Page 80 of Demon's Bluff

“Do it!” Elyse shouted, and I shook my head as I inched closer. Timing was everything, and why should I singe my synapses when Newt could bring Scott’s circle down for me?

“Mine!” Newt cried out in excitement as Scott’s circle pulled over him like a shirt…and was gone. Shocked, Scott stood there, white-faced with nothing between him and Newt but a slowly dying sparkle. “It’s been ages since I’ve had a coven member to bring me my morning tea,” she added, one hand reaching.

“Newt! Look out!” I shouted as I popped the lid to the first forget charm and threw it into her startled face.

Newt gasped, backpedaling as she pushed ineffectively at the spell soaking in. “Why?” she exclaimed, but it was her last lucid thought, and I grasped her arm, wanting to be the first person she remembered when her thoughts realigned.

“We girls have to stick together,” I said. “Run!”

Hesitating, Newt scanned the nearly empty bar, taking in the stage, the low lights, everything. A flicker of fear was a bare hint in her black eyes…and then she vanished, leaving only the scent of burnt amber.

“My God, thank you,” Scott said, ragged as the glow about his hand flickered and went out. “Elyse…”

“Is at coven camp,” I said, and flung the second vial at him.

“Hey!” he yelped, struggling to get it off him, but it was too late, and I snatched up my bag, grabbed Elyse’s hand, and pulled her to the door. Her crow took to the air, beating about our heads until it landed in the rafters.

“Slick!” she called, and I pushed her out the door.

“Your bird is giving us away. Run. Don’t let Scott see you,” I said, glancing back once at Scott, who was still wiping the potion from himself. Crap on toast, I’d used a memory charm on a coven member.

But Elyse had fled, and I raced to catch up and yank her behind a nearby dumpster.

“I thought you said—” she started, and I inched forward to peer around the cold, stinking metal bin. I could hear sirens, but we had a moment.

“I want to make sure Scott gets out okay,” I said, and she sort of slumped where she stood, shaking from the close call. I knew how she felt, and I held a hand to my middle as the I.S. roared up and sent three witches into the building. I had a riddle instead of a mirror. Worse, I couldn’t stop what was going to happen tonight and it was my fault. Kisten had been ready to run, and seeing me convinced him that the world was better without him in it.

I couldn’t let that stick.

Elyse was trembling when she came up beside me and looked past the edge of the dumpster. “I can’t believe we got out of there,” she said as Scott was helped into the back of a squad car. They left the door open; he wasn’t being detained, only given a place to recover. “You got your mirror. All we need now is a stasis spell.”

Kisten…“I do not have a mirror, I have a riddle.” I took a slow breath, hoisted my bag higher up my shoulder, and then slipped out into the night, head down, heart aching.

“Rachel, you can’t.” Elyse followed, her steps quickening as she glanced over her shoulder at the amber and blue lights playing against the bar’s facade. “You have to let him go.”

“You’re right. I’m letting him go.” Jaw clenched, I studied Cincy’s skyline across the river to place myself. “But the world isn’t better withoutKisten, and if there is the chance that he survives the night as an undead, I’m not going to let him die twice thinking it is.”

Elyse’s steps hesitated, then she hustled to catch up.

I had come to the past with one goal. Now I had two. Three if you counted Elyse’s ancient stasis spell. Once an undead, Kisten could not survive biting another undead—the two virus strains would battle each other, and no undead vampire survived longer than three days without feeding. No soul meant no aura, and if he didn’t take in blood and the aura it carried to replace it, he’d starve. But if Kisten was undead, even for an hour, I would not let the sun burn him.

Coffee first, though. It was almost midnight, and I had a long night ahead.

Chapter

18

Junior’s was unusually quiet, butseeing as Al had been tormenting the city last night, it was understandable. Mark wasn’t behind the counter, which was a relief. That might have been awkward, though the guy was used to me acting odd and might never know the difference. The coffeehouse was the only place I was pretty sure I wouldn’t run into myself. If I had my timing right, I was either already knocked out at my church or, more likely, still at Kisten’s boat, trying to convince him to run away with me. It was all a little fuzzy, seeing as Jenks had hit me with a forget potion. Soon as I was sure I wouldn’t run into myself, I was going out to check on Kisten and cry ugly tears.

“How did I ever survive this?” I whispered as Elyse paid for our drinks with a twenty I had given her. It was odd, hurting this bad and wanting nothing more than to find Trent and have him fold himself around me, tell me everything was going to be okay—when it was Kisten I was hurting for. I loved Trent. Kisten being alive didn’t rub that out.

All I had wanted was to get the pixy-piss mirror and go home, and now I was further from it than before.Damn you back to the Turn, Newt.

My old phone hummed from my bag, and I ignored it. It wasn’t for me. David was currently having the worst week of his life. Maybe his second. I was already doing what I could for him.

Elyse had apparently gotten over Newt, seeing as she was flirting with the barista. I could have given her to Newt and been done with it. Solvedtwo problems at once. But no-o-o-o-o, I had to do the right thing, and I slumped deeper into the thin cushion, angry and miserable, angry because I’d gotten a riddle instead of the mirror, and miserable because I couldn’t help Kisten. He thought he was worthless, that Ivy and I—that the world—was a better place without him. I’d found a way to accept that he had died because of some inane vampire custom, but that he died thinking the world was better off without him? No.

Elyse’s red, dust-stained shoes scuffed closer, and I looked up as she set a small coffee in front of me. Numb, I took it in hand, fingers warming. It didn’t smell like a skinny latte with a pump of raspberry and a dusting of cinnamon, but if I had wanted my usual drink, I should have told her what it was.

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