As I walked across the space to where I knew the rip was, I opened the door and a cool wash of energy poured over and around me like the ultimate cold shower.
Inside the storeroom, I found Jessa in a lip-lock with a big hairy man, who could only be the contractor. Double crap.
“Jessa Feychild!” I exclaimed.
The two of them jumped and Jessa unwound herself from the man.
“Violet? I didn’t know you were coming,” she lied.
“Oh, this is Violet,” the ape man said. “I’m Derrick. Jessa has told me all about you.”
I glanced at Jessa for a moment to assess how I was supposed to play this. Jessa shook her head. I nodded.
“Did she tell you how long we’ve been dating?” I yelled.
The man paled and his jaw dropped.
“I think you should leave so I can discuss this matter with my ex-girlfriend.”
I shoved the man out the door and slammed the door behind him. I leaned against it and held in the laughter until I could here the shuffle of the men’s boots outside.
“I love you,” Jessa whispered as she turned toward the cold void in the middle of the room.
“I know sweetheart. Now what’s going on?”
I pushed against the door and walked toward what felt like a waterfall of energy. I closed my eyes and reached out. It felt like a cold draft slipping though my fingers.
“Want to see it?” Jessa asked.
“Can we do it?” I looked over at her.
She shrugged. “We’re the Key Holder and Guardian.”
“Which means?”
“No one knows what we are capable together.”
I smiled. Releasing every brick in my borders, I felt Jessa’s raindrop energy around me and the energy room smelled like roses. And then I felt it, the silvery bond between us, the one that made us top dogs.
Jessa reached out and took my hand. “Just close your eyes again.”
I did as was told. Her power crept up my arm and tickled up my neck until it settled in like a cool mask around my face.
“Try it now.”
I fluttered my eyes open and before me was a smoky dream-shimmering fount of energy. “Is that what you see?”
“In every mirror.”
It waved and tattered before us like a ghost flag on a pirate ship.
“Can you see the tear?” Jessa asked.
“Yes.”
“Help me weave it back together.”
“Missed that day in Home Ec, teach.”
Jessa pulled me toward it. I watched her small fingers reach into the void and pull at a piece of the frayed edge and twirled it into another piece and the ghostly material fused. But I could see the tear. Like a bright white scar.
As I looked closer, my curiosity pulling me toward the Veil, I could see the previous tears and scars of Jessa’s constant weaving.
“Just try to match them together.” Her voice was soft as she slipped her hand from mine. “Use your power to fuse them together.”
I could still see the transparent fibers and reached out. The tattered Veil tickled my fingertips. I pulled at one gently in the corner of the tear opposite from Jessa. And pressed it against another piece. The energy fused together in a white hot seal that burned my fingertips.
I snapped my hand away. “What the hell?”
“Shhhhh!” Jessa snapped.
I sucked at my finger. With a sharp sigh, I went back to work.
We worked toward each other making the tear in the Veil smaller.
“I suck at this.”
“Just do your best and I can go over it later,” she whispered again.
“Why are you whispering?” I asked as we worked head to head, slowing down so that we could patch it with the least amount of stretch.
“It’s an open window. Someone might hear us.”
And with that I snapped my mouth closed. A waft of sulfur came through the veil. Spencer. I’d seen this. He’d found a rip, and he still had the spell book. Not only was I dreaming about Spencer, but I was dreaming about Spencer’s future.
And if I was dreaming about Spencer’s future, was he as well?
“Quicker,” I said. If I was right, and I really wished I wasn’t, he was just about to launch himself at the swirling mass.
“What?”
“Just weave, woman!” I hissed as I pinched as quickly as I could. It was like pinching dough on the top of an overstuffed pie. We got to a part in the middle that no matter how we pinched, the Veil would just rip open in another spot.
Some thing hit the soft doughy center hard, throwing both of us back and against the wall. I cracked my head against the wall and the cool shimmer of her mask slipped from my eyes.
“What do we do?”
“Got a knife?”
I sat up and held the back of my head where it had smashed against the wall. When I looked down at my hand, it was covered in blood. I was getting tired of the Humpty Dumpty feeling. “Need blood?”
“Maybe your’s will do.”
She pulled me toward her and slammed my hand against the still opened tear.
I felt it pulse and ripple as the Veil sucked at the power my blood contained. It fused back together into a solid piece. And then went still.
“Crap,” I said as I held my head again.
Jessa’s power tingled around me and then it faded as she calmed down. “I think it’s stable.”
“What the hell happened?”
Jessa didn’t answer. As I rested my pulsing head in my hands, I looked over at her. She had the look, the kind of guilty look like when she used to not tell me that she had started texting an ex-boyfriend again.
“Jessa?”
“I’ve been testing myself.”
“Testing yourself,” I yelled and then my head rang as my own voice echoed in my ears. “Why would you test yourself?”
“You’re not the only one getting stronger, Violet.”
I looked up at her and her eyes flashed lavender for a second.
“While you are playing around with your dogs, I’ve been here, making sure that I can control the Veil.”
“While ripping it apart?”
