“A meeting with the Voodoo Queens.”
The Voodoo Queens—one of the most powerful gangs in the Bahamas, led by Satra James, quite likely the richest and most dangerous female smuggler in the world. The Queens run their own type of magic contraband called obi up the coast to the highest bidder, a syrupy elixir that renders the user almost catatonic, floating in a strange, haunting world between dreams and nightmares. I’ve never touched the stuff, but more adventurous Shaw boys say obi lets you see ghosts. That the product only survives the trip across the sea because Satra’s gang has made a deal with death and has trapped damned souls inside their bottles. There was a day I’d laugh that off, but now my job is believing there’s truth inside every rumor. McEvoy has had a corner on their US market for years, from what I learned through the Unit. I also know that the Queens won’t hesitate to use dark magic in their dealings too—when the situation calls for it.
“Are some of the other Shaws joining us?” I ask quietly.
“No,” McEvoy says, throwing me a glance. “It’s just me and you.”
Just me and you echoes through the silence of McEvoy’s car on the Highway Bridge, follows me like a warning bell right out of town. Why don’t we have backup?
Maybe McEvoy wants to flirt with death.
Or maybe that’s not really where we’re going.
Maybe he saw me meeting with Agent Frain.
Maybe he plans to get rid of me, nice and discreet.
The silence becomes suffocating as we take the highway past Annapolis, get off a few exits later, and the exit curves us onto a two-lane road. We follow the road until it becomes stones and dirt, and then pull down a dark drive labeled DONOVAN SHIPPING YARD. The drive soon brings us alongside shallow water. A graveyard of boats, cloaked in the shadows of their storm-beaten sails, rest like long-forgotten tombstones on the edges of the docks.
“This is where we’re meeting the Queens?” I gulp the panic down, keep my eyes trained on my window.
“We all thought somewhere private was best . . . away from prying eyes.”
McEvoy parks the car in one of the spaces in front of the boat shack. The place looks closed, maybe even abandoned—just a battered door and covered windows. He shuts off the engine, gets out, and I follow suit. We wait in silence in the frigid air on the nearest empty dock, which juts out a few feet into the dark water.
Finally a faint humming in the distance starts to tease at my ears.
“Must be them.” McEvoy walks to the dock’s edge. He pulls his coat collar around his neck, waves his other arm back and forth above his head, and then a motorized boat, maybe twenty feet long, emerges out of the gray, ropy mist like a mirage.
As the boat gets closer to the shore, its engine cuts and it begins floating toward us. Inside the boat sit three women, all long-limbed, straight-backed, poised as statues. The one in front—Satra, I’m guessing—turns the engine back on and carefully guides the boat alongside our dock. McEvoy and I lean down to tie it off. And then the two of us extend a hand to help the Queens onto the dock.
“A pleasure as always, Satra.” McEvoy smiles and kisses the woman’s hand.
“Likewise, Erwin.” Satra is tall and thin, younger, prettier, than I imagined. She wears loose-fitting trousers, a salt-laced blouse, clothes that carry the wear and tear of a smuggler’s life.
Two slight young things, her magic protection, I’m guessing, get off the boat behind her. They wear their hair in small braids, arranged and tied into complicated knots that rest like sculptures above their heads.
I’ve got talent, but I’m outnumbered. And island sorcerers are a different breed. Island sorcerers can call ghosts and spirits into their rituals. Rumors are that they can climb into your soul, turn you inside out, with magic.
If things go south, can I protect McEvoy?
Hell, can I protect myself?
“Apologies for picking a place in the middle of nowhere, but I’m sure you understand my desire to keep things”—McEvoy struggles to find the right word—“unassuming. You have trouble finding it?”
Satra shrugs and puts her hands in her pockets. “It was easy enough from Magic Row. The rest of my crew is still parked out there. Took the cutter in to find you.” She gestures behind her. “My associates took care of evading your country’s pigs.”
McEvoy sniffs in the frigid air. “Well, I’m here, Satra, and it’s cold.” His eyes flicker to the two sorcerers standing behind Satra. “You said you needed to ask in person. So ask away.”
Wait, so Satra called this meeting? Why?
“Sorry it had to come to this, Erwin. We go back a long time.”
“Way back. From my days in the coast guard.”
“And our history is the only reason I’m granting you this courtesy.” Satra stands feet away from McEvoy, sizing him up. “Because in all that time, you’ve never tried to trick me, one-up me. Lie.”