Black Magic Bayou (13 page)

It might have been my imagination, but it looked as if the words were moving like a snake.

I shuddered.

We trailed Santiago through the house, though my curiosity had me whipping my head around every few feet, catching a glimpse of something new I wanted to stop and investigate. In addition to the crammed bookshelves—all lined with historical volumes about the area, and spellcraft, and the supernatural—he had hundreds of knickknacks that sparked my curiosity.

The shelves were covered in stones, animal skulls, and bits of shiny rock and dried herbs. Small trinkets I was pretty sure were Nepalese, and puzzle boxes covered in runes. I had to put my hands in my pockets to resist the urge to touch absolutely everything.

Where the walls weren’t covered in shelving, red damask wallpaper peeked through. Framed photos hung at various intervals, showing beautiful landscapes of jungles and mountains.

The air inside the house smelled like incense and…was that tomato sauce?

Santiago led us into a large kitchen, where a heavy silver pot was on the stove, bubbling away, steam and basil scent wafting all around us. The island in the middle was covered in a mixture of spell implements and a chopping board with garlic peel and tomato seeds left on it. A huge mortar and pestle sat in the middle of the island, and I noticed an unground grasshopper leg inside, alongside bay leaves and something that might have been…

Well, it was a viscous fluid that looked deeply personal to Santiago, let’s stop there.

Overhead was a pot hanger with copper-bottomed pots and pans hanging alongside more dried or just-starting-to-dry herbs.

This guy was incredible.

I broke off a bud of dried lavender and rubbed it vigorously between my palms to release the smell. Santiago watched this with quiet interest, and I realized I’d done it without even thinking.

“What do you want?” he asked again. The words were for Cain, but he was staring at me.

“Do you have any wine?” Cain had already started to check through the cupboards, not waiting for a response or invitation.

Wilder leaned against one of the kitchen counters, crossing his arms over his chest. I doubted he’d taken his eyes off Santiago once since the first moment he appeared.

That made two of us.

Santiago opened a cabinet door below the sink with one foot and took out an uncorked bottle of red wine, the stained cork stuck in the mouth of the bottle. He set it down on the island and made a
by all means
gesture to Cain.

The Collector had found a wineglass and poured himself a serving of the red.

“Very gracious, thank you.”

“What. Are. You. Doing. Here?”

Guess Cain hadn’t called ahead.

We didn’t have time for tiptoeing around this, and Cain appeared to be having a grand old time sidestepping the point.

“A demon,” I said, finally trusting myself to make coherent words. “There’s a demon in the Delta Phi sorority house, and girls are going missing. Cain thinks you might be able to help capture it.”

Santiago narrowed his eyes at me. “Say that one more time?”

I glanced at Cain, who was sipping his wine, and at Wilder, who was still staring hard at Santiago with a naked kind of distrust that bordered on a glare.

“We need you to help us catch a demon.”

For the first time since we’d arrived, Santiago smiled, flashing pearly white teeth and one solid gold cap on his front incisor. I wanted to think it looked stupid, but he kind of resembled a pirate, and it was hard not to see some appeal in that.

“A demon, eh? Why didn’t you say so?” He took up the wine bottle and drank a swig right from it. “Are you my virgin sacrifice then?”

“W-what?” I sputtered.

In a flash Wilder had pushed himself off the counter and was standing in front of me, moving me back towards the kitchen door.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” Santiago set the wine bottle down, wiping an errant dribble from the corner of his lips with his thumb. “I was kidding. Kidding.” He lifted both his hands in a gesture of surrender, which did nothing to lessen the aura of danger around him. “No virgin sacrifices needed.”

My pulse hammered, and my hand was planted firmly between Wilder’s shoulder blades. I’d tracked my exit route from the first moment we set foot inside the house, and I was revisiting it in my head now. Left at the door, down the hall, right past the study, left again, and out the front door.

Left. Down. Right. Left. Freedom.

Santiago must have seen the panic in my expression because he took a step back, lowering his hands to his sides. “I’m sorry. It was meant to be funny.”

“Not funny,” Wilder snarled, his growl reverberating in my palm.

