Black Dust Mambo

  The squatter howls in pain, the Colt tumbling from his useless fingers to the carpet. Layne kicks the gun away, then kneels beside the squirming squatter, one knee on his plaid-shirt-covered chest, one knife jammed against his fleshy throat.

  “Poesy. My sister. You raped her, along with your squatter buddies. Then you beat her to death.”

  The squatter’s tear-glistening gaze locks onto the clan tat beneath Layne’s right eye, drinks in the yellowing bruises and scabbed-over cuts on his face. Recognition ignites, sparking a growing terror in the mouth-breather’s pale blue eyes. “Oh, shit.”

  “Yeah, ‘Oh, shit’ is right. Shoulda made sure I was dead too.” That memory had chilled Augustine to the bone. But it had also convinced him that Valin would do whatever it took to protect Kallie Rivière from those hunting her. Still, all of his prowess with knives and guns wouldn’t save her from a hex.

  Not unless he shot the hexer between the eyes. A feat he had a feeling the nomad could accomplish quite well.

  The revving engine noise ratcheted up a roaring notch or two. Standing beside his bed, Augustine closed his eyes and focused his thoughts inward.

 

 

  Augustine brought the nomad up to speed, telling him all they’d learned about the St. Cyr family and the mystery behind Gabrielle LaRue’s identity, and gave him the news about the near-fatal attack on Kallie’s friend, Brûler.

 

 

  In the end, unable to produce a valid reason to deny Valin control of his own body, Augustine agreed to the switch, knowing it wasn’t the last time. Not yet.

  Just before he closed his safety bubble of static around himself, he heard the nomad say, “What the hell? Why are my boxers wet?”

  Augustine grinned.

  THIRTY-ONE

  NO WILL OF HER OWN

  Since Dallas was still in surgery, Belladonna told Felicity she planned to go to her room and fetch her book so she could read while she waited. It beat the hell out of sitting there staring at the ceiling and imagining the worst.

  Belladonna paused at a coffee kiosk near the elevators, drawn by the heady smell of fresh-roasted coffee beans, and ordered a double espresso to go. She had a feeling she was going to need it. She told the barista that she’d be back in ten minutes and would pick it up then.

  Getting in the elevator, she tapped the button for the sixth floor. Kallie would be in the room across from hers reading Dallas’s blood. Unless she’d already finished. Belladonna’s throat tightened. The question in her mind was whether or not the Cain-and-Abel trick that Kallie was about to lay down would work on a breathing man’s spilled blood.

  At least she prayed Dallas was still breathing.

  She popped out of the elevator on the sixth floor and strode down an empty corridor. No Augustine. No black-uniformed guards. Either they were all inside the room or Kallie had already finished and they were gone.

  Wonder what she found out?

  She slipped her keycard in the slot, and the light flashed green. But before she could twist the handle, the door flew open and she half stumbled, half fell into the room. “Oh!” she gasped.

  A man stood in front of her. The man with the jade-green eyes from the carnival. The one that Dallas had run off.

  “Bonne nuit, Belladonna,” he said.

  Belladonna turned to run back into the hall . . . or tried to turn, anyway.

  As though she’d stepped into a puddle of superglue on the carpet, her feet refused to budge no matter how hard she tried. In fact, she couldn’t even force her feet apart. The electric prickle of building magic lifted the air on her arms, tingled against her scalp. The mojo bag hanging around her throat burned like a red-hot coal against her skin. The burnt odors of lavender, jasmine, and sandal-wood wafted into the air as the bag’s protective magic was overwhelmed.

  Hellfire. “Sunrise east, sunset west,” the man’s voice intoned. “Black yarn will bind her up best.”

  Cold fear shocked Belladonna into action. Someone was hexing her, and she sure as hell didn’t need to think long or hard on who or why.

  She reached a hand for her shoulder bag, thinking about her small bottle of anticonjure saltpeter. Too late, she remembered she’d given the bag to Kallie. She had a feeling it wouldn’t have mattered. As though tugged by an invisible string, her hand dropped to dangle uselessly at her side.

  “Moonrise north, moonset south, bind her limbs and silence her mouth.”

