Chest of Bone (The Afterworld Chronicles Book 1)

by Vicki Stiefel

  I ran a hand across her hair, touched those newly formed horns, so silky, breathed in a sob and hugged her—still warm—whispering over and over, “I love you. I love you.”

  At some point, Larrimer loaded Lulu into Fern’s backseat. She was asleep, for which I was thankful.

  “We should go.” He offered me a hand.

  I closed those half-lidded eyes and kissed her wrinkled cheek. And I released Bernadette and took Larrimer’s hand.

  We walked around front, where he tucked me into the passenger seat.

  When he got behind the wheel, I said, “Tommy? The two men?”

  “Their bodies, that creature, they’re gone.”

  “The chest?” I asked.

  “That’s gone, too.”

  My heart clenched. I’d failed, lost the chest. If I did nothing else in this world, I would get it back. At least, Lulu was safe.

  We headed home. Larrimer said he and Ronan would come back later to collect the Jeep and the rental. I called Balfour, told him we had Lulu. They wanted to debrief her immediately, but I said she was out, to give us a day or two. I’d call. He conceded, surprising me.

  I leaned against the car door and slept.

  The following morning, I awakened to pleasure. Not the pleasure of making love with James. But of feeling that glorious power when I wielded my fireflies. It sizzled through me, near erotic in intensity, a cascade of want. My hands shook, and I clenched them into fists.

  I swayed, pushed to a sitting position, inhaled a breath.

  Nothing pleasurable about my naked body, which told a different tale. My bruises looked like a Jackson Pollock painting. Someone had tended my cuts and butterflied and bandaged my torn calf. Bernadette’s handiwork.

  No, not hers. Of course not.

  Anger bubbled. I swiped a hand through my Medusa hair, dressed, and made it downstairs, where I found Larrimer leaning against the kitchen counter drinking a mug of fragrant tea. He was pissed, too, which only fueled my unsettled emotions.

  I walked over. “Where’s Lulu? Ronan?”

  “Still sleeping.”

  “And Bernadette?”

  “In the barn, covered with her old quilt. I thought she’d like that.”

  I leaned my forehead against his chest. “I just had the strangest experience.”

  “To say that after yesterday, it must’ve been a doozy.” He hesitated, then wound his arms around me.

  “Yeah.” I stood there for a while, battling that bubble of anger until it burst. “How could she not tell me she was my grandmother? That Tommy was my twin? And, dammit, we should still be living a life together, not her corpse wrapped up in the barn. It shouldn’t have happened that way. She shouldn’t be gone.”

  “But she is,” he said.

  Tears thickened my voice. “She was forced to be hard because I was a fricking mooshface.”

  He bent his head and whispered in my ear, “Warriors can be soft, too.”

  I stuttered a breath.

  Yes. I might be soft, but I was strong, too. A warrior. Bernadette had gotten it right, but not all of it. She’d missed the part of me, which was becoming.

  There was so much I didn’t know. So what, I could learn. I would learn. I stood on tiptoe and kissed his chin. “Thanks, dragon dude.” His pine and honey scent mixed with the burn of his anger made a potent cocktail. “You’re still pissed at me.”

  His hand stroked my hair. “Furious.”

  I stepped back. “Please understand why I went alone.”

  “Why should I?” His dark look was unrelenting.

  “Tomorrow. We’ll talk about it tomorrow. Please.”

  “Tomorrow,” was all he said as he walked outside.

  Lulu came down later, with Ronan. Her face pale, but her back straight, and her smile, while tentative, appeared often as we talked.

  She hadn’t been sexually abused, thank gods, or eaten any of the horrible meat. They’d knocked her around a bit, played cruel mental games, but she’d heal. It would be slow, take time. The ripples. Yeah, I knew all about those ripples. Fear had been her greatest enemy, but she’d used a banquet of her dad’s “tricks” to fight it. Dave had taught his daughter well. Ripples, sure. But she’d survived.

  “I’m so proud of you,” I said.

  She pointed a thumb at her chest. “Me, too.” Then she started to weep over Bernadette again, but that pain would ease.

