House of the Rising Sun (16 page)

He sat back, nodding slowly and keeping his voice calm just like he used to when his mother yelled at him. Except with her it never worked. “I am very sorry to have upset you. Trust me when I tell you my responsibility in this will be a burden I carry the rest of my life.”

Her glare sharpened. “I am not my mother. You can’t charm me into forgiving this.”

He held his hands up. There was only so much he could take. “I’ll get out of your house as soon as I can.” Beatrice would just have to deal with him being there earlier than anticipated. Good thing he’d already spoken to her.

She grabbed the bag and upended it onto the coffee table. Chest heaving, she ripped one glove off and planted her hand squarely on the vampire’s leather jacket. “There. Happy? I can’t sense a damn—”

Her eyes rolled back in her head and she jerked hard like she’d grabbed a live wire. A second later, she collapsed onto the couch behind her.

“Lally!” Augustine flew to Harlow’s side, his fingers pressing her neck for a pulse even though he could hear it pounding. He shook her gently. “Harlow, are you all right?”

Lally ran in. “What happened?”

“I don’t know. She grabbed that leather jacket to see if she could read anything off it and then she passed out.”

“I’ll call the doctor.”

As Lally rushed toward the door, Harlow let out a soft
breathy sigh followed by a moan. A faint sheen of sweat covered her brow.

“Wait, I think she’s coming to. Get a cold cloth maybe.” With a nod, Lally left.

Harlow moaned again, this time lifting her hand to her head. “What happened?”

He sat back to give her space. And to avoid being in striking distance. “You touched the jacket and had some kind of seizure.”

She blinked a few times like she was trying to focus. “My head is killing me.”

“Did you get some kind of read off it? Is that what happened?”

She put her hand over her eyes and slowly rolled her head back and forth. “I have no idea. The last thing I remember is…” She moved her hand and her gaze locked on him. Anger suffused her amber eyes with an uncomfortable darkness. “You telling me how you were responsible for my mother’s death.”

“You have to know I feel awful about that, Harlow. I would give anything to undo what happened. Anything. My own life. It’s why I agreed to be the Guardian. To make things right.” He sighed. “That’s why I need your help.”

Lally came in with a damp cloth. “Here, child, put this on your forehead.”

Harlow accepted it, but just held it as she pushed herself up to sit. She squeezed the washcloth while she stared at the jacket on the coffee table. He stayed quiet, waiting for her to speak next.

When she did, it was without looking at him and in a frighteningly even tone. “What do you think happened when I touched that jacket?”

“I have no idea. I don’t have any haerbinger blood; I don’t know what it’s like to get visions and feel things that belong to someone else.”

Lally cleared her throat softly. “But we know someone who does.”

He and Harlow looked at her at the same time.

Lally answered without either of them having to ask. “Dulcinea.”

Augustine left Harlow to rest and went to find Dulcinea. On a drizzly, gray day like this there was no certain place she might be. Tourists would be keeping dry, so there’d be little business for her in Jackson Square. For as long as he’d known her, she’d never had a physical address. Even after they’d both left the street life behind—he to move into Livie’s and Dulcinea to start her fortune-telling business—her home base had remained a mystery. He had a sneaking suspicion that most nights she turned into a cat and holed up in someone’s garden.

Parking was a lost cause, but then he remembered money wasn’t an issue anymore. He drove into the nearest parking garage, flashing the credit screen from his LMD for the attendant at the gate. The man scanned the bar code and motioned him forward without a hitch. Augustine let out the breath he’d been holding. Damn, that was nice. Being flush would take some getting used to.

He found her at Stella’s telling fortunes at a back booth and sipping an Abita. The place was crowded with tourists avoiding the weather, turning it into a sauna of beer fumes and stale bodies. He wished his fae senses had an off button.

She grinned widely the moment he walked into her field of vision. “Gussie!”

“Hey, Dulce.” He let the nickname slide since he was about to ask her two big questions. “You have a minute?”

“For you I have lots of them.” She looked at the patron across
from her, jerked her thumb toward the exit and said, “Scram or I’ll put a hex on you.”

Wide-eyed, the balding and slightly inebriated tourist scooted out of the booth as fast as he could. Augustine took his spot. “Since when do you put hexes on people?”

“Since never, but you know tourists. Witch, fae fortune-teller, voodoo priestess… eh, we’re all the same.” She drained her Abita. “How’s life as my favorite Guardian? I’m digging the new blade.”

