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“Wonderful,” I said.
“It’s a bit of vampire magic. They use it to hold their victims without protest.”
Fear seized my heart. “Vampires?”
She gave me a curious look. “What did you do to get mixed up with vampires?”
“I don’t know,” I said honestly.
“They’re dangerous,” she said.
“I see that. Given my sister’s in the ICU in a coma.”
“They’re dangerousfor me,”she clarified. “They’d never feed off a shifter. But I don’t want to anger any vamps.”
She was trying to shake us down.
“What does my sister need, and how much is it going to cost us?”
“Stone will pay whatever it is, if we need his help,” Liam said seriously. I widened my eyes at him, trying to get him to stop talking, and he added, “He knows he owes you, even if he’s not ready to apologize.”
“He’s going to need to do a lot more than apologize,” I muttered, momentarily distracted from how terrible Liam was at negotiating.
The witch waved her hand airily. “I don’t want your money.”
Liam brightened. “Great.”
“What do you want?” I demanded.
“I need you to bring me an athame.”
“What now?” It would help if I knew what I was bringing her.
“It’s a ceremonial dagger with a black handle,” she said. “I loaned it to my ex-boyfriend.”
“And he doesn’t want to give it back,” I filled in.
“Indeed.”
“Any other fun details?” I asked. “Is he a warlock? A vampire? A shifter?”
I had the feeling this mission would be a dangerous one.
“Worse,” she said. “He’s a politician. And he dabbles in a little dark magic.”
“Don’t they all,” I muttered. “Do we ask nicely or steal it from him?”
“Oh, you’re definitely going to have to steal it,” she said sweetly. “And in the meantime, I’ll start brewing the potion for your sister. It will take me the day to find all the ingredients, some of them are rare—closely guarded by the vampires and quite difficult to procure—so we can meet back here tonight for the exchange. Midnight?”
“Of course,” I said drily. “Why do business during a reasonable hour? Before bedtime?”
She gave me a strange look and I realized I sounded an awful lot like a mom. But for now, I needed to project fearless thieving badass.
Except I was far from fearless, and I was not particularly badass, and I felt haunted by library fines, forget full-on thievery.
But I’d do what I must for Rose.
As Liam and I stepped out into the brightly lit sidewalk, he said, “I’m glad Shaw is coming. I’m out of my depth.”
