Gray tidings, p.10
Gray Tidings, page 10
“They’re trying to tip us over.” Asa shot to his feet. “I’ll handle it.”
“Let me.” I was relieved for an excuse to dull my edge. “This ought to do the trick.”
Placing my hand flat on the nearest piece of metal, in this case, the doorframe, I shut my eyes and sent a nasty jolt through the exterior of the RV. Yelps and curses rang out, but we quit rocking. One or two shook it off and tried again, but I happily zapped them until they got it through their thick skulls.
With that done, I slumped in my seat and tried calling Colby, since we were stuck in place until the crowd finished dispersing.
A bright ringtone sang out, and Asa lifted the green blanket he knitted for her to reveal her phone on the bench.
Dread coating the back of my throat, I dialed Clay to get him here stat. “Hey—”
“Hey back,” he said cheerfully. “You’ll never believe what feral creature I spotted in the wild.”
Hope coiled in my chest, and my fingers tightened around the phone. “What?”
“Small, white, covered in spiderwebs.” He clucked his tongue. “Left her phone behind.”
“How did you…?” I stood and peered out the windshield, searching for them. “Where are you?”
She couldn’t have gone far covered in gunk, not without risking wing damage, so she must be close.
“Open up.” A hard bump against the RV announced their arrival. “My hands are full.”
Palm smacking the button, I opened the door on Clay. Asa rushed to help him with a tall metal pot he clutched with handsewn potholders, but I had eyes only for the snarl of moth girl caught in his wavy red-gold wig.
“Colby.” I rushed over and picked her out of his hair. “What happened?”
“I was setting up my computer, and the bus went nuts.” She held still while I picked spiderweb from her delicate wings and fur. “I tried to shut it down, but it must be on a timer or something.” She sneezed as I tickled the end of her proboscis. “All these people showed up and started pounding on the door, so I got out. I planned to wait in the trees until you got back, but there was so much gunk in the vent I was too heavy to fly. When I saw Clay, I kind of sailed to him to escape the roof.”
As I examined the material, I realized what it was and why it would be in an RV like this one.
“Silly string.” I held it up, and it sparkled under the lights. “White silly string.”
“The last event must have been a bridal shower.” Asa brought a wet cloth from the bathroom. “How did it get in the vents?”
“With enough alcohol, anything is possible.” Clay rattled around in the back. “We need to eat fast. I promised Ms. Melchior I would get her pot back to her within the hour.”
“Ms. Melchior?” I finished up with Colby and used the cloth to wipe off the sticky remnants.
“She’s a sweet old lady staying five slots down. She was sitting on her porch when I smelled her cooking. I went to compliment her, and one thing led to another.” He twirled a ratty potholder around his finger. “I bought her Frogmore stew. She made enough to last her all week, so it ought to last me—I mean us—tonight.”
“Frogmore stew sounds familiar.” I turned it over in my head. “Another name for a low country boil?”
“The student has truly become the master.” Clay faked wiping a tear that was really condensation. “I’m so proud.”
“Women are suckers when it comes to you.” I dug into a bag Clay produced from under his arm. “I just don’t see it.”
“That’s why we can be friends.” He tweaked my nose. “Otherwise, your pining would ruin what we have.”
“Mmm-hmm.” I set the heavy-duty foam plates Ms. Melchior had been kind enough to send in a row down one of the benches then Asa piled them high with corncobs, red potatoes, crawfish, and sausage. “Whatever you need to tell yourself.”
Colby, cleared for duty, returned to her laptop, muttering about showing them who was boss.
Them, I assumed, was the hacker or hackers who had ruined her day and earned annihilation via moth.
Mouth full of corn, I had to wipe my hands before checking my phone when a text notification chimed for me. Aedan had sent me grinning photos of Arden and Camber with their guests at a parade.
“They look like they’re having fun.” Asa passed me a bottle of water. “Who are the boys?”
