A Witch Called Red: A New Adult Urban Fantasy (Red Witch Chronicles 1)

by Sami Valentine

  Quinn rubbed his face. “I need to board up the window and call the security company. I’ll email the background check that I got on the victim. You’ll have it before you get to your hotel.”

  Vic narrowed his eyes before he shrugged and slowly turned. “See you at sunset then.”

  Red followed him out with a look back, feeling eyes on her.

  Quinn looked away when she caught him staring.

  Red caught up with Vic at the broken glass door of the building. “I don’t know him, but was that weird?”

  “Damn right it was! He has an extra bedroom and a couch. A nice couch.” Vic shook his head. “Sending us to a hotel. Cold. Ice cold. Damn, after eight hours in the van, too.”

  “You spent most of it sleeping or watching TV in the back,” Red pointed out without sass. She owed him after he had spent half of a month crisscrossing Nevada on a dead-end lead on her origins. One more in a long list. At this point, she was ready to believe Vic’s crazier theory about dark fairies kidnapping her.

  “Still. He could have given me some warning that Delilah—his sire, ex-wife, and professional ice queen—was connected to the victim.” He shook his head as he got into the driver’s side of the van. “I still haven’t decided if she asked him to investigate or he’s doing it out of guilt. He doesn’t make small talk, but the brood-meister at least gives me the heads up.”

  Red shrugged. “Does his ex-wife have a soul too?”

  Vic nodded and looked at her. “Not just that, but they’re the original gangsters.”

  “Oh, that’s right… He just looks so normal, I wouldn’t have…” Red licked her lips, trying to reconcile the stoic vampire in the center of Vic’s wacky college shenanigans

  and the Quinn from the Brotherhood’s legends.

  “You just met two of the four vampires so bad that the soul special was invented just for them.” Vic started the Falcon. “Delilah turned Quinn, and they rampaged around Europe for a century before turning Justine, who I hope you never meet because she is nuttier than a peanut farm. Lucas found his way into the crew after the nut job made him, then he never left. Blood, bodies, and mayhem piled up before they pissed off the wrong dude. August 1st,1900, the day everything changed.” Vic snapped his fingers.

  “The spell heard around the world,” Red said.

  “Exactly. They didn’t just piss off the wrong dude, they pissed off a magical librarian—which you never want to do. Killed his family or something. The guy, Father Matthew, doesn’t just shove empathy back into them, he writes a little guide to exactly how he did it with ideas how someone without soulmancy skills could do it. You know librarians, always trying to get people to read. Add a printing press and you get…”

  “The August Harvest.”

  “Yup. Thirty odd years of mages and more slinging souls at vampires. Breaking down the old bloodline system into a chaos of purges, revolts, and suicides. Vampire World War until the Blood Alliance brought order.” Vic shook his head. “It all started with that guy.”

  “I heard the story before but really, that’s Quinn Byrnes?” Red furrowed her brow. She would have expected a Dracula type in a cape with old world charm, not a stone-faced guy in a V-neck, hunching his shoulders and awkwardly deadpanning his way through small talk. “The Black Libertine, himself.”

  “Yeah, might as well be called the Stingy Libertine, now,” Vic said as he turned onto the highway. The lights of Los Angeles spread out before them.

  After pulling into a no-tell motel advertising both daily and hourly rates and checking in using a fake ID and credit card, Red was bushed. She brushed her teeth and changed into her House Ravenclaw pajama bottoms and baggy North Dakota tourist T-shirt in the tiny motel bathroom, then yawned good night at Vic who channel surfed crossed legged on the other bed.

  She slipped between the surprisingly clean sheets and fell into a dreamless sleep on the lumpy mattress.

  Metallica blared as a low vibration skittered on metal.

  Red jumped awake, blinking at the ringing cell phone on the stand between the beds. She yawned, half tempted to pick it up just to make the old rock song stop. Vic didn’t listen to anything from this century. He had gotten her hooked on classic rock, but before 4 a.m. wasn’t the time for a vintage Metallica wake up.

  “Vic, your phone.” She propped herself up on an elbow and squinted at the screen, surprised at the familiar name that she usually saw on emails sending them bounty orders. “Fat Jake Crispin is calling.”

  Vic coughed and rolled over, grabbing the phone. He rubbed his eyes. “Vic. Talk.” His eyes snapped open, and he bolted upright, looking over at Red and gesturing for something to write with.

  Red swung her legs over the side of the bed, walked over to the empty rickety desk, and tossed him a pen before looking for a pad of paper. The motel was too cheap to provide swag beyond brittle soap bars, but she did find a notepad under a Gideon bible in the bottom drawer. She tossed over a coffee-stained pad monogramed with ‘Smith and Reaper, Financial and Legal Services,’ thankful for whichever ambulance chaser had left it.

  Red crossed her arms and leaned against the desk, knowing from Vic’s lack of sarcasm that it must have been serious. She waited until he hung up. “Must be a red-letter day to get a call from headquarters.”

  “He’ll never forget it, either.” Vic ran a hand through his hair. “He lost his only daughter. Found drained. She was signed with DB Models. Crispin already talked to the LAPD. There’s another connection between the two vics. Both had a snake eating its tail carved on them.”

