Raven Cursed

CHAPTER THIRTEEN Tag Team Sex? That’s the Best You Could Come Up With?

Rick sat across from me looking caught and guilty and happy, which was a weird combo of emotions even from a were-cat who couldn’t shift yet. We had moved to a corner table for privacy, and the sisters who were off duty had broken up, going about their own business, including Mol.

“Talk,” I said, sounding a lot less mean than I intended. Maybe because he was just so pretty. Black hair fell over his forehead and ducked into his collar, waves catching the overhead lights. His eyes, Frenchy-black in New Orleans, looked Cherokee black here. And his cheeks were glowing with that “please touch me” look men had when freshly shaved. I curled my fingers under to keep them beneath the table and tried to look stern.

The two witch sisters brought Rick’s breakfast when it took only one, and I didn’t have to grow up with them to know they wanted to get close enough to touch, as well as hoping to overhear something juicy. Rick turned his hundred-watt smile up at them, the one he uses when he’s trying to woo his way into a girl’s pants. They both melted under the look, and I kicked him under the table. He laughed, slanting a teasing look at me. The girls giggled and departed with dual requests. “You need anything, you just holler.” And, “Any. Thing. At all.”

I shook my head. He grinned, sipped his coffee, took up knife and fork, and ate four bites before he complied with my request. Order. Whatever. And the pauses, gestures, and small torments were so familiar that they brought an ache to my throat.

“I miss you,” Rick said. My heart did a rollover-skip that I kept off my face with difficulty. “I miss human female company.” Of course he did. So much for the heart gymnastics. “I miss any company that’s sober, not grieving, and not vanishing some nights to hunt, coming back to the tent site smelling of blood. A scent that makes my stomach rumble. But mostly, I miss you.”

My heart went back to happy Pilates. “And?”

He sipped and ate some more, keeping me waiting. After he swallowed he sat back and gestured with his knife. “And I’ve had some very interesting phone calls in the last twenty-four hours, all of which I can respond to by spending time with you and the witches.”

“What calls? Who?”

“First, no one had my new cell number. Except you.”

I went still. “Crap.” Leo gave me the new cell a few weeks ago. I knew he could track me with the cell’s GPS. I hadn’t thought about him being able to read my cell phone history. That was a rookie mistake. “Leo,” I said. I explained about the cell and Rick nodded. “I’ll get a new throwaway phone,” I promised.

“Yeah. Let me know the number. But that doesn’t explain how everyone else got my number. That has to be my host.” The way he said host was like smearing the syllable into a toilet. Rick and Kemnebi were a strange pairing, no matter how I looked at it, and the fact that it had been my idea didn’t help. “It started yesterday. Jodi—who did not have this number—called to check on me, and told me this guy would be contacting me. No name. Just ‘this guy.’ Which sounded like The Man.”

“You’re The Man,” I said, putting it into caps as he had done. Jodi was his up-line boss at the New Orleans Police Department. If she told him to do something, like watch me, or sleep with a witch, he would. He always had in the past.

“Not anymore,” he said. I started before I realized he was responding to The Man comment, not my thoughts. “Even if I don’t shift at the full moon, I’ll never be human again. I’ll be a supe in hiding. Like you. Law enforcement work is going to be nearly impossible.” He stuffed a forkful of egg into his mouth and I went still, thinking back over his words, listening for anger or grief. I picked up only resigned acceptance and a kind of wry self-condemnation. But then, cats don’t grieve like humans or dogs do. It’s different with cats. Beast called it blood-grief, or hunt-grief, and it was violence incarnate. Or they get drunk for a month, like Kem. I nodded for him to continue and picked up my tea, sipping, keeping the cup in front of my mouth, my fingers wrapped around it for warmth. Rick went on, “Today, I get this call from a Mr. Smith Jones, who offered me a permanent job, of sorts, with an agency yet to be named.”

I sat back, thinking. It wasn’t NOPD—totally out of their jurisdiction. That left FBI and The Psychometry Law Enforcement Division of Homeland Security. The agency had fingers in every paranormal pie in the country except for the witches, most of whom grew up together, related by blood and heritage. Witches were a hard nut to crack even for PsyLed.

