“You don’t have to—”
“Pshaw,” she said, waving a spatula at me while peering into my fridge. “I didn’t eat breakfast because I was thinking of fasting, but you have mushrooms and peppers, and an omelet sounds divine right about now. Cheese or no cheese?”
I lifted an eyebrow, and after a moment’s struggle, gave in to the inevitable. Teresita in full force was like a bulldozer, simply plowing the path she’d chosen without regard to anyone else’s plan. “Definitely cheese. Thank you for the latte. Don’t forget to wash everything before you use it. And your hands. And the counter could probably use another wipe again before you chop things. Oh, the cutting board was sterilized, but you could always give it a wash, too. I’ll be back shortly.”
“I will wash all the things because I know how you are. Take your time. Oooh, pepperoni! Oh, it’s made with turkey. Blech. Veggie omelet it is.”
Twenty minutes later I emerged from my bedroom on a cloud of steam, clean, properly clothed, the latte consumed, and most of my brain cells now functioning.
“This looks lovely,” I told Teresita as we sat on my tiny balcony and shared an omelet, English muffins, and a bowl of green grapes. “Did you wash the grapes?”
“Yes.”
“With the veggie wash?”
“You know that stuff is bad for you, right?”
“Not as bad as E. coli and other things you can get from unwashed fruits and vegetables.” I took a bite of the omelet and sighed happily. “This is delicious. I didn’t think I was hungry, but, boy, I’m downright famished.”
“Of course you are. You’re a badass dragon hunter now. That has to burn a whole lot more calories than just a schoolteacher. How’s your arm?”
“Oddly fine. In fact, better than fine.” I held out my arm to show her. “It’s totally healed. Not even a mark to show where Helen chomped on me.”
“Wow.” Teresita gave me a hard look. “You really are a superhero now.”
“I’d scoff at you, but it’s rude to scoff at anyone who just made you food.”
“Dead right. Okay, let’s get this show under way.” She pulled out a tablet of paper and pen, and started writing. “Number one: figure out who killed your sister, and why. Number two: find the woman on the run from the bad ex. Number three—”
“Wait a minute,” I said, pushing back my now empty plate. “What’s this about finding Helen’s killer?”
Both of her perfectly sculpted eyebrows rose. “You don’t mean to say you don’t care who killed your sister.”
“Of course not! I care very much. I want whoever did it to be punished. But it’s not anyone…you know…normal.”
“Mortal, you mean? That’s the term your sister used.”
“Normal,” I argued. “My sister was mortal, although she wasn’t quite…normal.”
“I don’t know,” Teresita said, tapping the pen on her chin as she thought. “Wouldn’t you say you were immortal if you could come back?”
“Maybe. I guess so. Oh, I don’t know. The point is, no person in their right mind killed Helen. It had to be someone different. Someone who was weird.”
“Like she was?” Teresita’s eyebrows rose even higher, and I flushed with embarrassment.
“Helen wasn’t weird. She just marched to the beat of her own drummer. We both did. According to my therapist, that was our coping mechanism, our way to keep structure in lives that were filled with chaos and turmoil. If we weren’t a part of it, then we weren’t emotional hostages to my mother’s abuses.”
Teresita gave a little shrug. “That’s not what I was talking about. Your sister was half-dragon, half-demon, and one hundred percent badass. She had a sword, for freakin’ sake. Where is it, by the way?”
“Back where she died.” I grabbed our empty plates and carried them into the kitchen. Now that I’d had caffeine and food, I felt oddly restless, filled with a strange energy and need to be doing something. Making a list wasn’t a bad idea, but I wanted to be acting rather than just planning.
“Why did you leave it there?” Teresita looked oddly distressed. “Out where anyone and their brother could take it?”
“I doubt if anyone is going to be lurking behind a derelict strip mall,” I said, scrubbing the dishes and sink. “Except maybe deranged heroin addicts, but I can’t imagine even them wanting to hang out back there. It was seriously rancid, Teresita.”
