Black Magic Woman (5 page)

“That weak thing you call an apology will not pacify me, girl. You tried to imply that I share in the blame for your clumsiness, but I was not the one carrying drinks and spilling them on powerful men. You must admit your wrongdoing and beg my forgiveness!”

A murmur of toadying agreement rumbled among the man’s followers, making Asher wince. Apparently the man lacked not only magical talent, but also common sense. Asher would hazard a guess that the Witch’s Council had been denying him admittance for something like the last fifteen years. His arrogance only served to make him look like a bigger buffoon. Judging by Daphanie’s expression, she thought so, too. Or she would, if she were able to see through her perfectly understandable anger.

Asher watched as she set down the empty glass on a nearby table with an audible click. In the tense atmosphere of the club, all extraneous conversations had stilled. A quick glance over his shoulder confirmed that the table at which Quigley had sat just a few seconds ago was empty. Asher swore roundly, and his senses went on high alert. Everyone concentrated on the unfolding scene between D’Abo and the unknown human, who straightened her spine, lifted her chin, and gave the blustering witch doctor a look so dirty, it wouldn’t be cleared for late-night cable.

“
First
of all,” she bit out, pointing a finger at D’Abo and ignoring the shocked gasps of his flunkies, “I am not anyone’s girl, so I would appreciate the courtesy of not being addressed as one.
Secondly
”—she poked her finger in the direction of the man’s chest—“my mama taught me my manners, which I used when I apologized for what was an honest accident. But obviously you were raised in that barn my mama always mentioned, because anyone with a sense of civility would have accepted the apology and moved the hell on with his life.

“And
third.
” She stepped forward and poked again, this time barely making contact with D’Abo’s kente-cloth tunic. “I. Don’t. Beg. For anything. From anyone. Ever. You got that?
Boy?
”

Asher was sprinting toward the altercation before D’Abo’s shocked gasp had managed to suck more than half the oxygen from the room. And here he’d thought he’d have the rest of the night off.

Leave it to a human.

Three

Among the Others, a curious balancing act is maintained between embracing one’s identity as a member of a unique and powerful subgroup and desiring to be seen as more than a vampire or a shapeshifter or a demon. No Other wants to be judged by a stereotype, but very few want anyone to forget exactly how dangerous they can potentially be.

—A Human Handbook to the Others,
Chapter One

Just where the hell did this guy get off making such a scene over a spilled drink? For God’s sake, he’d been the one not watching where he was going! The bloody blowhard had been so busy pontificating to his adoring fan club that he hadn’t had any idea that Daphanie was about to intersect his path, and he sure as hell didn’t know how damned hard she’d had to work to stay out of his way. The jerk had almost run her over at least three times before one of his expansive and pompous gestures sent his arm slamming into the back of her shoulder, throwing her off balance, and resulting in the spilled root beer.

Sure, she felt bad about spilling the drink on his shirt. That was why she’d apologized. But it hadn’t really been her fault, and she was not about to be lectured at like a three-year-old or insulted in front of a crowd of strangers; she didn’t care who they were. Let them chew off her fingers or turn her into a toad or drain her blood from her body. She didn’t give a damn. She wasn’t the kind of girl who let people walk all over her, whether they happened to be human or not.

Which was why she’d lost her temper.

She had tried to hold it together. Honest. But the jerk just had to keep pushing. She’d gritted her teeth in the face of being called stupid. There was the heat of the moment to consider, after all. She’d even been prepared to overlook his ungracious dismissal of her apology. But when
any
man told her that she needed to
beg
for his forgiveness? Oh, no. Daffy didn’t play that game. Jackass could go suck her left nut.

In fact, she felt pretty proud that she’d restrained herself from telling him to do exactly that. Dude was acting like an idiot.

