by Jenn Bennett
“What’s wrong?” Lon said, startling me.
“Hajo came on to me,” I blurted. “He wanted me to sleep with him as payment for the job. The potion was a compromise.”
Lon’s eyes tightened, searching my face.
“Nothing happened, of course. He tried to kiss me, but I stopped him. I just wanted you to know.”
His expression was unreadable, so I immediately felt a little silly for confessing. It’s not like I did anything wrong. Why was I telling him this now? My heart pattered a nervous rhythm as I struggled to sort it all out. “I guess if the situation was reversed, and someone had tried to kiss you, I’d be pretty pissed if you kept it secret. Does that make sense?”
He slowly shook his head up and down, then reached for me. His hand slid around my neck. He gave me a gentle smile as he stroked my ear with his thumb. It felt good. Relief rushed through me. I let out a long breath and curved my hand over his, holding it still against my neck.
“I don’t want secrets between us,” I said. “Not ones that matter, anyway. I keep secrets from everyone all day long. But not you. Okay?”
He tugged me toward the bar stool, closing the remaining distance between us. “I’ve been waiting for you to say that for weeks,” he whispered.
“You have?” I whispered back.
He pushed my hair back over my shoulder to expose my neck. His eyes wandered there. “Sometimes I think I might die if I can’t touch you.” He said this with great seriousness, his voice suddenly much lower.
A fire sparked inside my chest and lit a path downward. “Is that right?”
“I swear.”
“On what, holy man?”
“Guess the Bible’s out.”
“Whose fault is that?”
“I swear on Liber Magica Daemonica.” He grinned sweetly, then gave me three kisses, placing one at the cleft above my lip and the others at each corner of my mouth. Delicate, lingering, drugging kisses. So very good.
His head bowed. He went straight for the sweet spot behind my ear. I shivered with pleasure, then reached between us and skimmed my palm over the front of his jeans. He made an appreciative noise. His hands skated up under my shirt, then dropped to unfasten my jeans.
“If he wakes up and catches us in here—”
“He’s asleep. I’m listening,” he assured me as he tugged my jeans over my hips, rocking them until they dropped to the floor. My panties followed. He barely gave me time to step out of them and kick them away before his hand slid between my legs. I yelped in surprise.
“Shh,” he warned playfully. His fingers smoothed, flicked, and rubbed. My breathing quickened. God have mercy, but the man had serious skills. I could hardly do better myself. He hadn’t memorized what I wanted—or what he thought I wanted. He listened to my emotional responses and made adjustments in his explorations. I sagged against him and muffled soft moans against his chest. Ten points for the empathy knack.
I somehow summoned the wherewithal to push his hand away. He smiled down at me with heavy-lidded eyes as I yanked his shirt up. He raised his arms briefly. I pulled the fabric over his shoulders and off his head, tossing it somewhere behind me with my discarded clothing, then reacquainted myself with the delightfully warm, rock-solid wall of his golden chest. So beautiful. I scored a fingernail down the golden trail of hair that bisected his torso and bent to kiss the scar over his ribs. He shivered violently. I couldn’t wait any longer.
Breathless, I pushed aside the nearby stool, then turned around and bent over the stainless steel countertop. The metal was cold against my stomach as he slowly smoothed a splayed palm down my spine. “Hurry,” I instructed, but I really meant, I need you right now. The metallic jingle of his belt buckle unfastening behind me made my breath hitch. A second later, there was heat and a familiar, insistent pressure . . . and with one long push, he was inside me. Every cell in my body suddenly roared to life.
“Holy Whore of Babylon,” I swore, clinging to the sides of the counter for support.
His pace was fast and hard and hyperventilatingly wonderful. Between a couple of hard smacks on my ass, I was thanking both him and every saint in the Bible. Even a few more that weren’t in it. I glanced over my shoulder so that I could watch him through jostling vision.
Unexpectedly, he pulled out with a groan. I cursed at him, then squealed when he flipped me around to face him. He slung an arm around my waist to haul me up until I was sitting on the edge of the counter. It was a good height for us. His jeans hung around the middle of his thighs, threatening to fall down to his feet any second. “Yes,” he whispered as he entered me again. “Just like that.”
