Borrowed Souls (Soul Charmer #1)(81)

This conversation was futile, and Callie didn’t have time for it anyway. So she went for the kill strike. “You don’t have cash, Mom.”

“How would you know? You barely visit me.” Zara threw the jabs while getting up from the couch and moving toward the door. She didn’t want to travel this road, either.

“Okay. Whatever. Let me know when you hear from Josh again.”

Zara paused near the door and her shoulders rose as she pulled in a rallying breath. “You find out what happened to Tess, or I’ll—”

“You’ll what?”

“I’ll find another way to make this happen. I need the relief a couple times a week, Calliope. I have a life to live, you know.”

It sounded like a threat, but then most conversations with Zara ended that way. “What do you mean?”

“You know.” If she could have underlined her words with a black marker, she would have. Zara was barely the right side of classy to be above using his name, or admitting she knew him.

The Charmer. Of course. “You can say his name, Mom.”

“I only said her name so you’d help. I’m not going to say his name. You shouldn’t either, or the fallout of messing with him is on you.”

She’d been buried under the Delgado family fallout for years. At this point, what was a little more rubble? Soul magic was already in Zara, and the obsession was enough to send her to Callie’s door instead of waiting until the next time the cat got stuck somewhere.

“Go see Father Gonzales.” Callie had to try something.

Zara’s eyes widened. “Excuse me? I see him plenty more than you do.”

“The soul magic doesn’t really fix anything. Work it out with Father Gonzales.”

“Her massages work. They ease the … ” Zara trailed off. When she sniffled a moment later, Callie recognized it was true emotion.

“It ruins you. I can’t explain everything, but you’re chasing highs just like Josh. Don’t fall down that hole, Mom.” She pled like her eight-year-old self would have. That was before Zara slid into total selfishness.

“So you’re saying I’m ruined?”

“I didn’t say that. I’m saying you’re better than letting some hack mess with your soul.”

“I’ll rise up to heaven.” No matter how devout the phrase sounded, the shaky breaths beneath it belied her fear.

“You can do that without Tess.”

“Fine. You’re clearly not interested in helping your own mother. I’ll just have to find someone who can.” With that last barb, Zara slammed the door behind her, and Callie hung her head. The sight of the chipped pink polish on her toes blurred as tears welled in her eyes. It’d been years since her mother had made her cry.

How did you get someone clean from the rush of soul rental? There wasn’t an additive you could just remove from the bloodstream. Callie’s tried-and-true method of hiding from her feelings didn’t make her the expert, but Zara would have to deal with her guilt to get free of that need. Callie wasn’t Zara’s biggest fan, but family came first, and there was no way she’d allow the Soul Charmer to rent to her mom.


“You don’t have to do this,” Derek said for the eight hundredth time. He’d parked his motorcycle in the same alley where they’d first met. She’d spent the afternoon worrying over how to keep her mom from the Charmer’s doorstep, and now the sun had set and she was the one slumming it downtown.

Callie rolled her eyes. “We both know I do.”

“Why not just—”

“There’s no ‘just’ anything. Not with this. Ford was clear this was a requirement. He’s right. I’m not having this traced to me.”

“I don’t like it.” His lips pulled tight, and every muscle on his face hardened.

“I’ve never liked the idea of renting a soul, and now that I know so much more my distaste has quadrupled, but guess what? The whole reason I agreed to work for the Charmer was for this soul. So I could do this job and save my brother.” Case closed.

Derek nodded, accepting he would lose this battle. He stowed their helmets on his bike and took her hand, and then led her in the side door of the Soul Charmer’s shop. She stayed in the hallway with a million picture frames while he went ahead to get the Charmer.

The anteroom was smaller than she’d realized. The black ceiling soared above her, but she could touch both walls simultaneously if she stretched her arms airplane style. Focusing on any one frame set her skin crawling. Every feature except for the eyes was blurred in the portraits. They watched her. There wasn’t enough magic in this room to turn her hands painful, but she didn’t feel alone. Hopefully that didn’t have anything to do with the woman she’d left in the building’s basement. Everything the Soul Charmer touched unnerved her, and she was about to let him touch her again. Josh owed her. Big time.

Derek peered in from the workroom and nodded to her.

“Ah, Calliope, dear. Is it already time for this?” There was no way she’d told the Charmer her full name. Her skin continued to crawl, but it had little to do with magic.

“Can we get this over with?”

He beckoned her with a rheumatic finger. “In a rush to get your first taste?”