Midnight Curse (Disrupted Magic Book 1) Read online

  Maybe it would have lasted if you hadn’t left yourself a bolt-hole, said the voice in the back of his head, for the hundredth time. Jesse got the bags out of his trunk and sighed, suddenly too tired to take the stairs. He rode the ancient elevator up to his floor and began trudging down the shabby hallway on autopilot. As he turned the corner, his thoughts were already sinking back into the swirling tar pit of the last two months. Jesse fumbled all the bags into one hand so he could dig the keys out of his jeans pocket—

  He smacked full-on into the small woman in front of him, her forehead nearly knocking into his nose. There was a growl from the floor, and in the confusion Jesse was halfway through an apology before he realized who he’d run into. “Scarlett?” he said incredulously. “What are you doing here?”

  “Hey,” she said, rubbing her head and backing away from him. “Ow. Sorry. I was looking for you, but I couldn’t wait . . . I . . .” she trailed off, looking him over. The bargest was standing just beside her, wearing one of those service dog capes. Shadow’s tail swished when she saw Jesse, but she stayed where she was.

  For a long moment, Jesse couldn’t make his mouth work. For the first time, he realized that he hadn’t actually thought he’d ever see Scarlett again. It had been too long, and so much had happened. But here she was. There was a suspicious-looking stain on her denim jacket, and her hair was slipping out of a loose bun at the back of her neck. A faint smell of smoke—possibly from pot—clung to her hair, though he’d never known her to smoke anything. Her bright-green eyes looked exhausted, and her expression was haunted—or maybe hunted. Even so, there was something new about her, something different. She held herself with confidence, and her shoulders were squared like she was ready for a fight. Not necessarily with him, just in general.

  She was lovely.

  For just a second, the old emotions resurrected themselves in Jesse’s numbed brain. He felt like he’d been knocked down, though he was still standing there with the bags, frozen like an idiot. Shadow whined, looking back and forth between them. Scarlett murmured something to her, and the bargest bounded forward to greet Jesse, her clubbed-off tail waving frantically.

  He finally snapped out of the trance and bent down, dropping some of the bags so he could scratch at her fur. “Hey, Shadow,” he said, letting her give his face one quick swipe with her tongue. “I missed you too.” Jesse had been with Scarlett when she’d rescued the bargest, but he hadn’t seen either of them in years. He was pleased that Shadow remembered him.

  The bargest darted back to her mistress’s side, but her tail still wagged for Jesse. “Listen, can we talk?” Scarlett asked, gesturing toward his apartment door.

  “Um, yeah, I guess.” He winced, remembering the state of his place. “It’s kind of a mess.”

  She shrugged. “I won’t tell Martha Stewart if you won’t.”

  He unlocked the door, leading them both into the cramped living room. Shadow immediately darted past him, trotting off to check the apartment for threats.

  “Wow.” Scarlett paused in the doorway for a moment, taking in the empty pizza boxes, beer bottles, and dirty clothes. “Just fully embracing the divorced guy cliché, aren’t you?”

  He was so surprised that he laughed out loud. His family had been tiptoeing around that kind of comment for weeks, even Noah. Trust Scarlett to just come right out with it. “Something like that, I guess,” he replied. “I need to put this stuff away.”

  She trailed him into the kitchenette, where he stacked the frozen dinners in the freezer. Out of the corner of his eye, Jesse could see Scarlett looking at the copies of his book stacked on the small table, not to mention all the mail and random junk. Shadow returned from her inspection and curled up under the table, giving Jesse a disappointed look. He wasn’t sure if it was the mess or the lack of enemies to kill, but he grabbed a couple of leftover hamburgers out of his fridge and tossed them to the bargest. Her tail wagged as she wolfed them down. All was forgiven.

  Scarlett was toying with the cover of the top copy. “I hate this picture,” she commented.

  “Me too.”

  “Why the hell would they put crime scene tape on a long brick wall?”

  He smiled briefly, but he didn’t like the way she was looking at the book. “Did you read it?” he asked. She hesitated, which pretty much answered the question. “You read it.”

