Mystic Jive: Hand of Fate - Book Four (6 page)

 “I’m going to miss you,” I said. In some ways, Henri knew me better than Rhys did. More than anything I wanted to tell him to stay, but Rhys was right. For the first time in his immortality, Henri was free to make his own choices. For good or bad, he had that right.

 Henri hugged me tight. “Don’t worry. March will be here before you know it, and I expect Blix to be talking by then. You’ve got to make him part of your life, Mattie. He could save your life one day, if you let him.”

“I will. I promise.”

Rhys and I hung around until Juno and Henri drove off in the band bus, with the roadies in the van behind them.

He slipped his arms around me. “Don’t worry, he’ll be fine.” He kissed my forehead. “And so will you.”

We waited at the side of the road for a break in the traffic before crossing to Rhys’s truck.

“Mattie, wait up a sec!” Lou called out from behind us. He trotted across the highway toward us.

The limo came out of nowhere. Low and lean, like a great white shark, it plowed into Lou without hesitation. He flew over the hood and hit the windshield. The limo squealed to a stop, backed up and there was a ghastly double thud as Lou fell to the pavement and went under the wheels. The car took off like a bat out of hell.

Lou lay in a crumpled heap by the side of the road less than ten feet from us. I ran to him, ignoring the angry protest of blaring car horns. Cars screeched to a halt or swerved abruptly around us.

Lou was on his side, his breath coming in labored gasps. I checked his carotid pulse and felt a thready heartbeat. “Please, just hang in there, for me okay?” 

“The ambulance is on their way,” Rhys said. “I’m going to move the truck.” Moments later, Rhys had his truck in position, blinkers flashing—a barrier protecting Lou from the oncoming traffic.

 “Stay with me, Lou,” I murmured.

Lou let out a low moan. “Ribs busted,” he grunted. “Felt ‘em go.”

“You’re going to be fine.” I said it as much for myself as for Lou, and I prayed it was true.

“That was no accident.” His cheek was a bloody pulp of road burn.

“We’ll find this guy and make him pay. I swear it,” I promised. I smoothed his hair out of his eyes, blinking back angry tears.

“No. Listen,” he gasped. He squinted in the glare of the truck’s headlights.

“Don’t you die on me, Lou! Don’t you even think about it.” In the distance I heard a siren whine.

“Those women,” he grunted. “They were looking for me.” He opened his fist. A blackened and battered coin lay in his palm. It was surrounded by a golden aura. “Take it. Keep it with you”

The coin gleamed brighter when I touched it.

He winced. “Ah, crap. I was afraid of that.”

“What is it?” The ambulance squealed to a stop behind Rhys’s truck, lights flashing.

“Detects black magic. We’ve been cursed.”

CHAPTER 7

BY THE TIME the EMTs loaded him into the ambulance, Lou was unconscious. The sheriff’s deputy arrived at the same time. We had to wait until he took statements from all the witnesses—more than a dozen of us. We all said pretty much the same thing—the limo had come out of nowhere. It happened so fast, no one got a license plate number on the vehicle, but hey, how many white stretch limos could there be in Penfield?

“It’s not the limo I’m worried about,” said the deputy. “It’s probably stolen. The driver has probably dumped it already. We’ll find it in a couple of days—in a barn or a canal somewhere, stripped for parts. Unless we catch them in the vehicle, finding the driver is going to be tough.”

Kevin, the bartender, described the two women who’d come into the bar. “It was those witches, dammit. They said they were looking for someone, but I wasn’t having any of it. I told them to clear out.”

“Do you know them?”

“No, but they all have a distinctive smell. These two reeked of it. Set the whole bar on edge.”

The deputy paled when he realized he was speaking to a were-guy. To his credit, he kept on going.

 “Who were they looking for?”

“They didn’t mention any names, and I didn’t ask.” Kevin answered, with more than a little heat.

The deputy took careful notes of everything the witnesses said, except the part about the witches. He addressed the crowd of witnesses. “Anyone recognize these ah, women?”

No one said a word.

“Anyone know of any connections between the victim and these women?”

Again, silence from the crowd.

I slipped my hand into my jacket pocket, feeling for the coin Lou had given me for safekeeping. He wanted me to have it—I wasn’t about to hand it over.

