“Yeah. Why?”
“It wasn’t all that long ago you were begging me to let you learn how to cook.”
“This is different. The club is about preventing kids from becoming addicted to dirty magic. Jeez. I thought you’d support me in this.”
“I do—”
“Especially after what happened.”
I snapped my mouth shut. Those four little words were deceptively innocent considering he was referring to spending several days in a coma. Ramses Bane, the Grand Wizard of the Sanguinarian Coven, had dosed my kid brother with a dirty potion hoping it would make me drop off the case. Instead I’d shot the asshole with a salt flare and cooked dirty magic after a ten-year abstinence to save Danny’s life. Now Bane was being kept in a secure location while he awaited trial, and I was getting shit from Danny, who had no idea what I’d done to save his life.
Swallowing the knot of remembered fear in my throat, I readjusted my approach. “I support you joining an anti-dirty-magic club. Of course I do. It’s just I wasn’t expecting it, is all. We haven’t really talked about… what happened in a while. I wasn’t sure how you were feeling about it all.”
His young face hardened. “How do you think I feel? If it hadn’t been for John, I’d be dead right now.”
My hand tensed into a fist on my lap. John Fucking Volos. Letting him take the credit for saving Danny had been the only way to ensure no one found out I’d fallen off the magic wagon. Over the last several weeks there had been so many occasions when I’d wanted to scream the truth. Without the help of my ability to read potions, John never would have been able to finish the antipotion that eventually saved both his and Danny’s lives. But I hadn’t told anyone because in addition to lying about cooking dirty, I’d also failed to report evidence that fingered my uncle Abe as the mastermind of the entire scheme.
But I couldn’t very well contradict Danny’s praise of Volos with getting some probing questions I was nowhere near ready to answer. So I swallowed the bitterness and forced a smile. “So when does this club meet?”
He pulled back, like I’d surprised him. “Every Tuesday and Thursday until about six thirty.”
My brows rose. “The meetings will be two hours?”
“Mr. Hart said it would be longer in the beginning because we have a lot of work to do to get the club going.” He toyed with his cell phone. “Making posters and stuff, I guess.”
“How will you get home?” Normally, Pen dropped him off after school.
“I’ll get a ride from one of the other members.”
“If not, I bet Baba would come get you.” Baba was our septuagenarian Wiccan neighbor. With my crazy hours, she often stepped up to keep Danny company if I had late nights.
His face screwed up. “I’ll definitely get one of my friends.”
“What’s wrong with Baba getting you?”
“Her car, for one thing.”
I grimaced. It’s not that her old Cutlass Supreme was horrible, even though the avocado green made it look like some sort of ’70s time machine. The real problem was the bumper stickers she’d plastered all over the back. As a witch, she felt the need to broadcast her support of her fellow Mundane magic users in the form of messages like WITCHES DO IT IN CIRCLES. There were also stickers with slogans like HONK IF YOU LOVE NAKED BINGO and TOM JONES MAKES ME FEEL LIKE A WOMAN.
So, yeah, I couldn’t exactly blame the kid for not wanting to ride in her hooptymobile. I didn’t want to be seen in it, either.
“All right, ask your buddies. We’ll use Baba as a last resort for rides.”
His face cleared. “Thank you.”
My center warmed at the rare gratitude. “When’s your first meeting?”
“Next week. Mr. Hart said the permission forms need to be in by Monday.”
“Who is Mr. Hart again? I don’t know if I’ve met him.”
“He’s the new chemistry teacher. The form’s in my room.”
“Go grab it and I’ll sign it.” He was almost at the door when another question occurred to me. “Wait!”
He froze and turned slowly in that teenager way of telling you they couldn’t wait to get out of your company.
“What’s the name?”
“Huh?”
“Of the club? Like DARE?” He stared at me blankly. Sometimes I forgot he wasn’t yet born during the days of neon and cocaine. “It was a movement in the ’eighties that stood for Drug Abuse Resistance and Education.”
“Oh.” He didn’t look impressed. “This one’s Don’t Use Dirty Elixirs.”
I frowned. “The acronym is DUDE?”
He nodded slowly, as if he found nothing funny about it.
“That’s kind of awesome, actually. You should tell that Mr. Hart what I do. Maybe he’d have me in to speak about the dangers of dirty magic.”
He shot me a look like I’d just taken a dump on the linoleum. “Mr. Hart said we won’t be having speakers for a while since we’ll be busy recruiting for the club.”
“But having speakers might attract new members.”
“It’s not my call.” Danny shrugged. “Can I go get the form now?”
I waved him off, trying to pretend his reaction to my suggestion hadn’t taken the air out of my sails. At some point I’d gone from being the cool big sister he worshipped to the annoying nag who said unbearably embarrassing things.
“I bet none of your friends’ moms knows how to apply a proper choke hold or reload a Glock in under ten seconds,” I said to the empty kitchen.
I’m pretty sure none of his friend’s moms ever had a feud with a dirty magic wizard end with her kid in a coma, either.
And with that cheerful thought, I turned to grab a beer. At least this development meant I was off the hook on my promise to teach Danny the basics of magic. I’d been waiting for him to bring it up ever since he recovered, but he hadn’t brought it up. I leaned back and took a long swallow of cold brew, satisfied that everything seemed to be under control for a change.
Chapter Three
October 18
Waxing Crescent
The next morning I pulled my old Jeep, Sybil, into the gym’s parking lot at eight sharp. The lot sat next to some abandoned train rails that used to carry steel from Babylon’s mills to the rest of the country. Now the tracks were rusted and choked with weeds. Sort of like Babylon’s justice system.