Big Beautiful Witches: I Married A Warlock (13 page)

They pulled up at the Wharf Rat by ten o clock.  It was a bar that made The Three Broomsticks look elegant and refined by comparison.  It stank of urine, there were rats scuttling about the floor, and prostitutes openly plied their trade in the dark corners.

“Ewww,” Fiona muttered to Erik. “I think she’s kneeling in pee. You really do take me to the nicest places.”

“Hey, ish thish your lady? How much?” A drunken werewolf staggered up to them, eyeing Fiona appraisingly.

“I already paid a pretty penny for her services.  You’ll have to look elsewhere,” Erik said.

“Shorry. Carry on.”  The werewolf turned, stumbled over to a spittoon, and vomited copiously into it, with accompanying retching noises.

“Damn it, Scorpion,  you scared him off. I wanted me some of that,” Fiona shook her head in mock annoyance.

“You’ll have to settle for this,” Erik said.

And before Fiona could protest, Erik bent down and kissed her, his lips hungrily claiming hers.  The rest of the world faded away, the din and the smell, and all that was left was Erik, kissing her as if he were drowning and she were his only oxygen.

Finally he pulled away.

“Didn’t you miss that?” he murmured into her ear.

“God, yes,” Fiona blurted out before she could stop herself.

“Then why are you hiding from me?”

Stalling, Fiona scanned the room.  “Shouldn’t we be looking for our suspects?”

“We’ve got all night. Answer the question.”

Standing at the end of the bar was a massively tall, broad-shouldered man who looked very familiar. Fiona glanced at him casually, then turned to Erik.

“That’s the half-giant guy from the warehouse – the one who cleaned up after the theft even though he was told not to.”

“And he’s talking to the two men we’re looking for,” Erik said, watching them in the smoke-clouded mirror behind the bar.

“There’s your proof of an inside job.  Give me the bug.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Oh, just headed to the restroom.”

He handed her a tiny silver sphere. It was a chameleon bug; it would change to the color of whatever it affixed to.

“Be careful.”

“Careful’s my middle name.”

Fiona shimmied her way through the crowd, growling under her breath when someone grabbed her butt, and stifled her natural impulse to turn and deck him.   She was here to do a job and get the hell out.

“Oops!” She stumbled and fell into the giant, who was deep in conversation with his two compatriots, pressing the bug against his leather jacket as she did so. She looked up at him, batting her eyes, and when she spoke she made sure it came out in a Southern twang. “Hey, sugar, you want a good time? Fifty bucks.”  She was counting on the fact that he was in the middle of an illegal business transaction and was unlikely to say yes.

“Back off, cow. I’m busy,” the giant rumbled, and turned back to his friends.

As she sidled away, he called out “Hey!”

Heart sinking, she turned back to him. Had he seen through her Glamour? Or worse, did he want to take her up on her offer?

“Nice tats,” he said approvingly, and then turned back to his conversation.

Chapter Thirteen

Fiona had to summon up all of her strength to resist Erik’s offer to walk her up to her doorway when he’d dropped her off. He’d stood there on the street, watching her, and every cell in her body screamed for her to turn and call out his name, to beg for him to be with her, to hold her…

She was weak when she was near Erik.   

But she’d kept her voice strong and steady as she pointed out that Delphine was home waiting for her, and turned and walked away from him, feeling his gaze burning into her back.

When she reached her apartment, Delphine wasn’t alone. Sitting  at the kitchen table with her were Maizie and Stasik.

Or what used to be Maizie.

“Holy I don’t even know what diety to invoke. “ Fiona’s jaw dropped as she stared at Maizie.

Maizie’s fair skin, formerly a glowing peaches and cream, had faded to ivory. Her black pupils were huge, and her eyes glowed with a strange inner light.

“She’s a
vampire
,” Delphine announced. “A vampire.  Can you believe it?”

“What the hell happened?” Fiona blurted out. She wheeled to glare at Stasik. “You risked her life like that? You selfish bastard. I should have my vines choke the life out of you.”

“Easy, Veggie.  I went to a clinic so I could get turned,” Maizie said.

“Against my knowledge and consent...but I’m glad that she did,” Stasik added.

“Maizie…that was so dangerous!”

“I know,” Maizie said quietly.  “And highly illegal.”

