Fates' Folly (22 page)

"Myra, darling," he crooned.

I ignored him, grabbing my bag off the floor
where I- or Bo, who the hell knows-had put it. I started digging
through the bag, at the same time looking out the passenger window
at the students going by. I briefly wondered why none of them
seemed to notice the creepy guy leaning against my window. Then I
remembered Hades' power of persuasion and misdirection. I would not
receive any help from the students.

I dumped out the contents of my school bag.
Sebastian started tapping on the window.

I moved the books, papers and my wallet out
of the way, tossed my cell phone aside too, thinking even if Riley
owned a cell phone I didn't have his number. I looked at the pile
of receipts, hair clips, pens and other crap that found a home in
the depths of my bag, but did not find my keys.

The tapping on my window changed from a light
finger tap to a metal clink. I turned around and was met with
Sebastian's smiling face and my car keys, clutched in his hand, as
he used them to lightly tap, tap, tap on the window.

"Must have been one hell of a kiss. Neither
one of you noticed your keys hitting the ground," he commented
pleasantly, as he pushed the key with the black grip into the door
lock and tried to unlock it.

But the key didn't turn and the lock didn't
tumble, thank the gods!

My car had an ignition key and a door key,
and because I had locked my keys in my car one too many times, I
kept them on separate key chains. Of course, I lost the key to the
doors months ago but that really wasn't important at this time.

"Come on, Myra, open the door. You're not
going anywhere, and as soon as this parking lot clears of all these
children, I'll just break the glass and pull you out anyway. Let's
save us some time, unlock the door."

I reached over and opened the glove box,
pulling out a flathead screw driver and wire cutters. I jammed the
screw driver into the ignition and tried to turn the car on. It
didn't work.

"Myra, pretty, you're panicking. Don't be
scared love. This is what The Fates destined you for- to serve
me."

"Fuck you!" I yelled, yanking the screw
driver out and jamming it into the plastic casing around the
ignition until the plastic gave. I pulled the plastic apart and off
of the steering wheel column, quickly pulling out the wires. I cut
the red ones, stripping their coating and twisting them together.
Sebastian started pulling on the door handle.

"I could easily break the glass, or just
shift into the car," he said.

I ignored him. Cutting the brown wires, and
trying my best to control my shaking hands, I touched the two ends
together, exhaling the breath I'd been holding when my little
Festiva purred to life. I didn't even look to see Sebastian's
reaction. I did not want to stall out, so all my concentration went
to putting the car in first and getting away. As far as I could
tell, that was exactly what I was doing.

I drove out of the school parking lot,
grabbing the screw driver before I shifted from second to third, it
was the only weapon I had if Sebastian shifted into the car. After
a few seconds, I relaxed, figuring it wasn't possible to shift into
a moving vehicle.

I took the next corner but had to slam on the
brakes, fishtailing into a one eighty, when a body shifted into the
passenger seat beside me.

Barty knocked the screwdriver out of my hand
and pushed down on my leg to keep the engine from dying, while he
screamed, "Go back! You fool! Riley will be here any minute!"

So much for my theory about shifting into a
moving vehicle. "Why the hell would I go back?" I yelled.

Barty rolled his eyes. "Oh, I don't know,
maybe because we're trying to catch the bastard?"

I didn't want to go back, but I didn't want
to hurt Riley's chances of catching Sebastian either, so I took a
deep breath and made my way back to the school parking lot. Riley
was pacing in the parking space where my car had been.

"You lost him," Barty said, practically
jumping out of the car before I came to a stop. Riley ignored
Barty. Looking at me, he asked, "Are you okay?"

I had to think about it for a minute. "Yeah,
I'm okay."

"Of course, she's okay. She ran and fucked up
our capture."

"What was I supposed to do, let him kill
me?"

"You're immortal, you idiot, he couldn't have
killed you. Even if you were mortal, you were in no danger of
injury. He was still playing with you."

"How do you know how close I was to
injury?"