  “Quinn left that detail out.” Red kept the emotion out of her tone, walking over to her bed and laying down. Her mind raced, trying to recall where she had seen that symbol before as she fluffed up her pillow.

  Vic knew her well enough to read her face. His nostrils flared as he huffed and laid back.

  Red had a sinking feeling about this case. Like an animal trapped in the La Brea tar pits, she felt herself being drawn in deeper. She felt like she knew Quinn already. After enough road trips, she’d heard all of Vic’s stories twice, and the best ones even more. Red couldn’t stop herself from grumbling. “So much for keeping each other in the loop.”

  “Hey, he might not have known.” Vic gritted his teeth and rubbed his eyes.

  Red lifted her eyebrows but tiptoed around poking at his bromance with Quinn. “What now?”

  Vic said, “Sleep. After that we do what you do in LA. We do some yoga, hit the beach, then check out the nightlife.”

  Chapter Four

  October 25th, 2018, Before Dawn, The Pump House Bar in Downey, Los Angeles, California, USA

  "I really don't like this," Red said as she pushed open the battered door of the Pump House.

  The hole-in-the-wall bar was sandwiched between an unopened taco shop and a nail salon in the southern part of Downey, known to the world for the oldest McDonald's, and known to a smaller number for having the oldest hunter bar in Los Angeles. In the pre-dawn hours, the city buzzed with cars making their 6 a.m. commutes, yet a hush lingered over the strip mall.

  "You keep saying that. I thought you wanted to try yoga." Vic followed behind her, pushing his sunglasses down to take in the sparse, wood-paneled bar decorated in NASA memorabilia.

  An old timer in a cowboy hat stared ahead, cupping a mug of steaming coffee in his hands.

  "Not with a fucking vampire teaching it." Red muttered under her breath so the lone bartender leaning against the bar couldn't hear. Vic had woken her only an hour after the call from the Brotherhood with the order that they needed to see the Supreme Master of LA at a pre-sunrise yoga class. Fuck that.

  Vic gasped dramatically. "Racist."

  "Cautious." Red rolled her eyes. She’d had her fill last night of cryptic vampires, their secrets, and being kept in the dark.

  Vic might have looked at Quinn with puppy worship in his eyes, but Red couldn't shake the fact that the blond souled vampire hadn't told them about what was carved on the victim, or t
hat his ex-wife Delilah Byrnes had a direct connection with her. Then adding Julia Crispin to the body count... Fat Jake Crispin might have written their bounty checks, but she needed more than an order from the home office before she walked into a vampire's nest. She nearly hadn’t walked out of the last one.

  A hunter's bar could give them the earful of gossip they needed to stay one step ahead of their enemies and allies. Red frowned as she looked around at the nearly empty place. That was the theory, at least.

  Vic took his sunglasses off and met her eyes. "The place has changed. I think they dusted."

  Hunter's bars didn't play by the usual rules. You could find gangs coming in for a drink after a night's hunt at the same time others were getting coffee and settling any bounties before hitting the road out of town.

  In a place like LA, this cramped bar should have been full. Vic made it sound like he could get home fries here any time of day. It didn't smell like home fries had been made here for a long time.

  Red leaned against the counter and held up two fingers. "Coffee, please. Black. To go."

  Vic leaned next to her. "I’m Vic. It's been a spell since I blew into town, where’s Murphy or Derek?"

  The bartender, sallow-faced and sleepy, shrugged before turning. "Vacation to Palm Springs. They won't be back until the first week of November."

  "Can I still get home fries?"

  The bartender shrugged. "No kitchen, Vic. I only know how to make coffee and pour the beer. It's just me and Chuck here, keeping the fires running." He nodded at the old-timer.

  Red shifted her focus to Chuck. "We saw a lot of California hunters blowing through Reno when we left."

  Chuck coughed, puffing his white mustache up, before sipping from his mug. "No one will be back until after All Soul's Day, young lady. You should get back on the road. Might make it to someplace sunny in Arizona before it starts."

  "What?" Vic asked.

  Chuck shrugged. "The Blood Alliance. There are enough souled vampires to keep the peace in town, the supreme made it clear. Guess most hunters decided there are other monsters in the west."

  "Y'all take orders from the head vampire?" Red tried to keep her surprise and disdain out of her voice. She failed.

  "Does it look like it?" Chuck tipped his hat back, his voice quiet but the threat coiling like a rattlesnake ready to strike.

  Vic looked between them and tilted his head at the bartender, motioning for Red to pay.

  Red slapped down a five-dollar bill and gestured for the man behind the counter to keep the change.

  "We're here on a Brotherhood case. Julia Crispin was found drained last night,” Vic said.

  Chuck's shoulders sank. "That pretty English gal had some stones on her. Maybe too many, getting so close to the vampers like that. I don't know much. I retired once the Brotherhood made that truce with the damn undead. I refused to be put on her list."

  "Who, Cora Moon?" Vic asked.

  "She has lists of vampires, lists of hunters, lists of lists." Chuck slurped his coffee with a grimace. "Best be off now, don’t want to be late for yoga.”

