Chapter Three #2
Elias watches mesmerized and I wonder if she’s unwittingly cast the same spell on him.
“I’m buying if you want to join me.” She slips on boots and then stalks to the door.
We both rush after her, in the hallway our shoulders jostle and Elias growls when he insists on going through the doorway first.
“Oh, give it a rest,” I whisper. “We are in deep here.”
“I know. And it’s time to figure out what is going on.”
“And who the hell she is.”
The Gin Room is only a few minutes’ walk from Maisey’s apartment block.
The daylight is fading and the air is cooling but once inside we are wrapped in subtle golden lighting and the warmth of bodies and breath.
There is a low hum of conversation and Maisey walks straight to the bar. “My usual, please, Terence.”
“Coming right up.” The tall barman with the small round glasses pours her a Bombay with light tonic.
“What do you guys want?” she asks.
“That looks good.” Elias points at her tall fizzing drink.
“Sure.” I nod. “That.”
“Two more,” she orders.
We don’t usually drink, maybe the odd beer, not much else, but right now we need to fit into Maisey’s world as best we can and that includes a drink at The Gin Room.
After a few minutes we find a booth at the rear. Several candles, dripping wax, sit on a shelf next to us, and the mellow music is much quieter. I settle opposite Maisey, Elias folds down at her side.
She takes a sip of her gin and lets out a sigh.
I glance at Elias, waiting for him to start the conversation.
But before he can, she sets her hands on the table, fingers spread, and says, “You guys might be the perfect investigators for these maulings. The police are stumped. Maybe with your extra sensory...”—she taps her nose—“talents, you can find the culprit.”
“We know about the attacks,” Elias says. “That is why we were out in the middle of the night.”
“Oh, I thought it was to screw each other.”
“We haven’t done that for a long time.” Elias glowers. “And we wouldn’t have last night.”
“Oh, no?” I say and wrap my hand around the cool glass. “Felt like it was going that way, Elias.” My cock stiffens at the memory of him gripping it in his fist.
He glares at me. But it’s not hate, it’s because he knows I’m right. Once tipped to a certain degree of lust, there is no stopping Elias, not least because he was an alpha for many years and his cock knots once buried deep.
“We want to help,” I say, tearing my attention from Elias. “In any way we can.”
“Do you think it is a shifter perpetrating the attacks?” Her eyes widen. “Not something I’ve considered before, and I’m sure the police haven’t either.” She blows out a breath. “But with what I know now, my train of thought has changed.”
“We have no information,” Elias says. “Nothing to go on except what was on the news.”
“I have more.” She pulls out her phone. “My friend is a cop and last year I helped find a missing child.”
“You did?” I ask.
“Yeah, I’d been doing a piece on the poor little soul, she was really on my mind then I had a dream she was in an archway, you know, like a building under a bridge.
Two men were with her, both dressed in smart suits and surrounded by magic stuff.
You know, a top hat, this crystal box for disappearing in, capes, weird stuff.
I did some investigating, turned out two guys ran a magic club from a place over near East Harlem, their premises one of those arched buildings.
” She pauses and shakes her head. “I told my friend, said it was probably nothing, but the cops went to check it out and there she was, terrified. They’d taken her, wanted a child for some new trick, and had no intention of giving her back. ”
“Fuck.” Elias runs his hand through his hair. “That was some dream.”
I nod. This confirms her magic is alive and well, even if she can’t explain it. “I’m sure her parents were very grateful, Maisey.”
“Yes, though...” She pauses and shakes her head again, her hair falling forward. “I did come under some suspicion.”
“What do you mean?” Elias asks.
“The police and the parents wanted to know how I knew, but I couldn’t explain it.”
“Have other strange things happened to you?” Elias asks.
“Well, I guess, but no stranger than other people.”
“Like what?” I lean forward.
“I’ve always had vivid dreams that seem to cross into reality, and often I’m doing something and I just stop dead and a place pops into my head and then.
..” She swallows. “Then I see on the news something has happened there. It’s like I know before I know.
” She pauses. “Occasionally I have made things move just by wanting them to.” She laughs but frowns at the same time.
“None of that makes any sense, I’m sorry. ”
“It does make sense.” I touch her hand.
She doesn’t pull away.
“And I know things I can’t remember being taught as a kid,” she continues. “I grew up in the city, yet plant names come to me. I crave remedies I’ve never heard of if I get sick. So much that I go on the hunt for herbs and the like.”
Elias smiles and his attention flicks to me, the smile still in place. A warmth goes through my chest. His smile has always done that to me. It’s rare and fleeting.
“I think I know why,” he says turning back to her.
“So tell me.” She takes a sip of her drink. Her eyes are wide and curious.
“The reason you know these remedies is because the knowledge has been passed down to you. The spells are in your blood.”
She frowns. “Spells?”
“Witches are rare since the murder of them on a mass scale,” I say.
“It wasn’t just women who burned, it was wisdom, ancient wisdom.
But they couldn’t kill them all, and some lived on, sending down their knowledge in ways that would not arouse suspicion when wise, healing women have been cast as evil by so many men for centuries. ”
“Go on...” She tips her head.
“You obviously had an ancestor who was a very powerful, very wise witch, and she has given you the language of remembering.”
“Remembering.”
“Remembering things you have not been taught,” I say.
“You are now walking a path that was buried on purpose for you to find,” Elias goes on. “You’ve found it. You have found us and our world.”
“Wow.” She leans back and closes her eyes. “If it didn’t make sense, it would be outlandish, but it does.” She looks at me. “All those unexplained things that have happened.”
I nod. “Now you understand why.”
“It’s also why you were so easy for us to find,” Elias says. “Your scent is unique and I believe we were destined for each other.”
“Destined for each other?” She frowns.
“Maybe to stop these killings,” I say. “Have you had any dreams about them?”
“No, but I do have these.” She taps her phone. “My friend at the police department gave me these images of the victims. They’re not pretty but perhaps you’ll be able to make sense of them.”
She spins her phone to face us as we crowd close to study them.
Elias’s scent fills my nose and his body heat radiates onto my shoulder.
A tremble goes up my spine as a pile of memories floods my mind.
So many times we’ve joined as one and found breath-stealing pleasure that made me forget the rest of the world even existed.
“Give me strength,” Elias mutters. “That’s savage.”
I look at the mauled bodies. The attacks had been brutal and frenzied. Claw marks, teeth marks, ripped flesh, and severed limbs.
Elias leans back and folds his arms. He’s paled a little. I do the same and beat down a wave of nausea. Nothing like this has happened for centuries. Ancient pacts exist for a reason. We do not hurt humans. Ever.
“What?” Maisey asks. “What are you thinking?”
“That this is no ordinary animal,” Elias says.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, it’s not some escaped exotic pet, in fact, it’s more than one animal.”
“More than one?”
“Yes.” I point to the picture on the screen. “That’s the work of a bear, look at the size of the claw marks and the force behind the attack.”
“And this one...” Elias flicks the screen to the right. “Is a coyote.”
“Goddamn coyotes,” I mutter. Just their name makes my stomach lurch.
“Okay,” she says slowly. “So what does that mean? Two different animals. I mean, it’s not as if bears and coyote are common around here ... oh!” She slaps her hand over her mouth.
We wait for her brain to catch up with her mouth.
“They’re shifters.” She nods. “Aren’t they?”
“Yes.” Elias reaches for her hand. “And this has to stay underground, this information. The police can’t get involved. We will handle it ourselves.”
“But we have to go to the—”
“No,” I say. “Our elders, our alphas will know what to do.”