Authors: A.J. Aalto
“Death wish territory, Wes,” I warned.
“Hey, my Harry imitation is solid,” he assured me. “I got it all down cold. Get it, hunter? Cold?”
I didn't encourage him, and neither did Batten, but it didn't matter.
Wesley's mood had shifted from self-pity to bitter humor and he didn't require an audience; he was amusing himself. “Watch this.” He plucked Harry's platinum cigarette case off the kitchen table, slid out a cig and held it limp-wristed with his thumb on the filter. When Harry did it, he managed to make it look masculine. Wesley looked like a straight guy playing a flaming gay man in an off-off-off Broadway play. He took up my old espresso mug, flicking his pinky finger high in the air, and took a tight-lipped dainty sip, making kissy-tasting noises.
“Right. That's quite enough,” Harry slammed his palm down on the kitchen counter. “I must insist you cease this discourteous charade.”
“Or?” Wesley challenged.
Batten finished dabbing his shirt dry and looked up expectantly with his carefully-blank cop face. I jumped in.
“Bo-oys, we have comp-any!” I sang. “Let's not say or do anything we'll regret. Now, Wesley, why did you do this?”
Wesley's bad English accent persisted. “I figured if I splurged on the swank, I could get some tail. Maybe even some neck. Know what I mean?”
Batten made a queasy noise and stood. “My cue to leave.”
“What, you guys all get to fuck and I don't?”
“Stay out of my head!” Batten and I chorused, then scowled at one another in passing as he made for the mudroom.
Wesley snorted. “You two are doorknobs. In fact, all three of you are plain stupid. Three cold, lonely people who desperately want each others’ heat, and you do practically nothing about it. Well, I'm not going to be like you. I'm upping my game.”
Harry's eyebrows shot to his hairline. Ignoring the implication of an awkward triangle in the room, he said, “Are you given to understand that the fairer sex will find you more attractive if you emulate me?”
I, on the other hand, was both terrified and titillated by the improbable implications, not to mention the contortions, mechanics, and outcomes, but even my most fevered lustings recognized that the chances of anything remotely lascivious taking place along those particular lines anywhere but in my head as exceedingly dim. But the seed had been planted, and it spread some very hot, slippery roots quickly. I really hoped Wesley wasn't tuning in, because if he said anything about what was running through my mind at that moment, I'm not sure who would kill me first, or if I'd die of embarrassment before they got the chance.
No way am I going to the grave without taking this fantasy for a test drive
, I promised myself.
“Fuckin’ duh.” Wesley laughed. “Chicks drip for you prissy-ass Eurotrash vamps with the debonair crap.” I amended my opinion of my baby brother to include “misogynist ass” to “gorgeous and stupid”.
Batten paused at the mudroom and opened his mouth, maybe to offer a counterpoint of a personal nature, starring Yours Truly, then finally managed, “So much win in that statement, I don't even know where to start.”
“Ah! This must be my delivery from Shield,” Wesley announced, hearing something out front that I didn't. “Wallet, dahlink?” He made gimme-gimme finger motions at me.
My upper lip still curling up with disgust, I handed him my credit card without a word. His sashay-prance made another appearance as he moved down the hall. “Tally ho!”
“This is … this …” Harry's mouth worked around his rage until he noticed Batten still hovering by the mudroom. “Just exactly what are you sniggering at, lad?”
“Gotta admit, it's fuckin’ funny,” Batten said. “Come on. Dead guys have a sense of humor, right?”
Harry drew himself up, the unearthly sheen of his eyes swallowing any hint of human grey there, the preternatural vigor of him pushing into the room. As quickly as it came, though, it dissipated, when Harry's lips peeled into a half-smile.
“Oh, bugger,” he said ruefully; Batten and he shared a rare companionable chuckle.
I heard Wesley's awful English accent to my left at the delivery man. “Tut tut! I'll thank you to address me as
Lord
Guy Harrick Dreppenstedt, viscount Baldgate, my good man, for I earned my title!”
The wry smile had only half formed on my mouth when Wesley's ungodly shriek split the air.
C
HAPTER
18
I HIT THE HALLWAY FIRST,
running full tilt with my heart in my throat. Wesley floundered backward into the wall, palms-to-face, surrounded by a putrid green-brown ring of smoke. The noise he made was a constant blare, a drawn-out wail with no end. He toppled to the ground and rolled, heels kicking the floor. The air hissed and shimmered where heat belched from between his fingers. I didn't have to call for Harry: he was already there, barking orders for us to pursue.
