“What happened?” Alexis asked behind me.
A moment later, I felt her, Celestina, and Brandon at my heels. “We’re going after him.” I ran toward my car, but seeing two vamps leaning against the passenger side, while a third stood by the driver’s side cradling his giant chin in his palms, I almost stopped but didn’t allow their presence to startle me. I hadn’t expected the others hanging around the house to retreat to my car in hopes of preventing me from following Darius.
Kendall grunted at the sight of them, but once we stopped ten feet short of them, I glanced off to my right and watched Darius hop into his Ford Focus. If I had any hope of catching up to him, I had to dispatch these vamps ASAP.
“What’re you waiting for?” Alexis asked from behind me as she came to a stop. “Torch these bitches!”
It seemed my sister finally accepted that Zephora had entered our mother’s body, and that she couldn’t trust Darius. I couldn’t have asked for better timing to take on an additional ally…even if it meant that I couldn’t completely trust her. Still, for the moment, I appreciated the extra help.
I skidded to a stop at the same moment Kendall and Alexis did likewise on either side of me. I raised a hand, calling upon the anger that I’d so far denied from taking over my emotions, and aimed for the vamp at my driver’s side door. A jet of fire surged from my palm the same moment a streak of ice propelled from Alexis’s hand and slammed into the arrogant vamps standing alongside the passenger side.
Since Alexis had complete control over her powers, she froze a pair of vamps in place with no trouble. She had so much power (and control) over her ability that they had no chance to dash away. My feeble attempt to burn the vamp beside the driver’s side, however, hadn’t worked out as I’d planned. Because I couldn’t call upon the same authority like my sister, the vampire hurried around the hood and headed toward me, as my three-foot wide swath of flames set the grass on fire across the street.
Although perturbed that I couldn’t match my sister’s skill-set, I still felt more than capable of handling the vamp once we squared off. Unlike Darius, who had no doubt picked up innumerable fighting techniques over the past few centuries, this vampire had just been turned and had no time to perfect the sleekness of a master vampire. Unable to control his movements, he slinked around like he raced toward me on a Slip ’N Slide while unable to maintain his balance. His approach seemed almost comical: all flailing arms and bent legs.
But a second before he came upon me, Brandon called out to me, so I swung back toward him, only to find a drumstick flying toward me. I snared the stick and spun back around just as the vamp lifted both arms above his head, no doubt expecting to land on top of me.
Shocked by his quick ascent, I veered to the side, called upon the heat raging through my body until it lit the stick in my palm, and plunged the wood deep into the vampire’s chest.
The vampire arched his back, throwing his arms back and over his head as though struck from behind rather than from the front. He wind milled his arms but couldn’t regain his balance and tipped backwards until he hit the ground with a thump. A second later, his body erupted in a cloud of dust.
“Huh,” Kendall said, glancing at the two frozen vamps standing beside the car before setting her sights on the pile of granules on the ground. She glanced at Alexis and me. “You both score points for originality. Sorry, Serena. Unfortunately, lots of people die in fires.” She jerked a thumb at my sister. “But how often do you see someone suspended in chunks of ice.”
I ignored her sarcasm just in time to see Darius’s Ford Focus swing a left around the corner, and disappear. “Get in.” I rushed into the driver’s seat at the same moment Alexis called shotgun, while Kendall and Brandon hurried into the back seat. I had no intention of allowing my niece to accompany us.
“Hey, what about me?” my niece said as my friends shut the passenger doors, barring her entrance.
“You’re staying put,” said Alexis.
The bright lights of Darius’s Focus shined a block around the corner, so I stomped on the accelerator, swung in that direction, and continued down the street.
“Wait!” said Alexis. She motioned toward the frozen vamps.” We can’t leave them like that.”
I could try defrosting them, only to stake them in the heart, but that would take too long. Instead, I decided to try out my newfound ability. I got out, hurried over to them, placed my hands on both chunks of ice, and called upon the energy around me until I felt tremendous power mounting inside me. When the pressure felt like it would cave in and flatten me to the ground, I pushed the energy outward with as much force as possible.
