word bounced around Sassy’s brain. She’d be dead if she didn’t keep the witch talking.
Unbidden, Grim’s face appeared in her mind’s eye. The thought of him calmed her. What would Grim do?
He’d whack the old biddy with his sword. Sassy didn’t have a sword. She’d have to rely upon her wits.
Unfortunately, they seemed to have gone wandering.
Think, Sassy, think.
Stall the witch. That was it. Bargain for time to escape.
“What happened?” Sassy squeezed the words past her constricted throat.
“Couldn’t go home if I’d wanted to—that demon wanted to party.” The witch shuffled across the room and snagged a ladder-back chair. “Headed for New Orleans and had a big old time. Drinking, carousing, and killing. Got knocked up while I was at it.” She showed her sharp black teeth. “Demons really like to screw.”
“Pregnancy must have put a damper on things.”
The witch plunked the chair in front of Sassy. Straddling it, she regarded Sassy over the back.
“Nah. Had the baby, dumped the brat in Hannah with my old man, and kept on partying. Told him the baby was his.” The witch chuckled. “Damn fool believed me.”
This was good, Sassy thought. Engage the homicidal maniac. Take her mind off things or she’d make a Sassy Sandwich.
“Didn’t your husband come after you?”
“Couldn’t,” the witch said. “Didn’t know where I was. Sent the baby special delivery. Woman was mute and illiterate. Put a compulsion on her to kill herself soon as she unloaded the kid. She obliged.” She grinned. “Walked into the river and drowned.”
Dear Lord.
“But enough about me. Let’s talk about you. You look delicious.”
The witch’s tongue shot out of her mouth. It was long and gray, like a slug. Slurp. The slimy muscle dragged across Sassy’s face.
“Tasty.” The witch smacked her lips. “Just what the witch doctor ordered.”
She leaned closer and Sassy gagged. The witch smelled like rotting hamburger, and her black eyes shone with malice.
Sassy’s time was up.
“Your boots,” she squeaked, scrambling for something, anything, to say. “I’m a shoe ho from way back, and I-I’ve never seen anything like them. Where’d you get them?”
“Dandy, aren’t they?” The witch stuck out a skinny leg and admired her showy footwear. “Took ’em off Charlie Skinner. Sneaky bastard stole from me. Snuck into my garden and took one of my prize mimosa trees.” Her oozing black eyes glittered at the memory. “I don’t like thieves. Which reminds me . . .”
She reached for Sassy with clawed hands.
“The demon.” Sassy was wheezing like a pair of bellows. “H-how did you keep it from killing you?”
The witch sat back. “What’s it to you?”
“It’s interesting.” Sassy was shaking so hard the chair rattled beneath her. “Y-you’re interesting.”
“Flatterer.” The witch shrugged. “Okay, I’ll tell you. I bound the demon’s life force to mine. If I died, the demon died.”
“Very clever.”
“You bet your ass it was. Demons go through humans like a hot knife through butter. I’d have died damn quick if I wasn’t a witch.” The witch grimaced. “Black magic comes at a cost. Unfortunately, there were a few . . . er . . . side effects, like a thirst for human flesh.”
“Oh.” Sassy swallowed. “T-that is unfortunate.”
“The fairy potion satisfies the craving and slows the aging process. Can’t restore my youth, but it helps. Two hundred years later, I’m still here.”
“Two hundred years? My, you don’t look that old.”
It wasn’t a lie, exactly. The witch looked older. Like Egyptian-mummy-been-fluffing-up-dust-for-two-thousand-years old.
“Save your breath, girly.” The witch bared her fangs. “The sweetie-pie routine is wasted on me.”
A knife appeared in her skeletal fist. Flames from the fire shimmered on the bright steel. The knife slashed down, and Sassy screamed.
Sassy.
Grim reached for the mill and materialized in Sassy’s office. She was not inside. The roaring in his head made it hard to think. Outside. Look outside. He sped from the building. The yard was in turmoil. With a groan, the main shed buckled and collapsed in a belch of flame and smoke. Toxic fumes drifted in billows. Men shouted and scurried about in confusion.
Their mouths moved, but Grim heard nothing but the pounding in his head. Sassy was somewhere in this shambles. Hurt, perhaps, or . . .
Ah, sweet Kehv, no. Let him find her and hold her. Soon, else his heart would burst.
The smoke shifted and Grim spotted Houston. Moving with the preternatural speed of the Dal, Grim blurred across the yard, not caring if the humans saw.
He grabbed the burly plant manager and spun him around. “Sassy. Where is she?”
“Relax. Sassy left with Eddie Furr not long