Industrial Magic (61 page)

As Lucas approached, Jeremy lifted his head and met his gaze. Then he sank his teeth into Edward's side and lifted him, to flip him onto his back so Lucas could tie him. Edward slammed his fist into the back of Jeremy's left foreleg joint. Jeremy's leg buckled and his grip on Edward slid.

Beside me, Savannah began to cast. I prepped a knock-back spell, then heard Savannah's incantation and whirled.

"No!" I yelled. "Don't—"

The last words to the spell left her lips as Jeremy regained his hold and tossed Edward up. As Jeremy swung Edward, he moved into the path of Savannah's binding spell and stopped dead. Edward landed on top of Jeremy. Savannah broke the spell, but Edward already had hold of Jeremy's rear leg. He bit it. Jeremy recovered and twisted, but Edward kept his teeth firmly planted in Jeremy's leg, drawing blood and injecting his sedative. Lucas lunged at the pair. He caught Edward in the side and knocked him away from Jeremy. As the two skidded across the alley, Jeremy stayed where he was, looking around as if confused. Then he snorted, and slid to the pavement.

Lucas and Edward hit the ground fighting, each grappling for a hold on the other. I prepped a binding spell. I knew I couldn't use it while they were tumbling together, but nor could I risk using anything dangerous. I felt useless enough standing there watching. At least the binding spell made me feel I could stop Edward if things went wrong.

The two men were an equal match in size and strength. Lucas had one forearm jammed under Edward's throat, so he couldn't bite, but every time Lucas lifted his free hand to cast, Edward knocked it down.

Edward wrenched away from Lucas and managed to get halfway to his feet before Lucas yanked him down again. They rolled together. When they reached the wall, Edward reared up and twisted. Lucas's head slammed into the brick.

The blow dazed Lucas only for a moment, but in that moment Edward saw his chance. His head arched back, mouth opening. I cast my binding spell—cast it too fast and knew before I even finished that it hadn't worked. Savannah and I both raced toward them, but we were ten feet away, too far to cover the distance in time. As Edward's head swung down for the bite, Lucas recovered and ducked. Edward's fangs still caught the skin of his neck. As Lucas tore himself away, a fine mist of blood sprayed across the alley. The air surrounding Lucas started to shimmer. He dove out of the way. I grabbed Savannah and yanked her backward.

Edward stopped. He saw that first glimmer of the portal and his lips curved in a slow smile.

"Natasha," he whispered.

Lucas pitched himself at Edward, trying to shove him away from the portal. And Edward let him. He knew the portal wasn't about to open. Not yet. He hadn't spilled nearly enough of Lucas's blood. Edward grabbed Lucas by the hair and snapped his head back, teeth arcing down to tear through his throat. Lucas's eyes went wide as he realized his mistake.

"Binding spell!" I shouted at Savannah.

As she cast, I dove for Edward. I caught the back of his shirt and threw myself sideways. I managed to rip him away from Lucas, but not before his fangs made contact. More blood sprayed. The ground began to vibrate.

Edward wrenched away from me. As my grasp on his shirt slipped, Savannah cast her binding spell. Edward froze. Lucas wheeled to grab him.

"No!" I yelled. "Go!"

He hesitated.

"Get away from the portal!"

Lucas's gaze darted from me to his father to the portal, shimmering behind me. Then he turned and jogged toward the other end of the alley.

"Keep holding him," I said to Savannah. "I'll grab the rope."

Something moved behind Savannah. It was just Jeremy waking and lurching to his feet, but the sudden motion startled her and the binding spell snapped. Edward tore free of my grasp. Lucas spun around, saw Edward, and lifted his hands to cast.

"No!" I shouted. "Keep going!"

Lucas hesitated only a second before racing down the alley. Edward shot after him. And I followed, passing Jeremy as he tried to shake off the sedative, growling softly.

Ahead, the two men disappeared around the corner. A moment of silence. Then trash cans crashed like cymbals, the sound not quite drowning out a yelp of pain. I hiked up my skirt and tore down the alley.

