by Greco, Karen
Frankie responded. "We'll get you as soon as we can. Once you shut down, go to my bunker room and wait for us. Stay off the phones, even the untraceables, and definitely off the computer. We don't know who or what they're wired into."
"Got it," Darcy said. From the sound of her voice, she had moved into efficiency mode.
Frankie was so in control it was reassuring.
Darcy counted down. "Shutting down comms in three, two..." And she cut out.
With Frankie in the lead, we carefully slipped out the side door and into the alleyway. We crept around the corner and found ourselves at the edge of a riled up crowd.
Leila was on the dais. Max was beside her carrying Babe, who was bleeding out. Bertrand and Tavio stood just behind them. Bertrand's face was blank and completely unreadable. Tavio looked shell-shocked. About 100 police officers, dressed in full riot gear, kept the crowd a safe distance from platform.
"This is a dangerous world, my fellow Americans," my mother's voice boomed through the sound system. "We thought we knew the enemy. We fought wars with that enemy and spent billions of dollars to keep this country safe from that enemy. And it turns out, a different enemy was living amongst us all along. This enemy is more insidious, able to hide in plain sight. This enemy is more dangerous because they are their own weapons."
She paused as the crowd gasped. She raised her eyebrows and nodded. A perfect politician.
"My friends, what I am about to tell you is from your worst nightmare. The boogieman is real, friends. The boogieman is real. This woman before you? She is a witch."
The crowd murmured in disbelief.
"I know, I could scarcely believe it myself. Kittie, darling, bring him forward."
"She's fucking joking," Frankie muttered.
"I told you she was a demon," I said through gritted teeth.
Tavio shifted as Kittie pushed Elias out in front of her. He moved at a shuffle, his eyes vacant.
"See this man?" my mother said, pointing at Elias. Her voice quieted the crowd. "He was turned into a zombie by this witch using voodoo. While under her control, he caused the rampage last night at the club that killed three people and caused millions of dollars worth of damage, leaving this beautiful city in shambles."
My heart raced. "Kittie's been working for my mother all along. Frankie, this whole thing was a setup."
"A setup?" Frankie whispered.
I nodded and fought back tears. "Since Chicago. Since Elias. At least. Fucking hell, Frankie. How long has she been tailing us?"
Frankie, without an answer, just shook his head.
"This witch also murdered my colleague in that abandoned theater when we moved to arrest her," Leila continued with her lies. "Snapped his neck without even touching him, a decorated member of our military. Just snapped it like it was nothing."
She had them. The crowd cheered their agreement.
"Remember Salem?" she called out over their cries for revenge. "Then let's light her up and see if this poor young man, whose future with the rising rock band Killing Haley is in jeopardy, snaps out of it. Do you want to see if we can save him from her witchy grasp?"
Shrieks rose from the crowd. Someone yelled, "I love Killing Haley!"
Leila turned towards Bertrand. "Mr. Mayor, what say you?"
Bertrand's eyes swept across the crowd, stopping briefly on me. He gave a small shake of his head and broke away from my gaze.
"Burn the witch," he said calmly into the microphone.
The crowd went wild.
Babe was taken from Max's arms by two military policemen. They dropped her on top of the bonfire that was just in front of the platform.
I struggled to get to Babe, but the route to her was packed tightly with angry bodies. I pushed forward, trying to break through the mass of people. A few turned and looked at me, their faces consumed with rabid hate. Frankie snatched me by the scruff of my jacket and dragged me out of the thick of it.
"We can't get through," he said, pressing his lips to my head. "I'm sorry. We can't get through."
Leila lit a torch. She raised it above her head as the crowd chanted, "Burn the witch! Burn the witch!" The crowd was clearly spelled somehow. They were blinded with fear and hate. The cops obeyed her orders without question.
I closed my eyes and willed my witch to do something, anything, to stop this. The winds kicked up, howling with the rage I felt inside. An ice-cold rain started pelting the crowd.