“Thanks. Being Guardian is good, I guess. That’s part of why I’m here.”

She poked his chest. “How’s the brand healing up?”

He stared at her. “How do you know about that?”

Shrugging, she gave him a typical Dulcinea grin. “I know lots of stuff.”

“I hope that’s true, because I have a situation I need help with.” He explained what had happened with Harlow, skipping the part about the
Nokturnos
kiss. “What’s it sound like to you?”

Dulcinea twisted so that her back was against the outside wall and her feet flat on the booth seat. She wiggled her fingers at the bartender, then pointed to her empty bottle. “She wears gloves all the time?”

“All the time.”

“How long has she worn them?”

“I don’t know but judging by how she talks, I’d say most of her life.”

Dulcinea rapped her fingers slowly on the tabletop as she thought. “Sounds like a combination of things. One, she never learned to use her abilities, and two, she’s deprived herself of touch for so long that even the slightest bit creates a much greater impression now. She’s made things worse for herself, not better.”

That might explain a little about why she’d reacted so
strongly to his kiss. “Do you think she’s capable of seeing something from the jacket?”

“I do, but you’re never going to get it out of her if it’s so overwhelming it blanks her out. My guess is there’s probably a time frame to her reading objects. Too many days go by and the piece loses whatever was connected to it.” The bartender dropped off a fresh beer and picked up the empty. Dulce twisted again, this time to face Augustine. “I know you need that information, but she’s going to be gun-shy about trying it again. If she’ll even consider it.”

“I don’t think she will. Not without some kind of serious persuasion. All she really wants is me out of her mother’s house.” He shrugged. “It’s fine. It’s not my house and she’s got every right to kick me out. Besides, I have a place to go, so it’s not a big deal.” He sighed, thinking how much he’d screwed things up. “But yeah, I need that info. You have any suggestions?”

“Actually, I do. Let me be the buffer.”

“In what way?”

“I put my hands on the jacket, then she puts her hands on me. It’s pretty clear we share the haerbinger gene and you know how like-kind fae can sometimes magnify each other’s powers.”

“But don’t they usually have to be related for that to work?”

“Not always.” She raised her brows. “What do you think? Will she go for that?”

He honestly had no idea. “It’s worth a shot. You willing to come back to the house with me right now?”

She held her hands up and looked around the bar. “And give all this up?” She laughed. “You know I’m in.”

He laughed, too. “Thanks, Dulce. I owe you.”

“Yeah, you do.” She took a long swig from her beer.

“You’re right, which probably means it’s not a great time to ask my second question, but I’m going to anyway.”

She slouched in the seat, eyes twinkling with curiosity.
“Feeling frisky, is that it? I know rainy days were made for getting naked and sweaty, but I think it’s better if we left that part of our relationship in the past.”

He held his hands up. “Agreed. We’re much better as friends.” Some things weren’t meant to be repeated. “I was going to ask if you would help me with this Guardianship.”

She wiggled back to an upright position. “When have I not helped you? What do you need?”

He looked her straight in the eyes, mustered all the sincerity he could so she would understand exactly how much he wanted this. Then, for added insurance, rested his hand over the top of hers knowing the contact would let her feel how serious he was. “I want you to be one of my lieutenants.”

Her mouth dropped open.

It wasn’t a no, so he kept going. “You can live in the Guardian’s house with me and Beatrice, she’s Khell’s widow—she’s going to be one of my lieutenants, too—I’ve already worked it out. I need people I can trust. People that want to clean things up as much as I do, who love this city and want the best for it. And I know you feel that way because—”

“I think you’ve forgotten one thing.” She slipped her hand out from under his.

“What’s that?”

She picked at the label on her beer bottle. “I’m a remnant of indiscriminate origin. I have no idea what my bloodlines are except that they’re fae
and
varcolai.”

“So?”

“So the Elektos aren’t going to like you putting a remnant in a position of power. Especially not one with my record.”

“Screw the Elektos. I have final say on who’s a lieutenant and who’s not. And I say you’re in. If you want to be.” He’d ask Fenton about expunging her record, too. She’d like that.

She smiled, nodding slowly. “All right then. I’m down. Do I
get a sword, too? I could totally rock a sword. Or one of those stun sticks? Oh, what about a company car?”

