Hexbreaker - Jordan L. Hawk

by Jordan L. Hawk

  What would Cicero do if Tom didn’t show up quickly enough? He wouldn’t let Janowski actually touch him, would he? The thought of opening the door to find Janowski cock-deep in Cicero quickened Tom’s steps down the stairs. Now where the devil was the scotch …

  He didn’t see the hex drawn on the brick floor until it was too late. The air suddenly thickened around Tom’s legs. Startled, he tried to press forward, then step back, but it was as if an invisible hand held him in place. The sensation spread, pinning his arms and torso as well.

  Maybe the hex had been put here to catch someone coming down illicitly, and the guard had just forgotten to warn him? But the hex…

  This was the sort of hex the ultra-rich used to guard their priceless jewels, or banks to secure their vaults. Hexes to humanely trap mice might be in the reach of a household with the money to spend, but something large enough to trap a human? That took power and lots of it, which meant an equally large amount of cash.

  Sloane was a familiar himself. Was it his magic in the hex? But surely an undertaking like this would have left him flat on his back, drained of magic.

  The door opened above him. “Mr. Halloran,” Sloane said.

  The stairs creaked beneath his feet—and beneath another set of feet as well. Tom managed to turn his head far enough to see Kearney following Sloane.

  He hadn’t just stumbled into this trap. It had been laid especially for him. And at the same time as Janowski took Cicero up into a room.

  Oh Saint Mary. Cicero was in danger.

  He could feel the hex humming against his skin. Breaking this would take significantly more effort than an alarm or locking hex.

  “Sorry, boss,” Tom said, in the vague hope he was wrong and there was some way to salvage the situation. “Mr. Kearney said to come down, and nobody warned me—”

  “Save your breath,” Sloane interrupted. He walked around the edge of the circle until he faced Tom. Kearney remained at Tom’s back, at the bottom of the stairs. “We decided to look into your story. Ask around 11th Street.” Sloane regarded him with cold, reptilian eyes. “No one had heard of you, let alone hired you to tend bar.”

  “You must’ve talked to the wrong people,” Tom said, trying to sound as dumb as he could. He pushed against the hex with his ability, felt the hum grow slightly more muted. But only slightly. “I ain’t—”

  “Stop.” Sloane’s teeth clicked together, as if he ate the word. Or wanted to eat Tom. “This hex holds you completely immobile. Which means we can do anything we want to you, and there’s nothing you can do but take it.”

  Tom forced his breathing to remain even. He couldn’t just use his hands on this hex, like he normally did. He needed to silence it using every inch of skin it touched.

  Sloane’s flat eyes flickered to Kearney, then back to Tom. “Joe is very inventive, I assure you. He’s hoping you’ll continue to play dumb, so he can have a bit of fun. Make no mistake, you will not be having fun. Not in the slightest.”

  The thrum of the hex around him slowed. But not enough.

  “I disagree with him on this matter,” Sloane went on. “I hope you tell us the truth, so I can put this tedious business behind me. So to start. Did the MWP send you and the cat?”

  Cicero. “He don’t know anything,” Tom said. “We got nothing to do with each other.”

  Kearney hit him from behind, a sharp blow straight to the kidney. Tom’s concentration shattered, and he let out an involuntary cry of pain. He tried to turn, to bring up his arms to defend himself, but the hex still held him tight.

  “I’d worry about your own skin,” Sloane advised. “That little whore will get what’s coming to him. Janowski will see to it.”

  Blind, red rage washed across Tom’s vision. A strangled cry escaped him as he threw everything of himself into breaking the hex, like a strongman pulling a fraying rope. Fury pulsed out from him, transmuted by his ability, and the heartbeat of the hex died beneath its savage onslaught.

  The effort should have left him drained, but fear and anger pushed him past anything so minor as exhaustion. Before either of the men could react, he spun on his heel and smashed his fist into Kearney’s jaw in a vicious uppercut that snapped his head violently to the side.

  Kearney went down like a sack of flour. Tom sprang over him and ran up the stairs. “Joe!” shouted Sloane behind him.