“I accused him of being PsyLed,” Rick said, letting me know that we were thinking alike. “When he said no, I could hear the lie. Seems I have cat ears now, to go along with the improved sense of smell and vision.” Rick sipped his coffee and bit into a homemade biscuit.

“Even if I don’t shift at the next full moon my life is going to suck three days a month for the rest of my unnatural life. It won’t be like I can hide it. No agency or department would have me except undercover with African black were-cats, none of which will exist in the U.S. when Kem sobers up enough to go home. Even if there were were-cats here, I’d have a hard time infiltrating. Their sense of smell is too acute. They’d pick up on any hidden agenda and tear me apart. So my life as a cop is gone unless I admit I’ve got the were-taint and join PsyLed as an outted supe. Half supe. Like that.” Rick shrugged, eyes on the coffee in his cup. “Anyway, that’s a decision for another day. Smith Jones had a job for me. He asked me to make contact with you, see if you could get me close to the vamps. He wants me to join your security team.”

My heart went cold as a stone. Deep inside, Beast chuffed with laughter, which made no sense, as anger shot through me like frozen lightning. “You son of a bitch,” I murmured, without inflection, setting down my cup. “You want to use me to get close to Leo.”

Rick laughed and a tension I hadn’t consciously recognized left his limbs. He sat back in the booth and met my eyes. “I told him no.” My mouth opened and closed with a snap. “I’ll always want to be a cop,” he said, “but my life is different. Forever. So, no cozying up to friends and lovers to find out info. Except for one thing that might be important.”

“And that is?”

“Why did Evangelina leave talks that were progressing so well between the vamps and witches and come back to Asheville? The vamp and witch parley has stalled. Jodi told me no new meetings have taken place since she left. Why did Leo finally agree to an MOC parley? Two questions that ended up here, together.” Rick leaned back to his plate and ate several more bites. One of the girls refilled our cups, lingering, as if for an opening in the intense silence to chat with pretty boy Ricky Bo. When she wandered away, her disappointment was an odor on the air. Softly, Rick said, “A small group of New Orleans vampires kidnapped and killed witch children for decades. Centuries. And Evangelina Everhart walks out on restitution talks? Not in a manufactured huff she could use to get concessions from vamps who want to settle. But just wanders away.” His fingers walked through the air as if floating.

PsyLed was worried about the same things I was, which was just weird. Of course, I knew about Amy Lynn Brown’s miraculous recovery, and they didn’t. But weirder was Evil Evie’s display of spell casting, which Rick didn’t know about. She had an agenda. I sipped. Rick ate. I offered my thoughts as far as I could. “She knew about the parley for MOC status.” Rick nodded as if that was obvious. And it was. There were only just so many people she might be here for. I was pretty sure she hadn’t followed the twins or Derek and the security types. That left Rick and Kemnebi, but she wasn’t hanging around the Tennessee side of the mountains. And so that left Grégoire and me, here in Asheville, though as far as I could tell, she had gotten here before either of us. “Do you, or Jodi, or PsyLed have any idea why Leo chose Grégoire, specifically, to handle this parley, over his own heir?”

“Initially, Leo was supposed to come himself.” When I raised my brows, Rick shrugged. “It’s scuttlebutt. Leo trusts Grégoire. They were lovers in France before they emigrated here. Maybe for a century.” He laughed at my expression. “Leo swings all ways—human, vampire, bi. I just heard about it. That info just got added to the woo-woo files yesterday when a photocopy of Magnolia Sweets’ diary was delivered to NOPD, no fingerprints, no return address, so it could be fake, but it makes sense.”

I wanted to bang my head on the table. Magnolia Sweets had been Leo’s primo once upon a time, his prime blood-servant, before she was bitten by a werewolf and went all furry. Maggie Sweets was the bitch who had tortured Rick, and she was dead now. Her death could be laid partly at my door. Her death was also the reason the two lone wolves were chasing me and trying to rebuild a pack by biting humans and witches. It made sense, except for the part about who had found and sent the diary. That was a puzzle.

