“I’m scared.” Sadie said as she took a seat next to Briar on the grass. Briar snapped back from whatever dream land she had drifted off to and looked around, hoping just once to see the light. Everywhere else in the world the grass was yellow and trees had lost their leaves. Seattle though, had a way of hanging on to that beauty as long as it could. That beauty was all that she could see though.
"Don’t be afraid Sadie. There is a whole new beginning waiting for you. I know it's hard to say goodbye but try and remember that this isn’t forever."
With a nod Bri watched her stand and the peacefulness came on like a smooth breeze along a river. Bri couldn’t see the light but she knew it was there because the look on Sadie’s face assured her that whatever was waiting beyond Pete would be a lot of R and R for the poor kid.
She waited until the image that had been Sadie disappeared into the thin air before standing and taking in the feeling. It was gone long before Bri had felt enough of it. She took her time walking back over to the parking garage, leaving a trail of vesh in her wake. Vesh was a glamour that made it hard to distinguish what was before you. The humans may walk by, sense she was there but wouldn’t be able to see it. Vesh came in handy when she was on a job like this one… or with Fangs. She had never in all the time spent with him, never let that glamour slip. He never saw her scars, never sensed she was other than human and never had a passing thought of who she really was.
She stepped into the office once more and tapped herself on the back, just a slight mess. She closed her eyes and let the thought pass. She could almost hear his voice in her mind as if he had been here with her like he used to, the fain Irish accent making everything sound like melted sex…even insults.
"Jesus Pumpkin, leave it to you to kill a man with a dull blade and no back up." He would look at her and shake his head. She had always loved when he worried for her. Fangs, her former lover had no idea that Bri was Sleeping Beauty, a human turned demon in a single act of vengeance. She never allowed him that close, had always preferred him at arm’s length. Perhaps that was why she stood in an empty parking garage alone and no back up in sight...
Naaaaah. She just hadn’t called for her back up yet, back up being clean up and she reached for her phone and called Winter. On the third ring Snow White answered. "Let me guess, you need a cleanup crew?"
Bri laughed. Jeeze she loved this girl, all the girls. They had a connection that was forged in pain and betrayal. They learned long ago to trust nothing but one another. There was Winter, the woman known to humans as Snow White. Winter had been made a Contaca soul over three hundred years ago when her step mother attempted to kill her by poisoning her repeatedly by slipping the insides of apple seeds into every meal. They day she thought she finally killed her, she took her body to a winter cabin the family had owned. The creatures in that cabin had not been dwarfs.
"I do, but it's a neat one." Bri had not taken her time with Carl Barnes. She was fast and efficient and though she could find comfort in his screams she never lingered. Bri didn’t enjoy killing, but as much as her father annoyed her from time to time, she did agree in balance. Killing the things she did, it made the balance shift. She was all about the eye for an eye. The look of relief on Sadie’s face said all it needed to. Though she hated the ugly side that her life was made of, she loved the beauty too.
Bri gave her the address and the location of the office inside of the garage. "I think if you send me Messy, Chatter and Crazy we should be good."
"Need Fury for clean up perhaps... er...the body I mean?" She was funny that Winter. Fury was a surefire way to ensure that nothing was left behind, even bones.
"No this one is getting sent off to the Seattle PD with a list of twelve other girls and the locations of their bodies."
The sigh from Winter was nothing but sadness and loss, all for the other innocent twelve that didn’t witness their justice. "Poor things. Of course. I'll be sure to let Chatter know that a glamour is needed for transfer." A moment of silence before she spoke again her voice soft and just like a chime. “Are you ok Bri?”
“It was a bad one Win, but the names and locations of his other victims are tucked nicely in the breast pocket of his shirt, and I was careful to keep the blood off the paper. It’s sad but justice was definitely served.”
“I’ll get the boys there quick.”
"Thanks Win, I appreciate it. I know its short notice and you have your party tonight." Winter had a birthday party only three times a century. Tonight was her fourth twenty first birthday, her first had been celebrated as a human and the last three have been a celebration of her immortality.
"Tell me your dressing up right?"
Grooooooan!
"Mm-hm. can’t wait." That was an understatement but Bri wasn’t going say a word. Winter had always been available on a seconds notice, her seven demons always prepared to go the extra mile for the girls just because Winter asked them too. They would give her the world. They were the reason she had been entrusted as a Contaca Soul. The seven Havoc demons who had been hiding in the winter cabin were on the extinction list. Havoc demons were small and snack like for Borneds, the kind of demon that come straight from the womb looking for blood. Borneds as opposed to Turneds were normally the type of demon you run from. Borneds liked killing where Turneds were like Bri, turned into a demon. Borneds were born as demons, it’s in their blood. With the exception of the Havoc demons, one should run like the fucking wind if a Borned is on your ass. Ashess, Belle, Bri and Winter spent a lot of time corralling the born demons back to hell. Winter had saved the Havoc demons, the only gentle and loving of born demons. They were hers to protect and she did an amazing job.
