Chapter 19

I held onto Phoebe, whispering soft words that didn’t mean anything while she cried. A few minutes later sirens announced the cavalry was coming. A few minutes after that, EMTs pried her from my arms to check her out. I saw half the night shift, a handful of uniform cops, and most importantly, the lieutenant striding toward us through the trees.

“What happened?” he demanded.

I opened my mouth but I didn’t know what to say. I couldn’t tell if he wanted me to explain the case or what happened in the last thirty minutes. If it was the second one I was in trouble. I didn’t know how to explain it. Amadeus used me somehow, pulled the death witch magic from me, then Jakob arrived and stopped him, maybe? I wasn’t sure of anything.

“They had the girl on the altar. Detective Baptiste managed to break the circle but it knocked him back. He’s pretty beat up.” Mark summed up with conviction. I only believed half of it.

I looked at Mark, willing him to hear the questions I couldn’t ask: where was Jakob? Was Amadeus all right? What was going on?

“And these?” The lieutenant gestured to the people around us, two still curled tightly and moaning, another three huddled together scared.

“There’s two more in the woods somewhere. These two will wake up with a throbbing headache any minute now. I never touched the other three.”

The lieutenant nodded then strode off to handle the growing chaos around us. The circle, or what was left of it, was filled with cops, an ambulance parked firmly to one side. There was no more magic here, certainly not enough to distract me. A pair of EMTs took Phoebe away, leaving me free to ask Mark the question I desperately wanted answered.

“Where’s Jakob?”

“Home, cooling off so he doesn’t kill Baptiste.”

“Oh come on, don’t exaggerate…”

“Let’s see, he’s known me for four centuries, he made me, and when I touched your hand at dinner he lost his temper and threw me against a wall, then sliced my face open. After what Baptiste did, do you think I’m exaggerating?”

“What did Amadeus do?”

“I don’t even know where to start. It’s probably too long to explain out here anyway.” Mark gestured to the circus of cops around us. “It’s like biting but with magic. He used you, could have drained you dry. You can guess how Jakob would react to finding Amadeus with his teeth in your throat.”

“Okay, good point. I’m heading home to him. You make sure Amadeus doesn’t do anything stupid.”

“Too late for that,” Mark sang behind me as I walked away.

“Mallory!” Phoebe shouted over the insanity. Both Mark and I headed toward her. “Don’t go yet! I need a ride.”

I looked at her, seated on the back bumper of an ambulance, a blanket wrapped around her. She didn’t look like she was going anywhere. A completely unseasonable breeze drifted over me and I realized Phoebe was reading me.

“I know how I look but I’m fine. I can go home after I give a quick statement, but they want a friend to take me. I don’t want to tell the girls about all this yet, so I figure, if you drop me off—”

“No,” the EMT interrupted her. “You shouldn’t be alone.”

“Right, you said that.” Phoebe flashed him a winning smile. “Of course, she’d stay for a while. Detective Mors is my friend, you can trust her.”

“Pheebs…” I wanted to help spring her from EMT jail but I was worried about Jakob. Phoebe had been through a violent crime; Jakob could be out committing one.

“I’ll get her home,” Mark offered.

“What?” we both asked in unison. He answered her.

“Hey, you said we’d be friends, right?” He turned to the EMT and flashed a badge. “I’ll stay with her, too, until sunrise anyway.” The EMT looked at Mark, judging him. Mark must have passed because he looked at us one last time and headed back into the ambulance.

“Wow, you’re really turning into a nice guy,” I marveled.

“Yeah, don’t tell anyone. It’ll ruin my reputation.”

I left the two of them by the ambulance and asked for the first uniform cop I saw for a ride back to the station. She spent the drive giving me a half an hour discourse on witches and how dangerous they were.