Santiago tilted his head to one side, observing Wilder for the first time in any real way. He wasn’t remotely scared by the grown werewolf in his kitchen. Even though Wilder was in human form, something told me Santiago knew perfectly well what we were.

I was equally entranced and terrified of him, which meant he was the kind of threat that was most dangerous to me because it had the power to lure me in.

I regretted coming here. I wish I hadn’t asked Cain for his help.

My life would have been better had I never known Santiago existed.

The problem was, now that I’d met him, in spite of fear and common sense screaming,
Left, down, right, left, freedom,
I wanted to stay. The witch part of me I’d been ignoring far too long was demanding it. I wanted to know more. I wanted…

I wanted to embrace the fear.

Santiago was watching me over Wilder’s shoulder, his expression neutral but nonthreatening. He was trying to make himself seem normal and safe, when he was neither.

“Can you do it?” I was glad my voice sounded strong and steady.

“Maybe.” He lifted the bottle from the counter again, sloshing the red liquid around inside the green glass. It was downright hypnotic.

Left. Down. Right. Left. Freedom.

“Wilder.” I squeezed the back of his neck, and he relaxed into my touch. “It’s okay.”

He didn’t move immediately, then after a few tense seconds where I thought he might punch the witch, he stepped away from me and returned to his place at the counter. My fingertips trailed his arm as he went, as much to soothe myself as him. His skin was hot.

Santiago held the bottle out to me.

My smart human female brain said, Do not accept booze from strange men.

My witch brain said,
Take his offering.

I grabbed the bottle and took a long pull. The wine was surprisingly sweet and fruity, with an edge of cinnamon. I wasn’t sure what I’d expected—blood maybe? But it was good. I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand and passed the bottle back to our host.

“Wolf?” He waggled the bottle at Wilder.

Wilder simply gritted his teeth and curled a lip.

“Fair enough.”

“My
manners
,” Cain exclaimed, putting down his empty glass. “Santiago Medina, please allow me to introduce you to Wilder Shaw, bodyguard and consort to Her Royal Highness Miss Eugenia McQueen, Princess of the South and Alpha of the New Orleans pack.”

Of all the words Santiago took from this, he glanced at Wilder and said, “Consort? Mm. Shame.”

After a comment like that I knew there was no way to correct Cain without making it seem like I was dismissing Wilder’s place in my life or insinuating I wanted the attention Santiago was hinting at. Besides which, just because Wilder wasn’t technically my consort didn’t mean he wouldn’t be.

We were taking things slow.

Santiago returned his focus to me and dipped his lower body in a bow while grabbing my hand and placing a kiss on my knuckles. He kept his gaze on me the whole time, making me squirm uncomfortably. “Your highn—”

“Genie. Please. For the love of God, we’ll be here all night if people keep using my full title.”

“Genie,” he repeated, turning my name over his tongue like it was a sweet chocolate.

Fuuuuuck.

“Santiago,” I replied, trying to keep my tone flat and unemotional.

“McQueen.” His brows lifted, and his entire expression changed in a heartbeat. “
McQueen
.
Mierda
.”

Shit.

Cain didn’t say anything, but he had a wicked, knowing smile, and it was obvious he was enjoying this very much.

“
La Sorcière
.” Santiago took up my hands again, but this time he was investigating them more seriously, like they might hold the secrets of the universe. He traced my lifeline, my heart line, then turned my wrists so he could look at my fingernails. He raised my hand, and before I knew what he was doing he had slipped my index finger between his lips, tracing the whorls of my fingerprint with his tongue.

The air escaped from my lungs in a whoosh, and as it rushed back in I came to my senses, yanking my hand away and slapping him
hard
across the cheek. “What the
fuck
?”

Santiago touched a hand to his cheek but licked his lips unapologetically, contemplating the taste I’d left behind. My heart was pounding, and I held my hand to my chest, breathing hard.

Wilder had stepped away from the counter but no farther, watching my interaction with the witch through slitted, angry eyes.

“You,” Santiago said. “You’re the one.” His eyes were shiny with excitement, and he ran his tongue over the one gold tooth. “You are the one she chose.”

I glanced over at Cain, wondering if he might be able to bring some clarity to this insane moment, but he was observing us with his own hungry kind of interest.

