by Devon Monk
“Oh, sure. Best coffee in the city, yah. Dug a pit this morning, roasted it with my own hands over the fire. Fresh just for you.”
“Right.” I glanced out my living room window and through the bare tree limbs that spread across my view of the street and buildings on the other side. It was six o’clock on a late-November morning and still dark. Rain gusted sideways past the window, flashing like gold confetti in the headlights of slow-moving traffic crawling toward downtown Portland, Oregon, and the freeway beyond. The police station wasn’t all that far from my apartment, but I didn’t have a car. The bus ran every half hour and would take me straight to the station doors.
It was doable.
“I’ll be there in about forty-five minutes.”
“Good. And, Allie?”
“Yes?”
“Don’t leave town. And be careful.”
A chill ran down my arms. Why would he say that? I wouldn’t skip town. And I was always careful. Well, as careful as the situation allowed. “I’ll be there in forty-five.”
I hung up the phone and scowled at it. Okay, maybe he had a reason to worry about me not showing up. I’d gotten myself into some weird stuff a few months ago, not that I remembered much of it. My friend Nola, who lived three hundred miles away on a nonmagical alfalfa farm in Burns, had taken me in afterward. She tried to tell me what she knew about the days I no longer remembered and the weeks that had gone by while I’d been in a coma. But her information was sketchy too.
The one thing that had become abundantly clear to me was just how much memory I had lost. It still gave me nightmares.
I glanced over at the table by the window. The blank book where I wrote everything just in case magic took my memories was there. I walked over to it, flipped it open. The most current pages were the basic itinerary from the last few days—me settling into my new apartment, the phone messages from my father’s accountant I hadn’t returned. The sandwich shop I discovered a couple streets over that made really good paninis (I give the salmon rosemary five stars), and the name of a song I liked on the radio.
But as I flipped back toward the front of the book, I found the blank page. The corner of it was worn from me going back to it so often in the last few weeks. Right there on that blank page I should have written everything that had happened to me between when I last saw my father alive and when I woke up at Nola’s farm a month later.
Blank.
No matter how hard I stared at it, the notes I should have written were not there.
Things I really wish I could remember, like what had happened between me and a man named Zayvion Jones. I remember him hanging around St. Johns neighborhood in North Portland. I remember him asking me out for lunch, and I remember him going with me to see my father.
What I didn’t remember—the things my friend Nola had said happened—was falling in love with him, so much so that I’d sacrificed myself to save him.
It just didn’t sound like me.
Slow to trust, slower to love, I couldn’t figure out how I had fallen for him so completely in such a short time.
I shut the book and pressed my fingers against my forehead. Magic is not for sissies. Sure, it can do a million good things—keep cities safer and hospitals going, and even just make a bad paint job look good—but it always comes with a price.
Sometimes magic makes me pay a double price—pain for using it, and loss of memory. Yeah, I’m just lucky that way. It was almost enough to make me want to give it up altogether. Almost.
The phone rang again, and I looked through my fingers at it, trying to decide if I really wanted to talk to anyone else this morning. It might be a Hounding job, which would mean money, or, heck, Nola checking in on me.
I picked it up.
“Hello?”
“Hello, Allie.” A woman’s voice this time. I searched my memory and came up with nothing—see how annoying that is? “I’m sorry to call so early, but I’ve left a few messages on your cell phone and thought I’d try to catch you before you went out for the day.”
I flipped my book open again. Who had been leaving me messages? Just my dad’s accountant, Mr. Katz. I glanced at my cell phone—no light at all. The battery was dead, blown. I’d had it only a couple days, and it was currently plugged in to the charger.
I’d had zero luck with cell phones lately. Any electronics that worked through a line, like my computer, seemed to hold up okay, but anything wireless self-destructed when it saw me coming.
“Allie?” the woman said.
“Yes,” I said, still trying to place her voice. “My cell isn’t working. You might want to leave messages here on my home phone.”
“Do you want me to have Mr. Katz set you up with a new phone?”
And that was when I knew who it was. Violet. My dad’s latest wife. She had a young voice, and from the newspaper articles Nola had shown me, I knew she was about my age. I think I had met her, but that memory was toast too.
“No, that’s fine. It’s still under warranty. Sorry I haven’t gotten back to you. Why are you calling?”
She hesitated, just a pause, an inhalation, but it made every instinct in my body rise up.
“Are you in trouble?” I asked.
She exhaled with a sort of laugh. “I’m fine, just fine. I was hoping you might want to get together for lunch today. I haven’t heard from you since before the coma. You didn’t contact me when you came back into town. I know we’ve only met once, but . . . well, since you weren’t able to come to the funeral . . . and there’s still so much unfinished business with Beckstrom Enterprises and your role in managing the company . . . I just thought . . . I don’t know. I thought we might want to get to know each other a little better. Talk about some things.”
