Under a Spell uda-5 Page 2

  Steve.

  Steve was our resident troll—resident, in that he was an independent contractor who never seemed to leave the confines of the Agency. Troll, as in, well, troll. He who resides underneath bridges, asks ridiculous questions, and desperately wishes to deposit his little troll babies deep in my lady parts.

  He’s grey and vaguely scaly, is constantly showing off his tufts of lichen-green chest hair, and has a cache of dirty jokes and bad pickup lines that would make any honky-tonk or used car salesman envious. I should say that I have a soft spot for the little guy—he is mostly harmless (that stench did kill a few flowers) and he had been instrumental in saving my life. But the spot that was soft for him was growing a little harder each time he “bumped” into my backside or left me love notes that frankly should have started “Dear Penthouse Forum,” rather than “My Dear Sweet Sophie’s Legs.”

  Steve grinned salaciously when he saw me, and he suddenly jumped off his chair, pushing it to the side.

  “Steve thinks Sophie looks distressed.”

  Also, Steve always referred to himself in the third person. I’m not totally sure that that’s a troll thing—I’m pretty sure (hopefully) that it’s purely a Steve thing.

  “Would Sophie like to tell Steve all about it?”

  I swung my head—and pinched my nose. “No thanks, Steve. It’s nothing.” I continued down the hallway and Steve trotted next to me, finally picking up speed and pushing his chair in front of him. He bumped it into my calves, jumped on it, and laid his swamp hands on my shoulders. “Steve is a very good listener. And he will give you massage. . . .”

  Steve dug his thumbs into the meat above my shoulders, leaving two wet spots on my blouse.

  “Soph—I mean, I appreciate the sentiment, but like I said, I can handle this one.” I tried to squirrel out of his grasp, but for three feet of lichen and swamp slime, he had an impressive grip. I softened, slightly, as he cocked his head and listened intently to me, his coal-black eyes registering nothing but sweet concern as his fingers moved little circles up toward the top of my shoulders. “Steve knows where a lady carries her stress. Steve studied reflexology.”

  “Hey. HEY! Hands off you little swamp creep!”

  Apparently, in Steve’s world, ladies carried most of their stress in their breasts.

  Steve jumped off his chair and took off running down the hall.

  “I’m going to call HR on you, you little pervert!”

  I pushed open the ladies’ room door and turned the tap on cold, ready to plunge my whole head in the sink. The back of my neck was clammy and sweaty and my cheeks were flushed midlife-crisis-Corvette red. I settled for splashing water on my face instead of the dunking, as I was trying to present a more sophisticated, less stained Sophie Lawson.

  “Okay,” I said to my reflection. “Everything is going to be okay. I’m in charge. I’m in charge.” I pushed wet, floppy tendrils of hair behind my ears, wiped the mascara from under my eyes and gave myself the tough-as-nails, sexy chick stare I’d been working on.

  “Yeah,” I purred. “I’m in charge.”

  With my self-confidence damp but re-inflated, I turned for the door, and busted directly into Vlad LaShay. His black eyes were wide, his lips set in a hard, thin line. Gone was his usual king-of-the-underworld swagger; in its place was something that I had never seen on any vampire, let alone this one: fear.

  “Vlad, this is—”

  Vlad grabbed both my shoulders in his cold hands and walked me backward back into the ladies’ room, glancing nervously over his shoulder every few feet.

  “You’ve got to hide me,” he said finally.

  “Who am I hiding you from?”

  “Kale.”

  My eyes shot around the room. “You realize that this is the girls’ room, right? And that in addition to being pissed off by you, she’s a girl? Who could very possibly have to pee at any given moment?”

  Vlad grabbed the trashcan and pulled it in front of the door. “I don’t plan on staying in here all day. I need you to sneak me out of here, and then keep Kale distracted long enough for me to get out of the office and into the elevator.”

  Aside from being the demon clearinghouse for everything that went bump (or groan, or splat, or bite) in the night (think DMV with longer lines and check boxes that included dead, undead, and other), the Underworld Detection Agency had also recently become the hotbed for hormonal ancient teen-vampire-slash-teen-witch activity.

  It was like the Jersey Shore house with fewer suntans.

