by S. E. Akers
Tanner. Without saying a word, he pulled me into his arms. I wasn’t too stunned by his presence. Bea had said he would be tracking us (I would too if someone had stolen my Vette), but I was surprised he wasn’t radiating any sort of euphoric bliss. Not a trace. And of all times — when I desperately needed it.
“Bea’s de—”
“Shhh,” Tanner whispered as he pressed me against his chest and gently stroked my head. “I already know.”
The three of us headed off in search of the car. Tanner insisted that he drive. I didn’t object, considering my current state, and after all, it was HIS car. Katie ended up having to squeeze her crouched frame into a tiny custom space niched out behind the front seats. I prayed we didn’t hit any harsh bumps or surely my bosom friend’s freshly-healed head would go straight through the back glass. She said it wasn’t that bad. Though I supposed I wouldn’t have cared if someone had tied me to the rear bumper and dragged me down the road as long as I was back inside my body. She talked the whole way home — non-freakin’-stop. I, however, was way too emotionally drained for BFF chitchat. My head was a muddled mess of heartfelt memories about Bea. Tanner was quiet too. I peeked over at him several times. I could tell by the way his hazel eyes were locked rigidly on the road, he missed her too, just as much…if not more. I noticed something else on his wrist — two circular puncture marks. I hadn’t paid a lot of attention to his appearance before. I’d assumed he was mussed from tracking us across the state. But the longer I stared at the unhealed wound, the more I thought about “who” had given me the howlite and the fact that Tanner hadn’t called us for a couple of hours after we had ‘jacked his car. The reason was clear. He’d had a run-in with Damiec this evening. And if he wasn’t voicing it, I sure didn’t plan on bringing it up.
Roughly an hour from home, Katie formally announced everything she planned on eating for breakfast. With all the food my starving bosom friend had rattled off, she’d inevitably pack on at least twenty pounds before lunch. I couldn’t blame her. She hadn’t eaten anything in five months. Food was the last thing on my mind. All I wanted to do was sit in a steamy tub until I was all cried out and then crawl under the covers of my bed to wait for another unavoidable teary round.
I hopped out to open the garage door, and after a weighty jerk, watched its retracting louvers reveal the first of many empty “Bea-less” rooms to come.
Katie was busting to get out and stretch her legs. “Finally,” my ravenous BFF announced as she crawled out in a huff and headed towards the door. Katie paused in the doorway and started sniffing the air. “I smell…hot dogs.”
“That’s your stomach talking,” I replied. “I think there might be some leftover ham biscuits in the fridge.” Katie darted inside, her appetite leading the way. Just as I started to head inside, Tanner stepped in front of my path, blocking me with his brawny chest.
“How you holding up?” he asked.
I lifted my head and looked into his eyes. Though there weren’t any tears, I spied a shade of lavender so unmistakably somber and gray. “How are you?” I rebutted and gave his hand a soulful squeeze. I glanced at his wound. He’d caught me too and pulled down his sleeve with an intentional jerk. It was evident by the look on his face that Damiec was still alive — a sour mixture of regret and disgust. There wasn’t even the hint of a victorious grin. Not a second later, Katie charged back into the garage.
“Weren’t they in there?” I asked.
She waved one of the biscuits in the air. “Oh, yeah,” Katie answered mid-chew. “I was just wondering why there’s two naked guys who look stoned and smell like a backyard barbecue sitting on the sofa in the living room?”
Tanner raised his brow. I simply shook my head with a faint grin. Well, now I know what happened to the Webbers.
Katie dug her hands into her hips. “I knew I smelled roasted weenies.”
Two pairs of stretchy tracksuits later, our guests were clothed but not that comfortable. Katie headed off to the bathroom for a shower while Tanner and I stayed in Bea’s bedroom with our guests and called a taxi. Welch only had one to speak of, Hess Cab Company, owned and operated by a sweet old man named Vernon Hess. It was a modest one-vehicle operation that pending on the time of day you called, he was either hung-over or well on his way to drunk.
“He said he would be here in two hours,” I announced.
“Two hours? For a taxi?” Tanner posed.
