by Angie Sandro
The ground beneath us begins to shake. We all grab for one another, trying to stay on our feet. An explosion of sound comes from the house, a mixture of breaking things and high-pitched cries. Landry’s in the house. Along with everyone else I love.
“Someone’s screaming,” I yell to be heard over the rumbling. “They need help.”
George shakes his head. “It’s not safe. Wait for the tremors to stop.”
I can’t.
Sophia grabs my shoulder when I start toward the house. Tears streak her cheeks. “Stop. Listen, before it’s too late.” Her fingernails dig into my bare skin as she shakes me, hard. George grabs her wrists and jabs his thumbs in a pressure point. She stumbles back, sobbing. She’s broken.
“I’m listening to you. I swear.” I try to shrug off her hand but her fingernails dig into my skin. I’m about two seconds away from losing control. “Look, Sophie, either you figure out how to walk and talk or get the hell out of my way.”
She must hear the threat in my voice because she gets right to the point. “Once you get inside, find the potion and drink it immediately. Without it, possession is a death sentence. What more do I have to say or do to make you understand the danger? I showed you the butterflies—”
“Do you really value my existence so little, Sophia?” Gaston says, stepping from the trees. My heart lifts at seeing him. He’ll help me fix this.
Sophia stiffens. “I would do anything for you.”
“Would you?” He turns to me. “I think she’s lying. Magnolia reminded me how much I loved Sophia. I would do anything to be with her. Anything.”
“I love you too, Gaston,” Sophia says. “I always have. I swear.”
He hasn’t looked away from me, even though Sophia stands here pleading with him to believe her. “I want to be with her forever, Mala.”
“O-okay, that’s fine, Gaston,” I say, patting Sophia’s hand. “We can talk about you and Sophia later. Right now, I need your help. Something horrible is happening.”
The screaming coming from inside hasn’t stopped. If anything, it’s getting louder.
With my words, his appearance changes. My mouth drops when the moon shines down on his unblemished features. “Oh my God, Uncle Gaston. If you could look like this, why did you never—”
“I didn’t mean to betray you,” Gaston says softly. He reaches for my face, but Sophia jerks me away. His hand curls into a fist and drops to his side. “I didn’t have a choice. The loa possessing Magnolia is too strong to fight. And it promised that if I let it use me, I could finally be with the woman I love.”
“Gaston…please.” Sophia clings to my arm, sobbing. “Don’t do this. It’s not worth it.”
“I need a body, Mala. I don’t want to be alone anymore. I’m sorry. Magnolia…”
“Made you an offer you couldn’t refuse.” I finally get it. Betrayal. All the signs are clear now. He’s the man I fought in my dream. The super soldier who almost killed me with the knife I stole. The knife he got back. Nothing but an ancestral spirit with all of its faculties intact was coherent enough to pull off multiple murders. If he’s here needing a body, then Tank’s probably dead, like Judd. “What did you do to Mama?”
“She’s been contained. If you cooperate, I’ll let her go.”
“No! Free her now, and I won’t shred you into vapor.” The wind lifts my hair. I breathe in the air, sucking power from every molecule. Hot fury races through me, and I try to keep it contained. I don’t want to hurt Uncle Gaston, but I will. If he leaves me no choice.
His face shifts back to his scarred mask. Because that’s what it is. He’s been hiding his true self this whole time. “Please, Mala. Don’t make me do worse than I already have.”
Sympathy flares, but I shove it down. “How many people have you entered? Kids…you killed kids.”
“I was a kid when I died!” he screams. “I didn’t ask for this. To be away from Sophia all of these years. Am I ashamed? Yes. I did what I had to do. What my aunt asked of me. Now it’s time for you to do as you’re told.”
He moves before I can raise a hand to defend myself, but it doesn’t matter. I’m not his target.
George’s back arches, and his eyes roll up in his head as Gaston enters his body. Sophia and I are screaming for him to stop, but it’s too late. My brother, my first love, and best friend is gone.
Chapter 30
Landry
Nice Catch
Snap her scrawny neck. The words echo through the room.
