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Chris shrugged. “I’m just here for moral support. This demon and magic stuff has always been so far from my area of expertise. But Cosette isn’t going to be able to help.”
Not the crystals. Not Cosette or any of the fey. Not magic. What else was left? What was I missing?
“There is someone else who maybe could help us,” Claudia said, interrupting my thoughts. “The thing is, I don’t know if she will. Or even how much she could help. I don’t—”
“No. No! Don’t backtrack now,” I said. If Claudia was bringing it up, then I had to believe it was a plausible solution. “I can convince her. Or I can make Dastien do it. He’s got the good abs. Just tell me where to point him. He’ll say something in French. Take off his shirt. It’ll work.”
What are you dragging me into, chérie? He was laughing, but only on the inside.
I’m sure it won’t come to that. I’ll try to protect your virtue as long as I can. I let go of his hand and leaned across the table. I was desperate not to get sucked into Astaroth’s realm again. I had to stop his plan from ever coming to pass. “Who do we need to see?”
“Her name is Samantha Lopez. She’s kind of a cousin. Sort of. And she lives in LA, but—”
I shook my head. “A cousin in LA and I never met her? No way.” I didn’t have any relatives in LA.
“She’s from my father’s side. A second cousin once removed or something.”
Okay. That made more sense. Our mothers were sisters. So, if it was her father’s side, then I wasn’t related to her and maybe my mom didn’t know about her. “She’s a witch?”
“Not exactly.”
“So, how can she help?” Adrian asked.
“She’s got a unique ability. She deals exclusively in hauntings, but she does have some experience with demons.”
“This girl sounds awesome,” Chris said. “But we’ve been ass-deep in demons for a while now. If she has specific knowledge about them, why are we just now hearing about her?”
“Well…” Claudia looked at Lucas and I knew they were talking, but whatever was said, it needed to be aloud.
“What is it?” This girl—whoever she was—sounded perfect. “You haven’t brought her up until now. So, what’s her deal?”
Claudia sighed. “She’s a couple years younger than me, so she’s your age. Maybe not yet eighteen? Anyway, she visited a couple times before my parents took off, but I hated to drag her into Luciana’s evil world. Plus, she’s had enough stuff on her plate to deal with. The last time I spoke to her, she’d
been looking into ways to bind her abilities. When everything with Luciana started to get worse a few years ago, I stopped emailing her back. She needed a friend, and I turned my back on her.”
Claudia wasn’t the type to do that kind of thing and not feel one hundred percent guilty about it.
“At first, when everything went wrong with Raphael, I thought about calling her but it seemed like a long shot. Especially if she’d managed to get rid of her gifts like she wanted. And she wasn’t super good with demons last I heard.” Claudia glanced to her mate, who gave her a reassuring nod. “Muraco was so sure that Peru was where I needed to go, so I went there. But after everything in Santa Fe, I did some digging. With Luciana gone, I wanted to see how Samantha was doing and explain. I’ve been emailing her for weeks, but she hasn’t answered me. But from what I’ve found out, I don’t think she was able to bind her abilities. In fact, I think she’s gone the opposite direction.”
I had questions—like what kind of things this girl could do and what she was exactly—but I kept it zipped. None of that mattered. All I needed was help, and at this point, I couldn’t afford to be picky.
“I feel bad asking her after all this time, but Samantha’s the only other person I can think of,” Claudia said finally.
“Let’s give it a shot. Worst thing she could do is say no.” And if she was open to it and could maybe cut the tie between Astaroth and myself, then it was worth it.
“I second that. Let’s call her,” Chris said.
“Actually, I think it’s best if we go see her,” Claudia said. “I haven’t gotten her to take my calls or emails. But we’re a little harder to ignore if we’re on her front porch.”
“And if it doesn’t work out?” I asked.
“Then we come back here and do more research. We find another way and we try that. Because I’m not giving up. Are you?” Claudia asked.
“No,” I said.
“Neither am I,” Dastien said.
“Me, too,” Adrian said.