  Mine? Yeah, I wasn’t gonna think about that. What I did think about, talk about with James, was reporting her death. I was terrified that when the lab techs got ahold of her, they’d recognize something was “off.” She wasn’t Mundane, but Fae. Did that make her body different? Hell, there were horns.

  The Union had appropriated Dave’s remains. What if they did the same to Bernadette’s? I would not have those creeps dissecting my grandmother’s body. Since no solution leapt in front of me, I waited. Tomorrow would be here soon enough.

  We did normal things. Tended to the animals. Cooked. Well, Larrimer cooked, I assisted. Played Boggle. We talked and we laughed. And cried a little, too. It started to snow around six, and we lit a fire and watched Alien, which scared the hell out of me, per usual. Larrimer and I made love. Oh, did we ever. What outside world?

  Except a thread of fear wove a spell around me. His mission done, the chest gone, James… He would be leaving. I tried not to think about his absence. The place he’d made in my life, and the resulting hole if he walked out it. Would he stay? Could he stay? Did he want to stay? He might hate The Union, but their claws dug into him deep.

  The sun came up the following morning just the same as always. When I awakened, Larrimer was no longer beside me, and I ran a hand across sheets still warm from where he’d curved his body around mine through the night. I already missed him.

  I felt fewer aches and pains, sensed a little more energy flowing through my veins. I went to slip my feet into my bunny slippers. Except they weren’t in the closet.

  I went on a hunt, obsessed with finding my fuzzy slippers. The hunt was good. Anything so I didn’t have to think.

  Barefoot, I slipped downstairs. Larrimer was on the phone, I suspected talking to his powers-that-be, and I paused to watch him. He wore a white t-shirt, was making my coffee, the boiling water singing merrily from the kettle. I loved the beauty of him, of his back tapered to his muscled ass, his movements fluid, as he ground the coffee beans, then added the grounds to his French press.

  I expected him to reach for the kettle, but instead he pulled a small vial from his pocket, unscrewed it, and sprinkled some powder atop the ground beans. Then he took the boiling water and poured it slowly, expertly into the French press.

  What had he just done?

  He ended his call and lay his phone on the counter.

  I moved, and he turned and frowned. “I didn’t hear you come down.”

  “Just call me Clea the cat,” I said lightly. “I’m looking for my bunny slippers.”

  “I put them under the couch, so the dogs couldn’t get to them.”

  “They wouldn’t dare.”

  I got Bernadette’s tin of walnut chocolate chip cookies and carried it into the living room.

  Larrimer had stoked the woodstove. The room was warm, homey, just like yesterday, with the dogs sprawled on the floor, the afghan draped on the sofa, the kitten curled on the chair with lousy springs.

  What had Larrimer put in my coffee?

  I found my bunny feet, slipped into them, and hunkered into one end of the couch. I waited for Larrimer. Seconds later, he handed me my go-mug and took the couch’s other end. Mutt, Jeff, and Grace crawled up and settled themselves between us, with Grace beside me. The only thing missing was my beloved red chair. What was left of it lay in a corner of the living room, broken to bits by Larrimer as he’d freed them from the cellar.

  Of course, Bernadette was missing, too, and she couldn’t be put back together. My chest ached, and I massaged it with the heel of my hand.

  I could hear her say
, get over it, get on with it.

  What had Larrimer put in my coffee?

  “How did you find me?” I asked to him.

  “I put a tracker on Fern.”

  “Cute.”

  “Yes.”

  Monosyllables. Affectless. Typical.

  “Bernadette was frantic for you,” he said.

  No crying in baseball, remember.

  “Somehow she knew,” he continued. “I took the Jeep, told her and Ronan to stay. She must have followed in my rental.”

  I sipped my coffee. It tasted the same. My hands shook, and I stilled them.

  “It would have worked,” I said. “My plan.”

  “But it didn’t.”

  “I don’t want to argue. I believed doing it alone was the safest way.”

  “The Master would have killed Lulu and taken you. He wants you.”

  “Tommy didn’t want me.” I spat the words. “He wants the magics. The power. Do you think he’s dead?”

  “If we’re lucky.”

  I curled my legs under me. “He killed his own grandmother. She’d never given him anything but love.”