It didn't occur to me for a second not to obey. As Batten bolted from the front door with his head bent to the night wind, I was right on his heels, just in time to see our mark duck behind the Hummer.
We hit the dirt road in unison like two synchronized swimmers breaking the surface, looking left and right for clues. There was a flash down the street to the left, a grey uniform, heading into the woods.
I heard Batten check his clip behind me. “Hell if I'm letting you go first. Get behind me.”
I made a
hurry-the-fuck-up-then
motion at him as we moved at a more cautious, watchful run, eyes darting for signs of danger. I patted myself down, but knew it was futile: I wasn't carrying the Cougar mini. I was sure I'd hear about that later, but I might have caught hell if I had been carrying, too. There's no pleasing some people.
It was late summer, so every bush and tree was overgrown, clawing, reaching, overburdened with leaves and fruit. Even with the attacker leaving us a trail, the going was slowed by whipping branches and stirred-up vines. Running the clear path in the forest with Hood had not prepared me for thrashing after a bad guy through the thick of it. Insects buzzed in swarms, and gnats clouded our sweaty faces.
This was getting us nowhere. I could see a grey uniform ahead, and above that, the back of a short blond buzz cut. The gap between us was getting wider with each stride. For a moment, I considered circling back the other way, around the lake, and letting the guy come to me. Then I realized he was circling back. This angle was taking him to the snowmobile path, and I heard Hood's warning in my head (“
Not deeper into the woods, dummy
!”) just under the sound of Batten's cursing.
Batten was slowing down, and it didn't take any psychic Talent to know what he was thinking: even if we caught him, there was nothing for Batten to do. The guy had done nothing illegal.
He was going to get away with… whatever he'd done to my little brother.
Fuck a whole
basket
of that
.
We needed a boost. Lunging over a log, I corrected myself.
I
needed a boost.
As we came into a flat space where the trees were sparse, the brush thinned out enough for us to pick up our pace to a healthy jog and look around a bit further. Batten confirmed my suspicions about his change of heart by falling behind. I stripped my gloves and tossed them aside, focusing on the evening warmth.
Swooping above the edge of the clearing was a reddish brown owl, an Eastern screech-owl; the words just blurted from my mouth. “
Mighty Morrigan, Battle Maiden, ride with me
,” I pleaded.
With an eerie, horselike whinny, the owl took a spiral dive out of the sky, and I jolted ahead of Batten like I'd been blasted from a cannon. Green, vigorous Earth energy soared into my muscles and I took flight, shedding the weight of worry for Wes, losing my frustration, feeling like a thoroughbred on an open plain.
Batten shouted something I didn't hear, but in seconds I'd left him so far behind that it didn't matter. I homed in on my target with new vigor and determination, dodging bushes and flying between saplings. He'd reached the snowmobile path, and my sense of direction put him not too far from my house. There was a van with a Shield logo parked on the trail, hugged tight on either side by trees. Uniform guy was fishing out keys.
He heard my branch-snapping, dirt-thumping approach, glanced over his shoulder with wide eyes, and whipped around.
I charged, sprang over a log, and with a cry of “
Heeeeyah!
” that would later seem comical, karate-chopped him in the collarbone.
It did not, alas, have the effect I had hoped. He dropped his keys, but didn't even flinch from the blow. My hand reported that I had slugged a brick wall, and immediately began to throb.
“Careful, minion,” he said, picking his keys out of the dirt. “I don't hurt humans, but I will defend myself.”
“Who are you calling minion, fucksock?” I stood there, wishing I had my gun. “Nice Shield van. No revenant would distrust a delivery from Shield.” I took a half-step back and had a revelation. “You're what's-his-dick, Spicy the Prior's flunky.”
“I've done nothing illegal.”
“The fuck you haven't.” I put up my dukes. “That's… unwanted window washing with shitty aim, maybe.” I hated the lack of legal standing revenants were afforded, like they were mosquitoes or leeches or weeds.
“So was your attempt at fisticuffs. Do you really want to pursue this with your FBI friend right behind us? You haven't lost him, you know.” He put the key in the van door. “Besides, an old-school vampire hunter like him? Whose side of vampire law do you think he's on?”
