Autumn Bones Read online

Page 4

 

  “Sure. ” She sounded amused. “Why not? It’s been ages. If that’s what you want, give me a few minutes to freshen up and change my clothes, and I’ll be right over. ”

  “Um . . . yeah. ” Glancing toward the nightclub, I did the math in my head. Lurine’s lakeshore mansion was only six or seven minutes away, but the freshening up could easily triple that amount of time. “Can’t you come as you are?”

  “Daisy. ” Now she sounded reproving. “I have an image to maintain. ”

  This was true. Over the millennia, Lurine has maintained a long series of identities. Currently, the world knows her as a small-town-girl-makes-good B-movie starlet who married a very, very wealthy octogenarian and retired to her hometown after his prompt expiration.

  I sighed. “Well, if you can hurry, I’d really, really appreciate it. Is there any way we can turn down the volume on his rutting effect before you get here? I thought I might try using dauda-dagr. It works on humans. ”

  “Mmm. ” Definitely dubious. “No, I wouldn’t recommend it unless you actually mean to kill him. You don’t, do you?”

  “No! I just want to make him stop. ”

  “Well, then you should definitely avoid making contact or his urge could overpower yours, even with Hel’s dagger. But it may still be useful as long as you don’t touch the satyr. Try circumscribing him with salt and iron. That might hold him for a while. I’ll be there as soon as I can. ” On the other end of the phone, Lurine blew a kiss before hanging up.

  “Wait—” I made a face as the line went dead. “Okay, she’s on her way. Anyone know how to circumscribe someone with salt and iron?”

  “Yes, of course,” Stefan said. “Do I understand that she’s offered to take the satyr into her own custody?”

  “Yeah, but not until she’s freshened up, which could be a while. So what’s the deal on this circumscribing?” In my own defense, let me say that it’s not like being Hel’s liaison came with a handbook. “And crap! Where am I going to get salt?”

  “There should be salt somewhere in the bar supplies,” Cody offered. “For rimming margarita glasses. Daise, are you saying Lurine’s going to take that, um . . . guy in there home with her?”

  “Uh-huh,” I said. “I’m pretty sure that’s what she meant. ”

  He shuddered. “Brave woman. ”

  Well, sort of. If I understood correctly that Lurine meant to take the satyr home and screw him senseless until the rut passed, I was pretty sure she meant to do it in her true form, which was more than a match for any supernatural penis.

  “Wait,” Bart Mallick said faintly, still slumped against his squad car. Oops. I’d forgotten about him. “Lurine Hollister?”

  “Eldritch code of honor,” I said to him. Lurine’s nature was known to people she trusted, but it was far from common knowledge. The tabloids would have a field day if it got out. “You keep our secrets, we keep yours. Okay?”

  He flushed and nodded.

  “Stefan?” I said. “The circumscribing?”

  “It is as it sounds, Daisy,” Stefan said. “Pour a line of salt around the subject, and draw a second circle around him with the point of your dagger. ” He looked genuinely concerned. “Are you sure it’s worth the risk if your patroness is on her way?”

  “I’m sure. ” That was a lie, too. But this was my responsibility, and I couldn’t bear the thought of standing around the parking lot doing nothing, waiting for someone else to save the day. With every minute that passed, the possibility of things taking an ugly turn in that nightclub increased.

  Stefan inclined his head. “I will accompany you. ”

  Cody’s nostrils flared. “I’ll go. ”

  The patient, watching ghouls glanced from one to the other with interest. In certain circles in the eldritch community, there’s nothing they like better than a standoff between a pair of alphas. Okay, make that most circles.

  I drew dauda-dagr. “Thanks, guys, but this is going to be tricky. Either one of you would just get in the way. I have a better chance going it alone. Stefan, if it works, I’ll call you with a go-ahead to bring in the troops. Okay?”

  Reluctantly, they agreed, which I guess makes me the real alpha in this particular scenario.

  Yippee.

  Taking a deep breath, I headed back toward the nightclub. Third time’s a charm, right?

  “Daisy?” Stefan called. “If you can turn off the music, it may help. ” He gave me a faint, worried smile. “It turns out your parents were right about rock and roll. ”

  Okay, so he was off by a couple of generations, and I wouldn’t exactly classify a techno dance club mix as rock and roll, but I appreciated the advice. Giving him a quick thumbs-up with my free hand, I yanked open the door and plunged into the club.

