War-N-Wit, Inc. - The Coven (War-N-Wit, Inc. - Book 3) (2 page)

“Lovely.
So tell me all about it.”

Chapter Two

I peered around the corner of the Tallahassee alley where we’d parked the SUV. Yep, there he was. The skip. Danny Delvecchio, a/k/a Ferret a/k/a Dapper Dandy Dan. At the moment, operating as Father Daniel right in front of the Teen Rescue Center run by St. Benedict’s and soliciting donations with practiced ease. I shoved the wimple completing my nun’s ensemble above my eyebrows. Damn thing kept slipping down.

“
One more time, from the top,” Chad said.

“Magic Man!
It’s not rocket science! He’s just a sleazy con man parading around as a priest. Which is
really
low, even for a bail-jumping con man.”

“Sure is.
So from the top. You’re going to—”

“I’m going to rush up
, grab him and babble about a poor boy doubled over in the alley who’s probably overdosed and come with me now, I need help. That about it?”

“That’
s about it.”

“Okay.
I’m on it!”

I
peered around the corner again. Good a time as any. I hitched my habit up a bit and headed toward him in a sprinting semi-jog.

“Father! Father, I need help—”

Before I could grab his arm, I heard an echo. Not in my voice though.

“Father! Father, I need help!” And a hand, not mine, grabbed
Dapper Dandy Dan’s arm from behind.

“Oh!
Thank you, sweet Jesus!” The hand dropped Dandy Dan’s arm and grabbed mine. “You’re even better! The Lord provides!”

An older nun hauled me
through the door of the Rescue Center, her habit flying out around her legs.

“One of the girls—she’s in labor
and I’m all by myself right now, even all our kids are gone this morning! We didn’t know she was pregnant. She’s been hiding it under big sweatshirts. I’ve called for an ambulance but I don’t know if they’ll make it, she’s been in labor for a while, I think, she’s in denial! She refuses to believe she’s having a baby!”

She pulled me through
a curtain separating the front room from a back room used as a dormitory. The girl lay on a cot under a sheet she clutched close, refusing to let go. And she was all of fourteen. Maybe.

“Sister Marie!
Sister Marie! It’s just a
stomachache!
You’ve got to let me up, I’m not—” She broke off and writhed in pain. Sister Marie dropped to her knees besides the cot.

“Sandra, you’ve got to listen to me!
I’ve called for help but it might not get here in time. You’ve got to let us help you, child. You
are
having a baby and if you don’t listen to me and open your legs, you can hurt it. Badly. You don’t want that, do you?”

Wisps
of gray hair peeked from Sister Marie’s wimple, and a harsh ray of sunlight highlighted every wrinkle on her face. Her hand, visibly work-worn and roughened, smoothed the girl’s hair back from her forehead. Sitting there in a halo of harsh sunlight, face lined with compassion and concern, she was the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen. I felt like a fraud. Until I remembered. I could help. There was no such thing as coincidence. I was here for a reason.

I dropped down on my knees on the other side of the
cot and took her hands away from Sister Marie.

“Sandra!
Look at me!” Her eyes rolled, a wild colt caught in a maelstrom of pain she didn’t understand. “Look at me!” Beautiful dark eyes focused on mine. I concentrated and gathered strength. I wasn’t just a telepath. I had a strong streak of mind control. A power that scared me shitless, because to abuse a power is to lose it. I’d only used it twice to my knowledge, once accidently and innocently, an occasion that had hurt no one. And once to bring down an old enemy who’d haunted Chad and me through every lifetime. Memories of that made me hesitate. But only for a moment. Because then Chad was there, talking me through it.

Do it, Ariel!
Nothing’s a coincidence! You’re there for a reason! Do it!

I concentrated and threw power through my eyes into hers.
Just a bit. “Sandra! You
are
having a baby, honey. It hurts, I know it does, but it won’t hurt as much if you relax and listen to Sister Marie. Open your legs, honey, the baby’s head doesn’t have much room and you can hurt it if you keep clamping down. Open your legs and relax! And breathe! Breathe with me! It doesn’t hurt as much now, does it? No, it doesn’t. It doesn’t hurt.
It
doesn’t hurt
.”

Under the covers her thighs spread apart.
Sister Marie threw the sheet back and parted the girl’s legs wider.

“Whatever you’re doing, Sister, keep doing it!
Please!”

Sandra tried to raise her head to look down at Sister Marie, panic rising again.

“No! No, don’t look at Sister Marie. Look at me.
Look at me
. It doesn’t hurt.
It doesn’t hurt.
”

“It doesn’t hurt!”
Sandra’s voice was full of wonder. “It doesn’t hurt!”

The baby’s
cry sounded with the wail of the ambulance pulling up outside.

“Thank you, God!” exclaimed Sister Marie, wrapping the baby in the cot’s coverlet.
“Thank you for this new life and for sending us Sister—what’s your name, child?”

“Ari—Agrippa. Sister Mary Agrippa,” I said.
Was Agrippa even a feminine name? Was it even Christian? I had a vague memory connecting it to Rome. Too late now, though.

The paramedics barreled into the room and took over
, sending Sandra into a fresh panic.

“No!
I don’t want to go! Not by myself!”

“Sister Agrippa, you should go with her.
I’ve never seen anything like the way you calmed her down.”

“No!
I mean, no, Sister Marie, you should go. You know at least some of her history, they’ll have questions. You go.”

I
bent over Sandra and send a bit more power into her eyes. “You need to go with them and you need to do what they say. I’ll come check on you later at the hospital, I promise. You have to start a new life now, honey, because you’ve got a new life to take care of. You’ve got people to help you. And you’ve got a baby to think of.” I knew some runaways ran because their parents were nightmares. But I also knew most parents of runaways lived a walking death, wondering every moment if their child was dead or alive. I added a little push to my next words. “If you know in your heart your parents love you and want you and are worried to death, you call them, you hear?”