A second later, both frozen bodies exploded. Chunks of ice surrounded by dust filtered through the air.
“Cool!” Celestina said.
Alexis didn’t look impressed. “Now get back in the house, lock the doors, and don’t let anyone inside.”
“But I should be able to come,” said Celestina. “It’s my birthright. I’ve heard you say that enough to Granny, so it has to be the same with me, right? Now that she’s dead?”
“What are you…saying?” asked Alexis, scrutinizing her daughter to see if she’d tried to manipulate her.
“Hello!” Celestina rolled her eyes. “Aunt Serena was dead, too. You killed her, remember?”
My sister flinched at the reminder, which proved that she felt at least some remorse for her actions. But she still didn’t appear convinced that our mother had died.
With each passing second, Darius put more distance between us. Granted, he wouldn’t get far because the street he’d turned onto contained a few speed bumps, which would slow his passage. While that might allow me a few moments to keep his vehicle within eyesight, I’d still need to follow him…and I’d have to pass over those same speed bumps. All told, as much as I wanted to think we still had time to catch up to Darius, with each passing second, he put more distance between us.
“And I made the dead come back to life,” my niece continued. “Last I heard, kids my age sign up for track or soccer…not awakening the dead. Face it: I’m a freak. You’re a freak. Aunt Serena’s a freak, and…” she glanced at Kendall, “she’s a freak. Her boyfriend’s a freak. We’re all freaks!”
“Boyfriend?” Brandon shifted in his seat, unable to find a comfortable position. “Wait a sec. Who said anything about…”
“Aren’t you?” asked Celestina, nodding at Kendall. “The way she looks at you…well, you sure seem to like it.”
“Huh?” Kendall piped in, incredulous. “No one said anything about boyfriend-girlfriend?”
Alexis grinned. “We all presume you’re ready to be his awfully wedded wife.”
“That’s crazy talk!” Brandon said, breathing so heavy he might soon hyperventilate. “You can’t read minds like your mom.” A frightened expression took hold of him as he remained silent for a few seconds. “Can you?”
Emotionless, Celestina held his gaze for a beat. “I don’t know…can I?”
Brandon pushed back against the seat. “Okay, I’m gonna say it since no one else will. You are definitely up for Creepy Girl of the Year status.”
“Just like Mom.” A cheery grin appeared on Celestina’s face.
“Facing the truth is half the…bottle,” said Kendall, given my sister’s predilection for drinking.
“You mean battle?” Celestina asked. “I’ll never be an exotic dancer. You have to be really pretty to do that.” That remark clarified that, no matter how mentally unbalanced Alexis might be, Celestina regarded her mother as nothing short of beautiful. “Besides, I only dance in the shower.” She shrugged. “I sing in there too, sometimes.”
That statement removed some of my uneasiness. I’d done the same thing on occasion. But a moment later, my nerves strained my patience. “Celie, your mom’s right. It’s best this way. I’m sorry, but we’ve gotta go.” After making sure she stood clear of my car, I shot away from the curb, heading in the direction Darius had gone. Just as I swu
ng a left, I glanced back at my niece.
With a nearby lamppost shining light down on her, Celestina stood in the middle of the street, head down, hands at her sides. From this vantage point, her brooding posture looked disjointed, angry and…spooky.
That image sent goosebumps up my arms, partially because of the way she’d pinned me to the wall, but also at the possibility that she might resort to an even more heinous punishment the next time we saw each other.
Shivering at the possibility, I redirected my thoughts. Otherwise, I’d lose sight of my objective: getting close enough to remain only a few car lengths behind Darius. I went over the speed bumps a little too quickly, jarring the car, making it wobble in every direction.
“Wow, thanks” Kendall said, cringing. “I just lost my dinner out the window.”
I ignored her sarcasm, thankful that I’d managed to keep sight of Darius’s vehicle in time to see him take an entrance ramp onto I-90 West, heading toward Rockford. “Where is he going?”
