by Renee George
I had my hand behind my back, focused on turning it into a hoof. Jack had the gun on me, and Mrs. Dwyer had the syringe of death, and all I had was a strong will to live. I hoped it was enough.
"What about Mr. Dwyer? Does he know about Luke? Jack?"
"He knows about Luke now. It's all over town. He refuses to see our son buried. As to Jack, yes, I told him he's my son. He'll have to deal with it. He's the only child we have left, and when I'm gone, Jack will take my place in the family business."
"Mom," Jack said, his attention completely focused on his mother.
I used the opportunity to hit the tempered glass near the edge with my hoof. It shattered with a loud popping sound. Jack swung his weapon around, but I lunged out the window before he could get it trained on me.
And I ran. A shot rang out, and Mrs. Dwyer was right behind me, yelling at Jack to drive down the road and park. She was super nimble and quick. Quicker than me. Crap. Crap.
I shed my clothes as I high stepped into the woods and soon as my pants were off, I shifted. My panties were a little tight over my tail, and my bra stretched across my barrel chest, but Mrs. Dwyer would have caught up to me if I had taken the time to remove them. I picked up speed as I scented another deer coming up on me fast. I pushed hard with my back legs, pivoting over and past obstacles. Cal would meet me in my place in the Hackenstraw woods. At least I hoped that's what he'd meant when he said he'd meet me at the full moon. I just had to get there.
Overheated, lathered, and panting hard, my deer was exhausted by the time I reached the Hackenstraw property. I couldn't stop, though. Mrs. Dwyer looked like she could go several more rounds.
I was close now, less than a mile to my little clearing, where I knew Cal would be waiting for me. I just had to run, but my legs, they were so fatigued it felt like I was running through mud with sandbags attached. And my ankle had started to really ache at the stress I had put on it. I began to trot, because it was all I could manage.
That's when the flying deer woman tackled me in a spectacular leap.
"Ayeee!" The noise ripped from me as I tumble to the ground, my legs buckling beneath me. I rolled, my neck twisting at an awkward angle.
My deer was getting pummeled, I had to shift back to have a fighting chance. So, I made myself Dakota. I grabbed at Mrs. Dwyer's wrists to keep her claw-hooves from cutting me up. "Stop," I screamed. Tears were leaking down the side of my face. "Mary Ann, please stop!"
She blinked down at me, her half-human half-deer face gazing at me as if really seeing me. Her fur receded, and she looked mostly human again.
"I don't want to do this," she said. "But I have to. For Jack's sake."
"Cal knows. He'll tell people. Killing me won't save either of you," I told her. "You'll just do the same thing to my mom that has happened to you. You'll turn her into a mother who didn't die before her child. You can't want that for her. You can't want that for your friend."
Her hot tears dripped down on my skin and joined my own. "It's all muddy now." she had me pinned with one monstrous hand while she held out the other. Slowly, it became human again, and where there had been a thick line of keratin, now lay the syringe. "You deserve a peaceful death. I don't," she said. "But you do. I'm sorry." She held up the syringe and plunged it into her neck. "You shouldn't have to watch this. Tell your mother... tell her..."
"Dakota!" Cal shouted.
"Over here," I called back. I eased Mrs. Dwyer aside. I stared at her as she took her last breath and the life left her eyes. And then, I cried.
"It's okay," Cal said, holding me tight. "You're safe."
"Jack," I said.
"We got him. Eldin is taking him to the station."
Tyler, Willy, and the sheriff came running out of the woods toward us, my brother's face so full of worry and dread. Cal stripped his shirt off and put it over my head. My legs were so dead, he had to carry me to the road.
"Why pick a place so far away?" I asked him as he eased me into his truck.
"Your text shook me. It was the only place I could think of quickly."
"You found me, though." I cupped his face. "My hero."
"Face it. You were your own hero. But I'm willing to take the credit if the job comes with perks."
"Like dancing chickens."