I stretched a leg out and pressed my toes against a stool, struggling for leverage. He dug his fingers into my hips as they lifted off the table to meet his. Our pace increased. We gave each other no quarter—it was furious, breakneck, bruised-and-sore-later sex. My pulse jackknifed and sped up. The stool under my straining toes clinked against the counter. I became increasingly sure that I was going to have a heart attack or an aneurysm. Maybe my bones would snap from the strain. But I didn’t care, because it was just there, in the distance, so close.
“Look at me,” Lon growled.
“I can’t . . .” do two things at once.
“Yes, you damn well can.”
A strangled laugh caught in my throat, then I groaned in frustration.
One of his palms slapped down on the counter behind me. The other gripped the back of my neck. He lowered my hips back down on the table and pressed his forehead against mine again. Our labored breath mingled. I wrapped my legs around his waist and dug my heels into his ass. “Yes, yes . . . God, yes. Hold on—”
The transmutation roared in my ears and sent chills dancing across my skin. His horns brushed my hair as they spiraled into place. I curled my fingers around them like handlebars on a bike.
“Look at me,” he said, a breathless, gentle command this time. And I looked—I couldn’t not look. His eyes were a lush, dark forest, his lashes guarding the only entrance; everything I wanted was inside. He kissed me like he was staking a claim. His wavy hair and fiery golden halo fell around my face, blocking out everything but him. “No secrets.”
No secrets, I agreed in my head. He could hear my thoughts now. No need to speak. Slick and swollen, I constricted around him as the vanishing point flickered and the distance gave way.
“Christ!” he murmured in amazement, his grip on me tightening in response.
Thank you, thank you, thank you, I thought in my head as my muscles slackened one last time, ebb and flow, so close now . . . just needed to catch it.
“My pleasure,” he confirmed between huffed, short breaths.
Now, Lon, now, I encouraged, quivering madly, squinting my eyes shut to make it over the last peak.
“Look at me,” he pleaded one final time.
And I did.
Several minutes later, both exhausted and happy, we pulled each other’s clothes back on and made our way upstairs. I hadn’t crashed before midnight in weeks, but I was fully prepared to collapse on his bed and drift into a beautifully deep sleep, nestled up against him. I could think of nothing better. Tomorrow I’d deal with Hajo’s search and Jupe’s early-blooming knack, but tonight I was done. The world could just go to hell, I didn’t care.
As we shuffled through the living room, shutting off lights along the way, Lon picked up the remote to turn off the TV, then halted. “What the hell?” he mumbled, turning the volume up.
The 11:00 news was broadcasting live from Brentano Gardens. Tension flared as my mind jumped to what had happened there earlier. Jupe must be in more trouble than we’d thought.
But the panning Channel 7 camera was nowhere near the scene of Jupe’s mind-crime. On the opposite end of the park, the news was reporting that while the Spirit Cove ride had been temporarily closed due to a mechanical malfunction, another La Sirena teen had gone missing. He was last seen by his friends before he left to buy a bag of hot churros.
The remnants of the fried dessert were found behind the Sweety Tooth carnival booth . . . next to three crumbled dollar bills spattered with blood.
“Is that him?” Lon asked, peering out the window of the Singing Bean Musical Coffeehouse the following afternoon.
“No. And we still have ten minutes. I told them two o’clock.”
Lon quietly fumed as he glared out the window and sipped tea from a paper cup.
A few minutes passed before Hajo sped up to the coffee shop on a green-and-silver Ducati that looked more like an insect than a motorcycle. Sounded like one too. I doubted it was street legal. Nothing about Hajo was.
“That’s the death dowser,” I said, tapping twice on the window with my fingernail.
Lon watched Hajo as he took off his helmet, then murmured, “You’ve got to be kidding me,” before crumpling his cup and hurling it into the trash.
I adjusted the loop of the skinny black-and-white-striped knit scarf around my neck as I headed outside to greet Hajo. He looked much the same as he had the other night, including the simmering, lusty look in his eyes as he smiled at me. I wondered if he was high. His smile flattened when he saw Lon over my shoulder.
