Dead Drop

by Carolyn Jewel

  “There’s a comforting thought.”

  He made the turn onto the main road. “I don’t want to owe you any favors. When this is done, I walk away and we never have to see each other again.”

  She waved a hand. “You’ll just make sure I get killed by the end.”

  Palla went dead silent. She couldn’t tell if he was doing anything with his magic, but she could tell he was pissed off. She didn’t need a link with him to know that. If he’d said something like that to her, she’d be righteously pissed. “I’m sorry. That was uncalled for.”

  He took the next right and parked in the first available spot.

  “Now what?”

  He turned off the car. Gold and yellow sparks shot through his eyes, tiny whirlwinds of color. “You think I’d kill you so I don’t have to pay you.” He delivered his judgment in a low voice, and she winced. “Even though I’m not allowed to harm the magekind.”

  “You already tried once.”

  “You know why I did that. Get over it.”

  “No.”

  “Like I’d accidentally on purpose not watch out for you.” His low voice filled the car. “Drive off without you. Let you take a bullet through that soft human heart of yours. Forget to tell you to watch out for the step off the cliff.”

  “Why wouldn’t you when you were willing to be wrong about what would happen that night at Maddy’s?”

  He punched one of the buttons for the interior lights. “I can fix that.”

  “I don’t see how.”

  He grabbed her near arm, and she pushed herself straight on her seat, stomach nothing but a black hole of emptiness. He growled. “Stop it.”

  “What the hell?” Her heart about flew out of her chest. This time he was going to kill her. He would. She yanked on her arm. “Let go, you crazy bastard.”

  His fingers tightened on the back of her elbow, not hard, but not gentle enough for her to break free. “I’m going to make it so have to believe me.”

  “What? No!”

  With his free hand, he slashed the side of a finger at a diagonal just below the crook of her elbow. She didn’t feel anything at first, and by the time it registered that he’d opened a nick in her skin and that she was bleeding, he’d swept a finger through the blood.

  Her skin prickled with some bizarre rolling reaction from head to toe. The world narrowed to just them. “What the hell?”

  “I will protect you with my life, Wallace Jackson.” Slowly, he licked her blood off his finger. The back of her head went cold and then hot because Palla had just made her a promise bound by her blood. Their gazes locked, and she felt the power there, and it scared the hell out of her. He released her arm like the contact was poison to him. He sat back. “Problem solved.”

  “What the hell,” she whispered.

  His eyes flickered with more colors. “In or out of Nikodemus’s territory, now I can’t let you die.”

  “I didn’t mean it. Jesus.” The horror and finality of what he’d just done came home. “No. You can’t do that.”

  “Stop me, how about.”

  “You’re insane if you think I meant any of that. You didn’t have to do that.”

  “You have no say in who I swear to protect.” He curled his fingers into a circle. “Zero.”

  “You can’t go around making oaths like that.”

  Palla smirked. “Angel, it’s too goddamned late.”

  “Well, what if I don’t want you to die for me?”

  “Get off it, Wallace.” He started the car again., “I didn’t do it for you. I did it for her.”

  “Fuck you.”

  “Fuck you back. Twice as fucking hard.”

  CHAPTER 9

  Palla parked in the driveway she pointed to and tried to settle himself. He hadn’t been blood-sworn since before running afoul of Christophe dit Menart. Five hundred plus years later, and he still didn’t like being sworn to a human. His oath to Wallace, so new it felt raw, rasped along his nerves when he took stock of the house and its surroundings.

  Her house wasn’t secure. Not one single ward was set to warn off potential attackers. To his left, a chainlink fence surrounded a yard that was dirt and weeds. There was a window-box, though, with a blooming plant in it. White and pink whatever it was. He didn’t like it. There was no way she’d be safe here, past, present or future.

  “This is your house?”

  “No. I live two streets over. I just want the drug dealers here to shoot you.” She pushed open the car door and got out before he had time to turn off the engine. He did that quick and jumped out.

