Picturing a scrawny kid in a flannel shirt and jeans, with badly cut blonde hair and a pizza face, I homed in on that horrific melody. I watched the kid rip out those power cords and play with the whammy bar, impressing himself with the ridiculous sounds he could make. Then I gently told him to go stand in the corner.
He obeyed, practically dancing his way across the room in my mind and trying to look like some guitar god from the Eighties.
Good. One down, two to go.
Next, I pictured a beautiful woman wearing a black dress. She had red, curly hair that she didn’t quite have tied back well. It hung in her face. But she didn’t seem to mind as she played that heart-wrenching, haunting melody out on a grand piano. When I looked at her face, lost in the beauty of her song, I could see tears welling in her eyes. This song made her so terribly sad, and it came from her soul.
I walked over to her and whispered, “I’m so sorry,” in her ear. Then I put my hands on the piano and pushed it across the floor. She went easily, as though neither she nor her piano weighed anything at all.
That just left the other guitarist. I imagined a handsome Hispanic man, working that complex melody on a beautiful, black guitar. He had glittering black eyes, just like Ash. And dark skin. God, he was beautiful. It made me long for Ash.
I bit my cheek to force myself to focus on the job at hand. I had no time to mess around with Ash, and I needed to focus so that Ephraim would have to eat crow.
Mentally, I pointed to the center of the room. The Ash lookalike walked sexily to stand where I indicated, continuing to play his fast melody and staring at me with those gorgeous eyes.
“Good work, Sassy,” Ash said. “You’ve got them separated.”
His voice startled me. I’d been so focused on disentwining the three different songs, I’d forgotten he was there. Plus, the fact that one of the characters I’d invented looked like him, well, could he see that?
“Tell me what you see,” Ash said.
I blushed. I mean, it was good that he couldn’t see exactly what I’d imagined, but I didn’t want to admit to him that his beautiful body was standing in the middle of all this, playing guitar for me.
“Um, there’s a rock-and-roll guitarist to my left, a Spanish guitarist straight ahead, and a woman playing piano to my right,” I said.
Ephraim laughed.
“Amateur,” he commented.
“Asshole,” I shot back.
“All right, Sassy,” Ash said. “You need to disarm the Spanish guitarist first. Then the pianist. Then the rock-and-roller.”
Damn, that sucked. The kid was the most annoying of the three. I wanted him gone first. He made it hard to concentrate.
Probably that was the point. Whoever designed this was a dick.
I sighed heavily and stared at that sexy Ash-looking Spaniard. He smiled back. His play intensified, and he started strutting towards me. His melody was entrancing. I could get lost in it.
A moment later he was right on top of me. He refused to quit playing, but he towered over me, smiling, enigmatic. He leaned towards me for a kiss.
I reached up and gripped the neck of his guitar, silencing the strings. He vanished.
“Excellent, Sassy!” Ash said. “You got the first one.”
“There are still two more,” Ephraim taunted.
Damn right, there were. And with the classical guitar gone, the kid with the electric turned up the volume. He was so damned loud now, I almost couldn’t hear the piano. I suspected that was by design too. The closer you got to disarming the thing, the more intense the remaining ones got.
I walked over to the pianist. How was I going to get her to stop? She had eighty-eight keys to work with. I couldn’t just silence them the way I had the guitar.
And damn, I could hardly hear her song. I could see her playing, but I could barely hear the notes. That fucking kid was as big an asshole as Ephraim.
Tears fell from the woman’s eyes like rain in a thunderstorm. Her hands flew over the keys, furiously pounding out notes. Her agony was so raw. I could feel it in my own heart. I too was weeping. How did I make this stop?
I just wanted to comfort her. If I could reach her somehow.
Putting a hand on the side of her head, I brushed her hair aside. She looked at me, distraught.
“It’ll be okay,” I said. “I promise.”
Gently, I reached down and took her hands from the keyboard. The music ceased. Then she and her piano disappeared.
