In the basement.
Sneakers sliding in—No, don’t think. Move. Basement. Dad’s workroom.
Beneath the workbench.
Her mother’s voice. Her dead mother…Oh, Mom—
The spell.
Runes beneath the table. A spell of concealment. The ancient Etruscan language rolled off her tongue in fierce bites. Knife across her palm, her blood on the runes.
The workbench slid away from the wall.
And she screamed and screamed as blood poured out
…
* * *
Shooting straight up in bed, Shea Tedaldi gasped for air in the semi-dark bedroom, tears in her eyes.
The bed creaked as her hand shot to her left. Warm, soft skin, rising and falling in the rhythm of sleep. Leo’s small body huddled on his side under the covers.
She breathed a sigh of relief.
Just a dream. Another dream about that awful night that left her terrified and shaking.
Whoever was on their tail was getting closer. The voices in her head—those maddening, unintelligible, buzzing voices in the back of her mind—were frantic.
It was time. She and Leo needed help or they needed to leave this dingy apartment in Reading, Pennsylvania, and run like hell. Just like they’d done four months ago in Atlantic City.
The voices had put up a clamor then, too, so much so she’d decided to move here and finally look up the man her mother had believed she could entrust with Leo’s life.
So why are you thinking about running again? Without even talking to the guy?
Well, that was easy. Because five years on her own had taught her that people screwed you all the time. Since running away from home at seventeen, she’d learned to rely only on herself.
Yeah, and how’s that working for you so far?
“Oh, just shut up,” she whispered as she slid her legs off the side of the bed and sat on the edge, willing the shakes and the tears to stop. No need for them. Leo was fine. At least, as fine as a six-year-old with monsters on his ass could be.
Turning, she watched her brother sleep, his too-long hair inky black against the stark white sheets.
Everything about him was growing fast. He needed a haircut. And, since shopping wasn’t exactly on her to-do list, he needed new clothes. His ankles had started to show beneath his jeans. He’d need new shoes, too, and socks, because his were full of holes.
But mostly, Leo needed not to worry about boogeymen who wanted to cut out her heart and turn him into a monster. He needed his parents…
She took a deep breath and straightened her spine, twisting her neck back and forth until it cracked.
Time to get off your ass.
Because the men who’d killed their parents were getting close again. And the man who’d ordered their murders, Dario Paganelli…he wanted Leo.
Her stomach rolled and she rubbed it with her hand, trying to ease the ache. But nothing helped.
Dario Paganelli was the boogeyman her parents had whispered about behind closed doors, the monster who had forced them to live like hermits. He was the cause of Shea’s every fear and heartache.
He’d made her life hell without ever meeting him. And now that monster wanted Leo, a little boy who looked like an angel but controlled enough power to burn a house to the ground.
Goose bumps danced on her skin. Paganelli was a cold-blooded monster who would break Leo, remake him in his own evil image. Then turn him loose on his own people.
Great Goddess, he’s only six.
Sighing, her gaze shifted to the small round table in the corner.
The altar at their home in Wisconsin had been made from the base of a lightning-struck walnut tree from the dense woods enclosing their property. Nearly five feet in diameter, that altar had dominated the small clearing where her parents had held their rituals for the Great Goddess Uni. Passed down through the millennia, those rituals connected them to the Etruscan Mother Goddess, renewed their faith in Her and Her protection over them.
Shea prayed every day, just as her mother had. But so far, she’d gotten no guidance from the supposedly all-mighty Uni. No inspiration. No help.
Which was why she’d moved them here. To get help. And to hide.
The largest population of the once mighty Etruscan race, maybe five thousand or so, lived here in Reading and Berks County, conveniently located over a ley line of earth power and smack up against the Schuylkill River. A ley line and running water to power their magic must have seemed like a hole-in-one to the first Etruscans who’d moved here from the old country in the early 1800s.
They’d blended into the melting pot of nineteenth-century Reading but maintained their ancient culture. They lived outwardly normal lives but instead of adding to the collection of churches that stood on every other corner, they built hidden temples for their goddesses and gods.
