Diaries of an Urban Panther

by Amanda Arista

  I think I wrote a poltergeist scene once, set in a library. It was an angry little girl who was trying to kill the little girl in the house so she would have a playmate. She had levitated all the books off the shelves and then dropped them all to the floor.

  Someone did this to my office. Books lay on the ground ankle deep. The computer monitor was on the floor, but the tower was still there. My lap top bag was upside down, but my lap top was sitting on the chair. The software binders were still there, the phone, the fax machine had been knocked off but was still there and there was another strong odor of dog.

  “Is that urine?”

  Chaz nodded as he nudged a few of the books over with his boot.

  “But nothing’s gone,” I said still looking around.

  “Don’t think they were after your stuff, Violet,” Chaz said as he lead us downstairs.

  I kept the box tightly to my chest. Officer Briggs came to stand with us at the base of the stairs. “What’s missing?” he asked, his note pad ready.

  “Nothing. Nothing except that picture.”

  A deep crease formed between the man’s brows. “Nothing?”

  “Computer’s still there, laptop, everything’s here, just upside down.”

  Briggs closed his note pad. “Can you think of anyone who might want to do this to you?”

  I looked at Chaz who shook his head. “No,” I said. “I’m no one. I’m a writer for a Dallas blog.”

  “Professional enemies?”

  I dropped my chin in disbelief. “I’m a writer. We don’t interact with people. We don’t like you, a character dies a horrible death. Most of us rarely leave the house.”

  “What about you, Mr. Garrett? Do you have enemies?”

  Chaz shook his head. “None that I can think of, sir.” Note to self, not only is Chaz good looking enough to be on TV, he’s got the acting chops to back it up.

  Office Briggs sighed and scratched underneath his hat behind his ear. I remembered him doing that after the hit and run. Those hats must be uncomfortable.

  “It does sound personal, Miss Jordan. Very rarely do people just break in to ransack the place. Unless this is some sort of gang prank. But I doubt it. There’s been nothing like this in the neighborhood.”

  “What do I do?”

  Officer Briggs nodded as the other men packed up and gestured that they were going to be outside. “If you’ve got someplace to stay, I suggest you go there. Maybe stay with Mr. Garrett or that friend of yours?”

  I nodded. “Thank you, Officer Briggs.”

  “You’re welcome, Miss Jordan. I’ll be in touch with any information that might come off the prints or if anything new arises.”

  I stood there quietly as the men paraded out of my house. I counted to ten after the door closed, box clutched tightly to my chest, before the tirade began.

  “What the hell?” I screamed. “This is my house. The bastards broke into my house.”

  I wanted to pick up the vase of roses and throw them across my already destroyed house. Instead I put my box down on the table next to it and searched for a card.

  “No card,” Chaz said calmly. “But I think the message is clear.”

  “What?” I snapped. “I’m a crazy lunatic.”

  “More like he knows where you live and he can do whatever he wants.”

  Volcanic didn’t quite describe my anger. It sizzled down my back as I leaned forward and gripped the edge of my table. I completely understood the phrase of seeing red as my nails dug into the wooden edge.

  The ribbon on my violet box started to flutter.

  “Violet.” Chaz backed off a few steps.

  “Don’t Violet me. I’m angry. Just let me feel violated for a moment.” I took in deep breaths that were tainted by the sweet scent of the flowers. “This is my house, Chaz. My House.”

  “I know, Violet.”

  “No, you don’t,” I said as I turned around and leaned on the edge of the table. I wiped the moisture from my cheeks and crossed my arms tightly around my chest.

  “It’s been a long time since I felt at home anywhere, and I was finally finding some happiness. Boring pathetic writer happiness but it was a start. And it was like as soon as it happened, as soon as I found a little place to call my own, I get mauled in the back alley, almost hit by a car, attacked on my first date in years, and now my house got broken into. It’s like, why bother? Shit happens, and nine times out of ten it’s going to happen to me.”

  “Come on, if you hadn’t been a Perfect, you’d have never met me.”

