VenCo(71)

He took a step towards her, and she took one back. He took another, and she responded in kind—a predator’s waltz. He saw her lips moving before he heard the low whisper of some kind of prayer or spell.

“Now, now, enough of that.” But she continued, and he grew angry, like zero-to-a-hundred angry, the way he was apt to do. “I said enough!”

Her lips closed tight, without her permission. She struggled a bit, then resigned herself to silence, throwing her shoulders back and tilting her chin up.

He said, “I have a question about a girl. Have you seen one lately? A strange girl, I’d imagine, travelling with a spoon and an old lady.” He took another step forward. This time she didn’t move back. Instead, she raised one hand and placed it on top of her hat, pushing the brim down over her eyebrows.

“She would have been sent by a witch from an old family—Good, Meena Good. Ring any bells for you?”

In response, she winked at him from under the shadow of her smushed-down brim and then, quick as a fox, took off running, still holding her hat on her head.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake . . .” He spun on a heel and jumped back in the Rover. “Fucking hillbillies.”

He caught her in his lights as she jumped over a curb and into the trees beside the road.

He squealed out of the lot and took off in the same direction.

“I’m getting really tired of these games, ladies,” he seethed, leaning over his steering wheel, eyes on the trees. He saw her there, a soft smudge in the dark woods, taking nimble leaps over logs and bushes, turning to avoid trunks, and ducking under low branches. This was very obviously her land, a place where she could move with ease. He’d lose her soon; the denser forest was just up ahead, and that was where she was headed, moving like a skinny doe in men’s clothing.

Jay bared his teeth, grabbed the wheel tight, and clenched, flexing so that his whole upper body rocked back and forth quickly. Then he blew out a breath, relaxed his grip, and changed tactics. He flipped his headlights off and caught up to her pace and kept it. Once again, he numbed the part of him that was reactive and decisive, and listened. And soon he found what he was looking for.

Bom—bom. Bom—bom. Bom—bom. The sound of her heart as she raced through the trees, a siren pulse of fear and speed.

“There you are,” he whispered. “You should come closer. I want to hear you better.”

Bom—bom-bom. Bom—bom. Bom—bom.

The heart skipped a beat and then found its rhythm. In the bush, Ricky made a turn that brought her out of the thicker trees, still running well but angling ever so slightly towards the road. She probably didn’t even notice.

Bom—bom. Bom—bom. Bom—bom.

She was quick and knew this land, but she was still wine drunk and sixty, if she was a day. Soon enough, her feet were hitting gravel, and she was out of the trees, gasping for air, one arm pumping, the other still holding on to that ridiculous hat.

Jay brought the large vehicle right up beside her. She didn’t see him until the last second, when she realized she’d been fished out of the trees, that she was out in the open, and then it was too late. A slight jerk of the wheel and metal met flesh and bones snapped like dry pine. The hat she’d been guarding flew up off her head and landed in the dirt.



Ricky lay crumpled and shocked, watching it cartwheel into an oily puddle. “My hat,” she wheezed.

She heard a car door. She heard the crunch of good shoes on the shoulder. She heard the whistle in her breathing as the air leaked out of a punctured lung. And she heard her own traitorous heart—bom-bom—bom-bom—bom . . . bom—

The man crouched by her head.

He sought her eyes. “Look at me, Ricky. Ricky, look at me.”

Her vision blurring around the edges, she did as she was told.

“There’s a good girl. Now I’m going to ask you a question and you are going to answer me. The one with the spoon—where did you send her?”

He leaned in closer. She could smell his breath, sweet, like caramel and butter with something rotten underneath. He searched her eyes, his own flicking back and forth and then narrowing, and then he smiled and nodded. “Good girl. Very good.”

He straightened up, smoothing the pleat in his slacks, and walked away. She tried to focus on her hat but couldn’t see it. Everything was shadows over there. And there was some kind of music, a drum.

Bom—bom. Bom—bom . . .

She tried to focus on it. The trees were getting taller, the moon farther away. She heard a car engine start, headlights illuminated the branches above her, and tires hissed over pavement. But she didn’t care anymore. She wanted to hear the music. She had to listen carefully. She closed her eyes to concentrate.

Bom—bom.

Bom—bom.

Bom . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . . .





23

Confusion and Clarity




Morticia stood on the front porch sniffing the air. It was ocean and new leaves and loose soil. No hint of sadness. No depression. No Benandanti. “Did they leave?”

“Must have.” Meena joined her on the porch. “Let’s not let our guard down just yet—we have a witch to find.”

Once again, they set the dining room table for their work. This time they filled a copper bowl with rainwater from the barrel out back. The books said a wooden bowl worked best, then glass, but Wendy insisted on copper. “Back home, we use copper. That’s what we need to use now.” No one argued. She smudged the room with sweetgrass.