mounting looks like if we make the ceremony. Apparently it’s the point of them.”
Emma met him a step into the field, looking more afraid than he’d ever seen her. “How do you get rid of the possessing spirit?”
He wanted to touch her—touch always comforted him—but he didn’t. “The loa leaves at the end of the ceremony.” Her color came back some, but still she hesitated. He turned to her with a skeptical tone. “We’re in a field in central Texas. We’re going to listen to the drums and maybe watch some people fall to the ground.”
She stared at the lights flickering across the field and sniffed the air. “Maybe aided by a little Mary Jane.”
He smiled as the sweetness of marijuana wafted across the grass. “And who knows what else.”
She grabbed his hand, and his heart lurched. He had decided not to touch her. What was she doing touching him? Before he could ask, she ran forward, using all her speed. He could barely keep up, his feet moving faster than they ever had. Tall grass skimmed his calves like water at the beach. His fangs lowered. The moon brightened and every movement of every snake or mouse in the grass stood out as clear to him as they must to a hawk.
He wasn’t a doctor. He was a god.
They passed the failing barn, and Emma whipped around the perimeter of the gathering to a copse of trees on the other side. The drums never stopped, like no one had even noticed their passing. Emma was already hidden, the moonlight shining on her ruddy cheeks as she flattened herself against a tree and watched the gathering like a hunter.
How many times had she done this before, hunting men?
The thought was sobering. It was dangerous to be a god.
He pressed himself to another tree so he could watch as well. Torches lit the gathering. Twenty or so worshippers beat drums or pounded their feet in a dance. A couple of celebrants made more sound by blowing into plastic construction pipes painted black, white, and purple. The chaotic rhythm shouldn’t be music, but it tugged at his feet to move. Some celebrants wore white dresses, a stark contrast to the night, while others wore the casual jeans and hoodies of everyday life. In his button-down he felt overdressed, a clinical voyeur observing a ceremony so alive it had its own heartbeat. A wooden pole had been erected in the center of the group, and a man and a woman danced around it, one carrying a white chicken
and the other a black. The chickens were alive, clucking and flapping like they knew what happened next.
It was a world away from the sporadic services, Catholic or Baptist or Presbyterian or whatever his host family had practiced, that he’d attended as a child. It was wild and frightening, primal and beautiful. His heart beat furiously, racing like it hadn’t done since he was human.
The chickens met a quick end, their blood spilled onto complicated patterns drawn on the ground with light powder. As if cued by the sacrifice, a man and a woman fell to the ground in seizures. As a doctor, Javier wanted to go check on them. As a human, he knew that was supposed to happen.
“Oh my God. This is wild.” Emma’s whispered voice tickled his ear.
He hadn’t even noticed she’d moved, and her presence, so close to him, sent shivers over his skin. He ran his tongue over his teeth, the pain giving him a focus so he didn’t turn to her and embarrass himself. “It’s incredible.”
She hesitated, and he could feel her confusion like his own emotion passing over him. “You ain’t freaked out?”
“No.” But she was. Fear thrummed through her, from her pinched expression to her shuffling feet. “We’re vampires. They’re humans. What are they going to do to us?”
The seizing couple got up, and someone presented the man with a top hat and sunglasses. He put them on, looking regal in the battered hat, and smiled at the crowd, teeth bright white in the darkness. “What the fuck do we have here?” His accent was not from around there, with a touch of French and a touch of something else. “A gathering of bitches and assholes.”
The crowd went nuts, like that was a compliment. He was given a cigar, and both of the possessed were presented with bottles of brown liquid.
The woman took a swig and turned, her eyes narrowing as she looked right at Javier. Her eyes were green, her skin fairer than most of the gathering, her black curls mixed with bright orange. She looked like a teenager, but her gaze held the pain and joy of millions. It was the opposite of the zombie, possessed and fully alive.
Emma’s fingers curled into his shirt. “She sees us. Don’t she?”
“Vampires. Come here.” The woman pointed to the ground in front of her. The drums stopped as all the gathering turned their way. “Maman Brigitte wants to see her children.”
“Shit,” Emma muttered. “She sees us.”
The woman smiled, and the intensity was magnetic. Javier stepped forward, licking his lips. “We came to talk.” Emma followed behind him.
Maman Brigitte shook her head. “No. You came to dance.”
And to Javier’s surprise, he felt like that was exactly what he’d come here for.
Chapter Nine
This shit was fucked up. Even without the sacrificed chickens—hopefully somebody would eat those—the music pounded violently inside Emma, violating her sense of self. People danced and sang and banged and moved in ways that had no meaning or purpose. No control. It was like they were all possessed, not just the two people with spirits inside them.
“Guests!” the loa-man announced, pointing at her and Javier. She cringed. “Guests of the Guédé!”
“Drums!” the one who called herself Maman Brigette cried, and the music began again. The woman grabbed Javier by the ass and pulled him against her, dancing with sexual abandon to the sinuous music—and Javier just went with the flow, an amused smile on his face. The worshipers around them started to dance as well, singing and cheering like a frenetic mob. The man came at her, and she dove into the crowd, away from his grasping fingers. No way that psycho was dancing up on her like that.
The mosh pit she’d entered didn’t help much. Hands grabbed for her, indiscriminately touching. She ducked sideways, into a gap in the center, and searched for Javier. This had to end. She would rescue him from the possessed woman and get them the hell out of here.
