Waking The Serpent

Carter laughed. “I thought about suggesting the promising-sounding Carl’s Custom Meats, but it’s a little too close to the wildlife park for comfort.”

Phoebe grinned. “That’s why I’m sticking to salad.” She carefully speared a cherry tomato. “So, you’re not from the local chapter, I take it.”

“No, does it show? Not wearing enough crystals?” He winked and ate a bite of his sandwich, managing not to end up with mayonnaise at the corner of his mouth as Phoebe would have done. “I live in Scottsdale. I’m with the Phoenix chapter.”

“And do they not have strict rules about consorting with ‘evocators’ in the Phoenix chapter?”

“They don’t think highly of the practice, I have to admit. Though most who profess to have the ability are charlatans.”

Phoebe paused with a hunk of romaine on her fork. “Do you think I’m a charlatan?”

“I haven’t seen your work, so I have no basis upon which to make such a judgment. But your sister’s talent as a witch is impressive. I imagine your talent must be every bit as much so.”

“Well, I don’t do it to impress anyone. I do it because I can, and people seem to need it.”

“By people, you mean shades.”

“You don’t think shades are people?”

“I think they were people. But I think letting them cling to what they were can be dangerous. For both the shade and the evocator.” He paused and looked up from his lunch, giving Phoebe a perfect million-dollar smile. “But I’m willing to keep my mind open to other possibilities.” It was more than Ione or the rest of the local Covent had ever done. Carter took another meticulous bite while Phoebe pondered and chewed. “Have you ever encountered a hostile shade?”

“Hostile?” She swallowed her bite. “No, I wouldn’t say hostile. A few who were angry and confused at first.” And of course there was Lila, who’d tried to feed her to a snake last night to appease some Aztec god. “What do you think of Rafe’s—Mr. Diamante’s situation?”

Carter set down his sandwich and took a sip of his Perrier. “As his legal counsel, I have to believe he’s sincere in his account of what happened. Whether his suspicions are correct about how it happened, I can’t say.”

“But you think it’s possible. That a shade might have stepped into him without his knowledge.”

“Possible? Absolutely. Whether such testimony would be admissible in court is another matter. Of course, everything Rafael has told me is confidential, so all of this is merely hypothetical, you understand.”

Phoebe nodded and swallowed a mouthful of salad. “Of course. I didn’t mean to pry.”

Carter touched her arm. “I didn’t think you were prying. Just reminding myself, really. You’re easy to talk to. I find I’m forgetting myself.” He regarded her for a moment. “Can I ask you something personal?”

Phoebe pushed lettuce around in her plastic clamshell. “Fire away.”

“Is there a reason you aren’t a member of the Covent? Other than the obvious philosophical differences, of course.”

“Yes, there is.” Phoebe smiled. “I’m not a witch.”

“So you don’t believe the animating forces of nature have a spiritual component.”

“I’ve never been big on spirituality. I believe in science.”

“Yet as an accomplished evocator, you work with spirit beings.”

Phoebe shrugged. “I suppose I consider magic to be just another facet of science. The flip side, if you will. I don’t attribute it to any god.”

“Some might attribute it to the flip side of a god.”

Her brows quirked upward. “The province of the Devil? Isn’t that considered heresy in the craft?”

Carter laughed with genuine amusement. “No, of course not the Devil. I was thinking along the lines of a goddess. Inanna or Astarte, for instance. Lilith.” He glanced at his conspicuously expensive watch. “I’m afraid I need to get back. But it was delightful talking with you, Phoebe—I hope I can call you Phoebe?”

He certainly had a way of making everything he said sound utterly sincere.

She smiled. “Of course.”

* * *

Upstairs, Carter paused before they went their separate ways. “I hope we’ll have a chance to talk again soon.” He took her hand and brought it to his lips and Phoebe blushed, not sure anyone had ever kissed her hand before.