I opened my eyes, hoping that the icy rain cooled off the crowd and extinguished the fire. But Leila just stared at me, smirking, my powers no match for her own. She touched the torch to the wood and it ignited in a whoosh.
I turned and pressed my face, soaked with tears, into Frankie's chest. We were outnumbered out-magicked. There was nothing we could do. "I can't see anymore. Get me out of here."
The crowd cheered when the flames consumed my aunt's body. Frankie and I edged out way back to the alleyway and fled into the empty streets of downtown.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
The door to the bar shuddered as the person outside pushed on it hard a few times, but the new, steel door held tight. I silently waited for whomever it was to move along, but the shadow cast by the few streetlamps that remained working didn't change.
The sound of metal scratching in the lock got my attention. Dog's too. Her hair stood on end and a low growl began to vibrate from her chest.
I picked up the double barrel shotgun propped against the bar beside me. I found it tucked far back in one of Babe's closets. The thing was old as hell, but it worked. From my vantage point on the floor, I had a perfect shot. I balanced it on my knee and swallowed one shot of tequila and then poured out another.
The lock clicked, successfully picked, and the intruder pushed open the door slowly. I took the gun in both hands and aimed it at the door, pumping it once. The door stopped moving at the sound.
"Nina?" Frankie called out into the dark room. "You in there?"
"Dammit Frankie, I almost shot you." I placed the gun on the floor beside me. "Get in here in and lock the door before someone sees you. You didn't break the lock, did you?"
He slipped in and closed the door behind him. The lock slid into place with a satisfying thunk. Dog flopped onto her back and splayed out her legs for a belly rub.
He dropped to the floor to indulge her. "What the hell are you doing sitting down here in the dark?"
"I lost track of time and missed curfew."
That wasn't entirely true. I missed curfew on purpose. I wanted to stay at the bar. It's where I felt the strongest connection to my aunt.
The entire state was under martial law, and my mother was now in charge. She was Department of Defense, just like us, but she was passing as human. And she had a rank. It had to be pretty high if she could exert martial law.
Leila put a curfew in effect to cut down on the rioting, although I suspect it was to keep the supernatural factions from leaving town. The humans were the ones rioting. The supernats were simply trying to slip into hiding.
While we were running around trying to stop the mass murder of the Betas -- which Leila had carefully orchestrated to keep us occupied -- she was behind the scenes, quietly exerting control over the humans, both in and out of government. What I wasn't clear about was how. It had to be a spell or potion or some sort. Maybe she dropped something in the water supply.
Or maybe humans were so blinded by their own fear that they were following her of their own accord. It wouldn't be unprecedented.
"Why are you out after curfew?" I snapped back at Frankie.
"I was looking for you. Christ, Nina, you should have called. Darcy and I didn't know where the hell you were."
I ignored him. "Maybe Casper and I should put a spell on the door so no one can break in." We already had a pentagram spray painted in red on the door, as a reminder to the neighborhood that Babe was outed as a witch. Business definitely dropped off. "Do you think it's true? That they have spell-finding technology?"
/> "No, I think that's pure bollocks. Spell-finding technology," he scoffed. "That would be a witch."
"Of course, my mother," I spat out. "She's the spell-finding technology."
"But she can't admit it," Frankie said.
I swallowed the shot. "Help yourself to a glass and any bottle you want. You may want to give the glass a rinse though. They're dusty."
Ever since the witch-hunt and murder of Auntie Babe two weeks before, the bar had no customers. Al and Eva came around, and a few of the neighborhood regulars stopped by. But that was it. We didn't even get nosy, curious people. Of course, all nightlife suffered from the after-dark lootings, the vigilante mob swarms and now the curfew.
The city looked virtually bombed out. Fires raged nightly in buildings downtown. Eva's botanica was hit hard and fast within a day of Babe's public execution. Molotov cocktails were thrown through the front windows, destroying it. Luckily she wasn't in there when it happened, and Al had the foresight to remove items of value and the usable ingredients for spells, which were stored in Babe's apartment. The rest was plastic tourist junk that smelled acrid as it melted and burned.
