Elements of Mischief

by Tate James

  For me, you know, finding out that things could be raised from the dead at all came as a pretty huge shock.

  “Necromancers?” I asked with a slightly dry, skeptical sort of laugh. “You're telling me that my parents are necromancers?”

  “Your father is,” Gram said grimly, “he's the spirit elemental.”

  “If women are so rare in this world,” I scoffed, crossing my arms over my chest, “then how the fuck does that asshole have six wives?”

  “Male spirit elementals are like male calico cats,” Billy said which was sort of unhelpful since I didn't know shit about pussy. Heh. That was more Britt's thing than mine. Although there was that one time my senior year of high school … “Male calico cats are a one in three thousand phenomenon. Because being a spirit elemental is tied to the sex chromosomes, only women can technically fill that niche. That means your dad has an XXY chromosomal disorder called Klinefelter syndrome; only one in ten thousand male spirit elementals is fertile.”

  “Dude, you just lost me there,” I said as Gram harrumphed next to me.

  “If you'd paid more attention in school,” she began, but I was already blocking her out—just like I'd done when she was alive.

  “Does it matter?” Billy asked, lighting up yet another cigarette. “Who cares about that fucker anyway? As soon as the COCS Heads get ahold of him, he's fucking done for.”

  “He's my biological dad,” I said, and felt satisfied when Billy actually choked on his next inhale. “And those crazy women—like the metal dragon—are my bio moms.”

  I crossed my arms over my chest, effectively propping up my tits and drawing Reg's eyes to the creamy mounds (I had to admit—I did have pretty sweet boobs).

  “So, you plan on telling me why there's a metal elemental? Do we have one of those, too?”

  “We don't know,” Reg said, crossing his hands together behind his head. “And if we did, you've never fucked him so we have no way of tracking him down.”

  “The hell is that supposed to mean?” I asked, not caring that Gram was still standing there listening to the conversation.

  “Well, clearly you've nailed Warden in the past,” Reg continued even though Billy was giving him a shut the fuck up right now look. “Talk about a fucking coincidence …”

  “What?!” My shriek bounced down the corridor and both men shushed me, glancing over their shoulders at the bedroom where Joan was recovering.

  “Ari, just …” Reg took me by the elbow and quickly steered me down the hall to what must have been his bedroom. Inside, I found an adult's room, not a child's leftovers like with Shane. Hmm. And in here, it was just as grand, just as opulent as the rest of the house—four-poster bed, velvet curtains, heavy rugs, a fireplace as tall as I was.

  “No, I will not just anything, Reginald!” I was yell-shouting, causing the words to lose a little of their impact, but my point must have gotten across because Reg sighed dramatically while Billy groaned and flopped himself down in an expensive looking leather armchair. The entire fucking house was minted and these four were trying to tell me they had to move into Gram's mansion because they didn't have a pot to piss in? Yeah right.

  “Look, Sugar Tits,” Reg started again, holding his hands up defensively, “I don't know why you're acting so surprised here. You're a smart girl—surely you've noticed you have a connection with energy? Otherwise, where the fuck all the lightning coming from?”

  “I thought that when we all … you know”—this was my not so subtle euphemism for screwed five ways to Sunday—“with the runes and the magic orgasms …” Okay, it sounded a bit silly out loud, now that I thought about it.

  “You thought what, Firebug? That you'd somehow magically fucked Warden through the cosmos?” Billy snorted at his own joke, but that was exactly what I had thought happened.

  “But … I've never fucked a Warden before …” I flailed and then petered off. How could I have slept with another elemental and not even known? I mean, surely the magic would've been a dead giveaway?

  Gram's spell, maybe? It made sense, didn't it? If she'd cloaked my true identity from the world …

  “Are you sure?” Billy asked with a brow cocked, his smirk as sharp as sin. “Because I'm pretty sure half the girls I've fucked in the past gave me fake names.”

  “Yes,” I growled, “I am sure—I'm not nearly as big a slut as you. And honestly? That doesn't come as much of a surprise, William—if we'd ended up in a one-night stand, without all this magic shit tying us together, I'd have given you a pseudonym and then cut and run, too.”