The
eteri
who shoveled lasagna and rigatoni at Marelli’s Trattoria on south Seventh Street would choke on their food if they discovered Uni’s Temple was built into the back of the building.
Here, she and Leo were just another two faces in the Etruscan community. Two more bodies at temple where they sat in the back and kept their heads down. Until everyone lifted their faces toward the ceiling to ask for Uni’s protection for the Etruscan race. Then she begged for Leo’s safekeeping.
But did Uni hear? Did She care?
Hell, after everything she’d seen in the world, after her parents’ murders, Shea wasn’t sure the Great Goddess existed anymore.
But monsters did exist. And for those, she had weapons.
She lifted the attonitum from its spot on the bedside table. It looked like a cross between a revolver and an inoculation gun and would be useless in the hand of an
eteri
.
But in hers… The iron grip warmed to her touch, while the quartz crystal concentration chamber pulsed with a pale pink light, responding to her
arus
, the magic inherent in the blood of all Etruscans. The solid copper barrel would focus that power wherever she pointed, strengthening it into a heated blast similar to a laser.
There was nothing sleek about the attonitum, nothing like the Beretta Px4 Storm her dad had taught her to shoot and that she always carried. But the gun didn’t give her the headache the attonitum did.
Such a failure.
Using magic was always a lesson in pain. Her head pounded whenever she worked a spell or used her Goddess Gift to heal even a minor cut. And though she’d developed a mental shield to keep the voices to a dull buzz, a migraine was never far away.
But she’d use the weapon, to protect Leo. She’d made a promise. And she knew, even in death, her mom would hold her to it.
Like someone had twisted the volume dial, the voices grew louder, chattering over each other like angry hornets. Though she couldn’t understand them, Shea knew they were warning her. She and Leo were out of time.
Reaching under the bed for the backpack always within arm’s reach, she pulled out her mom’s grimoire and a sheet of paper fluttered out from between the pages.
She didn’t have to read it to know what it said. She’d memorized months ago what her mom had written before her death.
“Too much to say and not enough time. Know we love you and your brother. In time, we hope you can forgive us for all we hid from you. Please understand that we did what we thought was right.
The men who will kill us will come after Leo. These men work for Dario Paganelli. If Paganelli catches you, he’ll kill you, Shea. He’ll take your brother and pervert his powers to hunt the remaining Priestesses.
Neither you nor your brother can fall into Paganelli’s hands. The consequences are unspeakable. Use the locator spell to find Mr. Brown in Reading, Pennsylvania. He’s a
grigorio
and a friend. He’ll protect you both. Tell him I sent you and that all is done in time.
And always remember we love you.”
Tears filled her eyes but she blinked them back.
Their dad had been a
grigorio
, too, one of the legendary Etruscan warrior priests. Great warriors who could handle a sword as easily as a gun and who always had a ready smile. Her dad had seemed invincible.
And Dario had killed him.
The bed jostled and she turned to find Leo staring at her.
She smiled at the drowsy look on his sweet face and ran a hand through his soft dark hair.
“Hey, bud. How’d you sleep?”
He shrugged but said nothing.
Biting back a sigh, she leaned forward to lay a kiss on his forehead. “Think you’re awake enough to give me a hand with something?”
Leo’s eyes widened as he nodded, but he held out his arms for his morning hug first. She was already halfway there and wrapped his skinny little body against her.
So small. He was so small.
No, she couldn’t let fear screw with her mind right now. They had a spell to perform.
“Okay, then.” She opened the grimoire to the spell her mom had mentioned. “Let’s see what we need.”
She and Leo headed to the window. Since empathic healing was her only Goddess Gift, and headaches and migraines hampered her spell-working abilities, she needed Leo’s unusual strength to feed most spells.
It used to scare the shit out of her, that sense of helplessness she got whenever she tried and failed to work a spell.