“Good,” Ash said. “You got the second one.”
I could barely hear him. The electric guitar was so loud now, it felt like my ears would bleed.
I moved towards the kid, intent on taking the guitar away from him. But he jumped around the room in my mind, as though he were on wires in a kung fu movie. Every time I reached for him, he flew away to another place.
“Come on, Sassy,” Ash said. “You can do this.”
Easy for him to say. His brain wasn’t melting under the one-hundred-decibel sound from this asshole kid’s guitar. Where was his mom? Couldn’t she make him stop?
I wasn’t sure what to do. I was getting tired chasing him around the room. He stayed out of my reach. I leaped at him, and he always dodged me.
“She can’t get it,” Ephraim said. “We’ve been at this for fifteen minutes, and she can’t defeat the last ward.”
“I’m not quitting, asshole,” I said through clenched teeth.
“Sassy, focus,” Ash said. “The last ward is tricky. It’s designed to elude you. Center yourself and pull it into the decharmer.”
No shit, it was elusive! I’d figured that one out for myself. But how was I supposed to nail down a kid with an electric guitar who could fly?
Wait a second. An electric guitar.
He might be flying around the room, and he might have a wireless hookup, but he still needed an amp to make the sound.
I returned my attention to the corner of the room where I’d first ordered him to go. Sure enough, a Fender amp, cranked up to ten was sitting on the floor. I smiled.
“Bite me, Ephraim,” I said.
Then I walked over and shut off the amp. The deafening sound ceased. The kid looked sad. Then he disappeared.
I opened my eyes and lifted the lid of the case. Nothing happened.
“Well done, Sassy!” Ash said.
I turned my attention to Ephraim. He looked furious, his face fire-engine red with anger.
“So,” I said. “We’ll go with the original plan. I’ll get the knife and kill the dragon. Ephraim can provide a distraction.”
He held me with a hate-filled stare for several more seconds. Then he turned and stormed from the room.
“That was well done, Ms. Kincaide,” Scott said.
“Yeah, it was,” Erin said, clapping me on the back with her good hand.
“I’m really proud of you, Sassy,” Ash said.
Heat washed through me. God, I wanted him. I mean, I had to admit it. I wanted Ash’s hands on me, his body against mine. I wanted to feel all of him everywhere.
“Uh, thanks,” I said, trying not to look like some sort of horny dog with my tongue hanging out.
Scott started talking about finalizing details and all that. I kind of tuned out. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Ash smiling pridefully at me. It was getting harder to resist the idea of taking him home with me.
Twenty-three
W e spent the rest of the afternoon going over the particulars of the mission. There was a presentation on the general layout of Dirk McCray’s mansion. I only paid half-attention to that. Showing me a map and telling me where everything was did nothing for me. I’d just forget it all by the time I got there anyway. And Ash was supposed to be monitoring us in the truck and communicating by some sort of magical wireless devices.
It all reminded me of being in class in high school and college. Scott droned on like one of my teachers, and my brain thought about more interesting things like the plot of the book I was reading and just h
ow many more experience points it was going to take to get my monk to tenth level.
Towards five o’clock, Ash sat me down in small room with a table and two chairs. It felt like one of those interrogation rooms you see on police dramas. He seated himself across from me and opened a large envelope, pulling out a fancy card.
“Okay, here is your party invitation,” he said, sliding the card across the table. “You’ll present it when you arrive at the gate.”
I glanced down at it. The cream-colored paper was so heavy, it was almost like cardboard, but it was soft with frayed edges. The writing was so ridiculously frilly I could only make out a few words. It looked like the kind of invitation a bridezilla orders for her five-hundred-guest, hundred-thousand-dollar wedding.
“And here are your ID documents,” Ash said.
He handed me a driver’s license and passport. I glanced down at them. The license was sheer artwork. It was a perfect replica of an Ohio driver’s license straight down to my actual photo that adorned my real ID.