After making sure he had all our contact information, the deputy told us we were free to go.

I managed to maintain my cool until Rhys started up the truck. “Did you notice Deputy Weber’s eyes glaze over when Kevin mentioned the witches?”

“Aye. But to be fair, most of the witnesses were all werewolves and vampires. He might have been a bit overwhelmed.”

“Maybe,” I admitted. “Lou says the sheriff’s department has a hands-off stance when it comes to the Penfield witches. He says they’re a cult. I’ll bet no one lifts a finger to find out who did this.”

“That’s why the paranormal community has to stick together. I think it’s great that you and Lou have teamed up.”

It wasn’t the first time I’d heard Rhys say that. We pulled into the hospital parking lot. “Yeah, but it’s not right. Lou said those women in Growlers were looking for us.” I showed Rhys the glowing coin that Lou had given me. As soon as I dropped it into Rhys’s hand, it turned dark.

“Interesting.” Rhys switched on the cab light to examine the bit of blackened metal more closely. He turned it over in his palm. “It’s a coin, all right. Silver. Couple thousand years old, I’d guess. I’d need to examine it under magnification to be sure.”

He held it out to me,

At my touch, the glow returned. “Lou said it detects the presence of black magic.” I shoved the coin into the pocket of my jeans. “What do you know about curses?”

“That’s not really my area of study. I’ve run into more than a few artifacts that were said to have been cursed or blessed in some way. I suspect a lot of them were fakes.”

“What about witches?

“I’ve been accused of being a witch myself more than once. It’s just a label, Mattie. Times past, any female healer, even a midwife, could be considered a witch. I don’t have much experience with modern witches. What many would describe as black magic is merely the aspects of focused power used for unnatural purposes. Humans have always been fascinated by the occult.”

I wanted to ask him more, but we’d reached the waiting area. Honey Briscoe was there, sitting alone on one of the orange leatherette couches. Her eyes were red and puffy.

I sat beside her. “What happened? Is it one of the boys?”

She shook her head. “No, they’re fine. It’s Lou--.”

“Yeah, we know.” I put my arm around her. We saw it happen.”

Rhys took a chair opposite. “Is he going to be okay?”

“You just missed the surgeon.” She began. “He said Lou’s got head trauma with brain swelling, a badly broken leg, crushed ribs, and who knows what else. He’s in bad shape. They’ve put him in an induced coma until the swelling comes down,” Her lovely brown eyes filled with tears. “I couldn’t believe it when they called me. It was like Nate all over again.”

She blew her nose on a crumpled tissue. “He is the boy’s godfather and he’s got no one else. I’m listed as his next of kin. They said he’d been hit by a car?”

We told her about the hit and run. I didn’t mention the witches or the coin or the curse thing. No point in making things worse. Rhys caught my eye and I knew he agreed with me.

But Honey wasn’t fooled. “Growlers Pub? That’s in Penfield. What was he doing over there?”

Rhys explained about Henri’s going away party.

She made a face. “Well, Growlers
is
neutral ground. But Penfield isn’t safe for him.”

 “Why, what’s wrong with Penfield?”

“There’s a coven there—a cult, really. They used to be called the Penfield witches, but that’s misnomer. The sorcerer who leads it now is obsessed with the dark arts and arcane knowledge. They’re not above using physical violence to get what they want. They’ve sworn to kill Lou if he ever sets foot in Penfield again”

“Kevin told the deputy it was witches,” Rhys said.

She shot him a cynical look. “That won’t matter. They’ve got people on the sheriff’s payroll who will make sure that the witness statements get misplaced or misfiled or trashed. It happens all the time. They’re evil and know perfectly well that no one dares to stop them.

Rhys and I exchanged a glance. “You really think the Penfield witches that did this,” I said, softly.

She clenched her fists. “Don’t call them witches! It’s an insult to--.” Her shoulders slumped. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. Call them whatever you like.” She sighed. “It’s been a long day and I need to get home to my boys. I can let you know if Lou’s condition changes.” She picked up her purse and stood to leave.

Rhys and I walked her out to the parking lot and made sure she got to her car.

