“Without dying in the process,” Doc added dryly.
Dominick shrugged. “That goes without saying.”
“And the imp, too, I suppose?” I asked.
“Yes, but I do not expect that to be an easy task for you, so there is no time limit. Keep in mind, however, that an imp thrives on chaos. Look at all it has accomplished in such a short time already.”
Thrives on chaos, huh? Why couldn’t these pets of his thrive on peace, love, and happiness? “How can such a little thing cause so much trouble?”
Dominick extracted his gloves from his pockets. “Its size is deceptive.”
Doc eyed me. “Dangerous things come in small packages.” To Dominic, he asked, “Why does it seek out honey?”
“Imps are well-known for having a weakness for honey.”
Doc scoffed. “I don’t believe it’s that simple.”
“Think of it as an addiction. They will stop at nothing to sate their need. Fermented honey is favored. Always has been.” He smiled and shook his head. “You should have seen the destruction a clan of imps caused during the … never mind.”
Splendid. I had a crazed addict on my hands now, as well as a vengeful devil hunting me down. “So, will the imp calm down for a while now that it got hold of some mead?”
“Perhaps. But if there is one thing I’ve learned about imps, it is that their ability to wreak havoc is surpassed only by their need for more honey.”
“Shit.” I glared at him. “Why must you keep such pain-in-the-ass pets?”
“Because if I don’t, they will fall into the wrong hands.”
“And your hands are the right ones?” Doc asked.
“Well, in Violet’s case, I’m the lesser of two evils.”
“I don’t know,” I told him. “You and Rex Conner are running neck and neck right now.”
He chuckled. “Ah, your ex-lover. He is quite full of himself.”
I was surprised he’d noticed. Dominick was very enamored with himself as well.
“What are you doing with Rex?” I pressed. This was my opportunity to see if it had anything to do with the growing caper-sus problem at the mine that Mr. Black had warned about while at Prudence’s earlier.
“Using him,” Dominick said without hesitation. “Does that bother you?”
“Only when you send him my way with silly messages.”
One of his eyebrows lifted challengingly. “I have committed no such crime.”
“Then why did he come to me saying you had?”
“I have no idea.”
I wasn’t sure if I could believe him or not.
He must have read the doubt on my face. “Trust me, Violet, manipulating your ex-lover as some sort of pawn serves me no purpose.”
I still didn’t believe him, but I moved on anyway. “I want you to lay off about getting your lidérc back. I’ll catch it for you as soon as I can.”
His lips pursed. “I’m not so sure about that now.”
“Why not?” I asked.
“Because it may catch you first, and if that is the case, we will soon be short one Executioner in Deadwood.”
Chapter Seventeen
Sunday, January 13th
When I was a kid, one of my favorite places to hang out was Aunt Zoe’s glass workshop, especially in the winter when the warm blasts from the glass furnace made the place nice and cozy, like now. Surrounded by her creative fodder, I was inspired to dream big about my future, often returning home to my parents’ place filled with hopes and ideas for what might yet be.
Fast forward almost three decades, two kids, and a shitload of inherited problems later, and here I stood again among my aunt’s glass block and metal tools. The stale smells of charred wood and damp newspaper were not quite covered up by the cinnamon air freshener this morning. On the old stereo on the shelf, Emmylou Harris was singing about drinking Bluebird wine. My big dreams about what was yet to come had been replaced by even bigger self-doubts about how to kill a monster without ending up dead myself.
“I don’t know, Violet.” Aunt Zoe sat on a bar stool at her worktable. Multi-colored glass vases, goblets, and squishy-looking evergreen trees—lots of trees—covered most of the space in front of her where her notebook full of drawings lay open. “I’m not sure that the mirror is the answer to this particular problem.”
The mirror in question was the one hanging on the wall by the door. Its four corners were fogged with age. A picture of me in my purple boots had been lodged in the edge of the mid-sized frame for years. It was the same mirror that had been hanging in here ever since I was a little kid. Once long ago, Quint had told Aunt Zoe that he wanted the mirror for himself when he was grown up. With a kind smile, she’d explained to Quint that he couldn’t have it, because only the girls in our family had the strength to use the mirror without letting it change them.
I’d always wondered what she’d meant by that. Now, I questioned her words even more, especially after Mr. Black had mentioned something about it being a “gateway.” Over the last few months, I’d passed through a few so-called gates in this realm—at least I think that was what I’d done. Anyway, it was time to find out what was so special about this mirror, besides that it looked really old.
I stared at my reflection in the glass, patting down my wayward spirals. I hadn’t had a chance to shower yet this morning, coming straight out here in my pajamas and robe to see Aunt Zoe after waking up and finding a note on the nightstand from Doc that said he’d taken all three kids to the Rec Center. I tilted my head and turned my chin to get a better look at the bruising around my eye. It was now as green and blue as it was purple and black.
“How will we know if we don’t try it?” I looked at the weirdly shaped symbols etched into the dented frame made of some metal that had a thick layer of
