Page 40 of Demon's Bluff
“I love you, too. Be careful.”
“I will.” But my mom had disconnected, and I tucked my phone in my pocket. A thin trail of cold-blue pixy dust sifted down from the front window, worrying me.
“Your mother is amazing,” Trent said as I turned back to the table, digging down through the folded jeans to find my size. Everything had artful rips and tears…which meant they were expensive, not old, and I glanced at the bejeweled pair of tens I’d probably left in a donation dumpster six years ago. “I found something for the girls,” he added as he lifted his basket. “And a pair of shoes I don’t need.”
“Can’t ever have too many shoes.” Frustrated, I moved a stack. Everything was made tolookold. I was going to show up naked. I knew it.
“Hey, guys?” Jenks’s short stop before us sent a wave of dust over us. “We got an issue.”
My heart gave a hard pound. “What is it?”
“Laker.” Jenks landed on the bejeweled jeans. “He’s in the parking lot.”
“The bounty hunter?” I glanced at Trent. “How is he following us?”
Trent put my red shirt into his basket. “Maybe he tagged your car?”
“We parked three blocks from here,” I protested, then ducked down below the table when the tall human pushed open the door and a fanfare of bugles sounded. “Jenks, is there another way out of here?”
“Yeah, but it’s an alley, and I don’t like it.” He rose up, wings rasping. “Hang on. Let me get a squint at what he’s doing.”
“Jenks?” Trent whispered, and a hint of energy fizzed between us as he began to pull on the nearest ley line, slow and easy, filling his chi and making my skin tingle.
“Yep, it’s Laker.” Jenks stood on a stack of jeans, hands on his hips. “He’s talking to the woman at the register. Showing her his phone…” His wings stilled as his dust shifted to a bright silver. “She’s pointing to the kids’ section. Tink’s a Disney whore. She outed us.”
Trent grimaced. “We can fight our way out,” he said, sounding eager for it.
“I’d rather not.” I glanced at the basket, uncomfortable. We needed to pay for this stuff, bare minimum.
Jenks dropped down to put our eyes on the same level. “No pixy in their right mind would be out here this time of year. He knows me. I’ll lure him away from the door. Give you enough time to slip out the front.”
But it was too cold for him to catch up if we went far, and a flash of anxiety furrowed my brow. We would all leave together, or none of us.
“Okay. You distract him.” I pulled the bejeweled jeans out from under him and dropped them into Trent’s basket. I was pretty sure they were mine, which would put them old enough. I’d gotten them when I’d been interning with Ivy. “Trent and I will stay low until he takes the bait, and we will meet you outside the door. From there we go to the car. Together.”
“You both should walk out of here,” Trent said. “I’m the one he wants.”
“All or none, cookie man,” Jenks said, and then he darted off, flying no more than two inches above the floor like a deadly shadow.
All or none,I thought, feeling a pang of belonging and gratitude. It hadn’t been that long ago that Jenks would have cut Trent’s Achilles tendons if I had asked him to. “It’s too cold for him,” I whispered, worried as Trent and I hid behind an endcap. “Even in here.”
“Disguising me as Ivy might not have been the best idea,” Trent whispered, then motioned me to stay put as he cautiously peeked around the endcap.
“Yeah, maybe.” Crouched beside him, I renewed my grip on the ley lines, and with a whispered “Finis,” the glamour broke, little shimmers of light cascading over him. Trent seemed to shudder, and though he had never looked anything like himself to me, now everyone could see him as himself.
Jenks swore colorfully from the far end of the store, calling for me, and Trent’s lips quirked. “Laker heard that. Let’s go.”
Trent’s fingers found mine, drawing me to my feet and pulling me into motion as a thrill coursed through me. Pace fast, he strode to the register, smiling grandly as he line jumped to the front. The woman manning it glanced up, then did a double take, her lips parting when she recognized Trent.
“Put the change in the animal rescue jar,” he said to the woman as he dropped two fifties on the counter and pulled me past her.
“Th-thank you!” the woman called, then added an irate, “Hey! You can’t take the basket!”
I cringed. Laker might not have heard the “Thank you,” but her shrill demand to leave the basket must have carried.
“Heads up!” Jenks shrilled, and I jerked from Trent, energy whooshing through me like liquid flame as I pulled on the ley line and turned.
Laker stood atop a table of puzzles at the back of the store, one hand gripping an amulet, the other wielding a staff. Energy rippled down the length of wood, and I shoved Trent toward the door when the wizard shouted a word of Latin and a spell shot from the end as if it was a gun.