“Monster truck rally at the All State Arena?” Brandon asked. “Or maybe just a…monster rally? Hey, do you think they have those? Rent out a convention center, invite a bunch of werewolves, vamps, demons, and evil ghosts, and then have a few seminars in the morning before breaking for lunch: animal arms and legs for the werewolves, a couple pints of human blood for the vamps. Demons can suck down a soul or two.”
Not missing a beat, Kendall said, “No, they probably stand around and play beer pong. Sort of like a group of college kids trying to one-up each other with talk of ‘hey, I can climb walls like Spider-Man.’ ‘Oh, yeah, well, I can intercept and bend radio waves!’”
The group carried on with idle chitchat for the next half-hour until Darius pulled off the expressway.
I followed, trying not to give away that we were trailing him.
Everyone in the vehicle remained silent, unmoving, as though doing so would prevent Darius from looking through his rearview mirror to spot us. Approaching the red light, I slowed the car.
Although oncoming traffic zoomed by from left to right, Darius stomped on the accelerator, ignoring the red light, and swerved left, heading south.
Obviously, he suspected that we’d followed him. I moved up toward the light, watching his Ford Focus speed away. If I followed him, disregarding the traffic signal, I’d divulge that we followed him. Was it worth the risk?
“What’re you doing?” Alexis asked, irritated. “Go after him.”
I neglected her, keeping my eye on the Focus as it raced down the street, nearly out of sight.
“Go!” Alexis shouted.
The light had turned green. I jammed my foot on the gas, swerving a quick left, speeding past cars on my right, scanning the vicinity, doing my best to predict what driver’s might do on either side of me to prevent me from making a mistake and crashing into one of them.
“Jesus!” Alexis said, clapping her hands in frustration. “I don’t even see his car. It’s gone!”
“I see it.” The Focus was barely visible as it dipped down a slight hill before rising again and rushing past another red light. I kept my foot on the gas, scanning every direction, preparing for the unexpected, until I saw Darius’s car tear down the street, rushing up a slight slope in the road before disappearing behind it. The red light he’d run appeared before me. Cars, SUV s and commercial trucks streamed onto the road on either side of me, and just as the last vehicle on the left and right veered onto the street, I slowed down as the light hit yellow. When it turned red, I jammed my foot down on the accelerator, not giving the driver in the oncoming left-hand turn lane the chance to begin making his turn. As I breezed through the intersection, I glanced in the rearview mirror and saw my backseat passengers pressing their hands against the front seats, their eyes awash in fright.
“That’s right,” said Alexis, wide-eyed and sitting up in her seat. “Go Vin Diesel on his ass!”
I didn’t plan on gunning it like a character in one of the Fast & Furious flicks, but I couldn’t let Darius get away now, not after we’d spent so much time following him. I planned to remain a good distance away, giving him no reason to expect that anyone tailed him. Nevertheless, he’d been paying attention, otherwise he’d have had no reason to rocket through a red light just past the tollway exit. I hoped that by not chasing him, I threw off his suspicion in hopes he hadn’t seen me trailing him.
At this time of night, on a main road for this area, most of the cars drove north and south, and the green lights that consistently greeted us confirmed my theory. Therefore, I kept following the Focus from a few car-lengths in distance.
“Where is he going?” Alexis asked, opening her mouth again to speak, but thinking better of it, she snapped it shut.
The Ford Focus swung a quick right, giving me no chance to follow without being detected, so I drove for another block. “Can you see his car?”
“Yeah,” said Kendall. “He’s slowing down. He’s going toward that huge building up ahead.”
Hearing that Darius planned to end his trip, I slowed down, did a U-turn, and took the road he’d traveled down. “Where is he?” I continued down the road. “I can’t see him.”
“He’s on the other side,” said Alexis. “Off to the right. He probably doesn’t even know we’re here.”
I slowed the vehicle, unwilling to give Darius the impression that those he suspected of following him might have completed their objective.
