Caught Forever Between (5 page)

At the
mambo
’s cold words, Cass opened her eyes. Gabrielle LaRue stood in the doorway between the front and the back of the shop. She stepped forward, the door swinging shut behind her. She fixed Cass with a gaze as icy as her words, her eyes like night-hidden stones. A purple scarf covered her hair and silver flashed at her ears, throat, and wrists. Her purple dress was simple and summer-sheer, and her brown feet were sandals-clad.

A queen stood before her, a queen full of dark power, one who weighed and measured her better than any set of scales. Cass straightened. Met the
mambo
’s gaze.

“You set all this in motion, girl,” Gabrielle said, crossing the floor to stand beside her crouching godson and his downed prey. “You a decision to make.” Her gaze shifted to Helena. Helena met the
mambo
’s dark eyes and lifted her chin slightly. “Justice for your mama or — ” Gabrielle glanced at Raleigh. Her lip curled slightly as though she smelled something bad — maybe the bitterness he’d splashed all over the shop and himself when he’d pulled the trigger That Night. “ — justice for your Michelangelo.”

Returning her attention to Cass, she looked at her for a long moment. “You must choose one. The other be released, y ’hear, girl? Released until the day a higher power calls ’em to task for what they done.”

“I didn’t shoot Alex,” Raleigh said, his voice thin. “He’s my fucking
brother
!” Sweat gleamed on his forehead. His strained face looked ghostly even in the kitchen’s clear light, his eyes as dark as midnight.

A sudden pang pierced Cass. He looked like Alex had when she’d discovered him on the blood-pooled floor, pale and fading, eyes shut. She remembered Raleigh walking into the shop, the color draining from his face as he looked at his brother held in her blood-smeared arms; remembered his words:
He’s dead, isn’t he?
Remembered the shocked expression on his face when she’d breathed,
No. Call 911.

Remembered the shattered-heart feel of the world ending as Alex’s blood pulsed past her fingers

Tearing her gaze away from Raleigh, Cass looked at her sister kneeling before her, broken wrist held tight against her chest. Helena met her gaze. Held it. She said nothing. Her earlier words looped through Cass’s mind:
I’d do it again. I’ve got no regrets.
And felt again Helena’s arms wrapping around her, comforting and warm, strong enough to hold her forever. Recalled Helena’s voice shushing her, soothing her — right after she’d murdered their mother.

Cass shifted her attention back to Devlin. He watched her through the dark fall of his hair. “I choose Raleigh Paris,” she said. “D’you hear me,
loup garou
?”

“
Oui
,” Devlin growled. “I hear you, for true.”

“No!” Helena exclaimed. “Cass, this is all wrong — ”

Her words ended when Devlin threw back his head and howled. The sound reverberated through the small room, lonely and full of yearning, dark and primal. The hair rose on Cass’s arms and neck.

Helena stared at Devlin, lips parted, eyes wide. Raleigh struggled frantically to push himself free of the
loup garou
’s weight.

In seconds, Devlin stripped off his clothes. His muscles rippled.

Gabrielle strode past her morphing godson and, hand to elbow, eased Helena to her feet. “You be free, girl,” she said, her gaze stern. “You weren’t named. Time to go.”

“No, I — ” Helena began, but the
mambo
held her hand up to her mouth and blew the glittering dust cupped in her palm into Helena’s face.

Coughing, Helena wiped at her face. The dust sparkled like tears in moonlight, like blood in the dark, like gold in a sunlit stream. Her hands fell to her sides. Her eyelids drooped.

Behind Gabrielle, the
loup garou
shifted, flowing like water from one form to another. Devlin howled, his voice full of anger, hurt, and hunger.

“Let’s leave this place,” Gabrielle murmured. Grasping Helena’s good hand, the
mambo
led her from the kitchen.

Cass pressed herself against the wall, breath caught in her throat, as she watched Devlin shape himself into a creature as much a part of the night as the moon. Gleaming fangs. Silver eyes. Black fur. Claws.

She realized she was seeing his true form — the crouching hunter silhouetted by a swollen blood-red moon. Saw flames where his heart should be.

