A Fistful of Charms (44 page)

My breath came in a heave, and I held it. My knees were locked to keep me upright. Ivy couldn't do a thing, and I could hear her frustration in her breathing as she forced herself to not interfere. She couldn't best DeLavine. Not without leaning on Piscary's strength, and she was out of his influence. DeLavine knew it. That we had invited him here to help Peter meant little.

“Bitten and unbound,” the undead vampire said, and a shudder rippled through me. “Free for the taking. I sense two demon marks on you. I feel two bites, but only one reached your soul, and so carefully—so careful she was, a kiss so soft, but a whisper. And someone…someone has put their mark in your very…cells. Claimed by many, belonging to none. Who would look to me to get you back?”

“No one,” I rasped, and his eyes fixed on mine, stilling my next word. I stood upright under his control and would have fallen if his will wasn't propping me up.

“Please,” Ivy whispered, standing beside Jenks slumped on the floor. “I beg favor.”

With a light interest, DeLavine touched the unscared side of my neck. “What?” he said.

“Leave her as mine.” Ivy's pale face made her eyes look even blacker. “I ask this as a thank-you for helping Peter.” She licked her lips and held her arms down. “Please.”

DeLavine lifted his eyes from me, and I blinked, finding a thread of will returned to me. “This,” the vampire said, lifting my chin with a finger, “should belong to a master, not you. Piscary has indulged you beyond reason. You're a spoiled
child, Ivy, and you should be punished for stepping out of your master's influence. Taking her as mine will bother Kalamack and put me in good with Piscary.”

Ivy's eyes flicked to me and away. I could almost feel her thoughts realign themselves, and my pulse hammered when her posture melted from tense to seductive.

God save us
. She was going to give him what he wanted so he would leave me alone. I couldn't let her do this. I couldn't let her turn herself into filth for me. But as tingles raced through me to set my mind confused, I could only watch.

“Such a sweet sip,” DeLavine said, his back to Ivy. A new glint was in his eyes, making me unsure if he was talking about Ivy or me. “A wolf in sheep's clothing, stinking of Brimstone, but still very weak,” he said. “I might kill you by mistake, witch. But you'd enjoy it.” He inhaled, taking my volition. Exhaling, his breath under my ear sent a jolt of desire right to my core. “Do you want this?” he breathed.

“No,” I whispered. It was easy. Ivy had given me the fear to find the strength to say it.

But DeLavine was delighted. “No!” he exclaimed, his pupils wide and dilated, his lust-reddened lips curling upward. “Curiouser and curiouser.” His fingers traced the line along my shoulder that I knew he wanted to send his nails, digging to cause pain and a delicious path of blood to my neck that his mouth could follow.

Eyes on mine, he smiled to show his long canines. The thought of them sinking into me pulled a shiver from the depths of my soul. I knew how it would feel, and the fear of my blood being raped from me mixed with the memory of how good it could be. I closed my eyes, starting to hyperventilate, fighting him, losing to him. DeLavine eased closer, almost touching. I could sense his need to crush my will rise higher. He didn't care about Peter. Not anymore. I was too damn interesting.

“So strong a will,” he said. “I could flake your consciousness from your soul like stone.”

He moved, and behind him I saw Ivy gather her resolve.
No,
I pleaded silently, but her fear for me was stronger than her fear for herself. Guilt, shame, and relief kept me silent when, shifting forward with a sigh to tell him where she was, she touched DeLavine's shoulder.

I watched in horror and fascination as Ivy's long leg slipped between his from behind. She curved a sinuous arm around his chest so that her fingertips played with the base of his neck. Tilting her head, she sent her lips to mouth his ear. And while DeLavine looked at me with Ivy bringing his hunger fully awake, she whispered, “Please?”

My blood pounded as she put her teeth on his ear and tugged. “I'm fond of her….” she added. “I want to keep her the way she is.”

DeLavine took his eyes from me, and I felt the tears start, even as the vampire pheromones and watching them play whipped my libido high.
This was so wrong
.

