Six Times a Charm

by Deanna Chase

  Oh yeah, way to tick them both off. Problem was, Ant Eater was right.

  Frieda moved forward, scared silly but prepared to take the girl. The werewolf with the nose ring stepped in and, more gently than I would have thought, he lifted her into his arms. They passed her back through the crowd, hopefully to someone who would actually take care of her.

  Andrea shook with anger, her blonde hair falling into her eyes, her boobs practically popping out of her corset top. “You live and breathe by our good graces and you gutter rats have the nerve to insult us. Our leader,” she said the word with distaste, “might not be willing to hold you to the fire, but the rest of us are.”

  Fang looked ready to rip her a new one. He dragged her backwards by her neck and threw her to the floor. She yelped in pain and scurried behind Rex. Fang’s face twisted into a mask of rage. “Our pack had none of these problems before we took in you witches and your corrupt spells.”

  Ant Eater rested her hand on her revolver. “Hold up, asshole. That was a personal thing between the brat and me. We ended it this afternoon. None of you were invited as far as I can tell. And the Anaconda Spell doesn’t make you sick. It makes you dead.”

  Right on, sister.

  Rex seethed. “Of course the witch will claim this isn’t her fault. We should eliminate them now before they can cast any more of their death spells. I know a demon who is willing to pay big.”

  Vald? He wanted to hand the whole coven over to a fifth level demon?

  So much for rescuing Grandma. I’d be joining her if Rex had his way.

  The werewolves erupted, pelting the witches with beer cans and bottles. A window shattered.

  “Halt!” Fang ordered. “What I say goes and I haven’t made my decision yet.” While the crowd quieted down, he kept an eye on Rex and said, “The debt I owed to Dimitri is paid and then some. You witches are a menace.”

  Andrea curled herself around Rex like a python. She snarled at Fang, showing as much disrespect as she dared. “For all you know, these witches killed your son,” she spat. Then to the group, she announced, “JR is missing. There is no second in command.”

  Fang launched himself at her, ready to tear her throat out. Rex met him halfway, luring the pack master into a face off.

  Ant Eater let out a string of curses that would make your hair curl. “Why does everything have to be a God damned pissing match?”

  Like she was one to talk.

  Violence could erupt at any second. The werewolves held the whole coven hostage. Any show of weakness could tip the balance.

  I held my head high. Fake it ‘till you make it.

  Sidecar Bob rolled haphazardly in the melee. He covered his head with his hands as pack members surged around him. Rex descended on Bob like a pit bull on a pork chop. He grabbed Bob by the ponytail and lifted him until his neck arched forward, open and exposed. The crowd jeered their approval.

  Did I tell you I can’t stand bullies?

  I started in for Rex, but before I could make it, the bulldozing took a deadly turn. I caught a glimpse of a dagger in Rex’s right hand.

  Oh, no, no, no, no, no.

  I plucked a switch star from my belt and let it fly. It whistled through the air and sliced clear through Bob’s hair. Rex leapt backward holding a shaking dagger and the remains of Bob’s ponytail.

  I did it!

  The crowd hushed and dropped back. Rex didn’t know what to do.

  “Well that sure shut ‘em up,” Ant Eater said behind me.

  The switch star flew back to me and I let it spin on my finger for an extra second or two, enjoying the reaction. I figured the universe could grant me a moment of indulgence.

  “We’ll get your son back,” I told Fang. “And I’ll do what I promised about the black souls.”

  Rex stood defiantly in the corner. He recovered from his defeat a little too quickly for my taste. I strolled deliberately toward him. I had a pretty strong hunch he was behind the poisonings. I stopped in front of him, tilting my chin up as I addressed the room. “I’ll get to the bottom of this, too.”

  Rex snarled at me.

  Fang, the ungrateful beast, was beyond ticked. He glowered at both of us, growling low in his throat. “I’d hate to have to kill you, Lizzie.”

  I’ll bet.

  Chapter 14

  “We need a plan,” I told Ant Eater as she banged out of the trailer and practically sprinted across the field. Not smart with all the— “Ouch!” —holes littering the ground. I rubbed at the ankle I’d nearly twisted, but gave it up almost as soon as I’d started. We didn’t have time and, frankly, nobody cared but me.

