What Voodoo Do You Do? Read online

  That was the way it had been for as long as I could remember. As long as Davis was the chief cop in Rome, I didn’t expect it would change.

  I looked around the dimly lit room, my nose wrinkling as a sour smell stung my nostrils. A glance at the trash can next to the desk told me the smell probably came from one of the carry-out containers filling the can. It was definitely time to empty that trash.

  The floor beneath my feet was covered in wide planks in a dark wood of indeterminate origin. The floor’s polish had long ago worn down to a dull, muddy finish that rolled like a wave in some spots and was badly scratched in others. It creaked as I came inside and stepped back to hold the door wide for the first of two gurneys bearing our demon-possessed victims.

  Imagine my surprise when I’d learned that Mavis kept gurneys at her house. She also, apparently, had medical supplies and a radio she used to call an ambulance when phones were out, as they often were during storm season. She used to work at Rome General Hospital, drove a car big enough to fit a gurney in the back, and, given the fact that the small, country hospital boasted only two ambulances that were usually unavailable when needed, I was guessing Mavis might have served as a backup EMT for Rome General a time or two.

  I knew she had the skills to be a med tech. I’d watched her expertly treat and bandage the wounds I’d sustained fighting the demons before she’d allow me to talk to Davis.

  Since I’d become Lares, the things I’d learned about my mom had been a constant surprise.

  The big desk facing the door was made of a wood. It was old, but beautifully crafted, with dark grain under a reddish-gold stain. The desk’s pristine surface held a small laptop sitting on an old-fashioned paper blotter and not much else.

  Two plain wooden visitor chairs faced the desk.

  A folding table on the wall to the right of the desk held a pot and fixings for coffee, along with real mugs instead of the usual Styrofoam cups.

  Davis Marshal was an old-fashioned guy with craggy good looks. He was known for his sense of fairness, strong work ethic, and traditional values. Davis was a nice guy and a darn good cop.

  He was also missing in action when we came through the door.

  Monty wasted no time running over to sniff the floor around the table with the coffee. I had no doubt he was searching out crumbs to fill his empty belly. The poor thing had never gotten his breakfast. He probably thought he was dying.

  The wall opposite the coffee center held a door. Next to the door on the wall was a series of hooks, each hook holding a different key.

  A little further down the wall, a small grandfather clock ticked away the time. It was a comforting sound, albeit one that seemed out of place in a police office.

  A beat later, a flushing noise explained why the chief was missing.

  We waited as the sound of running water, followed by the harsh belching of a hand dryer filled the silence.

  The man who came out of the small bathroom in the back corner of the office jolted to a surprised stop when he saw us. “Oh.” He frowned at the two gurneys. “What’s going on? Do those people need an ambulance?”

  Rome’s one-and-only full-time cop was dressed in a flannel shirt and jeans, his sharp gaze and chiseled features easily identifying him as a cop, despite his casual dress.

  Davis didn’t wear a gun unless he was called out to a crime he thought would get violent, and his shield was usually stuffed into the pocket of his shirt.

  With his thick mop of dark hair, graying on the sides, and tall, leanly muscled body, Davis was a good-looking guy and still solid despite his sixty-some years.

  Like most people living in Rome, Davis Marshal might be relaxed about the way he dressed, but he was addicted to the rules of life in the small town. Everything had its place. Things were done a certain way. And life held no surprises except for the universally accepted things like death and, sometimes, taxes.

  I was about to rock his world. I felt bad about that.

  “Hey, Davis.” I motioned toward the gurneys. Mavis and Bev each stood with a hand on a possessed’s chest, no doubt feeding their spell with magic to keep the couple unconscious. “We brought some prisoners.” I glanced around the office, my gaze falling to the door with the keys next to it. “Do you want us to take them directly to a cell?”

  He frowned. “Prisoners?” He walked over and stood between the two gurneys. “That’s the Thomas’s.” He turned his frown on me. “What kind of crime did they commit?”