  At the center of this week’s activities were apparently Vlad—Nina’s nephew, my boss, and the acting head of the Vampire Empowerment and Restoration Movement—and his ladylove (or something), Kale. The fact that Vlad was an immortal sixteen-year-old (now a hundred and thirteen years young) meant that he had ruddy pink cheeks and had perfected that wholly teenage boy look of both scrutiny and complete indifference. The fact that he was my boss made it awkward that he had been couch surfing at my place for the last twenty months and technically had the power to fire me, but apparently not the power to pick up his socks. The fact that he was involved with—nay, head of—the Vampire Empowerment and Restoration Movement meant that he dressed like a less appealing combination of Count Chocula and had every polyester Dracula costume ever sold. Kale, his paramour—or now, predator—is a teen witch who is firmly entrenched in our intern program under a powerful witch-cum-Tupperware saleslady named Lorraine. Lorraine works in the billing department so five days a week Kale answers phones and gets training on accounts receivable, QuickBooks, and how not to make it rain in the Underworld Detection Agency break room.

  Several exceptionally soggy bologna sandwiches let me know that she wasn’t exactly great at the latter.

  “If I’m going to hide you from cute little Kale”—eighteen, chronologically and supernaturally, with a bunch of wince-inducing piercings, bright blue hair, and an unsavory attraction to the trembling vamp in front of me—“you’re going to need to tell me why.”

  Vlad shot yet another glance over his shoulder. “There’s no time.”

  I hopped up on the sink and examined my nails. “I’ve got all the time in the world.”

  “Fine! Fine. Kale heard that I may have had a little incident with a certain female vampire at one of the VERM meetings.”

  “You may have had?”

  “All right, I had, okay? I’m sixteen, willpower isn’t exactly my strong point.”

  “You’re a hundred and thirteen and, technically, my boss.”

  “Are you going to argue what I am and am not, or are you going to help me?”

  “Why do you need me? Can’t you just have someone take her out shopping or something? I mean, Kale has a temper. A bad one.” I shuddered.

  “That’s why I need you.” Vlad’s eyes were so earnest that I couldn’t help but soften to his plight. “You’re magic immune, so if she tries to fry or filet you, nothing will happen.”

  In addition to being one-hundred-percent human and the one and only breather down here in the Underworld, I also have the uncanny ability to not be affected by magic. Though vampire stealth, banshee death screaming, or a witch’s magic might have been more convenient, being immune to the aforementioned fileting and frying had come in handy more times than you’d think.

  “Fine.” I hopped down from my perch and shoved the garbage can away from the door, just before it barreled open and I caught a face full of it.

  “Crap! Nina!”

  Nina’s eyes were wide—coal black, like her nephew’s—and her hand slapped over her open mouth. “Did I get you?”

  “It’s not too bad,” I mumbled.

  She began jumping up and down, tiny little soundless hops as vampires have no discernible weight. “So, so, is it true? Is it true?”

  “Is what true?”

  “That you’re going back to high school! You get to relive all your high school fantasies! The football games, being crowned prom queen . . .”

  “It’
s refreshing to know that in the eight years we’ve lived and worked together, you haven’t retained a single memory about my high school torment. Or, as I like to call them, The Dark Years. No football games, no prom queen. No twirling memories.”

  Nina rolled her eyes. “I know, I know—it was all bullies, headgear, and a grannie that played mahjongg with a pixie. Boohoo. Some of us didn’t even have that.”

  I took Nina in and felt no sympathy for her. She was tall and ballerina slim with glossy black hair that hung down her back in gorgeous waves that nipped at her tiny waist. Her eyes were wide and deep set; her nose was a cute little ski jump, and her lips—ruby red and pursed right now—were perfect and heart shaped with a pronounced cupid’s bow that led men to stare and follow. Where my legs were stumpy and shoved in tights like sausage casings, hers were long and toned, her marble skin exposed and completely flawless.

  And, as a vampire, she would forever remain that way.

  In addition to being that frustratingly flawless, Nina is my office mate, my roommate, and my very best friend. She also happens to have the fashion prowess of every dead couture designer in the world, and fangs that could shred a grown man to ribbons should she have the inkling to do so (or wasn’t bound by UDA-V bylaw not to). But right now, she was really pissing me off.

