by A. J. Aalto
“Is it the pain that makes it fun?” Batten lowered his voice. “Was this my fault?”
“Sure. I was too distracted to walk, daydreaming about all the sweet things you do for me. Oh, wait.” I gave him my Sarcastic Eye Roll, the Extended Version.
“I meant—”
“I can read a text without keeling over. I can even do it while walking.”
“Can you?” he challenged, watching me hobble.
“Hey, do me a favor: shut the fuck up.”
“And you do me a favor: don't hit Agent Golden again. She's already reported you to me and I don't want to hear it.”
“What the? I didn't hit her. For fuck's sake, it was a tap.” I heard it, and it sounded lame even to me. “I won't come anywhere near her, ever. Done.” Then I remembered: “Crap. The Kawasaki.”
Batten's face went through a range of emotions as though he were trying to figure out if I was firing on all cylinders. “Is that why you're wet?”
“The rain,” I said emphatically, “is the only reason I'm wet.”
“You drove Harry's motorcycle,” he clarified, “in the worst thunderstorm of the season.” He paused to plant his hands on his hips in exasperation. “Along some of the worst roads in Colorado?”
“They're not that bad.” I only almost-died twice.
“Got a license?”
“Well, wouldn't I need one?”
Annoyance brewed along his jaw line. “Do you even know how to ride a motorcycle?”
“Could I have driven it if I didn't?” I demanded hotly.
He exhaled hard, as if that could expel his frustration. “I'll bring the bike back to the cabin after I wrap up here.”
I wondered if I was only imagining the hint of carnal promise in his voice; being pissed-off and being aroused should be two entirely separate things if you're sane, but irritation seemed an aphrodisiac for Batten. Or maybe I always imagined carnal promise in Batten's comments. It was bad enough that I was already picturing him astride the powerful motorcycle, taking control of it, riding it hard. I bit my bottom lip hard to keep from saying something stupid and nodded in my most professional way.
He looked me over again and shrugged out of his nylon jacket, tossing its body-warmed weight in the direction of my chest. His irritation made him sloppy, and I had to snatch at it as it flapped aside
“We'll take care of the monsters, Baranuik. You just try to make it through the parking lot without killing yourself. And cover up; the office doesn't need your light show.”
Dr. Edgar was watching the two of us with interest, as though he'd discovered a complicated knot which had to be teased out into orderly filaments for closer examination. Choosing not to touch his staff, I snatched the umbrella from Declan's arm, flushing away the frustrated lust in my veins by focusing on how much Jerkface Batten irritated me. That was easy. The fact that I was thinking in terms like teased, touching his staff, snatched, flushing, and frustrated told me all I needed to know about how well that bit of self-delusion was working.
I drew in my breath, summoned a scathing retort, and then let it simmer unsaid. Bottling up this sort of bitter tonic was not in my nature; it was bound to come out somewhere else. I hoped my pillow didn't disintegrate under the acidic torrent of foul language later. “Helmet's in my office. Don't crash. Harry would be miffed if your death scratched his bike. He might kill you for taking another of his toys for a joy-ride anyway.” Oh, jeez, I really need to get my mind out of his gutter. Or his head in mine. Fuck.
Defiantly popping my chin up, I used the umbrella as a crutch and propelled myself out the front doors and past the smirking junior agent at the front desk.
“Now you'll remember me, right?” I fired at him over my shoulder.
The junior agent gave me a casual salute, still grinning.
When my new assistant paused by a car in the back lot, swinging his keys on his forefinger, I found a reason to dislike him just a little more. Declan Edgar, that lucky jerk, drove a rented Buick.
CHAPTER 13
THE TRIP BETWEEN BOULDER and Ten Springs was mostly trees and jutting red rocks. Since Declan drove like someone's grandmother (not mine, because according to Harry, Grandma Vi had been a leadfoot) I had plenty of time to admire the scenery and inspect his “new to him” wheels. I laid my damp gloves across the dash to dry and curled my bare hands together in my lap, careful not to touch anything.
