by SM Reine
“But the card came back,” I said.
“I guess they always come back. I had to try.”
They always come back. She said it with so much confidence, and she hadn’t seen me try to throw out and burn the card. She really had seen this before.
“What did you mean when you said that the Ace of Pentacles ruined your life?” I asked.
“You’re supposed to solve the cards, right? That’s what the poem says. I’ve got no fucking idea what that means, but I don’t think it was an accident that the card showed up a week before my family bankrupted, my dad burned down the house for insurance fraud, and he got sent to jail. I went to foster care over that.” Gloria poked me in the chest. “It was the fucking card. I didn’t solve it, and I got fucked. Pentacles mean money, you know.”
I didn’t know. “Do you still have your card?”
“It disappeared. I didn’t solve it, so the card left. Best as I can figure it.”
The way she said it was like she thought the cards had a mind of their own. Maybe they did. “And what does The Devil mean?”
“Figure it out. Solve it on your own.” She cupped my cheek in her hand. “Seems like you don’t have much of a choice anymore, do you?”
Tatiana’s footsteps banged up my stairs. “Got it!” She jumped into my single-wide holding a book. She was shaking enough from her sprint across Lobo Norte that I couldn’t see the cover, so I took it from her. The cover said “Tarot for the Solitary Practitioner.”
“Are you kidding me?” I asked. “Are you going to tell me you got a card, too?”
“I have a whole deck,” Tatiana said. “Not the same one, though. I bought it at Borders before coming here to work. I’m Wiccan. I kinda dabble in divination for fun.”
I barely heard her. I flipped through the book. It was a cheap thing printed on crappy paper with flimsy glue binding, but it only took a second for me to find The Devil. Number fifteen. Seemed like he really should have been thirteen, considering the way my luck had been going.
Gloria pulled the book out of my hand and read aloud. “The Devil’s in the major arcana. That means it’s a big card, a big deal.”
“Of course I know that,” I lied.
“Says here that The Devil means you’ve gotten yourself chained to a problem, and you’ve got to free yourself to escape.” Gloria laughed mirthlessly. “Well, that was easy. Card solved. Now you can live your life without fear of dying.”
I was pretty sure it wasn’t that simple, and I could tell she thought the same. She started flipping through it—probably to look for the Ace of Pentacles. I took the book back from her before she could lose my page.
The description was barely three sentences long. It really was what Gloria had said. The two people were chained to The Devil by choice.
“But I’m not here by choice,” I said. “I don’t understand.”
My head was spinning with all the information I’d gotten that day. Gloria had gotten one of these magical cards before. Johnny didn’t hate me. The Needles wanted me back for reasons I didn’t understand. It might have been because I wasn’t human—although nobody knew what I was.
I wasn’t even on the stripper pole and it felt like the whole world was upside down.
Gloria checked the time. “Better see if Johnny’s done with the generator. Gonna open the bar for a cage match tonight.”
“You’re doing the match? The one where Big Papa plans on turning all the survivors into werewolves?” I went to the window and looked outside. The gangs were still camped across the road, surrounding The Lodge. They looked restless. Ready to fight again. There must have been more than a hundred of them. “We can’t let them make that many werewolves.”
“How you planning on stopping them?” Gloria asked. She didn’t give me a chance to respond. “Tonight’s the new moon. I’d be surprised if there were more than a handful of survivors.”
At my confused look, Tatiana explained, “Werewolves change on both the full and the new moon.” I didn’t bother asking how she knew. It seemed like everyone knew more than I did these days.
Cooper was going to change again tonight. I remembered how he had looked two weeks earlier, wracked with the pain of the transformation, and I felt sick for him.
They were going to go into the cage like that. It would be a bloodbath.
I didn’t want Cooper in it.
“I’ll come help you get ready, Gloria,” I said. I needed to be close so that I could stop him before he got in that cage.
But Gloria shot me a hard look. “I told you, no more stripping. The demons will figure out who you are if they haven’t already. Stay here.” She hesitated by the door, then fished around in her purse and pulled out a box the size of her hand. She shoved it at me. “Just in case.”
