Page 1 of Wicked Witch of the Wolf

Chapter

One

Daylight had broken just minutes ago, knitting darkness and light together in shades of deep violet and orange. A gusty desert breeze flung dirt onto the windshield of Ida’s 1972 LTD. My partner Fennel purred next to me.

It wasn’t a happy purr.

“I’m sure we can get right in and out with no fuss at all.” Ida was usually wrong about such things, but it didn’t matter. I’d taken the job, and I’d get it done, no matter how long it took.

Fennel purred louder.

“Do you think it’s a ghost?” Ida asked, waggling the eyebrows I’d drawn on her face before leaving this morning. She maintained that my steadier hand kept her from looking unintentionally angry or surprised.

My bestie had just turned eighty, not that age had slowed her down. She ran 5Ks on the regular, could pass for Helen Mirren on a good day, and had a personality like fine champagne—sparkling and dry, with just the right amount of sweetness.

She was also a retired professional necromancer, which was whyI’d brought her along for this job—well, that and because she was the one who’d gotten me the job in the first place.

“If we’re lucky, it’s just a kid pranking the mayor.”

“Carmen doesn’t have any kids,” Ida said. “Like me, she never wanted them.”

“Doesn’t have to be Mayor Derecho’s kid. Could be someone else’s.” I fastened a delicate gold collar around the cat’s neck then gave him a scratch between his cute black ears. “What’s got you all worked up, Fennel? You weren’t this purry when we faced off with a demon two months ago.”

“He’s mad we woke him up,” Ida said. “Should’ve brought the gnome, instead.”

“Meow,” he replied, and yawned. He was not a morning cat.

“Cecil’s even less of a morning person, and he has a propensity toward violence when inconvenienced.”

“Fair point,” Ida said. “Also, it’s Cinco de Mayo, remember? So, it’s been almostthreemonths since the demon. If you’re talking about the highway one.”

“I was talking about the big bad one.” I stared at the early morning sky, wishing I were still curled up like a warm little shrimp in my comfy bed. “It’s worrisome that we have to specify which, isn’t it?”

I was referring to Belial, the demon who’d attacked me in my own parking lot a couple months ago. I still had nightmares from when he’d shoved my head through a portal into hell. I’d been lucky to make it out of that salt circle alive; if Ida hadn’t humbled herself and called one of her worst enemies to come to my rescue, I wouldn’t have.

She shrugged. “Like I told you before, we all have demons, Betty. It’s not like yours are any worse than the rest of ours.”

“After dealing with Belial, I’d have to disagree.”

“Okay, you got me there. That one was super scary.”

“And Bertrand Sexton, of course.”

“Yeah.” She flicked a glance atme. “Sexton’s another story.”

I was grateful she hadn’t referred to him as “Grandpa Sexton” this time. I’d only recently discovered the cemetery demon was my grandfather, and I still hadn’t adjusted to the news. I was avoiding the demon like he was a … well, a demon.

Ida hung a left and coasted down a quiet street in a new development outside Smokethorn. The city, not the county.

Smokethorn the county encompassed several towns, the largest of which was La Paloma, and the smallest was an incorporated area an hour from here called East Pluto. Each had its own mayor and operated largely independently from the other. The county population was somewhere around 170,000, so most of our towns were cozy.

Well, not exactlycozy. Desert folk liked their space and tended to sprawl. Paranormal desert dwellers doubly so.

“So you think the kid pranking the mayor is a paranormal?” Ida asked.

“Probably. Though I’m not convinced it’s a kid. That was more of a hopeful guess.”

I counted the empty houses in the high-end development. It seemed the mayor was the only occupant on her street. Each home sat on an acre of land, and the lack of people combined with the large land parcels made it seem particularly lonely.

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