by Ilana Waters
God, this was hard. I hoped Reaper thought the perspiration pouring down my face was from fear, same as Jimmy’s. Fire, earth, air . . . I needed three kinds of magic to work this spell, and none of them were going easy on me. Every muscle in my body felt like it was seized up, but I couldn’t let it show. I had to make Reaper believe there was nothing unusual going on.
“Of course they have it coming!” Reaper snapped. His body shook with the force of his words. He pressed the sword closer to Beverly’s throat, where it made a small cut that drew blood. Beverly inhaled sharply, and Jimmy stared up at her, wide-eyed with terror. He stood just below the shelf now, arms out in front of him as if this would freeze Reaper and prevent the unthinkable.
“They deserve to die,” he shouted. “Just like the old one they’re working for. He killed my master—my true father!”
“Ah, so you do care about something.” My voice grew heavier as I worked to complete the spell. Fire, earth, air . . . you all know each other. You are all part of the same great magic. I need you to come together, to work in cycles like you always have . . . Now the pain in my head was excruciating.
“You know,” I continued, “it’s a natural response to grow bitter and cynical when one’s heart breaks.” The last word nearly came out in a gasp as I tried to disguise how out of breath I was. “It’s hard work to remain hopeful, to have compassion.” Jimmy, step away from the shelf, I said.
What? Why? He seemed immobilized by his fear for Beverly.
Just do it! I yelled in my thoughts. He complied.
“Unfortunately,” I called out to Reaper, “in my book, you don’t get credit for what comes naturally. You get credit when you work your ass off.” The ignition on the Ford coughed, sputtered, and finally turned on. All the vampires turned their heads toward it in disbelief.
“And I work my ass off at magic.”
The car’s headlamps sprang to life like two enormous floodlights, which I bent and aimed right at Reaper’s sensitive vampire eyes. He howled in surprise, and his grip on Beverly loosened enough for her to leap away. Lifting both arms above my head, I saw the Ford rise from the sea of cars. My entire body felt like lead from the effort, but with all the strength I had left, I hurled the car at Reaper.
The impact of the Ford going through Reaper and hitting the wall was more than I bargained for. It started sending the shelf and its contents crashing down. Dear reader, I cannot even begin to describe the noise. The sound of the metal and glass from all those cars and trucks hitting the floor . . . suffice it to say, my ears are still ringing.
The statue flew out of Reaper’s hand and also began falling. The tractor trailer on the shelf below made a giant moaning sound, the way large pieces of metal do when they’re moving. It started coming down as well—with Beverly directly beneath it.
“BEVERLY!” screamed Jimmy. With vampire speed, he flew at her, sending them both tumbling into a corner just as the trailer hit the ground, only inches away. The statue was still falling, about to be shattered on the cement below. With Jimmy lying on top of Beverly, her hand shot out at the last second and caught the tiny green monkey. She opened her palm. The statue was intact.
“YES!” I shouted, throwing my fists in the air. Jimmy pulled Beverly to her feet and wrapped her in his arms. His hat was completely dented on one side, but otherwise, he and Beverly were unharmed.
Looking directly up, we could see Reaper’s legs dangling from below the Ford. It hissed and sputtered, curls of smoke rising from the front. Reaper’s eyes were even wider than when I’d run him through with the pole. His throat made a gurgling sound as he tried to speak, but only short puffs of air came out. Finally, he closed his eyes, his arms and sword spread before him, and lay unmoving on the hood of the car.
The other half of his body fell with a thud to the floor.
We stood together, dazed, as dust from the crash rose, then fell again. Somewhere in the background was the ringing sound of a hubcap clattering to the ground. We were all silent for a few moments, almost unable to comprehend it all. But the silence was broken when Beverly’s face scrunched into a frown, and she hit Jimmy hard in the arm.
“Ow!” he cried. “What was that for?”
“I told you to leave!”
“You’re out of your mind,” Jimmy said. “I wasn’t about to go anywhere.”
“Well, that’s quite a change from the last time,” said Beverly, her eyes flashing.