“Yeah. Hey, we’re lucky he was even sober enough to answer,” I insisted. Just as Tanner was about to make a small-town crack (which I sensed brewing), the doorbell chimed through the house.
Tanner glanced at Bea’s bedside clock. “Expecting someone?”
“No,” I replied as I noted the 9:32 AM time.
“Go see who it is and get rid of them,” he urged.
I hurried down the hall and made my way to the front door. With a curious squint, I spied the distorted image of an elderly woman on the other side. It wasn’t Mrs. Culbert or any of Bea’s other friends. In fact, I’d never seen this woman around town, ever. I watched her for a moment, pacing back and forth and looking like she would rather be anywhere else but here. I could tell that from her matching coat & suit ensemble and by the way she sneered as she wiped some coal dust off her formerly immaculate white gloves. I picked up on something else. Something more interesting than her hoity-toity clothes. My senses were tingling with traces of mystical energy radiating from this strange woman on the other side of the door. Warily, I hurried back to the guest bedroom to retrieve my gris-gris purse, simply to err on the side of caution, and tucked my hilt inside it. Something about her presence didn’t feel “right”. Just as she pressed the buzzer again, I swiftly yanked open the door.
“Can I help you?” I asked with a firm clutch of my purse. The portly little woman never said a word. She simply responded by throwing her coat at me as she entered the house and strutted like a peacock into the living room.
Excuse me? Stunned, I drifted behind her and watched as the pompous woman gave the room a pensive scan with an unorthodox sweep of her arms.
“Nice to see she’s recanted her wards,” the woman announced as she peeled off her gloves and smacked them in her hand. “I feel at home already.” The woman walked over to the fireplace, her nose leading the way. “Though I do detect a lingering scent of sage in this blend.” Before I could respond, she shushed me with a pretentious wave and locked her frame like a statue. “I don’t sense anything…so I’ll overlook that,” she asserted in a derisive tone.
I pulled out of my wide-eyed stupor when the woman started rearranging several of Bea’s precious trinkets lying on the mantle to her liking. I rushed over and put them all back where they belonged. To my shock, I spotted something else propped up there — the pictures she’d taken with Ty and me just hours ago. It was rather stunning to see them sitting there, especially this soon. Bea must have printed them off right after we’d left for the dance. Even more surprising was the fact that they were both already housed in elaborate, gold-leafed frames.
She always did think of “everything”…
I shook off my distracted daze and turned to the discourteous decorator to my left. “Umm… WHO are you?” I demanded.
“I might ask you the same, young lady?” the woman snapped and then moved one of the knickknacks back to where she had placed it. “The housekeeper?”
“No,” I said with a glare and repositioned the porcelain bird figurine, again.
“Well, if I must adhere to the rules of formality,” she huffed with a detestable roll of her brown eyes, “I’m Helaine Aderelle… Mordova’s sister.”
Mordova?
“Whose sister?” I questioned.
The woman let out an offended gasp. “Don’t tell me she’s still using that atrocious ‘Beatrix’,” Helaine sneered. “I chose Mordova for her. The ungrateful cow.”
Now I could see why Beatrix was dreading her visit. It hadn’t been a minute and I already thought she was a spiteful
old bitch.
“Just go and fetch Mordova quickly. I have a full schedule, and I haven’t got all day. I don’t want to spend my entire morning in the boondocks…consorting with the swine of the earth.”
Right then, I was REALLY hoping she would take another stab at moving one of Bea’s figurines again. ‘Cause I was planning on giving that eager arm of hers a good wrenchin’ after feeling the sting of that haughty broadside “slap”.
“Beatrix isn’t here,” I answered through my gritted teeth.
Before I could elaborate, Helaine let out a perturbed diva-like huff. “I’m not surprised. She’s probably regretting our bargain, but that’s neither here nor there. The pact was sealed with magic…so a deal, is a deal.”
I edged closer. “What ‘deal’ was that?”
Helaine stepped right into my face. “That’s none of your business.”
I folded my arms. “It is if you want me to tell you ‘where’ BEATRIX is.”
Helaine pursed her lips. “The deal where she pledged to relinquish her golden topaz and all of its powers to me.”
