Dirty Magic (32 page)

“Hello, Kate.”

My feet froze to the ground. For a moment, all I could do was stare. Volos stood on the far side of Danny’s bed, holding my brother’s hand as though he belonged there.

The instant my brain snapped out of it, my gun was in my hand and pointed at Volos’s chest. “Get the fuck away from him.”

His hands didn’t tremor as they rose. “Easy there.”

“I said get away from him.” My voice was permafrost on the air.

Footsteps squeaked down the linoleum hallway. “Officer Prospero?” the head nurse called.

“Call security,” I said quietly without taking my eyes off Volos.

“I thought you were security.” Volos smiled. “Put down the gun. You know I wouldn’t hurt either of you. In fact, I’ve come to offer my help.”

I stared hard at his innocent expression for a full fifteen seconds. I knew better than to trust that poker face, but I was also extremely curious to hear how and why he was offering help. Finally, I looked over my shoulder. “Leave us.”

The shuffling of reluctant feet followed. Volos and I stared at each other across my brother’s silent form until we were again alone.

“What do you want?”

“Won’t you lower the weapon?”

“No.”

“Fair enough.” The corners of his lips lifted. “But if you’re going to shoot—” He unbuttoned the top few buttons of his shirt. The top of what looked like a stretchy black undershirt peeked out between the widened collars. “You’re going to want to aim for my face.”

I frowned at him. “What the fuck is that?”

“Bulletproof fabric.”

It looked a lot like the same fabric that made up the patch Mez had given us to wear for the tunnel raid. “Why are you wearing it here?”

“Says the woman pointing a gun at me.” He tapped it with his knuckles. At my narrowed eyes, he sighed. “Let’s just say some of my former colleagues aren’t exactly my biggest fans.” He smiled tightly. “I’m sure you understand.”

“What do you want?”

“To help you.”

My eyes narrowed. “Why?”

He straightened himself as though my suspicion ruffled his feathers. “Recent events notwithstanding, we once were very close.” He cleared his throat. “More to the point”—he glanced at Danny with a look bordering on warmth—“I have always had an affinity for the kid.”

A heavy weight settled on my chest. It had been so long since I’d thought about the good times. Back before Mom died, when John and I were still in love. We used to take Danny to get ice cream from the cart on Canal Street. Once, when Danny dropped his cone in the gutter, John bought him two more to get him to stop crying.

I clenched my jaw against the memories. They were dangerous.
He
was dangerous. “Just say your piece and get out.”

The skin around his eyes tightened. Volos wasn’t used to being spoken to like that. From what I’d seen of this slick, new CEO persona, he commanded ultimate respect at all times.

He tilted his head. “Where’s this hostility coming from? You know damned well I had nothing to do with this mess.”

“Doesn’t mean you’re innocent or that I trust you.”

“Trust … right. You know a lot about that.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

He ignored my question. “Let’s put our past aside for the moment and focus on Danny. What Bane did was beyond a crime.” He paused, letting it hang there just long enough to pique my interest. “I may have access to a remedy for your brother’s ailment.”

“He doesn’t have an ailment.” My stomach clenched like a fist. “He’s brain-dead because of a fucking dirty potion.”

He made a noncommittal gesture as if I were splitting hairs. “Regardless, it’s clear conventional medicine and clean magic aren’t the proper tools.”

“Are you saying I should employ illegal dirty magic to cure my brother when it was illegal dirty magic that harmed him in the first place?” It was so ridiculous that I laughed bitterly. “You’ve got balls, I’ll give you that.”

“What I am saying is that sometimes you have to fight dirty with more dirty.” He raised his hands in a pleading gesture. “He’s not going to recover without it, Kate. You know that.”

“More to the point, what makes you so sure of that? Maybe you’re in bed with Bane.”

“That’s your stupid stubborn pride talking.” He smiled sadly. “You know I’m as much a target for Bane as you are.”

“So if you didn’t cook it, how could you possibly know where to get the antipotion?”

