Romancing The Dead (27 page)

Quickly, I grabbed clothes from my dresser. Underwear and socks, cutoff jeans, and a T-shirt that asked, “Got Magick?”

Sebastian raided his side of the closet for a fresh pair of jeans and a button-down. He left it undone as we snuck out into the living room to see who the intruder was.

We spotted him peering at the hole in the living room. He pulled at some of the loose boards experimentally. “Stop that,” I shouted, thinking of the hex magic that still clung to the damage.

The intruder jumped and spun, holding the crowbar and flashlight in his hands like a weapon. In the twilight, he squinted at me.

“Garnet, is that you?”

The voice sounded familiar, though for a moment I couldn’t quite place it. Could it be my landlord? “Randy?”

Randy was in his sixties and had a full head of hair. Athletic and trim, he had intense green eyes and a handlebar mustache. With his sensible shoes and fashionable suit coat, Randy looked like a cross between an aging biker and gay guy. I always figured he might be both of those, in fact.

“Are you still living here?” he asked, sounding horrified. “And who’s this? Is this someone I should add to your lease?”

I introduced Sebastian as my fiancé. They did the manly shaking of hands.

“Congratulations,” Randy said. “I hope you two will be happy here after the remodeling.”

I looked at Sebastian. Then, I took his hand in mine. “Actually, I’m moving in with Sebastian.”

“We’ll probably look for our own place,” Sebastian said to me. Although his words were a statement, his eyebrows raised in question.

“Sure,” I agreed, while giving Sebastian’s hand that extra squeeze to tell him I’d come to a decision. “There’s no hurry. It’s very comfortable at the farm.”

We walked over to Jensen’s where Sebastian picked up his car. Our fingers entwined as we walked. The evening air was cool and smelled faintly of fish where it blew in across the lake. Nighthawks flashed through the air, gobbling mosquitoes as they flew. The car was parked in the alley behind the shop.

“So,” I said, as I got into the passenger side. “There really was a Mustang?”

“Yeah,” he said. “But I never even got in the door. Someone shot me with an arrow in the alley. ” He touched his chest as if still feeling phantom pain. “Once transfixed, I couldn’t move. They—it was a man and a woman—hauled me into a Jeep and drove off to the cemetery. The grave was already dug. I think I heard the funeral before I drifted into torpor.”

The thought of being buried alive made my skin crawl. At least Sebastian didn’t need to breathe. “I saw where you scratched the coffin.”

He nodded. “When they removed the arrow and replaced it with the stake, I had a moment to try to escape. They were too fast. Supernaturally so.”

“Yeah, Micah’s a God.”

“That would explain it,” Sebastian said with a raised eyebrow. He started up the car. We drove for a while lost in our separate thoughts.

“I’d thought you were with Blythe. Or a ghoul,” I said. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. Once I fell asleep it wasn’t so bad.”

Micah was still out there somewhere too. I was surprised he hadn’t made another move on me, actually. That thought made me nervous. He and Marge must be planning something.

“Maybe it’s time to pay Marge a visit,” I said.

I explained Marge’s connection to Micah. Sebastian got out his cell and called William to ask him to look up Marge’s address on the coven list. Mine had gotten lost with a lot of my loose papers when the tree attacked my house. Sebastian ’s copy was all the way back at his farm. “You have William on your speed dial?” I mouthed while Sebastian waited for William to find his copy. Sebastian shrugged. “He’s a good guy.”

Did I detect a note of “and he’s cute too” in Sebastian’s voice? Sebastian had once tried to use his glamour on William. I’d had to break it up before Sebastian sunk his teeth into William’s neck. “William had better not be in your little black book,” I said.

“He’s not; he’s on speed dial,” Sebastian said, his voice full of teasing.

I smacked him in the arm playfully.

“Driving,” Sebastian reminded me.

A second later, we were on our way to Marge’s house. Streetlights began flickering to life. Tree frogs chirped a chorus of goodnights. Soon we reached Marge’s house. As we pulled up, I was surprised to find her sitting on a front porch swing, reading a book.

She had one of those grand, wraparound porches on a stately, though clearly in need of minor repairs, Victorian. Paint peeled and blistered on slats, and here and there shakes had worked loose on the roof. Still, there were pots filled with flowers on the stairs, a neat lawn, and a pleasant garden filled with cheerful black-eyed Susans. My first impression of her place was much the same as it had been of her person—a little dumpy, but extremely comfortable looking.

