Page 29 of Monsters of Mayhem

She glanced down at her wrist and then slowly back up at him.

She put her hands on her hips loosening her wrist and stopping still to stare at him. “What exactly is it that I think?” she asked, smiling.

He was walking into a trap, no doubt about it. Women were trap makers at the best of times, but Laney was a master at it. She could read a room like nobody’s business and lead everybody through it by the nose without even thinking twice about it. I’d watched her do it a million times when I’d been with Caroline.

“You’re thinking.” Ratchet donned his most charming smile. “You know.”

“No, I don’t know,” Laney said. “What are you doing here?”

“I missed you,” Ratchet said.

“You’re full of shit,” Laney said. “Do you want to find Caroline? You know she doesn’t want to be found especially by you and him.” She tossed her chin in my general direction and in such a way it made me doubt she had ever liked me in the slightest.

Though I thought we’d had our friendly moments.

Those were the good days when my relationship with Caroline was fresh and new. We’d been taking care of each other and Laney had seemed happy we were together. Though she had told me early on if I ever did anything to hurt Caroline, she would hate me forever. So, if she hated me now, I would understand. I had abandoned Caroline. I didn’t expect forgiveness but I did expect her to work in Caroline‘s best interest.

I took four steps forward until I was right beside them. “We need to talk to you somewhere private.”

Laney looked me up and down and took a big deep breath of air. She let out the long sigh. “Do you think you can just waltz in here with your good looks and your charm and get me to do whatever you want?”

“I’m not asking for much,” I insisted. “I just want to talk to you. You need to understand what Caroline’s up against. She doesn’t even understand it herself.”

“What I understand from my phone call with her is she’s up against you,” she said, “and that makes me kind of, I don’t know, not really want to talk to you much.”

“Ten minutes in the parking lot. We’ll give you a free ride to the area where she is staying,” I said.

“Wow sounds like an offer I can’t refuse,” Laney laughed. “Look. The last time I gave a guy ten minutes in the parking lot it wasn’t really an experience to remember if you know what I mean. So, if you want to explain to me a little better what’s going on, I suggest you do it now.”

“No, we can’t,” Ratchet said, “but if you insist, I can show you a little bit of what’s going to happen.” He held out his hand with the palm of his hand up. He turned his back so the three of us were surrounding his hand and nobody else could see it.

Flames flew from the center of his palm and then suddenly burst right up to under Laney’s nose.

She jumped back. “What the fuck?” she asked. “What the hell is that?”

“Now can we talk in the parking lot?” I asked.

“Is everything all right here, miss?” A security guard came up next to us.

Laney frowned at the security guard and looked back-and-forth between the two of us. “Yeah, yeah,” she said. “It’s just fucking fine. Thank you.”

I smiled. Laney swore like a sailor and was incredibly brazen, but she always had manners about her when needed. There was something pretty unique about this woman. I could tell why Caroline had her as a best friend.

“Look,” she said. “I don’t know what mumbo-jumbo you’re pulling with that thing.” She waved her hand over Ratchet’s palm, “but I’ll give you ten minutes in the parking lot and then you can maybe explain your little magic trick better and also why my friend is calling me from Alameda needing to be rescued when I thought she was on a romantic getaway with you.”

If looks could kill, I’d be dead meat.

“Thanks,” I said, nodding my head and feeling grateful for her response. It was by far the best we could’ve hoped for.

Chapter 18

I don’t know what I was expecting when I heard a coven was going to walk in the door. It certainly wasn’t anything like what I got. I guess part of it was. I was expecting they would be a bunch of old ladies in black clothes, specifically dresses with weird little boots on walking in and hunched over mumbling strange words. It wasn’t really like that at all. It was five women together. Two of them quite young; they looked about eighteen. Another couple were in their thirties and then there was one who was old like Eunice.

“This is your coven?” I asked, completely surprised.

“Yes, it’s hereditary,” she said. “The coven gets handed down from generation to generation, so Ella and Lena there inherited their positions when their mothers passed away.”

“I thought supernaturals lived for a long time,” I said.

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