September 8 | Before Daybreak

I smelled rain. Casting another net of Empathy, I waded through impressions of drunken stragglers hunting last call, but no hint of Aurie. Tired electric dance music pumped sluggishly from emptying clubs, and cars zipped by with people trying to get home. A thin mist now blanketed the city.

"Where the hell are you?" I whispered, chest tight.

I had visions of terrible things happening to her. However, Aurie had gone on her own before and been fine. If Darcy Cyprian wanted her, he could've snatched her many times over by now, and he hadn't. She was okay. She had to be.

A light drizzle started falling. As the cold, fat rain droplets came harder and faster, it was time to admit defeat. I returned to my apartment where I tried calling Detective Zyr. His voicemail greeted me. I tossed the phone on the nightstand with a frustrated sigh.

"Guess I gotta wait you out," I muttered to myself.

Trudging to the bathroom, I showered. My mind wandered through worse case scenarios while I lathered up. Cool grey morning sky illuminated the basement windows by the time I finished. Exhausted, I climbed into bed, but instead of the brief nap I intended, I was dragged under by deep sleep.

And gauzy dreams of sex. The sheets twisted around me. I was with Zyr. Irete hoshii...I wanted him inside. The rough, hungry coupling ached. Then lightning flashed, and Aurie stretched between us. My racing heart echoed the thunder rumbling in the distance.

Fricative anxiety whirred internally like cicadas underscoring the storm. Yet, the nervousness was easy to ignore as her body slowly danced above me. I held her waist, and she rose and fell, riding me to completion.

I gave Aurie an under-eyed stare from beneath black lashes. "Dashite...Uhn! Dashite, come for me," I seduced her. Abandonment was written on her beautiful face, but it was briefly obstructed by Zyr bowing over me.

"Do you really want to say goodbye to this?" he inquired.

No, of course, not. I smiled languidly as he clenched a fistful of my hair and dragged my mouth to his before I could answer.

With another flash of lightning, the lovers disappeared. "Zyr?" I called out. "Aurie?" My body felt chilled. Somehow, the bedroom of bliss had become a dark hall of nightmares. I dropped to my feet, running past scores of closed rooms. I had the feeling I was chasing something irretrievable once truly lost.

At the end of the corridor, there was Aurie. She flickered in and out of existence like the phantom she was. "Where's the sacrifice?" she asked in overlapping voices. Crimson raindrops descended through the high ceilings of the dissolving house. Suddenly, we were outside beneath a blood moon. Zyr howled warnings at the omen. Only it wasn't Zyr howling.

It was a Skype call.

I jerked awake. "Aurie?" I murmured. My gaze flew to my favorite chair, but she wasn't in it. Another clap of thunder rattled the church, and I patted around for my cell phone. Squinting at the screen, it was eleven a.m.

I fell back and threw off the duvet, stumbling blearily to the laptop, not bothering to answer the client calling me. I pressed mute and strode to the closet. I rushed through my morning ablutions in the bathroom and put on whatever passed for clothes. On the way out the door, I snatched my purse off the coffee table.

But the clutch slipped from my fingers, and the contents spilled in the perfect flat-lay. I knelt to collect the essentials—Chapstick, sunglasses, identification—Something was missing. Resting on my heels, panic rose like bile. No, she couldn't have.

She had.

I thought back to last night's drive with Kittie Cad. I remembered the sticky Formica table littered with an overflowing ashtray, a single bulb overhead, blue smoke curling from a cigarette hanging from an older woman's lips, a scruffy grey cat scampering underfoot as the priestess cackled at my questions about Resurrection.

"Got the sacrifice?" the old woman had asked.

Aurie had found the voodoo loa's business card. Never mind my plan to explain everything today at daybreak. She had gone in without knowing the stakes. My hands felt cramped from my desperate grip on the phone as I re-dialed Detective Zyr.

"Maji-ka-yo?! I need you. Call me back," I left a message at the tone.