I didn’t bother to interrupt; the case swirled around in my mind enough that I barely heard. She dropped me at the garage and I got into Lara, starting her engine and shifting gears while the memories of the night filtered back to me. Amadeus’ back, the way his flesh had been scrubbed off by the forest floor, Jakob in that circle, hurting but not killing, tearing Phoebe’s hands free, and lastly Phoebe’s face, eyes wide with terror. I wondered if Christine looked that way once, or if her death took place in the bathroom, far away from the sacrificial circle.

Mark had been right, and wrong. Christine had taken a risk; she’d gotten into the car with a woman she barely knew, a woman who flirted with her. That woman turned out to be part of a group of killers, and that was where Mark was wrong.

Christine had come back to beg me to stop them from killing someone else. I succeeded, even if I took too long to spare my best friend the terror of being up on that altar. I turned into Jakob’s driveway thinking about the other people the Terra Prima group hurt, the lives they’d affected. One of them was inside, hopefully cooling off from a fury that could break bones and tear bodies in half. I took a deep breath and went to see the man I loved.

I unlocked the door with my key, listening to the quiet of the house. It was so quiet I doubted he was there. After whatever Amadeus had done, I didn’t want to use my magic to find out. Instead I dropped my keys but not my gun as I went, listening for any indication of what was going on. There might be a fight or maybe an execution. Light spilled from under the door to Jakob’s office. I stood, picturing the inside, his desk, with its neat blotter and fountain pen resting in the center, the out-of-place office phone. I finally pushed the door open, hoping the neatness hadn’t been destroyed by violence.

It hadn’t. Jakob sat in the tall executive chair; his head bent forward resting on the opened fingers of his hand. His shirt and pants were soaked in blood I hoped wasn’t his.

“Sweetheart?” I asked softly, not sure I wanted to disturb him.

“How is she?” He looked up at me, his eyes filled with worry.

“Fine, shaken up, but still Phoebe, you know? She wanted to go home alone but they wouldn’t let her. She was begging a ride from me in a second.”

“Is it that late already?”

“No.” I shook my head. “Mark said he’d take her.”

“He’s a good man.”

“So are you,” I offered, trying to see if that was the problem.

“I suspect Amadeus thinks otherwise.”

“You mean he’s conscious enough to think?” I joked, perching on the edge of the desk, my body in front of him. “That was a pretty strange kiss.”

“It was more than that, you know. There was a time…” He traced the outside edge of my chin with his fingertips. “How much do you want to know about the darkness in the world, my love? How much should I protect you?”

I thought about the case I’d had this morning. If he could protect me from that I was willing, but something told me there was more going on here. “I like it when you ride in to save the day, but I’m an adult. If there’s something I need to know, tell me.”

“There was a time,” he started again but faltered, then stood up quickly, kissing me hard. I held onto him, kissing him back, my hands low around his waist to avoid the wound he’d gotten earlier in the night. We stopped kissing and he whispered in my ear, “Vampires used death witches, the way he used you tonight. They killed them for the power, and then for sport. They feared them, so they exterminated them, or they craved them, so they bred and killed them without remorse. I will not tolerate it.”

I shivered a little at his tone. “I’m glad. I want you to protect me from that.”

He drew back and looked at me, his eyes locked on mine, his voice solemn. “I promise I always will.”

“Come to bed.” I tugged at his shirt, still wet with blood. “I want to make sure your back is all right.”

“It’s fine.”

“You won’t really know that until someone takes a look at it. Come to bed,” I said again, and this time he understood.

When I woke up the next morning Jakob was still awake, watching over me. I pulled him into bed next to me, snuggling up against his body, telling him not to worry. I didn’t want to know what terrible memories had him so shaken but eventually he started to drift to sleep. He’d been right about the stab wound; when we got to bed there was nothing there, just a pair of matching holes in his shirt and undershirt.

My commute in was lovely; the sun rising in front of me painted the sky a thousand shades of gold and pink. I knew what was ahead of me: paperwork, a few interviews to wrap up our investigation, and meeting with the lawyers to hand off the case.

