by G A Chase
If arguing with an angel was a bad idea, Kendell thought punching her would definitely be frowned upon. She struggled to keep her cool. “You know that’s not what I meant. I need you back among the living. No one understands me the way you do. We’re two halves of this puzzle, and I don’t like you rushing off to fight the devil alone.”
“I’ll walk with you to the door to Guinee to make sure Myles is still there, but I’m not crossing over with you. Now, where did you leave that little turd of a devil?”
Kendell considered not telling Sanguine, but she feared that would only make her more determined. “I left him in the past.”
Sanguine frowned in apparent confusion. “How did you manage that?”
“He’s figured out how to move time forward and backward as if he were turning an old-fashioned movie reel by hand in a projector. What I figured out from Marie’s journals was how to step from one frame to the corresponding frame in the next coil on the spool.”
“Doesn’t sound very precise.”
“I had to do something,” Kendell said. “Any time was better than sharing that moment with Colin.”
Sanguine led the way up the steps. “So long as he’s trapped in the past, I’ll find him.”
Kendell followed her, hoping Myles had a more convincing argument to make Sanguine return home. When they got to the large office, she was surprised to see Papa Ghede standing next to Myles in the interdimensional doorway.
“Thank God and the loas of the dead!” Myles gave her a look of relief that filled her with love.
Papa Ghede stood aside from the door. “We’d better get moving. The sooner we get the three of you out of Guinee, the better for everyone, alive and dead.”
Sanguine stood at the entrance of the office. “You’re getting a little ahead of yourself, old man. I’m not leaving hell.”
Kendell wondered how anyone survived the original loa’s glare of displeasure. “You have to go. Leaving your body uninhabited by a soul is a sure way of turning it into a zombie. A living soul wandering around Guinee with five-foot-long wings doesn’t exactly go unnoticed. Someone’s going to get the bright idea that there’s a body among the living for the taking. I can only hold back the tide for so long. Stay in hell, and the loas of the dead will invade your grandmother’s creation and drag you out by your feathers.”
Kendell hadn’t processed all the dangers of taking Sanguine’s body out of hell while comatose, but then, she hadn’t yet realized the young woman had gone for a little spiritual joy ride either. “I’m no longer asking,” she said. “I’m telling. Get through that fucking door. We’ll discuss what to do about Colin over coffee and beignets. I don’t care if you do have wings. I can still kick your butt, and you know it. This isn’t just about you anyway. My bandmates are withering away while you’re on this vendetta. Move it, sister.”
For the first time that Kendell could remember, Sanguine backed down instead of rising to the fight. “I love you too.” Meekly, she walked ahead of Kendell and through the gate that Myles held open.
25
Sanguine sat on the couch in Kendell and Myles’s apartment, feeling like an angel who’d had her wings clipped. Having Delphine de Galpion poke and prod her while filling the room with noxious scents from her voodoo candles didn’t help at all.
“I’m fine. Why can’t you all just leave me alone for once?”
Madam de Galpion’s eyes looked like they were floating in the haze. “I’m not checking for any ill side effects. Though spending a month in hell wasn’t the smartest move. Your body wasn’t meant to be left unattended for that long.”
Kendell hovered around like an overly protective mother hen. “Baron Samedi said she might suffer from some permanent version of déjà vu. He called it déjà vecu. Can you tell how far off she is in her perception of time?”
The whole experience was giving Sanguine a splitting headache. “Far enough ahead that I’ve been able to block out this conversation.”
The dark woman motioned for Myles to open the French doors. The fresh air was probably meant to help Sanguine’s disposition. It didn’t work.
Madam de Galpion snuffed out her odious candles. “With Sanguine bouncing around in hell’s perverted concept of time, it’s impossible to know how far off she is. My guess is she can see days—maybe a week—into the future clearly. She’ll probably get hazy images as far as a month in advance. But time isn’t always a smooth-running river. What she sees won’t necessarily happen. The more intense the event, the more likely it will happen. But ask her if it’s safe to eat the rest of that muffuletta that Myles put in the fridge a week ago, and her accuracy will be anyone’s guess.”