Soon as I stepped out the door, a deluge threatened to drown me. Gasping from the icy needles stinging my skin, I didn't notice the Uber waiting curbside until Kittie Cad rolled down the window and shouted my name over the drumming rain.

She shoved open the door. "God, I couldn't find your apartment! Get in."

"What are you doing here?" I dropped into the backseat with her, shivering. Kittie's disheveled blond hair fell over her grief-stricken face, but none of that registered as I snapped my seatbelt in place. "You're a lifesaver, Ms. Cad. I needed a ride. I think Aurie has—"

My best friend turned pleading, ruddy eyes to me and extended her cell phone. "I need you to call Terrance and tell him we went to Hollygrove to see the loa," she interrupted me. I darted a glance at the driver and blinked pointedly at Kittie for talking about Overlay City business in front of him.

"Where to?" he asked in a dull voice.

Kittie snapped, "Can you wait?!"

Once she stopped glaring at the back of his seat, I whispered, "Hey, you know I can't talk to Terrance about my world. There are laws—"

"Fuck the laws! You broke them before. I need you to break them again for me."

"Kittie, tell me what's going on. Why are you so frantic?"

"Because some leech journalist saw his car in what they're calling a drug-related rendezvous in Hollygrove! Can you believe that? They've got pictures, and they're distorting them to fit their narrative! He's destroyed, and I'm mortified this is happening to him because of me."

"I'm sorry, Kris!" I reached to comfort her, but she blocked my touch.

Her tremulous smile unnerved me. "Mys, I don't need your apologies. I don't need your pity. I just need you to come out of your antisocial shell for a moment and try to help me fix this," she insisted. "His PR team will devise a way to spin things politically, but that won't save our relationship. Terrance thinks I'm using again. You're the only one I know who can vouch for my character. Convince him I'm not."

Gods. I didn't want to talk to her boyfriend. I caught a glimpse of the dashboard clock. It was almost noon. I calculated how long it might take to convince the mayor Kittie hadn't used heroin in years. Far too fucking long. Aurie had already been missing more hours than I wanted to count.

Even the driver grunted, "Hey, if you guys don't give me a destination, I'm gonna have to cancel the trip. I ain't got all day."

My best friend narrowed her eyes and slapped the seat in response. The guy got the point and shut up.

"Kittie, I'll talk to him," I conceded, "but I can't tell him the real reason we were there. He'd never believe the truth anyway. It's too nonsensical for hu—" The driver watching in the rearview stopped me short of saying 'humans.' "Him," I amended.

"I believed you but say whatever you want. Long as it doesn't involve drugs. Here's the phone," she said as I stole another glance at the clock. "What is it, Mitsuyo?" She bristled.

"Well, ask yourself if he's worth it if he'd jump to such conclusions anyway," I reasoned. Kittie stared at me, dumbfounded. Clearly, it was the wrong thing to say. I opened and shut my mouth several tries before finally getting out, "Look, I don't understand why your boyfriend would take the word of an acquaintance over you, but the vagaries of relationship etiquette is one reason I prefer to be alone."

With an unamused chuckle, Kittie dropped the phone and snatched a cigarette from her purse. She poked it between her lips, and the smell of smoke carried the word sacrifice.

"You can't smoke in here, ma'am," said the driver.

Ignoring him, Kittie jabbed a finger at me with the lit cigarette in hand. "You're alone because you would rather believe no one is worth saving than trust someone to care to save you. For as long as we've known each other, I've been trying to prove you wrong and show you I care enough to always be there for you. But you know what? I'm done. Get out."

"What?" Her words slammed me.

"Get the fuck out of this car, Mitsuyo!"

I slowly opened the car door to give her time to come to her senses, but that didn't happen. "I never asked anyone to save me," I said as I climbed out. Kittie Cad stared out the other window without another word.

The rain soaked me as the Uber pulled away, and I was left alone. Utterly and completely.