The case had messed with my schedule enough that I had a second Saturday in a row off. I decided I’d spend the day with Phoebe, whether she wanted me to or not. Rhythm said we should all go dancing and if Pheebs was up for it we would. Otherwise some nice peaceful, one-on-one time with my best friend who almost died sounded lovely.

The morning started slow. The FBI took our two prime suspects, Marina and George. We got a phone call graciously offering to let us watch, but not take part in, those interviews. Both Danny and I declined. I didn’t ask him his reason but I knew mine.

I wanted to close the case and be done with it. I knew the why, they were zealots, protecting the earth. A construction effort tears down trees? Destroy the equipment. A woman helps a company get away with polluting? Kill her. A senator doesn’t do enough to protect the earth? Kill him too.

The only thing I didn’t know was why Phoebe ended up on that altar. The more I thought of it the less I cared. The thing that mattered was she had and she’d gotten off it.

An hour of paperwork, then a second hour, a call came in but I made Wilson and his partner take it for us. He owed me and I wanted to wrap up a long incident report form. Then about halfway through my morning, someone I hadn’t expected to see showed up.

“I’d like to make a statement.” Ethan looked terrible; his mass of tight curls slicked back into a stub of a ponytail. The tension seemed to stretch his skin too tight, or maybe it was just the first time I’d seen him after a shave.

“I’m sure the FBI will take it.” I returned to the form in front of me. Ethan’s role in all this was still a little blurry for me. I wasn’t willing to put him on the “friend” list just yet, even if he wasn’t a definite “foe.”

“They did. Last night and then again this morning with the organization’s lawyers. I want to make sure the SIU knows I had nothing to do with it too.”

“Nothing?”

Danny raised his eyebrow at me, not stopping my question but chiding me. I gave in to his look.

“All right, let’s grab an interview room.”

****

Phoebe was a spirit witch. When she read you she got an exact image of what you were thinking about. If she caught you thinking about a cat, she saw the color of its fur and eyes, even the pattern on the cushion it was resting on. It was a handy skill, one I assumed Simon had as well.

It was Simon’s other skill as a spirit witch that made me put him in the observation room, his ability to know immediately when someone was lying. I wasn’t willing to give Ethan the benefit of the doubt and I didn’t want to call him on his lies. I just wanted Simon to tell me what they were.

“Make your statement.” I sat across from Ethan at the small interview table. Danny sat at the head of the table, chair pushed back in a way that told me he’d let me run the show. I was grateful. Florescent light poured down on Ethan, bouncing off the white linoleum floor and the white walls. I hoped the artificialness of it bothered him.

“Terra Prima had nothing to do with the violence.” He paused and I took the opening.

“What about you, personally?”

“I had no idea. I don’t believe in violence. I don’t even eat meat.”

“When I saw you the night after Representative Lloyd’s attack you called it ‘a victory for the trees.’ But you’re saying you didn’t have anything to do with it?”

“You know the Saints lost the Superbowl and you didn’t have anything to do with it.”

My mouth hung open for a second, surprised he’d dare to bring up the Saints. I was being too nice. I didn’t even glance at Danny. This wasn’t about playing good cop and bad cop; this was about being mean.

“If you had no idea what was going on why’d you ask Phoebe to take a ritual bath?”

“I had other plans,” he said, coolly.

“If those other plans were so important how did she end up on that altar?”

“George scheduled me for a late interview. By the time I got back Phoebe was gone. I thought she’d stood me up.”

“She ever stand you up before?” Danny asked, his tone a lot nicer than mine.

“No.”

“And you didn’t get worried?” I said, my voice sarcastic. “Didn’t go looking for her?”

“I did actually. I went to her place, the coffee shop she likes, and I called around to her friends. I left a message with you.”

I swallowed my next angry question; I hadn’t been home yet to check my messages.

“When did you find out what was going on?” Danny took over.

“Later last night, George called me to bail him out.”

“Did you?” I asked.

“No! I love Phoebe. I ignored him and went to her place. She wouldn’t let me in. There was…there was someone…” He paused, groping for a way to explain Mark’s presence. “She wouldn’t even speak to me. I’m going to try to see her today.”