"Exactly, like dancing chickens."
Epilogue
One month later...
"You can put those boxes back in the spare bedroom. And the rest of you grab furniture and start hauling it up." My whole family had come out to help me move. The twins were carrying a sofa up to the third-floor apartment I'd rented a few days earlier.
The trial for Jack Trevor and Ludlow Davis hadn't taken but a few weeks. Doctor Smith's autopsy confirmed that Luke had died from exsanguination due to a neck injury. Jack had tried to make it look like a lycan attack by turning into his coyote and mauling Luke to cover the actual wound. Which meant, there was enough evidence against them both to warrant the Tri-Council to send one of their executioners to Peculiar. When I asked about how Mary Ann could master her half-form so completely, Mom told me it took more practice than she ever wanted to do. A lifetime of training. I didn't watch the trials or the conclusions. I wondered how different things would have turned out if Mary Ann Dwyer had just turned herself in after she'd killed Luke. She'd taken both their lives that night, it just took a while longer for Jack to die.
Willy started a counseling group for Luke's victims. Two of the girls hadn't remembered anything about the night, but they had known something bad had happened to them. I just hoped his death gave them the smallest amount of satisfaction.
For me, I was finally moving out on my own. Well, sort of.
Cal put his arms around me. "It's a nice view," he said.
"The lake is beautiful."
He kissed my neck, a low growl in his voice. "I'm not talking about the lake."
I laughed as he slid his hands over my stomach.
"Are we going to tell them?"
"Tell them what?" I asked.
"That you're going to marry me."
"You haven't asked me, yet," I said.
"Woman, I put a baby up in you, how much more of a proposal do you need."
I snorted so loud that my family all turned to look at me. I was only weeks along and not showing. But with therianthrope and lycanthrope pregnancies, it would only take another three or four weeks before I looked like I'd swallowed a melon.
"Are you two going to stand around or are you going to help?" Tyler asked.
I ignored my brother and said to Cal. "When you're serious, mister, you will put a ring on it."
Music started playing in the parking lot. I tried to see where it was coming from. "Did someone leave their car stereo on?" Suddenly, Eldin Farraday stepped out into the open. And... he started dancing to "Having My Baby" by Paul Anka. Then Taylor, who was on the steps, started dancing, too. Soon, the parking lot and the stairwell were filling up with our friends, and everyone was dancing and singing. Then Cal let go of me as he belted out the final lyrics as he went down on one knee.
I felt such an intense surge of happiness swell inside me, I thought it might cripple me. He held out a box and flipped it open when the music stopped. Inside was a gold band set with an emerald cut diamond with two sapphires on either side.
"Dakota Augusta Thompson, you're the woman I love, and I want to marry you and have as many babies as you want."
"How about nine," I told him.
He grinned. "Let's make it an even dozen."
"Deal." I held out my hand.
"Is that a yes?"
"Yes, Callum David Rivers, I will marry you."
He put the ring on my finger and kissed me until my toes curled, then shouted, "She said, yes!" to the cheering crowd of our loved ones.
The End
Gone With The Minion - Chapter 1
Madder Than Hell Book 1
How do you save your family when they’re about to lose the literal farm? You make a deal wit
h a demon, of course. And then you spend the next one hundred and forty-nine years making him sorry he forced you to sign in blood on the dotted line.
To save her family, Southern Belle Olivia “Liv” Madder made a bargain with a demon lord and ever since, she’s been haunted…by her three dead sisters, and her own guilty conscience. Every decade, since the deal, Liv has had to find a human willing to bargain their soul with Moloch. If she fails, even once, he’ll not only drag her to Hell, but he’ll take her sisters, too. It doesn’t mean she can’t make Lord Jerkface miserable in the process by removing his lesser demons from the Earthly plane.