A woman screams, but it’s not Mala’s aunt. She’s dangling like a ragdoll in Etienne’s large hands. He hasn’t been able to grab her throat because she continues to fight, silently fending off his grasping free hand with the glass. I see a blackened nub where his right thumb used to be. She stabs repeatedly at him, drawing more of the dark blood, but it doesn’t matter.
He died a long time ago. This…thing feels nothing. Not pain or empathy. I push up, again, but my legs won’t stay underneath me. I fight them as much as the exhaustion and dizziness that blurs my vision. Mala will kill me if I don’t save her favorite aunt. Why isn’t anyone else helping her?
People huddle under the tables. They look shell-shocked. Dirty faces watch what’s happening with dazed eyes. Almost as if they’ve zoned out in front of the TV.
Mala’s dad meets my gaze and then his eyes drop to the top of his wife’s blonde head. She presses her face into his chest, sobbing. Isabel has gone into nurse mode. She presses napkins to Molly’s bleeding face. Her husband protected her from most of the glass, but not all.
My gaze travels back to Ms. March. Her swings come slower. If I didn’t know better, I’d think Etienne is playing with her like a cat plays with a mouse before eating it. But that means a bit of a sadist lurks behind those dead eyes. Unless his puppet master controls him more than I thought.
Magnolia smiles at me, and I shiver from the coldness in her gaze. “The fight for life never gets old, even for one as old as I.”
“Can’t you just let her go, Magnolia? Please.” I roll over until I’m propped against the sofa with my legs stretched in front of me. The right one has an ominous lump in the middle of the bone. The leg broke when I either smashed into the wall or when I landed. “Take me instead. I won’t fight if you let everyone go.”
“Oh cher, merci. But I’ve already got you. What I want is for Mala’s good-for-nothing coward of a father to crawl out from under that table of his own free will. I already knew he was a pile of manure after abandoning his daughter all these years. But I’m going to give him the opportunity to redeem himself by saving his poor, dear sister.” She jams a wad of chewing tobacco between her lip and gums and licks her fingertips. “’Course, I’m getting impatient with the delay, and the poor lady doesn’t have a whole lot of strength left. I know I said I’d be merciful and kill her quickly, but”—she leans forward and whispers dramatically from behind her cupped hand—“I lied.”
I stare at Mala’s father, but he only has eyes for his sister. How he can watch what she’s going through and do nothing is beyond me. My gaze moves to Dad. He hasn’t moved from the position he fell in. I can’t tell if he’s breathing or not. I try not to worry. He survived the psycho Delahoussaye siblings. He’ll survive Magnolia.
“G.D., help me,” Ms. March whimpers, exhausted. Defeated. And she knows it. I can see the resignation in her eyes when she moves them from her brother to me. Her swipe at Etienne is too slow. He slaps the glass from her trembling fingers. His big hand wraps around her throat and squeezes.
I close my eye so I don’t have to watch her die.
My head throbs. The gash on my temple still bleeds. Everything around me grows muffled, fading…“Wake up, host.”
I jerk awake as another wail fills the room. “No, don’t, G.D!”
“I have to. She’s my sister.” George Dubois Sr. finally mans up. He ignores his wife’s pleas and crawls from beneath the table. Etienne drops Ms. March, and she falls boneless beside Dad.<
br />
George Sr. scrambles toward his sister, but before he can touch her, Etienne grabs him by his suit jacket and drags him across the hardwood floor. His fingernails score the wood, and he kicks out. The heel of his dress boot connects with Etienne’s jaw. A tearing sound fills the room as the lower-left jaw bone rips free, only remaining attached to his face by a hanging, leathery piece of cartilage. It dangles, swinging against his shoulder when Etienne bends over.
George Sr. screams and kicks again, but misses. Etienne grabs his foot and drags him forward, sliding him through his legs, then grasps his jacket and heaves him upright. The man swings at Etienne, but damn it to hell and back, I can’t even call this a fight. Ms. March went Battle Royale on his ass, intending to be the last one standing. And she would’ve won if the fight had been against a live person. Mala’s dopey dad looks like he’s trying to play patty-cake with a zombie. Pathetic. His daughter obviously takes after the women in her family.
Magnolia laughs, meeting my gaze. “Yeah, you right about that, boy.”
