L. BANKS - Cursed To Death

“I was losing my mind.” He looked at her without an apology in his eyes. “Truth.”

“Yeah… you were,” she said with a slight half smile.

“It’s still there, you know,” he said without a trace of humor in his expression. “Just not as acute, and requiring a great deal of concentration to keep it at bay.”

“Oh… I’m sorry, I just thought… Never mind.”

Hunter nodded. “But that does make me feel better, just knowing that in the shadow lands I have some measure of restraint. The more I think about it, before, when the contagion hit, shifting through the borders of dimensions made the virus spike in my system, so perhaps this is something else.”

“In here,” she admitted, “I’m not as angry…” Sasha lifted her hair up off her neck. “Did you notice last night, every time we went into the shadows, we might have been fighting, but we seemed to get clear once we came out?”

Hunter just nodded and stared at her.

Clarissa held her cell phone away from her ear as the others in their ragtag, human-wolf combo squad watched her try to calm Ethan down.

“Ethan, Ethan,” Clarissa soothed, “they are investigating, and uh, they will be back soon-you know Sasha and Hunter are on top of it.”

Woods almost spit out his coffee as Bradley slapped his forehead. Winters snickered and just shook his head while both Shadow Wolves sat stone-faced, drinking their coffee and staring out the window. Clarissa gave the guys who were smirking the evil eye, telling them with colorful hand signals to knock it off.

“Why don’t you tell ol’ Ethan the truth, ’Rissa,” Fisher said, shoveling eggs into his mouth with a wide grin. “The big guy got horn-”

Bear Shadow’s grip on the front of Fisher’s t-shirt stopped his comedic banter.

“That’s my sister,” Crow Shadow warned with a growl. “Be cool up in this diner, and any family business stays family business-understood, familiar?”

“You didn’t have to get personal and call me a familiar, man. I was just joking around.” Fisher yanked out of Bear Shadow’s hold and stuffed a piece of bacon into his mouth. “Could everybody just chill out and eat? My bad, all right?” he said, chewing, which made both wolves visibly relax.

Bradley leaned forward, lowering his voice, glancing around the table while Clarissa continued to try to appease Ethan on the phone. “But don’t you think all of this is a little strange?”

“What’s strange?” Bear Shadow said with a low growl. “Ardent affection toward one’s mate in season is natural.” He shoveled a large forkful of sausage into his mouth, followed by a healthy hunk of pancakes. “It is the way of the wolf, human. You wouldn’t understand.”

Ignoring the affront to his human heritage, Bradley pressed on. “You two have not been able to normalize your eyes since Hunter came out of The Fair Lady. That’s not normal. Ethan’s glamour was completely gone when I went back in to get directions to this diner.” Bradley stopped speaking as the waitress came over to refresh everyone’s coffee.

“Pardon me, but can I ask y’all a question?” their waitress said with a bright smile. She tossed her loose blond curls over her shoulder, openly flirting with Woods.

Woods smiled, as did every male at the table. “Shoot… but only with a very small-caliber weapon.”

The young woman giggled and poured coffee all around. “I was wondering if there was one of those conventions in town, you know those science fiction kinds of things where people dress up? I know we get all kinds for Mardi Gras… but you fellas have the wolf-eyes contact lenses in, and a little earlier there were some real handsome gentlemen with long hair and bows and arrows and multicolored contact lenses in… but I never knew you could get the kind that changed colors depending on how the light hit-and they had the ears, too,” she said laughing, gesturing to her own to describe how the ones she’d seen had been pointed. “I’ve always wanted to go to one of the cons, I guess they’re called… Are they fun?”

Stunned silent for an awkward few moments, no one spoke. Finally Bradley piped up to cover for the group. “It’s actually being held in Houston and all of us are just passing through… but they are fun. If they have one here next year, you should go.”

“I think I will,” she said brightly. “Thanks, guys!”

Fisher and Crow Shadow got up from the table.

“Reconnaissance,” Fisher said. “Gotta get a visual.”

Crow Shadow nodded. “Definitely.”

Clarissa covered the receiver with her hand, and then quickly got off her cell phone with Ethan. “Call you back.”

No one spoke until the two soldiers returned, shaking their heads.

“Dudes were probably long gone,” Fisher said, sliding into his seat.

Crow Shadow confirmed Fisher’s assessment. “No fresh scent of Fae.”

“But did you hear that?” Bradley hissed in an urgent whisper, looking around five ways.

“The Fae glamour isn’t holding in the streets-normal humans like me and Winters, and, and that waitress saw Fae archers ?” Bradley took an agitated slurp of his coffee as Bear Shadow and Crow Shadow leaned in closer. “Now tell me that’s the way of the wolf. Something really freaky is going on and I don’t think we’ve been fully briefed.”

“I thought it was just me, just second sight kicking in stronger this time for some reason,” Clarissa said as she glanced around the table. “But Ethan is also wigging out and won’t say what he needs to speak to Sasha and Hunter about.”

Woods’s line of vision was still on the retreating waitress’s butt, however. “She sure is a pretty young thing, though.”

Bear and Crow pounded each other’s fists as Fisher nodded and released a low whistle of appreciation.

“Is it just me, or do you guys with a little canine in you seem to be inordinately preoccupied with tail?” Bradley folded his arms over his chest, drawing snarls. “Seriously. Plus, we’re told to sit outside of The Fair Lady for over an hour with no explanation. Something went down. It’s clear from the little bit of Clarissa’s conversation I could hear that something else happened at Ethan’s establishment-something he’s not willing to discuss with us, and our fearless leaders are AWOL. All of this is just a little coincidental for my liking.”

“Dudes,” Winters said, his gaze ricocheting around the group, “not being judgmental but, you all have been a little extra… just a tad over the top. Like, on edge.”

Clarissa nodded and then closed her eyes. “Winters is Winters, Bradley is Bradley… I’m all right.” She opened her eyes. “But anyone with some paranormal in their DNA just feels a little off center, energy wise. I can’t explain it.”

“Do you think that’s what hit our alpha, some funky mojo?” Fisher said, wiping egg yolk off his plate with his toast and then stuffing it into his mouth. He held up his hands when Crow Shadow snarled at him. “Hey, hey, hey, I’m trying to be sure that everything is cool. I admit, I wasn’t feeling altogether a-okay when the big guy came out of the bar.”

“Honesty will keep us all alive if something untoward is happening all around us,” Clarissa said, giving Fisher a high five. “Talk to me. When Hunter exited The Fair Lady, what did you notice?”

“Aw, man, it’s personal,” Fisher said, taking a big slurp of coffee. “Let’s just say I was really hungry and cannot wait for this party in a few nights.”

“Woods?” She stared at him, but his gaze was still fixated on the blond’s backside.

“Yeah. Me, too,” Woods muttered, not looking at Clarissa as he spoke. “I definitely need to walk the dog tonight. I won’t last three days.”