“Friends from high school.” I used my fingers to zoom in on Aedan’s scowl in the background of the one photo he ended up in next to Arden. “Poor guy.”
“Any word on Nolan?”
“He’s supposed to show for breakfast.” I texted Aedan good night. “Maybe he won’t, and the girls can enjoy their trip without him ruining their fun.” Possibly with an evil scheme. “But Aedan is point on that. He’ll protect them, freeing us up to figure out what’s going on with Pontchy.”
“And your father?”
“No idea.” I lost my appetite. “The missing Garnier witch has his name written all over it, but covens tend to police their own. It’s not a Black Hat matter, and he’s made it clear he doesn’t want my help.”
“But it bothers you.”
“I feel responsible,” I admitted. “If I had laid Mom to rest, he wouldn’t be out there kidnapping people.”
“We don’t know for certain it was him.”
He was kind enough not to remind me that, had I tried to help Mom, she might have killed me. The burn of her summoner’s compulsion enflamed her, twisting her love, forcing her to act on orders Jai gave her.
“I promised Blay jambalaya with andouille.” I lifted the sausage speared on my fork. “Does this count?”
“As much as Clay is feeding us on this trip, I wouldn’t worry. Blay will get his jambalaya eventually.”
Three meals a day were for amateurs in foodie cities. Between snacks and meals, we were averaging six.
“Listen to this.” Clay, who hadn’t come up for air since tucking into his meal, read off his laptop screen. “Our body snatcher is moving in a clockwise motion. I emailed the Kellies for a list of morgues, since Colby is out of commission for a bit, and they picked up on the pattern.” He crammed a whole potato in his mouth then lifted a finger for us to wait while he chewed. “Now we’ve got locations for the top two morgues most likely to get hit next.”
“We can follow up tomorrow.” I grinned when Asa fed me the last bite of his crawfish. “We should rest.”
“You’re the Double D now,” Clay chided. “Tell your minions to check for you.”
“That’s what I should do.” I ought to order Freddie’s team to zip their pants and report for duty. “It would save us time.”
But there were so many delicate threads crisscrossing this city, I worried a rough hand might snap one.
“I know that tone.” Clay slumped in his seat. “We’ll be casing the morgues first thing.”
“At some point,” Asa broke in gently, “you’ll have to put your resources to good use.”
“I need agents I can trust to manage the ones I can’t. Until I have time to make that list, however short it may be, I can’t risk it.”
That was the fatal flaw in the system. Trust. The lack thereof. Few agents trusted anyone outside their teams, which meant no one wanted to work together. Too many factions with age-old grudges kept them from accepting the truth—that we were all in this together.
Black witch, warg, vampire, fae. It didn’t matter. The director owned us. That made us all the same.
“You have to give trust to get trust,” Clay said wisely. “And no, that wasn’t written on the last fortune cookie I ate.” He cleared his throat. “It was the one before that.”
“Fine.” I held up my hands. “I’ll call in the primary team to check the morgue angle for us.”
“The light.” He pumped his fist. “She’s seen it.”
“Yeah, yeah.” Sticking my tongue out at him, I dug through my bag for clothes. “Dibs on the shower.”
As soon as I stepped past Clay, he stuck his leg out in front of Asa to prevent him from following me.
Given the shower was about two feet squared, I didn’t kick up a fuss. I sanitized the vent in case Colby needed it again, then washed the lake off me and wondered where Dad was spending the day. And if he had a Garnier witch for company.
9
Much as I hated to admit it, the bunks, while cramped, were oddly cozy. The thin mattresses were comfy, the pillows firm, and the sheets soft. Each cubby included a small TV mounted to the wall and a pair of complimentary earbuds wrapped in plastic rested on every pillow. They even came with cute theater-style curtains for privacy from your fellow sleepers.
Before I faced the day, I checked my phone and found either the Kellies or Clay had looped me into their emails. There were eight missing corpses total, and the humans who worked at the morgue were getting antsy. The problem was quickly growing too large to hide with the wave of a magic wand.