I made introductions. No one bothered to shake hands. Part of me almost regretted that I’d confessed all that stuff about Hajo last night. Lon looked as if he was considering the best way to murder him. Before the situation plunged into a dank pit of awkwardness, Bob drove up. His Hawaiian shirt reflected his oh-so-repentant mood: a somber brown background speckled with black bongo drum silhouettes. He looked up at the darkening stormy sky as he exited his car, then reached through the open door for an umbrella.
Lon followed my line of vision to Bob and promptly headed toward the Earthbound before I could stop him. He held up a casual hand to the oncoming car while he crossed the street, not bothering to look up when the car slammed on brakes and honked.
With a neon-orange umbrella in hand, Bob closed his car door and turned around to find Lon headed right for him with a deathproof swagger and an intent to do some verbal damage.
“Poor Robert,” Hajo sympathized as he saddled up to my side. “Glad that’s not me.”
Lon wasn’t saying much, but he was awfully close to Bob’s face. Bob backed up and flattened against his car, talking rapidly and waving the orange umbrella in front of him to indicate his innocence. A few people gawked as they walked past them.
I should’ve known Lon would be angrier about Bob’s betrayal of my vassal potion than about Hajo’s stepping over the line. Hajo was a stranger. Bob was a friend. Treachery was far worse when it was personal. Lightning cracked through gray sky in the distance. Please let this day be over soon.
With his eyes forged into a single dark slash under a rigid brow, Lon trailed Bob as he scurried across the street. Bob’s round face was flushed beet-red. Dammit. Now I felt sorry for him again. I couldn’t help it. He looked like a kicked dog. When his eyes met mine, I mouthed “sorry.” Then I quickly took control of things before the three of them ended up pounding each other’s heads into the sidewalk.
“I’ve got the tracking object on me,” I said to Hajo. “Do you do this on foot?”
“Usually on my bike.”
“I’m not letting the tracking object out of my sight,” Lon said without emotion as he stuffed his hands into his pockets. “No offense, but I don’t trust junkies.”
Hajo was momentarily taken aback. He composed himself, smiled, and said coolly, “None taken.”
“If you have sømna on you now, I’m not getting into a vehicle with you,” Lon said. “I’m not going to chance getting pulled over and arrested.”
“I’m not carrying,” Hajo said.
Lon didn’t press it, so I assumed he read Hajo’s answer as honest. “All right. Let’s go.”
We piled in Lon’s SUV. I drove. Death Boy and Lazy Eye sat in the second row behind us, their feet wading in Jupe’s pile of comics. Lon sat in the passenger seat with a short-barreled Lupara shotgun in his lap, like some Sicilian mobster. I wanted to ask him who he planned on shooting, Hajo or some dead bodies, but he was in a black mood, so I let it go.
Before I put the car in gear, Hajo spoke up from the back. “There’s the little matter of payment before we start.” I glanced at him through the rearview mirror and pulled the brown, half-ounce bottle of the potion out of my jacket pocket, handing it to him through the front seats. Then I pulled out onto the street and headed toward Ocean Drive.
Hajo held the tiny bottle up against the window, checking the level of the liquid in the dimming afternoon light. He unscrewed the dropper top and sucked up the medicinal.
“Bob?” Hajo prodded.
“Is this really necessary?” Bob asked. “I told you, I can vouch for her.”
“Open wide,” Hajo insisted.
“Only one drop. No more. It’s brewed from a mixture of calamus root and Atropa belladonna.”
Hajo paused.
“Deadly nightshade,” I clarified. “One of the most toxic plants known to man. One too many drops could cause heart palpitations and blindness. A few more could kill.”
“One drop. Got it,” Hajo said. “Open.”
Sour and depressed, Bob opened his mouth and allowed Hajo to drop the liquid on his waiting tongue. Bob made a face and swallowed.
“How long for it to take effect?” Hajo asked.
I waited as Bob’s pupils dilated into enormous black holes. “Now,” I said.
Hajo studied Bob. “How long does it last?”
“Thirty minutes. An hour. Depends on the person.”
“Have you dosed me with this before?” Bob asked me nervously. He was starting to sweat again; he was quite possibly the sweatiest demon alive.
“I never thought I needed to,” I replied.
He sighed and swallowed hard. “Go ahead and do what you’re gonna do, Hajo.”