  Belladonna tried to yell for help, but her lips refused to part. Her trapped scream vibrated in her throat. Her heart battered her ribs.

  The man held up a poppet for her to see. Her eyes widened. “By air and earth, water and fire,” he said, “so be you bound, as I desire.”

  Belladonna’s heart sank, and the first tendrils of real terror rooted deep into her guts. Black yarn bound the little cloth body from head to foot, and a piece of tape covered its mouth of black thread X’s.

  Stepping forward, the hoodoo lifted his palm and blew black dust into her face. She tried to close her eyes, but couldn’t. The pungent smells of anise and bergamot filled her nostrils. Her eyes watered, stung by the dust.

  “I command you, Belladonna Brown, I compel you,” he said, his voice low but brimming with power. “My bidding you desire, no will of your own, my word holy fire.”

  His will muffled her thoughts. Suffocated her sense of self. Her fear vanished. All emotion vanished except for the need to keep his jade-green eyes focused on her, his gaze sun and moon and whirling Earth. His voice burned against her mind, her heart.

  “Mine thou art, Belladonna,” he whispered, unwinding the yarn from the poppet’s legs. “And it is time for us to go. You’ll drive us to Bayou Cyprès Noir. There’s work for us to do and people to see.”

  Kallie looked up from the laptop’s monitor when Layne-Augustine walked into the office, met his pine-green gaze and knew—even before she heard him speak or took full notice of his clothes—that it was Layne, and not Augustine.

  A sense of connection rippled into her, a soothing heat that quieted her troubled thoughts and stirred up certain parts of her anatomy. Her lips parted, but no words came out. He stood in the doorway, staring back at her, something close to panic in his eyes.

  Then he looked away, breaking the spell, and said, “Augustine told me about your friend. I’m sorry. I hope he pulls through.”

  “I appreciate that,” she murmured, leaning back into Augustine’s leather captain’s chair, wishing he hadn’t looked away, but not sure what would’ve happened if he hadn’t. She could just imagine the hotel manager leading tourists into the room.

  “They’ve been like that for decades, staring at each other, mouths open. Tragic, really.”

  Kallie shook her head, a rueful smile on her lips. Looks like we need to avoid stare-downs. “Did Augustine tell you what was going on?”

  “Yeah, he did.” Layne looked at her again, but this time it felt normal, no connection shock. Relief flickered in his eyes. “Whatcha find out?” He nodded at the laptop.

  “C’mere and I’ll show you,” Kallie replied. Wow. Did I just sound like a dirty old man offering candy to a pigtailed and stacked teenager? Heat rushed to her cheeks.

  A smile brushed Layne’s lips. He crossed the room and walked behind the desk to stand beside her chair. He was wearing the black Inferno T-shirt, jeans, and flame-painted scooter boots that he’d had on when Augustine had initially possessed him.

  He bent down to look at the monitor, one hand on the arm of Kallie’s chair, his dreads swinging soft against her arm and smelling of sandalwood, orange blossoms, and Augustine’s cigarettes.

  Kallie’s pulse leaped through her veins. “Who am I looking at?” he asked, studying the photo of a pretty
black-haired, brown-eyed woman with toffee-colored skin.

  “Babette St. Cyr,” Kallie answered. “Rosette’s mama. The photo’s from her obituary.”

  “If she’s dead, then she can’t be the third person involved in this, yeah?”

  “I think she is,” Kallie said, looking up at him. “When I did the blood divination, it showed me a heron for Rosette’s papa, Doctor Heron, and that made total sense. I’m sure he’s the goddamned bastard who slashed Dallas’s throat. But then it showed me a woman standing in front of a house. Babette.”

  Layne crouched down so he could be at eye level with her. “Maybe that’s because Babette is the reason behind everything. Augustine told me that she died while her husband was in the pen. Maybe he blames your aunt, or Gabrielle LaRue or whoever, for her death.”

  “That was my first thought too,” Kallie said, her hand sliding beside Layne’s to grip the chair arm. Excitement burned through her like adrenaline. “But then I remembered that I’d asked who had been responsible for what had happened to Dallas, and the blood revealed Doctor Heron and Babette.”