He watched me quietly for the span of three heartbeats. “I may be out of the dirty magic trade, but old training dies hard. Once I saw what Gray Wolf did to people, I decided to start gathering materials to see if I could work out an antipotion.”

Something clicked. “Wait. Is that why you received the shipment of oil of rose quartz?”

He nodded. “That’s also why I ordered the oil instead of distilling it myself. I knew it was only a matter of time until Bane made his big move.”

I stared at him as a million questions and thoughts tripped over themselves in my head. I must have stayed quiet too long because he shifted uncomfortably. “So you figured it out?”

He grimaced. “It’s not progressing as quickly as I’d hoped. I never had your talent for breaking down the recipes of existing potions.” He let it hang there, like a hook with a juicy worm.

“Surely you have access to wizards who can help you—”

“No one I trust. If word gets to Bane that I’m working on an antipotion, he’s bound to do something desperate.”

“So if you don’t have the antipotion to offer, what are you doing here?”

“I want you to help me cook it.”

My stomach pitched south. “Fuck you.”

“Kate,” he said, coming toward me, “you know that between the two of us we’ll figure out the cure for Danny.”

I shook my head rapidly, as if I could knock his words free of my ears. “I can’t.”

He frowned. “I get it. You’re a little rusty. It’ll come back.”

I held up my hands. “No, you don’t get it. I don’t cook anymore.” I looked him in the eye. “Ever.”

His mouth fell open. “You’re joking.”

I pointed at my brother, who looked like the poster boy for desperate cases. “Do you honestly think I would joke about something that could save his life?”

John’s mouth snapped shut. “I don’t—I had no idea you didn’t cook at all.”

I crossed my arms protectively and looked away from the mix of curiosity and concern in his blue gaze.

“Surely you’d make an exception here.”

I shook my head. “Magic did this to him, John. I’m not going to multiply the crime by cooking dirty in some vain hope of curing him.”

He ran a hand through his hair. “I—okay, I can maybe figure something out. It’ll take some time, though, Kate.”

I shook myself. “I didn’t say I’d let you give him a potion whether I helped cook it or not.”

“Why the hell not?”

“Because I don’t think I could afford the price you’d ask in exchange.”

“I don’t want your fucking money.”

I looked him hard in the eye. “It’s not money I’m worried about. It’s the inevitable favors.”

His jaw hardened like I’d offended him. “What have I done that you would think so little of me?” he asked quietly. “You left me, remember?”

I crossed my arms and glared at him.

“I don’t want anything from you. I just want to help the kid.” He sighed. “For his sake, I hope you’ll put your pride aside sooner rather than later.”

“Don’t hold your breath.”

He turned to look at my brother’s pale, expressionless face. “Eventually you’ll realize that even if you catch Bane, he’ll never give up the formula for the antipotion. Or maybe Danny will take a turn for the worse. Or maybe the money for his care will run out.”

I swallowed hard. It had run out before it began, hadn’t it?

“Or you’ll just run out of hope.” He looked up then, straight into my eyes. “And when that happens, you’ll have no choice.”

I pointed a trembling hand toward the door. “Get out.”

“Kate—”

“Get out!” I screamed. My weapon was in my hand again without me realizing I’d drawn it. “
Get out!
”

He held up his hands and scooted toward the door. Just outside, the nurses were running again along with a couple of security guards.

“I’ll be waiting for your call.” With that, he ducked past the security guards and nurses who had congregated at the door. The instant his blond head disappeared into the crowd, I sagged against the bed. I looked over at the gray face of my sixteen-year-old brother and felt the fragile facade I’d been maintaining shatter into a million pieces.

“What are we going to do, Danny?” I whispered. “What the fuck are we going to do?”

B
y noon, I was on my way to the gym. Heading there had been a decision motived by two factors.