  The cellar door swung open as the guard on the other side reacted to Sloane’s alarmed shout. Tom grabbed him around the back of the neck and smashed him face-first into the wall. Bone crunched, and blood sprayed from his shattered nose, but Tom didn’t waste time waiting to see if he was down for good.

  Tom burst into the main room. A line of dancers performed a skit, and he raced across the stage in front of them, taking the shortest route to the stairs on the other side of the room. They shouted at him in outrage, and one of the customers threw a glass at Tom’s head. It missed, and he hit the steps.

  “Cicero,” he called. “Hold on! I’m coming!”

  “Just cooperate,” Janowski said. He drew a knife from the waistband of his pants and held it loosely at his side. “I’ll go easy on you, if you do.” An ugly smile warped his mouth. “Well. Easier, at any rate.”

  The metallic taste of fear filled Cicero’s mouth at the sight of the knife. He edged away without conscious decision, until the back of his legs hit the bed.

  Tom would arrive any minute now. He’d use their partial bond to find Cicero, and…

  Bloody hell. Did he realize he could do that?

  “Back off,” Cicero said, fighting to keep his voice from trembling.

  Janowski laughed. “Don’t arch your back at me. I’m not impressed. You were so keen to know who I was meeting later, so I’ll tell you. Your boss, Sloane. But he’s got another problem to take care of first. I hope that chink bartender has enough ice.”

  Oh hell. Thomas.

  Cicero swallowed. He had to get away from Janowski, had to save Tom. But he wasn’t even sure how he was going to save himself.

  “You’re going to kill me, then?” he asked, and now his voice did shake. Damn it. “Or just talk my ears off?”

  “Kill you?” Janowski snorted. “You’re too valuable for that. I’m just going to hold you here until Sloane’s done downstairs.” His eyes glittered in the light of the single gas jet as he took a step closer. “But until then…no one said I couldn’t have a little fun. Get on the bed.”

  Cicero held out his hands to either side. “All right.” He slid onto the bed, braced one foot against the footboard—and shoved, hard enough to propel himself over the other side.

  He was in cat form before he hit the floor. Janowski swore. Cicero darted beneath the bed, making for the door.

  Except he needed to change back into human form to have the hands to open it.

  Before he could risk it, Janowski grabbed for him. His fingers brushed Cicero’s ears, but failed to get a grip. Cicero changed course, claws scrabbling wildly on the wooden floor, before streaking back beneath the bed.

  He crouched, as far back against the wall as he could. He had to get out of here, had to get to Tom. But how?

  “Your choice,” Janowski said. His knees thumped the floor by the bed, on the side between Cicero and the door. “It goes hard for you, then.”

  He thrust his arm beneath the bed, stabbing at Cicero with the knife. Cicero darted to the side—and sank his teeth deep into Janowski’s hand.

  Janowski screamed and jerked, but Cicero didn’t let go, adding his claws to the mix. The knife fell free. Janowski wrenched his hand back, and Cicero let go to avoid being dragged from beneath the bed.

  Janowski was shouting now, furiously, a string of Polish that sounded none too complimentary to Cicero. “I’m going to gut you,” he raged, switching to English. “You fucking wop, I’m—”

  The door swung open. Cicero glimpsed Tom’s shoes and heard a loud crack. Janowski collapsed to the floor, moaning. A leather wallet spilled out of his coat pocket, scatte
ring hexes everywhere.

  “Cicero!” Tom cried. “Where—”

  Cicero slipped out from under the bed. Shouts and the thud of feet on the stairs came through the open door.

  Tom ran to the window, ripped back the drapes, and flung it open. “Not too far down,” he said. “Come on!”

  Cicero started to follow, but the spilled hexes caught his eye. Even a cursory glance showed they looked nothing like any he’d ever seen before. Were these the hexes Sloane had been waiting on?

  He snatched one up in his teeth, leapt over the moaning Janowski, and made for the window. Tom was already half out, so Cicero jumped to his shoulders, sinking his claws into Tom’s coat to keep his balance.

  As the main floor of the resort was underground, it was only a short drop to the street below. The moment Tom’s feet hit the sidewalk, he broke into a run. Shouts rang out from the open window behind them, but Tom only put his head down and raced faster, legs and arms pumping. People on the sidewalk scattered before them.

