Rogue Souls Read online

  That was a solid plus. Her home had taken on a musky scent that wasn’t that “man” scent every romance novel she read referenced, but more the funk found after many days of not showering and keeping the windows latched. Her brother was ripe, and it was funking up the place.

  The television blinked brightly across the living room. The news was on, but she doubted Josh had been catching up on Gem City goings on. The anchor’s voice was soft with the low volume, but Callie followed. “The dismembered body was found in the Railyard District. The police are investigating the identity of man, but as yet have no leads. Potential suspects were not shared with us at time of broadcast.”

  Ford was everywhere. The news anchor and her perfectly coifed hair knew as well as Callie did that crime lords coiled beneath their city. What Callie didn’t know was how Ford kept avoiding the cops. Maybe the goods she’d stolen for him were icing on the bribery cake.

  Callie grabbed the tufted red throw pillow from the closest chair at her dinette set and threw it across the room at Josh’s sleeping form.

  He grunted but didn’t fully wake or acknowledge the light weight of the pillow on his shoulder. A full bowl of cereal sat on the carpet next to the couch. Josh’s hand dangled a couple inches from it. At least he’d gotten up at some point and wanted food. Even if he hadn’t ate it. It wasn’t for show if he did it when she wasn’t here. Her stomach did that keening move it reserved for real worry. Josh had a way of bringing that sensation forward. She wanted his sobriety to stick this time. Since he was zonked, she opened the front closet door. She rolled the vacuum cleaner out. Though the place needed a good cleaning, that wasn’t her goal now. She had stacked her hopes in a pile in the back of the closet. She was used to keeping secrets, but this was more about hiding from her failure.

  The books she’d bought when she was training to be a medical assistant had bent corners, faded covers, and in-your-face ocher stickers proclaiming their USED status. She knelt on the carpet. It was the standard “accessible beige” of every apartment, but hers hadn’t been replaced in several years and was more of a “beat-down brown” these days. She sat aside her anatomy and physiology books and tugged out the fat book in the middle. The DSM-V had to have a guide for what Josh’s comedown would be like. You’d think she’d remember this from ER stints, but she only saw those patients in fleeting moments in the first forty-eight hours. She’d known nurses and other PAs that picked their specialty for personal reasons. Their grandma had cancer, so they went into oncology. Their dad had a valve in his heart, so they found themselves working in the cardiology department.

  Callie was the exact opposite. She should probably want to help people like Josh. She should have been driven to save the lives of addicts, but at the time it’d been this insurmountable task. Josh had bounced out of the second rehab center at that point. The professionals were trying and failing with him. She knew what addiction looked like. She had seen it in the pockmarks on Josh’s arms, in the twitch of his left eye, in every sudden glance at the blank spaces in the corners of the room. She didn’t need to see that shit at work. So, she’d found herself in the ER clinic. She’d still seen the junkies hustling for opioids, but she also had helped with broken bones from less-than-successful first bike rides and asthma attacks and the flu (as well as every virus that people wanted to think was the flu and that she could not actually dispense the flu vaccine for). Callie smiled at the memory. She’d loved her work then. Until it was gone. Until Josh ruined that for her, too.

  No. She shook herself. She couldn’t pin her problems on her brother, and she shouldn’t dwell on the past. It didn’t fix a damn thing in the future. She skimmed the sections of the DSM-V on addiction, but most of the details were focused on how to know if someone was on drugs. The small comedown part focused on increased sleeping and eating in the first couple days to a week. It’d been a couple weeks since Josh went clean, but maybe he’d been doing meth so long his body needed more recovery time? The fact he had food at the ready was a good sign. Maybe that was bowl number three for the day. Callie relaxed onto her heels. She was getting herself worked up over nothing. It was kind of nice to have a moment to realize she might not have to be as worried.