  “Are you insane?” He cast a wide psychic net. If there were any magekind or free kin here, he wanted to know. He didn’t get anything that made him freak out. A couple of dabblers was all. That didn’t make her safe, though. She needed some level of magic in place to protect her house and there was nothing here. Nothing.

  Wallace stared at him over the top of the car. “If you ask me if it’s safe to park here, you can just please go away.”

  He patted the roof. “I’m sure your drug dealer neighbors will take good care of it.”

  “They’re not drug dealers.”

  He made sure his expression didn’t change. “Aren’t you all drug dealers here?”

  “Go away.”

  “You’re the one who brought up drug dealers, not me.”

  “How long has your irony detector been broken?”

  “Half a century at least.” Fine with him if he ended up waiting outside. He could set some wards and get the place at least minimally secure. Maybe he should have Kynan come by, too. Kynan could make sure the house was as safe as possible. “I’m happy to wait here and protect my car while you pack your things.”

  “Pack my things.” She frowned. “What for?”

  That gave him a jolt, that she hadn’t figured out that she wasn’t going to be staying here. With humans, words changed with context, with expressions, with inflection. He hoped he hadn’t mistaken her words and bound himself to her for nothing. “Did you mean what you said, or was that all hot air, and I have to find out if Nikodemus can break my bond to you?”

  “I meant what I said.” A light went on in the house next door and she sighed. “Come inside so we can get clear without everyone listening to my business.”

  He followed her in. For a house that wasn’t very big and could have used an exterior paint job, it was not a broken down dump. Her landlord wasn’t a deadbeat. The inside was in good shape, and the floors were high-quality hardwood. While she put down her purse and locked the door, he made a quick ward over one of the windows. In the process of forming the medallion from the substructure of the window casement, in this case a combination of metal, plastic, and wood, he added two of the nasty tricks Kynan used with his wards. That ought to give an intruder pause.

  “Have a seat.” She pointed to a bright blue sofa. “Can I get you something to drink? I have water and cheap beer, your pick.”

  Palla looked around, appalled. “This is a girly place.”

  “I am a girl, in case you didn’t notice.” She smiled hard enough for him to wonder if she meant something else besides being in a good mood. “Beer or water?”

  “Nothing.” Everywhere he looked there was a picture, statuette, or object to provide a splash of color. Lots of pink and yellow and green. Bright colors.

  “I’ll be right back.”

  “Sure.”

  While she was off doing whatever, he went to the front door and each of the widows in turn and set protective wards. There wasn’t time to do a proper job, but it was enough that he’d have some warning if magehelds tried to get in. He wouldn’t know they were here until it was too late, so he needed something that would slow them down. If it came to that.

  By the time she returned, he was slouched on a chair that was actually comfortable. He threw the green-and-orange pillows on the couch and stayed slouched. “Hey.”

  “Hey.” She’d changed into a pair of faded jeans, a gold
shirt with blue flowers, and yellow socks that reminded him of that bikini he’d seen her wearing. She sat on the couch and pulled a girly pink pillow onto her lap. Her fingers smoothed one of the tassels on the pillow. Anxiety, maybe? He wasn’t sure.

  He limited his private interactions with humans to highly recreational, non-procreative sex. Beyond that paid as little attention to his human partners as possible. Even with his general fucked-up-ness and the fact that he wasn’t good with humans, he got that Wallace didn’t have to help him. She wasn’t sworn to Nikodemus, with all that an oath would mean about where her loyalties would be. She wasn’t a full-on witch. Other than what she’d learned from her work with Maddy, she a was complete newbie to the world he lived in. She’d said herself that a year ago, she’d hadn’t even known demons existed. She had no blood ties to him. Fact was, she owed him nothing. “Thank you.”

  “Sure.” There was no mistaking her skepticism.