  “They attacked two people in the street,” Bev said, frowning as Davis turned her way. “It was a particularly gruesome attack.”

  Davis put his hands on his hips and shook his head. “That girl there…” He jerked his head toward the woman. “…she was on the cheerleading squad with my Delilah. She doesn’t have a mean bone in her body.”

  Mavis and Bev looked at me. It was time to do my thing. I sighed. “Davis, you should probably take a seat.”

  He shook his head again. “I’m fine where I am.” He stepped closer to the man on the gurney, bending down to examine his arm. “Those look like dog bites.” He glared at us. “What’s really going on here?”

  I grabbed a chair from in front of the Police Chief’s desk and pushed it toward him. Sending my energy into the air around Davis, I gave him what I hoped was a reassuring smile. “Sit, Chief. Please?”

  He held my gaze for a long moment, his belligerent expression finally softening. He nodded and sat. I pulled the second chair over and sat down in front of him. The golden glow of my magic flowed from me to him, his body relaxing under its influence. “Chief, these people are demon-possessed. They need to be locked up until we can figure out how to get the demons out of them.”

  He narrowed his gaze on me. “Demons don’t exist, Aggy.” He glanced at Mavis. “Why are you letting her spread such nonsense around?”

  If I remembered correctly, Mavis and Davis had gone to high school together. They might have even dated. Though, if high school during their time was anything like the high school years I’d barely survived, the name rhyming thing would have definitely been a problem for them.

  I’d expected Mavis to look embarrassed by the question. I’d underestimated her. “Because she’s telling you the truth, Davis. If you’d open that notoriously impenetrable mind of yours, you’d see that.”

  He shook his head.

  “Demons do exist,” I said, giving my energy an extra little push. I watched it hit him, turning his gaze dull and unfocused. Oops! Too much.

  I reduced the pressure until his gaze sharpened. Then I tried again. “Magic exists, Chief. Magical creatures exist. It would be nice if we could ignore them, but circumstances have made that impossible.”

  “What kind of circumstances?” he asked, belligerence tightening his craggy features.

  “A Hellmouth,” I said, noting the hard glint in his dark blue eyes. Chief Marshal was no pushover. He was clearly resisting my influence. “At Golden Years Senior Home. It’s a very dangerous situation, and I’m afraid these two young people might be the first victims of it.”

  Davis turned to stare at the couple, his brow lowering. “They look sick. They should be at the hospital.”

  Worry tightened my chest. What if I couldn’t get him to understand? I’d already told him that magic was real. If I wasn’t successful in getting him on board, I had probably just created a big problem. “Chief, they’re not sick. They’re possessed.” When he shook his head, I tried another tack. “How about this. You help us get them locked up in a special cell. They’re currently under a spell that the demons will push through quickly once Bev and Mavis stop reinforcing it. Then you can see what we’re talking about.”

  His frown deepened. He stared at me for a long moment, clearly trying to read the level of madness in my eyes.

  “She’s telling you the truth, Davis,” Mavis told him.

  Finally, he sighed. “I’ll humor you for a few minutes. But if those people still look sick after a few minutes in the cell,
I’m calling an ambulance.”

  I slid a glance toward Mavis, and she winked.

  I took that to mean it would be okay. “Fine. You do have a special cell, right?” According to Gren, who’d pronounced himself my teacher in all things magic and Rome, the previous Chief of Police in Rome had known about magical creatures and had a cell with iron bars on the sides and top and a stone floor beneath it. The cell had been infused with nulling magics, which were regularly reinforced by the town’s local coven.

  I glanced at Bev. “How long since the cell’s been reinforced?”

  “Just last week,” my sister of the heart said. “After your seating, we figured we’d better be prepared for whatever came.”

  “Good call,” I mumbled, a shudder sliding over me at the memory. I’d been late to the party, so to speak, in knowing about magic in general, and my magic in particular.

