“I’ve worked security at four other buildings.” Benton held up as many fingers. His nails were short and black. Whether from blood or dirt, Callie didn’t care to guess.
She stood behind him and leaned forward to speak into his ear. Stale cigar stench clogged her nose. “You’ve worked jobs, but haven’t paid the Soul Charmer.”
Benton surged closer to the bar. His whiskey sloshed over the lip of the glass and onto his fingers. He slammed his shoulder backward and shifted to face Callie. The wide, milky eyes and taut tendons in his neck eased. Idiot. He licked the spilled liquor from his fingers. “I have experience, but they still won’t even let me take their exam.”
She gave two fucks about his ability to get a job. “That must suck. You owe the Charmer.”
“What do you mean?”
That’s not how this worked, and he knew it. “Cash or souls.”
“I ain’t got anything on me.”
“How are you paying for that Wild Turkey?”
Benton shot scattered looks in either direction. “It just you?”
It was, and normally she hated that. Her boyfriend Derek typically made these collection calls. He looked the part. Hulking and covered in leather and scars. She hid her wounds on the inside, and wielded dark eyeliner as war paint. Not exactly scary mofo material. Callie needed more from Benton than a simple rented soul, though, and that information need to be acquired alone.
Callie sat on the barstool next to Benton. It sagged to the right, but she managed to keep her spine straight. When you’re five foot nothing keeping your head up counted for something. “Did you want to return the soul now or give me what’s in your wallet?”
His huff of laughter carried derision she was too well acquainted with. She knew it better than he knew that whiskey. The flask in her back pocket thrummed against her hip. It was a way to hold souls, but it also spoke to the magic running through her veins. It was ready. Was she? Callie grabbed Benton’s wrist. Skin to skin. A single bonus soul wouldn’t make Callie go en fuego, but she was quickly learning how to turn up the heat.
“Please, little girl.” Benton said derisively. He tried to yank his arm back.
He couldn’t escape her grip, though, not with magic on her side.
She focused on the flutter in her chest and the responding call within his. Callie pooled the magic in her palm. The heat, the energy. She let it coalesce between her palm and his wrist until he began to squirm. Expletives began to bubble from his lips. She let go.
Benton cradled his reddened wrist to his chest. “What the—”
“No. I ask the questions.”
“You can take the soul,” he practically shouted. Johnny T shot her a look, and she shrugged back.
“I was going to take it anyway.” How was this idiot her source of information? Dark times. “Have you seen Nate?”
There. The reason she’d taken this retrieval instead of sending someone else for this delinquent renter. “Nate?”
“Yes, lanky motherfucker. Talks a lot of shit. Slings narcotic treats. Nate.”
“Ford’s dead.” Benton’s voice shook, and Callie understood.
“I know that. I didn’t ask about Ford. I asked about his former number two guy. Nate. Have. You. Seen. Him?” She was running out of time. Both in this bar and for answers. Finding Nate was top priority right now, and each day he dodged her calls, the worse her world got.
Benton scratched a phantom itch behind his ear.
She wriggled her fingers close to his face. “Focus.”
“No one’s seen Nate.” Benton paused and licked his cracked lips. “Corner guy near the cathedral on El Paseo got his stuff from him, though.”
Callie leaned in. Before she could say anything, Benton added, “That’s really all I know. All the dealers are working directly for Nate right now, but word is no one has seen him. That’s all I know. Honest.”
She believed him. Damn it. “Don’t tell anyone I asked, okay?”
“Sure. What about the Charmer?”
She’d almost forgotten about the late dues on the soul. Heat still tingled through her fingers and forearms, but she’d almost associated the discomfort with the heavy energy in the bar and the shimmering fear filling her core. For once, the Soul Charmer wasn’t the greatest of Callie’s worries.
The missing henchman of a dead man prodded greater terror into her bones. Callie took the highball glass from Nate, and downed its remaining contents into two hard gulps.
He opened his mouth to complain. Callie yanked the flask from her back pocket with smooth familiarity, popped the cap, and slapped it against Benton’s chest. A couple soft words of beckoning and the second soul slipped inside.
A neon beer sign lit Benton’s face in unnatural orange, but the color was cooler now. The extraction hadn’t hurt—though she got the impression she could make it hurt if she better understood what she was doing. The guy leaned away from her anyway.
This was the part she wasn’t so good at. She could handle collecting the soul. Flask, chest, boom, done. She could even now beckon the soul, and push one back into someone’s body. Collecting cash? There she was on less stable footing. She bit the inside of her cheek. What would Derek do?
Demand the money. She was a third of his size, running on fumes, and worried about her own problems, but she had to get this done. She thrust an open hand toward Benton. “Wallet. Now.” Her cool tone sounded vicious. She was simply goddamn tired.
It worked, though. He dropped his wallet into her waiting palm. She pulled out a trio of twenties. “Thought you were broke. Couldn’t get a job,” she muttered.
“Pawned stuff,” was all he said, but she didn’t want the particulars anyway. Her brother had hawked their mom’s