Her dad had always said, “It’s all right, sweetheart. You’ll get the hang of it eventually.” He’d never given up on her. Her mom…
Since she couldn’t think about that without getting depressed, she pushed it out of her mind and focused on the task ahead. Setting an unopened phone book on the window sill, where the sun shone directly through, she dropped a pinch of saffron, a pinch of cinnamon and a topaz stone to draw the light into the bottom of her moon bowl, which would capture and hold the spell’s energy until she released it.
Lifting her face into the sun, she said, “Usil, Lord of the Amber Light, hear our humble plea. Illuminate the abode of Mr. Brown with your soft breath.” She bit down on her bottom lips as a sharp pain knifed through her temples. “Okay, Leo, blow.”
Leaning close, Leo blew the dry ingredients over the phone book, the scent of the spices strong in the morning air. When they’d settled on the book, Shea opened it somewhere near the middle.
Please, let me have done this right…
Shea breathed a sigh of relief when the soft breeze they’d called with the spell blew across the pages for several seconds. As quickly as it started, it stopped again.
Starting at the left, she ran her finger down the columns of names and numbers. And there, in the center of the left page, listed under appliance repair in the yellow pages, was a number for G. Brown. A number with eight digits and a street name but no building number.
It looked like a misprint, but Shea knew better. Since she couldn’t use a regular phone to make this call, she’d have to wait until she got to Harry’s to use the old black rotary phone in the dressing room. That phone was connected to the communication system only Etruscans could use.
More waiting.
Please don’t let it be too late.
She turned to Leo with a smile, this one more natural. “Looks like it worked, babe. We’ll give Mr. Brown a call later, okay? You and me, we’re a great team, huh?”
Leo nodded but he didn’t smile. He never smiled. He barely ever spoke.
And it broke her heart.
She took a deep breath. “Alright, then, how about some breakfast?”
Leo’s big dark eyes, so like their dad’s, just watched her. Silent. Waiting.
Shea wished she knew for what.
* * *
Another dead end.
Gabriel Borelli slammed the front door behind him and threw his coat at the nearest chair. It missed and fell to the floor with a heavy thud.
Fuck it. He’d check the weapons later.
Right now, he needed a drink. That bottle of Mezzaluna vodka in the cabinet didn’t stand a chance. Not after the month he’d had.
Four fucking-endless weeks chasing a rumor that turned into a dead end. The
versipellis
Harry had put him in touch with had been positive she’d seen a man who fit Dario Paganelli’s description in a restaurant in the Outer Banks. It’d been his first lead in more than a year, but it’d been a damn bust.
And now it was time to face the music for his absence.
Bottle in hand, he took a healthy swallow before he picked up the black handset from the 1940s-era phone and dialed the eight-number code to get Phil.
“May I help you?”
As always, that high-pitched female voice made him think of the old Lily Tomlin phone-operator skit on “Laugh In.” His dad had loved that show.
“It’s Brown. Messages?”
Phil’s purely feminine sigh made his temples throb.
Damn, this is gonna suck.
“There are several, as you would know if you’d checked in every week, as you’re supposed to. Not once a month, Gabriel.”
Gods be damned. He was a
grigorio
, a lean, mean, Etruscan bad-ass whose enhanced senses made it damn-near impossible for anyone to get the drop on him. His affinity for all metals but iron gave him the power to slap bullets out of the air with a simple spell. And his unusual strength made him hard to kill and nearly impossible to beat in a fight.
And Phil was not his mother so why the hell did he, a twenty-eight-year-old man, feel like he had to apologize?
No way. He wasn’t gonna do it. He didn’t need to—
“Look, I’m sorry.” Shit, you’re an idiot. “I’ve been out of touch—”
“And where exactly have you been?”
Not in this lifetime, babe.
“Personal business. What messages?”
Phil huffed and, for a few seconds, he was sure he was going to have to apologize again and that might just make him chug the rest of the bottle.
“Crimson Moon called three times.”
Yeah, he’d figured his mom would call at least once while he was gone, even though she had his cell number.
“Lupe’s Low End called twice.”