“It won’t happen again.”
“It better not.”
I pulled myself off the ground by one of the shelving units. My head spun as I gained my balance.
“Where are your shoes?”
“Somewhere.” I rested my head against the cool metal.
“Violet, is something wrong?”
When I black out, I didn’t have the luxury to land on Jessa’s plush carpet, just the smooth cement of her back room.
Chapter Thirteen
HIS LAUGHTER ROLLED across the open field. He’d done it. And he had her to thank for it.
When he hit the edge of the woods that morning, he knew. He’d seen this before. He tread carefully through the woods knowing that the branches would rip what was left of his pants.
He followed the feeling in his gut. By evening, he would hit the clearing with the portal he couldn’t open. He knew that there were two Biggers waiting for him. And he had a day to prepare for it.
When the moment came, he almost couldn’t believe his ears. “We knew that you couldn’t resist.”
He snatched his hand away from the water’s surface and snapped his head around. The Bigger stalked across the clearing. The wolf’s white mantle nearly glowed in the low moonlight and his teeth looked whiter for the dark surroundings.
It was a trap. He had seen it coming. Every detail was just as he had seen it in the dream.
Another Bigger broke the edge of the forest behind him. Nearly surrounded.
The plan was in place. This is your edge, he told himself. She won the day for him.
The wolf stalked toward him as he rose. He left the pack here. He could get it later. He slipped the wooden shank he’d made into his palm.
“You half-breeds always taste so good.”
He licked his lips. Any second, the o
ne coming up behind him would be caught in the first trap he’d set. It really was a feat of architecture. His pranking days of college were finally being used for some good.
When the trap was sprung, he didn’t flinch. The wolf did. It raised his hackles and looked around the clearing.
He could smell its fear. He smiled.
The wolf launched its body at him. His lightening fast reflexes were able to dart away and keep his balance, despite the bum leg. This wasn’t only a fight for survival; this was revenge.
The wolf landed in the pond and bounced off the surface.
He snickered at the cartoon-like spectacle as the wolf flailed to through the air.
He was on top of the beast when it landed and rammed the wooden stake into its heart.
And then again.
And then again.
His arm was halfway in to the beast’s sternum, covered in warm thick blood, when he felt the relief of energy within the beast.
He opened himself up to the slow steady ebb of power and took it for his own. You keep what you kill. Rule number one in the pack.
He looked down at the dead beast beneath him. Its glassy eyes looked up at the moonlight sky.
As he stood, he felt the power of the beast, green and smelling like mulch, the wolf’s power settled around him. He felt its energy settle into his muscles and his animal. It soothed him.
He walked over to the pond and washed the blood from his hands. He had another Bigger to kill, but that would be easy after it exhausted itself in the trap, and he wanted clean hands before he tackled the other kill.
The portal was closed, though he imagined that with enough fairy blood he could open it again. The smell of her still lingered around the pond, her magnolia scent just hovering around the water.
He took in a deep breath of her and laughed.
MY CELL PHONE woke me up. More important, the ring tone that I had assigned Chaz woke me up. I wanted to talk to him, needed to talk to him. I reached out to get the cell phone off my night stand and rolled right off a couch.
“Violet?”
I looked down at the carpet and then up at her. My head pounded and my mouth was as dry as cotton. “Drugs?”
Jessa came out from her kitchen with a steamy mug of something. “Already gotcha covered.”
She knelt down on the floor and handed me a steamy mug of coffee and two ibuprofen. I slugged back the pills with the hot coffee and let it burn my tongue and then spin around in my brain.
“Phone?”
Jessa reached up to her coffee table and pulled my purse on the floor. “What the hell do you have in here?” she asked as she dug.
“Rations for the end of the world?”
She pulled out the diary, the planner, a few books, and then finally found my phone at the bottom of the purse.
“Thanks, Buttercup.”
Jessa snorted. “How’s the head?”
“How’d you even get me back here?”
Jessa looked away and bit her lower lip.
“Jessa?”
“Derrick?” she confessed.
“The construction ape?”
Jessa scrunched her nose and nodded.
I laughed and it made my head throb. “He’s still going to ask you out, you know. Girlfriend or not.”
“Already did.”
“Over my unconscious body? You heartless little flirt.”
“I said no. For now.”
I rolled my eyes and pressed speed dial 3 on my phone and waited. It rang and rang and rang. His voicemail picked up again. “Hey, leave a message, and I’ll get back to you.”
I sighed as the phone beeped in my ear. “Hey Chaz. Just calling you to update you on the situation. Which again, landed me bloody but fine. Guess I’ll talk to you later.”
I hung up and looked at my lock screen. This was weird. Something wasn’t right. I tried to remember the last time we spoke. Three days ago. Four? Right before the Hogs and Henny parking lot. Five days. And hadn’t I just heard his ringtone?
“Furrow much?” Jessa asked as she sat down on the couch next to me.
“Chaz didn’t answer.”
“Maybe he’s busy.”
“Then he’d answer and tell me that he was busy.”
