Magic and Mayhem: A Collection of 21 Fantasy Novels

by Jasmine Walt

  Joseph appeared extremely uncomfortable. He wrung his hands together. Chewed his lower lip. Stroked his bushy beard. Finally, he spoke in extremely quiet tones, his eyes not meeting hers. “Ms. Petit, I’ve always been impressed with the way you’ve done things around here. But Red and his kind, they want to rid the town of, well…you know, the…”

  “The supes?” Chia breathed out the word in a barely audible voice. “He wants to rid Charming of the supes?”

  Joseph looked right. He looked left. He met her eyes, blinking rapidly. “There’s been discussion, yes.”

  The doors at the back of the room exploded open and slammed shut, no doubt by supernaturals leaving the building, enraged, having heard Joseph’s quiet comments with their extraordinary hearing.

  Socyone, standing close to Chia, stiffened.

  Chia groaned and threw back her head. “There will be war. In my Switzerland, there will be war. We’ll go backward instead of forward!”

  “Durand’s going to serve as an example.”

  Chia hissed in a low voice, laced with rage. “He’s a nuisance, yes. Troublemaker, I get it. But he’s being framed. There’s no way in hell he’d done all the shit—excuse my French—all the stuff he’s accused of. In fact, Red’s proxy or one of the people he came with might have used magic to strangle normal thought in here,” she whispered. “Don’t you think that’s a little hypocritical? It caused people here to twist facts. Before they entered this room, none of them would have said that. They’ll probably leave here and wonder why the hell they said the things they said.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “You’re right, I don’t. But besides the fact all of these things occurred in a short period of time, no ordinary human can sniff out a bounty hunter. Someone fed them that line. Someone handed them a load of crap to explain their losses and they bought it. Only supes, and well, I can detect the bounty hunter signature smell. I’ve got some sort of singular supe sense.” She ran a hand through her pink and black hair. She pushed away the sensation of what Hung’s scent made her want to do to him…with him…under him…on top of him.

  Joseph looked pained but didn’t say anything. His hands kept wringing, ‘round and ‘round.

  Chia lifted her gaze to glance at him. Her head felt heavy. Her limbs felt heavy. Everything about her felt heavy and fatigued. And it’s not even lunchtime. “Let me guess. The regionals are coming up, right?”

  “Yeah, but…” Joseph began, repeating her earlier words. He huffed out a sigh and said, “Yes. And I want to be re-elected. It’s as simple as that.”

  The crowd had begun to talk among themselves, unable to hear what was being said near the stage. Chia stood, getting out of her crouch. “Can I have your attention? Everyone. Please.” She put her fingers in her mouth and blew out a loud wolf whistle, not wanting to subject them to any more howler monkey cries. When the room silenced, she asked, “How many here want me gone?”

  The group shifted nervously, like cattle in the presence of a predator. The door in the back opened and fell shut, but Chia couldn’t see who had left.

  “What we really want is to be done with Hung Durand,” someone shouted.

  “Or, keep him busy with other things,” a seductive female voice called out.

  Titters of laughter rippled throughout the room.

  “Yeah, he’s one fine male, I tell you what,” another female said.

  Chia’s jaw clenched together. One of her ghosts, the ghost of jealousy, wound around her arm. It made her want to leap off the stage and strangle the women. She shook her arm vigorously in an effort to dislodge the wraith.

  “Get the bastard out of these parts,” a male countered, no doubt the husband of one of the females who’d expressed their appreciation of Hung Durand.

  Chia nodded. “I want that, too. We all do. I’m going to get him this time. You have my word.”

  People looked right and left, shrugged, then clapped and cheered.

  “You’ll see. In one week’s time, he’ll be history. Nothing, not even his scent will remain.” Her lower body kicked up a fuss of protest. You can’t mean that. You love his scent. She almost slapped herself, trying to quench her desire. Stop this. Would you rather have your job or what’s hanging between Hung’s legs between your … A gush of silky fluid onto her panties gave her answer. Stop it! “Okay, so this meeting is adjourned. Thank you all for coming, but I need to plan and scheme. I’ve only been alerted to his presence this morning. As far as we know, he’s in the wind. All of this could be a moot point.” She smiled and nodded as the participants took their leave. When only she, Socyone, and Joseph remained, she said, “Sorry you had to come all this way for nothing.”

