Magic Possessed

by Jaime Rush

  Smitty had already caused them plenty of grief. If he captured a Dragon skirmish on video and sold it to the media, they’d be in a heap of trouble. Crescents who worked in various capacities in the industry might discredit the footage as a hoax, but it would be their death knell. Once it hit the Internet, thousands of people would be dissecting it. And even worse, coming here to spot the “gator ape” itself. Egads.

  “Enough of this.” She reached into the house and grabbed the shotgun she kept by the door. “I’d love to go Dragon and incinerate him.” She shot Kade a look. “But I’d get into all kinds of trouble.” She flew down the steps, found the spot she wanted, and aimed toward that light. The bullet hit the branch just above the son of a bitch. She saw the camera drop and heard it hit the ground. He lost his balance and fell, too, becoming a pile of ill-smelling, badly dressed old man.

  “Off my property!” she hollered, stalking toward him with the shotgun pointed at the ground. She had no intention of harming the man, but she wanted him to get the message: no friggin’ trespassing. “Now.”

  He scrambled to his feet and searched for his camera. “I’m jus’ lookin’ for the gator ape. I know it’s here. I’m pretty sure it ate the skunk ape, ’cause I ain’t seen that one since I saw the gator ape. I know you got it here. Maybe more than one. Jus’ let me have a picture, and I’ll be on my way.”

  Yeah, right. And umpteen thousand others would be sneaking around taking his place.

  “There are no apes here. Or anywhere. And no skunk apes either.” Before he’d caught sight of a Dragon, he’d been hunting Florida’s equivalent of Bigfoot.

  As he reached for the camera, she let off another shot, shattering it into pieces. “Leave.”

  With a stumbling gait, he took off into the dark. She tucked her pinky into her mouth and let out a series of whistles warning that Smitty was on the loose.

  A second later, her phone rang. Jessup. “Was that why I just heard two shots?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Please tell me you killed him.”

  “Not hardly.” She slid a look to Kade. “Not with a member of the Guard standing next to me. No, I don’t want to kill him, and neither do you.”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “Okay, you may want to but you can’t. He’s crazy, annoying, but he is a human being.”

  “A crazy old coot who’s going to get us terminated,” Jessup said. “I’ll keep an eye out for him. He’ll probably come this way. Did you at least maim him a little?”

  “Nope, but his camera is dead.”

  “Well, that’s something.” His voice lowered. “How’s your investigation with the pretty boy going?”

  “We’re onto something now, so don’t do a thing. Promise me.”

  “I’m only going to hold out for so long, little sister. And if I see one of them on our property, he’s dead.”

  That’s what she was afraid of, that everyone now had that attitude. Especially with her and Kade trespassing tonight. “I’m going to find the one who did it, who started all of this. And they’re going to die.” She disconnected, swallowing her own rage.

  Kade was watching her, looking sultry in the shadows and colored lights. “You’re a damned good shot. Remind me not to piss you off.”

  Her laugh came out husky. “Too late for that. Remember, you were an intruder, too. You tasered me, fought me—”

  “You fought me. I was trying to explain why I was here, and you went all alligator wrestler on me.”

  Her mouth twisted into a smile at the memory of slugging him and grinding him into the mud. “I’ve tussled with smaller gators that were a lot tougher than you.”

  “Why, thank you for that.”

  “Just saying.” She jabbed a finger in his direction as they walked toward her car. “And you trespassed in my shop.”

  “Technically it wasn’t trespassing; the door was open.”

  “Technically it was, because you weren’t invited in.”

  “You’re right. I’m a trespasser, a man who would sneak up on you while you’re grieving and tase you to boot.” He stared hard into the distance. “I’m a bad, bad man, Vee.”

  She thought he meant that; all trace of that playful tone was gone. The man was mercurial. He kept his gaze on everything but her as they got into her Infiniti.

  “You’re not so bad,” she said. “You’re helping me investigate. That means a lot to me.”

  “I need to find out what’s going on for myself.”

