by Liz Schulte
I licked my lips. “I think if she thought you were a threat, she wouldn’t hesitate.”
He nodded again and this time I did leave.
Femi strutted into the living room, the clean kid trailing behind her, still clutching the dirty doll to her chest and probably ruining her new clothes, but at least she looked more human. I reached into the bag at my feet and pulled out a new doll.
“Wanna trade?” I asked.
She held on to her doll tighter and wouldn’t look at me.
“I already tried to get it away from her. She’s not letting go without a fight.” Femi glanced back at the kid. “How old do you think she is?”
I studied her malnourished body. I had no idea. She was tiny and her face didn’t hold the baby fat someone her size would normally have. The demons must have had her for a really long time. She wasn’t going to talk to me though. Out of all of us, she only seemed to like Holden, the one person who wasn’t here. I cleared my throat. “I’ll get Holden.”
If she understood me, she made no indication. I stepped outside and shifted into Holden then waited a few minutes before I came back inside, imitating his confident I’m about to kill you walk.
The kid looked at me. Her face went from happy to scared as hell in about three milliseconds. Maybe I put too much “I’m about to kill you” in my gait. I stopped and spoke in Holden’s voice. “Come here, kid.”
The girl turned and fled to the back of the warehouse.
Femi shrugged. “Guess you’re not her favorite anymore, Chuckles. Where’s Baker?”
“He is Baker,” Olivia’s voice said from the doorway on the opposite side of the room. We both looked at her and I shifted back to myself. “The human can tell the difference.”
Femi bristled. “There’s no way. I couldn’t tell and all my senses are heightened. He even smelled like Holden. How could she know?”
“She’s lived surrounded by darkness and evil. It’s what she knows. It’s what she trusts. She senses it in Holden and recognizes it. Baker can imitate a lot of things, but not that.”
“In my experience, good and evil aren’t black and white,” I told her. “They’re choices. Holden hasn’t chosen to be evil in quite some time.”
“But he still has it in him. How long do you think he can go until he gives into it? Before he starts feeding it again?”
I smiled. “One thing Olivia always understood about the boss is he doesn’t do anything he doesn’t want to do. He will only give into to evil again if he loses hope.”
“Then you admit that he committed evil deeds out of desire, because he wanted to, not because he was forced to.” She stared at me for a moment, then turned away and went back into her room.
“Nice chat,” I called after the only person who could squash Holden’s hope like a bug.
Femi squinted into the dark shadows at the back of the building. If she had a tail it probably would have twitched. “Do you believe it?” she asked. “Can the kid really tell who you are even when you shift? She’s just a human.”
“Don’t underestimate humans. They’re very good at surviving and this kid has survived in a situation that woulda turned vampire hitman’s hair white. Demons aren’t meant for this world. Even if they aren’t trying to kill you, the pure evil they exude is enough to mark you forever. Despite how she looks, she’s tough. She has to be or she wouldn’t be here.”
“We don’t know how long she was there.” Femi curled the end of her ponytail around her long, thin fingers.
“I guess that’s something we should find out.” I flashed a grin. “All we need to get from her is a name.”
“Maybe she doesn’t speak English. Know any other languages?”
“One or two.”
The front door groaned as Holden pushed it open. “Where’s the kid?” he asked after he locked it again.
“I tried to fool her into thinking I was you and she ran away.”
“Olivia thinks the kid can tell the two of you apart because she can sense the evil in you.”
At Femi’s words Holden finally looked interested in what we were saying. “Shift again, Baker. You wait here, Femi.”
I shifted so I looked exactly like him down to his perfectly laced boots. Not even his own mother should have been able to tell us apart. I started down the hall but he stopped me. “Just a sec. Call Olivia out here.”
“Hey, Liv,” I yelled in Holden’s voice.
She stepped out of the room and blinked in our direction.
“Can you tell us apart?” he asked her.