Hajo spun the bottle in his hand, thinking for a short time before he spoke. “I can’t ask you to do something you wouldn’t mind doing. That proves nothing. It has to be something that you would only do against your will or better judgment.”
I didn’t like the sound of that. Lon and I glanced at each other.
Hajo settled on his test. “Since you and Mr. Butler aren’t the best of friends, Bobby boy, I’m guessing you wouldn’t be eager to piss him off any more than you already have. That would be the last thing you want right now.”
Bob panicked, reacting to the vassal effect and Hajo’s suggestion as Lon turned to glare at them, unhappy about where this was headed.
“Even though you’re deathly scared of him, you’d do anything for Cady, wouldn’t you?” Hajo said. “Why don’t you show Cady how you really feel about her. Kiss her. Now.”
Lon and I uttered a series of outcries that quickly erupted into random angry shouts as Bob unbuckled his seat belt and stuck his head between us. He was mumbling as he reached for me—saying that he was sorry, that he had to do this.
“Sit down!” Lon barked, shoving at Bob.
Hajo laughed as Bob pressed forward. For several seconds, the front seat was a mass of tangled arms and Bob’s clammy lips trying to make contact with my face, then Lon stuck the antique sawed-off shotgun into Bob’s chest. “Sit the fuck down.”
Bob wailed, but tried to push the gun away, undeterred. I cut the wheel harder than I expected—I was unaccustomed to driving something so big. The SUV swerved violently, hit the curb, and plowed over it. Bob’s head slammed against the side of seat. Lon grabbed the oh-shit handle and braced himself while cussing me out. I got control of the car, but not before a couple of drivers honked, and not before my heart rate tripled.
Bob moaned and gripped the side of this head, trying to catch his breath. This had gone too far. Nobody could stop Bob but the person who dosed him.
“Hajo!” I bellowed into the rearview mirror. “Make him stop!”
Lon twisted in his seat, shoved Bob roughly, and pointed the Lupara at Hajo. “Now, you son of a bitch.�
��
“All right, all right!” Hajo said, still fighting back laughter. “Bob, stop trying to kiss Cady. Sit in your seat and be a good boy. Simon says.”
Bob whimpered as Hajo pocketed the little vial, pleased as pie. “You brew good stuff, Cady,” he concluded. “Now let’s hunt your dead body. Where’s this tracking object you promised?”
We drove around La Sirena with the rear windows cracked while Hajo held Bishop’s key in his hands and went into some sort of mild trance. One hour passed, then another. On occasion, he mumbled a quick direction: “Turn right,” or “Trail’s gone cold. Loop back around.” Compliant but depressed, Bob was crumpled in the seat next to Hajo, wedged up against the door.
Lon and I sat in silence as rain drizzled, the wipers keeping a steady rhythm on the windshield. Worry stalked me from a distance. I wasn’t sure what I wanted more: for Hajo to find some thirty-year-old mass grave, or for him to fail and find nothing. Either prospect was undesirable, and both made me anxious.
Nightfall approached. As we curved around the shore outside the city limits, Lon sneaked his hand over the leather armrest and gently prodded my arm. When I glanced over at him, he was resting the side of his head against the seat, a tender look on his face. He tucked his long hair behind one ear, then ran his knuckles over the elbow of my jacket. I switched hands on the wheel so that I could link fingers with him.
With a sudden cry, Hajo woke up from his stupor. He’d caught the thread.
His directions became increasingly frequent and urgent. Bob perked up and watched with interest as Hajo guided us down an unmarked rocky side street that meandered around the coast. It was hard to see much of the terrain under dark skies and dreary rain. The headlights illuminated a thicket of evergreens on the left that blocked our view of the main road and, as I steered the SUV around a sharp curve, a row of concrete buildings stacked up in the distance, clinging to the shore. From a rickety post, a metal sign hung sideways, riddled with rusted-out holes. It read: PACIFIC GLORY TUNA CANNERY.
“Huh,” Lon murmured. “I remember touring this place on a school trip when I was a kid. It used to rival Bumble Bee until it was shut down in the late 1970s. Botulism outbreak. Put hundreds of locals out of work.”