“Phoebe?” The surprised voice was a deep baritone. Phoebe looked up to find Rafe staring at the two of them, dark brows drawn together in mistrust. “What’s going on?”

Carter let go of her hand and gave Rafe a placid smile. “Just lunching with Ms. Carlisle. We all have business in court today, as it happens.”

Phoebe glanced from Carter to Rafe. “You have business in court?”

Rafe looked grim. “Barbara Fisher’s death has officially been ruled a homicide. And I’m officially being arrested.”

Chapter 9

Phoebe’s face was slightly flushed as she studied Rafe, as if he’d interrupted something more than lunch. Her surprise at the news, at least, seemed genuine.

Hamilton filled in the details Rafe had left out. “I was able to get Rafael an immediate arraignment hearing on the condition that he come in on his own. This is just a formality. We’ll be entering a not-guilty plea, of course. I’m completely confident he won’t be spending a moment in jail.”

Phoebe glanced from one man to the other. “I hope everything goes well.”

“I’m sure it will.” Rafe couldn’t help adding with a touch of bitterness, “When you’re my father’s son, things usually do.”

He couldn’t get the idea out of his head that Phoebe’s lunch with Hamilton was more than just business. Or had they been discussing Rafe’s case? Was that why she was blushing? Was that guilt? What other reason would Phoebe have for meeting with Rafe’s lawyer? He hadn’t slept well last night; maybe he was imagining things. It was probably just a social meeting like Hamilton said. So why did seeing Phoebe Carlisle with Carter Hamilton fill Rafe with such misgiving?

If he had any sense, the legal proceedings he was about to face should be filling him with much greater misgiving. In twenty minutes he’d be standing in front of a judge for his formal arraignment on a murder charge. Every step of this seemed surreal.

He realized he was still staring at the two of them as if he’d caught them in flagrante. Rafe addressed Phoebe, trying to ignore the unpleasant conviction that he was somehow being punked. “Have you had any more contact with the step-ins?”

She cast a sideways glance at Hamilton. “Briefly. We can talk later, if you like.”

Hamilton frowned. “If you have any information relevant to Rafael’s case, it’s important I’m kept apprised.”

“I’ll keep you apprised,” Rafe interrupted. “If there’s something I need you to know.”

Hamilton’s expression flickered with disapproval before settling back into the usual, neutral-yet-confident smile he must have learned in law school. “Of course. So long as there are no surprises that come up in the prelim. I don’t like surprises.”

“I’ll call you, Phoebe.” Rafe nodded to Hamilton. “I guess we’d better get this over with.”

* * *

Rafe thought perhaps his father would show up for the arraignment, but as the judge read the charge of second-degree murder, Rafael Sr. was nowhere to be seen. Maybe he was avoiding the inevitable media swarm. Or maybe he just didn’t give a damn. After all, he’d thrown his money at the problem and he expected it to go away.

With his plea entered and bail posted, Rafe had seen enough of courts and lawyers to last him indefinitely, but Hamilton was sticking to him like an annoying lapdog.

“You’re going to need some help getting through the media gauntlet outside.” Hamilton followed close behind as Rafe headed downstairs. “Why don’t I have my car brought around to take you back to your place? I can have someone drop yours off later when things settle down.”

“I’m parked around the side.” Rafe pulled out the baseball cap he’d tucked into his back pocket and tugged it on as he headed for the exit. “I’m good.”

“I’ll follow you over, then.” Hamilton was still at his heels. “We can talk about strategy.”

Rafe sighed and turned around, palm in front of him to hold the lawyer at bay. “No offense, Hamilton, but all I want to do right now is have a drink. And maybe a smoke.”

“I didn’t know you smoked.”

“I don’t.”

“I see.” Hamilton gave him a patronizing smile. “We can’t really afford to get complacent right now—”

“That’s what my father is paying you the big bucks for. So why don’t you go be lawyerly somewhere and I’ll go do what my father thinks I do best—enjoy the fruits of his labor.”