  Eventually, the sounds of pursuit vanished. Tom stumbled to a halt in a narrow alleyway between tenements. Above them, sheets swung ponderously back and forth on washing lines, frozen solid from the cold. Despite the icy temperature, Cicero smelled the sweat on the nape of Tom’s neck.

  He hopped down, dropped the hex, and shifted back into human form. His arms went around Tom, and he found himself hugged close in return.

  “I was so worried about you,” Cicero said, at the same moment Tom said, “Christ, I was scared they’d hurt you.”

  Cicero laughed and hugged him tighter. “Are you all right? What happened?”

  Tom rubbed at his lower back, wincing. “Sloane set a trap for me in the cellar. I don’t know what happened, but he talked as though he knew we were up to something. He didn’t seem entirely sure whether we were there on behalf of the MWP, at least.”

  “You’re hurt?” Cicero’s hands fluttered, uncertain what to do.

  “Kearney hit me in the kidney while wearing his hexed gloves.” Tom straightened, letting his hand fall. “Honestly, I was so scared for you, I didn’t even feel it until now. I’ll probably piss blood for the next couple of days, but Lord willing, that will be the worst of it.”

  “Thomas…”

  “No permanent damage, cat, I swear. At any rate, they weren’t counting on me being a hexbreaker.”

  “Thank heavens.”

  Tom rubbed Cicero’s bare arms. “You must be freezing in that outfit. Put your fur back on.”

  The icy air bit through the gauzy trousers as though they weren’t even there, and Cicero’s toes were numb from the half-frozen slush of garbage carpeting the alley. He’d have to clean them thoroughly when he got back to the apartment. “Not just yet.” He bent down and picked up the hex. “Look. Janowski was carrying a wallet full of these.”

  Tom took it and angled the paper to see it more clearly in the light filtering from the street. His face paled to the color of spoiled milk. “It’s the hex,” he said numbly. Then he blinked. “I mean, is it? The hex that caused Whistler and Barshtein to go mad?”

  “I don’t know, but Janowski was bringing them to Sloane.” Cicero crossed his arms for warmth. “First thing tomorrow, you need to take them to the Coven.” He paused as a fearful thought occurred. “Sloane doesn’t know where you—we—live does he?”

  “Nay. I lied when he asked—which didn’t help matters when he started looking into my story,” Tom added glumly.

  Cicero snorted. “Oh yes, it would have been much better if he’d been able to ask your neighbors about you. If he’d known for sure you were a copper, he might not have bothered trying to interrogate you.”

  “Aye, true enough.” Tom bit his lip. “The hex that trapped me took power to make. And there were hexes on the door to the room where I found you.”

  “A silencing hex.” Cicero had started to shiver, so he leaned against Tom. Tom wrapped his coat around them both. “And something to hold the door closed, even without a lock.”

  “Fucker,” Tom said savagely. “I ought to have ripped his prick off.”

  Cicero nuzzled closer. “I’m just glad you arrived when you did.”

  “I know Sloane is a familiar, and he gave the anarchists money, but doesn’t that seem like a lot of powerful magic just tossed around?” Tom’s voice was a rumble against the ear Cicero pressed to his chest.

  “Yes.” What it meant, Cicero didn’t know, couldn’t guess. “Another thing for you to mention at the Coven tomorrow.”

  It hurt unexpectedly, that he wouldn’t be the one to go in. To take the hex to Dominic and see what he made of it.

  Hell, even though he couldn’t wait to curl up in bed beside Tom, a part of him felt a pang of regret that he wouldn’t be going back to the barracks tonight with the other familiars.

  “Come on,” Tom said gently. “Get back in cat shape, and I’ll carry you the rest of the way home, all right?”

  “All right.” But Cicero lingered for just another moment. “This hex…it doesn’t look like anything else I’ve ever seen before.”

  “Nay,” Tom said, his voice subdued. “It surely don’t.”

  Tom trudged up the steps to the apartment the next morning. He’d put on his uniform and gone to the MWP first thing, leaving the hex Cicero had taken from Janowski in Dominic’s capable hands.

