by Gary Jonas
“Can you swing toward me?” I asked.
“The sword is pulling free. We’ll only get one shot at this.”
“I’ll catch you.”
“What’s wrong with your left arm?”
“It’s jacked. Hang on.” I turned to the man and pointed at my left arm. “I need you to pull on my arm as hard as you can.”
“What?”
“Pull!”
He took hold of my forearm and pulled. One sudden jolt of agony, and I felt the arm roll back into its socket. The relief was instant. My shoulder still throbbed, but it wasn’t incapacitating. I turned back to Kelly.
“Okay, let’s do this.”
“Here goes nothing,” she said.
She swung back and as she started forward, the sword slipped free. I reached for her.
At that precise moment, Esther popped into the room right beside me.
“You’re alive!” she said.
Her appearance and her shout distracted me.
My hand closed on air.
“Shit,” I said.
Kelly fell.
I winced and leaned out the window. Kelly hit the ground hard, and I heard bones breaking even from ten stories up.
“Oh my God,” the man said.
“Uh-oh,” Esther said.
“She’s gonna be pissed.”
“She’s got to be dead,” the man said, thinking I was talking to him.
Esther simply shrugged. “She won’t be too mad. You didn’t do it on purpose.”
I shook my head. I patted the man on the shoulder. “Sorry about the mess,” I said.
When I finally reached Kelly, she lay on the ground with both legs and her left arm broken.
“I’ll catch you,” she said, mimicking me.
I spread my hands. “I got distracted.”
“I saw Esther pop in.”
Esther hung back fifteen feet.
“It’s not her fault,” I said.
“I know. I blame you. Is my sword all right?”
The blade was bent, scratched up, and chipped.
“Uh, no.”
“Wonderful.”
I knelt beside her and set her left arm. It seemed to be healing already. I moved to her legs and felt along them.
“They’re broken.”
“No shit, butterfingers.”
“I missed. I’m sorry.”
“‘Sorry’ might be appropriate when you drop a baseball, but it doesn’t even begin to scratch the surface when you drop a woman ten fucking stories.”
“You lived.”
“You’re going to need to get me to a hospital. My bones are knitting together incorrectly. They’ll have to rebreak them and reset them because you suck.”
“I know.”
I tried to pick her up, but my shoulder gave out, and I dropped her to the concrete again.
“Oh, shit. I’m sorry.”
“You’re going to be.”
I pulled her up, and my side hurt so bad, I couldn’t get her over my shoulder. In the end, I had to drag her back to my car. We left the sword because she had plenty of them, including at least two in the back of my car. Well, she had plenty of them at her place and mine, but I guessed she was down to whatever was in our vehicles. I managed to get the passenger door open then struggled to get Kelly into the seat.
“Be careful with her,” Esther said.
I shot her a look, and she gave me a hesitant grin.
Good thing Ravenwood didn’t come outside. We’d have been easily dispatched.
I had trouble getting the seat belt fastened, and Kelly glared at me.
“Sorry,” I said for the third time.
Three was not my favorite number.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
At the emergency room, a kind nurse patched me up and put my left arm in a sling. I made some bad jokes, and she had the grace to at least smile. I found Kelly in a curtained area. She sat on a gurney where the doctor had to rebreak her legs to set them correctly. He was in the middle of lecturing her about getting to the hospital sooner. He seemed to think she’d waited a few weeks to come see him, but of course, she healed really fast. I knew she’d be completely healed within a few hours.
I entered the room. “You all set?” I said, keeping the bad jokes coming.
“You’ll need to get a wheelchair for me,” she said.
“I think I can manage that.”
“I haven’t released you,” the doctor said. “I need to put casts on those legs.”
Kelly shook her head. “No, you don’t.”
“Ms. Chan, your legs are broken. They need to be kept in place while they heal.”
“Don’t argue with the doctor,” I said.
She shot me a look. I knew I was already in the doghouse and ran the risk of eviction from even there. But she knew it wasn’t wise to have the doctor discover that her legs were already healing.
I leaned over and whispered in her ear. “You should have let me take you to see Lina.”
She whispered something that would be physically impossible and illegal in all fifty states and the territories.
“I’ll go get a wheelchair,” I said.
At least the doctor wasn’t looking at me as if I’d broken Kelly’s legs and kept her from help for ages. Maybe it was a good thing that I was pretty beat up myself. Regardless, I wanted to get us out of there before the police showed up. If the doctor thought Kelly had been abducted and tortured, he’d make a report and we’d be detained for hours. As it was, we had to wait while the doctor put casts on Kelly’s legs.
