To the Devil a Daughter Read online

  “Malcolm was diagnosed with end-stage pancreatic cancer six months ago. We’re preparing him for in-house hospice care right now.”

  I raise my hand and stop her right there. “I can’t cure cancer, ma’am. I can’t cure any kind of disease. That’s not how my powers work.”

  “I know that,” she says with a hard swallow. “I understand that. Matilda told me. I’m no fool. I’m not looking for a cure.”

  I stare at her. She’s a beautiful, middle-aged woman, very posh and put-together like someone you might see at an important charity event. My poor friends and I used to make fun of her type of women. But cancer doesn’t care if you’re filthy rich or a pauper.

  Like Matilda, she looks tired, with dark rings under her eyes. “My Malcolm is dying, miss. I’ve accepted that. We both have. But Macy is getting married next week. She moved her wedding up six months just so her daddy could see her married.”

  “I’m sorry,” I tell her, because I am, and I don’t know what else to say.

  “Malcolm wants to walk her down the aisle. That’s his last and only wish. But the cancer…” She hesitates and I see how difficult it is for her to explain this to a stranger. She’s very brave. “...the cancer has him in a wheelchair.” Gently, she reaches out and takes my hand. Her grip is desperate and surprisingly strong. “Is there anything you can do? Just for one day? So he can walk her down the aisle? So he can do the daddy-daughter dance? Anything?”

  I stare into her pale grey eyes—so full of helpless pain. I swallow. “I…don’t know.”

  “Vivian…Matilda said you’re an angel. That you can do small miracles.”

  “I’m not an ang—” I start to say, but then stop myself. In a way, I am. Just not the kind she’s thinking of. “Look, ma’am, I don’t actually know if I helped Connor or not. It might just have been a placebo effect. Some fluke. Connor might have done it all himself.”

  She nods. “What would you say if I told you I don’t care if it is real or not? If it helps Malcolm to stand up, even for a few minutes, I’ll pay you anything you want.”

  21

  THE DAY'S take is good, but it’s not enough to keep the lights on. Which is why that night, after we close and Sebastian scuttles off to his favorite pub, I put in the time and literal magic energy necessary to create a new talisman.

  To my surprise, it does not come out looking like the first one. I don’t do anything differently except to think about Malcolm and look at his picture, which the woman, Doris, has sent to my phone. I’m also munching on a bag of Cool Ranch Doritos while I work, bad witch that I am.

  Malcolm’s pendant is tear-shaped. I find my old power tools from when we were renovating the shop and drill a tiny hole in the top of the talisman and run a black cord through it the way I did with Connor’s.

  When I hold it up, it sparkles under the fluorescent lights like it’s made of polished diamond.

  I pick up my phone and text Doris.

  She texts back almost immediately. I’ll be right there with a check.

  And she is.

  22

  I’M TOO wired to sleep, so I build a big, safe nest of pillows and do the googling I wasn’t able to do earlier in the day. After an hour and a half, I know more about Mexican cartels than I ever wanted to know. Most cartels specialize in drugs and human trafficking—which I had expected. But I also learn about drug mules. Young girls and children forced to smuggle drugs over the border by swallowing them or, sometimes—horrifically—by having them sewn into cavities in their bodies. What makes it even more terrible is the fact that once these kids reach the U.S. and the drugs are extracted, they’re usually sold into sexual slavery—often to powerful white politicians and executives protecting the cartels.

  The pictures of dead, beaten children are sickening, and I realize that for all I’ve struggled and endured, I’ve never really known horror—not like these poor kids have.

  I throw my phone aside. Thanks to my stupid googling, I’ll never get to sleep tonight. Outside, I hear a dog howling somewhere. It’s a sad and lonely sound. I feel it cut right through my bones.

  Picking up the phone again, I call Mac at home. It’s an impulsive decision. His number is on a card paper-clipped to the inside of the folder he gave me.

  A young girl picks up. “Wello?”

  Must be Mac’s girl. I stutter on a response, and the sudden awkwardness of the moment stretches out, but I force myself to speak. “Is…is this Detective McCall’s phone?”