Not to mention that he was putting a damper on her entire evening. When Quigley had tried to distract her from revealing him to her sister with the offer of a trip to an Other nightspot, it had seemed like a real opportunity. Since the supernatural world had been revealed to her, Daphanie’s head had been spinning with the sheer realization of all she didn’t know about it. She figured an evening out with the imp would give her a chance to learn as much as she could about the world her sister would be living in from now on. Plus, how cool was it to be able to meet not just vampires and werewolves and changelings, but imps and demons and lamia and … whatever the heck the ass monkey in the tribal cloth turned out to be?

Okay, so she could have lived without making his acquaintance, but up until that moment she’d been having a blast. She’d seen things she’d never even imagined before. How was it she could have lived for half of her life in this city and never had a clue about what was really going on around her? How had she missed all this before? It boggled her mind, but it also made her vow that from now on, she wouldn’t let herself miss a thing. Fate had presented her with this opportunity, and she intended to take these lessons from the imp and run with them. After all, where else would she get the opportunity to find a guide to the world of the Others? Somehow, she thought her sister might find herself a bit preoccupied for the next little while.

Remembering Danice—and, by extension, Mac—brought Daphanie back to the moment, annoying, insulting, arrogant prick and all. She needed to keep in mind that this wasn’t her world, but it was her sister’s. Danice might not know this jerk personally, but that didn’t mean that she wouldn’t hear about it if Daphanie really lost control and did something stupid.

Daphanie repeated that to herself as she worked to unclench her fingers from her glass of red wine. She was the outsider, the guest in this place. It was up to her to be the bigger person, stop poking the jerk in the chest, and walk away with dignity and grace.

She could do it.

“You presume to lay a hand on me! Filthy little whore! A curse on you!”

The deep-throated fury of the words reverberated through the room, echoing off the walls and ceiling as if they had been designed especially for their properties of acoustical amplification. Even the floor seemed to tremble slightly beneath Daphanie’s feet. A tiny little corner of her mind wondered idly if the glass in the entry doors had shattered from the vibration, but she couldn’t look to check. It would have been impossible to see through the thick, red fog clouding her vision.

What
had he called her?

Whore

Whore

Whore

WHAT
had he
called
her?

Daphanie watched, with curious detachment, as her left arm snaked out of its own volition. She never commanded it to move. She never intended for it to shift from its position at her waist, elbow bent and wrist relaxed. And she certainly never meant for the glass of red wine dangling from her hand to arc upward in slow motion, or for its contents to splash vividly and wetly directly into the big man’s face.

Nope, that had not been part of her plan.

But neither did she have any control over the warm surge of triumphant satisfaction that flowed within her as she watched the cabernet impact its target’s puffed-up cheeks, pretentious goatee, and bulbous nose. Even if she’d wanted to, she couldn’t have repressed the happy glow her independently minded arm and an indifferent vintage had caused.

Not that she wanted to.

And now there was nothing left to say.

Calmly, Daphanie set her wine glass down beside the abandoned dregs of the root beer and turned to go.

If the last bellow had caused the floor to vibrate, this one should have buckled the structure’s support beams. It probably registered somewhere on the Richter scale, yet Daphanie didn’t care. She set her sights on the exit across the room, intent on leaving with whatever calm she still possessed.

“
SOSA!
Get her!”

A rush of movement behind her caused Daphanie to snap her head around just in time to see one of her enemy’s minions reaching for her with grasping hands and blank eyes that flared just briefly with malicious excitement. She lifted an arm to ward him off and opened her mouth to yell … something, but his hand snaked out beneath her guard, surprisingly swift and accurate, to grab the hem of her top.

Daphanie jerked away, hearing the sound of fabric ripping. Cursing, she looked down, expecting to see herself nude from the waist up, but luck was still with her. The flunky called Sosa had managed to tear a strip of fabric off the bottom of her shirt, but she remained decently covered.

Apparently unsatisfied, the man darted toward her again, but this time he never made contact. Instead, a large figure seemed to swoop in out of nowhere and plant itself between Daphanie and her attacker. From around the interloper, she could just make out the expression of surprise and irritation on the face of the man who had insulted her.

