He remained motionless.
Now I was getting pissed off. I hate arrogant guys who can’t accept when it’s time to quit pounding their chests and get off the stage. Like, go ahead and swing on those vines. I don’t care. I don’t mind seeing those sexy arms. But, once you’ve made your point, if you keep it up, you’re just proving your own insecurity, dude, not your own awesomeness.
I hunted around stagnant energy of the house to call on some air element and send a blast of wind at him, gusting him back toward the stairs. Only he didn’t gust. Just a faint flapping of whatever jacket he wore.
Which was mighty interesting since it meant he was a solid, corporeal individual. Two for two.
Did this count as eye contact? I couldn’t even see his face. And he couldn’t see mine because I held the light out. What hint I could catch of his eyes didn’t matter because they still showed nothing—only more darkness. Almost like a vampire. Yet vampires are shrunken husks of death lurking in the…
Unless they were new vampires. But that couldn’t be because they would have to spawn. Mom and Dad would have known. It was pretty obvious in a tiny town when people started disappearing and turning into vampires.
If he wasn’t a spirit and he wasn’t a vampire he was a mage. Only spellcasters didn’t have magic like this. Making people do things? Telepathy? Realms of the dead, not the living.
Did he have a team? Casters working with a demon and the old vampires downstairs to get into our heads? Create images like the fox and serve blood to the undead underground?
Just the sorts of questions to contemplate at the bar with spicy wings and blue cheese and a frosty beer with a few devilishly handsome guys to talk over the case.
“Excuse me,” I said firmly. “We’ll be on our way now. Gideon! Wade!”
He watched me.
“Gideon! Wade! Adam! Come out to the hall! We’re leaving!”
Something moved, floorboards creaking.
I whipped around, blazing the light into the face of…
“Wade!”
He threw up a hand to shield his eyes, looking like he’d just woken up. “Ripley?” Voice thick. “What are you doing here?”
“Leaving.” I lowered the light. “Are you okay?” Oh, shit, now I was one of those fools asking such a question to a guy who’d just been mind-controlled by a sadist and his ghostly pals.
“I … yeah?”
Gideon staggered from another doorway behind him, Adam following, claws scraping the wood floor. Gideon scowled around to settle his glare on me. “Where did you go? Couldn’t find you.” He sounded furious. Like I’d left him.
I would have flipped him off if I hadn’t been clutching the light in one hand and holding onto the wall with the other. My knees were shaking uncontrollably.
“Nice to see you too. What were you doing? Scarfing down phantom roadkill? Jerking off? Slaying vampires?”
“Looking for you.” Still angry. “You can’t even bother telling us where you’ll go off to?”
“Whatever. Look—” I turned back, gesturing at the man to tell my friends that he was going to let us go. He wasn’t there. Well, fine. All the better.
Wade also pressed his arm into the wallpaper, forehead on the arm. Suspecting he was going to toss his cookies, I moved away. He only groaned, sounding seasick.
Adam paced over to sniff me up and down, apparently checking who I was.
“We can go,” I said. “We’ll head downstairs and out. But we can’t … you know … run off or get distracted or do anything stupid. Maybe we should hold hands? And if anyone sees something or feels something that makes him think he should stop or go somewhere else or do anything other than calmly walk out of here, just … don’t. Okay?”
They looked blankly at me.
“Okay,” I repeated. “Come on.”
“We’re not done here,” Gideon said. “What about the vampires? And the fox?”
“Screw them.”
“What about getting through the door?” Wade asked.
“Magic, what do you think?”
Adam growled.
I slung the light in the direction he faced. At the opposite end of the hall, only a couple of wolf bounds away, sat the fox at a dead end.
Very upright, tail around paws, big ears pricked toward us, eyes reflecting vivid green as traffic lights in the dark. The bushy tip of his tail twitched.
Adam charged.
“Adam, don’t!”
Gideon followed.