  I hear the girl take a deep breath and then screech out, “Daaaaaddeeeee!” so loudly I jerk away from the phone.

  Moments later, I hear someone rush into the room. “What are you doing with Daddy’s phone, baby girl?” I hear Mac say from a distance.

  The girl mutters something in baby talk I find hard to follow. Mac grunts assurances and then tells her to go get ready for bed. A few more seconds pass while I imagine him retreating to a more private part of the house. A door closes.

  “Mistress,” he says at last.

  “Stupid of me to call now,” I say, looking at the late hour on the phone. “I didn’t think, Mac, I’m sorry…”

  “It’s all right. No harm. No foul.”

  But I think about what could have happened if his wife picked up. I take a deep, shaky breath. I’d planned to call him and give him the information I’d gleaned from the case file, but now I’m too shaken to say anything at all.

  He relieves me of explaining myself by saying, “I’ve missed you.”

  I swallow at that. His voice is very low. “Can we talk?”

  “I’m in the study downstairs.”

  I like that he has a study. “Your wife won’t…?”

  “Brenda’s upstairs with Charity.”

  I swallow again. Charity must be the little girl who picked up the phone.

  “If now’s a bad time…”

  “Now’s perfect,” he assures me. “What are you doing?”

  I laugh. “Talking to you.”

  He laughs, too. I’m frightened by how well we click. This is all too frighteningly easy to end well. “All right. What were you doing before you called?” he clarifies.

  “Looking over the file you gave me.”

  “Did you suss anything out?”

  I think about telling him about the Toltecs and tipping him off about their hangout. It’s not far. And maybe it will lead him to the monster who has been doing these things—though I’m not sure what Mac or the police could do about a deadly Aztec goddess. But something holds me back. Once I tell him everything I know, my part in his investigation is over, and I don’t want it to be over just yet. So I say instead, “Nothing yet. Still looking over the files. A lot of redacting.”

  “For your own safety.”

  “Terrible pictures.”

  “I know. I shouldn’t have included them.”

  “I’m glad you did. It makes this feel a lot more real and urgent. These are the things you see and deal with?”

  “Sometimes. Not always. Sometimes I just wind up arresting psychics who break into churches in the middle of the night.”

  I giggle at that. “I’m a bad cat burglar.”

  “I wouldn’t choose it as a career path.” His mood suddenly changes. “Look, I shouldn’t have involved you.” He sounds genuinely remorseful about that.

  “Well, I’m not. I want to help. Not…help those men. You know what I mean. I don’t want to see that happen to innocent people.”

  “Yes.”

  I sense he wants to change the subject to something more…intimate.

  Before I can say anything else, he whispers, “I’ve been thinking about you all day, Mistress. Fantasizing, you might say. It’s helped me get through some seriously fucked up crap.”

  I swallow so hard it feels like a walnut is stuck in my throat. I experience this tremendous rush of power. I made someone feel better. I helped him through what may have been some gruesome details today. It’s a very empowering feeling, and I suddenly dec
ide it was worth calling him tonight.

  “I thought about you, too,” I say. My voice is low and breathy—what Nick used to call my sex-kitten voice.

  “Tell me what you’re doing now,” he begs. “Or what you want to do.”

  I can’t believe we’re phone sexing, but we spend the next ten minutes talking about the things we want to do to each other. I don’t even feel embarrassed about it because it all feels so right with Mac. Along the way, I discover Mac has a few highly repressed fantasies I don’t think even he thought about playing out until recently.

  We end the call on a high note, but the moment I hang up, the good feeling I’ve been warming myself with vanishes. I remember the sound of Charity’s sweet voice and I remind myself that Mac is married and has children. He was telling me about all the things he dreams about doing to me while his wife was upstairs, tucking his toddler daughter into bed.

  I slide down under the covers and look at the phone. I still have the information about the Toltecs on my browser. Maybe if what I was doing with Mac hurt, I’d stop. That’s the worse part of this whole cruddy situation, you know? Not that I feel bad. But that I don’t.

  23

  I CAN'T wait for my day off.

