Medusa's Dagger: A New Adult Urban Fantasy (Aya Harris Collection Book 1)

by Lacy Andersen

  “Okay, true.” He raised his arms in self-defense. “We’ll save each other. How about that?”

  Satisfied, I nodded and lowered my arms. As much as we liked to joke about it, I hoped I’d never have a repeat of the previous week. Chasing after criminals was hard work. I didn’t know how Gideon kept it up day after day.

  “How’s your partner?” I asked.

  The last I’d seen of Agent Silva, she’d been lying unconscious in the hotel bathroom.

  “She’s fine.” He waved his hand through the air. “It took her less than an hour to get back on her feet. But, she was pretty angry when she found out you helped take down Theo. I’d stay clear of her for at least a year. Or two.”

  I grimaced. I’d already gotten a small taste of the wrath of Agent Silva. It’d be best to avoid a rematch.

  “That reminds me, I’ve got something I have to show you.”

  Gideon unfolded the newspaper in his hands and flattened it out. On the front page was a giant picture of me lying on an ambulance stretcher, my face ghostly white.

  “Ian Welch, in all his glory, snapped this picture of you when they were wheeling you into the ambulance. Your face is splashed across every major newscast and paper across the country – supernatural or not. They’re saying a terrorist set off a bomb in the hotel. It was big news.”

  I groaned and smacked my forehead with the palm of my head. If the HQ didn’t know where I was before, they certainly did now. One of the harpies in Chicago was bound to recognize me from the papers in their local grocery store. It was only a matter of time before they tracked me down.

  “I’m going to help you,” Gideon said, stepping closer. He cupped my face with the palm of his hand and stroked his thumb along my bottom lip. “We’ll get through this – together.”

  I closed my eyes and let the warmth of his hand sink into my skin. Compared to Theo and Nicky, the HQ was a whole different ballgame. They had networks of resources and centuries of training to back them up. It was like two little ants trying to take on the elephant threatening to squash them.

  “Okay,” I said, against my better judgment. “Together.”

  Someone bumped into me from behind, sending me sailing into Gideon’s shoulder. I righted myself and turned around to help whoever had failed to see me standing there.

  “I’m sorry miss, I didn’t see you…”

  Trevor and I made eye contact and instantly we both turned bright red. A pair of dark blue scrubs hugged his shapely torso, while a stethoscope hung from his neck. He looked almost as good in scrubs as he had in a suit on our blind date. I hadn’t thought of contacting him since Gideon so rudely yanked me out of the restaurant. Trevor probably thought I’d cut out and ran from our date.

  “Trevor!” My nervous energy made my voice tremble. “It’s so good to see you again.”

  He mumbled something and shook his head, looking wildly around the hall at anything but me. The poor guy deserved an explanation, if nothing else. Nobody deserved to be ghosted like that. It was the least I could do.

  “Hey listen, about our date the other night…” I searched for the words that might make him feel better. “I didn’t mean to leave you hanging. I got yanked out on some business.”

  Gideon cleared his throat behind me, trying to hide a laugh.

  I smiled at Trevor and stepped nonchalantly backwards, pressing my heel on Gideon’s toe. “I just wanted to say I’m sorry. No hard feelings?”

  “Um… yeah.” Trevor pulled his iPhone out of his pocket and scanned the screen. “I’ve got to go. They need me in surgery. See you around.”

  Without looking at me, he made a U-turn and sped down the hallway. The signs tacked on the walls said the surgery was in the opposite direction, but I was pretty sure it didn’t matter to someone running away from the girl who stood him up. Oh well. Trevor was a big boy. He’d find love someday.

  “I guess he won’t be calling for a second date,” Gideon said in my ear.

  I spun around and smacked him playfully on the shoulder. “No thanks to you. What am I going to do now?”

  He gave me a cocky smile that tugged at my heart. “I think I have a good idea.”

  His lips were on mine before I had a chance to come up with a smart-alecky response. They pressed hungrily against me as my body responded in kind. The taste of cinnamon candy filled my mouth with a spicy heat.

