Firestorm (Smoke & Ashes Book 1)

by D. N. Hoxa

I walked up to him, searching my pockets for money. “Here’s five hundred. You’ll have it delivered to my place, right? I’ll give you the rest then.” I put the money in his hand. This surprised him even more than when I’d busted through his door last time and almost killed his men.

  “Sure,” he said, looking at the money in his hand, completely shocked. “Sure, I’ll send someone with it.”

  “Asap,” I reminded him and finally got the hell out of there.

  So. Nobody knew about me in the city so far. That was good. Michael Alifair had kept his mouth shut, the rest of the were-cheetahs were either on their way or already in Canada. Chelsea hadn’t shifted at all in the past four hours since Abraham left.

  I was going to meet his parents but not right away. He was going to go back to New York and make arrangements before we met. I’d told him the basics about me, which was that nobody had a clue why I shifted into a phoenix. He found the whole thing fascinating.

  Chelsea? Not so much.

  “We’re both technically shifters,” she was saying as she drew on her tablet, sitting on the other side of the couch with me.

  “Yep. Except I’m not a traditional shifter, so I don’t have the added benefits.” Like enhanced senses.

  “I don’t have benefits, either. I don’t feel any different. How long until I shift again?”

  “The full moon.” Which was two weeks away, thankfully. When shifters were made from human, after the initial transformation, they were only forced to shift during the full moon. Normally, born shifters learned to control the urge as teenagers, but with Chelsea, it was probably going to take a couple of months. We’d get through it. So long as she was alive, we’d figure it out. We had two whole weeks to do so.

  “What will it be like?” Her voice shook.

  “Why are you thinking about that? Stop thinking about that. You’re fine for now. You’re not going to shift for another two weeks. And I don’t know when your changes will appear, but they will. And at least that part’s going to be awesome. Just chill, okay?” It was like I was talking more to myself than to her. “You need to be thinking about Andrew. Have you talked to him? Have you decided what you’re going to do about him?”

  She didn’t miss a beat. “I have. I can never go back to him now. It’s over. He’s going to get out of the apartment eventually, but Sassy, I have no clue how I’m going to live alone.” It was obvious she’d thought about this a lot.

  “Then don’t. Live here with me until we figure out how to control your animal.” There was plenty of space in my apartment.

  She flinched. “Control your animal. That sounds so fucked up.”

  I sighed. “And your family. What about your family?” She had parents and two siblings. She wasn’t involved with them all that much because they didn’t approve of her life choices—both parents and her sister were doctors, and her brother was a vet.

  “I don’t know,” she whispered. “I’m not going to tell them anything. They don’t know you people even exist.”

  “You mean we people.” Because she was now a shifter, too.

  She flipped me the bird. “You know what I mean. And where the hell is Annabelle?”

  I looked at the piano now sitting there innocently at the edge of the kitchen, in front of the windows. Not the ideal place, but when Hank’s people brought it about an hour ago, I just told them to leave it there. It was temporary, anyway. The thing looked a lot bigger from close up than it had at the warehouse, but it was still pretty. I liked it.

  “Hate to break it to you, babe, but Feather Girl isn’t coming back.” Why would she? In her place, I wouldn’t.

  “Of course, she will. She knows you’re not going to kill her,” Chelsea said, and she sounded like she believed that, too.

  “I—”

  Somebody knocked on the door. Chelsea didn’t hesitate, but I jumped to my feet, too. Was it Lexar? Because I knew he wasn’t coming back anytime soon, but what if he did? Just to ask me a shitload of questions, obviously, if my father hadn’t told him everything already. And as I answered, I could see for myself that he was okay, too. You know, just because we’d worked together. No other reason.

  But Chelsea opened the door, and Feather Girl walked in, a small smile on her face. I was as shocked as Hank had been a few hours ago.

  I’ll be damned. She actually came back.

  I’d told her that I was going to kill her after I killed the nocturnal bitch since the moment we met. And she had the chance to disappear, go live her life anywhere she wanted, but she still came back?

  Why do I always end up with people who are fucked up in the head?

  “Where were you? I was starting to worry,” Chelsea said, closing the door behind her.