“The last time . . . which you begged me to forget about only a few minutes ago, when you were up there with him.” Jimmy folded his arms. “And I told you before: I was always going to come back for you.”
“But what if you hadn’t?” Beverly’s eyes brimmed with tears. “What if I never saw you again? I could have died in that horrible place, with those horrible men.”
“Over my dead body.” Jimmy’s voice was thick with emotion. “No matter how rough it gets, Bev, we’ll always be together.”
“Jimmy, Jimmy . . .” Her words were drowned out as they came together again, kissing furiously. I waited for a few minutes.
“Ahem,” I coughed. They ignored me and continued kissing.
“A-hem,” I coughed again, louder. Still nothing. “Uh, you’re both very welcome.” I raised a finger in the air and tried to make eye contact. “That wasn’t incredibly difficult or painful or life-threatening or anything.” They continued kissing as if it were the end of the world.
“Never mind me,” I finally said, looking away. “I’ll just stand here awkwardly.”
And for a while, I did.
Chapter 7
You can imagine the state we were in when we arrived back at the abandoned office, where Barrington was still asleep in his chair, snoring peacefully. We were bruised and scratched, our clothing torn and dirty. Beverly’s stockings were in shreds; her dress still had Carly’s blood all over it. Clearly, she couldn’t walk into the Drake looking like that. But her purse contained a dress folded into tinier pieces than I could have imagined, along with fresh stockings. She quickly changed while I faced the wall.
We were all in various states of exhaustion. Mine was from using all that magic. I was only sorry my nearest and dearest weren’t here to see tonight’s exploits. But I could always regale them with tales later.
The ache in my head had subsided somewhat. Now, it was just throbbing mildly. Otherwise, I was so sore, it felt like someone had beaten me with a bag of bricks. And I knew from past experience that it would only get worse before it got better. So much for my vacation. It looked like I’d have to spend the majority of it recuperating.
In addition to changing her clothes, Beverly was now standing under the office’s one dim lightbulb, trying to freshen up. She’d put her gloves and hat back on, and was using a compact mirror to reapply her lipstick.
“Oh, for pity’s sake.” She closed the compact with a snap. “This is pointless. I look awful.”
“You look beautiful,” said Jimmy, without a trace of irony.
Beverly rolled her eyes at him. “Here I am, rouging my lips when the rest of my makeup’s a mess, and I’ve got this shiner starting.” Indeed, there was the beginning of a large bruise under her eye where Reaper hit her with the statue.
“Must’ve been one hell of a hit to do that to a vampire,” I said.
Beverly smiled. “Luckily, I’m one tough broad. Oh, well,” she sighed. “It’ll be better in no time.”
“Yes, it would be nice to have a vampire’s healing powers right about now,” I said with a wince. Witches have similar restorative abilities, but mages don’t mend quite as fast. Well, faster than mortals, but still too slowly for my liking.
“I really must apologize for what we put you through tonight,” Beverly said over her shoulder. She was making a futile attempt to brush back Jimmy’s disheveled hair and straighten his smashed hat. “You know, the whole, ah . . .”
“Kidnapping, chloroforming, tying up, and dragging into a situation that, in your own words, meant ‘cer
tain death?’ ” I prompted.
“Er, yes.” Beverly turned around and cast her eyes down. “That.”
“Don’t forget hitting me in the face the last time we were here,” I said. On a related note, there was a bruise similar to Beverly’s forming beneath my eye.
“We really are sorry,” said Jimmy. “It was just desperation. We didn’t know what else to do.”
“Oh, I don’t know.” I smiled. “You could have used a cattle prod.” Beverly and Jimmy opened their mouths to protest. I held up my hand.
“Only joking. Though I would rather like to see that statue we went through all this trouble for.”
“I don’t know . . .” Beverly furrowed her brow.
“Oh, come on, Bev. It’ll be fine,” said Jimmy.
“I promise I’ll be gentle,” I said.
