I stiffened under his touch, and when I didn't answer, he gently went to turn me around.
"Abigail?"
"I was having coffee down there. No biggy. Just let me grieve in my way, okay? Her death isn't going to be something I just wipe away." I sighed and hesitated slightly. "I'm having nightmares of her death, of what happened with Ira and Hannah." I scrubbed my hands over my eyes. "Being down by her old shop helped me feel closer to her. Calmer."
Levi bowed his head. "I'm sorry Abigail, I would spare you from all of this if I could." He disappeared without another word.
I let out a long breath and looked at Merick. "I think you're safe now."
He didn't change back. He just meowed at me and curled up at the foot of the stairs. I continued my way up and went to my room to pack. I had no real way of knowing how long I was going to be gone, so I wasn't even sure where to start.
I was supposed to be on leave, so I didn't have to stick to the standard PIB black, but opening my closet, I realized that was pretty much the extent of what I had.
I shook my head and started throwing clothes into a duffel bag. Merick knocked on my door and walked in without me answering.
"I could have been naked," I said over my shoulder.
He snorted. "You changed into your pajamas over two hours ago. I figured I was safe."
"Did you need something?" I zipped up my duffel bag and tossed it near my bedroom door.
He shook his head. "I just wanted to tell you to be safe. Since you're going to be out of town, I'm going to go check in with my father and take care of a few personal things."
I was tempted to ask what he meant by personal things, but I didn't. He was a pretty private person, and prying would get me nowhere or vague answers. "Be safe while I'm gone. And don't let anyone blow up my house."
He laughed. "At least you aren't taking the car. Less chance of it getting destroyed."
In the last few years, I'd destroyed a total of six cars in various ways, but most of them had blown up. I shrugged a shoulder. "There's always time for that when I get back."
He shook his head. "Be careful in Luna Grove. If you need help, call Oliver since I can't go there."
"My uncle is MIA since he is technically working for Ira now." Something he had to do to save me from Ira when Mario betrayed me. "But I'll make sure to keep that in mind. I'm sure he'll come to my rescue if I'm in dire need."
Merick nodded. "He'll be more help than I will be. I'm sure Levi would rather you call him, but you and I both know that there is a lot of red tape a vampire must go through before they can enter another vampire's territory."
"Yeah, I'd be dead and buried by the time he'd be able to come to my rescue." I rolled my eyes and sat on my bed. "You know a lot about Luna Grove?"
"Just that we're forbidden from going there and that their magic runs extremely dark."
I sighed. "How dark are we talking? Certainly not everyone there is killing with black magic and sacrificing people?"
"Oh, Abby…" Merick shook his head and laughed.
The way he had said my name reminded me of my uncle, and I had to wonder if the two hung out enough for Merick to pick up the mannerism.
Merick was still laughing when he left my room and shut the door behind him. His reaction to my question wasn't comforting. At. All.
CHAPTER THREE
The next morning, barely after dawn, Simon was on my doorstep. The only thing that was saving him from me yelling at him was the coffee in his hands. He held it out to me the moment I opened the door.
"I didn't think you meant the butt-crack of dawn," I growled and attempted to smooth down the waves of my hair. "I haven't even showered yet."
He looked ashamed for a moment. "I'm sorry, I should have warned you."
"I guess I'll just shower when we get there," I muttered. "Give me a moment to get dressed and look halfway decent."
Simon nodded, shut the door behind him, and motioned for me to go on. I jogged back up the stairs and quickly changed into jeans and a shirt before pulling my hair back into a ponytail. I glanced at my daggers in my closet before throwing them into my duffel bag at the last minute. I pulled my gun from the safe and put it in a travel case, locked it, and put that in the bag as well. I was checking my bag, I could get away with the firearm. As a PIB agent, I had all my required licenses to carry in most states. I wasn't leaving the house without it.
I came down the stairs with my bag. Simon was sitting at the breakfast bar with Merick, and the moment I walked in they quit talking.
I raised a brow. "You know, it's not nice to talk about someone in their own house."
Merick shook his head. "I was giving Simon some advice on how to keep you a bit safer in Luna Grove."
"You know, everyone acts as if I'm not capable of taking care of myself. I'm perfectly capable of handling a handful of witches who deal in black magic."
"We know you are." Simon met my gaze. "What we're worried about is them finding out what you're actually doing there. A handful you can handle, an entire city?"
I shrugged one shoulder and picked my coffee up. "I guess we're going to find out. Come on, let's get going or we're going to miss our flight."
Simon grabbed my bag and walked out the door. I glanced back at Merick. "Again, don't let anyone blow up my house. And if Mario and Levi come around, please let me know."
Merick nodded and waved me on. "You've left me home alone before. I promise not to make a mess of things while you're gone."
I resisted rolling my eyes as I followed Simon to his truck. He threw my bag in the back and opened my door for me before he went to the driver's side. I climbed in the passenger side, shut the door, and leaned back against the seat.
"Wake me up when we get to the airport."
Simon chuckled. "Abby it's only a couple hours before you'd be up for work."