When her latest contracted soul dies before the bargain is sealed, she has less than four days to find another soul or her own agreement will be broken. But Moloch offers her a get-out-of-Hell-free card: steal an old book once owned by paranormal researcher David Jensen. The same David Jensen she fell in love with sixty years ago but left to protect him and his family. Then Moloch drops the biggest bombshell: David has died.
Heartbroken and feeling she has no choice, Liv makes the trip to Sanctum, Missouri only to find David’s grandson has the book. Worse, he’s keeping a mysterious family secret that threatens Moloch, Liv, and her three sisters. What’s a minion to do when her world falls apart? Get Madder than Hell and kick some demon butt.
Available at All Your Favorite eTailers
Chapter One
It took me two seconds to spot my mark and about half that time for him to spot me. He was on the move. Right out the opened French doors. I could see he was headed toward the garden. Why, oh, why did they always run? I shoved my way through the crowd of monkey suits and silk chiffons with as much grace as I could muster. Not an easy feat considering I was stuffed into the ill-fitting, scarlet-red, mermaid-cut, satin dress I’d…um, borrowed from the unconscious woman in the coat room. A frock more billowy and less mermaid-y would’ve been a better choice for running, but I’d picked this one because it matched my red stiletto pumps and my patent-leather clutch with its removable silver chain. The little purse hung off my shoulder and slapped against my thigh as I wiggled through the crowd.
I finally made it outside. Freshly blossomed lilacs burst out from the multitude of bushes like tufts of purple cotton candy and sweetened the humid air. I looked over my shoulder and saw that no one noticed, or more likely, cared that I was chasing the party’s host into the lavish garden.
The three-story mansion was overly ostentatious, even for Jefferson City, the capital of Missouri. The monstrosity, with its marble columns and wrought-iron balconies, reminded me of the plantation a few miles from my father’s modest farm in Georgia, where I’d been born and raised. In other words, the place stuck out like a bedazzled T-shirt at a Sunday morning church service. The owner of the mansion, Carmine Hennessy, was a lobbyist for some major companies in the northwest area of the state, and he was holding a fundraiser for his clients. Also, he wasn’t human—at least not completely—which made him an excellent fit for politics.
“Stop right there!” I screamed after the fiend. I watched him hightail it around the corner of the eight-foot-high hedge that surrounded the ornamental grounds. Good. The partygoers wouldn’t see me take ol’ Hennessey down. Bless the face-melting heat of the Missouri summer—no one inside would venture outside lest common sweat ruin their designer duds.
Unlike my attire, the lobbyist’s tailored tuxedo was perfect for hauling ass. The tight red evening dress hugged my knees and made it hard to do much but waddle like a penguin. I tottered around the shrubbery and took an awkward step forward. My heel dipped sideways, and the dewed grass kissed the side of my foot. Ack! My heels! My dearly departed sister Charlotte would be appalled at the treatment of my footwear.
I saw my target just a few feet away from another turn in the boxed hedge. I had scoped out the whole area the day before, so I knew the landscape. I also knew I couldn’t catch him before he entered the maze surrounding the marble inlay fountain with its ode to Hennessy himself. Yeah. There was a bronze statue of him holding an American flag in one hand and a champagne bottle in the other.
“I just want to talk,” I lied. “Don’t you want to make a deal?”
Offering to make a deal to a demon was the equivalent of showering a chocolate addict with truffles. He stopped about twenty feet from me and turned back, his head hitching to one side. “So,” he sniffed. “You’re the Madder. You don’t look like much.”
I smoothed my dress, and lifted my chin, and poured on my best Southern drawl. “That’s just a mean thing to say, sir. Especially to a lady.” My “a”s sounded like “uh”s, and I dropped the “r” in sir. I was pretty proud of the fact that I’d managed to master the non-regional American dialect over the years, but every once in a while, it was fun to pull out the Southern Belle.
The demon in the Hennessey suit snorted, the fear draining from his blue eyes. “Frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn.”