There. His smooth hair and starched shirt stood out in the whirl of curls and braids and rough fabrics. To her shock, a smile lit his face, and he danced with abandon, once again sliding smoothly into the new setting, like he was as comfortable with drums and cornmeal sigils as in his lab coat at the hospital. He laughed, and her breath caught at the beauty of him. He fit in no matter where he went. She’d never learned to do that. His hips moved to the beat, pressed against the woman so naturally, like moving together was a thing of beauty. Jealousy slipped through her, powerful and grim as she gripped the pole behind her.
He wanted. People should want each other, want touching and skin and sweat and orgasms. The fact that she didn’t was unnatural. She didn’t mind being unnatural. It was useful that passion meant nothing when she’d spent her life fucking to survive. But sometimes… sometimes she wished she could have this too.
They moved behind another couple, and she followed, dodging back into the crowd to see him again.
Before she did, another face distracted her. Dez’rae was here, dancing with a man who looked familiar. She couldn’t see him well enough through the shifting crowd. He didn’t matter. Maybe Dez could help, and then they could leave.
A shirtless man jumped in front of her, banging a drum and howling She jerked back and slammed into someone carrying a brown snake. The snake snapped at her, and she held back a yelp, yanking her arm away. Hands grabbed her hips—she’d gotten too far into the seething pot of humanity. She spun away, determined to get out of the madness, but everywhere she turned were gyrating bodies, face paint, animals, and the drums—the relentless drums pounded into her senses, driving her crazy.
More hands on her waist. She was going to scream.
“It’s okay,” Javier said gently. She turned. It was him.
She collapsed against his chest, and his protective arms came around her, blocking out the chaos.
“You okay?”
She shook her head, nose buried in his chest. “I can’t do this.”
His hands ran over her back. Sweat stuck her dress to her spine, but he didn’t seem to mind. “It’s okay. No one here knows us.”
Curiosity made her look up from the comfort of his embrace. “So?” Then she laughed, getting it. He liked this hot mess; he just didn’t want anyone fancy to know it. “Javier, I ain’t got no reputation to uphold. I don’t care who sees me. I just want everybody to quit putting their hands on me.”
His face shut down as his arms dropped away violently. “Sorry. I’ll get you to the car. Give me some time. I’ll find Nephtalie and talk to her.”
She tightened her grip on his shoulders, afraid he’d leave her alone. “No!” The music was just as loud with Javier here but didn’t seem as threatening as it had when she’d been alone.
“No?” He scowled. “What do you want from me, Emma? I need you to spell it out like I’m an idiot.”
Why was he so angry all of a sudden? Fine, she wouldn’t rely on him. What was she doing getting comfort from a man anyway? She put her hands on her hips. “I want to hear what she has to say.”
He crossed his arms, and they were at odds again. “I haven’t figured out who she is yet. We may have to wait until the ceremony is over.”
Emma shook her head. “No, I got another way.” She searched through the crowd and found her again. “Dez. Over there.”
Javier straightened, an odd look crossing his face as his posture twisted halfway between the doctor and the man who was having too much fun gyrating at a Pagan ritual.
She grabbed his arm and hauled. “Dez’rae works as a vet tech and is going to college. She understands your split personality.”
The man she sorta recognized took Dez’s hand and led her behind the barn—probably to have sex. He was about to be disappointed.
Bonus, they’d be somewhere away from the mob.
Javier stopped. “We can’t follow them.”
“Why not?” She rounded the corner. The man leaned against the wall, his hand on Dez’rae’s head as he guided her down. Her face was in shadow, her hands trailing down the man’s body. For a moment Emma hesitated. If this meant so
mething to them, maybe she shouldn’t interrupt it. The fire snapped behind her, the cries a chaotic chorus to the act about to happen.
But seriously, a blow job? How male-centric could you get? She stepped forward, purposefully cracking a stick. “What, not even a nipple tweak to get her started? What sort of lay are you?”
The man snapped to attention, his hand possessively on Dez’s head. The look of relief Dez turned to her, though, sent a charge to Emma’s gut.
“Get out of here,” the guy ordered, like he owned the planet. “Can’t you morons see what’s going on?”
Emma stepped forward, looking him up and down coolly, even as her temper rumbled just beneath her skin, urging her to put a couple new holes in him. “We don’t need you. You are dismissed.”
He stepped forward to preen and strut like he thought himself a big man. “You wait your turn. I got plenty enough for both you bitches.”
Before the word finished, Javier had the man’s face in the dirt. The jerk tried to move, spitting mud, but each twist just got him buried farther.
Emma couldn’t help smiling. “It’s okay, sweetie. We can handle this.”
Javier didn’t smile back. “I know you can. But you shouldn’t have to.” He picked up the man and held him still by the nape. His fangs were down, eyes glimmering unnaturally in the moonlight. “Guests of the Guédé, don’t you remember? You will respect her.” The man whimpered as Javier dug his fingers into his jaw and turned him to face Dez. “You will respect her too.” Javier tossed him away from the barn, back toward the crowd. “You don’t want to piss off the loa, now, do you? Bad luck’s coming your way.”
The terrified man ran. Emma smiled and tucked her hand in the crook of Javier’s arm. She could’ve dealt with him, but it was nice to have someone do it for her.
