One
Regret tasted like a discount food truck taco. Frak. Sal swore on his mother’s grave he had used real chicken this time, and I bought it. Literally. Goddess only knows what he had fed his regular customers until the health department caught up with him. Hence tonight’s discount. He was trying to lure in a new crop of suckers, and my forehead must have looked freshly stamped.
Rinsing my mouth out with a gulp of flat soda of undetermined flavor, I was tempted to chase this bad idea with another one. The Italian ice stand the next block down made for a good palate cleanser, but they served at a glacial pace worthy of their product, and I wanted to finish watching Robot Space Tentacles Attack Earth before I called it a day.
The shadow pretending to be mine unspooled its grasping fingers across the sidewalk in front of me and made a gimme motion.
“Fine.” I tossed my half-eaten meal, wrapper and all, into the darkness. “Don’t come whining to me if it makes you sick.”
The fingers shifted into a hand and formed the letter C. No. Wait. They mimed holding a drink.
“Are you serious?” I lifted my cup and got a thumbs-up in response. “Hope you like backwash.”
The void swallowed my offering and snapped back into shape, mimicking me once again.
I never should have fed it one of the single origin chocolate ganache squares my boss gave me on my birthday. Flavored with champagne and dusted in pure cacao, they were heaven in the mouth and hell on the wallet. Now they were the only currency the shadow accepted as a reward for good behavior. Thankfully, indulgences at that price tier came magically treated against melting in my pocket. Benefits of living in the Deep South.
Halfway down Peachtree Street Northwest, I got a text from Bishop, who might as well have been my parole officer given how often he required check-ins when the boss was out of town. Rumor had it he had been a desk jockey prior to my arrival. Lucky me, he had decided—or the potentate had decided for him—to hit the streets to keep a particular eye on the newest member of Team Atlanta.
>>We got trouble.
Nice and vague, just the way I like it.
>>Details to follow.
An address popped on-screen that forced me to pull up the GPS app.
I had been a resident of Atlanta for a year and two days, but Peachtrees still looked the same to me.
On my way.
Using a rideshare app exclusive to the city’s paranormal population, Swyft, I arranged for transportation. I didn’t have to wait long for a sporty two-seater painted lime green with black racing stripes to squeal up to the curb. The driver honked twice, and when I didn’t break an ankle sprinting around the car, she lowered her window.
Skin so pale it was translucent, I figured her for a vampire, but she hadn’t sent a warning tingle up my spine. Her wide blue eyes, the color of her pronounced veins, locked on me like a tractor beam, as if her will alone could haul me into the passenger seat. Her spiked pixie cut highlighted the roundness in her cheeks, and the elastics on her braces matched her hair and her wheels.
Open palm smacking her outer door, she called, “Are you coming or what?”
Sizing her up, I felt my eyebrows climb. “Are you old enough to drive?”
Returning the favor, she leaned out farther. “Do you see a student driver sticker, lady?”
Another texted nudge from Bishop forced me to take my chances. “Let’s go.”
I climbed in beside her, noted the aftermarket stereo system that belonged on a spaceship, and exhaled through my teeth.
“I’m an ace driver,” the girl snarled. “Stop huffing and puffing over there.”
“Does your attitude get you many tips?” I strapped in. “How about positive reviews?”
Once upon a time, I had taken pride in the number of glowing reviews I collected on the job. Those were the days. I didn’t get thanked for the work I did now, and I sure didn’t earn any tips. Heck, I considered it a good night if I made it home without blood on my clothes or spit in my hair, and those were the more sanitary bodily fluids that got splashed on me. Maybe things would have turned out differently had I not embraced the role of villain, rather than heroine, in the fairy tale that used to be my life.
Used to be was key. I wasn’t that person anymore. I had shed her and grown into a new skin.
I had buried the old me where no one would find her and risen with a new identity, a new purpose, and with hope that new and improved me would cancel out all the karmic debt past me had incurred. I was fully embracing the role of phoenix, which was only fitting since one graced the city seal.
Though I had to admit, as a necromancer living in a city teeming with paranormals, my old story hadn’t ended so much as I had flipped to the start of the next chapter.
“I have to make rent.” She stomped on the accelerator but mercifully left the radio off. “To do that, I zip as many slowpokes across town as I can in a night. Gas don’t pay for itself. Neither do groceries. Keep that in mind when you’re typing up the review I can hear you mentally composing over there.”
That stupid taco came back to haunt me as she cut lanes, slashed through an exit, then slammed on her brakes.
I swallowed it back down, hit release on my seat belt, then reached for the handle. “Thanks for the lift.”
“What’s he doing here?” the girl mumbled. “Hey.” She locked the doors, ensuring a captive audience. “What’s he doing here?”
“You’ve got to be more specific.” A manned barricade blocked the sidewalk. “Who?”
“Midas Kinase.”
The sound of his name sent a shiver whispering down my spine. “I don’t know.”
But I could guess, and I only needed one.
The Atlanta gwyllgi pack wouldn’t trot out its heir and chief enforcer for anything less than a capital crime involving a pack member. Crossing paths with him—or his keen nose—was the absolute last thing I needed tonight or any other night.
Gwyllgi scent memories filed away all sorts of information, meaning my true identity was only a sniff away. I had taken precautions, magical ones, to flesh out my new persona, but this wasn’t how I wanted to learn if the witch had sold me the promised charm or just an old silver band that sometimes turned my middle finger green.
“You’re Hadley Whitaker.” Her eyes rounded until they swallowed her face. “The Hadley Whitaker. I saw your name pop up on the app, but…geez. You’re really her?”
“Yep.” I tapped on the window so she would take the hint. “I’m really me.”
“No shit?” She all but bounced in her seat. “You know the Potentate of Atlanta?”
Linus Andreas Lawson III.
Appointed by the Society for Post-Life Management, the ruling body for necromancers, over which his mother presided, to protect and serve this city. He was Society royalty. Rich. Powerful. Influential. And engaged to my former best friend.
Yeah.
Our relationship was…complicated, even before I took a walk on the dark side.
Chills coasted down my arms, and my heart kicked hard once. “He’s my boss.”
“You’re like his heir, right? Scion? I forget what you corpse-raisers call it.”
Corpse-raiser.
This kid could teach a master class on how not to get repeat business.