The Witch With No Name. Ким Харрисон

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СКАЧАТЬ a moment to catch our breath, and then we’d have to move.

      It wasn’t as if we could stake their two master vampires; there were laws against that kind of thing. Unless Marsha and Luke could come up with ironclad blackmail, they were stuck.

      “Okay,” I said, feeling the need to get moving. We’d been here too long. “There might be some law or something you can tap into. Ivy’s going to need access to every document your names are on. Birth certificates, property deeds, insurance, parking tickets, tax returns, everything.”

      Marsha nodded, that same glow of hope back in her eyes hurting me. This wasn’t going to work, but we had to try something.

      Ivy rose to look out through a crack in the blinds. “Do either of you have a safe house?”

      “None we trust anymore,” Luke said, and Ivy let the blind fall.

      “I’ve got one,” Ivy said, coming back to help Luke stand. “You should be okay for a few days. Especially if you help out a little with the other guests coming in.”

      Wrapped in the blanket, Luke awkwardly got to his feet, pale and shaking. “Anything. Yes. Thank you.”

      Jenks took to the air, humming out under the crack in the door to check the hallway. Almost immediately he darted back in with a big thumbs-up.

      “We can’t just walk out with them,” I said, and Ivy gave me a glum smile.

      “They won’t try anything new until sundown,” Ivy said, catching Marsha’s arm before the woman went into the bedroom and shaking her head to leave everything. “They’ll want to be present the next time.”

      God help me. I hated vampires. “Okay, let’s move out.”

      “But he needs his clothes,” Marsha was saying as I collected my splat gun from the counter. Ivy was almost carrying Luke to the door, and tears began to slip again from Marsha. I totally understood. The entire place was a perfect blending of their love. It was sucky when happiness became this costly. But if they’d fought this hard for it, then it would last their entire lifetime. I just hoped that lifetime would be longer than a week.

      The hallway was quiet, smelling of dust and old carpet. Eyes were watching through peepholes, and it made me edgy. Marsha took Luke’s elbow to help him shuffle down the stairs in his blanket, and Ivy dropped back to talk to me.

      “Jenks, you’re going with Ivy, right?” I asked, knowing she wouldn’t tell me the address of her safe house, much less take me there. Jenks, though …

      Jenks’s wings hummed into invisibility, and he rose up a hand width. “Yeah.”

      “No,” Ivy said, frowning, and he made a face at her. “You’re not coming, pixy.”

      “Tink’s a Disney whore, like you could stop me!” he shot back.

      Smiling, I edged around Ivy to keep Marsha and Luke from heading out without us. “I’ve got my phone on,” I said, pushing them back to the mailboxes until I could look at the street.

      “I’ll be fine. See you at home,” Ivy said, ignoring Jenks and his sword pointed at her nose. “Hey, you doing anything tonight?”

      “Listen to me, you broken-fanged, moss-wiped excuse for a back-drafted blood bag!” Jenks said, a silver-edged red dust slipping from him.

      I looked back inside from the street, thinking this had been nice, even with the near miss. I liked working with Ivy. Always had. We did well together—even when it had gone wrong. “I’m working security for Trent,” I said, lips quirking as I saw her mentally smack her forehead. “You want me to bring you back something? It’s probably going to end somewhere with food.”

      “Sure. That’d be good,” she said, turning to give Marsha and Luke some last-minute instructions on how to get from here to there alive. “I’ll call if I need help.”

      I touched her arm, and her eyes met mine in farewell. Smiling, I turned away remembering something Kisten had once said: I was there when she had her morning coffee, I was there when she turned out the light. I was her friend, and to Ivy, that was everything.

      “Jenks, I’ve got this!” I heard, and then I shut the door, my steps light as I headed for my car. Ivy would get home okay. She was right that the masters would want to be there when they brought their children in line. Besides, everyone in Cincinnati with fangs knew Ivy Tamwood.

      Head up, I stomped along, eyeing the few pedestrians. Slowly my good mood was tarnished. Love died in the shadows, and it shouldn’t cost so much to keep it in the sun. But as Trent would say, anything gotten cheap wouldn’t last, so do what you need to do to be happy and deal with the consequences. That if love was easy, everyone would find it.

      I turned the corner, my head coming up at the clatter of pixy wings. “She said no, huh?” I said as Jenks landed on my shoulder, his wings tickling my neck as he settled himself.

      “Tink’s little pink rosebuds,” he muttered. “She threatened to dump insecticide on my summer hut. Besides, she’s got it okay. God! Vampires in love. The only thing worse is you mooning over Trent.”

      My smile widened. Maybe I’d make cookies. The man loved cookies.

      He made a rude sound, his silence telling me he was unhappy. “Sorry about the dog.”

      I lifted a shoulder and let it fall. “You didn’t know.”

      “I should have.”

      I didn’t answer, thinking about my date tonight with Trent. Well, not a date exactly, but I had to get dressed up as if it were one. I was still trying to decide whether to put my hair up or wear it down. Chocolate chip is his favorite.

      “Oh God,” Jenks moaned. “You’re thinking about him. I can tell. Your aura shifted.”

      Embarrassed, I halted at the crosswalk, waiting for the light. “It did not.”

      “It did,” he complained, but I knew he crabbed because he couldn’t say he was happy for me lest he jinx it somehow. “So it’s been like what, three months? Does he still curl your toes?”

      “Totally,” I said, and he made a rude noise at my blissful smile. “He’s a total toe curler.”

      “Awww, this is sweeter than pixy piss,” he said with false sarcasm. “All my girls happy. I can’t tell you the last time that happened.”

      My smile widened, and I pushed the walk button as if that might hurry it along. “I think it was when—”

      The unmistakable sound of tires screaming on pavement iced through me. My breath caught, and I turned. Jenks was gone, his white-hot sparkles seeming to burn an airborne trail back the way we’d come. A woman screamed for help, and I jumped back when a black sedan roared past me, the front fender dented. Somehow I knew, like when a picture falls off the wall, or the clock stops ticking.

      “Ivy,” I whispered, then turned and ran.

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