Hamilton was speechless for once as Rafe put on his sunglasses and pushed open the doors. The reporters waiting outside for their scoop weren’t quick enough to identify him, focused on Hamilton trailing behind, and they mobbed the lawyer as he emerged, expecting him to precede their prey.

Rafe ducked out of the crowd and made a beeline for the side lot before they caught on. That was probably the last time that trick would work. In his rearview mirror, he saw one of the crews dash for their van to follow him as he pulled out.

As he drove toward Sedona, he remembered what Phoebe had said about being drawn to the temple when she’d come this way on Saturday. It would be empty today, and taking the private road to the temple grounds through the Covent’s glamour would leave his pursuers wondering how they’d lost him.

Sure enough, when he turned toward the white pinnacles of the temple, the news van drove on down Highway 179 toward town—and Stone Canyon, where they wouldn’t find him.

The oppressive feeling he’d noted during the ritual definitely still lingered as the tires of his Escalade rumbled over the brick pavement of the parking lot. The heaviness increased after he’d crossed the courtyard and entered the nave to approach the altar. If Matthew was dead as Rafe feared and his shade lingered here among those the ritual had trapped, perhaps Rafe could reach him with the conjuring spell.

Calming his nerves with a shot of bourbon from the flask in his pocket, Rafe set up the altar and undressed. He called the quarters first for protection, invoking Tezcatlipoca, god of night and invisible forces, as the Guardian of the North; Xipe Totec, god of force and rebirth, as the Guardian of the East; Huitzilopochtli, god of will and fire, as the Guardian of the South; and instead of Quetzalcoatl as Guardian of the West, he chose Chalchiuhtlicue of the Jade Skirt—goddess of rivers, seas and storms—for a more feminine aspect.

As he called upon Matthew’s spirit to join him, however, the tattoo on his back began to itch. He thought he’d imagined it two nights ago as a hypnagogic hallucination at the brink of sleep, but now he felt distinct movement under his skin—the movement of a snake.

Rafe turned to look over his shoulder in front of the small mirror above the altar. In the flickering flame of the temple candles, the ink was undulating, the scarlet scales of the serpent’s belly rippling over invisible terrain, reflected candlelight glittering off the teal and violet feathers as they fluttered in an unseen wind. Rafe touched his fingers to the ink. There was no doubt about it. Quetzalcoatl was moving.

He’d called on the guardians for protection. Maybe this vision of Quetzalcoatl’s image was a message from his patron god. But he’d never heard of such a thing.

After taking a few deep breaths, Rafe collected a dried cutting from the century plant in the entryway and returned to the altar. Whatever was happening, it was clearly magic, and he needed to channel it before it got out of hand.

“I call on Quetzalcoatl, Lord of the star of the dawn.” He pressed the thorns of the agave spine to his tongue, letting the pain give him clarity. The old way involved a more intimate body part, but Rafe was interested in symbolic sacrifice, not masochistic fanaticism.

As the blood rose around the thorns, he let it drip onto the dried edge of the spine, and then burned the clipping in the censer with the incense. “Invest me with your wisdom, O Ehecatl-Quetzalcoatl, god of wind and light. Accept my sacrifice—chalchiuatl from my own veins—as your divine sustenance.”

Invoking the wind-god aspect of Quetzalcoatl seemed to make the wind rise outside, the inner doors to the narthex rattling as though moved by it, though the outer doors were closed and locked. Gooseflesh raised along his skin, the hairs standing up, and something rushed him, a shade stepping into him. He thought for an instant it was Matthew, after all. But he’d felt this presence before. Jacob.

* * *

Branches whipped in the wind outside Phoebe’s front window as another monsoon storm began to brew above the brooding sandstone dome of Thunder Mountain. Over the sound of the wind, she heard the rumble of a truck on the gravel drive. Curled up in the papasan with a cup of tea and a paperback, Phoebe peered out, aggravated that someone would interrupt her moment of quiet. The black Escalade looked familiar, and it was definitely heading for her place. Phoebe lowered her cup. That was Rafe’s truck.

