by Ann Charles
“Yep, but I don’t think that’s Cooper.”
“Then who is …” Her gaze hardened. “Violet Lynn.”
“Natalie invited Reid for supper,” I tattled and ran out of the room.
“That wasn’t our agreement,” Natalie called after me.
Reid was waiting on the porch with a bottle of wine. “Hey, Sparky.” He gave me a sideways hug as he passed. “I heard you kicked some devil-ass today.”
I held the wine while he took off his coat, happy to see his blue eyes and warm smile. “Gamay,” I read on the label. “The good stuff.”
“Only the best for Zo.” He draped his coat on the back of a dining room chair, looking downright dashing in his black sweater and jeans. He smelled even better—but not as good as Harvey’s soup.
“Come on, Romeo.” I led the way into the kitchen. “Look who made it, everyone.”
My kids cheered, which made Reid smile wider.
Aunt Zoe scowled, then started dishing up a bowl for Reid. “Have a seat, Martin. But don’t be getting any ideas.”
“Ideas about what, Zo?” he asked, his eyes traveling over her as he took the bowl of soup she held out. “I’m just your friendly neighborhood fireman dropping in to help you work on your stop, drop, and roll technique.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Cooper didn’t make it to supper, but he did call his uncle partway through the meal and said he hoped to make it in time for dessert. Something had come up at work that was slowing him down.
My fingers were crossed that his delay didn’t have anything to do with a certain imp.
Or one of the Nachzehrer.
Or any of the other “undead population” Dominick had mentioned.
Or that Duzarx thing Prudence had seen crawl out of the Open Cut.
Or … I poured another shot’s worth of tequila into my glass of lemonade. That was enough thinking about my to-do list for now.
After supper, Natalie and I had cleared the table and done the dishes while everyone else enjoyed the peach pie and ice cream that Cornelius brought. He’d stopped at the store after leaving a certain jerkweed patient at the hospital with a small concussion from blunt force trauma via a stapler.
Fortunately, Rex didn’t remember how he got the dent in his head, and being that he didn’t fully come to until he was on the way to the hospital, he had no memory of me being involved. Cornelius didn’t enlighten him, he just claimed to have found Rex by his car next to a patch of ice.
As far as I was concerned, Rex was lucky I hadn’t left a permanent dent in his cranium. While he wasn’t fully to blame because it’d been the lidérc running the show, that didn’t make up for his past assholery.
Cooper still hadn’t shown up by the time the kids finished with their dessert. Natalie didn’t mention anything about his tardiness, but I caught her looking toward the dining room more than once.
I let the kids escape the “boring” adult table talk and go watch a little television before bedtime. I was checking on them to make sure they were settled in with a movie that wouldn’t give them any trouble falling asleep when the front door opened.
Cooper walked in, sniffing the air as he unzipped his Deadwood police department coat.
I joined him in the dining room. “You didn’t ring the doorbell.”
His face furrowed. “Sorry. I thought—”
“Wait,” I interrupted. “I meant that as a good thing. You don’t have to ring it or knock anymore.” I waited as he took off his coat and draped it on the back of a dining room chair next to Reid’s. He still wore the blue jeans and shirt he’d had on earlier, but the sleeves were rolled up. His hair was sticking up in shark fins yet again and his eyes looked as tired as my bones felt. “Did you have any problems tonight at work that I need to worry about?”
He shook his head. “You’re off the hook for now.”
“Good.”
“Don’t celebrate yet. Your partner in crime got caught.”
My partner? “Natalie?”
He nodded.
I thought about what she’d told me about Tiffany seeing her at the diner. “She didn’t do anything wrong.”
“Not yet,” he said, “but she’s aroused suspicion.”
“Fudge berries.”
“Yeah.” He plowed his fingers through his hair, rearranging the fins. “We’re going to have to be especially careful now. If Hawke finds out that she and I are more than just longtime acquaintances who share more than a few friends, he’ll be up my ass even more.”
“He really needs to get a hobby.”
“You are his hobby. You’ve done one hell of a job getting under his skin.”