“Are you testing me?” she asked looking directly at Holden.
“One of us is,” he said as I stayed as still and stoic as possible.
She moved toward us slowly, looking each of us up and down. As an angel she could see our souls reflected in our auras. It should have been easy for her to pick Holden, yet her eyes still searched. When she was close enough that her light covered both of us her lip curled. “You’re Holden and you’re Baker,” she said correctly. “What does that prove?”
Holden stepped closer to her. “That my soul isn’t as dark as you would like us to believe. You had to rely on my physical reaction to your light to tell us apart.”
“So you are adept at hiding your darkness. Perhaps you have even hidden it from yourself.”
“You of all people should be able to tell.” His fingers curled around her elbow and for a split second her entire face changed. It softened somehow. The light around her eased and her forehead wrinkled. An instant later, though, she was gone in a burst of light.
“How is she doing that? I thought the building was warded against transporting,” Holden said, staring at the spot she’d just been.
“She musta found a hole. I’ll look into it,” I said.
“Make it a priority.” Holden turned back to me with a smile I didn’t expect. “Let’s find the kid.”
“Sure thing, but not to be a dumb Dora or anything, what the hell just happened?”
“It was the girl, wasn’t it?” Femi asked. “She’s why Olivia couldn’t tell which was which. She neutralized you or whatever.”
“Doesn’t matter,” he said. “She has a weakness.”
“Spill it, boss. Think of me as the chubby kid at a track meet. I need to catch up.”
His grin broadened. “I know how to get Olivia back. Let’s get the girl.”
With that he took off down the hallway in the direction the girl went. Femi shrugged at me like she had no idea what he was talking about either. I jogged to catch up, but he was already heading into the room with the bed. By the time I got there, he gestured under the bed and I nodded. I bent down and pulled the kid out by her ankle. When she was out she glanced at each of us once, then flung herself at Holden—the real Holden. Whatever she was basing her judgment on, the rug rat was good. Holden carried her back to the front room and I switched back into me.
He sat her in the chair then took a seat on the end of the coffee table so he faced her. “Name?”
She stared back at him, clutching her dirty doll, lower lip trembling.
“Je m’appelle Femi,” Femi chimed in, pointing at her chest.
The kid blinked, her eyes drooping with exhaustion, but still looked confused. We went through five more languages, but nothing worked. By the time we exhausted the languages we knew she was curled into a ball breathing evenly.
Femi sat on the couch and propped her feet up on the table. “Maybe they had her for her whole life and never spoke to her.”
“Yeah, boss. It’s pretty hard to imagine demons changing diaper or potty training.”
Holden stood up and pulled the doll from the kid’s relaxed hold. “Find her a blanket.”
He walked toward the back of the warehouse, still not explaining anything.
“Got to love Chuckles. He’s so forthcoming,” Femi said dryly.
I laughed as I got a blanket and tossed it to Femi before I moved the girl to the couch. Femi tucked the blanket around her small frame.
Femi shrugged. “Maybe we can find her a home.”
“If they kept her since she was a wee one, you gotta figure they’ll come looking for her. If we place her with some unsuspecting schmo, we’ll get them killed.”
“So we keep her. Maybe she’ll be useful. At the very least she might make it harder for people to find us if they start looking.”
“Well, if that’s your plan, she needs a babysitter. And that ain’t us.”
“Sounds like Holden was elected,” Femi purred.
I grinned. “Yeah, who knew the boss was such a kid magnet? Seriously though, we need Holden in the field. He has the best chance of reaching Olivia, not mention owns a knife that can actually kill these assholes. He can’t stay with the kid.”
“We could get Phoenix. He might need to go into hiding now that he’s free.”
“Get Phoenix for what?” Holden asked, reentering the room with a towel squeezed in his hands.
“To babysit the kid.”
“No.” Holden pulled a much cleaner doll from the towel, opened the door and sat it outside.