  “Oh, it’s always a pleasure,” he said, congenially.

  And you’re always a politician, she thought, shaking her head at his show of good will.

  “Anything I can do to help, let my people know. You’ve got Dora’s number, right?”

  “Yes, Socyone has your assistant’s number. We know who to call.” Not you, from the sound of it. “Head on over to Sunshine Sally’s. Get some lunch before you leave. It’s on me.”

  “That’s a mighty fine offer. I’ll take you up on it. Would you like to join me?”

  “No, thanks, I’ve got some business to attend to. Mr. Ashoroc,” she said, extending her hand. “It’s been a pleasure.”

  They shook hands and the big man left the building, leaving Chia with a head full of worry and no plan to remedy it. “This is going to be one long week,” she said.

  “Do you have a plan?” Socyone asked.

  “No clue. But I’d better find one, and fast, or it’s going to be my head on a platter, not Hung’s.” She shuddered, stroking her neck with her palm. “And I’d like to keep my head right where it sits.” The better to put my mouth around Hung’s….

  4

  The second she slid into her Jeep to head out for lunch, she knew she’d made a mistake. Distracted, worried, unable to think of a plan, she stepped on the running board and pivoted to slide her butt in. Her dopey ghosts bunched along the ceiling, flattening themselves like interior padding, as if offering up a clue. She got in without thinking or looking in the back.

  Two male hands wrapped around her head, obscuring her vision and preventing her from saying a word. She shrieked into the press of male skin. One of the warm hands peeled from her eyes and dropped to her neck, stroking her skin with lazy, calloused fingers. Her eyes flew to the rearview to see the blue and gold eyes of Hung Durand staring at her. Damn.

  When her hands started to lift in protest, a rope swiftly circled her waist and cinched her torso to the seat. Crap! She tried to struggle but he only gripped her jaw harder, pinning her to the headrest like a stuffed deer.

  “Your new tinted windows are a nice touch.” He leaned forward between the seats so his face rested mere inches from hers, his breath warming her neck. “But here I thought you, a mere mortal, could scent me. That’s what you’ve told me. It always made me think we had a special bond,” he purred in that damn sexy voice of his.

  She made a muffled sound, thinking, I’m stressed. Distracted. About to lose my job over you.

  “Someone’s trying to frame me. Some trumped up charges of vagrancy and theft. Like I have the time to do that. Might you know who that is?”

  She nodded her head as best she could, her eyes wild in the mirror.

  “Oh, don’t look so scared, my pet. You know I’d never harm you. You’re too much fun.”

  Yeah, well, the sentiment isn’t shared. I want to kill you, bastard.

  “Love the pink streaks in your black hair. Makes you look like a delicious, edible, dark chocolate, mercury eyed cupcake.” His fingers continued their lazy, unhurried exploration of her throat. The masculine scent he threw off made her want to rip off her clothes, climb in the back seat and straddle him. About six foot two, he always wore a three-day scruff on his face. Had wild, light brown hair that looked untamable. Tan skin, no matt
er the season. Lips that she could get lost with for days. Blue eyes that always had glints of gold, like he carried around his own sunbeam. Muscled masses where muscles usually weren’t, even in his fingers and no doubt his toes.

  Why, oh, why do I have to kill you?

  “I’ll remove my hand from your mouth if you promise not to kill me,” he said, as if reading her mind. “Oh, wait. I took your bullets out of the revolver in the glove box. And that tiny pistol under the seat? It’s secure in my pants, along with my huge one.” He chuckled and made a low growl in his throat. The darkly dangerous sound made her panties wet, wet, wet. “I sure hope you have permits to carry, you--the Queen of Rules.”

  She squeezed her eyes shut, pissed at herself for being so unaware. “Of course I have permits,” she hissed under her breath.