Anger blended with the energy from Morrigan's gift still surging through my hot muscles. I ran at him and slammed him bodily against the van, knowing it wouldn't do much damage, but needing to strike out.
He stumbled slightly, frowned, and made an altogether insulting shooing motion at me. “I'll be going—”
I brought my knee up sharply and felt it connect with his balls. His words left in a breathy squeak. “The word is ‘Revenant,’ dickbag.” Delicately taking the keys from his hand and tossing them into the woods, I asked, “Want to hit me yet? C'mon, I might like the rough stuff.” I wiggled salaciously.
“You're—”
I grabbed him by the ears and yanked hard, pulling him close enough to get a better hold, two fists full of hair at the back of his head.
“What the fu—umph?” He made confused and alarmed noises as I pulled his head against my chest burying his face in my modest but mighty cleavage. He held his hands out to the side, indicating
any refusal to fight back. Frustrated, I fell onto my back, dragging him on top of me (and maybe kinda accidentally on purpose catching him in the junk with my hip as I went over). He wasn't going to stay in that position. He rolled us until I was straddling him, then grabbed my wrists and tried to get my hands out of his hair.
I was having way more fun with him between my legs than the situation warranted. Then I felt the Morrigan's heat flare anew, squeezing his torso between my thighs as I licked my lips.
“Marnie! Get off him.”
I craned around, and through the wild tangle of my hair I could see Batten with his gun raised, glaring at me. The other man's hands fell away from my wrists and he went limp and submissive beneath my thighs, body soft with relief: the law was here and it was on his side.
I scowled. “He attacked me.”
“Is that why you're on top?” My legs may have humped the fallen man slightly. I was uncomfortably aware of the proximity of Batten's bod, and the suggestion that I get off seemed increasingly likely whether I wanted to or not. Morrigan apparently needed to get laid even more than I did.
“It was a reverse attack,” I tried. “He's shifty like that.”
“Marnie, I'm not going to say it again.”
“Good, because I don't want to hear it again.”
“Let him go.”
“Fine.” I let go of Blondie's hair and crawled off of him. “We'll play by the law. No problem, Special Agent Batten.”
The Prior sat up, running his fingertips into his hair along his scalp. “I have been sexually assaulted by a madwoman, agent. She hit my head on the ground and forced my face against her breasts. There may have been humping.”
Batten holstered his gun and propped his hands on his hips.
“What'd you do that for?” he muttered at me.
“I was angry. Smothering seemed like the thing to do at the time. The humping wasn't my idea, though.”
“You never smother me,” Batten shot back. To the Prior, he said, “If you wish to press charges, I can contact the local sheriff's department on your behalf, mister…?”
The Prior shook his head. “Never mind. It seems you have the situation under control. I'm done here. ”
The Prior turned to kick around the dark bushes for his keys. I heard them jingle, but made no attempt to help him.
“You ought to be more careful, Agent Batten, about the type of people you spend time with,” the Prior advised, kicking some more with the toe of his boot. “There is great evil in that house, great evil surrounding this minion and her Companion. The fate of your eternal soul is not something you should take so lightly.”
“You let me worry about the company I keep,” Batten said. “I will advise you to stay away from Miss Baranuik's home. She is a human being, and has rights under the law. I could, at the very least, charge you with trespassing and harassment.”
The Prior stared at Batten shrewdly. “I've heard that people who harass this family tend to go missing. Perhaps it's Miss Baranuik you should be chasing around in the night. Or maybe you already do…?”
Batten opened his mouth to snap something but I interrupted him with the wave of my hand.
“The law can't touch you tonight, Prior, because you've technically done nothing illegal. But this isn't illegal either…” I stabbed my finger in Blondie's direction. “
Dirty fungus/dirty rhymes/haunt your headache/for all time.”
The feeling of it must have been bizarre when the first one wriggled out of his scalp, because the single-eyed squint he did, combined with the sour puckering of his lips, was a facial expression I'd never witnessed before. There was movement in his blond hair, and the push of a smooth, soft cap. Batten's hands readjusted on his gun, his shoulders went up as though he wanted to aim at something, but wasn't sure what. When the next one began to grow, pushing up among his follicles, the Prior's half-squint became a full-on scrunch.