Page 15

B ack at Vi’s house, music spilled out the open doors onto the gallery, carrying down to the street where Kierce and I stood, staring up at what appeared to be a party happening in the living room. One that we hadn’t been invited to attend. Had Rollo gotten that desperate for social interaction? Really? He hadn’t lasted twenty-four hours under house arrest. I shrugged it off as Rollo being Rollo until it hit me.

Vi was upstairs. In her bed. Unconscious.

And Rollo, because no one else would have dared, had thrown a soiree.

My temper struck like a match after all the tinder Ankou had fed me, and I stormed upstairs only to stumble into a speakeasy from the 1920s. I might have been impressed with the flapper dresses and zoot suits, but it wasn’t thanks to attention to detail. These were authentic pieces, worn by authentic 1920s’ spirits.

“Frankie,” Josie yelled over the noise, proving real music was playing. “Come help me in the kitchen.”

Brain scrambling at the scene, I was glad for the direction. “Sure.”

Kierce was quick to follow me through the path the spirits carved to avoid brushing against him.

As weird as tonight had been, I was almost comforted to see this crowd recognized him for what he was. I had been starting to wonder after neither the nekomata or the toughs registered his—or my—divinity.

As soon as I entered the kitchen, Josie shoved me into a corner. “What’s going on out there?”

Back home, I was more mindful, but it was easy to forget when I was around so many who could see or speak to the dead, and her lack of ability to perceive spirits hit me like a ton of bricks. “Rollo didn’t tell you?”

“You think Rollo of all people would be useful?” She scoffed. “He started greeting people I can’t see then flipped on the record player. There are cold spots everywhere I walk, and I swear I feel eyes on me.” She cuddled into my side. “I’m so glad you’re back. Can you take me to my room and make sure no one is in there?”

Spirits couldn’t hurt her, most of them anyway, but that was still the safest place for her.

“Sure.” I guided her through the hall to her room, searched it top to bottom, then left her on her bed. As I turned to go, I bumped into Kierce, who had followed me. “Let’s find the man of the hour.”

A few steps later, Jean-Claude, who stood watch outside of Vi’s room, intercepted us.

“Care to explain what’s going on?” I glanced past him, to the noise. “What does Rollo think he’s doing?”

“He seized on the auction idea and invited Luca Tremain to visit, since he’s not allowed to step foot outside the house.” He rubbed his ears, the music too loud for comfort. “Tremain travels with this circus everywhere he goes.” His scowl deepened as whoops rose from the crowd of spirits. “You’ll have to reset the wards after they leave.”

Hmm.

Rollo must have lowered them to allow Tremain access and then raised them, locking in his guests. Otherwise, I would have noticed the breach on my way in. Tremain must trust Rollo a great deal to allow the magical containment of himself and his entourage.

“It’s no problem.” I racked my memory, but the name didn’t ring any bells. “Do I know him?”

“No.” He gripped my shoulders and pointed me toward my room. “You don’t need to either.”

The stern look he shot Kierce confirmed he wanted me under lock and key until Tremain left. As much as I itched to wade through the bodies to find Rollo and demand answers, I trusted Jean-Claude’s assessment of the situation.

“Come get me when you’re ready.” I was too tired to fight with him. “Kierce and I will be in my room.”

No sooner had we shut the door behind us than it swung open on Pascal carrying two plates and two glasses of milk. He thumped his hip against the knob, shutting us in again. He must have been the one who actually required help in the kitchen, but Josie sidetracked us before we could offer him any.

“I brought refreshments.” He held out the cake slices to Kierce and me. “Josie said it’s my best yet.”

“Thank you.” Kierce took his plate, sniffed it, then handed it back. “I’m done.”

Laughter stuck in my throat as his quirky manners totally missed the mark.

“No worries.” Pascal helped himself to the plate. “I was hoping you would say that.”

After inviting himself to flop onto my bed, he started shoveling in Kierce’s share like he might snatch it back. Kierce watched me savor the first bite, cocked his head to one side, and confusion wreathed his features until I poked him in the hip. “You okay over there?”

“Josie’s been teaching me polite ways to decline food.”

That explained a lot.

“That explains it.” Pascal echoed my thought almost exactly. “I didn’t expect you to bother pretending to be interested in the cake, so your lessons are going…um… great .”

Heartened by Pascal’s endorsement, Kierce grew earnest. “Did you find my excuse acceptable?”

A polite decline didn’t always work in the South. Folks showed their love through food. Even if you didn’t want to eat, you did. It was expected of you. For Kierce, a firmer stance might be required to get him off the hook in future social situations.