"And on work nights, I try really hard not to stay up all night watching stupid television."
He shook his head. "You're right, typically you're up all night trying to solve murders."
"Mm, yes, but in case you haven't heard, I'm on leave." I stuck my tongue out at him. "I'm pretty sure being on leave includes being able to sleep in."
He chuckled. "You can hardly tell you're lying." He shook his head. "Maybe you really want to be on leave."
"Or maybe I've just had a lot of practice at lying to supernatural creatures." I closed my eyes. "Seriously though, wake me up when we get to the airport."
Simon gave one more soft laugh. "Okay."
I dozed in and out of sleep on the short drive to the airport. Early in the morning there wasn't enough traffic to slow down the trip. Simon pulled the truck into the long-term parking, and we both got out. "Are we renting a car when we get there?"
"No, it's a small enough town that we can walk most places from the hotel. The alpha is picking us up when we get there."
I nodded. "Connection flight?"
"Nope, we'll fly into a main airport and then it's about a two-hour drive to the hotel. Curt will drop you off at the hotel before taking me to meet some of the other pack."
I'd be alone in the city for a bit, that would give me a chance to meet up with Ana without Simon hanging around and truly make it look like I was on vacation. Of course, Liz hadn't given me any contact information for Ana, so I had no idea how I was going to get a hold of her.
I pulled out my phone and thought about sending Liz a text to ask, but the paranoia in my brain stopped me. My uncle didn't know I was leaving town, and he typically had my phone bugged. At some point in the last year, I had stopped caring. Except now he worked for Ira, and it meant that Ira could get the information.
Simon put a gentle hand on the small of my back. "This way. Let's get checked in and I'll get you more coffee once we're on the other side of security."
∞
With our bag
s all checked, TSA completely sure that we weren't trying to sneak anything into the airport, and a steaming cup of coffee later, we sat playing stupid games on our phones while waiting to board the plane.
Simon sat next to me playing a puzzle game with an occasional curse while I worked on a word game. There was a strange sense of peace about the whole situation, even though there were gruesome murders to be solved. While I stared at the screen, I worked through the details I had read in the folder. Twenty-four hour time frames between the deaths, a death out of the city, a death in the city. Black magic, possible links back to Luna Grove. Various genders, ages, and features of victims, and all scenes had the mysterious runes. I had my laptop in my carry-on where I could access what notes of Tobias' that I had managed to turn into digital files so far. I glanced at the time on my phone. We only had a few minutes before the plane would start boarding.
"What are you thinking about?" Simon interrupted my thoughts.
I cracked a smile. "I was thinking about busting my computer out and working on some research."
"Oh?"
"Yeah, I've been working on organizing some of my father's work in digital format. I have a lot of his notes and drawings scanned in." Simon didn't know about Levi being my biological father. It was something that I could never tell Simon about. Hell, I wasn't even supposed to say the fact out loud.
"But it's about time for the plane to board."
"Exactly."
Simon nodded. "Just enjoy the work-free time." I could hear the unsaid 'while you can' in his voice.
I nodded, and we both stood as the loud speaker squeaked, and they started announcing the boarding of our flight. I hesitated slightly at the gate. Simon glanced at me. "You okay?"
"Well, you know how I have a bad track record with cars?"
Simon nodded.
"I'm really hoping that doesn't extend to planes." I found my courage and walked down the hall that led to the plane. Simon stayed right at my back.
"I don't think your bad luck extends this far. Besides, they routinely check the planes for any tampering, magic included."
That didn't help shake my nerves though. I told myself that I was paranoid, but I couldn't shake the tightness in my chest. I'd flown before. I wasn't scared of it, but just something about this made me want to puke.
Simon took my hand and wrapped his fingers with mine. "It's fine. Just take a deep breath, let's find our seats, and it'll be over before you know it."
Goddess, I hope he was right, because I wasn't sure how long I'd be able to stave off the panic that was building.
I sat down next to Simon, and after a few deep breaths the panic started to subside. I realized that it had to have been magic around the door. Once the cabin filled with seated passengers and bags were safely put in the overhead bins, the plane pulled away from the terminal.
"Welcome and thank you for flying with us today!" The cheerful voice of the flight attendant came over the speakers. "Some of you may have felt that uneasy pressure as you walked in, rest assure that it is simply our new anti-magic precaution."
That would explain it. I gritted my teeth. There were people out there who saw magic as a weapon and were trying to get witches and other supernatural creatures banned from planes, so I guess an anti-magic spell was probably the better option.
Simon snorted. "Next thing you know they'll be requiring a blood test for lycanthropy."
I snickered under my breath as the flight attendant continued her safety examples and explanations on what to do during an emergency. Not long after we were safely in the air and Simon was snoring softly beside me as the ground below went by.
I pulled out my laptop and set it up to work. My research on the runes that I was doing for the Cult weren't connected to the PIB database so working on them wouldn't trigger anything. I scrolled through the images that I had uploaded and compared them to the runes we had. All we knew about them were that the ones from Clarissa's circle were used at the demon summonings and for sacrifices. In the new case, the runes were used to simply kill, at least at this point.
