Summoning the Night (2 page)
Read Summoning the Night Online
Authors: Jenn Bennett
Designed by Esther Paradelo
ISBN 978-1-4516-2053-5
ISBN 978-1-4516-2055-9 (ebook)
To my Aunt Erin and Aunt Kitty,
who famously blackened out anything objectionable,
wicked, or filthy in their fiction.
Their Sharpies would've run dry before they finished my books.
Jupe pinched himself on the arm and grinned from the passenger seat of my Volkswagen. “Yep, I definitely feel different.”
I swiped my monthly pass through the card reader at the parking garage entrance down the street from my bar. It buzzed in acceptance, and the gate's striped barrier arm rose. “Well, you sure do
look
it,” I agreed, stowing the pass in a pocket on the sun visor.
“Different how?” Jupe tugged at one of the long espresso curls jutting out around his face. Like other Earthbound demons, his head and shoulders were crowned by a swirling halo of hazy light. His was an alluring spring green that matched his unusually pale eyes and gave off a lightning-bug luminescence in the shadowed interior of my car.
“You look older . . . more sophisticated,” I teased.
“Really?”
I rolled my eyes and pulled through the raised gate into the dark garage. “No.”
He punched me in the arm.
“Dammit, that hurt,” I complained in the middle of a
laugh, rubbing my shoulder. “See if I ever give you anything again, you ungrateful punk.”
Jupe snickered as he stretched out long, wiry legs and examined the savings deposit receipt perched on his knee, thoughtfully tracing his finger along the indented ink. The deposit was for $15,000, originally in the form of a check, made payable to me from Caliph Superior, the leader of my esoteric organization back in Florida. The money was payment for the black-market glass talon Jupe's father, Lon, had bought to help me out a few weeks ago. My magical order was rolling in dough, so I didn't feel guilty that they had offered to reimburse Lon. But when he refused their check, I couldn't keep the money for myself, so the only logical solution was give it to his son . . . while Lon was away in Mexico on a three-day photo shoot. Sneaky? Sure. But if you're going to lie to Lon, you have to do it while he's away on business. Otherwise he'll just sense it before you can make it out the door. Jupe taught me that trick. He should write a book,
How to Outsmart an Empath.
The boy has skills.
But who knew giving money to an underage kid would be so hard? Jupe and I spent almost an hour arguing with tellers inside my credit union: no, I did
not
want to put it in some giftable trust fund that Jupe couldn't touch until he was twenty-one. He already had a fat college fund and enough bonds and CDs to start a third-world country.
Problem was, the credit union didn't allow minors on a joint savings account without a parent or legal guardian cosigning, and I was neither. Girlfriend of the Boy's Father didn't qualify, apparently. The branch manager couldn't understand why I wouldn't wait until Lon was back in town to get his signature. I wasn't about to tell the manager that Lon would refuseâwhich he would. After a blue-faced argument, the manager finally, inexplicably, gave in.
“By the way, I know you still don't believe me,” Jupe said as he snooped inside the glove compartment, “but I really
did
do it. Me. I got the manager to make an exception and let us open the account.”
God, he really wasn't going to give that a rest. I swatted his hand away from the glove compartment and steered the car down the ramp to the next parking level; the Metropark garage sticks the monthlies in the dregs on the bottom floor. “You're a charmer, don't get me wrong.” And he was. Witty, geek-smart, almost annoyingly outgoing, and well on his way to becoming drop-dead gorgeous. Just yesterday he bragged that he'd overheard some girl in his class referring to him as “totally hot.” Did I mention he was cocky?
“I'm serious, Cady. I concentrated with my mind and twisted his thoughts around. I think it's my”âhe leaned over the armrest and spoke in a lower voice, as if someone could hear us outside the carâ“knack.”
Knack. Slang for a preternatural ability possessed by an Earthbound demon. Most Earthbounds have one, but many knacks fall short of spectacular. A little foresight here, a little nighttime vision there. A whole hell of a lot of psychokinetics, most of them no more than bland party entertainment, unable to lift anything heavier than a freaking spoon a couple inches off the table. Don't get me wrong: the occasional impressive ability
does
exist. I've met Earthbounds who could pick a lock with a touch, and others who could curse your unborn child. Those weren't exactly commonplace, though.
“You're crazy,” I said, waiting for another car to back out. A large, sparkling jack-o'-lantern clung to the top of its antennaâless than two weeks to Halloween. “For starters, you've got a couple more years before your demonic ability will start expressing. And second, you'll inherit it from your
mom or dad. It's genetic, you knowâyou don't just get a new ability out of thin air.”
“I know all that,” Jupe complained. “Who's the demon here, me or you?”
“You are. I'm mere human.” Well, human magician with a few extra skills, but still human.
“Yeah, and I got the stupid âknack' speech with the âbirds and the bees' from my dad when I was eight.”
“Poor, poor Lon,” I murmured. The car windows were fogging up; it was going to rain. I turned the defroster on and cranked up the compressor fan.
“All I'm saying is that I know about what's
supposed
to happen. But I'm telling you, Cady, I can make people do things. I can get inside their minds and change their thoughts.”
“
Pfft.
I've never even heard of a knack like that.” Well, Lon could influence thoughts when he was amped up into his transmutated demon state, but that's nothing Jupe knew about, or would ever know. Not from me, anyway. Besides, Lon's influence was temporary, and he had to be touching the person. Plus, it was more common for the inherited knack to be weaker than the parents', not stronger.
