Pirate's Alley

“You okay?” He jerked on the passenger-side door and helped me climb in. “You look kind of green.”

 

 

“I’m freezing. Nothing a little heat won’t cure.” Because, I told my body, you are not getting the flu. You have pirates to chase, elven non-husbands to pacify, political shenanigans to avoid.

 

Once inside, Alex ran the defroster and we waited while the layer of ice on the windshield melted enough for the wipers to operate. Within a few minutes of the heater turned on high, I’d finally begun to thaw, my energy flooding back with a gratifying rush.

 

I’d never again make fun of this behemoth of an SUV, even if I did need a ladder and an altitude-sickness potion to climb in it. It was big and heavy, had heated leather seats, and its vents shot out enough warm air to melt the snow that had frozen into crystals on our eyelashes and hair.

 

“I can’t believe Rand went out in this mess.” I reached over and brushed ice off Alex’s shoulder. Even Mr. Hot-Blooded Shifter had pulled a leather jacket out of the backseat and put it on. I wiped the cold water off on the leg of his jeans, earning a playful swat.

 

“I would say Randolph is a horse’s ass, but that would be unfair to the horse.” Alex pulled carefully out of his parking space and inched through the Quarter. “I’m gonna stick to the main roads just in case there are other idiots out here who’ve plowed a trail. I can’t see the edges of the street.”

 

We maneuvered the pinball arcade of Canal Street, filled with abandoned cars and people who’d parked on the neutral grounds like they did when they expected a flood, and headed to Uptown along St. Charles Avenue. Alex navigated the curving road by aiming the SUV at the midpoint between the ancient snow-laden live oaks lining both sides of the street and using the overhead streetcar electrical lines running through the middle of the neutral ground to stay on course.

 

Finally, we cut over toward Magazine Street, dodging stalled vehicles. Alex lurched to a stop by letting the truck slide its right front tire against the curb in front of Eugenie’s house—at least we assumed it was a curb.

 

The house was a big, solid early-century Victorian painted light blue, with cream-colored hurricane shutters, a broad front porch ringed by a gingerbread rail, and a side entrance for her Shear Luck salon. The porch light was on, and through the thick fall of snow and ice I saw a dark lump near the door, but no sign of Rand. Maybe he’d left a package and gone home like a good elf.

 

The snow here was deeper, up to my knees, so I waited for Alex and his long legs to blaze a trail to the house and I followed in his wake.

 

“What the hell?” Alex’s voice took on its gruff enforcer tone.

 

I couldn’t see around him until he got up the stairs, and I realized the big dark lump on the porch was covered in fur. “Is it a dog? Must be a stray, poor thing.”

 

He bumped the lump with the toe of his boot, and it rolled over. “No, it’s an elf in a fur coat.”

 

Rand’s eyes were open just enough to be covered in ice crystals and look creepy as hell. He would be a perfect elven mortuary display. “Is he dead?”

 

I hope my words didn’t sound like wishful thinking, because while I wanted Rand to leave me alone, I didn’t want him dead. His bonding scheme had almost gotten me killed, but it also had kept me from turning loup-garou. We could probably be of help to each other if he’d get over the notion that we were married. The very mistaken notion, at least in any real sense of the word.

 

There was also the possibility that if Rand died, it might kill me as well because of the bond, so I had a practical reason for wanting him alive.

 

“He’s not dead,” Alex said after spending a few seconds with two fingers placed over Rand’s carotid artery, assuming that’s what elves had. “I think he’s just unconscious. Call Eugenie and tell her to open the door; if we knock, she’s gonna think it’s him and not answer.”

 

I placed the call, and in a few seconds the dead bolt clicked, the scrape of a chain latch sounded, and Eugenie pulled open the heavy cypress door, wielding a butcher knife. She looked from Alex to me and, finally, down at Rand.

 

“Is he dead?”

 

Okay, Eugenie definitely sounded hopeful.

 

“No, he’s sleeping off his stored fat, like a bear in hibernation,” I said, looking down. He didn’t have an ounce of fat on him.

 

“Let me drag him in,” Alex said, grabbing Rand’s ankles and pulling him toward the doorway. His head bounced on the rough wood.

 

“Good grief, Alex. You’re a shifter. Pick him up.” It wasn’t the same as little ole weakling me dragging two hundred pounds of Jean Lafitte across a field in Vampyre, which had given new meaning to dead weight.

 

Suzanne Johnson's books