Puddleglum protested in his best throaty, mournful moan when she moved him from her lap, but he wasted no time taking her spot.

Phoebe set down the tea and went to the door, watching Rafe pull up in front of the carport. “What’s up?” She held the screen door open as he strode toward her with purpose. “Everything okay?”

When he arrived in front of her, Rafe pulled her into his arms and kissed her hard enough to have knocked her on her ass if he hadn’t been holding on to her.

With a sputter, Phoebe drew back from the unexpected greeting. “Are you feeling all right?” His eyes had a glossy, energized look.

“I’m wonderful.” With his arms still hooked around her lower back, he nuzzled her neck, making her shiver. “This vessel has everything I need.”

Not again. Phoebe peered into his eyes. “Jacob?”

His face fell, bottom lip protruding almost like a child’s disappointed pout. “You’re not my Lila.”

“No. And you have no business stepping into Rafe. If you want to talk to me, you talk to me. You don’t need to do it through him.”

Rafe’s arms dropped away from her. “He was willing.”

“I doubt that.” Phoebe regarded him expectantly, but Jacob only blinked at her through Rafe’s eyes. “Well? Are you going to release him?”

He folded his arms. “No.”

Phoebe sighed. Better to keep watch on him here than to leave Jacob on the loose with Rafe’s body, doing who knew what. “Then at least come inside.”

Whether of his own volition or at Jacob’s direction, Rafe stepped into the house—barefoot, she noted—and let Phoebe close the door. “Where’s Lila?” He touched Phoebe’s face, drawing his hand sensuously along her jaw. “She was here. Recently. You smell like her.”

“I smell like her?” He meant Lila as she’d been in life, obviously, but Phoebe grimaced at the idea of smelling like the dead.

“You have the look of her, as well. Maybe I can draw her in.”

Phoebe took a step back. “Or not. Why don’t we just talk? You could tell me what you know about the necromancer who’s been manipulating you. Rafe said you wanted his help to stop it.”

Rafe’s eyes regarded her. “Tezcatlipoca is very powerful, and he’ll become more powerful still because of Rafael Diamante.”

“Because of Rafe? Why? What does Rafe have to do with it?”

“He’s a conduit.” Jacob strolled farther into the house, touching the surfaces of things—the walls, Phoebe’s knickknacks—running his fingers over them as if it were a luxury to be able to feel things through Rafe’s skin. Which it probably was. Phoebe tried not to think about what else those fingers had touched at Jacob’s direction.

“A conduit for what? Not for shades? Is he a...an evocator? Like I am?” It seemed unlikely Rafe could have gone this long without being aware of such an innate skill.

Jacob’s eyes narrowed, studying Phoebe with renewed interest. “No. Not an evocator. A conduit for energy. He bears the mark of the ancients.” Jacob began to unbutton Rafe’s crisp white shirt with slow, sensuous movements.

“Jacob. What are you doing?”

He turned and continued down the hall. The shirt fell from his shoulders and slipped down his arms to the floor, revealing the magnificent tattoo of Quetzalcoatl, wings flexing as Rafe’s arms swung easily with his gait.

Phoebe couldn’t take her eyes off the ink. “Where are you going?” She raised her voice as he disappeared into her bedroom. Great. That was all she needed. Half-naked Rafe Diamante in her room, possessed by the shade of a smooth-voiced Lothario. “Jacob.” No answer.

She followed him against her better judgment. If she could keep him talking, she might be able to discover the identity of the necromancer. In the dusky half-light of her room, Rafe—or Jacob, rather—reclined on her bed with his hands clasped behind his head. The position displayed his pecs to maximum advantage. Man, this guy was like a catnip mouse to her inner Puddleglum.