“That’s not my fault.”
He hit me with a squint.
“Okay, maybe a little,” I said, changing my tune. “But he started it.”
He scoffed. “I was there the first time you two met, remember?”
“Oh, yeah. I was having a bad day.”
His face softened. “It was certainly memorable, Parker. Now, how about you lead the way to whatever smells so good in the kitchen?”
“Sure, but just so you know, your girlfriend is pissed.”
His eyebrows drew together. “Why?”
“Because you wouldn’t let me include her in our posse, but I’ve since changed that. Natalie is on board, too.”
“It’s not a posse.”
“A posse is a group of people with a common purpose, which is usually enforcing some sort of law and order.”
“I’m fully aware of what a posse is, Parker.”
“Good, then you know that I’m right.”
“Christ. Nat gets in enough trouble without being dragged into your catastro-fucks.”
“I love you, too, law dog.” I punched him in the shoulder.
“That’s assault, Parker.”
“Maybe, but I said I loved you first, so that negates the assault.”
A small grin curved his lips. “Your affection is an assault on my senses, as well.”
“Keep it up, Cooper, and I’m going to hug you.”
A full-on smile surfaced. “Try it and I’ll arrest you for battery.”
Laughing, I returned to the kitchen with him following. “Look, everyone. Cooper decided to grace us with his prickly presence finally. Aren’t we so lucky?”
Cooper and Natalie exchanged heated looks when he entered the room. Actually, hers was more of a gunslinger glare, and his was a very definite smoldering stare. He detoured to the cupboard and grabbed a bowl and a spoon from the drawer, dishing himself up some of the soup we’d left cooling in the pot on the stove.
A smattering of liquor bottles now sat in the center of the table, surrounding Aunt Zoe’s Betty Boop cookie jar, which was open and filled with chocolate chip cookies. Dang, Betty was really hitting the sauce this evening, and it was high time I joined her.
I took the seat next to Doc once again, toasting his bottle of beer with my glass of lemonade and tequila that he’d apparently refilled while I was in the other room. “Merci, Gomez.”
“Come here, Tish.” He hooked his finger in the neckline of his T-shirt, pulling me in for a kiss. His lips tasted like peach pie, giving me whipped cream notions.
“Knock off that shit, you two,” Cooper said, taking the open seat next to Natalie that Layne had vacated.
“Okay, Violet Lynn,” Aunt Zoe said after uncorking the Gamay wine Reid had brought. “Let’s hear what happened today.”
“Which part?” I asked, taking a sip of lemony-tequila, mind-numbing goodness.
“All of it.” She filled a couple of glasses and handed them to Cornelius and Reid.
“Thanks, Zo,” Reid said when he took his, purposely brushing her hand with his, which earned him a glare in return.
“Okay,” I said, pulling my legs up so that I was sitting cross-legged in my chair. “But Cornelius will have to help me with some of the first part.”
Keeping my voice low, I started with Rex walking into the offic
e. By the time I made it to the Hellhole, Cooper had finished his soup. Cornelius took up the story reins and explained that he saw Rex and me fighting on the monitor and rushed over, but the back door was locked, so he had to run upstairs and grab his key. When he finally made it inside the office, he found Rex on the floor with the smoky devil hovering in the corner. The lidérc had rushed Cornelius, and he’d felt the drain immediately, experiencing the same heavy clamminess I’d initially felt. Then he’d used the trick his grandmother had taught him for locking away the evil spirits in his head. He ended his part of the tale with, “Its bloodlust for Violet was too strong to hold for long, though.”
“See,” I told Doc. “That’s why we have to kill it.”
Aunt Zoe paused with her wine glass halfway to her mouth. “Violet, you were lucky to escape with your life this time.”
“I have to persevere,” I said, trying to sound noble.
Harvey snorted. “That’s what you tell yourself right before giving up the ghost, girl.”
“What’s this ‘Kill it’ shit, Parker?” Cooper looked up from pouring himself a glass of lemonade. He must have to go back to work, or he’d be pouring from the whiskey bottle someone had set out.