I rounded the corner as Edward sprang to his feet, recovering from whatever spell Lucas had cast at him. With a roar, Edward threw himself at Lucas. Lucas backpedaled and lifted his hands to cast again. Then Jeremy skidded around the corner. He whipped past me and launched himself at Edward. As Edward fell, Jeremy clamped his jaws around the back of his neck. Then he pinned him to the pavement, forepaws on his shoulders, mouth still on his neck. I raced in with the rope. Lucas grabbed Edward's hands, yanked them behind his back, and I tied them with the best knots I knew, then let Lucas add his own, just to be sure.

When we'd finished, I turned to Savannah, and nodded. She cast a binding spell on Edward. And it was over.

***

As Jeremy Changed back, I cared for Lucas, casting a spell to staunch the dribbling blood flow, then wrapping his neck with strips of fabric from my dress. Then, leaving Savannah in charge of the binding spell, we hurried into the alley to free Jaime and Benicio. Lucas headed straight for his father.

Jaime had her head down, but on hearing me, she looked up and flashed a wide grin.

"Hey," she said. "Everything under control?"

"Yes," I said, kneeling behind her. "Thank you so much. You were amazing."

At a noise of assent behind me, Jaime looked up and, from the sudden light in her face, I knew who was standing there. I glanced up at Jeremy and motioned to the ropes.

"Do you mind?" I said. "My fingers are too slippery. Sweating pretty hard, I guess."

He nodded and circled Jaime. "I'll start with your hands. If I pull too tight, just say so."

"Ummm, not yet, okay? Hold on for a minute. I'm still trying to figure out how to escape."

"You don't need to escape, Jaime," he said gently. "It's all over. I can untie you now."

"Oh, I know, and you can, just as soon as I figure out how I
could
have done it. It's humiliating enough to be kidnapped, tied up, and need rescuing. At least I have to be able to say, Thanks for setting me free, but I was actually just minutes away from doing it myself.'"

A low chuckle. "I see."

"What do you think of lip gloss?"

"In general? Or as an instrument of escape?"

"Escape. I have some in my pocket and I can almost reach it. What if I'd smeared lip gloss on the ropes? Could I have slid out?"

As Jeremy answered, I felt a hand on my shoulder. I looked up to see Benicio. As I stood, he embraced me.

"Well done," he whispered in my ear.

"I've just called the Cabal, Papa," Lucas said. "They're sending an extraction team."

"Oh, I don't believe that will be necessary."

Benicio pulled back from me. As Lucas and I exchanged a look, Benicio headed for the end of the alley.

"He's quite secure, Papa," Lucas called after him. "Perhaps—"

Benicio lifted a finger, and kept walking. His voice floated back to us, barely above a whisper. Lucas frowned and jogged after him. I followed, trying to hear what Benicio was saying. Then I caught a few words of Latin and knew he was casting. Lucas realized it at the same moment and broke into a run. When we reached the corner, though, Benicio had stopped the incantation. He was leaning over Edward, who lay on his back, staring up, cold-eyed and defiant. Benicio's lips curved in a small smile.

"Vampires are indeed the race of arrogance, aren't they?" he said, his tone pleasant, even congenial. "And perhaps not without reason. You did manage to kill my son once. Almost managed to do it twice. Did you really think you'd get away with it? If you had, I'd have pursued you through every level of Hell to wreak my revenge. As it is, though, things are a bit"—his smile broadened, showing his teeth—"easier."

Benicio lifted his hands and said the last three words of the incantation. As his hands flew down, a lightning bolt severed Edward's head from his neck.

No one moved. We all stood in shock, watching Edward's head roll across the alley.

Benicio lifted his hands again. This time, his voice boomed down the alley, as he cursed Edward's soul for eternity.

Full Circle

For me, the case truly ended only when it returned to where it had begun: with a teenage witch named Dana MacArthur.

