Obsidian Butterfly

"Do you have a problem with us hunting down and killing a god from your pantheon?"

A look crossed her face that I didn't understand. "If it is a god, then you ca

It was kind of fu

She gave me a long look, and I knew what she wanted, but … "You are indeed a goddess, but I ca

"His power is lust, and you deny him his power."

I felt the heat rush up my face and wondered what a blush looked like with glowing black eyes. It wasn't what she'd said. It was me knowing what she'd seen in my head. She knew more intimate details than my best friend. Just as I'd shared what she and Pinotl considered a very private and intimate moment of their sharing. Fair is fair, but somehow I didn't think Itzpapalotl blushed.

"I thought I was just denying him sex."

She looked at me the way you'd look a child that was deliberately misunderstanding a point. "Tell me, Anita, what is the base of my power?"

The question surprised me, but I answered it; the time for lying between us was past. "Power, you feed off of pure power regardless of the source."

She smiled, and that thread of power in me smiled with her, made me feel glowy all over. "Now, what is your master's base of power?"

I'd been ru

"Anita," she said, as if reminding me that I was supposed to be saying something.

"Sex, his base of power is sex," I said.

Again, she smiled happily at me, and I felt that warm answering glow. It was good to be truthful. It was good to be smart. It was good to please her. And that of course was one of her dangers. If you stayed near her long enough, it might become an end in itself to please her. Even thinking it, I couldn't be afraid of her. Good that I didn't live in Albuquerque.

"By denying him and your wolf, you cripple not just the triad of power, but him. You have crippled him, Anita. You have crippled your master."

I heard myself say, "I'm sorry."

"It is not me that you must be sorry to. It is him. Go home and beg his forgiveness, lay yourself at his feet and feed his power."

I closed my eyes, because what I really wanted to do was nod and just agree. I was pretty sure the spell would wear off before I got home to St. Louis, but putting this woman and Jean-Claude together as a team would have been my undoing. Even now, I was glad he was hundreds of miles away, because I nodded, eyes still closed.

She took the nod as assent. "Good, very good. If your master is grateful for my aid in this matter, let him contact me. I know that we can come to an understanding."

And for the first time since she'd zapped me, I felt a thrill of fear. I looked at her through a veil of her power and was afraid of her.

She read it in me. "You should always be afraid of gods, Anita. If you are not afraid, then you are a fool and you are not a fool." She looked past me to Ramirez. "I believe that I have helped you all that I can, Detective Ramirez."

He said, "Anita?"

I nodded. "Yeah, it's time to go see Nicky Baco."

"If Nicky lied to us, then so did his pack leader," Edward said, "because he said Nicky was telling the truth about not knowing where the monster was."

"If Nicky can share this kind of power with the werewolves, then I know why the pack lied."

"The werewolves will fight to protect Nicky," Edward said.

We looked at each other. "It'll be a blood bath if the police go in force." I shook my head. "But what choice do we have?"

"Nicky isn't at the bar," Ramirez said.

We turned to him, said in unison, "Where is he?"

"In the hospital. Someone beat the shit out of him."

Edward and I exchanged glances, and we both smiled. "Back to the hospital, then," I said.

He nodded. "Back to the hospital."

I looked at Ramirez. "If that's all right with you?"

"Can you prove what you've been saying about Baco?" he asked.

"Yes," I said.

"Then it's a death sentence. He'll know that. I've seen Baco in an interrogation. He's tough, and he knows that he has nothing to gain and everything to lose by telling us the truth."

"Then we'll have to find something that he's more afraid of than being executed." I couldn't help it. I turned and looked at Itzpapalotl. I met her eyes and there was no pull to them now. Her own power protected me from her. No stars, no endless night, just a dark knowledge of what I was thinking, and her approval of the plan.

"We can't do anything illegal," Ramirez said.

"Of course not," I said.

"I mean it, Anita."

I looked at him, and watched him flinch when he met my eyes, "Would I do that to you?"

He searched my face as if trying to decipher it. It was the way I looked at Edward sometimes, or Jean-Claude. Finally, he said, "I don't know what you'd do." And that, for better or worse, was the truth.

53

EDWARD GOT HIS SUNGLASSES out of the glove compartment and handed them to me before we went inside the hospital. My eyes hadn't changed back, though I knew the effect was begi

Nicky Baco was not in a private room. The police had his roommate moved to a different room. Nicky was in traction, and wasn't going anywhere. He lay in the bed and looked smaller than I knew he was. The leg that had been badly broken was in a cast from toe to thigh. Little pulleys and cords held his leg up at an odd angle that must have been hell on the back.

Ramirez had been questioning Nicky for about thirty minutes and was getting nowhere. Edward and I leaned against the wall and watched the show. But Nicky had done exactly what we'd feared he'd do. He'd grasped his situation and his options right away. He was going to die. So why should he help us?

"We know where the monster you made is, Nicky. We know what you did. Help us stop this thing before it kills again."

"And what?" Nicky said. "I know the law. There's no life in prison for a witch that uses magic to kill. It's an automatic death sentence. You got nothing to offer me, Ramirez."

I pushed away from the wall and touched Ramirez's arm. He looked at me, and the frustration was already showing. He'd been informed that Lieutenant Marks was on the way. He wanted to crack Baco before Marks arrived so he would get credit and not his lieutenant. Political, but the reality in most police work.

"Can I ask a few questions, Detective?"

He took a breath, let it out slow. "Sure." He stepped back to let me stand beside the bed.

I looked down at Nicky. Someone had handcuffed one of his wrists to the bed rail. I wasn't sure it was necessary with the traction, but it made a nice point. "What would the Red Woman's Husband do if he knew you gave away his secret hideout?"

He stared up at me, and even through the sunglasses I could see the hate in his eyes. I could also see the fast rise and fall of his chest, the thud of the pulse in his neck. He was scared.

"Answer me, Nicky."

"He'd kill me."

"How?"

That made him frown. "What do you mean, how?"

"I mean what method of death would he use? How would he kill you?"

Nicky shifted in the bed, trying to find a comfortable spot. The leg pulled tight, and he jerked on the handcuffed wrist, making it rattle up and down the bar. There was no comfortable position for Nicky tonight.