  “Did you see me throw that switch star?” I asked. Yes, I had to rub it in. “I think I finally got it. I let go of myself and pow!”

  “In here,” Ant Eater pointed to a VW bus, abandoned near the edge of the woods.

  “This is your plan?” Even in the dark, I found the brightly painted peace signs and stars obnoxious. And, phew, the thing smelled like weed and Big Macs.

  “Trust me,” she said, ducking inside.

  Fine. We didn’t have time to debate it.

  “Rex has to be behind the sick wolves,” I said, crouching to fit as she slammed the back door behind us. I sat back and felt the beaded seat covers dig into my rear. It was a simple process of elimination. We didn’t do it. Fang had no reason to upset his power base. “Rex will benefit most.” And he sure didn’t waste any time making a run for the Alpha position.

  “Nice job, Nancy Drew.” Ant Eater stumbled over an aluminum ice chest and the whole bus lurched. “Here’s the rub,” she said, pulling me close. “Fang’s son was the original second in command. He was no daisy ass, but he was a lot better than Rex. Now that he’s gone, Rex is going to make our lives hell.”

  Ant Eater’s WWE style of diplomacy didn’t help any either. I’d met four-year-olds with more finesse. But now was not the time to discuss it.

  “How do we even know JR is gone?” I asked her. I didn’t trust a word that came out of Andrea’s mouth. “Rex just wants to blame everything on us.”

  She gave a pained look. “Yes and no.”

  She knew more than she was telling me. Naturally. “Answer me straight or you don’t want to know where my next switch star is going.” I held her gaze, daring her to test me. “Are we behind any of this?”

  “Yes.”

  I leaned my head back against the side of the bus. “I don’t believe it.”

  “Hold up. We didn’t make any werewolves sick if that’s what you’re asking. I’d bet anything Rex is poisoning his own people. Makes for a hell of a power play.”

  It was the only thing that made sense. Rex wanted power and with JR out of the way, Fang was vulnerable. If Fang looked like he’d put the pack in danger by taking in the Red Skulls, he could be left open for a challenge. And who knew what Vald was willing to pay for us? But that still didn’t answer my question. I rubbed my eyes. “So what did we do?”

  “You know you’re supposed to destroy black souls for the werewolves, right?”

  Ah yes, the lovely assignment Ant Eater thrust on me. “What about it?”

  “They’re gone.”

  That should be a good thing, but from the look on her face, I could tell it wasn’t.

  “Remember those shadows that used to lurk everywhere?” She studied me. “Come on, I know you saw two in our trailer.”

  The shadows I saw above Pirate and Ant Eater. “What about them? You said back there I got rid of them.”

  “I lied.”

  Wonderful. “Then where’d they go?” I asked, knowing I probably didn’t want to hear the answer.

  “Into JR. He’s been compromised.” She clicked her teeth together. “Bound to happen sooner on later, the way he’s been on your tail.”

  “I never met JR.” I said slowly.

  “He found you before we did.”

  I stared at a wind chime hanging from the ceiling and tried to remember. “I didn’t see him.”
/>   “Dimitri was out there guarding you, long before you met your grandma.”

  I’d figured as much when Pirate had found his Phantom Menace. Sure all dogs bark at shadows in the backyard. Leave it to Pirate to find something real. But I didn’t know Dimitri brought friends. “Wait. Grandma Gertie only felt me when I was about to change. How could Dimitri know?”

  “You’ll have to ask him.” She blew out a breath. “First we’d have to get him to admit he was actually skulking around in your rose bushes.” She changed direction. “Now, here’s where we’re screwed. JR, heir to the werewolf pack, was Dimitri’s backup. Like any asshole spy, he searched the house after you left, probably trying to guess where we were hiding out.”

  “And Xerxes the demon came back.” My heart sank when I thought of that creature in my house again. Poor JR. I didn’t even know him and, yes, he was a jerk for wandering into my house uninvited, but nobody deserved to have a shrunken, razor-clawed demon on their tail, especially after I’d sent a few green glowy things through Xerxes’s skull.