  “We’ll be around if you hear of anything.” Vic nodded to him.

  Red raised her eyebrows and grabbed the to-go coffee cups. Now, she really didn’t like this.

  Rush hour started early and ended late in LA, and the sun still hadn’t risen when they finally reached their next destination. It lay on the weird middle ground between the hard scrabble neighborhoods of Inglewood and the UCLA campus.

  Moon Enterprises was the social good startup listed in Essence Magazine as one of the top ten black businesses on the rise in 1992. Beyond the article and the business registry, the internet couldn’t produce any more about the company. The shadowy CEO was known to the neighborhood but kept a low profile without giving a single quote to the press.

  You wouldn’t have thought that it was the vampire headquarters in LA by looking at it.

  "Are you sure this is place?" Red asked as she eyed the crowd of smokers in the corner of the parking lot kitty-corner to the tall building.

  Vic walked through the haze of smoke, hands in his pocket. “This used to be my hood.”

  “Hey, how many people do I gotta tell?” a Hispanic man in a plaid shirt mumbled as he flicked his cigarette. “No yoga, no hot meals, no nothing.”

  “We have an appointment.” Vic jerked his thumb over to Moon Enterprises.

  “That’s what they all say, hombre.” The guy shook his head. “Better not try that door until after sunrise.”

  An unmarked car that screamed law enforcement pulled up, and a too-pale blond uniformed officer opened the passenger’s side door and half stepped out. “Hey, I thought I told you punks to move along!”

  “Ease up,” his Asian partner said before waving at the crowd from the open driver’s side window. “The center is closed for the next two weeks, folks. Have a nice day!”

  The crowd wandered away, muttering, as the car drove off.

  Red glared at Vic but followed him across the street to the art deco concrete building. “I really don’t like this.”

  “You keep saying that…” Vic shrugged before pushing the intercom button next to the darkened door. “Cora Moon is expecting us. Two Bards come to play our respects.”

  “I’m a Bard now?”

  “Congrats on the promotion.” Vic pushed his sunglasses up atop his head.

  Red tensed, wishing she had a stake. Fat Crispin had sent them instructions to come unarmed to get the blessing of the supreme vampire master of Los Angeles as official representatives of the Brotherhood. They had the protection of a truce behind them, but her hunter’s instinct still screamed at her to arm herself. She knew a stake wouldn't be nearly enough to protect them from the nest of vampires inside, but it still felt like she was walking in naked.

  Red pushed away the flashbacks from Oklahoma City and tried to center her breathing. This wasn’t Oklahoma! This was the land of the teddy bear vampires, or so she tried to tell herself.

  The door opened automatically into a small tinted glass entry way. They walked inside.

  Her heartbeat jumped as the door behind them closed, and the one before them opened.

  Her adjusting eyes only made out the silhouette of a gloriously full afro and a white smile. "Welcome my Bard brothers."

  Vic stepped forward. "Howdy. Miss Cora Moon, I presume."

  The regal vampire wore a white bodysuit, hemp necklaces, and a pink tie-dye scarf around her head. She beckoned them forward. The faint smell of patchouli and lavender lingered around her. Her smile was wide and dazed, but her brown eyes took them in with laser focus. She looked like a hippie, but that aura was pure master vampire. She walked like she owned the city. In a very real way, Cora Moon did.

  Five vampires in black suits flanked them like secret service. Their jackets concealed the bulges of filled shoulder holsters.

  Red kept at Vic’s heels as they moved into the dimly lit lobby painted with murals of proud brown skinned people in African garb in 70s hues. The place had the look of a well-funded community center, but the energy was of a business hotel filled with conventioneers.

  Two clerks in suits and headsets typed at inhuman speeds in between answering questions at the circular front desk. Milling pairs and trios walked to the elevator and into the swinging doors of darkened hallways. Their eyes shone with amber light as they looked up at Red and Vic.

  She realized that they were the only two breathing.

  "I heard you offer a hungry man a hot meal here." Vic looked around, his hands balled into fists in his pockets as he tried to make small talk.

  "I can hear that belly growl, son, but with the Blood Summit, I had to close the first-floor drop-in center to the public." Cora gestured them forward past an open door where a PowerPoint presentation glowed over a crowd settled in a large room transformed from a cafeteria into a conference space. “Usually we have vegan breakfast cooking in there.”

  Red looked inside see a slide reading:
Tips to Avoid Trending on Twitter. 1. Smash the phone or camera first.

  "Tonight was our first round of knowledge sharing workshops before the official committees. Some go longer than others. We only get together every two years, and some vampires have more to say than others." Cora rolled her eyes. “Prétentieux, je sais, mais que pouvez-vous faire?”

  "Conferences really are all the same." Vic chuckled, but his laugh was thin.

  “I am lucky that my homegirl Delilah is happy to hostess.”

  Red glanced at Vic to see if he picked up on the name. Did Cora mean Delilah Byrnes?

  Cora pushed open a door into a brightly lit room painted with Sanskrit characters and lined with shelves of yoga mats. One teal and gold tie-dye mat remained in the middle of the room. "You two are a chill excuse to peace out for a bit.”