Alexis turned toward me. “Keep going forward, pass the next stop sign, and park in the lot up ahead.”
I did as she suggested and saw letters on the huge building that identified it as the Schaumburg Township District Library. Although I felt comfortable inside the confines of a library, having spent much of my time during the last four years at the DePaul University Library, I couldn’t help but wonder why Darius would want to visit this place. I parked, hoping that I didn’t see his vehicle swing around the corner and speed back toward Roselle Road in an attempt to lose anyone who followed him. Thankfully, that didn’t happen. We waited five seconds. Six seconds. Seven.
“What now?” asked Kendall.
“Yeah,” asked Alexis, irritation hitting her tone. “Let’s get out.” She grabbed the doorknob.
I pulled out of the parking spot, and in response, my sister swung her door shut. In case Darius pulled out of the parking lot on the other side of the building to head back toward Chicago, I wanted to make sure he didn’t leave without us.
“What the hell!” Alexis said. “What’re you doing?”
“Quiet.” I swung back toward the other side of the building and, sure enough, I spotted his empty Ford Focus. I let out a sigh of relief, and parked seven or eight spaces behind him and off to the right. “We’re going inside.”
An instant later, on opposite sides of me, Brandon and Kendall placed a hand on her shoulder…and locked gazes, stunned that they’d had the same protective instinct to calm my nerves. Brandon said, “We can look for it.” He turned his attention to Alexis. “Right? You guys probably have more important things to do.” He glanced at his watch. “It’s 9:50. They’re still open?”
All the lights were on. “Guess we’ll find out soon enough.” I hurried out of the car, but I didn’t wait as my passengers did the same. I headed toward the entrance and stepped through the automatic doors.
A security guard in a black uniform with a shiny tin star on the left side of his chest approached me. In his late sixties with close-cropped silver hair, he wore a black belt with a cell phone attached to it that emphasized his bulging belly. “Library’s closing in ten minutes.”
I nodded.
“What kind of library needs a security guard?” asked Alexis.
I released a sigh, annoyed by her ignorance. Obviously, with a two-story building this size and such a large community of patrons, management needed security for various reasons. I glanced at the guard, who merely frowned at my sister before looking elsewhere, spinning a flashlight in his palm.
“Where do you think Darius went?” asked Brandon.
“More importantly, why would he come here?” Kendall said.
“He’s probably not in the kidsZone,” I said, intrigued by the phrasing and spelling of the Youth Services Department. I swiveled away from the audio-visual area and the checkout stations. Based on a cursory glance in every direction, each of these areas either had very short stacks of books, which would make it difficult to remain incognito, or they didn’t leave any protective cover at all. If Darius suspected that we’d followed him, he probably wouldn’t enter either of those areas of the library.
But I couldn’t guarantee that, so I said to my sister, “Keep an eye on the children’s area. Brandon, monitor the parking lot. They might be using this place as a diversionary tactic.”
Alexis stared at me for a long moment, anger passing through her eyes. “You don’t know a goddamn thing about being a witch.” She shook her head. “There are ways to find someone…who doesn’t want to be found.”
I hadn’t thought of that. My sister probably knew a locator spell, but since she didn’t expound on that assertion, she seemed to make it clear that she didn’t have the knowledge or ability to perform that enchantment. Without a word, she headed toward the kidsZone.
I glanced at the carpeted stairs straight ahead and rushed in that direction. I cocked my head towards them to encourage Kendall and Brandon to follow me. Climbing the steps as quickly as possible, I reached the top and looked in every direction, expecting Darius to appear, only to knock me unconscious.
That didn’t happen. I couldn’t find him anywhere.
A few patrons milled about, returning books to the shelves, getting up from the comfortable seating, or holding books in their arms as they headed toward me, so they could walk down the stairs and check out before leaving the building.
I set my gaze on Brandon. “I need you to keep watch downstairs. Text me if you see him.”
When he went down the staircase, I said to Kendall. “Take this wing. I’ll head further out.” My nerves throttled me down an aisle in hopes of finding Darius.
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