Chapter 1
Present day…
Ah, the smell of fresh paint in the morning.
What she didn’t see was her business partner. Typical. She stalked across the gravel, searching the sections of vintage toys, old signage, and then rows of Coca-Cola machines for him.
“Seen Nevin?” she asked Jack, her expert on motorcycle restoration.
His olive skin gleamed in the sun, set off by the deep red of his tank top and mop of deep brown curls. He nodded toward the back. “Chewing the fat with a friend.”
“Augh.”
Jack hefted his wrench. “Want me to bust his chops, Miz Ruby? I’ll kick his ass all over the place…if you’ll pardon my French.”
“That’s not French,” she said, trying to ignore the “Miz Ruby” that he wouldn’t stop calling her, along with his flirtatious smile. “Thanks, but he’s my problem.” She appreciated his chivalry, but she wasn’t interested in any kind of romantic relationship.
She continued on to Nevin’s disorganized side of the yard and found him leaning against one of his junk sculptures, laughing it up with some guy.
“Nevin.” She kept her gaze on him, plastering on a pleasant-but-fake smile for his friend’s benefit. “Our client is picking up the Wayne gas pump at the end of the week, the one that doesn’t look anywhere near ready.”
Nevin rubbed his belly where his shirt rode up and exposed pale, flabby flesh. “You’re good at finding deals and making old stuff look new again. Me…” He gestured to the roof of a 1976 Cadillac Fleetwood he’d fashioned into a table. “How ’bout you do the resto stuff and let me focus on my art?”
“Resto is paying the bills. You haven’t sold one piece yet.”
“Aw, Ruby, you said business is good. Can’t we take it easy for a bit?”
No, she needed to push herself, to fill some need for…
something. Her pseudo-uncle Moncrief inherited the Yard, along with her, when her parents were killed in a boating accident fifteen years ago.
Because he traveled a lot performing his magic shows, he couldn’t deal with running the Yard.
Ruby had sobbed at the prospect of losing the last tangible tie to her mom, so he made a deal with Nevin’s parents: a half share for managing it.
After graduating high school, she wrested control from Nevin’s father, who proved with his son that being a lovable lackey was in his gene pool.
When he passed, Nevin’s mom insisted he step in, hoping to give him direction.
He’d been one of the early strays Ruby attracted.
While she had the kind of affection one might have for a dumb-but-sweet cousin, she wasn’t going to let him run the business into the ground like his father nearly did.
Or shoulder all the work while he played with his art.
The man with Nevin said, “Ruby Salazaar, don’t you recognize me?” The wiry guy in a white cotton T and faded jeans gave her an expectant smile. Smoke trailed from the cigarette clamped between his fingers.
Um, maybe? “Leo Canton?”
He looked nothing like the afro-haired kid whose parents were part of Mon’s touring troupe. His hair was trimmed short now, round glasses gone. “Been a long time.” He approached her with outstretched arms.
She warded him off. “You are not going to hug me like we’re long-lost friends. Unless you count cutting off my braid and terrorizing me as friendship, which I do not.”
He chuckled, dropping the cigarette and grinding it into the gravel with his heel. “You still got a braid.” His gaze followed it all the way down to her rear. “The color of honey. You nailed me good after I cut it off. I had that black eye for weeks.”
“You deserved every hour of it.” She’d pounded him, the rage so overwhelming it scared her.
She pointed to the cigarette. “Didn’t you see the sign?
Anyone who drops his butts has to pick them up and put a dollar into the ‘Jar of Bad Behavior.’ Which I use for the cat neuter fund.
” She nodded toward two kittens who were racing over to rub against Leo’s ankles.
Leo pulled out his wallet and handed her a fiver. “Still feisty as ever, and a hell of a lot stronger.” He had the gall to clamp his hand over her biceps but pulled away at the murderous glare she gave him.
Nevin made a tsking sound. “She hates to be touched, dude. Some guy grabbed her ass once, and she dropped him right to the ground. Dude clutched his cojones all the way outta here, yowling like a girl.” His pride warmed her heart.
“That doesn’t surprise me.” Leo slumped back against the car and crossed his arms over his chest. “You did get the best training on attack and evade, thanks to me.”
“You mean the Hunter/Prey game you and Jimmy used to force me into playing?” The two would start hunting her, prowling the tour buses or the stage equipment.
She was always the reluctant prey. Except some tiny, crazy part of her actually liked it while the rest of her hated it. “You two were horrible to me.”
