Chapter 14 #2
A very wet and bedraggled Felix set aside his umbrella to take one arm, and Kelsey took the other. Jena bit back a smile despite her predicament. Had he fallen into the puddle face first? Her amusement was cut short as they glanced at each other and heaved—
Jena bit back a scream as she scraped past the hatch’s metal frame and fell chest first into Felix’s puddle. Ugh, she pushed up to sit, dripping, her side on fire.
“Sucks, doesn’t it?” he asked.
His suit was smeared with rust and his button-down translucent and spattered with alley gunk. The rain pouring down wasn’t doing him any favors, either. He could probably ditch the umbrella at this point. It sure wasn’t worth putting her raincoat on. She scowled and shoved it back through the hole.
“If it makes you feel any better, it was deeper when I went in,” Felix said, stubbornly gripping his umbrella.
It didn’t, but at least her shirt was black…unfortunately, it had one hell of a tear in it now. She lifted it and eased down the waistband of her jeans. A long, jagged gash bled down her side. Christ, that was deep. No wonder it’d hurt so bad.
Kelsey’s head lifted, scenting the air. “You’re bleeding,” she muttered, glancing down the alleyway.
Before Jena could protest, she’d crouched beside her, and Kelsey’s mouth was on the wound—and then she was thudding into the wall across the alley, the ring on Jena’s finger buzzing like an angry bee.
Guess it didn’t like that.
“What the hell?” Kelsey asked dazed, shaking her head as she got to her feet. The were worked her tongue in her mouth, scowling. “That was like licking a cattle prod.”
“You do that enough to compare?” Felix asked, his curls dripping.
“Once was enough,” she shot back.
Jena glanced between them and then down at gash. It looked the same as it had, and she no idea why Kelsey had gotten shocked, but she was pretty sure she’d just discovered what the ring did. Whether that was the carrot or the stick though…
“Figure it out later, we need to go,” Felix said, flicking a sodden curl from his brow. “The rain helps, but all this is burning through my karma faster than I’d like.”
Jena pulled herself out of the puddle and reached in to lower the hatch, making sure it didn’t clang as it closed. A bright smear of her blood stained the metal. She tossed a handful of water over it. “Are we going down Cross, or cutting through—”
“Can’t you smell it?” A massive were growled, stepping into the alley and raising his nose to sniff. “It’s fresh.”
“I can, but between the rain and all these fans blowing, I don’t know where it’s coming from,” said another doing the same as he followed him.
Felix and Kelsey moved to stand by Jena, and he raised his hand making a scissors motion. Cutting through the cemetery it was. They slowly backed out of the alley. The weres’ voices followed them.
“Maybe they’re upstairs killing chickens or whatever witches do.”
The first were grunted. “Whatever keeps them busy. Malcom didn’t seem to care about what they did, as long as they stayed put…but this don’t smell like chicken blood…”
Jena stopped short at the name, and Kelsey bumped into her.
Felix glanced over his shoulder at them. “Come on!” he mouthed, tapping his wrist.
Right, karma. They hurried to catch up with him.
The row of shops on Cross backed up to a municipal parking lot bracketed by an L-shaped, chest-high, cement retaining wall.
Virginia creeper gone scarlet and yellow clusters of bittersweet berries spilled over the top, the vines lacing through the chain-link fence above.
Beyond it was the churchyard and the cemetery, then the tracks were another two blocks past a residential neighborhood and a stretch of pasture.
They headed to the far corner of the lot where the retaining wall had crumbled, and the fencing curled away from the post. Felix scrambled through the muddy gap, dropping his power as soon as they joined him behind the leafy blind.
“Next bit’s all you, I’m saving the rest of my karma for an emergency,” he panted, plucking at his suit.
“One that’s not related to fashion. God, this is disgusting. My tie is ruined.”
The entire outfit was gonna have to get tossed if Jena was any judge. “I’ll buy you another, and I’m not so sure you’re off the hook.” She frowned, looking past the crooked stone markers of the town’s founding members.
The main cemetery was through the hedge opposite them and a completely open stretch, aside from the few tombs dotting the grounds.
A chill mist grayed the distance, but they were gonna stick out like sore thumbs.
She put a hand to her still-bleeding side.
God, it throbbed. Kelsey’s spit was definitely not as effective as Chase’s. “Where’s your car?”