Sanguine leaned forward conspiratorially toward Kendell. “The answer will always be no.”
She could feel the puppy’s eyes on her long before the little ball of black fur jumped onto the couch. He sat at attention and stared at her as if he too were a voodoo practitioner trying to read her aura. His single bark echoed three times in her head.
“Hey, knock that off.” Something about the dog felt all too familiar. “You’re from my grandmother’s hell.”
Myles at least understood the connection. “You can experience his past, present, and future, can’t you?”
“Only for a moment. Those bug eyes I wore in hell must have left me with some awareness when it comes to hell’s creatures.”
Myles sat next to the dog and scratched his head. “Doughnut Hole may be from hell, but he’s not bound to it. And he’s not a creature. He’s a dog.”
“I didn’t mean any disrespect. I’m not always the most diplomatic while I’m processing new information. If it wasn’t for him, his sisters, and their mother, we’d all be in deep trouble. But if I can see his past and future, I should be able to see Colin’s too—should he end up in this reality. I’m not sure that does us any good, but it’s interesting.”
Madam de Galpion was still loading her magic tricks into her bag. “You’re still afraid he’ll find a way out of your hell?”
Sanguine found it hard not to take offense at the voodoo jab against the presumed weaknesses of her grandmother’s Wiccan invention. “He’s not a devil of our creation. Though the difference between our religions works to hold him captive, it’s not like I can anticipate his every move. Just once, I’d like to see you take some responsibility for you and your ancestor’s actions.” Sanguine hadn’t meant to be so confrontational, but the voodoo priestess had gotten on her last nerve with those damn scents.
“I was simply trying to figure out if I needed to keep my voodoo cabinets locked tight. From Kendell’s description of events, it sounds like he took a liking to my spirit totems.”
“Sorry. Getting used to this body again has taken a toll on my emotions. I feel like I’m getting a double whammy of PMS.”
Kendell waved some of the voodoo smoke out the window. “Sounds like a good time for me to take you out for those beignets I promised.”
Sanguine could already taste the sweet goodness. “Yes, please.”
Getting out of the apartment helped lift her mood, as did being alone with Kendell. The streets were filled with people. The strangers were like moving partitions that Sanguine tried to avoid. She walked on the balls of her feet, imagining she could once again hop into the air and spread her wings. Instead, she plowed into an overweight tourist in gaudy shorts and a Hawaiian shirt.
“Watch where you’re going!” the man said.
I’ll bet you’d sing a different tune if you could see me as hell’s angel. People bugged her to begin with. Taking offense after spending so much time in an almost deserted dimension wasn’t going to help her disposition.
“I miss my wings,” she whispered to Kendell.
“After breakfast, we’ll work on that vision issue. Knowing what’s coming at you might help.”
They didn’t resume their conversation until they were seated at a quiet table in a small courtyard with their coffees and beignets.
Sangui
ne knew she had a lot to apologize for. “I must have freaked you out when you couldn’t wake me up.”
“Charlie offered to wake you with a kiss, but I declined on your behalf.”
Though Myles’s fellow bartender wasn’t the worst of his friends, he was too much of a lothario to even be considered as boyfriend material, let alone Prince Charming. “I appreciate that. You didn’t consider trying to kiss me yourself?”
Kendell snickered. “I have a boyfriend.”
Sanguine took the levity as a good starting point to getting serious with her emotions. “I wanted to apologize, and say thank you, but I’m not good at either.”
Kendell held her hand. “You don’t have to.”
“You were right about me having to come back to my body, but don’t get any ideas that I’m going to listen in the future. That was a one-time admission.”
“Apology accepted, or was that a thank-you?”
