Shadow Rites

Inside me, a voice repeated, FUBAR, FUBAR, FUBAR, and it wasn’t Beast. It was me, starting to panic. Humans in danger, everywhere, all around me, if the witches intended to release some form of magical working. And to stop the witches, I might have to kill them.

As the cars raced down the street, a speaker blared, “Stop! Police. Stop, and put your hands in the air.”

But the witches turned as one and the girl reached into her shirt pocket. Time slowed for me, that battle-time change that made it seem as if I could see everything and everyone, almost—but not quite—standing outside of time. Me, moving through it, faster than normal. As if I had all the time in the world, but that was a lie. I raised my gun but forced my muscles to wait. To fire at a witch was a cop call, not mine.

The NOPD units both rocked to a halt, tires screeching. One cop opened his car door, weapon leading through the crack of the unit’s A pillar and the door itself. “Stop!” he shouted. “Put down your weapons. Show me your hands!” He was young, and his voice went high and breathless. Over the noise, I heard the other officer calling for backup. I was right. We were about to get FUBARed.

Still in a stutter-slow motion, the girl pulled something out of her shirt. She screamed a wyrd. Or part of it. The older woman grabbed her and shook her, the girl’s head snapping back and forth, the wyrd only half spoken—the powerful spell, contained in a single word, ended before it began. The turbaned older woman snapped her fingers and red sparks of power flashed out, visible to the human eye. The cops ducked.

The girl screamed, “No!”

The older woman wrapped her arms around the skinny one in a mighty hug. Threw out the fingers of one hand.

A blast of white smoke burst from her fingers and . . . the witches disappeared.

Just like that. In a vanishing act worthy of Las Vegas.

I shook my head.

Nothing made sense. And I hadn’t gotten a good look at them. Dang it.

CHAPTER 2

The Nose Doesn’t Lie

The cop in the car rushed out and over to the spot of the vanishing act, his gun in a two-hand grip at his side. He turned and saw me in the shadows, a weapon in each hand, and his service weapon tracked to me. I raised both hands and shouted, “I’m putting the weapons on the ground.”

“Down!” he yelled back, his weapon now centered on me. “Get on the ground. Get down!”

I bent and placed the weapons at my feet. Stepped back, both hands returning high in the air. I put both behind my head and laced my fingers, kneeling, then lying flat on the wet concrete, spread-eagled, my cheek on the wet sidewalk. The rain beat down on me. The cop sped over and dropped a knee into the small of my back. I grunted. That was gonna leave a bruise. He dragged my arms down and behind me and cuffed me while I struggled to breathe.

Eli called from the shadows, “That’s Jane Yellowrock, y’all.” The other cop whirled, his weapon trained on the sound of my partner’s voice. “I’m unarmed and alone,” Eli continued. “Coming out of the shadows hands raised. Don’t shoot. Sloan Rosen is putting a call through to you on your cells about us.”

Eli, still bare-chested, hands in the air, moved slowly out of the dark. He was barefoot again. Coward. I heard a cell vibrate, but the cop ignored the call. A moment later, he ignored his radio. So much for calling the woo-woo department for backup.

“Who are you? ID. What are you doing out here? Who were the women?” The cops talked over each other, the smell of anger and a thin thread of fear in their sweat, though both were as soaked as we were, the rain washing away scents and the tingle of magic.

Eli didn’t answer, just knelt near me and let the cops cuff him too. And then, because we had no ID and chose not to talk, we were shoved into separate units and driven to NOPD Eighth District on Royal Street. Our attorney was waiting for us there, which had to be Alex, doing his intel thing. I hoped he wasn’t still outside under an umbrella.

Brandon Robere was a lawyer, a graduate of Tulane Law, LLM, back in 1946, although he still looked like a man in his mid-thirties, a very self-assured man, currently oozing charisma, a confidence that was almost aggressive, and the kind of sensual magnetism that promised imaginative sexual escapades and the ability to handle anything or anyone. An alpha male at his finest.

The Onorio was lean, narrow-waisted, broad-shouldered, and former military, and was distinguishable from his identical twin by the small mole at his temple. It was the middle of the night, prime time for vamp business, and Brandon was dressed in a charcoal suit and tie, with lace-up Italian leather shoes that probably cost more than any pair in my closet. Brandon strode across the open space to us, and I watched as every female eye and most of the male eyes followed his passage.

Onorios were rare among vampire hierarchy, far above blood-slaves and blood-servants. They outranked secundos and primos. The couldn’t be blood-bound. They couldn’t be compelled. They needed vampire blood only occasionally. They lived for centuries. They had a magic that hadn’t been explained to me yet, but was clearly charismatic and compulsive. And maybe sexual. And probably a lot of other things. The fact that Leo Pellissier—the Master of the City of New Orleans and most of the Southeast U.S., and my boss—had three Onorios in his organization gave him power among the world’s vamps that I had yet to figure out.

From the front of the building, more help came. Moving with purpose in an unswerving line that took him direct to me was my sweetie pie. Not that I would ever call George Dumas, “Bruiser,” that. Not in a million years. We were still figuring out what kind of relationship we had, and sweetie pie did not begin to describe the man. Like Brandon, Bruiser was Onorio, another of New Orleans’s three. And he exuded power the way a billionaire politician did, wearing a suit and tie and his professional smile, his brown eyes finding me instantly.