  I sniffed and wiped the tears from my face.

  “Hey,” Chaz said as he stepped between me and the wreckage. “Why don’t you get out of here? I’ll clean up as best I can.”

  I shook my head. “Why don’t I just leave? Period. If I’m not here, the dogs have nothing to chase. I still have one coast I can live on.”

  Chaz’s jaw clenched. “Violet. If you’re not here to stop this, we can’t predict how bad it’s going to be.”

  “Maybe if I’m not here, it doesn’t happen at all. Cristina said it was about me and Jessa. If there is no me and Jessa, there might not be an apocalypse.”

  “Are you listening to yourself? Mights. You’re putting the fate of the world against a might.” Chaz grabbed my upper arms and shook me. “He messed up your house Violet. That’s nothing. The Havertys killed my father.”

  His words slapped me out of my pity party. “I’m sorry.”

  “You are going to get through this and then kick some major ass.”

  I nodded. “Okay.”

  Chaz’s hands fell away from my arms. He took a step back and leaned against the wall. “What’s in the box?”

  I looked back at the little box on the table. “Not quite yet, Chuck. Maybe someday, but not yet.” I drew the box to my chest again and hugged it tightly.

  “You are something else, Miss Jordan,” Chaz pushed himself off the wall and slapped this thigh. “Okay. I want you to go pack a bag for three nights, take your laptop and anything you think you need to figure out what the hell Cristina told you. And then you’re going to Iris’s.”

  “I won’t run, Chaz. Not anymore.”

  Chaz deflated. His plan was foiled. By me. Again. But his eyes twinkled when his new plan formed in his head. “Devin!”

  “What?”

  “Stay with Devin. He’s safe, practically untraceable.”

  I frowned. “Why are you trying to get rid of me?”

  “Never,” Chaz shook his head. “You need to rest. You need to figure out that prophecy. I’ll clean the place up. Keep an eye out for looters.”

  I knew he was right. The emotional roller coaster that was today had made my skin hurt with its ups and downs. Or really mostly the downs. “You just want to play hero if they come back.”

  Chaz shrugged. “I did get a new shotgun and a box of silver buckshot.”

  “Boys and their toys,” I said as I started climbing the stairs.

  Twenty minutes later there was a ring at the doorbell. I froze in place. Were they back? I shook my head and shook the fear from my skin. Don’t be an idiot, Violet. Would they really ring the doorbell if they were back?

  Bag over my shoulder, I went down the stairwell silently. Until I heard the familiar voice.

  “Devin!” I dropped the bag on the floor and went to him quickly.

  He opened his arms wide for me and I squeezed him tightly. “Are you all right?”

  I nodded against his chest. I looked up at him. “He called you, didn’t he?”

  Devin nodded. “Doctor Devin to the rescue.”

  Stepping away from him, Chaz came up behind me and handed Devin the bag I had gleefully left on the floor. Figured I’d just take what I took to LA. It was one of the few things I knew that they hadn’t touched. Guess they drew the line at dirty laundry.

  “Stay inside,” Chaz said. He looked down at me with stern eyes. “Work on that script that you’ve been putting off.”

  Geez. No
te to self: We need to work on Chaz’s subtle. “I’ve got my laptop and the tape recorder from our notes earlier.”

  Chaz handed me my violet box. “Keep it safe until we can find a place for it.”

  I nodded and took it, immediately holding it like a protective teddy bear.

  “Ready, sweetheart?” Devin offered as he gestured for the door.

  “When you are,” I smiled and followed Devin out.

  Chaz’s hand caught my shoulder. I turned around and looked at him as we straddled the threshold of what use to be the safest place in the world. His hand slid up to the side of my neck and the pit of my stomach flipped as I looked up at him.

  “Be safe, Violet.”

  I nodded.

  His hand trailed down my arm and then fell away. “Go. Get inside as soon as you can.”

  “So, no barhopping then?”

  He rolled his eyes and pushed me gently to where Devin was waiting with my door open.

