Nine Lives of an Urban Panther

by Amanda Arista

  There was a lightning flash behind me and the night was filled with the smell of ozone. I jumped and turned, ready for a fight. The Legacy sizzled down my arms at the new feeling of power.

  Two women walked toward me. A tall redhead and a younger girl. They were powerful. The feel of it preceded them like a warm breeze.

  “Prima Jordan,” the young girl said as she scuttled forward quickly. “I’m Twila.”

  I relaxed, curiosity calming the cat for a moment. “Remy’s girlfriend?” I asked as I walked a few steps toward them.

  “Prima Jordan,” the woman said. “I am Mistress Willowbourne.”

  Every muscle in my body flinched to keep in the snicker. The tall redhead in the ankle-length dress looked every part the Coven Mistress. The green cape was a bit much though.

  “I wanted to thank you for the information about the Shades. It proved invaluable.”

  “Well, you’re welcome, and I’d really like to extend the olive branch and talk, but I’ve got a little situation here.”

  “I know.” Willowbourne’s eyes flicked to the circle of trucks. It really was that obvious on this street.

  I gaped. “How?”

  But I knew the answer in the twist of Twila’s pale fingers at her waist. “Remy’s in there.”

  I gulped and turned back to look at the house. The Legacy burned down my back and I had to clench my hands into fists to keep my anger down. A third one? Why couldn’t they call out to me?

  “I do seem to owe you,” Willowbourne said.

  I licked my lips and turned very slowly back to the tall woman. “What?”

  The woman looked down at Twila. “It seems our star-crossed lovers are going to take the day. If you need some help, I might be able to assist, if the Mother wishes.”

  I looked over at Chaz. He only shrugged.

  Willowbourne rubbed her hands together and there was a ripple in the air around us. She was calling on her power and the trees around us seemed to give it to her.

  “Well then, let’s hope the Mother wishes three of my pack to be saved from a group of rednecks.”

  Willowbourne smiled. “Seems that the wind is right.”

  Chaz’s hand curled into mine as we walked toward the house. Willowbourne said she needed thirty minutes and we promised to deliver the rednecks to her in one piece.

  We were almost to the townhouse when Tyler came running out of the bushes.

  “Something’s wrong with Remy. I texted him and he didn’t text back. He always has that damn thing in his hand.”

  I winced. “He might have gotten himself kidnapped?”

  “What!”

  “Shhh. You’re blowing our plan to get him back,” I hissed as I grabbed his arm and pulled him into sync with us as we walked toward the house disguised as young twentysomethings on a Wednesday night.

  As we walked up to the front door, I feigned a stumble and launched my purse into the back of one of the guys’ heads.

  He turned around and his plaid shirt had seen better days. He reeked of beer though he had nothing in his hands.

  “Sorry about that.” I laughed as I bent down to get my purse.

  “No problem,” he grumbled.

  That was before I sunk my fist into his midsection. He doubled over and I elbowed the back of his skull. He dropped like a sack of smelly potatoes.

  I looked up at the boys who were looking at me with their mouths open wide enough to catch flies. “What? Did you really think that negotiating was going to work with these guys?”

  “No. Just remember to save one for me,” Chaz said.

  I winked at him as we walked in through the unlocked door.

  “WHERE EXACTLY DID you learn how to hog tie someone?” Chaz asked as I wrangled the last of the bunch.

  I cinched the knot tighter. “Waylon taught me, actually.”

  “Do you think he saw that you’d need the skills?” Chaz asked as he stood over them.

  I’d never thought of that before. “I don’t know. I think he did it because we were bored.”

  I pulled out my phone and dialed my Riko.

  “Officer Briggs,” he answered.

  “Tucker, I need you to pick up a few drunks in Highland Park.”

  “What?”

  “I need you to arrest someone.”

  “That’s not in my . . .”