“We’ll make getting it first, then. Number zero: go to Fashion Armadillo and fetch the fancy sword.” Teresita made a note on her tablet.
“Maybe it’s better left there,” I suggested. “Where no one can find it, and I can’t hurt anyone with it, I mean.”
Teresita gave me a stern look. “Have you forgotten your promise to help that battered woman?”
“No, but—”
“You need the sword. Your sister said so. Plus, it might help us to examine the area where she died. How else are we going to find out who killed her?”
“I thought about hiring a private detective. One who’s used to dragon hunters, assuming there is such a thing. Regardless, going back to that wretched strip mall isn’t going to help.”
“You never know.” She consulted her watch. “If we get going now, we can be back to hunt for the lady and her kids. Did you look at your sister’s phone?”
“No.” The memory of the phone call from the evening before haunted my waking thoughts as they had those in my sleep. “I had a…disturbing call last night.”
“Who from?”
“I don’t know. Some man who seemed to know that Helen was gone and that I had her phone.”
“Was he a heavy breather? Was he one of those phone sex pervs?” Teresita hoisted her gym bag. “You know you can block their number, right?”
I retold the conversation, adding, “That man seriously messed with my head. Even his voice sounded…evil.”
“Ugh.” Teresita thought for a moment, then whapped me on the arm with her notebook. “Do you think he killed your sister?”
“I don’t know.” I avoided thinking too much about that. I was still caught in an emotional tangle of grieving for a lost sister and hope that she would, in fact, come back into my life. It was a strange combination, one that left me feeling as if the ground beneath my feet was uneven. “I assume either he did, or someone he knew did, because how else would he know that I wasn’t Helen when I answered the phone?”
Teresita’s eyes widened. “Ooh, good point. What are you going to do about it?”
I loaded the dishwasher with our dishes, grabbed a couple of disinfectant counter wipes, and wiped off the counters, stove, and assorted other surfaces. “About the phone call and threat? Nothing. I promised Helen I would help this woman, and I will. If I can. The problem is, I don’t know where to start, short of going up and down every street in town asking if anyone is in trouble.”
“I have it!” Teresita said suddenly, snapping her fingers and pointing at me. “John and Aspen!”
“Who?”
“John and Aspen Fuller. You remember them—my mom used them to buy her house.”
“Oh, the real estate agents? What about them?”
“They handle rental properties as well as sales. Mom says Aspen told her they have fingers in all sorts of pies. And since they are the only real estate agents in town, I just bet you they would be able to tell us where this desperate woman and her kids settle.”
I rubbed the back of my neck, wishing absently I’d gotten more sleep. I felt distinctly out of sorts, both wired up and exhausted at the same time. “I don’t know…”
“What?” Teresita asked, her hands on her hips. “Why not?”
“For one, I don’t like them. They’re big in that creepy church over on Sparrow Avenue.” That slipped out before I realized it. Immediately, I apologized. “Sorry, Teresita. I didn’t mean your church was creepy, per se—”
She waved away my embarrassment before it had time to really take hold. “Don’t worry about it. We stopped going to the Ch
urch of the Mortified Flesh of the Anguished Witness after just a few visits. They didn’t ever seem to have regular worship hours and always seemed to be kind of put out when we’d show up on a Sunday morning. Plus Dan didn’t care for John Fuller, and you know me—I was a good Catholic girl until I took that comparative religions class in college that opened my eyes and had me running to atheism. Besides, their church had a seriously bad vibe about it. Aspen says it used to be a funeral home.”
“Bad juju all around,” I agreed.
“However,” she continued, frowning when I wiped down the counters a second time, “Aspen is chatty as all get-out, and I just bet you she would know if there were any new renters in town.”
“I guess we could ask her.” I threw the wipes into the trash, contemplated taking it down to the bin behind the building, but decided there was nothing in it but a few eggshells, and those weren’t going to contaminate anything. I washed my hands, adding, “I have no idea what sort of excuse I’m going to make for knocking at some woman’s door and asking if she has left a man who beat her up, though.”