Wade grabbed my arm. “This way?” Ready to go.
The fox vanished into a room with the two shifters right behind.
I hesitated while Wade pulled on my arm.
Crash—a window exploded.
I jumped and ran, Wade beside me.
We dashed into a room empty except for a round wood table in the middle with a vase on it, just as Gideon dived for the fleeing fox. He crashed headlong into us while the fox shot through the doorway and back down the hall. Being crashed into by the likes of Gideon is no small matter—literally. For the second time the three of us ended wrapped up in a sweaty tangle. This time, Gideon was shouting, swearing at the fox. I yelled in pain and surprise as I hit the doorframe and floor. Wade punched Gideon in the face, although I don’t think he meant to—or made much impression. Just one of those tackled and falling involuntary things. Gideon only tried to crawl over us, still convinced that his life would be better if he mashed that fox into a bloody pulp.
I totally understood about vengeance. Obviously.
I totally didn’t understand how he could be so blind.
“Gideon! Quit it!” Phone again dropped, I grabbed a handful of his hair, more or less by accident. “This is obviously not a real fox! So what happens if you do catch it?”
“Where’s Adam?” Wade was trying to look around, shoving at Gideon. “Get off her!”
“He went through the window.” Did I mention that Gideon was still shirtless? And damp? And for some reason that didn’t bother me the way mingling sweat with a stranger should have?
“What?” I gasped as we all twisted and tried to be first to fight to our feet.
Five seconds later we stood, chests heaving, sweat stinging eyes, bodies still pressed hotly together in the doorway, all facing the window. Wade had grabbed my phone and aimed the flashlight at it. The glass had been shattered, almost the entire frame cleared.
“What did he do?” Heart again in my throat, I rushed forward with the others.
“That flea sack was in the window. Seemed like it was going through,” Gideon panted. “Adam jumped.”
“And he went right through the fox, didn’t he? As well as the window?” I ran to look out, avoiding touching the jagged edge.
“Of course he didn’t go ‘through’ a fox. It dodged damn quick, didn’t it?”
“Quick brown fox jumps over the lazy wolf,” Wade muttered.
That was in really poor taste considering our friend might be lying dead out there. I’m sure the only reason I snorted with mirth was the whole panic/hysteria of the situation. And maybe the stupidity. Totally not because it was funny.
“Adam?” At least Gideon seemed to have momentarily forgotten the fox as we all peered into the moonlit night.
We looked over a yard of weeds with the barn, edged in silver light, to our right. An ancient overrun vegetable garden sprawling to the left. In the middle, having crashed through the branches of a plum tree, Adam was picking himself out of the weeds.
Visible by moon and stars, he staggered to his paws and shook himself.
“You know,” Wade said, “it’s not that far down.”
“You’re right.” I swung the daypack off my shoulder, then kicked the lower lip of the window, knocking away the remaining edge of glass. “Okay, help me down first. Then Gideon, you help Wade, and use the strap of the bag last to cover this edge as you lower yourself down. It’ll protect your hands if you’re careful.”
They looked at me and the bag and the window
and down as if I’d said something that didn’t make sense.
“What are you waiting for? Think the house has gone to bed? No, they’re just waiting for another chance to fuck with us.” I shoved the bag at Wade and grabbed Gideon’s hands. “Okay, can you be the rope? And I’ll sort of … repel down a few feet?”
I took a careful look down before starting. Dry shrubs and weeds around the house. I didn’t want to be impaled by a branch, but it seemed an okay place to land overall. Better than landing in a pit of vampires.
I turned my back to the window, holding tight to Gideon. “I’ll just … and you can…” Turned out, tall as I was, I couldn’t step backward onto a window ledge at the height of my own hip. “Uh…”
Gideon grabbed me around the waist and lifted me in the air like a pixie. Seizing his bare shoulders, I drew up both knees to my chest, felt backward, and found the windowsill with my feet. My shoes crunched fragments of glass. My forehead almost hit Gideon’s as I swayed and leaned into him, catching my balance.