  But Feather Girl didn’t say anything. Her eyes were stuck on the piano in front of the windows. She just stared at it for possibly over a minute, and then I ran out of patience and stepped in front of her.

  “You didn’t actually talk to your parents, did you?” They thought she was dead for years now.

  She shook her head. “Of course not.” Her voice was barely a whisper.

  “But you saw them? They’re all okay?”

  “Yep. They’re all perfectly fine. My mom, she’s….but you know, she’ll be okay eventually.”

  “Of course, she will.” I didn’t really believe that, but it felt like it needed to be said. I don’t think it ever gets better when you lose someone you love—a mother, a daughter—but you get used to the pain instead. It becomes a part of you, and you learn to live with it. People call it healing. I call it adapting.

  Feather Girl’s eyes filled with tears, and she blinked them rapidly for a second.

  “Yeah. Anyway, I’m ready.” She raised her chin up and rolled her shoulders and stared at me.

  A second ticked by.

  “Oh, God, Anna,” Chelsea said, covering her face.

  “Ready for what?” I asked with a grin.

  “To go back to Hell. C’mon, don’t drag it on. The bitch is dead. I’m done here,” she made herself say.

  Man, this girl had really won me over. How in the world had that even happened?

  “You’re not going back to Hell.” This place still needed her. She did more here in a few days than most supernaturals did their whole lives.

  Feather Girl flinched. “No, it’s okay. I sold my soul, remember? I deserve to be in Hell.”

  “No, you don’t,” said Chelsea from her seat, her eyes still stuck on her tablet.

  “I really do.”

  “I don’t think you do, either.” Maybe I was fucked up in the head, too. No surprise there.

  Pulling her lips inside her mouth, Feather Girl slammed her hands on her thighs. Her eyes filled with tears once more.

  “I’m so fucking stupid. I actually sold my soul, and for what? For nothing!” she shouted, and her voice shook.

  “No, you sold your soul for something you believed in, something you truly wanted. There’s beauty in that. People have done it for far less.” Or so I’d heard.

  A feather no bigger than my pinkie slipped from a tear on the side of her neck. It was still as weird as the first time I’d seen it happen.

  “Are you for real?” she asked. “Seriously, are you just messing around with me before you kill me? Because I can’t tell.” She squinted her eyes in suspicion.

  “She’s not messing around,” Chelsea said. “This is very serious, Anna.”

  She took a second to come to terms with that. “But I can’t. I can’t get over it. This guilt is…it’s too much. I can’t be here, guys,” Feather Girl whispered, and for a second there, it broke my heart. I felt her pain. I felt the guilt, too. I hated myself so much sometimes, who I was, where I came from, that I wanted the whole fucking world to just shut down and stop existing.

  I stepped closer to her. “I don’t know much about the situation you’re in, but I can tell you this: the day I let go of my past was the day I started to live.” And it was true—at least half of
it.

  The day I decided that it wasn’t my fault who my father was—that was the day I could actually breathe a little easier. Make a plan, give myself a purpose, kill as many creatures from Hell as I could. I was never going to Heaven, but that didn’t mean I had to stop doing what I knew was right. I already knew my destination, but I could still make the journey to it as pleasant as I could for myself. It’s what I tried to do every day.

  “Where the hell did you read that?” Chelsea shot from the couch. “That was pretty good.”

  I rolled my eyes. “I didn’t read it anywhere, asshole.”

  I was still looking at Chelsea when Feather Girl wrapped her arms around me and hugged me. All my instincts went into overdrive, and I had to grit my teeth to keep myself from moving. It was just a hug, and I was taking it.

  When she let go of me, she was smiling. Tears streamed from her eyes, but she was smiling. “You were never going to kill me, were you?” she asked, wiping her face with the back of her hand.

  “Well, I did think about it.” I did—in the beginning.

  “And that piano…” Her voice trailed off as she looked at it. “Is that for me?”