  “JR was attacked by black souls. A search party found him, strung out of his mind on your sofa.”

  I knew my home had been invaded, but my stomach churned to think of JR attacked in my living room. “What are black souls?” I asked. Frieda had said something about black souls when she first told me about this suicidal quest.

  “They’re trapped souls—too bad for heaven, too good for hell. If they don’t find their way to purgatory, the demons capture them and use them. These are nasty ass spirits. JR fought them off when they invaded your house.” She shook her head. “Gives me the willies.”

  I couldn’t imagine what it would take to fight off a black soul, but if it made Ant Eater squeamish, it had to be bad.

  “They didn’t possess him,” she said matter-of-factly. “At first. But they followed him. They’ll wear you down after a while, especially when you’ve got dozens of ‘em after you, like he did. Then he got caught up in the mess on the night the Red Skull bar imploded. A real fucked up situation. Nobody knew he was Dimitri’s second. And it seemed Dimitri was busy with you. He didn’t know his buddy was trapped until the next morning.”

  So that’s why he’d raced off on the morning he was supposed to teach me to throw.

  Oh my God. I’d been ready to drag him off his hog when all he wanted to do was go rescue his friend.

  “This time, JR wasn’t as lucky. Scarlet and Dimitri found him face down behind the bar, possessed by black souls.”

  Dimitri must not have seen him the night before, when he’d rushed inside, looking for my dog. A dog. I loved Pirate with everything I had, but guilt stabbed me in the gut when I thought of how I’d worried about an animal when there’d been a real person trapped in there.

  “They’ll possess any body they can, make the person stark raving mad before they drain his energy and turn him into one of them.”

  “Where is he?”

  She shook her head. “Dimitri has him stashed in the woods somewhere. Fang found out right before he dragged us into the trailer. Dimitri thought he could trust Fang. Just goes to show you werewolves are animals. Doesn’t matter that JR is a big boy, or that he worked with Dimitri all the time. No telling what Fang’s gonna do if you don’t handle it.”

  We had to fix this. Wait. I had to fix this. “How much time does he have?”

  “A day, maybe less,” she replied, the light from the van’s overhead light glittering off her gold tooth.

  Why did everything have to be a frickin’ emergency? “Why didn’t you tell me?” I could have at least tried to prevent this. I was the slayer.

  “Ha! As I recall, you happened to be cursing me with the Anaconda Spell. When I came to, the black souls had fled the trailer. Means they’d found an open body to possess. I didn’t know who until Scarlet told me.”

  “Dimitri, then.” The jerk. “Why didn’t he find me?”

  “Probably because you were off skulking around the garbage dump.”

  Talking to Grandma. I would have done anything to have her with me right now. This was such a mess.

  I shook off the self pity. I had to try to save JR. He was Dimitri’s friend, and besides, he’d been out there helping us. Those sounded like much more noble reasons than the sheer fact they were going to kill us if I failed.

  “Tell me,” I said. “I have the power to pull these black souls out of JR and help them find their way.”

  “Not exactly,” Ant Eater leaned close, elbows on her knees. A tentative knock sounded at the door. “Go away!” she hollered. “Now you listen to me, missy. Your job ends when you pull the souls out of JR. Let them find their own way.”

  It didn’t seem right.

  “You’ve got a job to do. You do it. And only it. Don’t try to channel Mother fucking Theresa.”

  How could she say that? “But I could save those people.”

  “They aren’t people anymore!” Her gold tooth glistened in the moonlight. “They’re things.”

  “You said yourself they’re lost souls. You don’t want the complication.”

  “Damned straight. Look, Lizzie—you can’t save the world.” She planted her hands on her hips, right above the Glock stuffed into her pants.

  “Get your hand off the gun.” She was making me nervous.

  “We have enough problems.” Her eyes bored into me. “JR is possessed. Fang wants to kill us and Rex is gonna sell us straight to Vald if you fuck this up.”

  Heavens, I hoped I could handle this. “Why didn’t Dimitri tell me any of this?”