Gideon turned his face up, breath on my skin, pulling me more off balance so my head really did hit his. He kissed me, his mouth an oven, yet welcome all the same, salty and sweet and tingling my blood.
“What the hell, man?” Wade snapped. “Can’t take advantage of someone like that. How would it be if the fireman treated your sister that way when he pulled her from a burning building?”
Gideon turned his face a bit, tongue on my lips as I leaned into him—blown away again by the anti-numbing properties of the touch.
Finally I had to pull away. Had to get out of here.
“That’d be her problem, not mine,” Gideon answered, and took my hands.
With him supporting almost all my weight, I backed down the wall, just as if going hand over hand down a rope, only Mr. Atlas was the rope. He bent over the edge, anchored against the wall on the inside, and held on until I really was dangling in open air, like hanging from monkey bars. When the rope ran out, I took a breath, called to Adam to catch me, and let go.
Nothing happened.
“Gideon! Let go!”
“Are you sure? It’s pretty far.”
“Let go of me!” I wriggled.
The next thing I knew I was plunging through open air and … damn, it was pretty far. Then, thunk, onto my feet before rolling across my hip until I ended up doing a spin and a half to end up on my chest in the hot weeds and baked earth.
Adam was at my side. He licked my face.
“All right?” Wade called.
“Ripley?” Even Gideon sounded worried—which made me feel good for some reason.
“Broke my ankle!” I shouted.
“What?”
“Nothing! I’m fine! Come on before something else happens!”
They did. Miraculously, nothing did happen. Wade tossed my phone out for me to catch. Gideon helped him scramble out and jump, then Gideon used the bag like I’d said to protect his hands, lower himself down, and let go, bringing the daypack and Mom’s spirit kit with him.
We raced around the house, past the barn, where the smell of cat food remained strong in stagnant air. The two cars and two motorcycles were as we’d left them.
Gideon said that Adam shouldn’t change again. I guess he couldn’t do it anymore in a certain span of time? I wasn’t exactly sure about the details but didn’t care. I told the wolf to get in, throwing open the back door of the Volvo. He had his clothes in my trunk anyway. We’d come back tomorrow for his motorcycle.
I popped the trunk as well, all of us grabbing bottles of water. I tossed the daypack in there and told them to follow me. They were heading for their vehicles, Adam in my car, when Gideon said, “Look at that,” and we all paused to look up.
The front door stood wide open, black inside beckoning to us.
The three of us stood there, transfixed. We hadn’t … done anything. We had to go back in and clear out the house, take care of business. That was the whole point. Not a midnight ramble and go home.
Had they opened the door to invite us back? Or had they opened the door after I’d said we were leaving and they were prepared to let us go? And we’d had the bad manners to exit via the window?
Adam barked. Not really a bark, but a sharp Roow! sort of sound.
We all jumped and rushed for our respective driver’s seats. I remembered and slammed the trunk, then jumped in, started lights and engine, and got the hell out of hell.
Only trouble now was that I had no idea where I was going.
18
So freaking hungry. When had I been this hungry? Certainly not in the past weeks or months.
I drove to First Chance without thinking. The only late-night gig in town, bar or otherwise, it was that or home. Home meant Mom and Dad’s home. Their things that I’d hardly touched, their memories—while I’d just epically failed the first time I’d set one toe out of doors to follow in their footsteps.
I’d been so certain that after this first cleansing I would feel better, maybe get my curse back, be more at peace. Instead, I felt really, really shitty. And starving.
So I headed for First Chance with Adam scratching at the window behind my head, then gagging, until I took the hint and rolled it down. He stood up all the way, filling the back seats, head out the window.