Sanguine grimaced at the cut. “I’m not sure. I told you I sucked at this stuff.”
Kendell leaned back in the chair with her coffee. “Then let’s talk about what you are good at. Without returning to hell, what do you propose we do about Colin?”
“You’re sticking with your refusal to let me kill him?”
“You’ve just come from Guinee. Do you honestly believe those loas stand a chance against him?”
“Good point,” Sanguine said. “I fear we’re back where we started.”
“Not quite. He has made it through the first gate, but now we know he’s just being his manipulative self again.”
Sanguine peered over her cup at Kendell. “What did he want with you anyway?”
“To plead his case.”
“Just like a guy—doesn’t know how to take rejection.”
Kendell’s blush told Sanguine all she really needed to know.
“He might have a slight crush on me,” Kendell said, “but our conversation was civil. For a devil infected with a misogynistic asshole, Colin can still pull out the charm.”
“Listen, sister, we’re going to destroy him. Maybe I can’t kill him, but that hell is too good for him. Don’t go getting soft on me. You said it yourself—you already have a boyfriend.” Sanguine had never been prouder of herself for not slapping some sense into Kendell.
“I just told you so you would know I see what he’s doing. I’m not naïve. In fact, I bet I’m more experienced with guys than you. His charm doesn’t work on me, but his infatuation is something we can use.”
Though Kendell was probably right, Sanguine could see that using her as bait would only call Colin forth. “How is it that guys, and girls for that matter, willingly follow you into hell? Maybe we should just make a Kendell voodoo-sex doll and leave it in his office. We’d never hear from him again.”
“Be nice. It’s not as if going after him like some avenging angel with creepy insect eyes worked all that well at keeping him in his dimension.”
“My intention,” Sanguine said, “wasn’t to make him happy with his situation. My aim was to kill him and remove all traces of his existence. A plan, by the way, which I still think could work if only it didn’t violate your two restrictions of not returning to hell and not killing him.”
Kendell put the cup back on the table in favor of the powdered-sugar-covered beignet. “I’m sticking by my requirements. He’d only end up—”
Sanguine raised her hand. “I know. You don’t have to make your case again. My plan does require a certain degree of competence among the loas of the dead while I complete my mission. So back to what we now know that we didn’t before. He has a crush on you.”
“And you can sprout wings and see into the future and past.”
Sanguine stuck her tongue at Kendell. “He can’t be trusted, but we did already know that. I guess even with age, he’s not changing.”
Kendell squirmed in her chair. “In exchange for having our conversation, he helped me get back to my time. Unfortunately, Myles had already left.”
“No need to thank me.”
She shook her head as though an idea was having trouble forming. “I do appreciate your rescue, but that’s not my point. You said he can’t be trusted. Everything he does is with some ulterior motive.”
Sanguine felt a cold chill run down her spine. “What did he have you do?”
“He said there wasn’t enough energy to send me forward through time.” She looked up. “We need to go to the World Trade Center. I have to talk to Luther Noire. That’s where Colin is getting his electricity, and I just gave him a fucking power converter.”
* * *
Kendell threw some money on the table and got up without waiting for the check. Sanguine rushed after her. “So what’s your plan? We just walk into Luther’s office and have a nice chat over tea while he bullshits us again about doing something? You know, you’re like the hero version of the villain who sets up a slow death for her adversary then walks away assuming everything will go according to plan. You have too much faith in people.”
Though Kendell didn’t like being made fun of, she knew Sanguine had a point. “Nice to see you’re back to your usual self. To answer your question, no. I have no plan to listen to more of his justifications and avoidance. We’re going to burn that building to the ground, paranormally speaking.”
Sanguine pointed down a side street. “Aren’t we going to need some voodoo bombs or something? Scratch and Sniff is that way.”
“I’m also done being manipulated by Delphine. We don’t need anything she has anyway.”
“Nice to see you’re coming around to my way of thinking, but shouldn’t we at least snag Myles? He’s proven useful in a pinch before.”