  Davis unlocked the door leading to the cells and slipped the key back into his pocket. He grabbed a skeleton key from the hooks beside the door and flipped a light switch on the wall. A long hallway was illuminated. Its walls were plain concrete block and the floor was poured concrete.

  He glanced at the gurneys. “Do you ladies need help with those?”

  “It might be better to have someone at the head and foot since we’ll be maneuvering down the hall,” Bev said.

  Eyeing the musty-smelling space, I saw her point. The floor was uneven in spots. The cracked concrete had heaved from moisture over the years, as well as the normal shifting of an aging building.

  Monty started to trot through the door, but I grabbed his trailing leash. “Not so fast, mister. You need to stay here where it’s safe.”

  He barked, his tail manically smacking the air.

  “I know,” I told him. “But that’s just the way it is.” Looping the handle of the leash around a chair leg, I went to help Bev with her gurney. Davis sent me an amused glance as I passed him. “What?” I asked the chief.

  He grinned. “Do you always talk to that dog like he understands you?”

  “Of course. Because he does.”

  Davis’s smile sagged. His eyes went round. “Are you telling me he’s a magical dog?”

  I fought a grin. I might have laid on the suggestion a bit too thick. “I’m not sure. But he’s definitely special.”

  Shaking his head, Davis went to help Mavis with her gurney. “I’ve had dogs all my life,” he told me in a grumpy voice. “Almost every single one ate poop and rocks. If that’s the kind of special you mean, then I guess I’d have to agree.”

  I shook my head, grinning.

  The chief and Mavis went first, the chief moving quickly as if he were anxious to get the whole thing over with.

  I bit back a sigh. My influence might have softened him up to the whole “magic exists” thing, but it hadn’t helped his mood even a tiny bit.

  The concrete beneath my feet was cold as we made our way along the dimly lit space. The bare bulb in the center of the passage was overwhelmed by the windowless space of the hallway, a fact not helped by the high, narrow windows in the cell area beyond.

  When we emerged from the passage a moment later, I found myself looking at a dungeon-like space that didn’t appear to have ever been updated since its origin. I wouldn’t have been too surprised to see metal rings on the walls with rusty chains extending to the floor.

  “Charming,” I said, without considering the company I kept.

  Davis’s broad shoulders squared, and his eyes hardened. “I don’t believe in coddling prisoners, Aggy.”

  “Clearly.” I grimaced, thinking about the occasional shop-lifting teen or falsely arrested person being locked up in there. The experience would definitely leave a scar.

  Davis pointed to the largest cell, which held two cots, a stainless steel toilet, and a small sink. “In here.” We rolled the two people onto the cots and left. Davis used the strange, old-fashioned key to lock the cell. The chief probably didn’t realize it, but Gren had told me the previous police chief had the skeleton key magically created by witches so that it could never be copied or the lock on the cell picked.

  As the lock clicked into place, a low-level hum filled the air, and a soft, green glow coated the entire cell.

  Davis blinked at the sight as if he’d never seen it before.

  That was when I realized my push had probably worked after all. At least on some level. It hadn’t adjusted his understanding of the situation, but it had apparently opened his eyes to magic.

  “What’s going on?”

  “Magic,” I told him with a smile. “That cell has been reinforced to ensure the prisoners inside can’t use energy or exceptional strength to escape.”

  He turned to Bev and Mavis. “What was in that blessing you all gave these cells last week?”

  “Aggy already told you. Reinforcing magic. Stop being so stubborn,” Mavis said.

  “Miss Mavis,” he said, fondness painting his tone, “I learned a long time ago that words mean nothing. I believe what I see with my own eyes and hear with my own ears.”

  The man on the cot stirred, his eyes suddenly snapping open. They glowed a deep, blood-red.

  I grimaced. “You’re about to see with your own eyes, Chief.”

  He sighed as if my presence was annoying him. It probably was. He’d be darn lucky if he walked out of that room simply annoyed and not terrorized by what he was about to see.

  The man on the cot flew toward us so fast he was nothing more than a blur on the air. He slammed into the bars of the cell near ceiling height, clinging to it like a giant spider.

