Blood of a Phoenix (The Nix Series Book 2) Read online

  “Easy, Phoenix. It’s me, Simon.”

  I blinked, and indeed it was Simon, and there was another person with him. Hooded in a deep cowled cloak, the stranger moved with a limp and even carried a tall walking staff. Shit, he, or she, I suppose, could have stepped off the set of the latest fantasy movie.

  I would have laughed if I’d not felt like every breath was going to be my last. No. That was not going to happen. I was not dying, not when Bear was out there waiting on me.

  “All right, Gandalf,” I muttered. “Let’s see what you’ve got.”

  Chapter Eight

  “She’s drained the wound on her own. That will have saved her life.” The voice under the cowl was distinctly male, if a bit on the raspy side. For a moment, I forgot where I was—in a shitty little hotel in Seattle on the hunt for a woman who could break a magical code. Sidetracked by an infection in my shoulder caused by abnormal spit. Done in by spit. Killer spit. That was too fucking funny even for me.

  I started to laugh, which probably was a warning sign that I was in deep shit. “You look like a short Gandalf, you know that?” I tried to smile because it was funny to me. Neither of them laughed; even Dinah didn’t laugh, and she loved to laugh at my jokes.

  “Hold her down. She isn’t going to like this part,” the raspy-voiced wanna-be Gandalf said.

  Simon sat on the edge of the bed and took Eleanor from my hand. “Hey, don’t kill him, okay? He’s going to help.”

  I looked up at Simon, only for a moment, it wasn’t Simon. It was Justin leaning over me. Justin holding me down and telling me that it would be okay, and my heart stumbled as I realized how much I’d missed him.

  My heart tripped as my eyes blurred with tears. “Justin, you’re here.”

  He looked past me and then nodded. “Yeah, I’m here. Just hang onto me.”

  I took his hand with my good one and he pressed his other hand into my chest, pinning me to the bed, then looked past me again. “Do it quickly.”

  “Fire will be the only way to cleanse her wound properly,” the raspy-voiced Gandalf said, and Justin nodded, so I relaxed into the cushions. I could trust him. Justin was one of the few I could trust.

  I picked up the smell of burning flesh first, like a BBQ gone bad. The pain didn’t start right away, like there was a lapse in the nerve endings that wired the wound to my brain.

  Two heartbeats and then the fire within the wound lit me up like a fucking bonfire. A scream ripped free of me and I bucked against Justin’s hands, fighting to get away from the pain.

  “No, you have to stay, you have to let him finish this or you’ll die!” Justin roared and I tried to do as he asked, I tried to hold still. Whimpers rolled from my lips and my body wanted to do what it wanted to do, which was get away from the pain. The rippling agony was hard to fend off, so I settled for vocalizing my discomfort and let them hold me there on the bed as they burned away the infection. I writhed, unable to keep completely still, but that was better than fighting my way free.

  “Goddess, damn me to hell, she is one tough cookie. This would have killed most humans,” the raspy voice grumbled. “A fighter for truth . . . wait, is that a tattoo on her back? Is this the Phoenix?”

  There was a clatter and I turned to see the stranger in the cowl lift a knife and swing it toward me.

  Justin grabbed Eleanor, threw himself over me and pulled the trigger. Eleanor boomed in the small space and the cloaked abnormal fell backward. Justin saved my life.

  “Good shot,” Eleanor said. “You saved her. I’ll do my best not to kill you, even if she tries. I’ll give you a one-shot warning.”

  Why would I try to kill Justin? My eyes focused on the scene and Justin faded into Simon. He turned toward me.

  “You okay?”

  I blinked a few times and glanced at my shoulder. Linx was still draining fluid, mostly blood now, and the skin around my shoulder was charred. As if my wound had been cauterized. I drew a breath and pushed with my good arm until I was sitting upright. “I don’t know about okay, but I think the worst has passed.”

  Simon slid off me and laid Eleanor on the table. “I’ll get rid of the body.”

  “Leave it,” I said. “We’ll go.”