  “I kind of hate you right now.”

  Her black eyes skipped over my full sink, up to my pink cheeks, to the damp paper towel I was pressing against my forehead.

  “You couldn’t make the rent without me. So, spill. I need all the details.” She hopped up on the counter and positioned herself with her back against the mirror, legs stretched out on the granite. She glanced over her shoulder at her non-reflection, bared her fangs and smoothed her hair.

  “Can you actually see anything in there?”

  “No.” She produced a lip-gloss from some secret spy pocket sewn into her vintage couture—this one, I knew, was a Gaultier—and pursed her lips, doing a perfect gloss job. “But old habits die hard.”

  Seeing as the last time Nina was able to see her reflection petticoats and powdered wigs were in fashion, the “old habits” quip struck me. My “old habit”—a perfectly pointy love triangle that included a delicious fallen angel and a just-as-enticing Guardian—was something I hoped to put to rest as soon as possible.

  God, I hoped I never came back to life.

  “Sampson is making me relive this hell.”

  “Relive? Hell? You have an amazing opportunity, Soph.”

  I groaned. “I know, I know, prom queen.”

  “Don’t be silly; you’re not prom queen material.”

  Um, thanks?

  “What I mean is, you have this amazing opportunity to mold young minds. To really make an impression on these girls.” She stuck out her lower lip. “I need some sort of legacy like that. Something to leave behind.”

  “You’re immortal. You are the legacy.”

  Nina shrugged, appeased, and went on. “You’ll be immortal, too—through these girls. Think about it: they’ll carry the memory of Ms. Lawson with them for the rest of their lives.”

  My stomach lurched and bile rose at the back of my throat. “For the rest of their lives?”

  They could remember my phenomenal failure for the rest of their lives.

  “I don’t think I can do this.”

  “Can we get back to me, please?” Vlad wailed from the toilet seat he was sitting on.

  Nina cocked a brow at me. “What’s he doing in here?” Then, to Vlad, “What are you doing in here?” She waved her hand at him when he tried to answer. “Never mind. Kale’s looking for you.” She turned her eyes back to me—intense, fixed. “And you have to do this. A girl’s life depends on it. Your life depends on it. And besides, you get to do a little ‘Hot for Teacher’ with Alex in the teacher’s lounge.”

  My spine straightened and something zoomed through me, landing solidly in my nether regions. Alex—fallen angel, delicious, earth-bound detective and me in the teacher’s lounge? Maybe there was an up side to this thing.

  “You didn’t tell her where I was, did you?” Vlad wanted to know.

  I chewed the inside of my cheek. “Yeah, well Alex and I seem to be a little less ‘Hot for Teacher,’ a little more ‘Me, Myself and I.’”

  Nina frowned. Do over, she silently mouthed.

  “Did you tell Kale where I was?” Vlad shouted, stomping across the restroom’s pink tiles.

  Nina glared at him, her eyes narrowed and nearly flaming. “No. But I’m thinking I should, you dirty little undead Hugh Hefner. How dare you cheat on Kale!”

  “Allegedly.”

  Nina cocked an eyebrow and I got out from in between them, fairly certain that at some point, lightning bolts would start shooting from her eyes or fangs would sink into undead flesh. Suddenly, a Mercy High coven and a possible kidnapper/murderer on the loose didn’t seem quite so terrifying.

  “Allegedly?” Nina spat. “You’ve got two options, Vlad. Take your chances with her or take your chances with me.”

  Vlad widened his stance and narrowed his eyes at his aunt, whose glare was still stone cold. They stared like that for a full, silent beat before Vlad huffed and went for the door. “At least I know Kale won’t behead me in my sleep.”

  “And don’t you forget it!” Nina yelled at the closing door. When she turned her eyes to me, she grinned. “I can’t believe you get a do-over. I mean, I get a lot, but you! You’re, you know, you!”

  “I’m investigating a past murder and the disappearance of another girl and whether or not a new coven is responsible. I’m not going all Never Been Kissed, Neens. This is serious.”

  “Ohmigawd!” Nina clapped a dainty hand over her open mouth. “How completely adorbs would it be if, during all the doom and gloom of your stupid detective work, you totally fall for the music teacher or something?”

