Waking the Serpent

by Jane Kindred

  Rafe’s phone chimed and he flicked to the screen while he sat at a red light. The image took several seconds to load and the light turned green just as Phoebe’s face came into view—and Phoebe’s naked torso—and—

  “What the fuck?”

  * * *

  Theia and Rhea sat beside Phoebe on the couch, trying to calm her down. She’d alternated between hysterical tears and incoherent rage, too freaked out to explain that, consciously, it wasn’t even her. She could barely even comprehend the fact that Carter had paid for a ride-along shade to animate her unconscious body. And for what? Blackmail? Just because he got off on it? But that there had been other men involved... She had no idea how many, or who. Or what she’d done.

  Phoebe clutched the edges of the couch cushion, certain she was going to be sick.

  “Honey, don’t worry.” Rhea rubbed her back. “The video blew over—or it will soon. This will blow over, too. In a couple of weeks, nobody will care who you boinked. They won’t even remember your name.”

  Phoebe let out a choked laugh at the word “boinked” and the laugh turned into a half sob. “But I didn’t. You don’t understand.” No matter how painful it was, she had to tell them. “It was a shade.”

  They shared a look across her. “You let a shade...?” Theia left the sentence unfinished.

  “I didn’t let the shade do anything. I had dinner with Rafe’s lawyer the other night—he got me out of a jam at the courthouse—and apparently...” Phoebe had to pause and swallow hard. “Apparently he roofied me. One of the shades I’ve been dealing with told me yesterday she stepped into me while I was unconscious in his hotel room.”

  “Oh, Phoebes.”

  Rhea jumped up from the couch and began to pace. “Goddammit. Who is this guy? Rafe’s lawyer? I mean, isn’t he in Ione’s coven?”

  Phoebe nodded, twisting her shirt in her hands. “From the Phoenix chapter.”

  “Have you told her?”

  “No, I haven’t told her.” Phoebe looked up. “And you’re not going to tell her, either. Do you hear me?”

  “Phoebe—”

  “I can’t prove anything, I can’t do anything, and I sure as hell can’t afford to get involved in an anti-defamation lawsuit with a lawyer of his caliber. Because I can tell you right now, that’s exactly what would happen if I accused him.”

  Theia tucked her short bob behind one ear. “But Phoebe, if there’s a predator in the Covent, other women have to be warned. Ione needs to know.”

  Phoebe’s stomach churned. She knew Theia was right. “I have to find out who’s involved first. The case I couldn’t tell you about—this is part of it.” She told them about Monique’s experience with the effectively un-prosecutable clients, and what Barbara Fisher had told her about the continued coercion of the sex workers’ shades.

  Theia shuddered. “That’s like...afterlife sex slavery.”

  Rhea’s response, as usual, was more action-oriented. “We need to find this necromancer and mess him up.”

  “That’s what Rafe and I have been trying to do. Find him, anyway. And stop him, somehow.” Except she was no longer sure she could trust Rafe. But Phoebe wasn’t going into that with them. She’d already shared more than enough. “Carter Hamilton is the only living connection I have to this group right now.” Phoebe smoothed the shirt she’d wrinkled with her twisting as she began thinking aloud. “I don’t know if he knows who’s behind it, or if Rafe has told him anything about our work with the shades. But sending this picture—it’s obviously a threat. And drugging me and conjuring Lila’s shade was all part of the threat.”

  “That’s why we got the message, too. We helped you break the necromancer’s hold on the shades tonight and he’s pissed off.” Theia glanced at her phone. “It was addressed specifically to us. It may not have gone any further—yet.”

  Rhea stopped pacing. “I’ll check to see if it’s been posted anywhere. Where’s your laptop?”

  “In my room. How are you going to search for it?”

  Rhea headed to the bedroom. “Revenge porn sites. Reddit forums. The usual suspects.”

  Theia looked thoughtful. “Phoebe, I think there’s one strong possibility you should consider.”

  “Which is?”

  “That this pig Carter Hamilton is the necromancer.”

  The thought had crossed her mind.