  “Dashiell asked me to make sure you stuck with the official story. He got me a copy before it went to print.”

  Jesse nodded, the small candle of warmth and hospitality in his chest flickering out. He should have expected that. He hadn’t heard anything from Scarlett, or anyone else from the Old World, so the book must have been acceptable. “Don’t tell me what you thought,” he said tiredly. “I don’t want to know.”

  She hesitated again, looking exactly as though he’d demanded to know her opinion and she was trying to dredge up a compliment. He didn’t want to hear whatever she scraped up, so he changed the subject. “Why are you here?” he asked, motioning to the only kitchen chair that wasn’t covered in stacks of junk or boxes. He was still moving things back here from the condo.

  Scarlett sat down, tucking her feet close to the chair so she wouldn’t kick Shadow. “Have you seen the news tonight?”

  He gestured to the state of the apartment. “Does it look like I’m keeping up with the news?” His voice came out sharper than he’d intended, and Shadow lifted her head from her front paws to eye him.

  “Jesse . . .” Scarlett looked pained. “Maybe this was a bad idea.” She stood up again. “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize things were . . .” She gestured helplessly around the apartment, and he let her flail. He found that he was now perversely interested in how she’d sugarcoat it. “It seems like you’re having a tough time,” she said eventually. “I didn’t mean to add to it.”

  “My hard time has nothing to do with you,” he said, annoyed now. Did she think he was still pining over her? That had been a long time ago. “It’s been three years. You have no idea what’s going on in my life.”

  That got her attention. “Of course I do,” she replied, a little heat in her voice. “You quit the consultant business because you couldn’t stand trading on your reputation as a cop. But you ran out of money, and then a publisher offered you a truckload of cash for a book. You figured, hey, tons of books are published every day, you’d take the advance and the book would pretty much vanish. Am I close?”

  He didn’t answer her, but he dropped into the chair she’d vacated, suddenly too tired to stand. But Scarlett wasn’t done. “Then you fell for your ghostwriter and did the whole quickie Vegas marriage. And I bet you were more surprised than anyone when the book was a huge hit,” she continued. “I don’t know why you’re getting divorced, that’s true, but you can’t say I haven’t paid attention.”

  “Because your boss made you,” he countered.

  “Jesse.” It was her turn to sound tired. “Do you know how many humans in this county know about the Old World, but aren’t a part of it in some way? There are like six of you. Of course we have to keep tabs.”

  We. She had never talked like that before, as though she were on the side of the Old World authorities. The cop part of his brain wanted to ask what exactly “keep tabs” meant. Surveillance? Bugs?

  Really, though, did it matter? He sat around in gym shorts watching television. What would they find? “Why are you here, Scarlett?” he asked again. An embarrassing new thought occurred to him. “Did my family call you to do an intervention? Because I’m gonna—”

  “No, nothing like that,” she interrupted. “I came to ask for your help.”

  He laughed, a full-throated sound that came out more broken than jovial. “Of course you did. You’ve got some nasty case you can’t solve, and you thought you’d crook your finger and poor stupid Jesse would come running in to throw himself in front of it. Am I close?”

  She just glared at him, turning on her heel to stalk toward the front door. Shadow was sudden
ly next to her, though Jesse hadn’t heard the bargest move from under the table. Jesse thought about calling them back, but before he could open his mouth, Scarlett paused with her back to him. She muttered something under her breath and then turned around again.

  “It sucks that you think I’d treat you like that,” she said matter-of-factly.

  “So this is like a pity thing, then?” Jesse countered, suddenly wondering again if Noah had contacted Scarlett. “Throw me a bone?”

  “Why would I pity you,” she snapped, “when you’ve so obviously got that covered?”

  He started to argue, but she lifted a hand. “Just . . . stop. I’m not here for me, or for the Old World leaders, and I’m definitely not here to fight. It’s Molly.”