“Maybe to some of it.” He laughed. “I actually don’t know. They
did
give me a vehicle to use.” He paused for effect. “It came with the job.”

“Not Khell’s old ride.” Her gaze moved toward the door like she expected it to be parked out front.

“The very same one.”

Her fingers stilled, a strip of label in between them. “The Tesla?”

He sat back and grinned.

Her eyes widened in shock. “Holy cats. I want to drive it.”

“I wasn’t under the impression you had a license.”

“I don’t, but I’m a lieutenant now. The law can’t touch me.” She threw her head back and cackled, then gave him a wink as she slid out of the booth. “C’mon, let’s go see little Miss Repressed Abilities about this jacket so we can start staking some vampire ass.”

H
arlow woke to find her hand still tingling with pins and needles. She checked the clock. She’d slept for about an hour, but the nap hadn’t done much toward helping her make a decision about trying to read the jacket again. Knowing what might lie ahead of her, she got up, went into the bathroom and splashed some cold water on her face.

But finding the nerve to do what needed to be done was going to take more than cold water. She clenched and unclenched her fist trying to work out the numbness as she walked a path into the carpet of her room. She never should have agreed to touch the jacket but Augustine was after her mother’s killer. That wasn’t something she’d stand in the way of.

Usually when it came to touch, she put up her personal firewall and went on the defensive, but this time, right before she’d touched the leather she’d decided to treat it like a system she was trying to hack, opening herself up in a way she’d never done before.

Bad idea.

She’d never expected to take such a surge. It had shaken her, hard. More than that, the split second of information she’d received before she’d passed out had jolted her heart, caused her brain to go nova and made her feel like she was dying.

And she was going to have to do it again.

Because no matter how she felt about Augustine, which wasn’t all that clear, or how damaged her relationship with
Olivia had been, her mother was still her mother. And maybe it was petty, but Harlow wanted the bastard who’d murdered her mother to pay, even if she had to use Augustine to do it.

If the killer had been a corporation, she would have hacked in and deleted his client files or locked up accounts or created some other kind of havoc, but this was something so physical that it would take a brute like Augustine.

Someone who wasn’t afraid to get dirty or spill blood. Someone who could take charge and do unspeakable things.

She stopped pacing to sit on the bed, fanning at the sudden warmth creeping over her skin. As if the idea of Augustine doing such things was somehow… attractive. Or maybe it was Augustine himself. No
freaking
way. Why did her stupid fae side have to get all worked up over him? That’s what had gotten her into trouble during
Nokturnos
. If only she’d picked a human guy to kiss. There must be some weird fae connection thing that made her feel that way. Like-attracting-like kind of thing. That was the only reasonable explanation for the way he… drew her to him. Or maybe it was none of that and what she was feeling was just animalistic bloodlust born out of her desire for revenge.

She liked that better, actually. Because there was nothing appealing about her mother’s feckless house companion, no matter how good a kisser he was. Except that he wasn’t really all that feckless since he’d taken on the Guardianship and pledged to protect everyone in the city.

Like a freaking superhero.

She glanced down at her tablet, where the latest issue of
The Dagger
had recently been delivered. It was currently her favorite graphic novel and not just because the Dagger was a total badass who took no prisoners as he defended Mecropolis, but also because the Dagger’s sidekick, Perl, was a computer whiz and unnaturally beautiful in the way only chicks in comics could be.

“Snap out of it,” she told herself. “You are not Perl and Augustine is not the Dagger.” Even if he had started wearing a sword on his hip. As far as she was concerned Augustine was barely a butter knife. She looked at the tablet’s dark screen, her face reflecting back at her. Maybe she had been living alone too long. Maybe online friends
really
weren’t a substitute for real-life friends.

She sat on the edge of the bed and put her head into her hands. At least the headache was almost gone. “Just go downstairs and do it. Read the jacket, find out where the vampires are and tell Augustine.” It would hurt again, but so what, right? What was a little pain for that kind of information?

Maybe too much to bear, that’s what. Especially when that small inner voice reminded her she didn’t like uncomfortable things. Like confrontation. Or pain. She inhaled, on the verge of melting because she
was
a coward. It’s why she hid herself away. Why she’d been too afraid to face the abilities she’d been born with except for the ones that made her life easier, and why she’d been too afraid to fix things with her mother. And now too afraid to endure the pain that might provide the answers to who killed her mother.

