Fire Water (Black Magic Outlaw Book 5) Read online

The Haitians came at me, clouded eyes creased in unmollified anger. I batted one kid to the side. Grabbed another by the arms and swung him in a circle around me, keeping the others at bay. For a minute there it was laughable. Twisted reality TV: one man against an army of third graders. But I had to give these kids more credit than that. It wasn't long before the voodoo came out.

  The driver circled the front of the truck and threw a handful of feathers my way. Dude must've plucked a whole bird. They weren't crow feathers. Not dove feathers. Just your garden variety Miami pigeon. The initial thrust of his hands spread them in the air. The Intrinsics took over and each individual feather reared and fired at me like a quill, aiming to stick me with the pointy end. It was a good bet they'd been dipped in some nasty toxin, too.

  Rather than risk the spellcraft catching me in my shadow form, I raised my barrier shield. It was meant for small projectiles of little mass. Feathers were the perfect candidates. They popped like firecrackers as they hit the energy field. The hardest part was keeping them all off at once so I erected a shadow wall to slow them down.

  Two wights charged my flank. I sidestepped one, grabbed the other, and spun to use him to block the last incoming feather. It struck his shoulder. I threw him to the street and he fell over, coughing.

  Two more wights came. I forced my shadow wall into them like a large unstoppable bowling ball. It couldn't squish them (or make that cool sound when you bowl a strike) but it sure as shit shoved them out of my way.

  Just when I was starting to have too much fun, a fist connected with the back of my head. I fell forward, mostly to deflect the force of the hit. In the same motion I reached into the ground and pulled out my shotgun. I flipped it in my hand, caught it by the barrel, and whacked the kid behind me over the head with the stock.

  The initiate with the feather wound was shaking his head on the ground, looking more confused than wounded. Don't get me wrong, he was slightly foaming at the mouth from the poison, but his eyes were clear. The poison was countering the effects of the wraith's magic. Pulling him back into the realm of human. I knew then the Bone Saints could be saved. The kid reached for some powder at his waist and applied it to his wound.

  The driver came at me again. This time he pulled a knife. At first I thought he'd lost his imagination, but the little dagger danced like a cobra. That definitely scored points for originality.

  I fended the other kids away with my shotgun-turned-club and stepped into the driver's personal space. I easily deflected his swipe with my left forearm. The arrow tattoo flared brilliantly as the snake attempted (and failed) to bite into my flesh. My right hand softened the bokor's stomach like a meat pounder. He dropped the knife. It bounced on the street like any other metal. Then I ripped a pouch of voodoo poison from his waist and flung it at the converging crowd.

  "Stay away and I won't hurt you!" I warned.

  I'd caught some of the kids with the powder, but this was a pretty standard voodoo trick. Many of them saw the attack coming and knew to close their eyes, avoid inhaling, and flee the area. I'd say a good two or three got the full treatment and had to call off the attack. I could only hope they'd be knocked out of their trances as well.

  That had cleared some space for myself. The wights were relentless, though. They came at me again.

  Headlights blinded me. An engine roared. I sank into the shadow just in time to avoid being leveled by my own pickup. The truck barreled over me, skipped the curb, and crashed into the wrought-iron fence surrounding the empty compound.

  That had been close. I took a heavy breath and ran my eyes over the scene behind me. A few others hadn't been so lucky. The driver and two kids rolled on the ground in pain. One tried to get up and immediately collapsed.

  The rusty pickup shifted into reverse.

  "You son of a bitch," I spat.

  As it backed up, I ran alongside it and opened the driver's door. I heaved on the steering wheel before I was fully inside. The pickup spun and avoided the Bone Saints on the return trip. The back bumper slammed into the other truck, which was a good deal more busted up than my 1970s behemoth. They don't make 'em like they used to.

  "You're really starting to piss me off," I said to the ghost, climbing in and shifting to park. I slammed the door shut and pounded the dashboard. The interior and exterior lights blinked on and off. The horn sounded. The wipers scraped back and forth on the dry windshield. The poltergeist was doing everything in its power to tell me it was pissed off too.

