Hell's Bell (Lizzie Grace 2)

“Yes.” I rubbed a hand across my forehead, but it didn’t really ease the strengthening ache. “Whatever did this is long gone.”

For now, at least.

“Good—although I have to admit, I’m finding all this a little hard to accept.” She hesitated. “But if we do have something like that on the reservation, how the hell do we stop it?”

“We don’t,” I said. “The RWA does.”

“More fucking witches is just what we need here.” She hesitated. “Present company not included in that comment, of course.”

Belle snorted softly. “You know, one of these days, your damn pack will have to—”

The O’Connors have a good reason to hate witches, I cut in. We don’t need to do or say anything right now to get them offside again. Not when things have started to thaw out.

One witch’s actions should not brand an entire race, she fired back. We had nothing to do with her sister’s death.

No, we didn’t, as it had happened over a year before we’d arrived in Castle Rock. But I could nevertheless understand their pain, as well as their need to pin blame. In many respects, their situation was similar to my own, even if the only person I could blame for my sister’s death was myself.

Ciara studied Belle for a moment, and then said, “I’ve a feeling you were about to say a whole lot more than that.”

“I was, but it doesn’t matter.”

Ciara grunted, and glanced at me. “I’ll have to ask you both to wait outside while I start proceedings in here.”

“I’m afraid I can’t wait. I have to go home.”

She frowned. “Aiden wants to speak to you—”

“And he knows where to find me.”

“But he said—”

“I don’t really care what he said, or what I might have agreed to when I rang him,” I snapped, and then drew in a breath, trying for calm. “Unless you want me puking all over your crime scene, you’d better just let me go.”

“Reading the dead isn’t a pleasant thing to do,” Belle said. “And believe me, the projectile vomiting that often follows isn’t an easy thing to clean up.”

Ciara’s gaze briefly swept me, and then she waved a hand. “Fine. Go.”

Meaning, perhaps, I looked as ill as I was beginning to feel.

I turned and quickly left—catching Belle somewhat flat-footed. She caught up with me in a couple of strides, and we continued in silence. By the time we’d reached the café, my head felt like it was going to tear apart, and my stomach was a couple of churns away from surging up my throat.

“Go climb into bed,” Belle ordered, in a voice that would brook no arguments. “I’ll make you up a potion.”

I grimaced. Belle’s strengthening and revitalization potions might be the reason why many incantations—and psychic shit like I’d done tonight—didn’t affect me as badly as they did other witches and psychics, but they were also the foulest goddamn drinks ever created.

Her grin flashed. “Says the person who gave me a potion not so long ago that hands down beat anything I’ve ever made over the years.”

“You only have yourself to blame. You’re the one who taught me how to make them.”

“That is, rather sadly, very true. Perhaps I’ll make an exception and be kind this one time.”

“Good, because you might just get the lot puked all over you otherwise.”

“You forget how quickly I can move when I need to.” She pushed me lightly toward the stairs. “Go, before you collapse and I have to carry your butt up there.”

I dragged myself up the stairs and started stripping off the minute I reached the landing. My bedroom’s darkness wrapped around me, warm and secure thanks to all the protections around it, and yet goose bumps nevertheless raced across my skin.

I wasn’t entirely sure either these spells or the exclusion ones we’d placed around this building would be enough to deal with something that could steal souls.