Chapter 13 I’ll take Bourbon #2
“I…” I stood from the table and put my hand over my mouth.
Then, before either of us could say another word, my forever protector jumped into action. Kaa slithered onto the table, lifting into a protective pose. She hissed and stared Raymond down.
“What the hell is that?” Raymond pointed at her.
I didn’t get to answer him, because Kaa took immediate offense.
I’d only seen her do the quick expansion once before, but her body grew so big, she took up half the kitchen.
Her tail slapped the mugs from the counter and knocked over the kettle, spilling hot water everywhere.
As I jumped back to avoid getting burned, she reached out for Raymond.
Kaa wrapped her body around him, quickly constricting. Raymond, with a look of disbelief, phased into a shadowy mist to avoid her. He reappeared on the other side of the room.
“Jericha, do something!” He pointed at me. “Get that thing under control.”
Kaa, clearly annoyed by the failure, hissed and redirected her attack.
I jumped in front of her. “Kaa, stop!” I held my hand out to her. “He is a friend. It’s okay.”
Kaa wasn’t convinced. She continued to hiss and sway her head, as if looking for a way to get around me without hurting me.
“Kaa, chill!” I raised my voice and immediately felt bad when she looked at me like I had crushed her soul. Kaa shrank back down, slowly backing out of the room as she did. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that!”
“So, there is a lot I don’t know about you,” Raymond said as he peeked around the corner to make sure Kaa wasn’t there.
“You’re one to talk.” I pointed at his shadow aura that still outlined his body.
“True.” He pulled the shadows back to his flesh, and the tattoos reappeared.
“Ugh, she’s going to be bitchy for at least a week after that,” I fussed.
“What is that?” he asked. “And why do you call it a she?”
“Kaa…is my pet, sort of.”
“A pet that looks like a plant but acts like a snake?” he huffed.
“You’re literally from hell.” I squinted and shook my head, jutting my neck out at him. “Are you telling me you haven’t seen wilder things?”
“Right, sorry. That’s just not something I would expect to encounter here.” He looked around me to the hall where Kaa had exited. “Am I safe here, or do you have more of those things?”
“She isn’t a thing,” I corrected him. “And she’s the only one. She’s protective of me, and after what just happened out there, she has every right to be.”
“Why didn’t she come out?” he asked suspiciously.
“What?” I searched for a towel to clean up the spilled tea.
“During the battles, she stayed inside. She didn’t sense the danger you were in? Why didn’t she help then?”
“She might have been sleeping. I don’t know.” I shrugged. “She doesn’t have a radar on me to know when I’m in trouble.”
“Got it.” Raymond sighed, and after a brief pause, he returned to our previous conversation. “Should we get back to trying to figure all of this out?”
“Yeah. I just wish I knew where we could start.” A sigh escaped my lips as I gazed at the now-wasted tea, the faint scent of ginger still clinging to the air. “I’m good at figuring out stuff on Earth. I don’t know anything about your world or those things that came from it.”
“You said you had a friend, right? Who helped you figure out what I am?” Raymond put his shirt back on. “Seems like she would be a good resource right now.”
“Yes, Jackie.” I nodded. “She was here earlier.”
“Is she actually coming back, or are you just telling me that to get rid of me?”
“She said she would come back, but Jackie is the type of person to get to her hotel and never leave again. If she’s already in bed, she’s not getting back out. But I think if I let her know demons actually attacked me tonight, she'd be well on her way.”
“Good. Call her back over here. We're going to need all the help we can get.” He looked at the broken bourbon glass and shook his head. “While you do that, I will go see if I can recruit some help of my own.”
“We're really about to face off against some demons, aren't we?” I huffed. “This isn't just going away.”
“Hey, I thought you'd be excited about the action. Think about it, Jericha. Me with my shadows and you with your vines.” He waggled his eyebrows at me. “We could have a lot of fun.”
“I'm going to choose to believe you aren't spewing innuendo right now.” I waved him off. “Go do what you gotta do. I’ll call Jackie and get her back over here.”
“Believe what you want.” He winked at me. “But the images I have in my mind aren't going away.”
A shadowy wall materialized behind him, the air growing cold. With a wave, he faded into the darkness, leaving only a faint chill.
“That is not okay!” I rubbed my arms and waited for the chill to leave. I turned around to find my phone but saw Kaa. She’d returned and sat coiled on the hall floor.
“Kaa, I'm sorry, okay?” I immediately apologized to her. If she was back, it was for an apology. “I wasn't trying to be mean. I was just trying to stop you from killing our new friend.”
Instead of her usual hiss, Kaa reared back and made a ticking noise that reminded me of being scolded by my mother.
“Maybe calling him a friend is a bit generous, but that's where we are right now. If we’re going to survive whatever is coming next, we have to play nice.” I retrieved my phone from the counter where I left it and cursed at the small chip on the screen.
I could have fussed at Kaa about all the things she broke, but that would only make things worse.
“There’s no way I have time to get that fixed.
” I glanced back at Kaa, who rolled her neck like she was telling me I deserved the cracked screen.
Instead of engaging in petty behavior with her, I dialed Jackie's number, grateful when she answered.
“Look, I know I said I was coming back over, but—” Jackie started, but I interrupted her excuse for ditching me.
“The shadow walker came over and then demons attacked us.” I took a deep breath; just saying the words had me ready to scream. “Get your ass back over here.”
“Coming!”
The call ended, and Kaa hissed again before slithering away.
“Oh, get over it!” I fussed and went to clean the mess she’d made.