  I clawed under the seats, hoping I'd left some spare spell tokens around. Nothing doing. No balloons. No mirror. All I had was a birthday candle, a used book of matches, and a single stray shotgun shell. Oh, and I had a spare tank top down there too. Not exactly top-notch exorcism material. I stuffed everything but the shirt in my pocket.

  Wights pounded on the windows and doors. I was surprised the glass held. I laid on the horn (which probably didn't do much since it was intermittently going off anyway) and gassed the truck, steering around the hobbled Bone Saints in the street. Best thing I could do for these kids was leave them far away from danger. If it's one thing I'd learned, poltergeists are unpredictable.

  I shot down the street, flooring the gas pedal and trying to catch up to Connor's crew before they disappeared again. The pickup unexpectedly swerved into oncoming traffic. I slammed the brakes and spun out, narrowly avoiding another collision.

  Great. You know those bumper stickers that say "God is my copilot?" Well, this was kinda like that except my copilot was the ghost of a dead gangbanger and he was suicidal.

  I gunned it again, but with a bit more care. The wheel kept trying to steer me into the nearest obstacle, and I kept doing whatever it took to survive. The sum total was I could (mostly) stay in my lane, but it took all my effort and slowed me down a bunch.

  Metal crunched against metal. My neck jerked as I got into another accident. This time, I'd been hit from behind. The other pickup had taken to the street again. The radiator leak wouldn't sideline it immediately and the wights gave no shits about long-term damage to the car (that's kids for you). A quick glance showed someone behind the wheel who wasn't old enough to drive and three more wights in the truck bed.

  All of a sudden this was a good old-fashioned car chase.

  Chapter 37

  We sped through Little Haiti, fortunate the road was mostly clear. I tried to fake my pursuers out with a hard turn onto 54th, but my poltergeist passenger made it difficult to pull off last-second maneuvers. It resulted in me telegraphing all my moves. I might as well have used a blinker.

  The steering wheel fought for its own control the whole time. With the other truck still behind me and none of the others in sight ahead, I had no choice but to move onward and hope for the best.

  The other truck was faster. It gained on my left and tried to force me off the road. I rolled my window down, extended my sawed-off shotgun, and blasted the right front tire. The rubber exploded and shredded off the wheel. Sparks flew above our heads and the other truck skidded into mine. The kid overcorrected the slide to the left and drove into a light post across the street.

  So much for the good old-fashioned car chase.

  I dropped my empty shotgun into the shadow and chuckled, pleased with how well that had worked out. The wight exited the truck and stood around, unsure how to proceed. His friend standing in the truck bed had no ideas.

  Wait a minute. There were supposed to be three of them in that truck bed.

  A knife punched through the ceiling above me. I jerked my head away. That was my knife. Those fuckers were in my truck now. One of them pounded on the back window and the other was draped over my roof, stabbing holes through the metal. As the pickup swerved his legs swept over my windshield. He scrambled for purchase and snapped off one of the wiper blades with his foot.

  "This day is turning out just dandy," I said.

  The wight in the back got smart and reached in through my open window. His forearm smothered my mouth and pressed my head against
the back window. (These tanks didn't have luxuries like headrests.) At first I didn't think the wight had much of a strategy, but his right fist began pounding said window. It's a good thing he wasn't a boxer but I could feel the blows through the glass.

  The real crux of the problem came when the knife punched through the roof again. The blade slashed across my temple. Warm blood trickled down the side of my face.

  Did I say that was the real crux of the problem? Sorry, that was a bit of a downer, for sure, but the flashing red lights ahead of me were the real doozy.

  Two black-and-white metal arms swung down to block access to Biscayne Boulevard. A freaking railroad crossing, flashing and dinging and doing its darn best to warn off the living and dead alike.

  I hit the brakes. Nothing happened. In my head I formed the image of the poltergeist—a Bone Saint himself but one I'd killed a long time ago as a zombie hit man—smiling in glee as his revenge was finally upon him.