  Chapter 22

  Rafe had to pull off the road into a grocery store parking lot to avoid wrecking the car. The text message was from an unidentified number. Who the hell would have sent this? It certainly wasn’t Phoebe, unless she was a total mental case. And the man in the picture wasn’t Hamilton, at least. Then again, he wasn’t sure if this wasn’t worse than seeing her with Hamilton. And whoever took it, there had obviously been more than two people involved in this intimate little encounter. Had Hamilton himself taken the picture and sent it to him? Just to get under his skin? But that would mean there’d been some kind of orgy at Hamilton’s hotel the other night, and it just didn’t make any sense.

  His phone chimed again and Rafe stiffened. He thought about turning the phone off—or throwing it out the window and smashing it—but when it sounded again with a reminder notification, he opened the text, breathing a sigh of relief that at least there was no picture attached this time.

  It was from Hamilton. Received a disturbing text a few minutes ago. Wondering if you had anything to do with it.

  So it wasn’t him. What was going on?

  I received one, as well, he typed back. More tabloid harassment, I guess.

  A moment later Hamilton called him. Rafe pressed the speaker button.

  “Rafael. Thank you for answering. I know this is awkward, but I think we need to figure out the significance of this little stunt. I don’t think a tabloid would bother sending personal messages. Is Phoebe in some kind of situation I’m not aware of? I know the Public Defender’s Office isn’t the most lucrative position. Women of Phoebe’s means don’t have that many options.”

  “Of Phoebe’s means?”

  “Struggling financially, with no spouse or family to fall back on.” He paused. “Like Barbara Fisher.”

  Rafe felt his teeth grinding together. “You think Phoebe is moonlighting as a prostitute.”

  “It’s not unheard of. And I’m not judging. But if she’s somehow involved with these people—the people who killed Ms. Fisher—well, it looks like they’re letting us know.”

  Rafe was having a hard time believing this. But then, he’d had a hard time believing Phoebe would sleep with Hamilton. And mostly because of ego. He’d imagined her attraction to him was something unique and special, that Rafe alone got her fired up...the way she got. But why shouldn’t she choose to sleep with Hamilton? He was a prominent attorney with connections. He could help Phoebe move on to bigger and better things than the Yavapai County Public Defender’s Office. Though that was a rather crass way of looking at things that maybe said more about Rafe than it did about Phoebe.

  “Are you still there, Rafael?”

  “Yes, I’m here.”

  “I think this is a warning we’d probably better take heed of. It doesn’t look like this picture has been released to the public. Not so far, anyway. But if a revelation about your involvement with yet another working girl were to come out...well, we can kiss a fair trial in Yavapai County—or anywhere in Arizona—goodbye.”

  “So exactly how am I supposed to ‘take heed’? What’s the warning? All I’m seeing is a big, giant sign that says ‘You’re screwed—and here’s a nice visual to go with it.’”

  Hamilton sighed. “I think the best thing either of us can do right now is keep our distance from Ms. Carlisle and concentrate on building your defense. And laying your father to rest.”

  Rafe glanced at the clock on the dash. The funeral
was in four hours. “Yeah. Guess I’d better start picking out a suit. And I think I can handle this one on my own, thanks.”

  * * *

  He arrived home as the stars over Stone Canyon were being swallowed up into the pale prelude to sunrise. The last funeral he’d attended had been Ford’s—just weeks after his brother’s—when Rafe had given his father the double whammy of maligning the memory of his longtime business partner and friend while they were both still grieving Gabriel. There hadn’t been any reason to tell him; Rafe had to acknowledge that now. He’d only done it to make himself feel better and less like there was something wrong with him—something that had made Ford do what he’d done.

  The picture of Phoebe had triggered everything Rafe had been trying to forget. A picture like that had once appeared in his locker at school. Rafe had gotten drunk for the first time at sleep-away soccer camp when he was only twelve. Ford, his coach, had been “cool” like that, treating him, Rafe thought, like a real man. His father had let him drink a small glass of wine once or twice at big holiday dinners, but that was a gesture to a boy. Ford had cracked open a couple of beers in his cabin to celebrate their victory on the field earlier that day and told Rafe to drink up. He’d earned it.