“He wouldn’t agree to what I have in mind.” Once Kendell had something in mind, she was like a hurricane—only small deviations were accepted.
Sanguine had to hurry to keep up. “Is this what it’s like to be you when I get hardheaded?”
“Probably.”
Finally, she grabbed Kendell’s arm. “Stop. We have to talk about this. You can’t just go storming into that tower expecting to pull it down through force of will.”
“Watch me.”
Sanguine stopped walking and clinched onto Kendell’s wrist like an anchor. “Kendell, you at least owe me an explanation of what we’re walking into. You might not always agree with my plans, but I do share them with you before marching into battle.”
“I didn’t ask you to join me.”
Sanguine spun her around with such force Kendell nearly lost her footing. “You’re being obstinate for no reason. Talk to me.”
Kendell had no interest in venting her anger before it was needed, but she did owe her cohort at least a reason for the attack. “Colin tricked me into loading up Marie’s voodoo totems with energy. Now he knows how to turn that electricity gathered by the World Trade Center into a source of voodoo magic. And we know he already used those dolls as his creepy-clown way of infiltrating our seven-gates house of mirrors. Put it all together, and I just gave him the keys for walking out of hell. I have to stop him. We don’t need anything or anybody because everything’s already up on the top floor of that fucking building. I just need to get up there.”
“And you think Luther’s just going to let you in?”
They were wasting time. “Nope. Either Colin is paying Luther—manipulating him like he does everyone else—or he has simply stolen the building. Whatever the situation, going through Luther will only alert Colin to what I’m doing. Satisfied?”
“Satisfied. Any ideas on how to get into the structure? The few times I was there, it felt like a paranormal Fort Knox.” Sanguine let go of Kendell’s wrist.
Kendell resumed her march toward the river. “The front door is guarded, but the basement entrance from Harrah’s underground parking lot isn’t. I need to access those turbines first anyway.”
“That whole place is guarded, under video surveillance, and probably booby-trapped. I’m not trying to stop you, just point out the obvio
us.”
For the first time since the guilt had taken control of Kendell’s thoughts, she stopped her advance. “You’re right, but there is someone who can get us in.” She pointed to the grand police station.
Sanguine’s look of shock nearly made Kendell laugh. “You can’t be serious. Lieutenant Cazenave? We know he was working for Luther.”
“Joe works for a number of organizations,” Kendell said, “but he’s only loyal to doing what’s right. He’s gone up against his own police force to help us. I trust him, maybe even more than I do myself.”
Sanguine nodded. “You are a pretty shady character. Have you given any thought to the fact that you might be arrested just for setting foot inside the station?”
Kendell tried to run down all the events that had happened since her first excursion into the paranormal world. “They don’t have anything on either of us. Myles did steal Luther’s van, but I doubt they’d press charges.”
“You seem to be forgetting one pretty big problem: Colin Malveaux is missing. The most powerful businessman in New Orleans, not to mention the nephew of the chief of police, isn’t someone to slip under the radar. And you, sister, are one of the most logical suspects.”
“You might have a point there. Chief Laroque did meet with Myles, though, to explain the dangers when Lincoln became Colin.”
Sanguine wrapped her arms around her stomach. “Yeah, but in private, in the dead of night, and in a place where he was certain the cameras and the other observation devices had been shut off. I don’t think you’re going to be able to count on his help. Do you have any other way of contacting Lieutenant Cazenave without walking directly into a prison cell?”
Even sending Myles wouldn’t do much good. Whatever beef the cops had with him that had resulted in his apartment being under surveillance had never been explained. Kendell’s only real hope regarding the police was the fact that Joe had worn his police uniform during the team’s second line out of hell. That simple indicator that he was back on the force had meant she and Myles no longer had to watch their backs, but Sanguine was right. If she did something stupid like unintentionally turning herself in, Joe was not likely to fix it.