But I had done as Clay suggested and turned the surveillance of the morgues over to Freddie’s team.
Light stabbed me in the eyes, and I squinted as a wall of warm, bare skin landed on top of me. “Asa?”
Hips pressing me into the mattress, he bit the side of my neck. “Expecting someone else?”
“Yes.” I tossed my phone aside. “Didn’t you see the line outside my door last night?”
“That was all for you?” He brushed a trail of kisses down my throat. “I didn’t realize you had so many admirers.”
“Well, most of the time they don’t stand single file. That’s why.”
“Ah.” He rocked against me. “That must be it.”
A sigh escaped me, and he fit his hand over my mouth as he did it again, and again, until I bit his palm to hold back the noise trapped in my throat. I hooked a leg over his hip, banging my shin in the process. His groan when I rolled my hips into his I swallowed whole with a kiss that stole his breath.
Lost in the taste of him, I shivered when he hit the right spot to spark starlight behind my eyes.
A ragged breath later, he sighed and went still above me.
“Good morning,” I breathed, laughed, really. “I could get used to this.”
“Your knee is bleeding.” He touched the wound gently. “I have a goose egg on the back of my head.”
“And?”
“And nothing.”
As I raised my arms to seek out his injury, I noticed him eyeing the bracelet he’d made for me. “Maybe I should make you one, so we match.”
“If you made me one, you’d have to make all your admirers one, and then you’d have no hair left.”
After murmuring a quick healing spell, I linked my fingers behind his neck. “Good thing I have a friend with a wig obsession.” As if Clay would ever let me butcher one. “As an alternative, I have this insane urge to tattoo my name on your forehead.”
“It would be cheaper than a wig.”
Belonging to someone was new for him, for me too, but love couldn’t grow if you kept it chained.
I learned that after reading The Pitbull and the Piranha.
Except, in that case, the hero kept the heroine in an aquarium.
Times like this, with Asa and me in our own little cocoon, I wanted to mate the heck out of him. I wanted to reach into his chest and knot the strings of his heart with mine. I wanted to bind him to me so tightly he couldn’t escape if he ever woke up and realized who he had fallen into bed with.
“It would ruin your pretty face.” I cupped his cheeks in my palms. “And I would probably murder the artist if you so much as flinched.”
Footsteps plodded outside the bunks, and we zipped our lips and froze like kids caught reading under the blankets when they should have been sleeping. But the steady thump-thump-thump aimed for the bathroom, and the second the door shut, Asa rolled out from under my curtain.
Sinking back onto my pillow, I snorted at his escape then brought my knee up to examine the cut.
“Ah-ha.”
The curtains whooshed open, and I yelped at the sudden invasion. “What is wrong with you?”
“Where is he?” Clay reached in, fluffing the sheet. “I know you’re hiding him somewhere.”
“You’re deranged.” I shoved him back. “I was in here minding my own business, like a good little girl.”
“I smell him all over you.” He tapped the side of his nose. “The stink is what woke me.”
“Liar.” I planted my foot on his chest. “You’re just a killjoy.”
Before I could kick him back, he gripped my ankle and tickled the bottom of my foot.
“No,” I howled, writhing and thrashing. “I haven’t peed yet.”
“I’m about to solve that problem for you.” He jerked then muttered, “Hey.” He spun, half pulling me off my bunk. “What’s this?” He twisted again, and my tailbone cracked on the floor. “Betrayal.”
“Unhand her, you fiend.” Colby dive-bombed him. “Else you’ll walk the plank.”
“I’m a member of your crew,” he protested. “How can you side with this scabby sea bass over me?”
“Scabby sea bass,” I echoed. “That sounds offensive.”
Expanding to her biggest size, Colby launched herself at Clay’s head. Upon which sat the wig from yesterday. A crime of fashion, in his book. He caught her, staggered back, hit the wall, slid to the floor, and rolled around while she giggled herself silly. The brightness of her laugh, paired with the sharpness of her eyes, told on her. On him too.