The Buick may have reminded me of myself, but it smelled like him. There was cologne that I didn't recognize, something heavy on the musk that was altogether wonderful; even though I was still determined to dislike him, I had to admit he smelled pretty good. In my experience, that meant he was single. There was cinnamon chewing gum in the console, the smell of which the sweltering summer heat had spread throughout the car. There was no extraneous travel garbage, but there should have been, I thought. Where were the fast food wrappers, or the extra pair of shoes, or the pens? Where was the old drive-through coffee cup? When I glanced in the back seat, I saw a small hard-sided cooler and a brown leather doctor's bag, which was kind of cool. I needed to know what was in it. There was a shopping bag on the floor behind the driver's seat from a local wilderness outfitter. The box peering out from it proclaimed a pair of size eight hiking boots. Outside, it had finally stopped raining, but the forest still dripped, pressing in against the road. The tree branches encroached closer to the right of way as we passed Ten Springs, until they were avidly reaching for the car with every wet branch, twig and flittering leaf.
“So, was your flight okay?” I asked, trying for some small talk.
He shook his head. “I never fly, Dr. Buzz. I come by sea.” He smiled, privy to a secret. “All the best by sea and sail.”
“You think you're better suited to this job than I am?” I challenged, looking at the side of his face. He was clean-shaven. I could find no pimple or skin tag or hairy mole. He wasn't particularly handsome, but even plain-faced, he was without flaw. Any small blemish, at this point, would have given me a faint hope that he wasn't perfect.
He shrugged. “I'm only here to assist you and write my report.”
I folded my arms and stared across the dash at the GPS. Batten had told him where I lived, and he'd input my home address from memory, without having to double check with me. One problem: my road wasn't on GPS, it was small and insignificant. Declan didn't look worried about it; he seemed confident he'd find it. I didn't like that one bit.
“What exactly makes you better?”
“I never said I was better,” he said.
“You didn't say it, but you think it,” I retorted.
He had the grace not to deny that. “I've had extensive training with Scotland Yard and the OSRA. I've got PhDs in both preternatural biology and paranormal psychology, and a Master's degree in preternatural anthropology, which is where my interest in the Dreppenstedt history comes into play. Besides English, I speak four languages fluently. Throughout the United Kingdom,” he pointed out, “I have no peer.”
I felt my eyebrows touch my hairline. “If you're so special, why come be my assistant? Why not head up a lab yourself, somewhere in the UK where you ‘have no peer’?”
A twitch, just around the corner of his eye. A sensitive subject. He summoned his calm demeanor, and damned if it didn't return at his beck and call. How'd he do that? When I got upset, I wanted to deck people.
“Can I let you in on a little secret, Dr. B?” he said, glancing sidelong.
“As long as you know I can't keep a secret to save my life.”
“We have something in common,” he confided. “I have the irresistible urge to punch everyone I meet, too.”
My lips worked away the reluctant smile that wriggled in them. “You don't show it.”
“I have had the need to master my emotions, and master them I have.”
“Well, aren't you special.”
“Maybe I am. Maybe this special man can help you in your work. Is that so hard to believe? Maybe we can help each
other.”
“Doubt it.”
“Try me,” he countered easily.
I thought about my ever-lengthening To Do list. Had I left myself time for something like “hide smug assistant's body”? I decided to change fronts. “What can you tell me about Waterloo teeth?”
“After the battle of Waterloo, tooth hunters would take the teeth of corpses on the battlefield to sell to dentists for use in dentures; the hunters often didn't wait for the injured soldiers to expire, and would pry out the teeth as the men lay dying. Next?”
“Can you turn back time to two minutes ago and not tell me about Waterloo teeth?”
“That, I can't do. Next?”
“Can you break a witch-walking spell with a paintball gun?”
His brow creased. “Why wouldn't I break it with ashes of pickled toad livers on heated slate?”
I didn't have an answer for that. I had no idea you could break witch-walking with toad livers. Until last December, when I was the victim of the incredible invisible psycho-geezer, I didn't know witch-walking existed; I still knew bupkis about it, but I wasn't about to broadcast that fact.
Except, judging by the light in his eerie Lime Jell-O eyes, I just had. He was one of those people who missed nothing. Oh, lucky me.
