Page 115 of Midnight Auto Parts

“I’m sorry to be just another person taking advantage of you.” I smoothed a hand over my aching chest.“My sister was dying, and I didn’t think. I reached for help, and your magic came to me.”I swallowed the excuses filling my mouth, grateful Kierce and Josie couldn’t understand us.“I will pay whatever price you demand of me.”

“I am weary of my vigilance. I tire of my burden and wish to know peace. I have watched you, Frankie Talbot, and I have seen your heart. I will absolve you for your crime, if you agree to act in my stead.”

Karma bit me on the butt swiftly this time, twisting the same terms I set down for Tameka onto me.

“Desecration of your people’s graves is wrong, but I won’t kill them for it.”

“That was my wish and my curse and my burden. I offer you a different path. Protect us. Watch over us. Keep us safe always. In exchange, we will gift you our magic whenever you need it. Come to us to heal. To grow strong. We will name you guardian and bless you in ways you cannot conceive of.”

“Always is an awful long time.”I preferred firmer start and end dates on employment offers.“Are you sure about that?”

“I trust in your sense of honor.”She slid her golden gaze toward Josie.“Consider what benefits a dryad might reap were she to sink her roots in our soil.”Her sharp eyes glinted, aware she had caught me fair and square.“Are there not trees who have existed for a thousand years? How much longer might your sister live with our essence flowing through her veins?”

Clever to dangle a solution for Josie’s longevity, the greatest new fear plaguing our family, in front of my nose.“Do you mind if I confer with Kierce? He has more experience in god bargains than I do.”

“He will tell you not to take it. To avoid gods and their schemes.”She rolled a shoulder.“He would not be wrong to caution you against trusting us. He was trapped by honeyed words once.”

A sliver of hope she knew what he had forgotten about himself stirred in me.“How can you be sure?”

“He wouldn’t be the Viduus otherwise.”

That fast, her logic dissolved the sliver into nothing.“There is that.”

“Make your decision.”She swished her tail.“You have minutes before the curse takes me again.”

“That’s why you waited until now. You wanted a ticking clock to hold up to my ear.”

“I admit that was part of it, but you were unconscious for some time. I could have hunted then. Would it have been better if I had claimed another life or waited to propose this compromise?”

Head hanging loose on my neck, I locked gazes with Kierce then Josie. “I’m about to do a stupid thing.”

“How stupid?” Josie stepped forward, and the trees leaned in. “Mary?”

But Anunit had taken my wrist in her mouth, and before Kierce could lunge for me, she vanished us.

Aweightless sensation buoyed me as I drifted above the pit, the reality of my situation sinking in.

“This is my astral self.”I jerked my hand from Anunit’s mouth.“You ripped out my soul?”Josie must be beside herself. “You can’t just snatch people out of their bodies.”

“You have proven yourself proficient at astral travel. You will find your way back when we are done.”

Blood soaked the dirt before me—Josie’s—driving home how valuable this bargain was for my sister.“What do I have to do?”

“Just as you did before, you will consume my energies once I return to my grave. You will inherit my gifts, and the guardianship of my people. Then at long last, I will be at peace. I will return to my slumber, to my mate, and I will be done with the greed of this world.”

“I should wait for Kierce.”I balked at the magnitude of the transition.“He can guide me through this.”

“You seek a way out of our bargain.”

“It’s a lot. I’ve barely had time to accept I died. That I’m a demigoddess.”I laughed, and hysteria edged it with a bittermania.“I’m doing my best. I’m trying to adapt and survive. To move on. But this? This is the kick I don’t need while I’m down. I want time to think it over, but you’ve made certain I don’t have that.”

“I could take your consort’s life as payment—since he holds the final bone—and be done with it.”

“Threats don’t make me trust you more.”

“Merely a counteroffer.”

“Yeah.”I scoffed at her offhand tone.“Right.”

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