  “So do you promise not to try anything?” His big arm, the one attached to the hand she didn’t want to stop touching her neck, dropped to her chest. It smashed against her breasts, gripping her against the seat.

  The painful sensation of her breasts being squashed only stirred her arousal.

  “You want to feel how hard I am, woman? Like you wouldn’t believe.” His lips curved into a half smile, laced with seduction.

  Again her eyes closed, desire brewing like strong, thick, heady liquor in her body.

  “Yeah, baby,” he murmured. “I feel it, too. But. Don’t try anything stupid, got it? Let’s not mess with the mood we’re both in.”

  Pushing against his grip, she forced her head up and down as best she could. Still, her mind whirled. I could turn the truck on, lock the doors, and race over to Dead Man’s Cliff, leaping out at the last minute before my Jeep sailed off the cliff. Nah, he’d have sprung himself free, miles before we got there. Okay, I could leap from the truck, yelling, ‘I’ve got Hung!’ Ix-nay to that idea. He’d leap from the truck, and turn into a bat or a snake or a hawk or something. The dude has limitless shape shifter abilities as far as I know. One of the extremely rare. I could…

  “Are you done thinking of all the things you could do to get rid of me? Things that will never work? You know me better than that.” He tsked in her ear and rubbed his arm back and forth across her now aching breasts.

  Her nipples, swaddled in a bra, woolen undergarments, a sweater, and a down and fake-fur coat, puckered in response. God, I wish I hated him more than I wanted to have sex with him. Again, she pushed her head up and down in assent, realizing the rat bastard was right. She didn’t stand a chance.

  “There,” he said, once he’d released her mouth.

  She opened and wiggled her jaw, coaxing feeling back into it. “Damn you.”

  “If you’d said fuck you, I’d have taken you up on it.” A seductive sneer spread across his handsome face.

  “How did you get into my truck in broad daylight?”

  He shrugged.

  Arrogant asshole. “And how do you know you’re being framed?”

  “I’ve got eyes and ears everywhere, love, you know that, too. Only thing is…I know the what, but not the who. Who’s trying to frame me?”

  “What do I get if I tell you?”

  “You’ll live to see another day.”

  “You told me you’d never harm me.”

  “That’s only partially true. If I had to, as much as it would pain me, I’d off you in a second.” His eyes appeared cold and menacing in the rearview as he spoke, not like the lover’s eyes he’d flashed at her mere seconds ago.

  “Not if I killed you first,” she blurted, much to his apparent amusement. She squinted, assessing him, wondering how much truth rang true from his statement. Figuring it an honest sentiment—the guy did, after all, hunt and kill for a living—she winced, her teeth ground together and she spit out, “It’s Red Mountainbear. He’s using Dick Nighthawk to organize their hive of hornets.”

  “Those two Native American wannabes?” Hung scoffed. “They shame the tribespeople, what with their assumed last names. You know Red’s given surname is White, right? Randall White ass. And Dick’s? Worthington. Ha! It should be Worthless.”

  “I didn’t know that.” Chia rubbed her jaw, still trying to coax it back to life.

  “You should hang out with me more often,” he said, smirking.

  Sweet baby Jesus, don’t tempt me. “And you should follow the rules! None of this would be happening if you did what you’re supposed to—register, state your business, get your business done and get lost.” She would have crossed her arms if she could have moved them into position and she wasn’t trussed up like Dillon had been this morning. Hung seemed to possess Herculean strength. “That’s one of the rules that keeps Charming safe.”

  “More like it keeps it antiquated. These lands were not founded by following stupid arbitrary rules. When I have a job to do, I like to get it done, not pussy foot around signing agreements.”

  “Yeah, but that agreement keeps Charming a safe place for all concerned.”

  “Said agreement,” Hung said, moving his arm leisurely in a small circle on her plump breasts, “alerts the target, or haven’t you ever thought of that?”

  “No,” she stated argumentatively. “Not if it goes through the proper channels. Jack Towne and I are the only two allowed to witness the treaty.”

  “And what happens when neither you nor Jack are around?”