  With less than a block to go, I tried to turn the wheel but the damned ghost had found his backbone. It was locked up tight. The knife in the roof pulled up and out, readying for another stab. I let go of the wheel and put both hands to work against the wight's arm, peeling it from my face and ducking away from the knife as it once again punched down.

  A train horn blared. Not in warning anymore—in alarm. The engineer kept the noise on and applied the brakes, for whatever good that did. Nothing was stopping that thing in time. I clenched my jaw (and my butt cheeks) as the pickup bore on a collision course with the metal juggernaut. I pumped the brakes a few more times in a last ditch hope of escape, but there was no response.

  The train chugged forward. The truck ran the red light. And I realized I had a single chance.

  My boot pounded the gas pedal all the way down to the metal. The pickup lurched out of its controlled cruise and crashed through the barrier arms blocking the road. The wheels skipped over the tracks hard and the entire truck caught air for a split second.

  Then we landed safely past the tracks right as the train sped past. Sparks rained into the sky as the train raked against my rear bumper.

  The pickup hopped up and down on the other side as I fought for control. The wights hung on for dear life. And I spied a little Cuban kid tagging the back side of a gas station.

  That did it. I shifted to neutral, pulled the parking brake, and leaned my whole body into the wheel, fishtailing the truck to a stop. The two wights took flight and landed hard in the street ahead. I jumped out and yanked my knife from the roof. Then I stomped toward the kid with the spray can.

  He was just finishing up an artsy letter A when I snatched the can from his hand. He spun around defiantly but saw the blood on my face and the two wights on the asphalt. He turned and bolted.

  "Smart kid."

  I marched back to my truck. It was still in neutral, slowly rolling backward in the street with the door open. I hopped on the front bumper, shaking the paint can up and down. Then I drew a giant pentagram on my rusty hood and rubbed some of my blood into the center for good measure. It wouldn't banish the poltergeist but it ought to contain him for a while.

  The light on Biscayne turned green. I hustled back into the truck and tossed the spray paint on the passenger seat. Then I bypassed the recovering wights and drove down the road, looking for signs of the other trucks.

  Connor wasn't in sight, but it was a good thing they were going east. The truth is, there's only so far you can go east before you're in the Atlantic Ocean. We were practically swimming already. I rolled ahead into the breezy neighborhood of Morningside.

  A gatehouse administered access to the district. It announced you were now on the right side of the tracks. Little Haiti may have been a minute away, but now you were entering a nice neighborhood. The gatehouses were meant to dissuade unsavory types. The street was still public, of course, but minimum wage security guards would take down license plates and keep up a good pretense.

  Two things told me that Morningside would have a spike in crime tonight. The arm blocking access down the road was broken, meaning someone had driven through just as I had at the train tracks. The other thing was, there was no security guard at his post. As I passed the gate I saw the man slumped unconscious over his stool.

  So Connor was here.

  I drove past the large Mediterranean Revival homes. It was a scenic neighborhood, all right. A nice place to go on jogs or walk the dog. Normal stuff that I could never do.

  My beat-up rusty pickup with the spray-painted pentagram started thumping and grinding and smoking as I drove down the quiet road. The damn tire was flat and the engine would need looking at. I cursed and pulled over. I'd jinxed myself with that comment about this being a nice neighborhood for a walk. I abandoned the pickup and hoofed it.

  No worry here, though. A healthy sprint got me in sight of the water in no time. Morningside Park spanned the coast. A nice green field with a beautiful bayfront view, even at night. The type of place to rent sailboats and kayaks, to play tennis and basketball, to go fishing or swimming in the public pool. This park really had it all.

  Including a decommissioned Soviet submarine illegally docked in the Bay.

  Connor's men were busy loading up the vessel. Two mercenaries with guns oversaw the dock. Luckily, the park grounds were clear. I sprinted ahead, eager to catch up before they were gone. My initial plan was just to up and announce myself. Get recaptured and go for a ride. But at the last second I was struck with an idea.