What if someone saw him? Not that it was likely in Middle of Nowhere, USA, dead of night. But what did you say if you were pulled over with a wolf in the car? Was keeping a wolf legal in Georgia? I’d only been in Atlanta for a couple years—getting work experience, applying for schools—while my parents had settled here. Now I’d been calling Midway City home for about three days, only because it seemed stupid to keep paying rent in the city now that their house was mine and I’d canceled college. I’d canceled everything until I completed my mission for them. I’d never had a reason to look up exotic animal regulations in the area. Maybe you could keep one with a license? Or maybe it was illegal—and I was screwed if someone caught us. Not exactly as if I had a clean record. Or loads of cash lying around to pay fines now that I had a mortgage, along with the sort of work that seldom paid anything.
When I turned onto Jefferson Street, I yelled at Adam to get his head in. He blew me off.
I pushed the button to roll it up.
He yelped, struggled, and managed to jerk his head inside.
“There are people here,” I snapped, gaze on the neon lights ahead. “Either turn back into a man and come inside or wait out here and keep your paws and head inside the vehicle.”
He was thrown into the door as I spotted an empty place and whipped into it.
I cracked all the windows a couple inches and climbed out. Only on my feet did I realize I was shaking, hands jittery, keys rattling, ankles sore and knees weak.
I formed my lips into an O; in, out, breaths down to my belly. Mom did yoga. She’d be all over me, saying how to get my focus back. Dad did the crossword—printed in the newspaper, pen and ink crossword like a grandfather. He’d be all, “What was Captain Kirk’s first name?”
The Harley pulled up beside me as I headed for the door with its bright lights, loud country music, and humming AC. Then Wade’s vintage convertible in a spot farther along.
I opened the front door and peeped along the inside corridor, covered in hundreds of Georgia license plates, to see the bar.
Wade climbed from his car. Helmet off, Gideon was putting on a spare T-shirt out of the saddlebags on his motorcycle.
Dammit, there was Jeff behind the bar. Tyler felt sorry for me—been letting me slide. Not Jeff. Maybe with friends?
Wade walked up and I eased back from the door to meet him outside. “How old are you?”
He gave me a blank stare, then glanced up at the lights, catching on for the first time that we weren’t at an all-night diner.
“Twenty-two. Why? Are you…?”
“Barely off, but the guy in there is an asshole. Maybe with you two along he’ll let us stay. They have the best wings ever. It’s the only good th
ing on the menu besides the beer. If I’m only here for the food…” I looked around as Gideon walked up in a crisp black shirt. “You have ID, don’t you?” Nothing would surprise me of a guy who went around with no phone.
He felt through his pockets, then returned to the bike to search. It took a minute, but yes.
We tried it. Two over twenty-ones—who made everyone in the bar turn and stare—with me; poor little tall girl who’d just lost her parents and needed some wings and a cold lemonade for late-night distraction from grief.
“Come on, Jeff. I’m not here to drink. So what difference—?”
“What’s the sign above the door say, Ripley? Huh? What’s the law say?”
“No one’s going to care. Just for tonight, please. I’m almost twenty-one. It’s close enough.”
“Yeah? I’m ‘almost’ sixty-three. But do I get a senior discount? Hell no. Because I’m not sixty-three.”
“You’re like thirty…”
“No, Ripley. Still no. Get out of here.”
“Will you let us order food to go?”
“The kitchen is closing.”
“Wings? Four orders of Devil Wings. Extra blue cheese. And whatever you guys want.”
I hurried out before saying anything that would jeopardize my chances of wings.
I can’t stand people like that. How could anything get done in the world if everyone waited for permission? I longed to walk back in with Adam at my side—on a chain leash and a spiked collar. Next time Jeff ordered me out I’d know what to say: “Make me.”
Instead, I sat in the driver’s seat with the door wide and fumed, telling Adam about Jeff while Adam panted in the back seat. It was still at least 85ºF in the middle of the night. I could tell he was listening, though. When I told about Jeff always ordering me out, no concern for special circumstances, he growled a little. This was so much better than a dog.
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