  “One of us is always around.”

  “You weren’t last night,” Hung said, easily.

  Chia’s face flamed hot, thinking of what she’d done to Dillon, what Dillon did to her, what they did to each other…

  “Yeah. That’s what I thought. Again, I thought you and me shared a special bond.”

  “Right, like you never seduce other women?” Chia snapped. Her boobs began to ache, slammed against the seat by Hung’s heavy arm.

  “I have to stay in practice somehow.”

  A surge of hopeful longing rocked through her. “Practice for whom? Me?” The words slipped out, as if a truth spell had been cast.

  “Come, come, Ms. Petit. I don’t need to answer the question for you, do I? All you have to do is give me keys to the garden gate and I’m yours.” One brown eyebrow cocked along his forehead.

  Oh, so, tempting. But I don’t believe him. “I can’t…you can’t…we can’t…” She spluttered, then snapped her mouth shut. “Look, Hung…”

  “Oh, how I love when you vocalize your appreciation of my endowments.” His lips curved in a wicked smile.

  “Damn. Stop it. Look, Mr. Durand, my main job in this town is to manage Charming. Your main job is to do whatever you do, and no, I don’t need any details. One of the requirements for you getting the job done in this town is to register first.”

  “If I were to follow your fucking rules,” Hung said, his temper flaring. “My target would be in Barrow by now and I wouldn’t have one hundred thousand dollars waiting for me in my bank account in the Caymans. I got in last night, actually tried to follow your ridiculous rule, got nowhere and barely caught up with my hit. Then, I had to ‘bend the rules,’” he made air quotes, “around your mariner laws to get safe passage for him back to the client. The fishing vessel I’d secured with a hefty portion of my profit almost gave up on me and left, profit in hand, thanks to you and your goddamned laws. Happy now?”

  Chia blinked. “You…you tried?”

  “I tried. First and last time, ever.”

  “But, you tried to follow the rules?” She felt giddy with delight. In the three years she’d managed Charming, since she turned twenty-three, Hung had never ever, not once, tried to follow the rules.

  “Yes. Don’t look so happy. It will never happen again.”

  “Why’d you even try?”

  “Doesn’t matter.” His gaze slid away from her.

  “It does to me.”

  “I thought you and me…we could…you know…catch up. It’s been a while.”

  Her eyes narrowed and it became her turn to smile wickedly. “You wanted to bed me, didn’t you? Times tough in the
tundra? No willing females?” The blood in her body pooled between her legs in response to the idea.

  “Maybe,” he said, eyes trained out the window. “And no, times aren’t tough. I’ve never sampled you before…”

  “Much.” She almost purred like a cat.

  “Much,” he agreed. His eyes slid back to meet hers and she almost gasped at the feral heat pounding into her from his fiery blue orbs. He brought his head close once again and took a long whiff of her. “Oh, yes, Chia Petit. I had a hankering for your kind of sexy.”

  Oh, God. Her eyes wanted to roll back in her head in a swoon. Focus, girl, focus. You want him dead remember? Your job’s at stake. “Stop with the seduction,” she managed to say. “I’ve got a job to protect, namely, mine. Red wants you, he wants my job, and he wants to parade your head around town on a platter.”

  “And how do you plan on preventing that? Or should I take care of it? I sure as hell don’t like being framed.”

  “No!” she exclaimed. “You’d be tried for murder.”

  “Let me guess, some ordinance or other stating I can’t act in self-defense?”

  Chia looked away from him.

  Hung scoffed. “Dang it, woman, you’ve got this place so protected there’s no room to breathe. Your town is laced with laws. Tangled, trussed up, bound tight.” He shook his head, his face lined with disgust. “I’ve got orders to hang around until my next hit rolls through town. I might get bored…so many restrictions on what I can and can’t do, you know.” His eyes pierced hers with hidden meaning.

  “Hung, don’t do anything stupid,” she said, thinking of him going after either Red or Dick.

  “Who said anything about stupid?” he said, looking at her with seductive, hooded eyes. “I assume some things are within the jurisdiction of this fine community.”