CHAPTER 1

 

 

 

 

 

Asheville, North Carolina – Present Day

 

On a dark city street, against a nighttime backdrop of lit office buildings and tree-lined residential areas, Lavinia Cutler urged her legs to speed the hell up. She kept her head down, a black hoodie hiding her face from any attention she may have attracted. Her hands dug deep into the pockets of her jeans.

Hurry. Hurry!

He needed her help. She was almost positive about the image she’d seen, flashing across the inside of her head like a film reel at the movie theater. Black and white. No sound. Almost positive because sixty-eight percent of the time, the things she saw didn’t come true. Or hadn’t yet happened. She couldn’t quite get the hang of this part-time psychic gig.

There was probably a trick to harnessing her cognitive powers. Some technique she hadn’t yet discovered, some skill she hadn’t yet mastered.

Lavinia wasn’t sure.

She was a store clerk, for God’s sake, alone at night and a little hungry. She’d skipped dinner. Once the vision played behind her eyes, dangling there like a carrot in front of a starving horse, she’d been out the door and gone without grabbing a bite to eat. She really needed to learn to keep a snack in her pocket for the next time she wigged out and lost her mind.

At least she’d remembered her sweater this time. The first vision she’d had about Pike had her running through downtown after him, wearing nothing but a tank top and sleep shorts and hastily donned sandals. In thirty-degree weather. North Carolina winters were no joke. Wind chill alone tended to take it down several degrees below freezing.

This time she was a little better prepared.

Pike Radclyffe was a stranger then, and had laughed at her when she’d finally found him. He’d laughed at her concern when she’d rounded a corner and saw him leaning against the entrance to a pub, with his hands empty and a couple of buddies circling him, all sharing a smoke. It was definitely not the bloody brawl she’d seen in her vision, accompanied by a blinding urge to help. It was pretty much the opposite end of the spectrum.

When she’d first seen Pike in her head movies, he’d been running down a couple of rat shifters. Rat shifters. Something Lavinia never thought she’d say in this geological age. She was just getting off work and walking through the front door when the vision had knocked her on her ass. Her brain spun under a tidal wave of colors and sounds, places she’d never seen and a man she didn’t know. Then a dose of tall, dark, and handsome was staring out at her from amidst his circle of friends. Men, not rats. No blood and no brawl.

He’d sent the crazy stranger on her way and told her to get to bed like a good girl. Oh, the embarrassment. She hadn’t even gotten a proper introduction out of him.

Most of her visions centered on the man. It was infuriating! For reasons she couldn’t fathom, the moment she’d opened the spell book eight years ago and muttered an incantation she should have left alone, Lavinia and Pike were deeply connected. A metaphysical bond neither one understood. It took a grand total of five years before she’d actually met him in person. She felt like she’d known him forever, having seen his smile in her dreams a week after the spell-gone-wrong.

Then every night since.

It took one smile, a single snarky smile where his pearly teeth flashed brilliantly in the night, and the image in her head melded with the real-life version helping her to her feet after her knees buckled.

She was toast.

Pike was the kind of man who turned heads. A dark fantasy. Or a wild nightmare? Lavinia still wasn’t sure. All she knew was that her body reacted viscerally whenever he stood within two hundred feet of her. Too bad he didn’t feel the same way. He found her meager paranormal gifts cheeky.

Did she mention the British accent? It was hard to resist.

Yeah, no wonder she was scurrying through back alleys trying to find him. To assist him, she amended. Her vision had told her that he was in trouble. Again. Or he would be soon. Or had been already.

She was almost positive this time.

A couple strolled past her, hand in hand. Lavinia kept her head down and sighed. Her stomach clenched from the odd combination of hunger and apprehension. Damn her short legs.

It was a mistake to make a right turn into the small dark space between two buildings. She knew it the second her booted foot stepped in a slick puddle of grime and glittering red eyes from the shadows snapped their full attention to her. A cold wind whipped her hair as she swiveled to the side to press back against the brick wall. Leaves and debris tumbled over the pavement, blown helter-skelter and swirling against her legs. She ignored the sensation. Now was not the time to lose focus.

This wasn’t how she wanted her night to end. Yet it wasn’t a complete surprise, either, since paranormal creatures had been flocking to her since her spell book accident.

And now there were three such creatures separating from the blackness, solidifying into shapes before her eyes. Once upon a time, she would have screamed and panicked. Both were natural reactions.

That night, she merely groaned and stifled a sliver of anxiety. Tried to remember what Pike had told her about balancing her stance. She was going to have to kick a little ass to save her own. Didn’t it figure? They never listened when she said she was a simple clerk.

“What do you punks want?” She asked the question with all the bravado of a bullfighter.

