Forsaken (30 page)

That she couldn’t argue with. If she worked at the coffee shop like Simi, she sure wouldn’t have gotten clawed up by an espresso machine.

“What about your people?” she asked. “Where they trappers?”

He shook his head. “Didn’t trap demons, only small varmints. Too busy runnin’ bootleg whiskey and tryin’ to stay out of jail. I’m the first one in the family.”

“They must be proud of you.”

“Not to hear them tell it.”

*   *   *

When Beck set
the carryout bag on the kitchen table, he hesitated.

“Which chair can I sit in?” he asked.

“That one,” she said, pointing at hers.

He reached for it and then changed his mind. “I better wash up first,” he said. As he walked down the hall toward the bathroom, he stripped off his T-shirt. He wasn’t just singed. There was a big red burn between his shoulder blades, intersected by newly healed claw marks.

“Beck?”

“Yeah?” he called out.

“We need to treat your back.”

“Nah, it’s okay.”

She fished a bottle of Holy Water out of his duffel bag, checked the label to ensure it was fresh, and then wedged herself in the doorway of the bathroom so he couldn’t escape.

He saw the look in her eyes. “That bad?”

“Not good.”

He blew a stream of air out of his lips. “Sink or tub?”

“Tub.”

She used the entire bottle on his back and shoulders as he bent over the bathtub to keep the Holy Water from going everywhere. Some got in his hair, but he didn’t seem to mind. From her vantage point she could tell he definitely had muscles in all the right places. Simi would say he was hunkalicious, but this was Beck after all.

“Those claw marks,” she said. “You got them the night Dad died, didn’t you?”

He stood up, swiping damp hair off from his forehead. “Yeah,” he said softly.

“You kept Dad from being…”
Eaten.

“He’d have done the same for me.”

“Thanks.” He shrugged like it was no big deal. She couldn’t push it much further or he’d get more uncomfortable, and that usually made him surly. She loaned him one of her dad’s T-shirts and tossed his in the garbage.

Famished, Riley attacked the chicken, the sweet corn, and the mashed potatoes with a vengeance. It was as good as her companion had promised.

“This is great stuff,” she said, wiping barbecue sauce off her face. “It’s really hot. I like it that way.”

“Best in Atlanta,” he replied. “I’ll take ya there when Mama’s workin’. She really likes me.”

“You charmed her on purpose, didn’t you?”

“Never piss off the people who feed ya. I learned that in the Army.”

It was an opening she’d not expected, a chance to learn more about him.

“What was it like over there?” she quizzed.

He didn’t answer for some time, but his eyes went distant, like he was seeing things she couldn’t hope to understand.

“I felt alive for the first time in my life. Kinda weird, if ya think about it, what with all that dyin’ around me. Somehow I knew I was supposed to be there to help those guys. Get a few of them home in one piece, not in some body bag.”

“Dad said it was hard on you, that you changed.”

Beck rubbed his chin. “Ya see so much. I was young and I didn’t know how to handle it.”

“You’re still young,” she said. “You’re not that much older than me.”

“I don’t feel like it,” he admitted. “Never really had a chance to be a kid.”

“Do you regret going over there?” she asked, wondering what sort of hell he’d endured.

“Some nights, when the dreams won’t leave me be.” Beck slowly pulled his eyes up to hers. “Other times, no. I don’t fear dyin’ now, not like some. I’ve seen it too many times.”

“Why trap demons?” she quizzed.

A faint smile came to his face. “Because of yer daddy.”

“Like me, then,” she said.

“It’s a good enough reason.”

He rose and headed for the couch. Instead of stretching out like she thought he would, he began to dig inside his duffel bag, carefully laying out different colored magical spheres on the seat cushions.

“Come here,” he said, beckoning. “I’ll give ya the quick and dirty on these things. Just act surprised when Harper does all this, okay?”

“It’ll be our secret,” she promised.

The spheres ranged in size from a golf ball to a grapefruit on steroids. There was every color you could think of—white for the snow globes, clear for the Holy Water, blue for the grounding spheres, purple for Babel spheres, and so on. He explained each one in detail, then put them back in the duffel bag.