I loved when they underestimated me. But I hated when they quoted Gone With the Wind. I dropped the accent. “I’m not Scarlett, and you’re for damn sure not Rhett, so let’s cut the shit.”
He raised a brow. “You know, now that I see you, I don’t know what all the hoopla's about.” Curling his lip, he sized me up. “You’re kind of doughy.”
“That hurts.” Actually, it did. I don’t care how old you are, women are women everywhere, and none of us want to be thought of as doughy—he might as well have said thick, or hippy, or FAT. Sure, I had curves—some in the wrong places—and my size D breasts were threatening to spill over the top of the borrowed dress, but it didn’t give this impostor the right to judge. Especially this skinny, short, pale, and balding imposter about to get his face kicked in.
The “hoop-la” as he called it was the buzz in the underworld about a rogue minion going bat-shit all over demon ass. That rogue would be me, Olivia Madder. Of course, this wasn’t the first time I’d been called “the Madder.” I’ve been tracking demons for more than a hundred years and some change. And while I’m not always successful in sending them back to Hell, I had a seventy-seven percent completion rate. Charlotte would’ve called that bragging, but I called it awesome.
“Tell me about the deal,” said Hennessey. “It better be good.”
The deal was that I was going to fry him. Now that he had me good and pissed, it was time to teach this uncouth jerk what all the fuss was about. I bent my knee up until I could reach my shoe and nearly fell over as the dress caught on the stiletto. In my struggle to stay upright, the back of the dress ripped at the seam.
Hennessey snorted again. “Had I known that stripping was part of your routine, I might not have been so quick to run.”
“Right. You insulted my curves, but now you want to see them?” With the breeze literally at my backside, but infinitely more room to move, I toed off the other shoe so I could get good balance on the balls of my feet.
The demon, undoubtedly baffled, raised a brow. “I don’t turn down any opportunity to view the naked female form. Especially given the deficits of my current abode. So, please, do continue bursting out of your clothes.”
I flipped him the bird with my free hand, before using my other hand to fling my beautiful red stiletto at him. He seemed startled to be the target of a Frisbee-ing shoe—so you can imagine his surprise when the spiked heel pierced his left eye. I was surprised, too.
I was aiming for his forehead.
A heel between the eyes wouldn’t kill the demon, but it would paralyze him long enough for me to work the spell needed to drive him from this plane of existence.
He howled as he toppled onto the well-manicured bluegrass. After a moment, his howls quieted, and he sat up, slack-jawed, and stared at me with his remaining blue eye.
“You rotten bitch.” He pointed to the red shoe protruding from his face. “Do you have any idea how hard this body was to come by? And now you’ve gone and ruined the freaking eyeball.”
“If it’s any consolation, I didn’t mean to h
it you in the eye.”
“Apology not accepted.” He grabbed the heel and struggled to disengage it from his face. “I’m sending you the bill for the blood on my tuxedo.”
I leveled my gaze at the demon — oh, sure, he was in human skin, but you can wrap a pile of dog shit in silk, and it’s still dog shit, if you catch my meaning — grabbed my other shoe off the ground and tried to walk as menacingly toward my prey as the constricting dress would allow.
I shouldn’t have bothered. Hennessey didn’t even notice. In fact, he was too busy with shoe extraction to realize I was now standing right beside him.
“What in the name of Moloch is this fucking thing made of?” he yelled.
Iron dipped in holy water and blessed by a white witch, but I wasn’t going to tell him that. I held up the other shoe and clicked the steel tip of the heel. A fan of barbs flicked out in a golf ball sized circle. I hit the tip again, and they retracted. The stilettos were my favorite, albeit least comfortable, weapons in my arsenal.
I grabbed the embedded shoe and told the demon, “Hold still.”
He tilted his head to the right to give me better access. “Thanks.”
Idiot. It was my stylish footwear protruding from his head, and somehow, he thought I was going to help remove it.
“Try not to damage the rest of the face,” he ordered. “It’s going to be difficult enough to heal the eyeball.”