  I spoke slowly. “Tucker. I need these guys to wake up in jail in their underwear with no memory. I know that might compromise your morals, but this is what I need.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  I hung up. I knew I was swimming with a sort of gray but as I watched Hannah walk up to one of the men still unconscious and kick him really hard in the shins, I also knew that my gray was worth her standing up for herself.

  I felt Willowbourne walk into the little townhouse. She looked around at the men scattered across the floor. “Your methods are effective, if a little brutal.”

  I crossed my arms. “Don’t judge my methods and I won’t mention the cape.”

  Willowbourne raised her eyebrows.

  That whole foot-in-my-mouth thing. I’d done so well. “I’m sorry. I get a little snippy after a fight.”

  “I forgive you.”

  Chaz came up behind me and squeezed my shoulder. I needed his steady reminder that Plan A actually seemed to be working right now if I didn’t ruin it.

  I stepped to the side and let the witch do her thing. Willowbourne walked through the group, running her hands over the heads of the men. “Which one needs the biggest wipe?”

  I pointed to TW.

  “Who does he need erased?”

  “Me.” Kandice appeared in the doorway of the house, Nash close behind her. Their fingers were so tightly woven together that I felt the ache of it in my hand.

  Willowbourne summoned her and when Kandice looked at me, I nodded. We needed to show trust among the species and I was going to offer it up first.

  Kandice went to her and the woman put a hand on her shoulder and then placed her white hand on the man’s head.

  I felt the pull on Kandice and then the push of a spell into the man’s brain. Willowbourne’s eyes went white for a moment, just like Yasmina’s had. It was pure Mother power and it smelled like rosemary.

  It only lasted for a moment and I was going to comment on it, but Chaz put his hand over my mouth. I did need him to protect me from myself.

  When Willowbourne let go of Kandice, Nash rushed to her side and pulled her against him. The witch completed the circle of men and then wiped her hands on her cape. Looked like it was good for something. “My part is done here.”

  “Thank you, Willowbourne.”

  “I will see you soon, Prima.” The woman and her train of skirt walked out of the door and into the night air.

  I looked over at Twila, still curled around Remy. He’d fared pretty well through this whole ordeal, only a small bruise on his cheek, which would probably just made Twila love him even more.

  “I think you should probably go with your Mistress,” I suggested.

  Twila’s arm only curled tighter around Remy’s.

  There was a crack of lightning in the front yard and the girl jumped. She kissed Remy on the cheek and scurried out of the house.

  “I need to learn that lightning thing. That was handy.”

  Tucker’s police lights filled the living room. Tyler flinched at the familiar pattern of red and blue against the walls.

  Tucker walked in the room and stopped cold. “What do I actually need to know?” he asked carefully.

  I wove my very simple story. “These eight men got drunk and broke into Hannah and Evan’s house.”

  Tucker lifted one eyebrow. “They sure did do a lot of damage.”

  I nodded. “They sure did, but they are not going to remember it. They were really drunk. Scouts’ honor.”

  Tucker scratched behind his ear. His nervous tick. “Was that a cape I saw leaving?”

  “Maybe.”

  Tucker shook his head
. “Okay. I need everyone out who doesn’t want their name on the record.”

  Hannah and Evan stayed. Nash offered to house them at the apartment for the evening until sunlight could help them rebuild their living room.

  This left Chaz and me to an empty townhouse. I fell onto my lavender bedspread and didn’t protest when Chaz pulled off my shoes.

  “Has it started yet?” Chaz asked as he kicked off his boots and pulled off his shirt.

  “Has what started?” I asked as I rolled over to stare at the ceiling.

  “Where your brain goes crazy?”

  I sighed. It had already been going that direction on the car ride home. I’m as cool as a cucumber as I beat the fool out of a bunch of rednecks, but now that there was quiet, the gears started churning out painful thoughts. “Already there.”

  Chaz made quite a showing of unbuttoning and unzipping my jeans. He pulled them down my long legs and I smiled as he had to tug to get the skinny jeans off my big feet.