  “Wow. Defensive much? Not what I meant, Ari.” He flicked his cigarette butt into the air and snapped his fingers, incinerating it completely. “I just meant, it's unlikely Warden's using his real name, you know? If he hadn't wanted us to track him down, then it stands to reason he was operating under a fake name.”

  My knees suddenly seemed incapable of holding my weight any longer and I sat heavily on the edge of Reg's king-size bed. If this really was his childhood bedroom repurposed then damn. What kid needed a king-size bed, I had no idea.

  “Ok, let's … let's look into that later.” Digging up skeletons from my shitty dating past didn't exactly seem like the most relaxing way to end a stressful day. For now, what are we going to do about Kuntemopharn?” See, I could be serious when I needed to be. Grams didn't know what the hell she was talking about.

  “Well, we need to kill him. Isn't that what your dead grandma told you?” Reg asked, stretching out on the bed beside me. His Pokemon shirt lifted to show his smooth expanse of abs, highlighted with swirling ink.

  I lost my focus momentarily.

  “Well that's an awfully rude way to refer to your guardian ghost.” Grams sniffed, touching her pearls like she was terribly offended, then disappeared again. Old bitch knew how to act, I'd give her that.

  “Ya'll need to hear what we just found out from the COCS Heads,” Shane said, letting himself into the room without knocking. George followed close behind him and gave me a small smile.

  My heart flip-flopped, but I just tossed a bundle of dirty blonde curls over my shoulder and pretended I was too cool to care.

  “George, is your arm okay?” I asked, running my gaze over him for any lingering signs of injury. He seemed totally fine though.

  “Good as new, Blossom,” he said, and took a seat next to me on the bed. His freshly healed arm brushed against mine and the addictive scent of wildflowers and moss reached my nose.

  “What did you learn, Skeeter?” Billy asked, and I cringed at Shane's nickname. It was so hard to picture myself ever falling in love with a man named Skeeter.

  Whoa. Where the fuck had that thought just popped out of? Ugh, focus, you lust-blinded fool!

  “Turns out the elementals helping Kuntemopharn are the same ones that went rogue from the California storm back around thirty years ago. They've raised him using their male spirit's necromancy power,” Shane informed us, not having heard the information Grams had just dropped on me, about them being my bio parents. “They know about Ari somehow, know that she's the strongest damn spirit we've seen in a while; they'll be coming back for her. No doubt about it.”

  “Yeah, they know about her because she's their kid,” Billy informed Shane and George, flicking out another cigarette. He must be really stressed, I hadn't seen him smoke quite so many in quick succession before.

  “What?” George asked, shocked, and I just shrugged.

  “Oh, and Reg spilled the beans that I've probably fucked Warden before and not even known who he was.” I was pissed. This whole thing was bullshit. I wished Grams would reappear so I could wring her scrawny neck. Obviously I knew that wouldn't solve my problems,but it'd damn sure make me feel better. Besides, she was dead anyway, so no harm done, right?

  “I see …” Shane drawled, watching me with curious blue eyes, “but you don't know who and when, huh?”

  “Jesus fucking Christ, you make me out to sound like Britt.” I wasn't dissing my girl—she
just really loved the dick. “I wasn't exactly a virgin when I met you guys, so stop acting shocked that I could've slept with your buddy somewhere down the line.”

  “That's for sure,” Reg snorted, probably thinking of our very first time together. You know … when I let him and Shane double plunge my drains in Gram's bathroom? Yeah. That time.

  “There's no 'could have' here, sug.” Shane's honey-like voice softened the words. “You have fucked Warden somewhere along the line or we couldn't have completed the marking ceremony when we did.”

  I racked my brain. There was that one guy at the rock concert, when we fucked in the bathroom. Or the dude I went on all of three failed dates with from my yoga class? A handful of others, too, but all of them, all of them, I had used protection with. In this day and age, you couldn't be too careful so I had never gone without … except once.

  Groaning, I dropped my head into my hands. Surely not. What were the odds? Fuck a hairy dingo.

