Mangled Read online

  Tommy made some ribald comment about my boobs for the fifth time that night and I gave up trying to hide the tear in my shirt that exposed the side of the left one. Deer antlers were more dangerous than I had given them credit for. I reminded Tommy he wished he’d got a chance at all this before he died. But our laughter and ribbing faded as we approached the cabin.

  “Crap on toast,” I muttered.

  Tommy’s brother was back. I could feel his magical signature. And my buzzards were restless. They usually only reacted to things that were a threat to my existence. Like wendigos or rogue hunters. But who knows, maybe witch magic gave them indigestion.

  Tommy scowled. “Caldwell.”

  I snorted. “Caldwell, really? What kind of douchebag name is that?”

  The witch in question regarded us from his seat in the Adirondack chair on my back porch as we approached. “I’ll admit,” he said with a wry grin that reminded me a lot of Tommy’s troublemaking expressions. “About as douchey as Thomas Whitehall the third.”

  I raised an eyebrow at Tommy and mouthed “Thomas Whitehall the third?”

  He flipped me off. “Stuff it. That’s what happens when your whole family is from a long line of snobby aristocrats that think they are special because they can do magic tricks.”

  Caldwell laughed. “Magic tricks? Sure kiddo.”

  Tommy growled. “What do you want, Cal?”

  His brother looked out at the woods for a time before he answered. “We really did miss you, you know?” He turned his dark blue eyes upward to look at his pale, ghoulish brother. “I’m sorry. It’s all because of me that everything…” he waved his hand helplessly, “fell apart.”

  Tommy took pity on him. “Look, I admit, I’ve been pissed off for five years. And, yeah, it hurt like hell being the only talentless one in the coven. The weakest link, the family embarrassment.” He shrugged. “But hey, I’m not weak anymore. And I kind of prefer hanging around a foul-mouthed wendigo chick to dancing and flirting with the next gold-digging political match.”

  I slugged him in the arm. “There’s nothing wrong with my fucking mouth.” Well, except the fangs. I mean, I didn’t swear more than your normal adult. Much.

  Tommy shook his head. But he didn’t have any room to talk. He invented curses that left me dazed and confused on a daily basis.

  Caldwell glanced at me in a way that made me re-think the mouth comment. What the hell was wrong with me? Jesus.

  I brushed past the brothers and headed inside to change. Cal caught my arm suddenly and I froze, barely stopping the growl that rose up in my throat. He jerked his hand back as if he’d been burned. “Sorry! Your clothes are all ripped though, and you’re bleeding.” He gestured at my exposed side, where the ribs below my breast had been scored by hard, sharp antlers. “Are you okay? What happened?”

  I narrowed my eyes at his concern. Not buying it. “I was hunting,” I said impatiently. “I should have been more careful of the horns.” I tapped my own antlers in illustration, hoping he took note of the sharp points.

  Tommy pushed by us. “She’s fine, Cal. She’s not some flighty witch who can’t take a beating and get back up.” He called back over his shoulder. “Want a beer?”

  Cal followed us inside, his brow furrowed as he regarded Tommy. “You can still eat and drink?”

  Tommy shrugged. “I still get hungry like usual. I don’t really get drunk, but I like a beer now and then.” He made awful white doe-eyes at me. “And Tess loves me so much she buys me the good stuff.”

  I pushed him away and trudged toward my bedroom to grab some fresh clothes.

  Showered and changed, I emerged to a scene of tentative brotherly bonding. It was sickening. I suppressed a smile.

  Tommy was telling Cal a story about a man-eating shadow creature we had helped Kwan and Cloud track, back before the whole…death and fuck off thing. Tommy was gesturing wildly and making absurd cross-eyed faces as he re-enacted the whole encounter.

  “And Tess just goes ‘this is boring,’ and like, rips its head off and tosses it in the bushes. I thought the hunters were going to shit themselves.”

  I shook my head. “Coffee.”

  Tommy pointed to the end table, where a steaming mug of caffeine and sugar sat waiting for me. I nodded thanks and plopped down, aware of Cal’s eyes on me, evaluating.

  “You worked with hunters?”

  I shrugged.