Eventually we were able to get out of there. I wheeled Kelly out to the Firebird.
“Where’s Esther?” she asked.
“She popped out while you were cussing in the car,” I said. “I think she’s keeping tabs on Ravenwood.”
“I wasn’t cussing in the car,” Kelly said.
I let that go. If she wanted to rewrite history in her own mind, that was okay with me. But when I initially suggested taking her to Lina, she went off on a profanity-laced diatribe about wizards in general and Lina in particular. Esther had shaken her head, said, “Bored now,” and popped away.
We reached the car, and I was helping Kelly into the passenger seat when Esther suddenly appeared. I jumped but in my defense, it’s hard not to be startled with someone appears right in front of you.
“Jump much?” Esther said.
“Where were you?” Kelly asked.
“I didn’t want to watch you bump off a doctor, so I thought I’d check on Ravenwood.”
“I didn’t bump off a doctor,” Kelly said, indignant.
“She wanted to but I told her it was bad form.”
“Hey, I was nice to the doctor.”
“Sure you were,” Esther said, clearly not believing her. I found this amusing. Esther looked at me. “How are you feeling?”
“Like I’ve been hit by a truck. If I had my way, I’d go to bed for a week. Why?”
“Because that’s how we can get Ravenwood.”
“Hit him with a truck?”
“No. Get him to feel like he needs to rest for a week.”
I leaned against the car. The sun had pulled its disappearing act, and the streetlights were coming on. “I’m listening,” I said.
Esther smiled. “Every time he uses magic, he needs to rest. Right?”
“Okay,” I said. “What are you suggesting?”
“Get him to use more magic. Lots more.”
“How?” Kelly asked.
Esther shrugged. “I just work here.”
“The only thing that comes to mind is to have a bunch of wizards attack him at once. He’d have to defend himself, and that might get him to use quite a bit of magic. Speaking of wizards, did Frank survive?”
Esther nodded. “Ravenwood has him at DGI down in the catacombs.”
“Did everyone else want to be like Mike?”
“Sure looked like it to me,” Esther said. “Nobody tried to argue with Ravenw
ood at all.”
“Wizards,” Kelly said and spit. “Bunch of spineless pussies.”
“How do you really feel?”
“Like going home. Oh wait, I don’t have a home. And why don’t I have a home? Because Ravenwood can use lots of magic and just switch bodies to rejuvenate.”
“Good point,” I said. “We’d need him to use more magic but not be able to transfer. Any ideas?”
“Get him an audition on American Idol.”
“Leave the humor to me, babe.”
“Don’t call me babe.”
“Can I call you babe if I have a good idea?”
“No, but if you have a good idea, I might forgive you for dropping me.”
“I didn’t drop you,” I said, feeling guilty. “I just missed.”
I moved around to the driver’s side of the car. Kelly leaned over and unlocked it. I pulled off the sling and tossed it in the backseat so it would be easier to drive.
“What’s your idea?” Esther asked.
“Sharon,” I said and held up my cell phone.
I called Sharon and as the phone rang, I started the car and backed out of my space. She answered on the third ring as we left the hospital parking lot.
“You’re interrupting my date,” Sharon said.
“No hello? No how are you?” I asked.
“What do you want, Jonathan?”
“We need your help.”
“Not tonight, you don’t.”
“I was thinking tomorrow afternoon.”
“I’ll get back to you.”
I hung up and looked at Kelly. “Guess it’s hotel time again.”
“You’d better stop at the store. You’re going to need ibuprofen tomorrow morning.”
“Tomorrow, hell. I need it now.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
I lay in a strange bed, trying to find a position that didn’t hurt. Every time I moved, it sent shards of pain slicing through my ribs, shoulder, back, legs, and arms. I felt like Indiana Jones when Marion asked him where it didn’t hurt, except my elbow hurt too.
Kelly was already asleep in the next bed. Must be nice not to feel pain.
Esther stretched out on the bed beside me. “Can’t sleep?” she asked.
“Bingo,” I whispered.
“If I were alive, I could give you a nice massage and we could fool around all night.”
“Hedonist.”
“You don’t have to whisper. Kelly’s asleep.”
