I shook my head. “I think it was human,” I said. “I just don’t know.”
Remy took a deep breath and surveyed the area where my car had gone into. You couldn’t see the back of it from here. The darkness beyond the road was full of misty tendrils and hanging moss, shivering with the cool, night wind. Something about the dark made my heart want to gallop again, so I looked away.
“I’ll go inside and have a look,” Remy said.
“No,” I said, probably a little too quickly. “Whatever it was, it’s gone now.”
“You’re sure?”
“I think so. I may have spooked it. Either that or it was just playing with me and it chose to leave. Whatever it was, do you think it had anything to do with the magick I just did?”
Remy seemed to consider this for a long moment—longer than I would have liked. “I can’t say,” he said.
His words made my stomach go cold. “You… can’t?”
“You’re a high magician; you don’t cast magick from the mind, you cast it from the heart. I don’t know of many other high magicians who use blood magick. And those who do probably don’t use it to bring things back from the dead.”
“So, you aren’t sure if we just did something we shouldn’t have done.”
He turned his face down and shook his head.
“Well, shit. Now what?”
“Nothing,” Remy said, “I’m going to figure this out and get to the bottom of it. The best thing you can do now is get back to Lumière. Its magick will protect you.”
“What about Tamara?”
“What about her?”
“Do you think she…”
“It’s not like her to do something like this. Tamara isn’t subtle—she’d have wanted you to know it was she who did this to you.”
I sighed. “Well, I don’t like the idea of cooping myself up in that house again. I’ve done it one too many times.” It was also empty in there again, only I didn’t want to admit to that.
“We don’t have a choice,” Remy said, “Not until I figure out what just happened to you.”
A frown darkened my face. “So, you’re telling me I’m supposed to wait back at my place for you to go and figure this out? You realize we’re throwing a masquerade ball in less than twenty-four hours.”
“I’ll have an answer by then.”
“You’re sure about that?”
He shook his head. “But I am sure that if you don’t get home and get some rest, you’re going to let this consume you.”
Sending me home, telling me he would handle things and expecting me to wait, was exactly the same kind of attitude that had prevented generations of New Orleans witches from learning how to fend for themselves and protect their city from intruders. I understood it was his instinct to do things on his own, and I thought about calling him out on it. But I didn’t.
This day had gone on long enough.
“We should wait for the emergency services,” I said. “They’ll want me to talk to them about what happened.”
“Tell them you saw a gator on the road,” Remy said.
I nodded.
“Will you be needing a ride, after?”
“Yeah.”
“Then I’ll wait also.” He sat down on the guard rail next to me.
“What should we do while we wait?” I asked.
Remy shrugged. “I suppose we could play a game.”
“Do you know any?”
“Not really.”
I nodded. “Probably best to just wait, then.”
“I could teach you more magick, but given the circumstances I don’t think that’d be the best idea.”
“No, I guess it wouldn’t,” I said, allowing myself to chuckle, but a shiver ran up my spine as I laughed, causing the whole thing to sound forced. Fake.
I wouldn’t tell Remy, but after that odd shiver, I almost wanted to lock myself up at home.
CHAPTER FOUR
Remy pulled up to my street in the French Quarter and slowly cruised along until he reached my gate. The high-beams on his car illuminated the back of the Harley parked in my front yard and the man sitting next to it. When Jared saw us, he swung his leg off the bike, pocketing his phone before patting his leather jacket down and walking toward the gate.
“I see you’ll be taken care of,” Remy said.
“Yeah,” I said, feeling the blood rush to my cheeks. Not wanting to be alone, I had texted Jared while we were in route. “Thanks for the ride, though.”
“You’re welcome,” he said. “I hope what happened tonight doesn’t cause you too much stress.”
I tugged on the door handle to open it. The night air was cool on my face, and I welcomed it, which was a sobering feeling—one that gave me clarity of vision and thought. I approached Jared, who stood in front of Remy’s car. He raised his hand in a gesture of hello. Remy didn’t respond. Instead he peeled away slowly, disappearing beyond the street corner.
Jared screwed his face up. “Guess he still doesn’t like me,” he said.
“Don’t take it personally,” I said, “Remy doesn’t like a lot of people. Anyway, thank you for coming. Really. I hope I didn’t keep you from anything”
He shook his head. “I was on a date, but it was going pretty poorly. You kinda saved me from it.”
My insides went cold, though they had no reason to. That Jared was in the dating circuit wasn’t a surprise. Not really. He’d been going on dates for the last month or so, and I couldn’t blame him for it. I couldn’t expect him to wait while I kept him at arm’s length for God only knew how long. At the same time, not even my most logical, rational self could keep away the tinge of jealousy stinging the back of my throat.
“Okay, well, still… I’m sorry for interrupting your date.”
Jared followed me inside, and we sat down at the dining table. He then went about the process of laying out the fried chicken he’d brought with him. It was simple but effective comfort food, and food I really needed at that moment in time.
“I trashed my car tonight,” I said after swallowing the first mouthful of food.
“What?” he asked. “Where?”
“On the way back from the mansion. I was driving, it was misty, and—”
“You aren’t hurt, are you?”
“No. The air bag beat me up good, gave me a headache, but other than that I’m fine. The car was way worse than I was. It’ll probably need to be in the shop a few days.”
“It sucks about the car, but I’m glad you’re okay.”
“Tell me about it. The first car I ever buy, and I trash it within a couple of weeks. I should’ve stuck to walking.”
Jared pushed my food over toward me. “You’re sure you’re okay, though?”
I nodded and put a French fry in my mouth. “I’m fine,” I said, “Really. Only… I haven’t told you why I had the accident.”
“I’m all ears.”
I took a breath. “So, it was misty,” I started, “and the road was hard enough to see. I decided to try and use a little magick to clear the road of mist, you know, the usual thing a witch might try given the situation.”
“And?”
“I must have been paying more attention to the spell than to the road, because the next thing I knew, something jumped into my path and zipped across. I had to swerve to avoid hitting it. I guess the roads were slippery on account of the rain, so I lost control of the car and ended up in the swamp.”