  Tommy looked at me for a minute, but apparently decided it wouldn’t matter if he talked about the past. “They saved Tess from the wendigo. They asked her to help them hunt the monsters, since she’s…one of them now.” He laughed. “Then I finally got her to go out with me and she tried to eat me. Kind of changed my outlook on life.”

  I snorted.

  Cal lifted an eyebrow at his brother. “So, you two are…?”

  I choked on my coffee as I tried to laugh and swallow at the same time. Tommy came to pound me helpfully on the back. “No way,” he said, slapping me harder than necessary, just for good measure. “We’re like family now.”

  I growled at him and he stopped pounding on my back, dancing aside with a grin when I made a swipe at him with my claws.

  “The little shit won’t leave me the fuck alone,” I added.

  Cal laughed. “Aspen and oak, Mom and Dad are going to hate this.”

  I raised an eyebrow at the odd cursing.

  Tommy disappeared into the kitchen and returned with a couple of beers. Handing one to his brother, he sank down on the old, worn out sofa next to him. They sipped their beer in silence for a few minutes before Cal looked up at me. “So, what happened to your hunters? There’s a lot of strange creatures hanging around out here….”

  I felt like I had swallowed glass. But let’s face it, I had been expecting the question. The witches were obviously in the know about the shadowy creatures that the normal humans couldn’t see. “They thought they could use me like a tool,” I said softly. “Keep me like a pet. It didn’t work out so well.”

  Tommy snorted. “It ended up with one of them dead and the other one swearing to hunt Tess down. Even though she secretly wants a piece of wendigo ass.”

  Cal raised one eyebrow, utterly confused.

  I sighed.

  “I didn’t kill him, if that’s what you’re wondering,” I said, taking a sip of my coffee and telling the monster inside to shut its fucking mouth. Coffee wasn’t flesh and blood, but damn it, it was coffee.

  Cal regarded me in silence for a time, occasionally darting an intense blue gaze toward Tommy. I took mental note. They might be brothers, but these men were different. While Tommy might look the part of a bad boy ghoul, he was open and at times more honest than I’d like, with the unfailing loyalty of a puppy.

  Something told me Cal was a much different flavor. There was a calculating intelligence there that I thought was sharper than he let on. I didn’t sense malice in him. But that quick, evaluating look told me he could be dangerous.

  “So,” I said, trying to draw the conversation away from the creatures in my backyard—and avoid discussion of how Kwan died and who killed him. Or how he hadn’t been the only hunter to die in my woods that night. “Tommy said you left for some sort of training?”

  Cal nodded and sat back with his beer, the sharp eyes going hooded. Interesting. “Yeah,” he sighed. “I…well I ended up being more powerful than anyone anticipated, and it happened too fast. I couldn’t always control it. Tommy told you? About the house fire?”

  I looked right at Tommy. My ghoul fidgeted, glared, and took a swig of beer.

  “Not much, actually,” I said pointedly. “The idiot never wanted to talk about his family. And I was stupid enough to think it didn’t matter.”

  Cal snorted. He looked down at his hands as he spoke, picking at the label on his beer bottle. “Tommy was only seventeen. I was twenty. I should have had more control over my temper.”

  I raised my eyebrows. “Oh, now someone has to tell me what the hell happened.”
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br />   Tommy shook his head, but didn’t say anything.

  Cal looked at his brother, maybe waiting for an objection. Then he said, “Tommy slept with my girlfriend, right in the middle of one of my parents’ big galas. I lost my mind and set the house on fire.”

  I looked at Tommy. I wanted to be shocked, but then again not so much. I had first-hand knowledge of his skills. When he’d kissed me—right before I killed him—he had certainly not kissed like a sweet, dorky home-town grocery store clerk. “Right,” I said sagely. I could see the idiot being so cocky that he’d steal his brother’s woman when he was still only a kid.

  Tommy grunted and drank more beer. “I was a shit-head. Cocky and jealous as hell.” He looked at his brother, finally, and I realized this was probably the first time they’d really talked about this. “I’m sorry, Cal.”

  I stood up, all the emotion in the room making me want to run away as fast as my legs could carry me. The brothers looked at me. “Uh…I’ll just be…outside. Checking on things.”