  She liked the idea that he was here for her, probably a little too much, so it was good that he wasn’t playing the white knight role. He sank into a dark silence as she drove toward the front of the property. When she passed the main house, her ma flagged her down.

  She walked over to the driver’s side as Violet opened the window, but her sharp gaze was on her passenger. “I heard shots, thought you might have run him off.”

  “No, Ma, that was Smitty.”

  “Lord, I hope you didn’t off him in front of the Vega. I’ve heard they’ll turn in their own grandmothers rather than go against the code.” She leaned in and snapped on the interior light. “I just wanted a gander at the guy who’s going to drag you through the mud and leave you broken on the other side. Yeah, I see the attraction. He’s got that bruised, bad-boy look. Bedroom eyes, and the kind of mouth that makes a woman think of staying in bed ’til noon.”

  “Ma,” Violet whined. Hmm, maybe her mother’s libido wasn’t dead after all.

  Her ma shifted those discerning eyes to her. “You didn’t listen to me about Bren, so I doubt you will on this one since he’s a helluva lot more appealing. But remember how you felt after the fallout on that one. There will be no pity this time either. The best we’ll do is not to say, ‘Told you so.’ Then again, I can’t guarantee it.”

  “I understand. Now, if you’re done, we’ve got a murderer to catch so we can avenge Arlo’s death.” Much more important than getting this embarrassing lecture.

  Kade leaned forward. “Ma’am, I’m not going to hurt your daughter. We’re friends, that’s all.”

  She gave them a skeptical look. “Yeah, I can see just how friendly you two are.” She jabbed her finger in his direction. “Know this: I will hurt you.” She patted the window and stepped back, watching as Violet pulled away.

  Violet shook her head. “Sorry, that’s how my family operates. Threaten first, assume next, and listen later.”

  “They’re protective of you. Nothing wrong with that.”

  “There is something wrong with it. When they thought Bren broke my heart, do you think they comforted me? Hugged me or even patted me on the back and said, ‘Gee, that’s a shame. Here, have a pint of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream.’ No, my brothers beat the hell out of Bren and sent me pictures on my phone. Cold comfort.”

  “And if I hurt you, they’d probably send you a picture every time they cut off an appendage.” He gave her a wry smile.

  “Yeah, exactly.” She pulled onto the road.

  “At least you have family. They may be dysfunctional, but they care about you. I have the Guard. Talk about cold comfort.”

  “And your sister. You have her, too.”

  He kept his gaze straight ahead. “I do have Mia. She’s a good kid, but extremely emotional. Her way of comforting is to freak out.”

  “I have a lot of family while you have respect.” She let out a sigh. “Don’t get me wrong, I love my family. Arlo and I weren’t close, not since his addictions took over. But losing him, especially like that…” She shot him a look, her grief reminding her of those minutes she let herself express her feelings. “Well, you know. Damn you for sneaking up on me during a private moment.”

  “I’m sorry.” Those words settled into the silence, and then he said in a soft voice, “You were crying alone.”

  “No, I wasn’t. You were there.”

  “I mean, you thought you were alone. Does cold comfort apply to grief as well?”

  “Our family will kill if
someone hurts one of our own, but we…don’t know how to hold each other or cry together. My brothers give me a hard time, tell me to buck up and be angry, not cry like a baby.”

  “I can relate to that.”

  Great, something else they had in common. They were supposed to be vastly different; so different, in fact, that there shouldn’t be one smidgen of chemistry between them. They should have anti-chemistry.

  A few minutes later, they were passing the clearly delineated border between the Slades and the Stramaglias. The latter had a fancy concrete wall along the front, with a fence continuing between the two properties. She found a place to tuck the car out of sight from the road.

  Thinking about hanging out in the dark with Kade, with only the moonlight filtering down between the trees, she said, “We should separate so we can cover more area.”

  “Definitely. But how will I let you know if I spot someone?”

  “Whistle. You know how to do that, don’t you, Kade?” she said in Lauren Bacall’s sultry voice. “Just put your lips together and…blow.”