  She had plenty of trouble on the table. She’d vowed to find out who had set their sights on the Soul Charmer. Her ballsy move would bite her in the ass most likely, but at least Callie wanted to find the answer to who killed that kid. She might not care who wanted to dick around with the Charmer; the bastard probably deserved it. She did, however, care a lot about who would leverage a teenager like that. Who would value life so little as to cut a kid? To take away whatever potential he still had. Soul user or not, that boy could have gone somewhere. She’d fucked up her life, but at least she could get retribution for the kid. He could have helped feed his brothers and sisters. Where would Callie and Josh have been without each other? Josh didn’t keep Callie upright and fed anymore, but there was a time when he was the one smuggling sandwiches to her at lunchtime. One didn’t forget shit like that.

  Callie was determined to make sure the dead teenager found outside the Charmer’s shop got peace, even that was only in the afterlife knowing that whoever slashed him for the rented soul would meet the full wrath of a vengeful Soul Charmer and his apprentice who would burn her way to the truth if she had to.

  And, let’s be real, she had to.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Callie met Derek at the base of the stairs outside her apartment. Snow had started to fall. She shrugged a little deeper into her coat, letting the edges of the collar skim her earlobes for a brief moment.

  “No scarf?” Derek said as way of greeting.

  She shrugged. “It’s okay. We’re taking the car, right?” Her breath steamed in the air.

  His sharp nod would have riled her when they first met, before she discerned it was plain agreement. No hidden meaning. “You left your scarf in the saddle bag on the bike.” He held the soft, grey knitted affair out to her.

  His eyes tracked her movements as she wrapped the scarf around her neck and knotted the front in a quick, practiced motion. He didn’t smile, not really, but she could see the tension in his cheeks that suggested he wanted to. He offered her a stiff nod of approval, and opened his right arm for her to cozy in.

  The break from the wind coupled with the warmth of his jacket against hers was welcome, the sense of calm that came with his strength and the smell of leather that brought comfort were better.

  They started toward her car. Derek’s motorcycle was parked beside it. The chrome glistened even in the concrete-colored light through the snow clouds. Usually she was fine with riding on the back. Callie didn’t have hang-ups about being behind Derek. It was safe there. Though when it was edging into the single digits temperature-wise, wind whipping your face was not a good thing. Scarf or no scarf.

  “How’s he doing?” He meant Josh. Derek had avoided her brother. She’d say the feeling was mutual, but Josh wasn’t really awake enough to have vocalized a real stance on the dude she was dating. Still, Derek liked meeting outside the apartment. Callie assumed it was his conflict avoidance skills kicking in. For a guy who tracked down deadbeats who didn’t return rented property, he really wasn’t much for letting things get ugly. Which was nice, since she had plenty of ugly sneaking into her life as it was.

  Callie didn’t miss a step, though her heart stuttered with a flash of worry.

  “He’s sleeping,” she said with the same weary tone she’d used the last three times she’d answered this way. She quickly amended, “Which is expected. The meth wrecked his system and now he needs to rest and recover. Sleep lets your body repair itself.”

  Derek made a rough sound in the back of his throat, which Callie took as agreement. He gave her a quick squeeze, like he knew she’d been convincing herself and not him. He’d only asked the question because he cared about her. She knew it, but she also liked that they hadn’t talked about it. He hadn’t made it a thing.

  Callie
always put family first, but Derek put her first. It was weird, but nice.

  She tossed Derek her keys and walked around to the passenger side.

  After she’d buckled in, she asked, “Do we have to go by the shop tonight?” Her usual disdain for the Soul Charmer’s emporium was increased tenfold today. Memories of dead bodies will do that to you.

  He tossed the flask into her lap. It had an onyx inlay, and in her hands became more than a way to sneak booze into a movie theater. It was the tool she used to extract rented souls from their hosts. The stone warmed to her touch, and she didn’t hate the sensation.

  “I’ll take that as a no?” The question was playful, because the times when she could poke a little fun were dwindling of late and Derek was her one respite. Most of the time.