“Oh yeah? Well, can you roundhouse kick the head off a rapidly-charging Type R zombie?” I quizzed.
“That's a trick question.” He smiled over at me as though he were starting to enjoy himself, then returned his attention to the road as it curved into a mountain pass. “There are no rapidly-charging Type R zombies. Next?”
The lights inside the pass blazed across the darkened hood, lighting his face in flashes. For a moment, my eyes played tricks on me, and his visage seemed to change shape and size, jerking up and down in his seat. The road was smooth, but his face looked as if it were bouncing. I squeezed my eyes shut against the nauseating sight.
“Could you cure a black witch's wart?” I asked.
“Of course.”
“Good. Depending on what methods I use to get rid of you, I might need a good wart remover.”
His smile broadened. “And if I wanted to get rid of you, I'd just whisper our victim's name until you bust a gut in front of SSA Chapel.”
“I didn't laugh at his name!” I objected.
“You wanted to.”
I scrunched down in my seat, crossing my arms over my chest. “I could chant his name all day long and be just fine.”
“Say it one time,” he challenged. “Just once.”
Cosmo Winkle! Cosmo Winkle! “I don't feel like it,” I said, pressing my lips together hard and recalling his disemboweled corpse. “And this is very disrespectful, considering.”
“Okay, Dr. Buzz, you're right, I'm sorry,” he allowed. “So, who's watching Lord Dreppenstedt this morning, if you don't mind me asking?”
“I called The Organization. They sent someone.”
He smiled anew. “You do know it's peopled with spies for the immortal monarchy, and even for the Overlord himself?”
“Of course I know about the spies. Everyone knows about the spies. I'm not a complete idiot,” I retorted. I am a complete idiot. “And, for your information, you might be without peer in your little country, but here in North America, I'm the shit.”
“Ah yes, the, what was it? ‘Great White Shark of Psychic Inves-tigations’ and renowned media darling?” His smile dialed up a notch; the competition already knew way too much about me. I slouched further in the passenger seat, glaring out the side window and watching the trees speed by in a dark green blur.
“Can't believe you only know five languages,” I muttered.
He laughed, a rush of sweet warmth that wrapped me up in caramel sauce and dunked my whole face in maple syrup. He whispered, “Who bloody well names their kid Cosmo Winkle?”
“Don't!” I gasped, helpless to smother the laugh that burbled up. I swatted him in the arm repeatedly. “Not funny!”
I really didn't want to like this guy, but the honest belly laugh that joined mine was flat-out adorable. The first of my many walls crumbled like it had been made of nothing more than sugar cubes. Never before had someone conquered one of my barricades so effortlessly; even Batten got my thorniest defenses. I doubted Declan even realized he did it. Stupid adorable assistant with the caramel laugh.
As the Buick turned onto Shaw's Fist's unnamed street, leaving pavement behind for dirt roads and potholes, I sank even lower; I hadn't had to tell him when to turn.
“I'm sure Lord Dreppenstedt is fine, Dr. Buzz,” he assured me, misreading the wilting laugh and the furrow in my brow. “At least the organization didn't send Viktor.”
“Viktor Domitrovich?” I chewed my bottom lip. “Big guy, big jaw, big everything? Sounds like the love child of Andre the Giant and James Earl Jones?”
His smile slid off like a cliff-side house in a mudslide. His foot got heavier on the gas pedal.
“Is there a reason I should be worried about Viktor?”
“He was on suspension.” He reached around behind the seat for his doctor's bag, pulling it over my seat and onto his lap. I didn't like the way he gripped it, as though he might need it soon. “For gross indecency.”
“Okay, yeah, he was pretty gross, but he wasn't indecent. Unless you have a thing against wearing six cows’ worth of leather.”
He shook his head; his black curls seemed to tighten around the tips of his ears protectively.
“What sort of indecency, Dr. Edgar?” I braced for the answer when he blanched.
“Necrophilia.”
Okay, so not the perfect bodyguard for two prone revenants. “Why the hell would they have him working with resting dead guys?” I yelped, rocketing straight up in my seat.