  “I mean it.” The words weren’t as hard to give up as he’d thought and once he’d said them, he realized he meant them. “You have no duty to help me. I know that. So, thank you.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  He leaned forward, forearms on his thighs. He needed this to work, what they were going to do. When he looked at her straight on, he did his best to modulate his words so he didn’t sound pissed off or impatient. Maddy had explained to him several times that humans generally didn’t like that. Wallace, being human and all, wouldn’t like that. “Now you have to commit.”

  “I meant what I said about helping.”

  “I know you did. And I meant what I said about you quitting your job.” He sat straight.

  “Just like that.”

  Palla let out a breath and tried to remember some of Maddy’s advice about dealing with humans. Like most blood-twins, he and Avitas hadn’t interacted much with them. “Help me out here. I don’t know what you mean.” He got to his feet. He owed her. “Five hundred years. My life wasn’t my own. I’m free now, but half of me is still gone. Gone.” Wallace’s eyes were on him, big and wide. “She’s suffering. Dying. In agony every second. And there was nothing I could do about it for five hundred fucking years.” He pushed away the madness that constantly threatened him and focused on her. “I don’t understand humans without a link. You sit there with expressions on your face and you say words and half the time I’m guessing what any of it means. So tell me. Tell what you mean. Or give me a link so I know.”

  Both her hands gripped the pillow. Looked to him like she was trying to kill it. “Fair enough. Quitting my job is a big deal. It’s like jumping out of a plane with no parachute.”

  Palla studied her. Anxiety, maybe. He understood money and that Wallace didn’t have much. “Two million is a damn nice parachute.”

  “It’s not that. It’s the change. Everything’s different and I don’t know—Look. This scares me. Not knowing what tomorrow’s going to be like.”

  “You’ll be two million richer, that’s what your tomorrow will be like. Wallace. Wallace, pay attention.” He ignored the face she made at him. “No matter what, I won’t let anything happen to you. I can’t. But this will be safer for us both if you do what I say, when I say it. You need to trust me.”

  “You seem to be under the impression that I don’t understand it’s dangerous. That I won’t take this seriously.”

  “My guess is you don’t.”

  She was radiating calm again, and that made him wary. “You’re talking about going into the home of a powerful witch and taking something from her that she doesn’t want to give up. Right?”

  He gave a curt nod.

  “I assume she has magehelds to keep things like that from happening.”

  “Yeah.” He hadn’t ever needed to be square with a human. He’d never cared about anything with them besides not breaking the rules. This business with Wallace was different. They weren’t negotiating the boundaries of what they’d do in bed and who got to use magic when.

  She sighed. “Let’s agree I might not know the details, but that I get that it won’t be easy or safe.”

  “I don’t want any misunderstandings.”

  “Agreed.”

  “Help me out here. I need the words you use with me to be clear.” He clasped his hands over his head and looked for some internal calm. There wasn’t any. There rarely was. “I need you to understand and accept the risks. I need you to tell me if you don’t understand. Tell me what you think I’m saying to you.”

  “Okay. You be as clear as you feel you need to be, and I’ll listen and let you know.”

  He went over what he’d already told her before he went into more detail. The risks of going into the home of a hostile witch in an area where Nikodemus’s rules weren’t in force. That once they found Avitas, Wallace would have to dead drop the talisman and then get the hell out. She repeated that and some of what she’d said before, and the best he could figure was if he was alive after all this and Nikodemus wanted an explanation, at least he couldn’t be accused of not trying.

  “You have to get the talisman to Nikodemus. He’ll free her.” The correct word was assimilate but he saw no reason for that disclosure. Nikodemus or maybe one of the other warlords sworn to him would crack the talisman and assimilate with what was left of Avitas, meaning absorb what remained of her life and in so doing give her peace. The process was by no means safe, but the kin considered an assimilation a sacred duty. An honor. Nikodemus, whose strength was multiplied by the thousands of kin sworn to him, would do everything possible to see that Avitas found peace. “You give Avitas to Nikodemus. The talisman. You give him the talisman, and then you’re done.”