  “You thought of someone?” George prompted, sliding his warm hand onto my knee in what was probably meant as a comforting gesture, but my over-sexed body took as a come-on.

  “Yes, no, I don't know. I need to talk to Britt. In the meantime, what are we doing about cuntmuffin?”

  “Kuntemopharn,” Shane corrected, “is hiding out in an abandoned pipe system on the far side of town. I suggest we take the fight to him before he has a chance to strike at us unawares again.”

  “I agree.” Billy nodded, giving me a long, lingering look and then lighting up yet another smoke. “Reg, let's go and see what sort of backup COCS is willing to provide. They're the Committee of Combined Supernaturals, after all. Maybe the wolves or vamps want to pitch in and help?”

  “I guess,” Reg agreed reluctantly, rising to his feet and tossing a sexy look my way before following the surly fire elemental from the room. I sort of felt like I was being set up—left with Shane, the original instigator of the supposed fight with Warden, and George, the mediator.

  Fucking Billy.

  Dickhead.

  Or rather, pierced dickhead to be more accurate.

  “So do you want to talk about who this guy is?” George prompted, his thumb drawing small circles on the inside of my knee, making me groan. I still wasn't wearing any fucking panties.

  “Not particularly,” I said, trying not have a full-blown meltdown. I mean seriously? Of all the men in this world, the one guy that I’d actually totally fallen for … was an elemental? And not just any elemental, but one of my like, destined chosen or whatever?

  Warden, huh? I mean, there had to be a time or two that I wasn’t thinking of that I didn’t use protection, like a drunken one-night stand or something … There was just no friggin way that Max Cornwall was Warden. Just no. Nuh-uh.

  “You know,” George said, leaning back on the bed and looking for all the world like a fucking god. I mean, who has abs like that? And body fat? Psh. Not on this guy. No human being looked this good (except for Channing Tatum, of course). His skin was that shimmery bronze that all pathetically pale people (myself included) go for at the tanning bed but can never quite achieve. “You can talk to us about anything; we’re in for the long-haul, Arizona.”

  “So you say,” I told him skeptically, even though in reality all I wanted to do right then was put my head on his chest and go to sleep with the sound of his heart beating against my ear (totally corny and lame, I know). “But I don’t know you guys from Adam. Theoretically, I get that we’re supposed to function as a unit or some shit, but …”

  “Then get to know us,” George said, lifting his brown eyes up to stare at Reginald’s ceiling. He frowned and I was prompted to follow his gaze. Then I saw what he was looking at, and I frowned, too.

  “It’s a mirror,” I said, feeling my right eye twitching.

  “It’s a mirror,” George confirmed as Shane kicked off his boots, pants … okay, wow. Shane was taking off everything. Once he was fully stripped down, he just climbed into Reginald’s king-size bed like we owned the place, tucking all eight inches of … I mean all six foot whatever of himself beneath the covers.

  “What would he need a mirror for?” I asked as George dropped the burnt umber color of his eyes back down to me and lifted the corner of his mouth in a slight smile. It was almost enough to make me forget about Warden-who-couldn’t-possibly-be-Max-Cornwall.

  “I thought you said you were experienced?” George joked as Shane chuckled from beneath the covers, propping his face on one sculpted, beautifully masculine arm.

  “I mean, I get that a mirror on the ceiling is like, the typical sleazy dude fuck fetish, but you’re telling me he used it as a teenager? Teenagers don’t need fetishes—they’re all just massive bundles of hormones. When did you guys move out? After college?”

  “Well,” George started, dragging the word out long enough to make me suspicious. “We’ve been looking for our spirit elemental for so long that we haven’t had much of a chance to set up a permanent place of residence.”

  He smiled at me, like that would make things better.

  My eye was twitching again.

  “So … when did you move out? Twenty-five? Twenty-six …?”

  George paused and ran his fingers through his hair, gently tousling the brunette strands before he stood up and started stripping. As I looked around, I realized that not only was this room bigger than Shane’s childhood bedroom, but also … it didn’t have any race cars. Or like … like any childhood things at all. Plus, the mirror …

  “Oh my god, you guys live with your parents still,” I said, feeling a wave of disgust roll over me.