“Eh,” she said, waving a hand. “We’ll worry about that when we get there.”
“You know how I hate that,” I grumbled, gathering up my wallet and keys, and following her to the door. “It doesn’t hurt to have things planned out in advance.”
“You seriously need some spontaneity in your life, sister.”
“Are you kidding? Spontaneity turned me into a mythical monster. I think that’s enough for one day.”
The drive out to the strip mall didn’t take long, and Teresita chatted the entire way out about a brave new life she envisioned for us, one where we battled evil and rescued the worthy. I let her ramble, being mostly focused on just what on earth I was doing even thinking I could fulfill the promise I had made to Helen.
I wasn’t a superhero, the animal in my brain yelled. No matter what Helen said, I was just me, an average person with a whole lot of anxiety, a desire to write a book, and a natural talent for mathematics. That was Veronica James to a tee, and nowhere in a description of me could the words badass dragon woman be found.
“—and once they finally make a movie about us, Salma Hayek can play me—or do you think I should go with Jennifer Lopez?—and we’ll find some cute white girl for your part. Someone a little quirky. Maybe that woman who does all those impressions on Saturday Night Live—ugh. Is this the place?”
I had pulled around to the entrance of the alley that ran behind the strip mall, unable to go farther because of the massive, rusted shape of a long-abandoned dumpster. I couldn’t see beyond it to where I had found Helen, but just the sight of the bulky metal shape brought a flood of emotions. I sat staring at the dumpster, the memories of the day before all too real.
“Hey, girl, you okay?” Teresita asked.
I pulled myself back from the mental abyss and let out a long, shuddering breath. “Yeah. Just a little…It’s all so fresh in my mind.”
She unbuckled her seat belt and leaned over to give me an awkward hug. “I’m sorry, Ronnie. I should have thought how hard this would be for you. If you like, I’ll go find your sword.”
“No, it’s okay. I can do this.” I summoned up what I fervently hoped was a smile that imparted bravery, although to be honest, I’d settle for confidence. “It’s just a place, and I don’t believe in ghosts.”
“Oooh.” Her eyes opened wide. “I wonder if they are real, too?”
“I hope not. I’m about at the limit of impossible things to believe before breakfast.”
She was silent for a moment, then gave me a pat on the arm. “How about I stay here in the car and let you have a few moments by yourself with your memories.”
“You’re a remarkably good friend,” I told her; then before I could think about it anymore, I got out of the car and moved around the large dumpster. Ahead of me were several smaller dumpsters, and the same assorted broken crates, torn boxes, and assorted garbage strewn along the entire back side of the building. I picked my way across the rotting debris from someone’s fast food meal and tried to find the exact spot where Helen had sat slumped.
A glint of metal caught my eye from under a flattened cardboard box. I started toward it, saying under my breath, “There you are,” when a shadow moved from behind the overturned dumpster beyond. A man moved forward and reached for the sword.
My sword. A surprising surge of possessiveness rose in me at the sight of the man near it. Helen had said it was bound to me, and yet now this stranger was clearly going to take it. As if he had the right! Blithely, I ignored the fact that I hadn’t wanted the sword to the point where I had left it discarded in a pile of trash, and rushed forward to snatch it from him. “Hey! That’s mine!”
The man grabbed the sword before my fingers could close around it. “No, it’s not.”
I didn’t think through what happened next. I see that now—my brain didn’t have time to actually pause and consider a reasonable plan of action. Instead, something inside, some instinct that I didn’t know I possessed, suddenly kicked into high gear, and I leaped forward onto the man, one arm around his neck, wrenching him to the side in a move that would have done a martial arts master proud.
Unfortunately, the sword stealer wasn’t as impressed as I was by my newfound prowess. Before I could even wonder at my strange new braveness, an anvil hit me in the middle of my chest and sent me flying backward to the building’s wall.