“How did you get this?” I asked.
“I hacked the BMV database,” he said with a shrug. “It’s not an easy thing to pull off, but I know magical coding in addition to technical. The State of Ohio isn’t expecting to defend against that.”
I nodded and glanced at the license again. My mouth turned down in a frown.
“Stefani Broadline?” I said. “What the hell kind of lame-ass name is that?”
“One that won’t be easy to trace,” he replied. “First, I searched the database, and there is no one in the state’s records with that name. So, in the event things go wrong, the authorities will be looking for someone who does not exist.
“Secondly, you’ll note the license indicates you live in Toledo. Thus, all the initial inquiries will take them well away from your actual identity and location. They’ll quickly discover they’re looking for a ghost.
“Finally, the name sounds neither too average nor too exotic. If I’d chosen Smith or Jones, investigators may have assumed immediately it was a cover. But by not choosing something outrageous, people may have difficulty remembering you.”
My heart raced at this information. Ash had thought of a lot of details and contingencies. It made this crazy-ass mission all the more real. Like I was involved in actual cloak-and-dagger shit. The Order really did intend for me to sneak into a charity fundraiser and assassinate the host. Suddenly, this wasn’t a fantasy novel. It was real life. Shit.
“The dress we’ve got for you is form fitting, but the skirt goes below your knees. I’ve included a garter you can wear to conceal the knife under it.”
“That’ll make it tough to fight in,” I commented.
“Which is why the skirt is also removable at mid-thigh. You’ll be able to steal the dagger and hide it under the skirt. But if things go badly, you can remove the bottom of it, so you’ll have better maneuverability.”
I shook my head.
“You guys have watched a lot of James Bond movies, haven’t you?”
“We’ve been doing this a long time, Sassy.”
That didn’t make me feel better. In fact, it kind of made me feel worse. Sure, they had thought of everything, but that meant they thought about this sort of thing too much.
“After you kill him, there is a balcony off his bedroom,” Ash continued. “You’ll head out onto it, where Stormy will have left you a rope with grappling hook for you to slide down. Get down on the grounds and head for the van. We’ll pick you up and get the hell out of there.”
“What about the dagger?”
“Wipe it to remove your fingerprints and leave it at the scene. It’ll help build the illusion we’re looking for.”
“Jesus, Ash, do you guys really do this sort of thing all the time?”
“Not this sort of thing exactly,” he said. “But when your job is to keep the magical world from being discovered by humans, you do engage in a lot of covert operations.”
I still didn’t feel better. I had this sinking feeling I was about to end my life as I had known it. The Order said they were going to take care of everything and make sure I never heard from them again. But I couldn’t help but think an operation of this scale would have consequences for everyone involved. It scared the hell out of me.
“Are you sure this is the only way?” I asked.
“Probably not the only way,” he said. “But it’s the best way.”
I frowned. That wasn’t really the answer I was looking for.
“Sassy,” he said, looking deeply into my eyes. “It’s going to be okay. I’ll be with you the whole way. I’ll make sure you get out alive and can walk away from all this when it’s done. Trust me.”
My heart melted, and my panties caught fire. Those beautiful eyes held me, promised me he could take care of everything. Ashrael Shinoch was the most perfect man I’d ever seen. I wanted him. I wanted him right there.
“Come on,” he said. “I’ll grab your dress and drive you home.”
Drive me home? My brain screamed at me not to let him do that, told me it was a really bad idea. My groin told my brain to fuck straight off.
“Okay,” I said.
We stood as one. Ash picked up the documents he’d given me, stuffed them back into the envelope, and handed them to me. I accepted them wordlessly. Then he went to the door, and I followed him out like a lovesick schoolgirl.
I didn’t want him to drive me home. I was terrified I was going to sleep with him, and I absolutely did not want to.
Except that I also did.