“Damn straight it is.” Fiona felt her heart clench with fear.   To become a vampire was no small thing. It required a formal legal application filed with the courts, could only be undertaken by those 25 or older, and had to be legally approved by the vampire council. And 90 percent of those who were approved didn’t survive the turn.

The process was so dangerous that all medical experimentation involving vampire conversions was strictly illegal. 

“It’s expensive, too, isn’t it?” Fiona said. “That’s why you were helping to rob those warehouses.”

“I plead the Fifth.”

 Fiona said “I figured it out the first day when I was at the warehouse and I found those herbs for treating anemia. I’m the only person who grows that particular subspecies; it’s my own cultivar.   I never told Erik.”

Maizie smiled ruefully. “I’m sure that he’ll figure it out eventually. He’s not stupid.  I came to say goodbye.  Stasik has turned over the control of his house to his first lieutenant. We’re being smuggled out of the country to Romania.  Between the thefts, and my illegal vampire conversion, I wouldn’t stand a chance here.”

Fiona’s eyes filled with tears.

She’d miss Maizie fiercely, but she could see that Maizie and Stasik were truly in love. She could see the way Stasik hovered protectively over her, the look of pure adoration in his eyes when he looked at Maizie. And Maizie looked more at peace than she’d ever seen her before. That inner anger which burned inside her had been tampered and mellowed.

“You can come visit us in Romania, you know. When we get there safely I’ll send word telling you where we are. And you can rely on Konrad for protection. He owes me his life, and I made him promise
.
”

Maizie threw her arms around Fiona, and crushed her in a hug, then stepped back.

“Just do me one favor?”

“What’s that?”

“Have a little faith in yourself.   Don’t let your mother’s craziness poison your life.  When you start playing her insults in your head…consider the source.” She looked at Fiona. “And for what it’s worth, I believe Erik’s in love with you. I don’t know what’s happening with Maegera, maybe it’s pressure from his family, maybe Maegera is somehow manipulating it to look as if he’s with her, but Erik truly loves you. I’ve seen the way he looks at you; it’s the way Stasik looks at me.”

She kissed Fiona’s cheek. “I’ll miss you, Veggie.”

Fiona blinked back tears. “I won’t miss you at all, Fang.”

“Fang! I love it.” Maizie winked at Delphine. “Be good.”

And she and Stasik got up and they walked out of the apartment,  leaving Fiona behind with a dull ache of loneliness as her best friend disappeared from her life.  The Crystal Ball was tomorrow, and she’d have to face it alone, face Erik, face everything.

She sat back down, her heart sitting heavy as a chunk of granite in her chest.

Chapter Fourteen

It was too much. It was just too much to tolerate.

Renoir had gone uptown to do some shoe shopping at one of his favorite boutiques, and there was Erik, standing like a giant Norse god in blue jeans, on the corner of  97
^th
and Main. He’d just walked out of a coffee shop, and Maegera had followed him out of the store, trailed by a miserable looking Bonnie, who walked with her head down.

Maegera looked furious;  she stomped away from Erik, climbing into a limousine. Bonnie scrambled in after her, and the limousine took off before Bonnie had even closed her door, in a cloud of white smoke and screeching rubber.

Clearly she and Erik had just had a lover’s quarrel.

Renoir couldn’t stand it any more. He rushed up and slapped Erik across the face.

He had to unfurl his wings and hover in the air to do it, because Erik was a foot taller than him, but it was worth it.

“Bastard!” he shrieked.

Erik rubbed his face and stared at him, astonished. “What the hell was that for?” he demanded.

“You used Fiona for sex and you’re running around town with that bitch, and you have the nerve to ask me why I slapped you?” Renoir hissed. “I should claw your eyes out!”

Erik stared at Renoir as if he’d lost his senses.  “I am not running around town with Maegera.  Every time I turn around, she’s there.  I stopped in to have a cup of coffee, she walked in the coffee shop and sat down at my table without an invitation. Going on and on about what she’s wearing at the Crystal Ball tonight, trying to make it sound as if we were going together. I finally told her in no uncertain terms that she and I would never be together, and she ran off in a rage. Thank God.”

Renoir glared at him. “I suppose you didn’t take her out to dinner at The Palace a couple of weeks ago?”