  Derek started the car. “Boss is still . . .” When he paused Callie had the sense it wasn’t because he didn’t know the word he was looking for, but because he spent so much of his day communicating with as few words as possible that shifting into conversation mode with her was awkward at first. Even after weeks and weeks together. She’d pity him if she didn’t second-guess why he stuck around her when she’d already broken his trust. He’d wanted to help with the Ford blackmail. He’d tried. She’d taken advantage of an injury he’d gotten on the job, ditched him, and broke into the police station alone. She did it to protect him, but it was still the wrong move and Derek was still fucking sore about it. Justifiably. He’d forgiven her but building back that bond took time. They don’t put that kind of shit in a Hallmark card, but it was the closest she had to romantic sentiments for now.

  Callie waited for Derek to continue, because she knew he would. “He’s still wrecked. Broke some jars against the wall. Probably good you weren’t there. Shattered glass and my girl on fire would be too much shit to handle.” He said it like a joke, but blocks of stress were building up around him, too. Locking his shoulders tight and forcing him to stretch his scarred hands every few minutes. His face when he’d come back from “taking care” of the corpse left outside the Charmer’s shop had gutted her. He had worn the grim pain of a man who had disposed of a body. It had been horrific, but honest.

  “If he’d give me a hint as to what he wanted me to do, it’d help,” she muttered, trying to steady her thoughts. “Did the Charmer have any suggestions as to where to start at least?”

  Derek shot her a look that said it was a dumb question and she should know that. The Soul Charmer wasn’t big on specifics. It made her whole plan to be his apprentice one of her most idiotic of recent memory. “We need to do a quick collection, but then we’ll start with what we know,” he said.

  “We know that a kid was murdered to get the Charmer riled.” She’d only employed that kind of under-the-breath vehemence when fighting with Josh in the back pews during Saturday night service until she started working for the Soul Charmer.

  Derek reached over and gave her thigh a quick squeeze. “Right, and our next step will be to figure out why.”

  “Why that kid or why do they want to screw with the Charmer?”

  “Both.”

  Luxe, modern homes shared city blocks with adobe shanties throughout Gem City. Most neighborhoods you could blend no matter your social standing. It was one of the reasons Callie had stayed here after high school. There was something to be said about never feeling like you lived in the bad part of town. There were shitholes everywhere. Only the commercial areas could truly be considered dangerous, and that was mostly after dark.

  The Soul Charmer’s shop was in a sketchy area, but he liked it that way. The Charmer was the kind of man who reveled in his customers feeling debased. It made little sense since the purity of their souls affected his gig, but she’d seen the glee in his eyes each time a well-dressed customer cast the floor an “oh, God” look when their heel sunk into whatever congealed beneath the thin carpet.

  However, that hodgepodge neighborhood setup didn’t apply everywhere. There were partitioned, planned communities on the edges of the city. Ones that constantly ran sprinklers to maintain green grass in the middle of the high desert. The residents were always transplants from the coasts. People who missed seasons and said everything was “too brown.” The desert wasn’t for everyone, but people who moved to the land of juniper bushes and hard-packed sand and thought they’d bring along Bermuda grass and oak trees should be kicked in the shins.

  It didn’t help that Callie’s car was a yellow stain on the pristine street.

  “Someone here needs his soul repossessed?” Callie didn’t have to groan for Derek to know exactly what she meant.

  “The prick pays triple list price for souls, if that makes you feel better,” Derek said before getting out of the car.

  The Soul Charmer loved his sliding scale for soul rental. It’s how Callie ended up working for him the first place. He’d bartered work for a brief rental. It soothed the memory’s sting to know he was good about fucking people over across the board and not only people he could jam his magic into.

  Callie slipped her hand into her coat pocket and palmed the flask. Her flask. The onyx almost hummed beneath her fingers. She wasn’t certain if the flask was eager for the soul collection to be done, too, or if it simply fed off the magic buzzing through her veins. She squeezed it into her palm and let the energy heat her against the brittle wind whistling past her.

  They hurried to the mark’s front door. It wasn’t just the single-digit temperature or the white flakes falling from the sky. Derek and Callie had more important things to do tonight. Bigger problems to solve. Getting side-eyed by neighbors would only slow them down.

  Derek thumped a fist against the door. The knock was hard and heavy and didn’t require repeating.