“I think my knack is like”âhe paused, as if he knew what he was about to say was going to sound ridiculous, but he just couldn't stop himselfâ“a Jedi mind trick.”
I snorted.
“I'm serious!”
“Dream on.” I shot him a sidelong glance as he snuck a couple fingers just beneath the waistband of his jeans and scratchedâvigorously, with a teeth-gritting, pained look on his face. That was the third time today I'd caught him scratching. “What the hell is wrong with you? You have ants in your pants?”
He scratched harder and groaned. “I've got an injury.”
Dear God, have mercy.
I held up my hand to stop him from saying more, waving away any mental images before they had a chance to pop into my head. “I don't
even
want to know.”
Affronted, he made a face at me. “Not
there.
It's . . . nothing. Never mind.”
No need to tell me twice. He could discuss it with the school nurse or his dad. Not my job description. I promptly changed the subject. “So, what was all that jibber-jabber earlier about you wanting an Eldorado?”
He'd talked the branch manager's ear off, telling him what he was going to do with the savings account. Jupe swore to the guyâwho couldn't have a given a rat's assâthat he wouldn't touch his new money until he turned fifteen and could apply for a driver's learning permit, and buy a car. That's right: a year from now this ADHD mess of a boy would be plowing down the same roads I drove on. Heaven help us all.
“Umm,
Super Fly
, duh. The Cadillac Eldorado is only one of the greatest cars in movie historyâthe original pimpmobile.” He waggled his eyebrows. “Driven by Youngblood Priest, played by Ron motherfucking O'Neal.”
I didn't even bother to curtail his obscenity-rich language anymore. Getting honey out of a hornet would be easier. When I was his age, my parents would've slapped me for talking like that. Then again, my parents turned out to be evil, power-hungry serial killers, so what did they know? I mean, these were the people accused of murdering the leaders of rival occult organizations when I was seventeen. They swore they were innocent, and because I believed them, they were able to persuade me to assume a fake identity, separate from them, and hide from the FBI for seven years. When they resurfaced
a couple of months ago, Lon tried to help me prove their innocence, but we discovered that they actually
had
murdered several people and were planning to kill one more: me. They'd conceived me during some crazy sex ritual that granted me the title of Moonchild and enhanced magical abilities that lay dormant inside me until I turned twenty-fiveâand they wanted to steal those abilities through ritual sacrifice. But I escaped and they were spirited away by a demon into the Ãthyr, where, I hope, karma bit them both in the ass.
So, yeah, compared to them, Lon was parent of the year. That's why I just stuck to the Butler house rule: no swearing around strangers. Unless Jupe was making an ass of himself in public, he could knock himself out.
“Yuck,” I complained. “Didn't Boss Hog drive an Eldorado in the
Dukes of Hazzard
?”
His wince told me that I was right.
“Anyway, I seriously doubt your dad's going to go for a pimpmobile.”
He clicked the release on his seat belt several times. “Then how about a 1977 Firebird Trans-Am?”
The boy was obsessed. He knew the make and model of every car produced in the last fifty yearsâat least the ones featured in movies or on TV.
“Oh,
hell
no,” I said. “Not a Trans-Am.”
“That's the Bandit's car. What's wrong with that?”
I puffed my cheeks out and made a puking noise.
“Hey, you're talking about Burtâ”
“Yes, I know. Burt motherfucking Reynolds. Put your seat belt on, Snowmanâwe've still got two more levels to go.”
He refastened the buckle. “Holy shit! I've never been this far down underground. There'd better be an elevator. This looks like the kind of place where you get stabbed and left for dead.”
Ugh. Tell me about it. Parking here was the worst part of owning my bar, but it was better than leaving my car on the street. I once had my window broken and my car stereo stolen while parked in front of the bar. At least the garage had cameras and a guard on-premises 24/7.
“If I had to choose, I guess I'd go for the Eldorado,” I said, trying to distract both of us from the sight of a homeless guy sleeping in a dark corner by one of the stairwells. “But I'm kinda doubting that fifteen thou is going to buy you one.”
“My dad knows a ton of car collectors. He'll get me a deal.”
Mmm-hmm. Sure he would. We headed down the final ramp onto the monthlies' level. I spotted a tight corner space, not too far from the elevator.
“We're parking here?” Jupe asked, wiping away fog to peer out the window. “Gross.”
“Welcome to glamorous big-city life.”
“I bet the Snatcher would have a field day down in this dump.”
“Who?”
“The Sandpiper Park Snatcher,” he repeated, as if I were the dumbest person in the world. When I shook my head in confusion, he explained. “Some kid went missing in La Sirena a couple of days ago. Everyone at school says the Snatcher's back.”
I grunted and warily glanced out the window. Leave it to me to get spooked by a teenager inside my own parking garage. “Look, you said you wanted to see my bar before it opens today.”
“I do, I do!” he confirmed, throwing off his seat belt.
“Then help me haul this shit out of the car and let's get going before the rain starts.”
I popped the trunk as Jupe slammed his door shut and jogged around to meet me. The restaurant supply guy had screwed up our delivery yesterday, so that meant I had to take care of this weekend's garnish supplies by tracking down mondo sacks of lemons, limes, oranges, and pineapples. Jupe and I made a quick trip to the wholesaler's warehouse before the whole savings account fiasco earlier in the day. Along with the fruit, I let him pick out Halloween candy both for home and the bar, so we also had enough Tootsie Rolls, Pixy Stix, and severed gummy body parts to feed an army of demons.