"I am not forcing anyone Bri so if you don’t want to I won’t be upset."
Bri knew she meant it to, that was just Winter, to sweet for her own good. Bri would wear the damn costume because it meant something to Winter.
"No I'm excited Win. It's been a long time since I got to be just Sleeping Beauty." Understatement! Bri was Sleeping Beauty every day and it was something she couldn’t hide. Every spirit she spoke to knew damn well who she was, even men. There was no hiding herself from it but at least for Winter she could embrace it. No hiding from the whole 'Once upon a time...'
"My guys just left so maybe ten minutes you'll be good to go."
"Thanks again Win."
"Sure...I... ah… Sure." Bri could hear Winter biting her lip through the line and smiled.
"What is it Win?"
"It’s nothing, I ... just... well I ran into Fangs today and we got to talking and well..." As the words trailed off until stopping completely Bri didn’t need her to finish. He Bring his name made her insides hurt as if she had swallowed broken jagged glass.
"And... Fangs is coming tonight isn’t he Win?" Easier to state the obvious and wait to see if you were right, nine times out of ten you were.
"I’m sorry Bri. Before I knew what I was doing he was asking if he could bring anything." Bri almost asked if she told him to bring his own feeder because she didn’t think her guests would dig that kind of surprise, but she didn’t. "I promise I will play the offense all night tonight and make sure that you’re not within twenty feet of each other.
She almost told her that it wouldn’t matter, because if Fangs was in the room he was all that Bri would see. Again she chose not to. "I will be fine Winter, it’s been seven months since we split. I think we can be cordial to one another for the simple fact that we both adore you." An image of Fangs came to mind and Bri almost cried out at the pain the memory brought. Fangs wasn’t handsome in the classical sense. He had black eyes as dark as a ravens wing and were hardened by battle. Dark hair fell around his fallen angels face and a voice that reached to the very spine of Bri, raspy and deep with an accent made for romance. He was... everything to her at one time. "He should be there, he adores you Winter."
"I feel like I am betraying you though. I swear I didn’t mean to invite him."
"Winter you are
not betraying me, its fine really. Fangs and I didn’t work out and it was my choice remember? I’m fine. There are no sides here. It will be fine." How many times would she say fine until she believed it?
"If, well if you’re sure."
"Positive." Luckily the squealing tires rang and echoed through the garage when the black van switched off the lights and slid into a spot beside the office doors. When Chatter hopped out Bri laughed at his glamour. Dressed like a Rotor Rooter employee he dropped the image the second he slammed the door.
"How are ya Bri?"
"Good thanks for getting here guys." She said and hugged the small red body of Chatter and Brainy jumped in on the action. She could hear Crazy pounding on the inside panels of the van so she walked over, glaring at the other two demons who were, essentially, Winters babies, and let Crazy out. He leapt immediately into her arms and growled at his brothers and planted a big kiss on Bri's cheek. Laughing she set him down and opened the door to the office.
"Have at it guys." The hoots and hollers of the demons faded and Bri propped the door open so they could get in and out easily. They were no more than three feet tall and with only three fingers on each hand it made it a difficult project to open a door.
" Bri!" Winter snapped from the other end of the phone. Bri forgot she was there in the havoc the little guys brought. She had been worried Crazy would get bit good and hard for planting that kiss on her cheek. The boys were very territorial of Winter and the girls, and they didn’t get to kiss her so jealousy was bound to ensue.
"Sorry, your boys showed up and Crazy got left behind in the van so I had to save him."
"God they have been such stinkers lately." Spoken with an exasperated sigh and absolute love. Bri got it completely, even Fury was a sweetie.
"Ah they’re good guys."
"Listen I need to get back to planning this gig tonight. I'll see you at ten."
Bri let Winter go and yelled a “see ya” to the havocs and walked back to the park where her car was parked. She tried to pretend that seeing Fangs would be fine, but she remembered the last time they were together. She had touched him a little too long, and with her touch and his being dead and all came a flush of emotion she hadn’t expected. Fangs loved her as much as she him and that was fine as long as the words weren’t spoken.
But Bri learned quickly that she couldn’t have his thoughts either, and as Fangs closed the distance between their bodies and pressed himself deep inside, in a fluid move he entered her and she read him loud and clear.
You are my life Bri....
There was no place far enough from Fangs to keep those thoughts from attacking her. He didn’t know she read him, he didn’t know that he would never touch her again, he didn’t know that the emergency that had her running from his condo was nothing more than her fear.
How could she be his life, when her life was something that was not in her possession?
*
Winter hit end on her cell phone but stayed in place, watching as the remaining four havoc demons played Call of Duty on the Xbox 360. They were her boys, she thought and smiled thinking of the last three hundred odd years that she had been given the task as their handler. Perhaps tonight they would agree to taking on another.