And then she was gone. Tatiana was about two steps behind her.
“Can I keep this?” I asked, lifting the book on tarot cards. It wasn’t much, but it was better than nothing.
Tatiana gave a long-suffering sigh. “Guess so. You did save Kelsie’s life. I get it back if you die, though.”
She left before I could think of a response.
I hope I don’t die, either.
Shutting the door behind them, I opened the box Gloria had given me. They were shotgun shells. Confused, I tilted the box to read the side. It said “double-aught silver buckshot,” and I remembered how Big Papa had cringed away from her bag. That explained everything. A smile spread over my lips as I set the box of shells next to Bo Peep.
Then I smoothed out the crumpled poem and read it again. The Forbidden yearn for a world that no longer exists… What were the Forbidden? And the mists? What was that supposed to mean?
The note to me had been signed with initials: “N.K.F.” This asshole would have answers. I just needed to find her.
But first, I had to survive the night.
XV
Cooper didn’t come to see me before the fight. I’d been hoping he would, yet I was alone as the sun dropped toward the horizon and the bar filled with the ruckus of carousing bikers.
I paced in my living room. My whole body was jittering with the shocks of the week.
The Devil. Peyton. Not human. The Forbidden. Silver buckshot.
And Gloria thought that I’d stay inside tonight. Cooper had thought he could make me stay, too.
I didn’t need to be protected…did I?
Maybe I did. I trusted Cooper and Gloria, and both of them had independently come to the same decision. I needed to let them help me. It was insanity to do otherwise.
Plus, I was scared shitless of the idea of facing the Needles again. All of the earlier bravado had drained out of me, leaving me scared and trembling in my chaps.
The knocking at my door made me jump.
Cooper.
I threw open the door without even thinking to look through the peephole. Stupid me—the man standing on my steps, bathed in the crimson light of desert sunset, wasn’t my werewolf.
It was Peyton.
I tried to slam it shut again but he shoved his foot in the crack. His physical body pushed against my magical wards, trying to intrude, trying to shatter them. My magic held firm. I couldn’t shut the door, but he couldn’t get inside, either. “Come on, baby,” he said. “Aren’t you going to give me a kiss for luck before the match?”
Peyton was going into the cage. He was going to try to become a werewolf. “I hope Big Papa rips your throat out,” I said.
“Don’t get your hopes up, sweet tits. I know what you are. I know what you can do. As soon as I’m a werewolf, I’m going to take you as my mate. I didn’t tell the incubi who you are because I want you for myself.” He leaned in close to whisper that last part at me.
I couldn’t resist. I slammed the heel of my palm into his stupid fucking face.
The blow was hard enough that his head snapped back, but he reacted just as quickly. He snatched my wrist. Jerked me through the door, flung me down the stairs. Dirt burned against my b
are knees.
I was outside the wards.
Scrambling to my feet, I tried to hurl myself back up the stairs again, but he caught my hair and jerked me back to the ground.
The scream escaped me before I could think to stop myself. I didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of knowing it hurt. He had hurt me enough over the years. But it came out of me ragged and raw and aching, voice cracking in the dry air.
Peyton yanked my head back and pressed his mouth to my ear. “I’m going to love claiming that cunt of yours again. I wonder how much the rest of the pack will pay for the privilege of doing the same.”
I tried to elbow him, but he was so much stronger than me. I didn’t even stagger him. He grabbed my wrist, twisted it behind my back.
“I’d rather die than let you fuck me again,” I ground out through gritted teeth. “You made me a whore, but I’ve still got standards.”
“You don’t get to die,” Peyton said. “I’m going to teach you a lesson for running after I sold you off. You embarrassed me. I’ve got so many lessons to teach.” He yanked my braids again and licked up my jaw.
This time, I screamed because I was pissed, not because it hurt. “Gloria!”
It wasn’t my friend who responded.
Cooper hurtled out of the bar, Mad Dog about three feet behind him. They moved so fast that they blurred.