  In the five minutes I’d been outside, the funk had ripened further and the om-mani-fuckme-hum had reached a deeper register that vibrated in the very marrow of my bones. Even with dauda-dagr clutched tightly in my hand, I could feel the atmosphere’s effect. Honestly, I’d never stopped feeling it, but I had a lot of experience with containing my emotions. When I was a little kid, my mom read a book about creative visualization and used the concept to make up techniques to help me deal with my frequent temper tantrums.

  I tried to use one now to cope with the effect of the pheromones, imagining it as a brimming cup of desire, tipping it and spilling it away.

  Yeah, that didn’t work. The contents of that cup refused to spill.

  I tried a different one, one my mom had invented especially for emotions too strong and stubborn to be dismissed. I put my funk-driven lust in a box and tied a bow around it, a pretty package to open later.

  It worked.

  Feeling clear and sharp, I headed for the bar, dodging writhing bodies and ducking under the pass-through at the service station.

  “Whoops!” I tripped over someone. Well, a pair of female someones. One of them wore what looked to be a bartender’s apron around her waist, and nothing else. “Excuse me,” I said, tapping her on the shoulder. “Do you know where I can find the salt?”

  She lifted her head from what she was doing, giving me a glazed look and reaching for me with one languid hand.

  “Yeah, thanks, not right now. ” I plucked her hand from my leg and transferred it atop the hand I had wrapped around dauda-dagr’s hilt. “Are you a bartender? Is there salt back here?”

  Her eyes cleared. “What the fuck?” She looked down at the figure beneath her. “Who is this? Do I even know her?”

  “I have no idea,” I said apologetically. “Do you have any salt?”

  “Salt?”

  “Yes!” I was getting impatient. “Look, I’m sorry, but I don’t have time to explain! Do you have any salt?”

  Looking bewildered, she pointed to a shelf. It took me a few seconds to identify the plastic tub of bright green lime-flavored margarita salt as the item I wanted. “Perfect. ” Grabbing it, I scooted away from the entangled pair. “Thanks. ”

  There was no answer. Well, not a verbal one. The funk was back in effect.

  On the far side of the dance floor, the DJ booth was empty. I managed to work my way around the edges of the floor and climb into the booth, where an imposing array of lights and switches confronted me. I’m pretty sure aircraft control panels are less complicated. Since I didn’t have a clue, I hit anything and everything that looked like it might be a power switch until the bass-heavy dance mix went mercifully silent. Now it just sounded like the sound track to the world’s most ambitious gay porn movie.

  I went back into the fray. Getting to the satyr was going to be the hard part. There was a constant slow-motion swirl of activity around him, a dense concentration of men swapping places, partners, and positions as they waited their turn to kneel at the altar, as it were. Men of all shapes, sizes, and ages, ranging from burly bears with furry chests to waxed-chested gym rats with six-pack abs to drag queens w
ith heavily smeared makeup. I pushed my way into the throng, squeezing past the vertical bodies and clambering over the horizontal ones until I was close to the epicenter.

  “Bitch, please!” One of the buff gym rats disengaged to give me a look of glazed indignation. “No cutting in line. ”

  Holding dauda-dagr in a reverse grip, I pressed the back of my hand against his forehead. “Police business. I need you to step back and clear this space, sir. ”

  “Huh?” He blinked at me, the glaze only semi-clearing. Either the effect of the funk was stronger this close to the satyr or gym boy was under the influence of something else. Or both.

  I touched dauda-dagr’s tip to his bare chest. “Step back. ”

  With a pained hiss, he did. If that’s what it took, fine. I stole a quick look at the satyr, who appeared oblivious to my intervention, happily grinning and thrusting away. Prying the lid off the plastic tub of lime-flavored salt, I made a circle around him and his current tribute-giver, tilting the tub to pour out a stream of salt with one hand and using dauda-dagr to clear space with the other.

  Luckily, once the salt was poured it seemed to keep the orgiasts at bay, and it clung firmly to the dance floor, which was slick with viscous fluid. Yeah, that’s pretty much a straight-up “Ew!” I left a gap in front of the satyr and his partner and retraced my steps, using the point of the dagger to draw a line through the salt.

  Sometimes it’s better to act than think, and doing what it would take to close the circle was definitely one of those times. Holding dauda-dagr and the salt tub awkwardly in one hand, I wrapped my free arm around the waist of the guy kneeling before the satyr and executed a sort of half-assed hip throw on him.

  It wasn’t pretty, but it worked. I didn’t spend four years in Mr. Rodriguez’s Li’l Dragonz Tae Kwon Do classes for nothing.

  The satyr looked down at me, his grin faltering briefly. It returned as he took a step in my direction, his erection glistening obscenely as it bobbed above me. As strange as it may sound, it was also weirdly hypnotic.