My lips parted as I tried to rationalize what I’d just heard — but honestly, I couldn’t. “Why would she ever do THAT?” I charged.
“Because she needed one of my white topazes. I only granted her one in exchange for the rights to her stone. She vowed to surrender it, along with all of her powers after the first spring full moon had set. So here I am… Here to claim what is rightfully mine.” She plopped down on Beatrix’s sofa and snapped her fingers. “Now, go fetch her this instant, girl! Tardiness is one of my biggest pet peeves.” She slapped her gloves down on the coffee table and crossed her legs. “You wouldn’t like to see my bad side,” she added with a snitty nod.
She was probably right, but I had a sneaky suspicion that I was about to get a hefty dose of it.
I nestled down in Beatrix’s favorite armchair. “About that,” I began, but was interrupted by Tanner charging into the living room.
“I thought I smelled something foul out here.” He turned to me. “Shiloh, trash belongs on the curb, not the sofa.”
“Tanner Grey,” Helaine grumbled like an angry storm cloud. “I’d rather hoped someone’s blade had found a comfy spot in the center of your heart by now. Ah, well…I guess I’ll have to wish harder.”
You couldn’t chip the scowl off Tanner’s face. No love loss there.
“I seriously hope you are not entertaining thoughts of deterring this matter in anyway. Your attempts will cost no one but you,” Helaine warned.
“Not at all, Helaine,” Tanner insisted. “I promise… You’ll leave here with exactly what you deserve.”
Helaine’s eyes narrowed and then shifted back to me. She snapped her fingers. “I’m still waiting, girl!”
“And you’ll be waiting for a while,” Tanner remarked. “Beatrix is dead.”
Helaine shot to her feet. “DEAD!?!” she screeched. “NO! That’s impossible!”
“Improbable, yes…but not impossible,” Tanner asserted with a hint of a grin.
“HOW?” Helaine raged. “I DEMAND TO KNOW PRECISELY HOW THIS HAPPENED!”
“The Onyx used a white chalcedony on her,” I revealed with a raspy voice.
Helaine stormed around the room. “So HE has MY STONE!” She picked up a candy dish and hurled it at the wall. One crash and all that was left were shards of crystal and bashed Godiva truffles. Then she grabbed a vase sitting close by. “UGH! How could she be so CARELESS!?! Selfish little bi—”
“She wasn’t,” Tanner clarified. “She didn’t die at his hands.”
Helaine placed the vase back down on the table and turned around with a heated glare. “Then tell me…by WHOSE crafty hands did my dear sister fall?”
“Mine,” I admitted, while the official acknowledgement of my deed stung my ears like a whip.
Helaine spun around, looking utterly dumbfounded. “YOU? How in the blazes could YOU finish off MY SISTER?” she challenged and circled me like a lion. “That golden topaz makes her almost impossible to kill. Granted a white chalcedony could do it, but not too much else. What did you use? TELL ME THIS INSTANT!”
I whipped out my hilt and extended the diamond between our faces. “This,” I replied with a frigid glare. She jumped back, clearly shell-shocked, but at least it shut her up and stopped any more of her spit-spray of words from pelting my face.
“YYY—YOU!” Helaine stammered and then let out a growl that would frighten a rabid dog. “This was NO ACCIDENT!!! I’d stake my life on it! That scheming bitch!” She snatched up a picture of Beatrix and spit on it. Tanner yanked the frame out of Helaine’s hands before she could hurl it at the wall and grabbed her by the neck.
“I think you’ve worn out your welcome,” Tanner snarled and dragged her towards the door. She threw her arms against the doorframe and wiggled out of his grasp in a jerk.
“I’m not going ANYWHERE!” Helaine raged as she raised her hands. “Not without my stone!” We watched her twiddle her fingers several times, attempting to conjure something. But oddly, nothing ever happened — no matter how many times she tried or how hard her digits twisted.
It was right then when I remembered Bea having me throw that funny smelling incense into the fire. Now I knew why it reminded me of Ms. Lá Léo’s shop, and by the seething look plastered on Helaine’s face, she now sensed its energy-blocking effects too.
