Dance in Shadow and Whisper (Marionettes of Myth #1)

Chapter Twenty-Three

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

The van coughed and shuddered when Toivo killed the engine. The three of them leaned to the east side of the car, studying the house-turned-gunsmith shop. The structure reminded Toivo of the older, original homes from the early part of the twentieth century, tall and slender and rustic. It was nice, quaint, and simple, in a part of Oakland that wasn't awful, anyway.

He checked Kali's face. She still wasn't quite herself, and he knew she wouldn't be for a while. None of them would.

He still recalled what it felt like when it had happened, the flame that caught the gas leak in his veins when his sixth sense ruptured with dads—he stopped that thought and crammed it to the back of his brain. He had to make sure he and Kali and Carmi stayed together.

He had to hold them together.

He checked the rear view mirror before he popped open his door. "Come on. Let's see if they're willing to take us."

Kali said nothing. Carmi bounced to the edge of the seat and tossed Toivo a pack. They didn't have much in their name, not until they could have safe access to their house, but they at least had some monetary power. A little shopping trip would take care of their meager supplies.

They collected up the stoop steps and Toivo pushed open the door. A bell chimed overhead. He proceeded hesitantly to a desk, avoiding direct eye contact with the display cases and the weapons inside that were no different than the ones that had—no. He stopped himself again.

Elvis's voice filtered out from the hallway behind the front counter. Toivo also picked up tapping on a keyboard and some sort of shuffling that quickly ceased. A woman laughed from deeper in the shop and mumbled something to someone before she called, "Here I come!"

Soft footsteps carried her out to them, but when she emerged, the lingering chuckles faded from her lips. Her face switched to surprise—the kind of surprise that said Toivo and Kali and Carmi weren't her normal clientele. He didn't really suppose they were, not with the aura of death that they dragged around.

And he also wasn't surprised that Yuuhi would send them to an unquestionably attractive woman, with the sun in her copper flesh and honey in her eyes, a curvy frame hidden beneath a ruddy shirt and torn jeans. Even the way her unkempt dark brown hair feathered around her long neck drew him right in.

He tried on a smile, found it didn't quite fit, and settled with, "Someone told us that we'd be safe here."

Her smell was strange. He tested it politely—since outright asking someone their species was bad manners—but he couldn't pinpoint it. She smelled almost demon with the earth in her blood, but there was something else. Something odd. Something smoky, ashy, like a forest crippled by wildfire but swelling with new life by spring.

Carmi stepped up to the counter and stretched his arms across the glass. "We're war refugees. You're pretty."

Her eyebrows shot up. "Not as pretty as your war faces."

Toivo fought the urge to slap his palm to his forehead. Instead, he grabbed Carmi by his hair to drag him away. "And he's trying very hard to hit puberty. Sorry."

Her lips budded with a half smirk. "Then I know better than to believe any schmoozing that comes out of his mouth." The smirk faded as her gaze lifted to Toivo again. "Do you want to sit down first or something?"