“That wasn’t so hard,” she said, sucking on the last of her iced tea. It was more syrup than tea, just the way she liked it.

“We’re not done.” Beck dropped his hand into the bag and pulled out a blue sphere. “Quick, what is it?”

“Ah … ah…” she struggled.

“Think! The demon is fixin’ to nail ya, and yer not givin’ me an answer.”

“Babel sphere?” she guessed, then winced.
Wrong!

“Babel spheres are purple.” He handed it to her. “This is a groundin’ sphere. It pulls a Geo-Fiend into the earth so it can’t summon weather or make earthquakes.”

“It didn’t work for Dad.”

“It did. The demon got lucky.”

He pulled out another sphere.

This one she knew. “White. It’s for Firebugs.”

“That was too easy.” Another appeared in his hand.

Red.
“Ah … oh, Lord.” This was hard.

“A shield sphere,” he said.

And so it went until she could pretty much identity each sphere for its properties and use. Whites went up, the rest went down. Blues needed to contact metal. Purples needed to land at the demon’s feet. Reds only lasted a short time.

“Did Dad ever say anything to you about the Holy Water?” she asked, holding up one of the spheres.

“Only that he was worried that it wasn’t workin’ as well as it used to on some of the demons.”

“What kind of demons?”

“Threes. Why ya askin’?”

She waved him off. “Just wondering.”

He returned the orbs to the bag and zipped it shut. “Ya still confused about the spheres?”

“Yeah. Were you at first?”

“Got it right off,” he said. “No sweat.”

“You lie!”

A boyish grin told her she was right. Then he set a small box on the couch between them.

Riley stared at it then up at him. “For me?”

When he issued a quick nod, her heart rate sped up. There was no writing on the box, so she had no clue what might be inside. It could be something really neat.

The moment the lid came off, she gasped. A long black demon claw sat inside. The top of it was captured with silver wire and it had a thick chain curled up behind it.

“Is this…” she asked with a slight shiver.

“Yeah, it’s the one out of yer leg,” he admitted. “I asked a friend of mine to make it so ya could wear it. I hope ya like it.”

In some perverse way, she did. A lot. When she looked up at Beck, concern covered his face. This really did matter to him.

Riley looped it over her neck and then held it away from her body so she could see it. The claw looked scary close up, just like its former owner.

“It’s awesome, Beck!”

His expression relaxed. He acted like he wanted to say something more but then shook his head. Standing, he put the strap of the duffel bag on his shoulder and scooped up his coat with his free hand.

“Take a trip to the market tonight. Introduce yourself to the witches who make these puppies,” he said, tapping the side of the bag. “They’ll tell ya how the spheres work.”

“But what about Dad?” she asked, confused. She’d need to be at the graveyard in an hour.

“I’ll watch him ’til ya get there.”

As he reached the door she called out, “Beck?” He turned around, reminding her more of the young man who’d gone to war, not the old one who’d returned. “Thanks. For everything. I mean it.”

A slow grin edged onto his face. “You’re worth it …
Princess
.”

Her tennis shoe hit the door a second after it closed.

TWENTY-NINE

As Riley waited for Simon at the edge of Centennial Park, she tried to relax. Her back was sore from playing tag with the concrete support and she still felt scorched, though she’d washed her hair and changed clothes. No wonder trappers bought most of their threads secondhand: they had the shelf life of fresh oysters. Riley returned her attention to the nest of papers in her lap. If her father had one weakness, it was details. Riley only wanted to see the bigger picture, not the complete history of Holy Water since the dawn of time. She wanted to know why he was interested in the topic, but so far she’d not found anything that answered that question. One thing came through clearly in his notes—her dad was worried.

Frustrated at her lack of progress, she jammed the papers into her messenger bag. Her hand trailed up to the chain that secured the demon claw. She’d pulled it out a couple of times to look at it, marveling how really neat it was, but then hid it again. Metal was valuable and it wouldn’t be smart to let anyone know she was wearing some. The silver in the chain and the wrapping was the good stuff, the kind her mom used to have before they had to sell it to help pay for her chemotherapy.

“I bet this was way expensive,” she mused. She still couldn’t believe he’d done it.
I guess I really don’t know him that well.