“He’s working a mission, Violet. You were out of commission for a while. Maybe he’s finally getting some sleep.”
“He’d still answer my call. He always answers my calls.”
JESSA HAD A total of thirty-six mirrors in her apartment. Five were full-length mirrors located in every room for easy ‘jumping.’ There were two in the foyer across from each other that I’d caught Jessa staring in a million times before I knew that she was mentally surfing the Veil.
It took us two hours and a steak and cheesecake dinner to realize that we had other ways to see if Chaz was doing okay.
“Do you have something of his?” Jessa asked as she stood before the mirror in her foyer.
I had to think. Did I? “A keychain. He brought me a keychain from Vegas last time he went.”
“That will work.”
I retrieved the keys from my purse.
When I joined Jessa again at the mirror, her eyes glowed lavender. “You have gotten stronger.”
“I don’t need blood any more to spy on people, just the connection.”
I put my hand on her shoulder. “I am so sorry that you had to do all of this on your own.”
“It would have been nice to have my best friend here.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Just be here now, okay?”
“Just call me, kid.” I rested my head on hers in the mirror, and she laughed and elbowed me away from her.
As Jessa prepared to work her mojo, I prepared to see Chaz in any dire state of need. Bleeding, shot, lying injured in his Challenger at the side of road. Frankly, I’d caused him to be in worse conditions when we were together. And my luck since we’d been apart hadn’t been much better.
I didn’t prepare to see him canoodling with a cute little blonde.
My skin prickled and my fingers curled around Jessa’s shoulder.
He was in her apartment with his shirt off. There was a painting on the wall that gave it a homey feeling rather than a seedy motel. The lights were dim, but from what I could make out with my very keen eyes focused very keenly on him, was that they were in the living room. He was sitting on the couch, every inch of his abs defined by the little light that streamed in from a street light. The blonde, petite and pert by the tank top she was wearing, was kneeing before him, nestled between his knees.
Compromising was not enough of an action verb to describe the situation.
“Violet,” Jessa whispered.
“Might as well stay for the show.”
The woman, whose face was hidden from our vantage point, leaned forward and Chaz stopped her, his hand sliding down the side of her body to hold her wrists to her side.
He licked his lower lip and said something to her that made her toss her head back.
“Violet, I think we should stop,” Jessa said as she backed away from the mirror.
I cemented my feet to the floor. I’d done this before, watched this before with the lovely ex-fiance. Might as well burn all the happy Chaz memories out of my head with the fiery passion of their sins.
Wow, I really am over dramatic sometimes.
“Maybe we should . . .”
The woman moved faster than a blink. One moment, she was running her hands up his thighs. The next moment, she had her head buried in his neck as she straddled his hips.
Chaz didn’t throw her off.
He didn’t launch her across the room and defend my honor.
He simply closed his eyes and leaned back against the couch. His arms out stretched, fists clenching the couch pillows.
And then a fiery redhead walked into the scene in nothing but a towel.
“Holy shit,” Jessa yelled as she broke the link to the mirror and scurried to the far wall as the image faded fr
om the mirror.
I saw my reflection become crisp in the mirror. The yellow in my eyes was only highlighted by the dark circles under them from lack of sleep. My hair hung limp with a kink in the back from the concussion.
I was neither petite nor pert.
“He barely even kissed me before he left,” I whispered. I ran the scene through my head. He’d tossed his stuff in the back of his Challenger like he always did and kissed me on the cheek as Tucker watched.
Jessa pulled at my hand and walked us into the living room.
“He’s been hiding things from me in my own house.”
Suddenly, everything hurt. My chest, my arms. Even my feet hurt, like I’d already run a million miles away from him, from this new truth.
“No,” Jessa said definitely. “There has to be an explanation.
“He won’t even answer the phone to give me one.” I walked all the way across her apartment and pressed my face against her cold patio windows. My skin felt raw and burned. “Why didn’t I see the signs? I’ve seen them before.”
“With who?”
“With Kyle. He started to back off in the month leading up to the glorious event.”
Jessa winced. “So what are you going to do?”
I hit my head against the glass and then turned around to look at her. Her bright eyes were filled with tears. I reached out my hand and held her’s tightly. “Wait until he gets back? I’d rather break up in person than over the phone.”
“Why?”
“Because then I could maim him on the spot instead of having to stalk him.”
Jessa cracked the smallest of smiles. “You do have a built in dark side.”
I winked at her and she pulled me to her before I sank to the floor.
I soaked her jeans in tears and maybe the blanket that she pulled around us as well. Chaz. Mister White Hat. Getting his rocks off with a blonde. Why did it always have to be a blonde?
Jessa stroked my hair, and I felt her sniff along with me. “You need a hair cut.”
I took in a deep shuttering breath. My tear ducts already hurt and my lips were swollen. “I need to be able to go out my door without someone trying to cut my head off.”
“So we bring the hair cut here.”
I looked at the clock across the room. “Its nine at night.”
She looked down at me and brushed my too long bangs out of my face. “Fairy princess, remember?”
Claws and Effect Page 17