The fist seemed to come out of nowhere.
Bone cracked against bone. The hand in my hair was suddenly gone, and Peyton sprawled out on the dirt behind me. Cooper jumped on him, grabbed him by the vest, slammed his fist into Peyton’s face again and again.
A gentle touch on my shoulder made me jump, startled. Mad Dog was trying to help me stand up. I allowed him to pull me to my feet. I was shaking too much to do it on my own.
Peyton shoved Cooper off of him, scrambling away on hands and knees before standing up again. He was bleeding out of his right nostril. “You fucker,” he breathed, spraying blood on the dirt. “I’m going to tell the Needles.”
Cooper seized him by the throat. “Tell them what? That you’re violating the peace in Lobo Norte?”
“The peace doesn’t mean anything tonight,” Peyton said. “All the rules have been broken for the new moon and the cage match. I can do whatever the fuck I want to that bitch.”
I lunged for him. Mad Dog gripped me tighter, holding me back.
Cooper’s eyes were glowing with fury. He dropped his grip on Peyton’s throat. “The rules are gone, huh? Good to know.” His voice had dropped an octave to a deep, rumbling growl that shot heat right between my legs.
Fear flashed over Peyton’s face. He covered it fast. He always had. “Don’t get cocky, Trouble. I’m coming after you.”
“I hope you do,” Cooper said.
Peyton smoothed his hands over his vest as he backed away, working nonexistent wrinkles out of his clothes. “See you in the cage.” He didn’t run back to the camps across the street, but he didn’t exactly walk, either. He kept glancing over his shoulder as he left.
Cooper rounded on me, capturing my face in both of his hands. “I’ll kill him. I’ll fucking kill him. He’s not going to see another sunrise.”
I buried my face against his chest. His touch felt so good after Peyton hurting me. “I would rather die than be stuck with him again, Cooper. I mean it.”
“That’s not going to happen,” he said.
“It won’t,” Mad Dog said. “Trust me. Peyton’s not joining the pack. We’ll make sure of it.” They couldn’t promise that. They didn’t know Peyton. If there was a way to buy his way to victory, he’d do it. Cheating, lying, getting his big ugly friends to help—whatever it took, he always won.
But Cooper’s body, trembling with rage against my cheek, made me think that he might stand a chance. In fact, he was shaking really hard. Worryingly so.
“Are you okay?” I asked, stroking his jaw.
“The moon,” he grunted. “It feels like I’m about to lose it.” I knew he meant that to be a bad thing, but a thrill of excitement shot through me. I suddenly couldn’t seem to breathe.
“He’ll be fine in the morning,” Mad Dog said. “You probably want to back off for now.”
I didn’t want to back off. I wanted to wrap myself in his arms and feel the change shiver through his muscles.
But Cooper pushed me away. The camp was breaking up as the bikers streamed toward the bar. The generator was running full bore, music pounded inside, and I could hear screaming.
It was time for the cage match to begin.
They were already cleaning up the first fight when I followed Cooper and Mad Dog into the bar.
I say “cleaning up” because the guy that Old Yeller had been fighting was no longer alive. I couldn’t even tell who he was—just that he’d been one of the South Side Furies, judging by what I could see through the blood on his vest. Old Yeller was coated in his blood up to the elbows. He was smiling, baring fangs that had begun to protrude from his gums.
“Next!” he crowed, kicking the other biker’s body out of the cage.
Gloria checked her chalkboard. “Larry Smith!”
The big man lumbered into the cage, slipping on the blood twice before finding his footing. The door shut behind him.
I hid in the shadows behind the bar, watching with my heart frozen in my chest. The fight was brutal. It was a new moon—how could it be anything else? Old Yeller fought like he’d already changed into a wolf.
Larry stood up to him for a minute—two minutes. I watched the clock. He only needed to survive five. I wasn’t sure he’d make it. He was trying to stay out of Old Yeller’s reach, but it would only take one good hit to knock his head off.