  Chief Davis Marshal took two steps back, his eyes wide and his mouth open. “Holy…”

  “There’s nothing holy about that, Chief,” Bev said, her lips curved in a tight smile.

  The man in the cell opened his mouth and spat something black and slimy all over the front of Davis and me. Bev jumped away with a yelp, and Mavis ducked behind her gurney. Before I could react, I caught movement out of the corner of my eye, and the cell bars clanged as the woman joined the man. I watched in horror as she clambered over the bars like a giant arachnid, growling in a voice that was way too deep for a human being.

  Davis stood with his arms arched away from his body. Slimy black stuff oozed down his shirt and dripped onto the floor. He hadn’t moved since getting hit with the nasty stuff.

  “Believe us now, Chief?” I asked.

  He didn’t respond at first, slowly turning his gaze to mine. “What’s wrong with them?”

  Mavis rolled her eyes. Bev sighed. I started to pat him on the shoulder and then stopped, grimacing at the mess. “Demons. Those people can’t be let out of that cell, Chief. Not until we figure out how to get rid of the demons.”

  He scrubbed a hand over his chin, scraping off a slimy strand of demon spit. “I understand.”

  And I believed he finally did.

  We turned away and started back toward the office. As we reached the door, a horrendous squealing sound jolted us to a stop.

  I looked at Bev and Mavis. “Did that sound like metal bending to you?”

  “Goddess save us,” Bev breathed out. “It did.”

  Another squeal had us turning on our heels and running back to the magically reinforced cell. We arrived just in time to see the man shoving his shoulder through a ten-inch gap between the bars. He was a big guy, broad in the shoulders and kind of meaty, but his bones must have compressed somehow because he’d managed to squash a quarter of his body through the opening before we could react.

  Without thought, I opened my mind and sent a 9-1-1 call into the ether.

  We were about to be overwhelmed by what was coming at us. And I was pretty sure we needed a lot of help.

  8

  When Virtue Dares and Evil Sleeps

  I turned to Davis. “Get weapons. Anything you can find. And, whatever you do, don’t let them out of this room if they manage to get past us.”

  He nodded and started running.

  I looked
at Bev and Mavis. They were already spinning magic in the air. The strands of glowing energy knitted themselves into something that looked like an advanced math equation to me. I had no idea what they did when they crafted a spell. For all I knew, it could be math-based.

  The woman inside the cell snarled. I turned to find the two demons fighting for access to the single opening. The man still had one arm and a shoulder through, but the woman was clawing and biting at him, trying to yank him out so she could escape.

  Whatever they’d been to each other during their lives, the poison invading their bodies had killed any humanity they’d once had.

  With a terrifying speed that created a blur on the air, the woman was thrown back and the man shot through the dented bars. He slammed into me, sending us both flying backward. I hit the bars of the cell across the room, the sound echoing through the stark space.

  Agony speared through my back and neck. A galaxy of stars created sparkly little spots in my vision, obscuring part of the nightmare that was snapping at my face.

  I fought to stay conscious. If I passed out, the teeth snapping at my face and the long, black claws the demon had grown since taking over the human man’s form would rip me into tiny little pieces.

  In a move that was more desperation than skill, I smacked the demon on the side of the face and sent energy spearing through his skull. His head jerked to the side, but the jolt of power didn’t seem to have much more effect than that.

  A shrill scream brought my head whipping around to find the female clinging to Bev, her teeth buried in my sister’s shoulder as Bev stumbled backward.

  Screaming with fear and rage, I all but levitated from the floor and threw out my hands. “Expel!” The single command was edged in panic, my voice shrill above the snarling and screaming.

  The female flew away from Bev, her body folded in on itself as it crashed through the open doorway of another cell.

  Mavis flung her hands out, and the glowing mesh of magic she’d been building hit the door of the cell and slammed it shut, wrapping around the entire iron cage like a huge mesh bandage.