  Layne chewed on his lower lip as he considered. “And it showed her in front of a house, but not the heron?”

  “Right. I looked up the St. Cyr Delacroix address and Googled the house. Wide porch. Palm trees. It’s the one I saw Babette standing in front of.” Kallie’s pinkie brushed against the nomad’s thumb. “Layne, what if Babette was so furious over her husband’s affair with Gabrielle that she poisoned his clients, then let him take the fall? And died without ever telling him or their daughter the truth?”

  Layne whistled. “More than enough reason for her not to cross over. Hell, if she was that crazy-jealous in life, she might still be that crazy-jealous.”

  “My thought exactly. And now that her husband’s finally come home, maybe she’s influenced him or . . . Hell, I don’t know what her role in this is or even how big it might be, but I think it’s worth a trip to Delacroix to find out.”

  “If she’s the main force behind all this blood and death, then she needs to be stopped, yeah,” Layne said, glancing at her picture on the monitor again. “Otherwise, once Rosette and Jean-Julien are dead, she may try to influence others to carry out her revenge.”

  “Provided she’s a part of this.”

  “Blood don’t lie.” Layne smoothed his hands over his dreads, his face thoughtful. “How far away is Delacroix?”

  “Mmm. A hundred and forty miles or so. Couple of hours.”

  “It’s almost midnight and my clan’ll be here anytime,” Layne said. “But Gage’s cremation ain’t until late morning tomorrow, so that gives us plenty of time for a trip to Delacroix and back.”

  “Could Babette shanghai you?”

  Layne shook his head. “Not with Augustine still in the cargo hold.”

  “You don’t have to go with me,” Kallie said. “I can always lay a talk-to-the-dead trick and—” She quit speaking when Layne laid his warm palm over her mouth.

  “Shut up, woman. That sounds dangerous as hell. You ever lay a trick like that before?”

  Kallie shook her head, struggling with the urge to kiss his palm.

  His gaze dropped to his hand, then back to her eyes. His hand remained over her mouth. “I’m going with you, sunshine. With Doctor Heron loose on the premises, you’ll be safer away from this damned hotel anyway.”

  “Safer?” Kallie pushed his hand away, indignant. “I can take care of myself. I don’t need a bodyguard.”

  “I’ve seen your right hook, no argument here. But ain’t no shame in needing someone to watch your back. This is a man who fights dirty—magic and knives. A man who kills souls.” Grief flared in his eyes.

  Kallie slipped her hand over the top of Layne’s. Rubbed her thumb across his scarred knuckles. “I’m so sorry about Gage,” she said.

  “I know, and it ain’t your fault, Kallie.”

  Before she even knew what she was doing, Kallie leaned over the arm of the chair and pressed her mouth against Layne’s, kissed his soft lips.

  His breath caught in his throat, surprised, and Kallie half expected him to jerk away, appalled.

  What the hell am I doing? I slept with his best friend!

  Heart pounding hard and fast, she started to pull away, ready to stammer an apology, but Layne’s hands cupped her face. Held her still. And he deepened the kiss. His lips parted beneath hers, his breath coming fast. Their tongues touched.

  A lightning bolt of mind-blanking heat streaked from her lips to her nipples, sparked down her spine and between her legs. She slipped her arms beneath his dreads and wrapped them around his neck.

  Layne’s fingers trailed from her face to weave themselves into her hair. A low growl vibrated in his throat and the next thing Kallie knew, he’d lifted her from the chair with easy strength and set her on his lap. She straddled his thighs, her arms still laced around his neck, her lips still lost to his molten kiss.

  He held her tight with one arm around her waist, his other hand cupping her left breast, his thumb circling her hardened nipple through her tank and bra. She moaned her approval against his lips. She felt him stiffen underneath her.

  She slid her hands down his sides to pluck at his T-shirt, wanting to peel it off, but that would mean he’d have to let go of her and the kiss would have to stop.

  And then coherent thought might kick in again.

  With a little sound of frustration, she broke the kiss and tugged at his T-shirt. Layne’s fingers locked around her wrists, held her hands in place against his belly. She looked up at him. Hunger and heat glimmered in his eyes.

