Borrowed Souls (Soul Charmer #1)(50)

Derek took the lead. “Wait here.”

“Can’t you help me?” When soliciting borderline-legal goods, it was best not to whine. This lady apparently had never gotten the memo to always be kind to your dealer. She was also wearing like-new shoes. Callie couldn’t keep a new pair clean more than a week. What kind of person was desperate for a soul, but had time to drop dollars on new shoes?

“Nope,” Derek said as he pressed his hand against Callie’s lower back and ushered her in front of him and through the curtain portioning the shop from the back workspace.

There was no avoiding the meeting with the Soul Charmer. She’d accepted this. Derek’s fingers lingered, a security blanket and a reminder she wasn’t going into this alone. Lot of good that’d done last time. He’d stood silent while his boss had forced magic into her body. Her knees now locked, and Derek stumbled into her.

“What’s wrong?” He scanned the floorboards and the ceiling, as if expecting an attacker wedged within the rotting wood to emerge.

“Do you have my back?” she asked, both hoping he’d hear her need and hating that she couldn’t do this on her own.

“Did you not feel me slamming into you?”

He overstated the situation, and she flushed. “Pretty sure I’d be on my back if you used that kind of force,” she said, but the chill of the eerie hallway in the Charmer’s emporium smothered the entendre.

The moment of brevity was worth it though, as Derek’s cheeks turned a subtle pink. Vulnerability exposed, he answered her original question. “Yes, I’ve got you.”

“You know—”

“I do.” She believed him, but Derek continued. “I’ll step in if I have to.”

Trusting Derek had to be a bad idea. Yes, he’d protected her in bars and diners and when her hands went “flame-on,” but he also worked for a man who terrified Callie. One she couldn’t say with one hundred percent certainty was totally human—there had to be some reptile gene splicing in action there. And yet Derek worked with him, willingly. The seedy business of soul renting was only a couple rungs up the ladder from the wares Ford shilled.

And yet.

Derek’s hand found her back again, and despite the reservations rumbling in her head, she started toward the next doorway without any additional urging.

Like the previous time, she still stumbled through the passage. She scrubbed her hands together, as though it’d remove the oily feeling the Charmer’s magic left on her skin. It might have worked, if the oil was something tangible. Derek didn’t flinch at the magic—maybe he was used to it, or maybe he didn’t feel it the same way she did—but he also didn’t acknowledge Callie’s obvious reaction.

The Soul Charmer wasn’t facing them when they reached the workspace. Callie did a double take. With his shoulders curled forward and his head ducked down, he’d appeared decapitated. Freaky shit was the name of the game here, but Callie had limits. Walking through magical tar was one thing. People literally losing their heads was a whole other.

They moved a few steps into the room, and the Charmer popped his head up. Well, at least people were keeping their heads. That had to count for something.

They edged a smidge closer, and Callie clamped her hand around Derek’s forearm. “We have a problem,” she hissed.

His eyes widened. Through barely parted lips he replied, “Not a good time.”

She squeezed harder, and seconds later he jerked his arm away.

“Shit.” Derek was staring at Callie’s hands. He hadn’t seen the full encounter with Bianca and her abundance of soul magic. He hadn’t seen Callie’s physical reaction. He’d stepped in at the last minute to stop her from torching Tess’s minion, but now he was witnessing the whole thing firsthand. The deep lines cutting across the center of his forehead suggested it was nearly as holy-fuck scary to watch as it was to experience. Why was it happening now, though?

It’d taken a few moments with Bianca for the dull heat to build up to scorching embers. Callie held her hands out, palms up, as though asking for a blessing. They’d already begun to peel and blacken. After the subdued heat with Joey’s soul repo, she’d almost made herself believe the fire with Bianca was a one-time deal. She whimpered, the sight harder to bear than the numbing heat. With each second they looked more like campfire logs that had settled to the bottom of a fire pit. She shuffled backward. If this was the Soul Charmer’s fault, she needed to put some distance between him and her to slow the burn.

“We’ve got a problem over here,” Derek hollered. The Charmer was only a couple meters away, but acted as though he’d barely heard him. Derek yelled again, louder this time. The Charmer finally turned, looking more absent-minded grandfather than the wicked serpent Callie knew him to be. Focusing on his paternal fa?ade wasn’t an option, though, as flames began to lick her palms.

“Oh!” The Soul Charmer clapped in delight, a huge grin taking over his face. What the fuck? Callie wasn’t a shiny new toy being gifted to a toddler on his birthday, but that’s all she was to him, judging by that glint in his dark eyes.

Her attempt to bite out a cutting response was nothing more than a seething hiss. Callie’s body was funneling all its higher capabilities, trying to hold it together as goddamn fire tore her hands apart. She’d immediately healed last time, she reminded herself over and over. Mantras weren’t effective when you could see your skin scorching. No flames wove up her forearms, though. The searing flames remained contained within her hands and fingers.