  I melted into his arms and pressed my chest against his, relishing the feel of his quickening heartbeat. This was so much better than what I’d imagined. Every part of me lit up with electric energy, tingling where his skin touched mine. Sighing, he wound his hands in my messy hair and paused to catch his breath.

  “I’ve been wanting to do that for days,” he whispered.

  I stared at his mouth, mesmerized by the shape of his lips. Reaching up to my tiptoes, I brushed my lips softly across his, pausing in the corner to kiss him.

  The sounds of whoops and hollers behind us broke up the kissing session. Angel, Steven, and Johnny had just landed on the hallway, standing in the middle with a dozen Get Well balloons and three vases full of multi-colored lilies. They pumped their fists and whistled, telling us to get a room.

  “And here comes the embarrassing best friends,” I mumbled with a smile.

  Gideon squeezed my hand, but didn’t let go. I was intensely aware of my hand in his, and the nervous energy burning like a red hot coal in my stomach. Whatever this was, it felt right. I’d been so intent on hiding in Arcana from my past, that I’d forgotten how to put myself out there. Life’s adventure didn’t come without a bit of risk.

  We could worry about the HQ and my unhinged brother tomorrow. Tonight, we’d celebrate our victory.

  ~

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  ~

  Turn the page to read an excerpt of Athena’s Jewel,

  the second book in the Aya Harris Collection.

  ~

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  Excerpt from Athena’s Jewel

  The second book in the Aya Harris Collection

  Prologue

  The man yanked her through the backdoor of the club, ignoring her hisses and snapping fangs. Only a minute ago, he’d been flirting with her over a bloody margarita. She’d liked the easy way he smiled and the strong pulse of blood in the vein on his neck. This wasn’t how she imagined the night would end.

  With a quick hand, the man snapped a metal collar around her neck and stepped back as her fangs disappeared and the strength in her arms faded away.

  “I’ve got another one for you, Timur,” he called into the darkness of the alleyway. “A vampire.”

  She jerked back as out of the gloom, a moving truck inched forward. The truck’s fog lights lit up the small patch of wet cement in front of her and a pile of discarded Bacardi boxes. She watched a giant man step out of the passenger seat and approach them. He bent down low to get a good look at her, his rank breath hot and heavy on her face.

  “She’ll make a good addition to our haul,” the giant said in a gravelly voice. “Throw her in back with the others.”

  The drug they’d slipped into her drink began to cloud her head like a heavy fog descending on a valley. Her friends had left her to hit up the new club down the block. No one knew she was missing. They’d never find her.

  “Don’t worry, pretty thing,” the giant said, stroking her face with his huge index finger. “We’ll take care of you. We take care of all the girls that work for us.”

  They threw her in the back of the truck, slamming the door behind her. As the truck began to sway down the alleyway, she peered into the darkness. Five sets of eyes stared back at her – reflecting the same fear boiling beneath her skin.

  Chapter One

  The fire breathing toad ga
ve one last belch of acrid smoke before hopping into the mess of boxes in the storage room. I jumped in after it, careful not to squish it. The last thing we needed was for our storage room to go up in flames. Ancient parchment and wooden artifacts didn’t hold up well against fire, no matter how magical they were.

  “Do I have to remind you, Mr. Jones, that this is a museum? Not a zoo?” I said through clenched teeth.

  Mr. Jones held the empty toad cage and laughed, his bulging belly bouncing up and down. “My dear, this is a supernatural museum and that is a supernatural toad. He belongs here as much as anything.”

  Shaking my head, I kept silent. Mr. Jones had acquired the toad on his latest expedition to Egypt. Along with it, he’d found a staff that was enchanted to find gold, the mummified head of an Egyptian magician, and a wooden flute that could send anyone into a coma with its lullabies. I didn’t mind dealing with his crazy and dangerous items, but animals were another thing altogether.