  Her forehead creased, and she leaned forward. “You think you aren’t coming back.”

  No way did she care what happened to him. Why would she? “Understand this. Please. I will die to save her. I will die to save you.”

  “That’s not your only plan, right? To die. It better not be.”

  “No, it’s not.” This had to be as straightforward as possible. When, if, they came to a final yes, he wanted to be sure she said the word without ambiguity. If he had to lie to do that, no problem.

  “Just making sure.”

  Since she seemed to think it mattered, he sketched out the basics of a plan where they both lived. “You can do this. I know you can. I’ve watched you settle people down without them knowing what you’re doing. Dead dropping me. What you did tonight—the way your magic works—” He looked her straight in the eye, as honest as he knew how to be with words. “You’re the difference between me dying without saving her and one of us getting out alive with the talisman.”

  She clenched her hands on her lap. Tense as hell, even he could figure that out. “Okay, then.”

  “Whatever I say is necessary to make this come off, you’ll do that?”

  She licked her lips. “I can’t promise that.”

  “Explain.” He had to know they were agreeing to the same thing. He paced the tiny living room. He needed parameters. Boundaries.

  “I won’t kill anyone. I won’t try to kill anyone, either. I can’t.”

  He stopped walking. There weren’t enough wards here. Not by half. “Angel, sometimes it’s kill or be killed. Simple as that.”

  “If you believe violence is an option, killing always looks like a solution.”

  “It is a solution.”

  “Maybe it is for you. But not for me.”

  He rubbed a hand across his face. “Doesn’t matter.”

  “It does.”

  “I can do all the killing we need.”

  “I don’t approve.”

  He gave her a hard look. “I don’t need your approval.”

  “As long as you’re clear that isn’t an option for me.”

  “Your whole deal is making sure no one gets angry enough to want to off someone. I guess you better make sure you can do that.” A smile pulled at his mouth. He couldn’t help himself. “But, Wallace, get serious. I already know you
’re no killer.”

  “All right, then.”

  “Use your words, Wallace. You know the one I need.”

  CHAPTER 10

  One word. That’s all it took to change her life forever. When she’d gotten up this morning, she hadn’t thought for a second her day would end like this, with Palla in her living room, a malign presence who had, nevertheless, sworn to protect her life with his. While she tried to fit this into a comfortable box, Palla took out his phone and made a call. Whoever he was calling answered.

  “C’est moi,” he said, perfectly comfortable in the language. “Oui.”

  Her language in high school and college had been Spanish. Obviously fluent, he spoke too fast for her to do more than guess at what he was saying. In the middle of his conversation, he speared her with a look.

  “Social?”

  “What?”

  “Your social. So I can get the money transferred where you can get to it.”

  Since she didn’t have any money to steal, she gave him the number. He repeated the digits in French. There was more rapid conversation from him with a few silences punctuated by words like alors, oui or other words she didn’t understand. “What’s your cell?” She gave that to him, too. He texted that to whoever he was talking to and there was more discussion, and then he disconnected his call. “My guy in Geneva will text you his contact info. By tomorrow he’ll have everything taken care of.”

  Across the room, her cell phone beeped.

  “Take care of what?”

  “The money. You have bill pay, right?”

  “Yes.” The back of her skull kept tingling. She’d wondered if his oath to her was the reason she could feel his magic when before she couldn’t. Now, she was certain of it. Whenever the flecks of color in his eyes showed up, she got that shiver of cold through her head and down her back.

  “Follow his instructions for getting him your account info, and he’ll make sure your bills are paid while you’re busy with me. He’s not going to rip you off, but if he does, I’ll make it good. If I’m not around to do that, then tell Nikodemus, and he’ll make it good.” He tapped his phone some more. “Here’s the contact info to reach Nikodemus. Call or just go right to his house. Whatever works.”