My dad had been married six times. Years ago I’d stopped trying to make nice with the women who attached themselves to and were discarded by my father. Which is why I surprised myself by saying, “Sure. Let’s do dinner instead, if that’s okay. I have a lot of things to get to today.”
Violet sounded just as surprised. “Oh. Good. Dinner’s fine.”
We settled the time and restaurant—not one of the exclusive swanky spots in town, but Slide Long’s, known for its seafood—and then we said our good-byes.
I stared at the phone for a minute, trying to sort out how I felt about getting to know her.
I guess I was a little curious but mostly just lonely. My best friend lived three hundred miles away. The man I was supposed to love was nowhere to be seen. I didn’t even know any of my neighbors.
And my dad was dead.
I wondered when I’d stopped liking being alone. Maybe somewhere in the days I couldn’t remember, I’d given up on the solitary woman bit and had actually let people into my life. And maybe I had really liked it.
Or maybe I just wasn’t in my right mind. Which might also explain the whole ghost-in-the-bathroom bit.
Well, whatever. Right now I had to get down to the police department and tell them what I knew about the day my dad died. After that I’d scout around town and see if there were any Hounding possibilities.
I picked up my journal and quickly wrote that I was giving a statement and had dinner plans with Violet. I paused, wondering if I should write that I’d seen a ghost. Common sense won out, and I simply wrote: Saw Dad’s ghost in the bathroom. Not fun. And hoped that would be that.
Chapter Two
I blew out all the candles and checked to make sure my windows were locked and my heater wasn’t turned up too high. My apartment looked like it always did: sort of half-decorated, a few boxes still out from my move a week ago, laundry piled on one corner of the couch waiting to be folded, and empty coffee cups perched here and there amidst a half dozen paperbacks I was reading.
The place was coming together. Pillows on the couch and a couple pieces of artwork I’d bought at the Saturday Market did some good to add color to the off-white walls and tan rug.
And best of all, not a ghost in sight. If I manage
d to stay here long enough, it might even feel like home someday.
I gathered all the empty cups and took them to the kitchen sink. I was procrastinating, and if I waited any longer I was going to miss the bus and miss my appointment with Love and Payne. Then they’d be on my doorstep, wearing their not-at-all-amused faces.
Going in to see the police before coffee wasn’t my idea of fun.
I took a nice deep breath and put the last cup in the sink. I could do this. Go downtown, give my statement, and then head over to Get Mugged—my favorite coffee shop in the whole town—and get me a decent cup of joe and something for breakfast.
All the normal stuff normal people do. Normal people who use magic only occasionally because they don’t want to pay the physical price of pain. Normal people who use magic only to make themselves look thinner at their high school reunions or to keep their cars shiny in the summer. Normal people who use magic only to get high on Friday nights.
Normal people who don’t see ghosts.
So what if I wasn’t good at normal? Didn’t mean I couldn’t have some fun.
I turned out the kitchen light and walked around the half wall, snatching up my knit hat on the way. I tugged the hat over my head, thankful my hair was short enough I didn’t have to tuck it up. I headed to the living room and pulled my coat and scarf off the back of my couch and put them on. I put my journal and dead cell phone in one pocket and then checked for my gloves (black leather driving gloves that were actually warm and stylish, wonder of wonders) in the other pocket.
The gloves served two purposes. One, they kept my fingers from freezing—it had been cold the last week or so. I was amazed the rain hadn’t turned to snow yet. And two, the gloves hid the marks magic had left on my hands. Which meant I didn’t have to put up with the stares and questions.
Yes, I get tired of making up excuses for something most people wouldn’t believe. That magic, magic in my bones, painted me, marked me, scarred me. Most days I liked how it looked but some days I didn’t want the attention.
With my keys and wallet tucked in my pockets, I went out the door, locking it behind me. The delicious spice of cinnamon and yeast caught at the back of my throat and made my empty stomach cramp in protest. I inhaled deeply and sighed. Sweet torture, someone was baking cinnamon rolls. I put one hand over my stomach and picked up the pace a bit. I hadn’t eaten since my peanut butter sandwich for dinner yesterday, and I was suddenly very hungry.
I marched down the hall and noted the last apartment door was propped open. The tenants had moved out about a week after I moved in, and it looked like someone had rented it already. I passed in front of the door and inhaled deeply again, this time picking up on the more subtle scent of almond and deeper spices—a man’s cologne, the slightest tang of sweat and something sweet like licorice—as I passed by the door. I didn’t hear anyone moving around in there, but clearly, moving was going on.
There were no elevators in the Forecastle, which was one of the reasons I practically begged the landlord to let me rent. I had a serious thing about small spaces. I seriously hated them.