It was another piece of advice from the man of her visions: If you couldn’t feel tough, then act it. Fake it. It was better to sound intimidating than crawl into a little ball and hide, which was her preferred method of dealing with less-than-welcome supernatural stalkers.

The closest ghoul opened his mouth to answer, but Lavinia beat him to it. “Let me guess. You want my blood, my soul, or my liver. Judging from the graveyard dirt on your pants, I’m going to say liver.”

Her nerve endings bristled a warning before the three of them moved into attack mode. Another danger. Another mess-up on her long list of mess-ups. She couldn’t claim to be new at this gig. The accident happened eight years ago and she’d had plenty of time and opportunity to get it right and get her priorities in line. Mainly, her safety.

The three ghouls smelled…off. It wasn’t necessarily a bad smell, just off. These were freshly risen, just out of the ground. She’d guess there was a necromancer on the loose but that wasn’t her problem. His pets, however, were.

This wasn’t her first encounter with ghouls and it probably wouldn’t be her last. The way her life had been going lately, every step she took turned out to be wrong. Not just wrong but hazardous. These ghouls were another hurdle she’d have to jump over, before one of those fools bit off a leg.

Though she was now technically immortal—a side effect of the spell book mishap—Lavinia’s body and constitution were weak. She was hopeless at fighting and tried to stay out of the worst scuffles. Most of the time that meant staying at home to avoid a fracas.

“I have a great idea.” Her voice shook even as she tried to maintain an intimidating tone. There was no time to run. Any sudden move and those ghouls would be on her. They may not look like much, but when they had a mark they moved like a pack of lions circling for the kill.

“How about we all just go our separate ways? It’s obvious the person I’m looking for isn’t here. Pike? Pike?” She craned her head then clapped her hands together and took a step back. “Nope, he’s definitely not here. I’ll bid you all a good night—”

The first one charged at her without warning. Lavinia reacted on instinct and kicked him hard enough to send him spinning off into the other two. Her victory was short-lived. Hackles rising and an uneasy feeling flipping in her gut, she watched the ghouls recover with a snap of all three heads in her direction.

“Come on.” Her taunt was half-hearted. “I can…take you.”

Ghoul Number 3 slunk to the right while his two comrades roared and charged. Lavinia sidestepped the first, only to be caught by the second one. He threw her against the side of a garbage bin, leaning over her with frenzied eyes. There was no more humanity there. Ghouls, the risen dead, were nothing more than vessels raised by a warlock or necromancer for one purpose. Mayhem. Bedlam. A thorn in her side when all she wanted was to act normal.

The force of a knee to her abdomen sent her against the wall of the closest building. Her face shoved against the brick before she dropped to the ground.

What was it Pike had said about widening her stance? She needed to keep her legs hip-width apart, her arms out in front of her, and pretend she had eyes on the back and sides of her head.

Lavinia couldn’t even stand. She choked in a breath. “You guys are good,” she managed.

Ghoul 2 grabbed her by the scruff of her neck, her hair tangling between his knuckles. Lavinia screeched when he hauled her into the air. She reached above her head to pry herself loose, fighting against the wave of searing pain radiating down her spine. The ghoul leaned close and let out of a gust of fetid air from its rotting mouth. Then threw her down.

Instead of bouncing and rolling into a crouch the way Pike had instructed her to do at least a dozen times, Lavinia just…dropped. Splatted would be a better term. She landed on her side and the air left her lungs.

Her lips opened for another comeback, only to find she couldn’t get her mouth to work. She tried to scream for help. She’d bitten her lip on the fall.

“Dammit,” she choked out.

Ghoul 1 took her by the ankle, swinging her around toward the garbage bin again. Lavinia scrunched her eyes shut and prepared for immediate contact. But instead of slamming into metal, she collided with leather. Warm, living leather. Or at least the man who was wearing the leather was alive.

She assumed he was alive. Part of her wasn’t quite convinced.

“Love, you need to stop going out alone. What have I told you?” Pike asked in a gruff tone. His arms came around her shoulders and drew her close. “This is the third time this year. Which only just began, may I add. I’m not always going to be around to save you.”

Thank. God. Those were the two words circling in her head on a loop.

“Now, you sit here while I kick some ass. Can you do that for me? Lavinia?”

The man was well over six feet tall, wearing a jacket that had seen better days. She drank him in as he helped her into the small space between the bin and the wall. An Adonis.

“Are you hurt?” he asked when she failed to respond.

She shook her head, noting the dry dragging sounds of the ghouls creeping closer. They didn’t like being ignored. And were probably foaming at the mouth trying to get to her, her liver, and whatever pieces of Pike they could reach. “I’m fine.”

Pike pointed a finger at her face before setting her down. Making sure to plant her feet. “Stay here. I mean it.”

