Chapter 2. Annette #3
This kid didn’t act like a typical shoplifter, though.
Oh, he dressed the part, and he’d scoped out the visible security cameras right after he walked in.
But he wasn’t gravitating toward the pricier merchandise—the sterling silver jewelry, the framed print from the Bewitched movie with Nicole Kidman’s autograph, the handmade wands with crystals and semiprecious stones and gold wire . . .
He left the souvenirs and entered the bookshop area. He sniffed, and his nose wrinkled. Either he wasn’t a fan of incense or else I hadn’t burned enough to fully hide the harvester’s stink.
He approached the nearest shelf and grabbed a book without looking. He pretended to flip through it while staring over the top of the pages at me.
“Are you interested in The Millionaire’s Mistresses?” I asked.
He checked the cover of the book in his hands and blushed hard.
“Nothing to be embarrassed about,” I said. “Klasky’s a talented author. Her sex scenes are particularly spicy. Check out the end of chapter eleven.”
He shoved the book back onto the shelf like it was burning his fingers. Behind him, Morgan covered his mouth with one hand to hide his amusement.
The kid reached toward a different shelf, then seemed to give up on the pretense of browsing. He folded his arms and studied me with the intensity that usually got people slapped or propositioned. But there was little sexual interest in his scrutiny. No more than the usual, at least.
“Did you see or hear anything strange around here last night?” he asked.
My attention sharpened. “I can honestly say I did not.”
He grunted and approached the counter. His hands were strong, with calluses on the first two knuckles. He stood with his back toward the wall, checking the doorway and the windows every fifteen seconds or so. “You don’t sound local. Where are you from?”
“I grew up in Paris.” I opened camera seven’s feed on my computer screen.
Temple had etched a spell onto the fisheye lens in the center of the ceiling.
As a normal security camera, it was all but useless, feeding a constant stream of static .
. . unless someone or something magical entered its field of view.
Amidst the gray snow were two humanoid shapes: me sitting behind the checkout counter, and Morgan, who’d gotten up to set his shelf cards around the shop. Morgan’s image was fainter than mine, but we both had the purple tinge that indicated demonic magic.
Our visitor was invisible to camera seven: fully human, with no illusions or charms masking his appearance.
He reached for one of the books on our counter display. This time, he studied the cover before picking it up. “Everyday Witchcraft? Do you believe in this nonsense?”
“I believe we sell more of ‘that nonsense’ than any other genre.”
As he returned the book to its stack, the static from the camera shifted for a moment.
I paused the feed and clicked back and forth between frames until I saw it: a thin shadow on his left hip, roughly the size of a large knife.
His trench coat hid it from normal sight.
“Morgan, would you please go downstairs and check on your sister?”
I tried to make it casual, but Morgan was perceptive. He sized up our guest, squared his shoulders, and stepped toward me in full teen bravado mode. “Is there a problem, Grandma?”
“It’s been quiet down there for at least three minutes,” I said, deliberately misunderstanding the question. “So, in all likelihood, yes.”
“I meant—”
“Now, Morgan.”
He frowned but did as I’d asked, stopping only to set the last of his shelf cards with the used graphic novels.
Our knife-toting guest watched him go. Once I heard Morgan’s creaking footsteps descend into the basement, I folded my arms and asked, “Who are you?”
I didn’t know with one hundred percent certainty that this was the dumbass who’d attacked Jenny’s harvester last night. But I was at ninety-seven percent and climbing. He’d probably tracked his prey from the stink and any blood it had lost on the way here.
And now he’d waltzed right into my shop, my home, with no clue what he was facing. Guys like this tended to be dumber than a dozen dicks, strutting around with an inflated sense of their own superiority, certain they were smart enough to do whatever they wanted without getting caught.
“You first.” His nostrils flared. “Who are you? What are you?”
I’d studied my own appearance over the years enough to know I looked perfectly human, albeit more attractive than most. That wasn’t vanity, just simple fact.
Like most succubi, I was tall with smooth skin and ample curves.
My hair had maintained its fiery red and gentle waves with only the occasional strands of silver.
The only visible clue to my nature was that I appeared at least fifteen years younger than my sixty years.
“My name is Annette. I’m one of the owners.” I stood and flexed my hands. My fingertips were stiff with the need to extend my claws, but I kept them retracted for now. “Your turn. Start with a name.”
“Ronnie.”
“From your accent, you’re not from Massachusetts. You sound southern to me. Alabama?”
His face wrinkled slightly. He’d come in here expecting to be the one asking questions, and now he was off-balance. “We—I traveled a lot.”
“And where did you pick up that magic knife?”
Ronnie’s poker face sucked. His left hand shot to his hip like he was reassuring himself I hadn’t stolen his weapon from behind the counter.
“Draw that in here and things will go very badly for you.” I spoke calmly and matter-of-factly, and was rewarded by the sight of his throat moving as he swallowed hard. I hardened my expression. “Tell me why you attacked that harvester.”
Before he could answer, Morgan shouted from the basement. “Grandma, you’d better come down here. It’s an emergency.”
For a second, panic clenched my chest as I imagined Ava injured or worse. Had she fallen? The house did its best to protect its people, but it wasn’t infallible. She could have slipped and hit her head or—
“It’s not my fault,” Ava yelled.
In those seconds when I was distracted, Ronnie backed toward the door, never taking his eyes off me.
Shit. I yelled down, “Can it wait?”
“I don’t think so,” Morgan answered.
Ronnie reached for the doorknob.
I gauged the distance between us. Even if I vaulted the counter, he’d be out the door before I reached him, and I didn’t want to explain to the neighbors why I’d jumped a kid a third my age in the middle of the street.
“Mind the knob.” I brushed the wall behind me to get the house’s attention.
I hated asking it for help. It always seemed so self-satisfied afterward, like a puppy waiting to be praised.
“There’s a metal spur that can prick your hand.
The downside of hand-cast, period-accurate brass. I’ve been meaning to file it down.”
Ronnie frowned and checked the doorknob. There was nothing to see, of course. As if I’d ever leave a problem like that untended. But when he turned the knob and opened the door, he hissed in pain and brought his hand to his mouth.
“Sorry about that,” I said. “Do you need a band-aid?”
He scowled, wiped the edge of his palm on his pants, and hurried away.
The instant he left, I grabbed a tissue and went to the door. A tiny smear of blood streaked the old brass knob. I dabbed it onto the tissue. That should be more than enough for Temple to track our guest.
“Grandma?” Morgan yelled.
I locked the door, hung the BACK SOON sign in the window, begrudgingly patted the wall to thank the house for its help, and went to find out what kind of hell my grandchildren had gotten into.
“You have questions? Do tell.”
“We put together a list.”
“I can already tell this is going to be painful. All right, let’s hear them.”
“Noah wants to know if we can get cloaks. He has a black cape he uses for his Batman cosplay, and—”
“You watch too much TV. No cloaks. What’s next?”
“Sophia asked whether we’ll be able to bring her labradoodle ‘Scooby Doodle’ back to life after the ritual.”
“She wants to reanimate a dead pet? Haven’t any of you ever read Pet Sematary? The answer is no. Next?”
“Next is a question about getting matching tattoos. Symbols of power to mark our devotion to R’gngyk.”
“It’s R’gngyk, with soft g sounds. And this isn’t a street gang. We’re not— Actually, tattoos do sound kind of badass. I’m gonna mark that one as a Maybe.”