  His brow furrowed. “Molly the vampire? Your old roommate?” He’d met her a few times, and actually kind of liked her. He didn’t know many vampires, but Molly had struck him as . . . good. She had an edge of intensity, sure, but she’d always seemed kind and interested, and she’d clearly loved Scarlett. Jesse had been there when Molly asked her to move out, and he’d seen how it had hurt both of them. “What happened?”

  “She’s being set up. I’ve got about”—she checked her watch—“nineteen hours to figure out what happened, and then they’re going to kill her.”

  He stared, but she didn’t laugh, or take it back. “I guess we’d better sit down,” Jesse said at last.

  Chapter 8

  Jesse managed to pull together a pot of coffee from the ruins of his kitchen, and I started relating the events of the evening. It took me the better part of an hour to explain everything: the Trials, the bloody note, Molly, the murders. Jesse was as surprised as I had been about Molly’s living situation before the murders, though he had a theory about why she’d arranged her life that way.

  “She missed you,” he said, in a tone that suggested it was completely obvious. “She had to kick you out so she could feel safe, but she missed the camaraderie. So she set herself up with twelve little replacement Scarletts.”

  My jaw dropped open.

  “Think about it,” he went on. “College kids have tons of spare time, weird schedules, and they love to sit around drinking coffee and analyzing movies. Who does that remind you of?”

  “Me,” I admitted.

  “How old were you when you moved in with Molly?”

  “Twenty, twenty-one.”

  He nodded. “Same as those girls, I bet. But their lives are—were—simpler than yours. I can see Molly feeling at home with them.”

  I didn’t know what to say to that, so I picked up the story again. I kept my description of the crime scene straightforward, but it was hard to make it sound anything but grisly. Jesse was taken aback, but he’d seen worse things when he was a cop.

  To my surprise, he readily agreed that Molly wouldn’t have killed those girls. I had thought I would need to talk him into it.

  “If you told me she’d killed some guy who tried to attack her, I would believe it,” he said. “But she wouldn’t hurt those girls any more than she’d hurt you.”

  I felt a weight lift from my chest. Someone else believed Molly. I wasn’t alone anymore.

  He tilted his head, considering. “But just to play devil’s advocate, what if she slipped and killed one of them, maybe by overfeeding, and then had to kill the rest because they’d witnessed it?”

  “She’d just press them to forget, Jesse.” I said. “Besides, there were too many of them. That scenario relies on the girls stumbling in at intervals to witness the crime scene and then get murdered. This isn’t a British farce.”

  He bobbed his head, conceding the point. “Besides,” I went on, “if Molly absolutely had to kill them, she would have done it fast and painlessly. Probably snapped their necks.” I swallowed hard, thinking of the girl wearing the same T-shirt I owned. “Those girls suffered. Vampires don’t do that.”

  He raised his eyebrows again. “You’re saying there are no evil psychopath vampires?”

  I sighed. “Of course, it’s theoretically possible, just as with humans. But that’s why all vampires go through a twenty-year apprenticeship after they’re turned. If Molly were a serial killer, her master would have terminated her a hundred years ago.”

  He rubbed his face with both hands. “It’s a good argument, Scarlett. Wouldn’t Dashiell realize all of this too?”

  “Yes, but the Trials are tomorrow night. Dashiell isn’t concerned about justice. He’s concerned about squashing it quickly. And there’s Molly, literally caught red-handed.”

  Jesse pointed a finger at me. “That’s another thing I don’t get. I think I remember you mentioning the Trials once, but what exactly happens?”

  “It’s a little like a cross between a human court trial and a business convention,” I explained. “They do trials for about eight hours, and then they party until sunrise.”

  “Who goes on trial?”

  “Anyone. If you have a grievance with someone else in the Old World, you can ask to be put on the agenda. Usually, it’s minor skirmishes between two different races. Both parties get to speak, and then they each get a sort of rebuttal. Then Dashiell and the others decide. It’s actually pretty simple.”

  “Do you get a vote, now that you’re a partner?”

  I watched him suspiciously. Had there been the slightest note of bitterness when he’d said “partner?” Not the time, Scarlett. “No. We talked about it, but four voting members would wreck the numbers. I do have the opportunity to put in my two cents before they vote, though.”