Ivy flowed around him to get between us. Standing with her legs wide, she ran her hands over him between his suit coat and shirt. She threw her head back, and a laugh of delight came from her, shocking me. “I can feel your scars!” she giggled, turning it into a soft, desire-filled sound of deviltry at the end. She was Ivy, but she wasn't. Playful, sensual, and domineering, this was a side of her she hadn't wanted to show me. This was Ivy doing what she did best.

Both captivated and repulsed, I couldn't look away as she bent her lips to his neck and his eyes closed. He exhaled, his hands trembling as he grasped her wrists and held them down.

“Tonight?” Ivy whispered, loud enough for me to hear. And DeLavine opened his eyes, smiling wickedly as he met my gaze.

“Bring her.”

“Alone,” she countered, pulling her hands from his grip to explore his inner thigh. “What I want to do would kill her.” She laughed, ending with an eager moan. The playful sound of desire turned my stomach. This was probably what she had been in those years she wouldn't talk about, and she was returning to it to keep me safe.

God, how did I get to this place where my friends sell themselves to keep me alive?

Ivy shifted, doing something I couldn't see to make DeLavine's eyes widen. Peter hissed, and I wasn't surprised to find a jealous, sullen expression on his face. The woman behind him was running her fingers over him in distraction, but it didn't appear to be helping.

“Innocence can be exhilarating,” Ivy murmured. “But experience? There's a reason Piscary indulges me,” she said, the syllables as certain and warm as summer rain to make my pulse quicken. “Would you like to know…why? Not many do.”

DeLavine smiled. “Piscary will not be pleased.”

“Piscary is in prison,” she said, pouting. “And I'm lonely.”

The pheromones they were kicking out had tingles of passion pulsing through me. I was either going to climax where I stood or vomit. Ivy had left Skimmer and followed me here to escape her past, and now she was returning to it to save my life. I was going to unwittingly kill her. I made her bite me, and now she was whoring herself to keep me safe. She thought I was going to save her, but I was going to kill her.

All but forgotten, Peter stirred. “Please, DeLavine,” he said sullenly, and I despaired at the filth I was wallowing in, the system that Ivy had worked within her entire life. “She knows the spells,” Peter continued. “I hurt so badly.”

DeLavine let go of my will. My pulse beat wildly, and with his support ripped away, my muscles gave a massive spasm and went limp. Barely conscious, I crumpled.

“For you, Peter,” I heard from above me as I worked my arms under me so I could push my face off the floor. Dizzy, I wedged myself into a seated position. The undead vampire was ignoring me, his gaze tracking the perimeter of the room. Ivy had unwrapped herself from him and was standing at the curtained window, her head bowed as she tried to bring herself down. Guilt hit me, and I took a breath that was almost a cry.

“There are a few things I want from this,” DeLavine was
saying, having apparently forgotten me lying on the floor. “Peter wants his last sight to be of the setting sun.”

“That can be accommodated,” Ivy said softly. Her voice was still husky, and I ignored the memory of hearing it whisper in my ear. Head down, I crawled to Jenks, checking his pulse and pulling back his eyelids to see if his eyes dilated. He was okay, and I slumped against the front of the couch, content to stay on the floor. Ivy wouldn't look at me, and quite frankly, I didn't want her to. How could…How could I ever repay her for this?

“Accommodated?” DeLavine scooped up Rex and looked into her green eyes. The cat looked away first. “There is no accommodate. Do it.”

“Yes, DeLavine.” Ivy turned, and I stifled a shudder at the thinnest brown rim to her eyes. They were almost fully dilated, and just standing there breathing, she looked like she wanted to pin someone to the floor and have at it.

Peter looked ticked that Ivy was taking something from his mentor that he wanted, and Peter's future scion was frightened as she saw her future, turned into nothing more than a source of blood and memory. When Peter died, she would have a shell of the man she fell in love with. She knew it, but she wanted it all the same.

“I'm concerned about possible damage to his facial structure,” DeLavine said, gently setting Rex down and going to Peter. Not a hint of his blood lust showed, but I could feel it, shimmering under his voice. “Auto crashes can be extremely disfiguring, and Peter has suffered so many indignities already.”