I clicked through them and compared them to the base that Merick had found a few months ago, hoping to find something else that made sense.
An hour or so later, I still hadn't made any progress, and the flight attendant asked us to move our seats upright and put things away.
Simon only woke up when the wheels hit the ground. For a moment I envied his ability to sleep through everything.
We got off the plane and walked through the airport to grab our luggage. A loud squeal of joy echoed through the concourse the moment we came down the escalator to the baggage claim.
A tall blonde woman threw her arms around me the moment I was steady on my feet. "Abby it's so good to see you!"
I wrapped my arms around her and gave Simon the side eye. He shrugged one shoulder and walked over to a man standing near the carousel. I assumed that the man was the alpha and focused on the woman in front of me.
"Ana!" I tried to put as much excitement into my voice as I could. It was nice to see an old friend, especially one from the academy. She didn't hold on to me too long before she stepped back.
"How was the flight?" She put an arm around me and guided me to the bags that were starting to circle out.
I shrugged. "Oh you know, a few thousand miles in the air riding a tin can." I snorted. "It was as good as it could be."
I saw my duffel bag come around the bend next to Simon's green suitcase. Simon pulled them both off the belt and handed me mine.
"Guess you don't need a ride to the hotel?" Simon asked.
Ana grinned. "I thought I'd take her out to lunch. I happened to run into Curt, and he said he was on his way here, and I mentioned I had a friend coming in."
"All the same, I'd rather head straight to pack lands anyways." Curt looked at me. "Abigail Collins, it's good to meet you." He held a big hand out to me.
I took it and he gave it a tight squeeze as we shook. "A pleasure to meet you, thanks for letting me tag along with Simon."
He held my hand a moment longer than I was comfortable with. "Of course, as long as you don't interfere with pack dealings."
I smiled. "With all respect, I've had enough of pack politics to last me a lifetime."
Simon snorted and covered it with a cough. "What she means is that she's helped us out before, and she understands how everything works."
"And that I'll respect your wishes to stay away from the pack dealings," I added.
Ana rolled her eyes and hooked her arm with mine. It reminded me a lot of how Clarissa used to pull me away from situations, and it made me hesitate a moment. Ana tugged on me. "Come on, let the wolves talk and we'll get going. I can drop you off at the hotel when we're done."
I glanced back at Simon, and he nodded. "I'll text you the hotel information in a bit."
I gave him an uneasy smile as Ana pulled me to the doors of the airport.
"We're going to have so much fun while you're here."
Fun, yes, that wasn't exactly what I called solving a murder that has to do with black magic, but hey, maybe she had a different definition. I smiled. "Where are you taking me to lunch at?"
"Oh, just a little mom and pop diner on the edge of Luna Grove. You're going to love it." She led me to her tiny car.
I glanced at it and glanced at her. "Okay, you're going to have to forgive me, but what are the chances that your car is going to blow up?"
Ana gave me a concerned look. "Not very. Does your car make a habit of that?"
"It's happened a few times."
"No wonder you're on leave." She shook her head and unlocked the car.
I got in the car and my phone dinged. A quick look at it told me that Simon had texted me the address to the hotel. "You don't know the half of it, but the paperwork says I'm on leave for bereavement and mental health."
"Yeah, and you may want to actually take a mental health vacation after this visit." She shook her head. "Thanks for going along with the airport visit."
I nodded, assuming it was safe to talk about the actual case now. "How bad is it?"
"We had a death show up twenty-four hours after the death in your city. Now it's just waiting for the next one to show up. Until then I have an entire packet of information for you to look over. We can't say anything in public about this, or you're going to put a giant target on your head as an investigating PIB agent." She tightened her hands on the wheel as spoke. "This has been going on for a few years now, and I haven't gotten any closer to solving it."
I leaned back in the seat. "I can't promise you anything, but I've had my fair share of hard cases. Let's put our heads together and see what we can manage to do."
She nodded and motioned to a bag in the back seat. "The packet is in there. I suggest we study it and go over it while we drive to the city. I wasn't kidding about lunch. Since you're here to visit, you're my responsibility. The local coven would like to meet with you."
I cringed. "I hate covens."
She glanced at me. "Are you not part of your local one?"
They had forced me to withdraw my registration, but she didn't need to know that. "No, I've had a few problems with them, so I try not to associate with them."
"Gotcha, it's a tight-knit community here, so…" she let it trail off.
"I can play nice. I'll meet with the priest or priestess, or whoever. Besides, it'll give me more of an idea on what I'm dealing with here."
She nodded and pulled the car onto the highway. I reached into the back and grabbed the bag and found a three-ring binder with information in it. "You weren't kidding."
"No, I wasn't. I've been in this town since I was a baby PIB, fresh out of the academy, they placed me here as a precaution."
And yet she hadn't nabbed the person doing this. Ana was on par with me at the academy. I highly doubted that it was incompetence that was the issue. "My file didn't specify how long you'd been undercover. That's a crazy amount of time."
Between the Lines (Here Witchy Witchy Book 7) Page 4