  He nodded. “Give me an example of a typical case.”

  “Okay, um . . .” I tried to remember some of the cases I’d read about that afternoon. “At the last Trials, a vampire named Gregory accused one of the witches of bad-mouthing him to his favorite human. Not only did she tell the human that Gregory was a douche, she also made the human a witch bag to protect her from being pressed.”

  “I remember Gregory,” he said, making a face. I’d forgotten that Jesse and I had questioned him during our first case. “What happened?”

  “The witch explained that Gregory was stealing money from this woman and forcing her to run his daytime errands, which was hurting her job.” I smiled. “Besides, Gregory is a douche. Dashiell and the others basically agreed that the witch was justified. She got a verbal reprimand for handling it herself instead of going through the proper channels, but that was it.”

  He blinked a few times. “That seems . . . pretty fair. I’m kind of surprised.”

  “It’s not a medieval inquisition, Jesse; the three of them are fairly reasonable people. Even Dashiell.” I suddenly remembered the look on his face as he dragged Molly away, and I winced. “Well, most of the time.”

  “What are the punishments like?”

  “For all the minor stuff, it’s usually monetary. Pay damages, restitution, or whatever. It’s often kindergarten stuff: you broke his toy, buy him a new one. But in very rare cases, usually involving vampires, they might serve time.”

  Now it was Jesse’s turn to stare in surprise. “You guys have a prison?”

  I shrugged. “Dashiell has a couple of cells in his basement. They’re almost never used, though. A vampire would have to do something bad enough that it can’t be fixed financially, but not so bad that they deserve a death sentence. Not a lot of crimes fall into that category.” A new thought occurred to me. “That’s where Dashiell will be keeping Molly now, I bet.”

  Jesse started pacing the small kitchenette as he considered this. The pacing reminded me of Eli, and I felt a jolt of guilt. My phone was still off, and I doubted Dashiell had bothered to fill him or Will in on what had happened. But I was also still angry.

  Jesse turned to face me again, and I pushed the thought aside.

  “You said it’s usually between two species, but not always,” he reminded me. “What are the exceptions?”

  “There are two.” I held up one finger. “If the disagreement is with Will, Dashiell, or K
irsten. For example, Kirsten sells spell materials to one of the witches, and the witch feels she’s been overcharged. Those kinds of trials are really rare, especially because no one wants to be the idiot who accuses Dashiell of something. It happens once in a while, though, and then I do get a vote, instead of whoever’s been accused.”

  “What’s the second exception?”

  I held up another finger. “Crimes against the Old World itself. People who did something that could have exposed us. Some of my cleanup jobs end up on trial, like if someone did something risky or exceptionally stupid. Last time, one of the werewolves went on trial for filming himself changing.” I shook my head. “He said it was for his personal curiosity, but Will was pissed.”

  “So that’s how Molly will be tried?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you’re sure she’ll be sentenced to death?”

  “For killing twelve girls with her teeth? Hell, yes.” A terrible new thought hit me, and if I hadn’t been sitting down, I would have dropped. “Oh, my God.”

  “What?”

  I met his eyes. “I’ll have to be there. Like, next to her. When she dies.” Killing a vampire was difficult and messy, and it left a body that decayed back to the condition it would have been in if magic had never touched it. It was much simpler and cleaner to kill a human being, so the null at the trial would need to stick close to the accused. “I had forgotten,” I said softly.

  Jesse shot me a sympathetic look, and for the first time since I’d arrived, he looked like his old self. “One thing I don’t get,” he said. “So Molly commits this huge crime—”

  “Blood-gorging,” I supplied.

  He nodded. “And you were there when she was caught. So why didn’t Dashiell just kill her right away?”

  “Because killing a member of the LA Old World is a big deal,” I answered. “This is the only major city on the continent where all three groups share power and live in peace. The only way that works is if we agree that all our lives have value. If Dashiell had just chopped off Molly’s head without a trial, or at least consulting the others, he would be contradicting that.”