“Normally, I would say it might be more politic to take a bite then claim you’re too full to hold anymore. You’re not a fan of sweets, so I’m not going to put you through that for the sake of politeness.” I recalled his expression when Carter attempted to feed him a cupcake after our first kiss. “You could claim you have a gluten allergy. It wouldn’t work for everything, but it does cover a wide variety of baked goods.”

“Hmm.” He appeared to consider it. “I’ll have to remember that.”

A flicker of blue light snared the corner of my eye, and I glanced over to find Pedro massaging the joints in his hands that had ached in life. The habit, like so many others, had rolled over into death.

“Hey.” I paused my snacking to examine the spirit. “What’s wrong?”

“Dis Pater was in town tonight.” He checked me over head to toe. “It’s you I’m worried about, mija .”

“How did you…?” I would have blamed Pascal, but he had stayed in too. “Who told you about that?”

“It’s all the spirits Tremain brought with him are talking about.” His clipped tone conveyed his distaste of Tremain, his spectacle, or perhaps it was filling the house with rambunctious spirits while Vi was vulnerable to possession that bothered him. But if the latter was the problem, he needn’t have worried himself. Rollo would have taken every precaution. “They claim there was a showdown on Ursulines.”

“Showdown is a bit wild west for what happened, but he was here.” A sour taste flooded my mouth. “So was Ankou.”

“I’ll give us some privacy.” Kierce rose and helped himself to my kit, laying a salt line around the room. He didn’t speak again until he activated the ward, erecting a quiet bubble where no other spirits could overhear our conversation. “Now we can speak freely.”

As I vented about the events of the night, Pedro stroked my hair, his expression growing darker.

“What can we do?” He glanced at his brother, including him in his offer. “How can we help?”

That he was always so quick to pitch his lot in with mine left my heart full to overflowing, but I was too afraid that the parade might swallow him whole to invite him to come out with me. He would be safer behind the wards at Vi’s once I checked them over after Rollo’s guests left. Pascal would be too.

“I’ll let you know once I figure out our next steps.” I set the cake aside, unable to stomach it. “I don’t trust this sudden altruistic streak from Ankou.” I took a moment to check my messages and found one from Carter. “I need to make a call real quick.” I pointed at my cell. “Carter.”

To give myself a smidgen of privacy, I rose and stepped a few feet away from the others.

“I had a question,” she said by way of greeting, “but Josie already answered it.”

“Ah. Sorry about that. Somehow I put my phone on silent.”

“How is everything?”

“Complicated.”

Carter grunted in commiseration, but she didn’t press. For now.

“How’s Harrow?” I ought to text him myself, but she was already on the phone. “Any side effects?”

“He didn’t tell you?” She sighed, as if she wasn’t surprised to hear we weren’t playing nice, but I thought we had been. “He decided to stay in New Orleans and make a long weekend out of it.”

A prickle started at my nape and stung its way down my spine. Harrow wasn’t one for making spontaneous plans. And staying in the city? The odds of one of us bumping into him were too high for it to make sense that he hadn’t given us a heads-up we might see him around.

“He didn’t say a word.” I thought back on the last time I saw him. “He’s just hanging out?”

Doubt kept drilling down, deeper and deeper into my subconscious.

“I guess?” She must have heard something in my voice. “You don’t sound convinced.”

“Did he call or text you?”

“Text.”

“And did it read like him?”

“Yeah.”

“Hmm.”

“That’s not a good hmm , is it?” She sighed. “What are the odds this ends badly for him?”

“Dis Pater popped in tonight, and Ankou. Plus Kierce and me. Anunit is here too. That’s five divine beings in the Quarter.”

And one of those beings had a thing for Harrow.

Anunit wouldn’t know how to text, but she was clever. During her time at the shop, she observed us talk that way often enough for her to grasp how to give him a vague order he could then interpret in his own voice. The same way she gave him a command to visit New Orleans without any clue of the intricacies involved in modern travel.

“You make it sound like New Orleans is a powder keg about to go boom.”

“Um…”

“I can come get Josie and Matty, if you need me to.”

“Thanks.” I dragged my bottom lip between my teeth. “I don’t think it will come down to it, but I’ll pass the offer along to Josie. I wish I could send Matty home, but I need him.” Saving Rollo had been a near thing. We would need every advantage we could get for Matty, and that meant keeping him close. “I would feel better if I could reunite body and soul ASAP.”

“I understand.” She cleared her throat. “The offer stands, though.”

“Thanks.” I smiled into the phone. “I appreciate it.”

The music cut out in the living room, a sign the party might finally be winding down, so I let Carter go.