  The Bones Saints were mostly loaded up already. A few thralls straggled behind—the last workhorses, carrying the heavy stuff from the trucks to the sub. Connor and the wraith weren't in sight. It was Chevalier who was left to the final preparations. He directed the zombies in their loading duties while the mercenaries waved their guns at him to hurry. The bokor complained to them as I hurried to get within earshot.

  A mercenary pulled a radio to his mouth. "The last truck didn't make it," he reported.

  The reply was muffled and scratchy. The mercenary told Chevalier to finish and load up. He did so, leaving only four thralls to the work.

  If Connor was writing me off he must've been serious about keeping his schedule.

  I scanned the scene, running out of time. There were only two oblong boxes left in a truck. I wondered what Connor was transporting. More Taíno artifacts? A pair of zombies hefted either end of a crate and carried it to the sub, leaving the last box to the other two. Those zombies were just leaving the dock now, giving me a short window to beat them to it. I rushed ahead and reached the crate, trying to pry the top open before I was seen.

  The damned thing was nailed shut. I grabbed the wood and ripped upward. A foot-and-a-half plank snapped off in my hand. A pungent smell washed through the small opening. It was unmistakable and immediately informed me as to the contents of the crate: death.

  So the Little Haiti undead weren't enough. Connor was bringing fresh bodies with him too. Making sure he had an ample supply. Those necromancers on the boat were gonna be busy.

  The two zombie workers were almost on me. While the top of the crate wasn't open per se, I had enough of a window to squeeze through. Even if it wouldn't be pleasant.

  I dove through the shadow and into the crate, bracing for a tight fit.

  Chapter 38

  Let's face it: Coffins aren't built for two.

  You get one of those high-end numbers the mortician upsells on you—you know, that whole speech about how the dead deserve dignity and it's your lucky day because dignity comes with a four-thousand-dollar price tag? Anyway, the dead don't appreciate a box with a shiny finish or memory foam insert, but one of those coffins would probably be a comfortable enough fit for two people at once.

  What I currently found myself inside wasn't one of those souped-up dealies. It wasn't one of those Wild West barely-fits-one hack jobs either. This was a storage crate somewhere in between the two ideas, not meant for a body but remarkably suited for one. Still, two was pushing it.

 
; On top of the tight fit was the unfortunate luck that the recently expired occupant was of the pudgier nature. Soft and ample, like a bloated Stretch Armstrong left out in the sun. I wasn't claustrophobic but this was plenty uncomfortable. My only plan? To wait.

  The two zombies lifted the box with little trouble. Surprisingly, their strength and inability for laziness meant they treated the cargo better than your average UPS driver. We were carried at an even keel. Shoes traipsed over the dock. The coffin turned upright as we went up the ladder and down the hatch.

  I'd never ridden a submarine before. I just hoped this wasn't a one-way trip.

  The small opening I'd ripped from the top let a bit of light inside the box. It was at my feet, though, so I couldn't do much in the way of peeking. Not that it mattered. I couldn't act until everything was quiet. Within a few minutes, my wish was granted. The box was shoved into a corner. Someone gave orders about stowing the cargo and some restacking and strapping down happened. At one point, another coffin was placed on top of mine, blocking out what little light I had.

  I waited for the sounds of shuffling to die down. The submarine powered into motion and dove. The diesel engine cut out when we went full electric, and I knew we were submerged and on our way.

  To the lost city of gold, then.

  When I was sure I was alone (corpses notwithstanding), I shifted into the darkness and slipped out of the crate. At least, that was the way I had pictured it working out. What actually happened was more of a bump against a wall. I rematerialized still stuck inside the box.

  "You've got to be kidding me," I muttered.

  I felt at the opening in the lid with the heel of my boot and found I was sealed in by the crate stacked above. You might think it an easy thing to slink around the shadows like some kind of unstoppable mist, but it really doesn't work like that. I can't move as freely as vapor. I'm not a ghost in the fog like in some John Carpenter movie. I need a good couple inches of clearance to slip past obstacles. Right now, I was flat-out stuck.