  So did guilt.

  And, like she’d feared, coherent thought returned in a rush of shame. Layne opened his mouth to speak, but Kallie jerked her hand free and pressed it against his lips. She shook her head. “You don’t need to say it. I understand. Gage.”

  Then he did what she’d yearned to do earlier and kissed the palm of her hand, his gaze holding hers. Inner light gleamed in his eyes like sunlight through mountain pines—so different from the way Augustine regarded her through those same eyes.

  Kallie’s head jerked up when she heard the office door creak open. Heard a familiar voice say, “The clan’s due within the hour, Augus—”

  Mc Kenna, in black jeans and a royal blue blouse underneath a tight-fitting black leather jacket, came to a dead halt in the center of the office, Layne’s leather jacket slung over her arm. The blackbird V tattooed beneath her right eye was vivid against skin pale from lack of sleep and, Kallie realized, grief.

  She stared at them, her face incredulous as she took in the sight of both of them on the floor, flushed with lust, Kallie astride Layne. Her dark gaze skipped from Layne to Kallie. Fury ignited in her eyes.

  “‘Keep away or yer a dead woman’ means ‘keep away or yer a dead woman,’” the nomad pixie said, her brogue thickening with each heated word.

  “Knock it off, Kenn.” Layne eased Kallie off his lap and onto her feet, then stood and turned. His honey-blond brows knit together in a scowl. “You’re aiming your rage at the wrong person. Kallie ain’t the enemy.”

  “Aye, she is. She’s bloody death in shorts and a tank top, and I warned her to keep her fucking distance. If not for her, Gage would be standing with us right now.”

  “Wrong,” Layne said. “If not for the asshole who made the hex, Gage would be standing with us right now. And I’m working with Kallie to take care of that.”

  “Working? Is tha’ what ye call it? Funny. We call it fookin’ where I come from.”

  “Dammit, that’s enough,” Layne growled.

  The leprechaun stalked across the room, stopping right in front of Kallie. Only a foot of tension-thick air separated them. She tossed Layne’s jacket at him. He caught it easily, its metal studs and chains jingling.

  Kallie met the nomad’s scorching take-no-prisoners death glare and held it, chin lifted. “We’ve found the man responsible for that hex,” she said, pleased with the cool, even
tone of her voice. “And we’re going after him.”

  “Looks to me like yer going after Layne. I guess fooking Gage in every way possible wasn’t enough fer you.”

  “Christ in a bread basket, woman!”

  Kallie’s muscles coiled and her hands curled into tight fists at her sides. “Stay out of it, Layne. This is between me and her.”

  “Christ. You too?” Layne threw his hands up in disgust. “Woman-stupid,” he muttered, then looked oddly pleased with himself.

  Light glinted in the leprechaun’s eyes, and a dark smile tilted her lips. “You think those are gonna save you, do you now?”

  “Save me—no. Flatten you—yes.” “Count to ten before you throw a punch, Shug. Count slow, like you would between rumbles of thunder.”

  One Mississippi . . . Ten! Kallie swung up her fists and shifted her weight. Something vibrated against her hip and she looked down, perplexed, until she remembered her cell phone.

  “Hey, lassie.”

  Kallie looked up in time to see the nomad’s fist looming in her vision like an incoming asteroid. She ducked, but not quickly enough. Mc Kenna’s hard knuckles grazed her cheek, knocking her off balance.

  Kallie stumbled against Augustine’s desk, bruising her hip against its edge, then caught herself and whirled away from the pixie nomad’s next air-swooshing blow. Adrenaline flooded her system, poured through her veins. She spun back around, fists lifted. And barely stopped herself from knuckling a blow into Layne’s back.

  He stretched his arms out, one hand in front of Kallie’s chest and the other in front of McKenna’s. “Stop it,” he said. “This ain’t solving anything, and we’re wasting time.”

  “Get out of the way,” Mc Kenna barked. “No. I need you to listen to me. Gage bought Kallie’s life with his own. That should mean something to you. It does to me. If anything happens to her and I trace it back to you—we’re finished.”