  Sometimes, on Sundays, I pack my car and go for a daylong drive to nowhere. I stop at parks and cafes and little faded mom and pop shops along the way. Sometimes I see a movie or a ballgame, if there is one. I usually pick a direction at random and just drive until something interesting happens. So Sebastian doesn’t even question me when I grab my overnight bag and head downstairs.

  “Oi, witchy, can you cover me tonight?” he asks as he ties on his apron in the prep room.

  “It’s my day off—and my night!”

  “Please?” He grins.

  “No. I’m not letting you off the hook so you can go out day drinking.”

  “Maybe I have a hot date,” he argues.

  “With a bottle of gin. No.” I wag my finger in his face. “Stay. I have plans.”

  A sly smile spreads across his face. “Is your date six-three with ebony skin and dreamy brown eyes?”

  “Maybe.” I can’t hold back a smile, thinking about Mac.

  Sebastian sticks his finger down his throat and bends over and mime-gags.

  “Stop it.” I smack him in the shoulder. “And behave yourself while I’m gone!”

  Before he can try anything, I slip out the door and hurry to my jeep, throw my bag into the backseat, and get in. I floor the accelerator as I pull out onto the street, but my direction isn’t random today. I know exactly where I’m going.

  I head east toward the Waterfront District. After a half hour, the neighborhoods thin out and become poorer and shabbier. More old projects look in need of urban renewal. I spot dingy little open-air markets and a bowling alley with the letters falling off. Old, rusting rail yards dot the landscape, remnants of the Philadelphia and Columbia Railroad. A whole church is a giant pile of rubble with—eerily—just the front wall with its tall, arched windows still standing. I spot an angel with a broken face, but I drive past it too quickly to let it bother me much.

  When I reach the Delaware, I go south, following its bendy progress past a collection of sagging, turn-of-the-century row houses until my GPS tells me I’m there. Up ahead is a roughly paved road that leads to an ancient redbrick roadhouse sitting out on a dock right over the river. It looks strangely abandoned with its mostly empty parking lot and dim windows, but maybe things pick up after dark. Situated behind the roadhouse is a saggy-looking working garage with the name “Al’s Mend-a-Wreck” painted on the side in worn white paint. I see some shadows moving in the windows, but no details. Looks like someone has newspapered all the glass. I plan to wait till after dark to make my move.

  I turn the car around and drive back up to Delancey Street, where I spotted a 24-hour railroad-style diner with shiny chrome accents. If it’s one thing I love about Philadelphia, you can find an interesting historical diner on almost any corner. They rival even the number of old and renovated movie theaters that Philly is famous for. This diner has been around for a hundred years, according to the sign in the lobby.

  After I’m seated, I order their all-day pancakes and a chocolate milk. When my dad used to take me to these places, we always ordered pancakes and chocolate milk. It’s one of my few good memories of my parents. I spend a good two hours there, watching people come in for dinner and leave chatting about where they’re headed next—the movies or a concert or shopping. I know where I’m going, but it’s none of those things.

  When I see the waitresses are giving me side-eye about sitting here so long, I get up, pay my bill, and go out to the jeep. I stop at a Walmart and go in and find the ladies room. Inside a stall, I drop my overnight bag and unzip it. Inside, I have vinyl pants, a strappy T-shirt with a cute red devil girl on it, a leather jacket with buckles, and motorcycle boots with silver skulls on them. I bought all of it for Halloween last year when I went as a biker chick, but I liked the outfit enough to take it with me to Philly, and now I’m glad I did.

  After changing, I stuff my street clothes into my bag and step out of the stall. There is an older woman at the sink. She takes one look at me and backs away, leaving the faucet running.

  I look in the mirror as I dig out the cosmetics I’ve brought. I’ve never been that good with makeup, actually. Mascara and lipstick are about the extent of my talent, but tonight I apply them liberally to make my eyes smoky and sinister and my lips black, then shake my hair out so it’s wild and shaggy. I try a few fierce facial expressions in the mirror. I think they look silly. I can feel my heart knocking almost painfully in my chest, and my hands keep clenching and unclenching nervously at my sides.