  Trying to show Ford he could handle it, Rafe had drunk not one but three beers, and gotten violently ill. Ford had held up Rafe’s drooping head as Rafe heaved into the toilet, and then led him to his bunk and held him, stroking the sweaty hair out of his eyes while the bed spun. Rafe—or Rafa, as he’d been known then—had looked up to Ford, a father figure who paid attention to him and praised him when he’d done something well. Rafael Sr. was too busy running for office to notice Rafe. Or to notice what was going on between his best friend and his wife right under his nose.

  Rafe supposed it wasn’t surprising his father hadn’t noticed when his friend had switched his attentions to his son. That night in the cabin, Rafe had been confused by Ford’s affection. Kisses of comfort on his forehead had become less comforting kisses on his mouth. Rafe was so out of it, he couldn’t push Ford away or tell him to stop. His eyes wouldn’t stay open.

  The hangover the next morning had made him forget all about Ford’s odd behavior the night before. He’d gone home from camp early with the “flu.” But when he’d returned to school the following week, he’d found an envelope in his locker with his name on it. He thought maybe someone had left him a get-well card. When he opened it, Rafe had felt the ground drop out from under him as if he were hanging from the edge of a cliff over a chasm with no bottom. It was a photo of Rafe lying on Ford’s bunk with his pants around his knees. Ford had been in the picture, too, but not his face.

  On the back of the picture was a penciled note: “If you tell anyone, there will be copies of this in every locker in the gym.” Rafe had been too young and naïve to realize Ford would never have let that picture get out. Even without his face, it would have been fairly easy to guess who it was. But Rafe had believed the threat—and subsequent threats—enough to be too afraid to try to put a stop to what was happening to him. Part of him believed, as Ford constantly implied, that what was happening was Rafe’s fault. Something about him had stirred Ford’s inappropriate desire. He’d even felt sorry for the man, unable to help himself because of whatever was wrong with Rafe.

  But the rage and acting out at school that had landed him in counseling had started almost immediately after that.

  * * *

  Rhea confirmed there was no sign of the picture online so far. “Don’t Google yourself, though. Just...don’t do it.”

  She had no intention of Googling herself. But what to do now, she wasn’t sure. She couldn’t expect Rafe’s help in figuring out what she was tangled up in. She couldn’t cast doubt on the attorney building his defense—or ignore that small bit of uncertainty about his involvement with the group responsible for the shades’ exploitation, even peripherally. Maybe he’d been telling the truth—or maybe his bargain with Jacob that night hadn’t really been the first time he’d done it.

  Then Carter had come on the scene, hired by Rafe’s own father, and endorsed by the Covent. It was too great a coincidence that Carter just happened to be involved in, as Theia had put it, the afterlife sex slavery trade. He either worked for the necromancer or he was the necromancer. And he’d set Phoebe up to let her know he could destroy her. Which meant Phoebe had been getting close to something. Barbara and Lila had said as much. He was warning her to back off. Which was exactly what she was not going to do.

  Rhea and Theia raided her pantry as breakfast making ensued in the kitchen. The sun was coming up. Seemed like a reasonable action to take.

  Phoebe leaned against the countertop of the breakfast bar. “Rhe, how would I go about placing an adult personal ad?”

  Rhea poised with her fork in mid-whisk in a fluffy bowl of raw eggs. “Um...okay. One—why do you immediately think I’d know? And, two—why on earth would you want to? Mr. Awesome Ass not doing it for you?”

  Phoebe sighed. “Okay. One—I’m not actually looking for a date, I want to lure someone out who might be involved in this thing. See if I can find an actual living, breathing, human being who can give me some information about it. And, two—Mr. Awesome Ass basically just called me a sloppy whore and walked out. Or did you miss that part?”

  “Honey, if he thinks you’re a sloppy whore, you’re doing it wrong.”