“How many employees does Terra Prima have?” Danny asked, gently turning the subject.

“Thirty and about eighteen regular volunteers, college kids, housewives who care that sort of thing. The seven who did this were five volunteers and two employees. We’d offered to hire a few of the volunteers, thought they were good people, but they didn’t want to come onboard. Now I know they were probably worried about the background check.”

“Background check?” I said, feeling sympathetic despite myself.

“Every employee has a full background check, just in case.”

“George and Rina passed?”

“With flying colors, Rina was a nurse, worked with a surgeon and George was in the war, a decorated veteran. I mean he drank too much, but other than that nothing in his background.” Ethan shook his head. “I guess I don’t have anything else to say really, just that I didn’t know what was going on, I don’t agree with it, and Terra Prima feels the same way. What happened was terrible, and I hope the victims get the justice they deserve.”

We thanked him and wrapped up the interview. I let Danny walk him out so I could check with Simon. It didn’t take long.

“Not lying, not a word, and seriously, Mal, he’s pretty sick about all this.”

“Yeah, well…”

“He loves her.”

I started to say something but a strange look came over Simon’s face.

“What?”

“We need to get back to the squad room.”

We walked down the hall, fast steps, almost running. I expected a ghost, a goblin, some supernatural creature and instead I saw Phoebe. She was wearing a green wrap dress, one I knew she wore to cheer herself up. Her hair was down, spilling around her in silken golden waves. She looked great, strong and confident, but looking at her, Ethan looked terrible.

They stood next to my desk, a foot or two apart, watching each other. Ethan took a step forward, maybe trying to take her hand or hug her and she took a step back. Beside me Simon flinched over whatever emotion Ethan felt.

“Phoebe, I love you, I didn’t know.”

She looked at him without any pity.

“You have to believe me!”

Phoebe could sense lies the same way Simon did. She had to know he was telling the truth but she only said, “I don’t care.” When she turned away from him to walk toward me, I wanted to applaud but Ethan started to follow her so instead I calmly said, “Mr. Georgio, there’s some paperwork for you to finish up.”

“I’ll help you with it,” Danny interceded and I went after Phoebe.

“Any chance you’re in the mood for lunch?” Phoebe asked.

“Sure.” I smiled. “Sushi?”

“Brilliant idea.”

****

The walk to Haroku’s, our favorite sushi shop, took us a few blocks from the squad room. February decided to be unseasonably hot; temperatures soared into the low seventies, threatening to go higher. If the weather held until Mardi Gras, there would be more naked bodies than usual. I grinned, thinking about how the parades would start soon, along with the parties the girls and I would go to. I could picture Rhythm dancing up a storm but wondered if Phoebe would be willing to get crazy for beads.

“I can’t wait either,” she said.

“You reading me, Pheebs?”

She nodded. “I’m reading everyone now, no more trying to play it normal, no more respecting people’s privacy. I don’t want to end up on an altar when some asshole offers to take me to a picnic.”

“So that’s how you ended up out there?” I asked, as we slid into the bright purple velvet booth. Normally we sat up front in the artistic wire chairs next to bistro tables, but today I wanted a bit of privacy so the booths in the back would have to do.

“Yup. George shows up and says Ethan is running late, he’ll meet me at the picnic.” Our waitress interrupted her and Phoebe ordered her usual lunch of tofu and veggie rolls with a grim look.

“But there wasn’t any picnic.”

“No,” she said angry. “And if I’d read him, I would have known. If I’d been what I am, a spirit witch, instead of playing normal, well, I wouldn’t have been up there.”

I suddenly wished I’d paid more attention to the speech by the victim’s advocate we had to sit through back in December. As it was I could only stumble through, searching for something helpful to say. “It’s not your fault, Pheebs. You’re the victim, remember?”

“I feel so stupid. And pissed, really pissed.” Her voice rose as talked, until she was almost shouting. “He was a nice guy. A decent guy, the kind you take home to meet your parents, and you know what? I ended up tied to a fucking altar!”