She wasn’t getting rid of them, never would she pass the buck. They were hers and she loved them all more than anything else in her life, but she had grown deeply over the last three years and grown as in fell in love. Marcus was an insurance agent and owned his own successful agency on Mercer Island, had his own money and he had made Winter his own personal Princess.
They went to the finest restaurants and Opera’s. He took her to some of the best underground Seattle rock concerts and made her picnics on the beaches of Puget Sound. She had crossed her fingers and dreamed nightly of him being the one, her one and tonight he told her he had a major announcement that he had wanted to save for her party.
It had to be marriage.
If he proposed then officially he would be given the choice to en- soul himself as a Contaca and be granted immortality. That was the second part of any proposal that Winter would ever have. She would never be the simple marrying kind. Her seven Havoc demons needed forever come first.
Forever was a tricky thing. She knew because she had already served over three- hundred years and had eternity to go. Happily ever after was a whole other dream for her and the girls. She thought of Bri then and the mess she put herself in with Fangs, feared she had done the exact same thing with Marcus. He too had no idea that Winter was the official, real deal, nothing-like-the-all-time-classic, Snow White. Let alone that it was demons not dwarfs.
Marcus loved Winter just as Fangs loved Bri and in the two years they spent together she never said a word. Winter assumed Fangs would have handled the truth better, being immortal and Vampire takes the sting out of the whole, you’ll live forever scenario.
But in thinking those thoughts came the harsh and very private reality that Winter feared turning out like Bri. She wanted love, wanted her amenamo, true love where Bri ran from it. Winter understood Briars’ stand on her secret life but Bri took it to a whole new level. Fangs had been duped into thinking Bri was human, an extraordinary human but all the same a human.
Winter wasn’t allowed to tell Marccus what she had been entrusted to protect. With that one secret came the others. She is Snow White, she has seven Havoc demons not dwarfs and that marrying her would mean he too would need to accept a life as a Contaca Soul.
Panic was bound to set in and she didn’t need the attack. She had an enormous mansion on the banks of Lake Sammamish that needed to be perfect for the party and four demons bound and determined to run amuck later if they didn’t burn some energy now.
Xbox it was then.
Winter bought the house over twenty years ago and remodeled over the years. She had needed a mansion so that on the bad days when the boys were fighting they would need more than separate corners, more like separate spaces all together. So she bought the biggest house she could find on property that would give freedom under vesh.
Seventeen bedrooms, two guest homes and a boathouse had done the trick.
She would need to talk with her demons, make sure that they understood the love she had for Mark, make sure they could welcome him. After three years of dating, the Havocs were burning their glamour and energy when Mark was around to ensure they appeared as human, as employees of the house. Mark never asked questions and Winter knew her investigating life had made her aware of Marks surroundings, though he never wondered why she needed a pool boy, a chef, a security guard two gardeners and one house keeper, normal on any other mansion ground but as a single woman, living with an on hand staff of seven men never struck Marcus as odd.
Why would it? He assumed she was paid well as a consultant, no idea that the Devine paid her even more than her make believe job. Everything was a balance and where Bri and Ashess worked alongside the Dark, she worked for the Devine. It was Belle who was cursed and completely alone, in life, she had no boss.
Had the situations been reversed Winter didn’t know if she would have been able to remain silent like her lover had.
More panic had her reaching for her phone to call Belle for a much needed friendly distraction when the chime to her door went off. She knew the instant before it rang that Ash and Belle were at the door and the energy behind they brought with them told her loud and clear that the contract set to ensure Bri’s freedom was in fact the real deal, changing Bri’s game plan immediately.
*
Briar left the park and headed for the I405 entrance and sat in traffic. Five miles, five miles until she could exit to the I90 and have smooth sailing across Lake Washington and into Bellevue. Bri lived in the joining town of Newcastle and King County hadn’t decided as of yet if it was a suburb of Bellevue or Renton. Bri cared less. Her house sat on the edge of a lake and across the street was one of the oldest, still functioning cemeteries in Washington. The cemetery was of no importance any longer
, but had been while she had a lover of the Vampire nature. Fangs had made one of the crypts in the cemetery his on nights he and Bri cut it to close to sunrise. It had been weeks since he had been by, yet she always found herself looking out the window, watching and waiting for him.
The end had been swift for her and Fangs. She simply couldn’t allow the love to get deeper, where it was in her veins as well as his. Let alone, what if one day in desperate need he fed off her. That would be more than a surprise, more like a catastrophic oh-shit moment. Fangs had been duped, fooled, lied to for over two years while he and Bri...whatever. And she knew that if he needed it, she'd have supplied her blood for him. Perhaps that should have been the first clue that it was more than a little love with Fangs. The whole, your-needs-before-mine thing was a major red flag that she had missed.
Awakened (A Fairy Tales Novel) Page 3