  I narrowed my brows. “No, it’s actually for Mrs. Yuni from the second floor.” I rolled my eyes. “Of course, it’s for you!” I had no clue how to play instruments, and Mrs. Yuni was a seventy-year-old human woman who’d figured out how to turn garlic into a fragrance and wear it all the damn time. Seriously, you couldn’t stand close to her without getting nauseous, but she was a sweet lady. “You can take it,” I said to Feather Girl.

  That surprised her. “Take it where?”

  “I don’t know.” Wherever she was going was a good place to start.

  “Where are you going to live?” Chelsea asked.

  Feather Girl shrugged. “No idea. I didn’t really think about it.”

  Right. Because she’d come back to my apartment to die.

  “You can crash here for a few days if you want,” Chelsea offered. “The couch’s comfortable.”

  I looked at her. Why was she inviting Feather Girl to stay in my place?

  “Really?” And now Feather Girl was looking at me with hope filling her eyes. God, I was hopeless.

  “Sure. Why the hell not? Stay with us. There’s room—”

  I was cut off when she attacked me with another hug, this one worse than Chelsea’s. She held me so tightly I couldn’t even breathe at all until she let go.

  “But just so you know—”

  Yeah, she wasn’t listening to me anymore. She ran to the piano, and Chelsea went after her, and, man, the way that girl looked at that piano—it was pure raw love. I’d never seen anything like it.

  With a sigh, I rubbed my face. Exactly what had I gotten myself into here?

  “Play something. Come on, I can’t wait to hear how it sounds from so close up,” Chelsea said to Feather Girl. When she laughed, her whole heart was into it. She didn’t ask me about the phoenix. Didn’t even mention it at all, like it made no difference to her whatsoever if I shifted into a firebird or not.

  I know it sounds crazy, but maybe she liked me, too?

  I sat down on my couch and grabbed my crackers, popping one in my mouth. It was going to be okay. Feather Girl was trustworthy. We’d figure something out for her, too, before I lost my damn mind. I had a busy few days ahead of me. I missed holding my camera in my hands and snapping pictures of beautiful ordinary things, and I was going to do that soon. I also had a lot to think about, a lot of people to visit, starting with Joleen and Abraham’s parents. Lexar…yeah, probably not. If he hadn’t come knocking on my door by now, he wasn’t coming at all.

  But for now, Feather Girl started to play the piano. She kneeled before it because there was no bench, but it didn’t seem to bother her at all. I rested my head on the couch and listened to the music. It was the most beautiful melody I’d ever heard, and it filled me with hope from head to toe in an instant—just like magic.

  For the next few minutes, everything was right with the world, and Philadelphia had never felt more magical.

  * * *

  —THE END

  * * *

  Thank you for reading!

  I hope you enjoyed Firestorm as much as I enjoyed writing it.

  If you liked Sassy’s story, will you take a moment to leave a review on Amazon/Goodreads? Just a few words should do it. I’d appreciate it very much!

  * * *

  To find out about new releases, giveaways, and more, sign up to my Mailing List or follow me on Facebook: D.N. HOXA.

  * * *

  Sincerely,

  Dori Hoxa

  Also by D.N. Hoxa

  The New Orleans Shade Series (Completed)

  Pain Seeker

  Death Spell

  Twisted Fate

  Battle of Light

  * * *

  The New York Shade Series (Completed)

  Magic Thief

  Stolen Magic

  Immoral Magic

  Alpha Magic

  * * *

  The Marked Series (Completed)

  Blood and Fire

  Deadly Secrets

  Death Marked

  * * *

  Winter Wayne Series (Completed)

  Bone Witch

  Bone Coven

  Bone Magic

  Bone Spell

  Bone Prison

  Bone Fairy

  * * *

  Scarlet Jones Series (Completed)

  Storm Witch

  Storm Power

  Storm Legacy

  Storm Secrets

  Storm Vengeance

  Storm Dragon

  * * *

  Victoria Brigham Series (Completed)

  Wolf Witch

  Wolf Uncovered

  Wolf Unleashed

  Wolf’s Rise

  * * *

  Starlight Series (Completed)

  Assassin

  Villain

  Sinner

  Savior

  * * *

  Morta Fox Series (Completed)

  Heartbeat

  Reclaimed

  Unchanged