  I darted out onto the porch and shut the door behind me with a bang.

  Eeew. Emotions.

  I wondered what it would be like to have a sibling. Then I let out a dry laugh. If I had a sibling, they’d probably be dead right now. Just like my mom, and my husband, and my child, and Tommy, and the last person I’d fucked. How my dad was still kicking, I had no idea. Maybe he had enough poison in him to keep even Death away.

  Sighing, I leaned my arms against the porch railing and looked out into the night. Glowing eyes peered at me from the forest. “Hey guys,” I said softly. “I see you. I know…just…give me a little longer, okay?”

  Despite my lack of family, I knew I had a commitment. I just balked at taking that last step of accepting my responsibility. I was entirely the wrong person for the job. My heart was too shriveled up and dead to be able to care for the life I felt around me. And my soul was too tired. And I had not one fucking clue what exactly I was supposed to do anyway.

  I kept waiting for someone else to come dashing in to save the day and free me of the burden of those glowing eyes, that fearful hope.

  “Any day now,” I muttered around a massive yawn.

  I could feel the sun lingering just out of sight in the murky dark. Turning, I made my way back inside, ignoring the fact that I’d caught the brothers hugging and thumping each other’s backs like a couple of idiots.

  “Tommy,” I said tiredly. “Your brother can stay and hang out. But keep an eye on him and don’t let him wander off into the woods.”

  My ghoul rolled his creepy white eyes. “Yes, oh Lord and Master.”

  I glanced back, my eyes meeting Cal’s. “You can hang around, but I swear if you fuck with Tommy again, I will tear you into pieces, devour you, and shit you out.”

  Cal’s expression was torn between laughter and surprise. Tommy just laughed. But I knew Cal understood—I might have been purposefully crude, but I was dead serious. I was down to my last nerve with loss and betrayal.

  And fucking emotions. If he made my ghoul all lonely and mopey…if he fucking cried, I was going to murder someone.

  *****

  I dreamed of Cloud. We met in a moon-drenched clearing in the forest. She was cold, and angry and my rage was overpowering. And then everything changed. She whispered something I couldn’t quite catch. The words sounded foreign. Then her cold expression crumpled, and I saw everything I had always hoped was there, hidden under all her armor—longing, tenderness, need.

  Her hands were buried in my hair, pulling desperately as she fed at my mouth, licking, nipping, dropping bruising kisses on my lips which I returned with my own brutal force. Her lean, muscular body pressed to mine, and I wrapped my arms around her, her knee between my legs, my hard, sensitive nipples pressed to her own full, heavy breasts.

  Moaning, I dropped my head to her shoulder. The hunger burned in me and I bit her, my fangs sliding through her golden skin. Blood filled my mouth and it was heat and passion and Cloud. Cloud. Cloud. Cloud.

  But something was wrong, and the oddity prodded at the flimsy walls of my dream world. The hunger wasn’t fading. It was getting worse. My throat ached, my belly cramped and burned. The beast in me clamored for me to chase, kill, tear, feast.

  I opened my eyes and hissed in anger. The fucking sun was still up. Even though I’d installed blackout curtains in my room, I could still feel the sun out there, pressing on the walls of my house, trying to invade my senses and leave me blinded and exposed, without the comforting coolness of my shadows.

  “Shit. Shit. Shit.”

  Then the smell hit me. I was out of my bed and in the living room, standing there in my underwear and a nearly see-through camisole. The scent of human flesh and blood called to me, begging the wendigo to let go and glut itself.

  If the dogman hadn’t done his spells on me the other night, I would have given in.

  I braced myself against the wall, claws digging into the aged paneling, as I stared at Suzie. She and Tommy were standing toe to toe, his hands on her shoulders as if they’d been arguing.

  “Tess?” Her voice wobbled. She’d been crying.

  It smelled wonderful.

  I would make her cry more while I ate her. The more emotion I wrung out of my prey, the sweeter it would taste. I growled, a low, rumbling purr starting in my middle.

  Tommy’s eyes widened. “Oh fuck. Mother fucker.” He stooped, flinging Suzie over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry. The girl shrieked, but he ignored it.

  I loved the sound. It made goosebumps break out on my arms. I could make her make all sorts of interesting noises while I lapped her up like gravy.