From the floor, I watched DeLavine run a finger down Peter's jawline, the touch both possessive and distant. It was nauseating. Peter's temper eased, his manner softening.

“Yes, DeLavine,” Ivy said. “The charms will minimize that.”

Oh, yeah. That's why they had come to the motel
. “I, uh—” I jerked when everyone's eyes fell on me. “I need a
swab of Peter's mouth so I can sensitize the disguise charm to him.”

Ivy's hunger was chilling. Recognizing my fear, she pushed herself into motion, going into the kitchen and my spelling supplies strewn all over creation. Nick backpedaled out of her way. Head down, she shuffled about, striding back to Peter with a cellophane-wrapped cotton swab. I would have at least watched to be sure Peter gave a gloppy enough sample, but DeLavine was moving again.

I pulled myself into a ball as he headed for me. Fingers grasping, I fumbled for Ivy's sword, pulling it awkwardly out from where Jenks had let it fall.
This was wrong, so wrong
.

DeLavine gave me a raised eyebrow glance, then dismissed me as he picked up the artifact, sitting alone and vulnerable on the bedside table. He had looked at me, but it had been different. He had seen me, calculated the risk, and dismissed me, but this time he'd looked at me as a possible threat and not just a walking sack of blood. I wondered what had changed.

“This is it?” he murmured, casually moving out of the sword's easy reach.

My fingers tightened on the hilt, but I didn't think it was the blade that had him watching me while seeming not to.

Ivy came closer, the open cellophane-wrapped swab in her grip. She seemed to have regained control, only a remnant of her runaway hunger perceptible in her subtlest movements. “It will be destroyed with Peter,” she said, but DeLavine wasn't listening, focused entirely on the ugly statue perched on the tips of his fingers.

“Such a wonder,” he mused aloud. “So many lives ended forever because of it. It should have been destroyed when it was unearthed, but someone got greedy—and now they're dead. I am…wiser than that. If I can't have it, no one will.” DeLavine took the thumb of his free hand and pierced the tip of his index finger. “Peter?”

“Yes, DeLavine?”

I held my breath as a drop of blood welled. With a careful attention, the undead vampire smeared it onto the statue. A shudder passed over me as it soaked in to leave a dark stain.

“Make sure,” DeLavine said softly, “that this gets destroyed.” He looked at me and smiled to show his long canines.

“Yes, DeLavine.”

With a confident satisfaction, DeLavine set the marked statue down. My lips curled as it seemed to me that the pain etched in the figure's face was deeper. Turning with an exaggerated slowness, the undead vampire sent his gaze across the room, landing on Nick scrunched in the corner of the kitchen. “This is repulsive,” he said, and suddenly the room was. “A dirty little hole stinking of emotion. We'll stay somewhere else. Peter, we are leaving. Audrey will make the arrangements to get you where you need to be come sunset.”

Audrey,
I thought, glancing at the woman. So she had a name. I shifted my feet so he wouldn't step on them, and he made his casual way to the door, snagging his coat on the way. Peter slowly rose, Audrey helping him with a professional grip that wouldn't hurt her back. The ailing vampire met my eyes, clearly wanting to talk to me, but DeLavine took his other arm in a show of concern born from memory, not love, and escorted him to the door.

Ivy opened it for them, and DeLavine hesitated while Peter and Audrey continued out.

My grip tightened on the hilt, but I could do nothing when the vampire bent to whisper in Ivy's ear, his hand curving about her waist possessively. My pulse pounded as she looked at the floor. Damn it, this wasn't right. She nodded, and I felt as if I had sold her to him.

The door shut behind him, and her shoulders slumped.

“I
vy—”

“Shut up.”

I dropped the sword and pulled my knees to my chin to make room when she knelt beside Jenks. With her vampire strength, she yanked him upright to lean against the couch, giving him a shake. “Jenks!” she demanded. “Open your eyes. I didn't hit you that hard.”

He didn't respond, his head lolling and blond hair falling about his angular features.

“Ivy, I'm sorry,” I said, my pulse quickening in guilt. “You…Oh God, tell him you changed your mind. We'll figure something out.”