Now she was shouting and I didn’t stop her.

“No more. No more nice guys, no more decent guys. It’s married men, shady characters, players, and generally bad guys from now on. Because they might cheat on their wives or dump me for no reason but none of them, not one of them, not ever, tried to sacrifice me, damn it!”

A better person might have reminded her Ethan hadn’t either; it was some people he worked with. I hadn’t liked Ethan enough for that and it didn’t sound like she wanted me to defend him, so I fiddled with my chopsticks.

“I’m reading everybody I date from now on. That’s part of who I am. They’ll have to deal with it. And I’m not looking for nice guys anymore. I’m dating the guys I like, the guys that work for me.” She was losing steam, calming down the longer she talked.

“Guys like Mark?” I asked slyly.

“Exactly! Socially stunted with tons of personal issues but really great in bed. He’s perfect. Well, not exactly perfect, he’s seeing someone new, but another guy like him. Does Jakob have any other single friends?”

“I could ask but I doubt it. There is this guy James though…” A minute later I was telling her about the mysterious and slightly insane Rowan, the bracelet, and most importantly the left-behind pair of jeans.

After her first rant, she was back to being Phoebe. I suspected it was only skin deep for now. She had a lot to deal with before she’d be completely back to her old self.

We walked back to the office planning the weekend out, dancing on Friday night, maybe a road trip on Saturday, and a big decadent brunch on Sunday. By the time I hugged her goodbye, I thought she was going to be all right.

With my worries for Phoebe calmed and after a phone call to Jakob proving he was all right, I threw myself into the last bits of the case. There was a meeting with one of the lawyers from upstairs, Ravenna Evans, a woman who earned her nickname, “the ice queen” with every emotionless act.

Rumor told she never dated, never had lunch out with anyone, and ate only raw meat. I didn’t believe the last one but with the way her long black hair was forced into a perfect bun and her pitch-black eyes glinted coldly I could believe the first two. She wasn’t happy to get “an SIU problem” and kept grilling me for hours.

When I got out of the meeting I had a message from Anna. I called her before I even glanced at the clock.

“Nancy’s gone.” Anna’s voice sounded wooden and she didn’t even say hello.

“Gone?” I asked.

“Gone. Took everything, left me, gone. I told her to get out when we had it out over the baby but I didn’t expect her to just go.”

“Maybe she’ll be ba—” Hold on, stop that meaningless comfort. “The baby?”

“Yeah, I’m pregnant.”

“Holy shit.” Danny looked up at me, but I waved him away. This wasn’t a squad room kind of thing.

“Thanks, Mal. I feel much better now.” Anna laughed.

Anna was pregnant. Raya had gotten her new witch. No more long drives to Houston, no more sex she didn’t understand. Anna could go back to her life. Except Raya’s meddling destroyed most of Anna’s life.

“I’m going to call Aden and tell him about it. Uh, would you mind…would you mind coming over? Sort of to hold my hand? I don’t know how he’s going to take it and with Nancy leaving…I sort of don’t want…”

“I’ll be there in a matter of minutes,” I declared, eager to do something to help. I hastily shoved papers into folders and asked Danny to cover the last of the forms. Generally doing as much as I could as fast as could to try and get out of there. I turned from my desk, slinging my purse over my shoulder, and nearly ran into Amadeus.

I was glad I’d caught myself; he didn’t look like he could handle it if I didn’t. His face was bruised, angry purple and red mixing with semi-healed green and yellow. He looked like an accident victim a week after the crash, holding himself stiffly, and standing up like the effort cost him. It was after five. The sun was set so he could be out, but he looked like he’d be better off at home in bed. I swallowed hard. I knew who made him look like that.

He’d made his living being good looking once; now it almost hurt to see him. I wondered how bad you had to hit a vampire for them to take that long to heal. “So…”

“You shouldn’t have been there and I shouldn’t have done it.” His face was stern.

“Is that an apology?”