Raleigh no longer scrabbled to get away from the
loup garou.
He stared, frozen, mouth open, as Devlin looked down on him, silver eyes moon-bright, lips wrinkling up on his muzzle as he snarled, saliva dripping from his fangs.

The sharp smell of piss filled the room as Raleigh’s bladder let go. A dark stain spread across his jeans and down one leg.

The
loup garou
’s muzzle dipped and, at the same moment, Raleigh threw his right arm across his own throat. The wolf bit into Raleigh’s forearm, tearing into the flesh. Bone cracked beneath fangs. A high, ragged scream pierced the air. And for one heart-stopping second, Cass wasn’t sure who’d screamed — herself, lost in a nightmare replay of finding Alex on the stone-tiled floor, or his brother, caught in the werewolf’s jaws.

Nosing past the damaged arm, the wolf’s muzzle closed on Raleigh’s throat. Blood sprayed onto the
loup garou
’s face, into the air, and spattered hot against Cass’s throat and chest.

Heart pounding, muscles coiled, Cass struggled to keep watching. Raleigh’s feet drummed against the floor as the
loup garou
’s muzzle burrowed into and shredded his throat. Her stomach clenched, and she swallowed hard. Raleigh gurgled. Thrashed. She remembered Alex’s blood pooled and smeared on the floor. Remembered his closed eyes, the froth on his lips, his convulsing body. Tried to remember the warm feel of Alex’s hand; tried to remember the sun.

But instead, the moon sucked her in, and the night swallowed her whole as she looked
through
the
loup garou
’s eyes, the tang of blood in her/his mouth as she/he, no,
they,
abandoned Raleigh’s ruined throat.
Their
claws and bloodied muzzle tore into the man’s chest, snapping through bone.
Their
fangs sliced into the man’s quivering heart. Tasted it. Gulped it down. Blood spread dark across the stone tiles.

The night suddenly released her, and Cass gasped for air, pulse racing. The reek of blood, piss, and animal musk saturated the air and left the scent of death upon her clothes and skin like a too-sweet perfume.

Raleigh was still. His eyes, half-lidded, glazed. He seemed to shrink, to become smaller and thinner. Cass stared at him, the rich and raw taste of his heart still on her tongue.

Her stomach lurched, and she looked away, her hands knotting into fists. What if she’d
seen
wrong? She’d been wrong about Helena, albeit not completely. Pain pierced Cass’s temple, doubled her vision for a moment. She felt something
close
within her, like shutters over a window.

The
loup garou
looked at her, silver eyes unblinking. Cass met his gaze, then looked within and saw . . . nothing. The pain in her head faded, leaving a dull ache. A different kind of pain squeezed her heart and stole her breath. Her intuitive sight was gone. She remembered the mambo’s words:
Justice ain’t never been free, girl.

“Are we done walking the road?” Cass asked.

The wolf circled Raleigh’s body, sniffing it, pushing at it with its muzzle. Pissed on it. After a few circuits, the wolf sat on its haunches and its body
undulated,
twisted in on itself.

Unable to look away, Cass watched as Devlin shifted back into two-legged form. He crouched nude on the floor, hair a wild tangle across his face. He glanced at Cass with gleaming eyes.

“I told you, for true,” he said, his voice thick and rough. “It’s a long way back from hell, and we got a ways to go yet.”

He stood, and Cass’s gaze swept over him, seeing in her mind the way she’d translate his lean, taut-muscled body and blood-smeared face onto paper, but that was
all
she saw, no matter how far into him she looked. Her throat tightened. She watched as Devlin pulled on his jeans and T-shirt, then tugged on scuffed-up scooter boots.

Bending, he eased Raleigh’s limp piss-and-shit-stinking body onto his shoulder, then stood. He looked at Cass. She stood and led him out the back door into the courtyard with its ivy-blanketed walls. Water gurgled through the white stone fountain, splashing into the small pool below — normally a musical, soothing sound, clear as wind chimes in the night. But not on this night. This night she only heard the liquid passing of time, time measured in cold water, time spilling away forever.

