Page 129 of Demon's Bluff

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Page 129 of Demon's Bluff

Focus distant, I sipped at my coffee, startled when my phone hummed. I glanced at it out of habit, breath catching. It was my mom.

Tuesday,I mused, looking at the time. I was probably bawling my grief out in my room as my heart broke to make room for Trent, the girls, hell, maybe even Ellasbutt. I loved Kisten, but I couldn’t go back to what I had been.

The phone, though, just kept buzzing. My other self was probably too engulfed in grief to pick up, and my mom would keep calling. I missed her, and knowing it was a bad idea, I hit the accept icon. “Hi, Mom.”

“Rachel? Oh, honey.” Her voice was living comfort, and my chest tightened. “I heard about Kisten. Are you doing okay?”

My throat closed. It was one of her good days when I didn’t have to be the smart one. “It hurts,” I whispered, feeling her loss twine with Kisten’s. She was right there, a few minutes away by bus, not on the other side of the continent. And yet I could do nothing but grip my phone and press it harder against my ear.

“I’m on my way,” she said hurriedly. “You’re at the church, yes?”

I blinked fast, trying to remember. “I think so.”

“Oh, sweetheart. Give me five minutes. I can’t make it better, but I can help you bear it. You’ll be okay until I get there?”

She knew what I was going through, had walked it alone when my dad had died. “Mom?”My God. She is the bravest woman I know.“I love you, Mom. I don’t tell you that enough.” Because in my grief, I would forget to say it as she rocked me, whispering things to make me feel connected, to convince me that I might be whole again someday.

“I love you, too. Five minutes.”

The phone clicked off and I closed my eyes, squeezing them tight so the tears wouldn’t start. She was the best mom, having the bravery to letme make my own mistakes and the courage to be there with a Band-Aid instead of a lecture.

My eyes opened, pulled by the rasping whirl of the blender. “Yeah, that was a mistake,” I said as I yanked the cord from the wall and put the phone in my shoulder bag. The door to the bathroom squeaked as Elyse came out, the young woman clearly in a better mood than when she’d gone in there. Her hair had dried flat and her shirt was spotted, but she met my forced smile cheerfully as she sat down and reached for the pastries.

“Man, I’d kill for a toothbrush.” The paper bag rustled, and then a frown crossed her face when she found it empty.

I stood and tugged my shoulder bag closer. “Ready? I think I saw the morgue van go by while you were in there.” My bag was heavy with both the book she’d stolen from Trent and mine, the faint scent of burnt amber coming from the one I’d brought stronger now for having been in the ever-after again. “I’m going to take the image of the barista, and then we can go.”

Elyse glanced at the woman still watching us from behind the counter. “Really? Yesterday you wanted to be yourself.”

“Yesterday I was stealing a body. This time I’m cremating one.”

She chuckled. “Fair enough.”

Crap on toast, she was in a good mood. All I felt was a growing sense of impending destruction. We were going home, but without the mirror, it wouldn’t be the happy-happy, joy-joy moment that she thought it was going to be. They would kick her out if she told them to drop their plans to make me their unwilling muscle.

I fumbled for the stone about my neck as I sent a stray thought out to the nearest ley line. Sure enough, my no-spell, no-product hair frizzed, making a veritable halo as energy ran a delicious thread through me.“A priori,”I whispered as I glanced at the woman.“A posterior,”I added as I then looked at myself reflected in the shiny stainless steel wall.“Omnia mutantur.”I whispered the words through the hole, aiming them at my middle.

A shudder rippled over me, and the world seemed to fade for a momentas the glamour took hold. “Good?” I asked, and Elyse stepped between me and the woman behind the counter.

“You should have waited until we were outside,” she said as she shoved me to the door. “Go. I’ll be right there.”

It felt good to be moving, and I went to stand among the street-grimed tables and tattered umbrellas. Motion made things better. Motion always made things better. Maybe that’s why I always seemed to be going somewhere. But moving meant changing, and that usually hurt.

Tired, I faced the sun and let it warm me until I heard the door open and felt Elyse sidle up beside me.

“Light just changed. Let’s go,” she said, and I took a long step to keep up with her as she headed for the street.

“What’s with all the coffee?” I asked, seeing as she had four cups in one of those single-use trays. “We can’t take it down there. I was told the scent might wake someone up early.”

Elyse smirked and handed it to me as we crossed the street. “You look like the barista from the coffeehouse. You’re making a delivery.”

“You stole someone’s coffee—no, you stole four people’s coffee to further a glamour?” I resisted the urge to glance behind us.

“I didn’t steal them. I bought them.” The woman seemed embarrassed. “If you weren’t going to lift her image, I was going to ask you to lift it for me.”

She bought them?A chuckle escaped me. “Be careful, Elyse. You might be developing a conscience.”

“Shut up,” she muttered, and my grin widened.




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