VenCo(102)

The spoon holds hot and cold and lets each warm or cool the metal along its stem by careful degrees. The embossing is unsubtle, holds tarnish in the crevices, throws small shadows.

“No!”

She opened her eyes. He was so close she could bridge the distance between them by extending one finger. He was perfectly still, a statue—a David even, except for the eyes. His eyes were anxious.

She took a step back from him and then walked around him slowly.

“Foolish boy,” she cooed, leaning close to his ear. “All I had to do was let you think you were smarter, and you would follow my misguided suggestion.” She grabbed a handful of his hair and pulled until his head was bent back. His eyes darted frantically, seeking hers. “See, in my dreams, time is slow. It’s almost impossible for anyone to move if I don’t want them to. My mother taught me that when I used to have nightmares.”

He hissed, “You don’t know nightmares, Lucky St. James. Not yet.”

“And this is why we are taking it back, the magic, the control, all of it. Because you were never capable of handling it in the first place.” She slid her other hand around his waist, down his stomach, over his cock.

“Too vain, too self-important. Even trying to mansplain the apocalypse.” She planted a soft, wet kiss on the side of his neck and then released him, backing away into the trees. “Maybe the end your kind has brought is not the end of the whole world. Maybe it’s just the end of your world.”

“I’ll bring you nightmares, little witch!” He was spitting now, his face flushed and his hands balled up into shaking fists. “Nightmares you can’t begin to imagine.”

She willed time to move for her alone, the spoon imprinted on her thoughts. She closed her eyes—she no longer needed them. Her body was being pulled, and she trusted the spell to take her where she needed to go. The forest grew quieter, the chirping and peeps fading to silence. When she opened her eyes again, she was walking up the front steps of the mansion where her body lay sleeping beside the most dangerous creature on earth.

In the foyer, she was pulled into the parlor, where the medical machines still blinked and hummed, and to the hospital bed and the body under its white sheet. And then she was released.

She steadied herself, no longer puppeted by the spell, then reached out and pulled back the sheet. An old man, a smile on his thin lips, most definitely dead, cold when she touched his cheek. And there, in the top pocket of his paisley pyjamas, was the seventh spoon.

She’d found it. Her heart raced: as soon as she woke herself up, Jay Christos would be released from her protective paralysis. He would be pissed, and he would be looking for her. She wouldn’t have much time.

“Okay, here we go. Time to wake the fuck up.” She took a deep breath and dialed up all her courage. She ran into the foyer and up the stairs to the second floor, dashing into the first room she found unlocked. Picking up speed, she threw herself against the tall front window as hard as she could, and then she was falling . . .

She jolted awake in the bed. The sensation of falling always woke her up right away. She went to wipe away phantom glass shards from her face, but her hands were stuck. She was tied up. And beside her, so was the Benandanti, twitching in his sleep now. She wondered how long it would take him to figure out she was gone from the dream. Once he was awake and free, she was as good as dead.

Nudging the pillow out from under her head, she uncovered the small blade she’d hidden there. Awkwardly, carefully, she managed to pick it up with her teeth and put it in her fingers, then bent them down to saw away at the restraints on the same wrist.

It only took a few minutes with the sharp, new blade, but it felt like forever. With one hand free, she made short work of the second strap, then used them to tie Christo’s legs spread-eagle to the bottom posts. Next, she reinforced the bonds holding his arms. She was tying the final knot when he began to speak, not quite conscious but moving towards it.

“Back to the house, eh? I’m on the way . . .”

She jumped away from him, even though she knew the double restraints would hold him, at least until she was out of there. She gathered her clothes and slipped her T-shirt on, then carried her boots and jeans out into the hallway. She shut the door behind her. She checked the knob and—thank god for old houses—it could be locked from the outside. She clicked it and finished dressing. Then she ran down the hall.

“LUCKY,” he roared from the bedroom as she reached the top of the stairs. “I’m going to kill you!”

Gone was all the seduction, the charm, the soothing lilt.

“I will fucking kill you!”

She ran down the stairs, her heavy footsteps competing with the thumping of the bed shaking. She ran so fast she crashed into the round table in the foyer, and the vase tipped, spilling fetid water and decaying flowers across the rug. She jumped over the mess and ran into the parlor where Gerard lay. She pulled back the sheet in one quick motion.

A scream shot through the ceiling from the bedroom above. “I’m gonna kill your grandmother! I’ll find that old bitch and peel her muscles from her bones like orange slices!”

Lucky reached into Gerard’s chest pocket. Her fingers hit metal. “Oh thank god!” She pulled it out, the seventh spoon. She found it! She had it! She slipped it into her bra, next to her skin, and dug from her pocket the last item she had bought at Walgreens—a box of matches.