Reluctantly, Beverly removed the statue from inside the front of her dress and passed it to me. Now that I held it in my hand, the concept of a jade monkey didn’t seem so silly. The stone felt cool and smooth against my fingers. It was rather beautiful, actually. The tiny creature stared back at me with rounded eyebrows, as if surprised we’d pulled the whole thing off. I passed it back to Beverly, who quickly returned it to her dress.
“Nice.” I nodded. “Too bad it isn’t magic.”
“Speaking of magic,” Jimmy said, looping his thumbs through his suspenders. “How’d you do that thing with the car?”
“Well,” I said, starting to count on my fingers, “earth magic was needed for the metal, both to move the car and get the gears working. Fire power to start the ignition, which made the lights go on. And a combination of air and earth magic to throw the damn thing against the wall.”
“I hate to say it, but I’m glad Reaper and Carly’s bodies burned so easily.” Beverly pushed the bottom of her hair up to plump it. “I was so intent on getting the statue, I never thought what would happen if we succeeded. Like having to cover certain things up.”
“Yeah, but it was hell trying to get that Model T down.” Jimmy rubbed the back of his shoulder with one hand.
“You’re telling me,” I said. “You only had to use muscles. I had to use my body and magic to help wrench that thing out.”
“Well, we couldn’t have mortals stumbling onto such a scene,” Beverly said. “They would’ve had a hell of a time explaining a vampire tacked to the wall with a Ford pushpin. It’s bad enough we made a mess of the factory. I hope to God humans never figure out what happened there. It could expose us all.”
“I wouldn’t worry too much about it,” said Jimmy. “I’m pretty sure no one’s been in the place for years, except for Reaper and his gang.”
“Yes, so, now that they’ve been defeated and you have your little monkey,” I said, rubbing my hands together, “I believe it’s time to release my friend.” I jutted my chin at Barrington.
Beverly and Jimmy looked at one another. “Actually . . .” Beverly said.
“I don’t know if we can do that, Mac,” said Jimmy.
My jaw almost hit the floor. “What? Of course you can. That was our agreement.”
“It’s not that we want to, it’s just . . .” Beverly bit her lip. “He’s seen too much.”
“He knows what we are,” Jimmy said.
I held up a finger. “I think I can help with that. Hey, Barry—Barry!” I walked over to his chair and began patting his cheek, but not too gently.
“Mmm? Hmph? Where am I?” Barrington’s voice was scratchy from sleeping. He blinked and shook his head as he tried to sit up. “Hey, it’s you! Kidnapped . . . suing . . . call . . . lawyers. Wait, why can’t I move?”
“Because you’re tied up.” I leaned over him. “But don’t worry. It’s just a dream.”
“It . . . it is?” Barrington’s voice filled with drowsiness again.
“Of course it is. In fact, everything that happened after you showed up at the gallery was a dream.” I stared hard into his reddened eyes. “You did that line of coke with the janitor in the bathroom, remember? Then you got all out of sorts, and someone put you in a cab home. Right?”
I sent waves of magic through Barrington’s mind, filling in the missing pieces of the evening with something that seemed plausible. His eyes glazed over as the spell took hold of him.
“Riiight,” he said slowly. “The janitor. And that really weird dream.”
“Exactly.” I stood up and brushed my lapels. “Now I’m going to untie you, and you’ll just follow us outside till we can get you a cab.”
“Follow you outside. Terrific.” Barrington stared off into the distance while I removed the ropes around him. Except for a few bruises and scratches on his wrists, he was unhurt. When I was through, I turned to Beverly and Jimmy.
“See? Nothing to worry about.”
“Fascinating.” Beverly shook her head and stared at Barrington. “You’ll have to teach us that trick one day.”
“It’s simple, really,” I said. “Vampires can do it, too. I’m surprised you didn’t know.”
We left the building together, with me steering the hypnotized Barrington. After walking a few blocks to a better neighborhood, we stopped and stood on a corner.
“Now, before we part ways,” I said, “I think you should both admit that you were pursuing this quest for stolen goods so that you could spend more time together.”
“What?” Beverly said at the same Jimmy went, “That’s crazy!”