“It’s what you’re going to get.”

“Fair enough.” I struggled with what else I could say. Thank him for helping me save Phoebe? Apologize for how Jakob hurt him? Threaten him with more if he ever did used me again that way? I decided to stay out of it, and only said good night as I pushed past him on my way out the door.

Anna lived in a subdivision of two and three-story brick houses with wide open yards and stone entry ways. Neat brick pathways snaked toward front doors dividing manicured green lawns and accenting bright white granite. Her house came toward the end of the block, four houses down from where her parents lived, smaller than most with only two stories and a wide granite porch.

A gift from her father, the house had room for a family. He’d bought it hoping she’d fill it with babies, something that seemed pretty far off when I first met her, but now it could happen before the end of the year.

I knocked in the flickering light of Anna’s gas lamps, seeing the house as a place for someone to grow up. I could picture Anna making hot dogs on the grill and maybe a swing set in the backyard. I could see Halloween costumes on the porch and rainy days curled up at the front window but it was hard to complete the pictures.

Would there be a dad involved? Another mom? Anna’s life was completely turned upside down and all because of someone else’s whim. Whatever I thought of Raya’s offer to me it changed when I saw my friend’s face: Anna looked helpless and alone. I never wanted to worship someone who made me feel like that.

I hugged her firmly before I even went inside. “It’s going to be okay.”

“You think, so?” she asked, sniffing a little.

“I know so.”

We walked into the living room and sat down in front of Anna’s phone. The leather couches still faced the giant fireplace but everything felt foreign. Anna dialed the number off a business card, her hand shaking. “Fire control technologies, Aden speaking.” His voice sounded crisp.

“Uh, hi Aden. It’s uh.” Her voice was shaking so I held her hand. It seemed to help. It helped more when he recognized her.

“The most beautiful woman I know. Are you going to breeze into my life again? I’m happy to drop everything for you.”

“Uh, actually this is a little more serious. I was uh, well, wait is this a good time to talk?” I looked at Anna and shook my head. Usually she was the most confident person in the world; today her confidence was gone.

“If it’s serious, I’ll make the time. What’s wrong?”

“I’m pregnant.” Just like that, just flat out loud. I put my arm around her while we listened to the silence on the other end of the phone. Eventually it had been too long and she asked, “Are you there?”

“Yeah, I am.” There was a pause. “Look, Anna…” He stopped again. “Look, I can be there in a few hours. Would you…would you promise not to make any decisions until I get there? We need to talk about this.”

“Um, sure, yes, I mean, I guess.” It wasn’t the answer either of us expected. The earnest worry in his voice threw me and I could tell Anna felt the same way.

“Just don’t worry, okay? I mean it’s your body and your life but don’t do anything drastic until we talk, all right? I’m shutting down my computer now. I promise I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

“Ummm, okay.”

“Are you alone? You shouldn’t be alone. Can you call a friend? Go out to a movie. What about your girlfriend, what’s her name? N—something?”

“Nancy, she left.” Anna’s voice went wooden. “I’ve got a friend here. I’ll be okay until you show up.”

“You’re sure?”

“I’m sure.”

“Okay, I have to hang up but don’t worry okay?”

“Okay,” she said, clicking the button to hang up.

We were quiet for a minute before I noticed she was crying. I found a box of tissues and handed her one.

“That went better than you thought, right?”

She nodded, blowing her nose loudly.

“Why the tears?”

“I don’t…I don’t know…” she cried.

“All right, let me distract you. This is all part of Raya’s plan. You’ll be okay.”

“I know, I know everything is part of Her plan, I’m just not sure I can—”

“No,” I cut her off. “Not like the comforting vague part of her plan nonsense, like Raya came to me the night you went to Texas. She wants another fire witch in your family, and She wants it to be one with Aden’s family. She laid the whole thing out for me but it’s kind of gross.”

Anna’s jaw hung open for a second before she snapped it shut with a smile. The tears stopped. Then she reached over and kissed me on the cheek.