Crossing the courtyard, Cass unlocked the padlock on the door leading to the street on the other side of the building. She stepped onto the sidewalk. An old battered Ford pickup was parked at the curb. She looked back at Devlin, lifted an eyebrow. He nodded. Cass glanced up and down the sidewalk. All clear. She stepped out so Devlin could follow with his burden.

Cass waited, hand on a cold bronze horsehead hitching post, while Devlin heaved Raleigh’s body into the bed of the pickup and covered it with a tarp. She watched, feeling nothing,
seeing
nothing, numb inside and out — just like she’d been after Alex had been shot. Wrapped in cotton. Muffled. Unreal. Her head and heart ached.

“Follow me.”

The words shook Cass awake like a hand to a dreamer’s shoulder. She looked at Devlin and just managed to catch the keys he tossed to her.

Devlin trotted across the street to a motorcycle. It was the Harley she’d seen outside his shack. He kick-started it into rumbling life. Cass started the pickup and followed when Devlin pulled away from the curb.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Raleigh’s
body splashed as it slipped into the swamp’s night-blackened water. Orange lambent eyes flashed for a moment before sinking beneath the surface. The water suddenly churned.

’
Gators,
Cass thought. “Justice,” she murmured, throat tight. She closed her burning eyes. Made herself see — one last time — the designs Alex’s blood had made on the floor, the dark spatters on his patterns and sketches.

Raleigh’s voice:
I didn’t shoot Alex! He’s my fucking brother!

Remembered:
He’s dead, isn’t he? Cass?

And Helena’s calm words:
I’d do it again. I have no regrets.

“
Automne
be your name,” Devlin murmured. “You be the twilight season caught forever between summer and winter, for true.”

Fingers brushed at her temples. Cass’s eyes flew open. Devlin stood just a handspan away, his lambent eyes full of moonlight. His fingers whispered against her temples again, there and gone, but the feel of him burned against her skin.

He gazed
into
her — she knew he was
seeing
— and she tensed, felt herself knot up against him. Leaning in, he nuzzled her, rubbing his cheek against hers. His scent — musk, sweat, and night-cooled green ivy — lingered upon her face. He smelled of the deepest night, wild and hidden. He also smelled of blood — Raleigh’s blood — and death.

“Your Sight is gone, and that’s a shame
,
” Devlin said. He straightened, but remained where he was, his heat baking into her body. “That be a hard price to pay. Didn’t I tell you to take your talent and go?” He looked away suddenly, staring into the night. “Our walk be done, for true.”

Cass nodded, then said, “I was right about Raleigh, wasn’t I?” She blinked back the tears threatening to spill from her eyes. “He shot Alex — ”

“Take the pickup,” Devlin said, leaving her question, her doubt, unanswered. “Gabrielle, she expecting it.”

“I want you to know — ”

Devlin shook his head. “Go.”

At the pickup, Cass glanced back the way she’d come through the dark. Devlin had stripped and hunkered down, his pale-skinned body
shifting.
On all fours, he ran into the night. She watched until he was gone, a swift black shape caught for a moment in the moonlight.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

C
ass
held Alex’s hand. The fresh fragrance of lilacs drifted through the room. The harsh coughing from the next bed had ceased — the bed empty and stripped bare. Out in the hall, voices called over the intercom, paging doctors and squawking codes. Inside, the machines monitoring Alex blipped and beeped.

Cass drifted into half dreams of the night and the moon, of autumn fires and gleaming eyes, of a black wolf and a man. But in her hands, she cupped the sun. A sun she could no longer
see.

Caught forever between, the
loup garou
and her, trapped between skin and fur, sun and moon, justice and vision. Maybe the walk along hell’s road never truly ended.

Grief squatted like a gargoyle on Cass’s heart. Her Michelangelo would need a new apprentice. And his brother was gone forever. But maybe Raleigh had vanished the moment he’d pulled the trigger. And Helena? The tiger defending the sleeping cub? Cass didn’t know. She hadn’t spoken to or even seen her sister since the
mambo
had led her from the kitchen.