First, Baba had returned with four women who looked old enough to be Methuselah’s aunts. The group often got together for such activities as quilting, making scrapbooks, and casting revenge spells under the full moon. I guess after Baba told them what happened to Danny, they’d decided it was a good idea to sit vigil around him and chant to Hekate for a quick recovery.

I hadn’t pointed out that some stupid chants weren’t going to fix my brother, but I didn’t argue with them about their plans. If chanting helped Baba feel less desperate about Danny’s situation, I wouldn’t stop her from finding the solace that I’d been unable to find. I had escaped as quickly as possible before they started drawing pentagrams from the salt packets they’d stolen from the hospital cafeteria.

The second reason I headed to the gym had been the conversation with Volos. After I’d calmed down a little, I realized he’d been right about one thing. The doctors at the hospital couldn’t cure Danny. They could keep him alive and somewhat comfortable—if you considered a coma cozy. But they had no idea how to reverse a dirty magic potion that combined blood magic with alchemy. What I needed was a wizard who knew a thing or two about street magic and had access to samples of Gray Wolf to analyze. And the only person who fit that description besides John Volos was Mesmer.

Luckily, I found him working alone in his lab. When I reached the top step, he poked his head around the divider and his face morphed into a smile. “Kate!”

“Hey, man.” I looked around at the empty gym. “Where is everyone?”

That day his dreads were back to their normal dark brown color, but his eyes were different. I squinted at them for a moment before I realized his irises were vibrant violet instead of the typical chocolate brown. He was also wearing eyeliner.

He sighed. “Morales and Shadi are working with the BPD to figure out where the hell Bane went. And Gardner is in Detroit trying to convince the ASAC not to pull the plug on the whole operation.”

I reared back, eyes wide. “What’s an ASAC and why would they pull the plug?”

“Assistant Special Agent in Charge, aka Gardner’s boss,” he explained. “And he’s pissed because the mayor’s raising hell about the clusterfuck in the tunnels.”

“Shit,” I said. “What a fucking mess.”

“No shit, sister. What brings you in?”

I hesitated, trying to figure out the right tone to use for my request. “I need to talk to you about something, actually.”

His brows rose in curiosity. “Oh?” He waved a gallant hand toward the lab. “In that case, please step into my laboratory, madam.” He pronounced it la-
bore
-atory, like someone from an old Frankenstein movie.

Once we were inside, my eyes automatically went to the shelf of beakers and Erlenmeyer flasks and burners. A mustard-yellow liquid boiled furiously in the largest of these and choked out a noxious rotten-egg scent. “What are you cooking?”

He shrugged. “It’s a little something I’m trying out. A potion that changes colors when it’s exposed to a person’s personal scent profile. I’m calling it K9 for now because it works kind of the way a dog tracks scent in the field.”

“Huh,” I said, impressed. “You thinking it’ll help track down Bane?”

He blew air from between his lips. “I have to get the formula figured out first. I tried it on a piece of pH paper yesterday and the stuff caught on fire.”

“Ouch,” I said. “Back to the drawing board, huh?”

He laughed. “Something like that. So,” he prompted, “what were you going to ask me?”

I crossed my arms and leaned back against the counter. The move jostled a test tube, which rolled toward the edge like a convict hell-bent on escape. I caught it a split second before it could shatter on the floor. “Oops,” I said with a self-conscious laugh. “Sorry about that.”

Mez shot me a worried look. “Everything okay?” He came forward to take the tube from me. He showed me the label on the side. I’d almost dropped a tube filled with nitroglycerin. I felt myself pale. Damn, I really need to get my head in the game.

“All right,” I said finally, “here’s the deal: I’m starting to think that the chances of the docs finding a cure for Danny are zilch. Plus, now that you’ve told me the ASAC is thinking of pulling the team out, the hope of catching Bane and forcing him to give us the antipotion is nil.”

He chewed on his bottom lip. “You don’t know that.”

I shot him a frank look that had him glancing down, almost as an apology for insulting my intelligence with platitudes. “So it comes down to finding the antipotion some other way.”