"You crashing upstairs?" Frankie asked as he settled beside me with a pint of beer and a bottle of Scotch.
"Can't you start with the cheap stuff?" I asked, glaring at the bottle of Glenfiddich in his hands. "We aren't exactly making money these days."
He uncapped the bottle and took a long pull. "Are your suppliers even returning your calls?"
He had a point.
I leaned my head against the bar. "Why didn't she just kill me?" It was my first time asking the question out loud. It had been gnawing at my gut since the afternoon when the world as we knew it ended.
"Don't know. Maybe she doesn't think you're a threat?"
"She had Marcello target me because she thought I was a threat just a few months ago." I frowned. It made no sense. She was gung-ho to off me in December. Now she lets me walk out of Veterans Memorial Auditorium, without blowing the whistle on me or Frankie as supernaturals? Considering all the roundups, by both the police and the vigilante mobs, we were being left alone.
Of course, we were all passing for human. Even Casper stuck to the factory building these days. It wasn't unusual for a priest to start an exorcism at random times and places — grocery stores, malls, parking lots. Since most of these "priests" were not given Vatican approval to do the ritual — most weren't even Catholic — Father Dougherty condemned it publicly. He said it made a mockery of the Catholic Church and the ritual of exorcism. I worried that the cops would round him up next.
"Do you know how many people died today?" I asked Frankie.
"Nina, you've got to stop listening to the news."
"Forty-seven," I bulldozed right over him. "Can you believe that? And I guarantee you that none of them were supernatural. They just had neighbors with grudges."
The news reports were parroting the official government response to the disaster with no small amount of glee. They had a front row seat in the war, and they celebrated every death as neighbor turned on neighbor. Old grudges were settled, with the individual playing judge, jury and executioner. It was great for the ratings. And, as long as someone could prove the dead was supernatural, which with the government guidelines was not hard, it was all completely legal.
Sure there were voices of dissent, but mostly from fringe groups. And PETA. The ACLU was strangely quiet. It was like no one was sure of what to do with non-human entities. Did Civil Rights apply to creatures that weren't human? PETA, at least, believed so.
"Yes, most of the deaths have been human. But you have to shut it out, Nina. This is killing you."
"No, Frankie, it's killing them," I said, jerking my thumb towards the door. "What's the point of all this? The supes go into hiding, the humans kill each other."
"Maybe that is the point," Frankie said. "Culling the herd, so to speak."
A knock on the door stopped both of us. Dog got up and paced in front of it, growling.
"We're closed," I yelled at the door. I picked up the shotgun and aimed it at the door again. "And we're armed, so piss off."
"Nina, it's Bertrand. Open the damn door."
"Do you think a double barrel shotgun could go through a solid door and do some damage to him?" I asked Frankie.
"Nina, I wouldn't advise trying it," Bertrand called through the door. "I've got Father Dougherty with me. What if you missed?"
I pointed the shotgun away from the door and gave Frankie the nod to open it.
"We need allies right now, not enemies," Frankie reminded me as he got up, sidled over to the door, and unlocked it.
Bertrand and Father Dougherty slipped into the dim bar as Frankie quickly secured the lock again.
It was like the start of a bad joke: A priest, a demon and a vampire walk into a bar.
I had never seen Bertrand dressed down in jeans and a leather jacket. Of course, even his jeans had a neatly pressed look about them. But without the expensive suit, he didn't carry quite the air of pompous ass.
"I am the one ally you want to keep, Ms. Martinez," he said.
Okay, he was still an ass, but not quite as arrogant.
"Hello, Nina. Frankie," Father Dougherty nodded at us politely. The old priest looked exhausted and pale. His skin was so white, he almost glowed in the dark.
"Where's your sidekick?" I asked. Tavio was usually the one glued to the Mayor's ass.
"He's back at the office, dealing with your mother," Bertrand said coolly. "That woman is quite something. Got to admire her patience and persistence, spending years in hiding, infiltrating the government. Reminds me why I wanted her dead."