Only it wasn’t an anvil; it was my attacker. And that’s when I got a good look at him. “It’s you!” I gasped, most of my breath knocked out of me by the blow. “You bastard!”
A sound similar to a roar emerged from me as I threw myself on my new neighbor while he was in the process of picking up the sword. He stumbled backward a few steps, then went down with me riding him like he was a rented mule. I grabbed his hair and slammed his head onto the filthy broken pavement.
His eyes were green, a pale, washed green like sea glass, but suddenly, the shape of his pupils changed, elongating a bit, and little flecks of green light formed on the outer edge of the irises, just like they were flames. It was weird and strangely compelling at the same time.
With an oath, he flipped me over until I was crushed beneath him, the entire length of my body pressed into the vile, disease-riddled ground. “Who the hell are you?” he snarled.
The panicked animal in my brain did something odd then. Rather than throwing me into a huge freak-out, it joined up with this strange new badass self and had me bringing my knee up under my attacker at the same time I punched him in the throat and twisted out from under him. I snatched up the sword and ripped it from the scabbard, standing panting with it in my hand, when he leaped to his feet.
That’s when I noticed he had a sword, too. We stood staring at each other, both of us breathing hard, and then suddenly the pain must have worked its way through his neurons, because he doubled over, grabbing his groin. I watched him for a moment, the wildness in my mind slowly fading, the animal crawling back to its hidey-hole.
I pointed the sword at him. “What are you doing here? Why were you trying to take my sword?”
“Your sword?” Slowly he straightened, his face twisted with pain. “That isn’t yours. It belonged to a dragon hunter.”
“I know. She was my sister. Wait, did you know Helen?”
“Your sister.” Slowly he straightened up, his face reflecting lingering pain and a whole lot of suspicion. “Is that why you’re here? Because your sister died here?”
“Well, yeah.” I made a vague gesture toward the ground. “Also, I left her sword here.”
“Bollocks!” he snapped. I thought at first it was directed at me, but realized that he was just swearing to himself.
“Er…” I started to say, but was interrupted.
“Ronnie?” Teresita called out. I skirted the sword thief Ian Iskandar and moved out to where I could see her standing at the large dumpster. “Everything okay? You’re not having a panic attack, are
you?”
“No,” I yelled, waving my sword at her. “I just stopped our neighbor from stealing this.”
“What? Hang on…” She scrambled over the boxes and crates, heading for us. I turned back to face my erstwhile attacker, but before I could say anything, he snatched the sword from my hand and bolted.
For a few stunned seconds I stared after him, not believing what had happened. Then fury hit me in a wave of red heat.
“Oh, he did not!” I growled, and took off at a run down the length of the mall. “Hey! Ian! What the hell? That’s mine! You can’t have it! Dammit, come back here and face me like…like…whatever you are!”
He ignored me, his long legs eating up the ground. I charged after him, but he beat me to the end of the building, his long black duster flapping behind him as he rounded the corner. I ground my teeth and raced toward it, ignoring Teresita’s demands to know what I was doing. I found a burst of speed I don’t remember ever accomplishing in the past and skidded around the corner to see Ian disappearing into the front seat of a black four-door sedan. I had a fleeting glimpse of a woman’s startled face at the window before the car started up. Clearly, the craven sword thief Ian was going to peel out of there, leaving me with a whole lot of questions, and not a lot else.
“Over my dead body!” I yelled, and just as Ian hit the gas, I wrenched open the back door and flung myself inside, hitting my head into the far door as I curled up my legs to avoid having them slammed by the other door.
I Am Definitely Not Wonder Woman
(Note to Self: Ask Mr. Manny If It’s Okay to Use Comments as Chapter Titles)
“CHRISTOS!” IAN SLAMMED ON THE BRAKES, MAKING the car fishtail wildly. My body hit the front seats, following which I tumbled to the footwell, where I flailed around trying to get onto the seat proper.
“Oooh, we caught a big fish,” a woman’s voice said.
I clawed my way up onto the seat, glaring at the woman, who was turned around to look at me.