3
“You were going to tell me about the Gatti family,” Sam said, quite a while later.
Eldon’s friend Norman had joined them at the table. They’d had another round of drinks, danced with a couple of female friends while Sam stayed seated, then ordered canapés, oyster toast, and deviled eggs to be shared. The waitress, Sam had noted, was also a familiar, her eyes a green-tinged yellow.
Shortly after they’d started eating, a slender Black woman wearing a beaded bandeau and yellow taffeta dress took the stage. The crowd quieted at her appearance, and she began to sing a blues song in a voice that spoke of whiskey and long nights. Sam was no judge of music, but it sounded beautiful to him.
“Right, right.” Eldon lit a cigarette, then shook out the match. He’d had quite a few drinks, but seemed steady enough. “The Gattis. That would be Wanda, Alistair, Philip, Teresa, and Doris. You met Doris at the door; Alistair is behind the bar tonight, and Teresa is waiting tables. Philip is off, and we might see Wanda at some point. She runs the joint, but they all have a share in it.”
“But they’re not actually related,” Sam said. It wasn’t a question; none of the Gattis he’d seen looked remotely alike.
“They call each other brother and sister,” Norman remarked. He was a washed out sort of man, his eyebrows so pale it looked as though he didn’t have any. “I don’t know who they think they’re fooling.”
Eldon shrugged. “None of my business. They showed up in Towertown back in…must’ve been 1920, about six months after the Volstead Act. Bought this place and started turning it into a speakeasy.” He lowered his voice. “This is Mickey Sullivan’s territory. Remember that name, Sammy—I’ll be introducing you to him at some point, when you’re a little farther along.”
This was a new, and not entirely welcome, piece of information. “You’re going to introduce me to a gangster?”
Norman laughed. “He’s a babe in the woods, ain’t he?” he asked Eldon.
“Practically a lamb,” Eldon agreed. Sam’s face heated, and he took a sip of his glowing drink to cover his embarrassment. “At any rate, the Gattis reached an agreement with Sullivan. He takes his cut of the profits, and in return they remain more-or-less independent operators within his territory. The police stay away because they don’t want trouble with Sullivan.”
“Is that how it’s usually done?”
Norman chuckled at Sam’s ignorance. Sam fantasized about dumping the oyster toast over his patronizing head.
“Gangs aren’t too fond of independent operators, shall we say.” Eldon tapped the ash from his cigarette into an elegant glass ashtray. “Not to mention, I’m sure Sullivan would prefer their magic worked for him, not for themselves. Five familiars, and only two of them bonded to witches? They’d make some serious dough if they agreed to bond with some of his hired witches. More than they’re probably getting out of this place.”
Sam might not know much about familiars, but he thought he remembered the bond between familiar and witch was a permanent one. “Maybe they just don’t want to?”
“A waste of magic if you ask me,” Norman said, not that anyone had.
“Sullivan tried to…persuade them differently,” Eldon went on. “Ended up getting his men mangled in the process, though the Gattis were smart enough not to kill any of them.” He arched his brow at Sam and lowered his voice further still. “Our nice waitress? The guy who poured our drinks? The dame in the suit at the door? They all turn into, I don’t know, lions and tigers and shit.”
Sam’s eyes widened, and he glanced automatically at Alistair.
Norman grinned and leaned in. “One swipe of Teresa’s claws and you’re done for. That’s why I always leave a tip.”
“Oh,” Sam said faintly. Maybe Alistair had been staring at him earlier because he’d be easy to run down. The slowest one in the herd.
No, that was stupid, not to mention offensive. Alistair might have been a little bit of a jerk, but he certainly didn’t seem as though he’d leap over the bar and start chewing on the customers.
“What about Zola?” Sam asked.
“Just a new hire, as far as I know,” Eldon said with a shrug. “The cook is a witch, though—bonded to Teresa, though Wanda’s witch Joel handles most of the magical end of things.”
“And you provide them with hexwork?”
“Some.” Eldon nodded at Sam’s drink. “Not the mass-produced crap, where you have a room full of draftsmen all copying the same hex over and over.”
“Enough of this,” Norman said. “I want to dance.”
Eldon rose. “Coming this time, Sam?”
“I’d rather just watch,” he said. The truth was, he had no idea how, but he was tired of Norman’s condescending remarks. Eldon shrugged and followed Norman in search of a couple of girls looking for partners. Once they were gone, Sam’s gaze drifted back across the room to the bar.
Alistair was staring again.
The Pride didn’t have set closing hours. At one time, such things had been regulated by the law, but since serving alcohol was illegal in the first place, the old rules no longer applied. So it was going on three in the morning when Doris ushered the last customers out and locked the door.
Alistair gathered the night’s haul of cash and took it to the safe in the office. Ordinarily he’d count it at his desk, but between the bartending and the witch, he was too exhausted and distracted to even consider it. Once the money was secured, he went back out to the main room, where everyone else had gathered to eat and drink together before calling it a night.
Doris sat in one chair, her feet propped up on another. When she spotted Alistair, she said, “I’m glad Philip will be back tomorrow, before Alistair has the chance to drive off all our business.”
Zola laughed, and Reinhold chuckled. He still wore his apron, its surface spotted with stains from cooking. “Make him wash the dishes, since Frank ran off,” he suggested.
Teresa looped an arm over her witch’s shoulders and kissed him on his scarred cheek. “Then you would have to put up with him.” She glanced at Alistair, then frowned. “Is everything all right?”
No, everything wasn’t all right. Nothing had been all right since Alistair had laid eyes on the witch.
Sam.
He’d been mixing drinks and grinding his teeth at the customers trying his patience, when he’d felt…something. An odd sensation, a sort of tug deep within. He’d looked up and spotted Eldon and a stranger talking to Zola.
The newcomer was dressed against the evening chill in a thick sweater and worsted trousers, and a cap that had given up the attempt to contain the exuberant curls of his auburn hair. At a distance, it was impossible to tell the color of his eyes behind the cheaters, but his round face was cute. He was of average height, and above-average weight, and tempting enough that for a split second Alistair wondered if there was any way of getting him into bed.
Then the tug became a pull, and the world seemed to turn on its axis. The instinct of a familiar, fueled by magic, drawn toward the one witch whose ability to funnel that magic was most compatible to his.