  “Watch it, he’s going for the magic books,” I yelled, spotting the tawny rough backside of the toad squeezing between two overflowing bookshelves.

  A wisp of black smoke trailed into the air. The toad was gearing up to let another belch loose. He’d nearly singed me earlier when I discovered the empty cage on my way to grab another bag of souvenir plastic shrunken heads.

  After my encounters last month with my brother Nicky and his demented Gorgon friend, Theo, I was a little fire-shy. My friend Angel had healed me well enough, but once in a while I still woke up screaming from my nightmares, thinking that I was on fire.

  The toad popped his head out from behind the bookcase and I snatched him up. Juggling his squishy little body like a hot potato, I shoved him into Mr. Jones’ cage and slammed the door shut. The toad croaked and stared at me with one beady eye, smoke leaking from his lips.

  “Take that,” I said, dowsing him with the remaining water in my coffee mug.

  The water hit him with a sizzle. With his flame extinguished, the toad wiggled under a plastic rock in his cage and buried himself in sand.

  “Well, that’s no fun,” Mr. Jones pouted. “It’ll take him at least a month to get his fire burning again.”

  I smiled in victory. No toad was going to burn down my Arcana Museum of Supernatural and Occult.

  Technically, I was only its curator and Mr. Jones was the owner. But I had plans to change that. My tiny savings account was growing each month. Soon, I’d have enough saved to approach Mr. Jones with a proposal.

  If he allowed me to buy in and partner with him in owning the museum, I’d take it to the next level. We’d create interactive displays. Draw more people off the streets. Have special exhibits once a month for extra expense. It was all outlined in my proposal. Now, I just needed to get the courage to present it to him.

  “Listen, Mr. Jones…”

  He flew past me, depositing the toad’s cage haphazardly on a shelf, and plucked one of his Egyptian parcels off the floor. I followed him through the storeroom, putting the cage on more solid ground and righting a tower of boxes he nearly sent tumbling to the floor.

  “Can’t talk now, dear.” He ran a hand over the thick gray beard that jutted from his chin. “We have a special visitor coming this week. Must get the museum ready. Our best displays out.”

  I nodded. On the rare occasions Mr. Jones was in town, he was always entertaining someone at the museum. He’d grown up among the rich and haughty of Arcana. His friends frequently visited, dripping in furs and diamonds.

  I wasn’t sure how a disorganized and down-to-Earth human like Mr. Jones kept such dazzling company. It might have been his vast bank accounts – at least that’s what Angel and I suspected. How else could a sixty year old man afford to go gallivanting around the world, collecting rare objects for a museum that barely stayed afloat financially? He had to be loaded.

  Following my boss out of the storeroom, I froze. The museum lobby tilted and spun, sending me straight to my knees. In a blink, the displays vanished and in front of my eyes was a dark street. I recognized the splitting headache and the taste of metal in my mouth. It was another vision. This was the clearest one yet.

  A young woman swayed toward me, glossy black pumps on her feet and a leather jacket hanging off her shoulders. She dug in her purse, bright red nails disappearing in the black bag. I wasn’t sure how she was still standing on those heels. From the looks of her, she’d had one too many to drink that night. In another hour, she’d probably be draped over a toilet, regretting her life decisions.

  Behind a parked Chevy Cavalier with a dent in the side appeared a man with a hood pulled over his head. He watched the young woman pass him, her attention locked on the contents of her purse. The street around them was abandoned. The streetlight above had busted, leaving the street blanketed in darkness. I knew the moment he pulled the switchblade from his pocket, that girl was in danger.

  “Watch out!” I yelled.

  But just like in all my visions, my voice went unheard.

  The hooded man grabbed a fistful of the woman’s hair and yanked her to the ground. Her screams were cut off by his hand closing over her mouth. He dug a knee into her stomach, pinning her to the concrete with his body weight.

  “What a yummy surprise,” the man cooed. He smiled, displaying three rows of sharpened teeth.