Barty put his hands on his hips. "Because I
was standing two cars over watching. I watched you slobber all over
the football coach, dropping your keys. I watched you get into your
car. I watched Sebastian walk up and tap on your window and I
watched you panic like some clichéd teen age slut in a bad horror
flick."

"I've been immortal less than a week, you
jackass! So please, excuse me when the crazed maniac, who murdered
me four days ago, shows up and I forget I can't die, and do my
damndest to get away!”

"You sound so proud of yourself. Why, if
tuck-tail-and-run is one of the tests in the Trials I should just
consider my tutelage complete," he sneered.

I stepped closer, wanting so bad to slap the
look of disgust off his face.

"Speaking of tuck tail, why, if you were
right there only two cars over watching my every move, didn't you
capture Sebastian? You are, after all, the Trainer Extraordinaire,
the self-acclaimed bad ass Celtic Warrior, or are you only good
enough to throw around girls."

Barty stepped forward, so only inches
separated us. "It was not my capture," he said, through gritted
teeth. "I have sworn an oath to follow Hades’ command, which also
means honoring the commands he gives others. I was already pushing
my oath by helping Riley watch over you, as it was. Do not ever
question my honor, bravery or reputation again." He smiled
maniacally. "It isn't pleasant to regrow a spleen."

I desperately wanted to kick him but I'd have
ended up on my ass, or worse. Even knowing this, I was so pissed, I
was still considering it. If I could get in one good kick to his
knee, it'd be worth it.

Riley must have read my intention because he
pulled me away from Barty before I could act. "You two are
squabbling so loudly that kids are starting to pay attention.
Barty, I will see Myra home. Are you willing to delay your lesson
half an hour or so?"

"I don't see a need for a lesson today. Myra
has shown such fortitude, I think she can have the day off," he
snapped.

I stuck my tongue out, but he had already
disappeared.

"I hate him," I said, walking back to the
car.

Riley walked beside me, smoothly steering me
toward the passenger side.

"I think the feeling is mutual," he said,
before he shut my door.

The contents of my school bag was scattered
all over the floor. I found my wallet, phone and hair clips, plus a
few pens and pencils and shoved them into my bag. Everything else,
I tossed onto the back seat or left it where it was.

Riley was trying to snap the plastic box
hanging from the steering wheel back together.

“You can just pull it the rest of the way
off," I said, picking up the screw driver and wire cutters, forcing
them into the glove box.

With a loud pop, Riley tore the rest of the
plastic off the steering column. "Where did you learn how to hot
wire a car?" he asked, pressing the brown wire to the already
connected red ones.

"My mama. She had an affinity for cars,
almost as much as she had for men.”

"It's a useful skill. Was your mother a car
thief?"

"No. She just didn't like the tendency her
boyfriends had to want their cars back after she had moved on to
someone new. So she would borrow their vehicles sometimes, go on a
wild ride, move us to another town, whatever she felt like."

We had been caught by Dempsey's only traffic
light. Riley was silent for a moment, then he said, "My mother's
throat was slit when I was four."

I turned to look out the window. I didn't
know what to say. The hum of the Festiva's engine seemed loud in
the silence, and I wished for the light to change. Finally, I felt
so uncomfortable that I turned back to Riley, about to offer a
sympathetic reply, when I realized he wore the same hardened, tired
expression that I evoked when anyone offered sympathetic drivel
after finding out about my childhood.

The problem for me had always been that, no
matter what a person said, no matter how eloquent or sincere, it
couldn't come close to meaning anything to me because unless you
lived with the experience of my mother raising you, you couldn't
possibly understand the complexity of my relationship with her.
Sympathy was really the most inappropriate response of all. So I
said, "Well hell, I guess she didn't do much car stealing then, did
she?"

Riley smiled. The light turned green, and the
Festiva's engine gave a tiny growl as Riley gassed it through the
intersection.

"No, she never took to thievery, though she
would have been impressed with the skill your mother taught
you."

"Thanks. I'm sorry I screwed up and lost
Sebastian before you could get there."