  “You can’t go. You have to heal, and if we leave it, this place is going to be crawling with cops.” He glanced at me, staring with a strange look in his eyes, and I realized that my towel had slipped to my waist. I frowned at him.

  “What? You’ve never seen a pair of tits before?” I pulled the towel back up with one hand.

  He shrugged. “Not yours. And they are rather nice. Can I touch—”

  “No. Seriously, I just went through hell and you want to touch my tits? What is wrong with you?” I shimmied to the edge of the bed, doing my best not to think about how I’d seen him for a few minutes. That he’d been Justin in my mind, and that I’d had a swell of love for him. Delusions? Or was my subconscious trying to tell me I could trust Simon? God, what if he’d shifted his appearance to look like Justin? Was that possible?

  “Not me, men in general. It’s a disease.” He sucked in a breath. “Shit, you are healing fast,” Simon said. “Look at your shoulder.”

  I did as he suggested and stared at the skin. He was right. While the flesh was still charred, the wound was indeed healing. I pulled Linx out and the hole from his probe closed over in seconds. “What the fuck is this?”

  “Whatever the healer put on you worked like a hot damn. He covered the wound in thick red paste and lit it on fire.” Simon leaned toward me, his eyes squinting as he stared at the thick scar. “It would be nice to have more of that red paste on hand. Just in case.” He turned away to look at the body of the healer. “Maybe he has more.”

  No doubt checking the healer for more goods was a smart idea. Because the reality was I was a normal going against a massive amount of abnormals, all who were either out for my blood already because of the bounty on my head, or they would be once I took them on. Like Genzo and his Yakuza, once they knew I was on their trail and hunting for the Ikimono myst. I walked to the bathroom surprisingly spry. “I’m getting dressed. We need to get out of here.”

  “You need help?” The hopeful tone in his voice was far too much. I shut the door between us and leaned against the bathroom sink.

  The heat and pain in my shoulder faded with each passing second, to the point that the wound was ninety percent healed already. I touched it with the tip of one finger, and felt no pain. I rolled my shoulder, lifted my arm over my head and stared as the charred skin flaked away leaving nothing but fresh smooth skin. That was some damn amazing magic. Why couldn’t Mancini and Romano create something like this? Of course, the question was stupid and I knew the answer. There was probably very little money in this, or else it was too expensive to make.

  I fumbled through my clothes and found the phone Mancini had given me. Time to see if he would live up to his word. I skimmed through the contacts until I found one I knew by reputation alone. Easter Willis. She was a cleaner in Seattle if the area code was right.

  I dialed her number and it clicked through. “Mancini, I’m surprised you’re calling.” Her voice was a low alto that was easy on the ears. She’d do good phone sex.

  “Not Mancini, but he gave me your number. I need a cleanup, room #115, at the Oceanview Motel, waterfront Seattle.”

  Her breathing changed. “How do I know I’ll get paid?”

  “Mancini will pay you.” I smiled to myself.

  “I’m checking with him. If he clears you, I’ll be there.” She hung up on me and I tucked the phone away.

  I shook my head. I had to get to the code breaker, and we had to get away from the abnormal healer whose body we were leaving on the chance Easter didn’t show. I shook out the new clothes I’d bought: jeans, long-sleeved shirt, and boots; put them on; then stepped into the main room.

  Simon had a bag that looked like it had probably belonged to the abnormal, spread out on the floor. “He had a few things worth
taking on top of more of that paste.” He held up a jar that glimmered like it had sparkling fairy lights within it when he gave it a light shake. “Kind of like blinding, only it makes the person you hit it with sleepy as a lamb.”

  “Isn’t it ‘gentle as a lamb’?” I arched an eyebrow.

  He shrugged. “Same difference.”

  I went to the side table where Dinah, Eleanor, and Linx sat. I picked up my shoulder holster and conceal and carry straps and slid my shirt up. The conceal and carry sat against my skin and after rinsing the pus off Linx, I tucked him into the holster strap. He shifted so he fit the holster perfectly. “Good?” I asked.