As I was considering whether it was premature to break the circle in preparation for spending the rest of my night in Vi’s library researching the finger bone, the choice was stolen from me as Jean-Claude swept into the room.

“You gotta see this.” He was dragging someone behind him by the arm. “I haven’t laughed this hard in ages.”

Craning my neck to see around him, I got an eyeful of the person he was restraining. “Harrow?”

A dirty tee caked in grease, blood, and food stains clung to his torso. His jeans rode low on his hips, a breath away from slipping off, which I blamed on him unbuttoning them to make room for his stomach.

Dear Lord.

His stomach, which had been flat, was now swollen as round and taut as a basketball.

Understanding smacked me upside the head as his golden eyes twinkled at me without an ounce of remorse, and I growled, “Anunit.”

“Your bird destroyed my avatar.” Not a shred of guilt laced those words. “What else could I do?”

“You were supposed to be recovering. I thought you were half dead after what we did. Half drained. You know what I mean.” I grimaced at the state she left Harrow in. “How could you do this to him?”

“You do not like this body, but I do.” She patted her distended stomach. “He holds much.”

“Get out of him.” I stomped my foot, not caring if I was pitching a tantrum. “Now.”

“I am too weak to be without a host.” She jutted out her chin. “He will have to endure me.”

I would have to call Carter back and explain how her partner would be staying here for the duration of his recovery. And judging by his belly, things were about to get ugly in his en suite. I wasn’t sure if Harrow had meant to stay and relax, like he told her, or if Anunit had been pulling his strings even then.

“Go shower.” I dragged a hand down my face. “He’s disgusting.” I sighed at Jean-Claude. “Can you get him a change of clothes and put him to bed in the room next to mine? I’m going to lock them in for the day and sort out this headache tomorrow.”

One thing was for certain. Anunit had her hooks in Harrow. As close as the primary Alcheyvāhā burial ground was to Savannah, he would never be safe from her without help. I had heard of a necromancer who tattooed runes on people. Mostly they were protective, I think. But I didn’t have the resources in that community to locate the practitioner responsible.

I had spent too much time running from them for that. Plus, as iffy as Harrow was when it came to magic, I wasn’t sure he would want an identifier inked into his skin when Anunit claimed to be a temporary nuisance who would leave after teaching me my duties.

“Of course, cher .” He cackled with delight. “Poor thing. He gone be sick when he snaps out of it.”

“Maybe bring him some antacids before tucking him in?”

“That I can do.” Fighting his grin, he yanked on Anunit. “Let’s go, you.”

After he shut the door, I kicked myself for not asking if the coast was clear, but I hadn’t expected Anunit to kidnap Harrow again . At the rate she was going, I would owe him more than an apology for what he was enduring at her mercy.

“I didn’t think when I agreed to become the new guardian that it meant I would be yanking Anunit out of bodies she has no business possessing.”

“I wonder how far he got before she caught up to him,” Pascal mused, tapping his chin. “We haven’t seen her since you all rescued Rollo.”

“If she was forcing Harrow to eat his way through the city, it would explain...” Kierce made a rounded gesture over his belly usually reserved for indicating pregnant women. “Do you think he should be allowed to digest it?”

“That’s a good question.” I shuddered to recall the tightness of his skin. “She’s used to eating massive quantities of meat. His stomach isn’t large enough to hold what qualifies as one normal portion for an animal her size. Let alone however many meals she’s force-fed him since we lost track of her.”

Despite the gravity of the situation, Kierce’s expression edged dangerously close to amused.

“I can’t believe I felt sorry for her, that I was worried about her.” I gritted my teeth, wondering if her farewell gift to Harrow—her cowgirl hat—was how she had tracked him. “Then again, maybe the best medicine is getting Jean-Claude to give her a dose of ipecac and let her enjoy the experience of purging her poor life choices.” As I was texting him the suggestion, Kierce chuckled. “What is it?”

“I was thinking cats vomit up their food all the time.” His laugh grew heartier. “You’d better warn Jean-Claude not to let her eat it again as soon as it comes up.”

“Eww.” I shuddered. “I could have lived my life without the mental picture of Harrow enduring that.”

I was definitely going to owe him after this. Anunit was proving to be more catlike in personality than I anticipated, from the purr in her voice to her sneakiness to her general disregard for rules when they clashed with her getting what she wanted out of any given situation.

“I’ll go tell him.” Pascal gathered the dishes. “I’ll see if Rollo’s shindig is winding down too.”

The sooner we reset the wards, preferably with a certain troublemaking goddess within them this time, the better.