Felix shot her a look. “Parked outside of town hall. There’s no way we’re going to be able to get it without being noticed. Especially not looking like this,” he said, frowning at his suit.
“I walked,” Kelsey said. “It’s not that far.”
Because of course she had, and yeah, it was. Damn it. Felix was right. They weren’t going to be able to make it across town without someone spotting them. Jena chewed her lip, but maybe…
“How much karma would you need to distort us enough not to be immediately recognizable?” she asked Felix.
He raised a brow. “A lot less than I just burned though, especially if Kelsey doesn’t mind shifting. A random couple with a dog in the rain is a lot easier to pull off than nobody there. Why, what are you thinking?”
Jena sighed. “I’m thinking desperate times call for desperate measures.” And that karma had the tendency to linger. “Do you mind shifting?” she asked Kelsey.
The were was already half out of her clothes.
“Nope, but whatever you do, make it quick,” she said glancing through a gap in the mess of weeds hiding them from the parking lot.
“You reek like wounded prey, and those two weres just came around the back of your shop. You got room in your bag for these?” Jena gave a reluctant nod, squeezing them out before packing them away.
Kelsey finished stripping and shifted into a sleek red wolf easily twice the size of anything you’d find in nature.
Jena blew out a breath. Damn it, now it was her turn.
“What do I need to do?” Felix asked.
“Just be ready to take it.”
He fluttered his lashes. “God, I love it when you talk dirty to me.”
Jena snorted and ran a hand over her face before placing her palms against the ground.
She hated eating sin. Yes, the power boost was amazing, but you saw all of it.
Every detail of how a person had accrued the shadow upon their soul.
That was the universe’s price for clearing someone’s karmic scales, and as far as she was concerned, it wasn’t worth it.
But if they were going to get through town…she took another breath and called up her power. These graves were hundreds of years old, how bad could their sins be? It was probably stuff like showing their ankles and snacking on the sabbath.
Her stomach lurched as the first wave hit her.
Shit, that’d been wishful thinking. Slavery, sexual assault…
damn it. The times may change, but shitty people didn’t.
Karma strained through her, the shadows sloughing off and dissipating into the aether as she channeled pure power to Felix.
He gasped, the houndstooth of his suit muddling to solid gray joggers and his hair becoming a mousy brown.
The umbrella turned solid purple, and beside him, Kelsey’s fur darkened, her form shrinking to a medium size dog’s.
Jena’s hair lightened out of the corner of her eye—
“We’re good,” Felix said.
Jena wasn’t after being privy to that. So much for the good old days.
She gratefully dropped her power, her hands trembling.
Lord. When people talked about the sins of their forefathers, they weren’t kidding.
Felix helped her up, and they started across the churchyard hand in hand.
Kelsey glanced back at the lot then trotted after them.
“The distortion won’t be enough to pass close inspection, but as long as no one comes within ten feet, we should be okay,” Felix murmured, holding open the cemetery gate for them.
They made their way through without incident, and fifteen minutes later they were cutting across someone’s backyard into the residential neighborhood.
Quaint gingerbread houses studded the treelined streets behind low stone walls and wrought iron fences.
Jena kicked through a pile of dappled leaves, her footsteps slowing at children’s excited screams from the next street over.
“Shit, I forgot about the trunk-or-treat,” Felix murmured.
Jena glanced at him askance. “The what?”
“Trunk-or-treat. Instead of letting the little urchins run around unsupervised to cause havoc after dark, parents sit by their cars in the driveway, decorate the trunks, and let the kids have at whatever candy’s inside.”
Was he serious? “In this weather?”
“Town hall lent them those big canopies for the main drag,” he said. “Wouldn’t want the little blighters to get wet.”
She shook her head. “Doesn’t gentrifying the holiday defeat the entire purpose?”
“Not if your purpose is to get stupid amounts of candy with basically no effort.” He craned his neck. “Unfortunately, my sister said the whole neighborhood was participating, and it’s gonna be mobbed. Someone will definitely get close enough to recognize us.”
Kelsey whined, pressing against Jena’s knee. She was looking back the way they’d—shit. “Keep walking. I’m pretty sure someone already has.”
Felix’s gaze snapped to the two weres that had been outside the shop crossing the backyard they’d just cut through. “No…” he said, his hand tightening on hers as one of the weres pointed at them. Felix tossed his umbrella. “Now we run.”