Phoebe leaned against the door frame. “If the necromancer is so powerful, why does he need Rafe’s energy?”

“How do you think the powerful become what they are? By taking the power of others.” Jacob ran Rafe’s tongue over his bottom lip and Phoebe felt her own lips clamping shut on a frustrated mewl. “Come here and I’ll tell you more.”

“I’m not going to give you Lila. I can’t, even if I wanted to. She’s not here. I don’t sense her anywhere nearby.”

“I know you want this man.”

Good grief. If Rafe was hearing this... Phoebe squeezed her eyes shut. Maybe he’d have another memory lapse with Jacob taking such complete control.

“Phoebe Carlisle.” Rafe’s voice sounded so ordinary as he spoke her name she thought Jacob had left him suddenly.

Phoebe opened her eyes and took a step toward the bed. “Rafe?”

“He desires you, as well.”

“Dammit, Jacob. That’s enough.”

Jacob lifted Rafe’s shoulders in a shrug. “I’m only telling you what this body is telling me.” His eyes flicked downward and back at Phoebe, just enough to draw her gaze to the obvious erection in Rafe’s jeans.

Phoebe yanked her gaze away, heat radiating off her skin. “I thought you wanted to tell me about the necromancer. Does he have a name?”

“Tezcatlipoca.” Him again. “That’s the name he calls himself. It’s a stolen name. He imagines himself a god.”

“And the reason he wants Rafe’s power is because of Rafe’s affinity for the Aztec deities? His family’s ancestry?”

“His family’s legacy.” Jacob withdrew his arms from the headboard and leaned forward. “Come. I’ll show you.” She’d heard that one before. Jacob turned away, looking over Rafe’s shoulder. “Touch the serpent.”

Phoebe let out a sharp laugh. She’d definitely heard that one before.

Jacob smiled. “I don’t mean anything by it. It’s the source of his power.”

Phoebe’s eyes threatened to fall right out of her head, they were rolling so hard at the double entendres. But Jacob merely waited, his hands propped to one side as if in a yoga pose. Quetzalcoatl’s feathery scales did seem rather luminous despite the low light in the room.

She closed the space between them, sitting on the edge of the bed so she could reach Rafe’s back, and placed her hand against the tattoo. It was oddly cool, though his flesh was warm. And Rafe smelled like the coming rain. His muscles rippled under her hand. Only it wasn’t muscle. It was the tattoo.

“What the hell?” Phoebe drew back, but Jacob caught her wrist and tugged her into his lap.

“The quetzal awakens, charmed by the evocator. And it will soon take flight.”

“Let go of me, Jacob.” She managed to rise onto her knees, straddling Rafe’s muscular thighs as she tried to climb off and tangling her skirt in the process, but the grip on her arm was like steel. He pulled her down closer. Between her thighs, she could feel Rafe’s heat against hers—nothing between Phoebe’s flesh and his jeans but the thinnest of microfiber. “I don’t think Lila would approve of this.” Her lungs seemed to be having trouble taking in a full breath of air.

“I can’t help what this body feels. What it desires.” He bucked lightly against her, and Phoebe knew he could feel how damp her panties were. The last time she and Rafe had been this close, she’d been in the grip of Lila’s control, unable to exert her own will. Now she had complete control over her own faculties. And she was moving in tandem with the gentle rise and fall of Rafe’s pelvis.

What was she doing? It was one thing to have entertained even for a second the thought of bargaining her body to Lila in exchange for the necromancer’s identity, or to have indulged in the fantasy of having Rafe at the mercy of Jacob’s desire for her. But she couldn’t participate in this—whatever this was—no matter how hard up she was.

Rafe’s lips were against her throat.

“Rafe.” Her voice came out hoarsely. “You have to tell Jacob to go.” He paused in his caress. “I know you can hear me in there. It’s your body. Tell him to leave.”

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