Cooper stood beside me, transfixed by the fight. He twitched a little with each blow. He wanted to be in that cage. He wanted to be fighting. I twined my fingers with his, and he looked down at me. His eyes were a brighter shade of gold. The wolf was stirring underneath the surface.
Gloria rang the bell. Five minutes had passed.
Larry Smith was on all fours in the cage—drenched in his own blood, but alive. The first to become a werewolf, and food for the incubus mafia.
I wasn’t sure if I was glad that he’d survived or not.
Big Papa stood. I hadn’t noticed him sitting in the corner again. “Swap out Old Yeller.”
The werewolf climbed out, giving a hand to Larry. Old Yeller had already healed what few wounds Larry had delivered. The only blood on him was from his last two opponents.
“Mad Dog,” Gloria said. “You’re up.”
My heart gave a little lurch as he moved to take Old Yeller’s place. When had I started to worry about Mad Dog, too?
Yet that little lurch was nothing compared to what I felt when I saw the name written beside his.
Peyton.
“Don’t let him in the cage,” I said, running up to grip Gloria’s arm. “He’s planning to cheat. I know he is.”
Her eyes flashed. She hadn’t realized I was in the bar until that moment, and I knew I was about to get bitched out. Cooper interrupted her. “Assign me to this fight,” he said.
She shot him a sideways look, as if she couldn’t believe he would have the gall to give her orders. “I already decided to put him up against Mad Dog.”
“Give him to me,” he pressed, stepping close to invade her space. I winced. That was the worst thing to do to Gloria. She knew exactly how to handle men that got within arm’s reach—or, to be more precise, stiletto reach.
To my surprise, Gloria didn’t twist his testicles off. She arched an eyebrow. “You want to fight this pendejo, wolf? Tonight?”
“He’s the reason Ofelia’s here.”
Gloria’s eyebrows lifted. “Oh?”
“He sold her for sex. Gave her to the Needles. Left her to be scarred.”
That was all the information Gloria needed, apparently. She didn’t even hesitate. She wiped Mad Dog’s name away and wrote Cooper’s name where it had been on the blackboard.
“No,” I said.
Neither of them listened to me. Cooper gave Gloria a satisfied smile, and then jumped over the bar to head for the cage. Shock left me glued to the ground for a few seconds. Only the panic of seeing Cooper walk toward that door allowed me to break free.
I ran after him and planted my hands in his chest. “You don’t know Peyton, you don’t know what he can do.”
He fisted a hand in my hair. I was still sore from Peyton’s grip, but it was different with Cooper. A good kind of ache.
“I don’t care. I’m going to win this fight for you, Ofelia.” He kissed me hard, lips and teeth and tongue, using his other hand to pull me against his body. The pressure bowed me over backward. The only thing keeping me from sprawling to the ground was Cooper—sweaty, gorgeous Cooper, who was about to climb into the cage with my nightmare of an ex-boyfriend.
When he released me, I held onto him for a final, lingering moment, gazing up at his face one last time. It wasn’t that I didn’t have faith in Cooper’s skill as a fighter, especially on a night where he was about to turn into a slavering beast. I just knew how awful Peyton could be.
Then Cooper stepped away, leaving me alone with my fear.
Fear, and hope.
Mad Dog slapped him on the back as he passed. “Fuck him up, man.”
“I plan on it,” Cooper growled.
He threw his leg over the bar of the cage, sauntering to the center before ripping off his shirt and tossing it outside. He had healed all of the wounds from Big Papa. He was as perfect as the first time I had seen him. The wolf on his chest looked angrier than usual, and that fury was reflected in his face.
It took guts for Peyton to get in the cage with him. I had to admit that much. Cooper was nothing but sculpted muscle. Maybe he’d been an anthropologist in another life, but in this one, he was a fighting machine.
Peyton dropped his shirt, too. He didn’t have the werewolf blood helping him out, but he did have steroids. His veins bulged. His neck and jaw were so muscular that it looked like he could have bitten the trunk of a tree in half. But he was only human.