The car ride wasn’t as awkward as I expected it to be. Ash and I chatted amiably, making small talk about the weather and how ridiculous it was that Dirk McCray could make a living from selling sex wear and still think he could make a run for Congress as a Republican. We agreed that politics was a strange business that saw people voting for exactly the kind of person they claimed to loathe.
As we pulled into my neighborhood, Ash became more serious.
“Listen,” he said, “I couldn’t say this at the base, but I want you to know I have your back.”
“What do you mean?” I asked, every fear that The Order planned to betray leaping into my brain.
“I’ve been over the mission down to the last detail,” he answered. “As far as I can tell, it’s all on the up and up. I haven’t found any signs that they plan to betray you or hang the murder of Dirk McCray on you to cover their own tracks. That’s not how we operate, anyway, but I’m making sure there won’t be an exception this time.”
“Uh-huh,” I said, suddenly worried in a way I hadn’t been before. “What about Ephraim? Big Brother Asshole will not let it go that I upstaged him.”
“I’ve been monitoring him tightly since we brought you in. He has repeatedly lobbied Director Scott to replace you or reduce your role in the mission. But he hasn’t done anything else. So far as I can tell, Captain Silverman will execute the plan as it’s been drafted.”
“And if he doesn’t?”
“Then I’ll make sure he pays for it and that you’re safe, Sassy.”
A lump came into my throat. Aside from Felicia, I couldn’t remember anyone trying to take care of me this much. I mean, Mama loved me and tried to protect me like any parent does. But she was a hard woman. She took no shit and beat Ben and I if we stepped out of line. And I couldn’t get over the fact that she had hidden me from my father and lied to me about it, punishing me severely if I pressed.
“You can trust me,” Ash went on. “I will make sure you get to walk away from this.”
“I thought you wanted me to stay,” I said, trying not to sound like I was fighting back tears.
“I do,” he said. “But I want you to get what you want. It’s your life, Sassy. If you want to walk away from all this, neither I nor anyone else in The Order has a right to stop you.”
I was seriously about to cry. God damn Ash for being so nice. If he didn’t stop with this shit, I was going to drag him up to my apartment and spend t
he night showing him how grateful I was for his concern.
Before I realized we were there, he pulled the car over to the side of the curb, put it in park, and shut it off. Then he opened his door.
“What are you doing?” I asked, hoping for one answer and terrified I would get it.
“I’ll walk you to your door,” he said. “Then we’ll pick you up tomorrow at three PM. You should get some rest tonight. Tomorrow will be a big day.”
He got out, shut the door, then opened the back door and retrieved my dress. I shook my head. How exactly did someone get some rest the night before assassinating a potential congressional candidate?
With a heavy sigh, I got out. Then I took a deep breath and forced my mind back into control over my hormones.
“You’re not coming up for a drink,” I said.
“What?” he asked, cocking his head in confusion.
“You can walk me to my building, but you are not coming up. No funny business, mister.”
He immediately flashed one of those trademarked embarrassed looks of his. Red cheeks, wide eyes. Shock. It was so damned cute, my resolve immediately started to weaken. Damn it!
“Sassy, I wasn’t—”
“Relax,” I said, trying to grab hold of my emotions before they got away from me. “I was just teasing you.”
And I was. But about what – that he might try to come up, or that I didn’t want him to?
He continued to blush crimson. Oh, shit. He didn’t want me after all. He thought I was crazy for even suggesting such a thing. Or maybe he did want me, but he was too embarrassed to say anything or had some code about sleeping with teammates. What the hell did it mean?
At that moment, I realized Ash was very definitely only half a sex-demon. He didn’t seem to know how to seduce anyone at all. He was mortified of the very idea that I would think that’s what he was trying to do. It was cute. Sort of.
Ash had parked around the corner of my building. We started towards the intersection, him carrying my dress in a bag slung over his shoulder. We looked like some sort of married couple. God, if Felicia saw us, she would be pissed.
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