  “If I liquor you up, will you explain why you haven’t called in ages?” Devin said waving a bottle of wine between me and my computer screen.

  “God. Devin. I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be sorry. Just start talking. Not that I didn’t enjoy Stalker boy’s little chat on the phone,” Devin marched back to the kitchen and began to rummage loudly around in the drawers for a bottle opener. “Ah-hah,” he cried out as he found the corkscrew. “Oh, is he the reason you haven’t call? God. I need details. Really steamy details.”

  Pushing up from the table, I turned around to watch him pour two very full glasses of red wine. He gestured for us to go into the living room, but paused as he looked at the research strewn over his dining room table.

  “Oh god, Vi. Please tell me that’s just research for a script,” he gulped, his eyebrows steeply arched above his worried brown eyes.

  “Yeah, of course,” I said as I quickly closed the top of my laptop, hiding the picture of the demon that I had brought up, trying to comprehend just what kind of wickedness could be conjured with a mirror.

  “You and your imagination,” Devin shook his head as he walked into the front room.

  “Wish this was in my head,” I whispered.

  He sat down on the couch and patted the cushion next to him. I really didn’t have time for this. I needed to be saving the world. But as I looked into his brown caring eyes, I couldn’t deny that I needed a friend right now.

  I stayed standing as I looked down at him, his long figure on my couch, his slender arm along the back of the cushion. He really was a friend. No weird destinies. No mystical weaving of fates. He was just Devin.

  He frowned. “Something wrong?”

  “No.”

  He patted the cushion next to him again. “So what’s going on in your world, Violet Jordan?”

  “So she hasn’t talk to you in a week?”

  “Yep,” I nodded as I reached across to put my empty glass on the coffee table.

  “Jessa’ll come around.”

  “Can’t wait for that, Devin. Need to make things right.”

  “Why push her?”

  “Because,” I said as I leaned back on the couch and looked over at him. “Because she’s my family Devin, and I can’t keep losing people that I love.”

  “Oh, dear heart,” he said as he wrapped his arms around me. “It’s going to be okay. We’ll get her back.”

  I nodded against his chest as he stroked my hair. Stupid hot tears ran down my cheeks and I tried to wipe them away before they smeared his perfectly fitted Armani shirt.

  “But don’t ever think that you’re alone, little Violet Jordan. You’ve at least got me.”

  “Thank you, Devin. For everything.”

  “And you’ve got Stalker boy.”

  “Not really.”

  Devin pulled me in against his chest and scooted down into the couch. “When he called me tonight, he was scared. He said, ‘Devin, I need you to take care of our girl.’ I thought it was just him being all macho, but when I saw the two of you tonight, in the door way,” Devin shook his head. He let out a soft whistle. “Wow.”

  “I’m just a project for him. He’ll fix me up and then be on his way. It’s his modus operandi.”

  Devin made a play shiver. “You know I like it when you use those big words.”

  We settled back on the couch, his arm still around my shoulder. I rested my head on him and all the information of the last hours danced around in my head. Something was brewing in the back of my brain, like a French press just ready to be pressed.

  “Is your birthday this month or something?”

  “Nope. April tenth.”

  “Oh.”

  “Jessa’s Silver Ball is in two days,” he said casually.

  We both gasped and sat up straight on the couch.

  “The Silver Ball. I’d forgotten.”

  “Certainly she invited you before the fight.”

  I ran my fingers through my hair to get it out of my face. “I was so mad, I tossed it.”

  A devious smile crossed Devin’s face. “Want to be my plus one?”

  “You’ve already RSVPed?”

  “It’s perfect,” he smiled as he pulled me back to him. “Like it was written in the stars or something. Doctor Devin to the rescue.”

  The brief thought crossed my mind that maybe it was. Maybe someone up there liked me. Or just liked jerking me around. Currently, I was thinking the second option.

  “You’ll wear something fab, and I’ll look handsome as ever. We’ll go shopping tomorrow, after work. She’ll have to be civil to you. It’s her party.”