Close beside me, Ivy gave me an unreadable look, her hands on Jenks's shoulders, her oval face empty of emotion. “I wouldn't have offered if I wasn't prepared to follow through.”

“Ivy—”

“Shut up!” she shouted, startling me. “I want to do it, okay? I can't touch
anything
without killing it, so I'm going to go back to things that are
already dead!
I'm doing this for me, not you! I'm going to enjoy myself, so just
shut the hell up, Rachel!”

Face hot, my mouth fell open. It had never occurred to me she might want to. “I…I thought you only shared blood with people you—”

“Yeah, I tried that, didn't I. It didn't work. If I can't have you, I may as well go back to the way I was. Shut. Up.”

I shut up. I didn't know what to think. Was she saying that to make me feel less guilty, or was she serious? She had damn well looked like she knew what she was doing, wrapped around DeLavine like that. I couldn't believe she really meant it. Not after her confession only an hour old. Apparently we were both going places we didn't want to—me forward and her back. “Ivy?” I said, but she wouldn't look at me.

“Jenks,” she said, spots of color showing on her cheeks. “Wake up.”

His breathing quickened, and it was no surprise when his smooth features scrunched in hurt. Eyes still closed, he reached for his head. Nick had come out of the kitchen, standing to look like a fifth wheel beside the TV, arms crossed over his faded T-shirt. Rex was having a field day, purring and rubbing on everyone, clearly happy we were on her level.

“Ow,” Jenks said when his fingertips found the bump, and his eyes flew open. “You hit me!” he shouted, and Ivy let go. He fell against the couch, anger in his green eyes until he saw me beside him, probably looking as bad as I felt. His gaze shot to the empty table, then searched until he found the statue. “Holy crap, what did I miss?” he said.

“Sorry.” Ivy stood and offered him a hand up. “He would have killed you.”

So she hit him and risked giving him a concussion?
Yeah, that made sense.

His gaze went to me, and my breath caught at the fear in it. “Are you all right? Did he touch you?”

“Of course he touched me,” I said, getting to my feet and wavering until I found my balance. “He's an undead vampire. They can't look without touching. They can't not touch. I'm a freaking vampire candy cane and they all want a lick.”

“Damn it all to hell!” Jenks rose, touching the back of his head when it probably protested at the quick motion. “Stupid pixy. Stupid green-assed, moss-wipe, thumb up my ass pixy! You knocked me out cold, Ivy!”

“Jenks,” I protested, “leave her alone.” But he wasn't mad at her, he was mad at himself.

“Tagged by a whiny little vamp,” he said, gesturing. “Rache, take this sword and stick it in me. Just go and stick it in me. I'm a back-drafted, crumpled-winged, dust-caked, dew-assed excuse of a backup. Worthless as a pixy condom. Taken down by my own partner. Just tape my ass shut and let me fart out my mouth.”

I blinked, impressed. Rex was twining about my feet, and needing some comfort, I picked her up. Immediately she jumped to the couch and bounced to Jenks, stretching against his leg. The pixy yelped when she flexed her claws into him, and the kitten skittered under the bed.

“Look! She drew blood. Rache! Your damn orange cat scratched me. I'm bleeding!”

“Rex!” Jax shouted, coming out from behind the top of the curtain. “Dad, you scared her! Rex, are you okay?” He darted under the bed after her.

“That is so unsafe,” I muttered. Tired, I hobbled to the kitchen to get away from Jenks, who had collapsed onto the bed and was holding his leg as if Rex had hit a femoral vein. I jerked to a stop before I ran into Nick. “Hi, Nick,” I muttered, hitting the
k
with an excess amount of force. “Get out of my way. I have a lot to do before I kill Peter and Ivy goes on her
big date.
”

His long face worried, he took a breath to say something. I wasn't going to listen. I owed him nothing. Feeling like I was eighty years old, I shambled around him.

“I can help,” he said, and I dropped into one of those nasty kitchen chairs, put my elbows on the table and slumped forward. I was tired, hungry, and ticked. I had completely lost control of my life. It wasn't a simple snag and drag anymore. No, now I had to save the world from my former boyfriend and my roommate from herself.
What the hell. Why not?