  “Fierce, not frightened…fierce, not frightened,” I tell the mirror Vivian. Then I lean forward and say, “Boo!” in the mirror, watching in satisfaction as a spiderweb of cracks suddenly appears.

  24

  MY COURAGE flags as I approach the roadhouse. I’m woman enough to admit that.

  In my head, I had this whole scenario played out. I was going to walk in like the proverbial wrecking ball, sit down, order a beer, and get some answers. I was going to look tough and scary, just the way everyone treats me every single day in the waking world, and no one was going to give me a hard time because I was the goddamn daughter of the devil. I was going to take those answers to Mac and, together, we were going to take down the Toltecs. Then he’d see how valuable I was as a member of his team.

  That was the fantasy I had in my head, anyway.

  The reality is a little different. The parking lot out front is packed solid with pickups and bikes, and I can hear honky-tonk music playing whenever the doors are opened. Every window is lit up, with figures swarming behind the dirty glass. The rickety old doors keep opening and closing as patrons—mostly big guys in leather vests and torn jeans—pass in and out, their voices rumbling in either anger or drunkenness as they light up a smoke or spit some chew onto the broken pavement. I can smell the stale beer and riverside mold of the place from here.

  I stop at the edge of the gravel parking lot. I’ve parked up the road in an empty slot outside a Kwikimart. I don’t want any of these types noting my license plate. I thought that was an especially clever idea, but now I’m wondering if having a getaway car closer wouldn’t have been smarter.

  “Jesus, remember who you are, chick,” I tell myself. I’m dawdling around like some girl at her junior prom, afraid to go in. I mean, I could conceivably set this place on fire, if I really wanted to. These big guys don’t even compare to what I can do.

  I remind myself of that fact as I straighten my shoulders and hype myself up. I’m about to take my first step across the parking lot when someone bumps my shoulder as they pass. It’s a big, longhaired guy of almost seven feet with his arm wrapped tightly around a tiny but tough-looking biker chick. He’s wearing a biker vest with a path on the patch. The patch is a stylized jaguar feasting on a human heart and the name TO
LTEC printed in an arch over the jaguar. He doesn’t even bother to look back as he and his girlfriend head for the door of the roadhouse.

  Trying not to let that rattle me, I follow them. They don’t hold the door.

  Inside, the place is as hot as a steam bath. Low yellow lights give the darkly wood-paneled walls a kind of leprosy. There’s an old bar that runs the length of the place, with a wall of bottles behind it—mostly tequila, mezcal, and the like. Leather vests and motorcycle jackets are framed and hanging on the walls, as are some celebrity photos of Mexican actors. Most are older, black and white photos, and I don’t recognize many of them, but I do spot Emilio Fernandez and Salma Hayek looking badass with her knives from Once Upon a Time in Mexico.

  There is a raised dais near the back where a live band is playing old hair metal Mariachi-style with acoustic guitars, a guitarron, and a vihuela. A number of pool tables and a jukebox are set to one side. The other side just has tables and booths for the patrons. The place is incredibly packed, with most of the patrons standing near the band, clapping, or solo dancing.

  Everyone who isn’t looking at the band is looking at me. I’m not a member of the gang, so obviously. But then I glance around. Several of the girls here also look like outsiders—college girls, working girls, and the waitstaff. None of the females has embroidered jackets, I note.

  It takes a moment, but then I realize the mistake I made by coming here.

  I am, literally, the only white person in the place.

  My face flushes at the realization and my hands start to clench, but I relax them as I move as inconspicuously as I possibly can to the bar. A number of big guys look over. None of them looks friendly, so I divert my attention and claim a small, two-seater in the corner instead and sit down.

  A thin, middle-aged Latina waitress slides up to the table. She’s wearing a white strappy shirt and black Daisy Dukes. Almost her entire body is covered in colorful tattoos—flowers, skulls, hearts, and calligraphy I can’t read. Her hair is long and shaggy, and there are five hoop earrings in each ear and one in her nose. She gives me a bored look and starts speaking rapid-fire in Spanish. I took Spanish in high school, but I honestly don’t remember much. I only catch a few words, but I think she wants to know what I want.