Kelly could sleep through an atomic blast, but if you stepped within two feet of her, she’d wake instantly, even if you weren’t breathing. Simply displacing the air seemed to alert her. But Esther was right, I didn’t need to whisper.
I rolled onto my side to face her, and I wished she were Naomi and that things were different. Thinking about Naomi, I had to sigh. I’d failed her. I knew that in order to get Ravenwood, Naomi would probably have to die. Either he’d kill her trying to escape or we’d have to kill her to get him. I felt like I was betraying her by even thinking about it.
More than that, I wasn’t sure I could do it.
Ravenwood wanted me dead, but other than that, I didn’t care much about his plans. He could do to the wizards whatever he saw fit. They were a bunch of stuck-up douche bags, and Kelly was right that not one of them had any backbone. They couldn’t be trusted except to act in their own best interests and even then only if it didn’t pose some risk to their status in the Council. They’d all been running scared for years, and whenever a group of them tried to do something different, such as creating the Sekutar warriors, it blew up in their faces.
There were lone wizards who were okay, but those who tried to work together always ended up deferring to whomever was in charge out of fear.
“Smoke is coming out your ears,” Esther said. “You must be trying to think.”
“Sorry.”
“It’s all berries.” She gazed at me for a moment. “You’re thinking you’ll have to take Naomi for a ride, aren’t you?”
“Yeah.”
“I don’t like her, but I don’t want to see you hurting. If anyone can save her, it’s you. When you get her out, are you going to give each other handcuffs?”
“Kinky.”
“You know what I mean.”
“Rings?”
“Yes, but the other handcuffs might be fun too. If I were alive, I’d let you handcuff me.”
I grinned. “Which kind of handcuffs?”
She winked at me. “Whichever kind you want.”
“Jonathan?” Kelly said.
“Sorry, did we wake you?”
“No. I haven’t been able to sleep.” She sat up in bed.
I painfully turned to face her. “Me either.”
“You’re too busy getting Esther all hot and bothered.”
“She started it.”
“She’s safe.”
“What?”
“You know I love you like a brother,” Kelly said. “And normally I wouldn’t tell you this, but—”
“It’s okay, Kelly. You’ve had the hots for me for years. I know. And you’re looking mighty hot in that little black sports bra.”
“You wish,” she said. She was wearing the bra. We’d sent our clothes down to be cleaned, so we were stuck in our underwear.
“No, you really do look hot.”
“And you’re trying to make jokes to avoid a serious discussion.”
“Guilty as charged,” I said.
“You need to hear this, though. If we can save Naomi, and understand, that’s a big if—”
“I know.”
“But if we can do it and you two try to have a relationship, you have to open up to her.” Kelly took a moment to collect her thoughts then spoke some of the truest words she’d ever said to me. “In the years I’ve known you, you haven’t had any relationship that lasted more than six months.”
I started to interrupt, but Kelly shook her head.
“Let me finish,” she said. “You do great for a while, but the only women who always stay part of your life are Esther, Sharon, and me. Do you know why that is?”
“Because you’re all awesome?”
“Because we’re safe. Esther is dead; Sharon is, well, she is what she is; and I’m like your older sister. My point is that once a relationship gets to the point where you need to take things to another level, you end things. The girl is too serious. Or you do stupid things to sabotage it like showing off the fact that magic doesn’t affect you, which didn’t exactly endear you to the Miller family.”
“Naomi ended it, not me.”
“You pushed her to it. She clearly wanted to take things further. You wouldn’t open up, and she finally gave up and moved on. I can tell from the way you look at her that you’re still in love with her. I’ll admit that I haven’t paid much attention to how she’s looking at you because I just want to strangle her, but if we can save her and if she feels like you do, I will promise to be nice to her. And you need to open your heart to her. I know it’s a risk, but you need to do it and see what happens.”
With that, she pulled up the covers, lay back, and went to sleep.
I lay there in the dark with her words echoing in my brain. I turned back toward Esther, who shook her head.
“I’m not going to be nice to her,” Esther said. “You can cash that check at another bank.”
The next morning, I woke up stiff and hurting. I tried to get up, but my body wouldn’t cooperate. I heard water running, so Kelly was in the shower. I glanced at the clock: 7:45. I closed my eyes and tried to go back to sleep, but a few minutes later, the water stopped. A few minutes after that, Kelly came out dressed in the same clothes as yesterday, only they were cleaned and pressed. I must have slept through the hotel staff returning our clothes. Kelly’s hair was still wet.