  “Ready, boss,” Linx said. I had the feeling he would have given me thumbs-up if he could have. I dropped my shirt and slid my shoulder holsters on next. I preferred the thigh holsters, they were a faster draw. But people tended to notice you if you had a pair of smart-mouthed guns on your thighs as if you were a cowboy in an old Western movie.

  I tucked the girls in their holsters and then turned. “You ready, Simon?”

  He was watching me with a funny look in his eyes. “You healed like an abnormal. He said not many humans would have survived.”

  “Good magic, I guess.” I shrugged, not bothered in the least by the comparison. “I’m not going to complain.” The truth was, I felt better than I had since the hit on the drug studio in Hollywood. My body felt . . . energized, as if all the wounds and bruises were gone and I was at 100 percent once more. Was it possible that there were vestiges of Diva left in my system, awakened by the red paste? I shook my head, it didn’t really matter I guess, long as I could keep going I’d take the strength from any direction.

  I led the way out of the room, and Simon stuck close.

  “I think we should still find a place to crash for the night,” Simon said as we walked down the covered pathway in the front of the motel.

  I shrugged. “I’m not tired.”

  He snorted. “I am. Whatever the healer did to you, he did not share with me.”

  “You want to be lit on fire?” I shook my head. “I can oblige that if you want.”

  “Nope. Just want to sleep.” He took the lead. “You think Mancini will help?”

  “I’ve called a cleaner off the phone he gave me, so he doesn’t have a choice except to help.” Even as I spoke, a big dark blue truck pulled up with a sign on the side. Like Magic Cleaning Services. I arched an eyebrow and stopped to see what Easter Willis looked like, curiosity getting the better of me.

  She slid from the truck, all legs and long red curling hair. Her wild gold eyes narrowed as she saw us standing there. “You make the call?”

  I nodded. “Obviously, Mancini vouched for me.”

  “He did. Though he wasn’t happy about it.” She smiled and I liked her immediately, an unusual thing for me.

  She turned and I realized that the side of her head away from us was shaved, so all that long hair was only on half her skull. Interesting look. Her arms were covered with tattoos from her fingertips all the way to her bare shoulders.

  “I’ll get it done and bill Mr. Mancini. He asked me to give you a message.” Easter pulled a bag out of her truck and settled the strap over her shoulder.

  “And that is?” I tensed, my fingers twitching to head for Dinah and Eleanor if she so much as made a whisper of a wrong move.

  “Keep a lower profile.”

  I sighed. “Yeah, easier said than done.”

  She laughed. “Whoever you are, you make him nervous. That’s something I thought only I did.”

  That gave me pause. I didn’t want to get together and have a slumber party and giggle over popcorn, but something about this woman made me think I could trust her. “You make him nervous?”

  She winked and walked past me. “Strong women are the bane of his existence, my friend.”

  Easter disappeared into the hotel and I turned away. “I like her.”

  “Goddess, you would,” Simon muttered. “She’s as fucking dangerous as they come. Almost as bad as a Magelore. Almost as bad as you.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Please, nothing is as bad as a Magelore.”

  “Mancini,” Simon said. “He’s as bad as a Magelore. Fuck, for all you know, he could be one and he mind fucked you in that limo, showed you want you wanted to see to gain your acceptance.”

  “Just remember,” I glared at him, “you’re the one who took me to him, so if I got mind fucked it’s your fault.”

  Still, my mind reeled with what he’d said. Because he was right, that very well could have happened in the limo with Mancini. I had no defense against a Magelore’s mind tricks. But for now, it changed nothing.

  “Taking out Genzo and his Yaks hurts Romano. So, either way, it’s a win.” Even if the prize might not be Bear. Fucking hell, I refused to think like that.

  We were a few blocks from the hotel, walking through the Seattle night, getting wetter with each step.

  “I think we’ll be better off sleeping on the street tonight rather than find another place to sleep. Tomorrow, we can get a car.”

  Simon stopped in his tracks. “You’re shitting me, right?”

  I snorted softly. “What? You’ve never slept on the streets?”

  “It’s late April, in Seattle. It’s not what I’d call balmy tropical weather.” He lifted his hands to the steadily falling rain that, while light, had not let up an ounce. “And you want to sleep in it.”