  “He didn’t want to freak you out. I don’t care.”

  “Fine,” I snapped. I’d defeated Xerxes. I could walk through death spells. I had to believe I could maybe, possibly, hopefully do this too. And I absolutely refused to give anybody the satisfaction of seeing how afraid I was. “So now I’m up to speed.”

  “That’s it?” She looked at me like I’d sprouted horns.

  Score a point for the demon slayer. “What do you mean, that’s it? What else can go wrong?” Unless they’d found another possessed werewolf on my yellow flowered throw rug and imps in my underwear drawer.

  I slid past her and threw open the door. Frieda practically fell inside. She’d chipped all the cotton candy pink nail polish off one hand and had started in on the other.

  “Horse feathers, Frieda!” We’d told the Red Skulls to run. I appreciated the support, but at the same time, we were trying to get her and the Red Skulls out of danger. “You should have left when you had the chance.”

  She twisted her plastic beaded necklace between her fingers. “You think I don’t know that?” she snapped. “Heavens to Betsy, I was scared out of my skivvies for you in that trailer.” She eyed my switch stars, glowing pink. “What happened? What are we going to do?”

  There was no “we” about it. The Red Skulls had to get out of there. From what I’d seen in that trailer, I had the distinct feeling we’d already sprung the trap. The Red Skulls were caught up in a dangerous game of werewolf politics. Whoever won, I knew it wouldn’t be us.

  Ant Eater poked her head out of the rusting van and scowled at Frieda. “Holy hell, blondie, if I didn’t know any better, I’d think you had a death wish.” She hitched up her leather pants. “Tell the coven I meant it when I said to bail out.”

  Frieda hesitated, clearly worried about us.

  “Lizzie and I will go after JR. We owe him. Besides, it’ll give you guys enough lead time to escape. We’ll meet up at the Dixie Queen.”

  Frieda nodded, twisting her necklace into new knots. Ant Eater glanced at me. We’d take the fallout if we failed—and if we succeeded. It was the best way for the rest of the witches to escape.

  I was ready. Still, I couldn’t help thinking about Pirate. “Take good care of my dog, will you?” Tears burned the back of my eyes. I didn’t know what he’d do without me. Or what I’d do without him if…

  Frieda gave me a little hug. “Bob has him. We’ll take good care of h
im.” To Ant Eater she said, “We’ll be packed and out in ten minutes.”

  Ant Eater slapped her on the butt as she left. Together we watched Frieda dash across the uneven field in platform sandals.

  “So what’s the Dixie Queen?” I asked her.

  “Hideout number four hundred and twenty six. A mothballed Mississippi cruise and casino boat. The beds suck, but the roulette wheel still works. Least it did in ‘88.”

  “You know, you should go with them,” I told her.

  She puffed out her cheeks, still watching Frieda. “Yeah? Who’s gonna watch your pansy ass?”

  I had to think I could do this. If I couldn’t, Ant Eater probably wouldn’t be able to save me anyway. At the dumpster, Grandma had told me what it meant to sacrifice myself.

  It amazed me how well Grandma knew me after our short time together. She’d been dead accurate when we talked out by the dumpster. I always did type out my grocery list on the computer. I never had a library late fee and I never did anything crazy until she showed up at my door. “Grandma said I needed to be more half ass.”

  “Oh and now you’re going to listen?” Ant Eater snorted.

  “Yeah,” I said, enjoying the moment.

  Grandma said it herself. The last slayer had the power to lock Vald away. I had the power to destroy him.

  “Vald wants you,” Ant Eater said.

  I knew.

  “If he finds you before you’re ready,” she said, “he could kill you. Or worse.”

  “Thanks for the pep talk.”

  “Candy ass.”

  “Road bitch.”

  She took a deep breath, then blew it out, watching the bobbing lights in and around the far trailers as the Red Skulls prepared to flee. “I’d slit my wrists if anything happened to the coven.”

  “Go.”

  She shoved herself away from the rusting hippie van. Before she could get far, I reached out and snapped her bra. She didn’t turn around, but I heard her chuckling as she jogged out into the night.