  The woman’s frightened scream was muffled by his fist in her mouth. I watched helplessly as he sunk his teeth into her neck like a shark and began to devour her alive. There was so much blood. The vision came to a sudden halt and I found myself back in the museum lobby, my face melded to the tile floor.

  “Did you have another one?”

  My assistant, Angel, came rushing to my side. She helped me sit up and lean against the wall. The room spun around me. At any second, I could eject the turkey sandwich I had for lunch all over the floor. Moving was out of the question.

  “Yes, just as bad as the last one.” I held a hand to my head. “No, wait. Scratch that. This one was worse.”

  She gave me a sympathetic smile and crouched down on her heels. “At least you’re saving lives.”

  “Yeah, I guess so.”

  I’d had four visions since Nicky left town, each one getting steadily worse. It was as if a switch had been flipped inside my head. What used to happen once a year, was now happening once a week. At this rate, I’d be spending the rest of my life in bed, nursing magical hangovers.

  “Tell me, was it a theft or something worse?” Angel asked, studying my face. “Your last vision was a guy stealing from a bank. I almost wanted you to let him get away with it.”

  Angel had a little bit of that down with the man attitude. I blamed it on her hippy mother. She’d been big into the love and peace movements of the sixties. Drank too much and smoked everything she could find. It was a good decade for her.

  She was proud of the fact that she’d conceived Angel in a weed-fueled night at Woodstock. Didn’t even know the guy’s name. But she got Angel, and that was all that mattered to her.

  “No, this was way worse,” I moaned. “Like, murder worse. I saw a manticore chow down on a lady. It was bloodier than a Tarantino film.”

  Angel grimaced. Manticores weren’t exactly common around here. They were one of the creatures forced to register with the Supernatural Investigations – the SI – when they entered the country. As a typically man-eating species, the SI liked to keep a close eye on their lot.

  “I’d better call Gideon.” I used Angel to pull myself off the ground. “He’s going to want to report this one right away. I think it happens tonight.”

  Angel straightened my royal blue sweater and swiped a hand on my rear, dusting off the particles from the floor. She was the kind of friend that didn’t mind pointing out a piece of food stuck in your teeth. It only made me love her more.

  “No need,” she said, studying my outfit. “Prince Charming is waiting for you at the front counter.”

  I bit my bottom lip and opened my eyes wide at her. Gideon had spent
most of the past few weeks out of town on official SI business, but he made a point to fly in as often as he could. Ever since we defeated Theo, he and I had a thing going. I wasn’t sure how serious it would become, but I liked the way he smelled and the way he kissed. You could build a relationship on that.

  “Go get him, chica,” Angel said with a smack of her lips.

  I finished brushing my clothes off and forced myself to walk calmly through the displays, although I wanted nothing more than to break out into a sprint. There he was, leaning casually against the counter and studying his phone, all five foot eleven of him. He’d had time to trade in his customary suit for a pair of worn denim jeans and his favorite brown leather jacket with the popped collar.

  As I took in the sight of his scruffy beard and tussled hair, the memories of his last day in town crept into my head, making me blush. We’d spent a lazy Saturday in his hotel room, ordering room service and testing out the Jacuzzi bathtub. Champaign and chocolate dipped strawberries were the special of the day. I wished we were back in that hotel room so I could trail my fingers along the tattoos hidden beneath his t-shirt and jeans.

  “Hi you,” I said.

  He looked up from his phone and gave me a crooked grin. “You’re a sight for sore eyes. Sorry for dropping in without calling. I tried texting, but you didn’t reply.”

  I sighed. “Sorry. We had a toad emergency in back. It’s taken up most of my morning.”

  His eyebrows pulled together in confusion, but he didn’t ask. Weird things like that were just a part of my job. They happened a little too often around here.

  “Listen, before I forget, I had a vision,” I told him.

  As much as I wanted to fall into his arms and get lost in those hazel eyes, I had to save that woman. Just the idea of getting eaten alive made me shudder.

  “There’s a woman on Tenth Avenue that’s going to be attacked by a manticore tonight. You might want to get someone on that.”