  He rolled me over and pulled off my jacket and let me fall back to the bed in my T-shirt and underwear.

  The churning thoughts might have stopped for a little while as I watched him peel off his UT shirt and let his jeans fall to the floor, the moonlight streaming through the window highlighting every perfect muscle in his torso.

  He crawled across the bed and pulled me into his arms as we rested on the cool pillows. I hadn’t even wiped the blood off my knuckles yet and I picked at the brown flaky mess as he held me.

  “I did this, Chaz. Tonight was all my fault. My bravado because I wanted to do something by myself.”

  “But Hannah and Evan are fine, better. Kandice and Nash are stronger than ever.”

  “And I had to break my promise to Tucker that I would never ask him to do something against his morals. What makes it worse was that Peter saw it coming. ”

  Chaz sighed, his breath cascading down my arm. “But I think the Willowbourne likes you.”

  “Really?”

  His fingers ran softly up and down my arm. “She’s hasn’t left her circle since I’ve been working Dallas. Tonight was a big deal.”

  “Really?”

  “It’s how she survived. She hid.”

  I sighed. “I just can’t help but think that Haverty might have had the right idea about keeping us hidden and the penalty that came with it.”

  Chaz sat up. “What?”

  I huffed and shifted to a sitting position on the bed. “Calm down. I’m not saying that I’m going to go all tyrant. I’m saying that . . .”

  What was I saying? That Haverty had to be a bastard because he didn’t have others to help him? That he had to crack an iron whip because if he didn’t, humans were being murdered all the time? Was I feeling sorry for the guy?

  “I think I’m saying that I won’t have to because I trust others. Which, according to Iris, is the last thing I should be doing.”

  “Iris?”

  “Yeah. Gave me this big speech on how I needed to do this alone because it would be easier on everyone.”

  The information didn’t sit well with Chaz and it weighed heavy across his brow.

  I licked my lips. “I think with everything that’s happened tonight, maybe, Iris and Haverty had the same problem.”

  “What was that?”

  “They were alone.”

  Chaz smiled. “Say it again, fearless leader.”

  My skin goose bumped and again I made a choice, and the echo of it hung around us. “I think we need to unify Dallas.”

  Though Chaz was golden for a moment, his eyes turned dark. “Where does Spencer come into all this?”

  Hearing Chaz say his name sent another shiver down my spine. “The others have to know. They need to know what he is capable of.”

  “Are you going to tell them about your connection?”

  “Hopefully they already know, but I’m not going to keep it from them. Hell, maybe one of them knows how to break it.”

  Because I already knew a way to break it. I curled back into Chaz’s arms and we lay back down on the bed. There was always a Plan C going round and round in my head. A plan that was guaranteed to break the bond.

  Chapter Twenty

  “HERE ARE THE Harrison files, your double-shot macchiato, and the conference call is set up for speed dial on two,” Pamela said as she set down the manila folders and his steaming hot coffee on his desk for the long evening ahead.

  Dylan barely looked up at her as he nodded his head. If he didn’t nail this . . .

  “Will there be anything else?” she asked, looking at the clock. It was already close to midnight and the dark seemed extra dark outside his tenth-floor window.

  “I’m good,” he said as he reached out for the paper cup.

  Pamela pushed the paper cup within reach of his grasping fingers.

  Dylan brought it to his lips without taking his eyes from the file he was flipping through.

  “See you tomorrow then.”

  Pamela left and Dylan finally lifted his eyes off the files and watched his assistant walk out of his office.

  “SO YOU CAN clearly see by the figures this is the only way to go,” Dylan spoke into his headset, kicking his heels up onto his desk and relaxing his hands behind his head.

  The investors in Japan said they had to think about it until their next morning, but Dylan knew he had them, part of his sixth sense. He would get the deal he had been working on for the past three months and he would get the promotion.

  He took off the headset and picked up an empty coffee cup. With a bank shot off the wall, he tossed the cup away and wondered if Pamela would be able to come with him when he moved to that corner office. She was just a temp, but the girl had skills, and those stockings with the stitches up the back of her long legs.