“What are you doing here, Guardian?” the large, sticky man demanded. “Don’t try to tell me this piece of trash is one of your precious pets.”

“I don’t keep pets, D’Abo.” The “Guardian” folded his arms over his chest so that the fabric of his coat stretched across broad shoulders and sharply defined shoulder blades. Only a pair of long top-to-bottom pleats seemed to keep it from splitting open. “And I would be careful about that sort of accusation, if I were you.”

Even from her compromised viewing place, by craning her head, Daphanie was able to make out the meaningful glance her protector shot in the direction of D’Abo’s entourage. It actually surprised her how
much
meaning could be packed into a face that could have been carved from stone. Or marble. By some kind of Renaissance master.

He had clean-cut, masculine features saved from outright beauty by the presence of enough crags and lines to show a wealth of experience behind the vaguely stubbled skin. Daphanie found herself itching to ask him to turn around and face her. She wanted the chance to see him full on. The glimpses she got from behind him and to the side only piqued her interest. It had been a long time since she’d been piqued by a man.

He didn’t seem to share her curiosity, though. Instead, his gaze remained fixed on D’Abo and the other man’s followers. Daphanie had to admit the accusation had merit. She hadn’t looked closely enough at the crowd of flunkies before to distinguish that the group was made up of two distinct types of follower: one type watched their leader with eager, worshipful attention, hanging on his every word and tripping all over themselves to agree with each pronouncement as if it had just fallen from the lips of God; the second type marched in an odd sort of formation in the man’s wake, eyes straight ahead, faces blank, stopping whenever their leader stopped but never appearing engaged in either the group around them or their wider surroundings. It was like watching a troop of toy soldiers, mindless automatons without any sort of independent spirit.

It kinda creeped Daphanie out.

Of course, the lack of self-determination hadn’t stopped the one called Sosa from coming after her the minute D’Abo had issued the instruction. The minion might not think for himself, but he didn’t hesitate to obey commands. It must feel good to be the king of your own little universe. Daphanie, however, preferred to live in the real world.

“If the girl is not under your protection, then you have no place in this,” D’Abo said, waving his hand in dismissal and puffing out his chest. “Step aside. It is my right to deal with the creature that has insulted me.”

“The only right you have here is the right to back off and go somewhere else before you do something I won’t be able to ignore.” The man standing in front of Daphanie never raised his voice above a low murmur, but the tone of command was unmistakable. Even she felt tempted to take a step back, but she’d be damned if she let D’Abo see her do it.

“I won’t be ordered about by you, Guardian. You have no authority over me.”

“I am called Asher Grayson, D’Abo, and I am merely one of my kind. Harm the human, and you’ll have the entire Council down on your head. Not to mention the possibility that my boss wouldn’t be pleased if he were to hear of it. Especially when you have no authority over a human woman who did nothing to you that a little soap and water won’t fix. Do you honestly expect me to stand aside and watch you take your wounded pride out on her? You know the laws, D’Abo.”

It was like sitting in her senior-year Spanish class and watching a Pedro Almodóvar movie without the benefit of subtitles—she understood about one word out of every three. It might be enough to get the gist of things, but it hardly proved illuminating.

As far as she could tell, the “Council” her protector—Asher, he had said his name was—referred to was probably the Council of Others. Danice had told her about them. They were like the senate of the Other community, although to Daphanie they sounded a lot more like the ancient Roman senate than the modern-American one. Apparently, the Council didn’t so much represent the population of nonhuman New Yorkers as it ruled them. The Council of Others made the rules and it enforced the rules, and all due sympathy to anyone who decided to break the rules, because it didn’t sound as if the Council as a whole possessed much of a sense of humor. Daphanie didn’t want to piss them off, and she wasn’t even part of their community. They had no authority over her, but she wasn’t inclined to take chances.