But guilt that I’d stood there and enjoyed his offer pricked through me. “I’m so embarrassed,” I whispered as I backed up and levered myself up to sit on the dresser beside my spelling equipment.
“Why?” Jenks hovered over the jewelry box, clearly wondering why it wasn’t on the shelf anymore. “He pushed your buttons, you said no. He insisted. You decked him.” Landing, he strode to the edge of the dresser and looked down. “She should leave you like that.”
“Doing my job,” Pike said, sprawled faceup now. “Nothing personal.”
But it had sure felt personal, and I slid from the dresser top, feet lightly hitting the old floorboards.
“Too bad,” Pike said, eyes finding me. “It could have been fun. Constance is right to be afraid of you. Kill me if you want. She’ll send someone else.”
“I’m not going to kill you.” I nudged his legs straight, wondering if I might be able to lug him up onto the fainting couch. His threats didn’t worry me as much as the lingering question of what I was going to do with him in the interim. “I don’t get it, Pike,” I said as I grabbed him under his shoulders and gave a heave toward the couch. “You know she’s so old she doesn’t remember anything of love. Why do you work so hard to keep something like that in charge?”
“If she dies, no one will protect me,” he said. “My brothers won’t stop until I’m buried facedown.” He made a bark of laughter, ending it with a muffled swear word. “I should have let that knife find its mark,” he said bitterly, arms and legs askew as I got him propped up against the side of the couch. He was too heavy for me to lift, and I left him there.
“And miss Alcatraz?” The air still smelled of vampire incense, and I went to push open another window.
“What are you going to do with him?” Jenks asked, his dust a dismal blue as he darted from the jewelry box to Bis’s shelf in a clear request for me to put it back.
“I don’t know.” Head down, I took my wooden pinky ring out of it and snapped it closed. “She’ll send her goons when she finds out he failed to seduce or kill me.”
“Then she’d better not find out, because Baribas and his kids can’t handle a full assault yet.”
Jenks settled on the shelf, overseeing as I stretched to shove the jewelry box back where it belonged. I hesitated, resting a hand on the cat-size gargoyle, whispering a silent promise that I’d get his soul back to him.
Depressed, I got down off the box and pushed it back into the pile. But I froze at a sudden idea, flashing warm as I looked at Pike slouched against the fainting couch and staring at his hands as if trying to get them to move. Constance wouldn’t send anyone until she knew Pike had tried and failed. All I had to do was keep him with me for a few hours more.
“Jenks, do we have any mouse nests in the garden?”
“Sure.” His voice came down unseen from the shelf. “Why?” His head poked over, and he looked at Pike, a wicked smile coming over his tiny features. “Oh, hell yes,” he said, then flew out one of the windows, whistling for Baribas, presumably.
“What are you going to do?” Pike said, and I crouched to shift his head up.
“Congratulations,” I said as I patted his cheek. “You’re going to have the chance to see the world from a view very few have.”
The curse to thicken my aura would have to wait and, feeling sassy, I stood and went to my spell library. I knew what I wanted was in there.
“I said, what are you going to do?” Pike said, frightened now.
“Be the demon,” I said shortly, and he paled, even under the immobilization curse. “I’m going to turn you into a mouse. You do anything I don’t like or stray from my side, and you will be a mouse forever. Or at least until someone sees you and feeds you to their cat.” I beamed at him. “So I suggest you sit in my pocket where I put you until I get this done.”
CHAPTER
21
I stood beside trent at Nash’s grave, my focus blurred on the delicate, bronzed flowers waving in the sun-drenched breeze at our feet. It was after noon and he smelled fresh and clean, his light aftershave going well with the sound of the wind in the new leaves. Guilt flickered for having momentarily enjoyed Pike’s attempted seduction, and I quashed it.
“Hodin said the flowers were gifts from the dead to the bereaved?” Trent asked, fingering the one that I’d given him. “To remind the living that they are loved?”
I nodded, wondering how expensive my agreement to stick up for Hodin was going to be.
“And these are the words that cast the spell and gathered the mystics?” Trent asked, attention on Hodin’s cramped script.
I nodded again, my sorrow heavy at what Nash had gone through, the strength of will he had shown, the pain he had endured to keep a young man safe—sacrificing his life to give Zack the chance to live his from beginning to end.
“I don’t know these words,” Trent said softly, brow creased. “And mystics enveloped him, and he vanished?”
My breath came in as I remembered to breathe. “Clothes and all.” God, this was depressing.
Trent shoved the paper in his pocket before taking my hand in a comforting squeeze. “I’m sorry you had to do this, Rachel.” His eyes began to swim, and tears pricked as he pulled me to him and held me. “Thank you. I’m grieving for Nash, but this is a piece of our heritage that we’d never hoped to regain. It will mean so much to so many people.”
I nodded, my throat tight. Yes, this was a good thing, but it might have cost me everything with Al. Trent’s arms eased and I stepped back, trying to smile as I wiped my eyes.
“I don’t recognize the flower,” Trent said as he tucked it in my hair. “It’s beautiful.”
“Dali did,” I said, remembering his disgust when he flicked it to the ground and spit on it.
Shoulders slumping, I turned us away and we started back to the church. The clattering of pixy wings sounded fitting in the garden, and the bright butterfly wings of the fairies in the graveyard were a stark contrast to my mood. A few vampires lingered at the firepit, asleep with their legs outstretched to the coals. The pig was gone, the leftovers now soup simmering in my makeshift kitchen for whoever needed it.
The grounds were surprisingly quiet with most everyone either sleeping or at work. Even the construction had taken a break, and I could hear birds and distant traffic. Apparently Finley was shopping. I half wondered if Trent hadn’t slipped her a check, because what I was looking at as we walked back to the church had big dollar signs attached. At this point, I was ready to accept anything, pride be damned.