  I growled again, crouching a bit, hands splayed against the wall. Tommy made a dash for the door and I lunged, claws swiping.

  I missed by a hair’s breadth. A shiny dishwater-blond curl drifted to the floor, sliced from Suzie’s head. Then my ghoul and his passenger were outside and bounding away toward town.

  I growled and jumped to my feet, the wendigo howling. We loved a good chase. I grinned and stepped outside.

  Only to howl again, this time in pain and anger. The fucking sun burned. It beat at my head with icepick strokes. My eyes watered. Every hunting instinct in me died down a notch.

  It was enough for me to wrestle control away from the monster inside me.

  “Son of a bitch!” I darted back inside. The place still smelled of human, so I ran around, opening all the windows to air it out.

  I paced, both exhausted and strung out. I should be sleeping at this time of day, but my senses had been jerked around so much I was like a wind-up toy that had been given too many cranks.

  After what seemed like hours, but was probably only a few minutes, Tommy returned.

  “Hey-ya, Tess,” he said casually, slipping inside and closing the sliding glass door and then pulling the blinds. “You okay?”

  I glared at him, pacing forward with my claws out. Could I kill my own ghoul? Again? “What the fuck, Tommy?”

  He held up his hands and I stopped, not more than a foot away. “What part of me being an out of control monster do you not understand, moron?” I punched him in the stomach and he let out his breath in a pained grunt. I hadn’t hit him that hard. Much as I wanted to right now. “I could have killed her,” I whispered, trying not to scream. “I would have fucking killed her if the sun hadn’t been up!”

  He glared right back. “I didn’t bring her here, Tess. She just showed up!” He flung out an arm, keys dangling from his fingers. “Her car is still in the driveway. I was trying to get her to leave. Do you think I want her to get hurt?”

  I backed down. “Maybe,” I couldn’t keep the petulance out of my voice.

  Tommy slumped onto the couch and let out a whoosh of breath, covering his face with his arm for a minute before he finally looked at me again. “I want her Tess. More than I’ve ever wanted anything in my life. I want to keep her.”

  I scrubbed my hands over my face and willed the claws away. Th
en I sank down on the floor in front of Tommy, sitting Indian-style in my skimpy underwear in the middle of the goddamned day, because my ghoul needed to talk.

  Fuck my life.

  “Go.” I gestured with my hand for him to get on with it.

  Tommy snorted, but did as asked. “I told her she can’t come here. I told her you were dangerous—we were dangerous. But she won’t listen. She insists that she…that she loves me.” He said it incredulously, as if he couldn’t possibly understand how that could be true. “She was worried because I haven’t been home lately. Because I’ve been out here.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Tell me your girlfriend isn’t jealous of our relationship.” But I was being an ass. I knew better.

  “No,” he said softly. “Suzie doesn’t have it in her to think something mean like that.”

  I sighed. “I know.” It was the truth. She smelled like rainbows and lattes and was as sweet and human as a little librarian college student could be.

  Tommy looked at me. “What am I supposed to do, Tess? I don’t want her to get hurt. But…shit, Tess, even when I was alive I never felt this way about anyone. And now…now I’m me. And she’s her. And fuck if I understand any of this.”

  He looked at me, pleading. “Brutus said I was going to taint her. To ruin her humanity. I know I’m not good for her. Hell, I’m dead for fuck’s sake.”

  I heaved a sigh, ignoring the grumbling of my wendigo madness to pay attention to the feelings. Ugh.

  “Look, I don’t give a damn what that inbred asshat Brutus said. He was a fucktard. So just get that shit out of your head right now.” I put a hand on his knee. “Tommy, you are a fucking idiot every day of your life, but I love you. People can love you. It’s possible.” I smirked. “Though I probably don’t count as ‘people’ anymore.” I waved that away. “I don’t care if you want to fuck the little librarian. She’s a big girl. She knows what you are. So again, not a fucking issue.”

  I squeezed his knee, fingers digging into flesh and making him squirm. “But,” I said, leaning close. “Do not let a human near me again until we figure out how to get this wendigo thing under control, okay? And for fuck’s sake especially not in the middle of the day!”