Page 1 of Deal with the Devil

Once upon a bad deal...

“Hey, do you thinkthose guys are following us?” Penny asked in Amelia’s ear, the scent of sunblock thick in her nose. Amelia and Penny spent a good four hours by the lake along the edge of the haunted forest. Unfortunately, it meant taking the scenic path through the trees back toward the house. Penny’s house, to be specific. Amelia lived on Penny’s couch. And Penny paid for them to have an all-day lakeside party that included two beach towels, two new bathing suits, food in a plastic cooler, and a rainbow umbrella. Amelia was carting the umbrella, using it as cover to subtly glance over her shoulder.

In about twenty feet, they’d break through the trees into the belly of King’s Fall. In about twenty feet, there would be too many people weaving through the sidewalks and streets to kidnap a person. In about twenty feet, their window of opportunity would expire.

Murder mystery writer brain, can’t turn it off.

If they were gonna strike, now was the time.Fuck.Amelia glanced left then right. Not a whole lot of options. If they ran for the city, the goons clearly tailing them could follow.Doublefuck.Amelia weighed their options and decided she was going to pay Penny back the thirty-six silver. Chucking the umbrella up and over her head, she broke into a run the second she heard them curse loudly. Penny was on the same brain wave, shot put tossing the cooler at them and booking it to the street. Arms pumping at her side, Amelia forsook her towel. Flipflops cracking against her feet, she debated leaving them behind.

They didn’t even have the time to take off their flip flops. The goons were already breathing down their necks.

Penny Armstrong and her twin sister Amelia weren’t what one would consider a ‘typical victim’ of petty crime. Not that there’s ever really one way to be a victim of a mugging or pick pockets. But Penny was tall and built like an ox; her muscles made weightlifters jealous. Ballet from the time she was four would do that to a person. She ran like a cannonball fired on thirty pounds of gun powder. While Amelia was short, she was not without her defenses. Her sister took ballet; Amelia took up street fighting. That way mom got her dancer protegee and dad got his boxing champ. Another defense of hers was being a feral, uncontrolled menace—she grabbed ahold of a massive branch cartoon-style, spun, and let it fly. It was the first time she caught sight of the goons tailing them.

Two men in black sweatpants and hoodies, their faces obscured by a magic rune glowing against their chests.Fucking wizards.

Amelia jogged after Penny, breaking onto the city streets. Their bodies were sticky from lake water, bathing suits half-dried, the pair came to a skittering stop midway through an alley as another person stepped out in front of them. A singular man. His facewasn’tobscured.That’s a bad sign.Amelia and Penny backed up, fists raised. He was maybe five foot seven, max, leaning over a silver cane with a fox head on the top. A head full of slicked back, black hair, two skinny horns protruding hisforehead, and cheekbones that could cut steel. He gave a cruel smile, “Ladies.”

“Nope!” Amelia and Penny yelped at the same time, barreling back toward the trees.

“Get them.”

Now, Amelia knew a few things in life—never try to beat a rich man at a game of chance, never bet anything you’re not willing to lose twice, and never, and she meant ever, marry the first person to ask for your hand in marriage. But she also knew, when a crooked smiling fiend in a good trench coat and cane says “Get them”, that their gooses were cooked. She just didn’t knowwhy.

“You, uh, get new friends down at the bank?” Amelia squeaked, bounding over the unconscious bodies of the goons. The thunderous footsteps filled the trees behind them as they made the piss poor choice to fly into the haunted forest blind. In flip flops and tankinis, no less.

“Nope! He’s not mine!” Penny ducked, narrowly missing a branch.

“Well, he’s not mine!” Amelia pointed to their right and the twins trampled down a hillside into the belly of the beast. The forest was not called haunted for no reason. It was an ecosystem of magic and mayhem. After a good mile or so, the trees began to move. They got up, pulling up their roots like skirts, and scrambled across the ground. The two women were bolting between them, hoping to get the pack of hooting minions off their tails. Kind of hard when Penny had neon green hair and Amelia was sporting a baby blue color.

The pair rounded another base in the mountainous terrain, skittering down a hidden path. Trees whizzed past them in dizzy patterns. Something lunged out of a rocky cliffside. They shared a single thought as they avoided a pair of grabbing hands. The hands belonged to a bookie named Kyle. Penny, without missing a beat, punched him square in the nose.

“Rick,” they huffed in unison. Penny’s husband Rick owed Kyle money. Amelia grabbed her sister by the arm, and they broke into another run. Her thighs burned and chaffed from the drying lake water. Her flip flops snagged on something, and she went tumbling down. As Penny rushed to help her up, her hands came across something sharp in the underbrush. A rusty pocketknife. The women shared a look for only a moment before hearing the gaggle of goons once more and rushing further into the forest.

“How much does Rick owe that piece of shit?” Amelia hissed under her breath as they picked their way through the underbrush and rocky, forest floor. A small oasis came into view in the form of a rotten husk of a cabin. They dove for a chance at cover, ducking in through a broken-out chunk in the side of the house and slithering along the wall quietly. Voices flooded the air as the thunderous herd of assholes passed the cabin without even a look. Amelia let out a quiet sigh of relief.

Penny leaned against Amelia, deflating. “I don’t know, I thought he owed him like 20 silver. I gave him some silver to just take care of it, to get rid of him.”

“Well, whoever slinky McGee was, Kyle must work for him and decided they weren’t gonna wait for Rick to pay up.” Amelia ducked, creeping across the floor of the cabin. She kept to the shadows, eyeballing the trees where they’d come from. There was no sound.That’s suspicious.She shook her head at Penny who pouted hard shortly before cupping her face.

Amelia told Penny not to marry that sleazeball. Rick and Penny had one torrid night affair, and she got knocked up. They had been married for the last five years. Amelia never liked Rick. He didn’t deserve Penny. Her sister was a miracle to behold, a hard worker, and a funny person. She could lighten a room at the drop of a hat. And as Amelia crept back to the corner that Penny took up cover in, she swore to herself if she ever saw thatdickhead Rick again, she would stab him with the rusty knife she found.

Bang.

Something slammed over the opening of their exit and the women shot back against the wall behind them. The front of the cabin wasrippedoff the building like it were the top of a muffin. Penny squeaked, scrambling as far into the wall as she could get as Amelia put herself between her sister and the crowd.

Five men in varying stages of black ‘shifty’ clothing stood in front of the building as the fiend with the cane sighed. An ogre dressed in a fine tailored suit tossed the siding of the cabin aside, the rotten chunks of wood breaking apart. Birds left the trees, and the forest was quiet. The fiendish man fixed the leather gloves on his hands. “I truly wonder how hard it was to grab two women in flip flops.”

“Keep back, creep!” Amelia flicked out the rusty pocketknife to her side.

He stared at her directly. A strange mix between purpley mauve and dark royal plum, the fiendish color palette winning through as he stepped into the single ray of sunlight breaking through the canopy. Like he was marble with cracks of gold and black all over. His cane pressed into the wood with a solid thud before he climbed up into the rotten cabin. Plum eyes with rivers of gold flickered from her to where she held the knife out at her side.

“Kitty has claws,” he purred smugly.

“What the fuck do you want?” Penny shrieked from behind Amelia.

“Mrs. Calhoon, a pleasure to meet you,” the fiend grinned from pointed ear to pointed ear, motioning behind him swiftly. Two of his goons tossed something out from behind them. Rick landed face first on the cabin floor.

“Babe.”

---