Shady Lady

“The tracking spell went out on the island,” Shannon put in, “but you told me Nalleli said they wouldn’t be able to scry her.”

“So our last known location is here. Or nearby,” I finished, annoyed with myself. People had hunted me often enough—through means both magickal and mundane—that I should be well able to predict their movements. “If we stay put, the next hitter on Montoya’s list will come to us.”

Fortunately, we had a killer of our own.

Kel nodded. “That seems likely.”

“That’s good, right?” I considered the interrogation aspect of my plan. “We’ll have ample chance to question him.”

The corners of his mouth curled. “You’re a formidable woman.”

“I don’t like being threatened,” I said. “I like it even less when people make good on those threats and try to kill me.”

Most likely we could expect Montoya’s man to burst into our room in the middle of the night. Instead of running, like sensible people, we hoped for that development as the best possible outcome. How fucked-up was that?

With a faint sigh, I picked Butch up. After dinner, he needed a bathroom break before we could retire for the night. The dog nestled into my arms as I opened the door. Kel followed me like he thought I might be in danger every waking moment, and based on events to date, I couldn’t say he was wrong.

“Lock the door,” he told Shannon.

Worry dawned on her pale face, as if up until this point, it had all seemed like a game. I didn’t want her traumatized, but a healthy amount of fear offered a certain value. Though I’d come up with this plan, anxiety thrummed through my veins. Butch caught my mood and stood up in my arms, licking my cheek with his little tongue.

“It’ll be all right,” I told him.

He yapped twice, disagreeing with me. I let that go. You just couldn’t win an argument with a Chihuahua.

When we reached the ground floor, I set him down just off the path and let him frolic in the manicured foliage. In the distance, I could hear drums and chanting; it came from the small clay house at the far end of the property. Smoke rose from the building, indicating that a tourist group was participating in the temascal ritual, which involved smearing mud all over your body and sitting in a steam bath with a local shaman. With faith and preparation, you could experience visions and learn about your animal spirit guide as well as purify your spirit. But after my time with Nalleli, I didn’t need a cleansing; nor did I imagine Kel had any dirt clinging to his soul.

The lights lining the walk shone brightly enough for me to keep an eye on Butch. I made sure not to look at Kel, who carried sigils in his skin that rendered me wildly uneasy; I didn’t want to recall what he’d said about my bloodline or what it portended. He astonished me when he turned my face toward him, forcing me to meet his gaze. In the dark his eyes shone like mirrors, silvered and reflective. Though he dropped his fingers right away, I could feel them burning on my cheek.

“You cannot hide,” he said softly. “Ignoring me does not change what will be. Refusing to acknowledge truth does not make it a lie. It only makes you a coward.”

“You can’t have it both ways,” I told him angrily. “Either I have free will or I have a destiny. It cannot be both.”

Kel smiled, and his tats gleamed blue in the dark, a tiny little ripple of power that I didn’t like at all. “No?” he asked, and I felt sure he already knew the answer, glimpsed from some high precipice.

“Well, maybe you do know how it all turns out. I don’t want to.”

And I didn’t—because such knowledge would pare away my humanity. As far as I knew, Kel couldn’t receive comfort from a touch or take pleasure in anything at all. Long ago, he had pledged to a greater good, and now he existed only to serve and follow orders. To me, that sounded like slavery.

Perhaps he read a glimmer of my thoughts in my expression. The light died away, leaving his face in shadow, revealing only the edge of his brow and the slope of his nose. He was magnificent and terrible in the dark.

“Some things about you, I cannot see.” He leaned in, and I froze, too astonished to breathe, until he plucked a struggling moth from my long hair.

Embarrassed and bewildered, I called Butch and fled back up the stairs as if all the hounds of hell followed at my heels, not a holy warrior sworn to guard me.

Dead Man Says What?

I woke to two silenced shots hitting the towels mounded to look like me. At Kel’s insistence, Shannon and I had bedded down on the floor in between the two beds. Now I appreciated his caution.

Her breathing said she was awake, but we didn’t speak. The slow grate of footsteps over glass, coming through the balcony door, suggested the gunman meant to check his work. He was competent; he’d just never run into targets like us before. Montoya should’ve briefed him better.

His shadow fell across the bed as he ripped the covers back. An oath escaped him when he saw he’d killed a number of dirty bath towels. Kel hit him from behind, wrapping a shoelace around the other man’s neck. Their struggle was relatively quiet, as such things go, until at last the gunman went limp. Kel made sure he wasn’t playing possum, and then he swung him over his shoulder, strode to the balcony, and jumped.

That was our cue. We weren’t conducting the interrogation in here; blood in a hotel room would arouse too many questions. For a moment I paused, shocked at the coldness of the thought. Likely, such a consideration wouldn’t have occurred to me before. I didn’t even know whether the thought had come from me or some darkness lingering from the demon who saved me . . . or the murderer’s weapon in my side. It was a pragmatic concern, however, and I could not deny its validity. Still, I shivered, a ripple of dread warning me that once I started down this path, there could be no return to innocence.

Yet I told myself I needed to find out what this hired gun knew. He couldn’t be a good man, or he wouldn’t be on Montoya’s payroll. Good men didn’t break into hotel rooms with a silencer and try to murder women sleeping in their beds. Determined, I threw off the blanket with Shannon hot on my heels. Since we were both fully dressed, I only needed to snatch Butch and hurry out the door. I took the stairs two at a time, an athletic feat that surprised me because I didn’t fall. When I hit the ground floor, I broke into a jog.

They had security here, but they wouldn’t say anything about registered guests exercising on the property in the middle of the night, so Shannon and I offered our best impressions of fitness nuts. The bored guard we passed just raised a hand in greeting; I could imagine his perplexity, but as long as he didn’t catch us doing anything worse, we’d be fine.

I ran through the parking lot and down toward the lake before doubling back toward the temascal hut. As she was taller than me, Shannon kept up easily. A smoky scent lingered, though the fire had gone out. I set Butch on the ground.

“You’re an important part of this plan,” I told the dog. “If anybody comes within sniffing distance, bark twice. I mean it—you can’t wander or be distracted by a bird.”

He lowered his head. I could almost hear what he was thinking: Not fair, that only happened one time. But he gave a yap, indicating he understood his mission. He was crucial to our success; early warning would permit us to escape undetected.

We sank to hands and knees to crawl inside; it was dark and close and there were stones inside that could be heated to inflict excruciating pain. In short, the place was ideal for inflicting physical and psychological damage. I sat down, and Shannon brought out the candles she’d tucked into her pocket. Kel had made a supply run earlier in the evening, lifting some from the patio tables for our purposes now. She lit the candles and eerie little flames kicked up in a semicircle, lending our faces a demonic aspect against the clay backdrop.

The killer lay like a Christmas goose, bound with arms over his head and ankles securely fastened. At most, he could flop around like a dying flounder. No threat—and if he moved with too much enthusiasm to the left, he’d burn himself on the hot rocks. To the right, he ran into Kel and his blades.