  “Nina . . .”

  “Fine. The Spanish teacher, whatever.” Her eyes had gone glassy and she was fluttering around the bathroom, apparently lost in some sort of in-her-head musical soundtrack. “And you’d get your first kiss out on the football field in front of everyone!”

  Now I was snarling. “I’ve had my first kiss. I’ve gone all the way—you know that.”

  “Half this floor knows that.”

  I narrowed my eyes, hopeful they were shooting daggers. Nina might be my very best friend and, she might have the ability to kill me with one soft press of her pinkie (or fang), but she was often the most supremely annoying person—undead or otherwise—I’ve ever known.

  “Okay, okay, I’m sorry. I was just having a little fun. Why are you so uptight? It usually takes you, like, ten chapters to get really upset over a murder.”

  I let out a long sigh. “It’s not the murder I’m upset about. I mean, don’t get me wrong. I’m very sorry for the girl who got murdered last year and I will absolutely not stop until we bring Alyssa home safe but, but . . .”

  Nina put a hand on my shoulder and even though it was ice cold, the gesture warmed me. “It’s okay, Soph. Whatever you have to say, it’s okay.”

  “I. Hated. High school.”

  A slick smile made its way across Nina’s perfect porcelain face. “Do over . . .” she sung.

  I bit my bottom lip to stop its trembling and let Nina’s words wash over me. But I couldn’t stop the tears that bubbled and clung to my lower lashes.

  “And . . . you know how I told Alex—I told Alex I loved him?”

  Nina sucked in a deep breath—which was purely for show as vampires don’t breathe. “I’ve heard about it incessantly.”

  “Now I’ve barely heard from him in weeks. Weeks!”

  In my mind, I wear kick-ass black leather and wield a sword while taking down the rogue demons (and occasional big baddie human) in the Underworld. In actuality, I am a blubbering, blotchy-faced mess in the Underworld Detection Agency ladies’ room.

  “It’s probably nothing, Soph. And even if it is, it’s not like he dumped you af
ter you had sex or anything. He dumped you after you told him you loved him. That’s saying something.”

  I crossed my arms in front of my chest and cocked out a hip. “It’s saying what, exactly?”

  I could almost see the cogs in Nina’s head spring into action as her eyes widened. “It says you’re great in the sack.”

  I was about to respond when Nina went back on her dreamy rampage. “Imagine the things you can teach those girls, Sophie.”

  “Really?” I glanced at myself in the mirror, saw my blotchy, snotty reflection staring back at me, and sighed. “I’m somewhere in the neighborhood of thirty living with two vampire roommates, working in an organization that immediately calls me when the toilet roll needs refilling or when a corpse turns up. What, exactly, should I be teaching those girls?”

  Nina opened her mouth, but I stopped her, holding up an index finger. “And don’t say I could teach them about being great in the sack.”

  Chapter Two

  My heart was thundering in my ears even before my clock radio started blaring something awful and upbeat. I sat bolt upright, eyes wide open and feeling like I’d stared at the ceiling all night—mostly because I had. Murder, I could handle. I wasn’t especially fond of it, but I was the kind of girl who found corpses and evil like a Kardashian could find paparazzi and Apple Bottoms jeans. But high school chilled me to the bone.

  I took a leisurely shower, tossing an entire canister of “Soothing Lavender” bath salts over my head hoping for some Prozac-like relief. It made my head feel like a nicely scented gravel pile, which calmed me enough to allow me to remind myself that I was an adult. That I was no longer that horrible-haired, buck-toothed, scared-of-her-own-shadow girl. I was Sophie Lawson and I kicked supernatural—and the occasion natural but unsavory—ass. I was feeling sassy and confident until I caught a glimpse of the clock and stopped dead.

  “Shit!”

  I was an adult Sophie Lawson with a heap of wet spaghetti hair boring a damp spot on the back of my blouse, not a speck of makeup on, and exactly eighteen minutes to make it to my first day at Mercy High. I bit my lip, one foot in the bathroom where pretty, pale pink cheeks, under-eye concealer, and sleek, straight hair lay, the other aiming toward the front door and respectable punctuality.