But unlocking this new side of her ability was terrifying. She didn’t
want
to know how to access such things. Or imagine what it might do to her. All that chaotic force flowing into her, scrambling her circuits. People were dark and messy and full of emotions, not clean and simple like her precious computers.

A knock on her door startled her.

“Harlow?” Augustine’s voice.

“Yes?”

“Can I talk to you?”

She hesitated, but they’d have to have this conversation sooner or later. “Yes. Come in.”

He opened the door, concern in his eyes. “You okay?”

“I’m fine.” She looked away. She didn’t want his pity. Or to
see her reflection in his eyes. In that magnetic storm of gray-green, she looked small and useless. “I know you want me to read the jacket again.”

He held his hands up. “I do, but that whole thing did not go the way I thought it would. I’m sorry you got hurt.”

Not the response she’d expected. “Thanks.”

He shifted, staring at her like he was trying to see into her head. “Do you remember anything?”

“Just the pain.” Which was mostly true. She’d seen something, she knew that much, but those images were gone, pushed out of her head by the intense rush of pain that had followed.

“That’s what I was afraid of. Maybe…” He ran a hand through his hair, revealing the stump of one growing horn.

What would she feel if she wrapped her naked fingers around that? “You want me to try again right now, don’t you?”

He looked up. “Yes, but before you say no, hear me out. I have a friend who thinks she can help.”

“The one Lally mentioned?”

“Yes. Dulcinea.”

“How’s she going to help?”

“She’s got some haerbinger in her just like you and your mom, enough that she thinks she can act as a buffer.”

Harlow frowned. “In what way?”

“She’ll touch the jacket, then you touch her.” He shrugged. “I have no idea if it will work. You might not get anything.”

“Except what I pick up from your friend.” She shook her head. “No. I don’t want her baggage in my head. Anyone I touch, I get information from. I can’t deal with it.” Can’t. Wouldn’t. It was all the same.

He nodded like he understood, but there was no way he could really know what that intense surge felt like. “Can you just come down and talk to her?”

She looked at the clock. “We need to be at the lawyer’s office soon.”

His expression hardened. “And then you want me out. I know. And I’ll go, but first, how about some help finding the vampire that killed Olivia.” He took a breath and softened his tone. “Please.”

“I want that vampire to pay just as much as you do.” If only her cowardice weren’t making her so reluctant, but she wasn’t made of the same kind of stuff he was. “I’ll talk to your friend.
Talk.
No promises of more.”

He lifted his head a little, like he was surprised she hadn’t fought him harder. “Thank you.” He turned to go, then paused, his hand on the door frame. “Whether you like it or not, I’m coming to the services tomorrow.”

She tucked her LMD into her pocket, then pulled her gloves on. “Of course you can come. I never said you couldn’t.”

That erased some of the tension in his face. “Thank you.” But the tone of his voice made it clear that the words were a struggle to get out. So what. She wasn’t going to feel guilty about making him move out. Especially now that she knew his role in her mother’s death. At least not
that
guilty. “Dulcinea and I will be in the library when you’re ready.”

She listened to his descending footsteps, her own feet frozen to the spot. She was never going to be ready, but he wouldn’t be pushing if time wasn’t of the essence. Inhaling deeply and cursing her fae bloodlines, she forced herself down the steps to the library.

The woman waiting with Augustine gave off the kind of in-your-face fae vibe Harlow had worked her whole life to hide. It was as if the woman wanted everyone within visual range to immediately understand that not only was she fae, but she was proud of it and how dare anyone think differently. Harlow
didn’t go into the library more than a few steps, her level of discomfort clicking higher.

Augustine stood. “Harlow, this is my friend Dulcinea.”

Dulcinea wiggled her fingers. At least she had the usual five. “Hey. I hear you’ve got some real gifts, huh? But you’re not sure what to do with them.”

Harlow stiffened. “I know exactly what to do with them—keep them hidden. But I want my mother’s killer found as much as Augustine does, so I’ve agreed to try to help.”

Dulcinea made a face as she looked at Augustine. “A fae who doesn’t like being fae? Bizarro.”

The conversation made Harlow’s skin itch. “I’m barely fae. A tiny percentage from my mother.”

Dulcinea laughed and pointed at Harlow’s hands. “Babe, if it was a tiny percentage, you wouldn’t be wearing those gloves. You pass as human pretty well, though. If not for your hair and eye color, it would be pretty hard to tell. Why not dye your hair and wear colored contacts if you hate being fae so much?”