Then he swirled around and shrugged off his jacket. The sight of his body underneath was almost worth the near-beating. Muscles stretched across broad shoulders, leading down to equally strong arms. The man must live at the gym in his free time.

Lavinia watched him lunge toward the nearest ghoul, his forearm bringing the creature into the crook of his arm where its neck was promptly broken. When the second and third charged, Pike was prepared.

Her vision hadn’t been wrong. Not entirely wrong. Pike was in the middle of a fight. In the brief flash of the future she’d seen, the dead had surrounded him, with fists flying and teeth gnashing. She glanced up and saw the vision in her head blending with the reality in front of her. Yup. Definitely a fight. Only this time, the fight was her fault.

He dispatched the second body quickly enough. Lavinia cringed when its neck snapped, a wad of decaying tissue splattering against her leg. Pike was swift and rounded a kick toward Ghoul 3. The creature ricocheted against the wall with a howl. A fist to the chin had the creature’s head snapping back before Pike grabbed it in a chokehold.

“Come here,” he demanded.

Lavinia glanced around then pointed at her chest. “Me?”

“You, yes. Come here and kill this thing.”

Her head shook vehemently. Dark hair fell in front of her face. “I’m not equipped to kill anything. Sorry. I’ll just stay over here until you’re done.”

His laugh was stifled by a groan. “Come here now.”

Her bones protested when she got to her feet, aching from her scrape with the wall. Lavinia swiped her cheek, noticed the smear of blood on her hand, and winced when heat sliced through the cut. Stalling.

“You have to learn,” Pike insisted. “Come.”

Like she was some dog. “I don’t know how.”

“You snap the spine. A quick twist to sever the head. It breaks the enchantment. Come on.”

She glowered at him and the ghoul that continued to snap his teeth in her direction. It wanted to take a bite out of whatever body part was closest. It would have, too, had Pike not been there to keep it contained.

“I’m not cut out to be a murderer. Sorry, not sorry.”

“Do it, so we can go home.”

“Home? We?” She almost screeched the word.

“So I can go home,” he clarified.

Of course. She should have known better. Pike had never invited her to his house in all the time they’d been friends. She shouldn’t have let a slip of the tongue get her excited. Unnaturally excited, given the circumstances.

With a self-righteous scowl, she stepped forward and ignored the ghoul’s snapping jaw. Her hands came down on both sides of his temples with a squelch. The scent of rotting flesh filled the air.

“I apologize, but you did try to eat me,” she said to the ghoul. She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and twisted.

Instead of the satisfying crack she fully expected, nothing happened. Nothing budged. Panic tripped over her skin.

Pike’s shoe tapped against the cement as seconds ticked by. “Oh, for goodness sake.” Lavinia’s poor attempt at decapitation was blown out of the water the moment he finished the job, the ghoul dropping and turning to dust in the blink of an eye. “You,” he pointed to her, “are hopeless.”

His dark gaze drew her in and enthralled her to the point where she couldn’t pull away even if she wanted to. Instead she stood in the dark, staring. Fascinated by the tiny embers burning at the centers of his coal-black eyes.

Pike shifted and crouched next to the first ghoul. The light from the street lamp glinted off a silver ring on his left ear. “They keep finding you. Or you keep finding them. I’m not sure anymore.” He shook his head.

The coppery smell of blood—hers—mixed with the foul odor of garbage and decaying ghoul. There wasn’t much she could say. Not when she was the one who’d fucked up. “I’m sorry—”

“Save your apologies,” he interrupted. “I don’t want to hear them.”

Lavinia begged to differ. There were too many things that needed to be said between them, things he needed to hear. She couldn’t get her mouth to cooperate.

Pike stood, dusting off the ends of his leather jacket and tilting his neck from left to right.

“What do we do now?” she asked.

He took her chin and forced her to look up at him. “Now I ask you why were you looking for me. Again.”

“I had a feeling that you needed me,” Lavinia answered slowly. She bit her lower lip. “I saw a vision in my head and I came right away. I didn’t really know where to go, so I followed my intuition.” Her fingers balled into fists. “Such as it was.”

His fingers dropped from her chin with a sigh, and Pike turned away and clasped the back of his head with both hands. “How many times do I have to tell you this? I don’t need help, love. You know I don’t.”

“You may not, but my gut told me a different story. It was very convincing.”

“Your gut is obviously lying.”

“I’m sorry I got blood all over your coat. I’ll pay to have it cleaned if you want me to. I didn’t mean for things to get messy.”

“Yeah, well, I’ll add it to your tab. Along with the rest of my clothes that you’ve managed to ruin. The dry cleaner knows me by name.”

She gestured with the toe of her boot toward the two remaining bodies. “What are we going to do with them? We can’t just leave them here for anyone to find.”

“The same thing I did with the last ghouls you managed to piss off.”