Ivy had gotten my bags from where she dropped them by the front door. Silent and clearly embarrassed, she set them on the table, making a show of putting Peter's swab before
me. Jenks had apparently decided he wasn't bleeding to death, and with his very lack of movement, pulled my attention to him.

Standing, he first looked at the artifact, then flicked his gaze at Nick. I nodded, understanding. With a casual slowness, Jenks picked up the artifact and limped forward. My eyes were on Nick from around the curtain my fallen curls made.

My stomach caved in when Nick watched Jenks without appearing to. He wanted it. He still wanted to snatch it from us and sell it to the highest bidder, even if it would mean I'd have to go into hiding to keep the Weres from tracking me down and killing me for it. Whether he would or not was still unanswered, but he was considering it.
Son of a bitch.

The vamp-bloodied artifact was set thumping down in front of me, and Jenks pulled the bags closer to indulge his pixy curiosity. “Catnip?” he said, pulling it out and opening it.

“It's for Rex,” Ivy volunteered, suddenly sounding shy, of all things.

A grin flashed over Jenks, and he made a soft trill of a whistle. Immediately Jax buzzed out from under the bed. “Catnip!” the small pixy shouted, grabbing a handful and darting away.

“Oh, hey! Fudge!” Jenks exclaimed, finding the half-pound box I had bought to replace what he'd lost. “Is this mine?” he asked, green eyes alight.

I nodded, trying to stifle my anger at Nick. Jenks enthusiastically leaned against the counter and opened the box. Bypassing the plastic knife, he broke off about a third of it and took a huge bite. Ivy watched, appalled, and I shrugged. His mouth moving as he hummed, Jenks finished unpacking the sacks. I was half dead, Ivy was whoring herself to keep me safe, but Jenks was okay as long as he had chocolate.

It was getting tight in the tiny kitchen, but I didn't want either of them to leave. I felt cold and vulnerable, and the closeness was helping me distance myself from the play DeLavine had made for me. Inside I was shaking for what Ivy was doing
for me—what she was falling back into—and if they left, it would start to show in my fingers.

“Rachel?” Nick said from the outskirts. “Can I help?”

Ivy bristled, but I stretched across the table and handed him a swab. “I need a sample,” I said. “It's an illegal charm, but I didn't think you'd mind.”

Face tight with frustration, he took it, turning away when he ran the cotton around the inside of his mouth. I remembered what DeLavine had said about so many people having marked me and squelched a feeling of shame. I didn't belong to anyone. But seeing Nick unable to enter the comfort I had found among my friends, I felt my Inderlander roots hard and strong.

Nick didn't understand. He never would. I'd been stupid thinking I could find anything lasting with him, and he had proved it by having no problem selling slivers of me to Al.

I wouldn't look at him when Nick handed me the swab, safely back in its cellophane wrapper. He moved as if to speak and I blurted to Ivy, “Piscary won't mind you helping Peter, will he?” Eyes down, I wrote Nick's name on the packet with a squeaky, big black marker.

“No.” The sound of water trickling into the coffeemaker blurred her voice. “Piscary doesn't care one way or the other. Peter isn't important to him. To anyone. To anyone but his scion, anyway. It's likely that he'll simply fade from DeLavine's awareness when he's distracted by more exciting things.”

Like you?
I thought, but I didn't say it aloud.

Ivy turned, her black hair swinging to show her earrings. “I'm making coffee,” she said. “Do you want some?”

Not if it was laced with Brimstone. Crap on toast, I was tired.
“Please,” I said, feeling Nick's gaze heavy on me.

“Jenks?” she offered, getting a tiny hotel mug down from the bare cupboard.

Jenks looked appraisingly into the box of fudge, hesitating before he closed it and set it aside. “No thanks,” he said, starting to mess with my spelling supplies.

“Rachel,” Nick tried again. “Can I sketch a pentagram for you or something?”

