Demons of Good and Evil by Kim Harrison

            Vivian should be here by now, and, nervous, I resettled my bag on my lap. If I was lucky, a quick show-and-tell and a formal statement that I had been used by Hodin might be enough. I was actively trying to make reparations, ensuring the victim’s care in the interim. It had to count for something that I’d broken the chakra curse. Didn’t it?

            “Who am I kidding?” I whispered. Vivian had been angry that I’d broken it without her present, but for little green apples, what was I supposed to do? Let the man die?

            “Your phone is going to ring,” Jenks said, his gaze fixed upon the distant spire of our church, and I reached for it as it hummed.

            “You know that’s as creepy as all hell, right?” I said, and he shrugged, his wings sifting a melancholy blue dust.

            But it wasn’t Vivian. It was David. “Hi, David,” I said, not putting him on speaker. The staff thought I was uncouth as it was. “I’m glad you called. Soon as I finish with Vivian, you want to drive me and Jenks around to find Parker? I’ve got an amulet primed for her. Doyle pulled a mess of hair—”

            “It’s me,” Cassie said, and my smile vanished. Why is Cassie using David’s phone?

            “Cassie? Is David okay?” I asked, and Jenks was suddenly wide-awake.

            “I don’t know!” the clearly frustrated woman shouted. “We got word of a pack mob forming at Eden Park Overlook, and when I went to get my gun from his safe, he left. Took the car and left me. I am not a glass doll!”

            “How long ago?” I said, stiffening. “Cassie, how long ago!”

            “Five minutes, maybe,” the distracted woman said. “I’m waiting for my ride. Rachel, it’s Parker. I know it. And if she’s got another one of those rings . . .”

            Damn it, did I just get myself banned from the tower restaurant for no reason? “Cassie, I’m like ten minutes from Eden Park,” I said, wishing I could line jump. “Maybe five if I can find a Were cabdriver.”

            “Thank you,” she whispered, voice distant. “He won’t ask for help.”

            A rueful smile quirked my lips. “He wouldn’t be an alpha if he did. I’ll be right there. If you get there before me, tell him not to do anything stupid.”

            The call clicked off, and I quickly flipped to Vivian’s icon, my thumbs hitting the wrong keys as I typed. “Had to go. David in trouble. I’ll show you the books when I get done.”

            “Two BLTs, a Cobb salad, and a plate of fries,” a dry voice said, and I looked up into the forced-pleasant face of the manager.

            “Ah, I’m going to need one of those BLTs and fries to go.”





CHAPTER


            22

            “As close as you can, thanks,” I said, my head down over the finding amulet showing the first signs of green as I sat in the back of the cab. We were almost there, and I could hear the bullhorns already. “Jenks, if it gets cold, you’re in the bag,” I added.

            “Yeah, yeah, yeah.” Jenks spilled a bright silver dust as he sat in his usual spot on the rearview mirror, holding the stem for balance. The cabdriver had been sneaking glances at him from the moment we’d gotten in, silent as Jenks checked his sword, took off his red bandana, turned his jacket inside out to protect the embroidery, and generally got ready to work.

            “I’m not kidding,” I said. “Give me some indication that you agree, or I’m going to spell you and put you in there now.”

            Jenks’s dust went red, and it made the speakers hiss when it hit the dash. “You do, and I’ll pee in your coffee every morning until the day I die.”

            “Which might be today, if you freeze to death.”

            The cabbie snickered, steeling his face into a bland nothing when Jenks hummed his wings. “You got something to say, Mr. Peabody?”

            The man—a Were, actually, as most of Cincy’s cabbies were—found my eyes through the mirror. “You’re Rachel Morgan, aren’t you. The runner? No one else works with a pixy.”

            It hadn’t really been a question, and I dropped the amulet to feel for the outlines of my splat gun through my bag. “What if I am?”