  Phoebe lunged over the counter and grabbed for her, missing Rhea’s shirt by an inch. Instead she stuck her finger in the batter and flicked some at her little sister.

  “Hey!” Theia whisked the bowl out of her reach. “No food fights with my unborn waffles. You do not want to mess with the hungry Theia Bear.” She’d earned the nickname when they were kids because of her prominent stomach growling whenever she even came close to missing a meal. Her stomach gave an impressive demonstration of it now.

  Rhea went back to beating eggs. “I might know of some websites you can check out. But I only learned about them from Googling your name.” She grinned and stuck out her tongue.

  * * *

  Despite her tendency to give Phoebe an unwarranted amount of little-sisterly shit just because it amused her, Rhea came through after they’d eaten their fill of waffles and scrambled eggs. Instead of placing an ad, they decided Phoebe should answer one—with a fake male profile.

  Within an hour she had a “date” with an escort, a sort of pre-screening coffee date, presumably to make sure the client was someone the escort was willing to entertain and that he was real and not a cop. Phoebe’s invented persona was also a lawyer—she figured she’d need to fit the profile—and she’d dropped hints about having known Monique, expressing her regrets and disappointment that a date she’d arranged with Monique a few days ago was no longer possible. She’d wanted Monique’s “special skills.” After running through the script on a few chats, she’d landed the coffee date with “Kimber.”

  They agreed to meet that afternoon at a little garden café in Tlaquepaque, a trendy arts-and-crafts shopping center styled after a Mexican village, just a mile or so from Phoebe’s neck of the woods across Oak Creek. Since Phoebe’s persona—Rob—had claimed to be a weekend visitor from Phoenix, trendy was the just the thing.

  She spotted Kimber in a shady corner under the sycamores as soon as she arrived. The bright pink sundress Kimber had promised to wear was the only one in the café.

  Phoebe walked up to the table and held out her hand. “Hi, Kimber. Rob couldn’t make it. I’m Phoebe.”

  The fresh-faced, college-aged blonde frowned and started to gather her purse without taking Phoebe’s hand. “I think you have the wrong person.”

  Phoebe sat before Kimber could tell her to get lost. “Sorry for the games. I’m not a cop or anything. I’m a friend of Monique’s.”

  “Seriously,” Kimber insisted. “You’re mistaking me for someone else. If you d
on’t stop bothering me, I’m going to call the manager.”

  “Could you just hear me out for a minute? I wasn’t lying when I said I was a lawyer. I was Monique’s lawyer, and I’m just trying to get some justice for her. She didn’t deserve what happened to her.” Phoebe looked up at the waitress approaching them and raised her voice. “Just a latte for me, thanks.”

  Kimber stared at her as the waitress walked away. “You’re the one from the video.”

  Phoebe tried to control the blush so she wouldn’t match Kimber’s dress. “Yeah. That’s me.”

  Kimber eyed her with new appreciation. “How’d you manage to bag the mythical beast?”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Diamante. He’s notorious for turning women down. Everyone thought he was gay.”

  Phoebe tried not to smile at the thought of being the only woman who’d ever gotten close to Rafe Diamante. She had to remind herself he might be further involved than he claimed. “Nope. Not gay.”

  “So, what do you want with me? I don’t know anything about what Monique was into.”

  Phoebe flicked her brows upward. “That’s not what you said when we talked online. You said you could hook me up with something ‘extra special,’ just like Monique.”

  Kimber sipped her iced tea. “You don’t want to mess with these people.”

  “Unfortunately they’re already messing with me.” Phoebe’s latte arrived and she busied herself blowing on the foam to cool it while waiting for the waitress to move out of earshot.

  Her “date” studied her. “You don’t look like any lawyer I’ve ever met.”

  “Yeah, I get that a lot. I think it’s the bangs.”

  Kimber laughed, the obvious tension she’d been holding in her body since Phoebe’s arrival easing somewhat. “Well, anyway, I still don’t know how I can help you.”

  “I suppose it’s too much to hope you’d be able to hook me up with the Heidi Fleiss of Sedona.”