“I was supposed to meet my mother there, and when I showed up, Maegera and my mother were waiting for me. Then my mother claimed she didn’t feel well and had to go home immediately.  I knew it was a setup the minute I set eyes on Maegera.   My mother would give up half her magic power if she could get me to agree to marry into that family.” 

Erik looked at Reonir with narrowed eyes.

“Wait a minute.  Does Fiona think that I’m seeing Maegera? ”

“Of course she does.   Maegera came into our store and told Fiona that you were planning on proposing to her, and that you wrote her love letters while you were away in the Troll Wars, and then she mailed Fiona a picture of you and her having dinner at The Palace.”

“What the hell!” Erik’s eyes glowed blue with fury, and suddenly the street around them was shaking. A garbage can exploded, showering the street with debris.

“Watch the outfit!” Renoir squealed, frantically brushing a greasy fast food wrapper off his silk shirt.

“How could Fiona believe that of me, after all the years she’s known me? Why wouldn’t she just ask me?’

“Uhhh…why do you think? Because her mother, and all the uptown bitches she grew up with, have done a number on her self esteem so she believed that she’s worthless and you’d rather pick a skinny witch over her. And for that matter,  wouldn’t it have been smart for you to tell her about the whole Maegera dinner incident so she wouldn’t hear about it third-hand and get the wrong impression?”

“Now that you mention it, yes,” Erik said grudgingly. “But I think so little of Maegera that I didn’t even bother saying anything about it. I should have known better.”

He shook his head. “So this explains why Fiona has been avoiding me. I need to talk to her.”

“She’s not home today.”

“Where is she?” Erik’s eyes gleamed dangerously, and Renoir darted back away from him, alarmed.

“I literally swore an unbreakable vow not to tell you where she is. I am be-spelled.  I am incapable of telling you.  Fiona didn’t trust me to hold up under torture. Or even under gentle prodding.”

“You’ve got to tell her what’s really happening!” Erik pleaded.

“I’ll try, but she may not listen.  It’s a very painful subject for her.”

“She’ll be at the Crystal Ball tonight, and then I’ll have the chance to tell her myself.” Erik’s rubbed his face with frustration. “What a mess. I’m going to give my mother a piece of my mind about this, believe me.”

Chapter Fifteen

“You have to listen to me! Maegera’s been lying all along! Erik never intended to propose to her!”

Night was falling, and Fiona was fussing with a topiary on the grounds outside of the building that housed the Crystal Ball, making it morph into different shapes.   She’d tried various hearts; frowning, she concentrated hard and it became a cupid shooting an arrow.

“Perfect!”  Serefina, one of the witches from the Florists Guild, trilled as she glided by. “Simply lovely, dear! And you look adorable.”

“Thank you, Serafina. You’re too kind.”  Fiona had grudgingly let Rosalind and Delphine talk her into wearing a pink silk Grecian style gown, and Rosalind had piled her hair up high and adorned it with pink silk roses and pearls.   Mala insisted on putting rosy lip gloss on her, proclaiming “This way you’ll get a hot date. Dudes like chicks with lip gloss. Rosalind told me.”

Fiona turned to Renoir, shaking her head.  “Renoir, that’s lovely of you to say that, but I’m swamped here. And that ship has sailed.”

“Erik told me himself! He said that his mother tricked him into going on that dinner date with Maegera- he didn’t even know she was going to be there.” Renoir was hopping from foot to foot with agitation. “This is important, Fiona! Look, there he is – ask him!”

Startled, Fiona spun around to see that Erik indeed was stepping out of a limousine that had dropped him off in front of the walkway that led to the Crystal Ball.

The Crystal Ball was held every year in a giant ball-shaped structure made of glass panels and supported by an iron framework.  Fortunately, Fiona was hidden by shrubbery, and the walkway that led to the front door was a long one.

Heart pounding in her chest, Fiona turned and dashed away, rushing to a side entrance and watching from the doorway until Erik was inside. There were hundreds of witches and warlocks attending, and hundreds of servants, waiters, waitresses, musicians, security staff…with luck she’d be able to avoid him until she was finished creating the special effects for the opening ceremonies.

If Renoir was telling the truth, then she’d made a complete fool of herself, and insulted Erik for no reason, rejecting all of his overtures and ruining any chance she might have had of a relationship with him.