Finn closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the chair, as though he were getting a facial. In a way, he was. Jo-Jo passed her palm over his face, forcing oxygen into his open wounds, making it circulate under his skin, using the molecules to heal and meld everything back together. It was like watching a time-lapse photo. The puffy swelling on Finn’s face reduced. The purple bruises ringing his eyes faded. The cut on his forehead and the ones on his fat lips zipped up.
It took Jo-Jo a few minutes to fix all the damage, and when she finally dropped her palm, Finn looked like his usual, carefree self, right down to the devilish glint in his green eyes. I couldn’t help but think of Fletcher, and how differently another elemental had used her Air magic on him. To flail and bruise and peel his flesh away one slow inch at a time.
Jo-Jo nodded, pleased with her work. “Now strip. And let’s get a look at the rest of you.”
Finn grinned. “Why, darling, I thought you’d never ask.”
Finn was all too happy to ditch the remains of his bloody, ruined tuxedo. Underneath, he wore a pair of navy blue boxers made out of high-end silk dotted here and there with white sailboats. Preppy. The boxers hung low on Finn’s hips, bringing out the ruddy tones in his skin. His chest was broad and solid, and a generous dash of brown, curly hair led down below the waistband of the fabric. But ugly bruises marred his figure. The fist-shaped marks painted his body in pansy purples and garden greens.
Still, most women would have found Finn extremely sexy and highly fuckable, especially when you added the boyish charm of his face to the rest of the toned, slick package. But I’d seen it and done it all before, during my younger, more foolish years.
Jo-Jo held her palm out over Finn’s chest and started healing the bruises on his torso and whatever damage lay inside his chest.
“You know, there’s something wrong when a guy wears more expensive underwear than I do,” I murmured.
“You’re just jealous more people see me in mine than they do you in yours,” Finn said. “Still having those boring one-night stands with the young studs down at the community college?”
“Still sleeping with anything that will hold still long enough?” I countered.
“Touché.”
Jo-Jo smiled at our banter, and, for a moment, the darkness of Fletcher’s death receded. I half expected him to come through the salon door, a cup of chicory coffee in one hand and a wide grin stretching across his face. But the old man wasn’t here. And he never would be again. We all knew it. We were just dealing with it the only way we knew how. By going on with business as usual. It’s what Fletcher would have wanted us to do.
After she finished with Finn, the dwarf turned to me. “Your turn, Gin,” she said.
I raised an eyebrow. “What makes you think I need healing?”
“Because you’re you — too ballsy and stubborn to back down from anyone.”
Jo-Jo knew me too well. Even as Finn got dressed, I took off the vampire hooker’s blood-spattered shirt, leaned back in my chair, and let the Air elemental work her magic. Jo-Jo removed my bandages and put her palm next to my wounded shoulder. A tingle sizzled to life in the muscle under my skin and spread outward. Then another, then another. Hot, warm, insistent, until my whole shoulder throbbed with them.
I gritted my teeth, trying to ignore the odd sensation that was nothing at all like the cool caress of my Ice and Stone magic. The forced influx of magic also made the spider rune scars on my palms itch and burn, as the silverstone metal reacted to the Air power. Silverstone absorbed all kinds of magic, and many elementals used it to store bits and pieces of their own power, sort of like batteries they could draw on later when they needed a little boost. Even through my scarred skin, the metal hungered for the Air magic being forced into my body.
“You know you could have prevented this,” Jo-Jo murmured, her eyes white in her face. “All you had to do was use your Stone magic to harden your skin. Ain’t nothing can penetrate your magic.”
The image of my mother, Eira, then my older sister, Annabella, disappearing into balls of fire flashed through my mind. For a moment, the air smelled like charred flesh. My stomach clenched.
“You know I don’t use my magic like that unless I ab solutely have to,” I said. “It’s okay for small things, but I’m not going to let myself depend on it. Not in my line of work. Because the moment I do is when it fails me. And then I die.”
Jo-Jo moved her hand to my kidneys, where Brutus had punched me. More tingles spread through my torso. “You’re going to have to rely on it one day, Gin. Magic is just as strong as the person wielding it. You’re strong. It’s not going to let you down because you never let yourself down.”
I didn’t know if Jo-Jo was speaking in vague generalities or because she’d seen some smoky glimpse of the future. Either way, I wasn’t buying it. “That’s all well and good — until the person I’m fighting is stronger than me.”
Flinging raw power, raw magic, at each other was how elementals fought. Testing their strength against the other person’s. Sometimes, the duels took seconds. Sometimes, hours. But eventually, someone’s magic always prevailed, always overpowered the other person’s. And when that happened, the unlucky elemental was overwhelmed and fell under the onslaught of the other’s power. Suffocated by Air, frozen by Ice, hammered by Stone.
Burned alive by Fire, like my mother and older sister.
I shook my head, banishing the ugly memories. “No thanks. All I need to get the job done is my silverstone knives. Nothing else. Magic is too easy. Makes you take stupid chances, makes you think you’re invincible, makes you sloppy. I’ll use it when I have to, but I’m not going to depend on it.”
I didn’t mention the fact I’d already done enough horrid things with my magic to last a lifetime. That I’d killed with it long before Fletcher had taken me in off the streets. That I’d lashed out with it without thinking, and used my power to crumble the stones of my own house so I could escape from my torturers. That the combination of fires the elemental had started and my magic made the whole structure come tumbling down. That Bria, my younger sister, had died because of what I’d done, been buried alive just like everyone else.
Some of the many reasons I didn’t use my power like that now, unless there was no other option. It only reminded me of that darker time, when everything I’d known had been lost in one fiery night.
Jo-Jo finished her work and dropped her hand, but her pale eyes stayed on my face. “We’ll see.”
The front door banged open, and heavy footsteps smacked against the hallway floor. A few seconds later, Sophia Deveraux stepped into the salon.
Sophia was an inch taller than her older sister, and her body was thicker, with an extra layer of hard muscle. Where Jo-Jo was light, Sophia was dark — as in Goth. Short, straight black hair clung to her head, matching her eye shadow, eyeliner, and lipstick. Her eyes were also a flat black. Instead of a dress, Sophia wore black jeans, black boots, and a black T-shirt embossed with hot-pink skulls. The skulls matched the plastic ones hanging off the spiked, black leather collar that ringed her thick throat. Even though she was a hundred and thirteen, Sophia had the moody adolescent look down pat.
Sophia flopped into one of the salon chairs and examined the pink glitter polish on her nails. Jo-Jo leaned over and patted her sister’s hand. Despite their obvious differ ences, the sisters were close. Living together for more than a hundred years would do that to you. Sophia gave Jo-Jo a half smile, her most animated and pleasant expression.