Lavinia merely shrugged. “They like the taste of my blood. Or my smell.”

“You’re like catnip to them. I don’t know what to say. Except stop seeking out trouble.” Pike nudged the first body with his shoe. A single twist of his heel and at once the ghoul disintegrated into a pool of gray ash. “There. Are you happy?”

She wished to tell him otherwise, but yes. Just the sight of him made her happy. It was uncomfortable and inconvenient. “I’ll manage.”

“Go home, Lavinia. Go home to your cat and stay out of trouble. I mean it this time.”

“I don’t have a cat.”

Pike chuckled. “That’s what you choose to focus on?”

Her hands went to her hips. “You know, if you would teach me better ways to defend myself, then maybe I wouldn’t have to rely on you for a rescue all the time. I know you hate being a knight in shining armor. And it would make me feel a lot more confident if I could go out alone, knowing that whatever happens, I’d be fine.”

“If you had a better sense of self-preservation and stayed home like I told you, then I wouldn’t be in a position to always come to your aid. You aren’t cut out for this life. This world. You’re better off going into hiding.”

“Then teach me,” she insisted. “Eight years has been too long to just muddle through. I can’t do it anymore, and you seem to have managed well enough. You’re my best friend, Pike. Help me out.”

“Some things you can teach. Others are inherent. Here.” His fingertip touched the spot below her collarbone. “And here.” He touched her temple. “You’re still too human to understand.”

He made it sound like a bad thing. Her gaze roamed over the blood on her leg, staining her fingertips, the ground, and now staining his jacket too. “I’m trying to figure it out,” she said. “I can’t stay at home and do nothing. I can’t go to work and worry about walking home alone because someone, something, might attack me.” And she couldn’t do anything when the visions came, always when she least expected them. Never clear and rarely good. “I could turn the corner and find Bigfoot waiting.”

His smile was wry. “Bigfoot is a myth.”

“Out of all the crazy things in this world, Bigfoot is the one that doesn’t exist! You see why I need help.” Her hands flew in the air. Then she dropped them, wincing when the movement opened the slice on her face.

“Looks like a cut. Nasty head contusion.”

“Things like that tend to happen when you greet a brick wall face-first.” She winced when he reached out to dab the cut with the hem of his shirt. “Stop touching it. You’ll get dirt in it. Or worse, ghoul juice.”

“Fine. You okay?”

She nodded again, slower this time. “I think so. Maybe I will go home.”

“Good idea.”

“I just—” She broke off. “I thought you were in trouble. I thought I could handle it. I can’t.”

“Love, for someone who can tell the future…you have no concept of personal safety.”

“I know, you’re right,” she said despondently. “That’s why I need you. Seriously this time. No more half-baked promises where you push me off on someone else. Or where you don’t show up.”

He pointed down to the ash scattering upwind. “I’ve helped enough.”

“You helped tonight, but I guarantee there will be others. Eh!” Lavinia pointed a finger at his face before he could say anything. “Don’t even try to deny it. I get into trouble like some people get into a pair of pants.”

“True,” he agreed.

“Maybe you won’t always be around to help me. I mean, I hope you are, but forever is a long time. You don’t really want me hounding you forever. Right?”

Pike took the time to scratch the hairs on his chin. “You’re not wrong.”

“Train me, and not just the few moves you showed me a couple of months ago.” She held her arms up in a fighting stance. Winced again when a twinge of pain shot from her ankles to her left hip. There was a warm bath and Epsom salt in her future. She didn’t need a vision to see that. “I need practice. Someone to tell me what to do and how to navigate this world. You’re my best friend,” she repeated.

“Love, if you need me to hold your hand, you won’t survive much longer.”

“I’m trying to get you to stop holding my hand, Pike.”

He could very well say no, Lavinia decided, and visibly shrank away when she remembered the first time she’d needed Pike’s help. About fifteen minutes after the party where she’d spotted him the second time around. Instead of finding the bathroom she’d desperately needed, Lavinia had ended up in the middle of a clamor of harpies. Harpies who didn’t appreciate being interrupted. A good bit of begging ended with her being lifted from the ground, about to disappear from the earth, when Pike turned the corner and talked them down. Bird-bodied, girl-faced, and sharp-clawed, they took to him instantly, forgetting about Lavinia in the process.

She couldn’t say what Pike got out of their friendship—besides her dazzling wit, of course—but she hoped he would continue to want to help her these many years later.

“Will you teach me how to live in this world?” she pleaded. “Your world?”

Pike glanced down at the ground then back at Lavinia. “I’m not sure you can handle me.”

“Oh, I can handle you. Trust me.”

It took a little more convincing and a lot more pleading. Finally, Pike laughed and gave her a wink. “Don’t worry, love. I’ll take you on. By the time I’m done, you’ll be decapitating ghouls like a pro.”