  “Aren’t you a little schemer?”

  It felt like a weight was lifted off my chest. I had a plan. There was a light at the end of the tunnel, even if it was the train.

  “Mirrors break. Magnolias bleed. At the darkest of the darkest night.”

  It was the umpteenth time I’d listen to the chilling words emanating from the tape recorder. Cristina’s cadence was creepy in real life, but every time I heard it I could see her eyes staring into the void, her white-knuckled hands as they clenched mine. My skin was permanently goose-bumped and my eyes were wide as I began piecing together the chilling puzzle strewn across Devin’s dining room table.

  After he’d left for work, I’d hooked my laptop up to the recorder and it transcribed the words into English, well, mostly English. Cristina’s mother tongue swirled in between the ominous English phrases. Depending on which side of the freaked out pendulum I was on, her accent either made the words softer and almost acceptable, or added the extra fear of the unknown. I couldn’t seem to stop shivering. And that was before I started fixing words here and there, giving the string of gibberish meaning. Then the gripping truth relieved itself on the glowing screen.

  “Mirrors break.” God bless Google. A simple search brought up a news article describing the burglary of several antique shops across the Metroplex over the past two weeks. Among the looted materials were three ancient mirrors. The article also mentioned a suit of armor, a chair that belonged to some king, and some ancient dagger thing. I knew that mirrors were used in all kinds of wicked little deeds. Guess Snow White’s queen had the right idea with her “Mirror Mirror” routine.

  “Magnolias bleed.” I didn’t really want to dig too deeply into that one. I was toast.

  “At the darkest on the darkest night.” This still had me stumped.

  Pushing away from the table with shaking arms, I got up, fixed another pot of coffee, and put some laundry in the dryer. I was being chased after by god knows what and I still had five loads of laundry from my one week of being gone. A girl can’t win.

  As I was sorting whites and colors, I came across the blood-stained shirt from the Worst Date Ever. How in the hell did this get in my suitcase? Before I could contemplate the divine hand it would have taken to get Chaz’s shirt from my hamper in the bathroom to my suitcase, it hit me. As I was measuring out the lilac-scented fabric softener, all the pieces fell together in my he
ad. That night in the alley. The trench coat. Hadn’t we found a book of some sort in the brute’s coat pocket? Where the hell was that?

  I tore through my purse to get my cell phone. God I needed to get a smaller purse.

  Chaz answered on the third ring. There was music blaring in the background, angry boy music.

  “What are you doing?” I winced as I brought the phone away from my ear for a moment until the music subsided.

  “Cleaning.”

  “Which is closer? The gun or the vacuum?”

  Chaz chuckled. “What are you doing?”

  “I’m saving the world. Guess the tables have turned.”

  “There’s my girl.”

  My skin chilled as I remembered what Devin had said the night before. “Right, well, I need to know what page was marked in the book that we found on the mutt, the night of . . . The night that we . . .”

  “Book . . . got it,” he saved me from myself.

  I could hear him stomp up the stairs of my place and closed my eyes. He was in my office right now, kicking books around to find the black trench coat on the floor. His tight T-shirt was probably stretched over his chest as he put his hand on his hip, looking around the mess, his . . .

  “Got it,” he exclaimed.

  I jumped up and snapped out of my revelry. “Check the dog-eared page.”

  “Um. The New Moon, the darkest night of the month. December sixteenth.”

  “Crap,” I muttered. I stood up and began to pace. “From what Cristina said, I think they are planning some mirror magic on the longest night. Think that’s what Jessa pulled on us the other day.”

  “I could have told you that.”

  “Well, don’t you just get a gold star.” None of this enlightened me as to exactly why they would need Jessa or how either of us was going to be involved in all this. But it seemed that I just had to keep her safe for a little more than a week while she continued to completely hate my guts. It was going to be great. Just awesome, really.

  “What’s the plan?”

  “Devin and I worked out a way to get Jessa to talk to me that doesn’t involve tying her to a chair.”