She looked up when the car door slammed shut. Clasping the book to her chest, Marge’s eyes were wild with fear. She stood up as though looking for a place to run.

Sebastian did that creepy vampire thing and was at her side with his hands on her shoulders before I could say, “Stop her.”

I blinked.

“Uh, good. Thanks, Sebastian,” I said, as I made my way up the buckled wooden stairs.

“I’m sorry,” Marge squealed. “It was wrong, I know that now, but . . . but it was like I was under some kind of spell. He ’s so handsome and so charming, and yeah, okay, I’ve never had that kind of power and it seemed so tempting . . . ” She cowered deeper as I came face to face with her. She put the book up between us like a shield. “Just don’t hurt me.”

“You tried to kill me. You buried my boyfriend.” Now didn’t that sound strange out loud?

Marge glanced nervously up at Sebastian’s impassive face. He was doing his stony-faced, badass grimace. Marge shrank in his grip. “It wasn’t me,” she said.

“Try again,” I said, poking a finger at her Hawaiian print. “I know you’re working with Micah.”

“That’s the thing. He made me.”

“He made you?” She looked so freaked out, part of me wanted to believe her. But I couldn’t quite buy it. “I don’t think so,” I said, trying to sound like the “bad cop.” “I think you panicked when I asked you if you knew where Sebastian was and you used your magic to try to strangle me.”

“Okay, yeah, that’s true,” she admitted.

“And,” I continued, “I think
you
suggested to Micah that your cemetery would be the perfect place to entomb a vampire. I’ll bet you’re hoping to get something out of it. You made some kind of deal with Micah. The question is, what for? Love?”

“Power!” Marge said, suddenly breaking free of Sebastian.

She launched herself forward as if trying to strangle me. I flung my hands up wildly to protect myself. I grabbed hold of something just as Sebastian came up from behind and pinned her arms. Marge jerked back wildly. I heard a snap. In my hands I held the broken remains Marge’s dog pendant necklace.

Marge was still screaming heebie-jeebies and I thought she might be beginning to speak the words to a spell, so I reached for Sebastian. “Grab my hands, let’s make a circle!”

He let go of Marge, who had been wiggling out of his grasp anyway, and clasped hands with mine. I shut my eyes to visualize a bubble of steel trapping Marge and her power inside. Sebastian’s energy merged with mine with a sudden sizzling pop. I cracked an eye open to peek at him, and he flashed me a “yeah, wow!” smile. We hadn’t had that kind of connection since the night we mingled our energy together to stop the Vatican witch hunters. My magical eye saw a quicksilver sphere completely encasing Marge. She railed against it like an insane mime.

Sebastian and I stepped back to admire our handiwork. Marge’s voice even sounded muted as she continued to hurl insults at us and tell us how no force on earth could stop the ancient power of the Trickster. She pushed her arms out dramatically, like a child pretending to have superpowers, as though she was trying to funnel magic at us. The bubble didn’t even shimmer.

Sebastian rubbed his hands together. “You’d think she’d at least be making a dent. She used serious firepower to rip out of my grasp,” he said.

I looked down at the broken necklace in my hand. “I wonder . . .”

But before I could finish my thought, the screen door opened. Max appeared with two glasses of iced tea on a tray. He had a paperback novel tucked under his arm. He stopped short when he saw Sebastian and me. After looking at Marge still doing the pantomime against the invisible bubble, he turned on his heels and went back inside without a word.

“You’re not much help!” Marge screamed quietly.

I’d have to agree. I tossed the charm in my hand a few times, waiting for Marge to catch sight of it. When she saw the necklace, she halted her raving. “I don’t think you’re getting much help from any quarter right now,” I pointed out. Marge’s face crumpled. “You mean the necklace was the source of my power? But . . . but Micah said I was his protégée. He said . . .”

“He lied,” Sebastian pointed out. “You were tricked.”

“That
dog
,” Marge hissed.

“What do we do with her?” I asked Sebastian. “We can’t keep the circle up forever, not at this strength, anyway. And without the charm, she’s not much of a threat.”

Sebastian considered for a moment. “Let’s go,” he said. “The circle will fade within a day. By then, hopefully, we’ll have dealt with Micah too.”

The things Marge called us as we left scorched my ears.