  “Maybe that was the problem.”

  “Don’t,” I said. “She did the best she could.”

  “I’m aware. Believe me.” He added a log to the stove and sat back down. He felt so distant. Again, a stranger.

  “So the Fae knife worked,” I said. “Charlie gave it to me.”

  He gave me a long look. “I could have used a fistful.” His face darkened, a thundercloud. “The chest is gone. If he’s still alive, he’s got it.”

  The chest. A niggle. I put it aside for a more immediate riddle.

  “I’ve got to go do some work.” He stood, an enormous presence, muscles taut, fists bunched. A predator on the move.

  He was still angry about my going alone to the meet. “Just one question,” I said. “What was that powder you poured into my coffee?”

  He stilled, shoved one hand into his jeans pocket. With his other, he reached for his mug of tea.

  I watched his eyes. Shuttered. But he didn’t fool me, not anymore. I’d leveled him, and he was strategizing the best approach. Should he hand me lies? Truth? Half-truth? I didn’t need to hear it. I felt it.

  “You’ve made me coffee every day since your arrival.” I held up my go-mug. “Delicious coffee. The best I’ve ever tasted. I just saw you pour powder onto the grounds. So tell me, James…” I paused. I didn’t really want to know, wanted him to deny it, to say it was just some special flavoring. “Tell me. What have you been dosing me with?”

  The room hushed, the only sounds—his breathing, and mine.

  Power poured off him. Dominance, demanding my submission. To drop my gaze, to leave the lie, to make like nothing was changed.

  “Taka gave it to me,” he said in a voice devoid of emotion. “She knew about your morning coffee addition.”

  Did she know what fucking Tampax I used, too? My jaw ached from clenching it tight. “I was to add a pinch of the powder each day. It was designed to increase your magics, your senses. It worked.”

  Which explained so much.

  I flung the mug at him.

  The bastard caught it one-handed.

  “I head up a team of five operatives like myself,” he said. “The Six. The Freak Team. We work together, often separated by great distances. I coordinate. We’re in contact. Always. Informing you about the powder…” He shook his head. “I’m willing to jeopardize myself. But not them. And not you.”

  “What do they have to do with anything? With us?”

  “If I hadn’t given it to you, and Taka deemed the powder ineffective, she would have pulled in another member of my team. Geirr. She threatened to, once. He’s different from me. He would try to hurt you. Then, I would kill him. Then, they would descend in droves. An unacceptable scenario. Too much risk. Zero payoff.”

  Larrimer looked at me, straight on, as if daring me to find fault with him.

  Find fault? I wanted to laugh my ass off. “How could you do that without telling me? How could you dose me with chemicals that you didn’t even know worked? Or what they would do?”

  “Pouring it on thick, aren’t you, Clea? When I saw it was performing its task, no side effects, I continued. The powder succeeded. Your powers increased. No interference from my handlers.”

  “Why didn’t Taka just take me, dose me herself, instead of having her minion do it?”

  He flinched. “They want you and the chest, so it had to be administered in the field.”

  Fury stung me. I was blind with it. “Like some date-rape drug. I counted on you. Believed in you. Trusted you.”

  “I earned that trust.”

  I was incredulous. “Earned it? You put a drug in my coffee, day after day, and never told me. You’re working for that bitch Taka and some bad guys just as nasty as Tommy. You betrayed me. Played me. What are you, James Larrimer? What are you?”

  He banged the mug he’d caught onto the table. The table cracked. “A guy who’s trying to keep you alive.”

  “Sorry, but that won’t fly. You have agendas inside agendas.”

  “You’re still breathing, aren’t you?” His anger lashed me.

  “There’s more to life than just a heartbeat and breath. Trust, James. It’s everything.”

  I felt violated, a woman who’d been deceived and manipulated and twisted by others’ agendas. Bernadette. Tommy. Bob. Even Dave never trusted me with the truth. And James.

  My heart stuttered, the pain insane. Soft, was I? Not anymore, boopie.

  I would never forgive. Never.

  “You may hate me,” he said. “But you will listen to me.”