“That explains a lot.” She sighed with a smile. “Like everything. Wow.” Her hands went to her belly and her grin got wider. “We should celebrate.”

“A minute ago you were crying. Now you want to celebrate?”

“Yeah, I do. I really do,” she said, warming up to the idea. “Will you call the girls? There’s food in the fridge.”

“Sure, I’ll call them but what are you going to do?”

“I’m going to pray.” She practically danced out of the room, leaving me wondering what craziness went on in her head. I went into the kitchen, my cell phone tucked between my head and my shoulder, trying to guess what kind of party food someone who didn’t cook could come up with in a few minutes.

I called Jakob first and let him know I’d be late. Then I called the girls. Phoebe got there first, smiling about a phone call she’d gotten from an old friend, a male friend who happened to be a stripper. Rhythm got there last, still breathless from rehearsal. Isaura brought a bottle of Champagne, tied with a cute pink ribbon.

“Pink?”

“Of course she’s going to have a girl! Come on, Anna have a boy? What would she do with him? Take him on fashion shoots?”

Our laughter brought Anna down from upstairs. Her worried look replaced with a smile and the fabled inner glow pregnant women were meant to have. I pulled a pizza out of the oven and followed it with a plate of cookies. The girls were so impressed with my cooking skills, I didn’t mention it was all wrapped in plastic an hour ago. We dug in to the crazy mix of cookies and pizza while Anna told them the story.

“So there it is, I’m pregnant, Aden’s on his way over, and Nancy’s gone.”

“Hurray!” Phoebe shouted earning a harsh look from Anna. “I mean over the Nancy thing not the pregnant thing.”

“No, she means the other way around, really Anna.” Isaura punched Phoebe lightly on the arm.

“Actually, full disclosure here, I meant what I said,” Phoebe corrected, rubbing her arm.

Anna shook her head, admitting defeat. “You’re right, you were all super nice about it but Nancy moved way too fast.”

“Is she gone forever? Or moved out so you can work on things?” Isaura asked.

“Gone for good, I mean, I think. She hasn’t called me since Wednesday. I went to work in the morning to talk to my editor. When I came home everything was gone. I stopped by her old place on Wednesday night but her old roommate didn’t know anything. After that she started avoiding me I guess, not answering her phone. But I mean, she’s like that. I have to be the one who’s wrong, the one who apologizes and asks her to come home. And this time I’m not asking.”

“Good, because her Holiday cards freaked me out,” Isaura announced.

“Me too,” I agreed.

“Me three,” Phoebe said. “And I didn’t like the way she sponged off of you.”

“And she had horrible taste in clothes.” Rhythm wrinkled her nose.

“Oh like you’d know. You’ve barely been around since Yule,” Anna chided her.

“I’ve been rehearsing, which reminds me.” She got up and pulled an envelope out of her bulky dance bag. “Tickets to the season opener in six weeks. The first set is on me—”

“Just like a drug dealer,” Isaura joked.

“After that I expect you guys to buy tickets, lots of tickets. So that’s two for Isaura and Ben, two for Mallory and Jakob—”

I happily took my two tickets, amazed at the way dance tickets could look like every other ticket I’d ever seen. Somehow in my head they’d been special, different.

“And two for Phoebe and uh, is it still Ethan?”

“Not anymore.” Phoebe shook her head. “Mr. Nice Guy turned out to be friends with a bunch of thugs who tried to sacrifice me.”

There was a round of gasps and while Rhythm passed over the tickets Phoebe started her story. My role in it was significantly more heroic than I remembered and Amadeus didn’t even show up. Mark did, in ways I knew would make Jakob blush, but since none of us would ever tell him, that was all right.

“What about when Ethan met Mark?” I asked when Phoebe finished with most of her story.

“What?” She looked up from her pizza confused.

“Ethan said he stopped by your place last night but he ran into someone who wouldn’t let him in the door. The only two someones there were you and Mark. So-o-o-o-o?”