“He's been on medication. I guess they reinstated him.” Declan's eyes went hard. The warm caramel laugh was long gone. “It just doesn't work very well, and not at all if he doesn't feed.”
“I did feed him.” I put my gloves back on. “Blood. Not mine. O-neg from Shield.”
“Warmed?”
I bit my lip, fighting to quiet the alarm clanging between my ears. “He specifically asked for it cold.”
“Cold blood's like foreplay.” And then I heard it. The Irish accent snuck in, elongating his vowels. “For fook's sake, Dr. B.”
* * *
I barely registered the two new vehicles sitting in the shady driveway near a film of gaudy pink spider webs as we came to a gravel-spitting halt. The cabin was dead silent when we blew in the front door at full tilt, Declan behind me, his doctor's bag a noisy slapping at his thigh.
We found Wesley at the kitchen table, picking his teeth with a fork and considering what he dug out of his molars with interest. He looked up at us with surprise when we came in, locking his Nordic sled dog eyes on us through his weedy, white-blond dreadlocks.
Behind me, Declan said, “Revenant.” There was no fear; rather, what I heard was a scientist's classification, like he was going to tag Wes and pin him in a shadowbox.
I put my hand out to intercept him. “No staking my bro. He's supposed to be here.”
“Who's the dumbshit?” Wes demanded.
“My guest, Wesley, be nice,” I said. “Where's, uh… everyone?”
Wes ran a pale hand through his equally pale blond hair. “There was some other guy here; some big ugly motherfucker. Harry sent him packing. Boy, is he pissed. If I were you, I'd avoid him until— too late.”
From the pantry, I felt rather than saw a shadow peel away from the others, and spun to face him. In the faint light offered up between the slats of the kitchen blinds, that shadow took the form of Harry—lithe, sinuous, and elegant. The subtle chill that always cloaked the older revenant purled across the floor and settled in a wash at my ankles. At first, I relaxed at the sight of him, fully intact, fully clothed in his usual resting attire, a stylish grey hand-tailored morning suit. His expression was that of a full-grown cat in the mood to bat lazily at an injured baby mouse. U
h oh.
“Darling?” Harry greeted, and my relaxation, it turned out, was to be short-lived. His voice was icy, an Arctic splinter. The temperature dip swept out as he forced it further, probing Declan and me with a frigid lash. “Who might this lad be?” Harry asked with misleading softness. “He who comes clanging into my kitchen like a knight's destrier in full plate?”
“Lord Guy Harrick Dreppenstedt, this is Dr. Declan Edgar, my new assistant,” I sighed. “And there's no need for the attitude, so back off, revenant.”
Harry's eyes paled rapidly through a range of colder shades, from battleship to lustrous chrome, as he looked Declan up and down. He smiled, flashing fully extended fangs. It was not a friendly gesture. “What could be in your kit and caboodle, doctor? Is there a stake in the bag?” With an eye-blurring yet still somehow prim slap, he struck the satchel from Declan's hand; it spilled onto the linoleum with a clatter before he had time to flinch.
Declan said, “You'll never find a stake in my bag, sir. I'm a scientist and historian, not a cold cook.”
“Is that so?”
“As you can see, it's all very innocent. Pens, paper. Alcohol. Medicinal herbs.”
I made a mental note to ask Harry what cold cook meant; I was pretty sure Declan wasn't confessing a love of frozen dinners.
“Wolfsbane,” Harry said crisply, enunciating with sharp precision. “Are you fool enough to imagine I cannot smell it?”
“I use it externally for chronic migraines.”
Wolfsbane had not been used medicinally for centuries. Likely the only person in the room who didn't know this was Wes; I couldn't guess as to why Harry accepted the explanation.
Harry did not turn to look at me when he addressed me. “Tell me, my fawn, is this day-brained rapscallion a suitor come to call?”
“Sweet fancy Christ,” I sighed, letting my head fall back and searching the kitchen chandelier for patience.
“Would that be a yes?” Harry fairly hissed it.
“If by some bizarre twist of fate I was being ‘suited’,” I said, making air quotes, “do you think I'd bring the guy here to be cross-examined, prodded, grilled, and finally chased off by you?”