  “You can’t be here!” The squat man who answered the door was already red in the face and they hadn’t even spoken yet.

  Derek shoved his way inside, and Callie followed. Their apoplectic host stood holding the handle of his front door, parting and closing his lips like he couldn’t decide the best curse word to throw at them. Sage and citrus filled the air, but there was no sign of natural sources for the scents in the sterile entryway.

  “Shut the door, Cameron,” Derek’s tone was drenched in disgust, too, and the implication that their host wouldn’t want his neighbors knowing he associated with the scourges of Gem City.

  Maybe he should have thought of that before he rented a soul. Callie stared at his puffy cheeks and his bird-like nose and tried to figure out what this guy did that needed a second soul. He slammed the door and clopped his way in fancy foreign loafers toward them. He certainly wasn’t a jewel thief.

  “What do you want?” He didn’t meet either of their eyes. He damn well knew what they needed.

  Callie took a step toward him. She didn’t want to be here anymore than he wanted her here. The tendrils of warmth began to coil in her palms. Not the inferno she experienced around the raw, uninhibited soul in the Soul Charmer’s shop or the full-on flames associated with a person stacking multiple rented souls in their bodies. No, Callie had come to recognize this burgeoning heat as the sign of someone storing a single bonus soul in their body. It was like holding her hand in the very edge of an open flame. Hot, but not enough to scorch if she didn’t linger too long. She was not going to linger with Cameron. They had people to see, a murderer to find. Normal Tuesday night shit.

  Cameron hurried backward on his heels.

  Derek pointed to a nearby dining room chair. “Sit.”

  Cameron did. “Fine. Okay. What do you want?”

  “When you borrow something from a friend, he’s gonna want it back,” Derek said.

  Callie resisted the shudder slamming into her spine. Nate had played that friend card, too. She shook it off. Derek wasn’t Nate. The Charmer wasn’t Ford. She wasn’t scared.

  Cameron balked. “For what I pay him, he owes me an extra few days.”

  “It’s been a week.”

  “Well, okay, but . . .” Cameron floundered. r />
  Callie stepped toward him again. “So now you’re giving it back, yeah?”

  Cameron knocked his elbow against the grand table next to them. It was probably one, solid piece of mahogany that cost four-month’s rent. He shifted his arm onto the table. His forearm covered a few pages of crisp white paper. Lots of blocky text with brackets and bullet points. If this guy thought she cared about his contracts, he really didn’t understand how normal people functioned at work. She wanted to pretend they were forgeries and he was a crime boss, but the truth was probably something closer to securing retirement funds for other pencil pushers.

  This house and this guy made her skin crawl. Every filigreed picture frame and every hand-woven rug looked like a lie to her. This guy wasn’t wholesome or pristine or ready to be on the cover of Rich Asshole Monthly. He was as filthy as the rest of them, only he refused to admit it. Her breaths were coming shorter and faster. She didn’t think it was the magic. It was this guy, and the way he made her feel. She didn’t wait for an invitation or even encouragement from Derek; she plucked the cap off the flask and clapped the opening against Cameron’s sternum.

  He yelped, which was a first. The soul push/pull process wasn’t painful. Maybe she’d smacked the container against him too hard?

  “You can’t just go around taking souls,” Cameron muttered.

  Callie tightened the lid on the flask, and small ice crystals began to form almost immediately along her fingertips. She shuffled backward until the chill subsided.

  “We done?” she asked Derek, not bothering to hide her contempt for this place and its owner. She wasn’t necessarily eager for a one-on-one with the kind of person who’d kill a kid outside the Charmer’s store, but she was ready to get out of here. Plus, keeping the Soul Charmer happy was a good way to avoid an armload of agony.

  “Just a sec,” Derek said to her. Then he turned to Cameron and stalked forward until he towered over the man. He held a closed fist up against the mark’s face. It covered a whole cheek, part of his nose and one eyebrow. If he punched the small man, it’d be more than a broken nose. He held the fist there until Cameron started to quake. “We don’t do this again. We will not be nice again.”