  “My ass—”

  “Listen!” His voice boomed. “You have to leave, too. Now.”

  I stood. “I don’t have to do anything.”

  His face tightened, his scars blazing white. But that honey-granite voice I so loved was a low growl. “Yes, you do. DarkPool, The Union, they’re coming for you. Taka’s coming for you. Scientist, yeah, she’s a scientist, but also a fucking government kiss-ass agent. She gives the orders. And they’ll take you and test you and analyze you. They’ll turn you inside out and leave you bloody and broken. If you think what I’ve done was a violation, just wait until the geeks and Taka get their hands on you. You’re special. You’ll be their first Mage. A prize. They’ll want to know exactly what you are, how you tick, why you tick. They want to control the magic. All the magic. You are their ticket in.”

  “I’m nobody’s ticket in!”

  “Believe that, if you will.”

  I opened my mouth with a retort. That I wasn’t going anywhere. That no one would scare me out of my home. That I had free will and was a free person.

  I said none of those things because I could picture it—trapped, panicked, twisted into a creature to be used for their agendas.

  This was truth. What Larrimer had said was truth. He knew those people. They’d made him. Taka had made him, and he was her minion.

  It terrified me, utterly.

  I’d flee. Take Lulu. I was her guardian, after all. And Ronan, he was eighteen, if he wanted to come. The bastard whitecoats wouldn’t get them, either.

  “I haven’t told Taka the chest is lost, so they’ll hold off coming after you for a little bit.”

  My blood bubbled. “They’ve been waiting for you to take the chest from me.”

  “Yes. But they have other operatives. Ways of ascertaining the chest is gone. Time―your time―is of the essence.”

  And woven through it all was James Larrimer. A chink in my armor. Even now, I didn’t want him to go. Pain was always easier to handle after the cut.

  “Leave,” I said. “Now. Get out of my house, my life, my world.”

  Lines of strain carved his mouth, and he held out a hand, palm up. “Clea, don’t—”

  “Now.”

  In minutes, he’d gathered his things and piled them on the dining table. He shrugged into his
coat. “Bernadette.”

  “My problem. Not yours.” All I had to do was figure out how to lay her to rest in ground frozen to granite hardness. I ran a hand across my face.

  “Unless you want the geeks to get her, we need to burn her.”

  I hadn’t thought of burning. He was right, of course, damn him. And he’d earned a place beside that pyre. It might go against the grain, but I would stall reporting her death. As solitary as she’d become in later years, I doubted anyone would notice her absence. Another layer of sorrow wrapped around me. “Would The Union take her?”

  “Of course,” he said. “Taka would love to get her scalpels on a dead Fae.”

  Never.

  In a glade deep in the woods, the four of us each said a few words over Bernadette’s pyre. Then we gave her a blazing sendoff and built a cairn above the ash. Larrimer and Ronan did the heavy lifting, for which I was grateful.

  Larrimer didn’t try to talk to me, nor I to him.

  Soon after, he stood by the door, his rental car packed. I was strung so tight, I might snap. Start screaming, beg him to stay, do something I might regret. Fuck. I loved the bastard.

  Face a cool mask, his eyes beseeched me.

  I crossed my arms.

  After a heartbeat, he said, “Heed my words.”

  “You sound like some movie swashbuckler.”

  He didn’t smile. “Leave. Do it. Be safe.” And he softly closed the door behind him.

  My heart splintered.

  umbness has its advantages. I accomplished a lot the following day. From the piles of money Dave had left me, I’d gotten oodles of cash, and transferred the rest over to his, and now my, lawyer. Client privilege, and all that. I used some of it to purchase debit cards and burner phones. When I explained everything to Lulu and Ronan—all except what Larrimer had told me in secret about himself—they eagerly fell in with the plan.

  We packed light, and I hired caretakers for the farm and animals, out-of-towners who’d done that duty several times before. Kind people.

  I gathered photos, guns, ammo, knives, Bernadette’s account books and journals and one of her baking tins, laptops, my iPad, the Storybook and a few other books, my yarn and needles. My Kermit and my cashmere blanket, a few more treasures, and a heart-shaped rock I’d found years earlier on a hill overlooking the farm.