As to the Leo-and-Grégoire-lover part, Grégoire had supported Leo when the master of the city’s back was against the wall, when he was being challenged by the vamp who was now the MOC’s heir, and had stuck around when Leo was in the dolore—the whacked-out grief suffered by vamps when people they love die. And Evil Evie, who was not acting like herself, had left restitution talks and come home to Asheville. For Grégoire? For me? Or Leo? Had she heard he was considering coming here himself? I blew out a breath. Okay. She found out about the parley and could further some sneaky, evil end better if she was here, drawing on her coven. “And Jodi doesn’t know why Leo agreed to Lincoln’s parley, after denying his petition for so long?”

Rick scraped his plate and sopped up the greasy egg remains with a hunk of biscuit. “Nope.” But he didn’t meet my eyes and I was guessing that he had ideas even if no facts.

I said, “To answer your question, I don’t know why Evangelina left New Orleans.” I didn’t tell him about the spell or the vamp bites or the werewolf scent she carried. I couldn’t. Rick was being courted by PsyLed. If he took the job, he’d be my enemy. The Everharts’ enemy. And now that I knew he could smell truth and lies, I couldn’t tell him a bald-faced one, maybe not even fudged-truth-lies. Things to think about. I fished in my pocket for my keys.

“Don’t you want to know about the other calls?”

I stopped, pulled my hand free from the denim. Rick smiled slightly, his eyes crinkling at the corners. I’d kissed him there several times, his eyelashes tickling my lips. Pain moved through me like snakes of fire.

“George Dumas called.” When I didn’t say anything, Rick said, “He wants to know if we’re seeing each other. He wants to ‘court’ you.” Rick waited as if expecting me to say something. But I had no idea if we were seeing each other or not. I had no idea if Bruiser was serious about wanting to “court” me, or was looking for a way to keep an eye on me, or had been told by Leo to sleep with me for some nefarious Leo-reason. My life was way too complicated.

I stood and pulled out my keys. “Thanks for the warning.”

Faster than a human could ever move, Rick’s hand slashed out and grabbed my wrist. His grip was crushing, were-strong. “Don’t you want to know what I told him?”

I looked back and forth between his eyes, seeing nothing there that I could read. The reek of big-cat heated the air, the smell of jungle, and murky water, and musky male. “Not really.” I jerked my hand to the side, away from his palm, against the weaker pressure of his fingers. Broke his hold. I dropped thirty bucks on the café’s counter and walked outside. As I got into my SUV, I tossed Evangelina’s scarf and hair into the passenger seat. The first patters of rain made little splats against the windshield as I took the wheel, feeling the leather give under my grip.

Molly might be in danger. Might. Maybe. I had no idea how witch magic worked, except that interrupting a spell or a working was dangerous to both spell caster and spelled. I had no idea what to do and I wasn’t used to feeling helpless. I needed to research spells and stopping them. I needed to go after Evangelina and knock some sense into her. I needed to be doing something. Instead I started the vehicle and backed away from the café, useless.

I spent the next few hours in my room, researching spells and how to interrupt them. There was precious little on the Internet about the subject and most of it was contradictory. When I ran out of info, I talked on Leo’s fancy cell with the paddler, Dave Crawford, who had organized the creekers—adrenaline-junky-kayakers who took the most dangerous, steep whitewater runs—to look for grindy markings, and aligning the newest sightings on a map. I was pretty sure where, within twenty-five linear square miles, the grindy was holing up. When I took into consideration the folded terrain inside that twenty-five square miles it was more like a hundred square miles. It was a huge amount of area to search.

Frustrated, I pulled on tight exercise clothes, black spandex, and went looking for a sparring partner. Wrassler, standing guard in the hallway in front of Grégoire’s room, told me how to find the hotel’s fitness area, his smirk ringing bells in my mind. I jogged downstairs, and took it in fast: the small room and blood-servants. The B-twins had cleared space, machines pushed to the side. Some tinkly Oriental or New Age music played over the speakers. The twins were dressed in black cotton martial arts uniforms—traditional karate Gi tops with kicker pants, and were still warming up. The clothes told me a lot about the martial forms they practiced. We had the place to ourselves. Wrassler had known they were here, of course.