Riley pulled the car into my driveway. "I
couldn't have taken him from the parking lot. I would have had to
use my sword. We would have battled, and the power of misdirection
and persuasion combined wouldn't have been enough to keep the
students from noticing."

We walked up the front steps, and Riley held
the screen door open for me.

"Still, you could have followed him," I
said.

Riley shook his head. "I doubt it. Though I
wondered why-"

He didn't get to finish his sentence because
Mrs. Crowell had come out of her apartment. She stood in front of
us, wearing a purple and orange Hawaiian shirt with matching purple
polyester shorts, that not only perfectly matched the bright
flowers in the shirt, but also her purple canvas slip-ons.

"Who are you?" she asked, pointing at
Riley.

"Mrs. Crowell, this is my uncle on my daddy's
side. He-"

"I didn't ask you, Myra Jane. I asked him,"
she shrieked, putting one of her gnarled talons in Riley's
face.

Riley took her hand in his and kissed the top
of it. I had to turn away so she wouldn't see me gag.

"Mrs. Crowell, it is such a pleasure to meet
you, ma'am. I do hope you will accept my apology for not properly
introducing myself when I first arrived in town. I'm afraid I have
been so busy trying to locate an old acquaintance of mine and
catching up with my dear niece that my manners have left me." He
said all of this with a southern accent used only by politicians
and the old moneyed families of the south.

"That's quite alright, dear," she said in a
sugary, almost sweet voice.

"No ma'am, it is not. My mama would have had
me over her knee with a wicked briar to my backside if she was
still alive today."

"Oh, I'm sure she would understand," Mrs.
Crowell said with what I guess was supposed to be a flirtatious
laugh.

"No ma'am, honestly, I was raised better. I
was going to correct my error yesterday when I saw you in Mrs.
Farnsworth's establishment, but you were both in such an animated
conversation, I did not want to appear rude."

Yeah, I'm sure they were quite animated
discussing my ass.

Mrs. Crowell beamed. "Oh, that's alright.
Don't you fret about it. I shouldn't have been so fierce moments
ago but, you know, I'm like a mother bird protecting her chicks
from the wilds of the world, and Myra is so very young and
careless."

"Don't harpies eat their young?" I
mumbled.

Riley turned to me. "Why don't you go ahead
upstairs, Myra, I'll be along in a moment."

At first, I wanted to balk at his dismissal,
but after only a second, I hurried up the stairs, thankful for any
reprieve from the old hag.

About twenty minutes later, having already
changed into cut offs and my Wonder Woman t-shirt, I was rocking in
my orange chair while eating the top half of a giant fudge round,
when Riley walked through the door.

"Did you have to cut off her head to escape
her clutches?"

Riley sighed. "No, but it was a close call.
Lucky for me, her soaps had started, another five minutes of having
to ooze sugary southern charm and I might have had to take my own
life."

"Well, I'm glad she was a pain in the ass for
you, too. It makes me feel better to share the misery."

Riley sat down on the couch. "You know, she
says your mother is visiting her in the form of an angel."

I shrugged. "She's an evil crack pot who
enjoys torturing me, and her latest effort involves made-up angelic
visits from my mama, cleverly designed so she can insult me while
claiming God as her backer."

Riley stretched, leaning his head back and
straightening his long legs out in front him. "She seems to really
believe what she's saying."

"So? To this day, I'd swear I saw a fairy in
the morning glories that grew in the ditch behind our trailer when
I was six. Nothing could have convinced me otherwise at the time.
We all create little fantasies for one reason or another. Maybe she
actually feels guilty for her treatment of me and has created my
mama's angelic visits to make herself feel righteous in her
cruelty."

Riley grinned. "That's a sound theory except
for one tiny flaw."

"What flaw?"

"Fairies are real and so are angels."

I took a huge bite of my fudge round to
cancel out the bad taste Riley's statement had left in my mouth.
"I'll have to think about the whole fairy thing. After meeting
Peter of the Pearly Gates, I have no issue believing in the
existence of angels- it's the thought of my mother being an angel
that is impossible for me to swallow."