Ivy's head came up, and I moved my fingers to tell her I could handle it. “No,” I said shortly, pulling my demon book closer and opening it up. My eyes lifted to the artifact, wondering if Nick had had the opportunity to switch it out with a fake, but I didn't think so. And there couldn't be two such ugly things.

“Ray-ray—” Nick tried again, and Ivy slammed the cupboard.

“What the hell do you want?” she said virulently, brown eyes fixed on him.

“I want to help Rachel,” he shot back, stiff and a little afraid.

Jenks snorted, crumpling up the empty bag and throwing it away. “You can help Rachel by dropping dead.”

“That's still an option,” said Ivy.

I didn't have time or the energy to deal with this. “I need quiet,” I said, feeling my blood pressure rise. “That's all I need. That's it. Just quiet.”

Nick stepped back, his arms crossing over his faded shirt to make him look alone. “Okay. I'll…” He hesitated, gaze flicking to Ivy and Jenks beside me, taking up all the room so he couldn't come in. His held breath slowly escaped him, and not having finished his thought, he walked away, his movements full of frustration. Slumping into the chair Peter had been sitting in, he stretched his long legs out and ran his hand through his hair, staring at nothing.

I would not feel bad for him. He had sold me out. The only reason I hadn't walked off from this was because the Weres would hound me forever if they didn't see the thing destroyed, and for that I needed Nick. And I needed him cooperative.

Jenks pulled a chair from under the kitchen table and sat beside me. I blinked in surprise when I realized he had correctly put everything into three piles. “Do you need any help?” he asked, and Ivy snickered.

“Help from a pixy?” she scoffed, and Jenks bristled.

“Actually,” I said before he could start swearing at her, “could you get Nick out of here?” I didn't want him to see the transference curse. God knows who he would sell it to. He couldn't invoke it without my or demon blood, but he could probably get some from Al in exchange for my underwear size.

A nasty smile curved over Jenks, but it was Ivy who put her palm aggressively on the table and said, “I'm doing it. I want to talk to him.”

I looked up, wondering, but she had turned away. “Come on, crap for brains,” she said, grabbing her purse in passing and heading for the door. “Rachel forgot something, and since I don't know anything about ley line magic, you're coming with me to make sure I get the right thing. Anyone else want anything while I'm out?”

Nick's face went defiant, and I simpered, knowing it was petty but unable to stop myself. “Watch out for the Weres,” I said. Maybe that had been mean, but I was mean. Just ask the kids I kept chasing out of my graveyard. They could play hide-and-seek somewhere else.

“I'm out of toothbrushes,” Jenks said, going to putter with the coffeemaker.

Ivy waited for Nick to shrug into the fabric coat that had been stashed in his truck. “You can use those more than once,” she said, as I'd already told him, and Jenks shuddered.

Clearly aware he was being gotten rid of, Nick yanked the door open and walked out. Ivy gave me a wicked, closed-lipped smile and followed him. “I'm not afraid of you,” Nick said as the door shut and my stress level dropped about six points.

“Here's your coffee,” Jenks said, setting it down in front of me.

He poured me coffee?
I looked at it, then up at him. “Is there Brimstone in it?”

Jenks plopped into the chair beside mine. “Ivy told me to put some in, but I thought you were well enough to decide.”

My blood pressure went right back up, and remembering
my reflection in the store window, I hesitated, wondering if I was being wise or stupid. Brimstone would keep me alert for hours while I made whatever charms I needed, simultaneously increasing my blood count to pretty near normal. When I fell asleep, I'd wake refreshed, hungry, and feeling almost as well as before I was bitten. Without it, I'd be spelling while fatigued. My legs would shake every time I stood, and my sleep would end with me waking up feeling like crap.

But using black magic or illegal drugs to simply to make my life easier was a lie of convenience—one that would delude me into believing I had the right to flaunt the rules, that I lived above them.
I will not turn into Trent.

I exhaled in a long puff. “I'm not going to do it,” I said, and he nodded, his green eyes creased with worry. Though he clearly disagreed, he accepted my decision, which made me feel better immediately. I was in charge of my life. Me.
Ri-i-i-i-ight.