  Kade rocked his head back, an agonized expression on his face. “I’ve had two unresolved, raging hard-ons recently. If you can refrain from references to putting your lips together and blowing, especially in that blatantly sexy way, my blue balls would appreciate it.”

  “I suppose this hasn’t been fair to you, has it? I’m sorry. In my defense, I didn’t ask you to fondle me.”

  He shot her an arrogant smile. “Oh, yeah, you did. Not with those lips but with your hips pressing seductively against mine—”

  She pressed her fingers over his mouth, horrified by the truth of that statement. “That was my Dragon, taking over. Let’s just say it’s been a while since it’s been…fed.”

  He grinned at that. “How long?” His lips moved against her fingers, warm and soft.

  “Let’s go back to communicating.”

  “We are communicating, babe.” He took her hand and rubbed it back and forth across his mouth.

  She shivered and pulled back. “I meant, about what to do if we encounter a murderous Dragon.”

  “I can whistle just fine, but not the Fringe way. You have a language all your own. Like that one you did to let everyone know Smitty was on the loose.”

  “Every clan has their own codes. For instance, one long, high-pitched whistle followed by two short ones is a Smitty alert. Other clans would have their own signal, if Smitty were bothering them. Unfortunately, he seems to target us because our property is accessible to him. Anyway, if I shared our codes with you, I’d be cuffed to the barn wall big-time. But we can come up with another code, just for us.” Boy, did that sound intimate. “I mean, for alerting each other.”

  She hooked her pinky between her lips. “Put your finger like this, and then blow.” She demonstrated with a sound like a whip-poor-will. “If it sounds like a bird, it won’t tip off the son of a bitch.”

  He mirrored her movement and blew out a mangled whistle. “I’ve never done it like this before.” He whistled normally, a soft catcall. “Yours sounded natural.” He tried her way again.

  She wrapped her fingers around his hand, positioning it, and finding herself too close for comfort. Her arm brushed against his. “Try again.” She kept moving his hand to change the angle until he got the sound right. Damn, his mouth did make her think of staying in bed late. And what they’d be doing. “Whip-poor-wills call repeatedly.” She mimicked the sound. “They’re calling for a mate, so you’ll hear one call and then a second one answering.”

  He raised an eyebrow. “So we’re going to call to each other like horny birds.”

  She let out a breath, backing away because she was way too close. “Birds don’t get horny. Finding a mate and procreating is their instinct, their life’s mission aside from survival.”

  He took her in with an amused expression…for a few seconds too long. “Thank you for that nature lesson. Is that how your Dragons are?”

  “No, they’re just horny,” she said on a sigh, then quickly added, “Try the whistle again.” She did not want the word horny to be floating between them.

  He tried again and nailed it.

  “Excellent. If I were a female whip-poor-will, I’d go for you.”

  “Vee, you kill me. You really do.”

  She reran her words in her mind. “I meant it as a compliment, not a come-on.”

  “Honestly, if you recited a grocery list, especially in that sexy Lauren Bacall voice, it’d still be a turn-on.”

  “Focus, Kavanaugh.” Violet pulled out her map, and they picked two points along the property line to stake out. She grabbed a small cloth bag from behind her seat with a backup set of clothing. The killer was Dragon. She knew as soon as she saw him, she’d Catalyze. “If we catch this person, we kill, right?”

  “Ideally, we want to incapacitate and then torture for information.”

  “Is that how Vegas work?”

  “If we need information. Otherwise we just kill. But we want to know why he’s doing this. And if anyone else is involved.”

  “You do the torturing, and I’ll kill, because I really, really want to kill him.” She looked into the darkness beyond the Slade’s front line of trees. “He’s responsible for a lot of deaths. And plans to be responsible for more.”

  “Once I find out what we need, he’s all yours.”

  Her Dragon clawed, hungry to emerge and exact justice. Usually Crescents’ humanity was strong enough to keep the beasts’ lust and bloodlust in check. The real trouble began if they broke loose. She pushed open her door. “Then let’s go.”

  Kade led the way, blending into the night with his dark clothes and silent stride. He’d done this before. Of course, he’d done it on her clan’s property more than once, busting Arlo for his pot farms. The very ones she warned him about having.