  “I’ve slept out in worse.” I pushed past him, heading toward a cluster of what looked like apartment buildings. I needed a computer and then I could transfer money into an account I could draw from. A computer with a good working connection would not be found on the street, so Simon might get his wish after all. I rubbed a hand over my face, wiping away the buildup of rain. “I have an idea.”

  “Why do I get the feeling I’m not going to like your idea,” Simon muttered.

  Dinah laughed. “She always has ideas, and they are mostly good. Some are quite fun and involve shooting.”

  I strode toward the cluster of apartment buildings, searching for one that was just the right style. Not too old, not too new. Middle class all the way.

  We ducked under the overhang in front of the door and I ran my hands over all the call buttons.

  “That’s an old trick,” Simon said.

  “Still works, which makes it a good trick,” I pointed out as the door buzzed and we let ourselves in.

  “Why are we doing this again?” Simon looked around the dated lobby. By the colors and carpet, the renovation was at least ten years old, perfect. I headed straight to the stairs.

  “Because you want to sleep and I need a place where I can use a computer for a little Internet banking.”

  Simon sighed. “You don’t want to at least consider the elevator?”

  “Cameras,” I said. “If they’ve got the money for them, that’s where they’ll be.”

  “Shit,” Simon said. “I could just mask us.”

  I stopped and looked at him. “You have Hiding abilities?”

  He shrugged. “Not like Zee, but yeah, I can tweak things.”

  Tweak things was an understatement, I suspected. Simon had been the one to break through Zee’s Hiding of me and Bear at the ranch. If not for the fact that Romano had refused to pay him, he might have tried to kill me there. His skillset was an interesting mix of killer, Hider, and what else did he have going on besides that flesh-eating trick up his sleeve?

  “Here,” he held out his hand. “Hang on.”

  Reluctantly I held out my hand. Dinah began to sing.

  “Nix and Simon sitting in a tree . . .”

  “Dinah, shut it.” I slapped my free hand over her but she kept on going.

  “F-U-C-K-I-N-G.”

  There were days I wished I had regular guns, ones that didn’t mouth off. This was one of those days.

  Simon laughed. “She’s quite the lady, isn’t she?”

  “She’s getting comfortable with you, which is interesting
, seeing as you lied and drugged me,” I said as he tugged me toward the elevator. He pressed the button and we stepped in.

  “Because I’m such a charmer?” He smiled and I shook my head.

  “No, they seem to think they know you because you’ve been around me for more than a few days.”

  “What floor?” he interrupted.

  “Third time’s a charm,” I said softly.

  He hit the button for the third floor. “A few days is the longest you’ve been around others?”

  “Anyone around me longer than a few days is likely in my good books. Otherwise, they’d be dead by then. Which almost happened, I’d like to remind you and them.” I looked up into the corner of the elevator and the camera there. “What will they see when they look at us?”

  “A pair of eighty-year-olds with bent backs. I gave you a walker. Try to shuffle when you walk.” The grin on his face was almost contagious. Almost.

  I looked away from him, remembering all too easily how, for a few minutes, he’d been a very real Justin to me. And that for a moment, I’d loved him fiercely. I didn’t like it; the emotions would mess with my judgment of him.

  I let my body hunch a little to help the illusion he’d created. At the third floor, we shuffled out and into the hall, and I took my hand away from his.

  “No cameras here.” He looked one direction and then the other.

  I nodded. “Not enough money for hall cameras.”

  He grunted. “Just what do you have planned?” Simon adjusted the bag on his shoulder.

  He wasn’t going to like it, so I didn’t tell him. I pulled Dinah from her holster and she gave a shimmy.

  “Oh, I know what you’re doing. Is this like the Lakefront job?”

  She surprised me by remembering. “Yes,” I said.

  “Want to fill me in?” Simon asked.

  I approached the first apartment door on my right and laid my cheek against it and slid down until the knob was in front of my nose. I drew a breath. Nothing.

  I stood and went to the next door, and the next.