“Okay. You promise
you’ll come to the hospital?”

“I promise.”

The stretcher rolled out the door with Sandra, baby and Sister Marie. I sat down on one of the empty cots and went limp for a minute. Then I straightened back up. I’d just helped birth a baby. Dapper Dandy Dan a/k/a Father Daniel didn’t have a prayer’s chance in hell. I whipped my phone out of the pocket of the jeans I was wearing under the habit and called Chad.

“How much of that did you get?”

“I knew there was an emergency of some sort as soon as the real Sister grabbed you and pulled you in. And I knew you
could
help, that it was the real reason we were here in the first place. Heard the ambulance coming blocks away, knew right away it was headed to the Mission. But I don’t know what kind of emergency.”

I filled him in.

“So what about our ol’ Dapper Dandy Dan?”

“Can you see if there’s a back door
?”

* * *

Talk about brass balls. Dandy Dan must have them. Through all that pandemonium with the ambulance, he was
still
out front manning the donations desk. I glanced back towards the dormitory room, making sure the curtains didn’t show any shadow behind them. All clear. I went out the door to Father Dan.

“Father, can you please come help with me something?
It won’t take a minute.”

He looked at the donations box.

“I really shouldn’t leave—”

“No problem.
We’ll just take it inside with us.” Jerk. That box might have twenty bucks in it but he couldn’t leave it for a minute to help a nun? Even if I wasn’t really a nun? This was one skip I
really
wanted to take in. I picked the box up and he followed the money like a dog following a bone.

“Okay, let’s get this done.
What do you need?”

I motioned him ahead of me towards the dormitory.

“I need help getting the cot mattress changed. The one that just had a baby delivered on it isn’t reusable, now is it?”

He turned around with a pained expression on his face, slightly green around the gills
, and started back toward the door, moving fast.

“Oh, no, not my department, that’s not my—”

I stuck my foot out and he sprawled on the floor. Chad, moving with his usual cat-like speed in such situations, appeared from behind the curtains and jerked Dan’s left hand up. He slapped a handcuff on it, grabbed his right hand and repeated the process.

“You mean it’s honest birth blood, not blood money, huh?
Well, you’re right about one thing. Your hands really shouldn’t touch it. They’re too dirty.”

“Not
you
again?”

“Oh, yeah, Danny Boy.
It’s me.”

He hauled Dandy Dan up and we
started out the door just as two more Sisters started in.

“What in Heaven’s name is going on here? Why are you manhandling Father Dan?”

I figured I was the best person to defuse this situation. After all, we shopped at the same clothes store.

“Sisters, I’m Sister Mary Agrippa.
Did Sister Marie by any chance call in for reinforcements?”

“Why yes, she did, Sister!
And she said you were amazing! So why is Father Dan—”

“Sisters, I’m so sorry to tell you this, but Father Dan
’s been using the Mission as his front. He’s not even a priest. He’s just a bail-jumping con man who’s been using you as cover while he stole money intended to help the kids.”

“Oh, no!”
The stricken looks on their faces hurt. But then, their lives truly were based on faith. And it infuriated me all over again that Dandy Dan could do this and not even care.

“I’m sorry, Sisters.”
One look at Chad told me it hit him the same way. “But he won’t be bothering anyone for quite some time. I don’t know how much is in his donations box over there, but whatever it is, at least your work’ll get some of his collection efforts.”

“
No!
” Dandy Dan didn’t look slightly green around the gills now. He looked
really
green.

“Oh?” Chad’s eyebrow raised.
“Maybe you’d better check that box, Sisters.”

“Oh, but should we?
Take tainted money?”

I moved to the box and grabbed the lid.
“Best way under Heaven to
untaint
it, Sister.” I looked down and my eyes widened. “Oh. My. God.”

Dandy Dan groaned.
Chad shuffled him over and looked down. He laughed.

“So, Father Dan.
You laundering drug money or you running bets?” The box held five big bundles of hundred dollar bills. Not a fortune, but enough for the Mission not to worry over the food bill for a while. Or any other bill.

“But we can’t take that! It’s not ours! And it’s—it’s—”

“If not the Mission’s, then whose is it?” I asked.

“And who would you give it back to?” Chad added.

“They’ll kill me over that money!” yelled Dan.

“Oh dear, we can’t put anyone in danger—”

“He exaggerates, Sister.
He’ll be in a nice, safe jail. Who’ll hurt him?” asked Chad.

“Well,
the roof is in very bad shape, but—”

“Fix the roof, Sister.
And feed the kids well.”

* * *

“I dread telling Sister Marie I was a fake,” I said, walking down the hall of the maternity ward of the South Central Medical Center.

“You’re lots of things, baby g
irl, but fake ain’t one of ‘em. Here it is.” He stopped in front of Room 577. We knocked on the semi-open door and were hailed in.

“Yes?” Sister Marie came toward us.
“I’m sorry, do I know—” She broke off and looked at my eyes. “Sister Mary Agrippa.”

“Not exactly.
I mean, not only. I mean—”

“Child.
Hush. Today you were Sister Mary Agrippa. And you did a great thing. Sister Grace and Sister Therese called and filled me in this afternoon about Father Dan. We do carry cell phones, you know.” She pulled hers out of the pocket of her habit. “Impossible to stay in touch and coordinate all our work in today’s world without them. It crossed my mind that as you left with the gentleman escorting Father Dan to the authorities, you might be with him.”