The door closed behind me with a soft whoosh. The twins paused in their stretches and I grinned at them, letting Beast rise in my eyes. They stepped apart slowly, facing an opponent. My heart started to pound, a fierce, hard rhythm. “How quickly does vamp blood heal you boys?” Brian laughed and shook out his hands, setting his feet, carefully balanced. Brandon bent his knees, finding his own perfect readiness position, one hand fisted in a defensive posture. With the other, he made a little “come and get it” motion. I leaped.

It wasn’t play. It wasn’t practice. It wasn’t sparring. It was the closest thing to real combat I’d had, outside of fighting for my life, in years. I proved to myself that longtime blood-servants were faster than humans, stronger than humans, and sneaky as cats. They didn’t play by TV rules, attacking one at a time. They played by fire ant rules—swarm and destroy. Punches, open handed and fisted, kicks, sweeps, blocks that disguised punches, kicks that hid more kicks, attacking from both sides and from front and back, holds better suited to judo or the wrestling mat, and moves that were strictly illegal in the fighting ring came at me. I loved it.

For nearly half an hour, they attacked, the beating we were giving and receiving growing in speed, force, and complexity, until we moved in a blur. The scent of vamp blood, their blood, human sweat, testosterone, and big-cat musk-and-blood filled the space; faint lust pheromones added to the wonderful stench. We overwhelmed the air-conditioning, our body heat condensing on the door and windows. When I cheated, using momentum and the Gi tops, throwing one brother into the other, both men lost the tops, fighting bare chested. Which made Beast pant with delight. I took two hard punches, one to the face, before I got her back into the brawl.

We fought hard, pulling no punches, and I gave as good as I took. It was painful, swift, and exactly what I needed, bruises, strains, sprains, blood on the mats, and all. When we were exhausted, sweating, and breathless, I heard a sound that pulled me out of the fight. The door to the fitness room closed with its soft whoosh.

I bounded out of Brandon’s fist-punch-range and into Brian’s space. Brian’s arm went around my waist, pulling me against his sweaty chest and abdomen, steadying us both, stopping the bout. Brandon whirled toward the door. We went still. Two of my security boys were inside the room, sitting on equipment, as if they had been there a while, dressed in workout clothes but looking lazy. Derek was standing in front of the door, his heels twelve inches apart, legs braced, hands clasped behind his back as if at Marine parade rest. He was dressed in baggy workout clothes. But his eyes were hard and predatory. Derek Lee was seriously ticked off.

I started to say something. Started to try to explain why I was faster than a blood-servant. As strong as one. Make that two. But Brian’s arm tightened on me in warning. I clamped my mouth shut. Brandon turned to me and said, “Nice bout, Yellowrock. Rematch. Soon. And we take the gloves off for that one.”

“Yeah. No more Mr. Nice Guy. No more holding back to protect the little lady.” Brian pushed me away from him as if I burned his skin and picked up a towel. He tossed one at his brother and they moved toward the door. I fell in behind them.

Okay, I got it. Act as if nothing had happened. Riiiiight. “You boys weren’t holding back,” I said. “You gave it all you had and I busted your butts. But if you’re gluttons for punishment . . .” The twins pushed past Derek and out into the hallway. Derek didn’t try to stop them. He didn’t reach out and grab my arm, to hold me back, but I could feel his eyes smoldering holes in my spine. He murmured, “You’re as bad as the suckheads. Maybe worse. At least they don’t pretend to be human.”

I blinked but didn’t give away that I had heard, though a heated shock flushed through me. I was in the hallway, the door wide open behind me, still talking. “. . . I’ll be happy to provide the fists and feet to teach you to respect the weaker sex.”

“If it’s sex you want”—Brandon said, wrapping his arm around me and pulling me along as Brian punched the elevator button—“we can oblige on that score too.”

“Ever heard of tag-team wrestling?” Brian asked. “We can make you scream for more until you’re begging us to stop.”

And we were in the elevator, the doors closing on us. I fell against the elevator wall as the unit moved, my eyes closed. “Crap,” I said.

The brothers chuckled, twin sounds of amusement. An unwilling grin pulled at my mouth. “Tag-team sex? That’s the best you could come up with?”