He shrugged. “We only did it ’cause your uncle paid us to.”
“What?”
Leo plucked a kitten from midway up his pant leg and set it down. “Five bucks a week. Skills building, he called it.”
“You’re serious?”
“Your uncle did things to protect you. He was super paranoid for some reason.” He peered into her eyes. “You still don’t…” He clamped his mouth shut and waved as he sauntered off. “Nevin, gimme a shout if you find the part for my truck.”
“I still don’t what?” she called after him.
“Have a sense of humor,” Leo said, though she knew that wasn’t what he was going to say. Well, she certainly wasn’t going to beg him for the answer.
She pinned Nevin with a glare. “Is this true, about Mon paying kids to torment me?”
He assumed the blank look of the guilty.
Her cell phone rang. “Speak of the devil.” She skipped right past hello. “Were your ears ringing? I’ve got—”
“Ruby, there’s trouble.”
Okay, shift of mood. She sighed. “Did you piss off your new neighbors already? I told you not to hang those weird artifacts all over your front porch. Creeps people out.”
“No, big trouble, ducky. Get over here, quick. There are things I have to tell you, things I should have told you long ago.”
Her throat tightened at the agony in his voice. “Be there in about forty minutes.”
“Speed.”
* * *
Speed in Miami traffic. Yeah, right. Especially since a storm had recently passed through, leaving the freeways wet and slick. Which made drivers either go too slow or too fast, both hazardous. The black mass of clouds now squatted roughly over the upscale neighborhood where Uncle Mon lived.
By the time she reached his house, the storm had moved on.
Everything glistened from the recent rain.
South Florida storms were wicked but brief.
Mon chose this area for its secluded lots.
Not that fans clamored over him. He had built his fame as a master illusionist overseas.
He was almost a rock star in Germany. Deservedly so.
Even as she’d watched from backstage, she had never once seen the trick, the hidey-hole, the sliding panel.
When she begged to know just one secret, he always said with a conspiratorial wink, “It’s real magic, ducky. ”
Her work boots scraped on the flagstones leading to his front door.
Nothing seemed amiss, so his trouble was likely some exaggerated fear spun from his eccentric mind.
She brushed past the animal bones, crystals, and silver stars hanging from the porch roof and lifted the knocker.
The brass moon banged against the heavy wood door, echoing inside the marble-floored foyer on the other side.
“Uncle Mon?”
She heard a strangled warble that sounded like, “Go!” Which didn’t make sense since he’d ordered her to come.
She pushed the door open and stopped cold at the surreal sight of Mon several feet above the floor, his feet dangling. A bolt of green lightning speared him to the wall, right through his chest. She felt encased in a solid block of ice, unable to breathe.
His horrified eyes found her. “G-get…out, child.”
Run. Obey Mon.
Leave Mon to die from this thing? Hell, no.
She ran forward and grabbed the flower arrangement from the table in the center of the foyer, her gaze on the bolt.
Pain wracked his wizened face. “Don’t let it see you.”
Which didn’t make sense either. She threw the vase with every ounce of strength she could muster.
It fell short, but she was already searching for something else before it even crashed to the floor.
She had to knock the bolt away from him, but with what?
The knives Mon collected that she was never to touch, except for throwing practice.
She ran into the den where he kept several mounted on the walls.
Two knives slid free of their fancy sheaths in her clumsy grasp.
She raced back, skidding to a stop and aligning herself so she wouldn’t accidentally hit him.
His arms now hung at his sides. His fingers flexed, the only fight he was putting up now.
No.
Before she could throw the first knife, the bolt formed into a ball of light and shot upstairs. Mon fell to the floor in a bone-jarring thump, and she threw herself at him, sliding on her knees the final two feet.
“Mon! Talk to me.”
She gasped at the hole burnt into his chest, nearly gagging at the smell of seared flesh. His eyes lacked the light of life, dull yet still fearful.
He uttered, “Get out. Will…kill if it sees you.” He was talking at least, even if he wasn’t making sense.
“Lightning can’t see. And it doesn’t come back. It’s random, ‘lightning doesn’t strike twice in the same place’ and all that. I’m calling nine-one-one.”
“No.” He raised a shaky hand and let it drop on top of hers as it went for her phone. “Can’t tell police. Rule Number One.”
“Mon, you’re in shock.”
“Tell them…lightning.”
“It was lightning. Ball lightning, I’m guessing, which I’ve heard can act really freaky.”
“Not lightning.” He took a stilted breath. “Magick.”