“Then who’s going to stay with her? Obviously she likes jinn,” Femi said. “We should get someone she doesn’t freak out around.”
“We’re not using a jinni as a babysitter. He’ll sell her back to the demons.” He frowned. “Is Olivia here?”
“Haven’t seen her,” I said.
He went to check her room anyway. “Maggie wants to help, right? Call her. Maybe the kid will like another human better.”
“You said you know how to get Olivia back. Care to share?” Femi stood and arched her back as she stretched her arms upward.
“No. I have to go. You guys take care of this. And, Baker, fix the runes before the angel gets back. I don’t want her to be able to escape again.”
“Do you ever want to punch him?” Femi asked as he closed the door. “Right in the junk?”
“Nah. I make it my business not to touch other men’s junk.” I stood up. “I’m going to see Maggie. Watch the kid.”
Femi frowned. “Because I’m a girl you think I should automatically stay home with a child? You babysit. I’ll find Maggie.”
“Kitten, it has nothing to do with you being a skirt. If Maggie’s going to roost here, I gotta sort some things out with her. If I go now, I can catch her before work.”
Femi rolled her eyes, but plunked back down. “You got two hours.”
I blew her a kiss and skedaddled. The sky was getting lighter by the second. I’d probably wake her up, but it was better to talk about this in person. If she came to babysit she’d have to quit her job. That meant fully immersing herself in the Abyss, something she’d wanted to do for a while now, but not something that was a good idea if she ever wanted a normal life. If I asked her without Femi around, maybe I could talk her out of going for it. We could find a different babysitter. Maggie deserved a life.
Her apartment building was quiet as I took the stairs two at a time up to her floor. I knocked on the door and waited. Nothing. I rapped again, then retrieved her spare key from behind the fire extinguisher, and let myself in.
The apartment was dark but smelled like her—sweet vanilla with a hint of caramel. “Maggie,” I called. A rustle came from her bedroom so I waited for her to come out, but she didn’t. “Come on, doll. We need to talk. The clock is ticking. We need help—and you want to help; it’s now or never. If you want my opinion, the correct answer should be never. But it’s your choice.”
I glanced at her window. It was almost sunrise. We really didn’t have time for pouting and hurt feelings. I tapped softly on her bedroom door. “Mags, I’m coming in.”
I pushed the door open slowly. The room was dark, too dark. The dim light from living room, where I was, made a triangle on the floor of her bedroom. I felt around for the light switch. It had been taped down. Something was wrong. My hand stalled at the tampered-with switch as I focused on the inside of the room. I made out Maggie’s form pressed flat against her headboard.
“Maggie, baby, you okay? Are you sick?” I scanned the room for whatever was holding her here. She couldn’t be possessed; the angel had taken care of that. It had to be something else. I took a step toward her and the heel of a hand hit my chest hard enough to knock me back.
A short skinny vampire whose blue eyes nearly glowed in the dim light stepped in front of me like he could stop me from entering.
“Fella, you picked the wrong human to feed on. If there’s so much as a scratch on her, you’re in for a world of hurt.” I moved toward him. If he’d touched her, I’d take a few notches out of him myself then hand him over to Holden for stress release. “Feel free to run. I love a good chase.”
His mouth twisted in a crooked grin. “Whatever this human was to you in the past, it’s over. She’s mine now.”
My fist smashed into his face with a crack of bone. Maggie screamed. I knocked the cad out of the way and went toward the noise. She wasn’t in her rumpled bed, but the sound came from that general area. “Maggie. Maggie, where are you?”
I sensed the vampire’s rapid approach and dodged his cowardly attack at my back, ramming my elbow into his side, snapping two ribs. Maggie cried out again, but this time I knew exactly where she was. I opened the closet door. She sat huddled on the floor, blood pouring from her nose, clutching her side. I scooped her up and carried her to the living room. She looked up at me, face pale. Beads of sweat and tears ran down her cheeks to her neck…past two red swollen fang marks.