The door dinged open and we stepped into the hallway. “Admit it, Legs. You have mental images right now. We know. Your heart rate sped up. Blood-servants can tell.”

I walked between and past them, feeling their eyes on me in all my sweaty glory. But I was not going to reply. Not. Going to.

“All you can think about is how big the bed is in the master room of the suite.”

“And how big we are.”

I couldn’t help my grin but I wasn’t about to let them see it. “I can be titillated without being tempted. Thanks but no thanks.”

We entered our suite and moved through the common space; I went into my room and shut and locked the door, hearing them laugh in that securely masculine way that makes a girl’s heart race and mental images dance around in her head. I leaned against the door at my back and remembered to breathe. I would not be tempted. I would not. Beast, however, had other ideas and a good imagination. Even better visual skills about things she wanted. I made it to the shower and turned it to scalding, stepping under the spray fully clothed. Just as quickly, I switched it to cold and leaned into the tile. Cold water sluiced down me. Very cold.

Dang blood-servants.

I got a much needed nap, followed by a half hour on the Internet again with a more refined search on breaking a coven leader’s spell without killing everyone involved—which couldn’t be done from the outside, apparently—and was dressed and ready for work as parley security chief, early. Tonight I was wearing tights, knives, and a split-skirt dress that went to my ankles, sterling silver stakes in my bun as hair sticks. A new Walther, delivered courtesy of Leo, rested at my back. Lipstick my only makeup. My eyes looked feverish, my cheeks bright with blood flush.

Hungry, ignoring the twins, I checked my com equipment as I stalked through the suite and down to the Black Bear Grill, where I ordered fried green tomatoes, orange glazed duckling, and the cowboy bone-in rib eye, with grilled asparagus and stag fries with truffle oil and cheese. And a bottle of wine. I didn’t once look at the prices, knowing that I could feed a family of four in Bangladesh or sub-Saharan Africa for a year on what I was letting Leo pay for one meal. I was a hedonist. I was evil. I needed to get down on my knees and beg forgiveness for everything. Instead I downed a glass of wine on an empty stomach and let the alcohol flood my system, knowing the sensation would last only minutes, but wanting the buzz, however fleeting. I tore off a hunk of bread and ate it with my second glass of wine. I felt, more than saw, the twins enter.

They flowed through the room, around tables and chairs and the other patrons, and they sat at my table. Silent, they helped themselves to my wine, looking at the bottle with disdain. They ate my fried green tomatoes when the order came. They ordered meals and salads and more appetizers. Brandon chose another wine from the list. In French. With a perfect French accent, of course. When the waiter left, I rested my arms along the chair rests and stared at them.

“We’re sorry,” Brandon said. Which was not at all what I expected them to say.

“We can’t do a job if we’re all in the sack together.”

“We can’t think straight if we’re thinking about you.”

“We can’t protect Grégoire if we’re thinking about protecting you too.”

“We might try to keep you alive instead of him.”

“If push came to shove.”

“We apologize.”

“We hope you’ll accept our apologies and lack of professionalism.”

It was sorta like watching tag-team wrestling. “Fine. You’re forgiven.”

“Good. Now let’s eat. We have a long night ahead of us.”

We ate. We chatted. And when the meal was done, we stopped in the hotel lobby to meet Gertruda, the Mercy Blade of the MOC of the Raleigh-Durham area. She had been in town all day, moving between patients in the hospital, using the healing magic and skill of her race, and this was my first opportunity to meet her. She swept through the doors, imperious. And totally unexpected. She was a plain woman, steel gray hair pulled back in a bun, wearing a denim dress with a frilly shirt underneath. She was homey, a little stout, grandmotherly. She was as unlike the other Mercy Blade I had met as it was possible to be, and she wanted nothing to do with me.

She glanced over us all, greeted the B-twins by name and ignored me totally. Lifting her nose at my proffered hand, she pulled her skirts aside and went to the elevator. “Well, that was lovely,” I said, my face burning.

The twins laughed. “Gertruda thinks women should be properly covered, with long skirts and no adornment. And no guns. It isn’t ladylike. Don’t worry about her.”