Once we got back to Sebastian’s farm, I buried Micah’s charm in the cornfield to negate its energy. After I fed Barney, Sebastian treated Mátyás and me to his famous homemade stuffed peppers. As father and son had a heart -to-heart, I snuck upstairs for a long, hot shower. Exhausted, I fell into Sebastian’s bed and slept.

I woke up to the sensation of lips nibbling at my ear -lobes. “Hmmm,” I muttered sleepily, and it changed to an “Oooh!” when Sebastian’s hand cupped my breast. I pushed him away reluctantly. “Mátyás is downstairs.”

“Actually, he’s been out all night. I guess he has a new friend from that coffee shop next to your store.”

Oh my God, Izzy’s getting lucky! I rolled over and tipped Sebastian’s mouth to mine. Well then, I thought, I might as well join her. Since there were still a few hours until I had to open up the store, Sebastian and I decided to stop at our favorite breakfast place: Ella’s Deli. Ella’s Deli is probably most notable for the large carousel out front, but inside is even stranger. It ’s filled with crazy things. There are toy trains that move overhead, weird animated jugglers, and things that pop out at you when you least expect it. It’s a bit like having a kosher-style breakfast at a funhouse.

It was early enough that we had the pick of the place. I chose my favorite table, the one that showed a display of Pez dispensers under the glass top. As we pored over the menu, Sebastian’s foot slid up and down my leg. I think he just wanted a physical reminder of my presence.

After the waitress took our order, I asked, “Are you okay? Really?”

“Torpor normally revitalizes me, but I’m not usually staked through the heart.”

It was hard to believe that was only yesterday. Blood, sex, and several hours of natural sleep had brought back Sebastian ’s preternatural “togetherness.” I should be so lucky. I had bed head, resistant dirt under my broken fingernails, and blisters on my palms. My throat was still raw from the attack and the bruises on my knees from my bicycle accident still ached. I looked up from my menu. Sebastian looked flushed and happy. He’d taken a bit more blood from me this morning, but I knew he’d have to find a more steady supply soon. “Hey,” I asked him. “Why didn’t you tell me you were breaking up with your ghouls?”

“Who told you that?” Sebastian sounded affronted. Of course, that’s when the waiter brought us our plates. I had eggs, hash browns, and toast. Sebastian got a pile of pancakes.

Once we’d unrolled our silverware, I said, “Alison. Oh, and can you please explain your choice there? Please tell me she’s got AB

negative or whatever the heck, because talk about high maintenance.”

Sebastian snorted around a mouthful of buckwheat and maple syrup. “I prefer O positive, the universal donor, but I don’t pick them for their personalities.” He chewed a bit more while staring at his plate. “How on earth did you get Alison’s name? She didn’t contact you, did she? I mean, I knew she was upset, but I thought all of that vowing to kill you stuff was just hot air.”

I smacked my forehead so hard I think I left a welt. “You never thought to tell me someone wanted me dead?”

“Alison is such a nonthreat, darling. Anyway, all the ghouls were pretty upset. I didn’t think anything of it.”

“Well, guess what? Someone’s been trying to kill me.”

“Yes, but magically. That can’t be a ghoul. Magical practice is expressly forbidden among ghouls.”

What was it Mátyás had said?
Someone’s a little rule breaker
. I had felt a shock when Alison and I first shook hands. Could she have powerful enough magic? Her aura
had
seemed almost hobbled by something. Now my money was on Alison. But it could be anyone, really. “Did all the ghouls have the same reaction?”

Sebastian poked his fork through the syrup on his plate, then glanced up at me. “Pretty much, yeah.”

“How many ghouls do you have?”

“None currently,” he said. “But I had seven.”

One for every day in the week. “Do you really need that much blood? How are you going to cope if you need some every day? I can’t do that. I mean, I
would
, but I’d be anemic in a month.”

“I’ll cope. Are you saying you think one of my ghouls has been trying to kill you?”

“Well, it’s pretty clear that there’s another attacker besides Micah and Marge. They were both there when someone tried to scorch your roof.”

Sebastian nearly snorted coffee out his nose. “My roof?”

“Didn’t I mention that?” I hadn’t thought to check for damage either. “I think it’s okay. You should probably . . . your house was kind of hit by lightning. Several times.”

“But no one was hurt, right?”

“Right,” I said.

“Still,” he said, taking a big bite of pancake, “I’d sincerely like to kill the responsible party.”