37
Savannah
Since Jaxson’s truck was out of commission and all the Order’s transport charms had been used to move captives and prisoners, we rode back to Magic Side with Harlow.
Exhaustion and defeat weighed on us all, which made it an awkward ride. When we pulled over for gas at a Mobil station after only an hour, I practically barreled out of the vehicle.
Only three and a half miserable hours to go.
“You okay?” Jaxson asked as we exited the vehicle. “You’ve been quiet.”
Because I didn’t want to talk about the next step. I knew what I needed to do: call Laurel. She’d killed Dragan and was the only one who might know where we could find his bones.
But it was a call I was loath to make.
I’d spent the drive reflecting on each interaction that I’d had with my aunt and uncle over the past month.
All that time, they’d said nothing. Swept the truth under the rug.
I couldn’t shake the sense of having been violated, like a piece of me had been taken against my will. The fact that it had been my parents and aunt who’d done it…that cut the deepest, like rubbing salt in a festering wound.
But there was no way around making the call.
I coughed to loosen my parched throat. “I’m all right, but I need to call Laurel, and I don’t want to do it in the car. Can you have the cops wait?”
Jaxson looked at his watch. “It’s nearly two in the morning.”
“I have a feeling she’ll answer, and we don’t have time to wait.”
He nodded, and I headed around the side of the J&H convenience store and leaned back against the red brick wall.
I pulled up Laurel’s number on my cell phone, my finger hovering over the call icon on the screen. Suck it up, Savy. Stopping Dragan is more important than your personal beefs.
The phone rang four times, and just as I was about to hang up, Laurel answered drowsily, her voice a mix of relief and concern. “Savannah? I’m so glad you called.”
Uncle Pete’s voice came over the line. “Who the hell is that?”
I could envision him lying in bed in his silly nightgown and eye mask, trying to figure out who would call at this time of night. I’d gotten to know them so well in just a few weeks.
A staticky sound came across the line as she muffled the phone, and I heard her whisper, “Shh. It’s Savy. I’m going in the other room.”
Her voice returned a second later, and I could hear her walking on the creaky floorboards. “It’s two a.m. Are you okay?”
My gut twisted, and tears burned the back of my eyes, but I kept my voice steady. “Let me be clear: I haven’t forgiven you for what you did to me, and I don’t want to talk about it. I’m in a bind, and I’m afraid that you’re the only one who may be able to help. That’s why I’m calling.”
There was a pregnant pause.
“I understand. I’ll help any way I can.” Her voice was hard and measured, and I could practically feel the push of emotions she was holding back.
I swallowed the budding ache in my throat. “Dragan is back. His ghost took over the leader of a werewolf biker gang. We stopped a blood ritual tonight, but he escaped by jumping into a new host. A friend.”
She sucked in a sharp breath. “That’s worse than I feared. How can I help?”
“To stop him, we need his bones. Do you know where they are?” My heart pounded in my chest, and I dug my nails into my palm while I waited for her answer.
“My.” Laurel’s voice was distraught, and I could easily picture the familiar furrow that cut her forehead. “That might be tricky.”
“Tricky or impossible?”
The long silence on the other end didn’t give me hope.
Finally, she spoke. “When I killed him, I disintegrated him. His body was nothing more than ashes that are surely long gone by now.”
The last thread of hope I’d had unraveled, and I rubbed my tired eyes. “We’ll have to think of something else, then. Thanks.”
“Wait!” she said as I was about to hang up. “Don’t go. Let me think for just a second.”
I held my breath.
After a moment, she spoke again. “Victor Dragan had a nickname: Ninefingers. Years ago, a vampire cut off one of his fingers as punishment for stealing from him. If you could find it…”
My mind raced. A finger? That was all that was left?
The vampire could have fed it to his dog or thrown it in the trash, or anything. It would be impossible to track down.
The hope that had welled up in my chest collapsed into a black hole. “Shit. What’s the chance that the vampire kept the finger?”
My aunt sucked her teeth. “Well, better than zero, so that’s something. He was known as a collector of odd things and art, so maybe he kept it. Hell, a sorcerer’s finger probably could be used to make a powerful potion, for all I know. I could ask Uncle—”
“Do you know his name?” I interrupted, not wanting to even know that Uncle Pete could potentially answer that question.
There was a long pause. “No.”