I forgot about her handy mind-reading skills. Must. Not. Think. At least not about anything important like escaping or rescuing my family. She’ll know my plan before I do, and I’m not anywhere near as clever as the billionaire who owns half of New Orleans. Of course, she has an unfair advantage by not being human. What did the grim book call her? A loa. A spirit inhabiting the body of Mala’s aunt for…My gaze goes back to her and I deliberately think, “How long?”
Magnolia’s head tips, and her eyebrows rise. “Long enough to forget what it feels like to be young.” Her fingers drum on the end of the chair as she grins. “Ever wonder why the matriarch of Mala’s family chose the name LaCroix? Because for generations I’ve been their cross to bear. Magnolia isn’t the first, and Mala won’t be the last.”
Etienne thrusts George Sr. in front of Magnolia and presses down on the man’s shoulders until he kneels before the queen. He can barely look her in the eye when he asks, “What do you want from me?”
“Leverage,” she says and spits. The tobacco juice splatters on his cheek. He rears up, but Etienne pushes him back down. “Ah, the guest of honor has arrived. Come on in, cher. We’ve been waiting for you. Say hello and good-bye to your father. You won’t be seeing him again.”
Mala enters the room, flanked by George. Sophia trails behind. My girl looks defeated. Broken. Not good. I was depending on her to rescue our asses. The corners of her eyes tighten as she scans the area, taking in the damage and lingering on the bodies of Dad and Ms. March. She steps in their direction, but George grabs her arm and yanks her toward Magnolia. She stumbles after him.
The fucker’s hurting her. What the hell’s going on?
“Drop your shield,” the loa hisses from the darkness.
“Hey, asshole,” I scream back, hands clenching so I don’t utter the words out loud. But I’m pissed. I want to do some damage. But I can’t. “If you’re going to help, then grow some balls and show yourself. Stop hiding in my head.”
I guess goading a millennia-old snake spirit to do something it doesn’t want to do doesn’t work. Maybe if I wave a dead chicken in its face I can at least bribe it into answering my questions, but the only chickens I see are the hot wings scattered across the floor. Instead of scrounging for leftovers, I squint at George, trying to see the unseen. A dark shadow hovers over his skin. A part of him, but not. And it’s different from the silvery shine around Etienne. George isn’t dead, but he’s not fully alive either. Something wears his skin.
My heart thuds, and blood rushes to my ears. I grit my teeth and grab on to the edge of the sofa to lever myself upright. I don’t put weight on my broken leg; it won’t hold. Still, I need to face whatever happens next on my feet.
“Mala,” I call out. Her head swivels in my direction, and a spark arches between us. Now she sees, knows, that all is not lost. I’m here. We’ll get through this together. “Kick down that gate, girl.”
She nods. Her shoulders straighten when she faces Magnolia again. “Don’t think you’ve won,” she says. “It’s not over.”
Magnolia’s lips twist. “Ever the smart-ass, girl. Told you it would get you in trouble someday, and this is the day. Bring her here, Gaston.”
George jerks on her arm again, and this time she struggles.
“Let me go, traitor. I can walk on my own.” Her nostrils flare. “You’re gonna pay for every horrible thing you’ve done. But for hurting Georgie, I swear you’ll never know peace. Your love will turn to dust. Just ask Sophia if you don’t believe me.”
Ah crap! It’s her uncle wearing George’s skin. Gaston doesn’t acknowledge her threats, but George Sr. rocks forward at her words, staring at the meat suit. “What does she mean? What happened, Junior?”
Gaston bares his teeth in a feral grin. “Nothing, Father. As you can see, I’m fine.”
Magnolia slams her cane on the man’s shoulder. “Worry about your daughter if you feel inclined to express fatherly affection. She’s the one in danger now.”
Gaston pushes Mala forward, and she trips, falling to her knees beside her father. Gaston places his hands to the side of her head. “Are you ready, Niece?”
She stiffens then relaxes. “Born ready, Uncle Gaston.”
Magnolia shakes her head. She thumps her cane on the floor. “Ferdinand, Sophia, get to your places.” She raises her hands as if conducting an orchestra. Sophia moves through the room. Her emerald eyes won’t meet mine, but when she reaches my side, she wraps her arms around my waist, holding the weight I can’t put on my injured leg.