“It’s not right.” I climbed into the truck and scooted over to sit next to Rhys. “Honey knows the sheriff isn’t going to do anything to find that limo driver. I’m going to find out who did this, and make sure Sheriff Reynolds does his job. He likes, me, Rhys. I know he does. He’ll listen to me.”

Rhys drove through the quiet streets of Shore Haven. Not even the bars were open at this hour. “This could be a real can of worms. If Frank were still around, I’d say we talk to him, but I don’t feel the same way about the new guy.” Agent Frank Porter had been the FBI’s local supernatural investigator until last year, when he took a new assignment in New Orleans. Rhys and Frank had been partners in a lot of special investigations that weren’t necessarily within the purview of the FBI’s authority. They trusted each other.

“Ted Roper,” I prompted. Frank had been a lot more approachable than Roper, who seemed more of a by-the-book kind of guy. “The only time I asked him for help, he made me feel like an idiot.”

Rhys parked the truck in front of the big old Queen Anne. Tonight was supposed to be our first night alone in the house. “What are you talking about? He saved your life in that fire.” He ran his hand over my still-short hair and helped me out of the truck.

“That’s not what I meant.” We walked up the path to the front porch. A sudden swarm of will-o-the-wisps filled the air, like a cloud above our heads. They completely surrounded us—dozens of them, swirling around our heads, pinging off our hair and clothes like demonic fireflies. In the quiet calm of the night air, I could hear them whisper:

Loosa, loosa, loose…Loosa, loosa, loose!

I grinned at Rhys, who looked just as astonished as I felt. “Can you hear them?”

He cocked his head for a moment. “Nope. I got nothing.” He shook his head.

“This is what happened to Charlie and me a while back,” I said. The lights bombarded us for another few moments, then, as suddenly as they’d appeared, they were gone.

“That was pretty cool,” he admitted. “I’ve never known fairy fire to behave like that. What did they say?”

I unlocked the door and stepped inside. “Same as before. It sounds like, ‘loosa loose’. Charlie thinks it’s a warning.”

Rhys took my jacket and hung it up next to his on the coat rack. The house seemed to echo in Henri’s absence. “Some folks believe they’re messengers of an impending death.

My throat went dry. “You think Lou is going to die?”

He caressed my cheek. “No, I meant that it’s a Senequois legend. Honey could tell you more.”

I led the way upstairs to my room. “Honey Briscoe?”

“Yeah. Her grandmother was a storyteller. Honey knows all the old stories. Maybe she knows about the Loosa thing.”

Rhys wrapped me in his arms. For awhile, my thoughts were focused on delving into the deeper territories of intimacy and naked delight that we shared whenever we were alone together. And snuggling up together on a chilly night after such a grueling day wasn’t bad, either.

But even with Rhys sleeping peacefully beside me, I couldn’t relax. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Lou crumpled beneath the wheels of that limo. He was a good man. How could someone have purposely run him down like that?

I hated bullies. So what if Lou and I had found out where they held their rituals? No reason to hex him, or whatever they’d done to us. Or run him down like that. The more I thought about it, the more convinced I became that the deputy who had taken our statements tonight didn’t believe any of the Growlers witnesses. Lou didn’t deserve this. At the very least, law enforcement should be looking after their own. The deputy acted like he didn’t care whether they found the driver or not.

But I did. I made a silent promise to Lou that I would find out who had done this horrible thing to him and bring them to justice. There had to be a way to find this guy. I picked up the coin Lou had given me from the bedside table. It glowed in the dark room like a beacon. I wondered if the black magic it detected in me was Morta’s, or if Lou had been right about the curse.

What did it mean?

I had an uneasy feeling that if Lou was right, I was about to find out.

CHAPTER 8

ALL DAY AT work, my mind kept wandering. I couldn’t stop thinking about Lou. Sheriff Reynolds wouldn’t do anything. The coin Lou had given me was dimmer today, but stilled flared whenever I picked it up. If there really was a dark sorcerer operating a cult in Monroe County, maybe there was something the FBI could do. The only person I knew in the local field office was Ted Roper, so I called him and asked him to meet me for lunch.

I figured it might be better to speak to him informally, so I suggested Rudy’s Red Hots, a lunch-wagon vendor who worked just a block from the FBI offices in downtown Rochester. The good weather was still holding, so we ate outside at the mini-tables Rudy had set up for his customers.