“Count me in.” Natalie raised her glass of tequila to me.
Cooper frowned at her. “That’s a bad idea, Beals.”
Natalie took a sip from her glass. “I don’t remember asking for your opinion, Coop.”
He glared across the table at me.
What in the hell did I do?
“Cornelius,” I said, shaking off Cooper’s dirty look. “I’m going to need your help to pull this off.”
He stared down into his wine glass like he was reading tea leaves floating in it. “I’ll go into the dark with you, but I’m not sure the lidérc will have anything to do with me again. It wasted no time leaving me once it escaped my dungeon.”
“That’s because it wanted Violet.” Doc ran his finger down the side of his chilled beer bottle, leaving a trail in the dew. “She’ll need to go into the dark alone this time. You’ll be there only to help boost her onto the same plane as the lidérc.” He looked over at me with a troubled gaze, adding, “And to act as a lifeline in case she goes where I can’t.”
Cooper lowered his spoon, glancing back and forth between Doc and me. “You’re okay with this, Nyce?”
Doc lifted his beer. “We ran into Dominick outside,” he said in lieu of an answer and took a swallow.
“Outside where?” Reid asked.
I grimaced at Aunt Zoe. “He was waiting in the shadows near the front porch when Doc and I got here.”
She swore under her breath. “What did he want?”
“To give me the mirror back.”
“And to play games with Violet, as usual.” Doc downed another swallow of beer. “To answer your question, Coop, I’m not okay with this, but if she doesn’t kill the lidérc, Masterson could use it to force her hand in the future.”
“Use it how?” Harvey asked. “I got the impression it’s a wily critter with a mind of its own.”
“It’s a vengeful devil,” Doc said. “If released from its cage, the lidérc will come again for Violet.” His mouth tightened, fury narrowing his eyes. “And that son of a bitch Masterson knows exactly how to release it without risk to himself.”
“The threat needs to be eliminated while Dominick isn’t expecting it,” Natalie said.
We were on the same page. “Or the lidérc,” I added.
“Let’s get back to your story,” Aunt Zoe said, a scowl set deep on her face. “Did you run into anything in the Hellhole this time?”
I shook my head and returned to my trip to the courthouse basement, making it to the point when Prudence took over Harvey.
“But you remember being there?” Reid asked Harvey.
“Sure do. It was like someone else was drivin’, though. That ol’ dame is one tough nut. She shoved me aside like I hadn’t been pissin’ while standin’ upright for sixty-plus years.”
Natalie sat back. “Did she hurt you?”
“Nope.”
Pushing aside his empty bowl, Cooper asked, “Did you feel like you were suffocating?”
“Not even a smidgeon.” Harvey combed his fingers through his beard. “Sort of reminded me of being roped and tied while bein’ tickled with a feather.”
I grimaced, that image now burned into my gray matter.
“To tell you the truth, though,” he continued, “I’ve been a little jumpy ever since. Each time I hold my spout and tap my kidney, I feel like I’m being watched. And with my ornery prostate these days, ol’ Prudy has plenty of time to inspect my maple tree while we’re waitin’ for the syrup to drip.”
Doc and Reid laughed out loud.
Cooper’s cringe matched mine. “Christ, Uncle Willis. There are ladies present, you know.”
He blew a raspberry and waved off his nephew. “Sparky and Zoe know all about my plumbin’ issues, and Nat shared a camper with me, so this ain’t breaking news to her either.”
“He’s right.” Natalie patted Cooper’s arm. “Your uncle and I have an understanding when it comes to south side lemonade.”
Aunt Zoe snorted. “Natalie, your vocabulary never ceases to amaze me.”
She shrugged. Her hand was still on Cooper’s forearm, only her fingers were drawing circles on his skin. “I’m a sponge for R-rated vernacular.”
Cooper looked down at her fingers, his chest rising and falling visibly.
“Have you ever tried smiling while you urinate?” Cornelius chimed in, leaning his bony elbows on the table. That snared everyone’s attention, even Cooper’s.