“Tell me you have the potion,” she whispers. “That at least one of you isn’t stupid.”
“Neither of us is as naïve as you seem to think. And although my girl’s stubborn as hell, she accepts sincere apologies.” I press my forehead against hers, showing her the image of the china teacup in my mind. “Dad told her it was chamomile.”
A full-bodied shiver runs through Sophia’s body. Her hands clench my shirt. “Don’t let Magnolia see.”
Hell, I’m doing my best to keep the old witch out of mind, but Magnolia’s slippery like an eel. The power inhabiting her shell winds in and out of my thoughts at will, fondling me everywhere that’s not protected by the power of its twin. Whatever magic the loa inside Magnolia used to capture us woke up the devil inside me. Its giddy anticipation races beneath my skin, enhancing my own emotions like a shot of adrenaline through the heart. I feel supercharged. And ready for a fight.
Magnolia pulls the bone knife from her pocket and scrambles from the chair. She drops to her knees. Her breath comes in heavy pants, like she’s about to have an orgasm from excitement. With a deranged cackle, she slashes the knife across the side of Mala’s father’s neck and leans forward. She drinks from the cut, then leans back, licking her lips like a wannabe vampire.
George Sr. covers his wound with a hand and falls onto his side.
“No, Dad,” Mala cries, leaning toward him, but Gaston jerks her back. He shoves her head toward Magnolia.
“I’ve already tasted your blood, and your mama’s before she died,” the old woman says, smacking her lips. She sets the knife into Mala’s open hand and presses the blade to her chest. “The door to the in-between opens. I’ve waited so long for this. Kill me.”
“What?” Mala’s fingers twitch on the hilt but don’t open. Nor does she remove the knife from where it presses about her aunt’s heart. She also doesn’t stab the old bat with it. What the hell?
Magnolia smiles. She grasps Mala’s cheeks with both hands and slams her toothless mouth over Mala’s pinched lips. Gaston shoves Mala forward at the same time. The knife slides into Magnolia’s body as if she’s made of soft butter. The shadow beneath Magnolia’s skin expands and, like water passing through a cell membrane, flows into Mala. My girl convulses as the shadow tears free from of its old host and claims its new one.
And I can’t do anything but watch. “It took the bait.”
“Time to reel it in, host
.”
I really hate all of these fishing metaphors, but I roll with it. It’s hard enough to compartmentalize my emotions and keep to the plan Mala and I made this afternoon. I just never thought we’d have to put it into play tonight. Neither of us expected Magnolia to attack at the party. In front of witnesses. But after reading Sophia’s book, Mala said she’d have to act fast now that the second murder site has been found or she would lose all the power those deaths accumulated.
Magnolia looks like a deflating puffer fish. The shadow filled the shell completely. Without it, her body withers. The muscles and fat beneath her skin disintegrate. Her eyes bulge in their sockets. Hollows form in her cheeks, emphasizing her sharp cheekbones. Her breasts shrivel and sag, leaving the dress she wore hanging around her thin frame like a sack.
With a final squeeze of her stick-thin arms, Magnolia pulls her head back with a choked gasp. White membranes cover her sightless eyes. Her body folds in on itself—nothing but leathery skin and bones drop to the floor.
Mala’s scream jerks my eye from the remains of Magnolia’s body. I lurch forward, forgetting about my leg. I collapse on top of Sophia in agony. Her hands rise to cup my forehead. Flames roll across my thoughts, and I scream as I’m swept away on a wave of fire. Spikes of energy race through my body. The veil breaks with a crash.
The room spins. Then I realize it’s not the room but me. I’ve been sucked from my body. I see myself lying on the ground, hugging Sophia against my chest. But she also stands at my side. Etienne collapsed in on himself the same way Magnolia did. I don’t see his soul here on the other side. Maybe he’s finally free. Ferdinand holds onto Bessie with one hand. He looks shocked. She, on the other hand, looks ready to kill and takes advantage of his distraction. She twists her arm loose and grabs a toppled lamp off the floor. He turns toward her as she swings and coldcocks the son of a bitch.