I laid her on the couch and took a step back. “What have you done?”
“Baker.” Her voice was thin as she reached out a clammy hand to me. “I can be one of you now.”
I took her hand and knelt beside her, then pushed the damp hair from her face and kissed her scorching hot forehead. “Just relax. It will make the transformation easier. Close your eyes.”
Her eyelids drooped and eventually shut. A few moments later she expelled the last breath she’d ever have to take.
“You’ll kill her if you leave her out here,” the vampire said from the bedroom’s doorway. “She needs total darkness. Even this much light will disturb a new vampire.”
I lifted Maggie and carried her back to the closet, where I placed her on the floor and reclosed the door. Then I lifted the vampire up from the floor by his throat. I didn’t squeeze hard enough to hurt him, because whatever I did to him Maggie would feel. “Leave, parasite. Go far away. Just know that someday, she will break the bond she has with you, and on that day I will find you—find you and squeeze every last drop of life from you.”
“I’m not going anywhere.” He peeled my fingers off of his neck one at a time and landed softly on his feet. “Unlike you, I do not abandon the people I bring into this world and leave them to their own devices.”
“I was protecting her.”
“By introducing her to a world she didn’t understand, then telling her just to forget all about it? Excellent job, champ.” My stomach rolled as the truth of the little creep’s words hit me hard. “She came looking for someone, anyone, who could make her a part of this world. I gave her exactly what she wanted and now she’s mine. You have no claim.”
This was a disaster. Vampires never did anything without a personal motive, but I couldn’t think of a single reason why this one would choose Maggie of all people. Vampires didn’t indiscriminately turn humans. He’d be bonded to her now until she made her own vampire. He’d have to mentor her. It was a long commitment, no matter how you looked at it—and he was right. It was something I couldn’t undo. If I killed him, it would hurt her, or, worst-case scenario, drive her completely insane. “What could you possibly want with a human
that you barely know?”
He slipped his hands into his pockets. “I don’t have to tell you anything.”
I couldn’t make him talk. I had nothing to threaten him with since physical violence was off the table. I leaned against the wall, facing him, and slipped my phone out of my pocket, then sent a message to Holden. “Problem. Come to Maggie’s.” Involving Holden wasn’t ideal. He’d be plenty pissed off with me for letting this happen, but if anyone could make the vampire talk it was him. Holden’s jinni mojo worked on Femi. There was no reason it wouldn’t work on a vampire too.
“What’s your name, pal?”
He sat on Maggie’s bed, his back resting against the white padded headboard, his feet stretched out in front of him. “Tom Jameson. And you’re Baker McGovern.”
“At your service. Have we met?”
“You can wait around here until dusk, but when she comes out of the closet she won’t have any more interest in talking to you than you would talking to a cow when you’re hungry for steak.”
“That so? Well, the way I see this, you have two choices. You can tell me why you chose Maggie and why you want her, and I’ll make sure her family doesn’t systematically dismantle your life and body. Or, you can wait for Holden and pray he’s in a good mood.”
Tom laughed, but the sound faded into nothing as a black mist filled Maggie’s living room.
“Too late.” I winked at him. Mist gathered and formed into Holden. If ol’ Tom hadn’t recognized Holden by name, he sure as hell knew him now, judging by his “I just stepped on a landmine” expression.
Holden eyes swiveled around until they landed on me. He was in the room in two steps. “Who the fuck is that?”
“That’s the vampire who turned your niece into a card carrying member of the undead.”
Tom was still as death and Holden’s glare froze on his face. “Repeat that.”
I did as I was told. Holden leaned his head back ever so slightly, flames dancing in his eyes—actual flames. I’d never seen anything like it. Blue flickers of curling, wisping fire erupted through his green eyes. It was eerie as fuck. “Why is he still alive, Baker?” His voice was soft and tendrils of smoke escaped from his mouth as he spoke.