"I think we've found something to agree on." I rested the shotgun beside me. "Help yourself to a drink, fellas. I suggest rinsing the glassware out if you use any."
Frankie settled back down in his spot on the wood floor and Dog dropped in between us, relaxed but alert. Bertrand pulled a stool away from the bar and sat on it across from us. Father Dougherty helped himself to Guinness. He blew dust out of a pint glass before filling it from the keg.
"Bertrand, we are on the floor for a reason," I said impatiently. "I don't want anyone to see bodies in the window. In case you haven't noticed, the humans are restless and they are staking first, asking questions later."
"That's what you're worried about?" he asked, raising his arm and making a sweeping motion across the wall with the door and the window. "Problem solved. Now you don't have to sit like 4 year olds."
"Great, and you just used magic on my place of business," I said as I scrambled to my feet, fuming. "Are you trying to get me shut down?"
"There are no magic detection devices," Bertrand said with a sigh. "Stop listening to the media."
Frankie got up off the floor and settled into a bar stool, bottle of whiskey at his elbow. "That's what I've been saying."
"How's Max?" I asked, dropping onto a stool and laying the shotgun on the bar next to me.
Frankie glanced at me.
"He's fine," Bertrand answered. "He's in my personal detail, so I am keeping him close."
"How's his temper?" I asked warily.
"In check," Bertrand said with a nod. "It's important no one know about his...talents. We agree on that as well. Tavio's helping with that."
I relaxed a little. As far as everyone knew, Berserkers were extinct. I was glad we all wanted to keep it that way. My mother and her Defense Department pal were a little too interested in finding one.
"I've seen Lachlan," Father Dougherty said, topping off his slow pour. "Unfortunately he's being held in a federal facility so we couldn't exactly speak freely. But he's doing okay. They will hold a tribunal for him, so that gives us time. At least your mother won't execute him without going through the motions of justice first."
"Let's all stop calling her my mother," I said, shifting uncomfortably at the word.
"Fair enough," he said smoothly. "Frankie, I wonder, may we share that bottle?"
> "Help yourself," Frankie said as he handed it over to Bertrand, who took a nip straight out of the bottle.
"Nina, I have no interest in working with your...that woman. But I need to go through the motions of being on her side. She knows I was the one who tried to kill her, so she doesn't trust me. She doesn't like me. But she can't kill me, and she has no choice but to include me." He smiled, snakelike.
"So what are you saying?" I asked.
"Let's work together," he suggested.
I laughed bitterly. "You've been keeping secrets, Bertrand."
Bertrand cocked his head at me. "Oh? Like what, Nina? I'm curious."
I glared at him. "You know something about that woman and my father...and me. And you aren't telling me."
"All you need to know right now is that your father was a friend and your mother..." He sighed. "Well, sometimes we can't chose who we love."
"That's the perfect non-answer," I muttered, pouring more tequila into my glass.
"Consider my offer before dismissing it outright," Bertrand said, ignoring my comment. "Blood Ops doesn't exist. You no longer have government protection. The humans want all supernatural creatures dead. From where I am sitting, it looks like I am your best alliance."
"Nina, I think we need to consider this," Frankie said, taking the bottle back from Bertrand.
"Demon, Frankie! Demon!" I washed the words down with the shot.
"I didn't remove Frankie's daywalking spell. I didn't out Max. And I didn't kill your aunt. I am truly sorry for your loss, Nina. Babe was a good woman and an exceptional witch," Bertrand said quietly. "Remember, you have another family member, your Uncle Tavio, who for some reason finds your rudeness endearing. You need allies to take this woman down, Nina."
"And if you think it only applies to this state, you are wrong," Father Dougherty said quietly. He stared into his beer. "Her reach is worldwide. Every state, every country, is in chaos trying to figure out what to do with all the monsters. The Vatican can't ordain priests fast enough to do all the exorcisms. And they are not even following they protocol they set in place. Anyone who requests an exorcism gets an exorcism."