“It seems the only hot air you’ll be conjuring in here will come from that venomous pit you call a mouth,” Tanner charged with a grin. Then with a swift raise of his foot, he kicked her out the door and clean off the stoop. We watched her crash into a cluster of Bea’s rose bushes that had just started to bud.
“You mark my words, both of you! I’ll have my stone… AND MY REVENGE!” Helaine swore in a rage while she plucked several broken thorny branches from off her now-soiled designer duds.
Tanner threw her coat at her. Once she had wrestled it from off her head, the irate Talisman blew down the street in a violent gust of air, whipping decorative flags wildly and shaking the leaves off every tree that lay along her path.
Tanner slammed the door. “I’m starving,” he remarked casually and headed for the kitchen.
I caught up to him in the hall and grabbed his arm. “Did Bea plan this too?”
“It appears so,” Tanner replied. “I knew she had gotten Helaine to give up one of her stones, but I had no idea how she’d managed to pull it off.” Tanner tilted his head back and let out a laugh. “Even in her death, she managed to sneak one past Helaine. Very clever.”
“I can understand why Bea didn’t want to tell me that she was going to die, but you?” I questioned. “After the countless lectures you gave me about ‘telling the truth’? Why didn’t you tell me?”
“She made me vow that I wouldn’t say a word. Kamya, too. I only agreed because I didn’t want to upset you. You should understand that.” Tanner lowered his head, looking somber and full of regret. “I figured I could fix the situation and everything would work out in the end…so I wouldn’t have to. That’s what I’ve been doing since I left here New Year’s Day. Trying to find a way to save her. That was my plan.”
“What about her phantom crystal?” I asked. “Wouldn’t it have broken the white chalcedony’s spell?”
“It could have…if she would have used it. She wouldn’t hear of it. Bea wanted to save its magic for you,” Tanner revealed.
I closed my eyes, feeling a heavy weight in my chest. My heart was sinking all over again, like I was back in the cave watching her brittle flecks crumbing away.
A curious revelation lifted my somber gaze. “So the red chalcedony wasn’t meant for Katie…it was intended for Bea all along?” I posed, needing to confirm my suspicions.
Tanner took a hold of my hands. “Yes. That’s why I sought it, to help my friend,” he admitted, unabashed. “There was always a chance we could get the fire opal back from Lorelei, but I thought the red chalcedony was the only thing that could change
Bea’s fate. She’s one of my oldest and dearest confidants. I couldn’t stand aside and do nothing. You must understand that.”
“I do… Now.” Truthfully, I would’ve wanted him to use it for Bea too. I roused a slight grin, hoping to ease his guilty conscience.
“It wouldn’t have worked,” Tanner acknowledged. “That’s not why it was granted to me. Fate allowed me to claim it because our destinies were intertwined. It was ultimately meant for you…so I could keep you alive.”
“Is that what destiny has laid out for you?” I asked. “Keeping me alive?”
Tanner began to stroke my hand gently. Every brush forced a sweet jolt to course along my nerves electrically. “I’d like to think there’s more to fate’s plans than just that.”
Just before I got the chance to hint at “how much more”, a loud irksome “buzz” from the scanner radio in Bea’s kitchen blared through the room like an air horn. I would have ignored the message completely, but it was downright alarming.
Unit five…This is dispatch.
There’s a possible breaking and entering
at 374 Stewart Lane.
Please respond.
Within a second, another voice answered the call.
This is Officer Ryan. I’m on my way.
Once the address had officially “clicked”, I asked, “Where’s KATIE?” Tanner rushed to the garage while I dashed to the other side of the house. All I found were the Webbers, still sitting lethargically on the bed.
Tanner bolted into the bedroom. “The Vette’s GONE!”
I kicked the post of the bed. “Awww crap!”
The two of us flew out the door, praying we beat Officer Ryan to what I predicted to be one Hell of a HOT MESS!
Tanner arrived just a few seconds before me, but unfortunately we were both too late. Ron Stowell was on his porch waving his shotgun while Katie zoomed down their long gravel driveway. She was in such a panic that she failed to see Officer Ryan’s cruiser whipping in. Needless to say, the jarring “bang” that roared from the crash sent my jaw to the ground.