  “Not anymore, sugar,” Shane drawled from under the covers, rolling onto his back and putting his hands behind his head. “Now we live with you.”

  “But … you had cars in your room …” I said and the corner of Shane’s lip quirked up on one edge.

  “That was our childhood room,” he explained and then gestured up at the ceiling. “Would you mind getting the lights, sweet thing? I’m worn slap-out.”

  I stood up, but George put a hand on my arm and stopped me from heading for the switch.

  “Practice makes perfect,” he said, and I realized then that he wanted me to magic the lights off. I just stared at him.

  “So you guys just all live in the same room?” I asked, wondering if their jokes about being ten percent bisexual were maybe a little off the mark. If they slept in the same bed together every night, didn’t that make them at least twenty or thirty percent? Thank you Kinsey sliding scale of sexuality …

  “We did as children,” George said and when he realized I was definitely not going to be using my Warden-please-don’t-be-Max-Cornwall powers, he moved over and turned off the lights himself. But not before, you know, slipping his pants off and exposing his, um, tree branch and berries to me. “We even cuddled up in that giant bed together. But when we got a little older, we started moving into our own rooms.”

  “And Warden?” I asked as George sighed and cast a glance over at Shane. It was dark, but silver beams of moonlight were slanting into the room and illuminating the two mens’ faces enough that I could see their expressions. Shane … was really not fucking happy.

  “And Warden,” George confirmed, and before he could stop me, I was heading out and into the hall where I bumped into Billy and Reg having a private conversation. Fuckers. Off to check out backup, my ass.

  “Where’s Warden’s room?” I asked and they both paused to stare at me like I’d sprouted antlers. Not that that would be too crazy weird or anything, considering all the shit I’d been through lately. I mean, shapeshifting into an elemental dragon was totally cool, so why not a big velvety rack o’ moose horns?

  “Why the fuck do you need to see his room?” Billy asked as I crossed my arms over my vinyl barely-there top and stared him down. “What does it matter? It’s not like he’s planning on coming back anytime soon.”

  “Tell me or I’ll just start opening random doors and looking.”

>   Billy sighed and shoved his hand through his charcoal hair like I was the most annoying creature to ever walk the planet. Reg just stood there and looked at me like he felt sorry for me which was pathetic—he was the one with a mirror on his ceiling.

  “Third door on the left,” Billy said, and I was gone, heading for that room like it would hold all the answers. Without hesitation, I opened the door and stepped inside, shutting it behind me and then flicking on the lights.

  As soon as electricity bathed the room … I knew.

  I fucking knew.

  “Jesus H. Christ,” I whispered as I moved into the room and paused at the edge of a black bedspread, neatly made and dust free, as if Max …Warden had been here just hours before. On the nightstand, there was a picture of all five boys, four of those faces newly familiar to me … and one of them dear. “You motherfucker,” I said, gritting my teeth. Even though I knew that I had been the one to run away, somehow that didn’t make Warden’s absence in my life hurt any less. I wanted to maybe castrate him and shove his balls down a storm drain … That is, if I ever saw him again.

  He had no social media presence, no online presence at all really, and if he didn’t even bother to contact his mother … How was I ever supposed to find him?

  Not that I wanted to, you know, because I so didn’t.

  I studied the picture, Warden’s hair black with a red streak down the front, haphazardly spiked into some sort of stupid mohawk or faux hawk or whatever the fuck. But it was his eyes, those two sharp pools of liquid jade that had my heart pounding.

  “Max …” I whispered to the picture, feeling like he was right there staring back at me. “You fucking asshole.”

  “Sweetheart?” George's soft voice called through the door. “Do you mind if I come in?”

  Did I mind? I didn't even know … My brain felt like it was exploding.

  “Sure,” I replied hesitantly and he slipped through the door, closing it behind him. He'd thrown on a pair of loose boxer shorts with My Pipe Can Make You Gush printed across the butt. They hung low on his hips, drawing my attention to his drool worthy V that pointed down at the good bits …