  Arlo. You were messed up, but you didn’t deserve to die.

  No stranger to prowling in the dark herself, she followed. Kade had showered at her house before dinner. Funny how her own soap and shampoo smelled different on him. Better.

  As she followed his silhouette into the woods, it was exactly as she imagined with the moonlight sprinkling down onto their path, over Kade, and across his face when he paused and turned to her. He gave her a nod and continued on. She remained there as planned, watching him disappear into the shadows.

  She settled on the ground against a tree, tuning in to the sounds around her: the rustle of a creature foraging for food and, far off in the distance, music. The Slades were having a party. Once in a while someone hollered. Death hadn’t yet touched them.

  An hour passed, and then another. The party continued, making her wish she were there having fun instead of flicking off ants or some other bug she couldn’t see as it crawled over her. A raccoon approached, then skittered off when it spotted, or smelled, her.

  Kade’s call jerked her out of her lethargy. She rose, following it while keeping an eye out for sounds and shadows. She called back, two lonely whip-poor-wills in the night.

  Horny, indeed.

  That Kade was calling meant someone was near, or approaching. Her Dragon vibrated, ready to Catalyze. She put her hand to her waist as she walked, feeling its heat as it moved against her skin. Kade wasn’t far, and within a few minutes, she came up beside him. At the same moment, she heard the crack of a twig nearby. Then a high-pitched whistle, clearly a Fringe call. She didn’t know what it meant.

  Kade wrapped his fingers around her wrist and pulled her close. Her backside bumped into him. In the near distance, a flashlight blinked through the trees. His hand tightened on her, but otherwise he gave away nothing.

  The Violet she used to be clawed at her as insistently as her Dragon did. Kade must have sensed it because he put his cheek next to hers and shook his head.

  The man—given his heavy footfalls—cut a zigzag path toward the property line. He gave another whistle, and she thought it might be a check-in signal: All clear.

  Then he turned
toward them, slashing the light back and forth. In a brief illumination of his face, she thought it might be Paul Slade. He was no doubt doing a security check, having heard about the murders. If he found them, he’d attack.

  Kade held out his hand, palm up. What looked like an orb formed on his palm and quickly grew larger. It wobbled, like one of those oversized bubbles that big wands made when you put them in a dish of soapy water.

  She could now see Paul’s face in the glow of his flashlight. The orb was nearly as tall as they. Kade pulled her close against the front of his body and brought the bubble over and around them. His hand splayed across her collarbone.

  He whispered very softly in her ear, “Stay still. Quiet. He can’t see us but he can hear us.”

  She wasn’t familiar with Deuce magick and had never seen an orb like this. The bubble felt cold, which was an odd contrast to the warm, muggy night.

  Paul slashed the light closer and closer to the edge of the bubble and then finally across it. The light didn’t penetrate, bouncing off the edge. He did pause, looking in their direction for a moment. Then he released another whistle and moved on.

  She and Kade remained in their insulated cocoon that muffled the sounds somewhat. When Paul’s flashlight was only a twinkle, Kade said, “I’m going to extinguish the orb.”

  “I’ve never heard of an orb like this.”

  “It’s a mirror orb. From the outside, the person sees only a reflection of the surroundings. If they look close enough, they could figure it out, but it’s not likely in the dark.”

  The orb shattered with a soft zzzt, like a popped bubble. Before she could even wonder if she should return to her post, they heard another sound: flesh hitting flesh. Hard.

  They ran, Violet loosening her clothing as she did so. The sight of two Dragons fighting sent her into Catalyzation. Now her night vision was crisp, clear, and tinted wine-red. Paul Slade and a Carnelian Dragon she didn’t recognize slashed at each other. She smelled blood. The Carnelian’s eyes flared as she saw them. Violet felt feminine energy.

  Paul’s Dragon took advantage of her momentary distraction and started to limp away. The female pulled out one of her scales and, with her clawed hand, threw it at him. Even though he ducked, it followed his movement and hit him in the chest, exploding in a flash of white.