Augustine rubbed his forehead. “Dulce, leave it be. That’s none of your business.”

A shot of pleasure ran through Harlow at Augustine’s defense, but not enough to override the intrusion of Dulcinea’s question or make Harlow dislike him any less. “He’s right. It isn’t any of your business, but I’ll tell you why. I like the color of my hair.” She tousled her shaggy mop for emphasis. “As for contacts, I stare at computer screens all day, every day. They’re not practical or comfortable. Anything else?”

Dulcinea sat back down, a ghost of a smile playing on her mouth. “All right then.”

Harlow put her hands on her hips and turned her gaze to Augustine. “Can we do this?”

Looking somewhat dumbfounded by her outburst, he nodded. “Sure, but I didn’t think you wanted to.”

“I don’t, but this isn’t just some parlor game for the sake of seeing what I can do. This is about my mother. It’s important.” The sooner she did this, the sooner it would be over. She looked at the small crystal clock on the closest table. “And I need to get ready for the lawyer.”

He gestured to Dulcinea. “You know more about this than I do. What do we need to do?”

“Not much.” Dulcinea scooted forward so she could reach the leather jacket still splayed over the coffee table. “I’ll put my hands on the jacket, then Harlow, you put your hands on me and do whatever you did the last time. I should be able to control the influx of information so that you don’t have the same reaction.”

Harlow wasn’t convinced. “Have you ever done this before?”

“No, but in theory fae powers can be chained like this.”

Harlow pulled back a little. “In theory?”

Dulcinea sighed, her patience clearly wearing thin, not that Harlow cared. “It’s been done.”

Augustine nodded, looking hopeful, as he sat back down.

Dulcinea tipped her head at Harlow. “Just not with such a thinly blooded fae like you and a remnant like me.”

“What’s a remnant?”

Dulcinea shook her head. “You really don’t know much about othernaturals, do you? A remnant is someone who’s a part varcolai—that’s shifter—
and
part fae and part human. Or maybe just fae and varcolai. Basically it would be like a person’s mother was half human, half wolf varcolai and their dad was human with a quarter cypher fae in him. That kind of thing.”

Harlow felt a certain satisfaction. “So you’re a mutt.”

Dulcinea’s eyes did a weird glowy thing. “You want to see if I bite?”

Harlow ground her back teeth together. “You want to read this jacket yourself? See what information you can get without me?”

Augustine’s heavy sigh cut through the tension. “Dulce, enough, okay? Harlow, please, I need this help from you.”

“Fine.” Harlow took the chair next to the couch Dulcinea sat on. “Do you have enough control to prevent your own emotions from spilling into me, too? Because I’d prefer not to have anything
extra
in my head.”

Dulcinea held up her hands. “I’ll do what I can, but that might be stretching me a little thin. Although, I
can
guarantee you won’t get the same shock you did the first time. I have enough control over
my
abilities to prevent that.” Her lips bunched to one side. “And so would you, probably, if you practiced with them instead of pretending they didn’t exist.”

A retort danced on Harlow’s tongue but she held it back, satisfied that the great and powerful Dulcinea wasn’t that great and powerful.

“Are we ready then?” Augustine looked at Harlow, his eyes filled with hope and pain.

The guilt he must be feeling… but she shook off feeling sorry for him. He’d earned that pain. “Yes. I’m ready.”

Dulcinea pushed her sleeve up so that her arm was bare, then she put her hands on the jacket. “Let’s do this.”

Harlow stripped her gloves. “Are you sure you can’t get anything off the jacket?” Maybe she wouldn’t have to do this again after all.

Dulcinea shook her head. “I can’t read objects. Just people. And even then…” Dulcinea tilted her hand back and forth to indicate her skills weren’t all that hot. Amazing how her bluster disappeared in the face of reality. “This is all you.”

With a resigned sigh, Harlow reached out and slowly wrapped her fingers around Dulcinea’s forearm.

The visions hit a second later. More pins and needles but without the same intense pain. They hurt, but she could bear it, at least for a little while.

This time, they also weren’t the blurred mess of information they had been before. Instead they came in shadowy screenshots, pixilated images and snippets of scent and sound. Not much more readable than the first try. She concentrated harder as she realized some of the input was coming from her surroundings. She closed her eyes in an effort to narrow her focus to only what was in her head.