While we'd been tracking Edward, Randy MacArthur had finally arrived in Miami to see his daughter. When the initial flurry of activity over Edward's execution died down, we admitted to Benicio that Dana was gone. Of course, the Cortez Cabal wasn't taking Jaime's say-so, but their necromancers tried to contact Dana and confirmed that she had indeed passed over. So, two days later, Lucas, Savannah, and I stood in a Cabal cemetery and said good-bye to a girl we'd never known.

Since I'd now seen what lay on the other side, Dana's passing pained me less than it might have. Yet I still felt the full weight of the tragedy her death brought for her father and her younger sister, and maybe even her mother. Even for Dana herself, there was tragedy here. She'd gone to a good place, and I was sure she'd be happy, but that didn't mean her life hadn't been cut short, that she hadn't missed out on so much. And for what? To avenge the death of a vampire who had herself killed so many, gone so far beyond the needs of her nature? As I stood in that cemetery, listening to the minister try to eulogize a girl he'd never met, I looked out across the graves and thought of all the other fresh graves in other Cabal cemeteries. I glanced over at Savannah, and thought about Joey Nast, the cousin she never knew. On the other side of the group of mourners, I could see Holden Wyngaard, a plump red-haired boy, now the lone survivor. I thought of the others. Jacob Sorenson. Stephen St. Cloud. Colby Washington. Sarah Dermack. Michael Shane. Matthew Tucker. All gone. And how many tombstones would it take to commemorate the lives of everyone else Edward and Natasha had killed, the scores of humans they'd murdered trying to become immortal? I thought of that, of all those lives, and I couldn't for one second disagree with what Benicio had done. No matter what kind of hell Edward now faced, it was no less than he deserved.

I looked out at the small crowd gathered around Dana's open grave. Her mother wasn't there. I still wondered what had gone wrong in that woman's life to make her abandon her daughter, and I couldn't help but wonder whether having a Coven would have helped. I'm sure it would have, at least for Dana. If she'd had other witches to turn to, she would never have ended up on the streets of Atlanta, and now here.

Yet, as bad as I felt for Dana, I had to accept that the responsibility for starting a second Coven did not lie squarely on my shoulders. I was willing to start one. I would always be willing, and I'd make that willingness known, but I would no longer actively try to convince witches that they needed a Coven. They had to come to see that for themselves. In the meantime, I certainly didn't lack for work. I had an interracial council to reform and a new partnership with Lucas to pursue. Yes, I would have been more comfortable pouring my energy into a dream that started with me, but I think part of growing up is realizing that everything doesn't have to be
mine.
It could be
ours
, and that wasn't a show of weakness or dependence. I liked what Lucas did. I believed in it. I wanted to share it. And, if he wanted to share it back, well, that was damned near perfect.

When the service ended, Benicio leaned over and whispered an invitation to lunch, before we left for Portland. We agreed, and he slipped away to offer final condolences to Randy MacArthur.

The others had all gone their separate ways. The werewolves left Miami the morning after the showdown with Edward. Cassandra and Aaron had followed later that day, after they'd met with Benicio and the other CEOs to discuss possible fallout between the Cabals and the vampire community. Jaime had done her Halloween show in Memphis the night before, then zipped back to attend Dana's morning memorial service before returning to Tennessee for her next show.

As the mourners drifted away from the grave site, I glanced back one last time. Lucas took my hand and squeezed it.

"She'll be okay," he said.

I managed a smile. "I know she will."

"Mr. Cortez? Ms. Winterbourne?"

We turned to see Randy MacArthur behind us, looking uncomfortable in a too-tight black suit. His hand rested on the shoulder of an equally uncomfortable-looking young girl with Dana's long blond hair.

"I—we wanted to thank you," he said. "For stopping him. This—it should never—I don't know how it happened. I had no idea how bad things were—"

"It's okay, Dad," the girl murmured, her red-rimmed eyes fixed on the ground. "It was Mom's fault. Her and that guy. He didn't want kids, and she let him chase Dana off."