“So nothing, I was either in the shower or asleep. I had no idea he stopped by.” She frowned a little, and I worried she might be considering giving Ethan a second chance. “Actually, you know Mark might have started to tell me but I was only wearing a bath towel at the time and then I invited him to—”

“Okay, I don’t need to know. I still have to work with him, remember?” The girls burst into howls. When they settled down I deftly changed the subject. “Speaking of other guys I work with, what’s up with you and Ben, Isa?”

“Hmmm.” She nibbled her lip discreetly and I knew we weren’t about to get the kind of details Phoebe had given us. “He’s a sweetheart. I’m trying to talk him into taking me to the gym. I mean I don’t love working out—”

“Or exercising at all,” Anna put in.

Isaura shot a dirty look at her. “But it’s important to him so I’m willing to try. It’s only fair; he’s been willing to watch Buffy with me.”

“He watched Buffy?” Rhythm asked with mock gravity. “Even the musical episode?”

“We haven’t gotten to it yet; we started at the beginning,” Isaura replied, oblivious to her sass. The rest of us caught it and started laughing.

We were still laughing a while later when the doorbell rang. The room fell completely silent. We looked at each other not sure who should say what.

“Oh for Goddess’ sake, it’s Aden, he’s worried sick, and you people are just going to sit here?” Phoebe declared, standing up to get the door.

“She’s reading people all the time now,” I told the group while she was gone.

“Athena knows I would, if some guy I thought I loved let me end up tied down,” Rhythm said.

Aden came into the room carrying a bottle of Champagne with a yellow teddy bear hanging off the top.

“Uh, hi,” he stammered, clearly surprised to see all of us. We all gawked. In the dark of the bar no one had really looked at Aden. Now that we were there was a lot to look at. His hair was a dark red brown and close cropped. It ran neatly down the side of his face in sideburns and then along his jaw line, coming up under his bottom lip to meet a fine mustache.

Aden was thin and his features had a hardness that was definitely male. He was wearing a dark pinstripe suit, a bright blue shirt, and a tie that swirled with a half-dozen colors: the red of his hair, the blue of the shirt, even a bit of the cream from his suits’ pinstripes. Anna might not have liked men but Raya picked a damn good looking one for her.

“Hi.” Anna looked at him and completely ignored us.

“Hi,” he replied, and I couldn’t help but feel guilty for the way we were all staring.

“Why don’t I get us some glasses?” I said, more so I had an excuse to leave the room. When I came back I brought the Champagne Isaura brought and all the glasses we could need.

“You’re all witches?” Aden was asking. He’d managed to sit on the couch, a discreet two cushions away from Anna.

“Not all of us!” Rhythm told him. “I’m a muse. Any chance you dance?”

Before he could get a word in Phoebe interjected, “Don’t answer! If you say yes you’ll be dancing before we get a chance to toast the baby!”

“Right.” I popped open the bottle and started filling glasses.

“Wait!” Aden stopped me from handing one to Anna. “I got non-alcoholic, you know for the baby.” He blushed, turning pink all the way to the tips of his ears which caused everyone in the room to coo over him.

“Okay, guys enough, you’re making him nervous.” Phoebe stood up and raised a glass to the two of them, clearing her throat a little. “To the two most crazy, star-crossed soon-to-be parents I’ve ever met, may your kid have a lot of love!”

We all joined in and Anna started crying again. Phoebe comforted her while Aden looked awkward about it all.

“Yeah, I think we need to leave these two alone. Finish your drinks, ladies, then we’re out of here,” I declared.

“You’re a spirit witch, too?” Aden asked.

“No.” I shook my head.

“She’s death, I’m air,” Isaura explained. “Phoebe’s our only spirit witch.”

Phoebe looked up at the sound of her name and Rhythm helped me get everyone outside. They were all going to head to Convenire. I thought about joining them, celebrating my case being closed, Phoebe being safe, and Anna’s new baby. I thought about it but instead I pointed Lara toward Jakob’s place. I could think of better ways to celebrate.