Elevators, changing rooms, even small cars set me off in a panic. I’d rather walk a million stairs than push a single elevator button. The other thing the Forecastle had going for it was it didn’t reek of old magic every time the weather got bad. And in Portland, the weather got bad a lot.
I headed down the central staircase, my boot heels silent on the carpeting. The lobby was cold and quiet and dark except for the ceiling lights. There were windows next to the doors that led to the street, but dawn hadn’t knocked the night out of the sky yet.
I pulled my hat closer over my head and tucked my chin in my scarf before opening the door.
Rain fell in huge heavy drops, cold as ice melt on the gusty winds. I pushed my hands into my pockets and tipped my head down, trying to keep my face out of the worst of the wet. I tromped up the sidewalk to the bus stop. The good thing about being six feet tall is I can cover some serious ground in a short time. But even though the bus stop was only a few blocks up the hill, I was out of breath by the time I hit the first curb.
Nearly dying had taken a lot out of me. I hated being reminded that I wasn’t as strong as I liked to be, but it was true.
Time. All I needed was a little time to finish getting well and then I’d be healthy and strong. I’d be normal again.
Magic pushed under my skin, stretching and making me itch a little. Reminding me it was there, ready to be used, to be shaped, to be cast. Reminding me it would do anything for me. So long as I was willing to pay the price.
Okay, maybe normal was too much to ask for. Right now, I’d settle for healthy.
I ignored the push of magic and kept a steady pace to the bus stop. I was drenched by the time I arrived. The bus stop itself was a cozy little Plexiglas closet of death beneath the glaring eye of a streetlight. My palms broke out in a sweat inside my gloves.
Oh, no way. No matter how wet and cold I was, there was no force in this world that could make me stand under that tiny roof with the other six people who were already crammed inside. Freeze to death in the driving wind and rain instead? No problem.
Five or six men huddled on the other side of the bus stop, between it and the curb. They faced the street, hands in their pockets, heads bent against the gusty rain.
Typical to Oregon, no one carried an umbrella, though everyone had on a hat or hood. We all waited, silent, a mix of old, young, and odd.
I scanned the faces, wondering if I knew any of them. It was possible they could be my neighbors. But no one made eye contact, and no one looked familiar. What everyone looked was wet, and tired of it.
The bus rumbled up to the curb and screeched to a stop. The curbside men got on first, and then a few of the speedier bus stop huddlers, myself in the mix. I reached the door and flashed my bus pass. The smell of people—lots and lots of wet people—hit me full in the face.
That was one of the disadvantages to being a Hound. Not only was I able to track spells back to their casters, but I also had a pretty sensitive nose, even without magic enhancing it.
I tucked my nose a little deeper into my scarf and beelined to the empty back of the bus. I took a seat near the door and leaned my head against the window behind me. That let me stare across the aisle and out the other window while the rest of the riders got on the bus. Across the street, a man pulled free from the shadows. He stood there, in the open and the rain, a darkness against darkness. He stared at the bus. He stared at me.
I felt his gaze all the way down to my bones.
I knew him. I was sure of it.
Zayvion Jones. The man I had fallen in love with—the man I might still be in love with. The man I hadn’t seen for weeks.
The doors hissed shut and the engine growled as the bus pulled out into traffic, leaving Zayvion lost to the rain and darkness behind me.
Loneliness hollowed out my chest. What had he been doing there on the street? Was he looking for me?
Well, if he was, he’d have to wait. My cell was toast. If he had a phone, I didn’t think he’d given me the number. I’m sure I would have written it in my blank book. Or at least I thought I would have.
I shook my head and tried to push Zayvion out of my mind. He knew where I lived. Obviously. He could leave me a note if he wanted to get ahold of me.
“Mind if I sit?”
That voice sent my stomach down to my shoes and left nothing but fight or flight rising up through me in a hot wave. I suddenly wished I’d brought my baseball bat with me.
I looked up.
Lon Trager, the kingpin of drugs and blood magic, smiled down at me. I’d saved Martin Pike’s granddaughter from his blood-and-drug den a while ago. My testimony had put Trager in jail.
He was supposed to get thirty years. Thirty. It hadn’t even been three.
He wore a nice business coat, expensive French cologne, and a hat straight out of a 1930s film. He didn’t wait for my answer before folding into the
seat next to me, his shoulders brushing mine. His face was long, dark, his cheeks hollowed out so the bones cut a hard line under his eyes. He was a predator. He was violence. A dealer, a pusher, a killer.
“Great day to be alive, isn’t it, Ms. Beckstrom?”
If he thought I was going to sit there and make nice talk, he was out of his mind.
I stood.
Six other men in our immediate vicinity rose out of their seats just a little and glanced at Trager. They each had at least one hand in a pocket. I pulled my nose out of my scarf and caught the faintest scent of metal and oil and gunpowder.