I was starting to think there was a lot more to this introduction than just catching a demon.

“What?”

“You are the one
La Sorcière
trained.”

“Yes.”

He rubbed his palms over the runic tattoos on each side of his head, dragging his fingers through his mussed, damp curls. He muttered something in Spanish, but I didn’t speak the language.

“I’ll help you. But I want something in return.”

My God, was I going to get through this day without owing everyone in town a favor? Those sorority girls better fucking appreciate this.

“Of course you do,” I sighed.

I was suddenly exhausted and craving my bed. The light on Santiago’s stove said it was a few minutes past seven.

A lot can happen in twelve hours.

Too much.

“Yes.” Cain clapped his hands together, and the sound reverberated through the room like thunder. “Let’s discuss price.” He pointed at Santiago as he skirted the island and picked up the wine bottle, filling his glass again. On the stove, the bubbling tomato sauce, forgotten until now, began to smoke, a burning smell circulating through the room.

Wilder reached over and turned off the burner, dots of red sauce splattering on his bare forearm.

“Santiago will help us capture the demon.
I
will keep it,” Cain announced.

Santiago groaned. “Madman. You don’t keep a demon, a demon keeps you. Send it back to the hell it came from, or you are begging for it to break free.”

Cain waved this warning off, drinking more of the wine. I could go for another sip myself. “I’m not worried about it,” he said. “And neither should you be.”

Santiago’s lip curled. “You have the freedom not to worry because other people do it for you.”

This was greeted with a serious stare from Cain. “If you knew what worried me, Santiago, you wouldn’t waste fear on a demon either.”

That slow, gnawing unease came over me again when I recalled the way Cain had looked when I saw him at The Dungeon. Fear chewed at my stomach, and I inched closer to Wilder to feed off the comfort he offered. Even wound up and full of rage, he could set me at ease.

I stood a couple inches in front of him but reached back and clutched his hand, squeezing it hard. He rubbed his thumb over my knuckles, and that was all it took to bring me back to myself.

“While you two squabble, there are girls who might be dying. If this is going to cost me, that’s fine. Tell me what you want, and let’s get this fucking show on the road.”

Cain and Santiago both stared at me like I’d been body swapped with someone worth paying attention to.

Good.

I pointed at Santiago with the same finger he had so recently sucked on. “You want something from me. What is it?”

“I want to taste your power.”

Oh, boy, maybe I should have tried the shallow end first before jumping off the highest platform. “Y-you… Excuse me?”

Wilder’s grip on my hand tightened until it was almost painful. I wasn’t sure if it was his anger at Santiago or if he was just trying to hold on to me. Either way I didn’t pull free. The pain kept me grounded.

“You have unbelievable potential inside you, Genie. Magic so pure I don’t think you even know it’s there. It’s something raw and primal, and I want to taste it.” His expression was earnest and full of excitement and longing, and I was deeply uneasy about the way it made me feel in parts of my body that weren’t controlled by logic or intelligence.

“Whatever that means,” I said cautiously.

“It wouldn’t be painful.”

Yeah, that’s really not what I was worried about.

“Fine, whatever. Catch the demon,
free
the girls, and you can taste my power.”

“
Genie
,” Wilder said in a voice not quite hushed enough to qualify as a whisper.

I faced him and placed one hand on each of his cheeks, tracing his stubble with my fingernail. “I can’t let those girls die, Wilder. I can’t leave them there. And we can’t fight that thing without help. Help comes with a cost.”

He stared at me, his expression hard but with genuine pain in his eyes. “Don’t do this.”

“It’s just magic.” I tried to smile, but I doubted it was believable. “Magic isn’t real life.
This
.” I placed one hand on his chest, then took his and covered mine with it. “This is real, okay? My power isn’t me. This is the cost, nothing more.”

Man, what a lie. But it was a kind lie. I doubted I could make Wilder understand how deep the magic went for a natural witch, and how magic
was
my real life, day in and day out, not a switch I could turn on and off. But I wasn’t lying when I told him what we had was more important to me than anything Santiago wanted, and
that
was the part I needed him to believe.