“Did you learn that during some sort of positivity training exercise?” Reid asked, his eyebrows wrinkled.
“My grandfather swore by it. Said he could pee like a racehorse while smiling like an idiot.” Cornelius shrugged. “Try it some time. You might be surprised.” He made a pained expression. “But I wouldn’t advise you do it in a public urinal at a truck stop, especially in Texas.”
Harvey smiled wide enough to see his two gold teeth. “Like this?”
“Not now, Harvey,” I said, wrinkling my nose at him. Now I’d be picturing him grinning like a lunatic every time he told me he had to go to the bathroom.
“Save it for your next meeting with Prudence in the tinkletorium,” Natalie said, scooting closer to Cooper and draping her arm along the back of his chair. “How did Prudence manage to take over your body, anyway? Is there a special name for that kind of spirit possession?”
I used my spoon to fish a lemon seed out of my glass. “I’m sure Cornelius and Doc can rattle off several big words that explain it.”
Doc pushed his chair back and carried his empty beer bottle over to the sink. “Prudence paved the way for temporary possession earlier in the day when we were at her place trying out the mirror.”
“You mean the astral projection stuff she did?” I asked, losing the seed again, dammit.
“The Tall Medium is referring to her experimentation with telepathy, remote viewing, and retrocognition.”
“See,” I said, finally snagging the seed. “Big words.”
Doc opened the refrigerator door. “She used extrasensory perception to transfer thoughts, view remote mental targets, and perceive past events in each of our heads.”
Cornelius tipped his wine glass in my direction. “Although she seemed to stay out of Violet’s head.”
“I don’t think Prudence can view Violet’s thoughts.” Doc grabbed a few beers from the fridge. “Or possess her at will, for that matter.” He held up a bottle. “Willis?”
Harvey nodded with a grunt. “So, ya think she was tryin’ each of us out?”
“Like taking a car for a test drive.” Cooper shook his head at the beer Doc held out to him. “I’m on call.”
“Exactly.” Doc set the extra beer in the center of the table and returned to his chair. “For whatever reason, Prudence chose Willis when push came to
shove.”
Harvey snickered. “The ol’ gal knows my weakness for the ladies.”
“I’ve never met a ghost like her,” Cornelius said.
Aunt Zoe grabbed the bottle of wine. “Her skills are undoubtedly tied to her having been an Executioner.” She poured herself a bit more Gamay, offering some to Cornelius, who nodded and held out his glass. “Her strength and abilities are increasing along with Violet’s.” She set the bottle down and pointed at me. “Finish the story, kiddo.”
I nodded and gave them the wrapup, including the bit about Doc and me at the Sugarloaf Building. I told them how the lidérc had paced, trying time and again to get to me. I wanted them to better understand this need I had to execute the bastard once and for all. Why letting it live was a worse idea than trying to go kill it.
Silence filled the room after I finished.
“So, what’s the plan?” Natalie spoke up first.
I turned to Doc for that answer. “Well?”
He shrugged. “We’ll have to do it at night. Cornelius, Violet, and I will set up downstairs in the Sugarloaf Building. The wards Masterson has in place will protect us physically while we help Violet reach the plane where the lidérc is more vulnerable.”
“You’ll need me to get into the place,” Reid said.
Aunt Zoe scowled at him. “Or you just give them the key and stay the hell away from that devil.”
“Do you need me to keep an eye on Parker?” Cooper asked. “Follow her if she physically leaves the séance?”
Cooper’s roles during past séances had been to keep track of me, since I had a bad habit of walking off and landing hip-deep in trouble. I wasn’t sure I liked the idea of him following this time, though.
“I suppose you could be there, but you can’t cross the wards,” Doc told him. “It can use you to escape. Only Violet can actually go inside.”
“What if it won’t come for you once you’re in there?” Natalie asked me.
“Why wouldn’t it?”
“Because it knows you’re on this other plane where it’s weaker. You said it’s no dummy and was hesitant back in the courthouse. I think you need some bait, and we both know that I can run a lot faster than you.”