“Don’t try to deny it. I don’t believe for a minute that you spent thirty years together—after swearing off each other—just to look for a tiny green monkey. You’re both intelligent. Surely you could have worked out a plan to get information from Reaper. Or you could have hired mortals with their newfangled technology and daywalking to find the statue for you. You deliberately dragged this out so you could be with one another while avoiding any talk of that night for almost one hundred years.”
Beverly shook her head vigorously. “That is ridicu—”
“Maybe you didn’t realize you were doing it,” I continued, “but the fact remains that you did do it.”
Beverly closed her mouth and pursed her lips. Jimmy’s eyes roamed all over, trying not to meet anyone’s gaze.
“I know it’s not my place to say this,” I said, “but the problem with having eternal life is that you begin to think it really is eternal. But as you saw tonight, immortality doesn’t equal invulnerability. You can lose each other as easily as any pair of mortal lovers. Only the means have changed. Now that you’re officially ‘back on,’ may I kindly suggest you enjoy the hell out of every minute you’ve got left?”
Jimmy looked at Beverly, who sighed in a resigned sort of way. They both smiled, and he put one arm around her and held her close.
“I think we can do that,” he said.
“Grand!” I said. Then I looked up at the sky. “Well, it’s nearly dawn. Think you have enough time to see Barrington back to his hotel before you drop the monkey off at the Drake? I’d see him back myself, but there’s something important I must take care of.”
“I guess it’s the least we can do,” said Jimmy, and I gave him Barrington’s hotel address from my cell phone.
“How do you know we won’t eat him on the way?” Beverly said, but her eyes were teasing.
I gave her a stern look. “Down, girl.”
“Well, nice meeting you, Joshua.” Jimmy gave me a firm handshake. Beverly hugged me and pressed her cool lips to my cheek.
“Yes, lovely meeting you both,” I agreed. “And I hope never, never to do so under the same circumstances again.”
“Same here,” said Jimmy.
“Although I trust you’ll invite me to the wedding,” I added.
“Vampires getting married?” Beverly grinned and rolled her eyes. “Kind of a mortal thing to do, don’t you think?”
“Oh, I don’t know.” A strong Chicago wind had picked up, and I pulled my jacket closed. “You were engaged once. Besides, stranger things have happened.” Several exam
ples sprang to mind, including tonight’s events.
“We’ll see,” Beverly said, linking arms with Jimmy.
“Sorry we ruined your evening.” Jimmy indicated the dazed Barrington, then grabbed his shoulder to prevent him from wandering into traffic.
“That’s all right,” I said. “Who needs one-night stands when you can be forced into life-or-death battles with vampires?”
Jimmy spotted a cab and flagged it down. The cab drove up to the curb and screeched to a halt. Beverly was the last one to climb inside.
“Good-bye, Joshua,” she said with a smile. “And thank you.”
“Good-bye, Beverly.” I smiled back as I closed the door for her. I watched them until I couldn’t see the cab anymore. Then I turned around and started walking in the opposite direction, but not before heaving a great sigh.
It was just as well the evening ended in a loss. Barrington wasn’t really my type anyway. Handsome, yes, but arrogant, entitled. Not the sort of companion I usually indulge in. And he threatened to throw me to a pack of rabid lawyers after I’d saved his life. Very ungrateful, if you ask me.
Now, it was time to do what I’d been putting off for so long. I hope you won’t judge me, or think me a coward for not doing it sooner. But I figured that if Beverly and Jimmy could make a go of it after nearly a century, then I really had no excuse.
It was time to call Colleen.
THE END
Or maybe not . . .
Epilogue
As Joshua walked back to his hotel in the predawn light of Chicago, he retrieved his cell phone from his pocket and dialed a number. He took deep breaths as it rang, only to nearly jump with relief when voice mail picked up.
“Hi, Colleen. It’s me, Joshua. Look, I know it’s been a long time since we’ve talked, but I was thinking that maybe—”
He never got the chance to finish. A large, beefy hand grabbed his arm, pulling him into an alleyway. A white-hot, excruciating pain shot through one side of his back, about kidney-level. He didn’t even have time to cry out. His eyes just squeezed shut as his face twisted in agony.