“We like you just the way you are.”

“She thinks I’m trashy,” I clarified. The twins shrugged, still amused.

We made our way back to Grégoire’s suite. The meeting was to take place there tonight, and Derek was already set up and waiting in the central seating area when we entered. He looked at me once, his expression telling me that we had things to discuss, but I knew it would be later, not when the package—his word for Grégoire—was at risk. The current phase of an ongoing job came first, before anything more personal. Derek was a pro.

Grégoire’s suite made the B-Twins’ suite look like a dollhouse, twice as big and three times as sumptuous. We checked the placement of eyes and muscle: one across the street watching the small crowd of protestors and the front door; two in the lobby where they could see the door, elevators, stairs, restaurant, and front desk; Wrassler was in the hall outside the suite. At ten to midnight, Grégoire left his bedroom and came into the common room. He looked relaxed, languid, and so beautiful he would melt the heart of a demon. No wonder Leo and he had gotten friendly. Grégoire was dressed down tonight, in pants and vest the color of port wine and a white silk shirt. He sat on the couch and crossed his legs. Okay, I got it. The formal parts of the parley were over. Now they were into the brass-tacks part.

The twins took position at the window and door where they wouldn’t hit each other with crossfire, but unless they were good shots, they might hit Wrassler through the door. I tapped my mike and told him to reposition.

Minutes passed. At twelve thirty, Lincoln Shaddock was half an hour late, a pretty dang big insult to Leo’s representative unless there was a bigger problem than I knew. I caught Derek’s eye and gave a minuscule head jerk, excused myself and stepped into the hallway, Derek on my heels. Into the mike I asked, “Who’s on tracking and traffic update?”

“That’d be me,” a voice answered. It was Angel Tit, a nickname based on a Vodka Angel’s Delight. Until recently, I hadn’t been trusted enough to be given the guys’ real names, but security on this gig required deep background checks, so I knew them all now. But the monikers we’d used in the past had stuck with us. “No problems, Legs. Traffic is clear. The rain has made some creeks rise, but not enough to be a danger.”

Rain? Right. It had been raining this morning when I left the Sassy Sisters. The hurricane had arrived in all its wet glory, another indication that New Orleans and its problems had found me again. I pulled my phone and punched through contacts for Adelaide’s number; I had input it during computer homework. When she answered, I said, “Where’s your boss?”

“With yours, I would hope.”

“He’s a no-show.” A shocked silence settled between us, sharp and electric.

“I’ll make some calls.” She clicked off.

I looked at Derek and Wrassler. “Any chance the wolves attacked him en route?”

“Anything’s possible,” Wrassler said. “But that one’s not likely to have caused Shaddock anything but a mild discomfort. Not a half hour.” Before I could continue a list of possible attackers, he said, “The protestors are all accounted for.” At my questioning look he said, “We got trackers on the vehicles and they’re all at home, out front, or at work, according to Angel.”

I nodded. Ten long minutes later, my phone vibrated and I answered Adelaide. “Tell me something good.”

“I can’t do that, I’m afraid,” she said, her words stiff. Embarrassed. She told me where Shaddock was, what he was doing, and added, “Shall I meet you there?”

I pulled the phone away from my ear and stared at the screen, eyes unfocused, thinking. And then it all started to come together. “Crap,” I whispered. When I put the cell back to my head, I said, “Twenty minutes,” and hung up.

I looked down at my dress and then at my men. “Call for two vehicles to be waiting around front in five minutes. Derek you’re with me. Wrassler, pick a guy and follow.” I stuck my head back inside Grégoire’s room. “The parley talks are off for tonight.” Grégoire’s eyebrows went up slightly. Before anyone could ask, I said, “I’m not quite sure why, but I have an idea. It’s possible that Shaddock was attacked. I’ll call back when I know more. I suggest you stay within the confines of the hotel until you hear from me.”

Without waiting for a reply, I backed out and closed the door. “I’ve gotta change. You guys need to be in jeans and well armed.”

“Vests?” Derek asked, meaning flak jackets. Combat clothes.

“No. But weapon up. We’re going to Shaddock’s barbeque joint for dinner and dancing.”