“You two were up all night, weren’t you?”
The pair broke apart and dusted themselves off, both striving for innocence and neither achieving it.
“I was securing my laptop,” she said primly, flitting off to her new computer, “if that’s what you mean.”
“I helped her.” Clay got to his feet. “What can I say? I’m a helpful guy who enjoys being helpful.”
“All you think about is food.” I ignored the rumble in my belly. “You’re ninety percent stomach.”
“We’re in New Orleans,” he reminded me for the millionth time. “The food is the main attraction.”
Once the path was clear, I got out of my bunk, but the bathroom was already locked.
Asa must have snuck in there to clean up after…
Ahem.
“We’re here to work, not to eat.”
“Blasphemy.”
“Truthphemy.” I stepped left to get around Clay, and he swerved into my path. “What gives?”
“Nothing.” He blocked me to the right then the left again. “Absolutely nothing.”
“Your lace hairline is curling—” I pointed above his shem, “—right there.”
“No, it’s not.” He reached up anyway. “Nice try.”
While he traced his forehead with his fingers, I ducked under his arm and pulled up short. “Oh no.”
“It was like that when I got here?” He whirled on me. “The moth made me do it?”
The moth, who very well might have put him up to it, was plugged in and missed him throwing shade.
“Pick an excuse and stick with it.” I inspected the nearest stripper pole, which had been crushed in his fists while he was doing goddess only knows what. “Why is the other one leaning?”
“I might have gotten a tad enthusiastic during my dance routine and accidentally kicked out on this pole and knocked that one loose from the ceiling.” He nudged me away from the damage, guiding me in a circle right back to where I’d started. “You mentioned something about work?”
Seeing as how Colby handled the paperwork, and Colby worshipped Clay, I had no doubt she could find a way to spin the poles’ destruction so he wouldn’t be held financially responsible for his mess.
They made it. They could clean it up.
Delegation at its finest.
“We’ve got a bead on Pontchy, on the food supply, and on the method of delivery.”
“We need to figure out who’s feeding it,” Clay pointed out, “and why they brought it here.”
“Do you think we can fit in one more errand?” I squinched my toes on the floor. “I want to check up on the missing Garnier witch. Can you get me the files on the coven and on Lazarus witches?”
For the moment, I wasn’t sure if Lazarus was a designation within the Garnier coven or a talent that occurred within certain bloodlines.
“Colby can.” His eyes glimmered. “She framed a new doorway into the Bureau database last night.”
“You’d tell me if she was in over her head, right?” I searched his face. “She’s fighting battles for me on a plane of existence I can’t see and don’t understand. I can’t just punch her laptop in the face and make threats if what she discovers hurts her. I’m counting on you to let me know if we need to pull her out.”
“Colby is brilliant.” He gripped my shoulders. “Give the kid some credit.” He shook me gently. “Me too.”
Exiting the bathroom on a cloud of steam, Asa toweled his hair dry, a smile on his lips. “Afternoon.”
Tracing the droplets running down his chest with my eyes, I asked, “You think you’re slick, don’t you?”
“Not unless I missed a spot while I was rinsing.”
“You two behave.” Clay jabbed a finger between us. “And, for the record, no more sleepovers.”
As a courtesy, I didn’t mention there was no sleep involved. “We need to walk the causeway tonight.”
Grumbling under his breath, he flopped down on the bench seat, content to ignore me.
“You need to see more?” Asa raked his fingers through the damp tangle of his hair, but it plastered itself to his chest and back, not that I was standing around transfixed by the simple act of him finger-combing his hair or anything that sappy. “I thought you determined where the deliveries were being made.”
“I want to make sure we’re not missing something.” I cupped his jaw. “Tell Blay to be ready.”
Until we caught the delivery boy—or girl—we couldn’t begin to piece together the rest of that mystery.
Pontchy had to go, that much was obvious, but we needed to find out why he had been lured here and by whom first if we wanted to avoid Return of the Lake Monster.