  The hex. He’d been right from the start. There was a connection between the Cherry Street Riots and Barshtein’s death after all, even if he couldn’t quite yet see how they fit together.

  Oh, this hex had been drawn on modern paper, not parchment like the ones hidden in the book. But Tom had recognized the form right off: the brutal, angular runes, linked together in savage figures. The rusty brown ink. The curling, twisted shapes that might have been stylized bears or wolves, fanged and slavering. It might not be identical to the old hexes, but it was damned close.

  He’d woken from nightmares every time he drifted into sleep last night, certain he heard screaming. He could almost feel the shape of Danny’s wrist in his grasp as they struggled. Hear Molly’s voice, high with terror.

  “Break it, Liam! Break the hex!”

  How many had Janowski carried in his wallet? How many had he already given to Sloane? And what did they intend to do with them on New Year’s Eve?

  Did it have something to do with the explosives? But if Janowski was still delivering hexes to Sloane, it meant whatever they had planned hadn’t been entirely disrupted by the loss of the bomb-making materials.

  Saint Mary, they needed answers.

  Should he have told Dominic? About the riots, about his past, about all of it?

  But if he did, then what would happen to Cicero? If he had a charge to look after those as needed him, then surely Cicero was at the very top of that list, now that he’d walked away from the MWP.

  As he drew closer to the apartment, Cicero’s voice drifted down from above, through the open stairwell. “I’ll be sure to mention your visit, darling, but I don’t think it’s a good idea if you come inside.”

  “Don’t be like that. Tom and I are old friends,” said another voice.

  Phelps’s voice.

  Tom dashed up the last of the stairs, taking them two at a time. At the end of the hall, Cicero stood in the doorway to the apartment, arms folded over his chest. Phelps leaned against the frame, looming over Cicero in an obvious attempt to intimidate. From the expression on Cicero’s face, it wasn’t working.

  Red tinged the corners of Tom’s vision. “Get the hell away from him.”

  Phelps stepped back. Alarm flashed across his face, only to be replaced by a sly grin. “Why Tom. So good to see you.”

  He had to be careful. If he pushed Phelps too hard, Cicero would discover the truth, that Tom Halloran was nothing but a fraud. And if that happened…

  He didn’t know precisely what Cicero would do. He might not turn in Tom. He might just leave, go to some other friend. Noah, for example.

  “If you want
to talk,” he said with effort, “then we’ll do it. But not in my home.”

  Phelps’s grin grew even more manic, and he glanced at Cicero. “No need. I just came by to let you know I saw someone else from the old days. I passed on your regards, of course.”

  A cold breath licked Tom’s spine. Just what he needed—some other surviving member of Phelps’s gang out for revenge.

  Eight years. Eight damned years of stability, of building up a new life, and now it was all coming apart around him.

  “Thanks,” he forced himself to say. “I appreciate it.”

  “Then I’ll be on my way.” Phelps tipped his hat to Cicero. “It was nice to meet the missus.”

  “Fuck you,” Cicero replied in a falsely cheerful voice.

  Tom moved aside just far enough to let Phelps edge past, then followed him to the stairs to make sure he left. When he was certain Phelps was gone, he came back to the apartment. Cicero waited in the doorway. “Who was that?”

  “Fellow who used to run a gang,” Tom said vaguely. They went into the apartment, and Tom shut and locked the door firmly behind them.

  “And let me guess—you put him out of business?” Cicero asked.

  Tom seized on the story. “Not just me, of course. This was years ago, back when I first started on the force. He served his time, and now he’s out.”

  Cicero’s brows drew down into a troubled frown. “Is he dangerous?”

  “He ain’t done anything yet,” Tom said, which was the truth as far as it went. “But if you see him, steer clear.” Time to change the subject, before Cicero asked too many more questions. “Rook wanted me to tell you the Coven is boring without you.”

  “Of course it is.” But Cicero didn’t smile.

  Tom slipped his arms around Cicero’s shoulders. The smaller man sighed and leaned into his chest. “I’m sorry,” Tom said.

  “None of it’s your fault,” Cicero murmured. “The Police Board can all burn in hell, though, as far as I’m concerned.” After a moment, he pulled back a bit. “What did Dominic have to say?”