  Dylan stood up and looked out of his office window. The skyline sparkled at the wee hours of the morning. He looked across the street at the iron-framed building covered in mirrors. He saw his building in its reflection and wondered whether, if he looked hard enough, he could see his own rising star.

  He looked closely, trying to count the floors on the reflection to see if he could find his office.

  The building before him exploded in a shower of glittering glass. Dylan jumped back from his window as it too cracked under the force of the explosion. The edge of his desk caught him as he watched the rain of mirrors.

  All Dylan could think was how much bad luck that would be.

  AT THE THIRD ring of my cell phone, my heart was pounding. Some part of my brain had finally associated the chirpy sound of the standard ring tone as a precursor to death and danger.

  Smart brain.

  “Hello?” I scratched my head and yawned.

  “If it isn’t my favorite cousin.” Waylon sounded far too chipper this morning.

  “Are you calling me because you had a dream about the Infomart exploding?”

  “No, I’m calling you because I’m on your porch and I wanted to make sure you were wearing pants.”

  I sighed and pulled the covers off my bare legs and slowly dropped my feet to the floor. Chaz hadn’t stirred yet and I didn’t want him to. Poor thing needed sleep like I needed more sleep.

  Grabbing a pair of lounge pants off the back of a chair, I shuffled out the door of the bedroom and headed downstairs. “Why the hell are you on my doorstep at this unearthly hour?”

  “Just dropped off Lexie at her first day of school.”

  I pulled on the pants in the living and looked down at Shadow, resting in his bed in the living room. He just shook his head and lay back down.

  I ran my fingers through my hair in the mirror in the foyer, checked my teeth, and picked the sleep crusts from my eyes. “Which one did you pick?”

  “The private Catholic one.”

  “So the soccer coach liked her?”

  I opened the door and Waylon answered me face to face. “Loved her.”

  I dropped the phone from my ear and motioned for him to come in.

>   He followed me through the living room and into the kitchen. “I stopped by to make sure you got through the full moon okay. Should I be asking you about your dream about Walmart?”

  I groaned as I started making coffee. “Please don’t. But can you confirm that you have not had a dream about the Infomart? Big building with lots of mirrors? ”

  Waylon put his hand up in a Boy Scout oath. “I have not. Why?”

  I sighed. “Chaz has this theory that if real psychics only dream about actual futures, then whatever I am might dream about possible futures.”

  “Who told him we don’t dream of possible futures?”

  I stopped and looked up at him. “He read it in some book.”

  “The book is wrong. I dream about all sorts of futures. Those history psychics only dream of past things, but the rest of us dream every possible angle of events.”

  I nodded. “Good to know that not all the crazy stuff in those books comes true.” I started the process of measuring out the beans and suddenly got a hankering for Bastian’s coffee cake.

  “In your case, I think all of yours are linked to Dallas.”

  I frowned. I’d only told him maybe three of the dreams that I’d ever had. “What?”

  “Well . . .”

  There was a lie coming. I knew it. I could tell when his gaze floated somewhere to the left of my elbow. “If you dare make up some story, I’ll know.”

  Waylon sighed and spoke fast, as if saying the truth faster would take the sting out of it, for him and me. “Lexie took your dream journal when she was at your place.”

  “What?” I spun around to glare at him and launched a half cup of coffee beans across the kitchen floor.

  “I asked her to.”

  “What?” I shrieked. “Why? And why couldn’t you just ask about it?”

  “I wanted to prove my theory.”

  “About what? That you can’t even trust your family?”

  “That you are tied to Dallas.”

  He reached around to the back of his pants and produced my dream journal.

  “And you stuck my journal down your pants. Geez, Waylon.”

  I grabbed my journal from him and flipped through the pages. There were Post-its on a few of them, highlights. “This might actually be worse than when you read my diary in seventh grade.”