The whole afternoon felt different, like aliens had kidnapped Backwoods Boy and rewired him to be nice. He’d acted like he wanted to be with her, laughed at her jokes, didn’t make her feel like she was being goofy at all. He’d even taught her how to trap a Firebug.

Hope it lasts.
It’d be good to have him as a friend, maybe even a trapping partner once she made journeyman.

Simon, however, fell into a different category altogether.
Oh yeah.

She looked up to see him approaching on the brick sidewalk, his eyes skimming the ground. He moved deliberately, as is he were thinking through some deep problem and was only vaguely aware of his surroundings. He’d sounded only half interested when she’d invited him to join her tonight. Initially she’d panicked, thinking he was growing tired of her, but that worry vanished when he’d agreed to see her.

As he grew closer, she called out, “Hi there!”

He shrugged. The Silent Order of Simons was back.

And they think girls are moody.

“Hey, no fair being so quiet,” she nudged.

He looked embarrassed for a second. “Sorry.”

Riley took his hand and squeezed it. When he didn’t return the gesture, she dropped it. For a half second she wondered if she’d done something to tick him off, but she couldn’t think of anything. This was just Simon. Sometimes he was fun, sometimes he was silent.

“What did Harper do to you?” he asked in a voice so quiet she almost didn’t hear him.

“Yelled a lot.”

“That’s it?”

“Yes,” she lied.

A relieved sigh. “Keep out of his reach. He’ll beat you for no reason,” Simon warned.

“You?”

“All his apprentices,” he said, then fell silent again.

As they walked into Centennial Park she forced her mind to happier times as a counterweight to grim reality. When she was little, Riley’s parents would tote her downtown to play in the five fountains, which were laid out in interconnecting rings like the Olympic logo. In the summer when it was blistering hot, the park was always crowded. Vendors sold kosher beef hot dogs, vegetable samosas, and root beer floats. This place was all about good memories.

Despite her companion’s uncomfortable silence, she couldn’t help but share that feeling. She gave him a playful hip-bump.

“My parents used to bring me here when I was a kid. I loved jumping around in the fountains.”

To her relief, Simon roused from his melancholy. “Mine did, too. We’d run around for a couple of hours then pile in the car and fall asleep. Mom and Dad appreciated the quiet since there were so many of us.”

Riley looked longingly at the water spraying high in the air toward the evening sky. The lights were on tonight, making the droplets sparkle like diamonds. As they walked by the nearest jet she pushed Simon closer to it. He yelped in surprise as the water hit him and then charged after her. She tried to run but her thigh wasn’t cooperating.

“Got you!” he laughed and grabbed on to her. He lifted her up and spun her around. When her feet were on the ground, he wore a smile. It made her feel good again.

When they broke apart, Simon caught her hand and held it tight.

“Thanks,” he said. “I take myself too seriously sometimes.”

“Only sometimes?” she jested. “You’d make a great monk. You’re good with the silent bit.”

“I thought about the priesthood,” he admitted, “but I decided I’d rather hunt demons. That way I can marry, have kids.” He looked over at her, like he was judging her reaction.

“How many?” she asked.

“Three, maybe four. More than that is too many, unless you have a lot of bathrooms.”

You’d make a good dad.

They paused at the edge of the Terminus Market. It was barely after dark and the market was growing more active, like a bear stirring out of hibernation. The lights made the multicolored tents glow like giant Christmas bulbs. Her dad had claimed it wasn’t like it used to be, as if that was a good excuse for not bringing her here.

She remembered mostly baked goods and craft items, but now there was a bit of everything in row upon row of tents, lean-tos, and camping trailers. People wandered from vendor to vendor, toting items they’d purchased—used tires, homemade bread, a basket of apples. There was a white nanny goat and its owner was milking it into a shiny pail. Riley gave Simon a puzzled look.

“He sells the milk,” he said.

“Isn’t that against the rules?”

“Yes, but the city ignores what goes on down here. As long as the stall fees are paid, they’re happy.”

As they passed a shop that sold jerky, Simon shuddered. “I don’t trust that stuff,” he confided in a lowered voice. “The guy says it’s beef, but you never know.”

“Well, it won’t be rat,” she said. “The Threes eat all of those.”