Page 8 of Spit

“Ugh.” She shuddered. “What do you think he wants?”

“It could be anything.” I shrugged.

“As long as it doesn’t take too long.” Kailee turned back to her screen and peeled off one of the post-it notes stuck to the monitor. She stood up, waving the note like a flag as she skipped toward me.

“Rock Hard Management came back to us. They want you on their team for the Elementals US tour.” Her pink grin was wide and triumphant.

My jaw dropped. “What? Me?”

Kailee nodded, her dark hair bobbing with the movement. “Their security manager has gone AWOL, and they want the infamous Lexi Boudaire to make sure the tour is locked downtoit.”

My eyes widened, and I shook my hands as if I was drying water from them. Unable to contain my excitement.

“They want me.” I brushed my palm over my mouth. “I can’t believe it.”

“Believe it.” Kailee grinned. “I need to work the schedule to cover some of your other consulting jobs, but this is what we were hoping for. Dare Security is going places—breaking into celebrity security is all about recommendations and good impressions. This could be our big break.”

“I’d be managing the tour andtheirstaff,” I told her.

“You’d still be a contractor for Dare Security.” Kailee perched her butt on the edge of her desk. “I’ll watch Rogue for you. I know you’re about to ask. I need to re-dye your hair before you go. The pink looks so good on you.”

“Death and darkness.” I cursed as I pressed the pads of my thumbs on my eyelids. “Please don’t let Beelzebub ruin this for me.”

“You think he will?” Kailee cocked her head to the side.

I grimaced. “Maybe.” The word was slow and reluctant as it pulled from my throat. “He always comes to find me on a new moon, and it's alwayssomething. He could want me to bartend for the evening. He could want me to kill a rogue demon. He doesn’t really give a warning before he demands bloodshed.”

“He’s Gluttony, right?”

“Yeah, and the bane of my existence.” I rubbed my forehead.

“How does a witch get mixed up with ademon king?” Kailee’s brow creased in concern. “He doesn’t own your soul, does he?”

“Sometimes I feel like he does,” I mumbled.

“You have a few days until the Elemental tour starts if we get the job. We fought for this company. We’ve bled for this company. This is the start of something big. No more bouncer jobs in the Supe clubs on Canal Street. We’re talking big bad threats and enough hazard pay to buy a Creole townhouse in the French Quarter. One of the ones with a balcony.”

“Our office is on Canal Street.” I pointed out. “You can see the river from here.”

Kailee waved her hand dismissively. “My father owns this building. Otherwise, we could never afford the rent. Don’t you want to have something of your own?”

I pulled my lip between my bottom teeth. “I am sick of having strings attached,” I said reluctantly, as I thought of my contract with Mr. Bub and my mother’s constant chomping at the bit to get me married off to a male witch with a strong bloodline—we hadn’t spoken in years, but every week I received an email filled with screenshots from tinder. Marie-Anne Boudaire was something else.

“We need this gig.” I echoed her earlier statement, jutting my chin as if trying to convince myself.

“We need this gig.” Kailee agreed.

My twin sister Rose communicated almost entirely through emojis.

Her hands were always in some dirt, growing something in her private greenhouse at the back of the Boudaire estate in Beaux Bridge, the self-proclaimed Crawdad capital of St Martin’s Parish. A place I wouldn’t go back to for all of the seafood broil in Louisiana.

My phone vibrated as I stepped over the threshold into my apartment, a preview of Rose’s message on the screen. Three eggplants. That was new.

Giddy, I called my sister and put the phone on speaker as I took off my shoes.

She answered on the seventh ring, but I wasn’t insulted. Rose lost phones more than she lost her temper. She was the twin who dressed in floral and carried a wicker basket filled with homemade jam, but when she got angry, she could slice a man in half.

“Did you get laid?” I asked instead of greeting her when she answered the phone. My words were coated in laughter.

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